290 American Association. 



built upon the ground of the observations made by the celebrated 

 Dr. Morton, and it was not to be wondered at that that gentleman 

 was taken as authority, for he possessed a scientific mind and was 

 a very careful observer. But, without disparaging that great 

 writer, he thought his deductions ought to be tested by farther 

 researches. The Doctor's conclusion was that a universal type of 

 cranium pervaded all the American family, which he divided into 

 the two classes of Toltec and Barbarous, though he regarded the 

 division as intellectual rather than physical. The form which he 

 found to be general in the skulls of all these tribes was marked 

 by much greater breadth fi'oro side to side than from the frontal 

 to the occipital bone, differing in that respect from the European 

 and African races ; and in the American races he found that the 

 forehead was not arched as in the others. All this had been rei- 

 terated by most subsequent American writers, and particularly by 

 Agassiz. Here the learned Professor read several authorities to 

 show the generally strong affirmation on the part of American 

 writers, of the unity of race throughout the Continent, always 

 with the same type. Now, in England he had paid a great deal 

 of attention to the forms of heads found in the ancient tombs of 

 the old country and in Northern Europe, and had noticed the 

 shortness of the longitudinal section in those heads, which, when 

 he came to this country, he wished to compare with the same 

 characteristic which he had believed was to be found in the Ame- 

 rican crania. He had therefore procured a number of Indian 

 heads, in the full expectation of finding this form ; but was entirely 

 disappointed in the result of his investigation. He found very 

 few of the heads of the type described by Morton ; yet so strong 

 had been the impression on his mind that it was long before he 

 became convinced that the variety was general. He had exa- 

 mined, however, in all twenty-eight heads, from the country south 

 of the Ottawa and north of Lakes Erie and Ontario, and of these 

 twenty-five essentially differed from the characteristics described 

 by Morton. It was true that Morton had examined two hundred 

 skulls, and he only twenty eight ; but taking Dr. Morton's collec- 

 tion even as it now existed, with all the additions since made to 

 it, there were in it only sixteen skulls of any one tribe. • Therefore 

 his twenty-eight all coming from a small section of country, afforded 

 as good data to work fi'om. However, Dr. Morton made an ex- 

 ception from his type of the Esquimaux, which he regarded as 

 analogous to the Mongols, though he admitted that philologically 



