REPORT ON THE HUMAN CRANIA. 
81 
mesorhine ; but of the males six were leptorhine and one platyrhine, whilst of the females 
three were platyrhine and three leptorhine. The mean orbital index in the males was 
86, in the females 88 ; the average in both was mesoseme, but of the males three were 
megaseme and two microseme ; and of the females three were megaseme and three 
microseme. In the three children the index in each case was megaseme. The mean 
palato-maxillary index was 114 in the adult males, and 113 '6 in the females ; in one male 
the breadth exceeded the length by only 1 mm.; the palato-alveolar region was mesuranic. 
The mean internal capacity of fifteen adult crania was 1387 c.c.; eight probable males 
had a mean capacity of 1436 c.c.; seven probable females of 1330 ‘5. The general mean 
of the whole series and of the males was mesocephalic ; that of the females was micro- 
cephalic. Four males were megacephalic, two were microcephalic. Four females were 
microcephalic and only one megacephalic. Of the young crania, one, aged about eight, was 
megacephalic. 
The characters of these New Zealand skulls may be summarised as follows : — dolicho- 
cephalic, but on the verge of mesaticephalic, metriocephalic, phaenozygous, orthognathic, 
mesorhine, mesoseme, mesuranic, and mesocephalic. 
COMPARISON OF THE CRANIA OF THE PACIFIC ISLANDERS. 
As the collection of human bones formed by H.M.S. Challenger included crania from 
several of the smaller islands in the Pacific Ocean, I may take this opportunity both of 
comparing these skulls with each other, and of making a general survey of the cranial 
characters of the people of the South Sea Islands. Our knowledge of these islanders has 
been greatly extended of late years by the labours of missionaries, by commercial enter- 
prise, and by the visits of ships-of-war of various nationalities. Numerous descriptions 
of the people, their physical characteristics, customs, implements, weapons, and language 
have been written, and crania have been collected and deposited in many European 
museums. In making this comparison, I shall avail myself both of the crania that I have 
personally examined and of the published descriptions of skulls so far as I have been able 
to obtain access to the literature of this subject. 
From the descriptions which have been given of the aborigines of the South Sea 
Islands by numerous travellers, it is now generally admitted that two well-defined races 
can be recognised. The one, named Papuan or Melanesian, which occupies New Guinea 
and the smaller islands to the east, south, north, and west. This race is distinguished by 
its sooty-brown or black skin, black frizzly hair, and well-developed beard. The second, 
named brown Polynesian or Mahori, 1 which inhabits, as was recognised by Captain 
Cook, the islands in the more eastern part of the Pacific, from the Sandwich Islands in 
1 This term Mahori is suggested in the. article South Sea Islanders, by W. L. Ranken, in Journ. of Anth. Inst., 
vi. p. 223, 1877 ; also in Australasia, by A. II. Wallace, London, 1880, p. 261. 
(ZOOL. CHALL, EXP. — PART XXIX.— 1884.) 
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