kind among the better known historic nations of Europe and Asia, the nearest approach is to be found in the history of the Pelasgi."[15] It will be of no slight interest if we can trace the congeners of this ancient people among the extinct aborigines of the north of Europe. Two later races are supposed to have succeeded each other in Scandinavia prior to its colonization by the true Swea race, the first settlement of which in Scandinavia Professor Nillson assigns to a much more recent date than has been commonly supposed--probably some time in the sixth century. Mr. Worsaae justly remarks, in his "Primeval Antiquities of Denmark,"--"It is a vain error to assume that certain races must incontestably be the most ancient, because they are the first which are mentioned in the few and uncertain written records which we possess."[16] Unfortunately extremely little attention has been hitherto paid to the size and form of the crania found in British tumuli. Some few examples, however, have been preserved, and will furnish the elements of a brief inquiry into this interesting department of Physical Archæology, in a subsequent chapter. To this branch of evidence it is probable that much greater importance will be attached when it has been thoroughly investigated, since to it we may look, with considerable confidence, for a distinct reply to the inquiry, which other departments of archæological evidence suggest as to the existence of primitive races in Britain prior to the Celtæ. So far as our present limited data admit of general conclusions being drawn, we find traces of more than one race, differing greatly in physical characteristics from any of the successive colonists of Britain within the era of authentic history. Professor Nillson is of opinion that the type of the old Celtic cranium is intermediate to the true dolicho-kephalic and brachy-kephalic forms, a conclusion in which Dr. Thurnam and others concur. Such is not the form of cranium of either of the races of the Scottish tumuli, and in so far, therefore, as such forms may be assumed to be permanent, we are necessarily led to the conclusion, that in these we recover traces of the Allophylian pioneers of the human family in Britain.