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THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

NOVEMBER, 1873.

LIBERAL EDUCATION OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. »

By Peof. WILLIAM P. ATKINSON,

THE MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE Off TECHNOLOGY.

THE collapse of that classical system of libei-al education which
has held almost undisputed sway since the revival of learning in
the sixteenth century, and the now generally recognized insufficiency
of the theory which makes the study of the languages of Greece and
Rome the sole foundation of the higher education, are leading, as all
familiar with the educational thought of the present day are aware, to
the greatest variety of speculations as to the system which is destined
to supersede it. That a theory of liberal education as well adapted
to the wants of the nineteenth — or, shall we not rather say the
twentieth — century, as was the classical theory to the wants of the
sixteenth, has yet been elaborated, would be quite too much to affirm.
"We are living in the midst of a chaos of conflicting opinions, and it
seems to be the duty of all who think at all on a subject on which the
vital interests of the future so much depend, and especially incum-
bent on all practical teachers to make such contribution as they are
able, from their studies and reflection or their experience, toward the
right solution of the problem. It is to such a contribution that I now
ask your attention.

I begin with a definition of Liberal Education, in regard to which
I presume we shall not be much at variance. The term liberal is op-
posed to the term servile. A liberal education is that education which
makes a man an intellectual freeman, as opposed to that which makes
a man a tool, an instrument for the accomplishment of some ulterior
aim or object. The aim of the liberal education of any period is the
right use of the realized capital of extant knowledge of that period,
for the training of the whole, or only of some privileged part of the

' A paper read in the Department of Higher Instruction at the annual meeting of the
National Teachers' Association at Elmira, N, Y., August, 1873.
VOL. IT. — 1

2 THE POPULAR SCIENCU MONTHLY.

rising generation, to act the part and perform the duties of free, intel-
lectual, and moral beings. So far as the nature of the human mind
and the foundations of human knowledge remain the same from age to
awe and generation to generation, a liberal education is the same thing
in every age and generation ; so far as the condition of society varies
from age to age, and as the accumulated capital of extant knowledge
increases, the liberal education of one generation will differ from that
of another. There are, therefore, both constant and variable factors
in our problem. It is with the variable factors, as modifying our con-
ception of the liberal education of the nineteenth century, that I have
here chiefly to do,

I reckon five leading influences which are acting powerfully to
modify all our old theories, and slowly working out a new ideal of
liberal education : 1. A truer psychology, giving us for the first time
a true theory of elementary teaching. 2. Progress in the science of
philology, enabling us to assign their right position to the classical
languages as elements in liberal culture, and giving us, in modern
philological science, an improved and more powerful teaching instru-
ment, 3. The first real attempt to combine republican ideas with the
theory of liberal education — in other words, to make the education of
the whole people liberal, instead of merely the education of certain
privileged classes and protected professions. And when I say the
whole people, I mean men and women. Nothing, I will say in pass-
ing, to my mind so marks us as still educational barbarians, so stamps
all our boasted culture with illiberality, as an exclusion of the other
sex from all share in its pri"vileges. No education can be truly liberal
which is not equally applicable to one sex as to the other. 4. As the
influence more profoundly modifying our conceptions of liberal educa-
tion than any other, I reckon the advent of modem physical science.
5, I count among those influences the growing perception that art and
aesthetic culture are equally necessary as an element in all education
worthy of the name. Let me give the few words, which are all the
time will allow me, to each of these influences.

And, first, the advance we have been making toward a truer edu-
cation-philosophy, based upon truer conceptions in regard to the
growth and early development of the human mind, is pretty well dis-
posing of what, perhaps, I may be permitted to call the old-fashioned
grindstone-theory of elementary education ; the doctrine, namely, that,
as preparation for higher culture, all youthful minds require a certain
preliminary process of sharpening upon certain studies, valueless or
next to valueless in themselves, at least so far as regards the vast ma-
jority of their recipients, but quite as needful, nevertheless, to them as
to all others who are hereafter to be considered as liberally educated,
for the indirect benefit their pursuit was supposed to confer. The ac-
cepted theory of liberal education has heretofore been, that it was a
certain very special kind of training which required this peculiar pre-

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 3

liminaiy sharpening process, and that, as the instruments for it, there
were certain almost divinely-appointed studies exclusively set apart, to
wit, the grammars of two dead languages, and the elementary por-
tions of abstract mathematics. It was not and could not be main-
tained that these studies would ever be the natural choice of the
youthful mind in the beginning of its scholastic career ; rather, it was
thought to be a prime recommendation that they were as remote as
possible from any thing the youthful mind would of itself appropriate
as intellectual nutriment. Like medicine, the value of such disciplinary
studies was supposed to be in direct proportion to their disgustfulness ;
for they were not food to nourish the mind withal, but tonics, where-
with artificially to strengthen it. They were rods for the spiritual part,
the counterparts of those material ones which the strong right arm of
the ancient pedagogue wielded with such efficiency on the bodies of
his youthful charge, and the benefit of both alike was not utilitarian,
but disciplinary.

That I may not be suspected of caricaturing, I will make two quo-
tations, the first from a lecture by Prof Sellar, Professor of Greek in
the University of Edinburgh : " The one extreme theory," he says,' " is
that education is purely a discipline of the understanding ; that the
form of the subject is every thing, the content little or nothing. A
severe study, such as classics or mathematics, is the thing wanted to
train or brace the faculties ; it does not matter whether it is in itself
interesting or not. The student will find sufficient interest in the
sense of power which he has to put forth in training for the great race
with his competitors. ' It is not knowledge,' they say, ' bvit the exer-
cise you are forced to incur in acquiring knowledge that we care about.
Read and learn the classics simply for the discipline they afford to the
understanding. You may, if it comes in your way and does not inter-
fere with your training, combine a literary pleasure with this mode of
study, but this is no part of your education. As teachers, we do not
care to encourage it ; we do not care to interpret for you the thought
or feeling of your author. All such teaching is weak and rhetorical :
we do not profess to examine into your capacity of receiving pleasure.
Accurate and accomplished translation, effective composition in the
style of the ancient authors, thorough grammatical and philological
knowledge — these are our requirements. The training in exactness, in
concentration, in logical habits, and in discernment of the niceties of
expression, is the one thing with which we start you in life. Whether
you have thought at all, or care to think about the questions which
occupy and move the highest minds, is no afiair of ours.'

" This theory is, I think, a purely English theory of education. It
has grown up within the last half-century, and it is in the University
of Cambridge that it has been, and still is, most fully realized."

My other extract shall be from an essay by the Public Orator of the
J " Theories of Classical Teaching : A Lecture," p. 10.

4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

University of Cambridge : " I conclude, then," says Mr. W. G. Clark,
" that the first subject of study must be the same for all, and that it is
no valid objection to any subject to affirm that it is dry and distaste-
ful, but, on the contrary, a strong recommendation. It cannot be de-
nied that this condition is amply satisfied by the Latin accidence, as
exhibited in our time-honored and much-abused text-books. . . . The
question arises where, besides the Latin grammar, -we can find any other
subject equally dry, and by consequence as powerfully tonic to the
juvenile mind, which recommends itself as deserving in lieu thereof
to form the basis of education by its general applicability and greater
fertility of after-results. Except the Greek language, which, from its
intimate connection with the Latin in structure and literature, is a
necessary complement to it, and not a possible substitute for it, I know
of none."

Here we have the very essence of what I have denominated the
grindstone-theory. I think that a truer philosophy lias exploded
these fallacies, and wellnigh obliterated that artificial line of dis-
tinction between studies for use and studies for discipline. True
education remains and must remain forever a discipline ; but juster
views in regard to the nature of the youthful mind are beginnicg to
show us that that discipline is of the nature of a nutritive rather
than a curative process, and that the disgust felt by the recipient for
the means employed is no measure of their disciplinary value. We
are discovering that the idea of discipline inheres not in the nature
of certain particular subjects, distinguishing them from all others
which are non-disciplinary and merely utilitarian, but in the right
method of teaching all subjects ; and the question, whether at any
particular period or stage of progress a subject is to be used for
purposes of mental discij)line, depends not at all upon the question
whether it belongs to one or the other of two imaginary classes, the
disciplinary and the non-disciplinary, but upon the quite difierent
questions whether the study is valuable in itself, and whether it is
suited to that particular stage of the pupil's mental progress. If so,
and if rightly taught, it will then be sure to be the right discipline.

This change in our education-philosophy has brought with it a cor-
responding change in our scale and estimate of the relative value of
various studies as the instruments and materials of education ; and, I
think, we have almost heard the last of the doctrine that abstract
grammar and abstract mathematics are the divinely-appointed whet-
stones and sharpeners of the youthful mind, and hence of the system
which makes a compulsory study of the Greek and Latin languages
the only gate of admission to the privileges of the higher education.
In place of that very simple but most nnphilosophical doctrine, I trust
that a truer psychology is providing us with a course of liberal study,
based upon correcter notions in regard to the laws of mental develop-

' " Cambridge Essays," for 1855.

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 5

ment. That we have such a completed practical psychology, or any
sucli logical and symmetrical course or courses of study based upon it,
is more than can be asserted, for education, as a science, is still in its
infancy ; but we certainly have attained to certain general principles
which are fundamental as regards the elementary education of the
future ; and the most important of these, which is even now revolu-
tionizing all our methods of elementary teaching, is the direct result
of the progress of modern physical science. It is, that education be-
gins with the concrete, and not with the abstract, and that the right
method for the teaching even of language itself is the right training
and development of the child's senses. The Latin grammar, there-
fore, as the right instrument for training the youthful mind, is fast dis-
appearing, along with that birch which was its material symbol and
needful complement, and a striking witness to the absurdity of the use
we put it to. Hequiescat in pace ! The lovers of the noble science
of classical philology may well be congratulated on its emancipation
from such degrading servitude.

In place of this rude and crude, and now happily obsolescent the-
ory, a deeper philosophy is leading us to inquire into the nature of the
undeveloped mind, and the true order of the development of its facul-
ties, and is, at the same time, guiding us to the right choice of means
for stimulating their natural and healthful growth and unfolding.
And here I will say that the answer which psychology gives to these
questions seems to me a little in danger of being misinterpreted for
the time being by one class of educational reformers. In their re-
action against the premature and unnatural stimulus given to the
powers of abstraction by the old system, they are in danger of run-
ning into the opposite extreme of paying a too exclusive attention
to the development of the observing powers in the new — a tendency
which the influence of modern physical science on our educational
ideas, especially, tends to foster. I doubt whether one extreme
will prove any better than the other, for both are equally one-sided.
The true lesson we are to learn is, above all things, to have regard to
balance and proportion. The youthful mind is not a different thing
from the same mind in its maturity. The germs of all faculties exist
in it, and their development is in no linear order, but rather like rays
diverging from one centre ; and the true conception of the different
stages of education is, as being divided by concentric circles, cutting
those rays at equal distances from the centre. The child's observing
powers should furnish him with intellectual material no faster than his
powers of abstraction can work it up into intellectual products, or than
the development of his powers of expression can give form to them.
On the other hand, his powers of expression should never be developed
in empty words, beyond the limits of his acquisition of the ideas words
stand for, as is now the case with so much of our word-mongering edu-
cation. Again, his imagination should never outrun his reason on the

6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

one hand, nor his memory overload it on the other, in accordance with
that prei^osterous doctrine we sometimes hear propounded, which ad-
vocates the employment of the youthful memory in laying up stores
of unintelligible knowledge, in anticipation of an after-time, when it
will become intelligible — as if there could be such a thing as not-
understood knowledge, in any other sense than as we speak of undi-
gested food — turning to poison in the system. The child is a philoso-
pher, a moralist, a poet in little, quite as much as he is an observer or
a rememberer, and his whole moral and intellectual growth will be
warped and stunted so long as you insist upon looking on him as a
mere observing or a mere memorizing machine, a mere receptacle for
facts or for words either.

If I am right in this view of the true character of elementary edu-
cation, it follows that the great departments, into which it should from
the very first be divided, correspond exactly with the primary divis-
ions of knowledge itself, as they will continue for the pupil forever
after. Let me, for the purposes of this discussion, make a triple divis-
ion of knowledge into physical, ethical, and sesthetical, according as
our thought is concerned with the world of matter, the world of mind,
and the world of art or beauty. I am concerned here less for strict-
ness of jDhilosophical accuracy than for the practical convenience of
this division. Now, as, in accordance with our fundamental concep-
tion of liberal education, the question as to a choice between these de-
partments of liberal learning is a futile one, because all are essential
elements in our conception of liberal education — so, if I am right, no
conception of elementary education can be a correct one that does not
provide for them all from the very beginning.

I need hardly point out what a change in all our methods this
change in our philosophy implies ; for it involves the doctrine that
the true place to begin the teaching of all art, all science, all knowl-
edge, is the primary school ; and I am not in the least afraid of the
seeming paradox. Rather I would earnestly maintain that, imless we
treat the child in the primary school as the germ and embryo of all
he is destined afterward to become, our education will be doomed to
ignominious failure. Whatever, therefore, enters into our conception
of liberal education — and we have already seen that nothing less than
all extant knowledge should enter into it — that should enter into it
from the beginning. Language and literature should be the subjects
of elementary teaching ; science should be the subject of elementary
teaching ; art should be the subject of elementary teaching. What-
ever is to enter into the higher stages of education is to have its seed
planted there, or it never will be planted. The true distinction, there-
fore, between disciplinary and non-disciplinary, is not a distinction be-
tween one set of studies begun early and another set of studies begun
late, one set of studies pursued for training, and another set of studies
mastered for use : it is a distinction between the earlier and the later

LIBERAL EDUCATION, 7

stages of all studies whatever. The cbiid, as well as the man, is linguist,
student of science, artist, philosopher, moralist, poet, though his philol-
ogy, science, art, philosophy, will be childish, not manly, germs and in-
tuitions, not results of developed reason. Is it not obvious that in this
view elementary schools become something far more 'than places for
drilling the youthful mind in the use of the mere tools of knowledge ?
Is it not obvious, moreover, that, looked at from this point of view, a
man's profession is only the outgrowth and fruitful consummation of
his whole training ; a divergence, when the time arrives that the whole
of knowledge becomes too wide a field to cultivate, into some special
fruit-bearing direction, which, whatever it may be, will lead to a truly
liberal profession, inasmuch as by a man so trained his calling cannot
but be followed in a liberal spirit ?

We have in England and America no conception of what may be
accomplished in the early stages of education, because we have been,
to so great an extent, adherents of the grindstone-theory. " No-
where," says Mr. Joseph Payne, commenting on the lamentable, almost
ludicrous, failure of that embodiment of the grindstone-theory, applied
to popular teaching through the medium, not of the Latin grammar,
but of the three R's — I mean the so-called English " Revised Code " —
" nowhere have I ever met, in the course of long practice and study
in teaching, with a more striking illustration of the great truth that,
just in proportion as you substitute mechanical routine for intelligent
and sympatlietic development of the child's powers, you shall fail in
the object you are aiming at." ' I think that the insignificant results
of our present elementary schools, as compared with the amount of
time, thought, and money, expended on them, and their want of real
vitality, are to be mainly traced to this fundamentally false concep-
tion of elementary teaching as concerned only with the acquisition of
the mere tools of knowledge.* By its fruits, or rather by its barren-

^ " Of four-fifths of the scholars about to leave school, either no account, or an unsat-
isfactory one, is given by an examination of the most strictly elementary kind " (Report
for 1869-'70). " We have never yet passed 20,000 in a population of 20,000,000 to the
sixth standard ; whereas old Prussia, without her recent aggrandizement, passed nearly
380,000 every year" (speech of Mr. Mundella, in the House of Commons, March 18,
ISYO). " What we call education in the inspected schools of England is the mere seed
used in other countries, but with us that seed, as soon as it has sprouted, withers and
dies, and never grows up into a crop for the feeding of the nations " (speech of Dr.
Lyon Playfair, in the House of Commons, June 20, 1870). See the FortnigMy Review
for August, 18*73, and Payne in Social Science Transactions for 18*72. If we should ever
need — which God forbid ! — a warning against the folly of substituting a sectarian for a
national system of popular education, we may find it in the wretched perversion of Eng-
lish popular education in the hands of her Established Church.

' " What wonder if very recently an appeal has been made to statistics for the pro-
foundly foolish purpose of showing that education is of no good — that it diminishes
neither misery nor crime among the masses of mankind ? I reply. Why should the thing
which has been called education do either the one or the other ? If I am a knave or a
fool, teaching me to read and write won't make me less of either one or the other —

8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ness, -^e may know it ; and I may add that it is because in our com-
mon schools we are completely outgrowing it, that day by day we see
in them so much new life.

So much in regard to the debt which a liberal education is des-
tined soon to owe to the progress of psychology, giving prevalence to
truer views in regard to its rudimentary processes. Let me pass to
the second influence, vrhich is acting powerfully to modify all our
previous conceptions of the subject ; I mean the progress of modern
linguistic science. I take this next in order because, contrary to the
current of thought prevailing at the present moment, I believe the
old doctrine will still be found to hold true, even after physical science
shall have at last found its true place in the new education, that the
study of that wonderful world of matter, which is the stage on which
man plays his earthly j^art, wonderful as it is, is yet inferior in dignity
and importance to the study of the being and doing of the actor who
plays his part thereon. Scientific studies, though for the time being
in the ascendant, yet, even when all their rights shall be accorded to
them, will, in a well-balanced system, take their place a little below
ethical studies. This, I say, as not believing in the current material-
istic philosophy in any of its forms, but as being an immaterialist, as
I must phrase it, since we have been robbed by unworthy and de-
grading associations of the word spiritualist. But, without raising
any question of precedence between branches of study which are both
essential to any true conception of a complete education, let me pro-
ceed to point out that the progress of linguistic science and of modern
literature has totally ti-ansformed the educational character and posi-
tion of the ethical studies of which they are the instrument and the
embodiment. When the Revival of Learning gave birth to the present
classical system of literary, or, as I have termed it, ethical liberal study,
it did so by putting into the hands of scholars not merely two gram-
mars as instruments of youthful mental discipline, as the advocates of
the grindstone-system would fain have us believe, but two languages

unless somebody shows me how to put my reading and writing to wise and good
purposes.

" Suppose any one were to argue that medicine is of no use, because it could be proved
statistically that the percentage of deaths was just the same among people who had been
taught how to open a medicine-chest, and among those who did not so much as know
the key by sight. The argument is absurd ; but it is not more preposterous than that
against which I am contending. The only medicine for suffering, crime, and all the
other woes of mankind, is wisdom. Teach a man to read and write, and you have put
into his hands the great keys of the wisdom-box. But it is quite another matter whether
he ever opens the box or not. And he is as hkely to poison as to cure hunself, if, with-
out guidance, he swallows the first drug that comes to hand. In these times a man may
as well be purblind as unable to read — lame, as unable to write. But I protest, that if
I thought the alternative were a necessary one, I would rather that the children of the
poor should grow up ignorant of both these mighty arts than that they should remain
ignorant of that knowledge to which these arts are means." — (Huxlev, " Lav Sermons"
p. 43.)

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 9

that unlocked the stores of a whole new world of ethical thought, in
the shape of the philosophy, the history, and the poetry contained in
Greek and Roman literature. How assiduously those literatures were
studied, how they leavened the whole thought of Europe, and mightily
contributed to disperse the intellectual darkness and hreak the bonds
of the spiritual despotism of the mediaeval Church, we all know. Clas-
sical j)hilosophy, history, poety, and art, nourished the European mind,
and were almost the sole foundation of its culture, through all the
period during which the Latin and Teutonic races of Western Europe
were slowly elaborating languages and literatures of their own. They
were thus of necessity the main instrument of culture of the schools
during the period when, save the obsolete scholastic philosophy, no
other instrument was forthcoming ; and I do not think it possible to
overrate the debt which Western Europe owes to them. But grad-
ually their educating influence has been absorbed, and in great meas-
ure exhausted, while partially, but by no means wholly, out of the
nutriment they furnished have sprung the national languages and
literatures which, as more and not less powerful educating instru-
mentalities, are to supersede them. It is to ignore the vast j^rogress
of the human mind since the days of Erasmus to try any longer to
make classical learning stand in the same relation to the modern stu-
dent that it stood in to Erasmus : and Erasmus, if he were alive to-
day, would be the first to abandon the dead pedantries of the past for
the fountains of new thought he would see flowing all round him.

When I say, then, that I think the languages and literatures of
Greece and Rome are soon to be abandoned, as the sole or main in-
struments of that side of liberal culture which I have preferred to call
ethical rather than literary, it is not that I do not fully recognize their
value and beauty, or the vast service they have done in emancipating
and training the mind of Western Europe : it is not that I do not
recognize their value as among the specialties of liberal culture now.
It is only as the sole or chief instruments of literary school training
that I believe them to be superseded. So far from believing that they
will be abandoned, I believe they will be more diligently and success-
fully studied in the future, when they will be left as a specialty in the
hands of that small number of students who, at any time, in this mod-
ern world of ours, will of their own free choice ^ pursue them. As a

1 The adTOcates of the classical theory sometimes point triumphantly to the number of
students Tvho, in colleges where the elective system prevails, freely, as they say, elect the
classics ; but it should be remembered that at present their w hole previous school training
has been by compulsion classical. Of science they are absolutely ignorant ; and it is not
strange that they should prefer to go on in studies whose elementary diflSculties they have
partially overcome, rather than engage in a belated encounter with new difficulties, of a sort
for which their minds have been by their very previous training unfitted. The present
system at some of our colleges of giving an election between science and literature, after
admission, and no similar election in regard to preparatory studies, seems to me to be the
very redudio ad absurdum of the grindstone-theory.

10 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

specialty for the fe^, classical studies still have a future before tliem,
and Tve can ill afford to lose the elevating and refining influence exer-
cised by their real votaries on those who do not directly pursue them ;
but as the main instruments of liberal culture their day seems to me to
be nearly over.

In England, the very stronghold of the classical theory, classical
study seems to be declining, in spite of, or rather through, the very
means taken for keeping it alive. " I fear," says the late Earl of Der
by, in the preface to his translation of the Iliad, " that the taste for and
appreciation of classical literature are greatly on the decline." " The
study of classical literature is probably on the decline," says Matthew
Arnold, in his essay on translating Homer. " I cannot help thinking,"
says Mr. Sidgwick, of Cambridge, "that classical literature, in sjjite
of its enormous prestige, has very little attraction for the mass even
of cultivated persons at the present day. I wish statistics could be
obtained of the amount of Latin and Greek read in any year, except
for jDrofessional purposes, even by those who have gone through a
complete classical curriculum. From the information that I have been
able privately to obtain, I incline to think that such statistics, when
compared with the fervent admiration with which we all speak of the
classics, upon every opportunity, would be found rather startling.'
And the truth is that the classical system of liberal education in Eng-
land maintains its place, so far as it does maintain it, solely from the
fact of its being a strictly protected system, through the enormous pe-
cuniary prizes to which it is the sole means of access." "

Our own attempts to establish a liberal education seem to me to
have thiis far proved little less than abortive, because, following as
we have in the steps of the mother-country, we cannot bring our-
selves to abandon the old shadow for the new substance. For
classical study has really dwindled into a shadow. Once it did
mean the study of philosophy, of ethics, politics, history, poetry;
now, for ninety-nine in a hundred of its students, it means none of
these, but the mere dry study of grammar. The scholars of the Ee-
naissance read their Plato in the original, and compassed sea and
land to find a teacher who could unlock for them his treasure-house,
but it was the treasure-house of his thought^ not his grammar. The

' "Essays on a Liberal Education, ed. Farrar," p. 106.

2 " The prizes proposed," says Dr. Donaldson (" Classical Scholarship and Classical
Learning," p. 15-4), " are of enormous value. It is estimated that the first place in either
Tripos (classics or mathematics) is worth, in present value and contingent advantages,
about £10,000. ... In classics, the majority of successful candidates for high honors
have been imder tuition in Greek and Latin for at least ten years."

The number of college fellowships at Oxford is somewhat over 300, and their average
value £300 per annum. There are 400 scholarships, of an average value of £S0, tenable
for five years. The incomes of nineteen heads of houses are estimated at £23,000 a year.
— (Heywood, in Social Science Transactions for 1871.) The sole access to all these pecu-
niary prizes has heretofore been through classical study.

LIBERAL EDUCATION. u

scholars of the Revival, -without Shakespeare or Milton, had to master
Homer and JEschylus, or go without poetry altogether. With no
■wealth of modern literature, such as lies all round us, they were per-
force classical students in order to be scholars. We cannot put back
the wheels of time, and reproduce their circumstances. The mind of
the generation refuses to be bound within antiquated limits : it will
seek the new world of thought which lies before it. Try, therefore,
to make classical scholars now of all liberally-educated boys, and
you make nine-tenths of them into dunces or pedants. How many
of the regiments of young men of this generation who have gone
through^ as it is well called, our older colleges, are real classical
scholars ? But the liberally-educated men of the times of the revival
of learning were real classical scholars.

The Rev. Mark Pattison, Rector of Lincoln College, gives the
following account of the present state of classical study even at Ox-
ford : " We must not close our eyes to the fact that the honor-stu-
dents " (that is to say, the students who have any expectation of win-
ning the pecuniary prizes) " are the only students who are undergoing
any educational process which it can be considered as the function
of a university either to impart or to exact ; the only students who
are at all within the scope of the scientific apparatus and arrangements
of an academical body. This class of students cannot be estimated
at more than thirty per cent, of the whole number frequenting the
university. The remaining seventy per cent, not only furnish from
among them all the idleness and extravagance which are become a
byword throughout the country, but cannot be considered to be even
nominally pursuing any course of university studies at all." *

If the treasurer of a great manufacturing corporation were to re-
port to his stockholders that, of all the raw material furnished, their
machinery was capable of making only thirty per cent, into cloth, and
that of a very peculiar and unsalable pattern ; that the remaining sev-
enty per cent, was not only not manufactured into any kind of cloth,
but was much of it disseminated over the country, in the shape of
deadly, poisonous rags, we should think there was something wrong
in the machinery of that mill.

Thus it is that, classical education having dwindled into a shadow,'^

^ " Suggestions on Academical Organization," p. 230.

- " I think it incontestably true," says Prof. Sidgmck, " that for the last fifty years
our classical studies (with much to demand our undivided praise) have been too critical
and formal ; and that we have sometimes been taught, while straining after an accu-
racy beyond our reach, to value the husk more than the fruit of ancient learning.
.... This, at least, is true, that he who forgets that language is but the sign and vehi-
cle of thought, and while studying the word knows little of the sentiment— who learns
the measure, the garb and fashion of ancient song without looking to its living soul or
feeling its inspiration, is not one jot better than a traveler in a classic land who sees its
crumbling temples, and numbers, with arithmetical precision, their steps and pillars, but
thinks not of their beauty, their design, or the living sculptures on their walls, or who

12 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

our colleges are looking about for a remedy, and a class of thinkers,
just no^, as we know, very influential, and looking to tke substitution
of the study of science as the sole remedy. Gentlemen, I have been
long enough attached to a school of science to have been convinced, if
I had ever doubted it, that science by itself is no remedy ; that as there
can never again be a liberal education, or the pretense of one, without
the scientific element, so, on the other hand, scientific studies alone can
never constitute a liberal education — scientific can never supersede
ethical studies as its foundation. What, then, is the true remedy ? I
think it is evident. It is, along with scientific study, of whose true
place I shall have more to say presently, to accept ethical studies in
their new form, in the form of modern literatures and modern languages,
and with classical studies as the special and subordinate, and not, as
heretofore, the main and primary instrument. This is the great change
which liberal education is silently undergoing, far more than it is a
change from a literary to a scientific basis.

I know of no educational fallacy more common and more mischiev-
ous than that of enormously overrating the educating value of the
process of acquiring the mere form of foreign languages, whether dead
or living ; yet it is in this barren study that we waste the precious time
that should be employed, from the very beginning of school-life, in
acquii-ing the substance of real knowledge. Languages, other than our
own, are the useful, sometimes the necessary tools for acquiring knowl-
edge ; in the literatures of other tongues there reside elements of cult-
ure not to be foimd, or not to be found in the same perfection in our
own, which may well repay the student who has time and perseverance
sufficient really to attain them without too great a sacrifice. But to
sacrifice an attainable education in not attaining them, what is it but
to sow the barren sea-shore, to travel half a journey, to possess one's self
of haK an instrument useless without the other half. Languages alone
are knowledge only to the professed philologist ; we sacrifice a real
education attainable through an instrument we already possess in the
fruitless labor of giving our boys other instruments they will never
make use of.

counts the stones in the Appian Waj, instead of gazing on the monuments of the ' Eternal
City.'" — ("Discourse on the Studies of the University of Cambridge," fifth edition, p. 37.)
I find a corroboration of this view of the present state of classical study on this side
of the water coming from a quarter where there can be no suspicion of too great leaning
toward modern studies. Prof. Tayler Lewis is reported to have expressed himself in a
recent pamphlet as follows : " He thinks it undeniable that there is danger that classi-
cal studies may be driven from our colleges ; and, in looking for a reason for this, he
seems to himself to have discovered it in the fact that we nowadays busy the undergrad-
uate too much with grammar and too Uttle with literature. ... He illustrates his posi-
tion by a comparison of the school of critical students even so great as Porson and
Elmsley with the earlier schools. . . . The one school, admirable as it is, and deep as
is our obligation to them, he regards as reading Homer for the sake of knowing Greek ;
the other as knowing Greek for the sake of reading Homer," — (New-York Kaiion, August
V, 1873.)

LIBERAL EDUCATION.

13

I think that we monstrously overrate the educating value of the
mere process of learning other languages ; but with the mother-tongue
the case is altogether different. Here the mastery of form and substance
can i>roceed ^:)ari passu. The mother-tongue is the only one which
can stand to our modern liberal education in the relation in which the
classical tongues stood to the scholars of the revival of learning. It
might be said that Greek and Latin were mother-tongues to them as
scholars, because it was through them alone that they reached the
thoughts which really educated them. They were not brought up on
empty words and barren syntax ; they studied no grammars, for gram-
mars were non-existent. Their minds were really nourished on the
philosophy of Plato, and Cicero's eloquence, and Homer's poetry, and
the lessons not the words they found in Tacitus and Thucydides. ISTow,
when we have a philosophy, a history, a poetry, a law, an ethics, which
embody all that is valuable in classical literature, together with all the
progress of thought has produced through these later centuries, we not
only fail to use them as those older scholars used their older instru-
ments, really and efficiently, but we equally fail in using the older
ones. We abandon both to feed our boys on a husk without a kernel.
What wonder that our higher education is struck with barrenness ?

When, therefore, I propose modern language-study instead of an-
cient, as a chief instrument of school education, I mean much more than
the mere substitution of the study of some modern language as lan-
guage, for some ancient language as language — German, for instance,
instead of Greek, as has sometimes been suggested. This would be
the mere semblance of a remedy, for the difficulty consists in the enor-
mous overrating, by what I have called the grindstone-theory, of the
educating value of the study of the mere structure and vocabulary of
any strange language whatever. It has sometimes been doubted if
we can ever really know more than one tongue, and certainly all our
deeper mental processes go on in that one we know best. If that is a
foreign one, it is because we have lost a mother to gain a step-mother;
and a stepmother she will ever remain. What is very certain is, that
too many of the recipients of our present education, in seeking to pos-
sess themselves of more than one language, end with having none
whatever. Neglecting to develop their minds through the instrumen-
tality of their mother-tongue, and never, therefore, really knowing it,
they equally fail in providing themselves with any substitute ; with
Shakspeare's pedants, " they have been at a great feast of languages,
and stolen the scraps."

My position, therefore, is that, so far as language-study shall form
a part of the elementary discipline of the liberal education of the
future, the centre and pivot of it all will hereafter be the scientific
study of the mother-tongue. I anticipate something almost like ridi-
cule for this proposition on the part of those — and they are many — who
midervalue our native language so far as to believe it to be incapable

14 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of becoming an instrument of disciplinary education. Time would fail
me to go into a defense of this proposition. I will only say that I be-
lieve that it is precisely the change which the progress of modern
philology is bringing about ; that it is fitting modern languages, and
preeminently our own, to become the instrument of a true mental dis-
cipline, so far as language-study can serve as such an instrument. On
the one hand it is giving a scientific form to the study of the Teutonic
element, and on the other there remains the still needful study of the
Latin language — a study which certainly need not lose in force and
vitality because it may no longer be pursued as the basis of a super-
structure never to be erected, but shall have a definite object and be
pursued for a practical end.

But far above and beyond its uses as language-study comes the
advantage of the direct and immediate entrance it gives to those re-
gions of thought in which the higher mental discipline really lies.
Through the direct road of the real study of the mother-tongue, and
that rhetorical and, above all, that real logical study which accompa-
nies and forms a part of it, can the study of what we vaguely denomi-
nate literature, and that which we are beginning still more vaguely to
denominate social science, but which yet, between them, contain the
substance of all we most need to know of man as distinct from Nature,
be made real portions of general knowledge — be transferred from being
a possession in the hands of the few, to be reached only by an abstruse
and difficult preparatory training, secrets unlocked by a key out of
reach of the hands of the many, to being a part of the general inheri-
tance of all men. For, to be so, they must be made primary and not
secondary ; in other words, that time and strength must be devoted
to a fruitful study of modern thought and modern literature, which
have heretofore been wasted in school and college on the futile attempt
to master ancient thought and ancient literature. The rudiments of
all those studies must be reckoned as the most valuable of all the
elements of general elementary training, which, in their higlier dej^art-
ments, and after liberal culture, diverging in various directions, form
the substance of professional knowledge, both that of those professions
now reckoned, and of all those hereafter to be reckoned liberal. For,
what should liberal education be but the preparatory general stage for
that work of life which all honest callings and professions carry on in
diverse directions afterward ? What is a professional education but
a liberal education taking a special direction ?

Can it now be said, with any truth, that our nominally-educated
young men go out into the world equipped with that general knowl-
edge of the sciences of law and government, and political economy,
with that knowledge of ethics and philosoj)hy, witli that acquaint-
ance with modern history and of the condition of the world they
live in, and with that real taste for modern literature, which should
form the equipments of every man calling himself educated? We

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 15

shall have to give a negative answer, just so long as we do not look
upon all these as the truly disciplinary studies, and the elements of
all these as the true elementary studies, the very school-studies fitted,
above all others, for maturing the youthful mind, and filling it with
true wisdom. So long as we insist upon approaching them through
the operose and roundabout method of dead-language studies, school-
days will flee away, and the object will not be accomplished. The
great vice of our education, as has been well said, is its indirectness.

Combining the ideas which I have thus presented — 1. That the
study of foreign languages as languages, whether dead or living, holds
a place in our present education-philosophy quite out of proportion to
its real value and importance, and that it is the discipline of philoso-
phy which we are indirectly aiming at, behind and through the disci-
l^line of language ; 2. That it is through one tongue and not many
that that discipline can best be imparted, inasmuch as that is the only
one that can or will ever, by the majority of men, be really mastered ;
and, 3. That now, for the first time, there is the possibility, through
the progress of modern linguistic science, of a scientific and systematic
study of the mother-tongue — I arrive at the conclusion that we are
presently to have, as a substitute for the exclusive or almost exclusive
use of classical languages and literatures, as the main disciplinary ele-
ment in liberal education, a systematic study of the English language
and a recognition of its literature as primary, not secondary. And
surely it is a strange phenomenon, if it be true, as a foreign scholar
has recently maintained,* that the sovereignty of the world is hereafter
to belong to the English language ; and if it be true, as I think may
well be maintained, that with this conquering language we possess the
world's foremost literature, it is a strange phenomenon that we think
them so little worthy of systematic study, give them a place so sub-
ordinate as instruments of our own liberal culture, that to-day we must
go to the Germans for a good English grammar ; to the French for
the best, if a very defective, history of our literatui-e. To my mind,
no more striking illustration could be given of our want of a true edu-
cation-philosophy.

How has it happened that we still lack such a philosophy ? The
answer to that question brings me to my next point, and the third new
ingredient in the liberal education of the future, the element contributed
by republicanism. I have said that the science of education was still
in its infancy ; I believe that it is only as a part of republican institu-
tions that it can reach maturity. For the only true liberal education
is the education of man as man ; the only truly liberal system is that
which can be applied to a whole nation, and such a system is only
possible as a part of republican institutions. And, when we consider
how short a time we have been living under them, and how crude and
imperfect they still are, it is not strange that they have not yet pro-
' De Candolle.

i6 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTELY.

duced what will be rather one of their maturest than one of their ear-
liest fruits, a truly liberal education-system.

The history of our errors in regard to liberal education is a very
plain one. They are the legacy of the mother-country from which we
came, a mother-country which is just beginning to correct her own errors,
even by the light of our limited experience. I wish to point out and
emphasize the fact that republicanism revolutionizes our very concep-
tion of liberal education. All forms of liberal education of the past,
and preeminently the one we borrowed from England, were forms of
exclusive class-education. The idea of caste was involved in their very
conception, to such a degree that the phrase, the liberal education of
the people, was a contradiction in terms. The antithesis was, popular
versus liberal education. There was the illiberal or servile education
of the masses, designed to fit them for the humble station in which it
had pleased Providence to j^lace them, and to content them therewith ;
there was the liberal education of the exclusive learned professions,
and the exclusive aristocratic class, which was liberal by virtue of its
being the education of the rulers and not the ruled.* Now, republican-
ism, by converting the people into rulers, transfers to them the claim
to a liberal education, which shall be universal A transfer of the
power alone, without a transfer of the jirivilege and the opportunity
necessary to prepare for the exercise of it, cannot but be disastrous.
If republicanism is to remain republicanism, and not degenerate into oli-
garchy or plutocracy, or end in anarchy, there must be one homoge-
neous education-system for all, and that one the highest attainable.
The line of demarcation between liberal and illiberal must be obliter-
ated, and what cannot be called liberal will be seen to be no education
at all, but only a miserable counterfeit, by which privileged classes
strive to perpetuate obsolete distinctions and indefensible abuses. For
a republic, there can be but one system, and one set of schools ; its
education, begun on the lowest benches of its national primary
schools, will one day be completed in the halls of its national uni-
versities. There will be no question as to the relative dignity of pro-
tected and unprotected professions, or callings, or classes, but all will

2 " Eeligious teaching, from Episcopal charges down to the lessons of the Sunday-
school, was, for a long time, as most of us can remember, in the habit of assuming that
true rehgion was identified with government by the upper classes. . . . We may safely
say that neither from Cathohc nor from Protestant theology could we extract any formal
witness in favor of the acquisition of political power by the humbler and more numerous
classes. But the lower classes have not been content to stay in their places. Whatever
the Church has taught, democracy has advanced irresistibly. Privilege after privilege has
been wrenched out of the grasp of the favored classes, power has gradually descended,
by the steps of the social stairs, until it has joined hands with the last class at the bottom.
At the present time, it is a confessed fact, whether we like it or not, that the working-
class, if it had peculiar interests, and were unanimously resolved to promote them, might
dictate the policy of the empire." — (Rev. J. Llwellyn Davies, " Theolosry and Morality," pp.
10, 12.)

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 17

be reckoned liberal which train and educate the faculties of man as
man.*

Now, the only conception of a liberal education that will satisfy
these new conditions, the only conception of an education capable of
becoming national and universal, at the same time that it is liberal,
is that of a training of the national mind through the mother-tongue
as the chief, and other tongues as the subordinate instruments, in
the elements of all those branches of knowledge which, used in their
rudiments as elements of general training, will develop, in their higher
stages, into the objects of professional pursuits. Is there any other
distinction than this between general and professional ? In the in-
fancy of knowledge, all callings, trades, and professions, are mysteries,
whose secrets are carefully guarded from the uninitiated. Every me-
chanic belongs to his trade-guild, and has his trade-secrets. When
Philip of Burgundy destroyed the little town of Dinant, in the
Low Countries, the art of making copper vessels became, for the
time being, a lost art. With the progress of general intelligence
mystery falls away from simpler occupations, but still attaches to

^ Nothing seems to me more thoroughly unrepublican and illiberal than the ground
taken, by some who profess to be preeminently the advocates of liberal learning, against
the promotion of higher education by grants from the state. Let the state promote the
advancement of elementary education, they say, but for higher institutions to handle gov-
ernment moneys is only to touch pitch, and therewith be defiled. The distinction repre-
sents a remnant of aristocratic feeling, and springs from the idea that it is the duty of
the educated, as a higher class, to take a paternal care for the masses ; not the duty of
the people, as a self-governing community, to give itself a liberal education. One cannot
well see a higher function to be performed by the people, acting as a body, than to pro-
mote, by pubhc action, its own higher education. If a line is to be drawn, beyond which
its action should not reach, where shall it be drawn ? Shall the people be allowed to pro-
mote the teaching of the three R's, and the four rules of arithmetic, but be forbidden to
meddle with any thing beyond them ? And in whose hands is the higher education to
remain, in a country which has no estabUshed church ? Is its progress forever to remain
at the fitful mercy of an unenlightened and unsystematic private charity ? The question
as to the right means and methods of governmental action is undoubtedly a grave one,
but no educational waste of state or national resources is ever likely to equal the waste
arising from the capricious absurdity of private endowments. We have, indeed, of late,
been startled by revelations of government corruption, but they have but a poor notion
of the capacities of republicanism who are scared by them into that meanest of all politi-
cal theories, the doctrine that the sole function of a government is merely to enact the
part of head constable.

A far juster view is that propounded by one of the best of England's teachers. " As
the condition of social, and, to some extent, political independence," says the Rev. Mark
Pattison, " is necessary to prevent material interests from stifling and absorbing studies,
so the condition of sympathy with the general mind is necessary both to sustain the
required activity and to make the university a proper seminary for the education of the
national youth. The nation does not hire a number of learned men to teach its children :
it itself educates them, through an organ into which its own best intellect, its scientific
genius, is regularly drafted. This education is, in short, nothing but the free action of
life and society, localized, economized, and brought to bear." — (" Oxford Essays for 1855,"
p. 259.)

VOL. IT. — 2

i8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

what are called the learned professions. The layman has nothing to
do with the study of the science of theology : that must be expounded
to him by his priest. The layman has nothing to do with the science
of medicine : he must be cured, or, more probably, killed, secundum
artem, by his physician. The layman has nothmg to do with the
science of the law : it is his business to get into lawsuits, and it is
the lawyer's secret how to extricate him. But these superstitions,
the relics of an age of popular ignorance, arc in their turn disappear-
ing, as just ideas of what constitutes real knowledge begin to penetrate
the minds of the w^hole people. It is seen that, so far from being mys-
terious, such knowledge is the very substance and material of sound
education for all men ; and the layman will no longer allow himself
to be led blindfold by priest, or lawyer, or physician, for there is no
longer any magical sacredness in their callings. And thus it comes
about that a knowledge of physiology, which will help save the pa-
tient from any need of a physician ; a knowledge of law, that shall
obviate the necessity for lawsuits ; a knowledge of political science
and history worthy of men who have become their own rulers; a
knowledge of political economy, that shall raise the honorable calling
of the merchant to the dignity of a liberal profession ; a knowledge of
theology that shall save us the degrading spectacle of the unchristian
quarrels of bigoted and superstitious sects — are reckoned more and
more to be essential elements in all education. It is only on sound
general knowledge, disseminated through the whole people by a lib-
eral education of the whole people, that we shall ever build up pro-
fessions, in regard to which we are not forced to entertain a doubt as
to whether they are not on the whole more of a curse to us than a
blessing.' And an education of this soi't must be begun in the primary
school, must have for its instrument the mother-tongue. It cannot be
based on the study of Greek particles, or any amount of skill, either in
the reading or the manufacture of Latin verses.

It is sometimes said that we, who have received this liberal educa-
tion we decry, are ungrateful in thus decrying it, and unconscious of,
and insensible to, all the benefits we derive from it. I am conscious of
no ingratitude in agreeing with an eminent Scotchman who discusses
these subjects, when he says, in speaking of knowledge and studies such
as I have been enumerating : " I am sure no one seriously applies him-
self to such studies without wishing that he had given to them many
hours in his youth which he fooled away, in obedience to his ' pastors

* " We need diifused knowledge in the commxmity to sustain soundness of public
opinion, and prevent the perversion of separate sciences into black arts and professional
secrets." — {Prof. Newman, on the Relations of Free Knowledge to Modern Sentiments.)

The affirmation of Prof. Seeley is destined, I fear, to find an illustration in the expe-
rience of this country, "that a people will never have a supply of competent politicians
until political science ... is made a prominent part of the higher education." — Inaugu-
ral Address on the Teaching of Politics.

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 19

and masters,' in learning what he has now forgotten, and to recall
which he would not now take the trouble to raise his little finger." '
I was the docile and diligent receiver of such training as, in my youth,
a "classical school" and our oldest New-England college had to give,
and surely it is from no vanity that I say that I was also a recipient
of their honors ; and it is from the melancholy feeling that my formal
education was so barren and empty when looked at from the stand-
point of real life, and real thought, and real mental training, that I am
so earnest an advocate of changes that I believe will give to future
generations the reality instead of the pretense of an education.

I come now to the study of Physical Science, as from this time for-
ward destined to play a wholly new part in our system of liberal edu-
cation. Nowhere, save in that astonishing document, the Syllabus of
his holiness Pope Pius IX., can any education-philosophy be found
so benighted as not to recognize its value and importance. Yet I am
far from believing that its true place, as a factor in the new education,
has yet been determined. While, on the one hand, among the old
high-and-dry advocates of the grindstone-system, certain merits and a
subordinate place are beginning to be grudgingly allowed it, we are
in danger, on the other hand, in this new country of ours, whose vast
material resources are waiting for development through its instrumen-
tality, rather of overrating than underrating its purely educational
function. It is not as an economical instrument for the development
of material wealth that I have here to deal with it, though that is a
very important aspect, but considered as a factor in a system of edu-
cation, and, as such, I claim for it no monopoly, but only a place as
the indispensable complement to those ethical and linguistic studies
which have heretofore monopolized the title of a liberal education,
and which, from the absence of science from that form of education,
have been reduced to their present effete and impotent condition. It
is to the incorporation into it of the study of science that we are to
look as the source of new life-blood.

You will not expect me to attempt to deal here with the great sub-
ject which forever occupies the minds of speculative thinkers, and
never more than at the present moment — the true relations of the world
of matter and the world of mind. That is too large a subject to be
dealt with, though upon right views regarding it will greatly depend
the correctness even of our educational theories. I will only say, that
though I am as far as possible from being an adherent of any form of
materialism, yet I believe that physical science is destined to be the
great instrument of these modern days to give new forms to our phi-
losophy and our theology — to give new forms to the same everlasting
problems, but not to give us new philosophy or new theology. It
will but cast old truths in new moulds, while it explodes old super-

> Mountstuart, E. Grant Duff, Inaugural Address as Rector of the University of Aber-
deen, p, 22.

20 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

stitions by adding new truths to the old ones. Our conservatives may-
spare their anxieties. Not a trutli the world gains is ever lost again ;
but they who, blindly believing they have all truth, oppose the new
form which science is giving to all knowledge, will soon find them-
selves side by side with tliose old Duusemen who could not believe in
the last revival of learning.^

Now, if the study of physical science is to play a vastly more im-
portant part than it has hitherto done in all future schemes of liberal
education, the first and most obvious consideration is that room must
be found for it. Bearing in mind, as we must constantly do, that the
word education stands for a strictly limited quantity, a limited amount
of time, a definite amount of mental efibrt, if that time and mental
efibrt have been wholly absorbed in one set of studies, it is very ob-
vious that these must undergo modification and curtailment in order
to make room for another set. And yet no error is at present more
common or more disastrous than the attempt to introduce the new,
without any disturbance of the older studies. Either the older curricu-
lum did not absorb, as it professed to do, the whole of the student's
mental energies, and was not therefore a com2:)lete education, or its
requisitions must be diminished to make room for another set of solid,
important, and disciplinary studies ; or else it must be maintained
that the new studies are not solid, important, and disciplinary, but
only fitted to be the amusement of idle hours, and the lighter tasks
with which gaps and intervals may be filled between the more solid,
older ones. That this latter is really the view of the more thorough-
going adherents of the classical system is pretty obvious. Thus the
Rev. S. Hawtrey, one of the masters of Eton, says, in a recently-
printed lecture : " It is for the masses that I fear, when I hear the cry
that boys should be freed from the severer labor of studying language
if it is distasteful, and therefore it is said unprofitable, and should
learn, instead, something about the wonders which science has achieved
m the present century." " It is very obvious that a writer who speaks

' " There is no reason for thinking that philosophy, which is only a just and perfect
judgment on the bearings and relations of knowledge, should not be as generally attain-
able as a wise judgment in practical matters is. And should our universities, ceasing to
be schools of grammar and mathematics, resume their proper functions, it will be found
that a far larger proportion of minds than we now suspect are capable of arriving at this
stage of progress. For, be it again repeated, it it not a knowledge, but a discipline that
is required ; not science, but the scientific habit ; not erudition, but scholarship. And
those who have not leisure to amass stores of knowledge to master in detail the facts of
science, may yet acquire the power of scientific insight, if opportunity is afforded them.
It is the want of this discernment and the absence of the proper cultivation of it which
produce that deluge of crude speculation and vague mysticism which pervades the
philosophical and religious literature of the day, and which is sometimes wrongly as-
cribed to the importation of philosophy itself and its recent unreasonable intrusion on
our practical good sense. The business of the highest education is not to check, but to
regulate this movement ; not to prohibit speculation, but to supply the discipline which
alone can safely wield it." — (Pattison, in "Oxford Essays for 1855," p. 258.)

" "A Narrative-Essay on a Liberal Education," p. 29.

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 21

of the severer study of language has very little comprehension of the
true nature of the study of science, or else, like the public orator of
Cambridge, in his " tonic " theory, confounds together the ideas of
severity and distastefulness. And Mr, Hawtrey's very childish con-
ceptions in regard to the teaching of science are further exemplified
when he goes on to ask : " Would there not be great danger of boys
becoming less vigorous-minded than they are ? . . . Will their becom-
ing acquainted with a string of scientific results stand them instead
of the mental training they now get ? "

Thus we see that the highest conception a master of Eton has of
the study of science is that it is " becoming acquainted with a string
of scientific results." I need not pause before this audience to refute
such a notion. If the study of modern science did not call for the ex-
ercise of all the highest faculties of man ; if it did not give an exercise
such as no other study gives to his reasoning as well as his observing
powers ; if without it the very study of language itself did not become
empty and barren ; if a knowledge of it were not necessary to the
solution of all the profoundest philosophical problems with which the
mind of man in these generations is occupied — then, indeed, a question
might be raised as to the propriety of its introduction into the curricu-
lum of liberal study. But if it is this, and more than all this, then
it claims more than a subordinate place ; it is no toy for idle hours,
no subject to fill up gaps and intervals of time. It claims a right to
no less than a full half of all available time and power ; of time for
training the student's senses — all left by our older training in worse
than Egyptian darkness — of power to be employed in training the
reasoning faculties, by processes as rigorous as any the older studies
can boast of. Nothing less than this will satisfy the demands of sci-
ence as an element in modern liberal education.

I have already indicated what seems to me to be the only way by
which room can be found for the real introduction of science into our
scheme of studies. By removing Greek wholly from the list of gen-
eral studies to that list of specialties which make up our completed
conception of the higher education, after it diverges in different direc-
tions ; by relegating Latin to a subordinate instead of a primary place
in language-training, we shall find room to place science on an equal
footing with literature as an instrument of general liberal culture ;
and I see no other way. And this scheme will have this further ad-
vantage, that, for all who carry their education beyond its rudimen-
tary stages, it will afford ample time and opportunity for the real mas-
tery of at least two of the leading modern languages besides our own :
for French, the modern daughter of the Latin — for German, a kindred
Teutonic dialect closely related to our own. I am aware that such a
scheme for the teaching of modern languages, including our own, so
systematically and scientifically, as that the mental discipline de-
rived from it shall not be inferior to that derived from the teaching

22 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the classics, implies an adaptation of the results of modern philology
to the purposes of elementary instruction such as has hardly yet been
realized ; implies a body of teachers of modern linguistic science such
as hardly yet exist — teachers whose instruction shall not be inferior in
philosophic breadth and thoroughness to the very best of classical
teaching. If we have few such books or teachers yet, there are indi-
cations on every hand that we very soon shall have them in the great-
est abundance, and that modern language-teaching and English lan-
guage-teaching are very soon to be relieved of the reproach of empiri-
cism which has heretofore prevented them from taking the leading
place which, as educating instrumentalities, rightfully belongs to them.
And, finally, time will also be gained by utilizing the at present
barren and empty study of mathematics. If there is any thing more
preposterous than the abuse of grammar, in our present grindstone-
system, it is the abuse of mathematical study. Rightly viewed, the
mathematics are the key to scientific, as language is the key to ethical
study. At present, both are used as mental tread-mills, unprofitable
mental gymnastics, keys to unlock empty chambers never destined to
be filled ; for their sole value is thought to lie in the mental exercise
they give. Robbed thus of all living connection with other knowledge,
they become the most disgustful, and therefore the most valueless, of
mental exercise. Put into vital connection from the very outset with
those great sciences, of whose laws they are only the symbolic lan-
guage, the mathematics spring into life. By themselves, they are to
most minds a series of barren puzzles, hardly rising in dignity or edu-
cational value above the game of chess, and so remote from all those
paths in which the human mind naturally travels, that it is only one
peculiarly-constituted mind in ten thousand that, in their abstract
form, can pursue them with either pleasure or profit,^ Looked at as
the language of the laws which govern the world of matter, and used
as the instruments to unlock so many of its secrets, they lose their dis-
gustfulness, and become a necessary, if a narrow and partial instru-

' Since writing the above, I have met with an unexpected corroboration of this view
in the writings of an eminent mathematician. " I am not likelv," says Mr. Todhunter,
the distinguished mathematical teacher of English Cambridge, " to underrate the special
ability which is thus cherished (by competitive examinations), but I cannot feel that I
esteem it so highly as the practice of the university really suggests. It seems to me at
least partially to resemble the chess-playing power which we find m.arvelously developed
in some persons. The feats which we see or know to be performed by adepts at this
game are very striking, but the utility of them maybe doubted, whether we regard the
chess-player as an end to himself or to his country." — (" The Conflict of Studies," p. 19.)
What the teaching of the higher mathematics appears to have become at Cambridge,
that the teaching of their elements, divorced from their natural connection with the
teaching of physical science, becomes in our schools and colleges.

On the fallacy that it was the mathematical studies at Cambridge of certain eminent
graduates of Cambridge that was the cause of their eminence, and for some wholesome
common-sense, in regard to the general subject, see a recently -published pamphlet, " The
Mathematical Tripos," by the Rev. H. A. Morgan, Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge.

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 23

ment of training — one which performs certain disciplinary functions
which no other instrument can perform so well ; but it is only live
mathematics, not dead mathematics, mathematical in vital connection
with physical science, not prematurely thrust as an ugly skeleton alone
upon the youthful mind, upon the pretense that its sole object is their
mental discipline. And, on the other hand, it is only for the study of
physical science, pursued by vigorous scientific methods, and in rigor-
ous, logical, and mathematical ways, that we can claim for it a place
as a disciplinary, that is, a real study. As the mere becoming ac-
quainted with a string of scientific results, it may well be left to the
contempt of the Rev. Mr. Hawtrey.

Bui the chief influence of modern science upon liberal education
will be its ethical influence. Its discoveries are transforming man's
conception of the earth he lives on, and of his history and his work
upon it. Before man acquires the control of matter, through ascer-
tainment of the laws that govern it, his life on earth is poor, narrow,
and full of hardship, and his earthly relations full of pain. So long as
that state continues, life on earth must seem to him a small matter,
and its opportunities for growth not much worth considering ; it is
only here and there that a philosopher in his closet attains to some
realization of the capacities that lie hidden in it. War and savage
occupations consume the days of the mass of men, and no culture is
possible save the perverted culture of the cloister. But the advent
of physical science means the emancipation of the masses into the
privileges of intellectual life. From a battle-ground, the earth is trans-
formed into a school-room, written all over with hieroglyphics, no
longer mysterious, but to which mankind have found the key : and,
with the right use of the secrets thus unfolded, will come to the mass
of men that accession of material wealth which will give the leisure
and opportunities that have heretofore been the monopoly of privi-
leged classes.

It is not wonderful that men, at first, are carried away with the con-
templation of its lower uses, even sometimes to the making them the
sole end of education. It is but a reaction from the opposite extreme,
only a dazzling of eyes with a flood of new light. Presently we
shall look about us, and find the old relations of things not greatly
altered. Matter is not going to supplant mind because we are learn-
ing so much more about it ; whether we understand or do not under-
stand the laws that govern it, matter remains the servant of mind, to
educate it and do its bidding. The higher uses of science will still
be spiritual uses. It has not come into the world merely to carry us
faster through space, merely that we may sleep more softly and eat and
drink more luxuriously, nor will education become the mere teaching
how to do these things. It is with the spiritual educating function
alone that we have to deal when we consider it as an element in lib-
eral education.

24 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

And thus one great result of the new form into which modern
science is casting all our conceptions of education will be a vastly
hio-her estimate of the educating value of those pursuits in life which
are concerned with material things, and a distinct recognition of them
as included among the liberal professions. It is interesting to observe
how the list of liberal professions enlarges with the advance of civiliza-
tion. At first the priest is the divinely-appointed monopolist of all
higher knowledge ; by degrees he is joined by the lawyer, as the in-
terpreter still of a divinely-established code; it is much later and only
after a certain amount of progress has been made in physical knowl-
edge that the importance of his function raises the physician's art to
the dignity of a liberal profession ; and that more at first through a
superstitious belief in the power of his spells and his magic than from
respect to the small reality of his science. Now that science has so
far entered into other callings as to make them worthy fields for the
exercise of the highest faculties, all those pursuits which have for their
aim the improvement of man's earthly condition will take their due
rank in the list of liberal professions, and the chemist, the engineer,
the architect, and the merchant, will have their appropriate liberal
educations as much as this clergyman, the lawyer, or the physician. It
may safely be affirmed that that view of earthly life of mediaeval as-
cetics which has left its traces so deeply imprinted in much of our sec-
tarian theology is fast vanishing like an ugly dream forever. The
intellectual and moral aspect of material pursuits is fast gaining,
through the significance given to them by modern science, a predomi-
nance over their mere material aspect. The worker in material things
is more and more, as the days go by, compelled to be an intellectual
being even in order to be a worker, and it is because the study of and
working in material things now give scope for the energies of great
intellects, that they more and more absorb them. Whoever continues
to believe in the antithesis between matter and spirit, and insists upon
looking on the world of material things as of necessity the world of
the devil, must see in this tendency only disaster to all our higher in-
terests ; but whoever sees that it is the true function of modern science
to spiritualize material things by enabling us to put them to higher
uses, will see in science not the great antagonist but the great hope of
the religion and the philosophy of the future.*

The advocates of the classical theory are never weary of reproach-
ing their opponents with opinions which, as they say, degrade the dig-
nity of true learning, by making it subservient to mere utilitarian

* The spirit of the older education is well represented in the following extract from a
work of that learned and arrogant pedant, the late Dr. Donaldson. He says : " If, then,
the education of the whole community is so dependent on that of the upper classes, and
if these owe their normal influence to the circumstances which enable them to escape the
trammels of material interests, it must follow that the liberal education which is the pecul-
iar attribute of the highest order ought to consist in the literature which humanizes and
generalizes our views, and not in the science which provides for the increase of opulence

LIBERAL EDUCATION. 25

aims. If to try by knowledge to make this world a bettor place to
live in, and to teach men how to make the highest and best use of it
be utilitarianism, then I make bold to say that any knowledge that
cannot make good its claim to such usefulness is worse than utilita-
rian, for it is useless knowledge. The charge that is meant to be
brought is this, that none but the advocates of classical learning have
or can have the higher ends of life in view in planning schemes of edu-
cation ; that all other systems look solely to the stomach or the pocket.
I do not know whether such charges are not too hackneyed to waste
words on ; certainly I can conceive of no lower form of utilitarian abuse
of education than the pursuit of fellowships by the cramming of Greek
and mathematics for the competitive examinations of an English
university. On the other hand, the truly liberal learning of England
is to be found more than anywhere else at this moment with that noble
band of students of science who are virtually excluded from all such
preferments.' It is not a difference in studies that constitutes them
liberal or illiberal; it is a difference in the spirit in which all studies
may be pursued. The study of chemistry and the study of Greek
particles may be equally base or equally noble, according as they are
pursued worthily or unworthily, with a selfish eye to the loaves and
fishes, or with an aim at the higher rewards of true culture, and the
higher advancement of man's estate. But I think we may well leave
aside this stupid charge of utilitarianism. It comes nowadays only
from those benighted pedants who are wholly ignorant of the true
spirit of modern science.

I have left myself no room, even if I were competent, to speak of
the last ingredient in any just scheme of modem liberal education — the
study of art, aesthetic culture. I fear there will be abundance of time
to develop that side of the question in this country before it is in any

and comfort. The higher traiaing of our youth must not be that of a polytechnic school.
We want such institutions, no doubt, for we need observers and surveyors, engineers and
artillerjTnen to do the work, which can best be performed by such intelU[/ent automatons.''^
— (" Classical Scholarship and Classical Learning," p. 90.)

' " I believe there can be no doubt that the foreigner, who should wish to become ac-
quainted with the scientific or the literary activity of modern England, would simply lose
his time and his pains if he visited our universities with that object. . . . England can
show now, as she has been able to show in every generation since civilization spread over
the West, individual men who hold their own against the world, and keep alive the old
tradition of her intellectual eminence. But in the majority of cases these men are what
they are in virtue of their native intellectual force, and of a strength of character which
will not recognize impediments. They are not trained in the courts of the temple of
science, but storm the walls of that edifice in all sorts of irregular ways, and with much
loss of time and power, in order to obtain their legitimate positions. Our universities not
only do not encourage such men, do not offer them positions in which it should be their
highest duty to do thoroughly that which they are most capable of doing ; but, as far as
possible, university training shuts out of the minds of those among them who are sub-
jected to it the prospect that there is any thing in the world for which they are specially
fitted." — (Huxley, "Lay Sermons," p. 55.)

26 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

danger of becoming a practical one. Yet, in the shape of elementary-
drawing, the rudiments of art are beginning to take their proper place
in our schools as a necessary and indispensable element of all real
education, and the art galleries and the foreign musicians of a few of
our older cities are beginning to exert their influence, if a slight one,
in introducing higher ideas of the importance of art into our new coun-
try. They will have but a limited influence, however, till the study
of the fine arts takes its proper place among us as a necessary element
in every conception of true education.

There is one form of art-study, and that, perhaps, the highest,
which is open to all, even to the humblest student, and the most ele-
mentary school, and that is, the study of poetry. It is a prime element
in any conception of a liberal education, which shall take as its chief
instrument of language-training the mother-tongue, that the real study
of English poetry will take the place of the pretended study of classi-
cal poetry. When that time comes, we may expect to see the great
poets of our native tongue exerting the same influence in the culture
and training of our children that Homer and ^schylus really exercised
over that of the Greeks. We shall not know what that influence is
capable of becoming till we have a real study of English, in place of a
sham study of classical literature. The great Greek philosopher says
that poetry is truer than history. Sure I am that we shall one day
come to see that in neglecting to train and cultivate the imagination,
we are neglecting the most powerful of all the faculties.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have thus given you, very feebly and im-
perfectly, an outline of a scheme of liberal education, applicable to a
whole free people, which shall use that people's own language on the
one hand, and the great instrument of modern science on the other, as
its chief disciplinary instruments, in lieu of the obsolescent scheme for
a liberal class education, based upon the study of dead languages as
its chief educating instrument. As a means for realizing that scheme
for the liberal education of the whole people, I believe that we must
sooner or later have in this our republic one homogeneous system of
free schools, from the lowest to the highest. The first step of that
education will be taken from the benches of the primary school, its
last lessons learned in the lecture-rooms and laboratories of universities,
free from all trammels of sectarian narrowness or class distinctions.
It wiU be from first to last a homogeneous, logically compacted, con-
sistent training in all available knowledge, to all attainable wisdom,
free to all men and all women to pursue to the extent the faculties God
has endowed them with wiU carry them. It is a Utopian vision, you
will say, this of popular liberal educatio-n. Say rather it is the neces-
sary safeguard and supplement of free institutions ; to despair of it is
to despair of the republic.

THE GROWTH OF SALMON. 27

THE GEOWTH OF SALMON.

By C. E. FEYEE,

SINCE the time of Magna Charta it has been an object, directly or
indirectly, on the part of the Legislature, to protect the supplies
of salmon with which our rivers used to be so abundantly stocked : but,
notwithstanding the laws which have at various times been enacted,
this fish gradually became scarcer till, in 1861, all the old laws were
repealed, and fresh and more stringent regulations made for protecting
and increasing our salmon-supplies. In addition to the fostering care
which is bestowed, under the Salmon Fishery Acts of 1861 and 1865,
on the fish in the rivers, means have been adopted to artificially rear
salmon, so as to increase their numbers more rapidly than could be
done in the ordinary course of Nature. Mr. Frank Buckland has been
the pioneer of this system of artificial breeding of salmon and trout,
and the experiments and operations which have been carried on during
the last few years have thrown great light on the hitherto unknown
habits of this "king offish."

Any one who looks into the fishmongers' shops just now can see
what a clean, fresh-run salmon, ready for cooking, is like — a silvery,
plump creature, whose " lines " are made for speed in water, and whose
graceful curves give the completest idea of vigor and strength in
stemming a rapid current of water.

But very few people, probably, know what sort of an appearance
this beautiful fish presents in its infancy. Hidden away during that
period in the upper waters of our salmon rivers, and ultimately in the
depths of the sea, it is lost to sight till it grows large enough to be
taken by the salmon-nets ; and, until lately, very little was known of
its natural history, or of its habits, though the experience of the last
few years has revealed many interesting facts concerning the develop-
ment of this fish, through the Qg^^ fry, smolt, and grilse stages, till it
becomes a full-2:rown salmon.

© @

Ne-w-laid Salmon Egg. Egg after about 35 Days.

Fig. 1 represents the Q^,g — natural size— of a salmon just laid.
Each female salmon carries, on an average, 800 to 900 of such eggs to
every pound of her weight. They are generally of a pinky opal color,
elastic to the touch, covered with a soft, horny membrane, with a mi-

28 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nute opening through which a particle of the spawn — the soft roe — of
the male fish enters, and the e^g is fertilized. From this moment the
young fish gradually develops, under the influence of the cold running
water. At the end of about thirty-five days — more or less, according
to the temperature, which should be about 40° — two little black specks
can be seen, as at Fig. 2, which are the eyes of the embryo fish ; the
vertebra may be discerned in the form of a faint red line, and a small
red globule, which shortly afterv\'ard appears, represents the vital or-
gans of the embryo fish.

At the end of about 80 to 100 days from the deposition of the egg
the fish has so increased in size that it bursts the " shell " and makes
its debut in the form represented at Fig. 3. The sac or umbilical vesi-

FiG. 8.

Fish coiirKG out op Egg.

cle attached to the under part of the fish contains a secretion re-
sembling albumen, which affords nourishment to the infant fish for
the first six weeks or so of its existence. By that time it is quite
absorbed, and for the first time we see a perfect fish, Fig. 4, with
its fins, gills, and scales, which have hitherto been present, but im-
perceptible except under the microscope, fully formed : and now the
young salmon begins to feed. His growth is not very rapid for some
months, the lines a, b, c, representing the average length of a salmon at
two, three, and four months old. At two years old the fish is about
nine to twelve inches long.

As soon as they are large enough and strong enough, the " sniolts,"
as they are now called, descend to the sea ; here they are lost sight
of until they return up the river as " grilse." The actual duration of
their stay in the sea is not yet known, from one to three years being
variously estimated as the probable length of time. The object of this
migration to the sea is to find the food which is necessary for the
secretion of the fat of the fish, who lives on the Infusoi^ia, smaller
fish and crustaceans, and the spawn of sea-fish, which abound in our
seas. The length of their stay in salt-water is regulated, no doubt,
by various circumstances, and is not the same in every case. When
the salmon has laid up a sufficient supply of fat in its body and on
its pyloric appendages, which are a wonderful provision of ISTature for
the secretion of an amount of fat sufficient to supply it during its so-

THE GROWTH OF SALMON. 29

journ in fresh waters, it ascends the river, its roe or spawn develop-
ing as it ascends ; till, about Christmas-time, or sometimes eai'lier, it
reaches the shallow head-streams of the river, in the gravelly beds of
which it deposits its eggs, returning immediately afterward to the sea,
no longer in the bright, plump, muscular condition in which it ascended,
but a lean, lank, iigly, wounded beast, which one would hardly recog-
nize as Salmo scilar. Fig. 5 represents the head of a " kelt," as those
salmon are called which have newly spawned. The curved projection,
or hook, on the lower jaw, is a cartilaginous membrane, the use of
which nobody knows. The fish is in a very weakly condition, as his
fat is gone, and he perhaj^s assumes this appearance to frighten other
animals, which might otherwise be tempted to attack him. The
drawing is taken from the photograph of a salmon, weighing twenty
pounds, which was found dead on the banks of one of our Welsh rivers.

br ~

^ 'M

Young Salmon Sis Weeks old.
a, b, c, size of salmon at two, three, and four months respectively.

This fish, had it survived, would have returned to sea, recovered
its fat, and presently come back worth £2 or £3, whereas, by dying
in this condition, it was worth nothing. It had, however, done its
duty by depositing perhaps 10,000 eggs. Only a very small percent-
age, however, of the eggs laid ever become adult fish. Floods wash
them out of their gravel nests ; ducks, and other birds, eat them ;
beetles and various insects attack them ; they are smothered with
mud, or left high and dry on the shore ; the young fish are poisoned
by pollutions, or diverted into mill-leats and canals, and so lost ; trout
eat them wholesale ; in fact, the whole of their earliest existence is a
very living death, and it is a wonder, with all the ordeals they have
to pass through, that we have any salmon left. To kill them legiti-
mately for food for ourselves is bad enough, and we ought to do all
we can to protect them when young.

In the artificial system of breeding salmon the adult fish are caught
just as they are on the spawning-beds, and the eggs taken from them ;
the ova and milt are properly mixed together, and the eggs placed iu

30 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

troughs of water so an-anged as to imitate as closely as possible the
natural conditions necessary for the development and growth of the
fish. Properly managed, ninety per cent, of the eggs will hatch out :
the young fish are turned into the river when they are about a year
old ; if they can be kept two years in tanks large enough, with plenty
of running water, so much the better for the prospect of their reach-
ing the sea in safety.

Pig. 5.

Head of a Kelt.

When we can make up our minds to keep all our pollutions out of
our rivers, and build " salmon-ladders " over all the wears, so as to
give the fish a fair field, and enable them to run up-stream unimpeded,
then, and then only, shall we see salmon as plentiful throughout the
country as it is said to have been in the North a century ago, when
apprentices are reputed to have stipulated in their indentures that
they should be fed on salmon not more than three days a week.
Without this, all our efforts to stock our barren rivers with artificially-
bred fry will prove comparatively unavailing. — Nature,

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE SEXES.'

By HEEBEKT SPENCEE.

ONE further instance of the need for psychological inquiries as
guides to sociological conclusions may be named — an instance of
quite a different kind, but one no less relevant to questions of the time.
I refer to the comparative psychology of the sexes. Women, as well as
men, are units in a society, and tend by their natures to give that so-
ciety certain traits of structure and action. Hence the question. Are
the mental natures of men and women the same ? is an important one
to the sociologist. If they are, an increase of feminine influence is
not likely to affect the social tj^e in a marked manner. If they are

' Conclusion of chapter on Mental Science and Sociology.

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE SEXES. 31

not, the social type will inevitably be changed by increase of feminine
influence.

That men and women are mentally alike, is as untrue as that they
are alike bodily. Just as certainly as they have physical differences
which are related to the respective parts they play in the maintenance
of the race, so certainly have they psychical differences, similarly re-
lated to their respective shares in the rearing and protection of off-
spring. To suppose that along with the unlikenesses between their
parental activities there do not go unlikenesses of mental faculties, is
to suppose that here alone in all Nature there is no adjustment of spe-
cial powers to special functions.*

Two classes of differences exist between the psychical, as betv/een
the physical, structures of men and women, which are both deter-
mined by this same fundamental need — adaptation to the paternal and
maternal duties. The first set of differences is that which results

■ The comparisons ordinarily made between the minds of men and women are faulty
in many ways, of which these are the chief:

Instead of comparing either the average of women with the average of men, or the
elite of women with the elile of men, the common course is to compare the elite of women
with the average of men. Much the same erroneous impression results as would result
if the relative statures of men and women were judged by putting very tall women side
by side with ordinary men.

Sundry manifestations of nature in men and women are greatly perverted by existing
social conventions upheld by both. There are feelings which, under our predatory regime,
with its adapted standard of propriety, it is not considered manly to show ; but which,
contrariwise, are considered admirable in -women. Hence, repressed manifestations in
the one case, and exaggerated manifestations in the other; leading to mistaken esti-
mates.

The sexual sentiment comes into play to modify the behavior of men and women to
one another. Eespecting certain parts of their general characters, the only evidence
which can be trusted is that furnished by the conduct of men to men, and of women to
women, when placed in relations which exclude the personal affections.

In comparing the intellectual powers of men and women, no proper distinction is
made between receptive faculty and originative faculty. The two are scarcely commen-
surable ; and the receptivity may, and frequently does, exist in high degree where there is
but a low degree of originality, or entire absence of it.

Perhaps, however, the most serious error usually made in drawing these comparisons
is, that of overlooking the limit of normal mental power. Either sex under special stimu-
lations is capable of manifesting powers ordinarily shown only by the other ; but we are
not to consider the deviations so caused as affording proper measures. Thus, to take an
extreme case, the mammae of men will, under special excitation, yield milk : there are
various cases of gynecomasty on record, and in families, infants whose mothers have
died have been thus saved. But this ability to yield milk, which, when exercised, must
be at the cost of masculine strength, we do not count among masculine attributes. Simi-
larly, under special discipline, the feminine intellect will yield products higher than the
intellects of most men can yield. But we are not to count this as truly feminine if it
entails decreased fulfillment of the maternal functions. Only that mental energy is nor-
mally feminine which can coexist with the production and nursing of the due number of
healthy children. Obviously a power of mind which, if general among the women of a
society, would entail disappearance of the society, is a power not to be included in an
estimate of the feminine nature as a social factor.

32

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

from a somewhat earlier arrest of individual evolution in women than
in men, necessitated by the reservation of vital power to meet the cost
of reproduction. Whereas, in man, individual evolution continues
until the physiological cost of self-maintenance very nearly balances
■what nutrition supplies, in woman, an arrest of individual development
takes place while there is yet a considerable margin of nutrition :
otherwise there could be no offspring. Hence the fact that girls come
earlier to maturity than boys. Hence, too, the chief contrasts in bodily
form: the masculine figure being distinguished from the feminine by
the greater relative sizes of the parts which carry on external actions
and entail physiological cost — the limbs, and those thoracic viscera
which their activity immediately taxes. And hence, too, the physio-
logical truth that, throughout their lives, but especially during the
child-bearing age, women exhale smaller quantities of carbonic acid,
relatively to their weights, than men do ; showing that the evolution
of energy is relatively less as well as absolutely less. This rather
earlier cessation of individual evolution thus necessitated, showing
itself in a rather smaller growth of the nervo-muscular system, so that
both the limbs which act and the brain which makes them act are
somewhat less, has two results on the mind. The mental manifesta-
tions have somewhat less of general power or massiveness ; and be-
yond this there is a perceptible falling short in those two faculties, in-
tellectual and emotional, which are the latest products of human evo-
lution— the power of abstract reasoning and that most abstract of the
emotions, the sentiment of justice — the sentiment which regulates con-
duct irrespective of personal attachments and the likes or dislikes felt
for individuals.^

After this quantitative mental distinction, which becomes incident-
ally qualitative by telling most upon the most recent and most com-
plex faculties, there come the qualitative mental distinctions conse-
quent on the relations of men and women to their children and to one
another. Though the parental instinct, which, considered in its essen-
tial nature, is a love of the helpless, is common to the two ; yet it is
obviously not identical in the two. That the particular form of it
which responds to infantine helplessness is more dominant in women
than in men, cannot be questioned. In man the instinct is not so
habitually excited by the very helpless, but has a more generalized re-
lation to all the relatively weak who are dependent upon him. Doubt-
less, along with this more specialized instinct in women, there go spe-
cial aptitudes for dealing wdth infantine life — an adapted power of in-
tuition and a fit adjustment of behavior. That there is here a mental
specialization, joined with the bodily specialization, is undeniable;

^ Of course it is to be understood that in this, and in the succeeding statements, ref-
erence is made to men and women of the same society, in the same age. If women of a
more-evolved race arc compared with men of a less-evolved race, the statement will not
be true.

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE SEXES. 33

and this mental specialization, though primarily related to the rearing
of offspring, affects in some degree the conduct at large.

The remaining qualitative distinctions between the minds of men
and women are those which have grown out of their mutual relation
as stronger and weaker. If we trace the genesis of human character,
by considering the conditions of existence through which the human
race passed in early barbaric times and during civilization, we shall
see that the weaker sex has naturally acquired certain mental traits by
its dealings with the stronger. In the course of the struggles for ex-
istence among wild tribes, those tribes survived in which the men
were not only powex-ful and courageous, but aggressive, unscrupulous,
intensely egoistic, Necessarily, then, the men of the conquering races
which gave origin to the civilized races, were men in whom the brutal
characteristics were dominant; and necessarily the women of such
races, having to deal with brutal men, prospered in proportion as they
possessed, or acquired, fit adjustments of nature. How were women,
unable by strength to hold their own, otherwise enabled to hold their
own ? Several mental traits helped them to do this.

We may set down, first, the ability to please, and the concomitant
love of approbation. Clearly, other things equal, among women living
at the mercy of men, those who succeeded most in pleasing would be the
most likely to survive and leave posterity. And (recognizing the pre-
dominant descent of qualities on the same side) this, acting on succes-
sive generations, tended to establish, as a feminine trait, a special so-
licitude to be approved, and an aptitude of manner to this end.

Similarly, the wives of merciless savages must, other things equal,
have prospered in proportion to their powers of disguising their feel-
ings. Women who betrayed the state of antagonism produced in
them by ill-treatment would be less likely to survive and leave off-
spring than those who concealed their antagonism ; and hence, by in-
heritance and selection, a growth of this trait pi'oportionate to the re-
quirement. In some cases, again, the arts of persuasion enabled
women to protect themselves, and by implication their offspring,
where, in the absence of such arts, they would have disappeared early,
or would have reared fewer children. One further ability may be
named as likely to be cultivated and established — the ability to dis-
tinguish quickly the j^assing feelings of those around. In barbarous
times, a woman who could, from a movement, tone of voice, or expres-
sion of face, instantly detect in her savage husband the passion that
was rising, would be likely to escape dangers run into by a woman
less skilled in interpreting the natural language of feeling. Hence,
from the perpetual exercise of this power, and the survival of those
having most of it, we may infer its establishment as a feminine faculty.
Ordinarily, this feminine faculty, showing itself in an aptitude for
guessing the state of mind through the external signs, ends simply in
intuitions formed without assignable reasons ; but when, as happens in

VOL. IV.— 3

34 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

rare cases, there is joined with it skill in psychological analysis, there
results an extremely remarkable ability to interpret the mental states
of others. Of this ability we have a living example never hitherto
paralleled among women, and in but few, if any, cases exceeded among
men.

Of course, it is not asserted that the specialties of mind here de-
scribed as having been developed in women, by the necessities of de-
fense in their dealings with men, are peculiar to them : in men also
they have been developed as aids to defense in their dealings with one
another. But the difference is, that, whereas, in their dealings with
one another, men depended on these aids only in some measure, women
in their dealings with men depended upon them almost wholly —
within the domestic circle as well as without it. Hence, in virtue of
that partial limitation of heredity by sex, which many facts through-
out Nature show us, they have come to be more marked in women
than in men.'

One further distinctive mental trait in women springs out of the
relation of the sexes as adjusted to the welfare of the race. I refer to
the effect which the manifestation of power of every kind in men has
in determining the attachments of women. That this is a trait in-
evitably produced will be manifest, on asking what would have hap-
pened if women had by preference attached themselves to the weaker
men. If the weaker men had habitually left posterity when the
stronger did not, a progressive deterioration of the race would have
resulted. Clearly, therefore, it has happened (at least since the cessa-
tion of marriage by capture or by purchase has allowed feminine
choice to play an important part) that, among women unlike in their

' As the validity of this group of inferences depends on the occurrence of that partial
limitation of heredity of sex here assumed, it may be said that I should furnish proof of
its occurrence. Were the place fit, this might be done. I might detail evidence that
has been collected showing the much greater liability there is for a parent to bequeath
malformations and diseases to children of the same sex, than to those of the opposite sex.
I might cite the multitudinous instances of sexual distinctions, as of plumage in birds and
coloring in insects, and especially those marvelous ones of dimorphism and polymor-
phism among females of certain species of Lepidoptera, as necessarily implying (to those
who accept the Hypothesis of Evolution) the predominant transmission of traits to de-
scendants of the same sex. It will suffice, however, to instance, as more especially rele-
vant, the cases of sexual distinctions within the human race itself, which have arisen in
some varieties and not in others. That in some varieties the men are bearded, and in
others not, may be taken as strong evidence of this partial limitation of heredity ; and,
perhaps, still stronger evidence is yielded by that peculiarity of feminine form found in
some of the negro races, and especially the Hottentots, which does not distinguish to any
such extent the women of other races from the men. There is also the fact, to which
Agassiz draws attention, that, among the South American Indians, males and females
differ less than they do among the negroes and the higher races ; and this reminds us
that among European and Eastern nations the men and women differ, both bodily and
mentally, not quite in the same ways and to the same degrees, but in somewhat different
ways and degrees — a fact which would be inexplicable were there no partial limitation
of heredity by sex.

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE SEXES.

35

tastes, those who were fascinated by power, bodily or mental, and who
married men able to protect them and their children, were more likely
to survive in posterity than women to whom weaker men were pleas-
ing, and whose children were both less efficiently guarded and less ca-
pable of self-preservation if they reached maturity. To this admiration
for power, caused thus inevitably, is ascribable the fact sometimes com-
mented upon as strange, that women will continue attached to men who
use them ill, but whose brutality goes along with power, more than they
will continue attached to weaker men who use them well. With this ad-
miration of power, primarily having this function, there goes the admira-
tion of power in general, which is more marked in women than in men,
and shows itself both theologically and politically. That the emotion
of awe aroused by contemplating whatever suggests transcendent force
or capacity, which constitutes religious feeling, is strongest in women,
is proved in many ways. We read that among the Greeks the women
were more religiously excitable than the men. Sir Rutherford Alcock
tells us of the Japanese that " in the temples it is very rare to see any
congregation except women and children ; the men, at any time, are
very few, and those generally of the lower classes." Of the pilgrims
to the temple of Juggernaut, it is stated that " at least five-sixths, and
often nine-tenths, of them are females." And we are also told of the
Sikhs, that the women believe in more gods than the men do. Which
facts, coming from different races and times, sufficiently show us that
the like fact, familiar to us in Roman Catholic countries, and to some
extent at home, is not, as many think, due to the education of women,
but has a deeper cause in natural character. And to this same cause
is in like manner to be ascribed the greater respect felt by women for
all embodiments and symbols of authority, governmental and social.

Thus the a priori inference, that fitness for their respective paren-
tal functions implies mental differences between the sexes, as it im-
plies bodily differences, is justified; as is also the kindred inference
that secondary differences are necessitated by their relations to one
another. Those unlikenesses of mind between men and women, which,
under the conditions, were to be expected, are the unlikenesses we
actually find. That they are fixed in degree, by no means follows :
indeed, the contrary follows. Determined as we see they some of
them are by adaptation of primitive women's natures to the natures
of primitive men, it is inferable that as civilization readjusts men's na-
tures to higher social requirements, there goes on a corresponding re-
adjustment between the natures of men and women, tending in sundry
respects to diminish their differences. Especially may we anticipate
that those mental peculiarities developed in women, as aids to defense
against men in barbarous times, will diminish. It is probable, too,
that, though all kinds of power will continue to be attractive to them,
the attractiveness of physical strength and the mental attributes that
commonly go along with it will decline, while the attributes which

36 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

conduce to social influence will become more attractive. Further, it
is to be anticipated that the higher culture of women, carried on
within such limits as shall not unduly tax t'he physique (and here, by
higher culture, I do not mean mere language-learning and an exten-
sion of the detestable cramming-system at present in use), will in other
ways reduce the contrast. Slowly leading to the result everywhere
seen throughout the organic world, of a self-preserving power inversely
proportionate to the race-preserving power, it will entail a less early
arrest of individual evolution, and a diminution of those mental dif-
ferences between men and women which the early arrest produces.

Admitting such to be changes which the future will probably see
wrought out, we have meanwhile to bear in mind these traits of intel-
lect and feeling which distinguish women, and to take note of them
as factors in social phenomena — much more important factors than we
commonly suppose. Considering them in the above order, we may
note, first, that the love of the helpless, which in her maternal capacity
woman displays in a more special form than man, inevitably affects all
her thoughts and sentiments ; and, this being joined in her with a less
developed sentiment of abstract justice, she responds more readily
when appeals to pity are made than when appeals are made to equity.
In foregoing chapters we have seen how much our social policy disre-
gards the claims of individuals to whatever their efforts purchase, so
long as no obvious misery is brought on them by the disregard ; but,
when individuals suffer in ways conspicuous enough to excite com-
miseration, they get aid, and often as much aid if their sufferings are
caused by themselves as if they are caused by others — often greater
aid, indeed. This social policy, to which men tend in an injurious de-
gree, women tend to still more. The maternal instinct delights in
yielding benefits apart from deserts ; and, being partially excited by
whatever shows a feebleness that appeals for help (supposing antago-
nism has not been aroused), carries into social action this preference
of generosity to justice, even more than men do. A further tendency,
having the same general direction, results from the aptitude which
the feminine intellect has to dwell on the concrete and proximate
rather than on the abstract and remote. The representative faculty
in women deals quickly and clearly with the personal, the special,
and the immediate ; but less readily grasps the general and the im-
personal. A vivid imagination of simple direct consequences mostly
shuts out from her mind the imagination of consequences that are
complex and indirect. The respective behaviors of mothers and
fathers to children sufficiently exemplify this difference : mothers
thinking chiefly of present effects on the conduct of children, and re-
garding less the distant effects on their characters; while fathers
often repress the promptings of their sympathies with a view to ul-
timate benefits. And this difference between their ways of estimat-
ing consequences, affecting their judgments on social affairs as on

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE SEXES. 37

domestic affairs, makes women err still more than men do in seeking
what seems an immediate public good without thought of distant pub-
lic evils. Once more, we have in women the predominant awe of
power and authority, swaying their ideas and sentiments about all
institutions. This tends toward the strengthening of governments,
political and ecclesiastical. Faith in whatever presents itself with im-
posing accompaniments is, for the reason above assigned, especially
strong in women. Doubt, or criticism, or calling in question of things
that are established, is rare among them. Hence in public affairs
their influence goes toward the maintenance of controlling agencies,
and does not resist the extension of such agencies ; rather, in pursuit
of immediate promised benefits, it urges on that extension ; since the
concrete good in view excludes from their thoughts the remote evils
of multiplied restraints. Reverencing power more than men do,
women, by implication, respect freedom less — freedom, that is, not of
the nominal kind, but of that real kind which consists in the ability
of each to carry on his own life without hindrance from others, so long
as he does not hinder them.

As factors in social phenomena, these distinctive mental traits of
women have ever to be remembered. Women have in all times played
a part, and, in modern days, a very notable part, in determining so-
cial arrangements. They act both directly and indirectly. Directly,
they take a large, if not the larger, share in that ceremonial govern-
ment which supplements the political and ecclesiastical governments ;
and as supporters of these other governments, especially the ecclesi-
astical, their direct aid is by no means unimportant. Indirectly,
they act by modifying the opinions and sentiments of men — first,
in education, when the expression of maternal thoughts and feel-
ings affects the thoughts and feelings of boys, and afterward in
domestic and social intercourse, during which the feminine sen-
timents sway men's public acts, both consciously and unconsciously.
Whether it is desirable that the share already taken by women
in determining social arrangements and actions should be in-
creased, is a question we will leave undiscussed. Here I am concerned
merely to point out that, in the course of a psychological preparation
for the study of Sociology, we must include the comparative psychol-
ogy of the sexes ; so that, if any change is made, we may make it
knowing what we are doing.

Assent to the general proposition set forth in this chapter does
not depend on assent to the particular propositions unfolded in illus-
trating it. Those who, while pressing forward education, are so cer-
tain they know what good education is, that, in an essentially Papal
spirit, they wish to force children through their existing school-courses
under penalty on parents who resist, will not have their views modi-
fied by what has been said. I do not look, either, for any appre-

38 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ciable effect on those who shut out from consideration the reactive in-
fluence on moral nature, entailed by the action of a system of intel-
lectual culture which habituates parents to make the public responsible
for their children's minds. Nor do I think it likely that many of
those who wish to change fundamentally the political status of women
will be influenced by the considerations above set forth on the com-
parative psychology of the sexes. But, without acceptance of these
illustrative conclusions, there may be acceptance of the general con-
clusion, that psychological truths underlie sociological truths, and
must therefore be sought by the sociologist. For whether discipline
of the intellect does or does not change the emotions ; whether na-
tional character is or is not progressively adapted to social conditions ;
whether the minds of men and women are or are not alike — are ob-
viously psychological questions ; and either answer to any one of
them implies a psychological conclusion. Hence, whoever, on any of
these questions, has a conviction to which he would give legislative
expression, is basing a sociological belief upon a psychological belief;
and cannot deny that the one is true only if the other is true. Hav-
ing admitted this, he must admit that without preparation in Mental
Science there can be no Social Science. For, otherwise, he must assert
that the randomly-made and carelessly-grouped observations on Mind,
common to all people, are better as guides than observations cau-
tiously collected, critically examined, and generalized in a systematic
way.

No one, indeed, who is once led to dwell on the matter, can fail to
see how absurd is the supposition that there can be a rational inter-
pretation of men's combined actions, without a previous rational in-
terpretation of those thoughts and feelings by which their individual
actions are prompted. Nothing comes out of a society but what
originates in the motive of an individual, or in the united similar mo-
tives of many individuals, or in the conflict of the united similar mo-
tives of some having certain interests with the diverse motives of
others whose interests are different. Always the power which initiates
a change is feeling, separate or aggregated, guided to its ends by in-
tellect; and not even an approach to an explanation of social phe-
nomena can be made, without the thoughts and sentiments of citizens
being recognized as factors. How, then, can there be a true accoujit
of social actions without a true account of these thoughts and senti-
ments? Manifestly, those who ignore Psychology as a preparation
for Sociology, can defend their position only by proving that while
other groups of phenomena require special study, the phenomena of
Mind, in all their variety and intricacy, are best understood without
special study ; and that knowledge of human nature gained hap-hazard
becomes obscure and misleading in proportion as there is added to it
knowledge deliberately sought and carefully put together.

THE RINGED PLANET 39

THE EINGED PLANET.

DURING the months of September, October, and November, Mars
and Saturn are companions as evening-stars. It will not be dif-
ficult to recognize them, though the ruddy glories of Mars have been
greatly reduced since July and August, when he shared with Jupiter
the dominion over the western skies after sunset. The dull-yellow
lustre of Saturn differs markedly from the red but more star-like light
of Mars ; and, as the two planets draw near to each other late in No-
vember (making their nearest approach on the 20th), it will be inter-
esting to observe the contrast between the red and yellow planets of
the solar system. Striking, however, as this contrast will be found to
be, it is insignificant compared with the real contrast which exists be-
tween the two planets. Mars is the least but one of the primary mem-
bers of the solar family, and, although he pursues a course outside the
earth's, he is unlike all the other superior planets in being unaccom-
panied by any moon ; his small orb, also, appears to have but a shal-
low atmospheric envelope, while in physical constitution he apparently
occupies a position between the earth and the moon. Saturn, on the
other hand, is inferior only to Jupiter in dimensions and mass, while
he is superior to Jupiter not only in the astronomical sense that he
travels on a wider orbit, but in the extent and importance of the scheme
over which he bears sway ; his orb, moreover, like that of Jupiter, ap-
pears to be the scene of marvelous processes of change, implying a
condition altogether unlike that of the earth on which we live.

We propose to give a brief sketch of what has been ascertained
respecting this wonderful planet, the most beautiful telescopic object
in the whole heavens, and the one which throws the clearest light upon
the nature of the solar system, and particularly of those giant planets
which circle outside the zone of asteroids.

We Avould at the outset impress upon the reader the necessity of
raising his thoughts above those feeble conceptions i-especting Saturn
and his system which are suggested by the ordinary pictures of the
planet. When we see Saturn presented as a ball within a ring, or
more carefully pictured as a striped globe within a system of rings,
we are apt to regard the ideas suggested by such drawings as affording
a true estimate of the planet's nature. In fact, many believe that the
planet and its rings are really like what is presented in these pictures.
It should be understood that what has been actually seen of Saturn by
telescopic means cannot, in the nature of things, afford any true pict-
ure of the planet and its ring system. The picture must be filled in,
not by the imagination, but by the aid of reason ; and then, though
much will still remain unknown, we shall have at least a far juster
conception of the glories of the ringed world than when we simply

40

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

contemplate drawings which show how the planet looks under tele-
scopic scrutiny. This will at once appear when we consider that Sat-
urn never lies at a less distance than 732,000,000 miles from the earth.
"With the most powerful telescope we see him no better (taking atmos-
pheric effects into account) than we should if this distance were re-
duced to about a million miles. It is manifest that at this enormous
distance all save the general features of his globe and of his rings
must be indistinguishable. Where we seem to see a smooth, solid
globe striped with belts, there may be an orb no part of which is solid,

Telescopic Aspect op SAxrRN, axd Size compared -wtcth the Eap.th.

girt round by masses of matter lying many miles above its seeming
surface. Where we seem to see solid, flat rings, neatly divided one
from the other either by dark spaces or by difference of tint, there may
be no continuous rings at all ; the apparent spaces may be no real
gaps ; the difference of tint may imply no difference of material. On
these and other points, the known facts afford important evidence,
and, by reasoning upon them, we are carried far beyond the results
directly conveyed to us by telescopic researches.

Saturn is distinguished, in the first place, by the enormous range
of his orbit, not merely in distance from the sun, but in the distances
which separate it from the orbits of his neighbor planets. His mean
distance from the sun is about 872,000,000 miles, his actual range of
distance lying between 921,000,000 and 823,000,000. These figures are
imposing, but they are, in fact, meaningless save by comparison with

THE RINGED PLANET. 41

other distances of the same class. Let it be noticed, then, that Saturn's
mean distance from the sun exceeds the earth's more than nine and a
half times. Now, Jupiter's distance exceeds the earth's rather more
than five times (five and a fifth is very nearly the true proportion) ; so
that between Jupiter's path and Saturn's there lies everywhere a span
fully equal to four times the earth's distance from the sun. So much
for Saturn's nearest neighbor on that side. But on the farthest side
lies Uranus, more than nineteen times as far away from the sun as our
earth is ; so that between the paths of Saturn and Uranus there lies
everywhere a span equal to Saturn's own distance from the sun. Now,
all this is not intended as a mere display of wonderful distances. So
far as mere dimensions are concerned, these arrays of figures are
more imposing than impressive. But, so soon as we take into account
the circumstance that a planet is in some sense ruler over the spaces
through which its course carries it, those spaces being by no means
tenantless, we see that, cceteris paribus, the dignity of a planet is en-
hanced by the extent of the space separating its orbit from the orbits
of its neighbors on either side. Now, the space between the paths of
Saturn and Jupiter exceeds the space inclosed by the earth's orbit no
less than 63 times, while the space between the paths of Saturn
and Uranus exceeds the space inclosed by the earth's orbit 270 times !
Assuming (as we seem compelled to do by continually-growing evi-
dence) that Saturn and his system were formed by the gathering in of
matter from the region over which Saturn now bears sway, we cannot
wonder that the planet is a giant, and his system wonderful in extent
and complexity of structure. It is true that Jupiter on one side, and
Uranus on the other, share Saturn's rule over the vast space, 330 times
the whole space circled round by the earth, which lies between the or-
bits of his neighbor planets. But Saturn's rule is almost supreme over
the greater part of that enormous space. Combining the vastness of
the space with its position — not so near to the sun that solar influence
can greatly interfere with Saturn's, nor so far away as to approach the
relatively-barren outskirts of the solar system — we seem to find a sufii-
cient explanation of Saturn's high position in the scheme of the planets
as respects volume and mass, and his foremost position as respects the
complexity of the system over which he bears sway.

Briefly, then, to indicate his proportions, and the dimensions of his
system :

Saturn has a globe considerably flattened, his equatorial diameter
being about 70,000 miles, while his polar axis is nearly 7,000 miles
shorter. Thus in volume he exceeds the earth nearly 700 times, and
all the four terrestrial planets — Mercury, Venus, the Earth, and Mars
— taken together, more than 336 times. In mass he does not exceed
the earth and these other smaller planets so enormously, because his
density (regarding him as a whole) is much less than the earth's. In
fact, his density is less than that of any other known body (comets,

42

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of course, excepted) in the solar system. The reader is doubtless
aware that the sun's mean density is almost exactly one-fourth of the
earth's ; Jupiter's is almost exactly the same as the sun's ; but Saturn's
is little more than half the sun's, being represented by the number
13 only, where 100 represents the earth's. Thus, instead of exceeding
the earth nearly 700 times in mass, as he would if he were of the same
density, he exceeds her but about 90 times. But this disproportion
must still be regarded as enormous, especially when it is added that
the combined mass of the four terrestrial planets amounts to little more
than the forty-fourth part of Saturn's mass. The combined mass of
Uranus and Xeptune, though these are members of the family of
major planets, falls short of one-third of Saturn's mass ; yet, by com-
parison with Jupiter, whose mass exceeds his more than threefold,
Saturn appears almost dwarfed. And it may be noted as a striking
circumstance — one that is not sufficiently recognized in our astronomical
treatises — that, while Jupiter's mass exceeds the combined mass of all
the other planets (including Saturn) about two and a half times, Saturn
exceeds all the remaining planets in mass about two and three-quarter
times. So unequally is the material of the planetary system dis-
tributed.

Fig. 2.

Satttrx a>;d ms iloox?.

The mighty globe of Saturn rotates on its axis in about nine hours
and a half, the most rapid rotation in the solar system so far as is yet
known.

But what shall we say to indicate adequately the dimensions of
that enormous ring-system which circles around Saturn ? Here we
have no unit of comparison, and scarcely any mode of presenting the
facts except the mere statement of numerical relations. Thus the full
span of the rings, measured across the centre of the planet, amounts
to 167,000 miles ; the full breadth of the ring-system amounts to
35,600 miles. But these numbers convey only imperfect ideas. Per-
haps the best way of indicating the enormous extent of the ring-sys-
tem is to mention that circumnavigation of the world by a ship sail-
ing from England to Kew Zealand by the Cape of Good Hope, and
from New Zealand to England by Cape Horn, would have to be re-
peated 21 times to give a distance equaling the outer circumference of

THE RINGED PLANET.

43

the ring-system. The same double journey amounts in distance to but
about two-thirds the breadth of the ring-system.

As to the scale on which Saturn's system of satellites is con-
structed, we shall merely remark that the span of the outermost satel-
lite's orbit exceeds nearly twofold the complete span of the Jovian
system of satellites, and exceeds the span of our moon's orbit nearly
tenfold.

And now let us consider what is the probable nature of the vast
orb which travels — girt round always by its mighty ring-system — at
so enormous a distance from the sun that his disk has but the nine-
tieth part of the size of the solar disk we see. Have we in Saturn, as
has been so long the, ordinary teaching of astronomy, a world like our
own, though larger — the abode of millions on millions of living creat-
ures— or must we adopt a totally different view of the planet, regard-
ing it as differing as much from our earth as our earth differs from the
moon, or as Saturn and Jupiter differ from the sun ?

We must confess that, if we set on one side altogether the ideas
received from books on astronomy, endeavoring to view these ques-
tions independently of all preconceived opinions, it appears antece-
dently improbable that Saturn or Jupiter can resemble the earth
either in attributes or purpose. We conceive that, if a being capable
of traversing at will the interstellar spaces were to approach the neigh-
borhood of our solar system, and to form his opinion respecting it
from what he had observed in other parts of the sidereal universe, he
would regard Jupiter and Saturu, the brother giants of our system, as
resembling rather those companion orbs which are seen in the case of
certain unequal double stars, than small dependent worlds like our
earth and Venus. There are, perhaps, no instances known to our
telescopists in which the disparity of light^ as distinguished from real
magnitude, is quite so great as that which exists in the case of the sun
and the two chief planets of the solar system.' But we see in the heaven
of the fixed stars all orders of disproportion between double stars, from
the closest approach to equality down to such extreme inequality, that,
while the larger star of the pair is one of the leading brilliants of the
heavens, the smaller can only just be discerned with the largest tele-
scopes yet made, used on the darkest and clearest nights. We have no

^ Even this is not certain. Jupiter, seen in full illumination from a stand-point so
distant that both Jupiter and the sun might be regarded as equally distant from it,
would appear to shine with rather more than the 3,000th part of the sun's light. This
would correspond to the difference of apparent brightness between two stars of equal real
magnitude and splendor, whereof one was about 54 times as far away as the other. There
can be no doubt that the larger reflectors of the Herschels, Rosse, and Lassell, and the
great refractors of Greenwich, Pulkowa, and Cambridge (United States), would bring the
farther of two such stars into view if the nearer were of the first or second magnitude ;
and it is not at all unlikely that some of the exceedingly minute companions to bright
stars, disclosed by these instruments, may be planets shining with reflected, not with in-
herent lustre.

44 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

reason to believe that the series stops just where our power of tracing
it ceases • on the contrary, since the series is continuous as far as it
goes, and since our own solar system is constituted as if it belonged
to the series prolonged far beyond the limits which telescopic scrutiny
has reached, we have reason for believing that such is indeed the in-
terpretation of the observed facts. In other words, we may not un-
reasonably regard our solar system as a multiple system, a double star
at certain ranges of distance, whence only the sun and Jupiter could
be seen ; a triple star at distances whence Saturn could be seen ; and
a quintuple star where Uranus and Neptune would come into view.
To show what excellent reason exists for regarding Mercury, Venus,
the Earth, and Mars, as not to be included in this view, it is only ne-
cessary to remark that not one of these planets could be seen until the
limits of the solar system had been crossed. To eyesight such as ours,
not one of the four terrestrial planets could be seen from Saturn, and
still less, of course, from Uranus or Neptune. It would be as unrea-
sonable to hold the ring of asteroids, or even the myriads of systems
of meteorolites and aerolites, to be bodies resembling the earth and her
fellow-terrestrial planets, as it is to hold these terrestrial planets to be
bodies resembling Jupiter and his fellow-giants.

In all characteristics yet recognized by astronomers, Jupiter and
Saturn differ most markedly from the earth and her fellow-planets.
In bulk and mass they belong manifestly to a different order of cre-
ated things ; in density they differ more from the earth than the sun
does ; they rotate much more swiftly on their axes ; they receive much
less light and heat from the sun ; the lengths of their year exceed the
length of the earth's year as remarkably as their day falls short of
hers ; the atmospheric envelope of each is divided into variable belts,
utterly unlike any thing existing in the earth's atmosphere ; and, last-
ly, each is the centre of an important subsidiary scheme of bodies
quite unlike the moon (the only secondary planet in the terrestrial
family) as respects their relations to the primary around which they
travel.

Notwithstanding all these circumstances in evidence of utter dis-
similarity, and the fact that not one circumstance in the condition of
the major planets suggests resemblance to the terrestrial planets, as-
tronomy continues to treat of the planets of the solar system as though
they formed a single family. It would appear as though the teach-
ings of the astronomers who lived before the telescope was invented
had so strong an inherent vitality, that more than two centuries and
a half of discoveries adverse to those teachings are powerless to dis-
possess them of their authority. For no other reason can be sug-
gested, as it appears to me, for the complete disregard with which the
most striking characteristics of the major planets have been treated
by modern astronomers.

