206 ANTHROPOID APES. 



perhaps resulted from some growth on the ovary. 

 Hence ensues a disturbance, probably inflammatory, 

 of the organ of nutrition.* 



Aeby also regards microcephaly, not as an ex- 

 pression of atavism, but as the result of a morbid 

 degeneration. " Microcephalic subjects do not 

 point back to the milestone which man left behind 

 him in hoar antiquity, and it is not through them 

 that the chasm between man and animals can be 

 bridged over, nor even rendered less wide." 



Virchow's researches led to the following con- 

 clusions, which we must here subjoin : — 1. There is 

 no species of apes which presents that precise con- 

 figuration which is found in a microcephalic brain. 

 2. Psychology offers the strongest arguments against 

 men-apes. 3. The instinctive side of psychical 

 activity, which is almost wholly absent in micro- 

 cephalic subjects, is very prominent in anthropoids 

 as well as in other animals.f 



In addition to these remarks, it may also be ob- 

 served that among savage races the medicine-men, 

 shamans, sorcerers, rain-doctors, etc., often assume 

 ape-like attitudes in the contortions, leaps, dances, 

 and other gestures which are inseparable from their 

 trade. Owing to their state of excitement, in which 

 they are not always mentally responsible for their 

 acts, this imitation may be often partly or wholly 



* Anatomische Vntersuchung eines Microcephalen Knaben. Re- 

 print of a paper written for the celebration of the three hundredth 

 year of the University of Wurzburg, p. 27. 



t Verhandlungen (kr berliner Anthropologischen Qesellschaft, 

 p. 248 : 1877. 



