AsBRaHAM—On a Model of a Human Face. 79 
XVIIT.—On a Mopvet oF a Human Fact From An Istanp orF THE Kast 
Coast or New Guinea. (With Plate III.). By P. 8. Asranam, 
M. A., B.Sc., Fellow and Curator of the Museum, Royal College 
of Surgeons in Ireland. 
[Read, January 10, 1881]. 
In a recent number of the Journal of Anatomy and Physiology’ 
Professor Turner described two ‘‘ masks”? formed from human facial 
bones, which had come from New Ireland or New Britain, islands 
lying to the north-east of New Guinea. These peculiar fabrications 
do not appear to be unknown to travellers in those parts; yet, as Pro- 
fessor Turner observes, they had not been previously described, nor 
indeed scarcely alluded to; and as I have been unable to discover any- 
thing of the kind in the ethnological collections of the British and of 
some other Museums recently visited by me, I am led to publish this 
note on the specimen (PI. III.) which is now in my care at the Museum 
of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. Together with a Papuan 
and an Australian skull, it was presented to the Museum by Staff Sur- 
geon Keelan, R. N., and was shown by me in December, 1879, at a 
meeting of the Dublin Biological Club. Asin Professor Turner’s smaller 
example, which resembles the present one in most respects, the fron- 
tal, ethmoid, and all the facial bones take part in the formation, as 
well as the greater part of the sphenoid. The separation of the bones 
from the rest of the cranium has been effected along a plane passing 
through the coronal suture, across the zygomata, through the greater 
wings of the sphenoid, and through the body of the latter near to its 
place of union with the occipital bone. The inferior maxilla is firmly 
fixed, approximately i situ, posteriorly by means of threads passed 
several times round each ramus at the neck, and apparently eround 
the malar, through the orbit, and anteriorly, half way between the 
angle and the symphysis, by other threads bound to pieces of wood, 
which are securely tied above and behind, probably to the palate 
bones, from which they come down obliquely to the jaw-bone. The 
condyles and coronal processes of the jaw are entire; but the latter are 
almost entirely hidden by the cement composition which has been 
used to model the face, and to fill in the orbits as well as the floor and 
back of the mouth. The cement substance was supposed to consist of 
““chuman ”’ or Madrepore lime, but as it does not effervesce with acid, 
on ignition turns from its brown colour to black, burns with flame, 
and leaves a copious ash—it is probably a mixture of clay with some 
resinous material. None of it is upon the forehead or upon the chin. 
The eyebrows are represented by a sharp rim, modelled upon the supe- 
rior margins of the orbits; the nose, which is very short, possesses a 
1 Vol. XIV., page 475, Plate XXX. 
