220 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1887. 



viz, that such changes do not become organic because they may occur 

 without implicating function. The profound alterations effected by 

 artificial selection are, of course, due to functional modifications, but it 

 has not been shown that these can not be artificially induced, or that 

 deformation must be universally morbid in character because it is a 

 departure from such standards of organic type as now exist in imagi- 

 nation. 



On the morphological side the question seems equally uncertain. 

 Given, however, any cause which will effectually modify function, and 

 modification of structure is inevitable. No naturalist supposes that the 

 digital variations recorded as inherited, or those of the teeth, skin, etc., 

 are attributable to any other cause than physiological change ; and the 

 same with transmitted club-foot, harelip, amaurosis, deafness. Fur- 

 ther, adjustments by involution take place in nature as well as those 

 by evolution, and although there are no structures whose properties are 

 not originally ascribable to predetermined structural traits, there are 

 yet structures which have no discoverable physiological features 5 and 

 while morphological species, or species whose specific forms have no 

 biological value, are recognized in zoology, and which, whether perma- 

 nently or not, are withdrawn from the action of natural selection, it is 

 difficult to see why the production of variety by any means that would 

 effectually chauge function should be disallowed. 



As was stated, there are reasons for suspecting that some such process 

 has occurred among mankind to a limited extent ; but whether or not, 

 when all accessible information on the subject is organized, this may 

 not prove to be a misconception attributable to insufficient knowledge, 

 remains to be determined. 



GENERAL NOTES ON DEFORMATION. 



Malte-Brun. (Geographic Uuiverselle. Ed. of Lavallee. Paris, 1858. 4to, t. 1.) 

 General remarks on the causes and modes of distortion of the head (p. 303). 



Humboldt & Bonpland. (Voyage, etc. Paris, 1811. 4to, 3 e partie, t. 1. " Essai 

 Politique, etc.) Remarks on head-flattening, its character and cause among Indians 

 of North aud South America. (Note, pp. 89, 90.) 



Jefferys remarks upon the fine forms of the Indians of North America, and says the 

 fact is attributable to " their bodies not being swathed and straitened in the cradle " 

 (part 1, p 96). The cradle-board was in use among all the tribes described by him J 

 but this error is not surprising in an author who characterizes the Eskimaux as " tall 

 of stature," and speaks of " their flaxen hair, their beards, the whiteness of their skin 

 * * * quite as fair as that of Europeans" (part 1, p. 43). Certain blond tribes do 

 occur among the Hyperborean races, but not where Jefferys places them ; although 

 the Eskimaux are not really dark-skinned. With regard to the fine forms so constantly 

 noted among the American and other savages, most writers have ascribed it to their 

 modes of life; Humboldt adding, in the case of the Americans, a certain racial im- 

 plasticity. Most of the earlier authorities have evidently judged an assumed eth- 

 nological fact from the stand-point of a social theory. There does not appear to be 

 any natural reason why a savage should be better shaped than a civilized man, and 

 that this is the case remains to be shown. There is, however, an excellent reason 

 why those who are physically defective should be eliminated from all aggregates in 