If we consider one feature alone of those which have been just

THE RINGED PLANET. 45

mentioned — the small mean density of the giant planets — we have at
once the strongest possible evidence to show that the condition of
these bodies must be unlike that of the earth. Of course, if we as-
sume that Saturn's substance (to limit our attention to this planet) is
composed of materials altogether unlike any which exist on earth, a
way out of our difficulty is found, though not an easy one. In that
case, however, we are only substituting one form of complete dissimi-
larity for another. And all the results of spectroscopic analysis, as
applied to the celestial bodies, tend to show the improbability that
such differences of elementary constitution exist — we will not say in
the solar system only, but in the sidereal universe itself. If, however,
we admit that Saturn is in the main constituted of elements such as
we are familiar with, we find it extremely difficult, or rather it is ab-
solutely impossible, to suppose that the condition of his substance is
like that of the earth's. There are certain unmistakable facts to be
accounted for. There is the mighty mass of Saturn, exceeding that
of the earth ninety-fold. That mass is endued with gravitating en-
ergy, precisely in the same way as the earth's mass. There must be
from the surface toward the centre a continually increasing pressure.
This pressure is calculable,* and enormously exceeds the internal
pressures existing within the earth's interior. There is no possibility
of cavities, as Brewster and others have opined ; for there is no known
material, not the strongest known to us, iron, or platinum, or adamant,
which could resist the pressures produced by Saturn's internal gravi-
tation. Steel would be as yielding as water under these pressures.
There must be compression with its consequent increase of density,
such compression exceeding many million-fold the greatest with which
terrestrial experimenters have dealt. That, with these enormous forces
at work, the actual density of Saturn as a whole should be far less than
that of water is utterly inexplicable, unless Saturn's condition be re-
garded as altogether unlike that of the earth. We see in the sun an
oi-b which, notwithstanding its enormous mass, has a mean density
much less than the earth's, and little greater than that of water ; but
we have no difficulty in understanding this cii'curastance, because we

' It is a misfortune for science that Newton never published the reasoning which led
him to the conclusion that the earth's mean density is equal to between five and six
times the density of water. This, as everyone knows, has been confirmed by several
experimental methods ; and, so far as appears, the problem is a purely experimental
one. Newton, however, made no experiments ; at least, none have been heard of as
effected by him, and it is scarcely probable that he had any instruments of sufficient
delicacy for a tasli so difiicult. Prof Grant ascribes Newton's conclusion to a happy
intuition ; yet it is very unlike Newton to make a guess on such a matter. It is more
probable that he guessed the elements of the problem than the result. He probably
assumed that the earth's mass is composed of a substance like granite, and, adopting
some law of compression for such a substance (based on experiment, perhaps), calculated
thence -the compression at different depths, and so obtained the mean destiny of the
whole mass.

46 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

see that the sun is in a state of intense heat, and we know that this
heat produces effects antagonistic, as it were, to those produced by the
attraction of his mass as a wliole upon every portion of his substance.
But, if we make no similar assumption in Saturn's case, we find his
small density inexplicable.

Another circumstance associated with the question of Saturn's den-
sity introduces new difiiculties of the most perplexing nature if it be
regarded according to the ordinary view, while it seems not only ex-
plicable, but manifestly to be expected, on the theory that Saturn's
whole orb is in an intensely heated condition. Saturn certainly has
an atmosphere of considerable depth. The belts which surround his
globe are evidently produced by clouds in his atmosphere, though
what the nature of these clouds may be is not as yet known. The
brighter belts are the cloud-belts, while the darker either show his
real surface, or, far moi*e probably, belong simply to lower cloud-
layers. These belts are variable in appearance and position, some-
times changing with great rapidity. Their real extent is enormous,
exceeding the whole surface of our earth, even in the case of the nar-
rowest belts yet seen. No one who has viewed them through tele-
scopes of great power can refuse to adopt the conclusion that the at-
mosphere in which these great cloud-zones are suspended must be of
great depth, certainly far deeper than our atmosphere. But such an
atmosphere, subjected to the attractions of Saturn's mass, would be
enormously compressed underneath those manifestly thick cloud-lay-
ers. A very moderate assumption as to the depth of the atmosphere
would lead to the conclusion that at its base it must be denser than
water — that is, denser than Saturn himself. No gas could exist as
gas at this density. Apart from this, we are here arriving at the
very theory which the ordinary view of Saturn teaches us to avoid —
viz., the theory that he is utterly unlike our earth in physical condi-
tion. We may much more conveniently arrive at the same general
conclusion, while avoiding other difiiculties, by simply adopting the
same explanation in this case which serves to account also for the
small density of Saturn's mass— viz., the theory that Saturn's globe is
in a state of intense heat.

But now let it be noticed how perfectly this view of Saturn's con
dition accords with the theories which are beginning to be established
respecting the genesis of the solar system. Whether we regard the
planets as formed from the condensation of enormous nebulous masses,
or whether we assume that they were produced by the gathering to-
gether of matter originally traveling in dense meteoric flights around
the central aggregation whence the sun was one day to be formed, we
see that the larger the planet the greater must have been its original
heat. The heat generated during the condensation of a nebulous mass
must depend upon the magnitude of the mass, since in fact the ac-
cepted theory of heat teaches us that the original heat of a globe so

THE RINGED PLANET. 47

formed is measurable by the actual difference in dimensions between
the globe and its parent cloud-mass, and of course the larger the
cloud-mass the greater this difference would necessarily be. It is
equally certain that the heat generated by the gathering-in of me-
teoric matter would be so much the greater according as the quantity
of matter gathered and gathering was greater ; for the heat is pro-
duced by the downfall of such matter on the globe it helps to form,
and the greater the mass of that globe the greater is its attracting
might, the greater the velocity it generates in the falling meteors,
and therefore the greater the heat produced when they are brought
to rest.

Saturn, then, would originally be much hotter than our earth, on
any theory of the evolutio7i of our solar system — and there are few as-
tronomers who doubt that the solar system was wrought by processes
of evolution to its present condition. But not only would Saturn be
much hotter than the earth, but, owing to his enormous size, he would
part with his heat at a much slower rate. On both accounts we should
infer that at this present time Satui-n is much hotter than the earth —
in other words, since our earth still retains no inconsiderable propor-
tion of its original heat, Saturn may be assumed to be in a state of
intense heat. What his actual heat may be is not so easily deter-
mined. We shall presently show reasons for believing that an inferior
limit, below which his heat does not lie, is indicated by the fact that
he still possesses inherent luminosity. On the other hand, a superior
limit is indicated by the fact that his inherent luminosity is not great,
and that, in all probability, the thicker cloud-zones of Saturn prevent
the passage of the greater part of his light.'

We should infer, then, that Saturn in some respects resembles the
sun, though of course the very same reasoning which teaches us to
believe tliat Saturn is very much hotter than the earth, leads us also
to the conclusion that it is not nearly so hot as the sun. Now, thus
viewing Saturn, we should be led to expect, apart from all telescopic
evidence to that effect, that he would resemble the sun in certain gen-
eral features. For instance, we might expect that he would have spot-
zones, while his equatorial zone would be free from spots ; or, if it
were thought that so close a resemblance was not to be looked for,
then we might still expect that his equatorial zone, like the sun's,
would be distinguished from the rest of his surface by some well-
marked peculiarity. This is the case. The equatorial zone of Saturn
is distinguished by a peculiar brightness from the rest of his surface,
insomuch that the late Prof. Nichol was led to regard this zone as the

' To prevent misapprehension, it may be as well to remind the reader that the ap-
parent continuity of Saturn's cloud-belts by no means implies that they are really con-
tinuous, and it is on a priori grounds highly improbable that they are so ; openings in
his cloud-zones two or three hundred miles in length and breadth would be quite undis-
ceraible at Saturn's enormous distance.

4S THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

scene of a constant precipitation of meteoric matter from the inside of
the ring-system.

Now, there is one important peculiarity which distinguishes the
equatorial bright zone of Saturn from that of Jupiter. Jupiter's axis
is almost square to the level of the path in which he travels around
the sun ; so that his equatorial zone lies nearly in that level, and is
therefore directly illuminated by the sun. The aspect of Jupiter in
fact, as seen from the sun, is always that which our earth presents in
spring and autumn. But Saturn has an axis very considerably sloped
to the level of the path in which he travels. It is more sloped even
than our earth's axis. So that in the course of his long year of 10,759
days (29^ of our years) Saturn's globe presents toward the sun all the
varying aspects which our earth presents, only with a somewhat greater
range of variation. At one time he is placed as our earth is in spring,
and then his equatorial belt, as seen from the sun, appears to lie straight
across the middle of his disk. Rather more than seven years later he
is posed as our earth is posed at midsummer, his northern pole is
bowed toward the sun, and his equator is seen as a half-oval, curving
far south of the middle point of his disk. He passes on from this po-
sition, and in seven more years he is placed as our earth is in autumn,
with his equator again lying straight across his disk. Then, seven years
or so later, he presents the aspect of our earth at midwinter, his equa-
tor curved into a half-oval passing far to the north of the middle point
of his disk. And, finally, at the end of yet seven years more (or, more
exactly, of one complete Saturnian year from the commencement of
these changes), he is again as at first. Now, it seems manifest that, if
the great cloud-zone which surrounds Saturn, appearing as a nearly
white ring, were due to solar action, it woiald fluctuate in position as
these changes proceeded. The very length of the Saturnian year
should insure the occurrence of such fluctuations. We have only to
inquire what takes place on our own earth, where, though we have
nothing comparable with the belt systems of Jupiter and Saturn, we
have, nevertheless, over ocean-regions, a sun-raised tropical cloud-band
in the middle of the day. This cloud-band /o//o^^s the sun, being equa-
torial in spring, passing far north of the equator, even to the very limit
of the torrid zone, in summer, returning to the equator in autumn,
passing to the southern limit of the torrid zone in winter, and returning
again to the equator in spring. In fact, this cloud-band as seen from
the sun would always cross the middle of the earth's face as a straight
line in spring and autumn, and as considerably more than a half-oval,
agreeing in position with the tropics of Cancer and Capi-icorn, at mid-
summer and midwinter. But nothing of the sort happens in Saturn's
case. His equatorial white ring is really equatorial at all times, in-
stead of being drawn to his tropics at his midsummer and midwinter
seasons. This, in our opinion, is decisive of the origin of this great
band. If it were sun-raised, it would obey the sun ; but, being raised

THE RINGED PLANET. 49

by Saturnian action, its position is solely determined by Saturn's rota-
tion, and it therefore remains constantly equatorial.

But next a very strange and, at a first view, incredible circum-
stance lias to be considered in immediate connection with the relations
we have been dealing with.

It sounds startling to suggest that Saturn ijrobably changes at
times in size and shape. Yet the evidence in favor of the suggestion
is very weighty. It may briefly be presented as follows :

In April, 1805, Sir William Herschel, t^Ao had hitherto alioays seen
the planet of an oval figure, found that it presented a strangely dis-
torted appearance. It was flattened as usual at the poles, but also at
the equator ; accordingly, it had a quadrangular or oblong figiire
(with rounded corners, of course), its longest diameters being the two
which (crossing each other in the middle of the disk) passed from north
latitude 43° on Saturn to the same southerly latitude. Or we may
otherwise describe the appearances presented, by saying that Saturn
seemed siDollen in both the temperate zones. Herschel found that the
same appearance was presented, no matter what telescope he emjiloyed,
and he tried many, some seven feet, some ten, one twenty, and one
forty feet in length. With these telescopes Jupiter jiresented his or-
dinary oval aspect. But Herschel is not the only astronomer by Avhom
such appearances have been noticed. On August 5, 1805, Schroter
found that Saturn's figure was distorted. Dr. Kitchener says that in
the autumn of 1818 he found Saturn to have the figure described by
Herschel. The present Astronomer Royal has seen Saturn similarly
distorted, and on anotlier occasion flattened in the temperate zones.
In January, 1855, Coolidge, with the splendid refractor of the Cam-
bridge (U. S.) Observatory noticed a swollen appearance in Saturnian
latitude 20° ; yet on the 9th the planet had resumed its usual aspect.
In the report of the Greenwich Observatory for 1860-'61, it is stated
that " Saturn has sometimes appeared to exhibit the square-shouldered
aspect." The two Bonds, of America, surpassed by few in observing
skill, have seen Saturn square-shouldered and have noticed variations
of shape. It seems impossible to reject such testimony as this. Nor
can it be disposed of by showing that ordinarily Saturn presents a per-
fectly elliptical figure. It is the essential point of the circumstances
we are considering, that they are unusual.

Now, we do not pi-etend to explain how such changes of shape are
brought about. But we would invite special attention to the circum-
stance that if these changes be admitted as having occasionally oc-
curred (and we do not see how they can be called in question), then the
result is only startling in connection with that theory of Saturn's con-
dition which we are here opposing. If Saturn be a globe resembling
our earth, then sinkings and upheavals, such as these appearances in-
dicate, must be regarded as involving amazing and most stupendous
throes — as in fact absolutely incredible, no matter what evidence may

50 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

be found in their favor. But, so soon as we regard Saturn's whole
globe as in a state of intense heat, and his belt-system as indicating
the continual action of forces of enormous activity, W'e no longer find
any difficulty in understanding the possibility of changes such as Sir
W. Herschel, Sir G. Airy, the Bonds, and others of like observing
skill, have seen with some of the finest reflecting and refracting tele-
scopes ever constructed by man. Nay, we may even go fui'ther, and
find in solar phenomena certain reasons for believing that Saturn's
globe would be subjected to precisely such changes. It appears to
have been rendered extremely probable by Secchi and others, that our
sun's globe varies in dimensions under the varying influences to which
he is subjected. At the height of the spot-period the sun seems to be
i-educed in diameter, while his colored sierra is deeper, and the red
prominences are larger than usual, the reverse holding at the time
when the sun has no spots or few. Of course this is not understood
as implying a real change in the quantity of solar matter, but only as
indicating the varying level at which the solar cloud-envelope lies. We
may safely assume that these changes, which correspond to the great
spot-period, afiect chiefly the spot-zones which lie in the parts of the
sun's globe corresponding to our temperate zones ; but, for the same
reasons that the sun's globe is perfectly spherical so far as measure-
ments can be depended upon, namely, because of its relatively slow
rotation — such difierences would be too slight to be measurable. Re-
garding Saturn, then, as we have already been compelled to do for
other reasons, as resembling the sun so far that he is in an intensely
heated condition, we see grounds for believing that his temperate zones
would be exposed to variations of level (cloud-level), which at times
might be very considerable, and thus discernible from our earth. For,
owing to his rapid rotation on his axis, all such efiects would be rela-
tively greater than on a slowly rotating orb like the sun ; and in fact
we recognize this distinction in the great compression of Saturn's globe.
Moreover, if we regard the waxing and waning of the solar si^ots as
associated with the motions of the members of the sun's family, wx*
can well understand that the members of Saturn's family, which lie so
much nearer to him compared with his own dimensions, should produce
more remarkable efiects.' But, whether this be so or not, it is certain

' It must not be understood that in thus speaking we countenance the theory that
either the planets produce the sun-spots, or the satelUtes of Saturn effect the remark-
able changes we have been dealing with. The real causes of all solar phenomena must
be sought in the sun's own globe ; and Saturnian phenomena are in the main, we have
little doubt, produced by Saturnian action. But even as our moon (probably) exerts an
influence on the occurrence of earthquakes and volcanoes, not by her own attraction
directly, but by affecting the balance between terrestrial forces, so it may well be that
the planets indirectly affect the sun's condition, and that the Saturnian satellites even
more effectually act upon Saturn. It would be extremely interesting to inquire whether
any connection can be traced between the changes of the Saturnian belts and the mo-
tions of his satellites. Or the inquiry might be more readily and quite as effectually
. applied to Jupiter and his system.

THE RINGED PLANET. 51

that, whereas there is nothing inexplicable or even very surjjrising in
sujiposing that Saturnian cloud-layers, resulting from the action of
intense Saturnian heat, alter greatly at times in level, the observations
Ave have described become altogether inexplicable, and cannot, in fact,
be rejected, if we adopt the theory that Saturn resembles the earth on
which we live.

It may be asked whether Jupiter, to which planet tlie same rea-
soning may be applied, has ever shown signs of similar changes. To
this it may first be replied, that we should not expect Jupiter to be
affected to the same degree, simply because the chief disturbing causes —
his satellites and the sun — are always nearly in the same level, owing
to the peculiarity in Jupiter's pose to which attention has already been
directed. But, secondly, such briefly-lasting changes as we might ex-
pect to detect have occasionally been suspected by observers of con-
siderable skill ; and among others by the well-known Schroter, of Lili-
enthal. Such changes have consisted, for the most part, merely in a
slight flattening of a part of Jupiter's outline. But on one occasion a
very remarkable phenomenon, only (but very readily) explicable in
this way, was witnessed by three practised observers — Admiral Smyth,
Prof. Pearson, and Sir T. Maclear — at three different stations. Ad-
miral Smyth thus describes what he saw : " On Thursday, June 26,
1828, the evening being extremely fine, I was watching the second
satellite of Jupiter as it gradually approached to transit Jupiter's disk.
It appeared in contact at about half-past ten, and for some minutes
remained on the edge of the disk, presenting an appearance not unlike
that of the lunar mountains coming' into view dui'ing the moon's first
quarter, until it finally disappeared on the body of the planet. At
least twelve or thirteen minutes must have elapsed, when, accidentally
turning to Jupiter again, to my astonishment I perceived the same
satellite OK^si^Je the disk ! It remained distinctly visible for at least
four minutes, and then suddenly vanished ! " For our own part, we
can conceive of no possible explanation of this remarkable phenomenon,
unless it be admitted that the change was in the apparent outline of
Jupiter. Of course, to suppose that even a cloud-layer rose or fell, in
a few minutes, several thousand miles (about 8,000, if the stated times
be correct), is as inadmissible as to suppose the solid crust of a globe
to undergo so vast a change of level ; but nothing of this sensational
description is required. All that would be necessary would be, that
an upper cloud-layer should for a few minutes be dissipated into vapor,
either by warm currents, or more probably by a temporary increase
of the heat supplied by Jupiter's fiery globe within the cloud-envelopes,
and that a few minutes later the clouds should form again by the
condensation of the vaporized matter. The changes in the aspect of
the Jovian belts are often sufficiently rapid to indicate the operation
of precisely such processes.

Associated with such phenomena as we have mentioned is the evi-

52 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

dence we have as to the brightness of Saturn and Jiiinter. If these
planets were perfectly cloud-encompassed, we should expect them to
shine much more brightly than earthy or rocky globes of equal size,
similarly placed, and surrounded only with a tenuous atmosphei'e. In
fact, we should expect the planets, if cloud-encompassed, to shine about
four times as brightly as though they were constituted like our moon.
They would in that case, however, be white planets, not only as seen
by the naked eye, but when examined with the telescope. In point
of fact, they shine, according to the very careful measurements of
ZoUner, about as brightly as though they were j)erfectly cloud-envel-
oped ; but they are neither of them found to be white under telescopic
scrutiny. Bond, of America, says, indeed, that Jupiter shines four-
teen times as brightly as he would if constituted like the moon ; and
though this is a surprising result, and would imply that some portion
of Jupiter's light is certainly inherent, it is well to notice that it is
confirmed by De La Rue's photographic researches ; for he found that
a photographic image of the moon can be taken in about two-thirds of
the time required in Jupiter's case, whereas the moon should require
but a twenty-fifth of the time required by Jupiter, if her reflecting
power were equal to his, since Jupiter is five times as far away from
the sun. It would follow from this that Jupiter shines nearly seven-
teen times as brightly as he would if he were constituted like the
moon. Taking the lowest estimate, howcA'er, we findtliat both Saturn
and Jupiter shine much more brightly than planets of equal size and
similarly placed, but having a surface formed of any kind of earth or
rock known to us. And, taking into account the well-marked colors
of these planets, it follows as an almost demonstrated fact that each
shines with no inconsiderable portion of inherent light.'

So soon as we view Saturn as a globe intensely heated, and the
scene of forces of enormous energy, we are compelled to dismiss the
idea that he is the abode of Life. But, singularly enough, this conclu-
sion, which was rejected by Brewster as rendering apparently unin-
telligible the existence of so large and massive an orb, girt about by a
system so complex and beautiful, does in reality at once present, in an
explicable aspect, not merely the vast bulk of Saturn himself, but the
scheme over which he bears sway ; for, as it seems to us, not the least
of the objections against the theory that Saturn is an inhabited
world, is found in the useless wealth of material exhibited, on that

' I might take, as equally convincing proof of the intensely heated condition of these
giant planets, the fact that the shadows of the nearer satellites, which theoretically should
be black, have sometimes been seen to be gray, and never appear to be much darker than
the fourth satellite in transit. And, as suflScient proof of the great depth of Jupiter's at-
mosphere, I could take the fact that sometimes two shadows have been seen, both belong-
ing to the same satellite. However, it would require more space than can here be spared
to show the force of these facts. I remind the reader that whatever is proved respecting
the condition of Jupiter, may be regarded as rendered probable of his brother giant,
Saturn.

TEE RINGED PLANET.

53

suppositiou, in his ring-system and family of satellites. It is very
well to grow rapturous, as many besides Brewster and Chalmers
have done, over the beauty of the Saturnian skies, illuminated by so
many satellites and by the glorious rings; and it is very proper,
no doubt, for those who so view Saturn's system, to dwell admiringly
on the beneficence with which all this abundance of reflected light
has been provided, to make up to the Saturnians for the small amount
of light and heat which they receive from the sun. But, unfortu-
nately for this w\ay of viewing the matter, the satellites and rings
do not by any means subserve the purposes thus ascribed to them.
Even if all the satellites could be full together, they would not sup-
ply a sixteenth part of the light which we receive from our full
moon ; and they cannot even appear very beautiful when we consider
that the apparent brightness of their surface can be but about one-
ninetieth of the brightness of our moon's. As for the rings, so far
from appearing to be contrived specially for the advantage of Satur-
nian beings, these rings, if Saturn icere inhabited, would be the most
mischievous and inconvenient appendages possible. They would give
light during the summer nights, indeed, when light was little wanted,
though even this service would be counteracted by the circumstance
that at midnight the enormous shadow of the planet would hide the
greater part of the rings. But it is in winter that the rings would
act most inconveniently; for then, just at the season when the Satur-
nians would most require an additional supply of light and heat,
the rings would cut off for extensive regions on Saturn the whole of
the solar light and heat which would otherwise be received. Dr.
Lardner was quite mistaken in supposing (after a cursory examination
of the mathematical relations involved) that the eclipses so produced
would be but partial. His object was excellent, since he sought to
show that " the infinite skill of the Great Architect of the universe has
not permitted that the stupendous annular appendage, the uses of
which still remain undiscovered, should be the cause of such darkness
and desolation to the inhabitants of the planet, and such an aggrava-
tion of the rigors of their fifteen years' winter," as would result from
eclipses lasting many months or even years in succession. But we
must not endeavor to strengthen faith in the wisdom of the Almighty
by means of false mathematics. So soon as the subject is rigorously
treated, we find that Sir John Ilerschel was quite right in his original
statements on this subject. The present writer published, in 1865, a
tabular statement of the length of time during which (according to
rigid mathematical calculations) the eclipses produced by the rings
last in different Saturnian latitudes. The following quotation from
the work in which this table appeared will serve to show that the
partial daily eclipses conceived by Lardner are very far from the
truth, or rather are only a part, and a very small part, of the truth :
"In latitude 40° (north or south), the eclipses begin when nearly three

54 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

years have elapsed from the time of the autumnal equinox. The
morning and evening eclipses continue for more than a year, gradu-
ally extending until the sun is eclipsed during the whole day. These
total eclipses continue to the winter solstice, and for a corresponding
p.eriod after the winter solstice ; in all, for six years, 236 days, or 5,543
Saturnian days. This period is followed by more than a year of morn-
ing and evening eclipses. The total period during which eclipses of
one kind or another take place is no less than eight years, 293 days.
If we remember that latitude 40° on Saturn corresponds with the lati-
tude of Madrid on our earth, it will be seen how largely the rings
must influence the conditions of habitability of Saturn's globe, con-
sidered with reference to the wants of beings constituted like the in-
habitants of our earth." * In the presence of such facts as these, we
may follow Sir John Herschel in saying that " we should do wrong to
judge of the fitness or unfitness of the arrangements described, from
what we see around us, when perhaps the very combinations which
convey to our minds only images of horror may be in realit}^ theatres
of the most striking and glorious displays of beneficent contrivance."
But we do well to exercise our minds in inquiring how this may be ;
and, as it appears to us, the views which have been advocated in this
essay at once afford an answer to this inquiry. "We are taxight to see
in the Saturnian satellites a family of worlds dependent on him, in the
same way that the members of the solar family are dependent on the
sun. We see that, though the satellites can supply Saturn with very
little light, he can supply them, Avhether by reflection or by inherent
luminosity, with much. And, lastly, we see that the ring-system
(which has been shown to consist of a multitude of small bodies, each
traveling in its own course), while causing no inconvenience by eclips-
ing parts of Saturn, may not improbably serve highly-important pur-
poses by maintaining an incessant downfall of meteoric matter uj^on
his surface, and thus sustaining the Saturnian heat, in a manner not
unlike that in which it is now generally believed that a portion at
least of the sun's heat-supply is maintained by the fall of interplanetary
meteors. In fine, w^e see in Saturn and his system a miniature, and a
singularly truthful miniature, of the solar system. In one system, as
in the other, there is a central orb, far surpassing all the members of
the system in bulk and mass ; in each system there are eight orbs
circling around the central body ; and, lastly, each system exhibits,
close by the central orb, a multitude of discrete bodies — the zodiacal
light in the solar system, and the scheme of rings in the Saturnian
system — doubtless subserving important though as yet unexplained
purposes in the economy of the systems to which they belong. — Corn-
Jiill Magazine.

' As this passage has been quoted nearly verbatim^ and without any sort of acknowl-
edgment, in a compilation on " Elementary Astronomy," recently published, the present
■writer, that he may not be suspected of plagiarism, ventures to point out that it is not he
who is the borrower. >

THE PHENOMENA OF HEREDITY. 55

THE PHENOMENA OF HEREDIT^XL < •'^ISk^ j/^,

TRANSLATED BT J. FITZGERALD, A. M. ^ V

IN human science there is many a ground of self-satisfaction and of
pride for the mind, but there are at the same time reasons for
humility and bitter disappointment. Notwithstanding the strenuous
efforts and the protracted meditations of the legions of investigators
who have gone before us, Nature still has abysses dark and deep be-
fore which the keenest sight becomes blindness, courage changes into
fear, and assurance into despondency. When we strive to throw
some light into these mysterious gulfs, the light does but reveal to us
the spectres of our own ignorance, and all that we carry away from
thj vain attempt is a renewed consciousness of our weakness and
indigence. It were wise for us to carry away something more, viz.,
a useful lesson. Indeed, there is nothing that is better fitted to
t(?acli us modesty and patience, to cool down presumptuous ardor, and
to put to shame overweening temerity, than the study of those phe-
nomena M'hich Providence would seem to have devised for the express
purpose of baffling man's curiosity. And yet many there are who pre-
tend to ignore the wonderful and complex phenomena which occur in re-
gions inaccessible to sight or sense, and who stubbornly question the
existence of invisible activities and insensible forces. Such is tlie fatal
skepticism against which we must cite the testimony of the sphinxes
that occupy our attention now. The lesson is all the more impressive,
inasmuch as, by strange contrast, these questions, so refractory to all
manner of theoretic exj^lanation, are precisely the ones with which
our empirical acquaintance is fullest. Here a knowledge of effects
seems in no wise to pave the way to a knowledge of causes.

These remarks have a special application to the subject of heredity.
It is an ascertained fact that the ovum contains in its seemingly homo-
geneous substance not only the anatomical structure of the individual
that is to spring from it, but also his temperament, character, apti-
tudes, sentiments, and thoughts. The parents place in this molecule
the future of an existence which is nearly always the counterpart of
themselves physiologically, oftentimes pathologically, and in many
instances psychologically. Such are the results of the latest studies
into this amazing vital economy ; and these we purpose laying befoi-e
our readers.

Heredity is that biological law in virtue of which living beings
tend to transmit to their descendants a certain number of their own
characteristic traits. It is a very nice question to decide whether we
must class under heredity the transmission of the anatomical forms

56 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

and physiological functions wbich constitute the species. At all
events, it is plain that in this case the parents are completely and
absolutely repeated in the children. Were this not so, there would
be no species, but only successions of beings without any relations
between them save that of generation. "Within the historic limits
of experience, the continuous reproduction of specific characters, al-
ways identical, or, in other words, the permanent integrity of spe-
cies, is a fact almost beyond question. The distinctive characters of
races and of varieties are transmitted with less regularity and fixity,
and it is precisely on the various transformations that these may un-
dergo from one generation to another that a famous school of natural-
ists rest when they would prove, in a more or less extended sense, the
transformation of organisms in time. But more irregular still and
more variable is the repetition of those characters which, as being
less general than those of a species or a race, may be regarded as be-
longing to the individual. Thus, in proportion as the characters be-
come more particular and more special, the more are they released
from the law of heredity, and the greater is the probability that the
children will difter from the parents. Still, observation — an observa-
tion as ancient as the human race itself — shows that these characters,
though personal, may be transmitted by generation. But within what
limits, and under what conditions ? This we have to inquire into with
all circumspection, for there is no other subject in which one is so
much in danger of making missteps, and of slipping on dangerous in-
clines.

Heredity is especially noticeable in the continuity of physiological
and pathological conditions. It is very clearly evident in the expres-
sion and features of the physiognomy. This was observed by the an-
cients ; hence the Komans had their Nasones, Labeones, Buccones,
Capitones, etc. {Big-nosed^ Thick-lipped, Sicollen-cheeJced, Big-headed).
Of all the features, probably the nose is best preserved by hered-
ity : the Bourbon nose is famous. Heredity also manifests itself
by fecundity and longevity. In the old French noblesse there
were several families which possessed high procreative vigor. Anne
de Montmorency, who, at the age of over sixty-five years, could still,
at the battle of St. Denis, smash with his sword the teeth of a Scotch
soldier who was giving him the death-blow, was the father of twelve
children. Three of his ancestors, Matthew I., Matthew II., and
Matthew HI., taken all togethei-, had eighteen, and of these fifteen were
boys. The son and grandson of the great Conde had nineteen between
them, and their great-grandfather, who lost his life at Jarnac, had ten.
The first four Guises reckoned in all forty-three children, of whom thirty
were boys. Achille de Harley had nine children, his father ten, and his
great-grandfather eighteen. Li some families this fecundity endured
through five or six generations. The average length of life depends
on locality, diet, stage of civilization, but individual longevity appears

THE PHENOMENA OF HEREDITY. 57

to be completely freed from these eouditious. It is observed among
those who lead the most laborious lives, as well as among those who
take the greatest care of their health, and it seems to be connected
with some inner power of vitality transmitted to individuals from
their forefathers. So well known is this fact that, in England, life-as-
surance companies receive from their agents statements as to the lon-
gevity of the applicants' ancestors. In Target's family, the age of
fifty-nine was very i-arely exceeded, and the man who made that family
illustrious had a presentiment, so soon as he had reached fifty, that
the close of his life was not distant. Albeit he had all the appear-
ances of good health and of great vigor of temperament, still from
that time forward he held himself ready for death, and, in fact, did die
at the age of fifty-three.

Heredity often transmits muscular strength and sundry other motor
activities. In ancient times there were families of athletes, and the
English have families of boxers. The recent researches of ]Mr. Galton,
as to wrestlers and oarsmen, show that the winners in the contests in
which these men engage generally belong to a few families in which
agility and dexterity are hereditary. Suppleness and grace in dancing
are also transmitted, as is shown in the case of the celebrated Vestris
family. The same is to be said with regard to various peculiarities
of voice, such as stammering, nasality, and lisping. There are several
families who are naturally singers. Children born of babbling parents
are themselves babblers by birthright. Dr. Lucas cites the case of a
servant-maid whose loquacity knew no bounds. She would talk to
people till they were ready to faint ; but she would also talk to ani-
mals and to inanimate things. Even when she was quite alone she
talked to herself aloud. She had to be discharged ; " but," said she
to her master, " I am not to blame ; it all comes from my father. He
had the same fault, and it drove my mother to distraction ; and his
father was just as I am."

The heredity of anomalies of organization has been demonstrated
in several instances. One of the most singular of these is the case of
Edwai'd Lambert, whose whole body, except the face, the palms of
the hands, and the soles of the feet, was covered with a sort of shell,
consisting of horny excrescences. He was the father of six children,
all of whom presented the same anomaly at the age of six weeks. The
only one of them who lived transmitted the peculiarity to all his sons,
and this transmission, passing from male to male, persisted through five
generations. Mention is also made of the Colburn family, where the
parents for four generations transmitted to the children what is called
sexdigitism, i. e,, hands and feet with six digits each. Albinism, lialt-
ing, hare-lip, and other anomalies, are in like manner reproduced in
the progeny. It has been observed that purely individual habits have
a like tendency to repeat themselves. Girou de Buzareingues informs
us that he knew a man who, when abed, was wont to lie on his back

58 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

with the right leg crossed on the left. One of his daughters had the
same habit from birth ; she constantly assumed that position in the
cradle, notwithstanding the resistance offered by the swaddling-bands.
The same author assures us that he has oftentimes noticed in children
other habits no less extraordinary, which they must have received
from their parents, and which cannot be attributed either to imitation
or to education. Darwin gives another instance : A child had the
odd habit of setting its fingers in rapid motion whenever it was par-
ticularly pleased with any thing. "When greatly excited, the same
child would raise the hands on both sides as high as the eyes, with the
fingers in rapid motion, as before. Even in old age he experienced a
difliculty in refraining from these gestures. He had eight children,
one of whom, a little girl, when four years of age, used to set her fin-
gers going and to lift up her hands after the manner of her father.
Finally, heredity has been observed in handwriting. There are fami-
lies in which the special use of the left hand is hereditary. Various
peculiarities of sensorial conditions are transmitted in a similar way.
Nearly all the members of the Montmorency family were affected with
an incomplete strabismus, which used to be called the Montmorency
look. The incapacity to distinguish between different colors is no-
toriously hereditary. The distinguished English chemist, Dalton, and
two of his brothers, were thus affected, and hence the affection itself
received the name of Daltonism. Deafness and blindness are some-
times hereditary, though not often, and deaf-muteness still more rare-
ly. Some carious instances are given of the transmission of certain
perverse tastes. Lucas, according to Zimmermann, relates the follow-
ing : A man in Scotland was possessed of an irresistible desire of eat-
ing human flesh. He had a daughter. Although removed away from
her father and mother, who were sent to the stake before she was one
year old, and although brought up among respectable people, this girl,
like her father, succumbed before her strange craving for human flesh.
This is clearly a case allied to insanity.

Insanity is, beyond all doubt, transmitted by heredity. Among
1,375 lunatics Esquirol found 337 cases of hereditary transmission.
Guislain and other physicians, on a rough estimate, represent the pa-
tients affected with hereditary insanity as one-fourth of the total num-
ber of the insane. Moreau, of Tours, and others, hold that the propor-
tion of the former is still greater. The heredity of insanity does not
imply merely direct transmission of insanity (alienation), properly so
called; hysteria, epilepsy, chorea, idiocy, hypochondria, may result
from insanity, and, vice versa^ they may produce insanity. In passing
from one generation to another, these various neuroses (nervous affec-
tions) are in some way transformed into one another.' Herpin, of Ge-

' Simple alcoholic intoxication may pass into profound neuroses. Children conceived
during an acute attack of intoxication are often epileptic, insane, idiots, etc. These facts
were observed long ago. A law of Carthage forbade all beverages except water on the

THE PHENOMENA OF HEREDITY.

59

neva, lias found, in the ancestry of 243 epileptics, seven epileptics, 21
insane, and 27 individuals who had suffered from cerebro-spinal affec-
tions. Georget, from numerous observations made at the Salpetriere,
came to the conclusion that hysterical women have always near rela-
tions who are hysterical, epileptical, hypochondriac, or insane. Moreau
calls attention to the "prodigious quantity" of morbid nervous con-
ditions to be found in the ancestry of idiots and imbeciles. A single
fact will give the means of judging of the varied and odd complica-
tions occurring in the hereditary transmission of neuroses. Dr. Morel
attended four brothers belonging to one family. The grandfather of
these children had died insane, their father had never been able to
continue long at any thing, their uncle, a man of great intellect, and a
distinguished physician, was noted for his eccentricities. Now, these
four children, sprung from one stock, presented very different forms
of physical disorder. One of them was a maniac, whose wild par-
oxysms recurred periodically ; the disorder of the second was melan-
choly madness ; he was reduced by his stupor to a merely automatic
condition. The third was characterized by an extreme irascibility
and suicidal disposition. The fourth manifested a strong liking for
art, but he was of a timorous and suspecting nature.

Scrofula, cancer, tubercular consumption, syphilis, gout, arthritis,
tetter, and, in general, all those chronic constitutional affections which
are called diatheses or cachexias, are very often transmitted from
parent to child. The heredity of these morbid states is almost as fre-
quent and as well defined as that of the neuroses. We may also affirm
the heredity of skin-diseases, and especially of psoriasis, although in
this case heredity is of rarer occurrence.

Tlie evolution of these hereditary maladies is extremely interesting
and dramatic. Planted in the children's system as germs, or as mere
predispositions, they are sometimes destroyed, beyond the possibility
of returning, by a multitude of favorable conditions and precautions :
in other instances, they begin at once their fatal work of destruction ;
or, again, they lie hidden for years, reappearing at length, remorseless
and terrible, under the influence of sundry exciting causes. Thus age,
sex, temperament, practices, habits, hygiene, surrounding conditions,
act a part in the development of hereditary morbid activities. Insanity
is rare in childhood, and epilepsy most commonly makes its appearance
in youth. Hysteria, scrofula, rachitism, and tubercle, appear in child-
hood and in youth, while gout, gravel, calculus, alopecia, and cancer,
are hereditary states of the adult. Women are more liable to insanity,
epilepsy, and hysteria, than men ; but men, on the other hand, are far
oftener than women attacked by gout, gravel, and calculus. The ner-

day of marital cohabitation, and Amyot says that " drunkenness genders naught that is
sound." Recent accurate observations have shown that the child that is conceived in a
fit of alcoholic delirium, though the latter be only transitory, carries forever the inefface-
able marks of a more or leas profound degeneracy.

6o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

vous temperament favors neuroses ; the lympliatico-sauguine, arthritis
and tetter ; and the lymphatic, scrofula. The changes occurring in the
physiological equilibrium of an individual have a very definite action
on the movements and aspects of constitutional affections. Thus, in-
sanity oftentimes appears following menstruation, pregnancy, or child-
birth ; and, in like manner, epilepsy and hysteria manifest themselves
at the first appearance of the signs of puberty. Education and habits
exercise a similar influence. Harsh usage and excessive severity, as
also complete lack of discipline and -watchfulness, have often deplo-
rable effects on the brain of children. Alcoholic excesses and high
living are extremely injurious to those whose parents had the gout or
the gravel, just as squalor and bad air decimate those who have in
themselves the germs of consumption.

This much at least is certain, that the fatal character of hereditary
disease is a great and mournful fact, of which they alone are fully and
sadly conscious who have daily to witness its consequences. One must
see the premature infirmity, the long-continued suflering, the irrepara-
ble catastrophes, the slow, cruel agonies, to which parents oftentimes
condemn their children, to form a judgment of the power possessed by
the demon of disease which lurks in the depths of their being. We
must read the authors who have treated these questions, and especially
the great alienists of France, if we would learn what a mysterious and
baleful energy is oftentimes brought into the world by the babe as it
opens its eyes to the light of day — the poor, innocent, puny creature,
which, for this brief moment of illusion, is the object of unbounded
joys and blessings, and bright hopes !

In short, we may say that the hereditary transmission, whether of
individual peculiarities of anatomical structure and of temperament, or
of liability to such and such a morbid condition — and the same holds
good for certain bodily aptitudes — is a very frequent, though not con-
stant, phenomenon in animals and in man.

Hereditary transmission of individual peculiarities of the mental or
affectional kind, and of aptitudes for such and such speculative or
moral activities, is also a phenomenon M^hich may be observed, though
more rarely than that just mentioned. When we go through the se-
ries of instances and authorities got together and cited by certain
writers, we are struck, it is true, by the apparent force of their argu-
ments, and one is ready to assign to heredity a large share in the de-
velopment of intellect and character, in the genesis of the thinking
individual. We do not see, we forget, the immense number of facts
which stand on the other side. The illusions of these mirages have
not been useless, seeing that they have led to researches of great in-
terest ; but they would be dangerous if they were to be taken by the
public as demonstrating the conclusions drawn bj^ some writers. We
will state, ia brief, the substantial benefits accruing from the researches,
and we will then try to refute the conclusions.

THE PHENOMENA OF HEREDITY. 6i

According to Galton, the memory was so notable a faculty in the
family of the celebrated English Hellenist, Porson, as to have passed
into a by-word, the Porson memory. Lady Hester Stanhope, she whose
life was so full of adventure, gives, as one among many points of re-
semblance between herself and her grandfather, her retentive memory.
" I have my grandfather's gray eyes," said she, " and his memoiy of
places. If he saw a stone on the road, he remembered it : it is the
same with myself. His eye, Avhich was ordinarily dull and lustreless,
was lighted up, like my own, with a wild gleam whenever he was
seized with passion." The imaginative and creative faculties, those
which play the chief part in art and in poetry, are sometimes trans-
mitted from father to son. Galton, in the work he published four
years ago (" Hereditary Genius "), and Ribot, in his recent book, give
long lists of painters, poets, and musicians, in order to show the part
played by heredity in the genesis of these artists' talents. There are
in these lists many instances in which this influence of heredity is in-
dubitable, but there are far more in which it is very questionable
indeed. Thus, these authors see the influence of heredity in the po-
etic genius of Byron, Goethe, and Schiller, because they find in the
ancestors of these poets certain passions, vices, or qualities — -just as
though these peculiarities of character could determine poetic genius.
The fact is, these lists do not show us any great poet who received
his faculties from his ancestors. We do there find that a great poet
is sometimes the father of mediocre poets — which is a different thing.
The heredity of aptitudes for painting is better established : in a list
of 42 celebrated painters, Italians, Spaniards, and Flemings, Galton
shows that 21 had illustrious ancestors. The names of Bellini, Caracci,
Teniers, Yan Ostade, Mieris, Vandervelde, and Vernet, will suflice to
prove that there are families of painters. In the family of Titian we
find nine painters of merit. The history of music presents instances
still more striking. The Bach family took its rise in 1550, and became
extinct in 1800. Its head was Veit Bach, a baker at Presburg, who
used to seek for relaxation from labor in music and song. lie had two
sons, Avho commenced that unbroken series of musicians of the same
name, who, for nearly two centuries, overran Thuringia, Saxony, and
Franconia. They were all organists, church singers, or what is called
in Germany city musicians. When they became too numerous to live
all together, and the members of this family were scattered abroad,
they resolved to meet once a year, on a stated day, with a view to
keep up a sort of patriarchal bond of union. This custom was kept up
until nearly the middle of the eighteenth century, and oftentimes more
than 100 persons bearing the name of Bach, men, women, and children,
were to be seen assembled. In this family are reckoned 29 eminent
musicians, and .28 of a lower grade. Mozart's father was second ca-
pellmeister to the prince-bishop of Salzburg. Beethoven's father was
tenor in the chapel of the Elector of Cologne : his grandfather had

62 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

been chanter, and then master in the same chapel. Rossini's parents
played music at fairs.

We find almost as effectual and continuous an intervention of
heredity in the transmission of passions and sentiments of a very dif-
ferent order — those which incline to vice. The liking for strong drink,
habits of debauch, a passion for gambling, acquire in some persons a
degree of force which can be accounted for only by some fatal organic
predisposition derived from their ancestors. " A lady with whom I
was acquainted," says Gama 3Iachado, " and who possessed a large
fortune, was possessed of a passion for gambling, and passed whole
nights at play : she died young, of a pulmonary complaint. Her eldest
son, who was in appearance the image of his mother, had the same
passion for play. He died of consumption, like his mother, and about
the same age. His daughter, who resembled him, inherited the same
tastes, and died young." The heredity of a disposition for theft, rape,
murder, and suicide, has been proved in several instances.

In proportion as you rise above the purely physiological and patho-
logical regions to those where the mind's activity takes a larger part,
heredity is found to lose force and constancy of action. There have
been families of scientists — the Cassinis, Jussieus, Bernouillis, Dar-
wins, Saussures, Geoffroys, Pictets. In literature and erudition, the
names of Estienne and Grotius, and others, occur. The Mortemarts
were famous for their wit. A genius for statesmanship or for gen-
eralship has sometimes been perpetuated for several generations in
certain families. On the whole, these cases of the transmission of
psychical qualities are not frequent. Their being so carefully noted
and so set in relief is apparently due to the fact that they are not of
common occurrence ; and besides, in many of these cases, education
had probably more to do than heredity.

Some years ago there appeared a book entitled " Phrenyogenie,"
in which is to be found, side by side with many chimerical and para-
doxical statements, one reflection worthy of attention, and this all the
more because it takes account of a peculiarity which appears to have
escaped the physiologists hitherto. The author of that book, M. Ber-
nard Moulin, strives to prove that children are Hying jjhotoffrajyhs of
their parents, as they were at the moment of conception. According
to him, the parents transmit to the children the tastes and aptitudes,
the spontaneous or the elicited exercise of which was then at the maxi-
mum. The broad conclusions which Moulin draws from his researches,
as to the art of procreating superior children, may perhaps call forth
a smile, but the facts cited by him in support of his views are curious.
Here are a few of them : Nine months before the birth of Xapoleon I,
Corsica was all in confusion. The celebrated Paoli, at the head of an
army of citizens which he himself had raised, was endeavoring to put
an end to the civil war, and to prevent an invasion by foreigners.
Charles Bonaparte, his aid-de-camp and secretary, displayed great

THE PHENOMENA OF HEREDITY. 63

courage at the side of his commander. The young officer had with
him his wife, Letitia Ramolino, a woman of Roman beauty, and of a
strong and masculine character. Napoleon was conceived in his tent,
on the eve of a battle, at the distance of two paces from the batteries
which faced the enemy. Robespierre was born in 1758, the year
which saw Damiens tortured and dragged about the Place de Greve,
a year of war, of famine, and of discontent. His father was an attor-
ney, and an insatiable reader of the " Contrat SoclaV Peter the Cruel,
King of Castile, was the son of Alfonso XL, who was ever at variance
with his wife. Scandalous scenes of anger, jealousy, and rage, con-
tinually disturbed the royal household, and the fruit of the commerce
of this wedded pair was Peter the Cruel, a monster of ugliness, physi-
cal and moral. History shows to us the parents of Raffiielle both de-
voted to the art of painting. The wife, a trite Madonna, delighted in
subjects where grace and piety prevailed ; the husband, a great dauber,
preferred strength for his part.

M. Ribot, in the remarkable work which he has just written on the
subject of heredity, investigates the laws of this mysterious influence,
which he regards as a sort of habit, an eternal memory. These laws
are little more than a statement of the habitual directions of heredi-
tary impulsion. Sometimes heredity passes from the father to the
daughter, from the mother to the son ; again the child inherits from
both parents. Finally, it often happens that the child, instead of re-
sembling his immediate parents, resembles one of his grandparents,
or some remote member of a collateral branch of the family. This is
called atavism. This fact was well known to the ancients. Mon-
taigne regarded it with wonder. " Is it not astonishing," says he,
" that this drop of seed from which we are produced should bear the
impression not only of the bodily form, but also of the thoughts and
the inclinations of our fathers ? Where does this drop of water keep
this infinite number of forms ? and how does it bear these likenesses
through a progress so hap-hazard and so irregular that the great-
grandson shall resemble the great-grandfather, the nephew the uncle?"
Montaigne's wonder has good ground ; nor do we to-day know any
better than those of the sixteenth century the causes of these strange
transmissions.

Such are the facts. In vain would we multiply them, or comment
upon them, to change their character. Cases of heredity will never be,
in the domain of physiology, any thing more than exceptions, as com-
pared with the cases which make against heredity. But now, if these
are only exceptions, by what right shall any man set up heredity as
the general law of the development of intellectual activity, or affirm
that heredity is here the law, non-heredity the exception ? Ribot ac-
cumulates the subtlest of arguments to strengthen this singular propo-
sition, but he is wasting his time, wasting his talent. Explain as you
will how the heredity of intellectual aptitudes is almost ever overcome

64 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

hj antagonistic or disturbing causes, the fact remains that heredity
has not the upper hand. "With what ingenious reasons soever you
console yourself on seeing the ideal sovereignty of heredity brought
down, in matter of fact, to a very low grade of authority, still heredity
is not helpeJ. In a word, if non-heredity has in fact a far wider em-
pire than heredity, the question arises. Why does M. Ribot adopt a
formula which implies the contrary ?

Besides, does not the history of the development of civilization
itself show existing in man the preponderant force of an eternal ten-
dency to metamorphosis, to innovation, and to change ? Fixedness
of thoughts and immobility of habits were, it is true, the law of primi-
tive peoples, as they still are of savage tribes ; but then there is noth-
ing to show that this is owing to heredity. This more or less pro-
tracted repetition of identical societies should rather, we think, be at-
tributed to the strong and irresistible instinct of imitation and to the
profound respect entertained for rites and customs established by re-
ligion. Among such peoples the future is like the present, and the
present like the past, because the same inflexible rule, the same author-
ity, and the same tyrannical superstition are imposed on them all.
Nothing possesses strength or obtains respect except through tradi-
tion, and tradition among such people is only the revered memory of
the will of the mysterious powers, manifested in days of yore. When
the English would have the Hindoos take a part in road-building and
the hygienic improvement of their country, they have still to show
tliat the usefulness of such enterprises was understood by the most
ancient Brahmans — so hard is it for this old race to conceive of a law
which should be obligatory without being traditional.

However that may be, and whatever part heredity may act here,
certain it is that this part is not important, since this singular homo-
geneity of primitive races, instead of being maintained and growing
stronger, does, sooner or later, gi^'e place to diversity. Every people
is in turn invaded by a force at once capable of acting counter to its
hereditary influences, and of releasing it from the iron yoke of antique
customs. It was in Greece that about 3,000 years ago the first move-
ment of this force brought about what Goethe calls " the liberation of
humanity." Since that day the crossings of distinct races, the many
new wants, and the various inventions to which they have given rise,
and the ideas which men, owing to their more and more intimate con-
tact with Xature, have conceived, have set in the place of primitive
simplicity a multiple and irresistible variability, as the present state
of the world clearly shows.

THE SHOVEL-NOSED SHARK. 65

THE SHOYEL-NOSED SHAEK.

By Ladt VEENEY.

THE following sketch from Nature (Fig. 1) represents the jaw of a
young shark — a tender innocent, indeed, for, if his life had not
been cut short by cruel Fate, he would have attained to the dignity of
nine rows of teeth, instead of the poor five which, as you may see in-
side the mouth, this little victim had been obliged to put up with. A
shark's age is counted by the number of rows— and his jaws are the
most awful engine of destruction which exists in the animal world :
the best possible means that could be devised to seize, to cut and tear,
and finally to hold fast any slippery subject, though of no use to chew
or masticate.

Still there seems a superfluity of naughtiness in this array of edges
and serrated points, set thus, one range following up another, as shown
in Fig. 2. What could he want with five rows of teeth ? It is almost
dangerous to run one's finger over them ; the points are like knives,
the jagged edges along the finely-modulated curves of each three-
cornered tooth are so keenly sharp.

There is a sort of hinge in the middle of both upper and lower jaw,
and from this centre the teeth point different ways, gradually dimin-
isliing to a mere root. Each is a brightly polished piece of ivory, and
each little jag of the graduated saws is exquisitely finished, and varies
according to its position. The mouth in question only measures nine
and eleven inches across, and is about two feet round, but in a full-
grown monster the jaws are wide enough to pass over a man's shoul-
ders without touching them. The snout is rounded, with very small
eyes almost at the top of his head.

The shark is the scavenger of the sea, the equivalent of the hyena
on land, and he swallows whole whatever ofiiil is flung overboard from
the ships — bolting it without any action of the teeth, unless when
his prey is too large to go conveniently down his throat, and he breaks
it up as it passes.

The stomach-coats are extremely strong, and some action seems to
go on in it to prepare the food for the gastric juice, as a substitute for
the mastication with which other warm-blooded animals reduce it to a
pulp in their mouth.

He is so fearless in his voracity, and follows a ship so pertinaciously,
that his habits are better known than most of the sea-denizens, and
familiarity does not certainly in this instance breed either respect or
afiection.

"With the passengers on board the merchant-vessels to and from
Australia, shark-fishing is a favorite pastime. One of these, lately

VOL. IT. — 6

66 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

caught, was twenty feet long. " Our ship was at anchor, and I was
holding a line over the, side, when the rope began to quiver. I felt
that I had hooked a large fish, and, pulling it cautiously, a large shark
came to the surface. I called out loudly, when all the passengers
came to my help. He struggled, however, so violently, lashing the
water with his tail, and trying to bite the hook asunder, that we were
obliged to keep dipping his head under vcater, and then haul him up
two or three feet so that the water ran down into his stomacli. We
went on repeating this till he was nearly drowned, then sending a
running bowline down the rope by which he was caught, and making
it taut under his hindermost fin, we clapped the line round the
steam-winch, and turned the steam on. Some then hauled his tail
up, while all available hands dragged at the other line which held his

The Ja-w of the Ii;fant Shake.

head. As soon as we got him on board, he sent about three feet of the
ship's bulwarks out by a lash of his tremendous tail — which was cut
off by the boatswain with a hatcliet, while a dozen of us with bowie-
knives finished him and opened his maw. Inside we found six large
snakes, two dozen lobsters, two empty quai't-bottles, a sheepskin and
horns, and the shank-bones of beef which the cook had thrown over-
board two days before. The liver filled two large wash-deck tubs,
and when the cook melted it down we got ten gallons of oil, which
sold at Brisbane at 4s. 6(7. a gallon." When his remains were thrown

THE SHOVEL-NOSED SHARK. 6j

over the side, they were as usual very soon disposed of by his affec-
tionate Mends and relations, waiting near, and delighted to profit by
the good fortune. The flesh is not bad eating when young.

The shark is always attended by a small blue pilot-fish, which
swims about five yards in front of him, and evidently guides him and
warns him of danger, his unwieldy size and length making it difficult
for him to turn. The pilot-fish appears to do his kindly offices from
pure friendship, with no filthy lucre of gain ; but he probably benefits
in some way by the leavings of his great ally, or the small fry which
gather round a dead prey. There is another (strictly speaking) par-
asite which attends the shark — the sucker-fish, about sixteen inches
long, which fastens itself on to him by a curious patch at the back of
its head, not unlike the sole of an India-rubber shoe : this adheres with
such force that a strong man can hardly drag the fish away when it
has thus fastened itself to the deck. Sometimes twelve or fifteen of
them may be seen hanging on to one shark. Probably they find it
convenient to seek their food, thus traveling, as it were, on their own
carriage, free of cost or trouble, and rushing through the water at a
rate which their unassisted exertions would certainly never attain.

Shabks' Teeth.

But, on the other hand, they must endure some very hard quarters
of an hour, when their great friend gets into trouble, helplessly hang-
ing on to his fortunes as they are.

The perils of the sea are certainly doubled in the regions where
these dreadful jaws are to be found. And the certainty of such a
death was one of the most touching parts of the simple heroism shown
by the soldiers on board the Birkenhead. As is well known, she
was a transport-vessel employed to take out detachments to varioiis
regiments in South Africa, with the wives and children. She struck
on a pointed rock near Simon's Bay, and it was soon found impossible
to save her. The men were drawn up on deck by their commanding
officer, and not a man stirred from his place as the women and children
were put into the few boats and sent off in safety to the land. Then,
standing as firmly as if on parade, with the sharks swimming around,
the whole body of men, with their officers, went down in the ill-fated
ship, very few of them being able to reach the shore.

There arc more gallant things done in quiet, unobserved moments,
and obscure corners of the earth, even than before the enemy. It

68 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

was far more difficult thus in cold blood to face a dreadful death, with
no excitement or sympathy from without, than to fight a whole array
of cannon in a Balaklava charge.

A young engineer-officer, some years back, was stationed in New
Zealand, in a very out-of-the-way district, far from the settled coun-
try. He was a gallant fellow, full of high aims and objects ; besides
which he rode well, shot well, could manage a boat, and swim admira-
bly, and had attained a twofold influence over the natives by his fear-
less courage and his noble nature.

One stormy winter's afternoon, the sea running excessively high,
and a tremendous surf over the bar, a ship was seen laboring into the
roadstead of the small village near which he lived ; she was hoisting
signals of distress, and was believed to be an expected immigrant-ves-
sel, and therefore with women and children on board.

The weather was so bad that there seemed no chance of her out-
living the gale, and not a sailor on the shore would lend a hand to
help, when Captain Symonds proposed to man a boat. Perhaps it
may be said that they knew the perils to be encountered better than a
landsman, however expert. Captain Symonds then called upon the
Maories to join him, and they immediately followed him into a risk of
life which the Englishmen refused to encounter, and for the sake of
sufferers not of their own race or country.

The boat pushed off; the wind was on the shore, the surf running
in violently, and a cross-sea made it more dangerous ; the bay, too,
was known to be full of sharks. Still, however, the little boat held on
till within a few cables' lengths of the distressed vessel, which was
watching them anxiously, when the tremendous heave of a wave struck
her side and she was capsized. Captain Symonds was seen swimming
undauntedly toward the shore, holding on by an oar, but he was swal-
lowed up by the sharks before he had made any way. Two of the
gallant black fellows escaped. The vessel perished in the gale.

It required a far higher kind of courage to face such a death, on
that dark stormy winter's evening, in the attempt to rescue unknown
passengers on board an unknown ship, than to storm the worst breach
ever surmounted in war, surrounded by one's comrades in the heat of
a battle raging in one's sight. The simple doing of God's work at the
moment when it was required, with no interior bargaining as to the
" worth while " of the sacrifice, in this obscure corner of the earth (as
it then was), by this young fellow, with his aspirations, his love of life,
his healthy longing after distinction, and the distinguished career open
to him, made his death as gallant an act as can be found even in the
lono- record of such deeds to be told of our English soldiers and sailors,
the largest portion of which are scarcely heard of at the time, and are
forgotten quickly afterward.

The sharks are certainly not heroic themselves, but they are the
cause of a great deal of heroism in others. — Good Things.

HEALTH AND COMFORT IX HOUSE-BUILDING. 6g
HEALTH AXD COMFORT m HOUSE-BTJILDING.'

By Dr. JOHN W. HAYWAED.

AS implied in the title, my subject is not house-building itself, as such,
but only certain arrangements for health and comfort therein.
House-building has at least two aspects — architectural and sanitary.
The former belongs exclusively to your own profession, but the latter
comes within the sphere of the medical profession also. It is the archi-
tect's province to provide dwellings for the people, and to see that
they are made protective and safe ; and it is part of the medical man's
province to help to make them healthy and comfortable. In this re-
spect the medical profession has lately been very forcibly reminded of
its duty by Mr. George Atchison, who said : " No greater benefit could
be conferred on mankind than the teaching them the necessity of ven-
tilation, but that lesson is more likely to be learned if it come from
the doctor than from the architect. . . . Until the faculty can convince
the people that their life is shortened and serious diseases ai'e brought
on by want of ventilation, architects have no chance."

House-building being the point in which the duties of the architect
and the physician meet, it becomes necessary that architects and medi-
cal men should occasionally discuss together the requirements involved
in this art. Much public and much mutual benefit would, I am sure,
result from such a practice. The object I have now in view is to in-
vite your consideration of a few conditions of house-building that I
deem of particular importance in a sanitary and medical point of view.

In building a dwelling-house, the conditions I deem of essential im-
portance are the following :

1. That the house shall be so placed as to be as much as possible
exposed to the fresh air and sunlight ; hecaicse fresh air and sunlight
are essential to the health, and growth, and life of the occupants. The
site, therefore, should be rather elevated, if not absolutely, at all events
in comparison with the surrounding objects.

2. That it shall be absolutely free from damp; because a damp
house is a most potent, and active, and ever-present cause of disease,
especially of rheumatism, neuralgia, colds, coughs, consumption, and
such like. The site, therefore, if not naturally dry, must be rendered
so by means of asphalt or cement, throughout the foundation, and
the roof, and gutters, and drainage must be perfect. All the house-
drains should terminate outside the house on an open grid or trap ;
that is, they should be cut off from the street drain, and they should
be ventilated by having a pipe run up from every soil-pipe and every
bend in the house.

' From a paper read at the Royal Institute of British Architects, Liverpool.

70 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

3. That it shall be so placed that the direct rays of the sun shall
have free admission into the living apartments ; because the sun's rays
impart a healthy and invigorating quality to the air, and stimulate the
vitality of human beings as they do those of plants, and without
sunlight human beings, as well as jjlants, would sicken and die. The
aspect^ therefore, should be southeast.

4. That the lookout from the living apartments shall be cheerful,
lively, and interesting ; because much of the time of the family must
be spent indoors, and a cheerful lookout is as necessary to render in-
doors attractive and even endurable in the daytime as society is in the
evening. The pi'ospect^ therefore, should be as extensive and varied
as possible.

5. The apartments shoiald admit into themselves a great quantity
of light ; because light is essential to the health and vigor of the in-
mates. The xoindoio openings should, therefore, be large ; but, as the
greater the surface of glass, the colder the rooms in winter, and the
hotter in summer,

6. The window-openings shoiild be well splayed, as well outside as
inside, so as to do with as little glass as possible.

7. The ici7idoics should be so arranged as to admit the direct rays
of the sun at the times when the apartments are in use ; because it is
when the apartments are occupied that they require the cheering and
invigorating influence of the sun's rays. For instance, the breakfast-
room window should admit the early morning rays ; the dining-room
windows, one should admit the morning rays for breakfast-time, and
the other the noon rays for dinner-time ; and the drawing-room win-
dows, one should admit the morning rays for callers, and another the
evening rays for company ; and the bedroom windows should, if pos-
sible, admit the early morning rays.

8. The interior of the apartments should provide wall-space for
the arrangement of furniture ; because, without wall-space no manner
of fui-nishing a room can make it either handsome, elegant, or comfort-
able. The windoics, therefore, should be few, and they and the door
and fireplace should be so arranged as to provide as much wall-space
as possible.

9. In the bedrooms, the window, door, and fireplace, should be so
arranged that the bed can be fixed entirely out of the draught, and
not have to be placed between the window and door, the window and
firej^lace, or the door and fireplace ; because a cold draught playing on
persons while sleeping is often dangerous to life, and always destruc-
tive of comfort.

10. The doors of the apartments, besides not admitting cold air
when shut, ought not to admit cold air when open ; because the draught
thus produced not only destroys the comfort of the apartment, but
produces lumbago, rheumatism, neuralgia, etc., in the occupants. The
doo7'S should, therefore, open out of a warmed lobby or corridor.

HEALTH AND COMFORT IN HOUSE-BUILDING. 71

11. The apartments should provide a large cubic space for air;
hecause plenty of air is essential to the health and comfort of the in-
mates. The apartments should therefore be as large and lofty as pos-
sible.

12. The apartments, besides providing a large cubic space for air,
should also provide for the escape of the foul and admission of fresh
air ; hecause, however large an apartment is, the air is sure to become
deteriorated and contaminated when the apartment is occupied by
living beings. There should, therefore, be tico special openings to
each apartment, one for the escape of the foul air, and another for the
admission of fresh air. There must be two openings, an outlet and an
inlet. It is useless to make one without the other ; it is useless to
make an outlet unless there is also an inlet, for no air can go out if
none comes in. This is a self-evident fact ; still it is very frequently
disregarded in attemping to ventilate apartments. There will, for in-
stance, be a perforated or louvered pane in the window, a perforated
brick or grating in the wall, an Arnott's ventilator in the chimney-
breast, an opening above the gas, with a tube leading to a grating
in the wall or into the chimney smoke-flue, or some other contrivance
for the escape of the foul air, while there is no opening at all for the
admission of fresh air; and the doors and windows are made to fit as
tightly as possible, and even list put round them to prevent any pos-
sibility of air getting in by them, as though that could go out which
never got in ! In these cases, if the outlet act at all as an outlet, it
must obtain its supply down the chimney — hence a smoking chimney ;
but generally, instead of acting as an outlet, it becomes an inlet to
supply the current up the chimney, and always so when the fire is
burning — hence the cold draught so generally complained of from the
ordinary ventilators, and hence the reason that ordinary ventilators
are so generally closed up in disappointment and disgust, and ventila-
tion decried as a nuisance, failure, and farce.

13. These openings providing for the escape of foul air and the ad-
mission of fresh air should, both of them, be special and permanent,
and altogether independent of every other arrangement of the house ;
such as opening the windows, doors, chimneys, eto. ; hecause the
escape of foul air and the admission of fresh air are most needed when,
in consequence of the coldness of the external air, we close the doors
and shut the windows. Special ventilation is most needed in winter,
in cold, frosty weather, with an east wind blowing, and when we are
very careful to shut the doors and windows, and adopt every other
means we can to exclude the out-of-doors air, particularly of sitting at
table for meals, or round the fire for evening entertainment.

14. The outlet should take the foul air from the upper part of the
room; hecause the foul air, being more heated, is specifically lighter
than the fresh air, and so rises to the upper part of the room. The
outlet should, therefore, be in or near the ceiling.

72 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

15. The outlet should be effectually protected against any possibil-
ity of back-draught — indeed, it should have a considerable amount of
suction ; because any liability to back-draught is quite incompatible
with an efficient outlet. The outlet, therefore, should not communi-
cate directly with the out-of-doors air, but, by means of a tube or flue,
should pass through some permanently heated contrivance. If the
outlet go directly to the out-of-doors air — as, for instance, a tube from
over the gas to a grating in the outer wall — there will certainly be
back-draught ; and so also will there be if the tube lead to an opening
into the chimney-flue ; at any rate, when the fire is not burning, and
particularly if the room-door be also open, and most certainly if there
be also a strong draught up the chimney of another room opening out
of the same lobby, as, for instance, a dining-room or a kitchen. To
prevent any possibility of back-draught the outlet should be provided
with some means of constant suction, and, the more thoroughly to re-
move the foul air, the more suction the better, provided there is also
an ample inlet for fresh air: if not amj^le, the suction would produce
a smoking chimney and draughts from around the windows and doors,
and perhaps draw in air from foundation and drains. The necessity
for this suction is generally acknowledged, and it is sometimes at-
tempted to be gained by carrying the tube before mentioned up a
little way in the smoke-flue, and even by bending it down and round
the fireplace. But a fatal objection to this plan is, that it is quite in-
operative for the greater part of the year, and is of no use whatever
unless the fire is burning ; when the fire is not burning it may, indeed,
become an inlet, and then an additional objection is, that a back-
draught down the smoke-flue carries the soot into the room, to the
spoiling of the ceiling, paper, and furniture. And, to be really effect-
ual, the suction referred to must be constant and pen^ianent, and oper-
ative both winter and summer, and day and night ; and whether the
apartment is occupied or not, and whether the fire is burning or not.
The outlet must, therefore, pass through some contrivance for keeping
it constantly and permanently heated.

IG. The inlet should admit only warmed air ; because the admis-
sion of cold air would produce dangerous draughts, and these special-
ly directed toward the part of the room occupied by the inmates in
cold weather, viz., the neighborhood of the fireplace. The inlet should,
therefore, open out of a warm lobby or corridor.

17. The outlet should be sufficiently large to carry off all the foul
air at the time when the apartment is being put to its maximum of
use ; because it is just at that time the outlet is most needed, its ca-
pacity for other times could be regulated by a valve. The outlet for
a dining-room, for instance, should be calculated for a dinner or supper
party, and that of a dravring-room for a ball, conversazione, or soiree,
and should be sufficiently capacious to carry off, at the very least,
fifteen cubic feet per minute for each occupant. The outlet should,

HEALTH AND COMFORT IN HOUSE-BUILDING. 73

ho-wever, be considerably less than the inlet, or it will produce
draughts.

18. The inlet, on the contrary, should be as capacious as possible ;
because it has to provide not only for the outlet in the ceiling, but
also for the chimney, and that when the fire is burning and requiring
for its supply alone from 600 to 1,000 cubic feet per minute. Indeed,
the inlet should be able to admit more air than can possibly find its
way out by both these outlets, otherwise it will produce draughts.
When the air can get out of an apartment more rapidly than it can
come in, there are sure to be currents ; but when more air can come
in than can get out — when the air' has to go out under pressure, so to
speak — there will be little or no current. And the inlet should be
through the wall of the opposite side of the room to the fireplace ;
because the fire will then draw the air into and across the room, and
thus cause it to circulate throughout the whole of the apartment. K
the fireplace be on the same side as the inlet, it will not only not as-
sist to circulate the air throughout the apartment, but it will prevent
it from so circulating by drawing it directly up the smoke-flue ; and
it should, moreover, be split up into as many divisions as possible, so
as to distribute the supply along the whole side of the room, and thus
assist to prevent any perceptible current ; and this will be further
helped by having the openings through the cornice instead of through
the skirting, because then the fresh air will be the warmest that is in
the corridor, and it will also have to descend through the warmer air
of the room before it can come in contact with the persons therein.
When through the skirting, it is the coldest air of the corridor ; it
comes through the coldest air of the room, and it comes first to the
part of the body where it can least be borne, viz., the feet.

In this country (England) it is necessary to provide specially for
ventilation. In consequence of the nature of our climate, the doors or
windows can very seldom be left open, even in the day, and never in
the night, without risk. Indeed, no direct admission of the external
air into the apartments of the house can be endured during at least
eight or nine months of the year — in fact, the great prevalence of cold,
searching, and shriveling east wind renders such an admission abso-
lutely dangerous ; so that no kind of arrangement of openings directly
to the out-of-doors air, such as drawing down the window-sash, per-
forated bricks or gratings in the wall, perforated or louvered square in
the window, the wire-gauze at the top of the window-sash, patent ven-
tilators, or any other contrivance that communicates directly with the
out-of-doors air, can possibly answer for ventilation in a country like
ours. In this country, where eight or nine out of the twelve months
in the year are cold, windy, and winterly, houses should be built with
reference to winter, and not with reference to summer ; and they
should be planned and built with the object of keeping out the cold
air and not with the object of letting it in ; ventilation shcflild be pro-

74 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

videcl for specially ; and in making this provision it should be borne
in mind that we are living at the bottom of an ocean of air, and that
the same manipulation is required as though we were living at the
bottom of an ocean of water, and were endeavoring to make it come
in at the bottom of the house and go out at the top in a continuous
stream.

From the foregoing remarks it will be seen that I maintain that
ventilation is the great and main necessity of house-building; and
that, whatever else may be left undone, this should be attended to ;
and, whatever else may be left imperfect, this should be made perfect
and complete ; and that it should include the whole house ; and should
be self-acting and inexpensive. It should, I repeat, be perfect and
complete, include the whole house, and be self-acting and inexpen-
sive.

Ventilation is the point for discussion between the architectural
apd medical professions, for it is here in particular that their duties
meet and combine ; the education, knowledge, and experience t>f both
professions are wanted here. However much the medical man may
be impressed with the absolute necessity of rooms and houses being
ventilated, he cannot himself provide it — this must be done by the
architect ; and, on the other hand, the architect cannot be expected
to provide flues and tubes, which involve exti-a expense, except under
the certainty that they are absolutely necessary and required arrange-
ments involved in the plan of every house. But there is a third party
interested in this subject, namely, the public. The public are, after
all, the "yea" and "nay" in this matter; it is, indeed, for them that
these arrangements are to be made, and they are the paymasters.
Whatever extra cost is involved, it is the public that will have to pay
it ; and it is of little use for a doctor to prove the necessity, or for an
architect to design the arrangements, unless the public be persuaded
to adopt them, and pay the cost involved. That the public can be
thus persuaded I have no doubt, but that this will take some time I
am equally ready to admit. It will take some time thoroughly to edu-
cate the public into the absolute necessity for special provisions for
ventilation, because they have hitherto been left under the impression
that special arrangements for ventilation are unnecessary and super-
fluous, or that they are impracticable, or at least incompatible with
warmth and comfort ; and I am sorry to have to add that they have
been encouraged in this ifnpression by many architects and engineers,
and that medical men have not protested with sufficient force and in-
telligence. Medical men have gone on from generation to generation
silently mourning the resulting evils of the want of eflicient and prac-
ticable means of ventilation, and architects have continued to design
houses with very little regard to these absolutely necessary provi-
sions ; while the public have submitted, and, if they have not thought
it was all right, have at least thought that the evil was quite beyond

HYPNOTISM IN ANIMALS. 75

their remedying, because every amateur (if not every professional) at-
tempt hitherto made had only ended in failure, disappointment, and
loss of monev. — The Builder.

HYPNOTISM IK ANIMALS.

Bt Peof. JOSEPH CZERMAK.

TEANSLATED FEOil THE GEEMAK, BY OLAEA N. HAMMOND.

Lecture Second.

YESTERDAY we proceeded far enough in our study of Kircher's
experiment, relative to the imagination of the hen, to establish
the fact of the usefulness of the string and chalk-line as necessary parts
of the procedure. Indeed, the stretching out of the neck and the de-
pression of the head are the only circumstances left which make any
decided impression on us. And, so ftxr as we can see, the gentle ex-
tension of certain parts of the brain and spinal cord which is produced,
appears to be the cause of the remarkable effect which ensues. Never-
theless, we must not be too hasty in forming our conclusions ; we miist
not, as the unlearned do, remain standing at an " event viewed un-
equally." * For, however apparently useless the string and chalk-line
may be, it is yet possible that they are not entirely without influence ;
and, on the other hand, the extension of the neck and depression of
•the head are by no means established as necessary circumstances to
the perfection of the result. So, to-day, as already announced, we will
resume and complete our investigations, and, at the close, I will en-
deavor to show what relation the whole subject has to natural science,
to " spiritualism," etc.

And I must request you to dismiss from your minds the hypothesis
that the extension of the neck and depression of the head have any
especial significance, for I have been entirely unable to produce in
pigeons the hypnotic effect which so readily ensues in hens, although I
proceeded in as nearly as possible a similar manner. On the contrary,
repeated experiments have shown that the unavoidable pressure ex-
erted upon the animal, as it is held, is of primary importance, and
that the apparently insignificant chalk-line is undoubtedly of some
moment. It is frequently the case that a hen, which, for a minute, has
been in a motionless state, caused by simply extending the neck and
depressing the head, awakes and flies away, but, on being caught
again immediately, can be placed once more in that condition of leth-
argy, if we place the animal in a squatting position, and overcome with

' By this phrase Prof. Czermak (pronounced Tshermak) means those cases of ebser-
vation in which the eyes and cars perform correctly, but the perception is at fault. The
reporter tells the truth, but what he reports never actually took place. An event viewed
unequally is one that has not been thoroughly tested.

76 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

gentle force the resistance of the muscles, by firmly placing the hand
upon its back. During the slow and measured suppression one often
perceives an extremely remarkable position of the head and neck,
which are left entirely free. The head remains as if held by an invis-
ible hand in its proper place, while the neck is stretched out of pro-
portion, and the body by degrees is pushed downward.

If the animal is left thus entirely free, it remains for a minute or
so in this peculiar condition, with wide-open, staring eyes. (The lect-
urer here caused a hen to be brought, which he placed in this remark-
able position by simply stretching out the neck and pressing down
the head ; the bird, having awakened, gave signs of returning to the
same state when it was placed in a squatting position, without moving
bead or neck.) Here the actual circumstance is only the consequence
of the emotion which the nerves of the skiu excite, and the gentle force
which overcomes the animal's resistance. Certainly, the creature a
short time before had been in this condition of immobility, and might
have retained some special inclination to fall back into the same, al-
though the awakening, flight, and recapture, together with the refresh-
ment given to the nervous system, are intermediate circumstances.
Similar experiments, where the influence and efiect of the pressure
which is placed on the animal's muscles are manifested upon the cuta-
neous nerves, are best made upon small birds.

To bird-fanciers, it has been a long-known fact that one can rob
gold-finches, canary-birds, etc., of the powers of their nervous systems,
so that they remain, motionless for a short time, by simply holding
them firmly for a moment, and then letting them go.

These experiments, which I will endeavor to perform before you,
are particularly striking, on account of the vivacity of the timid ani-
mals. Yet I must remind you of a possible failure, due to the unusual
circumstances of noise and numbers which may have a disturbing in-
fluence on these excitable little creatures.

Here in my hand is a timid bird, just brought from market. If I
place it on its back, and hold its head with my left hand, keeping it
still for a few seconds, it will lie perfectly motionless after I have re-
moved my hands, as if charmed, breathing heavily, and without making
any attempt to change its position or to fly away. (Two of the birds
were treated in this manner, without efiect, but the third, a siskin, fell
into a sleeping condition, and remained completely immovable on
its back, until pushed with a glass tube, when it awoke and flew ac-
tively around the room.)

Also, in a sitting position, with the head held a little to the back,
the birds fall into this sleeping condition, in spite of their open eyes ;
indeed, I have often noticed that the birds under these circumstances
close their eyes for a few minutes, and even a quarter of an hour, and
are more or less fast asleep.

I cannot omit to notice, with many thanks, that our assiduous nat-

HYPNOTISM IN ANIMALS. 77

uralist, Herr Geupel-White, has most kindly placed at our disposal the
rich material his zoological garden affords, to assist us in these experi-
ments.

My former experiment with the swan was also performed in Herr
Geupel-White's garden. In the experiments with the small birds, the
condition of immobility, which can change to actual sleep, is only
caused by the effect of the impression made in the animals, through
touching the skin and overpowering the resisting muscles. You will
see this in the continuation of our experiment. That, however, the ex-
citing of certain cutaneous nerves alone changes the normal functional
capacities, and calls forth a singular state of stupidity, is proved by
the following highly-interesting experiment with a frog, which Dr.
Lewissohn, in Berlin, has suggested, and most thoroughly investigated:

If one places a frog on its back, it does not remain in this unnatural
position for an instant, biit, on the contrary, turns itself over and
escapes. This you may see yourselves, when I endeavor to place this
frog on its back. But please notice the astonishing result if we tie its
two fore-legs with a string. (The lecturer tied threads around each
of the frog's fore-legs, drew the threads tightly, and laid the animal,
as before, on its back.) You see that the frog, breathing heavily but
otherwise quite motionless, now lies on its back, and does not make
the slightest attempt to escape, even when I endeavor to move it. It is
as though its small amount of reasoning power had been charmed
away, or else that it slept with open eyes ; an analogous condition to
that which we saw in the crabs, hens, and little birds. The only dif-
ference is, that the actual connection of the phenomena is much clearer.
Now, I press upon the cutaneoxis nerves of the frog, while I loosen
and remove the threads on the fore-legs. Still the animal remains
motionless upon its back, in consequence of some remaining after-effect ;
at last, however, it returns to itself, turns over, and quickly escapes.

That it is here a matter of restraint upon the nervous centres, in
consequence of the pressure on the sensitive cutaneous nerves, Lewis-
sohn has already proved. In this experiment, the impulse of motion
on the nervous fibres, which proceeds from the so-called motory centre
of the brain and spinal cord, remains quite capable of action on one
side, while, as regards the other side, the remarkable condition of stu-
pidity will no longer happen, if we have divided the cutaneous nerves
before tightening the threads.

Sometimes it is possible to make the frog lie motionless on its back
without the threads ; but this proves nothing against the soundness
of Dr. Lewissohn's results.

But let us return to our old experimentum mirahlle^ of the hen.
According to the analogy of the last experiments with the frog, the
tying together of the hen's feet, although not necessary, may con-
tribute something to the effect in Kircher's experiment, not only by
* Admirable experiuient.

78 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

keeping the animal firm and quiet, but also Toy pressing upon the cuta-
neous nerves. In order to imderstand the whole subject, we must go
further and adduce other facts which bear upon it.

The most interesting part of our investigation still remains, which,
as I remarked beforehand, will lead us to the doubtful regions of
mesmerism and somnambulism. And the question arises again : Has
the apparently unnecessary chalk-line in Kircher's experiment any sig-
nificance ; and, if so, what ?

I have already mentioned that I did not succeed in placing pigeons
in this motionless state by holding them firmly in my hand, and press-
ing their heads and necks gently upon the table, as I did the hens.

I therefore endeavored to treat the pigeons as I did the little birds,
that is, I held them with a thumb placed on each side of the head,
which I bent over a little, while the other hand held the body gently
pressed down uj^on the table.

Even this treatment, which has such an effect on little bu-ds, did
not seem to succeed at first with the pigeons. Almost always they
flew away as soon as I liberated them and entirely removed my hands.
I remarked, however, that the short time, during which the pigeons
remained quietly in my fingers, increased visibly, and lengthened sev-
eral minutes, when I removed the finger of the hand which held the
head, only removing the hand very little, or else not at all. The hand
holding the body could have been removed much sooner without doing
any harm.

While I zealously pursued this trace of new events, I found, to my
astonishment, that it led me to the observation of the pigeon's atten-
tion, and the fixing of its look upon my finger placed before its eyes.
It is this movement which, until now, has not been taken into our
consideration, and is the critical period which ia of such great im-
portance as a link between the phenomena we have noticed and others
to which we are gradually approaching. In order to determine the
matter still more clearly, I tried the experiment on a pigeon which
I had clasped firmly by the body in my left hand, but whose neck
and head were perfectly free, and held one finger of my right hand
firmly before the top of its beak — and what did I see ? The first
pigeon with which I made this attempt remained rigid and motion-
less, as if bound, for several minutes, before the outstretched fore-
finger of my right hand !

Yes, I could take my left hand, with which I had held the bird, and
again touch the pigeon without waking it up ; the animal remained in
the same position while I held my outstretched finger still pointing
toward the beak. (The lecturer demonstrated this experiment in the
most successful manner with a pigeon which was brought to him.)

I have repeated this striking experiment on a number of pigeons,
yet I do not know whether suitable animals are frequently found, for,
of course, it is to be understood that the experiment cannot always

HYPNOTISM IX ANIMALS. 79

entirely succeed, as it concerus essentially the concentration of the
pigeon's attention, and the fixing of its look. Individual, inward re-
lations, as well as outward conditions, must necessarily exercise some
disturbing influence, whether the animal will give itself up to the re-
quisite exertions of certain parts of its brain with more or less inclina-
tion, or otherwise. You then understand why apparently little cir-
cumstances may be responsible for the result of an experiment in
which this critical moment plays a part.

We often see, for example, how a pigeon endeavors to escape
from confinement by a quick turning of its head from side to side. In
following these singular and characteristic movements of the head
and neck, with the finger held before the bird, one either gains his
point, or else makes the pigeon so perplexed and excited that it at
last becomes quiet, so that, if it is held firmly by the body and head,
it can be forced gently down upon the table. It is as Schopenhauer
says of sleeping, " The brain must bite." I will also mention here, by-
the-way, that a tame i:»arrot, which I have in my house, can be placed
in this sleeping condition by simply holding the finger steadily before
the top of its beak.

But let me hasten, gentlemen, to say to you that, in the remarkable
and singular influence which the holding of the finger exercises on
pigeons, the influence of the mj^thical agents may not be removed ;
agents which may come from the organization of the experimenter,
and, perhaps, spring from the outstretched finger. Nevertheless, a
glass tube, a cork, a small wax-candle, or any other equally lifeless
substance, placed directly on the top of the pigeon's bill, has the same
magical efiect as when the human finger is used. We must only be
careful that the animal be placed so that its attention is fixed for some
time on the object. I have seen pigeons sit motionless for some min-
utes, with open eyes, after I had placed a lucifer-matcb, or a wax-light,
on the top of their bills.

Often, with hens, these experiments succeed in the most astonish-
ing manner. I have repeatedly seized hens with both hands by the
body so that their heads and necks were quite free, and forced them
gently against a pedestal on which a glass tube was placed, so that it
just touched the top of the bill. The animal, when left perfectly free,
remained gazing fixedly at the glass tube for more than a minute.
The same thing happened when a cork stopper was used, instead of
the glass tube.

Finally, I will mention that with the hens I often hung a piece of
twine, or a small piece of wood, directly over their crests, so that the
end fell before the eyes. I mention this experiment especially, be-
cause, when performed, the hens not only remained perfectly motion-
less, but closed their eyes, and slept with their heads sinking until
they came in contact with the table. Before falling asleep, the hens'
heads can be either pressed down or raised up, and they will remain in

8o TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTELY,

this position as if they were pieces of wax. That is, however, a symp-
tom of a cataleptic condition, such as is seen in himaan beings under
pathological conditions of the nervous system.

After I had discovered the events which I have just communicated
to you concerning the hens and pigeons, two things were clear to me :
1. That the drawing of the chalk-line in Kircher's experiment was of
some significance. The hand which draws the line, and the line itself,
are transferred to an object in which the animal's look and attention
are placed, through which a marvelous condition of certain parts of its
nervous system is called forth, accompanied by cataleptic phenomena,
and which can change to sleep.

2. That it produces soporific phenomena in animals, as has long
been conjectured, but, until now, never investigated or proved ; a pe-
culiar and mysterious state, resembling sleep, accompanied by cata-
leptic appearances and a change in the nervous system. This can
be produced in many men by a simple fixing of the look on some small
object, and through a concentration of the will.

It is well known that, in the year 1851, Mr. Braid, a Scotch surgeon,
established in Manchester, who was present at the mesmeric exhibi-
tions of Lafontaine, was first struck with the idea that these phenom-
ena, proclaimed as the effect of a magnetic flluid, were only a natural
consequence of the fixed look and entire abstraction of the attention,
which present themselves under the monotonous manipulation of the
magnetizer. Mr. Braid proved in his experiments the entire dispensa-
bleness of a so-called magnetizer, and his supposed secret agents, or
fluids, produced through certain manipulations ; he taught the sub-
jects of the experiments to place themselves in this sleeping con-
dition, by simply making them gaze fixedly at some object for a long
time with strict attention and unmoved gaze. It is therefore clear
that this condition of the nerves, caused by the steady look and at-
traction of attention, in one part of the brain, brings the other parts
into action with it and changes the functions, to whose normal activity
the phenomena of the will are united. This is the actual, natural,
physiological connection of this mysterious appearance. It only re-
mains to us now to ascertain which portions of the brain first and
secondly become altered, and in what these changes consist.

According to Braid, for example, on one occasion, in the presence of
800 persons, ten out of fourteen full-grown men were placed in a sleep-
ing condition in this way. All began the experiment at the same time ;
the former with their eyes fixed upon a projecting cork, placed secure-
ly on their foreheads ; the others, at their own will, gazed steadily at
certain points in the direction of the audience. In the course of ten
minutes the eyelids of these ten persons had involuntarily closed.
With some, consciousness remained ; others were in catalepsy, and
entirely insensible to being stuck with needles, and others, on awaken-
ing, knew absolutely nothing of what had taken place during their

HYPNOTISM IN ANIMALS. 81

sleep. Even more ; three persons of the audience fell asleep without
Braid's knowledge, after following the given direction of fixing their
eyes steadily on some point.

Braid's experiments, which are designated as the beginning of a
scientific investigation of extremely complicated nervous phenomena,
did not find at first the esteem and homage due to them, and grad-
ually sank into oblivion. This is explained by the fact that they were
associated with mesmerism ; and Lafontaine, whose " magnetic " exhi-
bitions were the first cause of Braid's investigations, protested, not
without some animosity, that " hypnotism," or " Braidism," was iden-
tical with his " mesmerism." Braid himself, in the course of his ex-
periments, seems to have lost his former scientific force as an investi-
gator. Then, in 1848, Mr. Grimes, the American, with his "Electro-
Biology," appeared, and took up the intellectual epidemic of mediums
and spiritual apparitions, which we witnessed in astonishment, and
saw the whole world more or less impressed by it. It was, naturally,
then, not at all surprising that hypnotism, or Braidism, remained al-
most unknown to science. Only once it attracted scientific attention
and interest, and then only for a short time. This was in 1859, in
December, after Velpeau and Broca, two well-known French surgeons
of La Societe de Chirurgie, in Paris, caused the most immense sensa-
tion by placing twenty-four women in a sleeping condition by Braid's
method, and then performing sm-gical operations without causing them
the slightest pain.

Then much was said in the journals about "hypnotism" in hens,
the description of which had already been found in one of Father
Kircher's works. Although characteristic enough for those days, yet,
to my knowledge, no one has been much impressed by the investiga-
tion of Kircher's experimenticm mirahile, for it treats of a real state
of hypnotism ; and, with animals, every one feels safe from all thoughts
of deception, but yet can bring into aj^plication all physiological means
of investigation, in order to penetrate the mysteries of the phenomena.
This proof of the actual appearance of hypnotism in animals is the
scientific result of my above-communicated observations and experi-
ments^ which I intend to continue lapon mammals, on which I have
jiot yet experimented.

These, however, have still another interest for us. They have
strikingly demonstrated how difficult it is to obtain actual facts from
" events viewed unequally." They have still further shown us what
insight, what strength of demonstration, and sharpness of criticism,
scientific investigations demand ; and, finally, they have made known
to every discerning person how little weight should be attached to the
reports of the most honorable and upriglit people, when these people
are not entirely penetrated with the idea of the exact nature of the
investigation.

This never-to-be-neglected foresight, in the estimation of reports

VOL. IV. — 6

82 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

and testimonies relative to such actual phenomena as appear to ex-
ceed the usual events of Nature, is especially justified when, in the
sleeping condition of the animal, every trace of visible deception is
removed ; how much more so are doubt, reserve, and refusal, an irre-
fragable law and duty, when it treats of phenomena which, on one
hand, are a scorn to science, and, on the other, not only give rise to
suspicion, but are an actual visible deception ! This last double char-
acter marks thousands of phenomena which eyes and ears have con-
sidered real in mesmerism, clairvoyance, spiritualism, etc.

In the mean while, strict natural science never decides a j^riori,
and the indicated character would never prevent science from drawing
phenomena of such a character into the range of its investigation
and trial. And yet, the science of our day is placed, in every respect,
opposite to spiritualism and its relations. Are not the passionate
complaints and reproaches to which the representatives of science,
and even science itself, are exposed, from the countless fanatics and
believers of this mysterious faith, quite unjustifiable?

By no means ! It will be easy, after all you have seen and heard
here, to justify the bearing of science. I considered myself unable to
withdraw from this ungrateful task, because it is a duty of my especial
profession to prepare a true explanation, and because my previous
scientific research ha^ led me to the region where superstition, preju-
dice, credulity, and even worse, absolutely rule. I called the task
"ungrateful," because one finds power's in opposition against which,
as Schiller says, " the gods themselves struggle in vain,"

They who are occupied with the questionable regions, which are
made attractive and ensnaring through wonderful and mysterious
things, are divided into two classes. The first is formed of persons
who care nothing about the confirmation and investigation of remark-
able events, but, on the contrary, occupy themselves with those events
through sordid but harmless motives. To this class belong the friv-
olous, and those professionless people who are influenced by vanity,
and endeavor to kill time with apparently great industry. Of this
class it is not necessary to speak further.

The other class is composed of upright people, who mean honestly ;
and these have a right to be looked after, and set properly on their
course, even if teaching and advice find deaf ears.

In this class are two distinct groups : 1. Good people, but bad
investigators ; that is, the scientific know-nothings, who have never
occupied themselves particularly with natural researches, and their
results and methods ; 2. Scientific people by reputation, who have
performed, for their own special departments, real services for science.

Of those who belong to the first group of this class, and who,
without profession or special education, undertake to explore such
complicated and puzzling events, we can simply say : If these true-
hearted people only had an idea of the requirements and difliculties

HYPNOTISM IN ANIMALS. ■ 83

of an exact natural investigation, a slight comprehension of the
streno-th of the proof which science must absolutely command, if
it treats of the confirmation of events, and the connection of the
simplest circumstances, they would entirely cease from their sense-
less and fruitless endeavors, and seek to acquaint themselves with
the valuable acquisitions of to-day's teachings, without which man
— comparable to a ship without a compass or rudder — tossed about
on the sea of error and deception — can be perplexed to imbecility !
The excellent advice to keep at a distance all mysterious and super-
natural manifestations, in spite of their charms and attractions, has
ali-eady been communicated to you. An instructive maxim says,
" There is a virtuous spirit of relinquishment in intellectual as well
as in moral power," And here, in order not to be led into temptation,
men must carry this relinquishment to the extreme of intellectual " tee-
totalism." It is more difficult to deal with the second group of this
class. It is clear that if the few natural investigators who compose
this group were not entirely divested of the spirit of strict research
which they may once have possessed, they would have found ways
and means to confirm, in a scientific manner, the " events viewed un-
equally " which they are not ashamed to testify to as though they were
actual circumstances, so as to win the confidence and esteem of all
natural investigators. As they have by no means succeeded in this,
the weight of their testimony sinks, in spite of its truth, to the level
of that of the unlearned persons mentioned in the first group of this
class.

In reference to the perception and knowledge of natural events
one cannot vote, per majora, as in human laws. The votes here
must be weighed. However, to give no opportunity for misconstruc-
tion, I will say, beforehand, that the natural investigators of whom I
speak have not lost all their weight and respectability in science be-
cause they vouched for the reality of unheard-of and absolutely in-
credible events, but because of the foundation on which they placed
this testimony.

They refer us triumphantly to the " scientific " investigation of a
Hare, a Crookes, a Butterow, and other well-known " natural investi-
gators ! " However, he who examines this startling literature, will
only become more confirmed in his ideas. The way alone in which
these " investigators " perform their experiments, and the manner
in which they make their reports, prove very clearly that they
are really no investigators at all. To give one striking example,
Crookes announces earnestly to the scientific society of London, of
which he is a member, that he has discovered a new feature in Na-
ture, which he calls "psychic force." Through the influence of this
force, according to Crookes, the weight of a body can be increased or
diminished several pounds, without visible interference !

And how do you think Crookes has investigated and estab-

84 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

lished this marvelous circumstance ? You will hardly deem it pos-
sible, when I tell you he did it simply by noticing, in the presence of
certain people, that a spring-balance, of the same kind as one uses to
weigh letters, gave movements the causes of which were not apparent.
I will here show you a small drawing, so that you may understand

it better, which illustrates the principle of an apparatus used by
Crookes. B is the strong mahogany board, several feet long, one end
of which rests on the table, 2\ by means of a sharp point placed in the
under side, while the other end is fastened to the balance, W^ which
hangs suspended from a rest, G. The index of the balance shows how
great the weight is which it has to bear. Every movement backward
or forward, any shaking or pushing which is communicated to the
board, must be made perceptible through a rising or falling of the in-
dex. And now, Crookes assures us that he has perceived such mo-
tions of the index, in the presence of others, when Mr. Home, the prin-
cipal medium, did not move the apparatus at all, but was held firmly
by the hands and feet, some distance from it ! And that is all !
Crookes ventures his monstrous assertion on the ground that the bal-
ance made motions which appeared to have no cause whatever !
Whoever is satisfied with the general assertions of Crookes, in this
respect, manifests such incapability of judgment concerning science,
that he has simply no right to speak about such things.

That a balance makes motions is a circumstance very easy to estab-
lish. We can accept it, as an actual event in Crookes's evidence, that
the balance has really made some motions in the presence of the so-called
mediums ; but when Crookes represents as an actual event that it was
the " psychic force " of the medium which caused this motion, and
altered considerably the weight of the body, it is, in spite of all
persuasion, no real circumstance, but a well-meant assertion of an
" event viewed unequally ; " a statement which does not deserve the

HYPNOTISM IN ANIMALS. 85

slightest belief nor the smallest amount of consideration. This asser-
tion does not deserve the latter, simply because it concerns an " event
viewed unequally " (for there are many events in this category which
deserve the highest esteem), but because the admissible part of
Crookes's statement is in itself worthy of no notice, and because not
the slightest proof is furnished that the motions only proceeded from
the so-called medium, and that they could partake of no heretofore
well-known natural cause !

Had such a proof been undertaken iu an exact manner, Crookes's
assertions would probably have deserved some notice, which would
have led to a repetition of his experiment, in order to test more thor-
oughly his " event viewed unequally ; " if this proof had been strictly
enforced, Crookes would have discovered one of the most remarkable
known events, and his assertions would have at once commanded the
utmost respect and consideration from all natural investigators ; as,
perhaps, with Volta, when he built his pile, which presented no less
incredible appearances ! But, as the events stand, Ci'ookes's state-
ments, as with hundreds and thousands of " events viewed unequally,"
concerning moving tables, flying guitars, self-playing pianos, etc.,
have been regarded with exactly the same claim to science as the best
and most astonishing sleight-of-hand performances, w^hich no one can
admit to be real natural investigations, although in a psychological re-
spect the real cause of the deception may be very interesting.

Little as it may afiect a reasonable man, not to be able to inves-
tigate some pretty and striking conjuinng trick, so also no one ought
to disquiet himself on account of events which hundreds of people
have testified to, even when the slightest proof is unproduced, so that
every thought relating to the possibility of such an interesting natural
phenomenon is removed.

Only through the idea that the phenomena are not visible do these
latter present a most remarkable significance in the eyes of the un-
learned. But, in this significance, they make no difference between it
and conjuring, which is often much more interesting and not less in-
explicable. But do they make a distinction in any other respect ?
As to that we will ask, at first, a little information from the " spirit-
ualists," " natural investigators," and " savants,'''' such as Varley, Wal-
lace, Crookes, Butterow, and others, before we allow them the right to
make the slightest reproof concerning science, and the dependence of
these things upon it.

These gentlemen have not the shadow of a right to complain of
any thing save their own incapability, nor have they the right to make
a i-eproach to any one except themselves, that they did not succeed
in establishing their " spiritual manifestations,"

I will expressly emphasize the fact that I did not say that one
must regard all phenomena, which occur daily, and which are of the
greatest significance and importance, as mere conjuring-t ricks, al-

86 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

though numbers of them could be i^roved to be such. Remember
the Davenport scandal ! For me, the first " manifestations " are
entitled to as little consideration as the latter, and I selected the
best authenticated of them when I communicated Crookes's experi-
ments as a characteristic example of " spiritual " literature to the
well-known English savant, the deserving scholar, our great chem-
ist Hoffman, of Berlin, formerly of London. And has any one of the
gentlemen who are " investigators " in this department said any thing
to the credit of the deceased American chemist and " spiritualist," Dr.
Hare ? Does not one find in the literature which they have the as-
surance to refer us to, accompanied by brainless chattering and fan-
ciful effusions, nothing, nothing at all, but childish or idiotic ar-
rangements, supposed to represent a psychological apparatus, and more
or less creditable reports as to the reality of " events viewed un-
equally ? "

In the mean while, you may properly ask if these events, which
have been witnessed by hundreds of worthy people, are needful
of scientiiic examination and proof, and whether they are worth it ?
Oh, yes ; but not all, and not in a very high degree. Science and its
followers have the right to consult their own time and opportunity.
They have something more to do than to occupy themselves in answer-
ing every question put to them. You all know the old saying relating
to the fool and the seven wise men. That which is worthy of no earnest
investigation, and which, nevertheless, can awaken esteem and con-
fidence, in spite of all singularity, should raise no claim to considera-
tion on the part of science. In this case, however, the moving tables,
flying guitars, mysterious rappings, of course take no part.

The clamors of hundreds and thousands of eye and ear witnesses
who triumphantly hint at " scientific investigations," but who are in-
capable of giving any proof of the experiments, do not change the mat-
ter in the least. Whether one or another investigator may consider
these things, is entirely dependent on his personal opinion, and on
casual circumstances. Whoever has no opinion on the matter, and
holds aloof from it, cannot meet with the slightest reproach. My
highly-esteemed friend Prof. Sharpey, who formerly was secretary
for many years of the Royal Society of London, was perfectly right
when he refused Mr. Crookes's invitation to be present at his experi-
ments with Mr. Home ; indeed, he acted with great wisdom, for
spiritualists and fanatics are very much inclined to trumpet forth men
of science as important witnesses on such occasions. The letter of the
celebrated astronomer Huggins, written on the 9th of June, 1871, to
Mr, Crookes, is nothing but a polite though decided denial of his
opinion relative to different phenomena which had taken place in
Crookes's house in Huggins's presence. And yet, this letter is quoted
triumphantly, and Huggins, probably much against his will, is con-
sidered, from all sides, as one of the " scientific authorities " who

HYPNOTISM IN ANIMALS. 87

had delivered their testimony as to the reality of spiritual writings,
supernatural manifestations, etc. Judge for yourselves ! For the
preservation of Huggins's honor, and as a striking example of these
gentlemen's proceedings, I feel necessitated to communicate this
doubtful letter to you :

Me. CbOOKES : Uppeb Sulse IIill, June 9, 1871.

Dear Sir : The proof-sheets which you sent me seem to contain a correct
representation of what took place in your house in my presence. My position
at the table did not allow me to witness the removal of Mr. Home's band from
the piano ; but this is considered by you, as well as the person sitting on the
other side of Mr. Home, to have taken place. The experiments show me the
importance of further investigation. I, however, wish it distinctly understood,
that I express no decided opinion in regard to the phenomena.

Your obedient servant, William Huggins.

Yet, as we have said, whether one or another scientific investigator
examines these things, his personal opinion is entirely dependent on
the circumstances. But, in regard to strict science, they simply
do not exist at all. Science neither recognizes nor denies them ; it
simply ignores, and it has a perfect right to do this, because time and
work are too precious to be wasted on phenomena which can oifer
no higher interest than that their causes are not apparent — ex-
actly in the same way as with conjuring. In these days, no one is
accused of possessing supernatural power, otherwise we might again
begin to burn people for heresy and witchcraft. Heretofore, nothing-
has compelled us to suppose spiritual manifestations and dubious phe-
nomena to be supernatural, and therefore the whole thing is probably
not worth any consideration whatever, except pei'haps in a psychologi-
cal point of view.

The absolute opposition of science to spiritualism, etc., is entirely
justifiable, as you, gentlemen, must admit, little as you may be sat-
isfied with our views, or much as you have been deceived in your
expectations. I can only say that, possibly in consequence of the
long reserve of science, much, perhaps, to the harm of mankind, re-
mained, and still remains, undiscovered ; for one, with the modesty
to which a natural investigator, more than any other else, is forced,
can say with Hamlet : " There are more things in Heaven and earth,
Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosopliy ! " In the mean while
this must be borne with. The right time will come for every dis-
covery and every step of progress.

88 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE SUEYIYAL OF IXSTIXCTS.

By ELIAS lewis, Jr.

AXrMAL life has its episodes, and apparently abnormal habits.
A gentleman, residing near this city (Brooklyn), had recently
a turkey tethered with a cord in a field during the early life of her
brood. He had also several other turkeys with which this one had a
long time associated, apparently on the most friendly terms, r.nd which,
during her temporary confinement, strolled and fed quietly around
her. But it happened one day that she became entangled with the
cord, so that her feet were drawn together, and, being unable to walk,
lay struggling on the ground. While thus helpless her associates
attacked her, evidently for the purpose of killing her outright. They
made no onset as when fighting, but deliberately and in the coolest
manner possible commenced their butchery by picking the head of the
unfortunate bird.

So intent were they that they scarcely heeded the approach of our
friend, who, from a distance, saw what was going on. Before he
reached the spot, the assailants had destroyed one eye and laid bare
the skull, inflicting injuries so great upon the creature that she soon
died. A similar act was repeated shortly afterward in the same flock,
and the phenomenon — certainly a curious one — is, we believe, not un-
usual.

Observation and inquiry have shown that a like disposition appears
not among turkeys only, but in several species of animals, exciting
them, when aroused, to attack and worry those of their kind if weak,
sick, or disabled. It has been noticed with cattle, swine, dogs, and,
as has been suggested by observers, may occur with all domesticated
or partly domesticated species in which it had existed in their wild
state. We are informed by drovers, of whom we have made careful
inquiry, that when herds of cattle are hurriedly driven, and especially
when they become excited or alarmed, one having fallen, or showing
signs of weakness, is sometimes set upon and gored by its associates.

Two gentlemen, who have been drovers forty years, and during
many years were themselves collectors and drivers of herds, assure us
that they have often witnessed such attacks, and have interfered to
prevent injury. They also state that the habit appears to be more
frequent with animals which have run at large wi^out much care or
restraint, than with those well domesticated.

