77Q Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



The heads, consequently, wliich. are found in the canoe houses are 

 generally those of the Bushmen. 



The people of San Christoval are said by Brenchley to be wretched, 

 poor emaciated creatures, many of them covered with scaly eruptions, 

 as though their skin was peeling ofi. This pityriasis is not rare among 

 the Melanesians. Those of the inland districts are puny, but healthier 

 looking. One native of Morrissi, examined by Virchow {loo. cit.), was 

 a healthy, well-grown male of twenty ; in height 5 ft. 2 in. ; hypsi- 

 brachycephalic, with a flat nose ; strong, but not very prognathous 

 jaws ; skin of a dark blackish-brown colour ; and beard black, thick, 

 curly, short. Webster {loc. cit.) says they are nearly black, with 

 woolly hair, and the countenance characteristic of the Papuan Negro. 

 The males have the western Polynesian habit of stiffening their hair 

 into mops, though not as largely as the Papuans, with yellowish clay 

 and lime, which cosmetic they call chinam (cf. Strauch, Zeitsch. f. 

 Mhnologie, vol. ix., 1877, p. 241). 



The different islands have for the most part different dialects ; and 

 in San Christoval that of the fisher tribes (Bauro), which contain many 

 Polynesian words, differs from that of the Bushmen, which is said to 

 be more like the Ulana dialect. 



San Christoval is the fifth largest of these islands, and the best 

 known. The inhabitants are usually hung with ornaments, and wear 

 heavy wooden and shell disks in their ears, sometimes lengthening the 

 lobe considerably. This perhaps is correlated with the fact that in the 

 second of our skulls the tympanic bone is much thickened. They 

 almost all have transversely-placed rods or shells in their noses. They 

 sometimes adorn their heads with handsome shell combs ; sometimes 

 they cut their hair in terraces from ear to ear. Mr. Brenchley saw 

 some women who had their hair partially shaved off, or cut close, so 

 as to leave a roadway across their heads. Many men are tattooed in 

 patterns, produced by a series of short incisions, made with obsidian 

 knives. Some of them have very flattened noses, but it does not 

 appear that they increase this by art\ They chew betel, and are 

 greedy for tobacco. They wear little or no clothing, and are exceed- 

 ingly ingenious in their carvings and artistic work, illustrations of 

 which are given by Brenchley. In the neighbouring island of Rubiana, 

 near New Georgia, they prepare skulls as ornaments, colouring them 

 with clay, fastening in artificial teeth of shell and wood, and mother- 

 of-pearl eyes. Such crania are not, as far as I know, prepared or 

 kept in the other islands of the group. 



The crania available for comparison with my two are — one in the 

 Hunterian Collection from Ysabel, and one from an island undeter- 

 mined, presented by Sir Erasmus Wilson ; as well as two artifically 



^ The new-born children of the island of Jap (Wuap), near the Pelews, have 

 their noses squashed flat after birth by their parents. They call the operation 

 " Andovreck": see Miklucho-Maclay, Zeltf:chrift fur Ethnologic, x., p. 10.3. 



