DISCUSSION. Mr. C. ROBERTS remarked that Mr. Galton had invited the meeting to examine, criticise, and suggest such alterations as they might think desirable in the anthropometric apparatus he had set before them; but his ingenuity in the preparation of instruments of this kind was so well known that there was little room for criticism. He had, however, confessed that he had not yet been able to devise a satisfactory instrument for testing the sense of hearing, and Mr. Roberts would therefore venture to direct his attention to a little instrument sometimes used for testing the hearing of idiots, which could, he thought, in Mr. Galton's hands, be made a useful and trustworthy test. It consisted of a series of slips of very different materials, such as wood, slate, metal, &c., suspended from a bar, and used like a set of gongs. For taking the diameters of the head in a ready way, which was also a subject on which Mr. Galton asked for suggestions, the speaker had always employed a pair of wooden callipers of his own design, which answered very well; but he wished Mr. Galton would direct his attention to devising a simple form of the instrument employed by hatters for gauging the heads of their customers. With regard to some of the apparatus before the meeting, he feared that the results obtained by the very ingenious contrivances for testing the sense of weight, the sense of touch, and the capacity for determining the perpendicularity, or the division of an object, were tests of education of certain faculties, and he should expect to find a post office clerk or grocer to have a finer appreciation of weight than any one less accustomed to the handling of weights. The test for colour-blindness was hardly sufficient. It was Holmgren's light green test, which proved no more than that there was some defect of the colour-sense, but which might not amount to actual colour-blindness. The purple test could easily be arranged in the same apparatus. Purple holds the unique position of appearing blue to the red-blind, grey to the green-blind, and red to the violetblind, and is employed as a test for all these kinds of colour-blindness. Mr. Galton had asked the speaker to explain the models for determining the colour of their eyes. The classification was made on simple anatomical grounds, and two great classes were formed dependent on the presence or absence of a layer of pigment in front of the iris. When this layer of pigment is present we have the whole series of dark eyes, varying from light brown to what is commonly called black; and when it is absent we have the series of blue and grey eyes, which result from the black pigment on the inner surface of the iris, showing through, with greater or less distinctness, the semi-transparent structures of the iris itself. In conclusion, Mr. Roberts observed that he should look forward to the results of the observations made in the Anthropometric Laboratory at South Kensington with great interest; and expressed his great satisfaction at the prospect which Mr. Galton held out, that the Laboratory was likely to be established in a permanent form. Mr. R. MELDOLA asked, with reference to the instruments for measuring the focal lengths of the eyes, whether Mr. Galton had not found it necessary to take two readings for each person, one for the right eye and the other for the left eye. He asked this question because a large number of people differed in the focal lengths of their two eyes, often to the extent of several inches, he himself being a case in point. Miss HENRIETTA MUELLER, Mr. R. B. MARTIN, Mr. G. GRIFFITH, M. BERTIN, Mr. E. W. STREETER, Dr. GARSON, Mr. G. M. ATKINSON, Mr. BLOXAM, Prof. THANE, Dr. W. H. COFFIN, and the PRESIDENT also joined in the discussion. Mr. GALTON, in reply, said that the method suggested by Mr. Meldola had always been adopted, and that the statistics led to the interesting result that there was no preponderating number showing that one eye had a general tendency to be longer-sighted than the other. In fact, the statistical records for the two eyes were exactly equal. NOVEMBER 25TH, 1884. Professor W. H. FLOWER, LL.D., F.R.S., President, in the Chair. The minutes of the last meeting were read and signed. The following presents were announced, and thanks voted to the respective donors : FOR THE LIBRARY. From ADMIRAL F. S. TREMLETT.-Les Alignements de Kermario. By James Miln. From the DEUTSCHE GESELLSCHAFT FÜR ANTHROPOLOGIE.-Correspondenz Blatt. September, 1884. From the BERLINER GESELLSCHAFT FÜR ANTHROPOLOGIE.-Zeitschrift für Ethnologie. 1884. Heft. 4. From the SOCIETÀ ITALIANA DI ANTROPOLOGIA.-Archivio per l'Antropologia e la Etnologia. Vol. XIV, Fas. 2. From the AUTHOR.-Über die Zahl der Zähne bei den Hasenschartenkiefer-spalten. By Prof. Dr. Paul Albrecht. Ueber die Morphologische Bedeutung der Kiefer-, Lippen-, Der Zwischenkieferknochen und seine Beziehungen zur From the AUTHOR.-Sur les Éléments Morphologiques Manubrium du sternum chez les Mammifères. By Prof. Dr. Paul Albrecht. Sur les Homodynamies qui existent entre la main et le pied des Mammifères. By Prof. Dr. Paul Albrecht. Ein neuer Fundort von Nephrit in Asien. By Dr. A. B. Meyer. From the EDITOR.