218 L. Manouvrier — Pithecanthropus erectus. 



inferior to our present races. "We will refer further on to this 

 question. 



The opinion expressed in Germany is explicable, in the first 

 place, by the fact that they commenced by attributing the 

 femur of Java to a man without further question. In the 

 second place, they emphasized too much the simian characters 

 of the cranium and teeth. They saw that, according to these 

 characters, the race of Java could not be attributed to the 

 human species, but forgot that, according to other characters, 

 they had no right to attribute it to the race of monkeys. For 

 no known anthropoid approaches the fossil race of Trinil either 

 by its cranial capacity or by its occipital characters at an adult 

 age. 



Besides, a view of the remains themselves and a more 

 thorough study of them have already resulted, so it seems, in 

 a change of the opinions first expressed. 



Be that as it may, Mr. Dubois can congratulate himself on 

 seeing placed in relief, at Berlin, the reasons according to 

 which his Pithecanthropus could not be a man and, in Eng- 

 land, much better reasons according to which the same Pithe- 

 canthropus could not be a monkey. 



The question rested there until the International Zoological 

 Congress was held in Leyden, September, 1895. At this con- 

 gress, where were found such eminent zoologists and anatomists 

 as Sir W. H. Flower of London, A. Milne Edwards, Perrier 

 and Filhol of Paris, and others, Mr. Dubois showed the fossil 

 pieces from Trinil, to which was added another tooth (2d molar) 

 which he mistook at first, before having completely cleared it 

 from its matrix, for a tooth of Suidce. The view of the orig- 

 inals did not result in calling forth decided affirmations from 

 the Congress. According to the information that I received 

 from Mr. Dubois and from Professor Kollmann of Bale, and 

 according to a communication made to the Paris Academy of 

 Sciences by Milne Edwards, the question was considered as 

 demanding further research. Professor Virchow, without 

 committing himself, emphasized certain pithecoid characters 

 of the skull and femur, notably the resemblance of the femur 

 to that of the gibbon ; he showed especially that, according to 

 researches made in the collections of Pathological Anatomy of 

 Berlin, the voluminous osseous vegetation presented by the 

 femur of Trinil in the posterior sub-trochanterian region might 

 be due to an abscess from congestion of the thigh, probably 

 following a caries vertebral. 



Mr. Dubois having satisfied himself, at Leyden, that the 

 direct view of the fossil remains from Java contributed much 

 to corroborate his demonstrations, kindly took those remains 

 first to Brussels, then to Paris, then to Dublin, to Edinburgh, 



