The selection of the last-mentioned figure was most unfortunate, for three years before, M. Gratiolet, the highest authority in cerebral anatomy of our age, had, in his splendid work on 'The Convolutions of the Brain in Man and the Primates' (Paris, 1854), pointed out that, though this engraving faithfully expressed the cerebral foldings as seen on the surface, it gave a very false idea of the relative position of the several parts of the brain, which, as very commonly happens in such preparations, had shrunk and greatly sunk down by their own weight.[1]
Anticipating the serious mistakes which would arise from this inaccurate representation of the brain of the ape, published under the auspices of men so deserving of trust as the two above-named Dutch anatomists, M. Gratiolet thought it expedient, by way of warning to his readers, to repeat their incorrect figures (figs. 54 and 55, p. 482), and to place by the side of them two correct views (57, p. 483, and 56, p. 482) of the brain of the same ape. By reference to these illustrations, as well as to fig. 58, p. 483, the reader will see not only the contrast of the relative position of the cerebrum and cerebellum, as delineated in the natural as well as in the distorted state, but also the remarkable general correspondence between the chimpanzee brain and that of the human subject in everything save in size. The human brain (fig. 58) here given, by Gratiolet, is that of an African bushwoman, called the Hottentot Venus, who was exhibited formerly in London, and who died in Paris.
Respecting this striking analogy of cerebral structure in Man and the apes, Gratiolet says, in the work above cited: 'The convoluted brain of Man and the smooth brain of the
- ↑ Gratiolet's words are: 'Les plis cérébraux du chimpanzé y sont fort bien étudiés, malheureusement le cerveau qui leur a servi de modèle était profondément affaissé, aussi la forme générale du cerveau est-elle rendue, dans leurs planches, d'une manière tout-à-fait fausse.' Ibid. p. 18.