Such occurrences, however, are well known among domesticated
cattle. A gentleman residing on Long Island had, a few years since,
a herd of cattle, one of which was taken suddenly sick, but was turned,
as usual, into the field with the others. In a short time he noticed
great disturbance among them, and, on hurrying to the spot, found

THE SURVIVAL OF INSTINCTS. 89

the sick one on the ground bellowing, and being gored by her asso-
ciates. An acute observer, also residing on Long Island, near this city,
Mr. J. D. Hicks, writes as follows : " In answer to thy inquiries, J. H.
and S, R. inform me that the fact has been noticed in their own ex-
perience that the well ones of a herd do sometimes seek to gore and
destroy a sick or maimed one. A cry of distress, instead of exciting
sympathy, seems to invite attack, and the first movement by one is a
signal for attack by others. Thee may rest perfectly assured of this.
I have myself more than once witnessed it."

The gentlemen whose initials are given are large owners of cattle,
and have for nearly half a century been familiar with their habits,
and with the habits of those brought in droves from distant parts of
the country. Of the habits of entirely wild cattle we know but
little. The wild herds of the pampas have descended from tame
stock, and it is not easy to show by instances the habits of the original
wild stock in this particular. A breed of cattle formerly common in
Southern Scotland, noted for their untamed and savage disposition, is
spoken of by Cuvier, under the name of white urus, and he says :
" When one of this breed happens to be wounded, or is enfeebled by
age or sickness, the others set upon it and gore it to death."

With swine a similar habit has been observed. We are in-
formed that it is sometimes necessary to separate disabled ones, for
safety, from the general herd. The drovers already referred to state
that, in the driving and transportation of swine, those which become
sick and faint are often objects of attack. Drooj^ing of the ears, and
other evidences of exhaustion, seem to excite the propensity, and may
occur while being driven, or in pens in course of transportation. In
cars, where they are probably much excited, weak and fallen ones are
often torn to pieces, and sometimes devoured.

On one occasion, after a sick pig was thus disposed of, a dead
dog was thrown among the excited animals, but no notice was taken
of it. We will mention, in this connection, that we have not learned
of any instance of an animal, strong and vigorous, being thus attacked,
nor where a sick or feeble one was defended by its associates when
such an attack was made ; and it is certain that with hogs, as with
cattle, the more untamed they are, the more violent and savage is
their disposition, and the more frequent the peculiar habit we have
under consideration.

Audubon observes that, with the wild-turkey, the old males, on
their marches, frequently destroy, by picking the head, those which
are immature, but it does not appear that full-grown and vigorous
birds are attacked. The old, sick, and disabled, are continually left
to their fate by moving herds of the American bison, and are fed
upon by wolves. That they are expelled by violence is probable, but,
so far as we know, there is no positive proof of the fact. It is known
that wolves, if wounded, are attacked and killed by their comrades ;

90 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

and the arctic fox, if disabled, is sometimes not only destroyed, but
eaten by its companions. One of a school of porpoises at play around
a vessel, as we once witnessed, was injured by a pole hui'led at it,
when it was instantly pursued by dozens of others with a celerity of
movement that was astonishing.

Darwin, commenting on this trait in animals, says : " It is almost
the blackest fact in natural history that animals should expel a
wounded one from the herd, or gore or worry it to death."

That the helpless and suffering should be thus destroyed does in-
deed seem to indicate an absence of sympathy in strange contrast
with the kindness and affection shown in innumerable instances be-
tween animals of the same species. But the kind-hearted author al-
ready cited remarks that " instinct or reason may suggest the expelling
an injured companion, lest beasts of prey, including man, should be
tempted to follow the troop. In this case their conduct is not much
worse than that of the North American Indians, who leave their feeble
comrades to perish on the plains, or the Feejeeaus, who, when their
parents get old or fall ill, bury them alive."

If the view of Darwin be correct, it is evident that the habit ori-
ginated in the wild and undomesticated state of the species, and that,
in destroying their disabled or wounded ones, they simply act out
their instinct of self-preservation.

They get rid of those which might delay their flight or allure pur-
suit ; and we may conclude that love of life and fear of danger, rather
than any primal ferocity, develop and fix a habit which at first sight
appears singular and unaccountably savage.

Animals in their wild state live in perpetual danger, and, we may
add, in perpetual fear. Sir John Richardson observes that wolves con-
tinually haunt the track of the buffalo, and the weak are often seized.
The peccary, says Cuvier, if it falls in the rear of the flock, is seized by
the jaguar, and the feeble, straggling ones of every herd become a prey
to its enemies, and incite pursuit. It would be strange, indeed, if this
source of danger, so obvious and persistent, should escape the sagacity
of animals, or be disregarded by their prudence. We know that ani-
mals of many kinds defend each other, and thus protect themselves.
The habit referred to is merely a method of defense. The courageous
and strong stand guard over the herd or flock in time of danger, and
the intelligence or instinct which prompts this also prompts the re-
moval of an element of weakness.

Nor do animals differ in this respect from man. Does history fur-
nish no instances where commanders of armies have sacrificed the
wounded, and destroyed by poison or otherwise the weak and helpless
that the strong might escape destruction ? Equally with animals and
with man, danger may suggest and put in execution means for secur-
ing safety, which show a strange absence of sympathy in the one case,
and of humanity in the other.

THE SURVIVAL OF INSTINCTS.

91

It is not probable that animals possess savage qualities other than
such as are or were originally of service to them and their kind. We
cannot understand that any quality or habit should be dtveloped in
an animal which was not serviceable to it ; but it is certain that both
may arise from the wants and necessities incident to its condition.

If strength and fleetness are essential in pursuit, so also is sagacity
in eluding it. An element of danger is detected and removed. A fox
will use every precaution that the hound may not be allured by his
odor, and the Avhite urus destroys its weak comrade which falls in the
rear unable to maintain its place in the flight. The habit with some
animals of destroying their weak companions is only one of many
which by repetition becomes at last common to the kind. With the
repetition of the act grows a disposition or tendency to repeat it as
the exciting cause or condition recurs. It becomes thus in the creat-
ure a tendency which we may term instinctive, and that such tenden-
cies are transmissible and are inherited needs no illustration here.
Perhaps there is no fact in biology more clearly established and more
fearfully significant than this, and it is true equally in man and in the
lower animals.

Habits thus developed do not readily disappear, but the old dispo-
sition or instinct may remain after the habit has been discontinued,
and long after i%has ceased to be of service to the creature. This is
shown by the fact that former habits frequently reappear when sug-
gested by former predisposing conditions, although these may have
been long overlooked or forgotten.

Under domestication many habits indispensable to animals in their
wild state become useless, and slowly but surely disappear, while
others are developed, and the animal undergoes a physical and mental
change ; but the time is very long before old instincts die out beyond
the possibility of resuscitation. They appear to continue in animals
under domestication as do those of the savage, in civilized life, despite
culture and education. We will illustrate by a single instance :

With the savage, hunting is the occupation of life. He hunts from
necessity, and his mental, moral, and physical being, are attuned to its
conditions. His hunting habits and hunting dispositions are thor-
oughly instinctive, but in civilized communities the necessity for hunt-
ing has chiefly disappeared. Still, the field and forest are hunting-
grounds. The savage is not there, but who will say that the old in-
stincts have not survived in the cunning of pursuit, the thoughtless
cruelty of destruction, and indiiference to sufiering ? It is true our
modern hunter has grown gentle, humane, and tender, in a thousand
directions, but the enjoyment of him who hunts merely for sport
cannot be in that spirit which has developed with his culture — which
weeps at the sight of agony, and is tender to the " mournful eloquence
of pain."

We refer to this only to illustrate the persistence of instinctive

92 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tendencies, and of the habits with which mental states seem directly
associated.

It is, -«»e believe, probable, perhaps certain, that the disposition in
some animals to destroy their weak associates has come down from a
former undomesticated condition of their kind, in which its correlative
habits were essential to safety and life.

If this view be correct, oar friend's birds may not be obnoxious to
the charge of being specially cruel ; and, seeing how persistent in-
stinctive habits may become in some of the higher animals and in
man, it is not strange that they continue in the turkey, a species re-
cently domesticated, and by no means remarkable for intelligence.

THE PRIMARY COXCEPTS OF MODERX PHYSICAL
SCIENCE.

Br J. B. STALLO.
II. — The Atomic Constitution of Matter as a Postulate of Thought.

MY inquiry thus far has touched the assertion according to which
the atomic hypothesis is the necessary basis of the theories
which constitute the sciences of physics and chemistry. I propose
now to consider the claim that this hypothesis is an essential pre-
requisite of the realization of material existence in thought.

To show how pointedly this claim is made, it will be sufficient to
extract a passage from a recent lecture of Prof. John Tyndall, before
the British Association at Liverpool, " On the Scientific Use of the
Imagination" ("Fragments of Science," American edition, p. 135).
The words of Prof. Tyndall, whose opinions, by reason of his eminence
among physicists, may be taken instar omnium, are these :

" Many chemists of the present day refuse to speak of atoms and
molecules as real things. Their caution leads them to stop short of
the clear, sharp, mechanically-intelligible atomic theory enunciated
by Dalton, or any form of that theory, and to make the doctrine of
multiple proportions their intellectual bourn. I respect the caution,
though I think it is here misplaced. The chemists who recoil from
these notions of atoms and molecules, accept without hesitation the
undulatory theory of light. Like you and me, they one and all be-
lieve in an ether and its light-producing waves. Let us consider what
this belief involves. Bring your imagination once more into play,
and figure a series of sound-waves passing through air. Follow them
up to their origin, and what do you there find ? A definite, tangible,
vibrating body. It maybe tlie vocal chords of a human being, it may
be an organ-pipe, or it maybe a stretched string. Follow in the same

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 93

manner a train of ether-waves to their source ; remembering at the
same time that your ether is matter, dense, elastic, and capable of mo-
tions subject to and determined by mechanical laws. What, then, do
you expect to find as the source of a series of ether- waves ? Ask your
imagination if it will accept a vibrating multiple proportion — a nu-
merical ratio in a state of oscillation ? I do not think it will. You
cannot crown the edifice by this abstraction. The scientific imagina-
tion, which is here authoritative, demands as the origin and cause of a
series of ether-waves a particle of vibrating matter quite as definite,
though it may be excessively minute, as that which gives origin to a
musical sound. Such a particle we name an atom, or a molecule. I
think the seeking intellect, when focussed so as to give definition with-
out penumbral haze, is sure to realize this image at the last."

The import of these sentences is plain. It is that an ethereal or
other atom, or a molecule, is related to its vibratory motion just as
any ordinary body is related to its movements of translation — as a
stellar or planetary body, for instance, is related to its movements of
rotation or revolution ; and that, just as the conception of the stellar or
planetary body of necessity precedes the conception of its rotary or
revolutionary motion, so also the conception of the atom or molecule
of necessity precedes the conception of the vibratory motion whereof
light, heat, electricity, chemical action, etc., are known or supposed to
be modes. In other words: to make the existence of matter, such as
we deal with in action and in thought, conceivable, we are constrained,
according to Tyndall, to assume ultimate material particles as pre-
existing to those motions or manifestations of force which are appre-
hended as light, heat, electricity, chemical action, etc.

In order to preclude all possibility of misunderstanding, it is per-
haps well to call attention to the fact that, while Tyndall speaks in terms
only of the relation of the ether to its vibratory motion, it is evident
from his own language that this is meant as an illustration or exem-
plification of the relation of all matter to any or all motion whatever.

Now, let us for a moment contemplate an ultimate particle of mat-
ter in this state of existence in advance of all its motion. It is with-
out color, and neither light nor dark ; for color, lightness, darkness,
etc., are luminar afiections, and, according to the received mechanical
theory of " imponderables," of which Prof. Tyndall is a distinguished
champion, simply modes of motion. It is similarly witliout tempera-
ture— neither hot nor cold ; for heat also is a mode of motion. For
the same reason it is without electrical or cliemical properties — in
short, it is utterly destitute of all those properties in virtue of which,
irrespective of its magnitude, it could be an appreciable object of
sense, unless we except the properties of weight and extension. But
weight is a mere play of attractive forces ; and extension, too, is kno-wn
to us only as resistance, which in turn is a manifestation of force, and
thus a phase of motion. Extension per se, abstract extension, cannot

94 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

be realized in thouglit, whatever ground there may be for dissenting
from the opinion of Sir W. Hamilton (" Lectures on Metaphysics,"
Boston edition, p. 385), that "we cannot represent extension to the
mind except as colored."

Thus the solid, tangible reality, craved by Prof. Tyndall's " scien-
tific imagination," wholly vanishes from the " seeking intellect " the
moment this intellect attempts to grasp it apart from the notion which
is said to presuppose it as its necessary substratum. If the deliver-
ances of the scientific imagination are authoritative in science, the no-
tion of the primordial atom must be relegated to the regions beyond
the bounds of scientific thought.

There is another and very obtrusive aspect of the atomic theory in
which its utter inability to satisfy the demands of the " scientific im-
agination " has long since been recognized. As I have already shown,
the atomic theory, in whatever form it is held, presupposes the separa-
tion of the atoms by void, interstitial spaces. The only difiTerence of
opinion respecting these spaces is as to their magnitude, the emergen-
cies of the modern theories of heat and light having led to the suppo-
sition that even in the case of the purely hypothetical " ether " (which
is nothing but a clothes-horse for all the insoluble difficulties presented
by the phenomena of sensible material existence — a fagot of occult
qualities and principia expressiva, whose role in the material world at
large is analogous to the part formerly played by the aura vitalis,
and similar phantasms, in the organic world) the interspaces are
very great in comparison with the dimensions of the atoms, so that a
group of these atoms is not infrequently compared with a stellar or
planetary system. Nevertheless, their motions are construed as effects
of their mutual attractions and repulsions. But how is the mutual
action of atoms existing by themselves in complete insulation and
wholly without contact to be realized in thought ? We are here in
the presence of the old difliculties respecting the possibility of actio
in distans which presented themselves to the minds of the physicists
in Newton's time, and constituted one of the topics of the famous dis-
cussion between Leibnitz and Clarke, in the course of which Clarke
made the remarkable admission (Fourth Letter of Clarke, § 45, " Leib-
nitii Opera," ed. Erdmann, p. 762) that, " if one body attracted an-
other without an intervening body, that would be, not a miracle, but
a contradiction ; for it would be to suppose that a body acts where it
is not " — otherwise expressed : inasmuch as action is but a mode of
being, the assertion that a body can act where it is not would be tanta-
mount to the assertion that a body can be where it is not. This ad-
mission was entirely in consonance with Newton's own opinion ; in-
deed, Clarke's words are but a paraphrase of the celebrated passage in
one of Newton's letters to Bentley, cited by John Stuart Mill in his
" System of Logic," which runs as follows :

" It is inconceivable that inanimate brute matter should, without

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 95

the mediation of something else, which is not material, operate upon
and aifect other matter without mutual contact. . . . That gravity-
should be innate, inherent, and essential to matter, so that one body-
may act on another, at a distance, through a vacuum, without the
mediation of any thing else by and through which their action and
force may be conveyed from one to the other, is to me so great an ab-
surdity that I believe no man, who in philosophical matters has a com-
petent faculty of thinking, can ever fall into it."

The thesis of the impossibility of actio in distans has been a
standing dogma among physicists ever since the revival of physical
science, three centuries ago. Twenty-five years before the publication
of Descartes's " Discoicrs,'''' it found expression in the axiom of Barthol-
omew Keckermann (" Systema Physicum," Hanau, 1612) : " Omnis al-
teratio fit per contactum ; " and Descartes's whole physical system had
its root in the proposition that " a body can no more act where it is
not than it can act when it has ceased to be, the principle, cessatite
causa cessat effectus, holding good in either case." It was this " pat-
ent absurdity" of material action through empty space which led the
greatest mathematicians of Continental Europe (the elder Bernouillis,
Huyghens, etc.) to reject the doctrines of Newton's " Principia," and
induced Leibnitz to construct his system of " cosmic circulations," in
which the old Cartesian vortices reappeared in a new dress, and under
another name.

The conflict between the theory of distant attraction and the au-
thority of the " scientific imagination " is one of the instances adduced
by John Stuart Mill (" System of Logic," book ii., chap, v., § 6) in
support of his proposition that conceivability is no test of truth, be-
cause it is the simple result of familiarity of thought or experience ;
and he expresses the opinion that "the majority of scientific men have
at last learned to conceive the sun attracting the earth without an in-
tervening fluid, and that " the ancient maxim, that a thing cannot act
where it is not, probably is not now believed by any educated person
in Europe" ("Logic," book v., chap, iii., § 3). But Herbert Spencer
("Principles of Psychology," ii., 409) justly doubts the trixth of this
opinion, expressing the belief that " the most that can be said is that
they " (the scientific men) " have given up attempting to conceive how
gravitation results." How formidable the difliculty under discussion
still appears to the minds of physicists at the present day, and how
completely the mental predicament of the nineteenth century is iden-
tical with that of the seventeenth, is evident from the many recent
renewals of the attempt to construe the action of gravity as a case of
ethereal pressure or impact. I content myself with the citation of a
very characteristic paragraph, written long after the sentences quoted
from Mill, in a late article of Prof. Challis "On the Fundamental
Ideas of Matter and Force in Theoretical Physics " {PhilosoxMcal
Magazine^ § 4, vol. xxxi., p. 46*7). " There is no other kind of force,"

96 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

says Prof. Challis, " than pressure by contact of one body with an-
other. This hypothesis is made on the priuciiDle of admitting no fun-
damental ideas that are not referable to sensation and experience. It
is true that we see bodies obeying the influence of an external force,
as when a body descends toward the earth by the action of gravity ;
and, so far as the sense of sight informs us, we do not in such cases
perceive either the contact or the pressure of another body. But we
have also the sense of touch or of pressure by contact — for instance,
of the hand with another body — and we feel in ourselves the power
of causing motion by such pressure. The consciousness of this power
and the sense of touch give a distinct idea, such as all the world un-
derstands and acts upon, as to how a body may be moved ; and the
rule of philosophy which makes personal sensation and expei-ieuce the
basis of scientific knowledge, as they are the basis of the knowledge
that regulates the common transactions of life, forbids recognizing any
other mode of moving a body than this. When, therefore, a body is
caused to move without apparent contact and pressure of another
body, it must still be concluded that the pressing body, although in-
visible, exists, unless we are prepared to admit that there are physical
operations which are and ever will be incomprehensible by us. This
admission is incompatible with the principles of the philosophy I am
advocating, which assume that the information of the senses is ade-
quate, with the aid of mathematical reasoning, to explain phenomena
of all kinds. . . . All physical force being pressure, there must be a
medium by which the pressure is exerted."

It is not my purpose, of course, to question the Newtonian doc-
trine of gravitation, or to urge the adoption of the views of Prof.
Challis and others, who seek to show that what seems to be attraction
is in reality a propulsion of solid bodies in immediate contact. That
the transfer of motion from one body to another by impact is no less
incomprehensible than actio in distans becomes apparent on a mo-
ment's reflection ; and that the hypothesis of an intervening " ether "
— itself composed of atoms, the interspaces between which are larger
in proportion to these atoms than the interstellar spaces — is simply a
new presentation of the old perplexity in a worse form, and in no wise
helps to remove the diificulties involved in the phenomenon of the cor-
respondence between the movements of two bodies without contact, is
equally clear, and has been sufficiently pointed out by Herbert Spencer
(" First Principles," p. 59). My object is merely to show that, if the
validity of every theory of the constitution of matter is to be tested
by our ability to realize it in thought — to bring it clearly before the
scientific imagination, to represent it mentally as a distinct image, or
whatever may be the form of words in which this requirement is ex-
pressed— the atomic theory fails as completely as any other theory of
the natiare of matter which has ever been propounded.

But what ground is there for the assumption that conceivability is

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 97

a test of reality ? This question has been the subject of a famous
controversy between Dr. Whewell and John Stuart Mill, and of a
more recent discussion between Mill and Herbert Spencer. Mill
broadly denies that " our capacity or incapacity of conceiving a thing
has any thing to do with the possibility of the thing in itself," while
Spencer deems it to be a universal postulate of all thought that an in^
conceivable proposition, i. e., a proposition " of which the terms can-
not, by any effort, be brought before consciousness in that relation
which the proposition asserts between them — a proposition of which
the subject and predicate offer an insurmountable resistance to union
in thought " — must necessarily be held to be untrue. My present pur-
pose does not, in strictness, call for a thorough examination of this
question ; nevertheless, it is desirable that the confusion into which (as
is usual in such cases) it has been thrown by the emergencies of the
debate should be partially cleared up.

Here, at the outset, it aj^pears to me to be unfortunate that Mill
repudiates, and Spencer does not insist upon, a distinction suggested
by Coleridge between the Inconceivable and the Unimaginahle, though
we may find reason for dissenting from Coleridge's proposition, that
" the Unimaginable may possibly be true, but the Inconceivable can-
not." It is true, as has been observed by Reid (and after him by
Stewart), that " conceiving, imagining, and apprehending, are com-
monly used as synonyms in our language ; " but the distinction above
referred to is, nevertheless, both real and important. Mill, indeed, de-
clines to recognize this distinction, not from any deference to the
usages of ordinary speech, but by reason of his antagonism to a
philosophical system. He is a strict scholastic nominalist, and denies
that there are any objects corresponding to concepts in the mind any
more than in Nature, for the reason that concepts, being the results
of abstraction, are general, while objects can be represented or imaged
in thought only as particular. And, having pointed out (" Examina-
tion of Sir W. Hamilton's Philosophy," chap, xvii.) that in reasoning
we rarely attend to all the attributes of which a concept is said to be
the complement, but deal exclusively with more or less of these attri-
butes which we are able to bring separately before the mind by means
of names that suggest them, on the principle of the association of
ideas, he claims that our reasoning is carried on by means, not of con-
cepts, but of names.

At the first blush, the remark of Sir W. Hamilton, that the war be-
tween the conceptualists and nominalists is a mere war of words,
would appear to be just. Surely the most inveterate nominalist must
admit that the material of our reasoning processes consists, not of the
sounds or written symbols composing words, but of the meanings
which underlie them. And, roughly stated, concepts are nothing but
these meanings. If a concept be, in the language of Sir W. Hamilton,
a " bundle of attributes " — as for purposes of discursive reasoning it

VOL. IV. — Y

98 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

undoubtedly is — then every increase or diminution of this bundle is in
effect the formation of a new concept ; and Mill's objection that we
cannot think by means of concepts, because in reasoning we bring
before the mind a varying number of the attributes composing them,
is seen to be founded on the mistaken assumption that for every object
there is but one corresponding concept, the truth being that an object
may be represented in thought by concepts without number. For
every object is the first link in innumerable chains of abstractions
varying in kind and diverging in direction with the comparisons insti-
tuted between it and other objects ; and each of the links beyond the
first is a concept under which the object may, in scholastic phrase, be
subsumed. A horse, for example, may be considered mechanically
as a system of levers and strings, a self-regulating locomotive, a
machine, etc., or as a thousand pounds mo^ng at the rate of 2.40
per mile, a heavy body, etc. ; or, chemically, as a congeries of cal-
cium and magnesium phosphates, carbonates, and fluorids, with albu-
mine, fibrine, and similar substances, as a compound of oxygen, hy-
drogen, carbon, nitrogen, sulphur, phosphorus, calcium, magnesium,
silicon, etc. ; or, zoologically, as a solipede, an ungulate, a mammal, an
animal, etc. ; or, economically, as a beast of burden, a domestic ani-
mal— and so on, indefinitely. The formation of concepts like these is
incident to all productive reasoning about individual things, and their
fixation by means of language (speaking of language in the compre-
hensive sense of all symbols by which forms of thought may be rep-
resented) an indispensable condition of the progress of scientific
knowledge, or, indeed, knowledge of any sort.

On the other hand, the most obstinate conceptualist will not deny
that, before any one of these concepts can stand as the representative
of an actual, concrete object, it must be supplemented with all those
circumstances of singularity or particularity which were left behind in
the progress of abstraction.

On closer examination, however, the war of words between Mill
and his antagonists proves to be a real contest of principles. The
elaboration of the data of exj^erience into concepts implies an estab-
lishment of relations between these data in conformity to laws not imme-
diately derivable from this experience itself — a mental digestion of the
crude material of sense ; and this is, in Mill's opinion, inadmissible in
view of the purely sensational origin of all knowledge. Mill has an
instinctive horror of every thing which purports to be something else
than a deliverance of sense, and contends that in our thought we are
at all times conversant, not with abstractions, but with facts. Whether
this be true or not, depends upon the meaning of the word " facts,"
irrespective of the necessary reservation that all the facts about which
we know any thing at all are the facts of consciousness. A satisfac-
tory discussion of this topic (to which very valuable contributions
have been made by Mr. Ferrier) is beyond the scope of my inquiry ;

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 99

it is sufficient for my purpose to have it conceded that in thought
properly so called, i. e., in those intellectual operations in which the
deliverances of sense are digested into that system of ideal forms and
relations which we call knowledge, or (what is the same thing) science,
we never deal with things as they exist, or are re^iresented as existing,
objectively — that we have not, nor can we have, present to our minds
the whole complement of phenomena which are the constituents of a
material object, but always some one or more of them selected or
" abstracted " from the rest ; that being so, not only for the reason
that all our thought is, in the language of Leibnitz (adopted by Her-
bert Spencer in the first chapter of his " First Principles "), symbolical,
the attributes even of the simplest material object being too numerous
to be represented in consciousness at the same time, but for the far
weightier reason that our knowledge of the attributes of a material
object is never complete. I may say here, incidentally, that, in assert-
ing the abstract nature of thought, I am not taking sides in the inter-
minable controversy between Realism and Idealism, or Presentationism
and Representationism ; a controversy which would be speedily ended
if it came to be thoroughly understood that the phenomena of vision,
which, ever since the time of Plato, have furnislied nearly all the meta-
phors for the description of intellectual operations, present but distant
analogies of the phenomena of perception, and that the puzzle about
mediate and immediate perception is but the common case of the ob-
scuration of a subject by a series of figures meant to illustrate it. In
my discussion, I am only generally concerned with the fundamental
relation which all our thought about objective reality bears to that
reality itself.

There is, of course, no agreement among thinkers as to the nature
or even the number of successive steps which lead to the formation of
the elements of distinct thought. The terms most commonly employed
of late (by those, at least, whose authority commands the most resi^ect,
viz., the comparative philologists, who are constrained, by the methods
of their own science, to treat psychological questions inductively), to
designate those steps, are Sensation, Perception, Representation, and
Conception. The first two of these I shall, for the moment, leave wholly
out of the account, as not relevant to the present inquiry, it being
admitted on all hands that the materials of distinct thought are either
representations or concepts. A representation may be generally de-
fined as an exhibition to the mind of the deliverances of sense (if the
object be real, or of the phantasy if the object be imaginary), in their
empirical order and form — in other words, as a mere mental image of
the object ; while, in the concept, these deliverances are reduced to
unity by the establishment of relations between them other than the
relation of their fortuitous concurrence, the concept, at the same time,
being made distinct by the establishment of relations between it and
the previous concepts of the mind. If I were writing a treatise on

loo THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

logic, or ^isychology, these definitions would have to be reduced to
forms far more precise ; but I purposely refrain from an attempt at
exact definition, because I wish to remain on ground common to all who
have made the matter in hand the subject of their investigation. For
my purpose, it is of little consequence whether or not the distinction
here indicated between representations and concepts is accurate and
clear ; nor is it necessary to determine the exact nature of the relations
established in conception between the constituents of a concept, or
between the various concepts themselves ; it is sufl[icient to know that
both in the representation and in the concept we have in some form
a complex of attributes which are ultimately, in the case of material
objects at least, traceable to sensible experience, and that the elabora-
tion of representations into concej)ts involves the establishment of
some sort of mental relations between their elements, as well as be-
tween the several concepts themselves.

At this point, it is important to guard against a confusion which
naturally arises from the fact that logicians and psychologists habit-
ually illustrate the evolution of concepts by examples taken from the
abstract sciences. There is a very wide distinction between the rela-
tion of a concept to the object* of thought in mathematics, for instance,
and the corresponding relation between a representation, or concept
of a material object, to that object itself. In mathematics, as in all the
sciences which are conversant with single relations or groups of rela-
tions established (and, within the limits of the constitutive laws of the
mind, arbitrarily established) by the mind itself, all concepts are ex-
haustive iu the sense that they imply, if they do not explicitly state, all
the properties belonging to the object of thought. Not only the con-
stituents of such an object, but also the laws of their interdependence,
being determined by the intellect, they may be strictly deduced, each
from the other.* Thus, a parabola is a line, every point in which is
equidistant from a fixed point and a given straight line : that is one

' The truth of the proposition that the system of forms and relations, whose discus-
sion constitutes the science of mathematics, is of purely subjective determination, does
not involve the assumption (erroneously attributed to Kant, who, on the very first page
of his " Critique of Pure Reason," expressly draws the distinction between the " begin-
ning of all knowledge with experience," and " the derivation of all knowledge from expe-
rience"), that the mind is furnished a priori with ready-made ideas or concepts ; nor is
it affected by the circumstance that these forms and relations are ultimately referable to
the facts of sensible experience. Mill's refusal to recognize this has betrayed him into
writing the extraordinary fifth chapter of the second book of his " System of Logic,"
in which he questions — albeit falteringly — the necessary truth of the propositions of
geometry. The inevitable outcome of this is seen in the writings of Mr. Buckle, who not
only boldly asserts that there are no lines without breadth (he strangely forgets the thick-
ness), but also that the neglect of this breadth by the geometrician vitiates his conclu-
sions. His comfort is that the error, after all, is not very considerable. " Since, how-
ever," is his language (" History of Civilization in England," ii., 342, Appletons' edition),
" the breadth of the faintest line is so slight as to be incapable of measurement, except
by an instrument used under the microscope, it follows that the assumption, that there

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE, loi

of its concepts. And in this all the properties of the parabola — that
it is a conic section formed by cutting a cone parallel to its sides, that
the area of any of its segments is equal to tAvo-thirds of its circum-
scribed rectangle, etc. — are implied, and from it they may be deduced.
Each one of its attributes is an implication of all the others. Our con-
cepts of material objects, on the contrary, are never exhaustive, for
their complement of attributes varies with our experience concerning
them. These attributes are expressive of the relations between the
object and other objects ; and, the number of objects being unlimited,
the synthesis of attributes is, of necessity, incomplete. And the inter-
dependence of these attributes, as well as the connection between the
objects themselves, or their representative images and concepts, has
its origin in laws, of which the laws of the intellect are but a partial
reflex. It is true that the concept of a material object contains ele-
ments whose interdependence is subjective (every intellectual opera-
tion, or rather its result, being in some form a synthesis of subjective
and objective data) ; but even these are liable to determination by
undigested empirical elements which are present along with them.
Moreover, our knowledge of the attributes of a material body is not
only imperfect, but these attributes are variable. This is obvious
enough in the case of those properties which are usually designated
as secondary qualities ; every one knows that the thermic, optic, elec-
tric, or magnetic conditions of a body change at every moment. But,
in fact, there is no property whatever, of a material body, which is
strictly invariable, or the law of whose variation is fully known. For
this reason, also, the concept of a material object can never expressly,
or by implication, be a full complement of its attributes.'

can be lines without breadth, is so nearly true, that our senses, when unassisted by art,
cannot detect the error. Formerly, and until the invention of the micrometer, in the
seventeenth century, it was impossible to detect it at all. Hence, the conclusions of the
geometrician approximate so closely to truth, that we are justified in accepting them
as true. The flaw is too minute to be perceived. But that there is a flaw, appears to
roe certain. It appears certain that, whenever something is kept back in the premises,
something must be wanting in the conclusion. In all such cases, the field of inquiry has
not been entirely covered ; and, part of the preliminary facts being suppressed, it must, I
think, be admitted that complete truth is unattainable, and that no problem in geometry
has yet been exhaustively solved."

Whether Buckle was able to think of a line as the limit between two surfaces, and
whether, in his opinion, such a limit has breadth (i. e., is itself a surface, so that we are
driven from limit to Umit ad infinitum), he does not tell us. Nor does he say whether or
not, in view of the fact that the breadth of a line depends upon the material out of
which it is constructed, or upon which it is drawn, there ought to be a pasteboard geome-
try, a wooden geometry, a stone geometry, and so on, as distinct sciences.

* I do not enter into the question whether or not the use of the word " concept," in
reference to material objects, can in all cases be justified, and whether the distinction be-
tween representations and concepts is not, in many cases, including the case of "singular
concepts," so called, very shadowy. In this connection, it is significant that the Germans
use the expression "empirical concept" {Fi-fahrunffsbeffriff),&3 equivalent to "repre-
sentation " ( Vorstellung).

102 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Bearing this in mind, we shall exj^erience little difficulty in de-
termining the conditions under which the representation and concep-
tion of a material object as real are possible. A representation of such
an object being an exhibition of the deliverances of sense respecting
it, it is plain that nothing can be represented as objectively real, ex-
cept in terms of experience. And, since our experience is only of the
singular and particular, it is also evident that a concept cannot be
represented in the mind as objectively real. Thus, matter as such is
not a real thing, but a concept; it cannot be "realized" in thought.
"We can realize, or imagine, or represent as actual, only some one par-
ticular thing, with all its accidents of particularity — as of particular
dimensions, of a particular color, of a particular temperature, and as
being either at rest (i. e,, in a state of tension) or in motion. All
attempts mentally to rej^resent the reality, in and by itself, of any of
the elements into which an individual object is analyzed by the pro-
cess of abstraction are necessarily futile. The history of speculation is
full of attempts of this sort — of attempts to grasp the " thing " as dis-
tinct from its properties, the substance apart fi*ora its attributes, or,
conversely, the attributes apart from their unity, the substance. It is
this old error which lies hid in the reasoning of Prof. Tyndall in the
passage quoted at the beginning of this article. And the same error
lurks in Faraday's endeavor to represent matter as a mere complex of
forces. In the one case the properties are imagined to be added to the
thing, or the attributes are supposed to be implanted in the substance,
as the plums are stuck into the pudding, so that the substance will
remain after the attributes are removed ; in the other case the sub-
stance is looked upon as a mere sum of the attributes — the pudding is
thought to be all plums, which not only have a reality by themselves,
but which are alone real. That this apparently trivial illustration is
entirely apposite, is readily shown by a reference to the grounds upon
which Faraday rejects the hypothesis of corpuscular atoms. While
the advocates of this hypothesis seek to remove the plums and to re-
tain the pudding, Faraday, on the contrary, takes the plums, and then
asks, " Where is the pudding ? " " What do we know," he says (Tyn-
dall, " Faraday as a Discoverer," p. 123, American ed.) " of the atom
apart from its force ? You imagine a nucleus which may be called
a, and surround it by forces which may be called m ; to my mind, the
a or nucleus vanishes, and the substance consists in the powers of m.
And, indeed, wliat notion can we form of the nucleus independent of
its powers ? What thought remains on which to hang the imagina-
tion of an a independent of the acknowledged forces ? "

The true root of all these errors is a total misconception of the na-
ture of reality. All the reality we know is not only spatially finite,
but limited in all its aspects ; its whole existence lies in relation and
contrast, as I shall show more at length in the next article. We know
nothing of force, except by its contrast with mass, or (what is the same

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE.

103

thing) inertia ; and conversely, as I have already pointed out in my
first article, we know nothing of mass, except by its relation to force.
Mass, inertia (or, as it is sometimes, though inaccurately, called, mat-
ter joer se), is indistinguishable from absolute nothingness ; for matter
reveals its presence, or evinces its reality, only by its action, its force,
its tension or motion. But, on the other hand, mere force is equally
nothing ; for, if we reduce the mass upon which a given force, however
small, acts until it vanishes — or, mathematically expressed, until it
becomes infinitely small — the consequence is that the velocity of the
resulting motion is infinitely great, and that the " thing " (if under
these circumstances a thing can still be spoken of) is at any given mo-
ment neither here nor there, but everywhere — that there is no real
presence. It is impossible, therefore, to construct matter by a mere
synthesis of forces. And it is incorrect to say, with Bain (" Logic," ii.,
225), that " matter, force, and inertia, are three names for substan-
tially the same fact," or that " force and matter are not two things,
but one thing," or (ib., p. 389) that " force, inertia, momentum, mat-
ter, are all one fact " — the truth being that force and inertia are co7i-
ceptual constituents of matter, and neither is in any proper sense a fact.
Nor is the ordinary analysis of physical reality into matter + force cor-
rect, inasmuch as force is already implied in the term matter. It is
an analysis of a thing into two elements, one of which is the thing it-
self. The true formula of matter is mass x force, or inertia x force.

We now have before us, in full view, one of the fundamental falla-
cies of the atomic theory. This fallacy consists in the delusion that
the conceptual constituents of matter can be grasped as separate and
real entities. The corpuscular atomists take the element of inertia
and treat it as real by itself, while Boscovichj Faraday, and all those
who define atoms as " centres of force," seek to realize the correspond-
ing element, force, as an entity by itself. In both cases elements of
reality are mistaken for kinds of reality. It is, therefore, sheer non-
sense to speak, with Papillon (see the article on the Constitution of
Matter in the September number of this journal, p. 553), of a "bare
energy, stripped of its material dress ;" of a " force in its purest essence,
upon which we look as on the marble of the antique, in splendid
nakedness, which is radiant beauty too." *

This disposes, in my judgment, of the authority of the " scientific
imagination," in all cases where an attempt is made to determine the
constitution of matter. In respect to the general question, however,
whether our ability to imagine a thing is decisive of its possible reality,

* The translation of the passage from which the above is taken, though on the whole
admirable, fails to do justice to the magniloquence of the original, which reads thus :
" Toutes ces energies n'apparaissent \ nous ^ de rares exceptions pres que revetues de
cet uniforme qu'on appelle la matiere. Une seule de ces energies se montre depouillee
de ce vetement et nue. . . . Comment la d6finir autrement que la force en sa plus pure
essence, puisque nous la contemplons comme un marbre antique dans une superbe nudite
qui est aussi une beaut6 radieuse."

104 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

it is necessary to add, that this question must be answered in the nega-
tive. Whether or not we can imagine, or mentally represent, a thing
as real, depends upon the question whether our past experience has
furnished us the data for such a representation ; and our experience is
constantly furnishing us new data.

That the impossibility or difficulty of imagining a thing (which,
however, must be carefully distinguished from the absolute impossi-
bility of forming certain concepts, of which I shall presently speak) is
no evidence for or against its reality, is a truth of the greatest moment
to the student of natural science. Liebig expressed it long ago {Ann.
Pharm., x., 179), in the words: "The secret of all those who make
discoveries is, that they regard nothing as impossible."

I come now to the conditions of conceivability, strictly and prop-
erly so called. These conditions are readily deduced from the inci-
dents in the act of conception to which I have referred. These inci-
dents are : The reduction of the elements of a representation to con-
sistent unity by bringing them into relation, and the establishment
of relations between the unit thus evolved and the previous concepts
of the mind. A concept can, therefore, be formed, if or, its elements,
can be united in thought by the establishment of relations between
them by which they are reduced to a unit — in other words, if the con-
stituent attributes are consistent with each other — and if b, the re-
sulting concept, can be brought into relation, so as to be consistent
with the previously-formed concepts of the mind.

Consistency of the constituent attributes with each other, there-
fore, is the first, and consistency of the concept with other concepts
the second, condition of its successful formation. The first of these is
what is known in logic as the law of non-contradiction, or the law of
consistency, and is the fundamental condition of all thought. It re-
quires that what is expressly or by implication asserted in the sub-
ject shall not expressly or by implication be denied in the j)redicate
of any proposition into which the concept may be resolved, or, in plain
words, that what is asserted in one form of words shall not be denied
in another.

Now, it is evident that, whenever the formation of a concept in-
volves a violation of the first condition, we have before us a case of
absolute inconceivability, and therefore of impossibility. For this
condition, as I have said, is the first constitutive law of all intelli-
gence, without which the whole system of relations, in which both sub-
jective and objective realities have their only warrant and support,
instantly collapses into the nothingness in which alone all things are
identical, and disappears in the night of absolute confusion, No one,
not even John Stuart Mill, ever seriously doubted the absolute impos-
sibility of the conception or existence of a round square, or of a straight
line which is not the shortest distance between two points. "When-
ever such a doubt has been expressed, it has arisen from a mental con-

I

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 105

fusion as to the import of the terms employed in the propositions, as
we shall see presently in the case of Mill.

But it is otherwise with the second condition of conceivability :
that the concept, when framed, shall be consistent with other concepts
previously formed. For these latter concepts may be spurious or in-
valid. Inconceivability arising from non-compliance with the second
condition is therefore purely relative, depending on the validity of the
concepts with which the concept in question appears to be incompat-
ible. For example, until the discovery of the composition of water,
of the true theory of combustion, and of the relative affinities of j^otas-
sium and hydrogen for oxygen, it was impossible to conceive a sub-
stance which would ignite on contact with, water, it being one of the
recognized attributes of water — in other words, a part of the concept
water — that it antagonized fire. This previous concept was spurious,
and, when it had been destroyed, the inconceivability of a substance
like potassium disappeared. Similarly, we are now unable to conceive
a warm-blooded animal without a respiratory system, because we con-
ceive the idiothermic condition of an animal organism to depend main-
ly on the chemical changes taking place within it, chief among which
is the oxidation of the blood, which requires some form of contact be-
tween the blood and the air, and therefore some form of resjjiration.
If, however, future researches should destroy this latter concept — if it
should be shown that the heat of a living body may be produced in
sufficient quantity by mechanical agencies, such as friction — a non-
respiring warm-blooded animal would at once become conceivable.

Mill not only refuses to recognize the distinction between what
may be conceived and what may be rei^resented in imagination, but
he also ignores the distinction between the cases of inconceivability
from the one or the other of the two causes just mentioned ; and he
maintains that all conceivability whatever is relative. The examples
which he discusses at length are all cases of inconceivability, and not
of unimaginability, and I propose to notice the more important of
them in passing. The most noteworthy of these examples is the in-
conceivability of a round square. In order not to do Mill injustice, it
will be best to quote his own language (" Examination of the Philoso-
phy of Sir "W. Hamilton," vol. i., p. 88, et seq., American edition) :

" We cannot conceive a round square," says Mill, " not merely be-
cause no such object has ever presented itself in our experience, for
that would not be enough. Neither, for any thing we know, are the
two ideas in themselves incompatible. To conceive a round square,
or to conceive a body all black and yet all white, would only be to
conceive two different sensations as produced in us simultaneously by
the same object — a conception familiar to our experience — and we
should probably be as well able to conceive a round square as a hard
square, or a heavy square, if it were not that in our uniform experience,
at the instant when a thing begins to be round, it ceases to be square,

io6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

so that the beginning of the one impression is inseparably associated
with the departure or cessation of the other. Thus our inability to
form a conception always arises from our being compelled to form
another conti'adictory to it."

Our inability to conceive a round square due to the fact "that in
our uniform experience, at the instant when a thing begins to be
round, it ceases to be square," and to the inseparable association be-
tween incipient roundness and departing squareness ! Whether any
one has ever had such experience as is here described, I do not know ;
but, if he has, I am confident that, even after being reenforccd by a
large inheritance of ancestral experience in the light of the modern
theory of evolution, it will prove insufficient to account for the insep-
arable association which Mill brings into play. The simple truth is,
that a round square is an absurdity, a contradiction in terms. A
square is a figure bounded by four equal straight lines intersecting at
right angles ; a round figure is a figure bounded by a curve ; and the
oldest definition of a curve is that of " a line which is neither a straight
line, nor made up of straight lines."

It ought to be said that there are expressions in the same chapter
of Mill's book, from which I have just quoted, which show that the
author was very ill at ease in the presence of his own theory. For in-
stance, he says (ib,, p. 88) : " These things are literally inconceivable
to us, our minds and our experience being what they are. Whether
they would be inconceivable if our minds were the same, but our ex-
perience difierent, is open to discussion. A distinction may be made
which, I think, will be found pertinent to the question. That the
same thing should at once be and not be — that identically the same
statement should be both true and false — is not only inconceivable to
us, hut we cannot conceive that it could he made conceivable.''''

That so clear and vigorous a thinker as Mill should have been
capable (especially when he was grappling with the thoughts of a
man like Sir W. Hamilton) of writing these sentences, is indeed won-
derful. First, he denies that inconceivability is, in any sense or in any
case, a test of truth or reality ; but then he says it may be otherwise,
if the inconceivability itself is inconceivable I That*is to say: a wit-
ness is utterly untrustworthy ; but, when he makes a declaration re-
specting his own trustworthiness, he ought to be believed !

That the whole theory of inseparable association, as here advanced
and applied by Mill, is without foundation, it being impossible, under
his theory, to know what the experience of his numerous readers has
been, except again by experience which he cannot have had, since
most of these readers were utterly unknown to him — that all attempts
to argue questions with any one on such a basis are supremely foolish.
Mill being bound, by his own doctrine, to accept the answer, "My
experience has been otherwise," as conclusive — that this theory is
suicidal and subversive of itself, and that every earnest sentence Mill

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 107

has ever written is its practical refutation — is too obvious, almost, to
require pointing out.

While the example just discussed was a case of absolute incon-
ceivability, the other instances given by Mill are cases of true relative
inconceivability. The first is that of antipodes which were long held
to be impossible, and are now not only readily conceived as possible,
but known to be real. This is true enough, but it finds its explana-
tion, not in the law of inseparable association to which it is referred
by Mill, but in the fact that our ancestors held an erroneous concept
of the action of gravity. They supposed that the direction in which
gravity acted was an absolute direction in space ; they did not realize
that it was a direction toward the earth's centre of gravity ; down-
ward to them meant something very difierent from the sense we at-
tach to that word. "With this erroneous concept they could not recon-
cile the fact that the force of gravity held our antipodes in position
as well as ourselves ; nor can we. But we have a juster concept of
gravity, and the mode and direction of its action ; the spurious notion
with which the notion of antipodes was inconsistent, has been re-
moved, and the inconceivability of antipodes is at an end.

Similar observations apply to Mill's remaining example (which is
to us the most interesting, and that for the sake of which I have car-
ried the discussion of this dry subject to this length) of the incon-
ceivability of actio in distans, to which I have already alluded. The
true source of our inability to conceive actio in distans is, I trust, now
apparent. This inability results from the inconsistency of this con-
cept with the prevailing concepts respecting material presence. If
we reverse the proposition, that a body acts where it is, and say that
a body is where it acts, the inconceivability disappears at once. One
of the wisest utterances ever made on this subject is the saying of
Thomas Carlyle (quoted by Mill himself in his " System of Logic," in
another connection) : " You say a body cannot act where it is not ?
With all my heart ; but, pray, where is it ? " Of course, a reconstitu-
tion of our concepts of material presence, in the sense here indicated,
would be in utter conflict with the theory of the mechanical construc-
tion of matter from elements which are absolutely limited, hard, un-
changeable, and separated from each other by absolutely void spaces.
It is significant that nearly all the efiicient laborers in the quarries
of physical science vaguely feel, if they do not distinctly see, that such
a reconstitution is necessary. Such a feeling was at the bottom^ of
Faraday's attempt to construct matter out of the convergence and
intersection of mere lines of force, so as to secure to each point of
intersection (or, in the language of Faraday, to each centre of force)
a virtual omnipresence, the extent of the lines of force being infinite.

I may be permitted to say, at the end of this long but unavoidable
excursion into the regions of logic and psychology, that the doctrine,
according to which there is no warrant for the deliverances of our

io8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

consciousness except the cumulation of purely sensational experience,
which not only may but must vary with the j^osition of the intellects
interpreting it — that truth, therefore, is nothing but the inveteracy
of error — is the dreariest creed ever promulgated ; and its association
with the many noble truths of which John Stuart Mill has been the
discoverer or the champion, is the most unfortunate " inseparable
association " established in recent times. And it is deplorable that
Herbert Spencer, who has the merit of being one of the most energetic
fumigators of the intellectual atmosphere of our time, should evince a
disposition to make concessions to such a creed, and endeavor to eke
out its shortcomings by the doctrine (in itself, no doubt, both sound
and fertile) of the inheritance of ancestral tendencies of the mind.
His own theory leads to conclusions utterly subversive of Mill's doc-
trine ; for, if organic life (including the life of the mind) has been
continuously evolved from inorganic matter, then the lines of our
ancestry run into all the phenomena of the material world, and the
order of these phenomena must be ingrained, not only in the structure
of our bodies, but also in the constitution of our minds. Or, to express
it in the language of modern comparative psychology : the ancestral
inheritance of our intellects must embrace, not only the associations
established by experience between the phenomena of consciousness in
the minds of our progenitors, but also the regularity in the evolution
of the natural events which gave rise to these phenomena — the laws
of Nature. These laws must, therefore, in a certain sense, be prefigu-
rations of the forms of our intellect, so that, after all, there is truth in
the sentence of Protagoras, that man is the measure of all things, and
sense in the words of Goethe (almost identical with a passage in Plo-
tinus), that the eye sees the light, because it is of solar nature. I do
not, of course, mean to stand committed to this argument in the form
in which it is here presented, not entertaining the notions respecting
the relations between organic and inorganic forms which underlie it,
and doubting that the continuity of the evolution of these forms is
truly represented by current beliefs. But, with the proper modifica-
tion of its premisses (which, however, cannot be affected by a few ver-
bal definitions), I believe the argument in favor of the a priori sanity
of the human intellect to be valid, in spite of certain structural falla-
cies resulting from the laws of its growth, which I shall have occasion
to discuss in my next article ; and I further believe the primordial
correspondence between the intellect and its objects to be entirely
consistent with the theory of evolution. Max Muller to the contrary
notwithstanding.

SKETCH OF MR. J. N. LOCKYER, F.R. S. 109

SKETCH OF ME. J. E". LOCKYEE, F. E. S.

THE subject of this notice, Mr. Joseph Norman Lockter, is a
young astronomer who has cultivated his science assiduously,
and made his mark as an investigator in the field of solar physics.
He was born on the 17th of May, 1836, at Eugby, in Warwickshire,
England. He inherited from his father a predilection for scientific
studies ; for, if the elder Lockyer had not the honor of being the first,
he was one of the first who contrived methods of telegraphing by elec-
tricity.

At a very early age, young Lockyer was deprived of his parents, and,
after attending one or two private schools in England, where he picked
up the first rudiments of his education, the orphan boy went abroad,
and there continued his studies for several years. Upon his return to
England, he obtained a position under government, in the War-office,
the duties of which have occupied him regularly for the past sixteen
years ; his astronomical and literary work having been performed in
the intervals of time snatched from the government service. In 1858,
he married an accomplished and intelligent lady, who not only sym-
pathized with him in his scientific pursuits, but has also shared his
work and rendered the most valuable assistance in various of his un-
dertakings.

In 1862, he contributed a very important paper to the me-
moirs of the Eoyal Astronomical Society, on the planet Mars, giving
the results of his telescopic observations on the physical conditions
and configuration of its surface. In 1865, in conjunction with Thomas
Hughes, the popular author of " Tom Brown at Eugby," he was aj^point-
ed editor of the army regulations, and placed upon an improved basis
the system of War-ofiice legislation. In 1865, in recognition of his
services as an astronomical observer, he was elected a Fellow of the
Eoyal Astronomical Society.

Solar observations had for some time attracted much of Mr. Lock-
yer's attention, and in that year he propounded his method for ob-
serving the grand solar phenomena of the red flames with the spectro-
scope at any time when the sun is visible, whereas previously it had
been impossible to see them except under the obscuration of a total
or annular eclipse. A more powerful spectroscope than any then
available was needed to solve this problem, and, at Mr. Lockyer's
solicitation, the Eoyal Society made a grant for this purpose. Vexa-
tious delays occurred in the construction of the instrument, and he did
not get it until two years later. The idea, however, proved successful,
and Mr. Lockyer made the brilliant discovery in which he had been
so long baffled for lack of means. He sent the account of it to the
French Academy, and his note had been hardly read, when news came

no* : ;TIIE popular SCIENCE MONTHLY.

that tlie French astronomer Janssen, then in India, had made the same
observation two months before. The inde23endence of these discov-
eries was recognized, and the French Academy struck a joint medal
in honor of them.

Mr. Lockyer has prosecuted his spectroscopic researches on the sun
with great industry and fruitful results, and, in conjunction with Prof.
Frankland of the Royal School of Chemistry, has made a series of in-
teresting experiments on the relation of gases under pressure to the
spectrum lines, thus throwing important light on the changes taking
place in the solar atmosphere.

Mr. Lockyer's contributions to scientific literature, as an author of
books, a periodical writer, and a scientific editor, have been numerous.
In 1862, he had editorial charge of the scientific department of The
Reader^ and subsequently edited the English edition of " The Heav-
ens," by Guillemin. In 1868, he published his excellent school treatise
on " Elementary Astronomy," and in 1869 became the editor of Nature^
when that able scientific paper was established by Macmillan & Co.
Last year " The Forces of Nature," an elaborate work, by the author
of " The Heavens," appeared, with amendments and additions from his
pen. He has published, during the present year, an excellent little
volume on " Spectrum Analysis," being a course of lectures delivered
in 1869, and revised to date. It is beautifully illustrated, and forms
the first of Macmillan's " Nature Series."

In 1870, he was appointed by the English Government chief of the
expedition sent out to Sicily for the purpose of observing the solar
eclipse, and, in addition to his other work, accepted the secretaryship
of the Royal Commission on Scientific Institutions and the Advance-
ment of Science. In 1871, having been named assistant commissioner,
he was requested to draw up a report on science-teaching in English
and Continental schools, and the same year he received the honorable
appointment of Rede Lecturer at Cambridge.

Mr. Lockyer is a gentleman of courteous and afiable manners, a vi-
vacious conversationist, and a ready and fluent public speaker. Like
many other scientific Englishmen, he recognizes that he owes a duty
to this country, and hopes to be able to discharge it when he can get
release from his multifarious engagements. He has been invited by
the Lowell Institute to give a course of astronomical lectures in Bos-
ton, and, when he comes to deliver them, he will probably repeat the
series in some of the other cities of the country.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

7772" RELATIONS OF BODY AND MIND.

THE question of the relation of the
mental and the corporeal powers
has always had a deep speculative in-
terest; but, as science is gradually
working it out, it is found to have also
a profound practical interest. It is
strange that a subject of such fascina-
tion, and concerning which so much
has been said in all ages, should be so
late in its rational elucidation. But,
besides the difficulties which spring
from its extreme complexity, the in-
quiry has been perpetually hindered by
prejudice and passion. Singular as it
may appear, the acquisition of the most
important of all knowledge, that of the
human constitution by dissection, has
been held as a crime until the present
generation. The prejudice that led to
this result led also to the further result
that the most important part of the
human system, that which is specially
devoted to psychical ends, has been
considered last. The early anatomists
refrained from dissecting the head for
fear of committing impiety, and there
remained, long after, a kindred feeling
against the analysis and study of the
brain. Even when it had been demon-
strated, and was admitted by all physi-
ologists, that the brain was the organ
of the mind, there still lingered with
many a belief that it was a sort of un-
accountable, half-superfluous append-
age to the body, with no such reason
for its existence as was obvious in the
case of other anatomical parts. Physi-
ologists might show that it had special
relations with the mind, but the stu-
dents of mental philosophy denied that
it was of any importance to them, and
proceeded vrith their inquiries as if it
had no existence at all. Buifon de-
scribed the brain as consisting of a
kind of " ignorant mucilage," and the

Rev. F. "W. Robertson expressed the
general metapliysical and theological
contempt for it by ridiculing the idea
of accounting for mental eftects " by a
few ounces more or less of the hasty-
pudding contained within the skull."
We are indebted to the phrenological
school for having made a vigorous
fight in behalf of the claims of the
head upon the students of mind, and,
whatever may be the imperfections
of their scheme, they have certainly
cleared away a vast amount of preju-
dice in the popular mind, and prepared
for the consideration of the material
apparatus in connection with mental
phenomena.

It is now well established that, in
the study of mind and character, the
physiological organism is not only to
be taken into account, but is to be
made the basis of investigation. Meta-
physical treatises open with a descrip-
tion of the nervous system, even if it
plays no part in the subsequent exposi-
tion. But, wherever mind is studied
with a view to practical ends, it is
found necessary not only to admit in a
general way the intimate dependence
and close interaction of the mental and
corporeal systems, but the relations
have to be worked out with the utmost
detail on both sides. In dealing with
abnormal mental manifestations, as in
the numerous forms of insanity and
the various grades of tieeble-minded-
ness, or with the psychological efiects
of stimulants and narcotics, or with
the development and decline of the
mental powers, or with the effects of
mental overwork and exhaustion, it is
now admitted to be indispensable to
start from the nervous system, and to
regard mental manifestations as con-
ditioned by its properties and laws.
Thus far it is only physicians, compelled

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

by the exigencies of practice, and pre-
pared with the requisite physiological
knowledge, who thoroughly accept this
point of view, but it is the point of view
that must yet be taken by all who deal
with the phenomena of human nature
on the basis of real and applicable
knowledge. Especially in that pro-
fession which aims to direct the devel-
opment of the mind and character of
the young, must the corporeal side of
their nature be thoroughly and syste-
matically studied. We lately heard of
a professor, high in honor and reputa-
tion as a teacher of teachers, whose
text-books of mind are the metaphysi-
cal treatises of Stewart and Hamilton,
and who strenuously denies that cor-
poreal considerations have any right to
be imported into the question : happily,
the class to which he belongs is fast
passing away. He who aspires to the
noble work of developing a human
being must take the whole nature of
that being into account. He has no
right to cleave it asunder and throw
away one part of it, especially that part
which is the organism of life, and brings
the individual into relation with the
universe. The teacher who has only
attained an intellectual comprehension
of certain branches in which he is to
give instruction, has hardly entered
upon his preparation. As we have else-
where written : " Education is an affair
of the laws of our being, involving a
wide range of considerations — an affair
of the air respired, its moisture, tem-
perature, density, purity, and electrical
state in their physiological effects ; an
affair of food, digestion, and nutrition ;
of the quantity, quality, and speed of
the blood sent to the brain ; of clothing
and exercise, fatigue and repose ; health
and disease, or variable volition and
automatic nerve-action ; of fluctuating
feeling, redundancy and exhaustion of
nerve-power, sensuous impressibility,
temperament, family history, constitu-
tional predisposition, and lanconscious
influence ; of material surroundings,

and a host of agencies which stamp
themselves upon the plastic organism
and reappear in character."

The latest contribution to tbe litera-
ture of this subject is a little book
entitl ed " Mind and Body : the Theories
of their Relation,"* by Prof. Alexander
Bain, author of "The Senses and the
Intellect," and " The Emotions and the
Will." The volume that now appears
represents the leading facts of the ques-
tion, and their latest theoretical inter-
pretations, and closes with an interest-
ing review of the course of past specu-
lation npon the subject.

It being now established that the
brain is the material instrument of the
mind, the questions are inevitable. What
do we actually know, and how much
is it possible to know, of the conditions
of this union ? It is not enough to rec-
ognize that when the circulation of the
blood in the brain is arrested, as in faint-
ing, consciousness ceases, nor that alco-
hol in its influence upon the nervous
system modifies mental action in one
way, and opium and hashish in other
ways ; that which we require to under-
stand is, in what manner the mechan-
ism and action of the brain are specially
related to the mechanism and action of
the mind. Nor is the question as to the
ultimate nature of mind and matter, or
how they can exist together, for this is
beyond the province of science to deter-
mine. What are the essence of mind and
the essence of matter, and whether they
are at bottom two things or one thing,
are beyond ascertainment, and will prob-

i This is number IV. of " The International
Scientific Series." In arranging the works of this
series, which aims to represent the latest result of
thought, it was deemed important that the new
psychology should be fully treated, and by the most
competent men. Prof. Bain was accordingly en-
gaged to deal with the more gaceral and philosophi-
cal aspects of the subject, while the volume of Dr.
William B. Carpenter, in the same series, will be a
regular practical text-book of mental philosophy
from the physiological point of view. It will be
issued in January, under the title of " The Princi-
ples of Mental Physiology : with their Applications
to the Training and Discipline of the Mind, and the
Study of its Morbid Conditions."

EDITORS TABLE.

13

ably ever remain so. The nature of the
union is a mystery, just as the nature
of tlie union between gravity and mat-
ter is a mystery ; in both cases we in-
vestigate only the laws of the phenom-
ena. As the problem is one of the con-
nection between two systems of action,
the first step toward its solution must
be to resolve these two systems into
their simplest elements. The structural
elements of the nervous system are mar-
velously simple ; they consist of micro-
scopic cells and fibres, the former being
seats or centres of force, and the latter
being the means of transmitting it.

Cells and fibres are the instruments
of mental action, and, exactly as we
rise in the scale of intelligence in ani-
mated creatures, there is an increase
in the mass of the nervous centres —
that is, a multiplication of the nerves
and fibres which constitute them. In
man, the most intelligent of the animal
series, the organ of intelligence is rela-
tively very large, and attains the high-
est degree of complexity.

Prof. Bain represents the nervous
elements of the human brain as fol-
lows : " The thin cake of gray sub-
stance surrounding the hemispheres
of the brain, and extended into many
doublings by the furrowed or convo-
luted structure, is somewhat difficult to
measure. It has been estimated at
upward of 300 square inches, or as
nearly equal to a square surface of 18
inches in the side. Its thickness is va-
riable, but, on an average, it may be
stated at one-tenth of an inch. It
is the largest accumulation of gray
matter in the body. It is made
up of several layers of gray sub-
stance divided by layers of white sub-
stance. The gray substance is a near-
ly compact mass of corpuscles of va-
riable size. The large caudate nerve-
cells are mingled with very small
corpuscles less than the thousandth
of an inch in diameter. Allowing for
intervals, we may suppose that a linear
row of 500 cells occupies an inch, thus

VOL. IT. — 8

giving 250,000 to the square incli for
300 inches. If one-half of the thick-
ness of the layer is made up of fibres,
the corpuscles or cells, taken by them-
selves, would be a mass one-twentieth
of an inch thick, say 16 cells in the
depth. Multiplying these numbers to-
gether, we should reach a total of
1,200,000,000 cells in the gray covering
of the hemispheres. As every cell is
united with at least two fibres, often
many more, we may multiply this num-
ber by four for the number of connect-
ing fibres attached to tlie mass, which
gives 4,800,000,000 fibres."

Now, in saying that such a wonder-
ful organism as this is the seat and em-
bodiment of the mind, we require to
give distinctness to our conceptions,
and are compelled to regard the con-
nected cells and fibres as the simple in-
struments of simple mental processes
as the whole fabric is the organ and
measure of the whole mind. The cor-
poreal elements are cells and fibres —
what are the psychical elements in their
lowest analysis ? The old division of
of the mind into faculties — as reason,
judgment, memory, and imagination
— is insufiicient, for these are far from
being ultimate elementary processes,
but are rather the most complex actions
of the collective forces of the intelli-
gence in different modes of exercise.
The later psychology resolves all these
so-called faculties into a few constitu-
ents which form, if we may so speak,
the contexture of the intellect. As
Prof Bain remarks : " "We have no
power of memory in radical separation
from the power of reason or the pow-
er of imagination. The classification
is tainted with the fault called in logic
' cross - division.' The really funda-
mental separation of the powers of the
intellect is into three facts, called : 1.
Discrimination, the sense, feeling, or
consciousness, of difference ; 2. Simi-
larity, the sense, feeling, or conscious-
ness, of agreement ; and, 3. Retentive-
ness, or the power of memory or ac-

114

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

quisition. These three fucctions, how-
ever much they are mingled in our
mental operations, are yet totally dis-
tinct properties, and each the ground-
work of a ditferent superstructure. As
an ultimate analysis of the mental
powers, their number cannot be in-
creased or diminished; fewer would
not explain the facts, more are unne-
cessary. They are the intellect, the
whole intellect, and nothing but the in-
tellect."

This resolution of the intellect into
ultimate discriminations of likenesses
and differences among things recog-
nized, remembered, and thought about,
and, as a consequence, the growth or
development of the intellect as a suc-
cessive combination and recompound-
ing of these relations of discrimina-
tion, is an immense step forward in the
progress of scientific psychology, be-
cause it first brings into close corre-
spondence the two orders of activity.
Instead of merely wondering at the
brain as an inexplicable mass of muci-
lage, we now regard it as an organism
built up with exquisite delicacy out of
thousands of millions of cells and fibres,
with myriads of intimate connections,
all guarded most securely and put into
multiplied and marvelous relations with
the external universe. It is impossible
here to go into the details of the sub-
ject, and we have aimed only to state
the present attitude and tendency of
psychological inquiry, which is briefly
this : Our feelings and volitions, apti-
tudes and acquisitions, are elements of
mind having their corporeal side which
it is both indispensable and possible
to understand — great progress having
been recently made in the investiga-
tion. Much in the relations of the
cerebral structures to mental action is
stUl profoundly obscure, but much is
also already known which is of the
highest service for useful guidance.
Metaphysics has been hitherto pro-
verbially barren, because it has in-
sisted upon considering mind as an

isolated abstraction ; while modern
psychology, by regarding the whole
nature as a unity, promises, on the
other hand, to be eminently produc-
tive of practical results.

MEETING OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION:

The British Association for the Ad-
vancement of Science commenced its
forty-third session September I7th, in
tlie town of Bradford. Dr. Carpenter
resigned the presidency, and, as the
health of Dr. J. P. Joule, his successor-
elect, did not allow him to assume the
duties of the chair, it was taken by
Prof. Williamson, the eminent English
chemist, who devoted his inaugural ad-
dress to the discussion of his own de-
partment of science. After a hand-
some tribute to the memory of Liebig,
Prof. Williamson entered into an ex-
position of the present conditions of
chemical science, the directions of its
greatest activity, the present state of
chemical theory, and the general rela-
tions of scientific education to the ad-
vancement of knowledge. The whole
paper is able, but it did not arrive in
time for publication in the present
number of the Monthly.

The chairman of the biological sec-
tion was Prof. Allman, the distin-
guished zoologist of the Edinburgh
University, and his address, upon tak-
ing the chair, seems to us a very able
and instructive scientific discussion.
But what is the British Association for
the Advancement of Science about, in
putting at the head of its biological
branch a man who favors Darwinian
notions, and is consequently a sham
scientist ? Do they not know that from
the Yankee Vatican has gone forth
a bull which excommunicates them
and their seed to the end of time ? In
his lively address before the Free Reli-
gious Association, in Boston, last May,
Colonel Higginson apologized for the
extent of theological disagreement by

EDITOR'S TABLE.

15

pointing out the diversities of scientific
opinion, and remarked : " I heard one
of the greatest scientific men in Amer-
ica reply, when somebody said, ' You
must at least admit that there is a di-
vision of opinion among scientific men
in regard to the doctrines of Darwin,'
' No, there is no difierence of opinion
among scientific men.' ' Why not ? '
' Because,' said he, ' no man who sup-
ports the doctrines of Darwin is en-
titled to be called a scientific man.' "
As to who the great man was who
made this destructive remark, nobody
will need to guess twice ; but it
squelches Prof. Allman, and turns the
British Association out-of-doors as a
lot of mere scientific pretenders, for
their representative biologist aired his
vagaries as follows : " I have thus
dwelt at some length on the doctrine
of evolution, because it has given a
new direction to biological study, and
must powerfully influence all future re-
searches."

Prof. AUman regards the doctrine
of evolution as a great and actual truth
of Nature, still obscured and embar-
rassed by many difliculties, and in this
he is at one with its oldest and strong-
est adherents ; but he insists that it
harmonizes and explains so extensive a
range of facts, which are without ex-
planation on any other view, as to be-
come invaluable as an instrument of
scientific research. On this point he
says:

" The hypothesis of evolution may
not, it is true, be yet established on so
sure a basis as to command instanta-
neous acceptance, and for a generaliza-
tion of such wide significance no one
can be blamed for demanding for it a
broad and indisputable foundation of
facts. Whether, however, we do or
do not accept it as firmly established,
it is, at all events, certain that it em-
braces a greater number of phenomena,
and suggests a more satisfactory expla-
nation of them, than any other hypoth-
esis which has yet been proposed. . . .

Or, finally, is the doctrine of evolutioa
only a working hypothesis which, like
an algebraic fiction, may yet. be of in-
estimable value as an instrument of re-
search ? For, as the higher calculus
becomes to the pliysical inquirer a
power by which he unfolds the laws
of the inorganic world, so may the hy-
pothesis of evolution, though only an
hypothesis, furnish the biologist with
a key to the order and hidden forces of
the world of life. And what Leibnitz
and Newton and Hamilton have been
to the physicist, is it not that which
Darwin has been to the biologist?"
Only to think of itl Would it not
have been well if those British sci-
entists had got some American to
teach them what science is, and how-
to preserve it from perversion and deg-
radation ?

PROFESSOR CZERMAK.

Otje readers will recall an impor-
tant lecture on " Hypnotism in Ani-
mals," a translation of which, by Miss
Hammond, appeared in The Popular
Science Monthly for September. It
gave some of the results of a very in-
teresting research in comparative psy-
chology; and, in a second lecture upon
the same subject, in the present num-
ber, the results of the investigation are
continued, with some strictures on the
so-called experimental investigations
of " spiritualism." The originality of
this inquiry, and the practical lesson
that is drawn from it, will be sufficient
to secure a careful perusal of these dis-
courses, but the reader's interest in
them will be increased by the painful
announcement of the recent death of
their distinguished author, which oc-
curred September 15th. Prof. Ozer-
mak was the head, and in fact the pro-
prietor, of the famous Physiological
Laboratory in Leipsic, where he lived.
He was the inventor of the laryngo-
scope, and his treatise upon it was
translated and published by the Eng-

ii6

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MOXTHLY.

lish Sydenham Society. He was a man
of large wealth, which he liberally de-
voted to the work of science by main-
taining his physiological school ; and,
besides being a skillful and able inves-
tigator, he was a man of enlarged cult-
ure and earnestly sympathetic with all
measures and movements for the diifu-
sion of valuable knowledge among the
people. He was warmly interested in
carrying out the project of the " Inter-
national Scientific Series," being a
member of the German committee to
decide upon the contributions from that
country; and, had he lived, he would
have prepared a volume for the series
himself. He wrote and spoke the Eng-
lish language with ease and elegance,
and his wife conversed in it so fluently
and perfectly that the writer felt sure
she must be an American lady, if not
English, until he learned that she had
never been out of Germany. Prof.
Ozermak died of a lingering disease
from which he had long suffered.

MB. PEOCTORS LECTURES.
Mr. PacHAED A. Proctor, the emi-
nent English astronomer, is to lecture
in this country during the ensuing sea-
son. We need hardly say that he is a
first-class man, and stands among the
ablest in his chosen department of sci-
ence. Nor is he a mere recipient and
reporter of other men's ideas ; he has
views of his own, and has made his in-
dependent contributions to the exten-
sion of astronomical science. But it is
as a lucid and attractive writer on as-
tronomical themes that Mr. Proctor is
chiefly known. He has written an
elaborate work on " The Sun," and has
just pubhshed a corresponding volume
on "The Moon; " these, with "Other
"Worlds than Ours," and his numerous
and excellent papers in the reviews on
stellar astronomy, show his thorough
familiarity with the whole field of celes-
tial phenomena. Mr. Proctor is said
to be a clear, rapid, and forcible speak-

er, which, with his illustrations, will
make his lectures the leading scientific
entertainment of the season.

LITERARY NOTICES.

The Philosophy of EvoLrTiON. (An Ac-
tonian Prize Essay.) By B. Thompson
LowNE, M. R. C. S., F. L. S. London,
John Van Voorst.

Hannah Acton, relict of Samuel, had
opinions. In this there was certainly nothing
remarkable, but she had also that which
gives dignity and power to opinion, that is,
money to back it. Ideas amount to very
little until incarnated, and then they acquire
an immense and lasting influence. A nar-
row-minded blockhead may cherish views
that nobody regards as worth listening to,
but if he puts a few hundred thousand dol-
lars behind them, and founds a college for
carrying them out, they suddenly rise into
respectability, and are made potential for
generations. Our friend Hannah had a no-
tion that there prevails a very low estimate
of the wisdom and goodness of the Creator
of the universe, and she was willing to spend
money to raise the standard, so she placed
a thousand pounds of good solid investments
in the hands of a committee of the Royal
Institution of Great Britain, to appropri-
ate the interest, every seven years, in the
shape of a prize of one hundred guineas,
for the best essay, " illustrative of the wis-
dom and beneficence of the Almighty, in
such department of science as the committee
should select," leaving it to their discretion
to withhold the reward if none of the essays
produced were thought worthy of it. Seven
years ago, the solar radiations — certainly a
magnificent subject — was proposed for a
prize ; but, as nothing appeared upon that
theme which would to any extent promote
the donor's intention, the money was not
granted. So the funds accumulated, and this
year two prizes were offered, one of them
for the best essay on the " Law of Evolution,
as illustrating the Wisdom and Beneficence
of the Almighty," and B. Thompson Lowne
got the golden prize for writing the httle
book before us. The fact is notable as
showing the advance of thought, for no
transformation suggested by the evolution-
ists as taking place among the lower animals

LITERARY NOTICES.

17

is more surprising than that transformation
of opinion in the scientific world that has
made such an award as this possible ; and,
if Aunt Hannah had been as prophetic as she
was devout, and scented afar the use that
would be made of her money, it is question-
able if the Royal Institution would ever have
got a shilling of it. As for the book itself, it
is but a sorry performance. It has been sagely
remarked, concerning prize sheep and prize
essays, that the former are useful only for
making caudles, and the latter for lighting
them ; and the observation is as true of Mr.
Lowne's book as of the class to which it be-
longs, for it is certainly the poorest piece of
work upon the subject that we have yet seen.
Most contributions to this question are in-
spired by such an interest in it as to enforce
study and secure some merit ; but this contri-
bution has obviously been made for a hundred
guineas. Literary labor need not be neces-
sarily bad because it is paid for, but prize
essays are an open appeal to mercenary
motives, and are apt to attract those who
are mainly influenced by them. Mr. Lowue
undoubtedly knows something of his sub-
ject, but he neither contributes any thing
to its original thought, nor, what was equal-
ly needed, has he given us a clear and full
popular representation of it. The book
which shall perform that office remains yet
to be written.

Elements of Physical Manipulation. By
Edward C. Pickering, Thayer Professor
of Physics in the Massachusetts Insti-
tute of Technology. 8vo. 225 pages,
price, 83.00. New York : Hnrd &
Houghton.

There are hopeful signs that the des-
potic rule of the verbal system in education
has had its day, and must lose its suprem-
acy in future exactly in the ratio of the
advance of thorough scientific education.
Nothing can be more futile than the mere
verbal teaching of physical laws, when it is
possible, by the performance of simple ex-
periments, to bring their operation directly
before the student's mind. It is quite as
preposterous as the prevailing habit of
learning the descriptive and observational
sciences by memorizing the statements of
books rather than by the direct study of
the objects themselves. That nine-tenths of
the school-study of science is at present

an unmitigated educational sham but few
wiU deny, and what is now wanted is less
an increase in the amount of scientific study
than a radical amendment of its method.
This want is widely felt, and is beginning
to be efficiently suppHed. Botanical and
zoological text-books are becoming more
and more guides to Nature, and there is
springing up a separate literature of work-
ing processes in the experimental sciences.
Treatises on manipulation have long been
standard necessities in chemical labora-
tories, and they are now i-ecognized as of
equal importance in laboratories devoted
to other departments of experimental sci-
ence. The admirable volume of Drs. Bur-
den - Sanderson and Michael Foster, on
" The Processes and Manipulations of the
Physiological Laboratory," is a recent Eng-
lish contribution in this direction ; and the
" Introduction to Physical Measurements,"
by Dr. F. Kohlrausch, of Darmstadt, the
translation of which has just been issued
by Churchill, of London, is a valuable vol-
ume of the same kind. Prof. Pickering's
new book, however, is now by far the Lest
guide that we have for the practical teach-
ing of natural philosophy. Assuming that
the instruments are in the hands of the stu-
dent, it shows him precisely how to use
them, what precautions to take, and what
errors to avoid. " It is intended as a
hand-book for teachers, for the large class
of amateurs who devote their leisure to
some branch of physical inquiry, and more
particularly as a text-book for the physical
laboratories now introduced so generally
in all our larger colleges and scientific
schools.

" It is hoped that it may also aid the
introduction of the laboratory system into
the high-schools and academies, as many
of the experiments are simple enough to
be performed there, and, at the same time,
the kind of apparatus described is such
that it can be made at very small expense."

The preliminary chapter is devoted to
general methods of investigation and the
more common applications of the mathe-
matics to the discussion of results, and a
short description is also given of the vari-
ous methods of measuring distances, time,
and weights, which, in fact, form the basis
of all physical investigation. The remain-

li8

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

der of the volume is occupied with a series
of experiments upon the following general
topics : the mechanics of solids, the me-
chanics of liquids and gases, and the phe-
nomena of sound and light. The worlv is
Trritteu in a clear style, is neatly and fully
illustrated, ami is the result of four years'
practical experience in the physical labora-
tory of the Massachusetts Institute of Tech-
nology. It is gracefully dedicated to Prof.
William B. Rogers, the founder of that in-
stitution, " as the first to propose a physi-
cal laboratory." The rapid spread of the
laboratory system of teaching physics in
the higher schools of this country will open
a wide field of usefulness for Prof. Picker-
ing's excellent text-book.

ClTILIZATION CONSIDERED AS A SCIESCE.

By George Harris, F. S. A. 382 pages.
Price, $1.50. D. Appleton & Co.

Although the author of this volume is
a lawyer, and is disposed to consider his
subject very much in the light of his pro-
fessional studies, that is, from the stand-
point of the moral sciences, yet he accepts
the broader view which regards civilization
as part of the order of Nature, and as, there-
fore, dependent upon many sciences for its
interpretation. His aim, however, is not
purely scientific, that is, to analyze and
generalize the phenomena of civilization ;
but, recognizing the government of natural
law, he rather attempts a practical discus-
sion of those agencies of civil and social
advancement which are most perfectly un-
der public control. He writes with a view
to the improvement of society, rather than
to the understanding or explanation of it,
and his book would have been more com-
pletely described by the title " Civilization
considered as a Science and an Art." Mr.
Harris fii-st inquires into the essential con-
stitution of civilization, to determine what
are its factors or the various forces and in-
strumentalities that have cooperated in its
development. Individual enterprise, scien-
tific discoveries and inventions, education,
legislation, internal and external inter-
course, religious institutions, language and
literature, and racial, climatic, and geo-
graphical conditions, are all enumerated as
elements of the grand result, while the
various values of these several elements
are considered in the successive chapters

of the book. The present work is a new
and revised edition of a volume that ap-
peared several years ago. The result of
his progressive studies has been, material-
ly to modify the author's opinions on points
at first held to be all-important. He at first
considered that legislative measures, ex-
pressly adapted for the purpose, are the
main means by which civilization has been
promoted ; but a careful examination of
the subject soon sufficed to correct this
error. The subtler and more pervasive in-
fluence of education was next fixed upon as
" constituting the real efficient cause, if not
the actual essence of civilization." But fur-
ther inquiry convinced the author that here
also he was so profoundly wrong that he
regards the refutation of this fallacy as the
main purpose of his work. He says : " Upon
taking a comprehensive view of the whole
matter, in all its different bearings, and
with regard to all its varied requirements,
the ultimate conclusion which I arrived at
was, that which is not only really needed,
but what is, in fact, in many cases, actually
intended in the demands for the intellectual
and moral improvement and advancement
of the nation, is not education merely, but
civihzation generally. This principle, which
has not been adopted without the fullest
defiberation and the sincerest conviction
of its truth, is the basis of the doctrine pro-
pounded in the following pages, and its
recognition is deemed of the utmost conse-
quence to the well-being of society. Edu-
cation is, in fact, so to speak, one only out
of several of the chains by which the car
of civilization is drawn onward. By apply-
ing to this one alone, not only is the ma-
chine moved very feebly and very slowly,
but there is considerable danger incurred
of snapping the single chain."

Mr. Harris puts forth no claim to the
discovery or extension of the scientific
theory of civilization, but his book con-
tains much information and many impor-
tant suggestions upon the subject.

The Logic of AccoTr>T« ; a Jf ew Exposition
of the Theory and Practice of Double-
Entrv Book-keeping. By E. G. Folsom,
A. M' Price $2.00. A. S. Barnes & Co.

There are two kinds of school-books
upon the same subjects. One is written
from the art point of view, and the other

LITERARY NOTICES.

119

from that of science; one deals with rules
and rote, and the other with principles ; one
narrows, the other widens ; one makes of a
student a good machine, the other an edu-
cated thinker. Mr. Folsom's book-keeping
is to be commended on broad educational
grounds, as it presents the subject in its
logical and scientific form, suitable for lib-
eral mental training. The difficulty with
book-keeping, as with arithmetic, is that,
under pressure of the utilitarian spirit, they
are degraded into mere blind mechanical
operations, acquired as a kind of dexterity,
and solely with a view to business. Book-
keeping is commonly learned in much the
same way as the management of the sewing-
machine, and to little better purpose, so far
as mental cultivation is concerned. Mr.
Folsom aims to redeem the study to its
higher uses by treating it as a science of
values and exchanges, which depends upon
reasons and laws. While making due pro-
vision for the practice of the art, his con-
stant method is to keep in view the prin-
ciples which should guide the student's
thinking. A work like this, pursued thought-
fully and thoroughly, in its philosophic
spirit, will afford the most valuable prepa-
ration for studying the science of pohtical
economy, which treats of the laws of value
and exchange as affecting communities and
nations on the largest scale.

Antiquities op thk Southern Indians, par-
ticularly OF the Georgia Tribes. By
Charles C. Jones, Jr. Large octavo,
532 pages, illustrated with Thirty-one
Plates, and several Woodcuts. Price
$6.00. New York : D. Appleton & Co.,
1873.

We have before briefly noticed this val-
uable contribution to American archaeology,
and now proceed to give our readers a fur-
ther account of it, as, since the publication
of the " Ancient Monuments of the Mississip-
pi Valley," no work has been written upon
this subject so minute in its details, so care-
ful in statement, and so extended in its ob-
servations. Although the antiquities of
Georgia claim the author's particular atten-
tion, he presents an intelligent and compre-
hensive view of the ancient monuments and
aboriginal relics of that portion of the ter-
ritory of the United States which is bounded
on the north by Kentucky and the upper

hmits of Virginia, on the east by the Atlan-
tic Ocean, on the south by the Gulf of Mex-
ico, and on the west by the Mississippi
River. The field of research — which is
manifestly one of great interest, abounding
with relics of unusual variety, symmetry,
and beauty — has hitherto been but feebly
explored. Here, in ancient times, dwelt
peoples who apparently occupied a middle
position in the scale of semi-civilization ;
influenced, on the one hand, to a greater or
less degree, by those ideas which in Mexico
and Central America culminated in such
complex and elaborate developments, and,
on the other, sympathizing with and sharmg
in those ruder expressions characteristic of
Western hunter tribes and their more north-
em neighbors.

" Our object has been," says the author
in his preface, " from the earliest and most
authentic sources of information at com-
mand, to convey a correct impression of the
location, characteristics, form of govern-
ment, social relations, manufactures, domes-
tic economy, diversions, and customs of the
Southern Indians, at the time of primal con-
tact between them and the Europeans. This
introductory part of the work is followed by
an examination of tumuli, earthworks, and
various relics, obtained from burial-mounds,
gathered amid refuse-piles, found in ancient
graves, and picked up in cultivated fields
and on the sites of old villages and fishing-
resorts. Whenever these could be inter-
preted in the light of early-recorded obser-
vations, or were capable of explanation by
customs not obsolete at the dawn of the his-
toric period, the authorities relied upon have
been carefully noted."

In the first four chapters we are made
atquamted with the political, social, and in-
dustrial status of the Southern Indians, as
disclosed by the narratives of the Spanish
expeditions, and portrayed in the accounts
of the early voyagers. The five succeeding
chapters are devoted to a history of mound-
building, and to a description of various
groups of mounds with their attendant in-
closures and fish-preserves. Among these
ancient tumuli, antedating the period of
European colonization, are mentioned and
classified temple-mounds, terraced mounds,
truncated pyramids, mounds of observation
and retreat, chieftain - mounds, family or

120

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tribal mounds, shell mounds, stone tumuli,
and single graves. In this region there is a
remarkable absence of megalithic monu-
ments and animal-shaped mounds. The
presence of rock-walls, embankments, and
defensive inclosures, is noted ; and, in con-
nection with the grave-mounds, cremation
and sundry funeral customs are alluded to
and discussed. The plans of these promi-
nent indications of early constructive skill
are based upon original surveys, and the im-
pressions conveyed of the monuments them-
selves are derived from the personal obser-
vations of the writer. The author does not
concur in the opinion, so often expressed,
that " the mound-builders were a race dis-
tinct from, and superior in art, government,
and religion to, the Southern Indians of the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries." His
reasons are fairly and cogently stated, and
it is shown that the practice of sepulchral
mound-building, and the construction of ele-
vated spaces for chieftain-lodges and coun-
cil-houses, were perpetuated within the his-
toric period. In accounting for the marked
decadence in industry, combined labor, craft
and power which characterized these peo-
ples in the eighteenth century, when their
condition is contrasted with that of their
ancestors, two centuries before, it is sug-
gested that " the inroads of the Spaniards
violently shocked this primitive population,
imparting new ideas, interrupting established
customs, overturning acknowledged govern-
ment, impoverishing whole districts, engen-
dering a sense of insecurity until that time
unknown, causing marked changes, and en-
tailing losses and demoralizations perhaps
far more potent than we are inclined, at
first thought, to believe."

Extended reference is made to the loca-
tion and contents of refuse-piles and shell-
heaps — objects which have of late attracted
so much attention in many pai-ts of the
world, indicating, as they do, the resorts of
primitive peoples, furnishing evidence of the
food upon which they subsisted, and reveal-
ing the implements and utensils upon which
they relied for daily use.

Stone-graves and the use of copper are
treated of in the tenth chapter. Plate VI.
— in which are figured the relics found in a
stone-grave in Nacoochee Valley — possesses
unusual beauty, and conveys an emphatic j

idea of the commercial relations existing
among the North American tribes. From
this grave were taken a laminated copper
axe, which had probably been obtained from
the shores of Lake Superior, a cassio Jlam-
mea, from the Gulf of Mexico or the Atlan-
tic coast, the remnant of a basket made of
a reed not native to the valley, and stone
implements laboriously constructed of ma-
terials brought from a distance. All these
were once the property of a single indi-
vidual.

In the chapters upon arrow and spear
heads — grooved, wedge-shaped, perforated,
and ceremonial axes — cutting, piercing,
smoothing, scraping, and agricultural im-
plements— the author enters upon a well-
considered analysis of the characteristics
of the prevailing types, and accompanies
his illustrations with descriptions and sug-
gestions indicative of extensive research
and accurate archseological knowledge.

In the fourteenth chapter we are made
acquainted with the different methods
adopted by the Southern Indians for the
capture of fish. Grooved, notched, and per-
forated net-sinkers and plummets are figured.
The chung-kee game — that famous game of
the North American Indians, to which they
were so passionately addicted that, when
all private property had been gambled
away, the desperate players hazarded even
their personal liberty upon the final throw —
is next considered ; and, in this connection,
numerous discoidal stones are shown. The
limits of this review do not permit us to
dwell upon the use of stone tubes in con-
nection with the arts of the medicine-mau
and the conjurer, as explained by the au-
thor, or to enumerate seriatim the matters
treated of in this entertaining and instruc-
tive volume. We commend, as worthy of
careful study, the chapters upon pipes
(which are considered under the three
classes of idol-pipes, calumets, and com-
mon pipes), on idols and image-worship,
and upon pottery. The Etowah idol, figured
at page 432, is perhaps the most notable
ancient stone image which has yet been
found in association with Indian relics north
and east of Mexico. Much historical infor-
mation has been collected concerning the
primitive uses of tobacco and the office of the
peace-pipe. In plate XXIII the typical forms

i

LITERARY NOTICES.

121

of the calumets and bird-shaped pipes are
given. The manufacture of ancient pottery
is fully considered ; and, in the accompa-
nying plates, the prevailing forms of terra-
cotta vessels, and the different styles of
ornamentation, are beautifully portrayed.
The use of pearls as ornaments is made the
subject of an independent chapter. It is
curious to observe what an important part
these little glistening beads played among
the ornament-loving peoples of this semi-
tropical region. The work concludes with
an examination of the primitive employ-
ment of shells as ornaments, implements,
and as a recognized medium of exchange.

It will be observed that nearly every
chapter in this work forms an independent
essay, complete in itself, and elaborate of
its kind. The originality of the work, both
as regards its general plan and the manner
of its execution, will be at once remarked.
The freshness and vigor of the illustrations
are admirable. The typical objects repre-
sented have never been figured before, the
originals, or nearly all of them, forming part
of the author's collection, and most of them
having been obtained by him in situ. Accu-
rate pen-drawings were first made under his
personal supervision and then these were
reproduced by the photo-Uthographic pro-
cess— all errors of transfer by an engraver
being thus avoided. As a necessary conse-
quence, these illustrations are unusually cor-
rect. They possess an individuality which
is very attractive. In grouping the objects
selected for illustration, marked taste has
been displayed. The plan of the work we
regard as natural and judicious. In that
portion of North America constituting the
field of these archseological researches we
have only a stone age. Here and there cop-
per implements and ornaments appear, but
that material in its manufacture was re-
garded and treated by the primitive work-
men not as a metal capable of being mould-
ed under the influence of heat, but simply
as a malleable stone. Chipped and ground
stone implements are found in juxtapo-
sition ; and, in their uses, are seemingly of
equal antiquity. Any attempt, therefore, in
the present state of the inquiry, to pursue
the classifications usually adopted by Euro-
pean archreologists appeared both unneces-
sary and improper. Realizing this fact, the

author has grouped and described the an-
tiquities of the Southern Indians principally
with respect to their uses. Monuments, im-
plements, manufactures, and ornaments, are
invested with such explanations as are sug-
gested by the early narratives, by peculiar
characteristics, by intelligent comparison,
and by the special circumstances under
which they were found. The classification
adopted has been, in many instances, gen-
eral, and the author has sought to avoid an
error into which writers on kindred subjects
are prone to fall, namely, a too rigid classi-
fication, and an attempt to refer each relic
to some definite use. So uncertain is the
boundary line which separates well-recog-
nized types ; so varied are the modifications
of established forms ; so great was the pov-
erty of the manufacturers ; and so various
the purposes to which the same rude tool
may have been applied in conducting early
mechanical operations, that the candid ob-
server may often confess himself at a loss
to determine the positive object for which
a given specimen may have been intended.

In his concluding observations the au-
thor says : " Upon a careful comparison of
the antiquities of the Southern nations with
those of the Northern tribes, we think a
greater variety and excellence of manufac-
ture, a more diversified expression of fancy
in ornamentation, a more careful selection
of beautiful material, a superior delicacy
and finish in the fabrication of implements,
both chipped and polished, a more pro-
nounced exhibition of combined labor in
the erection of tumuh, a more despotic form
of government, a greater permanency of
seats, a more liberal expenditure of care and
attention in the cultivation of the soil, a
more decided system of worship, and a more
dignified observance of the significant festi-
vals and funeral-customs, may fairly be
claimed for the former. We are acquainted
with no region north and east of the Eio
Grande in which the earliest exhibitions of
skill and taste in the manufacture of imple-
ments and ornaments of stone, shell, and
bone, are more varied and attractive, where
pipe-making claimed such special attention,
and where the antique pottery is indicative
of such diversity of form and ornamenta-
tion, and possessed of such homogeneous-
ness of composition and durability."

122

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Workshop Appliances ; includiag Descrip-
tions of the Gauging and Measuring
Instruments, the Hand Cutting-tools,
Lathes, Drilling, Planing, and other Ma-
chine-tools used by Engineers. By C.
P. B. Shelley, Civil Engineer. 209 Il-
lustrations, 312 pages. Price, $1.50.
D. Appleton & Co.

This is a hand-book of tools and their
uses, compendious in form, and copiously
illustrated, which will be of great value to
young artisans and mechanics, whether
working in wood or metal. There is no end
to machines for reshaping the materials of
Nature, and inventors are constantly adding
to them ; but the fundamental tools for pro-
ducing mechanical effects, with their re-
sources of variation, fall into a few classes,
and their modes of action are capable of
explanation within a narrow space. It is
the variation and recombination of com-
paratively a few implements that are con-
stantly coming before us in the form of com-
plex and obscurely - acting contrivances.
Two objects are to be gained by the use of
tools : 1. The production of given mechani-
cal effects ; and, 2. Accuracy in the pro-
cesses. Both of these objects are now at-
tained by mechanics with a remarkable de-
gree of perfection. Mr. Shelley describes
these in clear and simple language, which,
with his excellent illustrations, makes the
subject quite intelligible to ordinary readers.
Besides its value as a practical hand-book
to the working mechanic, this little volume
will have great interest for those who wish
to understand how the wonders of modern
construction are executed.

MISCELLANY.

Yosemite Valley of Glacial Origin.— In

the summer of 1872, Prof. Joseph Le Conte,
of the University of California, with several
students of the institution, visited the Yo-
semite and the mountains contiguous, and
carefully examined the results of the gla-
cial action which were everywhere appar-
ent. His conclusions were stated in an able
paper, published in the American Journal
of Science for May. The Yosemite Valley,
he thinks, was once filled to the brim with
a great glacier. In this he differs from
Prof. Whitney, who in his guide-book ex-

presses the opinion that there is no evi-
dence that such a glacier existed.

Prof. Le Conte observes that glaciated
forms are unmistakably observable at many
points on the walls of the valley, and in
some places even to the brim. In the con-
tour of the waUs of the valley, their round-
ed form, where the rock is hard, standing
unbroken and without debris at the base,
he finds proofs of glacial erosion. On the
north side of the valley, every projecting
shoulder is thus rounded, and in some cases
the smoothness is so complete, even at a
considerable height, that the rocks glisten
in the sunshine. Where the rocks are soft,
and on the southern side of the valley, which
is in shadow, frost and other agencies have
done their work of disintegration. The sur-
faces are broken, and the debris hes at the
base.

The bed-rock of the valley is covered
with mounds of bowlders and sand, which
are terminal moraines of glaciers, and by
stratified lake-deposits, the lakes having been
formed by the glacial mounds obstructing
the flow of waters.

But it was from the higher elevations
that the wonderful features of the glacial
erosion were most distinctly observed.
" From the edge of the run of Little Yose-
mite," says the author, "we had a magnifi-
cent bird's-eye view of the wonderful dome-
Uke form of nearly all the prominent points
about this valley, and their striking resem-
blance to glaciated forms cannot be over-
looked. The whole surface of the country
is moutonue on a huge scale. K so, then
the greater domes about the Yosemite have
been formed in a similar manner. If so,
then the whole surface of this region, with
its greater and smaller domes, has been
moulded beneath a universal ice- sheet,
which moved on with steady current, care-
less of domes."

This great ice-sheet preceded the sep-
arate glaciers which completed the erosion
of the valleys of which Yosemite is one,
and the scattei-ed snow-fields which were
discovered by Mr. Muir, of the expedition,
are feeble remains of the old glaciers. In
the opinion of Prof. Whitney, the Yosemite
was formed by a sudden engulfment of a
portion of the sierras, but Prof. Le Conte
observes that Yosemite is not unique in

I

MISCELLANY.

123

form, and probably not in origin. There
are many Yosemites. Many of the great
glacial valleys become deep, narrow caiions,
with precipitous walls near the junction of
the granites with the slates. This is the
position of Yosemite. It occurs in the val-
ley of the American River and the valley
of Hatch Hetchy, which, says the author,
almost rivals the Yosemite in grandeur,
and, in his opinion, all these deep, perpen-
dicular slots have been sawed out by the
action of glaciers, the verticality of the
walls having been determined by the per-
pendicular cleavage of the rocks.

Origin of tlie Potato-Disease.— Messrs.

T. & E. Brice, of Plymtree, England, claim
to have discovered the cause of the potato
and the foot and mouth diseases, which they
assert to be nothing else but the employ-
ment of chemical manures. It is remark-
able, say they, that both of these diseases
made their appearance about the same pe-
riod. It is some 250 years since the potato
was introduced into Britain, and there is
no record that the disease ever existed
until the year 1845, when, subsequently to
a continued rain for some days together,
the potato was found to be diseased gen-
erally throughout the kingdom. Previous
to that time the chemical manures had
been introduced, and they were used in
great abundance the same season that the
potato - disease first appeared. Messrs.
Brice were then of opinion that the manure
was the cause, and, having since investi-
gated its principles and action, they find
that it contains a very active poison — sul-
phuric acid : " Its particles readily attract
the particles of water, producing fermenta-
tion, and sometimes causing putrefaction
of the compound they adhere to. If the
chemical manures are distributed over the
land in a dry season, and there is not
enough rain to cause fermentation, the sul-
phuric acid remains fixed on the earth ; if
it is applied in a wet season, the rain causes
fermentation ; the effluvium ascends in the
atmosphere, and, mixing with the vapors,
helps to constitute clouds, when there is a
return in poisoned rain and dew on the po-
tatoes, and other bodies as well. Putre-
faction of the potato is the consequence,
and it has a very offensive smell." The

authors have made some experiments with
a mixture of water and sulphuric acid.
Fermentation and poisoning of the water
were the result, and an appUoation of the
mixture to the potato caused disease.

But the question naturally arises, Why
should the sulphuric acid cause disease
only in the potato and not in other
plants ? and on this point the Messrs.
Brice leave us in the dark. Here we
may mention another theory which has
been proposed to account for this potato-
blight. It has been observed that the
electrical state of the atmosphere has
something to do with the matter, and in
Ireland the potato-crop is described as
wearing a blighted appearance after a pro-
tracted thunder-storm. The theory is, that
the electrical condition of the atmosphere
causes the conversion of the starch into
dextrine, sugar, etc., and the tuber then
melts away. But again we ask. Why did
not the same causes produce the same ef-
fects previous to 1845 ?

As regards the foot and mouth disease,
the cattle and other animals travel and
browse where the poison has fallen, and it
is taken in with their food. The active
particles adhere to their feet, lips, and
mouth, destroying the scarf-skin and mu-
cous membrane of the mouth and throat.
The symptoms are such as might be pro-
duced by sulphuric and other corrosive
acids.

A Snbstitntc for Parchment.— Parch-
ment-paper has several properties in com-
mon with animal membrane. It is obtained
by the action of sulphuric acid or chloride-
of-zinc solution on unsized paper. When
sulphuric acid is employed, the best solu-
tion is one kilogramme (2.20485 pounds)
English concentrated sulphuric acid to 125
grammes (about 4.4 ounces) of water. The
paper is dipped into the acid so as to
moisten both sides uniformly. The length
of time it is to remain in the bath depends
on its own thickness and density. The
minimum time for the ordinary unsized pa-
per of commerce is 5 seconds, the maximum
20. When the acid has acted a sufficient
length of time, the paper is first dipped in
cold water, then in dilute ammonia, again
in water, to remove the acid, and finally it

124

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

is dried. When it is left to itself to dry, it
becomes shriveled, and has a bad appear-
ance. To guard against this, the following
process is adopted : An endless strip of pa-
per is passed by machinery first through a
vat of sulphuric acid, and then through
water, ammonia, and water again ; next a
cloth-covered roller deprives it of a portion
of the water, and finally it is pressed and
smoothed out by means of polished heated
cylinders.

When properly manufactured, parch-
ment-paper has the same color and translu-
cency as animal parchment, its structure hav-
ing undergone a change from fibrous to cor-
neous. In point of cohesion and hygroscopi-
city, it is very much like common parchment.
When dipped in water, it becomes soft and
flaccid. It is impermeable to liquids, except
by dialysis. These qualities render parch-
ment-paper specially suitable for diplomas,
important papers, and in general for docu-
ments which it is desirable to preserve. As
compared with ordinary parchment, this
paper possesses the advantage that it is
very little liable to be attacked by insects.
Then, too, .the characters inscribed on it
cannot be effaced without difficulty, and,
when effaced, cannot be replaced by oth-
ers— a perfect guarantee against all kinds
of falsification. By reason of its firm-
ness and durabihty, it is specially suited
for plans and drawings, particularly archi-
tectural drawings, which are much exposed
to moisture. Further, it might be used for
covering books ; or books, maps, etc., for
use in schools, could be printed on it, and
would be very durable. In place of animal
membrane, it is well suited for covering
jars of fruit, extracts, etc., as also for con-
necting the parts of distilling and other
apparatus. It furnishes excellent casings
for sausages. In surgery it is employed in-
stead of linen, oiled cloth, and gutta-percha,
for dressing wounds.

Improvements In Street - Sprinkling.—

An improved method of sprinkling streets
has been patented in England, by means of
which almost five-sixths of the expense of
watering may be saved. It appears that
the cost for labor in watering the streets of
London averages about $675,000 per an-
num, the cost of water being additional ;

and it is contended that this work can be
done in a far more effectual and advanta-
geous manner, by a system of permanent
pipes, for an expenditure of less than
$15,000 per annum, while the interest upon
the plant necessary for the purpose would
not exceed $100,000. An experiment made
in Hyde Park warrants the conclusion that,
with the permanent system referred to, the
services of one man would be amply suffi-
cient for laying the dust over the whole of
the drives and rides in that park — a task
which at present engages twenty men, with
as many horses and carts. This area may
be taken as a seventy-fifth part of the total
road-way in London to be watered ; and
hence we may conclude that about seventy-
five men, without either horses or carts,
could water the whole metropolis at the
cost for labor above stated. The city gov-
ernment of London is giving the matter
serious consideration ; and, if water is to
continue in use for the purpose of laying
dust on thoroughfares, the plan will doubt-
less be generally adopted on being proved
practicable. It is to be hoped, however,
that before long deliquescent salts will be
employed for this purpose rather than wa-
ter. The use of water in summer hastens
the decay of organic matter, and thus is
objectionable from a sanitary point of view.
Deliquescent salts will not alone lay the
dust, but will also disinfect the streets by
checking decomposition.

French Association for the Advance-
ment of Science. — The French Association
met at Lyons, on August 21st, the opening
address being made by the president, Qua-
trefages. He traced the history of scien-
tific progress during the past hundred years,
and advocated the claims of science as an
important branch of general education. The
reports of the secretary and treasurer show
that the Association is in a flourishing state,
and that it has already, in its second year,
commenced to give material encouragement
to original investigators of science. The
most notable of the papers read in the gen-
eral meetings were the following : Dr. H.
Blanc, Surgeon-Major of the British Army,
on " The Means of guarding against Chol-
era : an Essay based on Practical Knowl-
edge of the Causes and Mode of Propaga-

I

MISCELLANY.

125

tion of that Disease ; " Fernand Papillon,
on " The Relations between Science and
Metaphysics ; " the Abbe Ducrost, on " The
Prehistoric Station of Solutre ; " and Dr.
Bertillon on " The Population of France."

One of the sections of the French Asso-
ciation is devoted to the medical sciences.
In this department, the most remarkable
papers were those of M. Oilier, on " The
Surgical Means of favoring the Growth of
the Bones in Man ; " M. Chauveau, on " The
Transmission of Tuberculosis through the
Digestive Organs ; " M. J. Gayet, on " The
Regeneration of the Crystalline Lens ;" and
M. Diday, on " A Physiological Theory of
the Passion of Love."

In anthropology, we may mention M.
Lagneau's " Ethnological Researches on the
Basin of the Saoue and Other Affluents of the
Rhone ; " M. Chauvet's " Observations on
the Bone-Caves of Charente," Gabriel Mor-
tillet and Abel Hovelacque on "The Pre-
cursor of Man in the Tertiary Period."

The chemical section presents matter of
special interest only for chemists. In that
of botany, M. Merget read a paper on " The
role of the Stomata in the Exchange of Gases
between the Plant and the Atmosphere."

The CryptogrJipli. — A very ingenious
instrument, the cryptograph, was recently
described by its inventor, Pelegrin, in a
note communicated to the French Academy
of Sciences. The cryptograph is a con-
trivance jntended for noting down on the
spot and converting into mathematical ex-
pressions, so that they may be sent directly
and secretly by telegraph, the polar co-
ordinates of the points which determine a
given figure. By means of this instrument,
one may — at New York, for instance —
trace out figures seen and noted down by a
correspondent at any point in telegraphic
communication with him. The cryptograph
consists of a graduated arc of a circle, and
an alidade, or index, also graduated and
movable over the entire arc. The alidade
has attached to it a small, thin plate of
mica, which may slide up and down its en-
tire length. On the mica is a black point,
and this, it is plain, may occupy every pos-
sible position within the arc. A sight is
fixed in front of the instrument. In order,
now, to note down the outlines of a given I

figure, the observer places his eye at the
sight, and brings the black speck on the
mica over all the chief points, and marks
their polar coordinates, as shown by the
positions of the alidade and the shding-
point. These numbers may then be trans-
mitted by telegraph anywhere. With the
assistance of another cryptograph, in which
the mica is replaced by a style or pen, the
points noted by the first instrument are at
once found and copied on paper.

