MISCELLANEOUS NOTICES.

EDINBURGH.-On 3d December, the following gentlemen were elected office-bearers of the Phrenological Society for the ensuing year:-The Honourable Douglas Gordon Hallyburton, M. P. President;-Sir G. S. Mackenzie, Bart., Dr Francis Farquharson, Bindon Blood, John Syme, VicePresidents;-Charles Maclaren, H. T. M. Witham, Dr John Scott, Phineas Deseret, Dr Patrick Neill, James Simpson, Councillors; Dr William Gregory, Secretary;-Robert Cox, Conservator of the Museum. The following donations were presented, and the Society's thanks voted to the donors:Cast of the head of Mary Ann Burdock, executed at Bristol on the 15th April 1835, for the murder, by poison, of Mrs Clara Ann Smith; and casts of two Peruvian skulls, one from the Temple of the Sun at Pachacamac, and the other from an ancient Peruvian tomb at Huacho, an India town north of Lima-all presented by Samuel Stuchbury, Esq. Bristol; cast of the skull of a mechanician at Alyth, presented by the Dundee Phrenological Society: skull found in a stone-coffin in a cairn at Nether Urquhart, Fife, 16th March 1835, presented by the proprietor of the estate; Eloge Funebre de S. M. Don Pedro, and Manuel des Maladies Veneriennes, both by Count Godde de Liancourt, presented by the author; Annals of Phrenology, No. 5, presented by the publishers; two old skulls found at Gogar near Edinburgh, presented by Dr J. R. Sibbald; cast of the brain of the whale lately exhibited by Dr Knox in Edinburgh, and mask of the late Rev. J. Brown Paterson, minister of Falkirk, both presented by Mr Anthony O'Neil; bust of Dr Hahnemann, the founder of homoeopathy, presented by Dr Hirschfeld of Bremen ; cast of the interior and exterior of the skull of Dean Swift, presented by Dr R. T. Evanson, Dublin; duplicates of the same, and cast of the skull of Esther Johnson, or "Stella," presented by Dr Houston, Dublin; cast of the head of John Adam, executed at Inverness, on 16th October 1835, for the murder of his wife, presented by Sir G. S. Mackenzie, Bart. ; cast of the head of George Campbell, executed at Glasgow on 29th September 1835 for murder, and skulls of a magpie and a starling, presented by Dr Robert Macnish; cast of the skull of Michael Pickles, executed about twenty years ago at York, presented by Dr Jubb, Halifax. The Secretary read a letter from Dr Evanson, Secretary of the Dublin Phrenological Society (published in our last Number), relative to a proposed British Association for the Advancement of Mental Science; and the meeting expressed their cordial agreement in the resolution passed by the Dublin Society as to the desirableness and propriety of such an Association. With regard to the time and place of meeting, however, various opinions were entertained. Mr Hewett Watson suggests that the meetings ought to be held alternately in London, Edinburgh, and Dublin, where phre nologists are numerous, and the best collections exist.

LONDON. In the Lancet of 19th December 1835, there is an interesting account of the proceedings of the London Phrenological Society, at the meeting on 2d November. Four skulls had been transmitted to Sir James Macgrigor by Dr Stewart, principal medical officer of the army in the Mauritius, with the following letter, dated 27th December 1834:-"Sir, I am commissioned to forward to England, and to your care, the skulls of four human subjects, which are considered of sufficient interest to claim the attention of all lovers of phrenological science. This I am directed to do upon condition that they shall be presented to the Phrenological Society of London, upon an engagement to furnish a copy of the result of their examination. Should they decline agreeing to this condition, it is requested that they may be forwarded to the cultivators of the same science in Edinburgh, and with the like injunction. The inclosed sealed packet contains matter relating to these skulls. This packet is to be retained in your possession unopened, until the report of the Society to which they are presented shall have been received; it is then to be opened, and the contents to be at your disposal; the observations of the Society, or a certified copy thereof, to be transmitted hither for the information of all concerned in this island. The heads are numbered, and the reVOL. IX.-NO. XLVII. U u

