FROM THE NEW HEBRIDES. CAMERON. 423 



prominent superciliary ridges being very well demonstrated 

 in mesial sections of the skulls. The sutures were arranged 

 on a very simple plan, there being few of the elaborate 

 sinuosities encountered in the skulls of white races. No 

 suggestion of metopism was to be detected in either skull. 

 There was a fronto-squamous suture at the pterion on the 

 right side in No. 1 skull. The styloid processes were remark- 

 ably short as in aboriginal Australian skulls, but the anomalies 

 so frequently found in that race in the region of the foramen 

 magnum were not present. Prenasal grooves were marked 

 features of both skulls thus rendering the lower margins 

 of the nasal apertures very indistinct in appearance. The 

 nasal bones met at an obtuse angle, a condition which is 

 in striking contrast to Polynesian skulls where the union 

 occurs at an acute angle. 



The Dentition. 



The teeth were markedly worn in No. 1 skull and very 

 slightl}^ so in No. 2, from which fact one may safely gather 

 that No. 1 skull had belonged to a somewhat older individual, 

 a conclusion which was confirmed by an examination of the 

 degree of synostosis of the sutures as stated on page 407. 

 In the case of No. 1 skull it was noticed that the right molars 

 were much more worn than those of the left side. On showing 

 this condition to my colleague. Dr. Frank Woodbury, he 

 at once pointed out the cause, which was a pyorrhoea alveo- 

 laris round the first left molar of the upper jaw, which had 

 loosened the fangs of that tooth and no doubt made it very 

 tender on pressure. The alveoli of this tooth were almost 

 obliterated by the disease, and the tooth itself was missing 

 from the skull. 



The upper central incisors in both skulls had been lost, 

 probably during the period of inhumation, but were replaced 

 by neatly modelled wooden pegs, made as far as possible of 

 the size and shape of the missing teeth. These were appar- 

 rently put in to form a background against which the lips 



