726 The Heads of Great Men [December, 
I have not had the opportunity of going deeply into the 
matter, but I believe that often it is the father who has the 
massive head and large brain, a fadt which seems in some 
way to cause the brain of his offspring to be of that nature 
which produces a genius ; but I do not like to venture far 
on this ground. Compare, for instance, the two Skobeleffs, 
the Russian generals ; if the “ Graphic ” sketch be correct 
the father has a far superior head to his more famous and 
talented son, lately deceased. Compare Bismarck and his 
father (not very fine), the first two Peels, &c. 
There is also another curious item, which I do not ever 
remember seeing noticed, — all the great men of ancient and 
modern times have noses arched outwardly, the bridge not 
being depressed. Perhaps Socrates is an exception. Cyrus 
(of Persia) is said to have had a very peculiar nose, and 
Napoleon is reported to have declined to make a general of 
a man faulty in this respedt. 
A receding forehead is generally condemned ; nevertheless 
this feature is found in Alexander the Great, and to a small 
extent in Caesar ; also in the Sphinx (1400 B.C.), which 
must have embodied the Egyptian ideal of perfection ; in 
Savonarola, of Italy, and in our own James Watt. 
Other great men have positively small heads ; that of 
Lord Byron was “ remarkably small,” also those of Cosmo 
di Medici and Lord Bacon. 
Many men of genius of ancient times have only what 
may be called an “ ordinary ” or every day forehead ; for 
instance, Herodotus, Alcibiades, Euripides, Plato, Aristotle, 
Sophocles, Escliades, Epicurus, Severus, Lucius Verus, &c. 
And among the moderns, Swift, Goldsmith, Otway, Bunyan, 
Calvin,. Erasmus, Luther, Linnaeus, Rembrandt, Ariosto, 
Johnson, Moliere, Chaucer," Wedgwood, Caxton, Moore, &c. 
Many are of a medium size, as Rameses II., Homer (reputed 
bust), ^Eschylus, Demosthenes, Augustus, Leonardi da Vinci, 
Otto III., Cervantes, Loyola, Richelieu and Mazarine (fine), 
Addison, Chatham (Pitt), Crompton (male), Cartwright 
(loom), Moritz Retzch, Watteau, &c. 
Those that are remarkably fine and massive do not con- 
stitute the majority : we may mention Eschines, Cicero, 
Hippocrates, C. Scipio, Melandthon, P. Corneilli, Rabelais, 
Roger Ascham, Defoe, Rennie, “the” Felton, Fulton, 
Julius II. (Pope), Galileo, Crabbe, Shakspeare, Hannibal, 
Boccaccio, Voltaire, Shelley, Wordsworth, &c. 
Then, again, some are even low-browed, as Robert Burton 
(“ melancholy ”), W. Kalf (painter), Diogenes, Sir Thomas 
Brown (forehead “ remarkably low and depressed ”) — 
