from
the _Piltdown skull_, discovered in 1912 on Piltdown Common, near
Ucksfield, Sussex, England, built up something essentially monkey-like,
with receding forehead, projecting brows, and a gorilla-like lower jaw.
Prof. Keith, a renowned specialist, checking up on this reconstruction,
comes to an entirely different conclusion. He finds that the work of Drs.
Dawson and Woodward was done "in open defiance of all that scientists
know about skulls, whether ancient or modern." His words are: "I soon saw
that the parts of the reconstructed Piltdown skull had been apposed in a
manner which was in open defiance of all that was known of skulls,
ancient and modern, human and anthropoid. Articulating the bones in a
manner which has been accepted by all anatomists in all times, I found
that the brain-chamber, instead of measuring 1,070 cubic cm., as in Dr.
Smith Woodward's reconstruction, measured 1,500 cubic cm.,--a large brain
chamber for even modern man."

The _Neanderthal skull_ was found in 1856 in the neighborhood of
Duesseldorf by Dr. Fuhlrott, of Elberfeld. When the skull and other parts
of the skeleton were exhibited at a scientific meeting held at Bonn the
same year, a wide divergence of opinion at once developed among the
specialists. By some, doubts were expressed as to the human character of
the remains. Others held that the remains indicate a person of much the
same stature as a European of the present day, but with such an unusual
thickness in some of them as betokened a being of very extraordinary
strength. Dr. Meyer, of Bonn, regarded the skull as the remains of a
Cossack killed in 1814. Other scientists agreed with him. Modern science
accepts the antiquity of the Neanderthal man, but the controversy has
never ceased. The great Virchow declared the peculiarities of the bones
to be the result of disease.

Near Liege, in Belgium, not more than seventy miles from the Neanderthal,
the _Engis skull_ was found. After careful measurement it was proved not
to differ materially from the skulls of modern Europeans.

Such experiences should prevent us from making any assertions respecting
the primitive character, in race or physical conformation, of these
cave-dwellers. Indeed. Prof. Huxley, in a very careful and elaborate
paper upon the Neanderthal and Engis skulls, places an average skull of
a modern native of Australia about half-way between those of the
Neanderthal and Engis caves. Yes, he says that, after going throu