298 PRINCIPAL SIR W. TURNER ON 



differences in this index. As the width of the nostrils is much greater than that of the 

 anterior nares, whilst the height of the nose is little more when measured in the face 

 than in the skull, the nasal index computed from the face is necessarily materially 

 greater than when obtained by measuring the skull. Many therefore of the people of 

 these tribes would have had skulls whose proportions were dolichocephalic or 

 approximated thereto, and Waddell's observations on living persons are confirmatory 

 of the conclusions which I had previously formed from the study of the skull. 



SEISTANIS. Table V. 



In the year 1903 an expedition, under the command of Sir Arthur H. MacMahon, 

 K.C.I.E., was despatched by the Government of India to Seistan to act as an arbitration 

 Commission to adjust the boundary between Persia and Western Afghanistan, and the 

 distribution of the water of the Helmand river. Major T. Walter Irvine, I. M.S., was 

 the medical officer in charge, and he collected on the site of the ancient city of Zahidan 

 three human skulls, buried under a mound of sand frequently shifting through the 

 prevalence of strong winds. Two of these were sent by him to Professor Chiene of 

 Edinburgh, who presented them to the University Museum, and the third was 

 forwarded to the Anthropological Institute of London, from whom I received it. 

 Zahidan, from the extensive ruins which mark its site, had evidently been a city of 

 great importance and the seat of a bygone civilisation. It was destroyed by Timour 

 during his advance into India in 1367. It is also interesting to note that Seistan was 

 on the route followed by Alexander the Great and the Greeks in the famous march to 

 the Indus, when he invaded India in 327 B.C. 



The skulls were those of adults, two males, A and B, and one female, C ; the lower 

 jaw was absent in each specimen. The males differed materially in character from the 

 female, and require a separate description. They were massive skulls, well proportioned, 

 and unusually heavy : A weighed 1 lb. 9^ oz., B I lb. 1 5f oz. 



Norma verticalis. — In A the outline was rounded, and the cranium was of such a 

 breadth, 148 mm., that though the length was 179 mm., the cephalic index was 827, 

 distinctly brachycephalic. B had not the outline so rounded, for the breadth was less, 

 and the length, in part owing to the prominent glabella, was 183 mm. ; the cephalic 

 index therefore was 787, in the higher term of the mesaticephalic group. The outline 

 in both from side to side across the vertex was a wide, rounded arch. The sagittal region 

 was not ridged, the parietal eminences were fairly distinct, and the side walls bulged in 

 the squamous region. The parieto-occipital surface sloped steeply downwards, without 

 sign of artificial flattening. The skulls were cryptozygous. 



Norma lateralis. — In A the frontal eminences were prominent, the forehead was 

 only slightly inclined backwards, the glabella and supraorbital ridges were moderate 

 and the nasion was not depressed. In B the frontal eminences were distinct, the slope 

 of the forehead was more marked, the glabella and supraorbital ridges were very 



