EARLY MAN affords no satisfactory evidence in this respect, except that brachycephalic skeletons have occasionally been described as powerful and large. The fact is, any conclusion drawn from a comparison of the available femoral lengths is vitiated by the frequent uncertainty as to sex and head-form ; and more so by the circumstance that very few of these lengths have been recorded in the case of the distinctively dolichocephalic skeletons, whether of the Neolithic or the Bronze age. A comparison, however, of these femoral lengths in which the sex is known leads to an interesting result. In twenty-one male skeletons the aver- age length was i8'53 in. ; in seven female skeletons, 16*75 m> These lengths, taken as 27*5 per cent of the stature in life, represent an average stature of 5 ft. 73 in. for the men, and of 5 ft. o| in. for the women. The difference between these average statures, nearly 7 in., considerably exceeds that which obtains to-day in England and other civilized coun- tries, and must probably be set down to the effects of early child-bearing and hard work on a poor and irregular diet, in the case of the Bronze- age women. On the other hand the Bronze age compares favourably in this respect with the Neolithic age, from which we may infer that with advancing civilization woman's lot had already undergone amelioration. With regard to the distribution of funeral vessels in respect to head-form, the data are too slender to afford reliable inferences, for in only eight interments with drinking cups and eleven with food vessels, is the shape of the associated skull given. But it is noteworthy that the former vessels are relatively more frequent with long and medium skulls, and the latter with broad skulls. Circles. Of the dozen or more structures in the county popularly known as ' Druidical circles ' two are conspicuous for their magnitude, and are among the finest in the country. These are the famous circle of Arborlow near Hartington, and the little known ' Bull-ring ' at Dove Holes near Chapel-en-le-Frith. The literature of the former is volu- minous, no other antiquity in the county having been so much written about, while the latter has only been noticed by one writer, Pilkington, in his Present State of Derbyshire, 1789. Allowing for the circumstance that the one retains its ' megaliths ' and the other is shorn of them, these circles so closely resemble one another that it is beyond doubt they were the work of the same age, if not of the same hands ; and the similarity is not confined to the structures themselves, each being closely associated with a barrow or mound of unusually large size. Each consists of a central circular area of the natural surface, bounded by a wide but shallow ditch, on the outer margin of which is a rampart consisting of its throw-out, both being discontinued on opposite sides to form en- trances. These entrances or causeways are approximately north-west and south-east at Arborlow, and are more nearly north and south at Dove Holes. The dimensions of the two circles are practically identical. In each the diameter from crest to crest of the rampart is 250 ft., and the extreme diameter is from 20 to 30 ft. greater, while that of the central 181