marks upon them, contained in the inclosed packet, bear corresponding numbers. With the assurance that the interesting nature of the subject will, with you, be admitted as a sufficient apology for thus appealing to you in prosecution of a branch of knowledge now so generally and so highly cultivated, I have the honour to be, Sir, your most obedient humble servant, AN. STEWART, M. D." The Society, as a body, never draw inferences from heads; but Dr Elliotson individually undertook the task. The skull No. 1. he described to be that of a gentle, open, and inoffensive person, free from glaring vice, though probably not a splendid instance of active virtue. From No. 2. he inferred pride, obstinacy, selfishness, deceit, cruelty, and quarrelsomeness, as the leading characteristics; from No. 3, that the individual "would be exceedingly cruel, would fear nothing, would yield to nothing, and would be proud and selfish in the highest degree; and his vanity and caution must have been as striking as any part of his character. Veneration is large, so that he might have felt deference for those who were evidently his superiors." Of No. 4. it was stated-" This is by no means a bad skull. The individual might have been of a very respectable character, though not intellectually distinguished." Dr Elliotson's notes (which are here necessarily abridged) having been transmitted to Sir James M'Grigor, the packet mentioned in Dr Stewart's letter was forwarded to the Society, containing accounts of the characters of two of the individuals to whom the skulls had belonged; these characters having been furnished by the Chief Judge of the Mauritius, Edward Blackburn, Esq. a zealous phrenologist. Upon the characters of the other two individuals it appears that no particular observations had been made. Nos. 1. and 3, were stated to be the skulls of a Government apprentice and a female slave, both of whom died a natural death, and of whose characters nothing is mentioned; No. 2. to be the skull of a cunning, jealous, ferocious, and licentious negro, convicted of a barbarous attempt to murder a female; and No. 4, to be the skull of an Indian murderer of very brutal dispositions. It thus appears, as Dr Elliotson stated, that there were two skulls of ordinary persons, and two of very depraved persons, and that the phrenological characters perfectly agreed with the biographical; the two former having probably been sent merely to occasion difficulty and put Phrenology to a severer test. While, however, one ordinary skull and one bad skull answered to the characters respectively given of them in the MS., it is remarkable that the other two skulls indicated each the character that was given of the other in the MS. by which they were accompanied, Dr Elliotson remarked that there was no possibility of mistaking the character of the skulls, and that, phrenology being true, he had no doubt that the skull marked 4 should have been marked 3, and that skull 3 should have been marked 4. He added that he had written to the Mauritius to this effect, confident that it would be discovered, either that a mistake had been made there, or that the skull had been wrongly marked, in order the more fully to test Phrenology. Two sketches of each skull are given in the Lancet.

NEWCASTLE.-Extract from the Newcastle Chronicle of 19th December 1835: -"The first meeting of the Phrenological Society was held on the 7th instant, in the Lecture Room of the Literary and Philosophical Society, and was very numerously attended; Mr T. M. Greenhow in the Chair. At the request of the Committee of the Society, Mr J. Fife consented to deliver an address on the elementary principles of Phrenology. Mr Fife observed that he should best advance the objects of the Society by directing attention to the elementary principles on which Phrenology was founded; and, upon the present occasion, he proposed to adduce those evidences of its truth which were drawn from works published long before the promulgation of the theory, or advanced by men who desired to refute it, though philosophers, poets, and artists, from the earliest periods, had assented to the common observation that intellect in its highest state was invariably accompanied by a peculiar configuration of the head. Mr Fife exhibited casts of the skulls of various of the most barbarous and uncultivated nations, as also of some of the lower animals most resembling man, and pointed out the marked differences between them and those of the inhabitants of civilized countries a difference so constant and uniform as to make it a subject of great importance to persons disposed, from unacquaintance with Phrenology, to question the soundness of

