peculiarity. The edge of the angle of the jaw, and the hinder portion of the lower border of the horizontal ramus, instead of being vertical, curved slightly inwards. The inner side of the bone thus showed beneath the oblique line a kind of canal, or rather of large sulcus (gouttière), which extended almost as far as the chin, and markedly more pronounced than it was in a modern jaw, placed at our disposal by a dentist. I have searched for the facts on this point which might be found in our Anthropological Gallery. I have found very marked traces of inversion inside the angle of the jaw in a Bengalee, a Javanese, and a Bellovacian;* indications only in a Lapp, a young Negress, and an Egyptian mummy. On the other hand, an aged Egyptian mummy and a New Caledonian exhibited this character very markedly, and in a Batavian Malay it is as marked as in our fossil, or scarcely in a less degree. In this manner, various human races exhibit nearly every degree of this character; but, at the same time, the character of inversion is presented in individuals of every race.† Undoubtedly, new comparisons are necessary to demonstrate the value and significance of these characters. To what results can these contrary statements lead us? Without desiring to be too positive, I at present recognize in them the effect of the action of the masseter which acts outwardly, and of the internal pterygoids which act inwardly. The relative weakness of these last explains very well why the masseter commonly predominates. Their accidental preponder ance would lead to the habit of grinding the food, a habit often practised by aged persons. As for the canal or gutter, this is merely an exaggeration of that which normally exists. Indeed, at the point is found the sinus (fossette) in which the submaxillary gland is lodged. The inflection of the edge of the bone merely renders it more striking and deeper. The same savant especially called my attention to the form of the condyle. The lower and inner edge of the head is actually here very slightly marked. Besides, the head is perhaps more rounded and broader outwardly than in ordinary specimens; but these peculiarities cannot be considered as essential characters. In the same race may be observed very great differences. In the Tahitians and the New Caledonians, the head of the condyle is some * Classical readers will hardly need to be reminded that the Bellovaci were a tribe inhabiting the neighbourhood of Beauvais, in the present Departement de l'Oise. ED. + I learn that Dr. Falconer arrived at analogous results after comparisons which he made since his return to London. A. DE Q. This observation was made by M. Jacquart, aide-naturaliste of the chair of Anthropology. A. DE Q. times almost triangular, with one of the sides of the angle placed outwards, and one of the angles inwards. Does not age, again, exercise an influence in this respect? I should consider so, from the great cavity which is presented by the sigmoid notch. We thus see how it is necessary to institute further studies and comparisons before we pronounce on the real value of the peculiarities of the Abbeville jaw. Thanks to M. Lartet, I have been able to compare this jaw already with the median portion of an homologous bone, collected by him in the rubbish of the Aurignac cave, and with the body of the same bone discovered by M. de Vibraye in the grotto of Arcy. M. Pruner-bey has been good enough to unite with M. Lartet in the comparative examination which we have made of these precious remains. On all these points we have found ourselves of the same opinion. In the pieces which are common to all three bones, they present slight differences, but also resemblances. Thus, the gutter or canal of which I have just spoken, can be recognized on the Aurignac jaw, as on that of Arcy, although it appears perhaps a little less marked on the first. Here, also, we can only see the depression which I instantly recognized. As for the Abbeville jaw; it has appeared to all three of us to be that of an individual probably aged, undoubtedly of small size, or at most, approaching towards the medium size. I shall add, that in this jaw, absolutely nothing tends to support the theories sustained by some bold minds, which make man to have been descended from the ape by means of successive modifications. This jaw is rather weak than strong; it entirely indicates man, and it has nothing of the ferocious physiognomy, if the expression is permitted to me, which the same part of the skeleton offers in existing races. Finally, it is easy to ascertain, between the lower jaws of individuals and of existing races, differences as great and as marked as any of those which distinguish the Abbeville jaw from many of the jaws in the Museum Collection. In other words, these differences, on every point, enter within the existing limits of variation. It will be conceded that I only present the present note as a first sketch. The Academy has been able already to see that the anatomical and anthropological questions which this human fossil brings forth are numerous and delicate. To be resolved with exactitude, minute and prolonged researches are necessary-researches which I could not make in so short a time, and in the midst of pressing occupations. But I have thought that these few details would not be uninteresting. Without doubt, in a question, so grave, a single fact, however well demonstrated it may appear, cannot be considered to lead to a definitive solution. But I am convinced, there will be human fossils, as there are hâches chipped by the human hand. Since attention has been drawn to these last, they have been discovered, not at Abbeville alone, where M. de Perthes had first found them, but everywhere. Now that the existence of human remains in the same beds seems to be placed beyond doubt, we shall not fail to discover other specimens, if they really do exist, provided we search for them. But whatever are the scientific riches brought to light, it would be a crying injustice to forget that it is to the ardent convictions, the indefatigable perseverance of M. de Perthes, that we owe this double discovery, one of the most decisively important which could be arrived at by the aid of the natural sciences. Before reading the above note, M. de Quatrefages placed on the table the jaw which is the object of the communication, and