302 LECTURE X. 



The capacity of Malay skulls, measured with, water, equalled 

 thirty-sis to thirty-three ounces ; whilst in the diminutive 

 Hindoos it diminishes to twenty-seven ounces. 



" Under whatever aspect/^ says Huxley, " we view this cra- 

 nium, whether we regard its vertical depression, the enormous 

 thickness of its supraciliary ridges, its sloping occiput, or its long 

 and straight squamosal suture, we meet with ape-like characters, 

 stamping it as the most pithecoid of human crania yet dis- 

 covered. But Professor Schaaffhausen states that the cranium 

 in its present condition holds 1,033"24 cubic centimeters of 

 water, or about sixty-three cubic inches ; and as the entire 

 skull could hardly have held less than an additional twelve 

 cubic inches, its capacity may be estimated as at about seventy- 

 five cubic inches, which is the average capacity given by 

 Morton for Polynesian and Hottentot skulls." 



" So large a mass of brain as this would alone suggest that 

 the pithecoid tendencies, indicated by this skull, did not ex- 

 tend deep into the organisation ; and this conclusion is borne 

 out by the dimensions of the other bones of the skeleton given 

 by Professor Schaaffhausen, which show that the absolute 

 height and relative proportions of the limbs were quite those 

 of an European of middle stature. The bones were, indeed, 

 stouter, but this and the great development of the muscular 

 ridges noted by Dr. Schaaffhausen are characters to be ex- 

 pected in savages. The Patagonians, exposed without shelter 

 or protection to a chmate possibly not very dissimilar from 

 that of Europe at the time during which the Neanderthal man 

 lived, are remarkable for the stoutness of their limb bones. 



" In no sense, then, can the Neanderthal bones be regarded 

 as the remains of a human being, intermediate between man 

 and apes. At most they demonstrate the existence of a man 

 whose skull may be said to revert somewhat towards the 

 pithecoid type — just as a carrier, or a pouter, or a tumbler, 

 may sometimes don the plumage of its primitive stock, the 

 columba livia. And, indeed, though truly the most pithecoid 

 of known human skulls, the Neanderthal cranium, is by no 

 means so isolated as it appears to be at first, but forms in 

 reality the extreme term of a series leading gradually from it 