Localization of the Faculty of Speeeli. —

In a recent memoir on the localization of
the faculty of speech in the anterior lobes
of the brain, the eminent physiologist Bouil-
laud communicates to the French Academy
of Sciences the results of his protracted re-
searches on that subject. Some of the cases
cited by him in the course of the memoir
are extremely curious. In some instances,
says he, the inability to speak is restricted
to a certain class of words — certain proper
names, for instance ; in others, it extends to
all past events ; in others, again, only promi-
nent circumstances are involved ; and so
on. Cuvier tells of a man who had lost the
recollection of all nouns-subsfaniive, and who
would construct his phrases perfectly and
regularly, the places of the nouns being
always left vacant. Some years ago, M.
Bouillaud visited a patient whose vocabu-
lary did not contain a single verb, but who,
notwithstanding, talked with remarkable
volubility : his language was, of course, per-
fectly unintelligible. Others are unable, of
their own accord, to write some particular
word — hotise, for instance — though they can
copy it when it is placed before them. A
lady, forty-three years of age, was suddenly
deprived of the power of speech, and entered
the Cochin Hospital ; she heard and under-
stood perfectly every thing that was said
to her, but could not speak. She could
express herself in writing, however, and
thus it was learned that she suffered pain
in the forehead. From these cases, it fol-
lows that aphasia is produced by an inca-
pacity to execute the coordinate movements
requisite for pronunciation, and that it has
nothing to do with loss of memory as to the
meaning of words.

According to M. Bouillaud, these phe-
nomena are produced by lesions of the an-

126

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

terior cerebral lobes. He claims that his
theory is confirmed by the results of several
autopsies, and asserts that, wherever he has
had an opportunity to examine the brain of
patients affected in this way, he always found
the anterior lobes softened, inflamed, and
more or less profoundly disorganized. These
views gave rise to a warm discussion when
they were first published to the Academy,
and Flourens contributed an important me-
moir on the subject, in which he took the
ground that while the cerebral lobes possess
the faculties of will and perception, they do
not coordinate movements, the latter func-
tion appertaining, according to him, to the
cerebellum.

M. Bouillaud suras up as follows the
conclusions to which he has been led in the
course of bis studies : 1. All lesions of the
faculty of speech have their origin in affec-
tions of the frontal lobes. In some instances,
this lesion to the faculty of speech is owing
to the fact that the coordinated movements
requisite for the pronunciation of words can-
not be executed. Therefore, there exists in
these anterior lobes a coordinating centre
for this description of voluntary movements.
In other instances, lesions of the faculty of
speech have a bearing on the words them-
selves, and not on the act of pronouncing
them. Therefore, there exists in the same
lobes another centre, without the coopera-
tion of which speech is impossible.

2. When either or both of these condi-
tions exist, the faculty of speech may be
injured or utterly lost, while all the other
special intellectual faculties remain intact,
and vice versa.

The Reliailding of Antiocli.— In the re-
building of the city of Antioch, destroyed
by earthquake last year, the chief engineer
of the province of Aleppo, Mr. Haddan, an
Englishman, did his best to induce the peo-
ple to profit by the experience of the past,
and to construct their houses and lay out
their streets in such a manner that the
recurrence of earthquake might not again
prove so destructive. But immobility is
the law of the East, and the people will not
quit the ancient paths. It is a significant
fact, says the Builder, that many of the vic-
tims on the occasion of the last earthquake
might have escaped, if the houses had been

built with lime or bound with wood, and if
the streets had not been so narrow that the
rows of falling buildings met as they crum-
bled down, to form one destructive heap
over the crowds of people. Mr. Haddan
proposed that skeleton houses should be
erected with timber battens, well tied to-
gether with iron bands, on which overhang-
ing roofs would rest. Stone-walls, cemented
with lime, were then to be run up around
the wooden frames, in order to afford pro-
tection from sun and rain. A shock of
earthquake (which is a matter of frequent
occurrence at Antioch), how formidable
soever it might be, could then do no more
than throw the stone-walls outward, while
none of the falling stones could injure those
in the houses. The new plan of the town,
by straightening and widening the labyrinth
of tortuous lanes which previously existed,
would save the inhabitants from much of
the danger after escaping from their houses.
But, as has been already said, these sugges-
tions have been disregarded, and the town
is beginning to rise again on its old founda-
tions, built with mud instead of lime, and
likely to destroy its future population in
even greater proportion than it did last
year, for increased poverty makes the nev?
houses weaker than even the old ones were.

Intelligence of the Toad.— At the re-
cent meeting of the American Association
for the Advancement of Science, held at
Portland, Mr. Thomas Hill read a note on
the intelligence of toads, giving, among other
interesting examples of their sagacity, a de-
scription of the means by which the creature
contri%es to force down inconvenient forms
of food. " When our toad," says Mr,
Hill, "gets into his mouth part of an in-
sect too large for his tongue to thrust down
his throat (and I have known of their at-
tempting a wounded humming-bird), he re-
sorts to the nearest stone," and uses it as a
piece de resistance in a very literal sense.
This can be observed at any time, con-
tinues the author, by tying a locust's hind-
legs together, and throwing it before a
small toad.

On one occasion Mr. Hill gave a small
locust to a little toad in its second summer.
At once the locust's head was down the
creature's throat, the hinder parts protrud-

NOTES.

127

ing. The toad then sought for a stone or
clod ; but, as none was to be found, he
lowered his head and crept along, pushing
the locust against the ground. But the
ground was too smooth (a rolled path) and
the angle at which the locust lay to the
ground too small, and thus no progress was
made. " To increase the angle, he straight-
ened up his hind-legs, but in vain. At
length he threw up his hind-quarters, and
actually stood on his head, or rather on the
locust sticking out of his mouth, and, after
repeating this once or twice, succeeded in
getting himself outside his dinner."

On another occasion the author saw an
American toad disposing of an earthworm
in the following way. The worm was so
long that it had to be swallowed by sec-
tions. But, while one end was in the toad's
stomach, the other end was coiled about
his head. " He waited until the worm's
writhings gave him a chance, and swallowed
half an inch ; then, taking a nip with his jaws,
waited for a chance to draw in another half-
inch. But there were so many half-inches
to dispose of that at length his jaws grew
tired, lost their firmness of grip, and the
worm crawled out five-eighths of an inch
between each half-inch swallowing. The
toad, perceiving this, brought his right hand
to his jaws, grasping his abdomen with his
foot, and, by a little effort getting hold of
the worm in his stomach from the outside,
he thus, by his foot, held fast to what he
had gained by each swallow, and presently
succeeded in getting the worm entirely
down."

The Snn's Envelcpc— Prof. Charles A.
Young's paper, read at the American As-
sociation, on a liquid solar crust, led to a
very animated discussion. The author is
inclined to hold, with Faye, Secchi, and oth-
ers, that the sun is mainly gaseous. At the
same time, the eruptions which are continu-
ally occurring on its surface almost compel
the supposition that there is a crust of some
kind which retains the imprisoned gases,
and through which they force their way in
jets with great violence. According to the
author, this crust may consist of a more or
less continuous sheet of descending rain —
that is, a downfall of the condensed vapors
of those materials which we know from the

spectroscope exist in the sun. The con-
tinuous efflux of the solar heat is equiva-
lent to the supply that would be developed
by the condensation from steam to water
of a layer of about five feet thick over the
whole surface of the sun every minute of
time. As this tremendous rain descends,
the velocity of the falling drops would be
retarded by the resistance of the denser gases
underneath ; the drops would coalesce until
a continuous sheet would be formed; and
these sheets would unite and form a sort of
bottomless ocean resting on the compressed
vapors beneath, and pierced by innumerable
ascending jets and bubbles. It would have
an approximately constant depth, because
it would turn to vapor at the bottom as
rapidly as it grew at the surface, though
probably the thickness of this crust would
continually increase at a slow rate, and its
whole diameter grow less.

In other words. Dr. Young would re-
gard the sun as an enormous bubble whose
walls are steadily thickening, and its di-
ameter ever lessening, in proportion to the
loss of heat. The hypothesis offers no pe-
culiar explanation of the sun-spots, but wiU
agree with any of the current explanations
of that phenomenon.

NOTES.

Prof. Strong, of the Drew Theological
Seminary, Madison, N. J., is organizing an
expedition to Egypt and the Holy Land.
It will start about Christmas, and will em-
brace in its personnel, engineers, artists,
scientists, and a select party of tourists, all
under charge of Prof Strong, assisted by
Prof. T. Norman and Mr. George May
PoweU. '

The Boston Medical and Surgical Jour-
nal reports a ease of semi-asphyxiation from
the inhalation of coal-gas, which was very
successfully treated by the administration
of oxygen. Four men sleeping in one room
had inhaled coal-gas. Of these one died
before medical aid arrived ; the other three
were taken to the hospital. Here fresh air
and stimulants were resorted to, but the
most marked effects followed tlie adminis-
tration of oxygen gas. The inhalation of
this agent was followed by an almost in-
stantaneous improvement in the condition
of the patients. It was found that the sup-
ply of oxygon had to be kept up for some
time after the appearance of improved
respiration, for, when the administration

128

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the gas was discontinued, a relapse oc-
curred. Soon, however, the improvement
became permanent, and the patients were
discharged well.

A WRITER in a French scientific periodi-
cal states that by feeding silk-worms on vine-
leaves he has obtained cocoons of a mag-
nificent red, and, by feeding them on lettuce,
others of a very deep emerald green. An-
other silk-grower has obtained cocoons of a
beautiful yellow, others of a fine green, and
others again of violet, by feeding the silk-
worms on lettuce, or on white nettle. He
says that the silk-worms must be fed on
mulberry-leaves when young, and supplied
with the vine, lettuce, or nettle leaves, dur-
ing the last twenty days of the larva stage
of their life.

A London Times correspondent bestows
merited praise upon the ventilation of the
opera-house at Vienna. On the occasion of
the shah's visit, though the house was filled
in every part, and though the temperature
outside was no less than 85° after sunset,
still in the overcrowded house the tempera-
ture was just agreeable. The thermom-
eters in the house were under continual
inspection, and the temperature regulated
according to their indications. What facil-
itates this regulation is that the gas-lights
are under glass globes, which are so ar-
ranged that the smoke and heat are carried
out by the flue which is above every flame.
This arrangement has, besides, the advan-
tage that, even when the house is fully
illuminated, the light is never glaring.

Carbolic-acid paper is now much used
for packing fresh meats for the purpose
of preserving them against spoilmg. The
paper is prepared by melting five parts of
stearine at a gentle heat, and then stirring
in thoroughly two parts of carbolic acid,
after which "five parts of melted paraffine
are added. The whole is to be well stirred
together till it cools, after which it is melted
and applied with a brush to the paper, in
quires, in the same way as in preparing the
waxed paper so much used in Europe for
wrapping various articles.

From the official report of Captain G. A.
Stover, British political agent at Mandalay,
it would appear that Upper Burmah is richer
in metals and minerals than any other coun-
try in the known world. Gold exists in
profusion in the rivers and streams, and in
many districts the gold quartz is found in
abundance ; but the localities are generally
malarious, and the mines are not developed.
Silver, too, is found in considerable quanti-
ties. Rich deposits of copper exist, but
are unutilized. Iron abounds in the Shan
states and the districts south of Mandalay.
Lead is plentiful, and, though tin exists in
the Shan states, the mines have never been

worked. Coal equal to the best English
coal has been discovered in many parts
of the interior.

A Berlin correspondent of the London
Times gives an account of the extraordinary
performance of the new Prussian infantry
arm, the Mauser gun. The writer says :
" On a distance of 1,500 metres (1,640
yards), out of 480 shots, 399 hits were
effected in five targets placed behind each
other; and on 1,400 metres (1,564 yards),
out of 480 shots, 460 hits are reported.
To attack a line in a good position, de-
fended by disciplined soldiers armed with
the Mauser, would be the greatest blunder."

0. Feistmantel, of the Austrian Geolo-
gical Institute, lately read before that body
an essay on " The Fossil Plants of Ger-
many and Austria," which will attract the
earnest attention of the students of paleon-
tological botany. The author first visited
and thoroughly studied all the chief collec-
tions of botanical fossils existing iu the two
countries, and then set about a revision of
the species described. He shows that at
present the science of phytopaleontology
is in a state of confusion, the same species
being often described under different names.
Different portions of one plant too often
figure under sundry names, being some-
times referred to widely diverse genera.
Thus we find in some cases the fruit of a
plant attributed to one species, while its
leaf, trunk, etc., are attributed to others.

The performance of the "Woolwich in-
fants," or 35-ton English guns, will proba-
bly bring about a revolution in the art of
naval construction. Experiment has shown
that, with the service-chnrge of powder and
the 700-pound shot, these enormous engines
can send the projectile through 15 inches
of iron at 200 yards, through 14 inches at
300 yards, through 12 inches at 1,700
yards, through 11 inches at 2,600 yards,
through 9 inches at 4,000 yards, through 8
inches at 4,500 yards. In each case the
usual backing of hard wood has to be added
to the thickness of the iron target. Thus,
at a range of nearly three miles, a shell
one-third of a ton in weight can be made to
pierce the sides of some of the heaviest
iron-clads, which, a few years ago, were
thought to be well protected by 8 or 9
inches of iron.

His excellency Cherif Pasha, Minister of
Foreign Affairs, has made an order, in be-
half of his government, on R. Habersham,
Son & Co., Savannah, Georgia, through R.
Beardsley, Esq., consul-general of the Uni-
ted States at Alexandria, Egypt, for fifteen
tons of Sea-Island cotton seed for culture in
Egypt, under the express direction of the
ruler of that country, Ismail Pasha.

DK. JOSEPH DALTON HOOKER.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

DECEMBER, 1873.

EADICALISM, CONSERVATISM, AND THE TRANSI-
TION OF INSTITUTIONS.'

Br HERBERT SPENCER.

OF readers who have accompanied me thus far, probably some think
that the contents of these papers go beyond the limits implied
by their title. Under the head Study of Sociology, so many sociolo-
gical questions have been incidentally discussed, that the science itself
has been in a measure dealt with while dealing with the study of it.
Admitting this criticism, my excuse must be that the fault, if it is one,
has been scarcely avoidable. Nothing to much purpose can be said
about the study of any science without saying a good deal about the
general and special truths it includes, or what the expositor holds to
be truths. To write an essay on the study of astronomy, in which
there should be no direct or implied conviction respecting the Coper-
nican theory of the solar system, nor any such recognition of the law
of gravitation as involved acceptance or rejection of it, would be a
task difficult to execute, and, when executed, probably of little value.
Similarly with Sociology — it is next to impossible for the writer who
points out the way toward its truths to exclude all tacit or avowed
expressions of opinion about those truths, and, were it possible to ex-
clude such expressions of opinion, it would be at the cost of those illus-
trations needed to make his exposition effective.

Such must be, in part, my defense for having set down many
thoughts which the title of this work does not cover. Especially have
I found myself obliged thus to transgress, by representing the study
of sociology as the study of evolution in its most complex form. It is
clear that, to one who considers the facts societies exhibit as having
had their origin in supernatural interpositions, or in the wills of
individual ruling men, the study of these facts will have an aspect
wholly unlike that which it has to one who contemplates them as gen-

' Concluding article of the series on the " Study of Sociology."
VOL. IV. — 9

130 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

erated by processes of growth and development continuing through
centuries. Ignoring, as the first view tacitly does, that conformity to
law, in the scientific sense of the word, which the second view tacitly
asserts, there can be but little community between the methods of in-
quiry proper to them respectively. Continuous causation, which in
the one case there is little or no tendency to trace, becomes, in the
other case, the chief object of attention ; whence it follows that there
must be formed wholly diflerent ideas of the appropriate modes of in-
vestigation. A foregone conclusion respecting the nature of social
phenomena is thus inevitably implied in any suggestions for the study
of them.

While, however, it must be admitted that throughout these articles
there runs the assumption that the facts, simultaneous and successive,
which societies present, have a genesis no less natural than the genesis
of facts of all other classes, it is not admitted that this assumption
was made unawares, or without warrant. At the outset, the grounds
for it were examined. The notion, widely accepted in name, though
not consistently acted upon, that social phenomena difier from phenom-
ena of most other kinds, as being under special providence, we found
to be entirely discredited by its expositors ; nor, when closely looked
into, did the great-man-theory of social affairs prove to be more tenable.
Besides finding that both these views, rooted as they are in the ways
of thinking natural to primitive men, would not bear criticism, we
found that even their defenders continually betrayed their beliefs in
the production of social changes by natural causes — tacitly admitted
that after certain antecedents certain consequents are to be expected —
tacitly admitted, therefore, that some prevision is possilfle, and there-
fore some subject-matter for science.

From these negative justifications for the belief that sociology is a
science, we turned to the positive justifications. We found that every
aggregate of units, of any order, has certain traits necessarily deter-
mined by the properties of its units. Hence it was inferable, a priori^
that, given the natures of the men who are their units, and certain
characters in the societies formed are predetermined — other characters
being determined by the cooperation of surrounding conditions. The
current assertion, that sociology is not possible, implies a misconcep-
tion of its nature. Using the analogy supplied by a human life, we
saw that just as bodily development, and structure, and function, fur-
nish subject-matter for biological science, though the events set forth
by the biographer go beyond its range, so, social growth, and the rise
of structures and functions accompanying it, furnish subject-matter for
a science of society, though the facts with which historians fill their
pages mostly yield no material for science. Thus conceiving the scope
of the science, we saw, on comparing rudimentary societies with one
another, and with societies in difierent stages of progress, that they do
present certain common traits of structure and of function, as well

THE TRANSITION OF INSTITUTIONS.

131

as certain common traits of development. Further comparisons, simi-
larly made, opened large questions, such as that of the relation be-
tween social growth and organization, which form parts of this same
science — questions of transcendent importance, comjjared with those
occupying the minds of politicians and writers of history.

The difficulties of the Social Science next drew our attention. "We
saw that in this case, though in no other case, the facts to be ob-
served and generalized by the student are exhibited by an aggregate
of which he forms a part. In his capacity of inquirer, he should have
no inclination toward one or other conclusion respecting the phenom-
ena to be generalized ; but, in his capacity of citizen, helped to live
by the life of his society, embedded in its structures, sharing in its
activities, breathing its atmosphere of thought and sentiment, he is
partially coerced into such views as favor harmonious cooperation
with his fellow-citizens. Hence immense obstacles to the social sci-
ence, unparalleled by those standing in the way of any other science.

From considering thus generally these causes of error, we turned
to consider them specially. Under the head of Objective Difficulties,
we glanced at those many ways in which evidence collected by the
sociological inquirer is vitiated. That extreme untrustworthiness of
witnesses which results from carelessness, or fanaticism, or self-inter-
est, was illustrated ; and we saw that, in addition to the perversions
of statement hence arising, there are others which arise from the ten-
dency thei-e is for some kinds of evidence to draw attention, while
evidence of opposite kinds, much larger in quantity, draws no atten-
tion. Further, it was shown that the nature of sociological facts,
each of which is not observable in a single object or act, but is reached
only through registration and comparison of many objects and acts,
makes the perception of them harder than that of other facts. It was
pointed out that the wide distribution of social phenomena in space
greatly hinders true apprehensions of them ; and it was also pointed
out that another impediment, even still greater, is consequent on their
distribution in time — a distribution such that many of the facts to be
dealt with take centuries to unfold, and can be grasped only by com-
bining in thought multitudinous changes that are slow, involved, and
not easy to trace.

Beyond these difficulties which we grouped as distinguishing the
science itself, objectively considered, we saw that there are other diffi-
culties, conveniently to be grouped as subjective, wliich are also great.
For the interpretation of human conduct as socially displayed, every
one is compelled to use, as a key, his own nature — ascribing to others
thoughts and feelings like his own ; and yet, while this automorphic
interpretation is indispensable, it is necessarily more or less mislead-
ing. Very generally, too, a subjective difficulty arises from the lack
of intellectual faculty complex enough to grasp these social phenom-

132

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ena, which are so extremely involved. And, again, very few have by
culture gained that plasticity of faculty requisite for conceiving and
accepting those immensely-varied actualities which societies in differ-
ent times and places display, and those multitudinous possibilities to be
inferred from them.

Nor, of subjective difficulties, did these exhaust the list. From the
emotional as well as from the intellectual part of the nature, we saw
that there arise obstacles. The ways in which beliefs about social
affairs are perverted, by intense fears and excited hopes, were pointed
out. We noted the feeling of impatience, as another common cause
of misjudgment. A contrast was drawn showing, too, what perverse
estimates of public events men are led to make by their sympathies
and antipathies — how, where their hate has been aroused, they utter
unqualified condemnations of ill-deeds for which there was much excuse,
while, if their admiration is excited by vast successes, they condone
inexcusable ill-deeds immeasurably greater in amount. And we also
saw that, among the distortions of judgment caused by the emotions,
have to be included those immense ones generated by the sentiment of
loyalty to a personal ruler, or to a ruling power otherwise embodied.

These distortions of judgment caused by the emotions, thus indi-
cated generall}'^, we went on to consider specially — treating of them as
different forms of bias. Though, during education, understood in a
wide sense, many kinds of bias are commenced or given, tliere is one
which our educational system makes especially strong — the double
bias in favor of the religions of enmity and of amity. Needful as we
found both of these to be, we perceived that among the beliefs about
social affairs, prompted now by the one and now by the other, there
are glaring incongruities ; and that scientific conceptions can be formed
only when there is a compromise between the dictates of pure egoism
and the dictates of pure altruism, for which they respectively stand.

We observed, next, the warping of opinion which the bias of patri-
otism causes. Recognizing the truth that the preservation of a
society is made possible only by a due amount of patriotic feeling in
citizens, we saw that this feeling inevitably disturbs the judgment
when comparisons between societies are made, and that the data re-
quired for Social Science are thus vitiated ; and we saw that the effort
to escape this bias, leading as it does to an opposite bias, is apt to
vitiate the data in another way. While finding the class-bias to be no
less essential, we found that it no less inevitably causes one-sidedness
in the conceptions of social affairs. Noting how the various sub-classes
have their specialties of prejudice corresponding to their class-interests,
we noted, at greater length, how the more general prejudices of the
larger and more widely-distinguished classes prevent them from form-
ing balanced judgments. That in politics the bias of party interferes
with those calm examinations by which alone the conclusions of Social
Science can be reached, scarcely needed pointing out. We observed,

THE TRANSITION OF INSTITUTIONS. 133

however, that, beyond the political bias under its party-form, there is a
more genei'al political bias — the bias toward an exclusively-political
view of social affairs, and a corresponding faith in political instrumen-
talities. As affecting the study of Social Science, this bias was shown
to be detrimental as directing the attention too much to the phe-
nomena of social regulation, and excluding from thought the activities
regulated, constituting an aggregate of phenomena far more important.

Lastly, we came to the theological bias, which, under its general
form and under its special forms, disturbs in various ways our judg-
ments on social questions. Obedience to a supposed divine command
being its standard of rectitude, it does not ask concerning any social
arrangement whether it conduces to social welfare, so much as whether
it conforms to the creed locally established. Hence, in each place and
time, those conceptions about public affairs which the theological bias
fosters, tend to diverge from the truth in so far as the creed then and
there accepted diverges from the truth. And besides the positive evil
thus produced, there is a negative evil, due to discouragement of the
habit of estimating actions by the results they eventually cause — a
habit which the study of Social Science demands.

Having thus contemplated in general and in detail the difficulties
of the Social Science, we turned our attention to the preliminary dis-
cipline required. Of the conclusions reached so recently, the reader
scarcely needs reminding. Stiidy of the sciences in general having
been pointed out as the proper means of generating fit habits of
thought, it was shown that the sciences especially to be attended to
are those treating of Life and of Mind. There can be no understand-
ing of social actions without some knowledge of human nature ; there
can be no deep knowledge of human nature without some knowledge
of the laws of Mind ; there can be no adequate knowledge of the laws
of Mind without knowledge of the laws of Life. And, that knowledge
of the laws of Life, as exhibited in Man, may be properly grasped, at-
tention must be given to the laws of Life in general.

What is to be hoped from such a presentation of difficulties and
such a programme of preparatory studies ? Who, in drawing his con-
clusions about public policies, will be made to hesitate by remembering
the many obstacles that stand in the way of right judgments? Who
■will think it needful to tit himself by inquiries so various and so ex-
tensive? Who, in short, will be led to doubt any of the inferences he
has drawn, or be induced to pause before he draws others, by con-
sciousness of these many liabilities to error arising from want of
knowledge, want of discipline, and want of duly-balanced sentiments ?

To these questions there can be but the obvious reply — a reply
which the foregoing chapters themselves involve — that very little is to
be expected. The implication throughout the argument has been that
for every society, and for each stage in its evolution, there is an appro-

134 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

priate mode of feeling and thinking ; and that no mode of feeling and
thinking not adapted to its degree of evolution, and to its surround-
ings, can be permanently established. Though not exactly, still ap-
proximately, the average opinion in any age and country is a function
of the social sti'ucture in that age and country. There may be, as we
see during times of revolution, a considerable incongruity between the
ideas that become current and the social arrangements which exist,
and are, in great measure, appropriate ; though even then the incon-
gruity does but mark the need for a readjustment of institutions to
character. While, however, those successive compromises, which,
during social evolution, have to be made between the changed natures
of citizens and the institutions evolved by ancestral citizens, imply
disagreements, yet these are but partial and temporary — in those so-
cieties, at least, which are developing and not in course of dissolution.
For a society to hold together, the institutions that are needed and the
conceptions that are generally current must be in tolerable harmony.
Hence, it is not to be expected that modes of thinking on social affairs
are to be in any considerable degree changed by whatever may be
said respecting the Social Science, its difficulties, and the required
preparations for studying it.

The only reasonable hope is, that here and there one may be led,
in calmer moments, to remember how largely his beliefs about public
matters have been made for him by circumstances, and how probable
it is that they are either untrue or but partially true. When he re-
flects on the doubtfulness of the evidence which he generalizes, col-
lected hap-hazard from a narrow area — when he counts up the per-
vei'ting sentiments fostered in him by education, country, class, party,
creed — when, observing those around, he sees that, from other evi-
dence selected to gratify sentiments partially unlike his own, there re-
sult unlike views — he may occasionally recollect how largely mere ac-
cidents have detei'mined his convictions. Recollecting this, he may
be induced to hold these convictions not quite so strongly ; may see
the need for criticism of them with a view to revision; and, above all,
may be somewhat less eager to act in pursuance of them.

While the few to whom a Social Science is conceivable may, to
some degree, be thus influenced by what is said concerning the study
of it, there can, of course, be no efiect on the many to whom such a
science seems an absurdity, or an impiety, or both. The feeling or-
dinarily excited, by the proposal to deal scientifically with these most
complex phenomena, is like that which was excited in ancient times by
the proposal to deal scientifically with phenomena of simpler kinds.
As Mr. Grote writes of Socrates :

" Physics and astronomy, in his opinion, belonged to tlie divine class of
phenomena, in which human research was insane, fruitless, aud impious." *

" History of Greece," vol. i., p. 498.

THE TRANSITION- OF INSTITUTIONS. 135

And as he elsewhere writes respecting the attitude of the Greek mind
in general :

" In bis " (the early Greek's) "view, the description of the sun, as given in
a modern astronomical treatise, would have appeared not merely absurd, but
repulsive and impious : even in later times, when the positive spirit of inquiry
had made considerable progress, Anaxagoras and other astronomers incurred
the charge of blasphemy for dispersonifying Helios, and trying to assign in-
variable laws to the solar phenomena." "

That a likeness exists between the feeling then displayed respect-
ing phenomena of inorganic Nature and the feeling now displayed re-
specting phenomena of Life and Society, is manifest. The ascription
of social actions and political events entirely to natural causes, thus
leaving out Providence as a factor, seems, to the religious mind of our
day, as seemed to the mind of the pious Greek the dispersonification
of Helios and the interpretation of the celestial motions otherwise
than by immediate divine agency. As was said by Mr. Gladstone, iti
a speech made shortly after the publication of the second chapter of
this volume :

" I lately read a discussion on the manner in which the raising up of par-
ticular individuals occasionally occurs in great crises of human history, as if
some sacred, invisible power had raised them up and placed them in particular
positions for special purposes. The writer says that they are not uniform, but
admits that they are common — so common and so remarkable that men would
be liable to term them providential in a pre-scientific age. And this was said
without the smallest notion apparently in the writer's mind that he was giving
utterance to anything that could startle or alarm — it was said as a kind of com-
monplace. It would seem that in his view there was a time when mankind,
lost in ignorance, might, without forfeiting entirely their title to the name of
rational creatures, believe in a Providence, but that since that period another
and greater power has arisen under the name of science, and this power has
gone to war with Providence, and Providence is driven from the field — and we
have now the happiness of living in the scientific age, when Providence is no
longer to be treated as otherwise than an idle dream." ^

Of the mental attitude, very general beyond the limits of the sci-
entific world, which these utterances of Mr. Gladstone exemplify, he
has since given further illustration ; and, in his anxiety to check a
movement he thinks mischievous, has so conspicuously made himself
the exponent of the anti-scientific view, that we may fitly regard his
thoughts on the matter as typical. In an address delivered by him at
the Liverpool College, and since republished with additions, he says :

" Upon the ground of what is termed evolution, God is relieved of the labor
of creation ; in the name of unchangeable laws. He is discharged from govern-
ing the world."

This passage proves the kinship between Mr. Gladstone's conception

of things and that entertained by the Greeks to be even closer than

' "History of Greece," vol i., p. 466. ' Morni7ig Post, May 15, 1872.

136 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

above alleged ; for its implication is, not simply that the scientific in-
terpretation of vital and social phenomena as conforming to fixed laws
is repugnant to him, but that the like interpretation of inorganic phe-
nomena is repugnant. In common with the ancient Greek, he regards
as irreligious any explanation of Nature which dispenses with imme-
diate divine superintendence. He appears to overlook the fact that
the doctrine of gravitation, with the entire science of physical as-
tronomy, is open to the same charge as this which he makes against
the doctrine of evolution ; and he seems not to have remembered that
throughout the past each further step made by Science has been de-
nounced for reasons like those which he assigns.'

It is instructive to observe, however, that, in these prevailing con-
ceptions expressed by Mr. Gladstone, which we have here to note as
excluding the conception of a Social Science, there is to be traced a
healthful process of compromise between old and new. For, as, in the
current conceptions about the order of events in the lives of persons,
there is a partnership, wholly illogical though temporarily conven-
ient, between the ideas of natural causation and of providential in-
terference, so, in the current political conceptions, the belief in di-
vine interpositions goes along with, and by no means excludes, the
belief in a natural production of effects on society by natural agencies
set to work. In relation to the occurrences of individual life, we dis-
played our national aptitude for thus entertaining mutually-destructive
ideas, when an unpopular prince suddenly gained popularity by out-
living certain abnormal changes in his blood, and when, on the occa-
sion of his recovery, providential aid and natural causation were unit-
edly recognized by a thanksgiving to God and a baronetcy to the doc-
tor. And, similarly, we see that, throughout all our public actions,
the theory which Mr. Gladstone represents, that great men are provi-
dentially raised up to do things God has decided upon, and that the
course of affairs is supernaturally ordered thus or thus, does not in the
least interfere with the passings of measures calculated to achieve de-
sired ends in ways classed as natural, and nowise modifies the discus-
sion of such measures on their merits, as estimated in terms of cause
and consequence. While the prayers with which each legislative sit-

* In the appendix to his republished address, Mr. Gladstone, in illustration of the
views he condemns, refers to that part of " First Principles " which, treating of the recon-
ciliation of Science and Religion, contends that this consists in a united recognition of
an Ultimate Cause which, though ever present to consciousness, transcends knowledge.
Commenting on this View, he says : " Still it vividly recalls to mind an old story of the
man who, wishing to be rid of one who was in his house, said : ' Sir, there are two sides
to my house, and we will divide them ; you shall take the outside.' " This seems to me
by no means a happily-chosen simile, since it admits of an interpretation exactly oppo-
site to the one Mr. Gladstone intends. The doctrine he combats is that Science, unable
to go beyond the outsides of things, is forever debarred from reaching, and even from
conceiving, the power within them ; and, this being so, the relative positions of Religion
and Science may be well represented by inverting the application of his figure.

THE TRANSITION OF INSTITUTIONS. 137

ting commences show a nominal belief in an immediate divine guid-
ance, the votes with which the sitting ends, given in pursuance of rea-
sons which the speeches assign, show us a real belief that the effects
will be determined by the agencies set to work.

Still it is clear that the old conception, while it qualifies the new
but little in the regulating of actions, qualifies it very much in the for-
mation of theories. There can be no complete acceptance of Sociology
as a science so long as the belief in a social order not conforming to
natural law survives. Hence, as already said, considerations touching
the study of Sociology, not very influential even over the few who rec-
ognize a Social Science, can have scarcely any effects on the great
mass to whom a Social Science is an incredibility.

I do not mean that this prevailing imperviousness to scientific con-
ceptions of social phenomena is to be regretted. As implied in a fore-
going paragraph, it is part of the required adjustment between existing
opinions and the forms of social life at present requisite. With a given
phase of human character there must, to maintain equilibrium, go an
adapted class of institutions, and a set of thoughts and sentiments in
tolerable harmony with those institutions. Hence, it is not to be
wished that, with the average human nature we now have, there should
be a wide acceptance of views natural only to a more highly-developed
social state, and to the improved type of citizen accompanying such a
state. The desirable thing is, that a growth of ideas and feelings tend-
ing to produce modification shall be joined with a continuance of ideas
and feelings tending to preserve stability. And it is one of our satis-
factory social traits, exhibited in a degree never before paralleled, that
along with a mental progress which brings about considerable changes,
there is a devotion of thouglit and energy to the maintenance of exist-
ing arrangements, and creeds, and sentiments — an energy sufiicient
even to reinvigorate some of the old forms and beliefs that were de-
caying. When, therefore, a distinguished statesman, anxious for hu-
man welfare as he ever shows himself to be, and holding that the de-
fense of established beliefs must not be left exclusively to its "standing
army " of " priests and ministers of religion," undertakes to combat
opinions at variance with a creed he thinks essential, the occurrence
may be taken as adding another to the many signs of a healthful con-
dition of society. That, in our day, one in Mr. Gladstone's position
should think as he does, seems to me very desirable. That we should
have for our working-king one in whom a purely-scientific conception
of things had become dominant, and who was thus out of harmony
with our present social state, would probably be detrimental, and
might be disastrous.

For it cannot be too emphatically asserted that this policy of com-
promise, alike in institutions, in actions, and in beliefs, which especial-
ly characterizes English life, is a policy essential to a society going

138 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

through the transitions caused by continued growth and development.
The illogicalities and the absurdities to be found so abundantly in cur-
rent opinions and existing arrangements are those which inevitably
arise in the course of perpetual readjustments to circumstances per-
petually changing. Ideas and institutions proper to a past social
state, but incongruous with the new social state that has grown out
of it, surviving into this new social state they have made possible, and
disappearing only as this new social state establishes its OAvn ideas and
institutions, are necessarily, during their survival, in conflict with
these new ideas and institutions — necessarily furnish elements of con-
tradiction in men's thoughts and deeds. And yet, as, for the carrying
on of social life, the old must continue so long as the new is not ready,
this perpetual compromise is an indispensable accompaniment of a
normal development. Its essentialness we may see on remembering
that it equally holds throughout the evolution of an individual organ-
ism. The structural and functional arrangements during growth are
never quite right : always the old adjustment for a smaller size is
made wrong by the larger size it has been instrumental in producing —
always the transition-structure is a compromise between the require-
ments of past and future, fulfilling in an imperfect Avay the require-
ments of the present. And this, which is shown clearly enough where
there is simple growth, is shown still more clearly where there are
metamorphoses. A creature which leads at two periods of its exist-
ence two diflferent kinds of life, and which, in adaptation to its second
period, has to develoj) structures that were not fitted for its first, passes
through a stage during which it possesses both partially — during which
the old dwindles while the new grows : as happens, for instance, in
creatures that continue to breathe water by external branchias during
the time they are developing the lungs that enable them to breathe
air. And thus it is with the changes produced by growth in socie-
ties, as well as with those metamorphoses accompanying change in
the mode of life — especially those accompanying change from the
predatory to the industrial life. Here, too, there must be transitional
stages during which incongruous organizations coexist : the first re-
maining indispensable until the second has grown up to its work.
Just as injurious as it would be to an amphibian to cut off its branchiae
before its lungs were well developed, so injurious must it be to a so-
ciety to destroy its old institutions before the new have become well-
organized enough to take their places.

Non-recognition of this truth characterizes too much the reformers,
political, religious, and social, of our own time ; as it has characterized
those of past times. On the part of men eager to rectify wrongs and
expel errors, there is still, as there ever has been, so absorbing a con-
Bciousness of the evils caused by old forms and old ideas, as to permit
no consciousness of the benefits these old forms and old ideas have
yielded. This partiality of view is, in a sense, necessary. There must

THE TRANSITION OF INSTITUTIONS. 139

be division of labor here as elsewhere : some who have the function of
attacking, and who, that they may attack effectually, must feel strong-
ly the viciousness of that whicb they attack ; some who have the func-
tion of defending, and who, that they may be good defenders, must
over-value the things they defend. But while this one-sidedness has
to be tolerated, as in great measure unavoidable, it is in some respects
to be regretted. Though, with grievances less serious and animosities
less intense than those which existed here in the past, and which exist
still abroad, there go mitigated tendencies to a rash destructiveness on
the one side, and an unreasoning bigotry on the other, yet even in
our country and age there are dangers from the want of a due both-
sidedness. In the speeches and writings of those who advocate vari-
ous political and social changes, there is so continuous a presentation
of injustices, and abuses, and mischiefs, and corruptions, as to leave
the impression that, for securing a wholesome state of things, there
needs nothing but to set aside present arrangements. The implica-
tion seems ever to be that all who occupy places of power, and form
the regulative organization, are alone to blame for whatever is not as
it should be, and that the classes regulated are blameless. " See the
injuries which these institutions inflict on you," says the energetic re-
former, " Consider how selfish must be the men who maintain them
to their own advantage and your detriment," he adds ; and then he
leaves to be drawn the manifest inference that, were these selfish men
got rid of, all would be well. Neither he nor his audience recognizes
the facts that regulative arrangements are essential ; that the arrange-
ments in question, along with their many vices, have some virtues ;
that such vices as they have do not result from an egoism peculiar to
those who uphold and work them, but result from a general egoism —
an egoism no less decided in those who complain than in those com-
plained of. Inequitable government can be upheld only by the aid
of a people correspondingly inequitable, in its sentiments and acts.
Injustice cannot reign, if the community does not furnish a due supply
of unjust agents. No tyrant can tyi'annize over a people save on con-
dition that the people is bad enough to supply him with soldiers who
will fight for his tyranny and keep their brethren in slavery. Class-
supremacy cannot be maintained by the coiTupt buying of votes, un-
less there are multitudes of voters venal enough to sell their votes. It
is thus everywhere and in all degrees — misconduct among those in
power is the correlative of misconduct among those over whom they
exercise power.

And, while, in the men who urge on changes, there is an uncon-
sciousness that the evils they denounce are rooted in the nature com-
mon to themselves and other men, there is also an unconsciousness
that amid the things they would throw away there is much worth
preserving. This holds of beliefs more especially. Along with the
destructive tendency there goes but little constructive tendency. The

140

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

criticisms made, imply that it is requisite only to dissipate errors, and
that it is needless to insist on truths. It is forgotten that, along with
forms which are bad, there is a large amount of substance which is
good. And those to whom there are addressed condemnations of the
foiins, unaccompanied by the caution that there is a substance to be pre-
served in higher forms, are left, not only without any coherent system
of guiding beliefs, but without any consciousness that one is requisite.
Hence the need, above admitted, for an active defense of that
which exists, carried on by men convinced of its entire worth ; so that
those who attack may not destroy the good along with the bad.

And here let me point out, specifically, the truth already implied,
that studying Sociology scientifically leads to fairer appreciations of
different parties, political, religious, and other. The conception ini-
tiated and developed by Social Science is at the same time radical
and conservative — radical to a degree beyond any thing which current
radicalism conceives ; conservative to a degree beyond any thing con-
ceived by present conservatism. When there has been adequately
seized the truth that societies are products of evolution, assuming, in
their various times and places, their various modifications of struct-
ure and function, there follows the conviction that what, relatively
to our thoughts and sentiments, were arrangements of extreme bad-
ness, had fitnesses to conditions which made better arrangements im-
practicable : whence comes a tolerant interpretation of past tyrannies
at which even the bitterest Tory of our own days would be indignant.
On the other hand, after observing how the processes that have
brought things to their present stage are still going on, not with a
decreasing rapidity indicating approach to cessation, but with an in-
creasing rapidity that implies long continuance and immense trans-
formations, thei'e follows the conviction that the remote future has in
store forms of social life higher than any we have imagined: there
comes a faith transcending that of the radical, whose aim is some re-
organization admitting of comparison to organizations which exist.
And while this conception of societies as naturally evolved, beginning
with small and simple types which have their short existences and dis-
appear, advancing to higher types that are larger, more complex, and
longer-lived, coming to still higher types like our own, great in size,
complexity, and duration, and promising types transcending these in
times after existing societies have died away — while this conception
of societies implies that in the slow course of things changes almost
immeasurable in amount are possible, it also implies that but small
amounts of such changes are possible within short periods.

Thus, the theory of progress disclosed by the study of Sociology
as science is one which greatly moderates the hopes and the fears
of extreme parties. After clearly seeing that the structures and ac-
tions throughout a society are determined by the properties of it3

THE TRANSITION OF INSTITUTIONS.

141

units, and that (external disturbances apart) the society cannot be
substantially and permanently changed, it becomes easy to see that
great alterations cannot suddenly be made to much purpose. And
when both the party of progress and the party of resistance perceive
that the institutions which at any time exist are more deeply rooted
than they supposed — when the one party perceives that these institu-
tions, imperfect as they are, have a temporary fitness, while the other
party perceives that the maintenance of them, in so far as it is desira-
ble, is in great measure guaranteed by the human nature they have
grown out of — there must come a diminishing violence of attack on
one side, and a diminishing perversity of defense on the other. Evi-
dently, so far as a doctrine can influence general conduct (which it
can do, however, in but a comparatively small degree), the doctrine
of evolution, in its social applications, is calculated to produce a steady-
ing effect, alike on thought and action.

If, as seems likely, some should propose to draw the seemingly
awkward corollary that, it matters not what we believe or what we
teach, since the process of social evolution will take its own course in
spite of us, I reply that, while this corollary is in one sense true, it is
in another sense untrue. Doubtless, from all that has been said, it fol-
lows that, supposing surrounding conditions continue the same, the
evolution of a society cannot be in any essential way diverted from its
general course ; though it also follows (and here the corollary is at
fault) that the thoughts and actions of individuals, being natural fac-
tors that arise in the course of the evolution itself, and aid in further
advancing it, cannot be dispensed with, but must be severally valued
as increments of the aggregate force producing change. But, while
the corollary is even here partially misleading, it is, in another direc-
tion, far more seriously misleading. For, though the process of social
evolution is, in its general character, so far predetermined that its suc-
cessive stages cannot be antedated, and that hence no teaching or
policy can advance it beyond a certain normal rate, which is limited
by the rate of organic modification in human beings, yet it is quite
possible to perturb, to retard, or to disorder the process. The analogy
of individual development again serves us. The unfolding of an or-
ganism, after its special type, has its approximately uniform course,
taking its tolerably definite time; and no treatment that may be de-
vised will fundamentally change or greatly accelerate these : the best
that can be done is to maintain the required favorable conditions. But
it is quite easy to adopt a treatment which shall dwarf, or deform, or
otherwise injure: the processes of growth and development maybe,
and very often are, hindered or deranged, though they cannot be ar-
tificially bettered. Similarly with the social organism. Though by
maintaining favorable conditions there cannot be more good done than
that of letting social progress go on unhindered, yet an immensity of
mischief may be done in the way of disturbing and distorting and re-

142 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

pressing, by policies carried out in pursuance of erroneous conceptions.
And thus, notwithstanding first appearances to the contrary, there is
a very important part to be played by a true theory of social phe-
nomena.

A few words to those who think these general conclusions discour-
aging, may be added. Pi-obably the more enthusiastic, hopeful of
great ameliorations in the state of mankind, to be brought about rap-
idly by propagating this belief or initiating that reform, will feel that
a doctrine negativing their sanguine anticipations takes away much of
the stimulus to exertion. If large advances in human welfare can come
only in the slow process of things, which will inevitably bring them,
why should we trouble ourselves ?

Doubtless it is true that, on visionary hopes, rational criticisms have
a depressing influence. It is better to recognize the truth, however.
As, between infancy and maturity, there is no short cut by which there
may be avoided the tedious process of growth and development through
insensible increments, so there is no way from the lower forms of so-
cial life to the higher, but one passing through small successive modi-
fications. If we contemplate the order of Natiire, we see that every-
where vast results are brought about by accumulations of minute ac-
tions. The surface of the earth has been sculptured by forces which
in the course of a year produce alterations scarcely anywhere visible.
Its multitudes of different organic forms have ariseii by processes so
slow, that, during tlie periods our observations extend over, the results
are in most cases inappreciable. We must be content to recognize
these truths and conform our hopes to them. Light falling upon a
ci'ystal is capable of altering its molecular arrangements, but it can
do this only by a repetition of impulses almost innumerable : before a
unit of ponderable matter can have its rhythmical movements so in-
creased by successive ethereal waves as to be detached from its com-
bination and in another way arranged, millions of such ethereal waves
must successively make infinitesimal additions to its motion. Simi-
larly, before there arise, in human nature and human institiitions,
changes having that permanence which makes them an acquired in-
heritance for the human race, there must go innumerable recurrences
of the thoughts, and feelings, and actions, conducive to such changes.
The process cannot be abridged, and must be gone through with due
patience.

Thus, admitting that for the fanatic some wild anticipation is need-
ful as a stimulus, and recognizing the usefulness of his delusion as
adapted to his particular nature and his particular function, yet the
man of higher type must be content with greatly-moderated expecta-
tions, while he perseveres with undiminished efforts. He has to see
how comparatively little can be done, and yet to find it worth while to
do that little : so uniting philanthropic energy wnth philosopliic calm.

FURS AND THEIR WEARERS.

HZ

FUES AND THEIE WEAEEES.

By JAMES H. PAKTEIDGE.

THE skins used for fancy furs and robes are mostly olitained from
the carnivorous or flesh-eating animals ; as the sable, marten,
mink, ermine, seal, otter, bear, etc. : some are obtained from the ro-
dents or gnawers ; as the beaver, coypou, or nutria, muskrat, rabbit,
etc. : and a few are obtained from the ruminants, or those that chew
the cud ; as the bison, that sujjplies our buflalo-robes ; and the paseng
or wild-goat of Persia and the Caucasus, and the Assyrian or Siberian
sheep, from whose young kids and lambs we obtain the much-used
Astrakhan. We give illustrations of the principal fur-bearing ani-
mals, several of which are taken from Tenney's excellent "Manual of
Zoology."

American Buffalo. (Tenney.)

As furs are generally worn by those who consult taste rather than
necessity, their use depends very much upon fashion and caprice.
Hence their price varies much at different times, and is not always
regulated by their intrinsic value. As it is natural to prefer articles
that are rare and far-fetched, and as fui's can be easily carried to any
part of the world, most prefer foreign to domestic furs of the same
quality. Thus we export much of our fox, marten, fisher, otter, bea-
ver, and muskrat fur, while we import Astrakhan, Russian sable, er-
mine, Siberian squirrel, French rabbit, or cony, chinchilla, and nu-
tria fur.

At the present time, much of the fur worn is colored. In some
cases, the hair, fur, and skin, are all colored ; as the Astrakhan : but in
most cases the end of the hair or fur only is tinted, while the skin re-

144

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

mains untouched. The object of the tinting appears to he, to make
all parts of the fur on a skin of the same color ; to make an inferior
fur appear like a superior one of the same kind ; or to make the fur of
one animal pass for that of another ; as, for instance, the marten for
the sable. Dyed furs are generally not durable — soon fade, and ajj-

pear as if old and worn. Hair and fur frequently grow together on
fur-bearing animals ; and, if the fur alone be wanted, the hair, which is
usually longer than the fur, must be plucked or otherwise removed.
During the spring and summer the fur of many land animals fades, and
is shed for the season ; leaving nothing but hair remaining, or perhaps

Pine Marten.

fur inferior in color and fineness. In the autumn, a new coat of the
animal's finest fur is grown, which has comparative freshness and brill-
iancy of color. Furs, taken in the best season in the higher latitudes

FURS AND THEIR WEARERS.

^45

are called prime ; those taken out of season are, in common parlance,
said to be stagy.

Other things being the same, the colder the climate the better the
fur. Hence our best furs are generally obtained in the higlier lati-
tudes, or in cool mountain-regions, during the prevalence of snow and
the severity of winter. Thus the hunter is exposed to much labor,
fatigue, privation, and danger. They who, in the inhospitable clime
of Siberia, hunt the sable, in the most inclement season of the year,
undergo intense suffering and hardship.

K ->.>- ^_

^ h''"^'

Sables are three or four times as large as the common weasel, to
which family they belong. They are usually taken between Novem-
ber and February, in snares, traps, or pitfalls, baited with flesh or fish.
They are then of a beautiful black color, but are brownish in summer.
The fur of the Russian sable, by its richness and elegance, maintains
its preeminence. It may be distinguished from all other furs, by the
hairs turning and lying with equal ease in either direction ; which
may be shown by blowing it. It is limited in quantity, only about
15,000 being caught yearly, and the price of the best is almost fabu-
lous : a furrier suggests from 820 to 8150 per skin. Fresh furs have
what dealers call a bloomy appearance. Dyed sables generally lose
their gloss, whether the lower hair has taken the dye or not ; and the
hairs are twisted or crisped. Some smoke the skins to blacken- them,
but the smell and crisped hairs betray the cheat. To detect dyeing
or smoking, rub the fur with a moist linen cloth, which will then be
blackened. The Chinese, however, dye the sables so that the color
lasts, and the fur keeps its gloss ; then, the fraud can be detected only
by the crisped hairs.

VOL. IT. — 10

146 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The fur of the pine marten is nearly equal to that of the sable. Its
color is a lustrous brown, and it is frequently tinted so as to resemble
the real sable ; and efforts are said to have been sometimes made to
palm it upon buyers as the genuine Russian. That which is obtained in
America, some 200,000 skins annually, which is somewhat better than
the European, is usually called, by dealers, Hudson Bay sable. It is
an excellent and valuable fur, very full and soft, and, like the Russian
sable, is much used for muiFs, capes, collars, boas, and other kinds of
fancy furs. The fur of the beech or stone marten is much inferior to
that of the sable or pine marten. It is of a yellowish brown, and,
though often colored to i-epresent pine marten or sable, the practised
eye can easily distinguish it from them. The best specimens of the
fur are obtained in Europe, where it is much used ; but in this coun-
try, at the present time, it is not used at all. The skins of the fisher
or pennant's marten, whose fur is quite valuable, are also exported.
Less than 10,000 are caught yearly.

Euhlke, oe Stoa]

The mink is constantly found in almost eveiy part of Xorth Amer-
ica, some 250,000 being taken annually ; yet, contrary to the general
rule, it has been a very fashionable fur here for several years, for muffs,
collars, etc. The color of the finest is chestnut-brown, glossed with
black. The lighter colored is of less value, but it is often dyed so as
to deceive the ignorant or unobserving. Dealers sometimes call it
American sable. We occasionally hear of attempts to tame the mink,
and raise it on a large scale in a minkery or suitable place of confine-
ment. The present high price of the fur presents a strong inducement,
but I do not know that there is any prospect of success.

FURS AND THEIR WEARERS. 147

The ermine is abundant in the northern parts of Asia, Europe, and
America, about 400,000 being taken yearly. It is much smaller than
the sable. In summer it is of a yellowish brown, and is then called
a stoat ; and its fur is known among furriers by tlie name of roselet.
In winter, at the north, it becomes a pure white, and extremely beauti-
ful. F'arther south, the change from brown to white is less perfect.
The end of the tail remains black during the year. It was formerly
very valuable, and was much used in England to line the official robes
of judges and magistrates. It is still considered a choice fur. The
color of the Canada lynx is light gray, waved with black. Its fur is
long, fine, and vei-y thick, and furnishes a most beautiful material for
robes, ladies' sets, trimmings, etc. Some 50,000 skins are sent to mar-
ket each year. The Siberian squirrel is a neat, lively, active little
animal. Its fur in winter is short and silky, and of a pretty gray
color. The skins are used quite extensively for making ladies' sets
and children's furs ; several millions being taken annually.

Canada Lynx. (Tenney.)

The seal is a quadruped which spends the larger portion of its time
in the water, and whose shape very much resembles that of a fish. Its
neck is short, its body is tapering from the shoulders, and its legs or
flippers very much resemble fins. It can stay a long time under water
without breathing, at which time it can close its nostrils and ears.
The species are numerous, differ greatly in size, and are found in almost
every part of the world, but abound mostly in the higher latitudes.
They live upon fish and other aquatic animals, eat their food in the
water, but in fine weather they prefer the ice, or the rocks and sand on
shore, on which to sleep, to bask in the sun, or to play. The harp
seal furnishes the Esquimaux and Greenlanders with food, clothing,
light, covering for their boats, and other articles of con\ enience. The
eyes of seals are dark and lustrous, their sense of hearing acute, and
they delight in musical sounds. Their heads so much resemble the
human form, and their movements are so graceful, that the ancient

148

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

poets found no difficulty in transforming them, in imagination, into
tritons, sirens, nereids, etc., and making them the companions of Nep-
tune. The tales of mermaids and mermen, by modern sailors, are usu-
ally caused by them, though the manatus may sometimes be the cause
of the illusion. Several species have a fine, close fur. Others, like the
common seal, have only coarse hair. The skins of these, when dressed
with the hair on, are used to cover trunks, to make gloves, soldiers'
caps, etc. The skins of the sea-bear, or fur-seal, are extensively used
for gentlemen's and ladies' sets, and for various other purposes. The

Esquimaux spearing Seals.

FURS AND THEIR WEARERS.

149

original color of the fur varies from black, through brownish red to
ash-colored; and the dyer gives it whatever tint the market requires.
The skins have long hairs, black, brown, or gray, which are taken out
before the fur is in a condition to use. The number of seals of all
kinds, now taken yearly, is not far from 1,000,000.

Otteb. (Tenney.)

A few years ago, a large number of skins, of what was then called
in Britain the common fur-seal of commerce, was obtained from the
islands of the Southern Ocean. Instead of taking a moderate number,
and allowing the supply to be kept up, those engaged in the business
made an indiscriminate slaughter of the animals, and in a few years

Beaver. (Tenney.)

nearly exterminated them. In South Shetland, it was estimated that
they killed 320,000 ; in the Island of Desolation, or Kerguelen, more
than 1,000,000 ; and in South Georgia 1,200,000, The fur of this seal is

150

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of a uniform brownish-white color above, and of a somewhat deep
brown beneath. The fur-skin of this valuable animal is prepared in a
peculiar manner. The long hair which conceals the fur is first re-
moved, by heating the skin, and then carding it with a large wooden
knife. The fur then appears in all its perfection, and was formerly
much used in Europe for linings and borders of cloaks and mantles, for
caps, etc.

Fia. 10.

IlfDIANS CATCHINO MUSK-RaTS.

But by far the most valuable fur that passes under the name of
seal is that of the sea otter, or Alaska seal, which, while it has the
habits of the seal, forms a connecting link between it and the otter,
A large portion of this fur is obtained from two islands, St. Paul and
St. George, in latitude about 56|° north, in the Sea of Behring or
Kamtchatka, about 250 miles northwest of the peninsula of Alaska.
These islands were sold by Russia to the United States as a part of

FURS AND THEIR WEARERS.

15'

the Alaska territory. When, in 1869, General George H. Thomas
was sent by our government to examine and report upon the country,
he estimated the fur-hearing seals, or sea-otters, seen each summer on
these islands, at from 5,000,000 to 15,000,000, lying in the rookeries,
and covering hundreds of acres. For the last fifty or sixty years, the
Russian Government had limited the number of skins to be taken
yearly to some 80,000 or less. As General Thomas recommended that
the hunting and killing of these animals should be regulated by law,
Congress, in 18V0, adopted substantially the Russian system; and in
a few weeks the Alaska Company, of which Hon. Henry P. Haven,

Chinchilla.

of New London, Connecticut, is a prominent owner and influential
officer, leased from the United States the islands of St. Paul and St.
George. The company contracted to pay a rent of |55,000 per an-
num, and a revenue tax of $2.62-1- on each fur-seal taken and shipped
from the islands. Two United States officials are stationed on each
of these islands to see that the company complies with the conditions
of the lease, and to count the skins as they are shipped to San Fran-
cisco, Avhere they are again counted by the custom-house officers. The
number taken annually must not exceed 100,000. The catch in 1872
amounted to 96,009 skins. The sea-otter is the boldest swimmer of
the amphibious tribe, for troops of them are met with 300 miles from
land. When holding a forepaw over their eyes, in order to look
about them with more distinctness, they are called sea-apes. They
are exclusively found in the North Pacific Ocean and on its borders,
between the 49th and 60th degrees of latitude ; and, although living
mostly in the water, they are occasionally found on land very far from

152

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tte sea. Their fur is exceedingly fine, close, soft, and velvety, per-
fectly black in full season, but at other times of a shining, deep sepia,
or of a rich chestnut-brown. The longer hairs are silky and glossy,
but not very numerous, and are easily removed. The Chinese prize
the fur of the sea-otter so highly that formerly they paid for the skins
from sixty to seventy-five dollars each ; but they value them somewhat
less now. It still remains the choicest, most expensive, and most
fashionable, fur of its kind in the market for gentlemen's sets, ladies'
gacques, turbans, boas, mufis, etc., and consequently all inferior furs
that resemble it are made to imitate it.

Otters are fierce, wild, and shy, nocturnal in their habits, live much
in the water, and feed upon fish, which they catch with great dex-
terity. They love to sport by sliding down a bank of snow in winter,

^

or clay in summer, especially when they can, at the bottom, plunge
into water. The Canadian otter has long, glossy hair, of a dark color,
and an inner fur, close, fine, and soft, of a deep, rich liver-brown. If
the fur on any part of the skin lacks the right color, it is brought to
the requisite tint by dyeing. The fur is much esteemed, and is used
for caps, collars, gloves, etc., though much of it is exported to Europe.
The number of otters taken yearly is supposed to be about 40,000.

Beavers have a broad, horizontally-flattened, and scaly tail, a
webbed hind-foot, and a general form which is admirable for swim-
ming. They live mostly in and near the water, in large companies,

FURS AND THEIR WEARERS.

•53

and their chief food is bark and aquatic plants, which they collect in
large heaps for the winter. Their powerful teeth enable them to gnaw
down trees, even of the hardest wood. To obtain a proper depth of
running water, with a surface varying little in height, they build a
dam on a stream to make a pond, in which to build houses for winter,
using trees and branches mixed with stones and mud. They cut their
wood up-stream, and float it down. The houses are built where the

Raccoon. (Tenney.)

water is several feet deep, and their only entrance is at the bottom.
They ai-e continued so much above the water as to admit of an upper,
dry apartment, approached from the lower, and usually occupied by
two or three families. The fur of the American beaver is of a uniform
reddish brown, fine, thick, and of the best quality. It was formerly
almost wholly used for making hats. It is used for that now ; also for
gentlemen's caps, mufiiers, and gloves. A large portion of it is ex-
ported to England.

Fig. 14.

Badgee. (Tenuey.)

Nutria fur is obtained from the coypou, or couia, a South American
animal resembling the beaver in size and habits, but having a long,
round tail. Its similarity, or that of its fur, to the otter and muskrat,
may be inferred from its names : nutria meaning otter, and myopota-
mus river-mouse. In fact, Molina speaks of the coypou as a species
of water-rat, of the size and color of the otter. In the workshops it
is called the South American monkey. It has long, ruddy hair, and a

^54

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sliort, brownish, ash-colorcd fur, of considerable value, •which has been
largely exported to Europe for making hats. It has also been much
used here for hats, gentlemen's sets, and other purposes. The fur
somewhat resembles that of the beaver, as well as the otter. It is
estimated that 3,000,000 are caught annually.

The muskrat, or musquash, is a native of North America, much
smaller than the beaver, but with habits and appearance somewhat
similar. Muskrats feed upon mussels, aquatic plants, and roots of
grasses, and build winter-huts of sticks, grass, and mud, with an en-
trance under water, leading to a dry apartment above. In summer
they dwell in extensive burrows along the banks of the rivers. The
trapper, walking on the bank, hears the muskrat run from his hole into
the watei-, observes where he stirs the mud, and puts the trap quietly
down there. The number of skins taken yearly by trap and gun is
immense ; over 3,000,000. Many are maniifactured into hats on both
sides of the Atlantic, more than a million being exported annually to
England for that purpose. Besides hats, they are used here largely for
men's gloves, ladies' sets, robes, etc. They are frequently dyed to imi-
tate mink, and are then called Alaska mink. They are also plucked
and dyed to imitate seal and similar furs.

Wolf. (Tenney.)

The chinchilla is scarcely larger than a rat, and inhabits the cold
mountain-regions of Chili and Peru. It is chiefly remarkable for its
exquisitely fine fur, which is very soft, and of a pearly gray. It is
used for ladies' and children's sets, but more especially for lining and
trimming cloaks, pelisses, and other articles of clothing. Not more
than 100,000 are taken yearly.

The fur of the northern hare, which is white in winter and brown
in summer, is mostly used in the manufacture of hats. The skins of
the common European rabbit or French cony are used for ladies' sets
and children's furs. The fur is also used for hats. Several millions
are taken each year.

The fur of the skunk is used, under the name of Alaska sable, for

FURS AND THEIR WEARERS, 155

ladies' sets, sacque-trimmings, etc., of an inferior quality. The black
portions of the skin are sometimes carefully selected, completely de-
odorized, made into sets of furs of the natural color, and sold under
the name of black marten. The pole-cat, or fitchet weasel, has long,
coarse, dark-brown hair, and an under-coat of short, silky, pale-yellow
fur. This fur, though inferior, is imported and used for ladies' sets,
etc., and is sold under the name of fitch. The Virginia opossum has
the habit of feigning itself dead if slightly struck or wounded, but, if
seriously attacked and badly hurt, it will fight bravely. Its fur is a
long, woolly down, which is of a dingy v/hite. Though of little value,
the fur is colored so as to resemble fitch, and is sold under that name.
The color of the arctic fox during winter is a pure white; in sum-
mer, brown, gray, or bluish. It is then called a cross or pied fox.
The fur is long, fine, and woolly, and is occasionally used here for
ladies' sets and other purposes, but it is mostly exported to Europe ;

Wolverine. (Tenney.)

as are also the skins of the red fox and its varieties, the cross fox and
the silver or black fox. The color of an adult silver fox when in
prime fur is a deep, glossy black, with a silvery grizzle on the fore-
head and flanks. This variety is extremely rare, and its rich fur is
more valuable than that of any other quadruped. The skin of the sil-
very fox of Labrador has been sold in London for |500.

The panda, or Avah, of the Himalaya Mountains, is about the size
of a large cat. It is covered with a soft, thickly-set fur, which, above,
is of the richest cinnamon red; behind, of a fawn color; and, beneath,
of a deep black — while its head is whitish, and its tail like a lady's
boa, and banded with red and yellow. Fred. Cuvier calls this the
most beautiful of known quadrupeds.

The color of the raccoon is light gray overlaid with black-tipped
hairs. The outer hair is long and coarse, the inner softer and more
like wool. The fur is mostly used for making hats. It is sometimes

156 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

used for robes, as linings for garments, etc. About 500,000 skins are
taken yearly. The hair of the badger is fine, silky, and very long,
especially behind. At the roots it is of a yellowish gray, black in the
middle, and white at the tip. The skins were formerly made into
pouches by the Highlanders. The dressed skins make the best pistol-
furniture, and the hair is much used to make artists' brushes for spread-
ing the colors and softening the shades in painting. Some 50,000 skins
are sent to market annually.

The white or polar bear is an enormous animal, weighing sometimes
1,000 or 1,500 pounds ; is wholly carnivorous, and feeds upon seals
and other animals. The fur is long, fine, soft, woolly, and of a silvery-
white color tinged with yellow. Its skin makes a magnificent robe.
In the northern regions the skins of bears furnish the most useful and
comfortable winter apparel. They are made into beds, coverlets, caps,
gloves, and other articles of clothing. The black bear has hair com-
paratively soft and glossy. Its skin is used for hammer-cloths of
carriages, pistol-holsters, rugs, caps, etc. The cmnamon bear of the
Rocky Mountains has a more valuable fur than that of the black bear,
of which it appears to be a variety.

There are various other animals that furnish robes of different
quality and appearance, such as the wolverine, or glutton, the wild-cat,
the coyote, or prairie-wolf, the different varieties of the white wolf,
which is sometimes called the mountain or timber wolf The growing
scarcity of wild animals, and the resources of modern art, are gradu-
ally introducing into use various fabrics as artificial robes, many of
them convenient and comfortable, and some of them even elegant and
very desirable.

COERELATIOIsr OF YITAL WITH CHEMICAL AND
PHYSICAL FORCES.'

By JOSEPH LE CONTE,

PROFESSOR OF GEOLOGY AND NATCRAl HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA..

YITAL force ; whence is it derived ? What is its relation to the
other forces of Nature ? The answer of modern science to these
questions is : It is derived from the lower forces of Nature ; it is re-
lated to other forces much as these are related to each other — it is cor-
related with chemical and physical forces.

At one time matter was supposed to be destructible. By combus-
tion or by evaporation matter seemed to be consumed — to pass out of
existence ; but now w^e know it only changes its form from the solid

* An abstract of two Lectures given to the class in Comparative Physiology in the
University of California.

CORRELATION OF VITAL AND PHYSICAL FORCES. 157

or liquid to the gaseous condition — from the visible to the invisible —
and that amid all these changes the same quantity of matter remains.
Creation or destruction of matter, increase or diminution of matter,
lies beyond the domain of Science ; her domain is confined entirely to
the changes of matter. Now, it is the doctrine of modern science that
the same is true of force. Force seems often to be annihilated. Two
cannon-balls of equal size and velocity meet each other and fall mo-
tionless. The immense energy of these moving bodies seems to pass
out of existence. But not so ; it is changed into heat, and the exact
amount of heat may be calculated ; moreover, an equal amount of heat
may be changed back again into an equal amount of momentum.
Here, therefore, force is not lost, but is changed from a visible to an
invisible form. Motion is changed from bodily motion into molecular
motion. Thus heat, light, electricity, magnetism, chemical aflinity,
and mechanical force, are transmutable into each other, back and forth ;
but, amid all these changes, the amount of force remains unchanged.
Force is incapable of destruction, except by the same power which
created it. The domain of Science lies within the limits of these
changes — creation and annihilation lie outside of her domain.

The mutual convertibility of forces into each other is called corre-
lation of forces ; the persistence of the same amount, amid all these
protean forms, is called conservation of force.

The con-elation of physical forces with each other and with chemi-
cal force is now universally acknowledged and somewhat clearly con-
ceived. The correlation of vital force with these is not universally
acknowledged, and, where acknowledged, is only imperfectly conceived.
In 1859 I published a paper* in which I attempted to put the idea of
correlation of vital force witli chemical and physical forces in a more
definite and scientific form. The views expressed in that paper have
been generally adopted by physiologists. Since the publication of the
paper referred to, the subject has lain in my mind, and grown at least
somewhat. I propose, therefore, now to reembody my views in a more
popular form, with such additions as have occurred to me since.

There are four planes of material existence, which may be repre-
sented as raised one above another. These are : 1, The plane of ele-
mentary existence ; 2. The plane of chemical compounds, or mineral
kingdom; 3. The plane of vegetable existence; and, 4. The plane of
animal existence. Their relations to each other are truly expressed by
writing them one above the other, thus :

4. Animal Kingdom.
3, Vegetable Kingdom.
2, 3Iineral Kingdom.
1, Elements.

* American Journal of Science, November, 1859. Philadelphia Magazine, vol. xls.,
p. 133.

158 1IIE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Now, it is a remarkable fact that there is a special force, whose
function it is to raise matter from each plane to the plane above, and
to execute movements on the latter. Thus, it is the function of chemi-
cal aflinity alone to raise matter from No. 1 to No. 2, as well as to
execute all the movements, back and forth, by action and reaction ;
in a word, to produce all the phenomena on No. 2 which together
constitute the science of chemistry. It is the prerogative of vegetable
life-force alone to lift matter from No. 2 to No. 3, as well as to execute
all the movements on that plane, which together constitute the science
of vegetable physiology. It is the prerogative of animal life-force
alone to lift matter from No. 3 to No. 4, and to preside over the move-
ments on this plane, which together constitute the science of animal
physiology. But there is no force in Nature capable of raising matter
at once from No. 1 to No. 3, or from No. 2 to No. 4, without stopping
and receiving an accession of force, of a different kind, on the interme-
diate plane. Plants cannot feed upon elements, but only on chemical
compounds : animals cannot feed on minerals, but only on vegetables.
We will see in the sequel that this is the necessary result of the prin-
ciple of conservation of force in vital phenomena.

It is well known that atoms, in a nascent state, i. e., at the moment
of their separation from previous combination, are endowed with pecul-
iar and powerful affinity. Oxygen and nitrogen, nitrogen and hydro-
gen, hydrogen and carbon, which show no affinity for each other under
ordinary circumstances, readily unite when one or both are in a nascent
condition. The reason seems to be that, when the elements of a com-
pound are torn asunder, the cliemical affinity which previously bound
them together is set free, ready and eager to unite the nascent ele-
ments with whatever they come in contact with. This state of exalted
chemical energy is retained but a little while, because it is liable to be
changed into some other form of force, probably heat, and is therefore
no longer chemical energy. To illustrate by the planes: matter fall-
in «• down from No. 2 to No. 1 generates force by which matter is
lifted from No. 1 to No. 2. Decomposition generates the force by
which combination is effected. This principle underlies every thing I
shall further say.

There are, therefore, two ideas or principles underlying this paper :
1. The correlation of vital with physical and chemical forces; 2. That
in all cases vital force is produced by decomposition— is transformed
by nascent affinity. Neither of these is new. Grove, many years
ao"0, brought out, in a vague manner, the idea that vital force was
correlated with chemical and physical forces.' In 1848 Dr. Freke,
M. R. I. A., of Dublin, first advanced the idea that vital force of ani-
mal life was generated by decomposition. In 1851 the same idea was
brought out again by Dr. Walters, of St. Louis. These papers were un-

' lu 1845 Dr. J. R. Mayer published a paper on " Organic Motion and Nutrition." I
have not seen it.

CORRELATION OF VITAL AND PHYSICAL FORCES. 159

known to me when I wrote my article. They have been sent to me in
the last few years by their respective authors. Neither of these au-
thors, however, extends this principle to vegetation, the most funda-
mental and most important phenomenon of life. In 1857 the same idea
was again brought out by Prof. Henry, of the Smithsonian Institution,
and by liim extended to vegetation. I do not, therefore, now claim to
have first advanced this idea, but I do claim to have in some measure
rescued it from vagueness, and given it a clearer and more scientific
form.

I wish now to apply these principles in the explanation of the most
important phenomena of vegetable and animal life :

1. Vegetation. — The most important phenomenon in the life-his-
tory of a plant — in fact, the starting-point of all life, both vegetable
and animal — is the formation of organic matter in the leaves. The
necessary conditions for this wonderful change of mineral into organic
matter seem to be, sunlight, chlorophyl, and living protoplasm, or bio-
plasm. This is the phenomenon I wish now to discuss.

The plastic matters of which vegetable structure is built are of two
kinds — amyloids and albuminoids. The amyloids, or starch and sugar
groups, consist of C, H, and O ; the albuminoids of C, H, O, N, and
SP. The quantity of sulphur and phosphorus is very small, and we
will neglect them in this discussion. The food out of which these
substances are elaborated are, CO^, H„0, and H^N — carbonic acid,
water, and ammonia. Now, by the agency of sunlight in the presence
of chlorophyl and bioplasm, these chemical compounds (C0„, H^O, H^N)
are torn asunder, or shaken asunder, or decomposed ; the excess of O,
or of O and H, is rejected, and the remaining elements in a nascent
condition combine to form organic matter. To form the amyloids,
starch, dextrine, sugar, cellulose, only CO, and H^O are decomposed,
and excess of O rejected. To form albuminoids or protoplasm, CO,,
HjO, and H^N, are decomposed, and excess of O and H rejected.

It would seem in this case, therefore, that physical force (light) is
changed into nascent chemical force, and this nascent ciiemical energy,
under the peculiar conditions present, forms organic matter and reap-
pears as vital foi-ce. Light falling on living green leaves is destroyed
or consumed in doing the work of decomposition ; disappears as light,
to reappear as nascent chemical energy; and this in its turn disappears
in forming organic matter, to reappear as the vital force of the organic
matter thus formed. The light which disappears is proportioned to
the O, or the O and H rejected ; is proportioned also to the quantity
of organic matter formed, and also to the amoimt of vital force result-
ing. To illustrate : In the case of amyloids, oxygen-excess falling
or running down from plane No. 2 to plane No. 1 generates force to
raise C, II, and O, from plane No. 2 to plane No. 3. In the case of
albuminoids, oxygen-excess and hydrogen-excess running down from
No. 2 to No. 1 generate force to raise C, H, O, and N, from No. 2 to

i6o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

No. 3. To illustrate again : As sun-heat falling upon water disappears
as heat, to reappear as mechanical power, raising the water into the
clouds, so sunlight falling upon green leaves disappears as light, to re-
appear as vital force lifting matter from the mineral into the organic
kingdom.

2. Germin^atiox. — Growing plants, it is seen, take their life-force
from the sun ; but seeds germinate and commence to grow in the dark.
Evidently there must be some other source from which they draw their
supply of force. They cannot draw force from the sun. This fact is
intimately connected with another fact, viz., that they do not draw
their food from the mineral kingdom. The seed in germination feeds
entirely upon a supply of organic matter laid up for it by the mother-
plant. It is the decomposition of this organic matter which supplies
the force of germination. Chemical compounds are comparatively
stable — it requires sunlight to tear them asunder ; but organic matter
is more easily decomposed — it is almost spontaneously decomposed. It
may be that heat (a necessary condition of germination) is the force
which determines the decomposition. However this may be, it is cer-
tain that a portion of the organic matter laid up in the seed is decom-
posed, burned up, to form CO^ and H^O, and that this combustion
furnishes the force by which the mason-work of tissue-making is ac-
complished. In other M'ords, of the food laid up in the form of starch,
dextrine, protoplasm, a portion is decomposed to furnish the force by
which the remainder is organized. Hence the seed always loses weight
in germination ; it cannot develop unless it is in part consumed; "it
is not quickened except it die." This self-consumption continues until
the leaves and roots are formed ; then it begins to draw force from the
sun, and food from the mineral kingdom.

To illustrate : In germination, matter running down from plane
No. 3 to plane No. 2 generates force by which other similar matter is
moved about and raised to a somewhat higher position on plane No. 3.
As water raised by the sun may be stored in reservoirs, and in run-
ning down from these may do work, so matter raised by sun-force into
the organic kingdom by one generation is stored as force to do the
work of germination of the next generation. Again, as, in water run-
ning through an hydraulic ram, a portion runs to waste, in order to
generate force to lift the remainder to a higher level, so, of organic
matter stored in the seed, a portion runs to waste to create force to
organize the remainder.

Thus, then, it will be seen, that three things, viz., the absence of
sunlight, the use of organic food, and the loss of weight, are indis-
solubly connected in germination, and all explained by the principle
of conservation of force.

3. Starting of Buds. — Deciduous trees are entirely destitute of
leaves during the winter. The buds must start to grow in the spring
without leaves, and therefore without drawing force from the sun.

CORRELATION OF VITAL AND PHYSICAL FORCES. 161

Hence, also, food in the organic form must be, and is, laid up from the
previous year in the body of the tree. A portion of this is consumed
with the formation of CO, and H^O, in order to create force for the
development of the buds. So soon as by this means the leaves are
formed, the plant begins to draw force from the sun, and food from
the mineral kingdom.

4. Pale Plants. — Fungi and etiolated plants have no chloro-
phyl, therefore cannot drjiw their force from the sun, nor make or-
ganic matters from inorganic. Hence these also must feed on organic
matter : not, indeecT, on starch, dextrine, and protoplasm, but on decay-
ing organic mattei-. In these plants the organic matter is taken up in
some form intermediate between the planes No. 3 and No. 2. The
matter thus taken up is, a portion of it, consumed with the formation
of CO3 and HO, in order to create force necessary to organize the re-
mainder. To illustrate : Matter falling from some intermediate point
between No. 2 and No, 3 to No. 2, produces force sufficient to raise
matter from the same intermediate point to No. 3 ; a portion runs to
waste downward, and creates force to push the remainder upward.

5. Gkowth of Geeen Plants at Night. — It is well known that
almost all plants grow at night as well as in the day. It is also known
that plants at night exhale CO^. These two facts have not, however,
as far as I know, been connected with one another, and with the prin-
ciple of conservation of force. It is usually supposed that in the night
the decomposition of CO, and exhalation of oxygen are checked by
withdrawal of sunlight, and some of the CO, in the ascending sap is
exhaled by a physical law. But this does not account for the growth.
It is evident that, in the absence of sunlight, the force required for the
work of tissue-building can be derived only from the decomposition
and combustion of organic matter. There are two views as to the
source of this organic matter, either or both of which may be correct :
First. There seems to be no doubt that most plants, especially those
grown in soils rich in humus, take up a portion of their food in the
form of semi-organic matter, or soluble humus. The combustion of a
portion of this in every part of the plant, by means of oxygen also ab-
sorbed by the roots, and the formation of CO,, undoubtedly creates a
supply of force night and day, independently of sunlight. The force
thus produced by the combustion of a portion might be used to raise
the remainder into starch, dextrine, etc., or might be used in tissue-
building. During the day, the CO, thus produced would be again
decomposed in the leaves by sunlight, and thus create an additional
supply of force. During the night, the CO, would be exhaled.'

Again : It is possible that more organic matter is made by sun-
light during the day than is used up in tissue-building. Some of this
excess is again consumed, and forms CO, and H,0, in order to con-

' For more full account, see my paper, American Journal of Science, November, 1859,
sixth and seventh heads.

VOL. IV. — 11

i62 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

tinue the tissue-building process during the night. Thus the plant
during the day stores up sun-force sufficient to do its work during the
night. It has been suggested by Dr. J. C. Draper,' though not proved,
or even rendered probable, that the force of tissue-building {force plas-
tique) is always derived from decomposition, or combustion of organic
matter. In that case, the force of organic-matter formation is derived
from the sun, while the force of tissue-building (which is relatively
small) is derived from the combustion of organic matter thus previous-
ly formed.

6. Feementation. — The plastic matters out of which vegetable
tissue is built, and which are formed by sunlight in the leaves, are of
two kinds, viz., amyloids (dextrine, sugar, starch, cellulose), and albu-
minoids, or protoplasm. Xow, the amyloids are comparatively stable,
and do not spontaneously decompose ; but the albuminoids not only
decompose spontaneously themselves, but drag down the amyloids
with which they are associated into concurrent decomposition — not
only change themselves, but propagate a change into amyloids. Al-
buminoids, in various stages and kinds of decomposition, are called
ferments. The propagated change in amyloids is called fermentation.
By various kinds of ferments, amyloids are thus dragged down step
by step to the mineral kingdom, viz., to CO^ and H^O. The accom-
panying table exhibits the varioiis stages of the descent of starch, and
the ferments by which they are effected : "

1. Starch )

2. Dextrine > Diastase.

3. Sugar )

4. Alcohol and COa Yeast.

5. Acetic acid Mother of vinegar.

6. COa and HO Mould.

By appropriate means, the process of descent may be stopped on
any one of these planes. By far too much is, unfortunately, stopped on
the fourth plane. The manufacturer and chemist may determine the
downward change through all the planes, and the chemist has recently
succeeded in ascending again to No. 4 ; but the plant ascends and de-
scends the scale at pleasure (avoiding, however, the fourth and fifth),
and even passes at one step from the lowest to the highest.

Now, it will be seen by tlie table that, connected with each of these
descensive changes, there is a peculiar ferment associated. Diastase
determines the change from starch to dextrine and sugar — saccharifica-
tion ; yeast, the change from sugar to alcohol — fermentation ; mother
of vineo-ar, the change from alcohol to acetic acid — acetification ; and a
peculiar mould, the change from acetic acid to CO, and water. But

' American Journal of Science, November, 1872. The experiments of Dr. Draper are
inconclusive, because they are made on seedlings, -which, until their supply of organic
food is exhausted, are independent of sunlight.

* J. C. Draper, American Journal of Science, November, 1872

CORRELATION OF VITAL AXD PHYSICAL FORCES. 163

what is far more wonderful and significant is, that, associated with
each of these ferments, except diastase, and therefore with each of
these descensive changes, except the change from starch to sugar, or
saccharification, there is a peculiar form of life. Associated with alco-
holic fermentation, there is the yeast-plant ; with acetification, the
vinegar-plant ; and, with the decomposition of vinegar, a peculiar
kind of mould. We will take the one which is best understood, viz.,
yeast-plant (saccharomyce), and its relation to alcoholic fermentation.

It is well known that, in connection with alcoholic fermentation,
there is a peculiar unicelled plant wjiich grows and multiplies. Fer-
mentation never takes place without the presence of this plant ; this
plant never grows without producing fermentation, and the rapidity
of the fermentation is in exact proportion to the rapidity of the growth
of the plant. But, as far as I know, the fact has not been distinctly
brought out that the decomposition of the sugar into alcohol and car-
bonic acid furnishes the force by which the plant grows and multi-
plies. If the growing cells of the yeast-plant be observed under the
microscope, it will be seen that the carbonic-acid bubbles form, and
therefore probably the decomposition of sugar takes place only in con-
tact with the surface of the yeast-cells. The yeast-plant not only
assimilates matter, but also force. It decomposes the sugar, in order
that it may assimilate the chemical force set free.

We have already said that the change from starch to sugar, deter-
mined by diastase (saccharifi cation), is the only one in connection with
which there is no life. Now, it is a most significant fact, in this con-
nection, that this is also the only change which is not, in a proper
sense, descensi^'e, or, at least, where there is no decomposition.

We now pass from the phenomena of vegetable to the phenomena
of animal life.

7. Development of the Egg rsr Incubation. — The development
of the egg in incubation is very similar to the germination of a seed.
An egg consists of albuminous and fatty matters, so inclosed that,
while oxygen of the air is admitted, nutrient matters are excluded.
During incubation the qq^ changes into an embryo ; it passes from an
almost unorganized to a highly-organized condition, from a lower to a
higher condition. There is work done : there must be expenditure of
force ; but, as we have already seen, vital force is always derived from
decomposition. But, as the matters to be decomposed are not taken
ah extra, the egg must consume itself; that it does so, is proved by
the fact that in incubation the Qgg absorbs oxygen, eliminates CO^ and
probably H^O, and loses weight. As in the seed, a portion of the mat-
ters contained in the egg is consumed in order to create force to or-
ganize the remainder. Matter runs down from plane No. 4 to plane
No. 2, and generates force to do the work of organization on planet
No. 4. The amount of CO, and H^O formed, and therefore the loss
of weight, is a measure of the amount of plastic work done.

1 64 THE POPULAR SCIEXGE MONTHLY.

8. Development withix the Chrysalis Shell. — It is well
known that many insects emerge from the egg not iu their final form,
but in a wormlike form, called a larva. After this they pass into a
second passive state, in which they are again covered with a kind of
shell — a sort of second egg-state, called the chrysalis. From this
they again emerge as the perfect insect. The butterfly is the most
familiar, as well as the best illustrated, of these changes. The larva
or caterpillar eats with enormous voracity, and grows very rapidly.
When its growth is complete, it covers itself with a shell, and remains
perfectly passive and almost immovable for many days or weeks.
During this period of quiescence of animal functions there are, how-
ever, the most important changes going on within.. The wings and
legs are formed, the muscles are aggregated in bundles for moving
these appendages, the nervous system is more highly developed, the
mouth, organs, and alimentary canal, are greatly changed and more
highly organized, the simple eyes are changed into compound eyes.
Now, all this requires expenditure of force, and therefore decomposition
of matter ; but no food is taken, therefore the chrysalis must consume
its own substance, and therefore lose weight. It does so ; the weight
of the emerging butterfly is in many cases not one-tenth that of the
caterpillar. Force is stored up in the form of organic matter only to
be consumed in doing plastic work.

9. Matuee Animals. — Whence do animals derive their vital
force ? I answer, from the decomposition of their food and the de-
composition of their tissues.

Plants, as we have seen, derive their vital force from the decom-
position of their mineral food. But the chemical compounds on which
plants feed are very stable. Their decomposition requires a peculiar
and complex contrivance for the reception and utilization of sunlight.
These conditions are wanting in animals. Animals, therefore, cannot
feed on chemical compounds of the mineral kingdom ; they must have
organic food, which easily runs into decomposition ; they must feed on
the vegetable kingdom.

Animals are distinguished from vegetables by incessant decay in
every tissue — a decay which is proportional to animal activity. This
incessant decay necessitates incessant repair, so that the animal body
has been likened to a temple on which two opposite forces are at work
in every part, the one tearing down, the other repairing the breach as
fast as made. In vegetables no such incessant decay has ever been
made out. If it exists, it must be very trifling in comparison. Proto-
plasm, it is true, is taken up from the older parts of vegetables, and
these parts die ; but the protoplasm does not seem to decompose, but
is used again for tissue-building. Thus the internal activity of ani-
mals is of two kinds, tissue-destroying and tissue-building ; while that
of plants seems to be, principally, at least, of one kind, tissue-building.
Animiils use food for force and repair and growth, and in the mature

CORRELATION OF VITAL AND PHYSICAL FORCES. 165

animal only for force and repair. Plants use food for force and growth
— they never stoj} growing,

Now, the food of animals is of two kinds, amyloids and albumi-
noids. The carnivora feed entirely on albuminoids ; the herbivora on
both amyloids and albuminoids. All this food comes from the vege-
table kingdom directly in the case of herbivora, indirectly in the case
of carnivora. Animals cannot make organic matter. Now, the tissues
of animals are wholly albuminoid. It is obvious, therefoi-e, that for
the repair of the tissues the food must be albuminoid. The amyloid
food, therefore (and, as we shall eee in carnivora, much of the albumi-
noid), must be used wholly for force. As coal or wood, burned in a
steam-engine, changes chemical into mechanical energy, so food, in
excess of what is used for repair, is burned up to pi'oduce animal ac-
tivity. Let us trace more accurately the origin of animal force by
examples.

10. Carniyora, — The food of carnivora is entirely albuminoid.
The idea of the older physiologists, in regard to the use of this food,
seems to have been as follows : Albuminoid matter is exceedingly un-
stable ; it is matter raised, with much diflSculty and against chemical
forces, high, and delicately balanced on a pinnacle, in a state of unsta-
ble equilibrium, for a brief time, and then rushes down again into the
minei-al kingdom. The animal tissues, being formed of albuminoid
matter, ai-e short-lived ; the parts are constantly dying and decom-
posing ; the law of death necessitates the law of reproduction ; decom-
position necessitates repair, and therefore food for repair. But the
force by which repair is effected was for them, and for many physiol-
ogists now, underived, innate. But, the doctrine maintained by me in
the paper referred to is, that the decomposition of the tissues creates
not only the necessity, but also the force, of repair.

Suppose, ill the first place, a carnivorous animal uses just enough
food to repair the tissues, and no more — say an ounce. Then I say the
ounce of tissue decayed not only necessitates the ounce of albuminous
food for repair, but the decomposition sets free the force by which the
repair is effected. But it will be perhaps objected that the force would
all be consumed in repair, and none left for animal activity of all kinds.
I answer : it would not all be used up in repair, for, the food being al-
ready albuminoid, there is probably little expenditure of force necessary
to change it into tissue; while, on the other hand, the force generated
by the decomposition of tissue into C0„, H^O, and urea, is very great —
the ascensive change is small, the descensive change is great. The de-
composition of one ounce of albuminous tissue into CO^, H^O, and urea,
would therefore create force sufficient not only to change one ounce
of albuminous matter into tissue, but also leave a considerable amount
for animal activities of all kinds, A certain quantity of matter, run-
ning down from plane No, 4 to plane No. 2, ci*eates force enough not
only to move the same quantity of matter about on plane No. 2, but

i66 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

also to do much other work besides. It is probable, however, that the
wants of animal activity are so immediate and urgent that, under
these conditions, much food would be burned for this purpose, and
would not reach the tissues, and the tissues would be imperfectly re-
paired, and would therefore waste.

Take next the carnivorous animal full fed. In this case there can
be no doubt that, while a portion of the food goes to repair the tissues,
by far the larger portion is consumed in the blood, and passes away
partly as COj, and H^O through the lungs, and partly as urea through
the kidneys. This part is used, and can be of use only, to create force.
The food of carnivora, therefore, goes partly to tissue-building, and
partly to create heat and force. The force of carnivorous animals is
derived jjartly from decomposing tissues and partly from food-excess
consumed in the blood.

11. Herbivoea. — The food of herbivora and of man is mixed —
partly albuminoid and partly amyloid. In man, doubtless, the albu-
minoids are usually in excess of what is required for tissue-building ;
but in herbivora, probably, the albuminoids are not in excess of the
requirements of the decomposing tissues. In this case, therefore, the
whole of the albuminoids is used for tissue-making, and the whole of
the amyloids for force-making. In this class, therefore, these two classes
of food may be called tissue-food and force-food. The force of these
animals, therefore, is derived partly from the decomposition of the tis-
sues, but principally from the decomposition and combustion of the
amyloids and fats.

Some physiologists speak of the amyloid and fat food as being
burned to keep up the animal heat ; but it is evident that the prime
object in the body, as in the steam-engine, is not heat, but force. Heat
is a mere condition and perhaps a necessary concomitant of the change,
but evidently not the prime object. In tropical regions the heat is
not wanted. In the steam-engine, chemical energy is tirst changed
into heat and heat into mechanical energy ; in the body the change is,
probably, much of it direct and not through the intermediation of heat.

12. We see at once, from the above, why it is that plants cannot
feed on elements, viz., because their food must be decomposed in order
to create the organic matter out of which all organisms are built.
This elevation of matter, which takes place in the green leaves of
plants, is tlie starting-point of life ; upon it alone is based the possi-
bility of the existence of the organic kingdom. The running down
of the matter there raised determines the vital phenomena of germina-
tion of pale plants, and even of some of the vital phenomena of green
plants, and all the vital phenomena of the animal kingdom. The sta-
bility of chemical compounds, usable as food, is such that a peculiar
contrivance and peculiar conditions found only in the green leaves of
plants are necessary for their decomposition. We see, therefore, also,
why animals as well as pale plants cannot feed on mineral matter.

CORRELATION OF VITAL AND PHYSICAL FORCES. 167

We easily see also why the animal activity of carnivora is greater
than that of herbivora, for the amount of force necessary for the as-
similation of their albuminoid food is small, and therefore a larger
amount is left over for animal activity. Their food is already on plane
No. 4 ; assimilation, therefore, is little more than a shifting on the
plane No. 4 from a liquid to a solid condition — from liquid albuminoid
of the blood to solid albuminoid of the tissues.

We see also why the internal activity of plants may conceivably
be only of one kind ; for, drawing their force from the sun, tissue-
making is not nece&^arily dependent on tissue-decay. While, on the
other hand, the internal activity of animals must be of two kinds,
decay and repair ; for animals always draw a portion of their force,
and starving animals the whole of their force, from decaying tissue.

13. There are several general thoughts suggested by this subject,
which I wish to present in conclusion :

a. We have said there are four planes of matter raised one above
the other : 1. Elements ; 2, Chemical compounds ; 3. Vegetables ; 4.
Animals. Now, there are also four planes of force similarly related
to each other, vLz., physical force, chemical force, vitality, and will.

4, Animals.

3. Plants.

2. Chemical compounds.

1. Elements.
On the first plane of matter operates physical force only ; for chemical
force immediately raises matter into the second plane. On the second
plane operates, in addition to physical, also chemical force. On the
third plane operates, in addition to physical and chemical, also vital
force. On the fourth plane, in addition to physical, chemical, and vital,
also the force charactei-istic of animals, viz., will.' With each eleva-
tion there is a peculiar force added to the already existing, and a pe-
culiar group of phenomena is the result. As matter only rises step
by step from plane to plane, and never two steps at a time, so also
force, in its transformation into higher forms of force, rises only step
by step. Physical force does not become vital except through chemi-
cal force, and chemical force does not become will except through
vital force.

Again, we have compared the various grades of matter, not to a
gradually rising inclined plane, but to successive planes raised one
above the other. There are, no doubt, some intermediate conditions ;
but, as a broad, general fact, the changes from plane to plane are sud-
den. Now, the same is true also of the forces operating on these
planes — of the different grades of force, and their corresponding
groups of phenomena. The change from one grade to another, as

' I might add still another plane and another force, viz., the human plane, on which
operate, in addition to all the lower forces, also free-will and reason. I do not speak
of these, only because they lie beyond the present ken of inductive science.

i68 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

from physical to chemical, or from chemical to vital, is not, as far as
we can see, by sliding scale, but suddenly. The groups of phenomena
which we call physical, chemical, vital, animal, rational, and moral, do
not merge into each other by insensible gradations. In the ascension
scale in the evolution of the higher forces there are places of rapid
paroxysmal change.
. h. Vital force is transformed into physical and chemical forces ; but

r it is not on that account identical with physical and chemical force, and
therefore we ought not, as some would have us, discard the term vital
force. There are two opposite errors on this subject : one is the old
error of regarding vital force as something innate, underived, having
no relation to the other forces of Nature ; the other is the new error
of regarding the forces of the living body as nothing but ordinary
physical and chemical forces, and therefore insisting that the use of the
term vital force is absurd and injurious to science. The old error is
still prevalent in the popiilar mind, and still haunts the minds of many
physiologists ; the new error is apparently a revelation from the other,
and is therefore common among the most advanced scientific minds.
There are many of the best scientists who ridicule the use of the term
vital force, or vitality, as a remnant of superstition ; and yet the same
men use the words gravity, magnetic force, chemical force, physical
force, etc. Vital force is not underived — is not unrelated to other
forces— is, in fact, correlated with them ; but it is nevertheless a dis-
tinct form of force, far more distinct than any other form, unless it be
still higher forms, and therefore better entitled to a distinct name
than any lower form. Each form of force gives rise to a peculiar
group of phenomena, and the study of these to a peculiar department
of science. Now, the group of phenomena called vital is more pecul-
iar, and different from other groups, than these are from each other ;
and the science of physiology is a more distinct department than either
physics or chemistry ; and therefore the form of force which deter-
mines these phenomena is more distinct, and better entitled to a dis-
tinct name, than either physical or chemical forces. De Candolle, iu
a recent paper,' suggests the term vital movement instead of vital
force ; but can we conceive of movement without force ? And, if the
movement is peculiar, so also is the form of force.

c. Vital is transformed physical and chemical forces ; true, but the
necessary and very peculiar condition of this transformation is the
previous existence then and there of living matter. There is some-
thing so wonderful in this peculiarity of vital force that I must dwell
on it a little.

Elements brought in contact with each other under certain physi-
cal conditions — perhaps heat or electricity — unite and rise into the
second plane, i. e., of chemical compounds ; so also several elements,
C, H, O and N, etc., brought in contact with each other under certain
> Archives des Sciences, vol. xlv„ p. 345, December, 1812

(g-ft.

CORRELATION OF VITAL AND PHYSICAL FORCES. 169

physical or chemical conditions, such as light, nascency, etc., unite
and rise into plane No. 3, i. e., form organic matter. In both cases
there is chemical union under certain physical conditions ; but in the
latter there is one unique condition, viz., the previous existence then
and there of organic matter, under the guidance of which apparently
the transformation of matter takes place. In a word, organic matter
is necessary to produce organic matter; there is here a law of like
producing like — there is an assimilation of matter.

Again, physical force changes into other forms of physical force,
or into chemical force, under certain physical conditions ; so also
physical and chemical forces are changed into vital force under cer-
tain physical conditions. But, in addition, there is one altogether
unique condition of the latter change, viz., the previous existence then
and there of vital force. Here, again, like produces like — here, again,
there is assimilation of force.

This law of like producing like — this law of assimilation of matter
and force — runs throughout all vital phenomena, runs to the minutest
details. It is a universal law of generation, and determines the ex-
istence of species ; it is the law of formation of organic matter and
organic force ; it determines all the varieties of organic matter which
we call tissues and organs, and all the varieties of organic force which
we call functions. The same nutrient pabulum, endowed with the
same properties and powers, carried to all parts of a complex organ-
ism by this wonderful law of like producing like, is changed into the
most various forms and endowed with the most various powers. There
are certainly limits and exceptions to this law, however ; otherwise dif-
ferentiation of tissues, organs, and functions, could not take place in
embryonic development ; but the limits and exceptions are themselves
subject to a law even more wonderful than the law of like producing
like itself, viz., the law of evolution. There is in all organic nature,
whether organic kingdom, organic individual, or organic tissues, a law
of variation, strongest in the early stages, limited very strictly by an-
other law — the law of inheritance, of like producing like.

d. We have seen that all develojjment takes place at the expense
of decay — all elevation of one thing, in one place, at the expense of
corresponding running down of something else in another place.
Force is only transferred and transformed. The plant draws its force
from the sun, and therefore what the plant gains the sun loses. Ani-
mals draw from plants, and therefore what the animal kingdom gains
the vegetable kingdom loses. Again, an egg, a seed, or a chrysalis,
developing to a higher condition, and yet taking nothing ah extra^
must lose weight. Some part must run down, in order that the re-
mainder should be raised to a higher condition. The amount of evo-
lution is measured by the loss of weight. By the law of conservation
of force, it is inconceivable that it should be otherwise. Evidently,
therefore, in the universe, evolution of one part must be at the ex-

I JO THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

pense of some other part. The evolution or development of the whole
cosmos — of the whole universe of matter — as a unit, according to the
doctrine of conservation of force, is inconceivable. It could only
take place by a constant increase of the whole sum of energy, i. e., by
a constant influx of divine energy.

e. Finally, as organic matter is so much matter taken from the
common fund of matter of earth and air, embodied for a brief space, to
be again by death and decomposition returned to that common fund,
so also it would seem that the organic forces of the living bodies of
plants and animals may be regarded as so milch force drawn from the
common fund of physical and chemical forces, to be again all refunded
by death and decomposition. Yes, by decomposition ; we can under-
stand this. But death ! can we detect any thing returned by simple
death ? What is the nature of the difference between the living or-
ganism and a dead organism ? We can detect none, physical or chem*
leak All the physical and chemical forces withdrawn from the com-
mon fund of Xature, and embodied in the living organism, seem to be
still embodied in the dead until little by little it is returned by decom-
position. Yet the difierence is immense, is inconceivably great. What
is the nature of this difference expressed in the formula of material
science ? What is it that is gone, and whither is it gone ? There is
something here which science cannot yet understand. Yet it is just
this loss which takes place in death, and before decomposition, which
is in the highest sense vital force.

Let no one from the above views, or from similar views expressed
by others, draw hasty conclusions in favor of a pure materialism.
Force and matter, or spirit and matter, or God and Xature, these are
the opposite poles of philosophy — they are the opposite poles of
thought. There is no clear thinking without them. Xot only reli-
gion and virtue, but science and philosophy, cannot even exist with-
out them. The belief in spirit, like the belief in matter, rests on its
own basis of phenomena. The true domain of philosophy is to recon-
cile these with each other.

HEREDITY AXD RACE-DIPEOYEMEXT.

Br FEENAI^D PAPILLON.

TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH BY J. FITZGERALD, A. M.
II.

SO far we have been giving the historical refutation. A more direct
and scientific refutation will prove still more decisive and in-
structive. Having shown that heredity does not exert an exclusive
and continuous influence, we must now indicate the causes which act
simultaneously with it and in a contrary direction. We have to de-

HEREDITY AND RACE-IMPROVEMENT. 171

monstrate the constant and powerful influence of those forces which,
as we have said, tend to modify, transform, and complicate man's
thoughts, feelings, passions, manners, customs.

The special aim of education is to transmit to the child the snm of
those habits to which he is to conform the course of his life, and of
those branches of knowledge which are indispensable for him in the
pursuit of his calling ; and it must begin by developing in the pupil
the faculties which will enable him to make these habits and this
knowledge his own. It teaches the child to speak, to move about, to
look, to use his senses, to hear, to understand, to judge, to love. But
now the influence of education, opposed as it is to that of heredity, is
so great, that in most cases it is of itself alone capable of producing
a moral and psychological likeness between children and parents. If
heredity determined irresistibly and infallibly in the descendants the
essential characters of their ancestors' personality, education would be
superfluous. When once it is admitted that education, a long, watch-
ful, laborious training, is indispensable in order to call forth and per-
fect in the child the development of aptitudes and of mental qualities,
we must conclude that heredity acts only a secondary part in the won-
derful genesis of the moral individual. The argument is unassailable.
That hereditary influences make their mark in predispositions, in fixed
tendencies, it were unscientific to deny ; but yet it would be inexact
to pretend that they implicitly contain the future states of the psy-
chical being, and determine its evolution.

There is nothing more complex than education, nor must we think
here of studying its general economy, which has been the theme of so
many books. The importance which is generally attributed to works
on pedagogy is of itself a protest against the abuse of hereditarian
theories. Some fresh details as to one of the chief agencies in educa-
tion, viz., the instinct of imitation, and the part it plays in the de-
velopment of individuals and of races, will suflice to demonstrate the
energy of certain influences which have nothing to do with heredity.

An accomplished English historian, Bagehot, recently published
some excellent observations, which go to show what great influence is
exerted in the formation of customs and of tastes, and also how their
periodic revolutions ai'e explained, by the unconscious imitation of a
favorite character or type, and by the general favor accorded to the
same. According to him, a national character is only a local character
which has been favored by fortune, precisely as a national language is
only the definitive extension of a local dialect. There is nothing more
undoubted than the force of this tendency to imitation. It is in vir-
tue of this that certain processes in manufacture, ai't, literature, man-
ners, discovered under peculiar cii'cumstauces, attain a general ascen-
dency, and are rapidly imposed, first ui)on the docile and unthinking
multitude, and then on those who possess all the means of inquiry and
resistance. Here it may be observed that the 'elite are almost always

172 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

constrained to follow the tastes and the judgments of the masses,
under penalty of being ignored or contemned. A writer devises a
style which the public receive with enthusiasm : he has struck a vein.
He accustoms those who read his books, or who witness his plays, to
this style, be it good or bad, and the result is that, for some time, all
authors are compelled more or less to imitate the fortunate innovator,
if they wish to succeed. Hence, though one were not led to imitate,
by instinct or by nature, still he would do so from necessity or from
self-interest. The founder of the Loudon Times was once asked how
he contrived to have all the articles in that journal appear as though
written by one hand. " Ob," said he, " there is always one editor who
is superior to all the rest, and they imitate him."

The history of religions from beginning to end is full of facts show-
ing how men are guided, not by arguments but by exemplars, and ex-
hibiting the tendency they have to reproduce what they have seen or
heard, and to regulate their lives according to the bright and trium-
phant examples that stand before their eyes. Many yictories, esteemed
by apostles to be the eflfects of persuasion, are rather to be attributed
to that recondite influence which leads men irresistibly to imitate their
fellows. And does not this same agency of imitation appear in the
body politic, transforming little by little, but yet radically, the habits,
the opinions, and even the beliefs of men ? Xothiug is easier, than,
for a man who has acquired an influence over the populace, to bring
them over to his own sentiments, ideas, and chimeras. And the ob-
servation is confirmed by daily experience in the education of chil-
dren. In a school we often find the external characteristics — the tone,
the gait, the games, changing from year to year. The reason of this
is that some dominant spirits — two or three pupils who used to have
an ascendency over the rest, have left ; others are now in their j^lace,
and every thing wears a difi*erent face. x\.s the models change, so do
the copies. The pupils no longer applaud or jeer at the same things
as before.

