and the brain. The sphenoid bone somewhat resembles a bird or bat with out-stretched wings, from which resemblance it obtains its name.

The frontal bone (os frontis) occupies all the space from the sockets of the eyes upward, constituting the forepart of the cranium, and extending to the coronal suture, across the middle of the upper part of the head. The frontal bone (and the occipital) being originally formed in two symmetrical halves, the junction of these upon the median line is frequently marked by a suture extending upward from the root of the nose; but, in the majority of cases, the bones are consolidated into one, upon the median line, and no suture is visible. The bones are originally formed as a cartilaginous membrane, which becomes solidified into bone by the deposit of earthy matter, chiefly phosphate of lime, which commences about the center of the bone, and proceeds in rays toward the circumference. The centers of ossification, for the frontal bone, are located at the two points in the forehead, which frequently present a slight prominence about the center of the location usually assigned to Causality.

The parietal bone is of a quadrangular form, so bent in the middle as to cover the top, side, and back of the head. It unites with its fellow of the opposite side, by the sagittal suture, which may be distinctly felt upon the top of the head, running from the coronal suture to the middle of the occiput. Its name, sagittal, is derived from sagitta (an arrow), on account of its arrow-like straightness, and lying between the coronal and lambdoid sutures like an arrow between the string and bow. The center of ossification for the parietal bone, is at a point about three inches above the back of the ear, which presents a prominent angle between the side and the top of the cranium, near the middle of Cautiousness, as located by Gall and Spurzheim. This is a central point among our cerebral organs-intermediate between the moral and the animal, the energetic and the feeble-free from any perturbating impulse, and indicating, by its development, a sound and well restrained condition of the mind. The center of ossification of the frontal bone, corresponds to the reasoning powers, which lead us to truth, and the prominence of these two points, at the centers of the frontal and parietal bones, indicates solidity of mind, and capacity for investigating and determining what is true.

The occipital bone constitutes an important portion of the back part and basis of the skull. Its superior angle lies about the center of the occiput, between the parietal bones, with which it connects by the lambdoid suture. Near the ears it connects with the temporal bones, between which it lies, in the basis of the skull, extending forward so far as to join the body of the sphenoid bone. The occipital bone contains the great foramen for the passage of the spinal cord, the condyles upon which the head is supported, and the double depression for the reception of the cerebellum.

The temporal bone contains the apparatus of hearing, and presents externally, just behind the ear, the long prominence called the

L

mastoid process. This bony ridge, in which the nerve of hearing is situated, is called, from its superior density, the petrous, or stony portion of this bone. It gives great solidity to the basis of the skull. The temporal bone is bounded above by the squamous, or scaly suture, at which it overlaps the parietal-anteriorly by the sphenoid, and posteriorly by the occipital. A bony process, projecting from the temporal bone, unites with the malar bone to form the zygoma (or yoke), underneath or through which the temporal muscle passes, attached above along the temples, and below to the lower jaw, which it clenches firmly in mastication. The bulk of the temporal muscle is sometimes sufficient to enlarge the apparent developments in the temples; but we can easily make the proper allowance by placing the hand upon it, and requesting the individual to close the jaws firmly. By alternately closing and relaxing we may perceive, distinctly, the volume of the muscle.

The ethmoid bone, which is usually spoken of among the bones of the cranium, really belongs to the nose, and has no connection with the brain, excepting that it fills a small fissure in the frontal bone by its cribriform or sieve-like surface, through which is transmitted the olfactory nerve. This bone lies between the eyes, and contributes to their separation, producing that breadth between the eyes upon which cranioscopists have been accustomed to rely as the indication of the organ of Form. An examination of the skull will show, clearly, that the convolution of Form does not descend so far between the eyes as to exert much influence upon their separation, while the ethmoid bone, which lies directly between them, necessarily determines their distance apart.

Influence of the Brain upon the Cranium.-The bones of the skull are composed of two lamina, or plates, between which there is a cancellated or cellular texture, greater in quantity as the bones are thicker. Along the lower part of the temples, in the squamous portion of the temporal, the wings of the sphenoid, and the supraorbitar plate of the frontal, it is scarcely perceptible. The internal lamina of the cranium, which is in contact with the brain, is continually undergoing modifications of form by the influence of the adjacent convolutions. This modification of the skull, by the brain, does not arise from any considerable mechanical pressure of the brain upon the skull, but, from the laws of vital action, and the admirable adaptation which exists between the different parts of the human body. It is a law of the human constitution, that the hard parts shall give way to the soft; and that wherever the expansion of any structure requires additional room, the adjacent parts, shall be absorbed sufficiently to accommodate the growth. Thus, whenever any of the convolutions, or organs of the brain, become unusually active, their circulation of blood being increased, they expand somewhat in size, and are nourished more rapidly, so as to increase in absolute bulk. At the same time the bony substance is gradually absorbed, and the form of the convolution becomes impressed upon the bone.

In examining the interior of the skull, we find, that wherever the brain has been very active, the convolutions have made their digital impressions upon the bones; but, where the organs have been inactive, the bones have no such impressions; on the contrary, the internal plate is smooth, and instead of yielding before the brain, appears to grow inward to fill the deficiency caused by its absorption. Thus the skull becomes remarkably thick in those portions which cover inactive organs, and remarkably thin at the localities of the most active organs.

Sometimes the entire half of the brain has been atrophied, and one-half of the skull correspondingly thickened in consequence of one-half of the body having been paralyzed for a great many years.

