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British Association. 



The brain in his estimation was a far better guide in classifying animals than the foot, 

 but the same difference that existed between their brains was also observable between 

 their feet. The lecturer referred to a diagram which represented the fee tof the aye-aye, 

 tbe gorilla and man, pointing out the chief differences in the structure of the skeleton. 

 These differences he considered sufficiently great to elevate man from the sub-king- 

 dom to which the monkeys belonged, and to place him in a distinct sub-kingdom by 

 himself. 



Professor Huxley observed that the paper just laid before the section appeared to 

 him in no way to represent the real nature of the problem under discussion. He 

 would therefore put that problem in another way. The question was partly one of 

 facts and partly one of reasoning. The question of fact was, what are the structural 

 differences between man and the highest apes ? The question of reasoning, what is 

 tbe systematic value of those differences ? Several years ago Professor Owen had 

 made three distinct assertions respecting the differences which obtain between the 

 brain of man and that of the highest apes. He asserted that three structures were 

 " peculiar to and characteristic " of man's brain, these being tbe " posterior lobe," the 

 " posterior cornu," and the" hippocampus minor." In a controversy which had lasted for 

 some years, Mr. Owen had not qualified these assertions, but had repeatedly reiterated 

 them. He (Professor Huxley), on the other hand, had controverted these statements, 

 and affirmed, on the contrary, that the three structures mentioned not only exist, but 

 are often better developed than in man, in all the higher apes. He (Professor Huxley) 

 now appealed to the anatomists present in the section to say whether the universal 

 voice of Continental and British anatomists had not entirely borne out his statements 

 and refuted those of Professor Owen. The Professor then discussed the relations of 

 the foot of man with those of the apes, and showed that the same argument could be 

 based upon them as on the brain, that argument being that the structural differences 

 between man and the highest ape are of the same order, and only slightly different 

 in degree from those which separate the apes one from another. In conclusion, he 

 expressed his opinion of the futility of discussions like the present. In his opinion the 

 differences between man and the lower animals are not to be expressed by his toes or 

 his brain, but are moral and intellectual. 



Professor Rolleston said he would try to supply the members of the Association 

 with the points of positive difference between the human and the ape's brain. For 

 doing this we had been abundantly shown that the hippocampus minor and the poste- 

 rior lobe were insufficient. As differentive they must be given up at last. But as much 

 had recently been done for the descriptive anatomy of the brain by Gratiolet and others 

 as had been done for astronomy by Stokes and Adams, for language by Max Miiller, 

 and that this had been ignored in this discussion was little creditable to British 

 science. This analy sis of the brain's structure had established as differentive between 

 man and the ape four great differences — two morphological, two quantitative. The 

 two quantitative are the great absolute weight and the great height of the human 

 brain ; the two morphological, the multifidity of the frontal lobes corresponding to the 

 forehead, usually, popularly, and, as this analysis shows, correctly, taken as a fair ex- 

 ponent of man's intelligence, and the absence of the external perpendicular figure. 

 This had been abundantly shown by Gratiolet. No reference to these most important 

 matters had been made by Professor Owen, and this omission could not fail to put the 

 British Association's repute for acquaintance with the work of foreign fellow-labourers 

 at great disadvantage in the eyes of such foreigners, as might be present. Professor 



