July i, 1892.] 



SCIENCE. 



latitude were respectively 25° south of east and west; while a 

 third series of ornaments faced the full midday sun. Others 

 were similarly arranged for the summer solstice; and a great 

 stone over the temple showed, by alignment with the main 

 altar and a carved pattern on the wall, the true north and 

 south. 



Last year an English archaeologist undertook a journey to 

 Greece to make a special study of the orientation of the 

 ancient temples on that classic ground, hut his results have 

 not yet appeared. Certainly, as will be seen from the above, 

 the point is one full of significance. 



On Prosopology. 



There is little doubt that craniology, as a branch of an- 

 thropology, has been much over-estimated, and affords only 

 very insecure material for ethnic classifications. On the 

 other hand, the study of the features of the face, which may 

 be called Prosopology, from the Greek, prosopon, face, is 

 yielding constantly more valuable results. The width or 

 narrowness of the face, the nasal and orbital indices, the 

 prominence of the jaws, the facial angles, and the devel- 

 opment of the chin, all are points of prime ethnic signifi- 

 cance. 



One of the leading European writers on this subject is 

 Professor Kohlman of Basel, whose works are extremely in- 

 structive. In this country a series of papers on "The Eth- 

 nology of the Face," by Dr. A. H. Thompson, have ap- 

 peared in the Dental Cosmos for the current year. They 

 place the details of the subject iu a popular light, and em- 

 phasize its value; but they would be more satisfactory had 

 their author not been led astray by some of the books which 

 he quotes. To class the Eskimos and the American Indians 

 among the Mongolians is quite out of date; and to call the 

 white race Caucasians, and to divide them into blondes and 

 brunettes as leading subdivisions is scarcely less so. He 

 does, indeed, distinguish an " Americauoid " type, from 

 ■which he excludes the Eskimos and Aleuts as being "true 

 Mongols;" on what grounds he or any one would be puz- 

 zled to say. He describes the hair of this " Americanoid " 

 type as similar to that of the Mongolians, from which, in 

 fact, it differs in nearly every respect. In spite of these 

 drawbacks. Dr. Thompson's articles form a welcome and 

 praiseworthy addition to recent American contributions to 

 anthropologic literature. 



Linguistic Bibliography. 



The study of American languages will in the future be 

 vastly facilitated by the admirable series of bibliographies 

 by Mr. James C. Pilling, which are now being published by 

 the Bureau of Ethnology. Some idea of their thoroughness 

 may be gained from the fact that the latest issued, confined 

 to the Algonquian dialects alone, has 614 double-columned, 

 closely printed, large octavo pages ! Compare this with the 

 358 pages of Ludewig's " Bibliography of American Aborigi- 

 nal Literature," which included all the languages of both 

 North and South America ! 



Mr. Pilling has put forth similar volumes, less in size but 

 not inferior in completeness, on the Iroquois, Eskimo, Da- 

 kota and Muskokee groups of tongues; and proposes to lay 

 a similar basis for the study of all the North American 

 stocks. It would be most desirable for some similar cata- 

 logue to be made relating to the tongues of South America. 

 The Decrease of the Birth-rate. 



One of the most portentous problems is the decrease of 

 the birth-rate in certain social conditions. It is asserted on 

 apparently good authority that the Negritos and the Poly- 



nesians are dying out, largely owing to the infertility of 

 their marriages. Certain South American tribes, the 

 Guatos of Paraguay, for instance, will soon disappear from 

 the same cause. But we need not confine our instances to 

 savage peoples. Physicians say that our " colonial dames," 

 scions of Anglo-American families who have lived several 

 generations in this country, have much smaller families 

 than their great-grandmothers. 



la France this lessening of the birth rate has assumed 

 serious proportions, and has alarmed patriotic men lest as a 

 nation it should become numerically too weak to hold its 

 own in the conflicts of the future. The distinguished author 

 and statesman, the Marquis de Nadaillac, has published 

 some stirring admonitions to his countrymen on the subject 

 under the titles " Le Peril National and la Depopulation de 

 la France." He finds the birth-rate least in the cities, in the 

 richest communes, and in the most prosperous conditions of 

 society. Turning to its causes, he has convinced himself 

 that this diminution is voluntary and of malice prepense on 

 the part of married couples They do not want the bother 

 of many children ; they do not wish their property to be 

 split up; they prefer pleasure and ease to the labor of 

 parental duties. Young men prefer mistresses to wives, and , 

 mistresses are always barren. The competition of modern 

 life and its rabid thirst for enjoyment undermine the family 

 tie. The birth-rate is small, not for physiological but for 

 sociological reasons. How far this applies to the United 

 States has not yet been sufficiently investigated; but it is 

 probably nearly equally true here. 



THE VARIABILITY OF SPECIFIC CHAEACTERS AS 

 EXHIBITED BY THE EXTINCT GENUS CORY- 

 PHODON. 



BY CHARLES EARLE. 



It is a well-recognized law in biology, that a species or a 

 genus upon the point of extinction undergoes a great amount 

 of variation; and, as an example of this kind, I propose to 

 describe some of the variations which the species of the 

 fossil genus Coryphodon exhibit. 



The fine collection of Coryphodon material in the Ameri- 

 can Museum of Natural History has enabled me to study 

 this subject; and in a forthcoming paper in the Bulletin of 

 the Museum I shall attempt a revision of the American spe- 

 cies of Coryphodon. 



The great amount of variation in this genus is shown from 

 the fact that no less than twenty-one species have been de- 

 scribed, and only in a few cases have any of them been ac- 

 knowledged as synonyms. 



Taking up the variation of the teeth, I will first describe 

 the structure of a typical upper and lower molar of Cory- 

 phodon. The superior molars are a modification of the 

 primitive tri-tubercular type, in which the anterior crescent, 

 or antero-external lobe, has been lost, or so much modified 

 that only traces of it remain. On the an tero external por- 

 tion of the crown there is a prominent cone, which is in 

 connection with the single internal lobe by a sharp crest (see 

 Fig. a, c); this forms the main grinding surface of the 

 tooth. On the second superior molar of a true Coryphodon 

 there is always a well- developed postero-external crescent 

 (see Fig. e, c), which is homologous with the postero exter- 

 nal crescent of other forms. This crescent may undergo a 

 great amount of variation, as will be described later. In the 

 last superior molar the postero-external crescent is repre- 

 sented by only a crest, which runs parallel, or nearly so. 