This instinct of imitation is specially developed in persons of de-
fective education or civilization. Savages copy quicker and better
than Europeans. Like children, they have a natural faculty for mimi-
cry, and cannot refrain from imitating every thing they see. There is
in their minds nothing to offset this tendency to imitation. Every
well-instructed man has within himself a considerable reserve of ideas
upon which to fall back ; this resource is wanting in the savage and
in the child : they live in all the occurrences which take place before
them ; their life is bound up in what they see and hear ; they are the
playthings of external influences. In civilized nations persons with-
out culture are in the like situation. Send a chambermaid and a phi-
losopher into a country, the language of which neither of them is ac-
quainted with, and it is likely that the chambermaid will learn it before
the philosopher. He has something else to do : he can live with his

HEREDITY AND RACE-IMPROVEMENT. 173

own tliouglits ; as for her, if she cannot talk, she is undone. The in-
stinct of imitation is in an inverse ratio to the power of mental ab-
straction.

From these details it will be seen that this strong instinctive force
of imitation, which plays so important a part in the education of in-
dividuals and of races, is a very diiferent thing from heredity. It
may and it does act in concert with hereditary impulsions ; but far
more frequently it works independently and even in a direction coun-
ter to them. And the same is to be said of another force — a more
determined rival still, and a more puissant antagonist of heredity,
viz., personality, whose functions we have next to consider.

The individual personality of the soul, which is preeminently the
instrument of free inventiveness and tlie unfailing spring of the in-
novative faculty, might, in contrast with heredity, be called spontane-
ity.* To give a notion of the power of spontaneity, as compared
with that of heredity, we might draw up lists exhibiting cases in
which the manifestation of various passions or talents does not come
from ancestry, and in which the individual is born different from his
parentage, or distinguishes himself from them by the reaction of his
own will. Such lists would be endless ; for, the opinion of the parti-
sans of absolute heredity to the contrary notwithstanding, sponta-
neity and personal activity are the rule in the development of the
mind. In short (and this is the main point), heredity has its root in
spontaneity ; for, after all, those aptitudes, those qualities, which par-
ents transmit to their children, must necessarily have originated, at
some time, from the spontaneous action of a more or less independent
will. We hear of idiots, and of hysterical and epileptical subjects,
or, on the other hand, of painters, musicians, and poets, who derive
from their parentage the sinister or the beneficent activities which
characterize them. True enough ; but the question for us is. Whence
did the parents themselves derive this activity ? In taking a retrospec-
tive view of the ascendants^ we must reach the point where spontaneity
is preeminent; and this preeminence is all the less questionable in pro-
portion as it reappears in the descendants. The effects of heredity ap-
pear and disappear ; at first, they overmaster spontaneity, suspending its
influence; then they are exhaiisted, and spontaneity again reclaims its
rights. Thus spontaneity is a continuous, persisting force, while he-
redity is intermittent and transitory. Human nature, considered in its
progress from age to age, is a succession of independent minds, all the
more independent in proportion as they have less need of the concur-
rence of mechanical or organic powers in willing and acting. Where
they require such concurrence, a portion of their innate independence
is surrendered to the blind influences of heredity. And yet, even as
regards the origin of aesthetic aptitudes, spontaneity is the stronger
of the tM'o.

' Spontaneous. Produced itithoiii being planted. — CWebster.) Native, innate.

174 ^^^ POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

In studying the history of illustrious men, how often do we find
brilliant imagination and extraordinary capacity for art, poetry, and
literary comjiosition, which are by no means the result of heredity.
We have not far to go for instances of this. Lamartine, Alfred de
Musset, Meyerbeer, Ingres, Delacroix, Merimee, displayed talents for
which they were in no wise indebted to their parentage. The history
of men of science exhibits the part played by heredity still further
cut down. We are told of families of savants. How many of these
might be enumerated ? A dozen at the most. On the other hand,
how many illustrious savants there are, among whose ascendants are
found only people of very common stamp, or else distinguished for
talents of a very different order from those which characterize the
man of science ! What hereditary influences fashioned a Cuvier, a Biot,
a Fresnel, a Gay-Lussac, an Ampere, a Blainville ? It is plain that in
these instances spontaneity and education enacted the chief part. Nor
does the history of authors agree any better with the pretensions
made by the thorough partisans of heredity.

It is especially among philosophers that spontaneity appears to be
supreme. Our authors pi*esent no lists of philosophers who have in-
herited from their ancestors the talent for speculation. Here we have
a series of facts which make against heredity ; these its advocates say
nothing about, nor indeed are they made sufficient account of by either
party. Metaphysicians, precisely because in them the mental element
alone is active, are exempt from all the influences of heredity. In
proportion as the characters it tends to transmit are less of a physio-
logical and more of a psychological nature, the less is the influence of
heredity. But there is nothing more purely psychological, or more
free from sense-elements and mechanical factors, than, the mind of the
speculative philosopher. In point of fact, the great metaphysicians
had no progenitors, nor did they leave any posterity. The philosophic
genius has ever been absolutely individual, inalienable, and intrans-
missible. There is not a single great thinker, in whose line, whether
ascending or descending, we discover either the promise or tlie per-
petuation of the high capacities which made him illustrious. Descartes
and Newton, Leibnitz and Spinoza, Diderot and Hume, Kant and
Maine de Biran, Cousin and Joufli'oy, had neither ancestors nor pos-
terity.

Such is spontaneity. To form a precise idea of the part it plays,
we should have to determine, in a general way, and also in relation to
temperament, education, social and other conditions, etc., the genesis
and development of those faculties by which a given man of superior
power is distinguished from his progenitors ; we must group together
and classify the characteristic elements Avhich make up the very es-
sence of the personality and individuality — those marvelous elements
of free initiative and of total independence which stamp a man as a
genius. It would then be seen that most commonly superior abilities

HEREDITY AND RACE-IMPROVEMENT. 175

are so native to those who display them, so deep seated and endowed
with a life of their own, that education and training, instead of call-
ing them forth, serve rather to check their development. In a man of
genius we should discern self-reliant precocity, a passion for enter-
prise, a strong belief in his mission, a pride lifting him above sect-
prejudice or party ambitions, and attaching him exclusively to the
object of his meditations, for which alone he values life. Even when
temporal necessities compel him to take part in the transactions of
men, the world is for him only a peopled wilderness, where his soul
lives in solitude.

The materials for such a study exist in part ; they are to be found
in biographies written during the last two hundred years, by the sec-
retaries of the great academies, and in the autobiographic memoirs
left by several illustrious men. An ingenious and learned Russian
writer, Wechniakof, has lately published sundry works, in which he
considers, from this point of view, the anthropological and sociological
peculiarities which have had an influence in the individual development
of original genuises. Unfortunately, these opuscles do not form a
complete treatise, and yet a treatise on spontaneity would be a very
curious and very useful work.

The aggregate of all the causes of diversity, heterogeneity, and
innovation, which in man act in opposition to the principles of sim-
plicity, homogeneity, and conservation, we may designate by one
name, viz., evolution or progress. Regarded within the limits of
positive observation, blind Nature has been ever the same. It is to-
day, on the whole, what it was in Homer's time : the same sky, oceans,
mountains, forests, flowers. Man, on the other hand, is ever under-
going transformation. Generations succeed one another, but are un-
like. They are in a state of constant and rapid metamorphosis in
their faiths, their knowledge, their arts, their wants. Nations, like
individuals, grow up and decay. But the face of Nature is un-
changed : as Byron says of Greece :

" Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags as wild ;

Sweet are thy groves, and verdant are thy fields,

Thine olive ripe as when Minerva smiled,

And still his honeyed wealth Hymettus yields ;

There the blithe bee his fragrant fortress builds,

The free-born wanderer of thy mountain air ;

Apollo still thy long, long summer gilds,

Still in his beam Mendeli's marbles glare ;
Art, glory, freedom fail, but Nature still is fair."

We might multiply ad infinitum these historic contrasts between
the immutability of the universal fatalism which reigns in Nature,
and the incessant movement of liberty and invention in man, together
with the ceaseless striving of the soul to free itself from the grip of
Fate. History is but the record of what has resulted during ages

176 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MO XT ELY.

from this movement, from this striving. It is a protracted drama,
•where the goo.d genius of liberty contests the throne with the evil
genius of brute force, and where, under the eye of God, and with his
assistance, is Avon, slowly and laboriously, the victory of mind, which
searches, discovers, invents, creates, loves, adores !

In the first part of this essay we established the facts of heredity,
and showed the part it plays in reproducing physiological and psycho-
logical characteristics. In the second we pointed out and examined
the causes which run counter to the more or less tyrannical impulsions
of Nature, and to mechanical necessities. We have now to state some
practical conclusions as to the use that may be made of this knowl-
edge in perfecting the race.

The heroic combatants of Homer's epic invoked the names of their
fathers and ancestors, and were proud of tbeir noble blood. It was a
high instinct, and they who can justly boast of their forefathers will
always be in a position to earn for themselves the respect of their
children. In short, the phenomena of heredity authorize the belief
that parents of well-constituted body and mind are most likely to
transmit to their posterity their own likeness.

What measures are to be taken, then, to bring about happy alli-
ances, such as will produce offspring of high excellence in a physical
and moral point of view ? This is a very delicate question, and we can
give only a summary reply to it, based chiefly on an unpublished work
by the eminent surgeon, M. S6dillot, who devotes the leisure time of
his honorable retirement to studying the means of perfecting the race.
First of all, M. Sedillot thinks that we may obtain valuable informa-
tion as to an individual's real value by consulting his genealogy : the
history of his ascendants for four or five generations, with special
reference to intellect, morality, vigor, health, longevity, social status,
virtually contains a portion of his own history. Long before Gall the
fact was established (nor was it overturned by Gall's exaggerations)
that the form of the head is, in some measure, an index of a man's
mental calibre. From the remotest antiquity, the popular mind has
observed the relation which subsists between great size of head and
superior abilities ; and language is .full of expressions which witness
to the correctness of this relation. Pericles excited the astonishment
of the Athenians by the extraordinary volume of his head. Cromwell,
Descartes, Leibnitz, Voltaire, Byron, Goethe, Talleyrand, Napoleon,
Cuvier, etc., had very large lieads. Cuvier's brain weighed 1,829
grammes, the average weight of Europeans' brains being, according
to Broca, from 1,350 to 1,400 grammes. M. Sedillot regrets that we
do not possess measurements of the various cranial dimensions of
men distinguished for certain capacities, so that we might ascertain
the important relations which subsist between these dimensions and

HEREDITY AND RACE-IMPROVEMENT. 177

these capacities ; and he expresses the wish that such measurements
should be taken. But at least we know, in a general way, what char-
acters and what cranial dimensions correspond with the various de-
grees of cerebral activity. Most anthropologists hold that the man
whose head has not an horizontal circumference of 50 centimetres
(19.685 inches) is almost inevitably a person of only mediocre ability,
and that the one in whom this circumference attains or surpasses
58 centimetres (22.8346 inches) is likely to be a very superior man.
Instances are cited, it is true, of celebrated personages with small
heads ; but in such case the individuals gained distinction in some
very narrow specialty. It must not be forgotten that these dimen-
sions constitute but one of the external indices which enable us to de-
termine approximately the intellectual value of an individual. "We
have also to take account of the general form and relative proportions
of the various regions of the cranium, i. e., of that harmony which is
called beauty. An easy means, according to M. Sedillot, of studying
the conformation of the head, is by taking a side or profile view of it,
a little back of the forehead. One then instantly perceives the ratio
between the height and breadth of the forehead and temples and the
face, and a clear perception is got of the relative proportions of the
anterior or frontal, and the posterior or occipital contours of the head.
The individual who has the superciliary arches prominent, the temples
bare, nearly vertical and high, with broad, high forehead, and features
expressive neither of an unbalanced nor of a torpid mind, may in gen-
eral be regarded as a truly human type, and as possessed of a mind
that is fitted to do honor to the race. The story goes, that once a
certain Englishman sent his groom to the ale-house in search of his
friend Shakespeare. " How shall I know him ? " quoth the groom.
"The easiest thing in the world," replied his master; "everybody,
more or less, resembles some animal ; but, when you lay eyes on
Shakespeare, you will at once say, ' There is a man ! ' " Man in the
fullness of his harmonious beauty, such is the ideal toward which all
the elForts of our present imperfect humanity ought to be directed,
and it is full time that we should strive, by a wise use of the principle
of heredity, i. e., by healthy procreation, to develop a human race in
which the last traces of animality shall have disappeared, and in which
the Man shall be less rare.

What is it that constitutes the superiority of the English aristoc-
racy ? Their constant study to endow their descendants with the best
bodily, intellectual, and moral qualities. The Englishman docs not
marry from caprice or from passion ; he marries under the conditions
which are best fitted to insure the welfare of his children, for he knows
that on their welfare his own happiness, his honor, and his name depend.
The respect shown to young Englishwomen, the honorable liberty
they enjoy, the secondary importance that is attached to their fortune,
and the stress that is laid on their personal worth, are all so many

VOL. IV. — 12

178 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

causes increasing among that people the number of happy marriages,
and consequently givin'g vigor to the population. This is one of the
grand secrets of race-improvement by heredity. Instead of looking
for wealth, men must look for beauty, character, and virtue. So long
as they persist in forming alliances with women of feeble constitution,
or lacking essential qualifications, the race will decline and degenerate.
And, of course, the same deplorable consequences follow from the mar-
riage of noble and well- organized women with men of inferior type.
Fortunately, the tact and the instinctive dignity of women, and their
natural liking for what is exalted, usually prevent their descending
to debasing or dangerous alliances, and nearly always guard them
against ill-assorted matches. " In place of giving way to sympathetic
emotions," says M. Sedillot, " which disorder the judgment, let one
put himself the question, on seeing a person that pleases him, if he
wants to have sons and daughters of that same type ; and it is curious
to note how often the reply will be in the negative. It were unreason-
able, no doubt, to forego present advantage for the sake of some un-
certain advantage in the future ; still, wisdom requires us to bring the
two into harmony, and to remember how swiftly time passes away,
and how little is the value of tbe passing hour, as compared with the
hopes and the enjoyments of the future." M. Sedillot adds that, in ordi-
nary times, hygiene, the moral evidence of the advantages of health and
intelligence, would suffice for the regeneration of a people. France,
unfortunately, has need of stronger and more efficacious agencies ; she
must go back to the very fountain-head of regeneration and of life,
that is to say, must discover the speediest means of insuring to the
coming generations a future of virtue and mettle. In other times it
may have appeared difficult or ill-advised to import, into questions
touching the reproduction of man, figures and estimates not unlike
those employed in zootechny, where selection has long been practised.
But now such scruples must give way before the dictates of necessity,
which tells us in the most unmistakable way that we cannot afford to
commit one blunder more.

Here we have to point out the means of staying or of reducing as
far as possible the fatal heredity of disease, which is so powerful an
obstacle to the improvement of the race. The preventive or prophy-
lactic agencies which are to be employed to counteract the evolution
of disease-germs depend, of course, on the nature of these latter. A
consumptive mother must not suckle her infant ; she ought to intrust
it to the care of a good nurse. Those whose parents were affected
with chest-diseases thrive but ill on an excessively animal diet : a
regimen of lohite meats and light foods is best suited for them. As
regards occupation, they should carefully avoid all such as would
expose them to inhale dust, or to undergo alternations of heat and
cold, or to use the voice habitually. Residence by the sea-side, in
the south, and in localities where consumption is of rare occurrence,

HEREDITY AND RACE-IMPROVEMENT. 179

is the best prophylactic against this fearful disease. Individuals pre-
disposed to scrofula require pure air, substantial tonic diet, and an atmos-
phere like that on the sea-coast of Northwestern Europe. Those who
are threatened with gout or gravel must oblige themselves to the
strictest temperance and take abundant exercise. Regularity and
uniformity of life are the rule for those predisposed to cancer. Per-
sons who reckon epileptics among their ascendants require the utmost
care. All their functions must be tranquillized ; they must allow them-
selves no excesses ; must avoid fatigue ; must guard against emo-
tional excitement — in a word, they must be always surrounded with
tranquillizing influences. Those predisposed to insanity are to be
treated in a similar manner, that is to say, with great gentleness ; and
their passions are to be stilled. The course of life best suited to them
is one which does not call for much intellectual activity, and which
holds out no visions of fame or fortune. Preventing or checking in
the individuals themselves the development of disease-germs is, how-
ever, but a secondary consideration ; the chief point is, to prevent the
migration of these germs into new generations. But, to attain this
result, we must not only multiply and facilitate marriages which shall
be in conformity with hygienic and moral laws, we have furthermore
to discourage alliances the fruits of which can only be of blighted
constitution in body and soul. Physicians ought to use all their in-
fluence to prevent the intermarriage of persons evidently predisposed
to the various forms of neurosis, to tubercle, scrofula, etc. When the
ascendants of one of the parties are hereditarily of a morbid consti-
tution, the physician should at least insist on the importance of hav-
ing the other party perfectly healthy, possessed of great vigor, and,
above all, of a temperament the reverse of that of his or her partner.
In this way the danger of hereditary taint is diminished, though it
were better not to incur such danger at all. But this is a point
of so delicate a nature that we cannot dwell upon it here. We must,
however, say something about consanguineous marriages, a subject
which has given rise to much warm controversy during the past few
years. Some physicians, and among them Broca and Bertillon, hold
that races which are least mixed, which are purest, are better fitted
than crossed races to withstand the causes of degeneracy. According
to them, the evil consequences charged on consanguinity are the re-
sult of very difierent agencies, especially the hereditary affections of
the ascendants. Trousseau and Boudin, on the other hand, say that
marriages between individuals of the same stock oftentimes yield un-
healthy fruits — lunatics and idiots. The balance would appear to have
been struck in favor of the first opinion. It was but the other day,
that Auguste Voisin, in making inquiries of the relatives of more
than 1,500 patients in the Bicetre and the Salpetri^re, found that in
none of these cases could the disease be attributed to consanguin-
ity. If the latter had been so infallible a cause of degeneracy,

i8o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

its effects would have been seen in that large number of madmen
and idiots.

Although theorizers have exaggerated the influence of heredity, it
cannot be denied that it plays a part in the genesis of temperament
and character, and here we have a warrant for the employment of
every means that will favor the transmission of the most desirable
aptitudes. In ancient Rome, women of the highest distinction, who
were respected by all, imported into another family, with their hus-
bands' consent, their superiority of blood. Quintus Hortensius, the
friend and admirer of Cato, having failed to win his daughter Portia,
asked for his wife Marcia, and Cato gave her to him. The grossness
of such customs shocks our finer sense, but its explanation is to be
found in the anxiety of a Roman head of a family to insure for his
descendants the highest grade of masculine vigor, and the most solid
virtues.

Under the old constitution of society in France, the tenure of high
offices and trusts, and the following of some special profession by one
family from generation to generation, had their rise and bases in the
unconscious observation that aptitudes are hereditary ; and M. Sedillot
regrets that the revolutions of modern society have done away with
this wholesome tradition, which, in every grade of the social scale,
morally constrained the son to follow in his father's steps. This point
must not be overlooked by races which care for self-improvement.

Another point for such races to bear in mind, and one of readier
application, is the necessity of a sound and enlightened system of edu-
cation. On this toj^ic, those who have the future of France at heart,
have but one opinion, viz., that the coming generations must be in-
vigorated by giving more prominence to bodily exercise, and by ex-
empting children from employments injurious to health. They have no
thought of interfering with classical studies or the humanities, which
will continue to be the chief element in moral culture ; the only ques-
tion is, whether the young could not acquire the treasures of Latinity
and Hellenism in less time, and bestow some little study on matters
of modern interest. There are sundry branches in which they now
obtain no instruction, but which they might study much to the advan-
tage of their intellectual development. This is not the place to enforce
this argument ; but it does seem unquestionable that, by means of a
thorough system of education, proceeding on new principles, we might
be able, if not exactly to change the whole character of a people, as
Leibnitz thought, at least to do away with most of the influences
which, for want of suitable training, cause them to fall into decay.

The conviction that it is possible to counteract the dangerous im-
pulsions of heredity and to triumph over the tyrannies of Fate — at least
to acquire a moral superiority over them — is a most wholesome one to
spread abroad and to bring into acceptance. A strong will is in itself
a power. Even though it were not so easy a thing as it is, to prevail

HACKED S M ONERS. 181

over the blind forces of Nature, simply by the overmastering power
of a resolute and sagacious will, there would still exist abundant
grounds for believing that man has the power of modifying and
amending his own conduct ; that he is not the plaything of inflexible
Destiny; and that he may not give way, without resistance or re-
morse, to his evil instincts. Let us believe in heredity, in so far as it
may be made a means of improvement and of free perfectionment.
But let us withhold our assent when there is claimed for it a despotic
power so absolute as it would be madness to resist. Education has
not only to improve the race, but also to give men a desire for im-
provement, by showing them that it is possible. In alliance with a
judicious cultivation of desirable hereditary tendencies, education
overmasters noxious proclivities and regenerates the race.

We must not, however, attribute to education an exaggerated im-
portance, nor imagine that by itself alone it can call forth preeminent
ability. Its influence, like that of heredity, is limited. Genius, which
is the most perfect expression of mind, considered as a free creative
force, is controlled by neither. It is a mighty tree whose fruits give
sustenance to generations, and the conditions of whose growth are
such that we can no more foresee or determine its appearing than we
can prescribe rules for its behavior afterward, or estimate its fruitful-
ness. Fortunately, geniuses are not indispensable, and, in proportion
as the national average rises, the less need is there for them. But the
general average rises of necessity when all the citizens are animated
with the one desire of improvement. Hereditary cultivation, pro-
ceeding by means of a rigid selection of the influences which tend to
improve the race, may be confidently commended to those nations
who are ambitious of holding the first rank in the world. — Bevue des
Deux Mondes.

HlCKEL'S MONEKS.

By AIME SCHNEIDER.

THE moners are the simplest organisms we know of— we might
even say, the simplest that can exist. In them, life is exhibited
under the form that is best fitted to give us an idea of its essential
characters, stripped of all secondary attributes. The first moner was
discovered by the celebrated Prof. Hackel, of Jena, in 1864, and the
number has gone on steadily increasing ever since. These discoveries
have made a great stir in the scientific world, owing to their bearing
on our theories of organization.

The moner which best typifies the entire class is the Protomyxa
aurantiaca. This little creature, hardly visible to the naked eye, and,
at most, as big as a small pin-head, is of a fine orange-red color, con-

l82

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sists of a perfectly homogeneous and transparent mass of jelly, and
offers the paradox of an organism without organs. Nor is this absence
of organs merely apparent, or owing to the imperfection of our mag-
nifying-glasses ; it is real, and every thing about these little creatures
goes to prove their perfect simplicity of structure. This gelatinous,
homogeneous, contractile substance has been called sarcode, and also,
but improperly, animal protoplasm.

History of the Protoittxa Aubaxtiaca, accordog to Hackel.

1. The moner in a state of repose.

2. The same sendino; forth its pseudopodee and embedding a foreign body in itself.

3. The same in process of reproduction, after having exuded itslenvelope, and split up into a
number of spherical masses.

4. A young moner set free after the bursting of the envelope.

5. The same in a more advanced stage, with its pseudopodes.

In repose, the moner is nearly spherical, and gives no sign of
life. But soon this little ball flattens itself out, its mass expands in
various directions, and these expansions, which have received the name
oi false feet, or pseudopodes, keep up a continual movement of protru-
sion and retraction. Sometimes the moner floics all in one direc-
tion, and this is its way of moving from place to place. When, in the
course of this slow progress over the calcareous slime of the sea-bottom,
the moner falls in with one of those microscopic organisms called
diatoms, it embeds it in its own body ; the alimentary substances con-
tained in the diatom are dissolved and assimilated, and the indiges-
tible portions are left behind as the creature moves along. Thus, we
have the curious phenomenon of a creature which feeds without mouth,
without stomach, without apparatus of any kind, simply by incor-
porating into itself, as it moves, prey of every kind. In taking food,
the animal appears to be passive, its seizing on its prey being a mere
incident of its moving about.

A mJW METHOD WITH THE BRAIN, 183

In this way, the moner attains by degrees a certain size, and
then stops groAving and moving. It then becomes a little ball, exudes
from its surface a colorless, homogeneous matter which hardens, form-
ing a protecting envelope for the inclosed mass. Then, a very singular
phenomenon occurs : by an act entirely spontaneous, the inclosed mass
breaks up into a certain number of parts, which soon become inde-
pendent, constituting so many little spherical masses lying side by
side within the common envelope. The original moner then exists
no more ; it has reproduced itself by dividing itself up, without any
intermediary, into the^e new individuals, its progeny. Each young
moner is a determinate part of the mother-animal, and, leaving out
of consideration what she exuded to form the envelope, all the rest of
her substance is exempted from death, and is now to begin a new life,
which in turn will pass through the series of transformations already
described. The envelope will soon break up and set at liberty the
young moners, which, from the first, resemble the mother-animal.

At the grade of extreme simplification of life presented to us in the
moner, we have organization reduced to pure sarcode, and life mani-
festing itself by nutrition, reproduction, and contractility, each reduced
to its barely essential function — nutrition reduced to mere assimilation,
reproduction to a spontaneous fission into a group of young (fissiparity),
and contractility to the slow, diffusive movements of the pseudopodes.

Moners are mostly inhabitants of the sea. Some of them live at
inconsiderable depths ; but there is one, the Bathyhius Hdckelii, which
lives at the enormous depth of 12,000 fe6t, and sometimes even of more
than 24,000 feet. There is only one fresh-water moner.

Many naturalists rank moners among animals, classing them as
rhizopods. HSckel, who discovered them, regards them as the rep-
resentatives of an entire category of beings intermediate between
animals and plants, the protista, so called from protos (first), because,
according to this author, they are the first representative of terrestrial
life, from which all other forms of life are developed, on the modern
theories of Darwinism. — La Nature.

A NEW METHOD WITH THE BRALN".'

Br Pbofessob FERRIEE.

ALL are agreed that it is witli the brain that we feel, and think,
and will ; but whether there are certain parts of the brain de-
voted to particular manifestations, is a subject on wliich we have only
imperfect speculations or data too insufficient for the formation of a
scientific opinion. The general view is that the brain as a whole sub-

' A paper read before the Biological Section of the British Association.

i84 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

serves mental oijerations, and that there are no parts specially devoted
to any particular functions. This has been recently expressed by so
high an authority as Prof. Sequard. The idea rests chiefly on the
numerous facts of disease with which we are acquainted. There are
cases where extensive tracts of brain are destroyed by disease, or re-
moved after a fracture, apparently with no result as regards the mind
of the individual. Along with these facts we have others which are
very curious, and which hardly seem to agree with this doctrine. One
of these is, that when a certain part of the brain is diseased, in apha-
sia, the individual is unable to express himself in words. Other curi-
ous phenomena have been well described by Dr. HughHngs Jackson,
viz., that certain tumors or pathological lesions in particular parts of
the brain give rise, by the irritation which they keep up, to epilepti-
form convulsions of the whole of one side, or of the arm, or leg, or the
muscles of the face ; and, from studying the way in which these con-
vulsions show themselves, he was able to localize very accurately the
seat of the lesion.

The great difliculty in the study of the function of the brain has
been, in the want of a proper method. "When we study the function
of a nerve, we make our experiments in two ways : In the first place,
we irritate the nerve by scratching or by electricity, or by chemical
action, and observe the effect ; and, in the second place, we cut the
nerve, and observe what is lost. In regard to the brain and nervous
system, the method has been almost entirely, until recently, the method
of section. It has been stated by physiologists that it is impossible to
excite the brain into action by any stimulus that may be applied to it,
even that of an electric current ; they have, therefore, adopted the
method of destroying parts of the brain. This method is liable to
many fallacies. The brain is such a complex organ, that to destroy
one part is necessarily to destroy many other parts, and the phenom-
ena are so complex, that one cannot attribute their loss to the failure
only of the parts which the physiologists have attempted to destroy.

About three years ago, two German physiologists, Fritsch and
Hitzig, by passing galvanic currents through parts of the brains of
dogs, obtained various movements of the limbs, such as adduction,
flexion, and extension. They thus discovered an important method
of research, but they did not pursue their experiments to the extent
that they might have done, and perhaps did not exactly appreciate the
significance of the facts at which they had arrived.

I was led to the experiments which I shall have to explain, by the
effects of epilepsy and of chorea, which have been explained to depend
upon irritation of parts of the brain. I endeavored to imitate the
effects of disease on the lower animals, and determined to adopt the
plan of stimulating the parts of the brain by electricity, after the man-
ner described by Fritsch and Hitzig.

I operated on nearly a hundred animals of all classes — fish, frogs,

A NEW METHOD WITH THE BRAIN. 185

fowls, pigeons, rats. Guinea-pigs, rabbits, cats, clogs, jackals, and mon-
keys. The plan was to remove the skull, and keep the animal in a
state of comparative insensibility by chloroform. So little was the
operation felt, that I have known a monkey, with one side of the skull
removed, awake out of the state induced by the chloroform, and proceed
to catch fleas, or eat bread-and-butter. When the animal was ex-
hausted, I sometimes gave it a little refreshment, which it took in the
midst of the experiments.

First, as to the experiments on cats, I found that, on applying the
electrode to a portion c^ the superior external convolution, the animal
lifted its shoulder and paw (on the opposite side to that stimulated)
as if about to walk forward ; stimulating other parts of the same con-
volution, it brought the paw suddenly back, or put out its foot as if to
grasp something, or brought forward its hind-leg as if about to walk,
or held back its head as if astonished, or turned it on one side as if
looking at something, according to the particular part stimulated.
The actions produced by stimulating the various parts of the middle
external convolution were, a drawing up of the side of the face, a back-
ward movement of the whiskers, a turning of the head, and a contrac-
tion of the pupil, respectively. A similar treatment of the lower ex-
ternal convolution produced certain movements of the angles of the
mouth ; the animal opened the mouth widely, moved its tongue, and
uttered loud cries, or mewed in a lively way, sometimes starting up
and lashing its tail as if in a furious rage. The stimulation of one part
of this convolution caused the animal to screw up its nostrils on the
same side ; and, curiously enough, it is that part which gives otf a
nerve to the nostril of the same side.

Results much of the same character were produced by the stimula-
tion of the corresponding or homologous parts of the rat, the rabbit,
and the monkey. Acting upon the anterior part of the ascending
frontal convolution, the monkey was made to put forward its hand as
if about to grasp. Stimulation of other portions acted upon the biceps,
and produced a flexing of the forearm, or upon the zygomatic muscles.
The part that appeared to be connected with the opening of the mouth
and the movement of the tongue was homologous with the part af-
fected in man in cases of aphasia. Stimulation of the middle temporo-
sphenoidal convolution produced no results ; but the lower temporo-
sphenoidal, when acted upon, caused the monkey to shut its nostrils.
No result was obtained in connection with the occipital lobes.

These experiments have an important bearing upon the diagnosis
in certain kinds of cerebral disease, and the exact localization of the
parts afiected. I was able to produce epilejjtic convulsions of all kinds
in the animals experimented upon, as well as phenomena resembling
those of chorea or St. Vitus's dance. The experiments are also impor-
tant anatomically, as indicating points of great significance in reference
to the homology of the brain in lower animals and in man, and like-

186 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

wise served to explain some curious forms of expression common to
man and the lower animals. The common tendency, when any strong
exertion is made with the right hand, to retract the angle of the mouth
and open the mouth on the same side, had been stated by Oken, in his
'•'■Natur-geschichte^'' to be due to the homology between the upper limbs
and the upper jaw ; the true explanation being that the movements of
the fist and of the mouth are in such close relation to each other that,
when one is made to act powerfully, the impression diffuses itself to
the neighboring part of the brain, and the two act together.

The experiments have likewise a physiological significance. There
is reason to believe that, when the dififerent parts of the brain are stimu-
lated, ideas are excited in the animals experimented upon, but it is
difficult to say what the ideas are. There is, no doubt, a close relation
between certain muscular movements and certain ideas, which may
prove capable of explanation. This is supported by the phenomena
of epileptic insanity. The most important guide on the psychological
aspect of the question is the disease known as aphasia. The part of
the brain which is the seat of the memory of words is that which gov-
erns the movements of the mouth and the tongue. In aphasia, the
disease is generally on the left side of the brain, in the posterior part
of the inferior frontal convolution, and it is generally associated with
paralysis of the right hand, and the reason might be supposed to be
that the part of the brain affected is nearly related to the part govern-
ing the movements of the right hand.

It is essential to remember that the movements of the mouth are
governed bi-laterally from each hemisphere. The brain is symmetrical,
and I hold it to be a mistake to suppose that the faculty of speech is
localized on the left side of the brain. The reason why an individual
loses his speech when the left side of the brain is diseased is simply
this : Most persons are right-handed, and therefore left-brained, the
left side of the brain governing the right side of the body. Men
naturally seize a thing with the right hand, they naturally therefore
use rather the left side of the brain than the right, and when there is
disease, there the individual feels like one who has suddenly lost the
use of his right arm.

I may, finally, briefly allude to the results of stimulating the dif
ferent ganglia. Stimulation of the corpora striata causes the limbs to
be flexed ; the optic thalami produces no result : the corpora quadri-
gemina produce, when the anterior tubercles are acted upon, an intense
dilatation of the pupil, and a tendency to draw back the head and ex-
tend the limbs as in opisthotonos ; while the stimulation of the pos-
terior tubercles leads to the production of all kinds of noises. By
stimulating the cerebellum, various movements of the eyeballs are
produced. — Nature.

MARS, BY THE LATEST OBSERVATIONS. 187

MAES, BY THE LATEST OBSERVATIOIs^S.

FEOM THE FEENOH OF OAMILLE FLAMMAEION.

IN" order successfully to observe Mars, two conditions are requisite :
First, the earth's atmosphere must be clear at the point of obser-
vation ; and, second, the atmosphere of Mars must be also free from
clouds — for that planet, like the earth itself, is surrounded by an
aerial atmosphere which from time to time is obscured by clouds just
like our own. These clouds, as they spread themselves out over the
continents and seas, form a white veil which either entirely or par-
tially conceals from us the face of the planet. Hence the observation
of Mars is not so easy a matter as it might at first appear. Then,
too, the purest and most transparent terrestrial atmosphere is com-
monly traversed by rivers of air, some warm, some cold, which flow
in different directions above our heads, so that it is almost impossible
to sketch a planet like Mars, the image seen in the telescope being
ever undulating, tremulous, and indistinct. I believe that, if we were
to reckon up all the hours during which a perfect observation could be
had of Mars, albeit his period of opposition occurs every two years,
and although telescopes were invented more than two and a half cen-
turies ago, the sum would not amount to more than one week of con-
stant observation.

And yet, in spite of these unfavorable conditions, the Planet of
War is the best known of them all. The moon alone, owing to its
nearness to us, and the absence of atmosphere and clouds, has at-
tracted more particular and assiduous study; and the geography
(selenography* rather) of that satellite is now satisfactorily deter-
mined. That hemisphere of the moon which faces us is better known
than the earth itself; its vast desert plains have been surveyed to
within a few acres ; its mountains and craters have been measured to
within a few yards ; while on the earth's surface there are 30,000,000
square kilometres (sixty times the extent of France), upon which the
foot of man has never trod, which the eye of man has never seen.
But, after the moon. Mars is the best known to us of all the heavenly
bodies. No other planet can compare with him. Jupiter, which is the
largest, and Saturn the fullest of curious interest, are both far more im-
portant than Mars, and more easily observed in their ensemble, owing
to their size ; but they are enveloped with an atmosphere which is al-
ways laden with clouds, and hence we never see their face. Uranus and
Neptune are only bright points. Mercury is almost always eclipsed,
like a courtier, by the rays of the sun. Venus alone may compare
with Mars ; she is as large as the earth, and consequently has twice the

* Selene, the moon.

188 . TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

diameter of Mars; besides, she is nearer to us, her least distance being
about 30,000,000 miles. But, one objection is, that Venus revolves be-
tween the sun and us, so that, when she is nearest, her illuminated
hemisphere is toward the sun, and we see only her dark hemisphere
edged by a slight luminous crescent, or, rather, we do not see it at all.
Hence it is that the surface of Venus is harder to observe than that
of Mars, and hence, too, it is that Mars has the preeminence, and that
in the sun's whole family he is the one with which we shall first gain
acquaintance.

Aspect op Mabs, with its Cap op Polab Snow.

The geography of Mars has been studied and mapped out. What
principally strikes one on studying this planet is that its poles, like
those of the earth, are marked by two white zones, two caps of snow,
one of which is shown in the cut. Sometimes both of these poles
are so bright that they seem to extend beyond the true bounds of
the planet. This is owing to that effect of irradiation which makes
a white circle appear to us larger than a black circle of the same di-
mensions. These regions of ice vary in extent, according to the sea-
son of the year ; they grow in thickness and superficial extent around
both poles in the winter, melting again and retreating in the summer.
They have a larger extension than our glacial regions, for sometimes
they descend as far as Martial latitude 45°, which corresponds with
the terrestrial latitude of France.

This first view of Mars shows an analogy with our own planet, in
the distribution of climates into frigid, temperate, and torrid zones.
The study of its topography will, on the other hand, show a very char-
acteristic dissimilarity between the configuration of Mars and that of
the earth. On our planet the seas have greater extent than the con-

MARS, BY THE LATEST OBSERVATIONS. 189

tinents. Three-fourths of tlie surface of our globe is covered with
water. The terra firma is divided chiefly into three great islands or
continents, one extending from east to west, and constituting Europe
and Asia ; the second, situated to the south of Europe, in shape like a
V with rounded angles, is Africa; the third is on the opposite side of
tlie earth, and lies north and south, forming two V's, one above the
other. If to these we add the minor continent of Australia, lying to
the south of Asia, we have a general idea of the configuration of our
globe.

It is different with the surface of Mars, where there is more land
than sea, and where the continents, instead of being islands emerg-
ing from the liquid element, seem rather to make the oceans mere
inland seas — genuine mediterraneans. In Mars there is neither an
Atlantic nor a Pacific, and the journey round it might be made dry-
shod. Its seas are mediterraneans, with gulfs of various shapes, ex-
tending hither and thither in great numbers into the terra firma,
after the manner of our Red Sea.

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Chart of the Surface of Mabs, showing the Distribution of Lam) akd Water.

The second character, which also would make Mars recognizable at
a distance, is that the seas lie in the southern hemisphere mostly, oc-
cupying but little space in the northern, and that these northern and
southern seas are joined together by a thread of water. On the entire
surface of Mars there are three such threads of water extending from
the south to the north, but, as they are so wide apart, it is but rarely

190 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

that more than one of them can be seen at a time. The seas and the
straits which connect them constitute a very distinctive character of
Mars, and they are generally perceived whenever the telescope is di-
rected upon that planet.

The continents of Mars are tinged of an ochre-red color, and its
seas have for us the appearance of blotches of grayish green intensi-
fied by the contrast with the color of the continents. The color of
the water on Mars is therefore that of terrestrial water. But why is
the land there red? It was at one time supposed that this tinge must
be owing to the Martial atmosphere. It does not follow that, because
our atmosphere is blue, the atmosphere of the other planets must have
the same color. Hence it was permissible to suppose that the atmos-
phere of Mars was red. In that case the poets of that world would
sing the praises of that ardent hue, instead of the tender blue of our
skies. In place of diamonds blazing in an azure vault, the stars would
be for them golden fires flaming in a field of scarlet ; the white clouds
suspended in this red sky, and the splendors of sunset, would produce
effects not less admirable than those which we behold from our own
globe.

But the case is otherwise. The coloration of Mars is not owing to
its atmosphere ; for, although the latter is spread out over the entire
planet, neither its seas nor its polar snows assume the red tinge ; and
Arago, by showing that the rim of the planet's disk is of a less deep
tinge than the centre, proved that the color is not due to the atmos-
phere. If it were, then the rays reflected from the margin to us
would be of a deeper red than those reflected from the centre, as
having to pass through a greater height of atmosphere. May we at-
tribute to the color of the herbage and plants, which no doubt clothe
the plains of Mars, the characteristic hue of that planet, which is
noticeable by the naked eye, and which led the ancients to personify
it as a warrior ? Are the meadows, the forests, and the fields, on
Mars, all red? An observer, looking out from the moon, or from
Venus, upon our own planet, would see our continents deeply tinged
wdth green. But, in the fall, he would find this tint disappearing at
the latitudes where the trees lose their leaves. He would see the
fields varying in their hues, and then would come "winter, when they
■would be covered with snow for months. On Mars the red coloration
is constant ; it is observed at all latitudes, and in winter no less than
in summer. It varies only in proportion to the clearness of the atmos-
pheres of Mars and the earth. Still this does not preclude the suppo-
sition that the Martial vegetation has its share in producing the red
hue of the planet, though it be principally due to the color of the soil.
The land cannot be all over bare of vegetation, like the sands of Sa-
hara. It is very probably covered with a vegetation of some kind,
and, as the only color we perceive onMars's terra jirma is red, Ave con-
clude that Martial vegetation is of that color.

MARS, BY THE LATEST OBSERVATIONS. 191

We speak of plants on Mars, of the snows at its poles, of its seas,
atmosphere, and clouds, as though we had seen them. Are we justi-
fied in tracing all these analogies ? In fact, we see only blotches of red,
green, and white, upon the little disk of the planet ; but, is the red
terra firma ; the green, water ; or the white, snow ? Yes, we are now
justified in saying that they are. For two centuries astronomers were
in error with regard to spots on the moon, which were taken for seas,
whereas they are motionless deserts, desolate regions where no breeze
ever stirs. But it is otherwise as regards the spots on Mars.

The unvarying aspect of the moon never exhibits the slightest
cloud upon its surface, nor do the occultations of stars by its disk re-
veal even the slightest traces of an atmosphere. Contrariwise, the
aspect of Mars is ever varying. White spots move about over its disk,
very often modifying its apparent configuration. These spots can be
nothing else but clouds. The white spots at its poles increase or di-
minish with the seasons, exactly like the circumpolar ice of earth,
which, for an observer on Venus, would have the same aspect and the
same variations as the polar spots of Mars have for us. Hence we
conclude that these Martial white polar spots are masses of frozen
water. Each hemisphere of Mars is harder to observe during its win-
ter than during its summer, being often covered with clouds over its
greater part. This would be precisely the aspect of the earth if ob-
served from Venus. But what causes these clouds over Mars ? Plainly
nothing else but the evaporation of water. As for the ice, that is the
same water frozen. But is the water there the same as here ? Down
to a few years ago, this question remained unanswered, but now it ad-
mits of a reply, thanks to the spectroscope, and the observations espe-
cially of Mr. Huggins.

The planets reflect the light they receive from the sun ; on examin-
ing their spectra, we find the solar spectrum as though it had been re-
flected from a mirror. If we direct the spectroscope on Mars, we get,
first of all, an image perfectly identical with that produced by the
central star of our system. But, by the employment of more exact
methods, Mr. Huggins found, during the last opposition of the planet,
that the spectrum of Mars is crossed, in its orange portion, by a group
of black lines coincident with the lines which appear in the solar spec-
trum at sunset when the sun's light passes through the denser strata
of our atmosphere. Now, are these tell-tale rays produced by our at-
mosphere ? To decide this question, the spectroscope was turned on
the moon, which was at the time nearer the horizon than Mars. If the
lines in question were produced by our atmosphere, they must have
appeared in the lunar as well as in the Martial spectrum, and with
greater intensity in the former. Yet they were not to be seen at all
in the lunar spectrum ; and hence it is plain that they are owing to the
atmosphere of Mars.

The atmosphere of that planet, therefore, adds these special char-

192 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

acters to those of the solar spectrum, and this proves that the atmos-
phere of Mars is analogous to that of earth. But what is that atmos-
pheric matter which produces these significant lines ? From an exami-
nation of their positions, we find that they are not owing to the presence
of oxygen, nitrogen, or carbonic acid, but to watery vapor. There-
fore, there is water-vapor in the atmosphere of 3Iars, as in that of the
earth. The green spots on its globe are seas — expanses of water re-
sembling our seas. The clouds are made up of minute vesicles of
water, like our own mists ; and the snows consist of water solidified
by cold. Furthermore, this water, as revealed by the spectroscope,
being of the same chemical composition as terrestrial waters, we know
that Mars possesses oxygen and hydrogen.

These important data enable us to form an idea of Martial me-
teorology, and to recognize therein a reproduction of the meteorologi-
cal phenomena of our own planet. On Mars, as on earth, the sun is
the supreme agent of motion and of life. Heat vaporizes the water
of the seas, causing it to ascend into the atmosphere. This vapor as-
sumes visible shape by the same processes which produce clouds here,
i. e., by difterences of temperature and of saturation. Winds arise in
virtue of these same diiferences of temperature. We can observe the
clouds on Mars as they are swept along by air-currents over the seas
and continents, and several observers have, so to speak, photographed
these meteoric variations.

If we are as yet unable precisely to see the rain falling on the
plains of Mars, we can at least tell when it is falling, for we can see
the clouds dispersing and gathering again. Thus there is on Mars,
just as on earth, an atmospheric circulation, and the drop of water
which the sun takes from the sea returns thither after it has fiiUen
from the cloud which concealed it. And, although we must sternly
resist any tendency to fashion imaginary worlds after the pattern of
our own, still Mars presents to us, as in a mirror, such an organic like-
ness to earth, that it is hard for us not to carry our description a little
further.

Thus, then, we behold, in space, millions of miles away, a planet
very much like our own, and where all the elements of life exist, as
they do hei'e — water, air, heat, light, winds, clouds, rain, streams, val-
leys, mountains. To complete the resemblance, the seasons there are
very much the same as here, the axis of rotation of Mars having an
inclination of 27°, while that of the earth is 23°. The Martial day is
forty minutes longer than the terrestrial.

In the face of all these facts, can we be content with the conclu-
sions we have so far reached without going further, and considering
ulterior consequences ? If the same physico-chemical conditions are
present on Mars as on earth, why should they not produce the same
efiects there as here ? On earth the smallest drop of water is peopled
with myriads of animalcules, and earth and sea are filled with count-

TENNYSON AND BOTANY. 193

less species of animals and plants ; and it is not easy to conceive how,
under similar conditions, another planet should be simply a vast and
useless desert. — La Nature.

TENlS^TSOJSr AND BOTANY.

By J. HUTCHISON.

WORDSWORTH, in the supplementary preface contained in the
second volume of his works, asserts in the most emphatic way
the deplorable ignorance of "the most obvious and important phe-
nomena " of Nature which characterizes the poetical literature of the
period intervening between the publication of the " Paradise Lost "
and the " Seasons." It is to be feared that his opinion is, to a large
extent, justified by the facts of the case. A very cursory examination
of the productions of the poets who flourished during the seventy years
referred to will sufiice to show how little they were affected by the mani-
fold beauty and grandeur of the visible universe everywhere around
them. In this respect they contrast unfavorably, not only with their suc-
cessors of the present century, which might have been expected, but
with those of the two preceding centuries as well. The latter, whose
works embrace a period dating back a hundred years from Milton,
display, generally, a much more accurate acquaintance with the ap-
pearances and phenomena of the natural world, and spontaneousness
in the expression of it, than the school of Dryden and Pope, who may
be regarded as the most conspicuous examples of Wordsworth's strict-
ures. Of Pope, particularly, it might almost be said that, from his
writings, it could scarcely be inferred that there was much else in ex-
istence than courts, and fashion, and scandal — not much, at all events,
that was worth caring for. He excelled in the representation of the
modish life of the day — its fine ladies with their patches, its fine gen-
tlemen with their periwigs, and its general artificiality. Of Nature in
its endless continuity, and variety, and mysteriousness, which has
stirred the hearts of men in every age, and kindled many smaller poets
into enthusiasm, he knew and cared little, and the trim alleys and
botanical distortions of Versailles, which he has characteristically de-
scribed, may be taken as typical of his own inspiration on the matter.
It may be worth while mentioning, as a pertinent ilhistration of these
comments, that in his poem of " Windsor Forest," with the exception
of a semi-patriotic allusion to the oak,'in connection with ship-building,
there is not a reference to a single forest-tree, not even to any of those
famous historical oaks which abound in the locality. Nature and
simplicity, in truth, had gone out of fashion, and were not much in
vogue again till far on in the century.

Darwin, a mere poetaster compared with the genius of Twicken
ham, is a well-known instance of the opposite defect — of the absence

VOL. IV. — 13

194 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of poetic fire rather than of a taste for the delights of the country.
His " Botanic Garden " is a dreary, mechanical affair, several degrees
worse and more unreadable than Cowley's " Plants," a century earlier.
Both are constructed on an altogether erroneous principle. Science is
science, and poetry is poetry ; and while, as is well illustrated in " The
Princess " and " In Memoriam," the scientific spirit may be distinctly
present, yet any thing like a formal, didactic attempt at amalgamation
is certain to prove a failure.

Although belonging to an earlier date than the sterile period re-
ferred to, George Herbert might also be quoted here as a case of
poetic talent of a very genuine kind, yet unaccompanied by much
perception of natural beauty or picturesqueness. He has sometimes
been likened to Keble, a brother churchman and clergyman, but be-
tween the two, in their feeling and apprehension of the wonders of
ci-eation, the difference is singular and complete. Herbert's strong
point was spiritual anatomy. His probing and exposure of the deceits
and vanities of the human heart, and his setting forth of the dangers
of the world to spirituality of mind, are at once quaint and incisive.
But of any love or special knowledge of the physical world there is
scarcely a trace.* Keble's poetry, on the other hand, quite as un-
worldly as that of the author of " The Temple," is redolent every-
where of the sights and sounds of Nature. The seasons with their
endless changes, the motions of the heavenly bodies, the fragrance of
the field, trees, rivers, mountains, and all material things, are assimi-
lated, so to speak, into the very essence of his verse. That very world
which to Herbert was only base and utterly indifferent, seemed to
Keble, to use his own words, " ennobled and glorified," and awakened
in his soul poetical emotions of the highest and purest kind.

It is unnecessary to enter into much detail in order to show how,
much more truly than himself, Pope's predecessors, and especially
those of the Elizabethan era, were entitled to the designation of poets
of Nature. Shakespeare, Spenser, the two Fletchers, Milton, and
many others, might be adduced in confirmation. With reference to
botany, it is evident that the greatest of the tribe, in his universality
of knowledge, flowing over into every region of human research, was
well acquainted with the subject in its twofold aspect — trees and
flowers. Many beautiful floral descriptions occur in the plays, and
although the arboricultural allusions are less frequent, they are sufii-
ciently numerous to justify the belief that his knowledge was both
extensive and accurate. Perhaps the most important passage of the
kind is where Cranmer, " dilating on a wind of prophecy," portrays,
under the figure of a " mountain-cedar," the future glories of the reigns
of Elizabeth and her successor." Milton has many striking and appro-

* One of his biographers has discovered a solitary verse, on the faith of which he com-
placently assumes that Herbert " was thoroughly alive to the sweet influences of Nature."
^ Commentators affirm Ben Jonsou to be the author of the lines referred to.

TENNYSON AND BOTANY. 195

priate images borrowed from trees. His artistic use of the pine as a
simile for Satan's spear —

" to equal which the tallest pine,
Hewn on Norwegian hills to be the mast
Of some great ammiral, were but a wand " —

and the comparison of the rebel host to blasted pines, are fine exam-
ples of the poetical transmutation of botanical knowledge. Still finer
is the exquisite descilption in " Lycidas " of the vernal flowers strewed
on the hearse of his lamented friend. And, not to multiiDly quotations
further, the vale of Yallombrosa has been immortalized forever by
three lines in " Paradise Lost." *

In later poetry, not of the present century, Shenstone and Cowper
were both genuine lovers of Kature, and their works abound with pas-
sages relating to rural pleasures and scenery. Cowper, indeed, might
be styled par excellence the poet of the country. No one ever believed
more thoroughly than himself in his own epigrammatic line —

" God made the country, and man made the town."
The revolution in the poetical taste of the time, afterward consum-
mated by Wordsworth, was mainly initiated by the recluse of Olney.
In Shenstone's poems, now, it is to be feared, little read, there are
some verses bearing on the subject of this essay which have a curious
resemblance to Mr. Tennyson's famous song, " Come into the garden,
Maud." We quote eight lines to be found in the piece designated a
" Pastoral Ballad, in Four Parts : "

"From the plains, from the woodlands and groves,
What strains of wild melody flow !
How the nightingales warble their loves
From thickets of roses that blow 1

" Then the lily no longer is white ;

Then the rose is deprived of its bloom ;
Then the violets die with despite.
And the woodbines give up their perfume."

The ring and manner of this are very similar to Mr. Tennyson's com-
position, and, although the measure is a little different, these verses
might be interpolated in the modern song without in the least impair-
ing its harmony, or afiecting its verisimilitude.

The most distinguished names in the list of the natural poets of
the present century are undoubtedly Sir Walter Scott, Wordsworth,
and Mr. Tennyson. Of the two former it may be said, in passing,

* " Till on the beach
Of that inflambd sea he stood, and called
His legions, angel forms, who lay intranced,
Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks
In Vallombrosa."

196 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

that they have prohably done more than anybody else to foster the
modern idea of Xature, and the love of wild and picturesque scenery.
Our business, however, is more particularly with Mr. Tennyson, and
with the evidences of botanical knowledge to be found in his works,
that part of botany, at least, relating to trees. These allusions, we ap-
prehend, are more numerous, and show more insight, and acquaintance
with the forms, and processes, and changes characteristic of the inhab-
itants of the forest, than those of any other modern author. His verse
in this respect differs from other descriptive poetry chiefly in this, that
his notices are not general appellations or similitudes applicable
equally to any or all trees, but are specific, exact, and true only in the
particular case. Thomson, for example, in the " Seasons," is, in gen-
eral, curiously vague in his descriptions. He generalizes constantly,
and presents his readers with broad effects sketched en masse, instead
of individual details. Such phrases as " sylvan glades," " vocal
groves," " umbrageous shades," and the like, frequently occur, doing
duty in place of more minute representations. Mr. Tennyson, on the
other hand (and Sir Walter and Wordsworth may also be included),
pursues exactly the contrary method. His descriptions are, nearly
always, pictures of particular places instead of fancy sketches, and the
distinguishing features are given incidentally in the course of the nar-
rative. Where, again, particular trees are referred to, it is almost
invariably with a phrase or an epithet clinching the description as
precisely as a paragraph from Evelyn or Loudon. And, as poetry,
these casual, accidental bits of descriptive writing are infinitely more
effective than any amount of versified disquisition, of the Darwin sort,
on the processes of vegetation. Slight, too, though in many cases
they are, they indicate a deep appreciation of the results and tenden-
cies of modern science. In what remains of this paper it is proposed,
a little in detail, to adduce evidence from Mr. Tennyson's poems in
support of the views we have expressed. It will not be necessary to
go over the whole field, and we shall therefore select a few of the more
important trees, and see to what extent his notices of them are cor-
roborative of these preliminary remarks.

The ash will be the first example, and the reference in the lines
quoted below is to the proverbial lateness of this tree in developing
its foliage. It forms part of the Prince's song in " The Princess : "

" Whv lingereth she to clothe her heart with love,
Delaying as the tender ash delays
To clothe herself, when all the woods are green? "

This is a very striking comparison, happily expressed, and, besides
serving its immediate purpose, corrects an erroneous notion, somewhat
popular, that sometimes the ash and sometimes the oak is in leaf first.
Then, again, in " The Gardener's Daughter," Juliet's eyes and hair are
thus described:

TENNYSON AND BOTANY. 197

"Love, unperceived,
Came, drew your pencil from you, made those eyes
Darker than darkest pansies, and that hair
More black than ash-buds in the front of March ; "

a fact which all observers of the phenomena of the spring months will
recognize as accurate.

The lime seems a special favorite of Mr. Tennyson, so lovingly and
frequently does he use it for illustration. There is much imitative
beauty in the well-kK"«wn lines (also from "The Gardener's Daughter")
which form the conclusion of the description of a cathedral city — pos-
sibly Peterborough :

"And all about the large lime-feathers low,
The lime a summer home of murmurous wings.''

The giving out of branches close to the ground is a noticeable habit
of the lime, as it is also, to some extent, of the elm, particularly in
Devonshire, The mode of gi'owth and the development of the
branches are still further illustrated :

" Not thrice your branching limes have blown
Since I beheld young Laurence dead."

The epithet " branching " refers to another peculiarity — the number
and intricacy of the branches in the centre of the tree. On this point
Mr. Leo Grindon, a good authority, says : " So dense is the mass, that
to climb a full-grown tree is nearly impossible." The frequent use of
the lime for avenues and walks, a practice still more prevalent on the
Continent, is very pictorially stated :

" and overhead,
The broad ambrosial aisles of lofty lime
Made noise with bees and breeze from end to end."

Its spring-time is photographed in " Maud " in a single sentence,
thus :

" A million emeralds break from the ruby-budded lime."

Every student of botany will be able to verify the correctness of
this line. The buds are peculiarly red, and the appearance of thou-
sands of them bursting at once is precisely as the poet describes it.
Elsewhere, the period immediately preceding the foliation of the tree
is sketched with remarkable truthfulness :

" On such a time as goes before the leaf,
"When all the wood stands in a mist of green,
And nothing perfect."

The Spanish chestnut, Castanea^ is not one of Mr. Tennyson's
trees ; but there are frequent references to the horse-chestnut, ^sculus.
The three chestnuts in "The Miller's Daughter" will be in the recol-
lection of most readers of his poetry. The appearance of the buds

198 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

just before emerging from their green covering, and the time of their
development, are registered with minute accuracy :

" But, Alice, what an hour was that,

"When, after roving in the woods
('Twas April then), I came and sat

Below the chestnuts, when their buds
Were glistening in the breezy blue I "

" Glistening " is the exact epithet here. The early foliation of the
chestnut and elm we find in the exquisite fragment " Sir Launcelot
and Queen Guinevere." The lines on the chestnut are very charac-
teristic :

" In curves the yellowing river ran,
And drooping chestnut-buds began
To spread into the perfect fan,

Above the teeming ground."

This, with the similar remark on the elm, corresponds to the order of
Nature, and is nowhere better or more beautifully exemplified than in
Kensington Gardens every April.

So far as we have been able to discover, there is only a single line
devoted to the birch. It is to be found in " Amphion," that singular
reproduction, in sylvan form, of the mythological legend. It is inter-
esting to notice, by-the-way, that, in the later editions, the verse in
which the birch is mentioned is omitted, and another substituted. As
a whole, the latter is doubtless the more musical of the two, but we
are sorry to lose the apt and charming characterization of " the lady
of the woods." For the curious in Tennysoniana we print both :

" The birch-tree swang her fragrant hair,
The bramble cast her berry,
The gin within the juniper
Began to make him merry."

" The linden broke her ranks and rent
The woodbine-wreaths that bind her,
And down the middle, buzz ! she went
"With all her bees behind her."

Of all the poets who have sung the praises of the birch, Coleridge,
Keats, and, preeminently Sir "Walter Scott, none of them has surpassed
the initial line of the first stanza in condensed and subtile expressive-
ness. Scott's is somewhat similar, although not quite so good :

""Whfre weeps the birch with silver bark,
And long dishevelled hair."

"Dishevelled," implying disorders and entanglement, does not convey
a correct idea of the foliage of the birch. " Swang her fragrant hair "
is decidedly better.

The fuUness and ripeness of the poet's knowledge of trees are amj^ly

TENNYSON AND BOTANY. 199

illustrated in those passages of his poems relating to the poplar.
This is a tree with which he has Ijeen familiar from early childhood,
as we gather from the " Ode to Memory," where he fondly recalls —

" The seven elms, the poplars four,
That stand beside my father's door."

The famous poplar in " Mariana," which Mr. Read has reproduced in
his fine picture of the " Moated Grange," now at South Kensington, is
a prominent object in a very striking poem. The locality, it is
scarcely necessary to aay, is the fen country :

"About a stone-cast from the wall

A sluice with blackened waters slept.
And o'er it many, round and small.

The clustered marish-mosses crept.
Hard by a poplar shook alway,

All silver-green with gnarled bark ;

For leagues no other tree did mark
The level waste, the rounding gray."

As an example of landscape-painting in words, there is nothing more
perfect than this in modern literature. We are not aware if the doubt
was ever suggested before, but we think it is at least questionable if
Mr. Read is right in assuming the particular tree in his poem to be a
Lombardy poplar. "Silver-green," a remarkable epithet, is more
applicable to the abele, or white poplar, than to the fastigiate Lom-
bardy species, and the sound of the trembling of the leaves is less
noticeable in the latter than in most of the other poplars. In other
poems this rustling noise is described as " lisping," " hissing," and like
the sound of " falling showers," phrases all tolerably approximating
to exactness. In " In Memoriam " there is a special reference to this
white poplar whose silver-green foliage shows much more white than
greeu in a gale of wind :

" "With blasts that blow the poplar white.
And lash with storm the streaming pane."

The " quivering," " tremulous " aspen is also mentioned, but Mr.
Tennyson is too good a botanist to fall into the popular error of sup-
posing that it is the only tree which has fluttering leaves. Except
the Ontario species and one or two others, nearly all the poplars have
the same peculiarity, caused, it may not be superfluous to say, by
the compression of the leaf-stalk. Very curious it is to notice in the
upper branches, while a light wind is overhead, each particular leaf
shaking on its own account, while the branch of which it is a part,
and the tree itself, are perfectly motionless.

Of the beech the notices are scantier and less specific. Its pecul-
iarly twisted roots, rich autumn tints, smooth bark, and unusual leafi-
ness, are all described, however, more or less poetically. The following
verse from " In Memoriam" has a certain pensive sweetness of its own :

200 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

" Unwatched, the garden bough shall sway,
The tender blossom flutter down,
Unloved tliat beech will gather brown,
This maple burn itself away."

The rich autumn tints of the foliage of the maple are here alluded to.
Cedars, cypresses, and yews, all members of the great coniferous
family, are prominent objects in Mr. Tennyson's landscapes. In the
eighteenth section of " Maud " — beginning,

" I have led her home, my love, my only friend " —

and which contains some passages full of solemn tenderness and beauty,
and a splendor of language worthy of Shakespeare himself, occurs the
oft-quoted apostrophe addressed to the cedar of Lebanon by Maud's
somewhat distempered, though now happy lover :

" Oh, art thou sighing for Lebanon
In the long breeze that streams to thy delicious East,
Sighing for Lebanon,
Dark cedar. ....

" And over whom thy darkness must have spread
With such delight as theirs of old, thy great
Forefathers of the thornless garden, there
Shadowing the snow-limbed Eve from whom slie came.
Here will I lie, while these long branches sway."

The yew, though usually regarded as the emblem of death —

" Cheerless, unsocial plant, that loves to dwell
Midst skulls and coffins, epitaphs and tombs " —

might, in its extreme tenacity and length of days, be a fitter repre-
sentative of life and endurance. In the second chapter of " In Me-
moriam " the yew is described in the most masterly manner. These
are two of the verses :

" Old Yew, which graspest at the stones
That name the underlying dead,
Thy fibres net the dreamless head,
Thy roots are wrapped about the bones."

" Oh, not for thee the glow, the bloom,
Who chaiigest not in any gale,
Nor branding summer suns avail
To touch thy thousand years of gloom."

The locality, the hue, the prolonged life, and the general unchange-
ableness of appearance, are all here summarily noticed. The laureate
seems, however, to share the popular dislike to this tree, a feeling
which Gilpin, in his " Forest Scenery," ridicules as weakness. In
" Amphion," yews are called " a dismal coterie ; " in " Maud " a
" black yew gloomed the stagnant air ; " and, in " Love and Death,"

TENNYSON AND BOTANY. 201

we have the portentous image of the angel of death walkmg all alone
" beneath a yew."

Our limits forbid more than a mere enumerative mention of other
well-known trees, whose memory Mr, Tennyson has rendered sweeter
to all future generations of tree-lovers. " Immemorial elms," " perky
larches and pines," " laburnums, dropping-wells of fire," elders, hol-
lies, " the pillared dusk of sounding sycamores," " dry-tongued lau-
rels," " slender acacias " — all these and many others are to be found
within the four cornr^rs of his poems. One only remains, the oak —
" sole king of forests all ; " and, as Mr. Tennyson has celebrated the
praises of the monarch of the woods at great length in the " Talking
Oak," we shall add a few words on that charming composition by way
of conclusion.

As is well known, the poem takes the form of a colloquy between
an ancient oak, which formed a meeting-place for two lovers, and the
young gentleman in the case. He comes to question the tree about
his lady-love, who had visited the hallowed spot in his absence. And
Landor himself, in his happiest vein, never conceived a more exquisite
imaginary conversation. Here, in sportive phrase and bantering talk,
is the whole philosophy of forest-life set forth with a poetic felicity,
saucy humor, and scientific precision of language, each admirable of
its kind. The poem is literally a love-idyl and botanic treatise com-
bined, and never, surely, were lovers and science — January and May,
might one say — so delightfully harmonized, conveying, too, to those
who have eyes to see and hearts to understand, glimpses of a spiritual
interpretation of Nature, undreamt of by Pope and his school. Thus
pleasantly does the old oak of " Sumner Chace " discourse to Walter
of Olivia's charms ; and the reader will not fail to notice the skillful
way in which the poet's practical acquaintance with trees is turned to
account :

" I swear (and else may insects prick
Each leaf into a gall)
This girl, for whom your heart is sick,
Is three times worth them all ; "

and then, with a warmth of praise unusual and almost improper in
such a venerable inhabitant of the forest, he continues :

" Her kisses were so close and kind,
That, trust me on my word.
Hard wood I am, and wrinkled rind,
But yet my sap was stirred :

" And even into my inmost ring
A pleasure I discerned,
Like those blind motions of the spring,
That show the year is turned."

Farther on, the not ungrateful lover invokes all atmospheric and

202 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

other good influences on his partner in the dialogue, who has proved
so communicative a comj)anion :

" O rock upon thy towery top
All throats that gurgle sweet I
All starry culmination drop
Balm-dews to bathe thy feet !

" Nor ever lightning char thy grain,
But, rolling as in sleep,
Low thunders bring the mellow rain,
That makes thee broad and deep ! "

These, it will be admitted, are very melodious strains. Seldom has
the imagery of the woods been used with more appropriateness and
effect than in this poem, and its poetic excellence is rivaled by its
accuracy. No one but an accomplished practical botanist could have
written it. And throughout the poem, light and airy in tone as it is,
there is distinctly perceptible the scientific element — the sense of the
forces of Nature acting according to law, which, as we have already
said, pervades like a subtile essence much of Mr. Tennyson's poetry.
But enough has probably been said to justify the title of this article. —
St. PauVs Magazine.

"WATER TUENED TO BLOOD."

FROM THE FEENOH OF DE. N. JOLT.

FROM the remotest antiquity the red color sometimes observed
in water appears to have attracted attention. In all ages there
have been stories of rains of blood, and of rivers changed to blood, and
these phenomena have given rise to the most ludicrous explanations,
and to the most ridiculous apprehensions. In Exodus (vii., 20, 21),
we read : " All the waters that were in the river were turned to blood.
And there was blood throughout all the land of Egypt." Homer
speaks of the dews of blood which preceded the Trojan War, and
those which foreboded the death of Sarpedon, king of the Lycians.
Pliny in his " Natural History " (book ii., c. xxxvi.) tells of a rain of
milk and blood which fell at Rome in the consulship of M. Acilius
and C. Fortius. Finally, the historian Livy mentions a rain of blood
which fell in the Forum Boarium. In times much nearer to our own,
phenomena of this kind have been observed at various points in
Europe, producing ridiculous alarms, and even leading to actual
seditions.

The cause, or causes rather, of these so-called rains of blood are
now well understood. Every one knows that they are to be attributed

« WATER TURNED TO BLOOD:'

203

either to mineral particles diflused through the air strata which are
traversed by the rain, or to the dejections of certain moths in their
last metamorphosis, or to the remains of infusoria carried up by the

Red Water of the Salt-Marshes,
taken from the surface.

The same after it has been allowed to
rest. (The infusoria have risen
to the surface.)

winds. But the ignorant multitude continue still to believe in rains
of blood, and bow down blindly before so-called miracles which have
no existence save in the wild fancies of those who regard them as
articles of faith.

We are not concerned now with these errors and superstitions, on
which modern science has pronounced its verdict; we j^ropose rather
to consider some well-attested facts, the causes of which leave no
room for doubt or ambiguity. It is now ascertained beyond question
that, where fresh water wears a peculiar tinge, this coloring is due to
the presence of infusoria {Euglena viridis, E. sanguinea^ Astasia h(Xr
matodes), or to microscopic vegetation ( Oscillatoria rubescetis, Sphm-
roplea annulina), or to minute entomostraca {Daphnia pulex^ Cyclops
quadricornis).

The waters of the sea may also be tinged in a similar way. Thus,
in 1820, Scoresby found that the blue or green tinge of the Greenland
Sea was caused by an animalcule allied to the medusae. Of these he
counted 64 in a cubic inch ; this would be in a cubic foot 110,892, and
23,888,000,000,000 in a cubic mile. According to Arago, the long and
sharply-defined streaks of green in the polar seas include myriads of
medusae, Avhose yellow color, added to the blue of the water, produces
green. Ofi" Cape Palmas, on the Guinea coast. Captain Tuckey's ship
appeared to be sailing through a milky sea. The cause of the phenom-
enon was the multitude of animals floating at the surface, and masking
the natural tint of the water. The carmine-red streaks which various
navigators have sailed through on the high-seas are produced in the

204 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

same way. In 1844 Messrs. Turrel and Freyeinet saw the Atlantic
Ocean, off the coast of Portugal, of a deep-red color, owing to the
presence of a microscopic plant of the genus Frotococcus (P. Atlanti-
cus). This color was diffused over an area of no less than five square
miles. M. Montague, who has described the alga whicli producecl this

i w

t--

MoxAs DuNALu MAGNIFIED.— a. Very young Monas Duxalii. dead, and

individuals, colorless. 6. Individuals not of globular shape,

yet full grown, colored green, c. Adults
very deep red. d. Adults of lighter red.

phenomenon, closes his memoir in these words: "TVhen we reflect
that, in order to cover one square millimetre (0.03937 inch), we must
have 40,000 individuals of this microscopic alga, we are filled with
amazement on comparing the immensity of such a phenomenon with
the minuteness of the cause which produces it."

As for the waters of the Red Sea, the periodic reddening which
distinguishes them is caused by the presence of a confervoid alga
which naturalists have called Trichodesmium erytJirceum. Finally,
Pallas tells of a lake in Russia, called Malinovoe-Ozero, or Raspberry
Lake, because its briny water and the salt made from it are red, and
have the odor of violets.

The coloration of the Mediterranean salt-marshes, a phenomenon
long known to the salt-makers of Languedoc, but first studied by
savants in 1836, and by me in 1839, has also been explained in various
ways more or less near the truth. Messrs. Audouin, Dumas, and
Payen, of the Institute, have attributed it to the Artemia salina, a
minute branchiopod crustacean, which in fact swarms in the 2ycirten7ie-
ments,^ where the saltness of the water is far below the degree of
saturation requisite for the precipitation of salt crystals, but is of much
rarer occurrence where the water, being very highly concentrated,
assumes at times a blood-red color. Messrs. A. de Saint-Hilaire and
Turpin have supposed the real cause of this strange coloration to be
certain microscopic plants, of very simple organization, which they
call Frotococcus sanguineus and Hcematococcus kermesinus. This, too,
was the opinion of M. F. Dunal, who had studied the rubefaction of

^ The sauniers (salt-makers) of Languedoc give the names of tables, partennements,
and pieces maitresses to the various compartments into which the sea-water is passed as
it arrives at dififerent degrees of salinity.

« WATER TURNED TO BLOOD P

the water of our salt-marshes before St.-Hilaii'e and Tiirpin. As I was
at that time employed in teaching Natural History in the Royal Col-
lege of Montpellier, where I had among my pupils several youths who
have since become distinguished masters themselves (Louis Figuier,
Amedee Courty, and Henri Mares, for instance), I too had a desire to
study the curious phenomenon of the reddening of water, and to this
end I visited the salt-works of Villeneuve, two or three miles distant
from Montpellier. The water there was then of a very decided red
color. I collected on the spot some samples of the water which
looked most like blood, and also of water which, being less briny
than this, was also of a fainter red color. Under the microscope the
water collected in the various compartments exhibited myriads of
minute creatures, with oval or oblong bodies, often compressed in the
middle, but sometimes cylindrical. Very young individuals were
colorless, those a little older were greenish, and the adult were of a
deep red. The mouth had the form of a conical prolongation, and was
reti-actile; they were eyeless, and the stomach and anus could not
be clearly made out.

Fig. 6.

Fig. 5.

* «€i

Dead Monads, colorless.

OLy

Part of the DioE'^TnE Tube of Artemia Salina,
in which are seen (« a) doid but not digested
monads, and (6, h) cubical salt-crj stals.

"With a high-power microscope I was able to see in the anterior
part of these supposed protococci two long, flagelliform, and perfectly
transparent processes which they kept in rapid motion, and by means
of which they swam about in the drop of liquid spread out on the slide
of my instrument. There was no longer room for doubt. The proto-
cocci and hmnatococci of Messrs. Dunal, St.-Hilaire, and Turpin, were
animals— true monads, and I gave them the name of 3Io?ias Dtmalii,
in honor of ray preceptor. Prof Dunal. He was the first to suspect
the true cause of the red color of the Mediterranean salt-marshes ; but
he had only an indistinct insight into the matter. He examined the

2o6

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

animalcules only after they were dead, that is, at the moment when
they had become globular and motionless, like protococci ; and his
specimens were dead, because he had filled his vials up to the brim
with the water, and then sealed them hermetically. But these little
animals must, above all things, have free respiration. Accumulated
in immense numbers in a very small quantity of water, with the outer
air entirely excluded, they all died while being carried from Villeneuve
to Montpellier. They were then taken iox 2)rotococci, being motionless
and globular, I took precautions against committing this mistake, by
only half filling my specimen-tubes, and, better still, by examining the
water of the salines on the spot.

AETEjnA Satina (adult) natural size, and highly magnified, o. Median eye
eyes. a. e. Antennae. ;;. Incubatory pouch with eggs. ab. Abdomen,
pendages. c. Digeetive tube.

.. y, y. Pedunculate
ap. Tail-shaped ap-

It is a remarkable fact in the history of the Monas Dunalii that,
like the Protococciis nivalis^ which gives to the snow of the polar re-
gions now a green tinge, anon a red, this animalcule presents, when
young, a green tinge, which changes later to brick-red, and then to
blood-red.

« WATBB TURNED TO BLOOD. 207

The degree of concentration of the water has a marked influence
on them. On the 1st October, 1839, after the driest summer on record,
the liquid in the tables indicated 25° salinity in Baume's areometer,
and it was of so deep a color as to stain a corner of my pocket-hand-
kerchief a blood-red. On October 28th, after twenty-eight days of
steady rain, the water in the pihces mattresses, instead of presenting a
purple color, as on tlie first day of the month, resembled blood with a
very large amount of serum, and the monads in it were less numerous,
and of a lighter red, although the water was still of 20° salinity.

Finally, we must not omit to state that the monads are A'ery sen-
sitive to light, which they seek with a certain degree of avidity. This
may be easily seen by putting a number of these infusoria into a flask
two-thirds filled with sea-water. Soon they will be seen to rise to the
sui-face of the liquid, and to crowd together on the side where the
light is strongest. If the flask be turned about so as to bring them
on the darker side, they soon take their former position again. We
must also obs^we that these animalcules sometimes go down to the
bottom of the tables, and then the coloration of the surface grows
fainter, or entirely disappears.

From all this it follows that the red color of the Mediterranean
salt-marshes is caused by the Monas Dunalii ; but is that animalcule
the only cause of the phenomenon ? Has not the Artemia salina of
Audouin, Dumas, and Payen, also something to do with it ? This
problem was soon solved. We have first to bear in mind that these
little crustaceans are found in far greater numbers in brackish water
than in water at its maximum point of concentration, and that in the
latter case, indeed, they occur so rarely that their presence may be
regarded as in some sort merely accidental. In water of this kind, the
artemia appears to be sickly ; it evidently languishes in the over-dense
medium ; it swims about with difficulty, always keeping at the surface.
It is more or less of a red color along the line of its digestive canal ;
but this coloration is a secondary thing, and is owing to the monads
it has swallowed in water. The latter deposits in their intestine salt-
crystals, which may be seen through their transparent envelope, min-
gled with monads in a state of partial or total digestion.

Far, then, from being the cause of the purple tint of salt-water in
its last stage of concentration, the artemia is indebted for its accidental
coloring to the Monades Dunalii it takes into its digestive canal, or
which settle among the filaments of its branchial feet. This I have
demonstrated by keeping colorless artemise for a while in water tinged
by red monads, or simply by carmine, and so giving them a red color.

But, though the artemia has nothing to do with the coloration of
watei-, it is, nevertheless, a subject of wonder and study for the physi-
ologist. Like several other animals belonging to the great sub-king-
dom Articulata (psyche, bee, silk-worm moth), our crustaceans possess
the singular privilege of reproducing themselves without being sub.

2o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

jected to the general law of sexual union. Among several thousand
artemise studied by me, I have not found a single well-defined male
individual. The distinguished Genevan naturalist, Carl Vogt, said, the
other day, that he had had the like experience. Hence we may con-
clude that the artemia of our salt-marshes perpetuates its kind by
means of virgin females, whose eggs, although deprived of seminal
impregnation, are developed in an incubatory sac situated at the base
of the maternal abdomen. These produce young ai'temiae, which have
to undergo amazing metamorphoses before they arrive at a complete
resemblance to their parent. The name of parthenogenesis has been
bestowed on this singular mode of reproduction by virgin females,
independently of commerce with males ; oftentimes, the latter do not
exist at all, or at least are as yet unknown. In conclusion, we would
remark that the eggs of our virgin artemia pi-oduce only females, while
the unfecundated eggs of the queen-bee produce males, and males
only. — La Nature.

THE REQUIEEMENTS OF SCIENTIFIC EDUCATIOIN'.^

Br Peof. E. W. EAYMOND.

THERE is danger that, in our new-born zeal for scientific educa-
tion, we may sacrifice the interests of a truly liberal culture,
producing, as I have said, a generation of specialists, incapable of
appreciating the departments of human thought which lie outside their
own, or even of rising within their own departments to broad and
comprehensive views. We must not use the microscope till we spoil
the eyes. We must not overtrain the investigator until he becomes
less than a full man. The chemists, geologists, and engineers, must
not cease to be intelligent and active citizens. It may be demonstrated
that such a mistaken neglect of studies outside the range of a chosen
profession cripples activity and impairs success even in that profession.
It is one result of the brotherhood of knowledge that no man, whether
employed in the original investigation of Nature, or in the application
of natural laws to practical ends, can advance successfully without
perpetual communication of his thoughts to others, and the reception
of their suggestions and experiences in return. Hence the mastery of
language, which was the first condition of civilization, remains the
essential condition of progress. The power to comprehend statements,
logical arguments, and demonstrations, and to make such statements
as may be comprehended by others, and will carry weight and influ-
ence in the very perfection of their form, is a vitally important part

' Extract from the Inaugural Address at the dedication of Pardee Hall, of Lafayette
College, Easton, Pa., by Rossiter W. Raymond, President of the American Institute of
Mining Engineers,

REQUIREMENTS OF SCIENTIFIC EDUCATION. 209

of the preparation of every young man for his life's career. His suc-
cess, aside from his moral qualities, will be in direct proportion to his
influence over other men ; and this influence, again, will be in part
proportional to his command of the means by which the minds of men
are moved, mainly, language. Under this term we may include a
knowledge of the methods of practical reasoning, and if this knowledge
is best obtained by scholastic study of logic, then logic must be studied.
If Latin and Greek are necessary, then they must be studied. For
us, one thing is necessary — a thorough mastery of the English tongue —
and this alone has been made to yield, in Lafayette College, a mental
discipline not inferior to that of the classics.

But influence is not due to language alone. Behind this vehicle
of thought there must be fullness and variety of thought itself. Those
fruitful analogies, felicitous illustrations, graceful associations, which
come, and come alone, through wide acquaintance with human life and
literature, are so many elements of power, and, without this broad
basis of a common ground from which to move the minds of others,
the student of a special science, though possessed of the lever of Ar-
chimedes that would move the world, has no place whereon to stand.

In accordance with these prineijjles, the object of the system of
college education in America has always been development and disci-
pline of character, and the broad preparation of the student for his
subsequent special or professional pursuits. Our colleges may not
have succeeded in realizing this ideal, nevertheless this has been their
ideal ; and it is the right one, as much to-day as ever. Whatever
changes are required in our institutions of learning, to adapt them to
the necessities of the modern era, must be changes in accordance with
this principle — changes of means, not of ends, so far as colleges are
concerned.

That changes are required is admitted on all hands. It is admitted
that the physical sciences shoiild be introduced to primary and pre-
paratory schools ; that they should be taught for the double purpose
of mental discipline and of mental acquirement in the class-rooms of
our colleges ; that in teaching them the scientific, inductive, experi-
mental, instead of the dogmatic, method should be pursued ; and,
finally, that either connected with our colleges, or standing outside of
them, schools of thorough scientific and technical special training are
imperatively required. It is to inaugurate the wider activity of such
a school that we are met here to-day, and I shall say a few words con-
cerning the relation of this school to Lafayette College, on the one
hand, and to technical education and the needs of the present time in
technical departments on the other hand.

While we trust that in time to come scientific investigation will be
promoted in no mean degree by this school and its graduates, it must
be confessed that at the present time its object is chiefly the prepara-
tion of young men for practical pursuits involving the applications of

VOL. IT, — 14

210 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

science. Nor can it be fairly said that this department is inferior in
dignity to the pursuit of abstract science, so called. It is out of the
ranks of the practical workers that those peculiarly gifted in scientific
investigation are likely to arise ; and it is in the ranks of practical
workers that they must look, chiefly, for appreciation and support. It
is no derogation from the value of a discovery of truth, to say that it
can be made useful to man ; and, hence, there is no infei'iority in the
position of those who make it useful to man.

Indeed, that which the whole world chiefly needs to-day, and our
country not less than any other, is the application of scientific truths
and principles already known to the afi[:iirs, and labors, and problems,
of daily life. We might even aftbrd to pause in our career of fresh
discoveries, to consolidate the progress and utilize the results already
obtained. But the alternative is not pi-esented ; it is not necessary or
best that any part of the intellectual activity of the age should pause ;
the advance of science itself assists, and is assisted by, the applications
of science.

We need a scientific in the place of a barbarous or scholastic archi-
tecture ; a scientific in the place of a traditional agriculture ; a scientific
in the place of an empirical engineering ; we need more machinery,
more economical applicatians of power, more efiective processes of
metallurgy and manufacture, more exact knowledge, in all these par-
ticulars, of our own condition and necessities, and of the degree in
which these can be supplied by experience already attained abroad.
Lesoinne, a distinguished French writer, defines metallurgy as "the
art of making money in the treatment of metals." This definition may
be applied to almost all occupations of life. The practical art of each
is not only to achieve certain results, but to do so profitably, to make
money in doing so ; that is to say, to increase the value of the raw
materials, whether wood, or cotton, or ores, or time, or ideas, by the
use we make of them, and the transformation to which we submit
them, so as thereby to really elevate the condition of humanity : to
leave the world better than we found it. This is, in its last analysis,
the meaning of honestly making money. Men are put into this world
with limited powers and with limited time to provide for their own
sustenance and comfort, and to improve their condition. A certain
portion of these powers and this time is required for the support of
life in a greater or less degree of comfort, and with more or less mul-
tiplied means and avenues of enjoyment, activity, and influence.
Whatever their labor produces more than this, is represented by
wealth, and for purposes of exchange by money. To make money
honestly, is to do something for other men better or cheaper than they
can do it for themselves ; to save time and labor for them ; in a word,
to elevate their condition. It is in this sense, greatly as we Americans
are supposed to be devoted to making money, that we need to learn
how to make more money ; how to make our labor more fruitful ; how

REQUIREMEXTS OF SCIENTIFIC EDUCATION. 211

to assail more successfully with our few hands the natural obstacles
and the natural resources of a mighty continent ; how to build up on
the area of that continent a prosperous nation, united in varied, fruit-
ful, and harmonious industries, glowing with patriotism and inspired
by religion.

In this work we need specially the basis of a more thorough tech-
nical institution, applying principles of science to the material and
economical problems involved. This education is necessary to supply
the directing forces for the great agricultural, manufacturing, and en-
gineering improvements of the country. It is also needed as a solvent
and remedy for the antagonism between labor and capital. The true
protection of labor Avill be found in its higher education, and in open-
ing to the individual laborer for himself and for his children, by means
of that education, a prospect of indefinite improvement and advance-
ment.

In the realm of metallurgical and engineering operations the differ-
ence between theoretical and practical training is, perhaps, still more
striking. The student of chemistry in the laboratory cannot be made
acquainted with many of the conditions which obtain in chemical and
metallurgical operations upon a larger scale. All the chemists of the
world failed to comprehend or to describe correctly the apparently
simple reactions involved in the manufacture of pig-iron, until, by the
genius and enterprise of such men as Bell, Tanner, and Akerman, the
blast-furnace itself, in the conditions of actual practice, was penetrated
and minutely studied. Moreover, in all the experimental inquiries of
the laboratory the question of economy plays no part. It is the art
of separating and combining substances which the student follows
there, not the art of making money. That education of judgment and
decision, of choice of means for ends which the exigencies of daily
practice give, cannot be imparted in the school.

In mechanical engineering the same principle is illustrated. The
highest department in this art is that of construction, and in this de-
partment the highest function is the designing of machinery. !N'ow,
the most perfect knowledge of the theory of a machine and its mathe-
matical relations, of the strength of materials, or the economical use
of power, will not suffice to qualify a man to design a machine or a
system of machines, for the reason that in this Avork an element must
be considered not at all included in theoretical knowledge, namely,
the element of economy in the manufacture, as well as in the operation
of the machine. A machine, any part of which requires for its manu-
facture a tool (such, for instance, as a peculiar lathe) which is not
already possessed by the manufacturer, and which, after the construc-
tion of this one part, would not be necessary or useful for other work
— such a machine could not be profitably built. In other words, ma-
chines must be so designed, in a large majority of cases, as not to
necessitate the construction of other machines to make them ; and the

212 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MOXTHLY.

planning of machinery, so that it shall be at once economical and du-
rable in operation, and simple and cheap in construction, is not merely
an important incidental duty, it is absolutely the chief and most diffi-
cult duty of the mechanical engineer.

PREPAEATIOXS FOR THE C0:MIXG TRAXSIT OF
YEXUS.

THE nature of a transit of one of the inferior planets (Mercury or
Venus) is well understood, and the phenomena attending such
a transit have been thoroughly discussed, and fully described in many
places. The importance of the observation of these transits, and the
general character of the results expected from the expeditions sent
out to observe them, are probably understood by all, but it is thought
that a brief account of the means that are to be employed to accom-
plish the desired end will be of interest.

The records of the plans which have been formed, and of the prep-
arations which have been made by the diiferent governments of the
world and by private individuals, are, unfortunately for the general
public, published only in proceedings of scientific societies, or in many
cases they exist only in manuscript. "When the expeditions return
home after the observations are made, in astronomical Europe and
America will resound the busy hum of- preparation, and from the
beginning of 1875 the reader of astronomical items will be sated.

At first will come a series of preliminary reports as the parties
come in ; then we shall have the final rej^orts, giving numbers, data,
descriptions of instruments, and the observations made at the transit,
the longitudes and latitudes of the various stations, and, in short, every
result which the practical astronomer will have derived.

These final reports will be eagerly looked forward to, for upon
them depends the constant of solar parallax, and from them will be
deduced the definitive result of all the astronomical work done on the
globe on that day.

"We know already that the final outcome of all these vast prepara-
tions which we are going to describe will be a number very near to
8^848.

The whole world is united in an effort to know exactly how to
change this ; whether to write it greater or less. But the results of
these expeditions, if they are successful (and we can hardly fail of suc-
cess), will be, not simply the establishing of the earth's distance from
the sun on a certain basis, but much more.

So many expeditions of trained scientific observers will bring back
■wdth them data only second in importance to the main object of their

THE COMING TRANSIT OF VENUS. 213

journeys. The latitude and longitude of many of the almost unknown
islands of both oceans will be established with a certainty as great as
the corresponding coordinates of most seapoi'ts on our own Atlantic
coast. Observations for magnetic constants w^ill be made at places
widely separated, and much will be learned in this way. The line of
Russian stations, and the American station in Siberia, will be connected
by telegraphic wires to St. Petersburg, and possibly the stations in
the Indian Ocean may likewise be joined with New York or Wash-
ington, so that independent longitude determinations by telegraph
may be extended over seven-eighths of the globe.

Americans should not forget that our own Coast Survey has made
three independent determinations of transatlantic longitude in the
years 1867, 1870, and 1873, nor should they forget the wonderful agree-
ment of the results obtained over three different cables, by different
observers at different times. This agreement is so marvelous (con-
sidering the independence of the determinations), that the results are
here quoted :

Longitude of Harvard College Olserxatory^ west of Greenwich Olservatory,

Campaign of 1867 4" 44" 31=00

Campaign of 1870 4 44 31.05

Campaign of 1873 4 44 30.99

Mean 4 44 31.01

It must be remembered also that, incidentally as it were, the rela-
tive longitude of Paris and Greenwich Observatories was found : so
that it is to American astronomers, working by a method of American
invention, that the exact value of so important a coordinate is due.

Americans will have reason to be proud if equally exact determi-
nations can be extended by them from the Indian Ocean to New York,
and from Siberia to Greenwich.

These are only some of the incidental advantages which it may be
hoped will be gained by the various expeditions for which the different
governments have provided.

There are various ways in which the observation of the transit of
Venus may be made, and, in order to describe the instruments, and
the preparations which are making, it will be necessary to refer to
these briefly :

1. There is the method of contacts^ which consists in determining
the time at which the limb or edge of Venus's disk is tangent to the
limb of the sun. To make this observation, a small equatorial tele-
scope is needed, provided with suitable colored glasses to protect the
observer's eye, and with the usual appurtenances.

2. The niicrometric method^ which consists in measuring the dis-
tance apart of the bright horns of that part of the edge of the sun
which Venus partly obscures as she is moving on or off. As Venus
has a sensible diameter (about one minute of arc), it will take a sen-

214

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sible time for her disk to move ir om. Jirst contact (when her disk just
touches the disk of the sun exteriorly) to second contact (when her
disk is tangent interiorly to the sun's), and during this time the ap-
pearance of the two disks will be as in the figure :

This figure shows Venus coming on to the sun's disk, and it shows
the two cusps at a and b. It will be easily seen that, if we know the
length of the line a b, and the time at which it has this length, we
can calculate the time of contact from these data. So that a number
of measures of the cusps is the same as a number of first contacts. The
reverse phenomenon occurs when Venus passes off the sun's disk.

To measure these distances, the equatorials must be provided with
filar micrometers, i. e., with a contrivance by means of which two
spider-lines in the focus of the telescope may be moved toward or
away from each other. One of these lines is to be placed at a, and
the other at b ; the time is to be noted, and the number of turns and
parts of a turn of the screw which moves the lines is to be noted from
the head of the screw, which is finely divided.

3. The photographic method. This consists in photographing the
planet Venus on the disk of the sun, and noting the time of each pho-
tograph. The negatives are carefully preserved, and are measured
subsequently by a fine measuring engine. It will be seen that tliis
method is like the preceding, except that the measuring may be done

THE COMING TRANSIT OF VENUS. 215

at leisure, and without the hurry and anxiety which attach to any
observation of this nature.

This method requires apparatus of a special kind. The American
plan is to throw the image of the sun, with the planet on its disk, into
a stationary photographic telescope where the negative is taken. This
is taken out, and at once developed by the photographers, into whose
dark room the telescope penetrates. This method is due to Prof. Win-
lock, of Harvard College Observatory. The other method consists in
making the photographic telescope follow the sun in its motion by means
of clock-work, and in taking the negatives in the same way. The dark
room, however, is some distance off, and it appears that too much de-
pendence must be placed on the steadiness of the clock-work motion.

4. The heliometric method. This consists in measuring the cusps
with a heliometer, which is merely a large telescope which has two
object-glasses (or one object-glass cut into halves by a diametral cut)
which slide past each other. Each half produces a complete image,
and, by means of an observation of a tangency of images, the distance
of the cusps may be had.

5. The spectroscopic method. In brief, we may explain this as fol-
lows: It is known that there is a thin layer of atmosphere near the
sun's limb where bright lines may be seen with a powerful spectro-
scope, while on either side of this layer dark lines only are seen. As
Venus advances, the interposition of her dark body will cut off this
layer, and the instant of disappearance of the last vestige of any one
of these bright lines will be truly the instant of first contact.

The ordinary method of observing first contact is open to grave
uncertainties (on account of the different sensitiveness of the eyes of
various observers, and for other reasons), and it is hoped that this
method, as beautiful in theory as it will be diflicult and delicate in
practice, will obviate all these objections.

It is to be expected that the astronomers of the different nations
will adopt different plans of observations, in accordance with the
peculiar traditions of each school.

The Germans and Russians, among whom the use of heliometers
has been hitherto confined, will (with a single exception) alone use
them on the approaching transit.

The German Government will send one of these instruments to
the Kerguelen Islands, or to Macdonald Island, one to the Auckland
Islands, one to the Mauritius, and one to China (Chefoo). Lord Lindsay,
of England (the one exception spoken of), also takes a heliometer with
his very completely-equipped private expedition to the Mauritius.

Three of the twenty-seven Russian stations in Russia, Siberia,
China, and Japan, will be provided with heliometers ; at three, like-
wise, will the photo-heliograph be used, while the remainder of the
stations will be devoted to the ordinary contact observations and to
measures of cusps.

2i6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

At all the American stations the photo-heliograph, the contact
method, and the method of cusps, will be used. The American stations
will be eight in number. These will be principally in the southern
latitudes, in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, except one in Siberia, and,
perhaps, a photographic station in the Sandwich Islands.

Stations in Japan and China will be established also by the
Americans.

Most of the English parties are to be in northern stations, though
the Challenger exploring expedition is instructed to examine eligible
stations in the South Pacific. Of the stations of French observers
little is definitely known, although they will occupy a few posts.

Each party must be provided with instruments to observe the
actual transit, and it must further have the means of determining
accurately time, longitude, and latitude.

Of these qucesitce, the latitude and the local time are most easily
determined. Portable transit-instruments will suffice for the first de-
termination, and for the second there are various adequate means.

The American parties are each to be provided with a small port-
able transit-instrument and zenith-telescope combined, which instru-
ments are now making by Stackpole, of Xew York.

These are intended to be of the simplest possible construction and
of the greatest attainable stability, and they combine several ad-
vantages. In accordance with a suggestion first proposed by Stein-
heil, of Munich, the tube proper of the telescope will be reduced to
one-half of the usual length. A prism will be placed at the end of
the tube opposite the object-glass, by which the rays which enter the
telescope will be turned at right angles through the perforated axis
of the pivots of the instrument, thus utilizing the necessary length of
this axis by making it an integral part of the telescope.

The observer will thus occupy one position, no matter to what part
of the meridian his telescope is pointed, which is, in itself, a great
advantage, on the score of convenience. This also will doubtless con-
duce to a constant personal equation, as it has been shown by the
director of the Albany Observatory, and others, that personal equa-
tions vary with the altitude of the observed star.

These instruments are provided with fine spirit-levels and with
micrometers, which fit them to be used as zenith-telescopes, and thus
to determine two of the three important qmesitm.

The parties of other nations will use similar methods for this pur-
pose. The coordinate which is most difficult of exact determination is
the longitude, and the problem of its determination will be attacked
in various ways.

The English parties, true to the traditions of Greenwich, are to be
provided with portable altitude and azimuth instruments with which
to observe moon transits, both in the meridian and out of it. A long
series of such moon-culminations was observed between Harvard Col-

TEE COMING TRANSIT OF VENUS. 217

lege Observatory and Greenwich some years ago, and it is now known
that the result obtained was greatly in error. Indeed, Prof. Peirce,
in his discussion of the series of observations, came to the conclusion
that it was impossible to derive the longitude of a place by this means,
certainly, within one second of time.

The Americans and Russians intend to depend on the occultations
of small stars by the moon.

Occultations are much more likely to be free from systematic
errors than the moon-culminations, and, if they can be observed
throughout a lunation, a compensation of errors will obtain.

The Russians intend to mask their stations of observation, and
subsequently to connect by telegraph St. Petersburg with the most
important of them. The transportation of chronometers to and fro
between the stations whose longitude is thus determined and the
minor ones will assure the longitude of the latter.

The American parties in the southern seas will be transported to
their various stations in a ship-of-war which will touch at the different
islands and leave the parties, and which will make chronometric
expeditions between the various stations. Besides this, all existing
telegraph-lines will be utilized. As each of the parties of each nation
is to be led by some astronomer of eminence, it is certain that no
means will be neglected to make the preliminary results of the greatest
attainable accuracy.

The various assistants are now in training at Greenwich, Poltava,
and Washington, with the very instruments which they will use on
the expeditions.

At Washington and Poltava an apparatus for the representation
of the transit is in use. A disk representing Venus is caused to travel
over an illuminated space which is representative of the sun, and the
circumstances of the transit are then observed.

In this way it is hoped to obtain an idea of the personal error of
each observer in watching contacts, so that, in reducing the observa-
tions of the transit, all personality may be eliminated.

Most of the American parties will start in the spring of 1874, and
proceed in the most expeditious way to their stations. They must
take with them every thing which they can need during their stay,
for in most of the stations there is no supply of any kind to draw
upon.

We can hardly realize the absolute necessity of being provided
with every thing that may he needed on such an expedition : but let
us conceive the feelings of an astronomer on a deSert island with no
screw-driver, or with no ink, or matches, or soap !

There is no repairing a blunder of outfitting in these cases, and the
greatest care has to be exercised in providing for all contingencies.

Arrived at its station the party will put up its observatory, a little
wooden or canvas but which has been brought from America, for no

2i8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

wood grows on tlds island. The instruments must next be mounted,
and all gotten in readiness for work.

The astronomer and his assistant set up the transit, the small equa-
torial (five inches' aperture, and about seven feet long), and the clock,
and provide safe places for their chronograph and chronometers. Sup-
pose a chronometer-spring breaks now : there is no help nearer than
Kew York. The two photographers put up their hut and prepare for
work. From this time until the time of the transit, all is work.

Every day the methods which will be adopted on the important
day are rehearsed. Each one does the very thing which he will do,
takes the very steps which he must then take, and turns the very same
micrometer-screws just as he will turn them in December. This is
repeated until every one is sick of it, and, from a man, each becomes a
machine.

During the nights the chief astronomer is looking for occultations,
or taking diiferential measures between the moon's limb and a star,
while the assistant is determining time and latitude. Sometimes their
work is interchanged, to eliminate any personal peculiarities of ob-
serving. When the final day comes, they should have their latitude
and longitude thoroughly well known, and their clocks and chronom-
eters rated perfectly. The photographers, too, should know the exact
strength of both, the precise time of exposure, and the right developer
to make the best possible negative of the sun.

"When the time of transit actually comes, the chief will be at the
eqiiatorial, and will observe the first contact, and record the time on
his chronograph, and at once commence measures of the distance of
cusps. The assistant astronomer will see that the heliostat which is
to throw the image of the sun into the stationary photographic tele-
scope does this properly ; and within the dark room the two photog-
raphers must be taking negatives as rapidly as possible.

This continues during the transit from first to second contacts ;
afterward the photographs succeed each other, but not so rapidly, and
finally, the last contact is marked. It is all over now, and there is
nothing to do but to write down at once all notes which are to be
used in the report, and to prepare W: a journey home.

Six or eight months on a rocky island, vast expense, and much
trouble and discomfort : but lejeu vaut la chandelle. The moral of it
is, that Science expects every man to do his duty. Let us hope that
Science will not be disappointed.

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 219

THE PEIMAKY CONCEPTS OF MODERN PHYSICAL

SCIENCE.

Bt J. B. STALLO.
III. — The Asstimption of the Essential Solidity of Matter.

IT cannot have escaped the notice of the attentive reader of the
passage quoted in my last paper from Prof. Tyndall's lecture on
" The Use of the Scientific Imagination " that Tyndall urges the
theory of the atomic constitution of matter as the only theory con-
sistent with its objective reality. He takes it for granted that the
alternative lies between the definite, tangible, solid atom on the one
hand, and a shadowy abstraction — a " vibrating, multiple proportion,
or a numerical ratio in a state of oscillation " — on the other. There
is no doubt that the opinion thus expressed is shared by the great ma-
jority of physicists, as well as of ordinary untrained men. To the
minds of most persons, as to the mind of Tyndall, the conception of
matter involves the notion of definite, tangible, and indestructible
solidity. It is the general tacit assumption that, of the three molecu-
lar states, or states of aggregation, in which matter presents itself to
the senses— the solid, the liquid, and the gaseous — the last two are
simply disguises of the first ; that a gas, for instance, is in fact a
group or cluster of solids, like a cloud of dust, diflfering from such a
cloud only by the greater regularity in the forms and distances of the
particles whereof it is composed, and by the fact that these particles
are controlled in the case of a gas by their mutual attractions and re-
pulsions, while in the case of the cloud of dust they are under the
sway of extrinsic forces. And, while the transition of the three
molecular states into each other in regular and invariable order is too
obvious to be ignored, it is supposed that the solid is the primaryj
normal, and typical state of which the liquid and gaseous, or aeri-
form, states are simply derivatives, and that, if these states are con-
sidered as evolved the one from the other, the order of evolution is
from the solid to the vapor or gas. In this view the solid form of
matter is not only the basis and origin of all its further determinations
— of all its evolutions and changes — but it is also the primary and
typical element of its mental representation and conception.

While this view of the relation between the molecular states of
matter is all but universally prevalent, it is not difiicult to show that
it is in irreconcilable conflict with the facts of scientific experience.
All evolution proceeds from the relatively Indeterminate to the rela-
tively Determinate, and from the comparatively Simple to the compara-
tively Complex. And (confining our attention, for the moment, to the
two extreme terms of the evolution, the solid and the gas, and ig-

220 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

noring the intermediate liquid) a comparison of the gaseous with the
solid state of matter at once shows that the former is, not the end, but
the beginning of the evolution. The gas is not only corapax-atively
indeterminate — without fixity of volume, without crystalline or other
structure, etc. — but it also exhibits, in its functional manifestations,
that simplicity and regularity which is characteristic of all types or
primary forms. Looking, Jirst, to the purely physical aspect of a gas
— I speak, of course, only of gases which are approximately perfect,
to the exclusion of vapors at low temperatures and of gases which are
readily coercible : its volume expands and contracts inversely as the
pressure to which it is subjected ; its velocity of difiusion is inversely
proportional to the square root of its density ; its rate of expansion
is uniform for equal increments of temperature ; its specific heat is the
same at all temperatures, and, in a given weight, for all densities and
under all pressures ; the specific heats of equal volumes of simple and
incondensible gases, as well as of compound gases formed without
condensation, are the same for all gases of whatever nature, and so on.
In all these respects the contrast with both the liquid and solid forms,
the relations of whose volumes, or structures, or both, to temperature
and to mechanical pressure or other force are complicated in the ex-
treme, is great and striking. But this contrast becomes still more
signal, secondly^ under the chemical aspect. We cannot, in any proper
sense, assign the proportions of volume in which the combination of
solids and liquids takes place — indeed, the combination of solids as
such is impossible — and the numbers expressive of the proportions of
the combining weights upon their face exhibit an appearance of irre-
lation and irregularity which the most sustained endeavors of scien-
tific men (such as Dumas, Strecker, Cooke, L. Meyer, Mendelejeft', and
Baumhauer) have been iinableto obliterate. In the combination of gases,
on the contrary, all is simplicity and order. " The ratio of volumes, in
which gases combine, is always simple, and the volume of the resulting
gaseous product bears a simple ratio to the volumes of its constituents "
— such is the law of the combination of gaseous volumes known as the
law of Gay-Lussac. By weight, the ratio of combination between
hydrogen and chlorine is 1 to 35.5; by volumes, one volume of hy-
drogen combines with one volume of chlorine (the volumes being
taken, of course, at the same j^ressures and temperatures) so as to
form two volumes of hydrochloric acid. Oxygen and hydrogen com-
bine in the proportion of 16 to 2 by weight ; but one volume of oxy-
gen combines with two volumes of hydrogen, forming two volumes
of watery vapor. Xitrogen and hydrogen, whose atomic weights, so
called, are 14 and 1 respectively, combine in the simple ratio of one
volume of nitrogen to three volumes of hydrogen, the combination re-
sulting in two volumes of gaseous ammonia. And carbon, whose
'atomic weight' is 12, though it cannot be actually obtained in gas-
eous form, is assumed by all chemists (for reasons not necessary to

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 221

state here) to combine with hydrogen in the ratio of one volume to
four, so as to yield two volumes of marsh-gas.

