11 SEPTEMBER 1920, Page 15

THE BRAIN OF ANCIENT AND MODERN MAN. [To THE EDITOR

OF THE " SPECTATOR."] SIN.,—Permit me to correct an oversight in your article "Progress and Education" referring to the paper by me on " Progresa" which was published a month ago in Nature. You apparently hold (and you state that I also hold) that there has been an increase in the size of the human brain since the days of the Neanderthal cave-dwellers. As a matter of fact, I cited in my book Science from an Easy Chair, published in 1910 (pp. 371 to 411), the authoritative measurements of the cranial capacity of specimens both of the Cromagnon race and of the much earlier Neanderthal race, which give the remarkable result that the brain was as large as that of the average modern European, and in the Neanderthal race was

definitely of yet larger bulk. There has been no new discovery since 1910 lending to modify that result. May I also be per- mitted to refer to the chapters on "The Brain of Apes and of Man " and on " The Mind of Apes and of Man" in my book Diversions of a Naturalist (1915, Methuen) for a further exposition of facts and inferences in regard to size of brain, consciousness, memory, instinct, reason and educability (pp. 214 and 262 to 274) ?—I am, Sir, &c., E. RAY LA:MESTER. 44 Oakley Street, Chelsea, S.W.