the foundation on which that science is based. He explained in a condensed and luminous manner, how from the mode in which the head is balanced on the body, the proportionate quantity of brain lying in the anterior part of the cranium regulated the attitude; an instance illustrative of this, is the forward position of the head, ascribed by Homer to the wise Ulysses, accounted for by a predominating proportion of his brain lying in the anterior part of his skull, or seat of intellect, and this development of the brow appearing to cause his head to droop in a forward direction; thus characterizing the peculiar expression of dignity in the contour of the Greek statue a proof of the ancient poet having been an accurate observer of nature. The ancient Greeks have invariably attended to the shape of the head in the representations of their gods; and we observe by the specimens of their statuary which remain to us, that their beau ideal consisted in an upright and spacious forehead, widely different from those found in their figures of satyrs and fabulous monsters. Painters, whose art consists in accurate delineation of nature, have always represented the brow as the seat of intellect and intelligence, and the Italian and Flemish masters in particular have constantly and uniformly done so. Mr Fife related, that having on one occasion made a remark on some of the features of a Christ on the Cross, painted by an artist of his acquaintance, he argued that all the features were similar to what had been adhered to by artists from time immemorial-that, founded on a minute observation of nature, a particular outline had been carried out as the delineation of wisdom, piety, and benevolence. Shakspeare, Milton, and others, have associated dignity and intelligence with large and upright foreheads, and, as uniformly, the villain and the idiot with a contrary configuration. Mr Fife traced the progress of the studies and investigations of physiologists and anatomists in the middle and towards the close of the last century, which gradually led to the discovery of Phrenology by Dr Gall. He detailed the manner in which Gall so successfully demonstrated the anatomy of the brain; the circumstance which led to his discovery of the separate organs; and the opposition he met with from the Court of Vienna, lest his new view should lead to the doctrine of Materialism, an apprehension which Mr Fife finished his address by shewing, in the most satisfactory manner, to be equally absurd and unphilosophical. Mr Fife proposed at some future period to go more into the details of Phrenology, and to answer, severally, the objections of the most plausible writers against the science. His address manifested an intimate acquaintance with the subject, and was particularly interesting to persons commencing the study of Phrenology. On the motion of Mr Turner, the following resolution was then passed, and the Secretary was requested to communicate it to Mr Combe:-That the Phrenological Society of Newcastle, at this its first meeting, desires to testify its cordial respect to George Combe, Esq., and its acknowledgment of the great obligations which its members feel themselves under to that gentleman, for the information which they have derived from the excellent course of lectures lately delivered by him in this place; and particularly, for the effective means which he afforded to the establishment of this society, by the collection of busts, &c., obtained by means of his public lecture.' It was then announced that at the next meeting Mr M. H. Rankine would read a paper, entitled 'Some remarks on the doctrine of Helvetius and his followers, respecting the causes of inequality in men's minds, as controverted by facts and Phrenology." We learn that the subsequent meetings of the Newcastle Phrenological Society have been numerously attended, and that the interest excited by Phrenology in that town continues

to increase.

BELFAST-Extract from the Belfast Guardian, 5th February 1836 :---Another public meeting of the Belfast Natural History Society, (the fourth of the present session) was held in the Museum on Wednesday evening the 13th January. Nearly two hundred persons were present, and a paper was read by Mr Grattan on the busts of Sir Walter Scott, Lord Byron, and Thurtell, the murderer of Mr Weare, considered phrenologically. Some extremely valuable remarks were made in the course of the evening by Dr Drummond, President of the Society and Professor of Anatomy and

Botany in the Royal Belfast Academical Institution, who expressed his fulf conviction of the truth of the science of Phrenology, and instanced some important facts, illustrative of the subject, which had come under his own observation. In speaking of Thurtell, Mr Grattan fell into an inaccuracy which a gentleman who was present corrected next day in the following interesting communication: In order to remove one stain from the blue jackets, I must acquaint you that the noted Thurtell was a Lieutenant in the Royal Marines, and not in the Navy. He served in that rank on board his Majesty's ship Defence, 74 guns, and in the return of the fleet from the Baltic, in December 1811, that ship and the St George, 98 guns, were totally wrecked on the West coast of N. Jutland; the crews of these two vessels amounted to about 1100 men at least, of this number only twelve persons were saved, among whom was the unfortunate individual mentioned: so true in his instance our nautical proverb came to pass, that he who is born to be hanged will never be drowned."

FAREHAM, 25th December 1835.-Mr Miller of Emsworth, delivered an admirable lecture on Phrenology, in the Hall of our Institution, on Tuesday evening last. The lecturer urged his audience to free their minds of such moral defects as ignorance and prejudice, which frustrate sincere and honest research, and to give the science candour of reception and impartiality of investigation. The three grand principles of the science were then discussed, singulatim et seriatim, viz. first, that the brain is the organ through which the mind manifests itself; secondly, that the brain is a congeries of organs possessing a plurality of faculties; and, thirdly, that size, other things being equal, is a measure of the power of the faculty. Anatomy, physiology, genius, insanity, dreaming, somnambulism, with the evidence of many eminent authorities, all were made to contribute to the support of the principles of the science, the progress of which at the present day is so rapid, and becoming so widely extended, as calls for every individual to devote his mind to ascertain the soundness of its doctrines, what are its pretensions, its tendencies, and what is its utility, especially in reference to education, legislation, insanity, mental philosophy, and morality. The influence of circumstances and education was fully admitted in modifying human character; and though they never did or could create a faculty, yet they would strengthen it when in existence, and afford opportunities for action. The ignorance of phrenologists was freely confessed, as to the nature of the thinking principle, and all discussion on a subject beyond the reach of human comprehension reprobated. The lecturer concluded by declaring his belief that Phrenology was founded on the solid foundations of truth and as truth is the basis of religion, both Phrenology and Religion would be found to support and consolidate each other mutually and harmoniously; that every individual was competent to examine and decide for himself: and his chief object on the present occasion he declared was to excite reflection, induce observation, challenge scrutiny, and inspire a disposition for the love of facts, either to confirm or refute the science of Phrenology. The audience, which was as numerous as on any former occasion, and comprised many of the most respectable inhabitants, listened with the greatest pleasure; while the cordial thanks that were awarded to Mr Miller, shewed how warmly they approved the sentiments delivered.-Hampshire Independent, 26th December 1835.

