R Ckp^wdson Benington 
319 
If we turn to the factors on which the simotic index is based, the simotic chord 
and subtense, we note : 
(d) That both are far more variable in the Negro than in the European or 
Egyptian ; but 
(e) That the simotic chord does not differ very widely in English and Negro, 
both being somewhat less than the Egyptian. 
(/) That it is the subtense that is widely different in the Negro, its value 
being a little more than half that of European or Egyptian, while its relative 
variation is 35 — 40 °/ 0 compared with their 18 — -24 °/ o — i.e. not quite double. 
Roughly therefore we may say that the nasal span is the same for all these 
races and the selection has been that of size of nasal bones covering the span 
from one nasal process of the superior maxilla to the other. There are indeed 
among the negro skulls several in which the simotic index could not be measured, 
because there were practically no nasal bones to measure, e.g. Gaboon 1864, 
Nos. 10, 11, and 81, and Congo 70 (cf. Remarks on folding sheets of measure- 
ments). The significance of this is considerable when we consider the nasal 
bones of the higher apes*. 
Turning to the mesodacryal characters we see : 
(a) That the mesodacryal chord is larger in the Negroes than in Egyptian 
or English series, i.e. from the physiognomic standpoint the orbits are farther 
apart. On the other hand for the mesodacryal arc, while the English and 
Egyptian males have a somewhat larger value than the Negroes, there is no 
sensible difference in the females. Thus from the standpoint of the nasal bridge 
as a whole, it is the interorbital distance, the mesodacryal chord, rather than 
the arc which is the essentially differentiating feature f. Roughly therefore what 
the European has gained in nasal bones, he must have lost in superior maxillary 
processes. 
(6) The two mesodacryal indices amply suffice to differentiate markedly 
the Negro from the European or Egyptian crania, but the relatively small difference 
between European and Egyptian, unlike that of the simotic index, places the 
English nearer to the Negro than the Egyptian. This point is of considerable 
interest, because a large negroid admixture has been frequently asserted, without 
much basis than that of general impression, to exist in these and other series of 
Egyptian crania. 
We see, however, that in both mesodacryal indices, in mesodacryal chord and 
in simotic chord the English crania stand nearer to the Negro than the Egyptian 
* An investigation of the mesodacryal and simotic characters of these apes is now in progress. A 
female gorilla skull in the Laboratory possesses an almost similar absence of nasal bones at the 
bridge. 
t A familiar illustration would be the suspension of the same lengths of clothes line between 
two sets of posts at different distances apart, the droop corresponding to the mesodacryal subtense 
would be greater for the nearer pair of posts. 