It seems to be evident, then, that the typical and primary state of
matter is, not the solid, but the gas. And, this being so, it follows
that the molecular evolution of matter conforms to the law of all evo-
lution in proceeding from the indeterminate to the determinate, from
the simple to the complex, from the gaseous to the solid form. This
is no longer a mere pre&umption ; if the nebular hypothesis, so called,
after being stripped of its non-essential features, is recognized as a
true theory — as it is by all the prominent physicists of the day since
the recent revelations of the spectroscope — the gaseous form of matter,
in fact, precedes the liquid and solid forms in the order of Nature,
and the solid is not the initial, but the concluding term of material
evolution. Inasmuch, therefore, as the explanation of any phenomenon
consists in the exhibition of its genesis from its simplest beginnings,
or from its earliest forms, the gaseous form of matter is the true basis
for the explanation of the solid form, and not conversely the solid for
the explanation of the gas.

From the foregoing considerations I take it to be evident that the
true relation between the molecular states of matter is the exact re-
verse of that universally assumed. The universality of this assump-
tion, however, indicates that it is not due to a mere chance error of
speculation, but to some natural bias of the mind. The question
arises, therefore : What is the origin of this prevalent delusion re-
specting the constitution of matter ? I believe the answer to this
question to be exceedingly simple, and important in proportion to its
simplicity. There are certain fallacies to which the human intellect
is liable by reason of the laws of its growth which I propose to call
structural fallacies, one of which is that the intellect tends to con-
found the order of the genesis of its ideas respecting material objects
with the order of the genesis of these objects themselves. It is well
known that the progress of our knowledge depends upon analogy —
upon a reduction of the Strange and Unknown to the terms of the Fa-
miliar and Known. In a certain sense it is true, what has been .often
said, that all cognition is recognition. "Man constantly institutes
comparisons," says Pott (" Etymologische Forschungen," ii., 139),
"between the new which presents itself to him, and the old which he
already knows." That this is so is shown by the development of lan-
guage. The great agent in the evolution of language is metaphor —
the transference of a word from its ordinary and received meaning to
an analogous one. This transference of the name descriptive of a
known and familiar thing to the designation of an unknown and un-
familiar thing typifies the proceeding of the intellect in all cases where
it deals with new and strange phenomena. It assimilates these phe-
nomena to those which are known ; it identifies the Strange, as far as
possible, with the Familiar ; it apprehends tliat which is extraordinary

222 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

and uncommon in terms of that which is ordinary and common. But
that which is most obvious to the senses is both the earliest and most
persistent presence in consciousness, and thus receives the stamp of
the greatest familiarity. Kovr, the most obtrusive form of matter is
the solid, and for this reason it is that form which is first cognized
by the infant intellect of mankind, and thus serves as the basis for the
subsequent recognition of other forms. Accordingly we find that, on
the early stages of human history, the solid alone was apprehended as
material. It was long before even atmospheric air, obtrusive as it was
in wind and storm, came to be known as a form of matter. To this
day words signifying wind or breath — animus, spiritus, geist, ghost,
etc. — are the terms denoting that which is the fundamental correlate
of matter, even in the languages of civilized nations. And it is very
questionable whether either the ancient philosophers or the mediaeval
alchemists distinctly apprehended any aeriform substance, other than
atmospheric air, as material. It is certain that up to the time of Van
Helmont, in the latter part of the sixteenth and the first decades of
the seventeenth century, aeriform matter was not the subject of sus-
tained scientific investigation.

It is obvious, then, that, while the progress of evolution in Xature
is from the aeriform to the solid state of matter, the progress of the
evolution of knowledge in the minds of men was conversely from the
solid to the aeriform ; and, as a consequence, the aeriform or gaseous
state came to be apprehended as a mere modification of solidity. For
the same reason, the first form of material action which was appre-
hended by the dawning intellect of man was the interaction between
solids — mechanical interaction — and from this, again, it followed that
the difference between the solid and the gas was apprehended as a
mere difference of distance between the solid particles, as produced by
mechanical motion.

Again : familiarity, in the minds of ordinary men, is universally con-
founded with simplicity. And, the explanation of a phenomenon con-
sisting, as we liave seen, in an exhibition of its genesis from its simplest
beginnings, the mind, in its attempts to explain the gaseous form, nat-
urally retraces the stej^s in the evolution of its ideas concerning matter
— of its concepts of matter — back to the earliest, most familiar, and
therefore apparently simplest form in which matter was and is appre-
hended, and assumes the solid particle, the atom, as the ultimate fact,
as the primary element for all representation and conception of ma-
terial existence.

This is not the place to develop the important consequences which
flow from the total subversion of the prevailing concepts respecting
the constitution of matter that, in my judgment, is inevitable. When
it comes to be fully realized that an aeriform body is not a group of
absolute solids, biit is elastic to the core; that a gas is a gas through-
out, and in its very essence ; that in the simplest states of matter there

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 223

is no absolute residuum which is exempt from all change and remains
constant amid all variation — when the relation of primordial matter to
its structural, or rather formative, agencies is properly understood —
the whole science of molecular statics and dynamics will press at once
for thorough reorganization.

It may be proper, in this connection, before I proceed to the dis-
cussion of another topic, to say a few words about the ordinary me-
chanical explanation of the molecular states of matter, or states of
aggregation, on the basis of the atomic theory. This explanation pro-
ceeds on the assumption that the molecular states are produced by the
conflict of antagonistic central forces — molecular attraction and repul-
sion— the preponderance of the one or the other of which gives rise to
the solid and gaseous forms, while their balance or equilibrium results
in the liquid state. The utter futility of this explanation is apparent
at a glance. Even waiving the considerations presented by Herbert
Spencer (" First Principles," p. 60, et seq.) that, in view of the necessary
variation of the attractive and repulsive forces in the inverse ratio of
the squai'es of the distances, the constituent atoms of a body, if they
are in equilibrio at any particular distance, must be equally in equilibrio
at all other distances, and that their density or state, therefore, must
be invariable ; and, admitting that the increase or diminution of the
repulsive force, heat, may render the preponderance of either force,
and thus the change of density or state of aggregation, possible : what
becomes of the liquid state as corresponding to the exact balance of
these two forces in the absence of external coercion ? The exact bal-
ance of the two opposing forces is a mere mathematical limit which
must be passed with the slightest preponderance of either force over
the other. All bodies being subject to continual changes of tempera-
ture, the equilibrium can at best be but momentary ; it must of neces-
sity be of the most labile kind. If the mechanical explanation of the
molecular states were valid, all bodies would present the phenomena
exhibited by arsenic under the action of heat — they would at once pass
from the solid into the gaseous form, the intervening liquid state van-
ishing after the manner of all limits.

The notion of the essential solidity of matter of necessity leads to —
indeed, at bottom, is identical with — the assumption of its absolute
hardness or unchangeability of volume, and thus involves the theory
of the atomic constitution of matter in its ordinary form. This as-
sumption is connected with another fallacious bias of the mind, which
results from the inability of the mind to consider phenomena other-
wise than singly, and under some one definite aspect — the tendency to
assign absolute limits to every series of material phenomena. It has
been a favorite tenet, not only of metaphysicians but of physicists as
well, that reality is cognizable only as absolute, permanent, and inva-
riable, or, as the metaphysicians of the sixteenth and seventeenth cen-
turies expressed it, sub sjyecie ccterni et absoluti. This proposition, like

224 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

so many others which have served as pillars of imposing metaphysical
structures, is the precise opposite of the truth. All material reality is,
in its nature, not absolute, but essentially relative. All material re-
ality depends upon determination ; and determination is essentially
limitation, as even Spinoza well knew. A " thing in and by itself" is
an impossibility. And I may add here (without dwelling upon it fur-
ther, a discussion of this subject being foreign to my theme), the
" \\m\gper se " is not only impossible, according to the criteria of our
intellect, but it is not the object of knowledge, in any sense, and can-
not, therefore, be the legitimate subject of speculation. As Terrier
would say, we can neither know it nor be ignorant of it. I do not
speak here merely of objects without relation to the intellect, in the
sense of Feriier's " Theory of Ignorance," but of objects without rela-
tion to each other. " We only know any thing," justly says John
Stuart ]Mill (" Examination of Sir W. Hamilton's Philosophy," i, 14),
" by knowing it as distinguished from something else ; all conscious-
ness is of difference ; two objects is the smallest number required to
constitute consciousness ; a thing is only seen to be what it is by con-
trast with what it is not." Here, again, the doctrines of psychology
are corroborated by the teachings of the science of language. " Words,"
says Rev. Eichard Garnett ("Philological Essays," p. 282), "express
the relations of things ; and this, it is believed, is strictly applicable to
every word in every language, and under every possible modification."
Among those who have had occasion of late to insist upon the
relativity of all objective reality is Prof. Helmholtz. Speaking of the
inveterate prejudice according to which the qualities of things must
be analogous to, or identical with, our perceptions of them, he says
(" Die neueren Fortschritte in der Theorie des Sehens," Pop. wiss.
Yortraege II., 55, et seq.) : " Every property or quality of a thing is in
reality nothing else than its capability of producing certain effects on
other things. The effect occurs either between connatural parts of the
same body, so as to produce differences of aggregation, or it proceeds
from one body to another, as in the case of chemical reactions ; or the
effects are upon our organs of sense and manifest themselves as sensa-
tions such as those with which we are here concerned (the sensations
of sight). Such an effect we call a- ' property,' its reagent being un-
derstood without being expressly mentioned. Thus we speak of the
'solubility' of a substance, meaning its behavior toward water ; we
speak of its ' weight,' meaning its attraction to the earth ; and we
may justly call a substance ' blue,' under the tacit assumption tliat we
are only speaking of its action upon a normal eye. But, if what we
call a property always implies a relation between two things, then a
property or quality can never depend upon the nature of one agent
alone, but exists only in relation to and dependence on the nature of
some second object acted upon. Hence, there is really no sense in
talking of properties of light which belong to it absolutely, indepen-

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 225

dently of all other objects, and which ai-e supposed to be representable
in the sensations of the human eye. The notion of such properties is a
contradiction in itself. They cannot possibly exist, and therefore we
cannot expect to find any coincidence of our sensations of color with
qualities of light."

The fundamental truth which is implied in these sentences is of such
transcendent importance that it is hardly possible to be too emphatic
in its statement, or too profuse in its illustration. All quality is rela-
tion ; all action is reaction ; all force is antagonism ; all measure is a
ratio between terms neither of which is absolute ; every objectively
real thing is a term in numberless series of mutual implications, and
its reality oiitside of these series is utterly inconceivable. A material
entity, absolute in any of its aspects, would be nothing less than a
finite infinitude. There is no absolute material quality, no absolute
material substance, no absolute physical unit, no absolutely simple
physical entity, no absolute constant, no absolute standard either of
quantity or quality, no absolute motion, no absolute rest, no absolute
time, no absolute space. There is no physical thing, nor is there a
real or conceptual element of such a thing, which is either its own sup-
port or its own measure, and which abides either quantitatively, or
qualitatively, otherwise than in perpetual change, in an unceasing flow
of mutations. An object is large only as compax-ed with another which,
as a term of this comparison, is small, but which, as a term in a com-
parison with a third object, may be indefinitely large ; and the com-
parison which determines the magnitude of objects is between its terms
alone, and not between any or all of these terms, and an absolute
standard. An object is hard as compared with another which is soft,
but which, in turn, may be contrasted with a third still softer ; and,
again, there is no standard object which is either absolutely hard or
absolutely soft. A body is simple as compared with the compound
into which it enters as a constituent ; but there is, and can be no physi-
cally real thing which is absolutely simple. Similarly, all changes of
position or distance between two bodies are wholly relative, and it is
a matter of purely arbitrary determination, which of them is taken as
being at rest, and which as in motion. It is equally true to say that
the earth falls toward the apple, and that the apple falls toward the
earth.

I may observe, in this connection, that not only the law of causality,
the persistence of force, and the indestructibility of matter, have their
root in the relativity of all objective reality — being, indeed, simply
difierent aspects of this relativity — but that Newton's first and third
laws of motion, as well as all laws of least action, so calied, in me-
chanics (including Gauss's law of movement under least coercion), are
but corollaries from the same principle. And the fact that everything
is, in its manifest existence, but a group of relations and reactions, at
once accounts for Nature's inherent teleology.

VOL. IV. — 15

226 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The truth that all our knowledge of objective reality depends upon
the establishment or recognition of relations, has been proclaimed by
innumei-able thinkers, but, nevertheless, is constantly lost sight of, or
ignored. There is nothing more interesting and instructive, tlian a
review of the errors and j^erplexities that have been entailed by the
rejection or disregard of this truth both upon metaphysical specula-
tion, and upon physical science. The ontological vagaries spun from
the proposition that all reality is in its last elements absolute, do not,
of course, concern us here ; there is, however, one form of this propo-
sition which is so intimately connected with the main subject under
discussion, that it is, perhaps, well to indulge in a passing allusion to it.

Leibnitz places at the head of his " Monadology " the principle that
there must be simple substances, because there are compound sub-
stances. " JVecesse est,'''' he says, " dari substantias simplices quia
dantur co7npositm.^^ This enthymeme, though it has been long since
exploded in metaphysics, is still regarded by many physicists as proof
of the real existence of absolutely simple constituents of matter. Nev-
ertheless, it is obvious that it is nothing but a vicious paralogism — a
fallacy of the class known in logic as fallacies of suppressed relative.
The existence of a compound substance certainly proves the existence
of component parts which, relatively to this substa?ice, are simple. But
it proves nothing w^hatever as to the simplicity of these parts in them-
selves.

Among the most notable intellectual hobbles resulting from the
attempt to deal with quantity as an absolute, self-determining entity
are the various theories of infinitesimals in mathematics, and of the
real basis of the difierential and integral calculus. The consideration
of these theories is beyond the limits of my task, which restricts me to
the discussion of questions relating to physical science. But within
these limits, it is by no means difficult to find conspicuous proof of the
fact that the supposed physical constant of weight and volume, the
" atom," is by no means the only absolute real term — the only finite
infinitude — which is postulated by physical science in its most recent
forms. How completely the minds of modern physicists are under the
control of the conceit that physical entities, for purposes of their real
apprehension, can be disentangled from the net-work of relations as a
part of which they present themselves both to thought and to sense, is
at once seen upon the most cursory examination of the remarkable
speculative writings which have been published of late by eminent
scientific men. I select from the many lectures and essays of this
class which have fallen under my notice, a lecture delivered November
3, 1869, in the Aula of the University of Liepsic, by Dr. C. Neumann
(Professor of Mathematics at the university, and well known as the
author of several important contributions to the theory of Abel's In-
tegrals), " On the Principles of the Galileo-Newtonian Theory." ' The
1 "Ueber die Principien der Galilei-Newton'schen Theorie. Akademische An-

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 227

first part of this lecture is without special interest for us here ; but the
second part is of the greatest possible significance as an exhibition of
the tendency of physicists to postulate determinate last elements, ab-
solute spatial limits, and invariable physical standards in the construc-
tion of material phenomena. For this reason, I shall take the liberty
of reproducing, as literally as is possible in a translation, the most
important passages of this part of the lecture.

"The principles of the Galileo -Newtonian theories," says Prof.
Neumann {loc. cit.., p. 11), " consist in two laws — the law of inertia pro-
claimed by Galileo, and the law of attraction added by Newton. . . .
A material point, when once set in motion, free from the action of
an extraneous force, and wholly left to itself, continues to move in a
straight line so as to describe equal spaces in equal times. Such is
Galileo's law of inertia. It is impossible that this proposition should
stand in its present form as the corner-stone of a scientific edifice, as
the starting-point of mathematical deductions. For it is perfectly
unintelligible, inasmuch as we do not know what is meant by " mo-
tion in a straight line," or, rather, inasmuch as we do not know that
the words " motion in a straight line " are susceptible of various in-
terpretations. A motion, for instance, which is rectilinear as seen from
the earth, would be curvilinear as seen from the sun, and would be
represented by a diflerent curve as often as we change our point of
observation to Jupiter, to Saturn, or another celestial body. In
short, every motion which is rectilinear with reference to one celes-
tial body, will appear curvilinear with reference to another celestial
body

" The words of Galileo, according to which a material point left to
itself proceeds in a straight line, appear to us, therefore, as words
without meaning — as expressing a proposition which, to become in-
telligible, is in need of a definite background. 2'/iere must be giveyi in
the iijiiverse some special body as the basis of our co^nparison^ as the
object in reference to which all motions are to be estimated ; and only
when such a body is given, shall we be able to attach to those words
a definite meaning. Now, what body is it which is to occupy this
eminent position ? Or, are there several such bodies ? Are the motions
near the earth to be referred to the terrestrial globe, perhaps, and
those near the sun, to the solar sphere ? . . . .

"Unfortunately, neither Galileo nor Newton gives us a definite
answer to this question. But, if we carefully examine the theoretical
structure which they erected, and which has since been continually
enlarged, its foundations can no longer remain hidden. We readlhj
see that all actual or imagmable ^notions in the universe must be re-
ferred to one and the same body. Where this body is, and what are

trittsvorlesung gehalten in der Aula der Univcrsitat, Leipzig, am 8. November, 1869.
Von Dr. C. Neumann, ord. Professor der Mathematik an der Universitiit, Leipzig," etc.
Leipzig, B. G. Teubner, 1870.

228 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the reasons for assigning to it this eminent, and, as it were, sovereign
position, these are questions to which there is no answer.

" It will he necessary, therefore, to establish the projiosition, as the
first 2yrincl2)le of the Galileo-Newtonian theory, that in some unknown
place of the universe there is an imknown body — a body absolutely
rigid and unchangeable for all time in its figure and dimensions. J
may be permitted to call this body " The body Alpha." It looidd
then be necessary to add that the motion of a body woidd import, not
its change of place in reference to the earth or sun, but its change of
position in reference to the body Alpha.

" From this point of view the law of Galileo is seen to have a definite
meaning. This meaning presents itself as a second principle, which is,
that a material point left to itself progresses in a straight line — pro-
ceeds, therefore, in a course which is rectilinear in reference to the
body Alpha."

It will be observed that the assumption which underlies all this
reasoning of Prof. Neumann is that, to conceive motion as real, it is
necessary to conceive it as absolute — an assumption in every respect
analogous to that of Prof Tyndall, according to which the reality of
matter implies its constitution from absolute, unvarying elements.
The logical parentage of the body Alpha is precisely the same as that
of the " atom." And I may add that the assumption of Prof. Neu-
mann is the tacit assumption of almost all the physicists and philoso-
phers of the day, although it is not usually developed to its last con-
sequences. It is one of the tasts of Herbert Spencer, for instance, to
exhibit the contradictions involved in the essential relativity of motion.
" A body impelled by the hand," says Spencer (" First Princij^les,"
chap, iii., § 17), "is clearly perceived to move, and to move in a def-
inite direction : there seems at first sight no possibility of doubting
that its motion is real, or that it is toward a given point. Yet it is
easy to show that we not only may be, but usually are, quite wrong in
both these judgments. Here, for instance, is a ship which, for sim-
plicity's sake, we will suppose to be anchored at the equator, with her
head to the west. When the captain walks from stem to stern, in
what direction does he move ? East is the obvious answer — an an-
swer which for the moment may pass without criticism. But now the
anchor is heaved, and the vessel sails to the west with a velocity equal
to that at which the captain walks. In what direction does he now
move when he goes from stem to stern ? You cannot say east, for the
vessel is carrying him as fast toward the west as he walks to the east ;
and you cannot say west, for the converse reason. In respect to sur-
rounding space, he is stationary, though to all on board the ship he
seems moving. But now are we quite sure of this conclusion ? Is he
really stationary ? When we take into account the earth's motion
round its axis, we find that, instead of being stationary, he is travel-
ing at the rate of 1,000 miles per hour to the east ; so that neither the

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 229

perception of one who looks at him, nor the inference of one who
allows for the ship's motion, is any thing like the truth. Nor, indeed,
on further consideration, shall we find the revised conclusion much bet-
ter. For we have forgotten to allow for the earth's motion in its
orbit. This being some 68,000 miles per hour, it follows that, assuming
the time to be mid-day, he is moving, not at the rate of 1,000 miles
per hour to the east, but at the rate of 67,000 miles per hour to the
west. Nay, not even now have we discovered the true rate and the
true direction of his movement. With the earth's progress in its
orbit, we have to join that of the whole solar system toward the con-
stellation Hercules; and, when we do this, we perceive that he is mov-
ing neither east nor west, but in a line inclined to the plane of the
ecliptic, and at a velocity greater or less (according to the time of the
year) than that above named. To which let us add that, were the
dynamic arrangements of our sidereal system fully known to us, we
should probably discover the direction and rate of his actual move-
ment to differ considerably even from these. How illusive are our
ideas of motion is thus made sufficiently manifest. That which seems
moving proves to be stationary ; that which seems stationary proves
to be moving ; while that which we conclude to be going rapidly in
one direction turns out to be going much more rapidly in the opposite
direction. And so we are taught that what we are conscious of is not
the real motion of any object, either in its rate or direction, but merely
its motion as measured from an assigned position — either the position
we ourselves occupy or some other. Yet in this very process of con'
eluding that the motions ice perceive are not the real motions, loe tacitly
assume that there are real motions. In revising our successive judg-
ments concerning a body's course or velocity, we take for granted that
there is an actual course or an actual velocity — we take for granted
that there are fixed points in space toith respect to %chich all motions
are absolute ; and we find it impossible to rid ourselves of this idea.
Nevertheless, absolute motion cannot even be imagined, much less
hioion. Motion, as talcing ptlace apart from those limitations of space
which ice habitually associate with it, is totally unthinkable. For mo-
tion is change of place ; but, in unlimited space, change of place is
inconceivable, because place itself is inconceivable. Place can be con-
ceived only by reference to other places ; and, in the absence of objects
dispersed through space, a place could be conceived only in relation
to the limits of space ; whence it follows that in unlimited space place
cannot be conceived — all places must be equidistant from boundaries
that do not exist. Thus, while we are obliged to think that there is
an absolute motion, we find absolute motion incomprehensible."

I have quoted this elaborate exposition from the text of Mr. Spen-
cer, because it most clearly evinces the difficulty experienced even by
those who habitually insist upon the relativity, not only of all our
actual knowledge, but also of all our possible cognition, in freeing

230 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

themselves from the prejudice that nothing can be real which is not
absolute.

Prof. Xeumanu is not content with showing, or attempting to show,
that the reality of motion necessitates its reference to a rigid body-
unchangeable in its position in space, but he seeks to verify this as-
sumption by asking himself the question what consequences would
ensue, on the hypothesis of the mere relativity of motion, if all bodies
in space, except one, were annihilated. " Let us suppose," he says
{loc. cit., p. 27), "that among the stars there is one which consists of
fluid matter, and which, like our earth, is in rotary motion around an
axis passing through its centre. In consequence of this motion, by
virtue of the centrifugal forces developed by it, this star will have
the form of an ellipsoid. What form, now, I ask, will this star assume
if suddenly all other celestial bodies are annihilated ?

" These centrifugal forces depend solely upon the state of the star
itself ; they are wholly independent of the other celestial bodies.
These forces, therefore, as well as the ellipsoidal form, will persist, ir-
respective of the continued existence or disappearance of the other
bodies. But, if motion is defined as something relative — as a relative
change of place of two points — the answer is very different. If, on
this assumption, we suppose all other celestial bodies to be annihilated,
nothing remains but the material points of which the star in question
itself consists. But, then, these points do not change their relative
positions, and are therefore at rest. It follows that the star must be
at rest at the moment when the annihilation of the other bodies takes
place, and therefore must assume the spherical form taken by all bodies
in a state of rest. A contradiction so intolerable can be avoided only
by abandoning the assumption of the relativity of motion, and con-
ceiving motion as absolute, so that thus we are again led to the prin-
ciple of the body Alpha."

This reasoning of Prof. Xeumann is irrefutable, if we concede the
admissibility of his hypothesis of the destruction of all bodies in space
but one. But the very principle of relativity forbids such an hypoth-
esis. The annihilation of all bodies but one would not only destroy
the motion of this one remaining body and bring it to rest, as Prof.
Neumann sees, but it would also destroy its very existence and bring
it to naught, as he does not see. A body cannot survive the system
of relations in which alone it has its being ; its 2yresence or position in
space is no more possible without reference to other bodies than its
change of position or presence is possible without such reference ; and,
as I have abundantly shown, all properties of a body are in their na-
ture relations, and imply terms beyond the body itself. The case
put by Prof. Neumann is thus an attestation of the truth that the es-
sential relativity of all physical reality implies the persistence both
of force and of matter, so that his argument is a demonstration, not
of the falsity, but of the truth of the principle of relativity.

A POWDER-MILL EXPLOSION. 231

As there is no Unconditional in subjective thought, so there is no
Absolute in objective reality. There is no absolute system of co-
ordinates in space to which the positions of bodies and their changes
can be referred ; and there is neither an absolute measure of quantity,
nor an absolute standard of quality. There is no physical constant.

A POWDER-MILL EXPLOSION.

Bt WILLIAM AIKMAN.

I PROPOSE to have a talk about an explosion of a powder-mill. It
has never been my hap to see one described, and it has seemed to
me that an account of an occurrence of this sort, which does not come
under common observation, might not be uninteresting.

While explosions are not the final cause of powder-works — that is,
while they are not built expressly for the purpose of exploding — yet
they are located with reference to it. It was the fortune of this writer
to reside for a number of years within a few miles of the powder-
manufactories of the Messrs. Dupont, of Delaware, and so had oppor-
tunities of observing the thing of which he speaks. These works
will probably be a fair example of others.

These powder-mills, perhaps the most extensive in the country, are
about three miles above the city of Wilmington, on the banks of the
Brandywine River. The position was selected, some fifty or more
years ago, by the father of the present proprietors. It is one of the
most beautiful in this whole land. The river flows through an ex-
quisite valley, where at every step some new beauty of wood and hill
enchants the eyes.

The powder-works are placed at wide intervals for perhaps a half
mile along the banks. They are so secluded and hidden that they are
never seen or known to be there by an ordinary or uninformed trav-
eler. Should you be riding along one of the hilly and beautiful roads
near the mills, you would not only find nothing to suggest their prox-
imity, but could only by inquiry discover the roads that lead to them.

The elder Dupont, father of the late illustrious Admiral Dupont,
was a man of remarkable energy and business ability. In nothing did
he show his character and foresight more than in the selection of the
location of these mills. During the administration, or after it, of
President Jefierson, Dupont came to this country from his native
France with the purpose of establishing a manufactory of gunpowder
in some favorable location. He found his way to Virginia, and made
the acquaintance of Jefferson, who cordially welcomed him to the hos-
pitalities of Monticello.

TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Anxious to promote the prosperity of that noble State, Jefferson
urged upon Dupont Virginia as the place where his contemplated
works should be established, and detained him with the courtesies of
his home until he could exhibit to him the capabilities and attractions
of the country.

Dupont accepted the invitation, and willingly and carefully exam-
ined the various places brought under his notice. After a few weeks
of inspection and exploration, he reluctantly informed Jefferson that
he could not see his way clear to settle in Virginia.

"Is it that the country is not favorable?" asked his entertainer.

" No," was the reply ; "it is magnificent."

"Cannot favorable locations be procured? Is not water-power
abundant ? Cannot materials be found ? "

" Yes, yes, but I do not like one thing that I find here."

"But what is that?"

" It's your institution of slavery. I cannot settle where it will be
around me."

So Dupont came north, and the powder-manufactories were not
established in Virginia.

The city of Paterson, near Xew York, was then a small village,
with its glorious falls of the Passaic not utilized to death as they are
to-day, and without a manufactory of any importance within its pre-
cincts. Dupont was freely offered a location there, and was strongly
inclined to accept it. Every thing was favorable ; the position of the
land, the unbounded facilities of water-power, ease of transportation,
accessibility to a large city, all pointed out the desirableness of the
locality ; but the sagacious man declined all offers.

" I see," said he, " that this beautiful spot will not remain many
years as it is now. Before long, a city or town will grow up just
here ; extensive manufactories, attracted by this unlimited supply of
water, with so many feet of fall, will line the banks of this river.
When that time comes, the inhabitants will not brook the presence of
a powder-mill, and I, after years of labor, and when all my works are
established, will be compelled to move off and away. I must find
some place where I can reasonably hope to remain undisturbed."

The secluded banks of the Brandywine, in Delaware, invited him,
and the works were erected in its quiet valley.

The tract of land first purchased was large, occupying both banks
of the river. It has, in the lapse of years, been gradually increased
in size. The Duponts never sell, but are always ready to buy land
which lies in their vicinity. The same policy which shaped the action
of the father has been continued by the sons — to acquire a property
so extensive that no neighboring proprietor can be near enough to
desire the removal of their works or be injured by their proximity.
This they have accomplished. The country, for perhaps a mile on
either side of the Brandywine River, is in their possession, and no one

A POWDER-MILL EXPLOSION. 233

has a residence, except by their consent, within the possibility of harm
from an explosion in their works.

Thus, while such explosions are more or less frequent, the detona-
tion of one of them, if it be not of special violence, excites only the
passing remark of a dweller in the neighboring city of Wilmington,
and never injures any one outside the works.

Not only is the general location selected, but the various buildings
of these powder-manufactories are placed, in reference to the ever-
present danger of an explosion. The works are not connected with
one another in one great building, or in a connected series of build-
ings. They are built along the river-banks for over half a mile on
either side, and with so much of distance between them that an
explosion in one does not ordinarily communicate itself to another,
and its destructive effects do not extend beyond the immediate vicinity
of the building in which it occurred.

The buildings themselves are constructed carefully with reference
to these accidents. They — at least those where the process of manu-
facture reaches the stage of danger — are built of stone, with three
massive walls of solid masonry some ten or twelve feet thick. The
fourth side, that which looks toward the river, is made of light frame-
work. The roof is constructed as simply as possible, and is laid upon
the walls, and not built into them.

The design of this method of construction may be readily seen.
If an explosion occurs, the boarded roof and side of the building
readily yield, and are blown into the river, while the massive walls of
the other three sides withstand the shock. The building is like a
huge mortar. By this additional precaution, the lateral effects of
the explosion are prevented, and the buildings on either side are
measurably protected.

These precautionary measures, however, are not always effectual.
As a general thing — for explosions of greater or less violence are not
infrequent — a single dull, heavy detonation is heard, and it is almost
unnoticed by those residing in the neighborhood. If slight, it may
readily be taken for the noise of a blast in the quarries near by. As,
in certain stages of the manufacture, the machinery is set in motion,
and the workman leaves the room when the danger is most imminent,
life is not necessarily lost by the accident. The only harm that has
occurred is the loss of the simple machinery, the materials, and the
lighter portion of the building.

Sometimes the case is very different. I have a very vivid remem-
brance of one. It was the first and the most severe of which I had
any experience.

I was sitting with some friends in the parlor of my house, at about
eleven o'clock in the morning, when there came a sudden jar and a
fearful shock of some very heavy body falling, as I thought, upon the
piazza, which ran along the rear of the house. I started from ray

234 ^^^^ POPULAR SCIE2\-CE MONTHLY.

seat and toward the door, to see what had happened there, but had
scai-celj risen when another concussion and a mighty detonation
came. I supposed that a very heavy piece of artillery had been dis-
charged in the street, just in the rear of the house. Before I could
reach the door, but a few feet away, there came another detonation
and another terrific jar, which shook, as the others had done, the house
to its foundations. The three reports were in siich rapid succession
as to be almost simultaneous, but thought was quicker than they, and
leaped from supposition to supposition in an instant. The last concus-
sion dissolved my doubts as to the origin of those that had preceded
it, and I at once looked in the direction in which I knew the powder-
mills to lie.

A spectacle of exquisite beauty and sublimity met my eyes, which
will abide in my memory forever. I can hardly expect to convey to
the reader the impression which it made upon me. Towering in
the heavens, sharply defined against the deep-blue sky, was a column
of dazzling white, perhaps a mile in height, and a thousand feet in
diameter. Its sides were evenly cut and in perfect symmetry through
the whole length of the marvelous column, till they spread out on
either side at the top in a broad, palm-like canopy. The mid-day sun
was shining upon it, and lighting it up with an unearthly splendor,
while it seemed to stand almost over us. We gazed awe-struck and
entranced upon it, and could easily think of that pillar of cloud that,
in the olden time, stood in its awful majesty in front of the camp of
Israel.

It was so vast that it seemed close at hand, although it was three
miles away. \Ye watched it silently till it slowly changed its form,
and gradually drifted in great cumulous clouds away. It was a vision
of singular and glorious beauty, such as I never expect to see again.

In this instance three buildings had been destroyed. The shock
of the explosions was exceedingly marked and peculiar, difierent from
any thing that I had previously known. It had a sort of pervasive
character that suggested the cause as being immediately at hand.
My first impression was not of something at a distance, but rather of
the jar of a heavy body falling within four or five feet of where we
were sitting, and, when it was repeated, of a cannon discharged close
by the house. It seemed to be underneath and all around — to fill the
very earth and air.

This pervasive character of the shock is very remarkable. It is the
same in all that I have heard. It seems to be felt scarcely more vio-
lently in the immediate vicinity of the place where it occurred than
miles away. In this case we were between three and four miles oif, and
yet the explosion could scarcely have been more startling and severely
felt, or have seemed nearer, to those who were within a few rods of the
place. Indeed, on certain occasions, the violence of the shock is felt
much more at a distance than close at hand. In one instance that I

A POWDER-MILL EXPLOSION. 235

remember, the detonation and concussion were felt and heard distinctly
and severely in Philadelphia and in Chester County, Pennsylvania,
some thirty miles away, while they were scarcely noticed in Wil-
mington.

The sound and shock of these explosions must be strikingly similar
to those of an earthquake. A few years since — it was on the very day
that Chicago was burning — a severe shock of an earthquake was felt
in Wilmington, Del., and its vicinity. It is described to me, by those
who experienced it, as peculiarly alarming. The concussion was ter-
rific, shaking the houses, opening doors, disturbing furniture, and the
boom of the repoi't was exceedingly loud and startling. In an instant
all instinctively sprang to their western windows, and almost at once on
every accessible roof spectators were gazing toward the northwest, the
direction in which the Dupont powder-works are situated. The univer-
sal impression was, that there had been an explosion of unusual vio-
lence at those works. It was only when, after a time, no column of
smoke was seen to rise, that any other explanation was suggested.
The noise and the concussion were precisely like what had often been
heard before on such an occasion.

The pervasive character of the sound and the shock in both the
earthquake and the explosion of a powder-magazine are probably due
to the same cause. They are propagated along the line of rocky
strata. A continuous stratum of rock extends from the Brandywine to
Philadelphia and its neighborhood, and this gives an obvious explana-
tion to the fact, to which allusion has already been made, that the de-
tonation and concussion are heard quite as distinctly as, and sometimes
more so, at a distance, than, at a point nearer at hand.

I was curious to witness the effects of an explosion at the place
where it occurred, so I set out at once for it. A great concourse was
thronging the avenue leading toward the powder-mills, and dotting the
fields which lay between them and the city. There was no time to be
lost in hiring a vehicle ; so, giving some specimens of tall pedestrianism,
learned of yore in the streets of New York, I was soon in advance of
the crowd, and, in company with a young and wiry Scotchman, whom
I could not outwalk, was over the beautiful hills and through the
woods which skirt the Brandywine, and at the place.

It was difficult, indeed, as I think of it now after some years, quite
impossible, to realize what had taken place not an hour before. The
day was at its noon, and the lovely valley was sleeping in quiet beauty.
All was perfectly still, with nothing to suggest the terrible occurrence,
except it might be those two or three rounded heaps yonder, over
which a white canvas sheet was thrown. Under them lay the poor
mutilated I'emains of what a little while ago were stalwart men. It
was not good for loved one or stranger to look upon them now !

What struck me more than any thing else was the peculiar air of
cleanliness and order that was over the place. Every thing, trees,

236 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MOXTHLY.

stones, road-bed, were all blackened, but all were smoothly swept. It
seemed as if some time before there had been a fire which had black-
ened every thing, and that some one had gone round afterward, and,
carefully gathering up and conveying away all the dehi'is, had scru-
pulously swept the whole with brooms, leaving only the soot-stains
behind.

Nothing of the sort had been done. Here was simply the result
of the storm that had a little while before swept the spot. Usually,
the force of the explosion is so great that no debris can be left behind.
It is simply hurled out of existence. There are no broken boards or
pieces of shingle, or bits of wood, to be found. They vanish in an in-
stant. The ground itself has a singvilarly smoothed appearance, as if
beaten down and rounded off-
There were few questions to be asked. On these occasions the
proprietors and workmen are reticent, and information is not readily
accessible. Indeed, inquiries as to the cause of the explosion are gen-
erally useless. If it has been through the agency of a careless workman,
he is not thei-eto tell the tale. The man nearest, and most acquainted
with the fact, is probably the one who in an instant passes out of life,
often totally vanishes from human sight, not even a fragment of his
body remaining behind.

That many of these accidents are caused by the carelessness of
workmen, there can be no doubt. It is needless to say that the utmost
precaution is taken to guard the safety of the men and the works, such
as floors flooded with water, shoes in which only copper nails are used,
etc. The reader will perhaps smile when we say that smoking is ab-
solutely prohibited. Yet, incredible as it may appear, the authority
of the proprietors is absolutely necessary to enforce this prohibition.
A proprietor of a powder-mill once said to me, that in the face of the
ever-present danger, and of the most positive orders, it was impossible
to prevent the men, at times, from taking their lighted pipes into the
works ; that he had detected the men thrusting their lighted pipes
into their jacket-pockets to escape observation, as he had unexpect-
edly come iipon them ! A triumph of art — to smoke one's pipe in a
powder-mill, and " the boss not find it out ! "

Once in a while, on some special occasion, the pipe of some such
cunning fellow goes suddenly out, and he with it. He does not linger
to tell how it happened.

It might be supposed that it would be extremely difiicult to find
men in sufficient numbers to carry on a business so hazardous, in which
the workman's life is in such constant danger. But no such difficulty
is experienced. There are always more applicants than places for
them to fill. As in every business, however unpleasant or unwhole-
some, there will always be found men who are more than ready for
the work.

SKETCH OF DOCTOR J. D. HOOKER. 237

SKETCH OF J. D. HOOKER, F.R.S., LL.D.

AMONG the scenes of interest near Loudon which earliest attract
the foreign visitor, is the magnificent Botanical Garden at
Kew. It occupies 300 acres, which are crowded with the wealth of
the vegetable kingdom, and forms the most extensive and perfect hor-
ticultural establishment in the world. It has three museums, contain-
ing upward of 50,000 objects of rare scientific interest exquisitely ar-
ranged, the completest botanical library ever yet brought together, a
series of ample and admirably-constructed hot-houses, a pinetum, a
water-lily aquarium, an extensive and richly-stocked arboretum, fern-
houses, both tropical and temperate, an orchid-house, a house for be-
gonias and gesneracea, together with a variety of other greenhouses
and extensive plots of ground covered with herbaceous plants, and
beautified to perfection. Kew Garden is one of tlie most popular
places of resort in England. Some 700,000 people visit it annually, and
the least educated of all this multitude cannot pass through it without
learning something. The exotic plants nurtured in the hot-houses;
the indigenous and naturalized plants blooming in the gardens ; the
dried specimens preserved in the herbarium ; the various objects of
curiosity treasured up in the three museums of economic botany — vie
with each other in claiming the attention of even the most indifferent
observer.

Learned philosophers and young children can equally find there
abundant objects replete with interest for each, and worthy of length-
ened contemplation : one loiters to examine curiosities of vegetation,
such as the inner bark of " traveler's joy " {Clematis vitalha), used by
the Swiss as a vegetable sieve for straining milk ; or the inside of the
towel-gourd, used in the West Indies as a sponge or a scrubbing-
brush. There is an orange-tree, such as in the island of St. Michael
produces 20,000 oranges in a year. Here is the caricature-plant, with
the whimsical variegation of its leaves ; the telegraph-plant, with the
jerking of its lateral leaflets like the signals of the old semaphore ;
the tuberose, exhaling the most delicious perfume, and the stinking
carrion-flower of South Africa ; the pitcher-plant, each blossom con-
taining half a pint of water and a swarm of drowned insects ; and
the Yenus's flytrap, which springs its toothed leaves together for the
capture of gnats and flies. At every turn and nook there are curiosi-
ties to excite the observant, and gratify the seeker for systematic,
economic, or descriptive botanical knowledge.

Kew has been a place of plants, a nursery or seed-plot for the
study of floriculture and horticulture, for more than a hundred years.
It was a royal property, being purchased in 1730 by Frederick Prince
of Wales, the great-grandfatlier of the present queen. The original

238 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

director of Kew Gardens was William Aiton, who had charge of it
for thirty years, and died in 1793. He was succeeded by his son
Townsend Alton, who held the position for forty-eight years, when he
resigned in 1841. Up to this time the establishment had been much
restricted, but it was now given up by the royal family to the charge
of the government, in the interests of science, and for the advantage
of the people.

Sir William Jackson Hooker, Professor of Botany in the University
of Glasgow, became director in 1841, and he then commenced that
wonderful series of transformations which in the course of his twenty-
four years' directory made Kew Gardens the first establishment of its
kind in the world ; while its character has not only been worthily sus-
tained, but very appreciably expanded, advanced, and elevated, by
his son and successor, the subject of the present sketch.

Dr. Joseph Dalton Hooker was born June 30, 1817. He was an
only son, and his mother was a woman of ability, who shared in the
scientific and artistic reputation of her husband. Educated under the
scrutiny of his parents, the subject of this memoir was prepared from
the outset for his career as a botanist and a scientific observer. Des-
tined at first for the medical profession, young Hooker took his medical
degree at an early age, but, under the influence of his hereditary
preference for botany, the profession was given up, and he took to
science. His medical education was, however, of great value to him
in his subsequent experience both as botanist and traveler.

His first adventure in any public capacity as a botanical inquirer
was one that eminently befitted him in his then twofold character of a
practitioner of the healing art and as a purely scientific investigator.
This was in 1839, when, having but just entered upon his twenty-
second year, he took part as assistant-surgeon and naturalist on board
the Erebus in the expedition sent out, under the command of Sir
James Ross, to the Antarctic Ocean. Ostensibly Dr. Hooker's posi-
tion throughout that memorable voyage was that of a medical ofiicer
on one of her majesty's ships-of-war : in reality his especial object
all the while was to study the botany of the various regions touched
at in those remote portions of the antipodes in the course of the expe-
dition.

It is well to remember that Hooker received, during this four years'
voyage, only the moderate pay accruing to him as a medical officer, his
outfit being provided by his father, as well as his books and his instru-
ments. Throughout the whole of that period, moreover, Sir William
defrayed the expenses constantly incurred by his son when on shore,
both in traveling and in collecting, notwithstanding the whole of the
fruits of his labor, thus accumulated at considerable cost, were sought
out for no private end, but for the advantage of a national establish-
ment. Even after his return homeward. Dr. Hooker magnanimously
determined to forego all claim to promotion in the royal navy, devot-

SKETCH OF DOCTOR J. D. HOOKER. 239

ing four years more to the classification of the treasures he had brought
back with him at the close of the expedition. The result of these
eight years of toil was visible, in the end, in his splendid publication
of the " Flora Antarctica." The comparisons therein drawn of the
new plants brought home by Dr. Hooker in great abundance, with the
species already familiar to botanists in other parts of the world, helped
apparently to realize to naturalists the laws, hitherto but dimly con-
jectured, regulating the distributing of plants over the surface of the
globe.

Prior to entering ixpon the second of his many memorable expedi-
tions of research as a botanical collector, Dr. Hooker held the position
of botanist to the geological survey of Great Britain. On his return
homeward, Dr. Hooker gave to the world, in 1851, as the literary
fruits of his long journey ings, the two important volumes of his " Hima-
layan Journals." The three subsequent years were emj^loyed by
him in arranging his Indian collection. Immediately upon his coming
back, he had, moreover, resumed his labors as an assistant to his father
at Kew Gardens. Besides this, for nine years together, beginning
with 1851 and ending with 1860, Dr. Hooker was employed by the
Lords of the Admiralty in editing a series of publications in which
were recounted, in chronological sequence, the various botanical dis-
coveries of a number of notable voyagers, from Captain James Cook
down to Dr. Joseph Hooker himself. At intervals during the years
thus occupied, he entered upon several other important journeys to
diiferent parts of the European Continent, visiting, besides these, at
other periods, the north of Africa and the far West of the great Con-
tinent of America.

Dr. Hooker, in 1855, received the appointment of assistant-di-
rector of the Botanical Gardens, with a salary of £400, without any
residence. Sir William Hooker was at that time seventy years of age,
and was, therefore, fully entitled to have the assistance of his son
thus secured to him by the government. Three years after, he had his
salary increased to £500 a year, Avith use of a residence. His father
died in 1865, aged eighty-one.

As an example of industry, during the directorship of the Hookers
more than 130 costly volumes, treating upon all branches of botany,
have been issued to the world from the Kew establishment. Living
plants to the number of between 8,000 and 9,000 annually have, within
the same period, from that grand central point of distribution, been
sent to various parts of the globe — new and often most precious addi-
tions to the treasures of Kew being constantly sought out and brought
homeward through the agencies employed by the ever-vigilant direct-
ors. The correspondence involved in this constant intercliange of
communications between them and the botanists of both hemispheres
has been such that 40,000 letters, it has been calculated, have, in the
course of the comparatively brief interval we are refei-ring to, been

240 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTELY.

receivecl, and have been answered, nearly every one of tbem, by the
bands of tbe directors tbemselves.

The bistory of science furnisbes few instances like tbis of prolonged
devotion to a public enterprise so splendidly carried out as to become
a national bonor and a benefaction to tbe scientific world. The de-
velopment of Kew is a noble work of art requiring genius, taste,
enthusiasm and perseverance, as well as knowledge. Tbe world bad
to be ransacked to accumulate bis treasures, and those treasures are for
the most part living things. Tbe Hookers, father and son, have not
only given a generation of incessant work to tbe organization of tbe
Kew Gardens, but they have done it at a constant and large self-
sacx-ifice. They contributed effort and money to the perfection of a
work which is an bonor to the government, and one would think
that the least tbe government could do would be fairly to admit tbe
obligation. But, imder the Gladstone administration, the office of
Commissioner of Public Works was conferred upon a narrow-minded
blockhead named Ayrton, who looked upon science and its interests
with the prejudice and contempt characteristic of politicians. His
office placed him in charge of the Botanical Gardens as the superior to
whom its director was responsible, and he began a course of meddle-
some interference with tbe afiairs of the establishment which was so
insulting to Dr. Hooker, and would have been so injurious to the place,
that the leading scientific men of England united in a protest to the
government. The paper, signed by Lyell, Paget, Huxley, Darwin,
and Tyndall, was drawn up by tbe latter gentleman, and presented
the government in such a disgraceful attitude before the world, that
Parliament took up the subject and put a check to the offensive treat-
ment of Dr. Hooker by tbe arrogant and supercilious minister of pub-
lic works. A man's work must be bis monument, and Dr. Hooker
may be well content with that ; but, after what has taken place, the
Govei'ument of England owes it to its own dignity to recognize in
some fitting way the eminent services of tbe director of the Botanical
Gardens.

Dr. Hooker stands high, not only as an indefatigable explorer, but
also as a philosophic botanist ; and he long since espoused the doc-
trine that the species of tbe world's present flora have been derived
by descent and divergent modifications from ancient vegetable forms.
He married a daughter of the Rev. J. S. Henslow, Professor of Botany
in the University of Cambridge ; and bis wife is not only herself an
accomplished botanist, but she shares in her husband's labors, and has
recently translated a splendid work upon the subject from tbe French
language.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

241

EDITOR'S TABLE.

A XEW SCIENTIFIC SCHOOL.

ANEW institution, of great prom-
ise, has just been added to our
increasing list of scientific and tech-
nological schools. Pardee Hall, a spa-
cious and well-appointed edifice, cost-
ing $250,000, and the gift of Mr. Ario
Pardee, was added to Lafayette College,
at Easton, Pa., with imposing ceremo-
nies of dedication, on the 21st of Octo-
ber. The structure has a front of 256
feet in length, with lateral wings, the
centre building being five stories in
height. It is constructed of Trenton
brownstone, with trimmings of light
Ohio sandstone. The lecture-rooms,
cabinets, models, laboratories, appara-
tus, and the facilities for studying min-
ing operations, are on the amplest scale.
In chemistry, the establishment is espe-
cially strong. Many thousand dollars
have been expended for chemical appa-
ratus, much of it made to order in Ger-
many and France ; there is desk-room
for nearly 250 students, and, by the in-
troduction of the latest improvements,
the laboratories are claimed to be the
completest in America. It is stated
that Mr. Pardee, who is largely engaged
in mining operations, has contributed
not less than half a million dollars to
Lafayette College, which, under the
presidency of the Eev. Dr. Cattell, has
reached a very prosperous condition.

"We publish a portion of Prof. Ray-
mond's able dedicatory address, regret-
ting that we have not space for the
whole of it. It will be seen that he
takes broad grownd, and insists upon a
liberal culture for the special students
of science. "Wo hope that what he
says upon this subject foreshadows the
policy of the new institution. The
narrowness of the curriculum of our
technological schools, which aim, like
our business colleges, and like medi-

TOL. IT. — 16

cal and legal schools, to prepare im-
mediately for practical professional
life, is a very serious objection, as it
favors the false idea that scientific
education has no wider basis than
sheer pecuniary utility. That scientific
schools, as those of agriculture, mining,
and engineering, have hitherto been
liable to this reproach, is undeniable.
But that is certainly no reason why a
course of education that is marked out
with predominant reference to profes-
sional pursuits should not be at the
same time broad and liberal. Allow-
ances, of course, must be made for the
difficulties of initiating a new system,
which had to answer the question "Of
what use ? " at the outset. Healthful
beginnings are ever small, and it was
inevitable that the traditional system,
of culture, which ostentatiously repu-
diated every thing like practical uses,
should make the most of the poverty
and narrowness of the scientific cur-
riculum. But the first stage in the his-
tory of the scientific schools is now
past. They have ceased to be experi-
ments ; their need is acknowledged,
and they are being established on the
most munificent scale of endowment.
It is now demanded that the "new
education " shall be widened, harmo-
nized, and adjusted, so as to meet the
full requirements of a liberal mental
cultivation. Let the basis of training
be modern and scientific, instead of
ancient and classical, and, the new stand-
point being taken, let the courses of
study be widened, so as to include
moral, literary, and a3sthetic agencies
of training. Of course, with the growth
of the new, there must be riddance of
the old, but the old educational tree
has plenty of decayed branches and
dead wood, the cutting away of which
will relnvigorate its whole life.

242

THE POPULAR SCIE^^CE MONTHLY.

SCIENTIFIC LECTURES.

That lectures will always continue
to be, as they always have been, a valu-
able mode of public instruction, there can
be little doubt ; but, that what is called
the lecture system is going to prove an
agency of national regeneration, may
be seriously questioned. In so far as it
is in any sense a system, it has degen-
erated to a mere catering to public
amusements. The platform is crowded
with readers, singers, declaimers, dram-
atists, and buffoons, and the " course of
lectures " is transformed into a " series
of entertainments." People cannot have
their intellects on the rack forever, you
know ; they must have a little relaxa-
tion. This tendency to pander to a low
public taste, and, under the respectable
name of lectures, to degrade the plat-
form to purposes of mere speculation,
ought in every way to be withstood.
Let amusements stand upon their own
basis, and not appeal to tlie public under
false pretenses. Lectures upon science,
history, or philosophy, to be really valu-
able, should be given in courses with
sufficient fullness to produce some depth
of impression. It is in this way that
such men as Lardner, Mitchell, and
TyndaU, have helped on the work of
public education. We spoke last month
in commendation of Mr. Proctor, as a
popular teacher of astronomy ; and, to
those who desire lectures of a similar
first-class character in another and
widely-different field, we now recom-
mend Prof. Edward S. Morse, of Salem,
Majis. Prof. Morse's department is
zoology, in which he is an original in-
vestigator, of excellent standing, and
therefore thoroughly acquainted with
the actual phenomena of his subject.
As a teacher of natural history, he has
rare merits, a lively and wide-awake
manner, by which he keeps the atten-
tion of his audience ; simple and un-
technical language, suited to make
everybody understand him; and re-
markable skill in the rapid and accu-

rate drawing of diagrams upon the
black-board. To most lecturers this is
an interruption and a bore. They have
to stop speaking while they are draw-
ing, to outline the object they are deal-
ing with. Prof. Morse makes his figures
rapidly and elegantly, using both hands
at once, and keeps up an unbroken flow
of talk. The advantage of being thus
able to hold his audience, by engaging
two senses at once, is very great ; for,
not only is he more secure of the listen-
ers' apprehension by creating his forms
before the eye at the same time they are
described to the ear, but the pleasure
of full mental occupation is also in a
high degree favorable to the retention
of what is learned. It may be added
that in this way the lecturer's work is
not only of superior quality, but there
is a great deal more of it in the same
time. Every town where there is a
college or high-school, and any serious
mental activity, should arrange for a
special course of lectures such as Prof.
Morse furnishes.

" THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY^

The first article this month clo.ses
the series of papers upon " The Study
of Sociology " that have been run-
ning through our pages for a year and
a half. TVe have previously stated the
relation of this discussion to Mr. Spen-
cer's other works, but there still re-
mains much misapprehension upon this
point, and the present is, therefore,
a suitable occasion for a brief restate-
ment of the case. That we are here
concerned with the advance of a new
division of scientific knowledge of great
importance to the public is a further
excuse for repetition.

In 1860, Mr. Spencer threw out the
prospectus of a system of philosophy
which he expected it would take him
twenty years to complete. The under-
taking was new, comprehensive, and
original, as it proposed to construct a
system of general philosophy on the

EDITOR'S TABLE.

243

basis of the widest and most recent
results of science. From this point of
view it was a higher unification of
knowledge than had been hitherto at-
tempted; but it "was more than this.
As the truths and science of Nature
have proved in various v ays helpful
to man in the practical concerns of life,
it was the higher object of their sys-
tematic statement to arrive at a clearer
and more assured guidance in the con-
duct of human affairs. As the older
philosophies disavowed the end of
utility, a philosophy which is the out-
come of science, and rests upon the es-
tablished truths of Nature, may claim
the service of humanity as its highest
end. The scheme was, therefore, so
bold an innovation that it found favor
with but few. By many it was re-
garded as an intrinsically impossible
undertaking, and by others as a futile
endeavor of any one intellect. But
Mr. Spencer had well surveyed his
ground ; and, as the work quietly pro-
ceeded, there was soon evidence that
the execution was equal to the promise,
and that the enterprise had fallen into
the hands of one who had a genius for
it. As an example, Mr. John Stuart
Mill gave his testimony to the ency-
clopaedic scientific preparation of Mr.
Spencer for such a work, and at a crisis
of the undertaking he came forward
and offered to assume the whole pecu-
niary responsibility of its continuance,
on the ground that its failure would be
a public calamity. At the same time,
the leading organs of British opinion
began to concede Mr. Spencer's emi-
nent position and power, as when the
Saturday Revieio declared him to be
*' the greatest organizer of thought that
had appeared in England since New-
ton." It was noteworthy, also, that
men of the highest mark who had
studied him most thoroughly were the
readiest to concede his power, as when
Dr. McCosh years ago spoke of his
" giant mind," and in his late address
before the Evangelical Alliance re-

ferred to him as the Titanic thinker of
England.

But from various causes Mr. Spen-
cer's work did not take bold of the
general public. All the masterly pa-
pers that are now collected in his sev-
eral volumes of essays had been pub-
lished anonymously in the reviews, and
he was comparatively but little known
in the literary world. His form of
publication of " The Philosophical Sys-
tem" by subscription was not calcu-
lated to attract general readers, while
its formidable character repelled many
at the outset. As it was supposed to
be a destructive system, and its author
a dangerous man, the misrepresenta-
tions of the press were so gross and
malignant that Mr. Spencer refused to
furnish his series to them, and was
thus cut off from that source of pub-
licity. Yet his subscribers embraced
the most thoughtful men of England,
and upon many of these he made a
strong impression. While the mass of
English readers knew nothing about
him, students were devouring his works
and accepting his views. Calling at
the London book-shops for the " works
of Spencer," you would be handed the
" Faerie Queene," and, when you said
'■'■ Herlert Spencer," the rejoinder would
be, " "We never heard of him." Yet, at
the same time, the serious attention of
the House of Lords was called by one of
its members to the growing influence of
Spencer's ideas in the universities, and
even the Premier of England has re-
cently felt it incumbent on him to make
a speech to arrest the increasing influ-
ence of his opinions.

But this restriction of Mr. Spen-
cer's readers mainly to scholarly circles
has resulted in two evils : the first was
that other men appropriated his ideas,
and, by translating them into popular
forms, made reputations for themselves
at his expense; and the second was,
that the most erroneous and distorted
conceptions were formed by the public
of the character of the system itself.

244

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Mr. Spencer is perhaps too little con-
cerned for the passing influence of his
doctrines, and, except that the heavy
expenditure of publication requires to
be sustained as it proceeds, he would
be content to leave their character to
the verdict of the future. But many,
believing that his system of thought is
of great, immediate, and practical value,
vrere anxious that something should be
done to give it a stronger hold upon
public attention. Mr. Spencer was
therefore urged to suspend for a time
his methodical work, and to address a
wider circle of readers by the prepara-
tion of a small popular volume, and by
using the channels of periodical publi-
cation.

Moreover, he had reached a stage
in the unfolding of his system which
was not only favorable to such an
episode, but which urgently required
it. That which the world will prob-
ably regard as the great work of his
life, should he be able to complete
it, and which is also of the greatest
moment to society, is still before him ;
while all that he has hitherto done is
but a preparation for it. This is noth-
ing less than to organize and place
upon its proper foundations the science
of man's social relations. A dozen
years have been occupied in laying the
foundation upon which alone the social
science can be built. " The Principles
of Sociology " is to be his next and
great work, and it was felt to be on
every account desirable that Mr. Spen-
cer should say something at this time
to the reading public on the nature,
claims, scope, limits, and difBculties,
of this important subject. This he
consented to do, and, in the preface to
" The Study of Sociology," he admits
that he does not now regret it.

And the object proposed has been
already in a good degree attained ; the
articles have been widely reprinted
and extensively read. That they will
have a large and salutary influence
upon public sentiment admits of no

question. The views have been repro-
duced and commented upon extensively
by the press, who have generally rec-
ognized their importance, and the need
that they should be well understood in
a country where all men are govern-
ment-makers. A marked illustration
of the effect of these papers and of
Mr. Spencer's tables of "Descriptive
Sociology," the first of which is now
published, is furnished by the recent
inaugural address of Lord Houghton
before the British Social Science Con-
gress. The Times of October 2d re-
ports him as saying : " Their considera-
tion has impressed mo strongly with
the imcertain data on which all Social
Science is founded, and the importance
of the connection between Sociology
and Biology which Mr. Spencer, both
in his philosophical works and in the
elaborate tabular statement of social
facts which he has super^nsed, and
which I earnestly commend to your
notice, is now expounding and illus-
trating." It was to exert an influence
of just this kind that " The Study of
Sociology" was prepared. It is hence
not to be regarded as a treatise upon
sociological science, but rather an in-
troduction to it. It treats of questions
which bear upon it, but which Mr.
Spencer could not properly deal with
in his forthcoming " Principles of So-
ciology."

Men of science have their discour-
agements, general and special. The
English just now have a spasm of un-
happiness because the government will
not allow them to accept honors from
foreign sovereigns. It seems that tlie
Emperor of Brazil and the King of
Sweden are inclined to bestow their
marks of favor upon English savants,
who would be glad to accept them, but
a regslation of the Foreign OSice,
dated 1855, forbids any subject of her
majesty to accept a foreign order, or to
wear its insignia, without the queen's
permission ; and it is declared that

LITERARY ^-OTICES.

245

" such permission shall not be granted
unless the foreign order shall have
been conferred in consequence of
active and distinguished service before
the enemy, either at sea or in the
field," or unless the party " shall have
been in the service of the foreign sov-
ereign by whom the foreign order is
conferred." It may be thought that
this is a very light cross to bear, but
■we republicans cannot understand how
grave these considerations are in Eng-
land. Virtue may be its own reward,
and wealth, fame, and the honor of
making discoveries, may fill the meas-
ure of ambition nearly full, but noth-
ing fills out, and sweetens, and hap-
pifies the life of the typical Britisher,
like a decoration. "When, therefore,
an appreciative foreign sovereign sends
over a bundle of ribbons for distribu-
tion among the distinguished F. E. S.'s,
it certainly appears hard that they can-
not be allowed to wear them. The
editor of N^ature has all our sympathy
when he says : " It seems to us unjust
and cruel that men of science, to whose
labors it is mainly owing that our coun-
try and the world generally are mount-
ing rapidly higher and higher in the
scale of civilization, should be prac-
tically debarred from accepting the
few honors that come in their way."

LITERARY NOTICES.

The Atmosphere. Translated from the
French of Camille Flammarion. Edited
by James Glaisher, F. R. S. Wfth 10
Chromo-Lithographs and 86 Woodcuts.
450 pages 8vo. Price, $6.00. Harper &
Brothers.

A VOLUME like this, summing up our
knowledge of the atmosphere, has been
long wanted, and it is now well supplied.
The scientific investigation of the air may
be said to have commenced with the dis-
covery of its weight and the invention of
the barometer about 1643, and the eight
generations of investigation that have in-
tervened have developed avast body of facts
and laws relating to atmospheric phenom-

ena, so that, considered alone as a measure
of what has been done in this period toward
clearing up the mysteries of Nature, M. Flam-
marion's book would be very interesting.
The French edition was twice the size of
the present translation, and was a regular
cyclopaedia of atmology, but, by cutting ofiF
certain parts of it which dealt with the re-
moter relations of the air, as for example
its influence upon plants, and by retrench-
ing the exuberant imaginative style in which
it was written, and in which popular French
writers so delight, the translator has brought
the work within very reasonable limits, and
adapted it more perfectly to the taste of
English readers. The edition has, moreover,
gained greatly in accuracy and trustworthi-
ness by the rigorous censorship of its editor,
Mr. Glaisher, whose position as a scientific
meteorologist is no doubt superior to that
of the author of the work. The book is
very free from technicalities, and, in its sim-
pUcity, accuracy, and attractiveness, it is an
excellent example of popular scientific liter-
ature. Its general object, as stated by the
editor, has been " to produce a work giving
a broad outline of the causes which give rise
to facts of every-day occurrence in the at-
mosphere, in such a form that any reader
who wished to obtain a general view of such
phenomena and their origin would be
readily enabled to do so. The great num-
ber of subjects treated of will thus, to the
majority of readers, who merely desire an
insight into the general principles that pro-
duce phenomena, which every one has seen
or heard of, be found to be rather an ad-
vantage, as the whole range of atmospheric
action is thus displayed in the same volume
in moderate compass, without so much de-
tail being anywhere given as to make the
book other than interesting to even the
most casual reader.

" The work treats of the form, dimen-
sions, and movements of the earth, and of
the influence exerted on the meteorology by
the physical conformation of our globe ; of
the figure, height, color, weight, and chemi-
cal components of the atmosphere ; of the
meteorological phenomena induced by the
action of light, and the optical appearances
which objects present as seen through dif-
ferent atmospheric strata ; of the phenom-
ena connected with heat, wind, clouds, rain,

246

TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

and electricity, including the subjects of the
laws of climate. The contents are, there-
fore, of deep importance to all classes of
persons, especially to the observer of Nature,
the agriculturist, and the navigator."

The volume is elegantly executed, and
in its whole style is a credit to the pub-
lishers.

The Comparative Anatomy of the Do-
mesticated Animals. By A. Chauveau,
Professor at the Lyons Veterinary
School. Second edition, revised and
enlarged, with the Cooperation of S.
Arloing, Professor at the Toulouse
Veterinary School. Translated and ed-
ited by George Fleming, F. R. G. S.,
Veterinary Surgeon, Royal Engineers.
957 pages ; 450 Illustrations. Price,
$6.00. D. Appleton & Co.

The first edition of this comprehensive
work appeared in 1854, and it has held a
leading place as a text-book in the Conti-
nental colleges. It is an exhaustive and
exact description of the anatomical ma-
chinery of which the bodies of our domes-
tic animals are composed. As the first
trait required in such a work is accuracy.
Prof. Chauveau could not be satisfied with
a compilation, no matter how weighty the
authorities ; and, although the whole range
of anatomical erudition was consulted, the
work took its character from the direct
study of Nature, the position of the author
as anatomical prmcipal Ln the Imperial
Veterinary School affording him the most
extensive opportunities of observation and
dissection. Moreover, the author aimed at
something more than the mere accumula-
tion of an endless and arid mass of ana-
tomical details. He sought the bonds, and
relations, and meanings, by which they
could be connected and harmonized, in a
philosophic method. Inspired by the in-
fluence of the two illustrious anatomists,
George Cuvier and Geofiroy St.-Hilaire, he
thus speaks of their labors :

" The first, after immense researches,
ventured to compare the innumerable spe-
cies in the animal kingdom with each other ;
he seized their general characters — the
analogies which allied them to one another ;
he weighed these analogies, contrasted them
with the dissimilarities, and established
among them different kinds and different

degrees; and in this way was he able to
form natural groups, themselves subdivided
into several categories in which individuals
were gathered together according to their
analogies and alBnities. Then the chaos
was swept away, light appeared, and the
field of science was no longer obscured;
comparative anatomy was created in all its
branches, and the structure of the animal
kingdom was brought within those laws of
uniformity which shine throughout the other
parts of creation.

*' Geoffroy St.-Hilaire followed Cuvier
over the same ground. More exclusive than
Cuvier, he entirely neglected the differential
characters, and allowed himself to be gov-
erned by the consideration of resemblances.
He especially pursued the discovery of a
fixed rule for guidance in the search after
these resemblances — a difficult task, and a
dangerous reef, upon which the sagacity of
his illustrious rival was stranded. To be
more certain than Cuvier, and the better to
grasp his subject, he restricted the scope of
his observations, confining himself more
particularly to the class of vertebrata, in
order to solve the enigma whose answer he
sought. At last he found it, and made it
knoT>-n to us in those memorable though
abstruse pages, in which the meaning is
often obscure and hidden, but which con-
tain, nevertheless, magnificent hymns chant-
ed to the honor of the Creator. The shape
and functions of organs, he says, do not
offer any stability, only their relations are
invariable ; these alone cannot give decep-
tive indications in the comparison of the
vital instruments. He thus founded his
great principle of connections, firmly estab-
lished its value, and fortified it by acces-
sory principles. Then was the philosophi-
cal sentiment decidedly introduced into the
researches in organization, and anatomy
became a veritable science."

The new edition of the work has been
rewritten throughout, greatly extended, and
brought up to the present time; but its
method is the same. The two branches of
anatomy, human and comparative, are
brought iuto closer alliance, and the com-
parison of the organs of man with those of
animals is made a promment feature. The
work is, therefore, not only a complete dis-
section-manual for the student of veterinary

LITERARY NOTICES.

247

science, and a book of reference for the
veterinary surgeon, but it is also available
for the zoologist, the comparative anatomist,
the ethnologist, and the medical practi-
tioner. Although we have had good books
on the structure of the horse, this is the
first complete treatise on tue anatomy of
the domesticated animals in the English
language, and will contribute materially to
the progress of veterinary science, while
being useful also to the community at large.

O0R Common Insects. A Popular Account
of the Insects of our Fields, Forests,
Gardens, and Houses. Illustrated with
4 Plates and 268 Woodcuts. By A. S.
Packard, M. D. 225 pages. Price, $2.50.
Salem : Naturalists' Agency. Boston :
Estes & Lauriat. New York: Dodd &
Mead.

Dr. Packard has done an excellent thing
in preparing this little hand-book. His
large " Guide to the Study of Insects," with
upward of '700 pages and 1,200 figures, al-
though reduced to five dollars in price, ia
still too expensive for the great mass of
readers ; and it was therefore well to distill
it over, with the contents of the American
Naturalist, into a more portable and popu-
lar form. Good and cheap books on in-
sects require to be multiplied, for we are
all interested in them. They infest us in-
side and out, by day and by night, sleeping
and waking, at home and abroad; they
damage our food, poison our drink, spoil
our clothes, kill our domestic animals, rav-
age our gardens, blast our fruit, and de-
stroy our crops. The subject cannot be
ignored, but we naturally approach it with
prejudice. There are, however, compen-
sations in all things. Although insects
may be our enemies, they are yet sci-
entifically very interesting creatures. We
all have a high opinion of Nature, and are
never done praising her; but she runs to
insects incontinently — they could outvote
all the rest of the animal kingdom five to
one. As the higher tribes of life have been
perishing out in multitudes along the geo-
logical march, it cannot be doubted that
the same thing has happened in a much
greater degree to the insects, although their
vestiges were, of course, more difficult of
preservation. But Dr. Packard tells us
that there are upward of 200,000 living

species, and, as species are held by many to
be immutable, each one having been spe-
cially created, we have a clew to the exact
number of miracles that these pests have
cost : though why miraculous contrivance
took such an excessive turn in this direc-
tion will perhaps be found explained in
Dr. Bushnell's book of "Dark Things."
But, however they came, the insects are
here, a part of the world of life, growing,
multiplying, and dying, like ourselves ; un-
dergoing curious transformations, and ani-
mated by wonderful instincts — social, indus-
trious, and most instructive in all their ways
and history. Dr. Packard selects the most
common, those that are easily — often too
easily — observed, and gives us their various
stories with an interest that is quite ro-
mantic. His volume is compact with infor-
mation upon the subject, and is adapted to
all intelligent readers ; but, for sensible
boys and girls, it is worth a whole library
of the fictitious drivel that now forms so
large a part of the mental nourishment of
the young.

This volume consists mainly of reprinted
matter, but it contains a new and admirable
chapter entitled " Hints on the Ancestry of
Insects." The irrepressible question of
origins is not to be escaped, and, as it has
long haunted the souls of botanists, it now
begins to torment the entomological soul.
Insects cannot be studied without being
classed, and they cannot be classed without
knowing their resemblances and affinities,
and these cannot be made out except
through their embryological or development-
al history. The question how things are
runs into the question how they came to be,
and the first thesis of Scripture becomes
the last problem of science — that is, ffene-
sis. Dr. Packard inclines to the view that
the primal ancestors of insects were worms,
and he assumes without hesitation the doc-
trine of evolution as best explaining the
facts of the science. We quote one or two
passages upon this point :

" Many short-sighted persons complain
that such a theory sets in the background
the idea of a personal Creator ; but minds
no less devout, and perhaps a trifle more
thoughtful, see the hand of a Creator not
less in the evolution of plants and animals
from preexistent forms, through natural

248

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

laws, than in the evolution of a summer's
shower, through the laws discovered by the
meteorologist, who looks back through
myriads of ages to the causes that led to
the distribution of mountain-chains, ocean-
currents, and trade-winds, which combine
to produce the necessary conditions result-
ing in that shower.

" Indeed, to the student of Nature, the
evolution theory in biology, with the nebu-
lar hypothesis, and the grand law in physics
of the correlation of forces, all indepen-
dent, and revealing to us the mode in which
the Creator of the universe works in the
world of matter, together form an im-
measurably grander conception of the order
of creation and its ordainer than was pos-
sible for us to form before these laws Mere
discovered and put to practical use."

Again he says :

" Thus the ovipositor of the bee has a
history, and is not apparently a special
creation, but a structure gradually devel-
oped to subserve the use of a defensive or-
gan. So the organs of special sense in in-
sects are, in most cases, simply altered
hairs. The hairs themselves are modified
epithelial- cells. The eyes of insects, sim-
ple and compound, are at first simply epi-
thelial cells, modified for a special purpose ;
and even the egg is but a modified epithelial
cell attached to the walls of the ovary,
which in turn is morphologically but a
gland. Thus Nature deals in simples, and
with her units of structure elaborates as
her crowning work a temple in which the
mind of man, formed in the image of God,
may dwell. Her results are not the less
marvelous because we are beginning to
dimly trace the process by which they arise.
It should not lessen our awe and reverence
for Deiry if, with minds made to adore, we
also essay to trace the movements of his
hand in the origin of the forms of life.

" Some writers of the evolution school
are strenuous in the belief that the evolu-
tion hypothesis overthrows the idea of ar-
chetypes and plans of structure. But a true
genealogy of animals and plants represents
a natural system, and the types of animals,
be they four, as Cuvier taught, or five, or
more, are recognized by naturalists through
the study of dry, hard, anatomical facts.
Accepting, then, the type of articulates as

founded in Nature from the similar modes
of development and points of structure per-
ceived between the worms and the Crusta-
cea on the one hand, and the worms and
insects on the other, have we not a strong
genetic bond uniting these three great
groups into one grand sub-kingdom, and
can we not in imagination perceive the suc-
cessive steps by which the Creator, acting
through the laws of evolution, has built up
the great articulate division of the animal
kingdom ? "

Proportions of Pins used in Bridges.
By Charles Bender, C. E. No. IV.,

Van Nostrand Science Series, 52 pages.
Price, 60 cents.

This is a very small book, but it would
certainly be wrong to measure its impor-
tance by its dimensions. In science, we are
often told that there is no great and no
small, by which it is meant that the interest
and value of things in Nature are not de-
pendent upon magnitude. It is desirable, as
we all feel at times, that bridges should be
well constructed, and, as their parts are held
together by pins, all who travel are inter-
ested that these pins should be in proper
proportions. Thanks to Bender for de-
termining what these proportions are, and
to Van Nostrand for diffusing a knowledge
of them. We bear our testimony to the
importance of the research, and the value
of the publication, but we regret to say
that we cannot recommend this monograph
for popular reading, as it is brunful of
mathematics.

A Treatise on Analytical Geometry,
By William G. Peck, LL. D., Professor
of Mathematics and Astronomy in Co-
lumbia College, and of Mechanics in the
School of Mines. 212 pages. A. S.
Barnes & Co.

Prof. Peck has prepared this treatise
for the use of his own classes in Columbia
College and the School of Mines. His ob-
ject has been to present the subject in a
narrower compass than is done in the usual
voluminous works that are employed as
text-books in the mathematical depart-
ments of the higher institutions. The
author puts forward no claims to origi-
nality of method, and states that the gen-

LITERARY NOTICES.

H9

eral plan of the work does not differ essen-
tially from that adopted by the earlier
writers on the subject ; but he has revised
definitions, simplified explanations, abbre-
viated demonstrations, and conformed the
limits of the treatment to the growing
wants of scientific education.

Chronos : Mother Earth's Biography ; a
Komance of the New School, by Wal-
lace Wood, M. D. London : Triibner
& Co., 1873, 334 pages.

If a peripatetic scientific lecturer may
seek to draw listeners by proclaiming to
make science " as fascinating as fairy tales,"
surely the author of this bock is justified
in terming his work a "Romance of the
New School."

In eleven chapters he pictures with a
flowing pen the birth, growth, maturity,
and decay of Mother Earth ; and to those
who have puzzled their brains over the
severe, concise-formulas of Herbert Spencer,
who have passed working hours on the
nebular hypothesis, and striven with the
problem of the precession of the equinoxes,
or the data and inductions of Biology and
Psychology, it is like sailing with a " wet
sheet and a flowing sea " on the lighest
waves of the imagination over the formi-
dable obstacles which those philosophical
problems present.

The author professes to traverse the
field with seven-leagued boots, and surely
they are needed, for in this small volume is
crowded the result of prolonged and pro-
found speculations into the mystery of the
earth, its geology, its life, the periods of its
development, the evolution of its organ-
isms, its social history, and its final dissolu-
tion.

With liberal quotations from the writings
of modern scientists, with here and there an
enlivenment of humor, and — to deal with
him gently — some considerable irrelevant
frivolity, he puts forward in a fresh and
brisk, if not altogether attractive presenta-
tion of the subject, the most advanced ideas
of the evolutionists, and those who shudder
at the definition of evolution as " a change
from an indefinite incoherent homogeneity,
to a definite coherent heterogeneity," may,
not unprofitably, follow their chatty and
lively guide, who certainly is never dull
while acting as cicerone.

The first American contribution to the
International Scientific Series will be by
Josiah P. Cooke, Professor of Chemistry in
Harvard College, on the " New Chemistry."
It is well known that this science in recent
years has undergone a profound change in
its theory, with a corresponding change in
its nomenclature. The new view is firmly
established in the world of science, and
modern text-books are slowly adopting it,
while the mass of educated people still
think in the old chemical ways. A book
was needed to make this transition clear
and easy for the non-scientific, which should
explain the necessity and philosophy of the
change more fully than is possible in the reg-
ular manuals, and such a work Prof. Cooke
has now prepared. He has long taught
the modem views, and his College Text-
book of " Chemical Philosophy " embod-
ies them ; but, perceiving the public want,
he prepared a course of lectures familiarly
explaining the new doctrines, and delivered
them at the Lowell Institute in Boston (im-
mediately after the course of Prof. Tyndall),
with great satisfaction to those who heard
them. The volume containing these lectures,
carefully revised and illustrated, is now
going rapidly through the press, and will
be ready in a very short time. It will be
of interest to general readers who care to
note the progress of scientific thought; but
will be invaluable at the present time to all
teachers of chemistry.

PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

Acrididae of North America, by Cyrus
Thomas, Ph. D. (Geological Survey of the
Territories.) Washington : Government
Printing-office, 1873.

Essay on the Glacial Epoch. By Dr.
Philip Harvey. Burlington, Iowa, 18Y3,
pp. 24.

New Vertebrata from Colorado Terri-
tory. By Prof. E. D. Cope. Government
Printing-Office.

Law and Intelligence in Nature. By
A. B. Palmer, A. M., M. D. Lansing, Mich.,
1873, pp. 31. .

Thysanura of Essex County, Mass., by
A. S. Packard, Jr., with two other papers

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

by the same author, on the Xew American
Phalsenidae and the Cave Fauna of Indiana.

Serenth Annual Report of the Superin-
tendent of Missouri Public Schools.

Eleventh Annual Meeting of the Mis-
souri State Teachers' Association.

MISCELLANY.

The Coal-Flelds of China.— The coal-
fields of the Chinese Empire cover an area
of 400,000 square mOes, and yet China im-
ports large quantities of coal from Eng-
land. In the great province of Hunan,
says Iron, a coal-field extends over an area
of 21,700 square miles. Hunan boasts of
two distinct coal-beds, one bearing bitu-
minous coal, and the other anthracite — the
latter being favorably situated for water-
transit, covering an area equal to that of
the anthracite coal-fields of Pennsylvania,
and yielding anthracite of the best quality.
The coal-area of the province of Shansi is
30,000 square miles, enough to supply the
whole world for thousands of years, even
at the present rapid rate of consumption.
An immense supply of iron-ore adds to the
mineral wealth of this great province.

If it be asked, in view of these facts,
why it is that China imports foreign coal,
we have only to consider the methods of
mining followed by the Chinese, and the
want of good roads, in order to get a satis-
factory reply. The mode of working, says
the writer in Iron, is at once tremendously
severe and ludicrously ineffectual : the shafts
are not perpendicular, but are inchned
planes, 400 or 500 feet in length, running
down a slant of about 45°. Up this slant
the men carry the coal in baskets, one being
attached to each end of a short carrying pole,
which is borne upon the left shoulder. The
shafts are about seven feet high, and about
the same width, with a wooden roof, beams
on both sides for support, and wood along
the floor, so arranged as to form steps, up
which the miner pulls himself by catching
the projection of a step above him with a
smaU curved staff, which he carries in his
right hand. Even with cheap labor, this
barbarous method proves expensive.

But the great difficulty is conveyance.
The famous canals of the Chinese Empire are

confined to the lower basin of the Yangtsze.
The roads are simply in a state of nature.
Mere lines of deep ruts mark the track of
the primitive vehicles of the country. The
only repairs are effected by the rains, which
wash them level ; and then the sun hardens
the slushy mass. In some provinces two-
wheeled vehicles are employed, but in the
central provinces only the primeval wheel-
barrow, and in the hilly districts these rude
machines give way to beasts of burden.
The cost of transportation is, of course,
enormous. In the province of Shansi, coal
which costs about 25 cents per ton at the
mme rises to six dollars at the distance of
30 miles ; so that only those who live al-
most at the pit's mouth derive any benefit
from the coal-mines of the Celestial Empire.
This difBculty, amounting almost to impos-
sibility of transit, presses with equal weight
upon every department of Chinese industry.
The crops are splendid, but there are no
means of reaching the market, and the
apathy produced by the want of means of
transit amply explains why famine is a
chronic scourge in the land of plenty.

The introduction of a railway system
into China would not only enrich the pro-
prietors, but would confer immeasurable
benefit on the inhabitants of the country.
It has been proposed to tap the great
province of Hunan by extending a railway
from Upper Burmah to the confines of the
Celestial Empire, and there is little doubt
that within a few years the shriek of the
steam-whistle will be heard within the con-
fines of the "Empire of the Sun and Moon."

Serieulture in Brazil. — The Italiaa

newspapers, says la Nature, give some in-
teresting information with regard to the
measures now being taken in Brazil to for-
ward the production of a silk yielded by a
peculiar species of butterfly, which is as yet
but little known in that country, and quite
unknown in Europe. This butterfly {Bom-
byx. salumia), commonly called the porta-
espejos, has a spread of wmgs four times as
great as that of the common silk-worm
moth. The caterpillar feeds on the leaves
of the Ricinus communis and also of the
Anacardium Occideniale. The cocoon dif-
fers very widely in appearance from the
common cocoon. It is enveloped in a bag-

MISCELLANY.

251

like pellicle, resembling cobweb, which be-
ing removed, the cocoon is found to be oval.
In color it is grayish, and its tissue differs
from that of European cocoons in being
wove like a bird's-nest. The caterpillar
does not shut itself quite up in the cocoon,
but leaves an opening, through which it es-
capes in the imago-shape.

The Bombyz saturnia works rapidly,
completing the cocoon in three weeks ; in
three weeks more it quits it ; and thus the
silk-harvest takes up only six or seven
weeks. The process of filature, or of un-
winding the threads of the cocoon, is very
simple, the threads, owing to the peculiar
structure of the cocoon, being very readi-
ly separated from one another by the ac-
tion of warm water. The fibre possesses
considerable strength. One thread, twelve
inches long, will bear a weight of sixty-two
grains, and a cord of fifty-four threads a
weight of over two pounds. The thread,
however, is somewhat coarse, but efforts
are being made to get it of greater fine-
ness so as to fit it for weaving into fabrics
and spinning into sewing-thread. If this
Brazihan fibre passes successfully through
its period of trial and experiment, it will
give the world a very cheap silk, the cost
of production being much less than that
of European silk. The cocoon is found in
great quantities in the north of Brazil. The
caterpillar feeds on the tree, and withstands
the inclemency of the weather. The tree
is so abundant that whole ship-loads of
cocoons might be collected.

The Descent of Man.— M. Gabriel de
Mortillet, at the recent meeting of the
French Association, after showing that cer-
tam flints found in tertiary strata bear evi-
dences of human workmanship, goes on to
prove that this tertiary precursor of man was
not identical in species with the man of the
present period. " If there is one fact well
established," says he, " and admitted by all,
it is this : that there is a succession of
faun£E from one geological period to an-
other. From stratum to stratum the fauna
is modified, the animals change, and these
modifications, these changes, are all the
more marked in proportion as the strata
are wider apart. Between two strata in
contact there may exist species in common,

but strata widely separated from one an-
other have different species, and even dif-
ferent genera, in case they lie very wide
apart. These changes occur all the more
rapidly m proportion as the animals pos-
sess a more complicated organization. Thus
the mollusca, having a less comphcated or-
ganization than the mammals, have some-
times a far more protracted existence as
species. Certain shells are found identi-
cal in two strata, in which the mammalian
faunje are very widely different. These are
not mere hypotheses, but scientific data,
based on direct observation of facts.

"Now, since the formation of the cal-
careous strata of Beauce and of the loam-
deposit at Thenay, in which chipped flints
are found, the mammalian faunae was
completely renewed at least three times.
The differences between the mammals of
the Beauce limestone and the mammals of
the present period are not only sufficient
to characterize distinct species, but have
appeared sufficient in the eyes of zoologists
to warrant their classification into special
genera. The mammals of the level of the
Beauce limestone and of the Thenay loam
aU belong, almost without exception, to
extinct genera — genera nearly allied to
those at present existing, but yet quite dis-
tinct from them. How, then, could man,
who has a most complicated organization,
alone escape the action of this law ? We
must therefore conclude that, if, as every
thing leads us to presume, the Thenay flints
bear the evidences of intentional chipping,
they are the work, not of the present hu-
man species, but of another species of man,
possibly even of a genus the precursor of
man, which would serve to fill up one of the
gaps in the zoological series."

An Ancient Papyrus. — The King of Sax-
ony has purchased, and placed in the Leip-
sic Library, an Egyptian papyrus on the
preparation of medicines, which was found
at Thebes by Dr. Ebers. It is a beautiful
yellow papyrus, in a good state of preserva-
tion. It consists of 110 columns, and has
written on the back a double calendar in
eight columns. Each column is eight inches
wide, and contains twenty-two lines. The
writing is from right to left ; it >s all in
black ink, except the beginnings ot chapters.

2i;2

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

which are in red ink. The characters are
distinct, bold, and tasteful, and the priest
who traced them must have been an artist.
Their form, says La Nature, from which we
gather these particulars, would appear to
fix the seventeenth century b. c. as the
date of the manuscript; and the fact that
in the calendar the name of King Ra-ser-ka
(Amenophis I.) is mentioned proves that
the papyrus is not posterior to the first half
of that century.

The work itself dates from a period more
remote than the transcription on papyrus.
It is known that the most ancient Egyptian
writings were works about medicine. Ma-
netho tells us that the Egyptians honored
one of their first kings as a physician. This
assertion is confirmed not only by the frag-
ment of papyrus of Brugsh and Chabas, pre-
served in the Berlin Museum, but also by
the present document.

The first chapter of the papyrus treats
of the original production of the book,
which came from the Temple of On (Heh-
opolis). Then follow the remedies employed
for the cure of various diseases, together
with extensive details as to diseases of the eye,
remedies against the falling off of the hair,
for sores, fevers, the itch, etc. The chap-
ter devoted to the mistress of the house is
succeeded by one about the house itself,
which insists on the importance of cleanli-
ness, and tells how to banish insects, to ex-
clude them from houses, to prevent serpents
from coming out of their holes, to avoid the
stings of gnats and the bites of fleas, and to
disinfect clothing and dwellings. Then
there is a treatise on the relations between
soul and body, with secret methods of study-
ing the heart and its movement.

After giving this general description of
the papyrus, which he ascribes to the time
of the early Pharaohs, very shortly after
Menes, Ebers apologizes for not having
studied it more profoundly, for the want of
literary resources during his travels. But
he promises that he will decipher it com-
pletely with the aid of his colleagues, though
the task is one that will require several
years of labor. He hopes that, with the aid
of the various translations of the Bible, he
will succeed in determining the meaning of
the names of certain diseases hitherto unas-
certained. He will furthermore get assist-

ance from ancient Egyptian writings, from
the dictionaries of the Semitic languages,
and from some Greek works which are es-
sentially of the same nature as this papy-
rus, especially from a work by Dioscorides.
There occur, according to Ebers, 100 words
in the papyrus which are altogether new.
Of course it is not expected that the work
will throw any light on physiology, pathol-
ogy, or therapeutics ; still, it will be inter-
esting for the information it will supply as
to the history of medicine in remote ages.

The Weeping - Willow.— The pleasant
tradition that made this the tree on which
the captives of Sion, at Babylon, hung their
harps, has been lately disproved by the in-
vestigations of Karl Kock. He shows that
the Hebrew word " Garab," used by the
poet David, refers to a poplar, and not a
willow. This willow, because of the current
belief, Linnfeus named Salix Babylonica.
That the tree was not a willow, Kanwolf
had concluded long ago. Among systema-
tists the Linnasan specific name will have to
give way to that of Sallx pendida (Moench),
The hardiness of the drooping willow indi-
cates a climate colder than that of Mesopo-
tamia, and it is now regarded as of Chinese
or Japanese origin.

An Ancient Well in Illinois.— A corre-
spondent, writing from Fulton, Whitesides
County, Illinois, gives the following particu-
lars of the discovery of an ancient well in
that locality, which he thinks is deserv-
ing of further investigation. Some twenty
years since, a farmer, living on a high and
dry rolling prairie, about sixteen miles from
the Mississippi, in Whitesides County, dug
a well in his yard. The first five feet dug
through consisted of mould and clay, the
next twenty-two feet of sand and gravel,
and the succeeding five feet of black muck.
In the midst of this black earth the remains
of an old well were struck, the centre of the
new excavation falling within six inches of
the centre of the old one. This ancient
well was stoned up in a workmanlike man-
ner, the stones, in the opinion of the ma-
son employed, having been laid in a sand-
and-lime cement. It was filled with the
mucky material composing the stratum in
which it was found ; and, on clearing out a

MISCELLANY.

253

portion of this, water in the desired quan-
tity was obtained. The curb of the old
well, after the removal of a few of the top
stones, was made the foundation of the new
curbing, which was carried upward to the
surface. Tiie thirty-two feet of earth over-
lying the old well had never before been
turned up.

Our informant, Mr. George M. Wood-
ward, adds that these statements were
originally taken down from the lips of the
farmer himself, who, though not now living
on this farm, is still accessible ; and that
they are received as facts by all the intelli-
gent old settlers of the vicinity.

Scientific Prediction Tcrificd.— A strik-
ing example of the great accuracy attain-
able in scientific prediction is found in the
history of the Mont Cenis Tunnel. Before
the work was commenced, two eminent
savants, M. Elie de Beaumont and Signor
Sismonda, had expressed the opinion that,
in proceeding from France to Italy, the fol-
lowing rocks would be met with : 1. A bed
of schist, with anthracite, having a thick-
ness of from 5,000 to 6,500 feet. 2. A bed
of very hard quartzite, with a thickness of
from 1,300 to 1,900 feet. 3. Compact lime-
stone, with gypsum, anhydrite, and dolo-
mite, having a thickness of from 6,000 to
9,000 feet. 4. A series of calcareous schists,
23,000 to 27,000 feet in thickness. Messrs.
Beaumont and Sismonda said that no igne-
ous rocks would be encountered, all the
formations in these parts of the Alps be-
longing to the stratified rock.

Actual experience corresponded very
closely with the predictions of science.
First, there occurred the schists, with car-
boniferous sandstones, containing veins of
anthracite : thickness, 6,453J- feet. Then
the quartzites : thickness, 1,255J feet.
Next, beds of gypsum, anhydrite, and dolo-
mite, with a thickness of '7,'726J feet. Fi-
nally, calcareous schists for the remaining
28,323 feet of the tunnel.

The Brain and the Mind.— Dr. Burt G.
Wilder's paper, before the American Scien-
tific Association, on " Variations in the Cere-
bral Forms and Fissures of Domestic Dogs,"
contains some very interesting criticisms of
the various methods followed in studying

the relations between brain and mind. There
is, first, the phrenological method, wherein
the skull is accepted as an index of the
brain. But the fallaciousness of this method
is shown: 1. By anatomy, in that no defin-
ite correspondence whatever exists between
folds and fissures of the brain and the outer
surface of the skull. 2. By the fact that no
phrenologist has ventured to draw the ac-
cepted map of the mental faculties on the
surface of the brain itself. 3. By the fail-
ure, in many cases, of the most expert
phrenologists to define character by an ex-
amination of the head. The pathological
method is equally unproductive of satisfac-
tory results. This method proceeds by com-
paring brain-lesions with mental phenom-
ena observed during the life of the individ-
ual. But the patrons of this method are not
yet agreed as to the special function of the
cerebellum, nor as to the localization of the
faculty of speech. Then, too, there is good
reason for supposing that peculiar mental
conditions may exist without recognizable
brain-lesion, and vice versa. Finally, Dr.
Wilder asserts, on the authority of Brown-
Sequard, that " all parts of the brain may,
under irritation, act on any of its other
parts, modifying their activity so as to de-
stroy or diminish, or to increase and to
morbidly alter it ! "

The experimental method proceeds by
irritating or destroying certain cerebral re-
gions in living animals. This method satis-
factorily demonstrates the existence in the
brain of centres of action for different sets
of muscles. But, then, it necessarily pro-
duces abnormal action, and fails to show
the relation between brain and mind. Dr.
Wilder then describes his own method,
which is, in theory, that of the phrenolo-
gists, but differing therefrom in two impor-
tant respects: 1. In employing the brain
itself for comparison, in using large num-
bers, and in comparing the two sides. 2.
In employing canine instead of human
brains, on the ground of their simple fis-
sural pattern, and the possibility of an ac-
curate knowledge of the mental character-
istics of the dogs. Of course, better re-
sults might be expected from the study of
the brains of persons with whom we were
acquainted in hfe, but that is impracticable.
From the study of a brain, if a criminal or

254

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

pauper whom the investigator has never
known, nothing can be learned. It is other-
wise with dogs, where the brain and the
mind of the same individual are at our dis-
posal. It is worthy of remark that Dr.
Wilder is no believer in the localization of
faculties in different portions of the brain,
and is inclined rather to think that a cere-
bral hemisphere acts as a unit either singly
or with its fellow.

Relics of Man iu the Miocene.— In our

June number appeared a note by Sir John
Lubbock about the discovery, near the Dar-
danelles, of an engraved fossil bone, dating
from Miocene times, and supposed to fur-
nish evidence of man's existence at a very
early geological period. A paper was pre-
sented to the American Association, at its
late meeting, by Mr. George Washburn, of
Constantinople, wherein reasons were given
for questioning the value of these remains
as evidence of the high antiquity of man.
The fragment of mastodon-bone, so called,
is described by Mr. Washburn as having 50
marks, more than half of which are grouped
in the centre. Taken individually, they are
peculiar and puzzling ; but, taken together,
they can hardly represent the figure of an
animal, or show any evidence of design.
They may have been produced by worms
when the bone was soft. The smooth upper
surface of the stratum of limestone on
which the bone was found is covered with
exactly similar marks, many groups of
which make more striking pictures than
those found on the bone. One specimen in
particular is so marked that a vivid imagina-
tion might distinguish the picture of a wild-
boar with a spear in his side, with the Greek
letter n most clearly cut by the side of it. As
for the split bones found in the same stra-
tum, and the flint fragments, the author sat-
isfactorily accounts for the shapes assumed
by these, without supposing the interven-
tion of man.

The Octopus and its Prey. — Mr. Henry
Lee, of the Brighton (England) Zoological
Gardens, wishing to view the seizure of a
crab by an octopus, recently fastened one
to a string and had it lowered into the
aquarium close to the glass, while he watched
the operation in front. The crab had hardly

descended to the depth of two feet when an
octopus shot out like a rocket from one side
of the tank, opened its membranous um-
brella, shut up the crab in it, and darted
back to its hiding-place. As the animal
could not be well observed in this situation,
the attempt was made to pull the bait away
from him, so as to draw hun out of his re-
treat. But, as soon as the octopus felt the
pull, he took a firm grasp of the rock with
all the suckers of seven of his arms, and,
stretching the eighth aloft, coiled it round
the tautened line. Noticing several jerks
on the string, Mr. Lee told his assistant not
to use too much force. But the man assured
him that the jerking was done by the octo-
pus, and that the creature would soon break
the line if he did not let it go. " Hold on,
then, and let him break it," said Mr. Lee.
In three tugs more the line broke, though
it was pretty strong twine.

But Mr. Lee's object was to study par-
ticularly the animal's mode of seizing and
disposing of its prey. Accordingly, a second
crab was so fastened that the string could
be withdrawn if desired, and was lowered
near to the great male octopus. The crab
was seized precisely as the observer desired,
viz., caught between the octopus and the
glass plate. In an instant the prey was
completely pinioned. Not a movement, not
a struggle was visible or possible — each leg,
each claw, was grasped all over by suckers,
enfolded in them, stretched out to its full
extent by them. The bnck of the carapace
was covered all over with the tenacious
vacuum-disks, brought together by the adapt-
able contraction of the limb, and ranged in
■close order, shoulder to shoulder, touching
each other ; while, between others which
dragged the abdominal plates toward the
mouth, the black tip of the hard, horny
beak was seen for a single instant protrud-
ing from the circular orifice of the radiation
of the arms, and the next had crunched
through the shell, and was buried deep in
the flesh of the victim. The action of an
octopus when seizing its prey for its neces-
sary food is very like that of a cat pouncing
on a mouse, and holding it down beneath its
paws. The movement is as sudden, the
scuflBe as brief, and the escape of the vic-
tim even less probable. " The fate of the
crab," adds Mr. Lee, " is not really more

MISCELLANY.

=55

terrible than that of the mouse or of a min-
now swallowed by a perch, but there is a
repulsiveness about the form, color, and at-
titudes of the octopus which invests it with
a kind of tragic horror."

Cooling and Contraction of the Earth's
Crast. — Prof. Dana concludes, in the Sep-
tember number of the American Journal
of Science, a series of able papers on Dy-
namical Geology. He states that about 8
per cent, is the average change of density
for the earth's crust between the stony
and Uquid states, which is equivalent to
a change of volume from 100 to 92 per cent.
This, therefore, expresses the contraction
or shrinkage which the crust of the earth
undergoes in its transition from a liquid
condition to that of stone.

This contraction, as Prof. Dana long
since stated, is the source of those inequali-
ties of the surface which have resulted from
a bending of the earth's solid exterior.
From this cause have arisen the elevation
of continents and the basin-like depressions
now occupied by the waters of the oceans,
and from the same cause mountain-chains
have been uplifted.

The origin of the continental eleva-
tions and oceanic depressions was when
the earth's crust began to form on the fiery
liquid mass. Then, from change of den-
sity, already noticed, the cooled areas would
sink and be overflowed by liquid matter,
which, in its turn, would cool. Thus at
length a solid and comparatively stable
area would result — not elevated as yet, but
at the general level of the liquid areas.
These would, in their turn, undergo like
change of conditions, and a crust, more or
less stable, would envelop the globe. This
would thicken, by solidifying, underneath
the outer shell, as cooling proceeded.

But in thus solidifying it would undergo
a change, both of density and volume,
and this change would stand for a certain
amount of contraction and subsidence. This
amount, by the ratio given, would be in
depression to an extent of 5,000 feet, if
the crust or rocky layers be 12 miles thick.
But the ocean-beds will average in depth,
below the mean level of the continents,
16,000 feet. In order to effect so great a
subsidence, the stony layers must be 38^

miles in thickness. In the subsidence sev-
eral subordinate dynamical results must
occur. One of these is powerful lateral
pressure or thrust of the subsiding mass
against the more stable areas, and this
thrust might be horizontal, or obliquely
upward. A consequence of this pressure
would be an elevation or yielding, in some
form, of the areas against which the pressure
was directed. Possibly both have occurred ;
certainly the solid crust has bent, until
vast mountain uplifts have occurred, and it
became fractured to its profound depths.

From this and other considerations it
would appear that continental elevations
and oceanic depressions were outlined when
the crust began to form, and that they have
not since entirely changed places.

It further appears that the continents
are a growth, in which additions to their
margins have occurred. Such is evidently
the case with the continent of North Amer-
ica, as shown in its rocks, in its outlines,
and the character and results of its oscilla-
tions.

Improved Deep-Sea Sonnding ippara-
tns. — In the July number of the Monthly
may be found a description of Brooke's
self-detaching shot-apparatus for bringing
up specimens of the sea-bottom. This in-
strument has been considerably improved
by Commander Belknap, of the U. S. steamer
Tuscarora, now engaged in exploring the
bed of the Pacific, with a view to find a
suitable berth for a submarine cable from
San Francisco to Japan, via the Aleutian
Island chain. Commander Belknap's im-
provement consists, according to the Engi-
neering and Jfiriing Journal, of two cyUn-
ders, fixed one above the other when the
instrument is set and descending through
the water, and closing telescopically when
the shot is detached on reaching the bot-
tom. The lower cylinder is fitted with a
conical cup at the lower extremity for the
reception of parts of the bottom through an
aperture, which, while descending, admits a
flow of water upward through the cylinders
by means of valves which close hermetically
by the pressure of the water when the ap-
paratus is being hauled up. The upper
cylinder covers the aperture in the lower
one on detaching the shot, so that the water

256

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

cannot wash out the bottom contained in
the conical cup. Thus Commander Belknap
has discovered a practical and unfailing
method of not only bringing up safely a
larger amount of bottom from tlie ocean-
bed than has hitherto been brought up, but
also as much water as is caught between
the two valves in the lower cylinder at the
moment of striking the bottom.

NOTES.

More than a thousand lives are lost each
year in England from accidents in coal-min-
ing.

According to a writer in Iron, peals
of bells were in use in Eugland in the tenth
century.

An Aged Grape-vine. — At the Septem-
ber meeting of the Royal Horticultural Soci-
ety, a bunch of grapes was exhibited, taken
from the parent plant of the Hampton Court
vine. This vine dates from 1*761.

F. V. Kallab states, as the result of nu-
merous experiments, that the dyes fixed on
animal textile fabrics are in general more
permanent than those on vegetable tissues.

A NEW currency is soon to be issued in
the German Empire. Twelve dififerent kinds
of coins will represent all the variations of
value, and four metals, gold, silver, nickel,
and copper, will be used for the purpose.
The system will be decimal throughout, but
not uniform in values with any existing
system.

NoBBE maintains that potash-salts in
soils are necessary in order to enable the
chlorophyl-grains of the leaves to form
starch. Sodium and lithium are unable to
replace potassium in this function, and the
latter is even positively hurtful. The chlo-
ride of potassium is the most effective form
in which this element can be supplied to
the soil.

Dr. Adam Smith, in a paper read before
the London Society of Arts, recommends
the use of tea in the following cases : After
a full meal, when the system is oppressed ;
for the corpulent and the old ; for hot cli-
mates, and especially for those who, living
there, eat freely, or drink milk or alcohol ;
in cases of suspended animation ; for sol-
diers who, in time of peace, take too much
food in relation to the waste proceeding in
the body ; for soldiers and others marching
in hot climates, for then, by promoting
evaporation and cooling the body, it obvi-
ates, in a degree, the effects of too much
food, as of too great heat.

A GENERAL meeting of Italian savants
was to open at Rome on the 20th of Octo-
ber, to remain in session for two weeks.
An invitation was extended to scientific
men of foreign countries to attend the ses-
sion. The committee of arrangements say
that " this is the first time in many cen-
turies that reason and science could freely
and thoroughly make their voices heard in
the city of Rome."

Dr. C. Purdon, of Belfast, reports that
lung-diseases are far more fatal to the flax-
operatives of that town (in number 25,000)
than to the artisans and laboring-classes.
The most unwholesome branch of the flax
industry is the work of the "preparing-
room," which carries off annually 31 per
thousand of the workers. Dr. Purdon as-
serts that this great mortality is chiefly due
to these three causes : Putting children to
work at too early an age ; neglect of sani-
tary law ; and defective food and clothing.
He insists that the wearing of the Baker
respirator should be made compulsory on
the operatives.

In the printing-office of the Cleveland
Ledger a gas-pipe had been plugged with a
hard-wood stopper, at a point several feet
from any burner. About six inches below
it passed a belt, running from one pulley to
another, and in operation during the day.
About four days after the plug had been
driven into the pipe it was noticed to be on
fire, and a bright jet of light, as if from a
burner, burst forth from the side of the
plug, which was already charred, and being
rapidly burned up. The question now was,
how the flame had originated. It was
certain that no one had lighted it, nor
had any fire come near it. The only con-
clusion possible was, that it was caused
by electricity from the belt, and a full in-
vestigation confirmed this conclusion. Had
it happened in the night-time, it might
have enkindled an extensive conflagration,
and its origin would never have been known.