WORCESTER.-We observe, in the January number of our able contemporary The Analyst (which has now become a quarterly instead of monthly publication), a notice of the proceedings of the Worcester Literary and Scientific Institution, embodying a detailed report of a lecture on Phrenology by E. A. Turley, Esq., being the fifth delivered by him in that institution. "The lecture," says the report, "occupied more than an hour, and, in its course and on its conclusion, was repeatedly greeted with applause. There was not a whisper of dissent noticeable; and it may be not unreasonably inferred that the unanimous approbation resulted from a concurrence of opinion. The mode of argument was well calculated to elucidate the profound physiological science omprehended in this very interesting subject. The oral evidences were successively illustrated by a series of portraits and casts. These, and the re

searches displayed in the exposition, evinced the deep study bestowed on the subject. Those evidences are now submitted to the public, and all classes are interested in affording them a dispassionate consideration. As the benefit of mankind is the object, open discussion must be a public advantage; and the friends of truth, on either side, have powerful motives for promoting a calm, impartial decision. No person of candour and good sense will reject a proposed improvement without full and sufficient inquiry, nor persevere against an unbiassed refutation. The inestimable value of education is a general theme, and in the late session it occupied the wisdom of Parliament. Perhaps no system ever offered to the world, opened a more important field for investigation, than the probable effect of Phrenology on education, morals, and manners.'

FORFAR." It gives us much pleasure to learn that a society has been established in this place for promoting the study of Phrenology. The means for attaining this end are-1st, the formation of a library illustrative of its doctrines; and 2d, the procuring of a set of casts, &c., for experimental practice. It is gratifying to know that the prejudices against which Phrenology has so long struggled are at length giving way, and that an earnest desire for information on this interesting science has become more prevalent, not only here, but generally throughout the country. Instead of being assailed with unmeaning ridicule, it is now viewed as an important system in the philosophy of the human mind; and the longer it is pursued with a desire to learn, the better will it stand the test of inquiry. It is proposed that essays on the principles and practice of the science shall be read by the members at their monthly meetings. These essays will either be original or selected; and as the society already includes amongst its members several professional gentlemen, their knowledge of anatomy, so important in the study of Phrenology, will be brought to bear on the subject. In the mean time, we wish the institution every success, and shall rejoice to hear of its usefulness."-Montrose Review. In December last this Society consisted of about thirty members, among whom are the Sheriff-substitute, Town-clerk, and other gentlemen of the legal and medical professions. At the first meeting Dr Murray gave a lecture on the osteology of the cranium, and at the second Dr Allan submitted some remarks on the structure and physiology of the brain.

MONTROSE.-Mr W. A. F. Browne has been requested by the Directors of the Scientific Association here, to deliver twelve lectures on Phrenology, and has accepted the invitation. He has received also requisitions to lecture in Forfar and Kirriemuir.

AMERICA. Several numbers of the Annals of Phrenology have failed to reach us, though regularly published. We hope to be able to give some account of their contents in our next. The following is extracted from a letter dated Albany, N. Y., 1st March 1835 :-" Mr Price of St Paul's Episcopal Church, where I attend on Sundays, has been delivering a course of sermons on the evidences of Christianity, and said at the close of them, that he would take the liberty of recommending a few books to those of his hearers who might be inclined to follow out the subject. The first book mentioned was Combe on the Constitution of Man."

A paragraph, copied from the Gazette Medicale, relative to the head of Lacenaire, a French criminal, has lately appeared in several English papers. It states that the head of that individual has an excellent configuration, wholly at variance with his character. Such averments are exceedingly common, and uniformly turn out to have been either dishonestly or ignorantly made. We have instituted an inquiry into the facts of the case, and confidently anticipate a similar result in the present instance. The writer of the paragraph seems to look for bumps alone as the signs of strong propensities; for he speaks of the cranium presenting a "remarkable smoothness of the two sides, and particularly in those parts which are said to correspond with robbery and murder." Did it not occur to him that a smooth surface is as compatible with great development of certain regions of the brain, as the extensive plains among the Andes are with an altitude of many thousand feet above the level of the sea? [Since the preceding remarks were sent to