LECTURE VI. ' 161 



Messrs. Schroeder Van der Kolk and Vrolik are not over fond), 

 and we believe him to be in error. In order to prove that 

 the Negro brain rises at once without any transitionary stage 

 above that of the anthropoid apes, Mr. Owen asserts that 

 the posterior lobe of the hemispheres, the posterior cornu of 

 the lateral ventricle, and the pes liippocamjpi 7ninor, which 

 exist in the Negro brain, are absent in the former." The 

 Dutch anatomists now maintain that they have found and de- 

 lineated all these parts, and that singularly enough, whilst 

 praising the correctness of the sketches, he by a contradictio 

 in adjedo denies the existence of these parts ; they mention 

 the researches of Huxley, Marshall, and Rolleston, and are 

 glad to observe that they agree with their own. " We also 

 are glad," they say, " that the zoological gardens, now-a-days, 

 so easily furnish us with the necessary materials for com- 

 parison. An error, which formerly would have been per- 

 petuated, is now more easily removed; but we feel grieved 

 when we compare the assertions of Mr. Owen with the results 

 obtained by the above eminent naturalists, which confirm our 

 own." 



And thus Owen's characteristic marks of the human brain 

 are broken to pieces ; and Wagner, of Gottingen, observes 

 very justly, "I could never understand how comparatively 

 insignificant cerebral parts, which vary in individual human 

 brains, e. g. longer or shorter posterior cornua of the lateral 

 ventricles, presence of the pes hippocampi minor, nay, some 

 single or double medullary globules {eminentice candicantes) , 

 could be urged to be distinctive marks of the human brain, as 

 distinguished from that of the anthropoid apes." 



This being disposed of, the convolutions are taken to task. 

 These, it is said, are in man rounder, more complicated, more 

 numerous, and less symmetrical. All this is very true; but 

 like the proportions which the nerve-trunks, the spinal cord, 

 and the cerebellum, bear to the brain, they furnish only rela- 

 tive and quantitative, but not qualitative differences. 



With regard to the general arrangement of the convolu^- 

 tions, Grratiolet expresses himself as decidedly as concerning the 

 general cerebral structure. " On comparing a series of human 



M 



