Miscellanea 
573 
must have heen written down for each cell and thus can be readily calculated. We can also 
treat as given by 
but the cubing of the often rather large cell frequencies is troublesome, just as it is rather more 
troublesome to calculate 
than v^n — 
N 
owing to the largeness of the squares in the former expression. 
II. Measurements of Medieval English Femora. 
In a forthcoming memoir on the English Long Bones there will be a good deal to be said 
about the conclusions reached by Dr Parsons in his recent paper on the Rothwell femora. 
Meanwhile he has started an attack on the Biometric School in a Journal whose columns are 
not open to adequate reply, — i.e. to a reply of not greater length than the published attack — 
from members of that school. In his communication he suggested that I was unacquainted with 
the condition of affairs at Rothwell, and behind this charge tried to escape any answers to 
the essential questions I asked him, and thus those questions still remain unanswered. 
The communication I made ran as follows : 
My informant who I hope is trustworthy speaks of (i) " the great mass of bones beneath the 
church at Rothwell " and (ii) of " the great collection of human bones beneath the old parish 
church at Rothwell " ; further (iii) " there are probably some 5000 or 6000 individuals represented 
in the vault at Rothwell, either altogether or in part"; and again (iv) "The stack varies in 
height and breadth, but is nowhere as high or broad as that at Hythe, although it is much 
longer. I know that at Hythe there are the remains of rather over 4000 people, I think 
that this collection contains more than this, partly because the stack is so much longer, partly 
because the bones are so much more decomposed and have therefore settled more." 
Manouvrier after much piecing and mending while only able to measure the lengths of about 
16 femora from the neolithic burial places of Montigny and Esbly, was yet able to determine the 
pilastric index of 127, and the platymeric index in 127 bones, that is to say in eight times as 
many bones as those for which he could obtain the maximum length. And had he dealt fully 
with the head and neck and the popliteal region, the multiplying factor would probably have 
been ten. Had piecing, mending and a maximum of care in handling been used, I can hardly 
believe that what Manouvrier achieved at Montigny was not possible for Dr Parsons at Rothwell. 
Dr Parsons writes : " If the remains of femurs, whether they are fit or unfit for measurement, 
are counted it will be found that females are quite as numerous as males though measurable 
male femurs from their stronger build are less liable to break in being extricated from the pile of 
bones, and so there are more of them available for measurement." The italics are mine. 
Much depends on the method of ' extrication,' and if the capacity of a bone to stand a hole 
being drilled in it with a bradawl be part of the necessary fitness for measurement then the 
number might undoubtedly be limited. But trusting to what I know has been achieved by the 
