Gallipolis journal. [volume] (Gallipolis, Ohio) 1837-1919, 1854-11-30
RWe publish the following article.

from the London Leader, for the benefit
of such of our readers as feel either
exalted by very large heads or belittled
by very small ones. 1t win be seen
that there is something to be said on
both sides-the inside as well as the
outside:
THF SIZE OF HEADs.-With regard
to the large head and small head con-
troversy, we must say we have never
been able to come to any tangible con-
clusion. Cuvier's head must have
been large, for his brain weighed sixty
FIVE ounces. This is generally ac-
counted the heaviest known healthy
brain; but we were recently told Of a
working man who died in University
College Hospital, London, and whose
head was so large that the students
had the brain weighed, out of curiosity,
when they found it weighd sixty-seven
ounces, though perfectly healthy. On
inquiry, all that they could learn about
the man was that he was said by his
neighbors to have had remarkably
good memory. The brain of DR..
Abercrombie, of Edinburgh, weighed
sixty-three ounces. DR.. Chalmers bad
a very large head indeed Joseph Hume
and he were said to have the largest
heads in the kingdom, and yet his brain
weighed but fiftythree ounces-almost
under the average. On the other hand,
Byron had small head, at least Mr..
Leigh Hunt informs us that his hat,
which is not a very large one, used to
go quite over Byron's head, but his
brain is said to have weighed nearly
four pounds. Keats and Shelley had
very small heads, Mr.. Leigh Hunts
hat going over them, too. Rafella had
a small head; Sir Walter Scott had a
small head, so had Neander, the church
historian; so, also if we recollect Alright
what Bernal Diax says, had Cortez,
the conquerer of Mexico. Yelling
toms head is said to have been under
the average size The brain of Mrs.
Manning the murderess, was pound
lighter than her husbands.
The skull of Rush was very large,
measuring, we think, upward of twenty
four inches round. Pericles, as we
know, had large head; so had
Mahomet; so had Mirabeau; so had
O'Connel. Lamartine describes Napo-
Icons as a small head which had bulged
out. The skull of the poet Burns was
carefully measured when it was dis
inferred on the burial of his wife; it
measured twenty-five and a quarter
inches round, which, allowing half an
inch for the integuments, would make
the circumference of the living head
218 inches, a largish head, but not ex-
traordinary. Goethe's head, we be-
lieve, was not remarkable for size
About Shakespeare head our only in
formation must be from the Stratford
bust, which Chantrey pronounced from
certain signs to be almost certainly
modelled from an original cast taken af-
ter death. 1t is a curious example of
foregone conclusion, that Mr.. Hugh
Miller, speaking of this bust, in his ad-
mirable work, entitled ''First impress
sions of England and Its People," de-
scribes the head, from personal inspec-
ton, as very large one. The skull,
he says, must have been of capacity
to contain all DIR. Chalmers brains
This, as DR.. Chalmers was then alive,
was tantamount to saying it was of the
largest known dimensions. Now, with
this very description in our memory, we
have ourselves examined the Stratford
bust with the utmost closeness and care
and we unbesitatingly declare, that the
head in the bust is, if not a smallish
one, at least such as any average Eng
lish hat could easily fit. We 6elieve it
is smallish head. In short, from all
the statistics we have at command re-
specting large and small heads, includ-
ing our own private observations among
our acquaintances, we have never been
able TO obtain any presentable conclu-
sion on the point.
The opinion of David Scott, the pain
ter, was that large heads were general
ly found in successful men Of the world,
such as statesmen, bankers and the
like, and that the fneness of nervous
tissue requisite for the purely intellec-
tual lives of artists, thinkers, and lite
rary men generally connoted small or
average size of head. Even this opin-
ion, however, will break down, if sp-
piled in practice. We know very en-
ergetic, prudential, and weighty men,
with smallish heads, and we know men
with very large heads who seem at
home only in the most exquisite and
ornamental kinds of mental activity
More sure than any conclusion that can
be come to on this point of size seems
to be notion we have heard advanced
with respect to the form of heads
Length of head from front to back we
heard an eminent and very observing
man dsclare to be, according to his ex-
perience, the most constant physiogno-
mic sign of ability. Only in one emf
nent head, that of Sir Walter Scott, had
he found this sign wanting; and in this
case, if properly considered, the want
was significant. Next to length or
depth, his idea was, that height over
the ears, as in Scott's head, was the
best sign, although he had not found