CASTS OF CRANIA 63 



may be seen, for instance, in various cases containing 

 the brains of monkeys. 



What may be termed comparative brain shapes 

 and measurements were and are matters of the first 

 importance, both in respect to brain surgery and in 

 questions as to the relations of size and shape of 

 brain to intelligence. It was a subject to which 

 Flower gave particular attention, merging it 

 gradually in his general interest in the study of 

 Anthropology or the Natural History of man. One 

 of the great difficulties in the way of such com- 

 parison and inference was that the brains of all the 

 extinct animals had perished for ever, while those 

 of many existing creatures seldom came, after their 

 deaths, into the hands of scientific men. The 

 skulls, on the other hand, were generally available, 

 both of living and extinct animals. As the general 

 form of the brain corresponds pretty closely to the 

 shape of the portion of the skull which holds it. 

 Flower had the happy idea of taking casts of this 

 interior. Such casts were fairly representative of 

 the brain which once occupied the void, and made 

 it possible to render the series in a measure complete. 



Note.— In reference to the exposition of Darwin's theories in 

 the Museum, it should be said that Flower was on terms of 

 personal friendship with the former, and both he and his wife 

 from time to time spent the end of the week at Darwin's country 

 house in Surrey, to their very great interest and pleasure. 



