292 Proceedings of Royal Society of Edinburgh. [sess. 
they bear evidence of the difficulties encountered in the prosecu- 
tion of anthropological researches, and of the absolute necessity 
of subjecting every new discovery, whether it be a fragmentary 
human skeleton or a relic of man’s handiwork, to a minute 
examination at the hands of experts, such as we have had on 
the present occasion. One of the greatest drawbacks to physical 
anthropology is the difficulty of associating the facts of craniology 
with those of the other racial characters on which ethnology is 
founded. Skeletons do not reveal to us anything of the colour 
of the hair, eyes, or skin of the individual who owned them ; 
nor of the language they spoke, nor of the religious ceremonies 
they enacted, nor of the implements, weapons, ornaments, and 
clothing by means of which they fulfilled their destinies in the 
organic world. One of the most puzzling problems transmitted 
to us by classical writers is that they describe two early European 
races, one short and dark, and the other tall and fair, both of 
which were dolichocephalic. That brachycephalic immigrants 
entered France from somewhere to the east at the dawn of the 
Neolithic period, while the tall dolichocephalic race still lived in 
the country, there is abundant evidence to show. These latter I 
am inclined to regard as the descendants of the Palaeolithic 
people of Europe, who had acquired their fair skin, hair, and eyes 
during their struggles for existence against the severe conditions 
of life imposed upon them by the Ice Age. But as to the 
brachycephalic hordes who ultimately pushed their way into 
Britain, and introduced the Celtic language, which subsequently 
became the prevailing speech of the British Isles, I am absolutely 
at a loss to account either for their origin or racial characteristics, 
beyond the fact that they possessed round-headed and mentally 
capacious brain-cases. 
Note on the Fragments of a Beaker from Largs. 
By the Hon. John Abercromby. 
The fragment in question has an extreme length of 20 cm., and a 
chord of the circumference measures 13*3 cm. When whole, the 
beaker must have had a maximum diameter of about 17 cm., a 
height of about 22 ‘9 cm., and it seems to have belonged to type 
/3, i.e. ovoid cup with recurved brim. Although such a height 
