These specimens have recently been presented to the Anatomical Museum of the University, by J. Wharton Cox, Esq., who had received them from his father, Dr Cox of Sydney, the well-known Australian naturalist.

The masks had been procured by Dr Cox from missionaries, and were either from the island of New Ireland or New Britain, in proximity to the north coast of New Guinea. They were both formed of the frontal and facial bones, on which a face had been modelled in a composition, formed of a mixture of a resinous substance with earth or clay. This artificial face had then been painted with red, black, and white pigments. The larger mask was hollowed out behind, by the removal of the sphenoid and ethmoid bones, so that it could be adapted to the face of a wearer, and a bar of wood was fastened transversely across the hollow, which the wearer had evidently used for holding the mask between his teeth; as the mask had both the eyelids and lips separated from each other, the wearer could both see and breathe through these openings.