In the greater number of crania, we find that certain organs about the basis of the skull, which are associated with the animal functions, are distinctly impressed upon the adjacent bones. The perceptive convolutions of the front lobe, which are necessarily active in all cases, are very distinctly impressed upon the supra-orbital plate; and even the petrous portion of the temporal bone, hard as it is, receives very distinct impressions from the adjacent convolutions.

ART. III.-CAPITAL PUNISHMENT.

I Do not propose, at present, to develop my views in detail upon this most interesting question. It is a subject of great importancea many sided question-in discussing which we may glance at a great variety of philosophic principles. I would simply review the lecture of Prof. CALDWELL, now lying before me, upon this subject. This lecture, delivered last August, before the Jefferson Literary Society of Augusta, Kentucky, expresses the views of a distinguished medical philosopher and pioneer phrenologist of America; one who, still in green old age, presents an example of mental vigor and intellectual progress which should be emulated by the young. The following sketch of Dr. Caldwell, in the free and lively vein of Dr. Smith, of the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, makes quite a well-drawn and high-colored portrait of the learned Profes

sor:

"If there is a man in the medical profession of this country who stands out by himself, as a marked individual, distinguished as much for his profound attainments in science as for a general knowledge of human nature--who is a connecting link between the early philosophers of the United States and those now upon the

stage-it is Charles Caldwell, M. D., of Louisville, Kentucky. No less a giant in intellect than in his corporeal development, command ing in person, learned, dignified both by age and his position in various relations of life, it is emphatically true that he has no rival, fears no competitor, and is a living monument of the value of mental activity in promoting health and longevity. While most of us were in infancy, or unborn, he was pursuing the active rounds of every day business, and, in the full vigor of manhood, teaching the laws that govern our being. The last time we saw Dr. Caldwell was in one of the streets of Louisville, where his tall figure, solemn gait, and long bushy beard reaching down upon his breast, were well calculated to attract attention-and he had an unenviable share of staring eyes watching his stately progress over the sidewalk, moving onward with the dignity of one of the eastern magi. "That Dr. Caldwell has some eccentricities cannot be denied; and being rich in experience, and strong in facts, the gatherings of more than three-score years, under the most favorable circumstances for study, it is not, perhaps, strange, that he looks with some degree of contempt upon the acquisitions of multitudes of modern writers, who may happen to fall below his standard of excellence, or set at naught such doctrines as he has cherished from the first dawn of his medical inquiries in Philadelphia. He is said to be the last surviving pupil of Dr. Rush. If the mantle of that extraordinary master in medicine did not fall on Dr. C., the vivid impressions made by his preceptor upon a plastic mind have had an abiding influence, which the revolutions of times and seasons seem not yet to have effaced, and while his life continues they probably never will.

"Dr. Caldwell has written much that partakes of the iron character of his opinions. His style is hard, but the arguments are logical, though he rarely gains converts to his views. One reason why he does not take rank as high authority, is probably because he is too dogmatical-too determined. A writer in this Journal once spoke of him as a medical despot, who never would admit that any one else was his equal. But it should be frankly stated, that for many years he has had no superior as a bold, fearless, thorough and correct medical teacher, whether in the chair of a college or through the press. Fortunately for the world, old age does not invariably destroy the aspirations of genius, nor abridge the powers of the intellect. In the case before us, a venerable man, already past the period when repose is thought to be a necessary precaution to eke out the measure of life, Dr. Caldwell is still proclaiming, in one of the great schools of Kentucky, the laws that govern organized matter, the phases of disease, the philosophy of remedies, the theory of their action; and is still, as in years gone by, enthusiastic, terse, formidable as a debater and tactician, happy as a lecturer, and is neither eclipsed, nor perhaps matched by any one occupying a similar chair in the circle of the seven and twenty medical schools of North America."

The first part of the lecture is devoted to the impolicy of capital punishment, which he regards as demonstrable upon the phrenological basis. To the evidence of experience, he refers as follows:

"In Great Britain, the government has tried, within the last fifty years, the influence of every sort of punishment that a people full of resources could devise and execute, or a civilized one be induced to tolerate. In the course of these trials it has resorted to imprisonment, tread-mills, whipping, cropping, branding, transportation, and hanging. And, under each of them, the sum total of crime, in proportion to the amount of population included in the estimate, has increased. And, during a portion of the experimental period, the number of executions on the gibbet, especially in London, was truly appalling.

"But, within the last few years, the mitigation of the penal law has greatly reduced the number of such executions; and, during that interval, the amount of crime has perceptibly decreased. Yet has the population of London, within the same period, been materially augmented. And of the other large cities of the kingdom, the same is, in both respects, true. While their population has increased, crime has decreased, since the sum total of capital punishment has been lessened.

"Nor do the same results, from the same causes, appear to be less firmly established, in some of the most enlightened nations of continental Europe. There also statistical records, united to the observation of distinguished men, conjointly testify, that with the mitigation of the severity of criminal law, and its less rigorous administration, the frequency of murder, and other capital crimes, has been obviously diminished. Such is the evidence; and it is authenticated by the experience of no inconsiderable proportion of Christendom.”

Dr. C. next quotes the commands of Christ: "But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you;" Matthew v.

And again: "Therefore, all things whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the prophets."

These precepts he shows to be incompatible with the act of put ting to death a helpless prisoner in the hands of the law, who should be, to all right-minded men, an object of compassion, not of any vindictive feeling. After discussing the scriptural arguments, he continues :

"One human being should never destroy the life of another, except as the issue of positive necessity.

"An individual, for example, is assailed by an enemy, with an intent to commit murder; and he is unable to prevent the consummation of the deed, except by destroying the purposed destroyer. The necessity of the case fully justifies him in the fatal act. But if he first arrest the malefactor, disarm and master him, and then