30i MR. H. M. WALLIS ON THE GROWTH [Mar. 2, 



yellow hairs. This is a specimen in spirit in the Oxford Univer- 

 sity Museum. 



iii. Ears of Adults. 



In life this infantile growth is soon shed, but in later middle 

 age a hairy covering sometiaies reappears and may be noticed in 

 black-haired men of coarse skin and hirsute habit of body more fre- 

 quently than in others, although 1 have recently observed the ears 

 of a man of about forty, fresh complexioned, dark red moustache, 

 pale red hair, which exhibited almost all the phenomena I have 

 described. The hairs, which were straw-colourec) and very 

 numerous, grew thickly upon the backs of the ears, fringed the 

 edges of the helix, and had well-marked lines of growth. 



I transcribe from my notes the following particulars of a case 

 (see Plate XIX. figs. 4, 5) : — " T. F., atat. circa 44. Dark, hirsute, 

 bilious temperament. Hair of face, head, hands, and M'rists black. 

 That iipon the helLv is soft, pale, and fine : it converges from both 

 sides (above and below) upon a well-marked Darwin's Point, but 

 does not cross tips at that point, nor is there a tuft there. Thicker 

 bairs clothe the lo\Aer part of the anti-helix, aud, pointing down- 

 wards at first, follow one another round the edge of the spina 

 helieis, and changing their direction point upwards towards 

 Darwin's Point. The phenomenon was better defined upon the 

 left than upon the right ear. The subject was restive and difficult 

 to examine. The sketch was completed at some personal risk." 



Another instance (Plate XIX, tigs. G & 7) is the ear of a dark- 

 skiuned black-haired man of about fifty, of a similar type, remark- 

 able as having eyebrows of unusual fullness, each down-curving in 

 a tuft of bristles, the longer of which are fully two inches in length. 

 The moustache full and black, inclining to grey. The ears were 

 large and well-shaped, Darwin's Point easily located. The back of 

 the ear covered with pale down made up of minute hairs, the whole 

 edge fringed with small pale hairs with distinct direction, the two 

 growths meeting and crossing tips on the outer edge of the heUx 

 close to Darwin's Point. Besides these almost colourless hairs 

 there was a strong growth of pale brown hair, one inch in length, 

 upon the spina helieis directed upward and backward in the main, 

 and a more characteristic growth upon the upper edge of the 

 helix of dark hall'-incb bristles curving strongly and regularly 

 around its edges towards Darwin's Point. In this, as in the case 

 of figs. 4, 5, aud the case of the red-haired ])erson, the hairs upon 

 the ears were all paler than those upon the head. 



This phenomenon is not rare; any good observer will meet 

 with instances among his acquaintance ; but though well-marked 

 examples are not uncommon, they are usually disinclined to lend 

 themselves to research. 



The majority of ears, whether of adults or of children other than 

 infants, show no hairs, or where a weak and straggling growth has 

 persisted in spite of constant friction aud depilatory influences, 

 there is seldom any visible direction or " set'" traceable. 



