A STUDY OF THE NEGRO SKULL WITH SPECIAL 
REFERENCE TO THE CONGO AND GABOON 
CRANIA. 
By the late R, CREWDSON BENINGTON, M.D. 
Prepared for Press by KARL PEARSON, F.R.S. 
(1) Introductory. Attention has already been drawn in Biometrika (Vol. Vlll. 
p. 123) to the fact that the late Dr Crewdson Benington during his two years 
of work in the Biometric Laboratory had spent many months measuring the 
Congo crania at the Royal College of Surgeons and the crania brought by 
Du Chaillu from the Gaboon in 1864 and 1880, which latter series are both in the 
British Museum (Natural History). At the time of Dr Benington's death there 
was a great deal done, but each of these series was far from completed, and the 
delay in publication of this paper has arisen from the need of finishing the actual 
measurements, and reducing statistically not only Dr Benington's series, but other 
series for comparative purposes. The measurements on the Congo crania at the 
Royal College were completed by Miss E. Y. Thomson of the staff of the 
Biometric Laboratory ; the Gaboon crania at the British Museum were re-examined 
especially with regard to their anomalies, by Miss H. Dorothy Smith, Crewdson- 
Benington Student in craniology. Figs, (i) — (iii) in the text are due to her and 
the majority of the observations in the "Remarks" on the sheets of individual 
measurements are either due to or have been revised by her. The whole work of 
numerical reduction has been carried out by Miss Julia Bell of the Biometric 
Laboratory. In all anatomical points we have consulted Professor G. D. Thane, 
who with his wonted kindness has given us aid in a great variety of difficulties. 
The conclusions which Dr Benington would have drawn from his material of course 
fail us, for not even the mean characters had been calculated ; he had devoted the 
whole of his reduction work on these skulls to deducing the type contours 
discussed in the last issue of this Journal. I have made as limited observations 
on the material as seemed consistent with the general scheme of craniometric work 
in my Laboratory, leaving the comparative measurements to speak largely for 
themselves. My own impression after examining the numbers on which many of 