According to ofiicial reports, there were
consumed in Paris, during the first half of
1867, 893 horses, asses, and mules, which
supphed about 255,000 lbs. of meat. Dur-
ing the first half of 1870, 1,992 of these
animals were slaughtered, giving about
980,000 lbs. of meat. For the first half of
the present year the figures amounted re-
spectively to 5,186 animals, and 2,368,000
pounds ; and the same progress is shown
by the provinces. Horses slaughtered for
consumption fetch, on an average, from 125
to 150 francs per head — adding thus 100
francs per head to the value of worn-out
horses. According to the reports, the public
wealth of France is increased, by the eating
of horse-beef, to the extent of 480,000,000
francs.

DR. J. W. DEAFER.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

JANUARY, 1874.

CONOEENING SERPENTS.

By ELIAS lewis, Je.

FEW animals are more universally feared and detested than ser-
pents. Their presence startles us, however inoifensive they may
be. Nor can the gracefulness of their motion, or beauty of color, con-
quer the discontent we feel when we see them gliding in our path, or
coiled and glistening in the sunshine, in which they delight. The
enjoyment of many a summer's ramble has been imj^aired from this
cause, and we fear our article may be as distasteful to many persons
as are the objects of which it treats. But we may remember that ser-
pents, no less than more attractive creatures, are important in Na-
ture's economies. Their structure is a marvel of mechanical adapta-
tion, less complicated, perhaps, but as perfect in every detail as is
that of mammals and birds, and the mechanism which rolls the human
eye is not more complete, and scarcely more wonderful, than that
which moves the fangs of a viper. Perhaps, in the study of Nature,
we should estimate objects by their fitness, rather than by their at-
tractiveness or beauty.

" The serpent," observes Prof. Owen, " is too commonly looked
down upon as an animal degraded from a higher type. . . . But it
can outclimb the monkey, outswim the fish, outleap the jerboa ; it has
neither hands nor talons, yet it can outwrestle the athlete, and crush
the tiger in its embrace." Serpents, in their mode of locomotion, are
creeping animals, as their name implies, and constitute an order of the
great class Reptiles. This term also implies creeping, but includes
orders of animals which have limbs for locomotion, and do not creep.
Of these, turtles, lizards, and crocodiles, are familiar instances ; so that
animals of several species, which run, walk, or swim, are included in
the same class with those which creep. All of these, however, are
cold-blooded, the temperature of the body differing but few degrees
from that of the surrounding air or water. Their coldness is always

VOL. IV. — lY

258

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

obvious to the touch, and this is true with those found in hot as well
as in temperate climates, and adds greatly to their repulsiveness.

Fig. 1. Of serpents, their general form and

structure are the same. Their bodies are
rounded and elongated, and covered with
a scaly skin. The vertebral column is
continuous with the length of the body,
and is divided into joints from 200 to
400 in number, but in the large pythons
(Fig. 1), as stated by Dr. Carpenter,
422 vertebral joints have been counted.
To about 360, or f of these, were at-
tached pairs of movable ribs. A rat-
tlesnake, with 194 vertebrae, had 168
pairs of ribs. The vertebrae of tlie ser-
pent are united by a most perfect ball-
and-socket joint, and the ribs are joined
to the vertebrae in a similar manner.
These, held and worked by complete
muscular adjustment, give to several
their wonderful flexibility, strength, and
crushing power.

The well-known boa -constrictor,
and the aboraa, or ringed boa of South
America (Fig. 2), are illustrations of
this class of serpents, the term con-
strictor being given from their power
to close upon and compress whatever
is within their folds.

The structure of the backbone of a
serpent has direct relation to its loco-
motion, for it is without limbs, and rudi-
ments of pelvic bones are found only in
the boas, pythons, and a few other spe-
cies. But, where the type shades ofi"
into allied reptilian forms, the rudi-
mental limbs are developed and promi-
nent.

We read that the curse pronounced
\ipon the serpent was, " upon thy belly
thou shalt go," and the inference seems
to be that, previous to that time, its
mode of progression was not upon its
belly. This would imply a great ana-
tomical change in the structure of the creature at the time in ques-
tion, a change which, so far as we are aware, is not proved by paleon-

PoRT Natal Rock-Snake, or Python.

CONCERNING SERPENTS.

259

tological research, and the expression is probably a figurative one, as
observed by Dr. Buckland. Serpents progress by the " foldings and
windino-s they make on the ground," and the stiff, movable scales
which cross the under portion of the body ; but the windings are side-
ways, not vertical.

-\p

^>

Abohia, OB Ringed Boa.

The Structure of the vertebrse is such, that upward and downward
undulations are greatly restricted, and many illustrations, showing
sharp vertical curves of the body, are exaggerations. Most persons
have seen snakes glide slowly and silently, without any contortion.
They seem to progress by some invisible power ; but, if permitted to
move over the bare hand, an experiment easily tried, a motion of the
scales will be perceived. These are elevated and depressed, and act
as levers, by which the animal is carried forward. Nor can a serpent
progress with facility on the ground, without the resistance afforded
by the scales. It is stated that it cannot pass over a plate of glass, or
other entirely smooth surface. We saw the experiment tried, by

26o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

placing a small pane of glass in a box, in which was a common black
snake. He was made to pass over it repeatedly, but evidently found
that he had no foothold on it ; and the third time, as he apjjroached
it, elevated the fore-part of his body slightly, and brought his head
down beyond the glass, and, on passing, his body seemed scarcely to
touch it. This gave an opportunity to witness the wave-like move-
ment of the scales, that is, of their elevation, which runs from the head
to the tail, enabling the animal to move continuously, instead of by a
series of minute pushes, as would occur if all the scales be lifted and
depressed at once.

In the moulting of the snake, which occurs yearly, and sometimes
oftener, the outer covering of these creeping scales is shed ; this is
true also of the covering of the eyes, so that the cast epidermis
represents, with great distinctness, the external features of the animal.
In moulting, the outer skin is broken along the back, near the head,
and the animal emerges, frequently drawing with him the skin, turn-
ing it inside out. Prof. Owen states, however, that in one instance
exuviation commenced by the snake rubbing the skin loose around its
jaws, working it ba<5k against the sides of its cage, when, putting its
head through coils made by its own body, it pressed back the skin,
turning it outward. We have observed that the black snake, on
moulting, becomes more sensitive and irritable, but shy, and inclined,
for a day or so, to keep close in a corner of his cage. The scaly cov-
ering of serpents must diminish their acuteness of touch ; but we have
found them sensitive to exceedingly slight irritation. They are with-
out an external ear, and the phrase "deaf as an adder" is a familiar
one. Nevertheless, they have organs of audition beneath the skin or
protecting membrane, and we know by experiment that snakes hear
and distinguish sounds, and are said in some instances to recognize the
voice of their keeper. Some species, it has been observed, are influ-
enced by music, and we quote the statement by Chateaubriand of an
incident witnessed by himself. He says : " The Canadian began to
play upon his flute. The snake (a rattlesnake) drew its head back-
ward, its eyes lost their sharpness, the vibrations of its tail relaxed,
and, turning its head toward the musician, remained in an attitude of
pleased attention."

The snake-charmers (Fig. 3), familiar to travelers in Eastern coun-
tries, handle cobras with apparent impunity, cause them to advance
or retreat, to coil and uncoil, to bow their heads, or bring their deadly
mouths to their own by musical sounds, either vocal or instrumental.
A story is related of an English gentleman, residing in a mountainous
part of India, who was compelled to desist playing upon a flute be-
cause the music atti-acted serpents to his residence. The sense of taste
in serpents must be very feeble, as it is quite unserviceable. They
swallow their food whole, nor have they any teeth by which mastica-
tion can be accomplished. Their sense of smell is also obtuse. The

CONCERNING SERPENTS.

261

Snake- Charmers.

262

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

organs by which this is effected are near the muzzle, but, according to
Cuvier, they are without the sinuses which exist in the heads of mam-
mals. We have tested this sense in seVeral species of snakes, but only
pungent odors seem to specially annoy them. The tongue of the ser-
pent is a harmless appendage, tough, horny, and double-pointed ; and,
like the same member in man, has a wonderful propensity to be in
motion. That snakes sting with their tongues is an old but erroneous
opinion. Perhaps our own species is not equally innocent in that re-
spect. All serpents are carnivorous, and nearly all seize and swallow
living food. Their teeth are bony, hard, conical in shape, and exceed-
ingly sharp-pointed. None of the class have grinding or cutting teeth.
They are formed for holding their food, not to grind, crush, or cut it.
Moreover, all their teeth are recurved in form and position ; that is,
they point in or backward, so that an object once seized can scarcely
escape, and, if the jaws be fully distended, could only with great diffi-
culty be ejected. Instances are given where serpents have died from
their inability to swallow what they could not eject from their throats,
and it is obvious that life could not continue a very long time under
such circumstances, for, as Prof. Owen observes, " while swallowing,
the tracheae may be so compressed that no air can pass, and their only
resource is what is contained in the lungs."

In the non-venomous species, which includes those that constrict
or crush their prey, are found four rows of teeth in the upper jaw and
arch of the mouth, and two rows in the under jaw. Venomous spe-
cies have usually no more than two rows above, which are on the
palatal arch, and two below; but they have on the upper jaw two or
more poison-fangs, as shown in Fig. 4, an account of which makes the
most fearful chapters in the history of this family of reptiles.

A. Diagrammatic Section op the Eye
OP A Viper.
. Eyeball ; h. Optic nerve ; c. Chamber into which tears
are poured ; d. Epidermic layer covering the eye.

B. Head of Viper, showing
Poison-Fanqs.

We have observed that serpents swallow their food whole. They
make a meal from a mouthful, but the mouthful is sometimes a very
large one, for they will swallow animals twice or thrice their own

CONCERNING SERPENTS.

263

diameter. This is permitted by the extraordinary expansibility of
their body ; but the enlargement of their jaws is a complicated phe-
nomenon. In the act of swallowing, they yield at every point, side-
ways as well as vertically. The elastic integuments which hold the
parts of their jaws in place give way, and the apparently small mouth
becomes an enormous on-^.

Digestion proceeds slowly, and, if the meal be excessive, as it often
is, the serpent remains sluggish and comparatively helpless a long
time. " They have been kept four, six, and eight months, without
being fed, and with very little apparent waste of substance." Bruce
reports that he kept specimens of the cerastes, or horned-snake, two
years in a glass vessel without food, during which time they cast their
skins as usual.

ClECTrLATING StSTEM OF REPTILE.

a. Auricle receiving wom-ont venous blood from the system ; a'. Auricle receiving vitalized blood
from the lung ; v. Ventricle in which the two bloods are mixed, and from which it is thrown
into the general circulation.

Vital activity in serpents is low. In mammals, the normal mean
temperature is from 95° to 105° Fahr., and this must be maintained, or
disease supervenes. With serpents, the temperature is a few degrees
only above that of the surrounding atmosphere, and varies with it.
Thus, it may range, in their healthy active state, from 60° to perhaps
more than 80° Fahr. The temperature of a serpent was found, by
Hunter and others, to be 88.46°, that of the air being 81.5°. The tem-
perature of a frog was 48° in water at 44.4°. If the atmosphere he

264

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

continuously at 60°, some of our common snakes become sluggish and
inactive. In both mammals and reptiles the source of internal heat
is the same, the difference being in degree only. The low tempera-
ture of serpents (as of other reptiles) arises from the structure of
their vital organs, by means of which their blood is imperfectly
oxygenized. As the " worn-out " or venous blood enters the heart,
it is mixed with the vitalized blood from the lung (there being,
in most species, only one lung and a rudiment of another), and it is
this mixed blood which is thrown into the general circulation, as shown
in Fig. 5. The blood of a serpent has been said for this reason to be

only half alive, and their functions are accordingly sluggish and dull.
Their power of existence for long periods without food, and with little
waste of tissue, is chiefly incident to their low vitality.

Hibernation is with them a period of profound torpor. In our
temperate climates they gather in large numbers, in some hole, or bur-

CONCERNING SERPENTS.

265

row in the ground, or in clefts of rocks, for their winter sleep. We
once saw twenty-six black snakes taken from one burrow beneath the
roots of a partially-fallen tree, in February. Other observers have
found a much larger number. We are informed that more than 300
have been found in a single burrowing-place, and that many species,
venomous and non-veno.-nous, sometimes resort to the same rendezvous
and hibernate together. In the tropics the anaconda (Fig. 6), and per-
haps other species of serpents, sometimes hibernate during the dry
season of summer in the hardened mud of dried-up pools. It is by
the power to hibernate that serjients survive during the winters of
temperate climates, but they seem unable to withstand the extreme
and long-continued cold of the arctic zone. There, serpents, and in-

PiG. 7.

'^^~^'^^'^-

^y.

Northern Rattlesnake.

deed reptiles of all kinds, are rare, and frequently are entirely wanting.
In the Falkland Islands, Terra delFuego, and the mountains of South-
ern Patagonia, no serpents have been found. The persistence of
vitality in serpents is extraordinary, and continues after great mutila-
tions. They are said to have lived several days after removal of the
head and viscera. One placed in a vacuum twenty-four hours still
showed signs of sensibility ; and, many hours after decapitation, a rat-
tlesnake would plunge its headless trunk as in the usual act of striking.

266

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

In temperate climates serpents as a rule are less fierce than in the
tropics. In North America the CrotalidcB comprise twelve species
with rattles, and three species in which rattles are absent. Of the last
named, the copperhead and moccasin snakes are well known. Of the
first, the northern rattlesnake (Fig. 7) is familiar, and unpleasantly-
abundant in many parts of the country, but is nowhere fierce or in-
clined to attack. Fig. 8 is of the common viper, or adder of England
and the Continent.

All the gigantic crushing species are found in regions of torrid
temperature. Of these, the Guinea rock or fetich snake (Fig. 10) is
allied to the family of pythons already noticed.

There too are the most terribly fierce of the venomous species, as
the fer de lance (Fig. 11); the cobra (Fig. 12), sacred in India, the
killing of which with some tribes is considered sacrilege; the haje
or spitting-snake of Africa, a hooded species, and allied to the cobra,
and the horned puff-adder (Fig. 13), whose poison is used to tip ar-
rows by the South-African Bushmen.

Common Adder op Englajo) and the Continent.— {Venomous.)

The mere recital of their names excites in one unpleasant sensa-
tions. Deaths from the bite of serpents in temperate regions which
they infest are surprisingly rare. It is otherwise, however, in the
tropics, and perhaps no country has so fearful a mortality from the
bites of venomous snakes as India. In six provinces, which include
Assam and Orissa, with a population of about 121,000,000, 11,416
deaths were reported in a single year. This is about one in every
10,000 of population, and this is only an approximation to the actual
mortality, for many districts sent no returns. A majority of all the
deaths from this cause was from cobras ; yet this serpent, as ob-

CONCERNING SERPENTS. 267

served, is an object of veneration, and is regarded with peculiar
deference. If found in their houses, as it frequently is, it must be pet-
ted, cared for, tenderly fed, and propitiated, for it is an object of wor-
ship, and occupies a high place in the mythology of the Hindoos.
Indeed, the worship of serpents seems to liave.been widely adopted,
and figures more or less in a vast number of the religions of the world.
It is often referred to in the Scriptures, and is a subject of elaborate
discussion \u the profoundly learned and interesting volume of Fer-
guson, on " Tree and Serpent Worship."

We mentioned the fact tliat in most species serpents have but one
fully-developed lung. Into the cavity of this the trachea or windpipe
terminates, and it has been stated that they " in a manner swallow
air." What takes place in the process of breathing appears to be
this. Unlike mammals, serpents have no diaphragm, but by a move-
ment of the ribs the cavity of the body is enlarged, and, a pressure
being thus removed, the lung inflates and expands by the air passing
into it. Another and opposite movement of the ribs expels the air,
whence it appears that their process of breathing is essentially the
same as in mammals. Nor are their lungs in structure essentially
different. The air sacs or cells communicate with the principal pul-
monary tube, but a vastly smaller surface is exposed to the inhaled
air, and aeration of the blood is consequently extremely imperfect and
incomplete.

Pig. 9.

Small Vipebine Snake {Tropidonotua Tiperin'us).

Serpents are without proper organs of voice, the vibrating mem-
branes being absent. The passage of air into and out of the lungs, if
hurried and rapid, produces a hissing noise, the only voice possible to
them, but which we fear makes less interesting their somewhat unpre-
possessing features.

268

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

A scale-like covering, which is fixed and immovable, covers the eye
of the serpent, as shown in Fig. 4, and gives to it, as Prof. Nicholson
vividly expresses it, the " peculiar, stony, unwinking stare " for which
they are remarkable, and which, when they are enraged, becomes
intensely fierce.

Fig. 10.

This covering is evidently transparent, as the animal distinguishes
forms, but in the cast-off skin it is translucent only. Behind the eye-
ball is a lachrymal gland, with a duct which conveys tears to the
membranes of the eye. By this means they are kept moist. A con-
duit connects the eye-cavity with the olfactory opening, and, should
the creature shed tears, it would be through that opening, not directly
from its eyes.

In common with other animals, serpents have some habits and

CONCERNING SERPENTS.

i6g

instincts peculiar to themselves, which are directly related to the
necessities of their being ; but we are not aware that they display
great sagacity, cunning, or wisdom. They are not fertile in devices,
not especially artful, and the extreme simplicity and smallness of
their brain indicate their low mental powers.

The entire tribe of terpents for the purposes of this paper may be
divided into the venomous and non-venomous species. Of the non-
venomous, we will pass, with one or two remarks, the interesting
families of double walkers, and slow or blind worms (Fig. 14), types
which are structurally intermediate between true serpents and lizards.
The first of these derives its name from the fact that it can progress

Feb de L/nce.

with facility forward or backward ; the second from the erroneous
notion that it has no eyes. To this class belong the curious glass-
snakes, so named from their fragility. Other non-venomous serpents
comprise the inoffensive and harmless, and some of the most terrible
species. Of these we have noticed the gigantic rock-snake or python
of India, which attains a length of 30 feet. The Natal rock-snake is
found 25 feet long. Of equal size is the boa-constrictor of tropical
America, formerly an object of worship. The anaconda, or water-
serpent, which frequents the rivers of Brazil, and watches for its prey
along their banks, is sometimes more than 25 feet long. These are

270

TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

among the most powerful of their kind, in whose folds man is helpless,
and bones of goats and cattle are broken with a crash which, it is said,
may be heard many rods. We turn from tliese, whose fearful presence
we associate with the splendors of tropical forests, to species harmless
and often serviceable to man, yet everywhere persecuted by him.
Among these we find the beautiful ring and grass snakes of our
gardens; the milk and striped or garter snake; the common adder
(so called), but entirely harmless ; the active black snake or racer,
found nearly everywhere in the United States. More dreaded because
more dano-erous than the gigantic species mentioned, are the venom-

Cobra-de-Capello.

ous serpents, not powerful in strength or immense in size, but fierce
in some cases, and in their attack deadly. The largest of these is said
to be the bush-master, found in British Guiana, which, on the authority
of Waterton, attains a length of fourteen feet. But the belted hama-
dryad of Burmah is often seen twelve to fourteen feet in length, and is
a foot in circumference ; and it is stated that specimens have been seen
three fathoms (eighteen feet) long. If so, it is probably the largest
known venomous serpent. This terrible creature feeds on other snakes,
hence its scientific name, Ophiophagus elaps. Others, as the cobra and
the rattlesnake, are relatively small, rarely attaining a length greater
than six feet, usually not more than four feet.

CONCERNING SERPENTS. 271

But the distinguishing feature of venomous serpents is their poison
fangs and glands, by which the fatal fluid is secreted. They kill by a
stroke, or blow, which drives the fang into the flesh, and there dis-
charges the venom. Some are intensely active and fierce, and will
spring upon the traveler, as the fer de lance and the haje. Others, as
the northern rattlesnake seldom attack but rather retreat from man.

The fangs are in the upper jaw, as shown in Fig. 4. In a rattle-
snake, four feet in length, they are about half an inch long. Behind
them are the glands, which secrete the poisonous fluid, from five to ten
drops of which have, in some cases, been obtained from a single fang.
It is tasteless, and nearly colorless, and, on being dried up, leaves
minute crystalline spicules, or scales. The venom of all the poisonous
species of serpents appears to be essentially the same, but difiers in
intensity or virulence. The fang is perforated by a small canal in

The Horned Ptjff-Adder.

front of the usual pulp-cavity, through which the venom is discharged
by pressure brought to bear upon the glands from the act of striking.
A rattlesnake confined in a cage, when irritated, struck against the
wire bars with its fangs, throwing the venom a distance of three feet.
The fang usually lies flat, and partly hidden in the fleshy tissue, but
is erected when needed for use ; and it is only when erected that its
connection with the venom-gland is so adjusted that the fluid may be
thrown out.

The poison is always more or less dangerous to animal life. Cattle
have died from a bite of the fer de lance in a few hours. Smaller ani-
mals die directly. Horses have been killed by rattlesnakes, and
people bitten by them may die in a few minutes or in a few days, but

272 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sometimes recover. If the poison is discharged into the arteries or
veins, the vital functions directly fail, " the victim staggers, and falls
from exhaustion — depressing gloom settles on the features — a cold
sweat comes upon the face — and death at once supervenes." In such
cases the blood is unchanged, and appears healthy ; but, where the
effect is not immediate, it undergoes change — " ceases to coagulate,
the fibrine disappears, and the patient dies with ordinary symptoms
of slow poisoning."

A multitude of remedies have been suggested for the bite of ser-
pents; of these, ammonia and alcohol are prominent. Prof. Halfourd,
of Australia, reported the recovery of seventeen out of twenty cases of
severe bites, from the injection of a solution of ammonia into the veins.
The free use of alcohol in some form has been stoutly advocated by
many physicians, while others assert that patients have died from the
poison even while intoxicated by the remedy. An exhaustive paper

Blind ob Slow Worm.

on rattlesnake-bites, and their remedy, by Dr. Mitchell, was published
in No. 12 of the " Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge," to which
we are indebted for several interesting statements, and to which we
refer our readers.

The conclusions of Dr. Fayrer, from his exhaustive experiments
upon snake-poisoning in India, are, that most of the popular remedies
ai-e of little value, and he seems to differ somewhat from Prof. Hal-
fourd, The celebrated snake-stones, which are said to " absorb and
suck out the poison," he "believes are perfectly powerless to produce
any such effect." He advises ligature to prevent, if possible, the pas-
sage of the poison into the circulation. Whiskey and ammonia are

CONCERNING SERPENTS.

273

useful as stimulants ; but he found, by experiment, that neither liquor
ammonias nor liquor potassoe destroys the poisonous properties of the
venom, althougli mixed directly with it. Suction of the wound is
good, but may be dangerous. Immediate cauterization of the wound,
or removal of it by the knife, is indispensable.

It was found, by Di. Gilman, that healthy, vigorous vegetables
perish in a few hours on being inoculated with the venom of the rattle-
snake. Others have found the same results, although Dr. Mitchell did
not. Dr. Salisbury poisoned eight lilac and other bushes, the leaves
of which above — riot below — the point of inoculation withered in a
few days. Terrible and virulent as this poison is, it undergoes de-
composition in a short time, and becomes filled with forms of animal
life and covered with fungi. It may, when fresh from the fang, be
swallowed by the animal itself, or by man, without injury. Proi!
Baird says : " I have myself (rather foolishly, I must confess) swal-
lowed nearly the entire contents of one gland of a large rattlesnake ;"
but, if the animal be inoculated by its own venom, it speedily dies.
Such, however, is not the case with the venom of the cobra, according
to experiments made by Dr. Fayrer, who says : " I believe that it is

Ring ob Ghass Snake, common in England.

capable of absorption, through the mucous and serous membranes with
which it is brought into contact. Placed on the corjunctiva of dogs,
the symptoms of poisoning were rapidly developed." The same au-
thority states that the cobra does not die from its own bite, or that of
its kind, but that innocuous serpents are directly killed by it.

It is a singular fact that the flesJi of animals killed by snake-poison
may be eaten Avith impunity. The fowls killed by Dr. Fayrer were
taken and eaten by the sweepers. But the blood of an animal killed
by snake-venom is itself poisonous, and poisons the animal into which

VOL. IV. — 18

274 ^^^ POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

it is injected. The authority just quoted says: "I have transmitted
the poison through three animals, with fatal results."

The formation of rattles upon the tail of a rattlesnake is a curious
phenomenon. The notion that one is developed each year is incorrect.
Young ones have been known to have six or more ; sometimes two or
three appear in a single year. The number seldom exceeds fifteen.
The skin of one that was six feet long, now in the Museum of the Long
Island Historical Society of Brooklyn, has fourteen rattles. De Kay
cited, in 1842, the Clarion newspaper, published at Bolton, Kew York,
which stated that two men killed, in three days, in the town of Bol-
ton, at Lake George, 1,104 rattlesnakes, some of which carried fifteen to
twenty rattles. They were killed for their oil. The same author states,
on the authority of the Columbian Magazine for November, 1786, that
a rattlesnake was killed, having forty-four rattles, which seems an in-
credible number. The use of the rattles is a subject of discussion.
They are evidently well developed — not rudimental merely — and the
conclusion is irresistible that they are of service to the creature. We
cannot suppose that organs which are constant in a class of animals,
could have originated, if entirely useless and unserviceable to it.
Prof. Aughey suggests that the whirring rattle is a call-note by the
animal to its mate. That it was thus used on one occasion he was an
eye-witness. Again, it may be used to terrify its enemies ; or to par-
alyze its victims with fright, or to call assistance in danger. He
says : " I once witnessed an attack by seven hogs on a rattlesnake.
Immediately the snake rattled, and three others appeared ; but the
hogs were victorious."

The power of serpents to overcome birds by fascination is consid-
ered by most writers doubtful. But it cannot be questioned, we think,
that birds sometimes become powerless in the presence of snakes. We
once saw a cat-bird on a low branch with drooped wings, feathers
erect, and mouth open, apparently breathing heavily, looking directly
at the head of a black snake which was within fifteen inches of the
head of the bird, and very slowly moving forward. A sharp blow on
a board startled the snake, and seemed instantly to release the bird
from its dream, when it flew away. Perhaps the able paper on " Hyp-
notism in Animals," by Prof. Czermak, published in The Popular Sci-
ence MoxTHLT for September, 1873, may suggest a possible solution
of this phenomenon.

All serpents are essentially oviparous ; that is, the young are pro-
duced from eggs. Nevertheless, many species, including all the ven-
omous ones, according to Cuvier, bring forth their young alive ; but this
is in consequence of the eggs being hatched before being laid. A boa-
consti*ictor produced hoth eggs and living young in the Zoological
Gardens at Amsterdam. The eggs of serpents are without a calcareous
shell, and those of our common species are often exposed in turning
the ground in fields and in gardens. The young are at once quite ac-

CONCERNING SERPENTS. 275

tive, and we have seen them when very young display the instinctive
habits of their species.

The python coils around her eggs, and faithfully remains there
during their two months of incubation ; the temperature of her body
rising, in one instance, to 96° Fahr. All this time she refuses food,
" but appears feverish, aL.d drinks water freely."

The time when serpents first appeared upon the globe is compara-
tively recent. No fossil remains of them have yet been discovered,
until after the close of the Age of Reptiles. The oldest yet found
were in the Eocene of the south of England. Prof. E. D. Cope first
found them in the United States in the Eocene of New Jersey.
They have been found also by Prof. Marsh in the Eocene of Wyo-
ming. Prof. Cope discovered five new species during the past Slim-
mer in the Miocene of Colorado, and has also obtained them from
Post-Pliocene formations. So it appears that, during the whole of the
Tertiary, serpents abounded, and the fact that in the Eocene they
were so widely distributed suggests a much earlier origin for this
order of reptiles. How numerous they may have been during periods
subsequent to their advent is not easily determined. But, notwith-
standing their abundance in the tropics, and in contiguous regions, it
is probable that their period of greatest abundance, if not of greatest
development, has passed. Civilization destroys them, or drives them
to the swamps, the mountains, and the wilderness.

The number of species of snakes found in the State of New York is
seventeen. Two of these are venomous, the rattlesnake and the viper.
Sixteen species are named in Prof. Cook's catalogue for New Jersey,
and that gentleman remarks : " All of them are of great value to the
agriculturist, and the popular prejudice against them should be done
away M'ith." It should be more widely known and more often con-
sidered that snakes destroy immense numbers of animals which are
detrimental to the interests of man, as rats, mice, insects, larvse, and
worms of various kinds. The fer de lance infests the sugar-plantations
of some of the West India islands, not to destroy men, who fear it, but
to obtain rats for food, which swarm there in incredible numbers.
In the State of Maine are ten species of snakes, in Michigan fifteen
species, and from Baird and Girard's catalogue, published in 1853, we
learn that 119 species of North American serpents were at that time
known and described.

In the older settled portions of the United States theii' numbers
have diminished, and in the more thoroughly cultivated sections of
New England, New York, New Jersey, and perhaps other States,
their scarcity is a matter of common observation. Before persistent
warfare, and amid conditions which are becoming more unfavorable to
their habits of life, they will doubtless become fewer in number and
species, and, in such regions, the period of their extinction may not be
very remote.

276 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE THEORY OF MOLECULES.'

Br Peofessoh CLEEK ilAXVTELL, F. P.. S.

AIT atom is a "body which cannot be cut in two. A molecule is
the smallest possible portion of a particular substance. No
one has ever seen or handled a single molecule. Molecular science,
therefore, is one of those branches of study which deal with things
invisible and impei-ceptible by our senses, and which cannot be sub-
jected to direct experiment.

The mind of man has perplexed itself with many hard questions.
Is space infinite, and if so in what sense ? Is the material world
infinite in extent, and are all places within that extent equally full of
matter ? Do atoms exist, or is matter infinitely divisible ?

The discussion of questions of this kind has been going on ever
since men began to reason, and to each of us, as soon as we obtain
the use of our faculties, the same old questions arise as fresh as ever.
They form as essential a part of the science of the nineteenth century
of our era, as of that of the fifth century before it.

"^e do not know much about the science organization of Thrace
twenty-two centuries ago, or of the machinery then employed for
diffusing an interest in physical research. There were men, however,
in those days, who devoted their lives to the pursuit of knowledge
with an ardor worthy of the most distinguished members of the
British Association ; and the lectures in which Democritus explained
the atomic theory to his fellow-citizens of Abdera realized, not in
golden opinions only, but in golden talents, a sum hardly equaled
even in America.

To another very eminent philosopher, Anaxagoras, best known to
the world as the teacher of Socrates, we are indebted for the most
important service to the atomic theory, which, after its statement by
Democritus, remained to be done. Anaxagoras, in fact, stated a theoiy
which so exactly contradicts the atomic theory of Democritus that
the truth or falsehood of the one theory implies the falsehood or truth
of the other. The question of the existence or non-existence of atoms
cannot be presented to us this evening with greater clearness than in
the alternative theories of these two philosophers.

Take any portion of matter, say a drop of water, and observe its
properties. Like every other portion of matter we have ever seen, it
is divisible. Divide it in two, each portion appears to retain all the
properties of the original drop, and among others that of being
divisible. The parts are similar to the whole in every respect except
in absolute size.

' Lecture delivered before the British Association at Bradford.

THE THEORY OF MOLECULES. 277

Now go on repeating the process of division till the separate
portions of water are so small that we can no longer perceive or
handle them. Still we have no doubt that the subdivision might be
carried further, if our senses were more acute and our instruments
more delicate. Thus far all are agreed, but now the question arises,
Can this subdivision be repeated forever ?

According to Democritus and the atomic school, we must answer
in the negative. After a certain number of subdivisions, the drop
would be divided into a number of parts each of which is incapable
of further subdivision. We should thus, in imagination, arrive at
the atom, which, as its name literally signifies, caimot be cut in two.
This is the atomic doctrine of Democritus, Epicurus, and Lucretius,
and, I may add, of your lecturer.

According to Anaxagoras, on the other hand, the parts into which
the drop is divided are in all respects similar to the whole drop, the
mere size of a body counting for nothing as regards the nature of its
substance. Hence if the whole drop is divisible, so are its parts down
to the minutest subdivisions, and that without end.

The essence of the doctrine of Anaxagoras is, that the parts of a
body are in all respects similar to the whole. It was therefore called
the doctrine of Homoiomereia. Anaxagoras did not of course assert
this of the parts of organized bodies such as men and animals, but he
maintained that those inorganic substances which appear to us homo-
geneous are really so, and that the universal experience of mankind
testifies that every material body, without exception, is divisible.

The doctrine of atoms and that of homogeneity are thus in direct
contradiction.

But we must now go on to molecules. Moleciile is a modern word.
It does not occur in Johnson's " Dictionary." The ideas it embodies
are those belonging to modern chemistry.

A drop of water, to return to our former example, may be divided
into a certain number, and no more, of portions similar to each other.
Each of these the modern chemist calls a molecule of water. But it is
by no means an atom, for it contains two different substances, oxygen
and hydrogen, and by a certain process the molecule may be actually
divided into two parts, one consisting of oxygen and the other of hy-
drogen. According to the received doctrine, in each molecule of water
there are two molecules of hydrogen and one of oxygen. Whether
these are or are not ultimate atoms I shall not attempt to decide.

We now see what a molecule is, as distinguished from an atom.

A molecule of a substance is a small body such that if, on the one
hand, a number of similar molecules were assembled together they
would form a mass of that substance, while on the other hand, if any
portion of this molecule were removed, it would no longer be able,
along with an assemblage of other molecules similarly treated, to
make up a mass of the original substance.

278 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

Every substance, simple or compound, has its own molecule. Il
this molecule be divided, its parts are molecules of a diiFerent sub-
stance or substances from that of which the whole is a molecule. An
atom, if there is such a thing, must be a molecule of an elementary
substance. Since, therefore, every molecule is not an atom, but every
atom is a molecule, I shall use the word molecule as the more general
term.

I have no intention of taking up your time by expounding the
doctrines of modern chemistry with respect to the molecules of differ-
ent substances. It is not the special but the universal interest oi
molecular science which encourages me to address you. It is not
because we happen to be chemists or physicists or specialists of any
kind that we are attracted toward this centre of all material exist-
ence, but because we all belong to a race endowed with faculties
which urge us on to search deep and ever deeper into the nature of
things.

We find that now, as in the days of the earliest physical specula-
tions, all physical researches appear to converge toward the same
point, and every inquirer, as he looks forward into the dim region
toward which the path of discovery is leading him, sees, each accord-
ing to his sight, the vision of the same quest.

One may see the atom as a material point, invested and surrounded
by potential forces. Another sees no garment of force, but only the
bare and utter hardness of mere impenetrability.

But though many a speculator, as he has seen the vision recede
before him into the innermost sanctuary of the inconceivably little,
has had to confess that the quest was not for him, and though phi-
losophers in every age have been exhorting each other to direct their
minds to some more useful and attainable aim, each generation, from
the earliest dawn of science to the present time, has contributed a due
proportion of its ablest intellects to the quest of the ultimate atom.

Our business this evening is to describe some researches in molecu-
lar science, and in particular to place before you any definite informa-
tion which has been obtained respecting the molecules themselves.
The old atomic theory, as described by Lucretius and revived in
modern times, asserts that the molecules of all bodies are in motion,
even when the body itself appears to be at rest. These motions of
molecules are, in the case of solid bodies, confined within so narrow a
range that even with our best microscopes we cannot detect that they
alter their places at all. In liquids and gases, however, the molecules
are not confined within any definite limits, but work their way
through the whole mass, even when that mass is not disturbed by any
visible motion.

This process of diffusion, as it is called, which goes on in gases and
liquids and even in some solids, can be subjected to experiment, and
forms one of the most convincing proofs of the motion of molecules.

TEE THEORY OF MOLECULES, 279

Now, the recent progress of molecular science began with the
study of the mechanical effect of the impact of these moving mole-
cules when they strike against any solid body. Of course these flying
molecules must beat against whatever is placed among them, and the
constant succession of these strokes is, according to our theory, the
Bole cause of what is calLd the pressure of air and other gases.

This appears to have been first suspected by Daniel Bernoulli, but
he had not the means which we now have of verifying the theory.
The same theory was afterward brought forward independently by
Lesage, of Geneva, who, however, devoted most of his labor to the
explanation of gravitation by the impact of atoms. Then Herapath,
in his "Mathematical Physics," published in 1847, made a much more
extensive application of the theory to gases ; and Dr. Joule, whose
absence from our meeting we must all regret, calculated the actual
velocity of the molecules of hydrogen.

The further development of the theory is generally supposed to
have been begun with a paper by Kronig, which does not, however,
so far as I can see, contain any improvement on what had gone before.
It seems, however, to have drawn the attention of Prof, Clausius to
the subject, and to him we owe a very large part of what has been
since accomplished.

We all know that air or any other gas placed in a vessel presses
against the sides of the vessel, and against the surface of any body
placed within it. On the kinetic theory this pressure is entirely due
to the molecules striking against these surfaces, and thereby commu-
nicating to them a series of impulses which follow each other in such
rapid succession that they produce an effect which cannot be distin-
guished from that of a continuous pressure.

If the velocity of the molecules is given, and the number varied,
thence since each molecule, on an average, strikes the side of the
vessel the Same number of times, and with an impulse of the same
magnitude, each will contribute an equal share to the whole pressure.
The pressure in a vessel of given size is therefore proportional to
the number of molecules in it, that is, to the quantity of gas in it.

This is the complete dynamical explanation of the fact discovered
by Robert Boyle, that the pressure of air is proportional to its
density. It shows also that, of different portions of gas forced into a
vessel, each produces its own part of the pressure independently of
the rest, and this whether these portions be of the same gas or not.

Let us next suppose that the velocity of the molecules is increased.
Each molecule will now strike the sides of the vessel a greater num-
ber of times in a second, but besides this, the impulse of each blow
will be increased in the same proportion, so that the part of the press-
ure due to each molecule will vary as the square of the velocity.
Now, the increase of the square of velocity corresponds, in our theory,
to a rise of temperature, and in this way we can explain the effect of

28o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

warming the gas, and also the law discovered by Charles, that the
proportional expansion of all gases between given temperatures is the
same.

The dynamical theory also tells us what will happen if molecules of
different masses are allowed to knock about together. The greater
masses will go slower than the smaller ones, so that, on an average,
every molecule, great or small, will have the same energy of motion.

The proof of this dynamical theorem, in which I claim the
priority, has recently been greatly developed and improved by Dr.
Ludwig Boltzmann. The most important consequence which flows
from it is, that a cubic centimetre of every gas at standard tempera-
ture and pressure contains the same number of molecules. Tliis is
the dynamical explanation of Gay-Lussac's law of the equivalent
volumes of gases. But we must now descend to particulars, and cal-
culate the actual velocity of a molecule of hydrogen.

A cubic centimetre of hydrogen, at the temperature of melting ice
and at a pressure of one atmosphere, weighs 0.00008954 gramme.
We have to find at what rate this small mass must move (whether
altogether or in separate molecules makes no difference) so as to pro-
duce the observed pressure on the sides of the cubic centimetre. This
is the calculation which was first made by Dr. Joule, and the result is
1,859 metres per second. This is what we are accustomed to call a
great velocity. It is greater than any velocity obtained in artillery
practice. The velocity of other gases is less, as you will see by the ta-
ble, but in all cases it is very great as compared with that of bullets.

We have now to conceive the molecules of the air in this hall
flying about in all directions, at a rate of about seventeen miles in a
minute.

If all these molecules were flying in the same direction, they would
constitute a wind blowing at the rate of seventeen miles a minute,
and the only wind which approaches this velocity is that which pro-
ceeds from the mouth of a cannon. How, then, are you and I able to
stand here ? Only because the molecules happen to be flying in dif-
ferent directions, so that those which strike against our backs enable
us to support the storm which is beating against our faces. Indeed,
if this molecular bombardment were to cease, even for an instant, our
veins would swell, our breath would leave us, and we should, literally,
expire. But it is not only against us or against the walls of the room
that the molecules are striking. Consider the immense number of
them, and the fact that they are flying in every possible direction, and
you will see that they cannot avoid striking each other. Every time
that two molecules come into collision, the paths of both are changed,
and they go off in new directions. Thus each molecule is continually
getting its course altered, so that in spite of its great velocity it may
be a long time before it reaches any great distance from the point at
which it set out.

TEE THEORY OF MOLECULES. 281

I have here a bottle containing ammonia. Ammonia is a gas which
you can recognize by its smell. Its molecules have a velocity of six
hundred metres per second, so that, if their course had not been inter-
rupted by striking against the molecules of air in the hall, every one
in the most distant gallery would have smelt ammonia before I was
able to pronounce the aame of the gas. But, instead of this, each
molecule of ammonia is so jostled about by the molecules of air, that
it is sometimes going one way and sometimes another. It is like a
hare which is always doubling, and, though it goes a great pace, it
makes very little progress. Nevertheless, the smell of ammonia is now
beginning to be perceptible at some distance from the bottle. The
gas does diffuse itself through the air, though the process is a slow
one, and, if we could close up every opening of this hall so as to make
it air-tight, and leave every thing to itself for some weeks, the am-
monia would become uniformly mixed through every part of the air
in the hall.

This property of gases, that they diffuse through each other, was
first remarked by Priestley. Dalton showed that it takes place quite
independently of any chemical action between the inter-diffusing gases.
Graham, whose researches were especially directed toward those phe-
nomena which seem to throw light on molecular motions, made a care-
ful study of diffusion, and obtained the first results from which the rate
of diffusion can be calculated.

Still more recently, the rates of diffusion of gases into each other
have been measured with great precision by Prof. Loschmidt, of
Vienna.

He placed the two gases in two similar vertical tubes, the lighter
gas being placed above the heavier, so as to avoid the formation of
currents. He then opened a sliding-valve, so as to make the two tubes
into one, and, after leavmg the gases to themselves for an hour or so,
he shut the valve, and determined how much of each gas had diffused
into the other.

As most gases are invisible, I shall exhibit gaseous diffusion to you
by means of two gases, ammonia and hydrochloric acid, which, when
they meet, form a solid product. The ammonia, being the lighter gas,
is placed above the hydrochloric acid, with a stratum of air between,
but you will soon see that the gases can diffuse through this stratum
of air, and produce a cloud of white smoke when they meet. During
the whole of this process, no currents or any other visible motion can
be detected. Every part of the vessel appears as calm as a jar of un-
disturbed air.

But, according to our theory, the same kind of motion is going on
in calm air as in the inter-diffusing gases, the only difference being
that we can trace the molecules from one place to another more easily
when they are of a different nature from those through which they are
diffusing.

282 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

If we wish to form a mental representation of what is going on
among the molecules in calm air, we cannot do better than observe a
swarm of bees, when every individual bee is flying furiously, first in
one direction, and then in another, Avhile the swarm, as a whole, either
remains at rest, or sails slowly through the air.

In certain seasons, swarms of bees are apt to fly ofl" to a great
distance, and the owners, in order to identify their property when they
find them on other people's ground, sometimes throw handfuls of flour
at the swarm. Now, let us suppose that the flour thrown at the flying
Bwarm has whitened those bees only which happened to be in the lower
half of the swarm, leaving those in the upper half fi-ee from flour.

If the bees still go on flying hither and thither in an irregular
manner, the floury bees will be found in continually increasing pro-
portions in the upper part of the swarm, till they have become equally
difi'iised through every part of it. But the reason of this dilfusion is
not because the bees were marked with flour, but because they are
flying about. The only efiect of the marking is to enable us to identify
certain bees.

We have no means of marking a select number of molecules of air,
so as to trace them after they have become difiused among others, but
we may communicate to them some property by which we may obtain
evidence of their difiusion.

For instance, if an horizontal stratum of air is moving horizontally,
molecules difiusing out of this stratum, into those above and below,
will carry their horizontal motion with them, and so tend to commu-
nicate motion to the neighboring strata, while molecules difiusing out
of the neighboring strata into the moving one will tend to bring it to
rest. The action between the strata is somewhat like that of two
rough surfaces, one of which slides over the other, rubbing on it.
Friction is the name given to this action between solid bodies ; in
the case of fluids it is called internal friction or viscosity.

It is in fact only another kind of diflusion — a lateral diffusion of
momentum, and its amount can be calculated from data derived from
observations of the first kind of diff"usion, that of matter. The com-
parative values of the viscosity of difierent gases were determined by
Graham in his researches on the transpiration of gases through long,
narrow tubes, and their absolute values have been deduced from ex-
periments on the oscillation of disks by Oscar Meyer and myself

Another way of tracing the diffusion of molecules through calm
air is to heat the upper stratum of the air in a vessel, and so observe
the rate at which this heat is communicated to the lower strata. This,
in fact, is a third kind of diffusion — that of energy, and the rate at
which it must take place was calculated from data derived from ex-
periments on viscosity before any direct experiments on the conduction
of heat had been made. Prof Stefan, of Vienna, has recently, by a
very delicate method, succeeded in determining the conductivity of

THE THEORY OF MOLECULES. 283

air, and he finds it, as he tells us, in striking agreement with the value
predicted by the theory.

All these three kinds of diffusion — the diffusion of matter, of mo-
mentum, and of energy — are carried on by the motion of the molecules.
The greater the velocity of the molecules, and the farther they travel
before their paths are altered by collision with other molecules, the
more rapid will be the diffusion. Now, we know already the velocity
of the molecules, and therefore by experiments on diffusion we can
determine how far, on an average, a molecule travels without striking
another. Prof. Clausius, of Bonn, who first gave us precise ideas about
the motion of agitation of molecules, calls this distance the mean path
of a molecule. I have calculated, from Prof. Loschmidt's diffusion
experiments, the mean path of the molecules of four well-known gases.
The average distance traveled by a molecule between one collision
and another is given in the table. It is a very small distance, quite
imperceptible to us even with our best microscopes. Roughly speaking,
it is about the tenth part of the length of a wave of light, which you
know is a very small quantity. Of course the time spent on so short
a path by such swift molecules must be very small. I have calculated
the number of collisions which each must undergo in a second. They
are given in the table, and are reckoned by thousands of millions. No
wonder that the traveling power of the swiftest molecule is but small,
when its course is completely changed thousands of millions of times
in a second.

The three kinds of diffusion also take place in liquids, but the re-
lation between the rates at which they take place is not so simple as
in the case of gases. The dynamical theory of liquids is not so well
understood as that of gases, but the principal difference between a gas
and a liquid seems to be that, in a gas each molecule spends the greater
jjart of its time in describing its free path, and is for a very small por-
tion of its time engaged in encounters with other molecules, whereas
in a liquid the molecule has hardly any free path, and is always in a
state of close encounter with other molecules.

Hence, in a liquid, the diffusion of motion from one molecule to
another takes place much more rapidly than the diffusion of the mole-
cules themselves, for the same reason that it is more expeditious in a
dense crowd to pass on a letter from hand to hand than to give it to a
special messenger to work his way through the crowd. I have here a
jar, the lower part of which contains a solution of copper sulphate,
while the upper part contains pure water. It has been standing here
since Friday, and you see how little progress the blue liquid has made
in diffusing itself through the water above. The rate of diffusion of a
solution of sugar has been carefully observed by Voit. Comparing his
results with those of Loschmidt on gases, we find that about as much
diffusion takes place in a second in gases as requires a day in liquids.

The rate of diffusion of momentum is also slower in liquids than

284 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

in gases, but by no means in the same proportion. The same amount
of motion takes about ten times as long to subside in water as in air,
as you will see by what takes place when I stir these two jars, one
containing water and the other air. There is still less difference be-
tween the rates at which a rise of temperature is propagated through
a liquid and through a gas.

In solids the molecules are still in motion, but their motions are
confined within very narrow limits. Hence, the diffusion of matter
does not take place in solid bodies, though that of motion and heat
takes place very freely. Nevertheless, certain liquids can diffuse
through colloid solids, such as jelly and gum, and hydrogen can make
its way through iron and palladium.

We have no time to do more than mention that most wonderful
molecular motion which is called electrolysis. Here is an electric
current passing through acidulated water, and causing oxygen to
appear at one electrode, and hydrogen at the other. In the space
between, the water is perfectly calm, and yet two opposite currents
of oxygen and of hydrogen must be passing through it. The physical
theory of this process has been studied by Clausius, who has given
reasons for asserting that in ordinary water the molecules are not only
moving, but every now and then striking each other with such violence
that the oxygen and hydrogen of the molecules part company, and
dance about through the crowd, seeking partners which have become
dissociated in the same way. In ordinary water these exchanges pro.
duce, on the whole, no observable effect, but no sooner does the elec-
tromotive force begin to act, than it exerts its guiding influence on
the unattached molecules, and bends the course of each toward its
proper electrode, till the moment when, meeting with an unappro-
priated molecule of the opposite kind, it enters again into a more or
less permanent union with it till it is again dissociated by another
shock. Electrolysis, therefore, is a kind of diffusion assisted by elec-
tromotive force.

Another branch of molecular science is that which relates to the
exchange of molecules between a liquid and a gas. It includes the
theory of evaporation and condensation, in which the gas in ques-
tion is the vapor of the liquid, and also the theory of the absorption
of a gas by a liquid of a different substance. The researches of Dr.
Andrews on the relations between the liquid and the gaseous state
have shoAvn us that, though the statements in our own elementary text-
books may be so neatly expressed that they appear almost self-evident,
their true interpretation may involve some principle so profound that,
till the right man has laid hold of it, no one ever suspects that any
thing is left to be discovered.

These, then, are, some of the fields from which the data of molec-
ular science are gathered. "\Ye may divide the i;ltimate results into
three ranks, according to the completeness of our knowledge of them.

THE THEORY OF MOLECULES. 285

To the first rank belong the relative masses of the molecules of
different gases, and their velocities in metres per second. These data
are obtained from experiments on the pressure and density of gases,
and are known to a high degree of precision.

In the second rank we must place the relative size of the molecules
of different gases, the length of their mean paths, and the number of
collisions in a second. These quantities are deduced from experiments
on the three kinds of diffusion. Their received values must be regarded
as rough approximations till the methods of experimenting are greatly-
improved.

There is another set of quantities which we must place in the third
rank, because our knowledge of them is neither precise, as in the first
rank, nor approximate, as in the second, but is only as yet of the na-
ture of a probable conjecture. These are the absolute mass of a mole-
cule, its absolute diameter, and the number of molecules in a cubic
centimetre. We know the relative masses of different molecules with
great accuracy, and we know their relative diameters approximately.
From these we can deduce the relative densities of the molecules them-
selves. So far we are on firm ground.

The great resistance of liquids to compression makes it probable
that their molecules must be at about the same distance from each
other as that at which two molecules of the same substance in th«
gaseous form act on each other during an encounter. This conjectiire
has been put to the test by Lorenz Meyer, who has compared the den-
sities of different liqviids with the calculated relative densities of the
molecules of their vapors, and has found a remarkable correspondence
between them.

Now, Loschmidt has deduced from the dynamical theory the fol-
lowing remarkable proportion : As the volume of a gas is to the com-
bined volume of all the molecules contained in it, so is the mean path
of a molecule to one-eighth of the diameter of a molecule.

As/iuming that the volume of the substance, when reduced to the
liquid form, is not much greater than the combined volume of the
molecules, we obtain from this proportion the diameter of a molecule.
In this way Loschmidt, in ISG.*), made the first estimate of the diameter
of a molecule. Independently of him and of each other, Mr. Stoney in
1868, and Sir W. Thomson, in 1870, published results of a similar kind,
those of Thomson being deduced not only in this way, but from con-
siderations derived from the thickness of soap-bubbles, and from the
electric properties of metals.

According to the table, which I have calculated from Loschmidt's
data, the size of the molecules of hydrogen is such that about two
million of them in a row would occupy a millimetre, and a million
million million million of them would weigh between four and five
grammes !

In a cubic centimetre of any gas at standard pressure and tern-

286 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

perature, there are about nineteen million million million molecules.
All these numbers of the third rank are, I need not tell you, to be
regarded as at present conjectural. In order to warrant us in putting
any confidence in numbers obtained in this way, we should have to
compare together a greater number of independent data than we have
as yet obtamed, and to show that tbey lead to consistent results.

Thus far, we have been considering molecular science as an inquiry
into natural phenomena. But, though the professed aim of all scien-
tific work is to unravel the secrets of Nature, it has another effect, not
less valuable, on the mind of the worker. It leaves him in possession
of methods which nothing but scientific work could have led him to
invent, and it places him in a position from which many regions of
Nature, besides that which he has been studying, appear under a new
aspect. The study of molecules has developed a method of its own,
and it has also opened up new views of Nature.

When Lucretius wishes us to form a mental representation of the
motion of atoms, he tells us to look at a sunbeam shining through a
darkened room (the same instrument of research by which Dr. Tyndall
makes visible to us the dust we breathe), and to observe the motes
which chase each other in all directions through it. This motion of
the visible motes, he tells us, is but a result of the far more compli-
cated motion of the invisible atoms which knock the motes about. In
his dream of Nature, as Tennyson tells us, he

" saw the flaring atom-streams
And torrents of her myriad universe,
Running along the illimitable inane,
Fly on to clash together again, and make
Another and another frame of things
Forever."

And it is no wonder that he should have attempted to burst the bonds
of Fate by making his atoms deviate from their courses at quite un-
certain times and places, thus attributing to them a kind of ii-rational
free-will, which on his materialistic theory is the only explanation of
that power of voluntary action of which we ourselves are conscious.

As long as we have to deal with only two molecules, and have all
the data given us, we can calculate the result of their encounter ; but
when we have to deal with millions of molecules, each of which has
millions of encounters in a second, the complexity of the problem
seems to shut out all hope of a legitimate solution.

The modern atomists have therefore adopted a method which is, I
believe, new in the department of mathematical physics, though it has
long been in use in the section of statistics. "When the working mem-
bers of Section F get hold of a report of the census, or any other docu-
ment containing the numerical data of Economic and Social Science,
they begin by distributing the whole population into groups, according
to age, income-tax, education, religious belief, or criminal convictions.

THE THEORY OF MOLECULES. 287

The number of individuals is far too great to allow of their tracing the
history of each separately, so that, in order to reduce their labor within
human limits, they concentrate their attention on a small number of
artificial groups. The varying number of individuals in each group,
and not the varying state of each individual, is the primary datum
from which they work.

This, of course, is not the only method of studying human nature.
We may observe the conduct of individual men and compare it with
that conduct which their previous character, and their present circum-
stances, according to the best existing theory, would lead us to expect.
Those who practise this method endeavor to improve their knowledge
of the elements of human nature in much the same way as an astrono-
mer corrects the elements of a planet by comparing its actual position
with that deduced from the received elements. The study of human
nature by parents and school-masters, by historians and statesmen, is
therefore to be distinguished, from that carried on by registrars and
tabulators, and by those statesmen who put their faith in figures. The
one may be called the historical, and the other the statistical method.

The equations of dynamics completely express the laws of the his-
torical method as applied to matter, but the application of these equa-
tions implies a perfect knowledge of all the data. But the smallest
portion of matter which we can subject to experiment consists of mill-
ions of molecules, not one of which ever becomes individually sensible
to us. We cannot, therefore, ascertain the actual motion of any one
of these molecules, so that we are obliged to abandon the strict his-
torical method, and to adopt the statistical method of dealing with
large groups of molecules.

The data of the statistical method as applied to molecular science
are the sums of large numbers of molecular quantities. In studying
the relations between quantities of this kind, we meet with a new kind
of regularity, the regularity of averages, which we can depend upon
quite sufficiently for all practical purposes, but which can make no
claim to that character of absolute precision which belongs to the laws
of abstract dynamics.

Thus molecular science teaches us that our experiments can never
give us any thing more than statistical information, and that no law
deduced from them can pretend to absolute precision. But, when we
pass from the contemplation of our experiments to that of the mole-
cules themselves, we leave the world of chance and change, and enter
a region where every thing is certain and immutable.

The molecules are conformed to a constant type with a precision
which is not to be found in the sensible properties of the bodies which
they constitute. In the first place, the mass of each individual mole-
cule, and all its other properties, are absolutely unalterable. In the
second place, the properties of all molecides of the same kind are ab-
Bolutely identical

288 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Let OS consider the properties of two kinds of molecules, thjse of
oxygen and those of hydrogen.

We can procure specimens of oxygen from very different sources —
from the air, from water, from rocks of every geological epoch. The
history of these specimens has been very different, and, if, during thou-
sands of years, difference of circumstances could produce difference of
properties, these specimens of oxygen would show it.

In like manner we may procure hydrogen from water, from coal,
or, as Graham did, from meteoric iron. Take two litres of any
specimen of hydrogen, it will combine with exactly one litre of any
specimen of oxygen, and will form exactly two litres of the vapor of
water.

Now, if, during the whole previous history of either specimen,
whether imprisoned in the rocks, flowing in the sea, or careering
through unknown regions with the meteorites, any modification of
the molecules had taken place, these i-elations would no longer be
preserved.

But we have another and an entirely different method of comparing
the properties of molecules. The molecule, though indestructible, is
not a hard, rigid body, but is capable of internal movements, and when
these are excited it emits rays, the wave-length of which is a measure
of the time of vibration of the molecule.

By means of the spectroscope the wave-lengths of different kinds
of light may be computed to within one ten-thousandth part. In this
way it has been ascertained, not only that molecules taken from every
specimen of hydrogen in our laboratories have the same set of periods
of vibration, but that light, having the same set of periods of vibra-
tion, is emitted from the sun and from the fixed stars.

We are thus assured that molecules of the same nature as those of
our hydrogen exist in those distant regions, or at least did exist when
the light by which we see them was emitted.

From a comparison of the dimensions of the buildings of the Egyp-
tians with those of the Greeks, it appears that they have a common
measure. Hence, even if no ancient author had recorded the fact that
the two nations employed the same cubit as a standard of length, we
might prove it from the buildings themselves. We should also be
justified in asserting that at some time or other a material standard
of length must have been carried from one country to the other, or
that both countries had obtained their standards from a common
source.

But in the heavens we discover by their light, and by their light
alone, stars so distant from each other, that no material thing can ever
have passed from one to another ; and yet this light, which is to us the
sole evidence of the existence of these distant worlds, tells us also that
each of them is built up of molecules of the same kinds as those which
we find on earth. A molecule of hydrogen, for example, whether

THE THEORY OF MOLECULES. 289

in Sirius or in Arcturus, executes its vibrations in precisely the same
time.

Each molecule, therefore, throughout the universe, bears impressed
on it the stamp of a metric system as distinctly as does the metre
of the Archives of Paris, or the double royal cubit of the Temple of
Karnac.

No theory of evolution can be formed to account for the similarity
of molecules, for evolution necessarily implies continuous change, and
the molecule is incapable of growth or decay, of generation or de-
struction. •

None of the processes of Nature, since the time when Nature be-
gan, have produced the slightest difference in the properties of any
molecule. We are therefore unable to ascribe either the existence of
the molecules, or the identity of their properties, to the operation of
any of the causes which we call natural.

On the other hand, the exact equality of each molecule to all others
of the same kind gives it, as Sir John Herschel has well said, the es-
sential character of a manufactured article, and precludes the idea of
its being eternal and self-existent.

Thus we have been led, along a strictly scientific path, very near
to the point at which Science must stop. Not that Science is de-
barred from studying the internal mechanism of a molecule which she
cannot take to pieces, any more than from investigating an organism
which she cannot put together. But, in tracing back the history of
matter, Science is arrested when she assures herself, on the one hand,
that the molecule has been made, and on the other tliat it has not been
made by any of the processes we call natural.

Science is incompetent to reason upon the creation of matter itself
out of nothing. We have reached the utmost limit of our thinking
faculties when we have admitted that because matter cannot be eter-
nal and self-existent it must have been created.

It is only when we contemplate, not matter in itself, but the form
in which it actually exists, that our mind finds something on w^hich it
can lay hold.

That matter, as such, should have certain fundamental properties —
that it should exist in space and be capable of motion, that its motion
should be persistent, and so on, are truths which may, for any thing we
know, be of the kind which metaphysicians call necessary. We may
use our knowledge of such truths for purposes of deduction, but we
have no data for speculating as to their origin.

But that there should be exactly so much matter and no more in
every molecule of hydrogen is a fact of a very different order. We
have here a particular distribution of matter — a collocation — to use
the expression of Dr. Chalmers, of things which we have no difficulty
in imagining to have been arranged otherwise.

The form and dimensions of the orbits of the planets, for instance,

VOL. IV. — 19

290

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

are not determined by auy law of Nature, but depend upon a particu-
lar collocation of matter. The same is tlie case with respect to the
size of the earth, from which the standard of what is called the metri-
cal system has been derived. But these astronomical and terrestrial
magnitudes are far inferior in scientific importance to that most funda-
mental of all standards which forms the base of the molecular system.
Natural causes, as we know, are at work, which tend to modify, if
they do not at length destroy, all the arrangements and dimensions
of the earth and the whole solar system. But though in the course
of ages catastrophes have occurred, and may yet occur, in the heavens,
though ancient systems may be dissolved and new systems evolved
out of their ruins, the molecules out of which these systems are built —
the foundation-stones of the material universe — remain unbroken and
unworn.

They continue this day as they were created, perfect in number,
and measure, and weight, and, from the ineffaceable characters im-
pressed on them, we may learn that those aspirations after accuracy
in meas'urement, truth in statement, and justice in action, which we
reckon among our noblest attributes as men, are ours, because they
are essential constituents of the image of Him who in the beginning
created, not only the heaven and the earth, but the materials of which
heaven and earth consist.

Table of Molecular Data.

Hydrogen.

_ „ Carbonic Carbonic
Oxygen. Qxide. Acid.

Rank

Rank II.—
Rank III.—

!Mass of molecule (hydrogen = 1)
Velocity (of mean square), me-
tres per second at 0° C.
j Mean path, tenth-metres.
\ Collisions in a second (millions).
( Diameter, tenth-metre.
1 Mass, twenty-fifth grammes.

1

1,859

965

IV.YSO

5.8

16

465

560

,646

7.6

736

14

497

482
,489

22
396

379
9,720

9.3
1,012

Table of Diffusion: <''^"''"^f ^'

H&O...
H&CO.
H & CO".
0 & CO . ,
0 & GOV

CO & co^ ,

H

0

CO

CO''

Air

Copper ...
Iron ,

Calculated. Observed

0.7086
0.6519
0.5575
0.1807
0.1427
0.1386
1.2990
0.1884
0.1748
0.1087

Cane-sugar in water 0.00000365
Diffusion in a day 0.31 14
Salt in water 0.00000116

Diffusion of matter observed by Loschmidt.

Diffusion of momentum.
Graham and Meyer.

Diffusion of temperature observed by Stefan.

Voit.
Fick.

PAST AND FUTURE OF A CONSTELLATION. 291.
PAST AND FUTURE OF A CONSTELLATION.

By CAMILLE FLAMMAEION,

TEANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH, BY J. FITZCxEEALD, A. M.

THE notions hitherto entertained as to the stars and the lieavcns are
destined to undergo a complete revohition. There are no fixed
stars. Each one of those distant suns, flaming in infinitude, is swept
along in a stupendous movement which the imagination can hardly
conceive. Notwithstanding the countless millions of miles of space be-
tween them and us, making them appear to us only as luminous points,
whereas they are as great as our own sun, and thousands and millions
of times greater than the earth, still, hy means of the telescoi:)e and
computation, astronomers have been able to come at them, and to de-
monstrate that they are all moving in every possible direction. The
heavens are no longer motionless, nor can the constellations any longer
be regarded as the symbol of the unchangeable. Take, for instance,
Ursa Major, or the Great Bear, the first of the constellations to be ob-
served and named. "Who is tliere that has not taken that figure as the
enduj-ing symbol of the preestablished harmony, the unalterable dura-
tion of the firmament ? Well, that ancient constellation will be de-
stroyed. Each one of the stars which constitute it is endowed with a
movement of its own. The result is that, in course of time, the form of
Ursa Major will be changed. It now somewhat resembles in outline a
wagon, and hence its popular title everywhere of car, or wain, while the
learned have given it the name of the Bear, that being the only animal
known to the ancients as living in polar regions. As every one knows,
the four stars arranged in the form of a quadrilateral are supposed to
represent the four wheels, and the three stars in the front of the figure
three horses. But the proper movement of the separate stars will
alter this arrangement : it will bring the foremost horse to a point
back of where he now is, while the other two will move onward. As
for the two hinder wheels, they will proceed in contrary directions.
When we know the annual value of the displacement of each of these
seven stars, we can calculate their future relative positions. This I
have done, and I here lay before the reader the curious results of my
calculations.

In order to get an exact account of tlie difference in the form of this
constellation, wliich will be observable at a given time, let us first por-
tray its present state.

The Arabs gave these seven famous stars names which are some-
times applied to them still. Beginning with the hind off-wheel, and
then taking in the order indicated by the Greek letters (/3, y, 6, e, ^, rj)
the other wheels and the horses, the Arab names are as follows : Dubhe,

292

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Merak, Phegda, Megrez, Alioth, Mizar, and Ackair, The last is the
name given to the foremost horse. Persons possessed of good visual
powers can discern above the second horse, Mizar, a small star which
is called the Postilion. But these names are seldom employed in our
times, the usual custom being to designate the seven principal stars
of Ursa Major by the first seven letters of the Greek alphabet, as
shown in the diagram. All these stars are of the second magnitude,
except Delta (Fig. 1), which is of the third.

In the diagram, the arrows show the mean direction in which each
of the seven stars moves. It will be seen that, of the seven, the first

Fig. 1.

The Seven Stars of Ursa Major in their Present Positions.

and the last, Alpha and Et.n, are moving in a direction contrary to
that of the other five. It must be added that they have not all the
same velocity. Eta, for example, moves rapidly ; Epsilon slowly ;
and so on with the others.

The quantity of their annual proper movements in right ascension,
and in polar distance, is given for each of the seven stars in the fol-
lowing table :

R. A. p. D.

Alpha (a) — 0".013 + 0".09

Beta (/3) + 0".015 — 0".03

Gamma (y) + 0".016 + 0".02

Delta {6) + 0".019 + 0".06

Epsilon (e) + 0".Oir + 0".06

Zeta (0 + 0".020 + 0".04

Eta {n) - 0".033 + 0".03

In consequence of these proper movements, the relative distances
between the stars of the constellation are ever changing. But, as this
change only amounts to a few seconds in a century, many centuries
must elapse before it is perceptible to the naked eye. Our human
generations, our dynasties, nay, even our nations, are not sufficiently
long-lived to measiare this change.

We have here to deal with astronomical quantities, and, to appre-

PAST AND FUTURE OF A CONSTELLATION 293

ciate these, we must choose terms whicli correspond with them. The
earth has but one measure of time that can be employed here, viz., its
great year, the precession of its equinoxes — a slow revolution of the
globe, which is completed in more than 25,000 years. A period like
t hat might serve as a basis of measurement in geology and in sidereal
astronomy. Taking, then, four of these periods — in round numbers
100,000 years— we ought, after that length of time, to have a sensible
difference in the aspect of the heavens ; and, in fact, on computation,
I find that in this interval — which in the history of the stars is but a
brief span — all the present constellations will be broken up.

In Fig. 2 I give the geometrical results of my calculations as to the
proper movements of the stars in Ursa Major. Here is to be seen the
shape which that constellation will wear 100,000 years hence. There
is nothing like a wagon in this new figure. Alpha has moved down-
ward and ranged itself on the riglit of Beta, and both of these lie on
one line with Gamma, and even with Eta. Delta, Epsilon, and Zeta,

Uksa Major 100,000 Years hence.

are seen ranged on another line. If, in that distant epoch, the lan-
guages of terrestrial man shall still give to this constellation the title
of the Wain, no one will be able to understand why. In considering
what a mighty change it is destined to undergo in the future, the
question arises, How long has it worn the shape in which it is familiar
to us, and how did it look ages ago ? One hundred thousand years ago
there were, as yet, in all probability, no human beings on the earth,
and the antediluvian monsters were the only creatures that could then
view the starry sky.

Still, some of the older planets — Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and
Neptune — were, no doubt, inhabited even then ; and, as the heavens
have the same appearance when viewed from them as from the earth,
the dwellers in those worlds saw Ursa Major as it appeared in those
days. All that we have to do, in order to find the position of each
of the seven stars 100,000 years ago, is to move them back from their

2 94

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

present positions as far as they were moved forward in our second
diagram. The result is u figure having no resemblance to either of
the others. It is a sort of cross, with Beta at the point of intersec-
tion, Alpha marking the extremity of the left arm, and Gamma that
of the right ; Beta the top, Epsilon, Zeta, and Eta, the stem. Eta
was, properly speaking, not yet in association with the other six.
For the rest, on analyzing the movement of these stars, we see that
five of them. Beta, Gamma, Delta, Epsilon, and Zeta, are associated
together by a common tie. They are a group of friends : they move
on with one accord, and, as will be seen, maintain the same relative
position to one another. Alpha and Eta are only intruders, and,
though they happen just at present to be with the group, they really
have nothing to do with it. Look at Fig. 2 : Alpha, which is ever

Uksa Major 100,000 Teaes ago

moving toward the right, will, in time, quit the group for good. On
the other hand, Fig. 3 shows Eta coming in on the left; previously
that star had no relation at all to the five.

The remarks just made with regard to the secular transformation
of Ursa Major might be applied to all the other constellations. "VVe
have selected that one, because it is the best known of all, and one of
the most characteristic. To sum up : we find that a knowledge of the
proper movements of the stars completely transforms our common
notions about the fixity of the heavens. The stars move in all direc-
tions through the endless realms of space, and as the aspect of the
heavens changes, so does the constitution of the universe also change
from age to age, undergoing innumerable metamorphoses. — Revue
Scientifique.

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 295

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS.

By HEKBEET SPENCEK.

WHEN" made by a competent reader, an objection usually implies
one of two things. Either the statement to which he demurs
is wholly or partially untrue ; or, if true, it is presented in such a way
as to permit misapprehensions. A need for some change or addition
is in any case shown.

Not recognizing the errors alleged, but thinking rather that mis-
apprehensions cause the dissent of those who have attacked the meta-
physico-theological doctrines held by me, I propose here to meet, by
explanations and arguments, the chief objections they have urged :
partly with the view^ of justifying these doctrines, and partly with the
view of guarding against the incorrect interpretations which it appears
are apt to be made.

It may be thought that the pages of a periodical intended for gen-
eral reading are scarcely fit for the treatment of these highly-abstract
questions. There is now, however, so considerable a class interested
in them, and they are everywhere felt to be so deeply involved with
the great changes of opinion in progress, that I have ventured to hope
for readers outside the circle of those who occupy themselves with
philosophy.

Of course the criticisms to be noticed I have selected, either be-
cause of their intrinsic force, or because they come from men whose
positions or reputations give them weight. To meet more than a few
of my opponents is out of the question.

Let me begin with a criticism contained in the sermon preached
by the Rev. Principal Caird before the British Association on the
occasion of its meeting in Edinburgh, in August, 1871. Expressed
witli a courtesy which, happily, is now less rare than of yore in theo-
logical controversy. Dr. Caird's objection might, I think, be admitted
without involving essential change in the conclusion demurred to ;
while it might be shown to tell with greater force against the conclu-
sions of thinkers classed as orthodox. Sir W. Hamilton, and Dean
Mansel, than against my own. Describing this as set forth by me,
Dr. Caird says :

" His thesis is, that the provinces of science and religion are distinguished
from each other as the known from the unknown and unknowable. This thesis
is maintained mainly on a critical examination of the nature of human intelli-
gence, in wliich the writer adopts and carries to its extreme logical results the
doctrine of the relativity of human knowledge which, propounded by Kant, has
been reproduced with special application to theology by a famous school of

296 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

philosophers in this country. From the very nature of human intelligence, it is
attempted to be shown that it can only know what is finite and relative, and
that therefore the absolute and infinite the human mind is, by an inherent and
insuperable disability, debarred from knowing. . . . May it not be asked, for
one thing, whether, in the assertion, as the result of an examination of the hu-
man intellect, that it is incapable of knowing what lies beyond the finite, there
Is not involved an obvious self-contradiction ? The examination of the mind
can be conducted only by the mind, and if the instrument be, as is alleged, lim-
ited and defective, the result of the inquiry must partake of that defectiveness.
Again, does not the knowledge of a limit imply already the power to transcend
it? In aflSrming that human science is incapable of crossing the bounds of the
finite world, is it not a necessary presupposition that you who so aifirm have
crossed these bounds? "

That this objection is one I am not disinclined to recognize, ■will be
inferred when I state that it is one I have myself raised. While pre-
paring the second edition of the " Principles of Psychology," I found,
among my memoranda, a note which still bore the wafers by which it
had been attached to the original manuscript (unless, indeed, it had
been transferred from the MS. of " First Principles," which its allu-
sions seems to imply). It was this:

" I may here remark, in passing, that the several reasonings, including the
one above quoted, by which Sir "William Hamilton would demonstrate the pure
relativity of our knowledge — reasonings which clearly establish many important
truths, and with which in the main I agree — are yet capable of being turned
against himself, when he definitively concludes that it is impossible for us to know
the absolute. For, to positively assert that the absolute cannot he known is, in
a certain sense, to assert a Tcnowledge of it — is to know it as unlcnotcable. To
affirm that human intelligence is confined to the conditioned is to put an also-
lute limit to human intelligence, and implies absolute Inoicledge. It seems to
me that the 'learned ignorance ' with which philosophy ends must be carried
a step further; and, instead of positively saying that the absolute is unknow-
able, we must say that we cannot tell whether it is knowable or not."

'V\Tiy I omitted this note I cannot now remember. Possibly it was
because reconsideration disclosed the reply that might be made to the
contained objection. For, while it is true that the intellect cannot
prove its own competence, since it must postulate its competence in
the course of the proof, and so beg the question, yet it does not
therefore follow that it cannot prove its own incompetence, in respect
of questions of certain kinds. Its inability in respect of such questions
has two conceivable causes. It may be that the deliverances of Reason
in general are invalid, in which case tlie incompetence of Reason to
solve questions of a certain class is implied by its general incompe-
tence ; or it may be that the deliverances of Reason, valid within a
certain range, themselves end in the conclusion that Reason is inca-
pable beyond that range. So that, while there can be no proof of
competence, because competence is postulated in each step of the
demonstration, there may be proof of incompetence either (1) if the

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 297

successive deliverances forming the steps of the demonstration, by
severally evolving contradictions, show their untrustworthiness, or,
(2) if, being trustworthy, they lead to the result that, on certain ques-
tions. Reason cannot give any deliverance.

Reason leads both inductively and deductively to the conclusion
that the sphere of Reason is limited. Inductively, this conclusion
expresses the result of countless futile attempts to transcend this
sphere — attempts to understand matter, motion, space, time, force, in
their ultimate natures — attempts which, bringing us always to alter-
native impossibilities of thought, warrant the inference that such
attempts will continue to fail, as they have hitherto failed. Deduc-
tively, this conclusion expresses the result of mental analysis, which
shows us that the product of thought is in all cases a relation, iden-
tified as such or such ; that the process of thought is the identifica-
tion and classing of relations ; that therefore Being in itself, out of
relation, is unthinkable by us, as not admitting of being brought within
the form of our thought. That is to say, deduction explains that fail-
ure of Reason established as an induction from many experiments.
And to call in question the ability of Reason to give this verdict
against itself, in respect of these transcendent problems, is to call in
question its ability to draw valid conclusions from premises ; which
is to assert a general incompetence necessarily inclusive of the special
incompetence.

Closely connected with the foregoing is a criticism from Dr. Man-
sel, on which I may here make some comments. In a note to his
" Philosophy of the Conditioned " (page 39), he says :

" Mr. Herbert Spencer, in Lis work on ' First Principles,' endeavors to
press Sir W, Hamilton into the service of Pantheism and Positivism together "
(a somewhat strange assertion, by-the-way, considering that I reject tliem
both), " by adopting the negative portion only of his philosophy — in which, in
common with many other writers, he declares the absolute to be inconceivable
by the mere intellect — and rejecting the positive portions, in which lie most
erapliatically maintains tliat the belief in a personal God is imperatively de-
manded by the facts of our moral and emotional consciousness. . . . Sir W.
Hamilton's fundamental principle is, that consciousness must be accepted entire,
and that the moral and religious feelings, which are the primary source of our
belief in a personal God, are in no way invalidated by the merely negative
inferences which have deluded men into the assumption of an impersonal abso-
lute. . . . Mr. Spencer, on the other hand, takes these negative inferences as
the only basis of religion, and abandons Hamilton's great principle of the dis-
tinction between knowledge and belief."

Putting these statements in the order most convenient for discussion,
I will deal first with the last of them. Instead of saying what he
does, Dr. Mansel should have said that I decline to follow Sir W.
Hamilton in confounding two distinct, and indeed radically opposed,

298 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

meanings of the word belief. This word "is habitually applied to
dicta of consciousness for which no proof can be assigned : both those
which are unprovable because they underlie all proof, and those which
are unprovable because of the absence of evidence." * In the pages
of this review for July, 1865, I exhibited this distinction as follows:

" "We commonly say, ' we believe ' a thing for which we can assign some pre-
ponderating evidence, or concerning which we have received some indefinable
impression. "We believe that the next House of Commons will not abolish
Church-rates; or v^e believe that a person on whose face we look is good-
natured. That is, when we can give confessedly-inadequate proofs or no proofs
at all for the things we think, we call them ' beliefs.' And it is the peculiarity
of these beliefs, as contrasted with cognitions, that their connections with ante-
cedent states of consciousness may be easily severed, instead of being difficult
to sever. But, unhappily, the word 'belief is also applied to each of those
temporarily or permanently indissoluble connections in consciousness, for the
acceptance of which the only warrant is that it cannot be got rid of. Saying
that I feel a pain, or hear a sound, or see one line to be longer than another, is
saying that there has occurred in me a certain change of state ; and it is impos-
sible for me to give a stronger evidence of this fact than that it is present to my
mind. . . . 'Belief having, as above pointed out, become the name of an im-
pression for which we can give only a confessedly-inadequate reason, or no
reason at all, it happens that, when pushed hard respecting the warrant for
any ultimate dictum of consciousness, we say, in the absence of all assignable
reason, that we believe it. Thus the two opposite poles of knowledge go under
the same name ; and by the reverse connotations of this name, as used for the
most coherent and least coherent relations of thought, profound misconceptions
have been generated."

Now, that the belief which the moral and religious feelings are
said to yield of a personal God is not one of the beliefs which are
unprovable because they underlie all proof, is obvious. It needs but
to remember that, in works on natural theology, the existence of a
personal God is inferred from these moral and religious feelings, to
show that it is not contained in these feelings themselves, or joined
with them as an inseparable intuition. It is not a belief like the be-
liefs which I now have that this is daylight, and that there is open space
before me — beliefs which cannot be proved because they are of equal
simplicity with, and of no less certainty than, each step in a demon-
stration. Were it a belief of this most certain kind, argument would
be superfluous : all races of men and every individual would have the
belief in an inexpugnable form. Hence it is manifest that, confusing
the two very difi^erent states of consciousness called belief, Sir W. Ham-
ilton ascribes to the second a certainty that belongs only to the first.

Again, neither Sir W. Hamilton nor Dr. Mansel has enabled us to

distinguish those " facts of our moral and emotional consciousness "

which imperatively demand the belief in a personal God, from those

facts of our (or of men's) " moral and emotional consciousness " which,

^ " Principles of Psychology " (second edition, § 425, note).

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS.

299

in those having them, imperatively demand beliefs that Sir W. Ham-
ilton would regard as untrue. A New-Zealand chief, discovering his
wife in an infidelity, killed the man ; the wife then killed herself that
she might join her lover in the other world; and the chief thereujjon
killed himself that he might go after tliem to defeat this intention.
These two acts of suicidt furnish tolerably strong evidence that these
New-Zealanders believed in another world to which they could go at
will, and fulfill their desires as they did here. If they were asked the
justification for this belief, and if the arguments by which they sought
to establish it were not admitted, they might still fall back on emo-
tional consciousness as yielding them an unshakable foundation for it.
I do not see why a Feejee-Islander, adopting the Hamiltonian argument,
should not justify by it his conviction that, after being buried alive,
his life in the other world, forthwith commencing at the age he has
reached in tliis, will similarly supply him with the joys of conquest
and the gratifications of cannibalism. That he has a conviction to
this effect stronger than the religious convictions current among civil-
ized people is proved by the fact that he goes to be buried alive quite
willingly ; and, as we may presume that his conviction is not the out-
come of a demonstration, it must be the outcome of some state of
feeling — some " emotional consciousness." Why, then, should he not
assign the '' facts " of his " emotional consciousness " as " imperatively
demanding" this belief? Manifestly, this principle, that "conscious-
ness must be acce])ted entire," either obliges us to accej^t as true the
superstitions of all mankind, or else obliges us to say that the con-
sciousness of a certain limited class of cultivated people is alone meant.
If things ai-e to be believed simply because the facts of emotional con-
sciousness imperatively demand them, I do not see why the actual
existence of a ghost in a house is not inevitably implied by the intense
fear of it that is aroused in the child or the servant.

Lastly, and chiefly, I have to deal with Dr. Mansel's statement
that " Mr. Spencer, on the other hand, takes these negative inferences
as the only basis of religion." This statement is exactly the reverse
of the truth, since I have contended, against Hamilton and against
him, that the consciousness of that which is manifested to us throngli
phenomena is j^ositive, and not 7iegative as they allege, and that this
positive consciousness supplies an indestructible basis for the religious
sentiment (" First Principles," § 26). Instead of giving here passages
to show this, I may fitly quote the statement and opinion of a foreign
theologian. M. le pasteur Grotz, of the Reformed Church at Nismes,
writes thus :

"Is Science, then, the natural enemy of Keligion? To preserve our re-
ligion, must we cry Science down ? "Why, Science, experimental Science, is now
beginning to speak in f;ivor of Religion ; and it is Science that is about to reply
at once to M. Vacberot and to M. Comte through the mouth of one of the think-
ers of our age, Mr. Herbert Spencer." ....

30O THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

" Here Mr. Spencer discusses the theory of the unconditioned^ by which
word we are to understand God. The Scotch philosopher, Hamilton, and his
disciple, Mr. Mansel, say with our French positivists, ' We cannot afiirm the
positive existence of any thing whatever, except phenomena.' Hamilton and
his disciple differ from our countrymen only in this, that tliey bring in a 'mi-
raculous intervention,' which enables us to believe in the existence of the un-
conditioned ; and in virtue of this truly miraculous intervention the whole
system of orthodoxy is set up again. Is it true that we can affirm nothing be-
yond phenomena ? Mr. Spencer holds that in such an assertion there is grave
error. The logical side of a question, as he very justly observes, is not the only
one: there is also the psychological side; and, as we take it, he proves that the
positive existence of the Absolute is a necessary datum of consciousness. . . .

" This is the basis of agreement between Religion and Science. In a chapter
entitled 'Reconciliation,' Mr. Spencer establishes and develops this agreement
on its true ground. . . . Mr. Spencer, by standing on the ground of logic
and psychology, without recurring to supernatural intervention, has established
the legitimacy, the necessity, and the everlasting permanency of religion itself."

I turn next to what has been said by Dr. Shadworth H. Hodgson,
in his essay on " The Future of Metaphysic," published in the Co/i-
temporary Meviewior'^OYevaheY, 1872, Remarking only, with respect
to the agreements he expresses in certain doctrines of mine, that I
value them as coming from a thinker of subtlety and independence, I
will confine myself here to liis disagreements. Dr. Hodgson, before
giving his own view, briefly describes and criticises the views of Hegel
and Comte, with both of whom lie partly agrees and partly disagrees,
and then proceeds to criticise the view set forth by me. After a pre-
liminary brief statement of my position, to the wording of which I
demur, he goes on to say :

" In his ' First Principles,' (Part I., second edition), there is a chapter headed
'Ultimate Scientific Ideas,' in which he enumei'ates six such ideas or groups of
ideas, and attempts to show that they are entirely incomprehensible. The six
are: 1. Space and Time; 2. Matter; 3. Rest and Motion; 4. Force; 5. Con-
sciousness ; 6. The Soul, or the Ego. Now, to enter at length into all of these
would be an undertaking too large for the present occasion ; but I will take the
first of the six, and endeavor to show in its case the entire untenability of Mr.
Spencer's view ; and, since the same argument may be employed against the
rest, I shall be content that my case against them should be held to fail if my
case should fail in respect to Space and Time."

I am quite content to join issue with Dr. Hodgson on these terms ;
and will proceed to examine, one by one, the several arguments which
he uses to show the invalidity of my conclusions. Following his
criticism in the order he has chosen, I begin with the sentence follow-
ing that which I have just quoted. The first part of it runs thus:
"The metaphysical view of Space and Time is, that they are elements
in all phenomena, whether the phenomena are presentations or rejire-
sentations."

Whether, by "the metaphysical view," is here meant the view of

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS.

301

Kant, whether it means Dr. Hodgson's own view, or whether the ex-
pression has a more general meaning, I have simply to reply that the
metaphysical view is incorrect. Dealing with the Kantian version of
this doctrine, that Space is a form of intuition, I have pointed out
that only with certain classes of phenomena is Space invariably
united; that Kant habii-ually considers phenomena belonging to the
visual and tactual groups, with which the consciousness of Space is
inseparably joined, and overlooks groups with which it is not insep-
arably joined. Though, in the adult, perception of sound has certain
space-implications, mostly, if not wholly, acquired by individual ex-
perience ; and though it would seem, from the instructive experiments
of Mr. Spalding, that, in creatures born with nervous systems much
more organized than our own are at birth, there is some innate per-
ception of the side from which a sound comes; yet it is demonstrable
that the space-implications of sound are not originally given with the
sensation as its form of intuition. Bearing in mind the Kantian
doctrine, that Space is the form of sensuous intuitions not only as pre-
sented but also as represented, let us examine critically our musical
ideas. As I have elsewhere suggested to the reader —

" Let him observe what happens when some melody takes possession of his
imagination. Its tones and cadences go on repeating themselves apart from
any space-consciousness — they are not localized. He may or may not be
reminded of the place where lie heard them; this association is incidental only.
Having observed this, he will see that such space-implications as sounds have
are learned in the course of individual experience, and are not given witli the
sounds themselves. Indeed, if we refer to the Kantian definition of form, we
get a simple and conclusive proof of this. Kant says form is 'that which effects
that the content of the phenomenon can be arranged under certain relations.'
How then can the content of the phenomenon we call sound be arranged? Its
parts can be arranged in order of sequence — that is, in Time. But there is no
possibility of arranging its parts in order of coexistence — that is, in Space.
And it is just the same with odor. Whoever thinks that sound and odor
have Space for their form of intuition may convince himself to the contrary by
trying to find the right and left sides of a sound, or to imagine an odor turned
the other way upward." — {Principles of Psychology^ § 399.)

As I thus dissent, not I think without good reason, from " the
metaphysical view of Space and Time" as "elements in all phe-
nomena," it will naturally be expected that I dissent from the first
criticism which Dr. Hodgson proceeds to deduce from it. Dealing
first with the arguments I have used to show the incomprehensibility
of Space and Time, if we consider them as objective, and stating in
other words the conclusion I draw, that, "as Space and Time cannot
be either non-entities nor the attributes of entities, we have no choice
but to consider them as entities," Dr. Hodgson continues :

"So far good. Secondly, he argues that they cannot be represented in
thought as such real existences, because, ' to be conceived at all, a thing must

302

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

be conceived as having attributes.' Now, here the metaphysical doctrine en-
ables us to conceive them as real existences, and rebuts the argument for their
inconceivability; for the otlier element, the material element, the feeling or
quality occupying Space and Time, stands in the place and performs the func-
tion of the required attributes, composing, together with the space and time
which is occupied, the empirical phenomena of perception. So far as this argu-
ment of Mr. Spencer goes, then, we are entitled to say that his case for the
inconceivability of Space and Time as real existences is not made out."

Whether the fault is in me or not I cannot say, but I fail to see
that my argument is thus rebutted. On the contrary, it appears to
me substantially conceded. What kind of entity is that which can
exist only when occupied by something else? Dr. Hodgson's own
aro-ument is a tacit assertion that Space by itself cannot be conceived
as an existence ; and this is all that I have alleged.

Dr. Hodgson deals next with the further argument, familiar to all
readers, which I have added as showing the insurmountable difficulty
in the way of conceiving Space and Time as objective entities:
namely, that " all entities which we actually know as such are lim-
ited. . . , But of Space and Time we cannot assert either limitation
or the absence of limitation." Without quoting at length the rea-
sons Dr. Hodgson gives for distinguishing between Space as^jerceived
and Space as conceived, it will suffice if I quote his own statement
of the result to which they bring him : " So that Space and Time,
as perceived, are not finite but infinite ; as conceived, are not infinite
but finite."

Most readers will, I think, be startled by the assertion that con-
ception is less extensive in range than perception ; but, without
dwelling on this, I will content myself by asking in what case Space
is perceived as infinite? Surely Dr. Hodgson does not mean to say
that he can perceive the whole surrounding Space at once — that the
Space behind is united in perception with the Space in front. Yet
this is the necessary implication of his words. Taking his statement
less literally, however, and not dwelling on the fact that in perception
Space is habitually bounded by objects more or less distant, let us
test his assertion under the most favorable conditions. Supposing
the eye directed upward toward a clear sky; is not the Space then
perceived laterally limited ? The visual area, re-stricted by the visual
apertures, cannot include in perception even 180° from side to side,
and is still more confined in a direction at right angles to this. Even
in the third direction, to which alone Dr. Hodgson evidently refers,
it cannot properly be said that it is infinite in perception. Look at a
position in the sky a thousand miles off. Now look at a position a
million miles off. What is the difference in perception ? Nothing.
How, then, can an infinite distance be perceived, when these immensely
unlike finite distances cannot be perceived as differing from one
another, or from an infinite distance? Dr. Hodgson has used the

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 303

wrong word. Instead of saying that Space as perceived is infinite,
be should have said, that, in perception, Space is finite in two dimen-
sions, and. becomes indefinite in the third when this becomes great.

I come now to the paragraph beginning " Mr, Spencer then turns
to the second or subjective hypothesis, tliat of Kant." This para-
graph is somewhat difl[icalt to deal with, for the reason that in it my
reasoning is criticised both from the Kantian point of view and from
Dr. Hodgson's own point of view. Dissenting from Kant's view. Dr.
Hodgson says, "I hold that botii Space and Time, and Feeling, or the
material element, are equally and alike subjective, equally and alike
objective." As I cannot understand this, I am unable to deal Avith
those arguments against me which Dr. Hodgson bases upon it, and
must limit myself to that which he urges on behalf of Kant. He says :

" But I think that Mr. Spencer's representation of Kant's view is very
incorrect ; he seems to be misled by the large term non-ego. Kant lield that
Space and Time were in their origin subjective, but when applied to the non-
ego resulted in phenomena, and were the formal element in those phenomena,
among wliich some were phenomena of the internal sense or ego, others of the
external sense or non-ego. The non-ego to which the forms of Space and
Time did not apply and did not belong was the Ding-an-sich, not the phenome-
nal non-ego. lience the objective existence of Space and Time in phenomena,
but not in the Ding-an-sich, is a consistent and necessary consequence of Kant's
view of their subjective origin."

If I have misunderstood Kant, as thus alleged, then my comment
must be that I credited him with an hypothesis less objectionable
than that which he held. I supposed his view to be that Space, as a
form of intuition belonging to the ego, is imposed by it on the non-
ego (by which I understood the thing in itself) in the act of intuition.
But now the Kantian doctrine is said to be that Space, originating in
the subject, when applied to the non-ego results in phenomena (the
non-ego meant being, in that case, necessarily the Ding-an-sich, or
thing in itself) ; and that the phenomena so resulting, carrying with
them the Space they have been endowed with, become objective ex-
istences along Avith the Space given to them by the ego. The subject
having imposed Space as a form on the primordial non-ego, or thing
in itself, and so created phenomena, this Space thereupon becomes an
objective existence, independent of both the ego and the original
thing in itself. To Dr. Hodgson this may seem a more tenable posi-
tion than that which I ascribed to Kant ; but to me it seems only a
multiplication of inconceivabilities. I am content to leave it as it
stands : not feeling my reasons for rejecting the Kantian hypothesis
much weakened.'

'^ Instead of describing me as misunderstanding Kant on this point, Dr. Hodgson
should have described Kant as having, in successive sentences, so changed the meanings
of the words he uses, as to make either interpretation possible. At the outset of his
" Critique of Pure Reason," he says : " The effect of an object upon the faculty of repre-

304 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The remaining reply which Dr. Hodgson makes runs thus:

"But Mr. Spencer hiis a second argument to prove this inconceivability. It
is this: 'If Space and Time are forms of thought,,they can never be thought
of; since it is impossible for any thing to be at once the form of thought and
the matter of thought.' ... An instance will show the fallacy best. Syllo-
gism is usually held to be a form of thought. Would it be any argument
for the inconceivability of syllogisms to say, they cannot be at once the form
and the matter of thought? Can we not syllogize about syllogism? Or, more
plainly still — no dog can bite himself, for it is impossible to be at once the thing
that bites and the thing that is bitten."

Had Dr. Hodgson quoted the whole of the passage from which he
takes the above sentence ; or had he considered it in conjunction with
the Kantian doctrine to which it refers (namely, that Space survives
in consciousness when all contents are expelled, which implies that
then Space is the thing with which consciousness is occupied, or the
object of consciousness), he_would have seen that his reply has none
of the cogency he supposes. If, taking his first illustration, he will
ask himself whether it is possible to '' syllogize about syllogism,"
when syllogism has no content whatever, symbolic or other — has
non-entity to serve for major, non-entity for minor, and non-entity for
conclusion — he will, I think, see that syllogism, considered as surviving
terms of every kind, cannot be syllogized about ; the " pure form," of
reason (supposing it to be syllogism, which it is not), if absolutely
dischai-ged of all it contains, cannot be represented in thought, and
therefore cannot be reasoned about. Following Dr. Hodgson to his
second illustration, I must express my surprise that a metaphysician
of his acuteness should have used it. For an illustration to have any
value, the relation between the terms of the analogous case must
have some parallelism to the relation between the terms of the case
with which it is compared. Does Dr. Hodgson really think that the
relation between a dog and the part of himself which he bites is like
the relation between maimer and fo)'7nP Suppose the dog bites his
tail. Now, the dog, as biting, stands, according to Dr. Hodgson, for
the form as the containing mental faculty; and the tail as bitten

sentation, so far as we are afifected by the said object, is sensation. That sort of intui-
tion which relates to an object by means of sensation, is called an empirical intuition.
The undetermined object of an empirical intuition, is called phenomenon. That which
in the phenomenon corresponds to the sensation, I term its matter'' (here, remem-
bering the definition just given of phenomenon, objective existence is manifestly referred
to), * but that which efifects that the content of the phenomenon can be arranged under
certain relations, I call its form ' (so that form as here applied, refers to objective exist-
ence). 'But that in which our sensations are merely arranged, and by which they are
susceptible of assuming a certain form, cannot be itself sensation.' (In which sentence
the word form obviously refers to subjective existence.) At the outset, the ' phenome-
non' and the ' sensation' are distinguished as objective and subjective respectively ; and
then, in the closing sentences, the /orm is spoken of in connection first with the one and
then with the other, as though they were the same."

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 305

stands for this mental faculty as contained. Now, suppose the dog
loses his tail. Can the faculty as containing and the faculty as con-
tained be separated in the same way ? Does the mental form when
deprived of all content, even itself (granting that it can be its own
content), continue to exist in the same way that a dog continues to
exist when he has lost his tail ? Even had this illustration been
applicable, I should have scarcely expected Dr. Hodgson to remain
satisfied with it. I should have thought he would prefer to meet my
argument directly, rather than indirectly. Wliy has he not shown
the invalidity of the reasoning used in the "Principles of Psychology "
(§ 399, second edition) ? Having there quoted the statement of Kant,
that " Space and Time are not merely forms of sensuous intuition, but
intuitions themselves," I have written :

"If we inquire more closely, this irreconcilability becomes still clearer."
Kant says : ' That which in the plienomenon corresponds to the sensation, I
term its matter ; but that which effects that the content of the phenomenon
can be arranged under certain relations, I call its form.'' Carrying with us
this definition of form, as 'that which effects that the content .... can be
arranged under certain relations,' let us return to the case in which the intu-
ition of Space is the intuition which occupies consciousness. Can the content
of this intuition 'be 'arranged under certain relations' or not? It can be so
arranged, or rather, it is so arranged. Space cannot be thought of save as hav-
ing parts, near and remote, in this direction or the other. Hence, if that is the
form of a thing ' which effects that the content .... can be arranged under
certain relations,' it follows that when the content of consciousness is the
intuition of Space, which has parts ' that can be arranged under certain rela-
tions,' there must be a form of that intuition. What is it? Kant does not tell
us — does not appear to perceive that tliere must be such a form ; and could not
have perceived this without abandoning his hypothesis that the space-intuition
is primordial."

Now, when Dr. Hodgson has shown me how that " which effects
that the content .... can be arranged under certain relations "
may also be that which effects its own arrangement under the same
relations, I shall be ready to surrender my position ; but, until then,
no analogy drawn from the ability of a dog to bite himself will weigh
much with me.

Having, as he considers, disposed of the reasons given by me for
concluding that, considered in themselves, " Space and Time are
wholly incomprehensible" (he continually uses on my behalf the word
" inconceivable," which, by its unfit connotations, gives a wrong aspect
to my position), Dr. Hodgson goes on to say :

" Yet Mr. Spencer proceeds to use these inconceivable ideas as the basis of
his philosophy. For mark, it is Space and Time as we know them, the actual
and phenomenal Space and Time, to which all these inconceivabilities attach.
Mr. Spencer's result ought, therefore, logically to be — Skepticism. What is his
actual result? Ontology. And how so? Why, instead of rejecting Space and
Time as the inconceivable things he has tried to demonstrate them to be, ho

VOL. IV. — 20

3o6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

substitutes for them an Unknowable, a something which they really are, though
we cannot know it, and rejects that, instead of them, from knowledge."

This statement has caused me no little astonishment. That hav-
ing before him the volume from which he quotes, so competent a
reader should have so completely missed the meaning of the passages
(§ 26) already referred to, in which I have contended against Ham-
ilton and Mansel, makes me almost despair of being understood by
any ordinary reader. In that section, I have, in the first place, con-
tended that the consciousiiess of an Ultimate Reality, though not
capable of being made a thought, properly so called, because not
capable of being brought within limits, nevertheless remains as a
mode of consciousness that is positive: is not rendered negative by
the negation of limits. I have pointed out that —

" The error (very naturally fallen into by philosophers intent on demon-
strating the limits and conditions of consciousness) consists in assuming that
consciousness contains nothing lut limits and conditions ; to the entire neglect
of that which is limited and conditioned. It is forgotten that there is some-
thing which alike forms the raw material of definite thought and remains after
the definiteness which thinking gave to it has been destroyed," something
which "ever persists in us as the body of a thought to which we can give no
shape."

This positive element of consciousness it is, which, " at once
necessarily indefinite and necessarily indestructible," I regard as the
consciousness of the Unknowable Reality. Yet Dr. Hodgson says
"Mr. Spencer proceeds to use these inconceivable ideas as the basis of
his philosophy:" implying that such basis consists of negations,
instead of consisting of that which persists notwithstanding the
7iegation of limits. And then, beyond this perversion, or almost
inversion, of meaning, he conveys the notion that I take, as the basis
of philosophy, the " inconceivable ideas " " or self-contradictory
notions " which result when we endeavor to comprehend Space and
Time. He speaks of me as proposing to evolve substance out of
form, or, rather, out of negations of forms — gives his readers no con-
ception that the Voxoer manifested to us is that which I regard as the
Unknowable, w^hile what we call Space and Time answer to the
unknowable nexus of its manifestations. And yet the chapter from
which I quote, and still more the chapter which follows it, makes
this clear — as clear, at least, as I can make it by carefully-worded
statements and restatements.

Philosophical systems, like theological ones, following the law of
evolution in general, severally become in course of time more rigid,
while becoming more complex and more definite ; and they similarly
become less alterable — resist all compromise, and have to be replaced
by the more plastic systems that descend from them.

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 307

It is thus with the pure Empiricists and the pure Transcendentalists.
Down to the present time disciples of Locke have continued to hold
that all mental phenomena are interpretable as results of accumulated
individual experiences ; and, by criticism, have been led simply to
elaborate their interpretations: ignoring tlie proofs of inadequacy.
On the other hand, disciples of Kant, asserting this inadequacy, and
led by perception of it to adopt an antagonist theory, have persisted
in defending that theory under a form presenting fatal inconsistencies.
And then, when there is offered a mode of reconciliation, the spirit of
no-compromise is displayed : each side continuing to claim the wliole
truth. After it has been pointed out that all the obstacles in the way
of the experiential doctrine disappear if the effects of ancestral expe-
riences are joined with the effects of individual experiences, tlie old
form of the doctrine is still adhered to, while Kantists persist in as-
serting that the ego is born with intuitional forms which are wholly
independent of any thing in the non-ego, after it has been shown that
the innateness of these • intuitional forms may be so understood as to
escape the insurmountable difficulties of the hypothesis as oi-iginally
expressed.

I am led to say this by reading the remarks concerning my own
views, made with an urbanity I hope to imitate, by Prof. Max MuUer,
in a lecture delivered at the Royal Institution last March.' Before
dealing with the criticisms contained in this lecture, I must enter a
demurrer against that interpretation of my views by which Prof. Max
MuUer makes it appear that they are more allied to those of Kant than
to those of Locke. He says :

" Whether the prehistoric genesis of these congenital dispositions or inherited
necessities of thought, as suggested by Mr. Herbert Spencer, be right or n-rong,
does not signify for the purpose which Kant had in view. In admitting that
there is something in our mind which is not the result of our own a posteriori
experience, Mr. Herbert Spencer is a thorough Kantian, and we shall see that
he is a Kantian in other respects too. If it could be proved that nervous modi-
fications, accumulated from generation to generation, could result in nervous
structures, that are fixed in proportion as the outer relations to which they an-
swer are fixed, we, as followers of Kant, should only have to put in the place
of Kant's intuitions of Space and Time ' the constant space-relations expressed
in definite nervous structures congenitally framed to act in definite ways, and
incapable of acting in any other way.' If Mr. Herbert Spencer had not misun-
derstood the exact meaning of what Kant calls the intuitions of Space and Time,
he would have perceived that, barring his theory of the prehistoric origin of
these intuitions, he was quite at one with Kant."

On this passage let me remark, first, that the word " preliistoric,"
ordinarily employed only in respect to human history, is misleading
when applied to tlie history of Life in general; and his use of it leaves
me in some doubt whether Prof Max Miiller has rightly conceived the
hypothesis he refers to.

> See Fraser''s Magazine of May last.

3o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

My second comment is, that the description of me as " quite at one
with Kant," " barring " the " theory of the prehistoric origin of these
intuitions," curiously implies that it is a matter of comparative in-
difierence whether the forms of thought are held to be naturally gen-
eratedhy intercourse between the organism and its environing relations,
during the evolution of the lowest into the highest types, or -whether
such forms are held to be siq^ernaturally given to the human mind,
and are independent both of environing relations and of ancestral
minds. But now, addressing myself to the essential point, I must
meet the statement that I have "misunderstood the exact meaning of
what Kant calls the intuitions of Space and Time," by saying that I
think Prof. Max Miiller has overlooked certain passages which justify
my interpretation, and render his interpretation untenable. For Kant
says " Space is nothing else than the form of all phenomena of the
external sense; " further, he says that "Time is nothing hut the form
of our internal intuition ; " and, to repeat words I have used elsewhere,
"He distinctly shuts out the supposition that there are forms of the
non-ego to which these forms of the ego correspond," by saying that
" Space is not a conception which has been derived from outward ex-
periences." Now, so far from being in harmony with, these state-
ments are in direct contradiction to, the view which I hold, and seem
to me absolutely irreconcilable Avith it. How can it be said that,
" barring " a difierence represented as trivial, I am " quite at one with
Kant," when I contend that these subjective forms of intuition are
moulded into correspondence witli, and therefore derived from, some
objective form or nexus, and therefore dependent upon it ; while the
Kantian hypothesis is that these subjective forms are not derived from
the object, but exist independently in the ego, and are imposed by it
on the noji-ego ? It seems to me that not only do Kant's words, as
above given, exclude the view which I hold, but also that Kant could
not consistently have held any such view. Rightly recognizing, as he
did, these forms of intuition as innate, he was, from his stand-point,
obliged to regard them as imposed on the matter of intuition in the
act of perception. In the absence of the hypothesis that intelligence
has been evolved, it was not possible for him to regard these subjective
forms as having been derived from objective forms.

