---------------------+---------------------++---------------------
| Males || Female
+----------+----------++----------+----------
| Right | Left || Right | Left
+-----+----+-----+----++-----+----+-----+----
|Spec-|Per |Spec-|Per ||Spec-|Per |Spec-|Per
|imens|cent|imens|cent||imens|cent|imens|cent
---------------------+-----+----+-----+----++-----+----+-----+----
pc—plano-convex | 3 | 21 | 2 | 15 || 2 |13.3| 3 | 23
1—ordinary prismatic| | | | || | | |
or near | 6 | 43 | 6 | 46 || 9 |60 | 5 | 39
2—lateral prismatic | 1 | 7 | 2 | 15 || — | — | — | —
4—quadrilateral | 2 | 14 | — | — || 2 |13.3| 3 | 23
Various intermediate| 2 | 14 | 3 | 23 || 2 |13.3| 2 | 15
--------------------+------+----+-----+----++-----+----+-----+----
The most frequent shape is the ordinary prismatic; the next in
frequency is the plano-convex; the lateral prismatic is the least
common. The significance of these conditions must be left for future
consideration, when our data, especially on the American Indians, are
more extensive.
_Perforation of the septum._—The septum between the olecranon
and coronoid fossæ in Indians often shows a smaller or a larger
perforation. The frequency of this developmental anomaly or condition
differs from tribe to tribe, and it differs also between the sexes,
being as a rule more common in females. In the Munsee male humeri only
six instances of such perforation exist, three in right and three in
left bones, the total amounting to 22 per cent of the bones. In only
one instance is the opening large; in three it is medium; in one small,
and in one of pin-point size. In the 29 female humeri which could be
examined for this feature the conditions are quite different, the
perforation being present in no fewer than 17 cases, or nearly 59 per
cent of the bones. Eight of the 17 are right (47 per cent), nine left
(53 per cent). As to size of the perforation, one is pin-point, eight
small, and eight medium; none is large.
_Supracondyloid process._—This process, which in a more or less
rudimentary form, and especially in the form of a ridge, is not rare
in whites, is very uncommon in the Indians, though even in this race
in the majority of humeri some roughness, or even a slight ridge, can
be detected in its position. Among the Munsee humeri no specimen shows
more than a trace of the anomaly.
The rarity of this process in the Indian is of additional interest
from the fact that it seems to be shared by other branches of the
yellow-brown race, and also by the blacks; moreover, the process
appears to be absent, or nearly so, in the humeri of all known apes.
The problem as to why a feature of this nature, which appears clearly
to be reversive, should be more common in modern whites than in the
more primitive races and even in the anthropoid apes and the lower
primates, offers a fruitful field for investigation.