68 Richard Cull, Esq., on the 



students, indeed, are unable to advance beyond the study 

 of these differences. They constitute, however, only the 

 threshold of our temple. Resemblances must also be 

 studied. This tendency of the mind to fix itself on the differ- 

 ences in the varieties of man may be called the student's bias 

 of mind. We occasionally find this bias of mind remaining 

 in after life, and manifesting itself in over-estimating the 

 value of those differences in relation to the resemblances. 



Ethnology is a science of yesterday. Daubenton's obser- 

 vations on the situation of the foramen ovale, and Campers' 

 on the facial angle, were the result of researches to discover 

 a physical index to the mental capacity. In 1790 Blumen- 

 bach published his Anatomical Description of Ten Skulls, in 

 order to shew how certain varieties of man differ from each 

 other in cranial form. In 1820 Blumenbach completed his 

 work, having altogether described sixty-five skulls. 



In 1791 Dr Gall published the first part of an extensive 

 work, in which we see the spirit in which his researches 

 into the moral and intellectual nature of man were con- 

 ducted. The great and fundamental principle was the com- 

 parison of cerebral form with the manifestation of mental 

 qualities. In 1796 Dr Gall began to lecture at Vienna ; and 

 in 1798 we find him complaining, in a letter to his friend, 

 Baron Retzer, that he was called a craniologist. " The pro- 

 per object of my researches is the brain. The cranium is 

 only a faithful cast of the external surface, and is conse- 

 quently but a minor part of the principal object.'' In this 

 letter he speaks of national heads in relation to national 

 character. And to Dr Gall and his disciples we are most 

 indebted for collecting crania, casts of crania, and casts of 

 heads of the several varieties of man. 



Ethnologists have much yet to do in collecting crania from 

 various countries, and still more to do in ascertaining the re- 

 lationship of these crania to each other, both in time and space. 

 The mere geography of certain forms of cranium is but the 

 first step of a great inquiry. We seek to know if one form 

 of cranium passes into another. If so, under what circum- 

 stances, both physical and non-physical, does a mutation of 

 form take place 1 Our Society might, perhaps, with advan- 