which M. Boucher de Perthes had confided to him; two hâches which he had extracted with his own hands, one from the rubbish made by the workman, one from the actual side of the quarry worked in his presence, and which yet bears a covering of the matrix which can be seen on the jaw; finally, a box filled with this matrix. He further announced, that M. Chevreul had kindly consented to analyze the composition. HUMAN JAW DISCOVERED AT ABBEVILLE IN UNDISTURBED EARTH. -NOTE FROM M. BOUCHER DE PERTHES. Communicated by M. de Quatrefages. A long experience having taught me that one of the causes which prevent the naturalist from discovering human remains in the soils which he explores is the practice which the excavators have of allowing the remains to be lost, I have for several years offered a rather large reward to those who might bring me any, promising to double the recompense if they showed me these remains before they were disturbed, or in the place where they had been discovered. From this moment, many were presented to me; others were pointed out to me which I went to examine in situ. In these remains there were some very ancient, some very curious, but none that were fossil. Towards the end of 1861, in excavating in the sand of MoulinQuignon, a bed situated near Abbeville, at thirty metres above the level of the Somme, I remarked at four to five metres below the soil a bed of brown sand underlying the upper bed of yellow or grey sand, and reposing on the chalk. This argillo-ferruginous bed, nearly black, impregnated with a colouring matter which stuck to the fingers, and which should contain organic matter, varies from thirty to sixty centimetres in thickness; it is distinct from the upper bed, and follows all the undulations of the chalk on which it lies at a depth of four to five metres from the surface. During the year 1862 and the first months of 1863, as the quarry of Moulin-Quignon remained open, I was able to study this bed, and I found therein many flints chipped into implements, some very coarse and different by their colour and by their cutting, from those of the upper bed; the others much better made, seldom rolled and little worn, a fact which I attribute to the bed being less pebbly than that immediately above. The state of preservation of these hâches, due to the absence of large flints in this bed, and as I have said, a certain indication of organic matter, led me to hope to find therein bones or skulls. I said so to the terrassiers, repeating my direction to them to leave in its place anything they might discover. On the 23rd of March one of these terrassiers, Nicholas Halatre, brought me, in a mass of sand, two flint hâches, found at a depth of 4.50m. At fifteen centimètres lower, near the chalk, there was in the same sand a fragment of bone, or what he took for one, but which, after having detached the matrix I recognized as a human tooth. Half an hour afterwards I was at Moulin-Quignon, and saw the place whence the two hâches and the tooth had been derived; and the report of Halatre was confirmed by the other terrassiers. From the discovery of this tooth I might have concluded that the jaw was at hand; I had the earth opened, and found a third hâche, but night coming on interrupted my investigations. The following day, the terrassiers being employed elsewhere, the work was suspended. On the 26th, I engaged two other workmen, Dingeon and Vasseur, to continue the digging. On the 28th Vasseur came and brought me a second tooth, found not far from the place where the first had been discovered, adding that by its side was a bone, or something like one, of which he could only see a small part. I immediately went to the quarry, accompanied by an archaeologist of our town, M. Oswald Dimpre, a skilful draughtsman, and well known to the geologists who have visited our quarries. Arrrived at the bank, after having found the excavation just as I had left it, at five metres below the soil, I perceived in the black bed the end of the bone which Vasseur had mentioned. This earth was very compact, and it was necessary to be careful, in order not to do any mischief. I caused the soil around the bone, of which I saw the extremity, to be detached, and in spite of a mass of sand which adhered to it, I recognized the half of a human jaw. At twenty centimètres distant, in the same black vein, was a hâche, which M. Dimpre could only detach after several efforts, and by the help of a pick-axe. Near the jaw I found a second hâche, broken, and, below this, a third tooth. Then, in a quantity of the same sand which I had carried home I discovered a portion of a fourth tooth. This human jaw-bone was in the lowest part of the bed of black sand, and at some centimètres from the chalk. The following is a detailed account of the beds which covered it, measured by me, and a diagram of which was made by M. Dimpre : 1. A bed of vegetable earth 2. Earth undisturbed, grey sand mixed with broken flints 4. Yellow ferruginous sand; flints smaller, and more rolled; 5. Black argillo-ferruginous sand, colouring and sticking to the hand, appearing to contain organic matter; small pebbles, more rolled than in the higher banks; flints cut by hand; fossil human jaw M. 0.50 0.70 1.50 1.70 0.50 4.70 6. A bed of chalk, upon which the bed of black argillaceous sand rests, at a depth of five metres below the surface. It is then in the fifth bed, a bed covered by four other beds of sand and clay mixed with flints above it, where was found this jaw, which struck me at first by the perfect similarity of its black tint with that of the hâches found beside and below it, and the rolled or uncut flints by which it was surrounded. At first sight this jaw appeared to me to present certain differences from an ordinary jaw. M. Jules Dubois, physician to the hôtel Dieu at Abbeville, and M. Catel, surgeon-dentist, a good anatomist, to whom I showed it, made the same remark. M. Jules Dubois found that the ascending branch was more oblique from back to front than in a man of our day; and that the condyle itself is distorted in the inside, and somewhat low. His conclusion was that this man belonged to another race than ours. His confrère, Dr. Herquet, known, like M. Dubois, by his excellent memoirs upon natural and medical science, shared this opinion, adding that the difference from the ordinary form might be an |