22 LECTURE 11. 



results may be obtained by the most unpromising means, tbe 

 moment we know bow to group and handle a number of data 

 properly. It is from the recruiting tables of France that one 

 of the most ingenious writers on the Natural History of Man, 

 Paul Broca, has deduced the distribution of the large-sized 

 Kimri or Gaels, and the small-sized Celts in France, and 

 indicated the districts where these tribes have preserved theii" 

 purity, and those where they have become intermixed. 



You thus perceive, gentlemen, that in examining either in- 

 dividual characters or separate races, we must apply the prin- 

 ciples adopted in physics, meteorology, and the allied sciences. 

 Exact measurements and weights, expressible in figures, and 

 applicable to numbers and masses, can alone afford a basis for 

 scientific accuracy. Everything that rests merely upon personal 

 predilection or individual conception must only be added as flesh 

 and skin to the skeleton, afibrded by measurement and weight. 

 In ordinary cases, measurement and weight form the generally 

 received standard ; in others, the standard has yet to be found. 

 Attention has rightly been called to the necessity of devising 

 a table of colours for the estimation of the coloration of the 

 skin and hair (hke the cyanometers for the sky), in order 

 to obviate the confusion prevailing among naturalists as regards 

 the shades in the different races, some of which are, by one 

 writer, described as of olive colour, and by another, as of dark 

 coppery-brown.* It must, however, be admitted, that there 

 are many difiiculties in the preparation of standard colour- 

 tables calculated to lead to satisfactory results. 



If we are to devote our attention, before all things, to what can 

 be measured and weighed, the living man is the first object which 

 demands our investigation. The " average man" of Europe hav- 

 ing been determined by Quetelet, his system is now applied to 

 races. Hitherto, such observations have only been made 

 during three voyages in distant parts of the world. Burmeister 

 applied this method, to a hmited extent, to the Negroes in 



* The Antlu-opological Society of London, acting in concert with the Paris 

 SocidU d' Anthropologie, are about to bring out some tables of this description ; 

 and these will be accompanied by some general instructions which are to be 

 sent to all the fellows, correspondents, and local secretaries of the society 

 in different paa-ts of the world. — Editor. 



