18 Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. [Jan 1 . 



inherent in different races, as are difference of colour and other 

 peculiarities. This he illustrates by saying that colour is shewn to be 

 quite independent of climate : the black Negro and the yellow Mon- 

 gol maintaining the same complexion in tropical, temperate and even 

 arctic climates; the mental faculties of different races being equally 

 marked, and having always been so : that the child of a Yorkshire 

 peasant can be made by education equal to the most learned in the 

 land, whilst the child of an Australian is only capable of learning to a 

 certain point : and hence that certain races, like the Caucasian are 

 capable of civilization, while others like the Red Indian and Tasmani- 

 an are not. The paper though propounding no original or extraordina- 

 ry theory, excited considerable discussion among the members, the 

 subject being one, at present, of much interest in the scientific 

 world. 



Mr. W. T. Blanford took exception to the author's views, and pointed 

 out, that in many respects they were not such as were received by 

 ethnologists ; he thought that Mr. Darwin in his chapters on geographic 

 distribution in this work on the origin of species, had satisfactorily 

 explained most of the phenomena alluded to in Mr. Amery's paper. 

 This was followed by a most interesting description by Mr. W. Blan- 

 ford of much of the Fauna of Central India, in which the question of 

 the varieties of the Bengal tiger, the lion of Central India, various 

 bovine and cervine animals, as well as antelopes and birds, were dis- 

 cussed, and many interesting facts in the natural history of these crea- 

 tures were narrated by the author, who has made Indian Zoology a 

 special subject of study, and who is not merely a closet naturalist, 

 but one who has studied the habits of the animals in a state of 

 nature. We are glad to think that these qualifications are now 

 being applied for the benefit of science with the Expeditionary Force 

 in Abyssinia. 



At the August meeting, a paper by Dr. S. B. Davis on the Eth- 

 nology of India was read, and as the author premised, it was no new 

 subject, but yet one of great interest, and in the present day attracting 

 considerable attention. Dr. Davis did not propound any new view 

 or theory, but rather insisted on the value of the study of Craniology 

 as a much more reliable basis for the study of Ethnology, than Philo- 

 logy possibly can be ; and he objected to the affinities of the European 



