THE CRANIA OF THE MOUND-BUILDERS.’ 741 
forms the extremity of the skull. The temporal fossz are deep 
and the temporal ridge is prominent. The apex is about midway 
between: the coronal and lambdoidal suture. The parietal plates 
instead of swelling into a rounded outline, are flattened. The 
suture connecting the squamous bone with the parietal is less 
convex than in the European, and in this respect approaches that 
of the chimpanzee and the lower animals, which is nearly straight. 
The superciliary ridges are strongly marked and project beyond 
the general contour of the brain case, and the glabella forms the 
extreme point of the anterior portion of the skull. The orbits, 
where bounded by the superciliary ridges and the nasal septum, 
owing to the deep supraorbital notch, are of a quadrangular shape. 
‘The frontal eminences are very slight, which make the superciliary 
ridges more conspicuous, and the forehead more retreating. The 
zygomatic arches swell out beyond the parietal walls, which in the 
European skull so far overhang as to conceal them in the vertical 
view. From this point of observation it may be said that all the 
exterior prominences are visible, —the occipital protuberance, the 
zygomatic arches, and the superciliary ridges. 
_ The frontal bone is of great strength and slopes backward, 
_ encroaching on the parietals and giving origin to a low forehead. 
In the lower animals this bone becomes nearly horizontal and is 
placed behind the eyes. ‘In proportion,” says Humphry, “as 
=the cranial portion slopes backward, so do its facial buttresses — 
_ the nasal and angular processes— slant forwards; and in propor- 
_ tion as the brain is well developed and the cranial part of the bone 
is upright, so are the facial processes directed perpendicularly 
i downwards. In the lower animals for instance, they grow directly 
_ forwards, in the lower races of mankind they grow downwards 
and forwards, and in the best formed human skulls they grow 
almost vertically downwards.” 
Such are the characters which seem to predominate in the 
Mound-builders’ skulls,—characters which distinguish them from 
the negro on the one hand and the Teuton on the other. Indi- 
vidual variations occur, as might be expected, for we are not to 
ippose that all have been cast in a single mould. All the 
specimens indicate a low intellectual organization little removed 
On comparing the figure with a European skull, these anatomical 
its will be apparent by contrast ; particularly the increased 
