PREFACE. 



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The title of this work is perhaps sufficiently explanatory of its objects. The 

 principal design has been to give accurate delineations of the crania of more than 

 forty Indian nations, Peruvian, Brazilian and Mexican, together v^ith a particularly 

 extended series from North America, from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic, and 

 from Florida to the region of the Polar tribes. Especial attention has also been 

 given to the singular distortions of the skull caused by mechanical contrivances 

 in use among various nations, Peruvians, Charibs, Natchez, and the tribes inhabit- 

 ing the Oregon Territory. The author's materials in this department are ample, 

 and have enabled him to give a full exposition of a subject w^hich w^as long 

 involved in doubt and controversy. Particular attention has been bestowed on the 

 crania from the Mounds of this country, which have been compared with similar 

 relics derived both from ancient and modern tribes, in order to examine, by the 

 evidence of osteological facts, whether the American aborigines, of all epochs, have 

 belonged to one Race, or to a plurality of Races. 



I was, from the beginning, desirous to introduce into this work a brief chapter 

 on Phrenology ; but, conscious of my own inability to do justice to the subject, I 

 applied to a professional friend to supply the deficiency. He engaged to do so, 

 and commenced his task with great zeal ; but ill health soon obliged him to 

 abandon it, and to seek a distant and more genial climate. Under these circum- 

 stances I resolved to complete the Phrenological Table, and omit the proposed 

 essay altogether. Early in the present year, however, and just as my work was 

 ready for the press, George Combe, Esq., the distinguished phrenologist, arrived in 

 this country; and I seized the occasion to express my wants to that gentleman, 

 who, with great zeal and promptness, agreed to furnish the desired Essay, and 

 actually placed the MS. in my hands before he left this city. It is with great 



