REPORT ON THE BONES OF THE HUMAN SKELETON. 
115 
GENEKAL SUMMAEY. 
It may now be useful to gather together into a short chapter a summary of the leading 
facts and conclusions, which have been stated in more or less detail in the preceding 
pages. As regards the conclusions, I must again guard myself by saying that in some 
instances they are to be looked upon only as pro\'isional, for the number of skeletons of 
several of the races examined and measured, both by other anatomists and by myself, is 
as yet too few on which to speak in more than a tentative way. 
We may take for our standard of comparison the Europeans, as illustrated especially 
by the French, Germans and British, whose skeletons have so frequently and in such 
numbers been examined and described by anatomists. The European pelvis is large and 
roomy. In its external dimensions its breadth materially exceeds its height, so that the 
breadth-height index in men is about 79, and in women 74 or 75. The pelvic inlet is 
considerably wider in the transverse than in the conjugate diameter ; the brim index 
is distinctly below 90 both for men and women, and is platypellic. The sacrum both in 
men and women is broader than long, so that it is platyhieric. The lumbar curve of the 
spinal column, as estimated both by the relative depth of the front and back of the 
vertebral bodies, and by that of both the bodies and discs when in position, is greater in 
front than behind, i.e., kurtorachic. The mean scapular index is about 65. The radius 
is short in relation to the length of the humerus, i.e., brachykerkic. The tibia is short 
in relation to the femur, i.e., brachyknemic. The humerus is long in relation to the 
length of the femur, and the femoro-humeral index is moderately high. The shaft of 
the upper liml) is long in relation to the shaft of the low^er limb, and the intermembral 
index is moderately high. The skull may be either dolichocephalic, or mesaticephalic, 
or brachycephalic, but the face is orthognathous. 
K we now examine the skeletal characters of the black races we shall find that in 
many particulars they differ from the Europeans, and also differ amongst themselves. 
In the Bush race the pelvis in its external dimensions is high in proportion to its 
breadth, and the ilium approximates to the vertical in direction. In the Australians 
again, the external dimensions of the pelvis are not unlike those of Europeans, and a 
similar proportion of l)readth and height also exists in Negros. In the Negritos of the 
Andaman Islands, on the other hand, the height of the pelvis increases in relation to 
its breadth, and the breadth-height index is relatively high. The conjugate diameter 
of the pelvic brim is long in relation to the transverse diameter, and the brim index 
is high, or dolichopellic, in Australians, Bushmen, Hottentots, ELaffirs and Andaman 
Islanders ; but in Negros, Tasmanians and possibly the Melanesians of the Pacific 
Islands the conjugate diameter is not so long in relation to the transverse, and the brim 
index is not so high, or mesatipellic. In all these black races except the Negros, and it 
