"These rejoinders are correct, for when _locomotion_ is the matter in
question, it is evident that due consideration must be paid to the
muscles, which are the active agents in that function at least as much
as the bones, which only serve as points of attachment and are only
passive.
"3rd. In some of the races of man, the arch of the skull, instead of
presenting a uniform curve in the transverse direction, bends a little
towards the top of the two sides, and rises towards the median line (New
Caledonians, Australians, &c.). It is asked if this is not a preliminary
step towards the bony crests which rise in this region in some of the
anthropomorphous apes?
"Again we reply in the negative; for, in the latter, the bony crests
arise from the walls of the skull, and do not form any part of the arch.
"4th. Is it not very remarkable that we find the orang to be
brachycephalous, just like the Malay, whose country it inhabits, and
that the gorilla and chimpanzee are dolichocephalous like the negro? Is
not this fact a reason for our regarding the former animal as the
ancestor of the Malays, and the latter of the African nations?
"Even if the facts brought forward were correct, the inference which is
drawn from them would be far from satisfactory. But the coincidence
which is appealed to does not exist. In point of fact, the orang, which
is essentially a native of Borneo, lives among the Dyaks and not among
the Malays; now the Dyaks are rather dolichocephalous than
brachycephalous. With respect to gorillas being dolichocephalous, they
cannot at least be so generally; as out of _three_ female specimens of
this ape which were examined, two were brachycephalous (Pruner-Bey).
"5th. The brains of microcephalous individuals present a mixture of
human and simial characteristics, and point to some intermediate
conformation, which was normal at some anterior epoch, but at the
present time is only realised by an arrest of development and a fact of
atavism.
"Gratiolet's investigations of the brain of the ape, normal man and
small-brained individuals, have shown that the similarities pointed out
are purely fallacious. People have thought that they could detect them,
simply because they have not examined closely enough. In the last named,
the human brain is simplified; but this causes no alteration in the
_initial plan_, and this plan is not that which is ascertained to exist
in the ape. Thus Gratiolet has expressed an opinion which no one has
attempted to controvert: 'The human brain differs the more from that of
the ape the less the former is developed, and an arrest of development
could only exaggerate this natural difference.... The brains of
microcephalous individuals, although often less voluminous and less
convoluted than those of the anthropomorphous apes, do not on this
account become like the latter.... The idiot, however low he may be
reduced, is not a beast; he is nothing but a deteriorated man.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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