-Matériaux pour l'Histoire de l'Homme. November, 1884. The Illustrated Science Monthly. November, 1884. Revue Scientifique. Tom. XXXIV, Nos. 19-21. The election of the following new members was announced :WALTER HURST, Esq., and THOMAS WILSON, Esq. Dr. J. G. GARSON exhibited a prehistoric skull and some long bones from the Island of Antiparos. Mr. WALTER COFFIN exhibited a cast of the mouth of a hairy boy from Russia, showing abnormal dentition. The following paper was read by the author: FACTS suggestive of PREHISTORIC INTERCOURSE between EAST and WEST. BY ANNE WALBANK BUCKLAND. THE meeting of the British Association on American soil, and the increased importance accorded to the science of Anthropology at that meeting, suggested to me the desirability of endeavouring to gather together such broken threads as might help us to a knowledge respecting that early prehistoric intercourse, which most anthropologists believe must have taken place between the two hemispheres, although the date and the route of such intercommunication remain unknown. Dr. Wilson, in treating of this subject, points out three probable routes of migration from the eastern to the western hemisphere: 1, through the Isles of the Pacific to South America; 2, an Atlantic Oceanic migration, via the Canaries, Madeira, and Azores, to the Antilles and Central America, and probably by the Cape Verdes to Brazil; and 3, via Behrings Strait and the North Pacific Islands to the Mexican Plateau. But he adds: "The more obvious traces rather indicate the same current which set from Southern Asia to the Pacific shores of South America, moving onward till it overflowed by Behrings Strait and the Aleutian Isles, into the continent from whence it was originally derived.”1 It is obvious that as all these migrations necessitate a sea voyage of considerable length, they could only have been undertaken by peoples having some knowledge of the art of navigation; it is therefore desirable, in the first place, to ascertain how far the native vessels of the American continent support the theory of Professor Wilson. Taking the very interesting and instructive paper of General Pitt Rivers on "Early Modes of Navigation" as our guide, we find on the American continent, first, the dug-out canoe, the earliest and simplest of all boats, the distribution of which is almost universal, and which probably played an important part in the very earliest migrations of the human race, enabling them to cross rivers and narrow seas; but we find that the Waraus of Guiana, and the Ahts of North America, fashion their canoes after the Birmese model, whilst the Fuegians, otherwise so low in the scale of civilisation, sew planks together with thongs of raw hide, after the fashion of those in use in Africa and the Polynesian Islands. In California we see the papyrus float of Egypt; but the outrigger, so much used in the Pacific, does not appear to have found its way to America, although the Buccina, or shell trumpet, used on board the canoes of the Pacific, and known also in ancient Rome, is used in Peru. Rafts, like the Madras catamaran, were in use in Peru at the time of the conquest, and carried sails; one of these vessels having been met far out at sea, conveying both men and women, with provisions and articles of commerce, to the great astonishment of the Spaniards, who had never before seen sails used on the American continent. From this slight sketch it will be seen that the art of navigation had made some advance on the American continent before the Spanish conquest, and that the forms of the vessels used can be traced to various parts of the world, although the absence of the outrigger, and the general absence of sails, would seem to show that whatever connection there might have been with Asia and the Polynesian Islands must have ceased before the invention of those two important improvements in primitive navigation. Turning from navigation to the implements and utensils in use among the American nations before the conquest, we are again met by the fact that their congeners may be traced to many parts of the world. It would be impossible to point out 1 "Prehistoric Man," D. Wilson, p. 384. 2 See "Early Modes of Navigation," Colonel Lane Fox ("Journ. Anthrop. Inst.," April, 1875). all these, but I may note one or two weapons which, from their peculiar shape, have struck me as particularly useful by way of comparison. And first, an axe-head, probably of metal, which seems to have been regarded as sacred. This axe, called champi, with a handle more than a cubit in length, was given to princes on the occasion of their initiation into manhood, as a mark of honour. It is described in the Royal Commentaries thus: "The metal part had a blade on one side, and a sharp point on the other." This probably represents the wedge of gold said to have been carried by Manco Capac, and which sunk into the earth at Cuzco. In the remarkable rock-sculptures in the Yonan Pass, Peru, copied in Hutchinson's "Two Years in Peru," we find a rudely designed figure bearing this axe with a long handle, and having the head adorned with an axe-blade of a similar shape: this was probably an emblem of authority, for we find this same axeblade attached to the helmet of the curious and unique figure pourtrayed on a vase found near Trujillo, Peru, which Bollaert looks upon as representing the god of war, and which certainly has a strong affinity with Hanuman, the monkey-god of India. Bollaert also points out the similarity between the vase bearing this figure and those of Etruria, and further remarks that the flying insect resembles a figure on the Athenian vase of Electra at the tomb of Agamemnon. To this I would add that there is a remarkable resemblance between the ornaments round the girdle of this figure, and those singular Chinese or Japanese ornaments, called magatamas. This axe-head appears again as an ornament on the head of the Mexican god of hell (Miclantecutli), and it is also worthy of remark that the same squareness of face, and the pointed ornaments surrounding the faces, which apparently represent the sun-god in he Yonan Pass sculptures, and which appear so prominently in the figure on the great central gateway of Tiahuanaco, are seen in this Mexican figure.2 I have not been able to trace this axe-head ornament in Egyptian, Greek, or Etruscan sculptures, although it appears to me that the ornament on the Greek helmets which holds the plume, may have been derived from it; in fact, on some of the vases the form seems well defined. bronzes in the British Museum, labelled "Parts of Assyrian Helmets," are of precisely the Peruvian form, and it appears also on two horses among the Assyrian sculptures. It is seen, however, on some of the monuments from Halicarnassus now in the British Museum, and on the Hercules from the same place, Antiquities, &c., of South America," Wm. Bollaert, F.R.G.S., p. 203. 2 See Smithsonian Contributions, 1879-80. The horses bearing this ornament are said to be foreign. Two |