A disciple of Locke might, I think, say that the Evolution-view of
our consciousness of Space and Time is essentially Lockian, with more
truth than Prof. Max Miiller can represent it as essentially Kantian.
The Evolution-view is completely experiential. It differs from the
original view of the experientialists by containing a great extension
of it. "With the relatively-small effects of individual experiences, it
joins the relatively-vast effects of the experiences of antecedent indi-
viduals. But the view of Kant is avowedly and absolutely unexpe-
riential. Surely this makes the predominance of kinship manifest.

In Prof. Max Miiller's replies to my criticisms on Kant I cannot

QUICKER THAN LIGHTNING. 309

Bce greater validity than in this affiliation to which I have demurred.
One of his arguments is that which Dr. Hodgson has used, and which
I have already answered ; and I think that the others, when compared
with the passages of the "Principles of Psychology " which they cou-
cern, will not be found adequate. I refer to them here chiefly for the
purpose of pointing out that, when he speaks of me as bringing " three
arguments against Kant's view," he understates the number. Let me
close what I have to say on this disputed question, by quoting the
summary of reasons I have given for rejecting the Kantian hypothesis :

"Kant tells us that Space is the form of all external intuition, wliich is not
true. He tells us that the consciousness of Space continues when the conscious-
ness of all things contained in it is suppressed ; which is also not true. From
these alleged facts he infers that Space is an a priori form of intuition. I say
infers, because this conclusion is not presented in necessary union with the
premises, in the satne way that the consciousness of duality is necessarily pre-
sented along with the consciousness of inequality; but it is a conclusion volun-
tarily drawn for the purpose of explauiing the alleged facts. And then, that we
may accept this conclusion, which is not necessarily presented along with these
alleged facts which are not true, we are obliged to affirm several propositions
which cannot be rendered into thought. When Space is itself contemplated,
we have to conceive it as at once the form of intuition and the matter of intu-
ition, which is impossible. We have to unite that which we are conscious of as
Space with that which we are conscious of as the ego, and contemplate the one
as a property of the other; which is impossible. We have, at the same time,
to di:^unite that which we are conscious of as Space, from that which we are
conscious of as the non-ego^ and contemplate the one as separate from the other;
which is also impossible. Further, this hypotliesis, that Space is ' nothing else '
than a form of intuition belonging wholly to the ego, commits us to one of the
two alternatives, that tlie non-ego is formless, and that its form produces abso-
lutely no effect upon the ego — both of which alternatives involve us in impossi-
bilities of tiiought." — Principles of Psychology, § 399. — Advance Sheets from
Fortnightly Review.

QUICKER THAN LIGHTNING.

THE Faithful have a tradition that Mohammed, on one occasion, in
starting for heaven, upset a pitcher with his foot : he had ninety
thousand interviews with the Most High, and, when he returned, the
water was not yet spilled from the pitcher. It may be admitted that
this was quick work, and that Mohammed was undoubtedly smart ; but,
when it comes to " interviewing," the Arabs must yield to the Yankees.
In the laboratory of Columbia College, Prof. Rood has had interviews
with one of the messengers of the Most High at a rate that leaves the
prophet nowhere. Besides, with all respect to the hundred million
believers, the Mussulman story is but a piece of Oriental fancy, while
the Christian reports not only what he has actually seen, but can also

310 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

make others see. Our optics are none of the best, but we have seen
the professor run down his ethereal game, and can attest that it was
more exciting than a horse-race. Let us consider this " descent of
man " into the regions of infinitesimal time.

Of all the curious things that science has revealed, none are so
confounding to the ordinary reason as what has been learned respect-
ing the order of Nature in its extremest aspect of minuteness. Ob-
jects fade away from the customary range of the senses, and we habit-
ually think, what was long believed to be the fact, that there remains
nothing more ; or, that we find the edge and final termination of things
but little beyond what is familiarly recognized. But we now under-
stand that Nature is fathomless below as well as boundless above,
and that, beneath the grasp of unaided sense, there are an inexhaustible
wealth of wonders, a fixedness of relations, a definite play of interact-
ing forces, and a sharp exactness in the working of law, which we
could never infer from the coarser processes of the world of common
experience.

As we are to speak of the briefest known duration of luminous
efiects, it will be proper first to recall how much is involved in the act
of sight. When the man of experiment talks to us about what occurs
in the thousandth of a second, he is, of course, dealing with something
recognized, or which has affected both his body and his mind in that
short space of time, and this is necessarily an illustration of how quick-
ly his composite machinery can work. Then the agency which acts
upon him must be taken into account, and also the cause of that
agency, for they both belong to the same order of activities. When
we look upon a source of illumination, as a candle or a star, we are
affected by something that is done at those points. The light origi-
nates in the vibration of the molecules of matter. These vibrations
are communicated to some medium which can convey the impulses
at a demonstrated velocity of nearly 200,000 miles j)er second. The
luminous waves strike the retina of the eye, and they are again trans-
lated into the molecular vibrations of nervous matter, and the physi-
cal influence is turned into a sensation by the organ of consciousness.
The act of seeing thus involves the constitution and action of the visi-
ble object, the mode of movement of the force, the operation of the
organ of vision, the changes of the nerve-line, and the cerebral act of
recognition. There is a dynamic chain connecting thought and the
object seen through a nether world of minuteness, but where all is
correlated in a common scale of relations ; and, whenever we see any
thing, this whole train of transformations is implicated in the effect.
The molecular tremors of Sirius, the ethereal thrills of space, and the
rhythmic swing of the nervous elements, are but parts of a unified sys-
tem of subsensible dynamics. Bearing in mind, then, what is in-
volved in a single act of vision, let us now trace the course of experi-
ment which has led to the latest results regarding its duration.

QUICKER THAN LIGHTNING.

311

Phosphorus, the light-bearer, as its name implies, has the property,
long supposed to be peculiar to it, of faintly shining in the dark. But,
if a diamond is exposed to sunshine, and then withdrawn into dark-
ness, it continues feebly luminous for a considerable time, and is, there-
fore, said to be phosphorescent. Other substances, as sulphuret of cal-
cium, and sulphuret of bax :um, have also been long noted for this prop-
erty, and recent researches have shown that, so far from being any
thing peculiar, the same property is manifested in a much lower de-
gree by a vast number of substances. The dilFerences are in the
time the phosphorescence continued after withdrawal from the sun's
rays. It was found, in most instances, extremely short, only the small
fraction of a second, and it became necessary to devise some means
of measuring the time in different cases. A contrivance was necessary
which should expose an object to the sun, and then jerk it quickly into
total darkness, where it could be seen by the observer if it dragged
any light along with it, for even the thousandth of a second.

PHOSrHOROSCOPE.

A contrivance for this purpose was made by Edmund Becquerel,
and called the phosphoroscope. It consisted of a train of wheels and
pinions (Fig. 1) for producing rapid revolving motion. There was a

312 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

hollow barrel or case at the top of the machine, pierced with an open-
ing, within which, as seen in the figure, the object to be experimented
with is attached to a fixed stand. On the opposite side of the case
there is another opening in a corresponding position, not shown in
the figure. The outer case does not revolve, but within it there is a
pair of disks (Fig. 2) rigidly connected upon a spindle which is turned
by the machinery. Each of these disks has four openings, those of
the one being not opposite, but midway between those of the other.
Of course, then, when these disks are inside the case, it is impossible
to see through. The arrangement is then set up in the window of a
darkened room, so that one side is turned toward the sun, and the

Disks op Phosphoroscope.

Other toward the observer ; and, when the disks are turned, the object
is alternately exposed to the light from one side, and to the eye from
the other ; that is, it is seen in a moment after exposure to light, and
the duration of the moment can be determined by the rapidity of the
rotation. The object, therefore, if not phosphorescent, will never be
xeen by the observer, as it is always in darkness, except when it is hid-
den by the intervening disk. But, if its phosphorescence lasts as long
as an eighth part of the time of one rotation, it will become visible in
the darkness. Suppose, now, that the disks are made to revolve a
hundred times in a second, and that the body observed is visible, it is
tlien proved that its phosphorescence lasts the one eight-hundredth
of a second, that being the time which elapses between its exposure
to the sun and its exposure to the eye. When examined in this way,
a very large number of bodies show traces of phosphorescence, al-
though in some cases it is found to last no longer than the ten-thou-
sandth part of a second.

The question was thus opened whether phosphorescence is not a
general property of matter, and, to determine this, with the conditions
of its manifestation, a more thorough investigation of the subject was
needed. Prof. Rood proposed to undertake it, using, if possible, an
instaataneous source of illumination — the electric spark. But, in en-

QUICKER THAN LIGHTNING. 313

tering upon the inquiry, he soon found himself involved in preliminary
difficulties with the spark itself. His phosphorescent investigations
remain yet to be carried out, but the results obtained relative to the
electric flash are of extreme interest. The full account of the research
is given in a series of papers published in Silliman''s Journal^ and, if
the reader finds the follo\/ing statement insufficient in its details, he
will know where to go for further explanations.

Since the time of Franklin, the lightning-flash has been regarded as
a gigantic electric spark produced in the atmosphere ; the inquiry,
therefore, involved the nature of the meteorological discharge, as well
as of the spark artificially produced. Various attempts to determine
the duration of lightning have been made, with varying results. Fara-
day observed it, without any instruments for measuring the time, which
seemed to last for a second, but he was doubtful if part of the efiect
was not due to the lingering phosphorescence of the cloud. Decharme
observed the lightning-flashes from a distant storm, which also ap-
peared to last for from a half to an entire second. Prof. Dove employed
a revolving disk with colored sectors, and satisfied himself that single
flashes of lightning often consisted of a number of instantaneous dis-
charges. It is well known that, when a rapidly-moving train of cars
is illuminated at night by lightning, it seems to stand still, that is, the
duration of the flash is so brief that no motion of the train is percep-
tible while it lasts. The wheels are sharply defined as if perfectly
motionless, but if they had a blurred aspect we should know that the
illumination lasted sufficiently long to render the motion perceptible.
Prof. Rood extemporized a simple contrivance for observing lightning,
which acted upon this principle. It consisted of a white card-board
disk, five inches in diameter, with a steel shawl-pin for an axis, on which
it was made to revolve by striking the edge. He traced black figures
near the circumference of the disk, and when it was in rapid motion
these figures were sometimes seen as sharply as though they had been
stationary, although they were often blurred as though the disk had
moved through a few degrees during the act of discharge. He then
cut narrow, radial apertures into the circumference of the disk, and
observed the lightning through these openings. Here, again, the
apertures were sometimes seen quite unchanged, but they were more
frequently elongated into well-defined streaks some degrees in length.
He afterward measured the average rate of rotation imparted to the
disk in this way, and arrived at the conclusion that the lightning-flashes
on the occasion referred to had a duration of about one five-hundredth
cf a second. Dissatisfied with the roughness of these observations,
Prof. Rood arranged a small train of toothed wheels driven by a spring,
which rotated a circular pasteboard disk with four open sectors. This
instrument gave more regular and precise results; and, while it was
shown that the flash sometimes lasts for a whole second, the suggestion
of Dove was clearly verified that each flash " consisted of a consider-

314 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

able number of isolated and apparently instantaneous electrical dis-
charges, the interval between the components being so small that, to
the naked eye, they constituted a continuous act."

Several curious efiects were observed in these experiments. Work-
ing with a disk having a single narrow opening, the multiple elements
of the discharge were detected with great regulai'ity, and Prof. Rood
several times, instead of seeing the opening single, noticed that it had
a form resembling the letter X or V, the lines in diflerent positions
of the disk having, as it were, got crossed in his eyes by their quick
changes of position. On several occasions, when observing with the
naked eye, the normal zigzag flashes lasted not less than a second,
and the light seemed to pour steadily in a stream from the cloud to
the earth. Observations made in the area occupied by a storm, out
bej-ond its edge, and when it was quite distant, gave results that were
identical, which the professor thinks furnishes an " argument in sup-
port of the hypothesis that zigzag lightning, heat and sheet lightning,
etc., are really identical, being, in point of fact, due to the same cause
but viewed under different conditions." As the result of these experi-
ments. Prof. Rood concludes : " It is evident, from the foregoing, that
the nature of the lightning-discharge is more complicated than has
been generally supposed ; it is usually, if not always, multiple in char-
acter, and the duration of the isolated constituents varies very much,
ranging from intervals of time shorter than one one-thousandth of a
second up to others at least as great as one-twentieth of a second ;
and, furthermore, what is singular, a variety of this kind may some-
times be found in the components of a single flash."

Such being the rough conclusions reached concerning the duration
of the spark upon a grand scale, let us now consider the results of
experiment upon it where all the conditions are in command. In 1835,
Mr. Wheatstone attempted to measure the spark of a Leyden jar
charged by a common frictional machine. The light from the spark
was received upon a mirror mounted upon an axle capable of a high
rate of revolution. The image of the spark, being thrown upon the
mirror, was reflected to a distant point, and the time of the spark was
inferred from the fixity or movement of the image. By using this
arrangement, Mr. Wheatstone concluded that the discharge may take
place within the millionth of a second ; a result which was accepted
by the scientific world for a quarter of a century. In 1858, a German
named Feddersen, an accomplished physicist, dissatisfied with Wheat-
stone's results, entered upon a careful reexamination of the subject.
He used the revolving-mirror arrangement with frictional electricity ;
but, as Wheatstone had driven his machinery by stri?iffs, Feddersen
adopted a train of toothed wheels, and with this form of mechanism he
found that the image of the spark was drawn out by the revolving
mirror into a whitish streak which indicated that the time of the dis-
charge was not less than the twenty-five-thousandth of a second, while

QUICKER THAN LIGHTNING.

315

it was inferred that the spark, instead of being a simple effect, is com-
posite like the lightning, and is made up of several elements.

Such were the incomplete and discordant results of the investiga-
tion when it was undertaken by Prof. Rood. The arrangement he de-
vised consisted of two parts, one for the production of the spark, and
the other for measuring i:. Fig. 3 represents the first combination.
A galvanic battery was used to generate the electricity ; this was con-
nected with a large Ruhmkorff coil, which was again connected with a
Leyden jar, and this with the electrodes for producing the spark, S^

:|^ ~.

;5w^

-I

Golraoic Batter}-.

Ruhmkorfif Induction-Coil.

Leyden Jar.

Electrodes and Spark.

which were adjustable for varying its " striking distance." Connected
with the wires between the battery and the coil was an automatic " in-
terrupter " for breaking the circuit from three to six times in a second,
by which the frequency of the discharges could be regulated. Leyden
jars of different sizes could be used so as to give sparks of all degrees
of strength and intensity.

In the second part of his arrangement. Prof. Rood, like his prede-
cessors, employed a revolving mirror, turned by the gearing of Bec-
querel's phosphoroscope (Fig. 1), with the addition of an extra wheel
and a weight to drive it. With this he could get 350 revolutions of
the mirror per second, with a smooth and uniform motion. In order
to measure exactly the rate of rotation, the cylinder on the lowest
wheel was made to wind up a fillet of paper, upon which dots were
made by an electro-magnetic apparatus, regulated by a seconds-pen-
dulum, when a simple calculation gave the rate of the wheel to which
the mirror was attached, and the regularity of the train was thus put
to a sharp test. The light of the spark S (Fig. 4), passing through an
achromatic lens, I, struck the mirror, m, and was reflected upward,
forming an image at i, on the plate of ground glass G. The image of
the spark on the ground glass was viewed from above, and its position
and form were carefully measured by several methods. Of course, if the

3i6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

spark -was absolutely instantaneous^ its image thrown upon the ground
glass would be exactly the same, whether the mirror was motionless or
was revolving at the highest speed. But, if the spark had an appre-
ciable duration, its image would be prolonged or drawn out into a
streak, the length of which must depend upon the time of discharge.
The rate of the mirror's rotation being known, also the distance, m i,
and the length of the streak, it was easy to calculate the total duration
of the spark.

Fig. 4.

Eevolvikg-Mlreob Arkangement.

Prof. Rood now had the subtile agent he was pursuing pretty effect-
xially in his grasp, and the results that came out were very striking.
The ordinary spark was found to be a highly-complex effect ; to con-
sist of diverse and successive elements, and, in fact, to have its periods
and orderly history just like the geology of the globe. But, while the
" vast durations " of Lyell and Dana are vague and inferential, these
infinitesimal periods could be demonstrated with the greatest exact-
ness. The previous discordant results were reconciled, Feddersen be-
ing justified in assigning a longer period for the total duration of
the spark, and Wheatstone's time holding true of its elements.

With a Ley den jar of about a quart capacity (114.4 square inches
of coating), and all the connections as short as possible, so as to offer
the least amount of resistance to the electric flow, with brass balls as
electrode?, with a striking distance of about the twenty-fifth of an inch,
and the velocity of the mirror up to 223 per second, the image of the
spark thrown upon the ground glass and viewed by the naked eye was
drawn out into a streak one and a half or two inches long, the length,
however, varying with the speed of the mirror. The aspects of the
image are represented in Fig. 5. The first part was pure white, which
shaded into a brownish-yellow tint, passing on into a pretty distinct
green. When a polished plate of glass was substituted for the ground
glass, and a small magnifier was used to observe the image, a series
of bright points, on each side of the streak, became visible, in the po-
sitions indicated by the dots in Fig. 5. With high velocities, this suc-
cession of points was beautifully developed, and it consists of a series
of separate discharges following the first. It was thus found that the

QUICKER THAN LIGHTNING. 317

Leyden jar furnished a number of single sparks, each time the coil was
excited, the number varying between one and thirty, according to cir-
cumstances. The whole proceeding consumed an interval of time often
as great as one-fiftieth of a second ; that is, the jar loaded up and dis-
charged itself twenty or thirty times in that period. Prof. Rood found
the number of elements of the spark to vary with its length, the nature
of the electrodes, and the size of the jar. Short sparks are more com-
plex than long ones, small jars give more than large ones, and metallic
points a greater number than balls. The point to be determined was,
the duration of the several elements of the spark, and especially of its
quickest element. In one case of a discharge lasting the fiftieth of a
second, it began with an ordinary spark, followed by a pale-violet
light, lasting about one-sixtieth of a second, and then came a compact

Images op Spark drawn out.

body of ten or twenty sparks, this last act continuing for about one
two-hundredth of a second. The results of the inquiry are thus stated
by Prof Rood: "From the foregoing, then, it appears that, if a jar,
having a metallic coating of about one hundred square inches, be con-
nected, as above described, with an induction-coil, its discharge will
be effected by a considerable number of acts, of which the first is by
far the most intense. Furtlier, the metallic particles, heated up by
the first discharge to a white heat, almost instantly assume a lower
temperature, marked by a corresponding change from white to brown-
ish yellow ; and, as their temperature continues to fall, the tint changes,
in the case of brass electrodes, to green ; in that of platinum, to a gray
or violet-gray. These observations further demonstrated the fact that
four ten-millionths of a second is an interval of time quite sufficient
for the production of distinct vision,"

It was also shown that the first act of the electric explosion, repre-
sented by the white band, lasted through an interval of time so short
as to be immeasurable. It was proved that it could not occupy more

3i8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

than the millionth or the half a millionth of a second, but how much
less time it might occupy remained to be determined.

Prof. Rood now prepared for a more rigorous course of experi-
ments. He used a small Leyden jar, with a surface of eleven inches,
about equal to a moderate-sized wine-glass. To secure greater exact-
ness of observation, he devised a peculiar micrometer, consisting of
five lines ruled on a plate of glass smoked by lamp-black. This plate
was placed between I and S {see Fig. 4), but quite near to the latter,
and an image of the lines reflected from the mirror was formed on the
clear glass at i. The lines were observed by a microscope magnifying
ten diameters. In using this micrometer, the measurement was effected
by noticing at what rate of the revolving mirror the lines in the image
at i were obliterated, this obliteration being due to the circumstance
that by the motion of the mirror the dark lines were superposed on
the bright lines. The individual spark now produced was about a
millionth of a second in duration, but the faint train was still observ-
able. There was still the brilliant body of the spark appearing, first
followed by a faint streak of less than one-hundredth the illuminating
power of the first stage. The diagram, Fig. 6, represents the intensity

and time of the spark. The elevation, or peak, a h, shows the intensity
of the first compact body of the spark, and the line a c the duration
of the whole effect. The point was to get the time of a b, which
Prof. Rood had proved must be regarded as a distinct act in the suc-
cession of effects. All precautions for observation being carefully
made, the driving-weight was gradually increased, and the speed of
the mirror carried up to 350 revolutions per second, when the lines of
the image, which at first remained visibly as distinct as with a sta-
tionary mirror, became regularly less distinct, and at length vanished
by the gradual superposition of the white and black lines. Prof. Rood
says: "It was proved successively that the duration was less than
eighty, sixty-eight, fifty-nine, fifty-five billionths of a second ; and,
finally, the lines, after growing fainter and fainter, entirely disap-
peared, giving: as the result a duration of forty-eight billionths of a
second." By reducing the striking distance, a still lower figure was

THE EMOTIONAL LANGUAGE OF THE FUTURE. 319

reached, so that the professor states that " the duration of the first
act of the electrical discharge is in certain cases only forty billionths
of a second, an interval of time just sufficient to enable a ray of light
to travel over forty feet," The duration was twenty-five times
smaller than had ever before been measured. In this infinitesimal por-
tion of time a strong and distinct impression upon the retina is made,
so that " the letters on a printed page are plainly to be seen ; also, if a
polariscope be used, the cross and rings around the axis of crystals can
be observed with all their peculiarities." Nor is this all ; "as the ob-
literation of the micrometric lines could only take place from the cir-
cumstance that the retina retains and combines a whole series of impres-
sions whose joint duration is forty billionths of a second, it follows
that a much smaller interval of time will suffice for vision. If we
limit the number of views of the lines presented to the eye in a single
case to ten, it Avould result that four billionths of a second is sufficient
for human vision,"

We saw at the outset how much an act of vision involves, and we
have now some idea of how long it takes. If the discharge of the
thunder-cloud occupies, as was stated, the one five-hundredth of a
second, the " interviews " of our philosopher with the " amber-spirit "
were at least fifty thousand times " quicker than lightning."

THE EMOTIONAL LANGUAGE OF THE FUTURE.

MR. SPENCER recently called the attention, in a very interesting
passage of his "Psychology," to those secondary signs of a feel-
ing which are to be found in abortive attempts to conceal it, "A
state of mauvaise honte^"^ he well says, " otherwise tolerably well con-
cealed, is indicated by an obvious difficulty in finding fit positions for
the hands," A great mental agitation, though prevented from break-
ing out into violent expression, is pretty certain to betray itself in the
awkward, shuffling movements which are made to curb and suppress
it. Such indirect signs of emotion Mr, Spencer calls its secondary
natural language.

The fact that many of our emotions now betray themselves only
through the incompleteness of the efibrt of will to disguise them is not
a little curious, and offers several lines of intei-esting inquiry. It at
once suggests how very little play for emotional expression the con-
ditions of modern society appear to allow. For it seems tolerably
certain that the voluntary hiding of feeling is a late attainment in
human development, and is forced on us simply by the needs of ad-
vancing civilization. Savages, for the most part, know little of con-
cealing their passions, and this makes them so good a psychological

320 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

study. Children, too, who may be supposed to represent the earlier
acquirements of the race, are provei-hially unfettered in the expression
of their sentiments. In like manner, in the various ranks of our civ-
ilized society, we see that, while a cultivated lady appears to all dis-
tant onlookers to have a mind dispassionate and undisturbed by agi-
tating feelings, a west-country maid reveals her curiosity and wonder,
her alternations of joy and misery, with scarcely a trace of compunc-
tion. If we go low enough down the social scale we find the freest
utterance of feelings, and it is only when, in retracing our steps, we
arrive at a certain stage of culture that we discover signs of an active
emotional restraint. Where this self-conti-ol is defective we have Mr.
Spencer's secondary emotional signs. Higher up, among a few spe-
cially cultivated persons, the acquisition of this power of concealment
appears to be complete, and we have a type of mind capable of a pro-
longed external serenity unruffled by a gust of passionate impulse.
The survey of these facts at once prompts the question whether the
expression of our feelings by smile, vocal changes, and so on, is des-
tined to disappear with a further advance of social organization. To
attempt to answer such a question directly and briefly would perhaps
betray too much confidence. We may, however, seek to define the
various paths of inquiry to be pursued before a final answer can be
arrived at, and to hint at the probabilities of the problem under its
various aspects.

First of all, then, with respect to the distinctly unsocial feelings,
the answer seems to be tolerably clear. It beuig generally allowed
by biologists that the looks and gestures accompanying anger, jeal-
ousy, and pride, are simply survivals of hostile actions, the nascent
renewal of an attitude preliminary to attack, it is natural that they
should appear only in transitions of society from a barbaric to a civ-
ilized condition. When the age of destructive conflict, individual and
racial, shall have become the curious research of antiquaries, it may
be presumed that any bodily movements known to have grown out of
these struggles will cease from sheer desuetude. Indeed, one may
perhaps, without too optimist a bias, refer to the fact that all the
stronger manifestations of anger and malice have already become un-
familiar in real life, so that when we see their imitations on the stage
they are apt to appear ridiculously forced. The better part of modern
society has put such a ban on the ugly signs of rage that our only
means of discovering traces of this passion in a man is some incom-
pletely suppressed emotional movement, or some too violent efibrt to
command the muscles of expression. After many more generations
shall have practised the difficult art of noiselessly crushing out with
the foot an incipient wrath, it will be hard if such offenses to the eye
as frowning brow and scornful mouth do not entirely disaj^pear.

But the progress of social refinement probably affects other ex-
pressions than those of the distinctly hostile sentiments. It tends to

THE EMOTIONAL LANGUAGE OF THE FUTURE. 321

confine within ever narrower limits all manifestations of unpleasant
feeling. Since it is ag-rateful thing to Avitness pleasurable feeling, and
painful to see the expression of suffering in another, a polite form of
society does all it can to encourage the one and to suppress the other.
A man is for the most part supposed to be able to obtain all needed
sympathy, in his troubles, from his family and his intimate friends.
Before the rest of the world he is expected to hide his grief and main-
tain a cheerful aspect. It is one of the delicate forms of sensibility,
produced by a high culture, to be fearful of obtruding one's feelings
on unconcerned onlookers. This growing perception of tlie vulgar
aspects of uncontrolled emotional display appears to have much to do
with the partial concealments of feeling of which Mr. Spencer speaks.
But comparatively few persons are completely able to hide a sharp
and sudden vexation, however public the occasion of experiencing it.
An annoying piece of intelligence, affecting, it may be, one's matrimo-
nial chances or equally dear ambitions, will very likely call up a mo-
mentary expressit>n of dismay even in presence of a fashionable com-
pany. We wonder to how many persons it is still a necessity, under
the smart of a sudden disappointment, to flee as suon as possible from
all spectators, and relieve the pressure of emotion by a few energetic
expletives, if not a spare shower of tears ? We do not know how many
ages it may require to discipline our species in a perfect concealment
of painful feeling ; but, at present, it looks as though we were passing
through the hardest stages of this schooling.

One other influence which probably contributes to make emotion
more and more private and invisible is the partial revival of the Stoical
doctrine that all sentiment is a moral weakness. This idea appears to
hold most sway in our own countiy, and especially among those classes
who are most concerned to maintain a not too obvious gentility. A
common supposition among young aspirants to social rank seems to
be, that lofty breeding is best seen in a uniformly passionless and
vacuous arrangement of the facial muscles. To appear interested in
any object in his environment strikes the pseudo-aristocrat as a pitia-
ble infirmity of vulgar minds. The ways in which this curious self-
imposed check acts are at times very funny. We remember hearing
Macready give a series of readings to a fashionably-dressed assembly,
in a small provincial town, and we were much struck by the almost
heroic efforts which many of the company made to conceal the emo-
tion so powerfully aroused by the tragedian's art. Possibly English
people are less impressible by scenic disj)lay and music than Continen-
tal nations. Whether this be so or not, it is very curious to contrast
the perfectly apathetic aspect of an assembly at Covent Garden with
the lively demonstrations of an audience at a Paris opera, or the deep,
earnest absorption of the worshipers of Wagner at Berlin or Munich.
This notion that it is the final attainment of civilization to appear im-
partially indifferent to every thing about one, and constantly to pre-

VOL. IT. — 21

322 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

serve the semblance of an equanimity which knows nothing of the agi-
tation of pleasure or pain, may be expected to give the last touch of
refinement to emotional expression.

If these were all the facts bearing on the future of our emotional
life, we might well inquire what effect the habitual suppression of
emotional expression is likely to have on the quality of the emotions
themselves. It is probably clear to everybody that our feelings are
very much affected by the range of free expression accorded them.
At least the violent intensity of a passion is destroyed by successful
control of all the muscles, and, even if a slow, smouldering fire of hate
or jealousy may coexist^ft'lth a comparatively quiet exterior, the emo-
tional force is in this case robbed of its glory. It would thus appear
that, with social progress, as men are thrown more and more in each
other's society, their feelings will undei-go a very considerable trans-
formation ; some types of emotion disappearing, it may be, altogether,
the rest being so mollified as to be scarcely recognizable as the ven-
erable forms of luiman love, terror, and joy. But, gddly enough, we
find another set of influences, due to the very same social conditions
as the first, which tends to counteract these, fostering and deepening
feeling, and encouraging its manifestations. Mr. Spencer thinks that
the habit of expressing pleasure and pain arose as animals became gre-
garious. This condition exposed the members of the same flock to
common experiences of danger, etc. ; and in this way, from uttering
the sounds of terror under like circumstances and at the same times,
they would come to interpret them when given forth by their com-
panions. At the same time the gregarious mode of life clearly made
animals able to assist one another in a large variety of ways. Now,
on this supposition, which seems extremely plausible, the habit of ex-
pressing feeling is an attainment of social life, and, so far from disap-
pearing with the advance of this life, it should, one would think, go
on developing. In point of fact, we see in a number of ways how so-
cial progress serves to enlarge the area of sympathetic feeling. As a
man becomes more of a citizen, he is probably more and more desirous
to be in unison of feeling and intention with his fellow-citizens, at least
with that section of them whom he most respects. The sympathy he
looks for presupposes, it is clear, some expression of his own feelings,
and a responsive expression on the part of his neighbors. In this way,
then, there are two tendencies of social culture curiously conflicting in
their results. By virtue of the one a man seeks to repress feeling and
not to obtrude it unnecessarily on his fellow-citizens. By force of the
other he is ever craving with more and more vigor for a lively inter-
change of sentiments with others. What resultant, it may be asked.

uce

do these opposite forces prod

Without trying to determine the precise direction of this com-
pound effect, it may be just suggested that a kind of compromise
between the opposing forces is frequently effected by means of Ian-

THE EMOTIONAL LANGUAGE OF THE FUTURE.

323

guage. By this medium we may convey most minutely and accu-
rately the fact of a feeling and define its nature, without bringing it
forward as a vivid and naked reality. It is highly disagreeable to see
a look of disgust in another's face, but we do not quite so strongly
object to a man's telling i^s the cause of such a feeling and leaving us
to imagine by inference the nature of the emotion itself. Language,
while defining the precise variety of sentiment, contains also, in its
ever-varying modulation of voice, its changes of pitch, intensity, and
timbre, a large apparatus of pro^Dcr emotional expression. Moreover,
it seems fully allowable to accompany speech with a variety of other
emotional signs which are looked on as silly and weak if presented
independently. We rather expect conversation to be brightened by
the many subtile changes of the facial muscles and the refined and
subdued gestures peculiar to our nation. If a person habitually wears
a half giggle, we are probably struck by the imbecility of this mean-
ingless display. So too when a man meets us in the street looking
evidently soured and retaliative, we rather wish he would reserve
these unamiable exhibitions for his sympathetic friends. We have, in
a word, grown intellectual much faster than we have become emo-
tional, and we cannot sufier feeling to exhibit itself without some
explanation of its nature and causes being offered at the same time.
If a man will unbosom to us his sorrow or his joy fully and intel-
ligibly, we profess ourselves willing, provided he is not too wearisome
and exacting, to lend him a patient ear and to endeavor to enter into
his peculiar experiences ; but, without this explanatory recital, the
evidences of feeling are apt to appear unmeaning, if not actually
offensive.

We may just point to another influence which still further com-
plicates this question of emotional expression — namely, the growing
demands made by social refinement on the expression of kindly inter-
est in other people's concerns. While a man is judged to be incon-
siderate if he is frequently intruding his personal feelings in social
intercourse, rigid politeness requires us for the most part to lend an
appreciative ear to the tale of woe, however dull it may happen to
prove. This law calls into existence a very curious group of half-
artificial expressions. The degree to which polite persons have now-
adays to assume feeling may well alarm any one who cares mucli for
the honesty of social intercourse. We all know probably the draw-
ing-room smile of some of our lady friends. It is something quite
unique, never appearing in other places and at other times, but pre-
senting itself at the right moment with all the certainty of an astro-
nomical phenomenon. So too we know persons whose voices undergo
a most curious change when called on to converse with a stranger,
especially one of the opposite sex. No doubt some slight part of the
display may be set down to an unavoidable excitement, but the main
features of it would seem to be deliberately assumed. In this way it

324 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

appears that, owing to the requirements of modern society, our
volitions are called upon now to check feeling, now to force it into
play. The studied graces of smile, dilating eye, and mellifluous voice,
make up a perfectly new order of quasi expressions, which might per-
haps in a highly-artificial state of society gradually supplant many of
the older and familiar forms of emotional utterance. Whether the
agencies which tend to sustain genuine emotional expression will
prove to have more vitality than those which go to suppress it, and
how far, supposing spontaneous utterances of emotion to grow out of
date, artificial imitations of them will continue in fashion, are points
which we do not attempt to determine. Enough has been said, per-
haps, to show how curiously complex are the conditions of the prob-
lem.— Saturday Review.

GENESIS, GEOLOGY, AND EVOLUTION.'

Bt Eev. GEOEGE HENSLOW F.L.S., F, G. S.

THE theory, or rather doctrine, of the Evolution of Living Tljings
has not yet received that uniform acceptance to which it is un-
doubtedly entitled. That it will in time become generally received
may be reasonably presumed ; but at present, with many theologians
at least, the creative hypothesis obstinately holds its ground. Two
causes may be assigned to account for this fact. First, there is the
preconceived but erroneous idea of the method of creation derived
from a misconception of the first chapter of Genesis. Secondly, there
is the unfortunate but very general want of any scientific training,
not only among the clergy, but in the public generally ; and, as a re-
sult, there is that absence of a due power of appreciation of the argu-
ments of the scientific man, which is so conspicuous in tlieir style of
reasoning

In order, therefore, that the proof of the wisdom and beneficence
of the Almighty, as shown in the processes of evolution, may not be
considered as based on unsound premises, it will be desirable to point
out the untenableness of the present theological position, as well as
the grounds upon which evolution is founded ; and which will, let us
hope, be soon recognized as incontrovertible by all who seek the truth
in earnest. Until comparatively recent times the book of Genesis
was supposed to reveal in its first chapter an explicit account of the
origin of living things, namely, by direct creative fiats of the Al-
mighty. All the known animals and plants being far fewer than at
the present day, their differences were more pronounced than their
resemblances. Each animal and plant was observed to bring forth

' From his recently-published work, " Evolution and Eeligion."

G EXE SIS, GEOLOGY, AND EVOLUTION. 325

its offspring " after his kind," generation after generation, without any
noticeable change. Any other animals than those now living on the
globe were never conceived. Fossil shells were sujiposed to be either
deep-sea creatures thi-own up upon the beach, or, if found on land and
upon hills, easily accounted for by the Deluge.

Every living thing wa>^ believed to have been created at once by
the word of the Lord: and all within the space of six literal days.

When geology came to be studied with some philosophic spirit, it
was soon discovered that many fossils were not of living species ; that
six days was incontestably too short a period to account for geological
phenomena ; that a flood, even if conceded to have been universal,
was unable to solve many a problem of disturbance and stratification.
Moreover, it was perceived that the earth's structure was separable
into several strata ; and that each stratum contained a group of fossils
unknown either in the stratum above or below it; and upon this dis-
covery was based the principle that disconnected strata might be rec-
ognized by the identity of their organic remains. In addition to these
facts, the phenomena now known as dislocation, contortion, upheaval
iinconformahility, and others, frequently occurred, and apparently often
during periods intervening between the deposition of strata.

These latter appearances, taken into consideration with the daily
phenomena of volcanic action, induced the geologist to conceive,
and the theologian to adopt, the theory of successive creations after
cataclysmic and predetermined destructions of all existing life by the
Almighty : while, to meet the now well-established truth of almost in-
finite ages having elapsed, the theologian adopted the interpretation
of ages for the Hebrew word yortx or day. If, however, the first
chapter of Genesis be read without any reference to or thought of
geological discoveries, and the first three verses of the second chapter
be carefully compared with the fourth commandment, it will not ap-
pear how any notion of an indefinite time can be given to the word
" day " at all. The writer of Genesis seems to signify a day in the
ordinary sense, and apparently without any conception of indefinite
periods at alL

Geology ceased not to pursue her avocations steadily and uncom-
promisingly.

The study of the rocks soon brought to light a large increase of
the number of strata : so that at the present day there are thirteen
"formations," embracing thirty-nine principal "strata," the strata
themselves being often subdivided into minor ones. If, therefore, the
miraculous recreations be true, they must have been very numerous.
But Avith the discovery of additional strata a larger insight was ob-
tained into the distribution in time of animal and vegetal life. It
was then discovered that these " created groups " were not so rigidly
defined as at first supposed, and consequently the rule established by
geologists themselves can only be applied cautiously in attempting to

326 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

parallel distant strata — though some species appear to characterize
strata respectively, yet many range up and down through other than
those in which they attain their maximum development, or of which
they may be especially characteristic.

Two difficulties thus arose : the increase of mii-aculous interfer-
ences seemed to increase proportionately their improlalillty ; espe-
cially as there was no corroboration this time from the Word of God ;
while the fact of species ranging through several strata threw another
stumbling-block in the way of the cataclysmic theory ; for either they
must have been recreated two or three times, or else lived through
the supposed cataclysms considered as designed methods of destruc-
tion.

Another class of phenomena now appeared, to show a still greater
difficulty in the way of belief in the creative hypothesis. Zoology,
botany, as well as paleontology, gradually increased the number of
living and extinct forms almost indefinitely ; and in proportion as
fresh discoveries were made, so it was found that numbers of forms
took up positions, when classified, intermediate to other forms hitherto
well distinct — " osculant " or intercalary forms as they are called.
These often increased so much, that even genera well marked at first
became blended together by transitional or intermediate forms.

Hence it has come to pass, from the result of this discovery, that
so far from forms or types of organisms being easy and of a precise
character, in accordance with the idea of each being well defined after
his kind, systematic zoology and botany are the most difficult tasks a
naturalist can undertake. Here, then, an overwhelming difficulty,
only to be fully appreciated by a really scientific person, rises against
the conception of each kind having been specially created as we see
them now. Indeed, it maybe added that the very idea of kind or spe-
cies has been resolved into an abstract conception, finding in Kature
generally no more than a relative existence.

Fresh difficulties were still in store, which must be overcome if the
former theory of creation is to obtain any longer — horticulture, flori-
culture, agriculture, and the breeding of animals, have rapidly risen to
become important and flourishing occupations. From their pursuit it
was soon discovered that kinds reproducing their like never did so ab-
solutely,hwt that ofisjDring appeared always to difierfrom their parents
in some trifling if not considerable degree. This property of Nature,
to which also the human race is invariably subject, man has seized
upon, and by judicious treatment can almost mould his cattle to what-
ever form he pleases, or stock his fields and gardens with roots of any
form or with flowers of any shade of color required. After many
years of successful propagation, generation after generation, we have
now arrived at the result that animals and plants can be produced by
careful breeding and selection, which, had they been wild, our earlier
naturalists would have undoubtedly regarded as having been respec-

GENESIS, GEOLOGY, AND EVOLUTION, 327

tively created at the beginning of the world ! Here, then, we have
a practical basis of argument to account for the many transitional
forms which geology reveals in the past history of the world, as well
as among the plants and animals living at the present day.

Yet another fact may be mentioned. Geographical botany and
zoology began to be stuc^ied as travellers stocked our museums and
herbaria with an ever-increasing number of beings brought from
all parts of the world ; and the (so to say) capricious distribution of
identical forms in far-distant places — now explicable on the theory of
migration and subsequent isolation — as well as the appearance of rep-
resentative forms of allied though different kinds in certain districts,
explicable only on the theory of descent with modification, has a
strong 2)nma-/acie appearance against the theory of individual crea-
tions, even if geology did not furnish undoubted evidence of very fre-
quent interchanges between land and sea having taken place. With-
out at present giving more reasons, the above will be sufficient to show
cause why Science has found herself compelled to secede from the
cramping toils of the creative hypothesis, and to take up that of the
evolution of living things as better explaining all the foregoing
phenomena. In proportion as the probability of the former was seen
to decrease, so in the same degree does that of evolution increase.
Hence, at the present day the argument in favor of development of
species by natural laws may be stated in the following terms, viz. : " It
is infinitely more probable that all living and extinct beings have been
developed or evolved by natural laws of generation from preexisting
forms, than that they with all their innumerable races and varieties
should owe their existences severally to creative fiats."

But, even now, asks the theologian. Does not this theory contro-
vert the Bible, for we are distinctly told that God created every thing
after its kind ?

In reply, it may be confidently shown that the theologian cannot
be sure of the value of his interpretation of the first chapter of Gene-
sis, at least so far as he attempts to draw scientific deductions from it.
Thus it may be observed to him that the words " create " and " make "
are used indifferently ; that no definition is given to insure accuracy as
to their right interpretation. It is not stated whether God created
out of nothing or out of eternally or at least preexisting matter.
Moreover, in addition to the statement that God created or made all
things, there is the oft-repeated assertion embodied in the word Jiat,
but apparently overlooked, that He enjoined the earth and the Avaters
to bring forth living forms. What does this expression imply ?

The use of the imperative mood can only signify an age^it other
than the speaker. If, therefore, it be maintained that the sentence
(ver. 21) "God created every living thing that moveth" signifies He
made them by his direct Almighty fiat, it may be equally maintained
that the sentence " Let the waters bring forth abundantly every mov-

328 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ing creature " implies secondary agents to carry out the will of the
Lord. Such might be said to witness to natural law, which, after all,
is but a synonym for tbe will of God.

The real basis of the controversy between dogmatic theology and
this deduction of Science is simply this : The former has established a
creed based upon erroneous impressions derived from Scripture, and,
from having had power in former days to enforce its opinions, they
were credulously received without hesitation as long as no one dared
to or even could controvert them. It is the reluctance to surrender
this power to Science as much as the idea of her offering any opposi-
tion to theology that urges at least one body so obstinately to resist
her advances. Nearer home the opposition rests more on the latter
ground ; and it will not be until the representatives of our theology
can see and confess their false impi-essions of the meaning of the first
chapter of Genesis, that the doctrine of evolution can be hoped to
make any great progress among them.

Let us briefly review their false positions. They first clung to the
" six days of creation ; " they found they were compelled to surrender
the idea, and immediately adopted the interpretation of yom signify-
ing an indefinite period. Again, notice their readiness in adopting
the theory of cataclysms and reci-eations, a second time to the detri-
ment of Genesis, which furnishes no warrant for the idea ; for even
if six days be presumed to represent six cataclysms, geology furnishes
no corresponding evidence. It was a pure fiction altogether. And
even now they steadily oppose the doctrine of evolution. But surely
as each stronghold of theology has been quietly taken by Science —
not so much by offensive attack as by undermining and leaving the
edifice to crumble of itself — the tardy and ungracious capitulations
hitherto offered only insure the ultimate surrender a matter of pa-
tient expectation. A time will shortly come when the creative theory
must succumb altogether and tlie doctrine (not the theory) of evolu-
tion will be as much recognized as a fundamental truth of science
and theology as the - 2volution of the earth itself.

GROWTH AKD DECAY OF MIND.

"And so from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then from hour to hour we rot .ind rot,
And thereby hangs a tale." — As You Like It.

FEW subjects of scientific investigation are more interesting than
the inquiry into the various circumstances on which mental
power depends. By mental power I do not mean simply mental
capacity, or the potential quality of the mind, but the actual power
which is the resultant, so to speak, of mental capacity and mental

GROWTH AND DECAY OF MIND. 329

training. The growth and development of mental power in the indi-
vidual, and the process by which, after attaining a maximum of power,
the mind gradually becomes less active, until in the course of time it
undergoes at least a partial decay, form the special subjects of which
I propose now to treat ; but, in order to form clear ideas on these sub-
jects, it will be necessary" to consider several associated matters. In
particular, it will be desirable to trace the analogy which exists be-
tween bodily and mental power, not only as respects development
and decay, but with regard to the jDhysical processes involved in their
exercise.

It is now a well-established physiological fact that mental action
is a distinctly physical process, depending primarily on a chemical re-
action between the blood and the brain, precisely as muscular action
depends primarily on a chemical reaction between the blood and the
muscular tissues. Without the free circulation of blood in the brain,
there can be neither thought nor sensation, neither emotions nor ideas.
It necessarily follows that thought, the only form of brain-action which
we have here to consider, is a process not merely depending upon, but
in its turn affecting, the physical condition of the brain, precisely as
muscular exertion of any given kind depends on the quality of the
muscles employed and affects the condition of those muscles, not at
the moment only, but thereafter, conducing to their growth and de-
velopment if wisely adjusted to their power, or causing waste and de-
cay if excessive and too long continued. It is important to notice
that this is not a mere analogy. The relation between thought and
the condition of the brain is a reality. So far as this statement affects
our ideas about actually existent mental power, it is of little impor-
tance ; for it is not more useful to announce that a man with a good
brain will possess good mental powers than to say that a muscular
man will be capable of considerable exertion. But as it is of extreme
importance to know of the relation which exists between muscular
exercise and the growth or development of bodily strength, so it is
highly important for us to remember that the development of mental
power depends largely on the exercise of the mind. There is a " train-
ing " for the brain as well as for the body — a real physical training —
depending, like bodily training, on rules as to nourishment, method
of action, quantity of exercise, etc.

When we thus view the matter, we at once recognize the signifi-
cance of relations formerly regarded as mere analogies between men-
tal and bodily power. Instead of saying that, as the body fails of its
fair growth and development if overtaxed in early youth, so the mind
suffers by the attempt to force it into precocious activity, we should
now say that the mind suffers in this case in the same actual manner —
that is, by the physical deterioration of the material in and through
which it acts. Again, the old adage, " mens sana in corpore sano,"
only needs to be changed into " cerebrum sanum in corpore sano," to

330 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

express an actual physical reality. The processes by which the brain
and the body are nourished, as Avell as those which produce gradual
exhaustion when either is employed for a long time or on arduous
work, not only correspond with each other, but are in fact identical
in their nature ; so that Jeremy Taylor anticipated a comparatively
recent scientific discovery when he associated mental and bodily ac-
tion in the well-known apothegm, " Every meal is a rescue from one
death and lays up for another ; and while we think a thought we
die." This is true, as Wendell Holmes well remarks, " of the brain
as of other organs : the brain can only live by dying. We must all
be born again, atom by atom, from hour to hour, or perish all at once
beyond repair."

And here it is desirable to exj^lain distinctly that the relations be-
tween mind and matter which we are considering are not necessarily
connected with any views respecting the questions which have been
at issue between materialism and its opponents. We are dealing here
with the instrument of thought, not with that, whatever it may be,
which sets the instrument in motion and regulates its operation. So
far, indeed, as there is any connection between physical researches into
the nature of the brain or its employment in thought, and our ideas
respecting the individuality of the thinker, the evidence seems not of
a nature to alarm even the most cautious. Thus, when Mr. Huxley
maintains that thought is " the expression of molecular changes in that
matter of life which is the source of our other vital phenomena," we
are still as far as ever from knowing where resides the moving cause
to which these changes are due. We have found that the instrument
of thought is moved by certain material connecting links before un-
recognized ; but to conclude that therefore thought is a purely mate-
rial process, is no more necessarily just than it would be to conclude
that the action of a steam-engine depends solely on the eccentric which
causes the alternation of the steam-supply. Again, we need find noth-
ing very venturesome in Prof. Haughton's idea, that " our successors
may even dare to speculate on the changes that converted a crust of
bread, or a bottle of wine, in the brain of Swift, Moliere, or Shake-
speare, into the conception of the gentle Glumdalclitch, the rascally
Sganarelle, or the immortal Falstafl"," seeing tl)at it would still remain
unexplained how such varying results may arise from the same ma-
terial processes, or how the selfsame fuel may produce no recognizable
mental results. The brain does not show in its constitution why such
difierences should exist. " The lout who lies stretched on the tavern-
bench," says Wendell Holmes, " with just mental activity enough to
keep his pipe from going out, is the unconscious tenant of a labora-
tory where such combinations are being constantly made as never
Wohler or Berthelot could put together ; where such fabrics are
woven, such colors dyed, such problems of mechanism solved, such a
commerce carried on with the elements and forces of the outer uni-

GROWTH AND DECAY OF MIND. 331

verse, that the industries of all tlie factories and trading establish-
ments in the world are mere indolence, and awkwardness, and un-
productiveness, compared to the mii'aculous activities of Avhich his
lazy bulk is the unheeding centre." Yet the conscious thought of
the lout remains as unlike as possible to the conscious thought of the
philosopher ; nor will crusts of bread or bottles of wine educe aught
from the lout's brain that men will think worth remembering in future

Moreover, we must I'emember that we have to deal with facts, let
the interpretation of these facts be what it may. The relations be-
tween mental activity and material processes affecting the substance
of the brain are matters of observation and experiment. We may
estimate the importance of such research with direct reference to the
brain as the instrument of tliought, without inquiring by what pro-
cesses that instrument is called into action. " The piano which the
master touches," to quote yet again from the philosophic pages of
Holmes's " Mechanism in Thought and Morals," " must be as tliorough-
ly understood as the musical box or clock which goes of itself by a
spring or weight. A slight congestion or softening of the brain
shows the least materialistic of philosophers that he must recognize
the strict dependence of mind upon its organ in the only condition of
life with which we are experimentally acquainted ; and, what all
recognize as soon as disease forces it upon their attention, all think-
ers should recognize without waiting for such an irresistible demon-
stration. They should see that the study of the organ of tliought,
microscopically, chemically, experimentally, in the lower animals, in
individuals and races, in health and in disease, in every aspect of
external observation, as well as by internal consciousness, is just
as necessary as if the mind were known to be nothing more than
a function of the brain, in the same way as digestion is of the
stomach,"

In considering the growth of the mind, however, in these pages, it
appears to me sufficient to call attention to the physical aspect of the
subject, without entering into an account of what is known about the
physical structure of tlie brain and the manner in which that structure
is modified with advancing years. Moreover, I do not think it de-
sirable, in the limited space available for such an essay as the present,
to discuss the various forms of mental power ; indeed, this is by no
means essential where a general view of mental growth and decay
is alone in question. Precisely as we can consider the development
and decay of the bodily power without entering into a discussion of
the various forms in which that power may be manifested, so we can
discuss the growth of the mind without considering special forms of
mental action.

Nevertheless, we cannot altogether avoid such considerations, sim-
ply because we must adopt some rule for determining what constitutes

33'

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

mental power. Here, indeed, at the outset, a serious difficulty is en-
countered. Certain signs of mental decay are sufficiently obvious, but
the signs which mark the progress of the mind to its maximum degree
of power, as well as the earlier signs of gi-adually diminishing mental
power, are far more difficult of recognition. This is manifest when we
consider that they should be more obvious, one would suppose, to the
person whose mind is in question, than to any other ; whereas it is a
known fact that men do not readily perceive (certainly are not ready
to admit) any falling off in mental power, even when it has become
very marked to others. " I, the Professor," says Wendell Holmes in
the " Professor at the Breakfast-table," " am very much like other men.
I shall not find out when I have used up my affinities. What a blessed
thing it is that Nature, when she invented, manufactured, and patented
her authors, contrived to make critics out of the cliips that were left !
Painful as the task is, they never fail to warn the author, in the most
impressive manner, of the probabilities of failure in what he has under-
taken. Sad as the necessity is to their delicate sensibilities, they never
hesitate to advertise him of the decline of his powers, and to press
upon him the propriety of retiring before he sinks into imbecility."
Notwithstanding the irony, which is just enough so far as it relates to
ordinary criticism, there can be no question that, when an author's
powers are failing, his readers, and especially those who have been
his most faithful followers, so to speak, devouring each of his works as
it issues from his pen, begin to recognize the decrease of his powers
before he is himself conscious that he is losing strength. The case of
Scott may be cited as a sufficient illustration, its importance in this
respect being derived from the fact that he had long been warmly
admired and enthusiastically appreciated by those who at once recog-
nized signs of deterioration in " Count Robert of Paris," and " Castle
Dangerous."

Yet judgment is most difficult in snch matters. We can readily
see why no man should be skilled to detect the signs of change in his
own mind, since the self-watching of the growth and decay of mind is
an experiment which can be conducted but once, and which is com-
pleted only when the mind no longer has the power of grasping all the
observed facts and forming a sound opinion npon them. But it is
even more natural that those who follow the career of some great mind
should often be misled in their judgment as to its varying power. For,
it must be remembered that the conditions under which such minds
are exercised nearly always vary greatly as time proceeds. This cir-
cumstance affects chiefly the correctness of ideas formed as to the decay
of mental powers, but it has its bearing also on the supposed increase
of these powers. For instance, the earlier works of a young author,
diffident perhaps of his strength, or not quite conscious where his chief
strength resides, will often be characterized by a weakness which is in
no true sense indicative of want of mental power. A work by the

GROWTH AND DUCAT OF MIND. 333

same author when he has made for himself a name, when he knows
something of the feeling of the public as to his powers, and when also
he has learned to distinguish the qualities he possesses — to see where
he is strong and where weak — will have an air of strength and firm-
ness not due, or only partially due, to any real growth of his mental
powers. But, as I have said, and as experience has repeatedly shown,
it is in opinions formed as to the diminution of mental power that the
world is most apt to be deceived. How commonly the remark is heard
that So-and-so has written himself out, or Such-a-one is not the man
he was, when in reality, as those know who ai-e intimate with the author
so summarily dismissed, the deterioration, justly enough noted, is due
to circumstances in no way connected with mental capacity ! The
author who has succeeded in establishing a reputation may not have
(nay, very commonly has not) the same reason for exerting his powers
to the full, as he had when he was making his reputation. He may
have less leisure, more company, new sources of distraction, and so on.
The earlier work, his chef-d''oeuvre, let us say, may have been produced
at one great effort, no other subject being allowed to occupy his at-
tention until the masterpiece had been completed — the later and in-
ferior work, hastily accepted as evidence that the author's mind no
longer preserves its wonted powers, may have been written hurriedly
and piecemeal, and subjected to no jealous revision before passing
through the press.

Here I have taken literary work as affording typical instances. But
similar misapprehensions are common in other departments of mental
work. For example, it is related that Newton, long before he was an
old man, said of himself that he could no longer follow the reasoning
of his own " Principia," and this has commonly been accepted as evi-
dence that his mind had lost power. The conclusion is an altogether
unsafe one, as every mathematician knows. It would have been a
truly wonderful circumstance if Newton had been able, even only ten
or twelve years after his magnum opus was completed, to follow its
reasoning with satisfaction to his own mind — that is, with the feeling
that he still had that grasp of the subject which he had possessed
when, after long concentration of his thoughts upon it, he was engaged
in the task of exhibiting a summary of his reasoning (for the " Prin-
cipia " is scarcely more).

I can give more than one instance, in my own experience, of this
seeming loss of mastery over a mathematical subject, while in reality
the mind has certainly not deteriorated in its power of dealing with
subjects of that particular kind. I will content myself with one. It
happened that in 1869 I had occasion to examine a mathematical sub-
ject of no very great difficulty, but involving many associated rela-
tions, and requiring therefore a considerable amount of close attention.
At that time I had made myself master, I think I may say without
conceit, of that particular subject in all its details. Recently, I had

334

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

occasion to resume the study of a part of the subject, in order to reply-
to some questions which had been asked me. Greatly to my annoy-
ance, I found that I had apparently lost my grasp of it. The relations
involved seemed more complex than they had before appeared to me ;
and I should there and then have dismissed the subject (not having
leisure for mere mental experiments) with the feeling that my strength
for mathematical inquiries had diminished. But the subject chanced
to be one that I could not dismiss, for, though the questions directed
to me miglit have been left unanswered, the time had come which I
had assigned to myself (under certain eventualities then realized) for a
complete restatement of my views, enforced and reiterated in every
possible way, until a certain course depending upon them should have
been adopted, or else the discussion of the matter rendered useless by
lapse of time. I soon found, after resuming my study of the subject,
that it was far more completely within my grasp than before — in fact,
on reacquiring my knowledge of its details, the problems involved
appeared to me as mere mathematical child's-play.

The great difficulty in judging of the growth and development of
the mind consists in the want of any reliable measure of mental
strength — any mental dynamometer, so to speak. Our competitive
examinations are attempts in this direction, but very imperfect ones,
as expei-ience has long since shown. Neither acquii'ed knowledge, nor
the power of acquiring knowledge, is any true measure of mental
strength. The power of solving mathematical problems is not neces-
sarily indicative even of mathematical power, far less of general mental
power. The ordinary tests of classical knowledge, again, have little
real relation to mental strength. It may be urged that our most emi-
nent men have, for the most part, been distinguished, at school or uni-
versity, by either mathematical or classical know^ledge, or both. This
is doubtless true ; but so it would be the case that they would have
distinguished themselves above their fellows at public school or uni-
versity if the heads of these establishments had in their wisdom set
Chinese puzzling as the primary test of merit. The powerful mind
will show its superiority (in general) in any task that may be assigned
it ; and, if the test of distinction is to be the skillful construction of
Greek and Latin verse, or readiness in treating mathematical ^^roblems,
a youth of good powers, unless he be wanting in ambition, will acquire
the necessary qualifications even though he has no special taste for
classical or mathematical learning, and is even perfectly assured that
in after-life he will never pen a sapj^hic or set down an equation of
motion.

In passing, I may note that nearly all our attempted measurements
of mind depend too much on tests of memory. It is not recognized
sufficiently that the part which memory plays in the workings of a
powerful mind is subordinate. A good memory is a very useful ser-
vant ; nothing more. In the really difficult mental processes, memory —

GROWTH AND DECAY OF MIND.

335

at least what is commonly understood by the term — plays a very un-
important part. Of course a weak memory is an almost fatal obstacle
to effective thought ; but I am not comparing the worth of a good
memory and a bad one, but of an average memory and one excep-
tionally powerful. I conceive that quite a large proportion of the
most pi'ofound thinkers are satisfied to exert their memory very mod-
erately. It is, in fact, a distraction from close thought to exert the
memory overmuch ; and a man engaged in the study of an abstruse
subject will commonly rather turn to his book-shelves for the in-
formation he requires than tax his memory to supply it. The case
resembles somewhat that of the mathematician who from time to time,
as his work proceeds, requires this or that calculation to be effected.
He will not leave the more engrossing questions that he has in his
thoughts, to go through processes of arithmetic, but will adopt any
ready resource which leaves him free to follow without check the
train of his reasoning.

It would be perhaps difficult to devise any means of readily meas-
uring mental power in examination or otherwise. The memory test
is assuredly unsafe ; but it would not be easy to suggest a really reli-
able one. I may remark that only those experienced in the matter
understand how much depends on memory in our competitive exam-
inations. Many questions in the examination-papers apparently re-
quire the exercise of judgment rather than memory ; but those who
know the text-books on which the questions are based are aware that
the judgment to be written down in answer is not to be formed but
to be quoted. So with mathematical problems which appear to
require original conceptions for their solution : in nine cases out of
ten such problems are either to be found fully solved in mathematical
works, or others so nearly resembling them are dealt with that no skill
is required for their solution.

I must confess that I am somewhat surprised to find Wendell
Holmes, whose opinions on such matters are usually altogether reli-
able, recommending a test of mental power depending on a quality of
memory even inferior to that usually in question in competitive exam-
inations. " The duration of associated impressions on the memory
differs vastly," he says, " as we all know, in different individuals. But
in uttering distinctly a series of unconnected numbers or letters
before a succession of careful listeners, I have been surprised to find
how generally they break down, in trying to repeat them, between
seven and ten figures or letters ; though here and there an individual
may be depended on for a larger number. Pepys mentions a person
who could repeat sixty unconnected words, forward or backward, and
perform other wonderful feats of memory ; but this was a prodigy.'

^ " This is nothing to the story told by Seneca of himself, and still more of a friend
of his, one Fortius Latro {Mendax it might be suggested), or to that other relation of
Muretus, about a certain young Corsican." The note is Holmes's ; but there are authen-

336 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

I suspect we have in this and similar trials a very simple mental dy-
namometer which may find its place in education." It appears to me,
on the contrary, that tests of the kind should be as little used as may
be. Memory will always have an unfair predominance in competitive
examinations ; but tests which are purely mnemonic, the judgment
being in no way whatever called upon, ought not to be introduced,
and should be discax'ded as soon as possible where already in use.'

It is worthy of notice that the growth of the mind is often accom-
panied by an apparent loss of power in particular respects ; and this
fact is exceedingly important, especially to all who desire to estimate
the condition of their own mind. The mental phenomenon called
(not very correctly) absence of mind is often regarded by the person
experiencing it, and still more by those who observe it in him, as a
proof of failing jjowers. But it often, if not generally, accompanies
the increase of mental power. Newton displayed absence of mind
much more frequently and to a much more marked degree when his
powers were at their highest than in his youth, and not only did in-
stances become much less frequent when he was at an advanced age,
but the opposite quality, sensitiveness to small annoyances, began
then to be displayed. Even an apparent impairment of the memory
is not necessarily indicative of failing mental powers, since it is often
the I'esult of an increased concentration of the attention on subjects
specially calling for the exercise of the highest forms of mental power
— as analysis, comparison, generalization, and judgment. I have
already noted that profound thinkers often refrain from exercising the
memory, simply to avoid the distraction of their thoughts from the
main subject of their study. But this statement may be extended
into the general remark that the most profound students, whether of
physical science, mathematics, history, politics, or, in fine, of any diffi-
cult subject of research, are apt to give the memory less exercise than
shallower thinkers. Of course, the memory is exerted to a consider-
ble degree, even in the mere marshaling of thoughts before theories
can be formed or weighed. But the greater part of the mental action

ticated instances fully as remarkable as those here referred to. For instance, there is a
case of an American Indian who could repeat twenty or thirty lines of Homer which
had been read once to him, though he knew nothing of the Greek language. The
power of repeating backward a long passage after it has been but once read is somewhat
similar to that of repeating imconnected numbers, letters, or words This power has
been possessed to a remarkable degree by persons in no way distinguished by general
ability

1 It may perhaps occur to the reader that I who write may object to mnemonic tests,
becaiise they would act unfavorably if they were applied to my own mental qualities.
The reverse is, however, the case. I can recall competitive examinations in which I had
an undue advantage over others because my memory chances to be very retentive in one
particular respect : In its general nature my memory is about equal, I imagine, to the
average, perhaps it is better than the average for facts, and rather below the average for
what is commonly called learning " by heart : " but it is singularly retentive for the sub-
ject-matter of passages read overnight.

GROWTH AND DECAY OF MIND. 337

devoted to the formation or discussion of theories is only indirectly
dej^endent upon the exercise of memory.

Subject to the considerations suggested above, we may fairly form
our opinion as to the general laws of the development of mind, by
examining the lives of distinguished men and taking the achievement
of their best work, that by which they have made their mark in the
world's history, as indicative of the epoch when the mind had attained
its greatest development. Dr. Beai'd, of New York, has recently col-
lected some statistical results, which throw light on the subject of
mental growth, though we must note that a variety of collateral cir-
cumstances have to be taken into account before any sound opinion
can be formed as to the justice of Dr. Beard's conclusions. He states
that " from an analysis of the lives of a thousand representative men
in all the great branches of human effort, he had made the discovery
that the golden decade was between thirty and forty, the silver be-
tween forty and fifty, the brazen between twenty and thirty, the iron
between fifty and sixty. The superiority of youth and middle life
over old age in original work appears all the gi*eater, when we con-
sider the fact that nearly all the positions of honor and profit and
prestige — professorships and public stations — are in the hands of the
old. Reputation, like money and position, is mainly confined to the
old. Men are not widely known until long after they have done the
work that gives them their fame. Portraits of great men are a delu-
sion ; statues are lies. They are taken when men have become famous,
which, on the average, is at least twenty-five years after they did the
work which gave them their fame. Original work requires enthusiasm.
If all the original work done by men under forty-five were annihilated,
the world would be reduced to barbarism. Men are at their best at
that time when enthusiasm and experience are most evenly balanced ;
this period on the average is from thirty-eight to forty. After this
period the law is that experience increases but enthusiasm declines. In
the life of almost every old man there comes a point, sooner or later,
when experience ceases to have any educating power."

There is much that is true, but not a little that is, to say the least,
doubtful, in the above remarks. The children of a man's mind, like
those of his body, are commonly born while he is in the prime of life.
But it must not be overlooked that it is precisely because of the origi-
nal work done in earlier life that a man as he grows older is com-
monly prevented from accomplishing any great amount of original
work. Nearly the whole of his time is necessarily occupied in matur-
ing the work originated earlier. And again, the circumstance that
(usually) a man finds that the work of his earlier years remains incom-
plete and unsatisfactory, unless the labors of many sequent years are
devoted to it, acts as a check upon original investigation. This re-
mark has no bearing, or but slight bearing, on certain forms of literary
work; but in nearly every other department of human eflbrt men
VOL. IV — 22

338 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

advanced in years find themselves indisposed to undertake original
research, not from any want of power, but because they recognize the
fact that sufficient time does not remain for them to bring such work
to a satisfactory issue. They feel that they would have to leave to
others the rearing of their mental ofispring.

It cannot be questioned, however, that with old age there comes a
real physical incapacity for original work, while the power of matui*-
ing past work remains comparatively but little impaired. Dr. Car-
penter has shown how this may partly be explained by the physical
changes which lead in old age to the weakening of the memory ; or
perhaps we should rather say that in the following passage his re-
marks respecting loss of memory serve to illustrate the loss of brain-
power generally, and especially of the power of forming new ideas, in
old age. " The impairment of the memory in old age," he says,
" commonly shows itself in regard to new impressions ; those of the
earlier period of life not only remaining in full distinctness, but even
it would seem increasing in vividness, from the fact that the eye is not
distracted from attending to them by the continued influx of impres-
sions produced by passing events. The extraordinary persistence of
early impressions, when the mind seems almost to have ceased to
register new ones, is in remarkable accordance with a law of nutrition
I have formerly referred to. It is when the brain is growing that the
direction of its structure can be most strongly and persistently"
(query, lastingly) " given to it. Thus the habits of thought come to
be formed, and those nerve-tracks laid down which (as the physiolo-
gist believes) constitute the mechanism of association, by the time
that the brain has reached its maturity; and the nutrition of the
organ continues to keep up the same meclianism in accordance with
the demands upon its activity, so long as it is being called into use.
Further, during the entire period of vigorous manhood, the brain, like
the muscles, may be taking on some additional growth, either as a
whole or in special parts ; new tissue being developed and kept up by
the nutritive process, in accordance with the modes of action to which
the organ is trained. And in this manner a store of ' impressions ' or
' traces ' is accumulated, which may be brought within the ' sphere of
consciousness ' whenever the right suggesting strings are touched.
But, as the nutritive activity diminishes, the ' waste ' becomes more
rapid than the renovation ; and it would seem that, while (to use a
commercial analogy) the 'old-established houses' keep their ground,
those later firms, whose basis is less secure, are the first to crumble
away — the nutritive activity which yet suffices to maintain the origi-
nal structure not being capable of keeping the subsequent additions
to it in working order. This earlier degeneration of later-formed
structures is a general fact perfectly familiar to the physiologist."

One of the most remarkable features of mental development, char-
acteristic, according to circumstances, of mental growth and of mental

GROWTH AND DECAY OF MIND. 339

decay, is the change of taste for mental food of various kinds. Every
one must be conscious of the fact that books, and the subjects of
thought, lose the interest they once had, making way for others of a
different nature. The favorite author, whose words we read and re-
read with continually fresh enjoyment in youth, appears dull and un-
interesting as the mind grows, and becomes unendurable in advanced
years. And this is not merely the effect of familiarity. I knew one
who was never tired of reading the works of a famous modern novel-
ist until the age of twenty-five or thereaboixts, when it chanced that
he was placed in circumstances which caused novel-reading to be an
unfrequent occupation, and in point of fact certain works of this
author were not opened by him for ten or twelve years. He sup-
posed, when at the end of that time he took up one of these works,
that he should find even more than the pleasure he formerly had in
reading it, since the story would now have something of novelty for
htm, and he had once thoroughly enjoyed reading it even when he
almost knew the work by heart. But he no longer found the work in
the least interesting ; the humor seemed forced, the pathos affected,
the eloquence false ; in short, he had lost his taste for it. In the
mean time the works of another equally famous humorist had acquired
a new value in his estimation.' They had formerly seemed rather
heavy reading; now, every sentence gave enjoyment. They appeared
now as books not to be merely tasted or swallowed, as Bacon hath it,
but " to be chewed and digested." The change here described indi-
cated (in accordance at least with the accepted estimates of the nov-
elist and humorist in question) an increase of mental power. But a
distaste for particular writings may imply the decay of mental power.
And also, more generally, a tendency to disparagement is a very com-
mon indication of advancing mental age. " The old brain," says
Wendell Holmes, " thinks the world grows worse, as the old retina
thinks the eyes of needles and the fractions in the printed sales of
stocks grow smaller."

Another singular effect of advancing years is shown by the ten-
dency to repetition. It is worthy of notice that this peculiar mental
phenomenon has been clearly associated with physical deterioration
of the substance of the brain, because it may be brought about by a
blow or by disease. Wendell Holmes, speaking of this peculiarity,
remarks, " I have known an aged person repeat the same question five,

' Probably the best means of testing the development of one's own mind consists in
comparing the estimate formed, at different times, of the value of some standard work.
Of course different classes of writing should be employed to test different faculties of
the mind. A good general test may be found in Shakespeare's plays, and perhaps still
better in some of Shakespeare's sonnets. As the mind grows, its power of appreciating
Shakespeare increases ; and the great advantage of this particular test is, that the mind
cannot overgrow it. It is like the standard by which the sergeant measures recruits,
which will measure men of all heights, not failing even when giants are brought to be
measured by it.

34°

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

six, or seven times, during the same brief visit. Everybody knows
the archbishop's flavor of apoplexy in the memory as in the other men-
tal powers. I was once asked to see a woman who had just been in-
jured in the street. On coming to herself, ' Where am I ? What has
happened ? ' she asked. ' Knocked down by a horse, ma'am ; stunned
a little ; that is all.' A pause, ' while one, with moderate haste, might
count a hundred ; ' and then again, ' Where am I ? What has hap-
pened ?' ' Knocked down by a horse, ma'am; stunned a little ; that
is all.' " (Mr. Holmes appears to have sympathized with the patient's
mental condition.) " Another pause, and the same question again ;
and so on during the whole time I was by her. The same tendency
to repeat a question indefinitely has been observed in returning mem-
bers of those worshiping assemblies whose favorite hymn is ' We
won't go home till morning.' Is memory then," he proceeds, " a ma-
terial record ? Is the brain, like the rock of the Sinaitic Valley, writ-
ten all over with inscriptions left by the long caravans of thought, as
they have passed year after year through its mysterious recesses ?
When we see a distant railway-train sliding by us in the same line,
day after day, we infer the existence of a track which guides it. So,
when some dear old friend begins that story we remember so well —
switching off at the accustomed point of digression ; coming to a
dead stop at the puzzling question of chronology ; off the track on
the matter of its being first or second cousin of somebody's aunt ; set
on it again by the patient, listening wife, who knows it all as she
knows her well-worn wedding-ring — how can we doubt that there is a
track laid down for the story in some permanent disposition of the
thinking-marrow ? "

We seem to recognize here a process of change in the brain corre-
sponding to that which takes place in the body with advancing years
— the induration of its substance, so that it loses flexibility, and thus,
while readily accomplishing accustomed work, is not readily adapted
for new woi-k. Our old proverb, " You can't teach an old dog new
tricks," indicates, coarsely enough, but justly, the peculiarity, as well
mental as bodily, to which I refer. There is not a loss of power, but a
loss of elasticity. We see aged men working well in the routine work
to which they have been accustomed, but failing where there is occasion
for change either of method or of opinion. Again, one recognizes this
peculiarity in the scientific M^orker, whence perhaps we may regard it
as a fortunate circumstance that the tendency of the aged mind ac-
cords with its faculties, so that old men do not readily undertake new
work. Perhaps no more remarkable instance could be cited of the
combination I refer to — the possession of power on the one hand, and
the want of elasticity on the other — than the remarkable papers on the
universe, written by Sir W. Herschel, in the years 1817 and 1818, that
is, in his seventy-ninth and eightieth years. We find the veteran
astronomer proceeding in the path which, more than forty years before,

GROWTH AND DECAY OF MIND. 341

he had marked out for himself; but the very steadiness and strength
of purpose with which he pursues it indicate the degree to which his
mind had lost its wonted elasticity. In 1784 and 1785 he was trav-
ersing a portion of the same road. But then he was in the prime of
his powers, and accordingly we recognize a versatility which enabled
him to test and reject the methods of research which presented them-
selves to his mind. It was in those years that he invented his famous
method of star-gauging, which our text-books of astronomy prepos-
terously adopt as if it were an established and recognized method of
scientific research. But Herschel himself, after trying it, and satisfy-
ing himself that it was unsound in principle, abandoned it altogether.
In 1817 he adopted a method of research equally requiring to be tested,
and, in ray conviction, equally incapable of standing the test ; but he
now worked upon the plan he had devised, without subjecting it to
any test. Nay, results which only a few years before he would cer-
tainly have rejected — for he did then actually reject results which
were open to the same objection — passed muster in 1817 and 1818, and
are recorded in his papers of those dates without comment. We may
recognize another illustration of the loss of elasticity with advancing
years, in the obstinacy, one may even say the perversity, with which
Sir Isaac Newton, in the latter years of his life, adhered to opinions
on certain points where, as has since been shown, he was unquestion-
ably wrong, and where, had he possessed his former mental versatility,
he must have perceived as much. Compare this with his conduct in
earlier years, when for nineteen years he freely abandoned his theory
of gravitation — though he had fully recognized its surpassing impor-
tance— simply because cei-tain minute details were not satisfactorily
accounted for. Many other instances might be cited, were it worth
while, to show how the mind commonly changes when approaching an
advanced age, in a manner corresponding to that bodily change — that
stiffness and want of elasticity, without any marked loss of power —
which comes on with advancing years. That old age does not neces-
sarily involve any loss of power for routine work, has been clearly
shown in the lives of many eminent men of our own era. The present
Astronomer Royal for England affords a remarkable illustration of
the fact, as also of the associated fact that new work is not easily
achieved, nor an old mistake readily admitted or corrected at an ad-
vanced age.

It is well pointed out by Dr. Beard, in the lecture to which I have
already referred, that " we must not expect to find at one age the men-
tal qualifications due to another age — we must not look for experience
and caution in youth, or for suppleness and versatility in age. We
ought also to apportion to the various ages of a man the kind of work
most suitable to them. Positions which require mainly enthusiasm
and original work should be filled by the young and middle-aged ; po-
sitions that require mainly experience and routine work, should be

342 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

filled by those in mature and advanced life, or (as in clerkships) by
the young who have not yet reached the golden decade. The enor-
mous stupidity, and backwardness, and red-tapeism, of all departments
of governments everywhere, are partly due to the fact that they are
too much controlled by age. The conservatism and inferiority of col-
leges are similarly explained. Some of those who control the policy
of colleges — presidents and trustees — should be young and middle-
aged. Journalism, on the other hand, has suffered from relative excess
of youth and enthusiasm."

Before passing from the lecture of Dr. Beard, I shall venture to
quote the remarks which he makes on the evidence sometimes afforded
of approaching mental decay by a decline in moral sensitiveness.
" Moral decline in old age," he says, " means — ' Take care ; for the
brain is giving way.' It is very frequently accompanied or preceded
by sleeplessness. Decline of the moral faculties, like the decline of
other functions, may be relieved, retarded, and sometimes cured by
proper medical treatment, and especially by hygiene. In youth, mid-
dle age, and even in advanced age, one may suffer for years from dis-
orders of the nervous system that cause derangement of some one or
many of the moral faculties, and perfectly recover. The symptoms
should be taken early, and treated like any other physical disease.
Our best asylums are now acting upon this principle, and with good
success. Medical treatment is almost powerless without hygiene.
Study the divine art of taking it easy. Men often die as trees die,
slowly, and at the top first. As the moral and reasoning faculties are
the highest, most complex, and most delicate development of human
nature, they are the first to show signs of cerebral disease. When they
begin to decay in advanced life, we are generally safe in predicting
that, if these signs are neglected, other functions will sooner or later
be impaired. "When conscience is gone, the constitution is threatened.
Everybody has observed that greediness, ill-temper, despondency, are
often the first and only symptoms that disease is coming upon us.
The moral nature is a delicate barometer, that foretells long before-
hand the coming storm in the system. Moral decline, as a symptom
of cerebral disease, is, to say the least, as reliable as are many of the
symptoms by which physicians are accustomed to make a diagnosis
of various diseases of the bodily organs. When moral is associated
with mental decline in advanced life, it is almost safe to make a diag-
nosis of cerebral disease. . . . Let nothing deprive us of our sleep.
Early to bed and late to rise make the modern toiler healthy and
wise. The problem for the future is to work hard, and at the same
time to take it easy. The more we have to do, the more we should
sleep. Let it never be forgotten that death in the aged is more fre-
quently a slow process than an event ; a man may begin to die ten or
fifteen years before he is buried,"

When mental decay is nearing the final stage, there is a tendency

GROWTH AND DECAY OF MIND.

343

to revert to the thoughts and, impressions of former years, which is
probably dependent on the processes by which the substance of the
brain is undergoing decay. The more recent formations are the first,
as we have seen, to crumble away, and the process not only brings to
the surface, if we may so speak, the earlier formations — that is, the
material records of earlier mental processes — but would appear to
bring those pai'ts of the cei'ebrum into renewed activity. Thus, as
death draws near, men " babble of green fields," as has been beautifully
said, though not by Shakespeare, of old Jack Falstaff. Or less pleasant
associations may be aroused, as we see in Mrs. Grandmother Small-
weed, when " with such infantine graces as a total want of observation,
memory, understanding, and intellect, and an eternal disposition to
fall asleep over the fire and into it," she " whiled away the rosy hours "
with continual allusions to money.

The recollections aroused at the moment of death are sometimes
singularly affecting. None can read without emotion the last scenes
of the life of Colonel Newcome. I say the last scenes, not the last
scene only, though that is the most beautiful of all. Every one
knows those last pages by heart, yet I cannot forbear quoting a few
sentences from them. "'Father!' cries Clive, 'do you remember
Orme's " History of India ? " ' ' Orme's History, of course I do ; I could
repeat whole pages of it when I was a boy,' says the old man, and be-
gan forthwith: "'The two battalions advanced against each other
cannonading, until the French, coming to a hollow way, imagined the
English would not venture to pass it. But Major Lawrence ordered
the sepoys and artillery — the sepoys and artillery to halt, and defend
the convoy against the Morattoes.' Morattoes, Orme calls them.
Ho ! ho ! I could repeat whole pages, sir.' " Later, " Thomas New-
come began to wander more and more. He talked louder ; he gave
the word of command, and spoke Hindoostanee, as if to his men. Then
he spoke words in French rapidly, seizing a hand which was near him,
and crying, ' Toujours, toujours.' But it was Ethel's hand which he
took. . . . Some time afterward, Ethel came in with a scared face to
our pale group. ' He is calling for you again, dear lady,' she said,
going up to Madame de Florae, who was still kneeling. 'And just
now he said he wanted Pendennis to take care of his boy. He will not
know you,' She hid her tears as she spoke. She went into the room,
where Clive was at the bed's foot ; the old man within it talked on rap-
idly for awhile ; then again he would sigh and be still : once more I
heard him say hurriedly, 'Take care of him when I'm in India,' and
then with a heart-rending voice he called out, ' L6onore, Leonore ! ' She
was kneeling at his side now. The patient's voice sank into faint mur-
murs ; only a moan now and then announced that he was not asleep.
At the usual evening hour the chapel-bell began to toll, and Thomas
Newcome's hands outside the bed feebly beat time. And, just as the
last bell struck, a peculiar, sweet smile shone over his face, and he

344 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

lifted up his head a little, and quickly said, ' Adsum ! ' and fell back.
It was the word we used at school when names were called, and lo, he,
whose heart was as that of a little child, had answered to his name,
and stood in the presence of The Master."

Sadder than death is it, however, when the brain perishes before
the body. " How often, alas, we see," says Wendell Holmes, " the
mighty satirist tamed into oblivious imbecility ; the great scholar
wandering without sense of time or place, among his alcoves, taking
his books one by one from the shelves and fondly patting them :
a child once more among his toys, but a child whose to-morrows come
hungry, and not full-handed — come as birds of prey in tlie place of the
sweet singers of morning. We must all become as little children if
we live long enough ; but how blank an existence the wrinkled infant
must carry into the kingdom of heaven, if the Power that gave him
memory does not repeat the miracle by restoring it ! " — Cornhill
Magazine.

AN EPISODE ON EATS.

THE Norway rat, of which we wish to say a few words, is the Lem-
ming., a species of the mouse-tribe, somewhat smaller than the
Guinea-pig, to which in form it bears a considerable resemblance, only
the head and body are flatter. Its length is about six inches, of which
tlie short stump of a tail forms half an inch. It is black in color, mot-
tled with tawny spots, which vary in their disposition in different in-
dividuals, and the belly is white, with a slight tinge of yellow. The
fore-legs are short and strong, and the hind-legs are nearly one-half
longer than the former, enabling it to rim with considerable speed.
The feet are armed with strong hooked claws, five in number, enabling
it to burrow in the earth, and among the frozen snows of its native
region. Its cheeks are blanched, and it sports a pair of long light
whiskers, and its eyes, though small, are beautifidly black and pier-
cing. The lip is divided, and the ears are small and sharply pointed.
As its home borders on the region of eternal snow, in the valleys of
the Kolen Mountains, which separate Sweden from Xordland, its hair
is both thick and soft, and becomes almost white during the long and
cheerless winter of these inhospitable regions. The skin is much thin-
ner than in any of its congeners. When enraged it gives utterance to
a sharp yelp, similar to that of a month-old terrier-whelp.

It is a lively little fellow, when met with in its native haunts, dur-
ing the short summer — now sitting on its haunches nibbling at a piece
of lichen, or the catkins of the birch, which it conveys to its mouth
with its fore-paws, after the manner of the squirrel, or engaging in a
romp with its fellows, popping in and out of its burrow in the earth

AN EPISODE ON RATS. 345

where it sleeps and rears its young, of which the female has two or
three litters annually, numbering from five to seven in each. It is a
most audacious little fellow, and fears neither man nor beast, refusing
to give way save on the compulsion of superior force. Travelers speak
of having seen them frisking about in hundreds in their native forests,
when they dispute the path even with man. From the vantage-ground
of the mounds of earth at the entrance to their burrows, they sit on
their beam-ends and scan the intruders with comical gravity. If the
traveler has a dog with him, unhappily ignorant of the ways of this
cool and impudent varmint, he will likely advance with the easy non-
chalance of his tribe to smell the odd little animal — which betrays no
fear at his approach — to be rewarded by a sharp and trenchant bite on
the nose ; a reception so sudden and unexpected that it is ten chances
to one against his prosecuting his investigations further, for a dog is
too well bred to attack any strange living object which awaits his
approach.

//]////

LEiTMiNa, OR Norway Rat.

Unlike many of its congeners, the lemming does not provide a
sufficient store of food to last it through the long winter, when the
earth is covered with snow, and, as it does not hibernate, it is driven
to many a hard shift in its struggle for a subsistence. It devours the
bark of trees and small twigs, and drives tunnels through the snow,
along the surface of the ground, eating every shred of vegetation it
meets with. These food-burrows are all connected with a main bur-
row, leading to its home in the earth, which is ventilated by a hole
driven obliquely through the snow to the surface. These air-shafts
guide the arctic fox and the ermine to their whereabouts, and they
devour many of them, while kites and other predaceous birds are ever
on the watch to pick them up when they emerge upon tlie surface.
The natives of these regions kill and eat them during summer, when
they are in good condition ; and a traveled friend of ours, who has

346 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

partaken of its flesli, speaks of it as a most valuable addition to their
scanty cuisine. When captured young, it is easily tamed and becomes
an interesting pet. We saw one once in the possession of a Montrose
skipper, which allowed itself to be handled and fed out of tlie hand,
but it had an awkward habit of fixing its incisors into the fingers of an
incautious admirer on the smallest provocation. During summer they
swarm with vermin to such an extent that, although when examined
singly they can scarcely be discerned by the naked eye, they change
the color of the animal to a dull red.

The lemming multiplies so rapidly that in the course of ten or
twelve seasons food becomes scarce, and, on the approach of some win-
ter M'hen the food-question has become one of life or death, the over-
stocked market is relieved by an expedient unparalleled in its nature
among four-footed animals. This singular little creature is so local iu
its habits, that, unless under the circumstances we are about to narrate,
it never leaves the mountain-regions to establish itself on the plains,
where food is more abundant.

The inhuman suggestion of a modern writer that our paupers should
be packed into rotten ships, which should be sent out to sea and scut-
tled, is something like the method adopted by the lemmings them-
selves to avert the famine which threatens to annihilate the entire
species. When the time for the settlement of the question of partial
extermination for the benefit of the race, or total extermination by
starvation, can no longer be delayed, they assemble in countless thou-
sands in some of the mountain valleys leading into the plains, and, the
vast army of martyrs being selected, they pour across the country in
a straight line, a living stream, often exceeding a mile in length, and
many yards in breadth, devouring every green thing in their line of
march ; the country over which thgy have passed looking as if it had
been ploughed, or burned with fire. They march principally by niglit,
and in the morning, resting during the day, but never seek to settle
in any particular locality, however abundant food may be in it, for
their final destination is the distant sea, and nothing animate or inani-
mate, if it can be surmounted, retards the straight onward tide of
their advance.

When the reindeer gets enveloped in the living stream, they will
not even go round its limbs, but bite its legs until, in its agony and
terror, it plunges madly about, crushing them to death in hundreds,
and even killing them with its teeth. If a man attempts to stem the
living torrent, they leap upon his legs ; and, if he lay about him with
a stick, they seize it with their teeth, and hold on to it with such de-
termined pertinacity that he may swing it rapidly round his head with-
out compelling them to loosen their hold. If a corn or hay rick be in
the way, they eat their way through it ; and, on arriving at the smooth
face of a rock, they pass round it, forming up in close column again on
the other side. Lakes, however broad, are boldly entered, and the

AI^ UP IS ODE ON RATS. 347

passage attempted ; and rivers, however deep and rapid, are forded,
Impediments in the water being as boldly faced as those on shore.
They have been known to pass over a boat, and to climb on to the
deck of a ship, passing, without stop or stay, into the water on the fur-
ther side.

Their natural instincts are not in abeyance during this migration,
as females are frequently seen accompanied by their young, and carry-
ing in their teeth some one which had succumbed to the fatigues of
the march, which might not be stayed until the helpless one was re-
cruited.

Foxes, lynxes, weasels, kites, owls, etc., hover on their line of march
and destroy them in hundreds. The fish in the rivers and lakes lay a
heavy toll upon them, and vast numbers are drowned, and die by other
accidents in " flood and field ; " but the survivors, impelled by some irre-
sistible instinct, press onward with no thought of stopping, until they
lose themselves in the sea, sinking in its depths, as they become ex-
hausted, in such numbers that for miles their bodies, thrown up by thie
tide, lie putrefying on the shore. Comparatively few ever return to
their native haunts, but there can be no doubt that some do so, as they
have been seen on the return, pursuing their backward journey in the
same fearless and determined manner as their advance.

The peasants witness this dread incursion with terror. Until lately
they believed that the vast horde was rained from heaven as a punish-
ment for their sins, and during the time of their passage they used to
assemble in the churches, the priests reciting prayers specially com-
posed for such visitations. It was also believed that the reindeer ate
them, and that they so poisoned the ground they passed over that they
would not eat on it for a considerable time. As we have seen, the
reindeer bites them with its teeth in its agony and terror, and the
complete sweep they make of every blade of grass on their line of
march satisfactorily accounts for its declining for a time to graze
upon it.

A recent writer tells us that, in addition to this wholesale migra-
tion, which takes place about twice during a quarter of a century,
smaller migrations occur, in which many are killed, while others live
to return to their haunts ; but as there are several species of lemmings
spread over the northern regions of both the Old and the New World,
he may allude to another variety than the one we have been dealing
with, which is the 3Ius lemmus of Linnaeus and Pallas.

The superstitious notions and wonderful reports once prevalent
with regard to the lemming, as recorded by old writers, are not with-
out interest. Olaus Magnus says :

"In tlie foresaid Helsingia, and provinces that are near to it, in the diocese
of Upsal, small beasts with four feet, that they callLemmar or Lemmus, as big
as a rat, with a skin diverse-colored, fall out of the ayr in tempests and sudden
storms ; but no man knows from whence they come — whether from the re-

348 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

moter islands, and are brought hither by the wind, or else they breed of fecu-
lent matter in the clouds ; yet this is proved, that so soon as they fall down
there is found green grass in their bellies not yet digested. These, like locusts,
falling in great swarms, destroy all green things, and all dyes tliey bite on, by
the venome of them. This swarm lives so long as they feed on new grass. Also
they come together in troops like swallows that are ready to fly away ; but at
the set time they either dye in heaps with a contagion of the earth (by the cor-
ruption of them the ayr grows pestilentiall and the people are troubled with
vertigos or the jaundice) ; or they are devoured by beasts called commonly
lekeirt or hermalins, and these Ermines grow fat thereby, and their skins grow
larger."

Schoeffer, whom we next cite, believed that

" They sometimes make war, and divide themselves into two armies along
the lakes and meadows. They seem likewise to commit suicide, for they are
found suspended in the branches of trees; and they probably throw themselves
in troops into waters, like the swallows."

Although prepared to believe that they hanged themselves, he did not
believe that they were bred in the clouds. He says :

" "Wormius thinks plainly that they are bred in the clouds ; but the learned
Isaac Rossius, in his notes to Poraponius Mela, corrects him and says, the reason
why these animals are supposed to fall from the clouds is, because they used
not to appear, but immediately after rain they creep out of their holes, either
for that they are filled with water, or because this creature thrives much in
rain, which opinion seems most probable to me."

Pontoppidan, writing at a later period, says :

" They multiply very fast by what we see of them, though, God be praised,
but seldom, i. e., about once or twice in twenty years, when they come from their
peculiar abodes. At these times they gather in great flocks together, consisting of
many thousands, like the hosts of God, to execute his will — i. e., to punish the
neighboring inhabitants by destroying the seed, corn, and grass ; for when this
flock advances they make a visible pathway on the earth or ground, cutting off
all that is green, and this they have power and strength to do till they reach
their appointed bounds, which is the sea, in which they swim a little about, and
then sink and drown."

Pontoppidan, who had never seen the lemming alive, although he
collected a large amount of interesting information, credible and in-
credible, regarding it, notes a holiday held in his time throughout
Bergen, termed a mouse-festival, which had so far degenerated from
its ancient purpose, that the peasants put on their holiday clothes and
went to sleep. In former times the day was kept as a solemn fast,
*' to avert the plague of lemen and other mice, which some pretend
have been used to fall down formerly from the clouds."

Wormius, in his treatise on the lemming, gives an exorcism used
on such occasions, of which the following is a translation ;

*'I exorcise you, pestiferous worms, mice, birds, locusts, or other animals
by God the Father Almighty, and Jesus Christ his Son, and the Holy Ghost

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 349

proceeding from both, that you depart immediately from these fields, or vine-
yards, or waters, and dwell in them no longer, but go away to those places in
which you can harm no person ; and on the part of the Almighty God, and the
whole heavenly choir, and the holy Church of God, cursing you whithersoever
ye shall go, daily wastinj.; away and decreasing until no remains of you are found
in any place, unices necessary to the health and use of man, which may He
vouchsafe to do who shall come to judge the living and the dead and the world
by fire. Amen."

Traveling rapidly and by night, their sudden irruption into a lo-
cality, together with the complete destruction of the field and garden
crops, tended to make the ignorant peasantry look upon them as a
special visitation from Providence for their sins, and will readily ac-
count for the extraordinary notions held regarding them.

Many animals migrate from place to place, or take possession of
new territory, when food becomes scarce ; but we have only one other
instance of a living creature migrating in vast numbers to certain de-
struction, and that is the locust. When their numbers increase be-
yond the food-producing powers of their natural habitat, they pour in
countless millions into the colder regions beyond, smothering each
other in their flight, until the ground is covered with their dead bodies
to the depth of several inches, and water-courses are choked up by
them, until the air is tainted with the smell of their putrid bodies for
miles. None of them ever return whence they came. Their course
is always onward, until those that escape death by accident are
killed by the first cold weather they encounter. And in this way Na-
ture compels, from time to time, a vast body of these creatures to an
act of self-destruction in order that the species may not be annihilated.
— Abridged from Temple Bar.

THE PKIMAEY CONCEPTS OF MODEEN PHYSICAL
SCIENCE.

Bt J. B. Stallo.
IV. — Inertia and Force.

IF we look for the speculative background of modern physical theo-
ries, we find somethihg like this : Originally there was created, or
somehow came to be, an indefinite number of absolutely hard and
unchangeable particles of matter. There was also created, or somehow
came to be, a number of forces, equally unchangeable — the force of
attraction, the force of cohesion, heat, electric and magnetic forces, and
so on. The forces began to act and continue to act upon the particles
of matter, producing inorganic as well as organic forms. These par-
ticles and forces are ultimate facts of experience as well as of thought ;

35© THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

and the action of the forces upon the material particles is likewise an
ultimate empirical datura, and therefore inexplicable. Force and
matter, though presupposing each other in action^ are fundamentally-
disparate ; they are essentially distinct, and mutually irreducible en-
tities. Matter, as such, is passive, dead ; all motion or life is caused
by force ; and the only possible solution of the problems of physiology,
no less than of physics and cliemistry, consists in the enumeration of
the forces acting upon the material particles, and in the exact quan-
titative determination of the effects produced by their action.

Tills statement of the tenets of the prevailing physical philosophy,
to be exact, requires at most two qualifications. In the first place, the
recent doctrine of the correlation and mutual convertibility of the physi-
cal forces, as a part of the theory of tlie conservation of energy, has
shaken, if not destroyed, the conception of a multiplicity of indepen-
dent original forces. And, in the second place, physiologists, like
Du Bois-Reymond, recognize force as the invariable concomitant, if
not the essential attribute of matter, and assume that to every constant
primordial mass belongs a constant primordial quantity of force, so
that the problem of physics, chemistry, and physiology, resolves itself
into the quantitative determination of the mechanical interactions of
material constants primarily endowed -with forces acting equally in all
directions, or, as they express it, constant central forces.

I have endeavored, thus far, to show that there are no absolute
constants of mass ; that both the hypothesis of corpuscular " atoms "
and that of " centres of force " are growths of a confusion of the intel-
lect "which mistakes conceptual elements of matter for real elements ;
that these elements — force and mass, or force and inertia — are not
only inseparable, as is conceded by the more thoughtful among modern
physicists (or, as they usually, but inaccurately express it, that there
is no force without matter, and no matter wuthout force), but that
neither of these elements has any reality as such, each of them being
simply the conceptual correlate of the other, and thus the condition
both of its realization in thought and of its objectivation to sense.
The tendency to deal with these elements as separate and separately
real entities is so irrepressible, however, that it is necessary to subject
them to still further discussion, in order to clear up the prevalent con-
fusion in regard to them.

Newton's original definition of inertia "was in terms of force. Ac-
cording to him ('Principia," Definitio III.), " there is inherent in mat-
ter a force, a power of resistance, in virtue of which every body, as far as
in it lies, perseveres in a state of rest, or of uniform rectilinear motion."
In the definitions since Newton's time, the term " force " has usually
been avoided. Thus Young ("Mechanics," p. 117) defines inertia aa
" the incapability of matter of altering the state into which it is put
by any external cause, whether that state be rest or motion;" and
similarly Whewell (" Mechanics," p. 245), as " the quantity of matter

I

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 351

considered as resisting the communication of motion." As is readily
seen, all these definitions imply, nevertheless, that matter can be moved
or changed only from without, by forces external to matter itsell
Newton expressly (" Principia," Definitio IV.) speaks of force as
" impressed upon a body, and as exerted upon it to change its state of
rest or uniform motion in a straight line."

There is little difficulty in understanding how this language, in con-
nection with the etymological import of the word "inertia," led to the
assumption that matter is essentially passive, or, as it is commonly
expressed, dead. There are other reasons for this assumption, con-
nected with the evolution, not only of scientific concepts, properly so
called, but of cosmological ideas, to which I shall have occasion, per-
haps, to recur in the sequel ; indeed, Newton's definitions which I
have just cited are simply instances of the intellectual postulates of
his time. And the mathematical treatment of mechanical problems,
from the nature of its methods, necessitates the fiction that force and
mass are separate and distinct terms. In general, it may be said that
the assumption of the absolute passivity of matter is one of those errors
which are inevitable in the progress of knowledge — one of the "clay
moulds in which the bells of scientific truth are cast." But the perpet-
uation of this error is one of the most fa1;al impediments to real scien-
tific progress in our day, and is fruitful of vagaries which are wholly
incommensurable with the real state of modern scientific knowledge.
Thus, Prof. Philip Spiller, the author of a very serviceable manual of
physics, and a prolific writer on scientific subjects, has recently pub-
lished a cosmological treatise,* whose theorems are founded upon the
express proposition {op. cit., p. 4) that " no material constituent of a
body, no atom, is in itself originally endowed with force, but that every
such atom is absolutely dead, and without any inherent power to act
at a distance." It appears from the further contents of Spiller's
treatise, that he not only denies force to the atoms taken singly, but
that he also denies the possibility of their mutual action. He is driven,
therefore, to the assertion of the independent substantiality of force ;
and, accordingly, he assumes force to be an all-pervading quasi-xrvdX^-
rial presence — as he terms it, an " incorporeal matter" {unkoerperlicher
Stoff). In utter disregard of the fundamental correlation of force and
mass, Spiller identifies his force-substance with the ordinary luminif-
erous ether, so that this phantom, which, in the view of other physicists,
is not only imponderable, but destitute of cohesive, chemical, thermal,
electric, and magnetic forces (which, indeed, must he destitute of them
if it is to serve as the mere substratum of these various modes of mo-
tion)— which therefore is, if possible, still more " dead " than ordinary
ponderable matter — now suddenly, without changing its name, and
without ceasing to be the substratumofluminar and other undulations,
comes to be the very quintessence of all possible energy.

' " Der Weltaether als Kosmische Kraft," Berlin, Dcnicke's Verlag, 1873.

352 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

It may be said here, parenthetically, that all these recent attempts
(to one of which, by Prof. Challis, I had occasion to refer in my second
paper) to construe the apparent attractions of bodies as cases of ethereal
pressure and propulsion are simply returns to the state of scientific
anarchy which prevailed in celestial mechanics before Newton's time.
Prof. Spiller is evidently unaware that his theory — according to which,
force is an " incorporeal matter " — is noticing but a reproduction of Kep-
ler's speculations (not to speak of the Cartesian and Leibnitian theories
to which I have already alluded), in which the vortices supposed to
carry the planets along with them were asserted to be an " immaterial
species," capable of overcoming the inertia of bodies. It is plain that
this " immaterial species " is the same wooden iron which Spiller ex-
hibits under the name of " incorporeal matter," the only difference being
that the absurdity of Kepler's chimera was less glaring in the hazy
dawn of the mechanical notions of his time, than the extravagance of
Spiller's conceit in the light of the scientific atmosphere of our day.

It is almost superfluous to say to the intelligent reader of these
papers that Spiller's "dead matter" is a nonentity, inasmuch as we
know nothing of material reality except through its action. And it is
hardly worth while to point out in detail that the hypothesis of dead
atoms is not only inadmissible, but wholly useless. Unchangeable
particles destitute of gravity and all other force, even if the action of
force upon them were conceivable, must be equally acted upon from
all sides by the omnipresent ether, and could, therefore, in no wise
help to establish differences of density, or other differences not con-
tained in or evolvable from the ether itself. They could not even
add to the extension of a body, much less to its hardness, being wholly
without the power of i-esistance ; but, waiving this, and granting for a
moment that extension without resistance is possible, they would sim-
ply be bubbles of void space encysted in the universal ether, and to
the differentiation of this ether alone all the phenomena of the material
world would be due.

The truth is, that absolutely passive, dead matter is as unknown in
experience as it is inconceivable in thought. Every particle of mat-
ter of which we have any knowledge attracts every other particle in
conformity to the law of gravitation ; and every material element
exerts chemical, electrical, magnetic, thermic, and similar forces upon
other elements which in respect to these forces are its correlates. The
whole presence of matter to the senses consists in the manifestation
of power, in the exhibition of force. All this has been very clearly
seen and very explicitly stated by numerous physicists ; * but, unfor-
tunately, by most of them it has been speedily lost sight of in their
ulterior speculations.

In what sense, then, can inertia be truly predicated of matter ?

* Among those whose comprehension of this is clear, is M. Comte ; his observations
upon the subject (" Philosophie Positive," tome i., p. 375, et seq.) merits attentive perusal

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 353

The answer to this question will suggest itself at once to those who
have properly apprehended the principle of the essential relativity of
all material existence. A material object is, in every one of its
aspects, but one term of a relation ; its whole being is a presupposi-
tion of correlates without ; all things are, figuratively speaking (if
I may resort to such a figure without incurring the charge of illustrat-
ing ohscurum per ohscuriiis) shadows of each other. Every change
of a body, therefore, presupposes a corresponding change in its corre-
lates. If the state of any material object could be changed without
a corresponding change of state in other objects without, this object
would, to that extent, become absolute. But this is utterly unthinka-
ble, and therefore utterly impossible, as we have already seen. At the
same time it is also evident that, while every change of a body is thus
conditioned by changes without, these latter changes are equally con-
ditioned by it ; that all material action, therefore, is mutual ; that re-
action is invariably equal to action. A corollary from, or rather an
application of this is the well-known theorem that the forces within a
body or conservative system can alter only the positions of its con-
stituent parts, but cannot change the position of the body as a whole ;
and that, whenever such an internal change takes place, the momen-
tum accruing in one direction has its counterpart in an equal mo-
mentum accruing in the opposite direction. If we apply this theorem
to the universe as a whole, i. e., as a single dynamical system, and if
we bear in mind that, mechanically speaking, all force properly so
called, i. e., all potential energy, is energy of position, we see at once
that whatever energy is spent in actual motion is gained in position —
that the system, therefore, is absolutely conservative ; and we are thus
led, by a very simj)le approach, to the principle of the conservation
of energy.'

After this summary discussion of the first conceptual element of
matter, inertia., I proceed to the consideration of the other element,
force. In the canonical text-books on physics, force is defined as the
cause oi motion. "Any cause," says "Whewell (" Mechanics," p. 1),
" which moves or tends to move a body, or which changes or tends to
change its motion, is called force." Similarly Clerk Maxwell (" Theory
of Heat," p. 83) : " Force is whatever changes or tends to change the
motion of a body by altering either its direction or its magnitude."
Taking either of these definitions as correctly representing the re-

* If the term " force " is restricted, as it ought to be, to the designation of potential
energy, or mere tension, the expression " persistence or conservation of force " becomes
inaccurate ; for the sum of the forces in the universe, in this sense, is by no means
constant. The " persistence of force," or, more properly, the " conservation of energy,"
simply imports that the sum of actual or kinetic energy (energy In motion) and potential
energy (energy of position or energy in tension) in the material universe is invariable.
This, as is shown in the text, is but an amplification of the theorem that in any limited
conservative system the sum of the potential and kinetic energies of its parts is never
changed by their mutual actions.
VOL. IV, — 23

;S4

THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

ceived theories of physical science respecting the nature of force, it is
manifest, irrespective of the considerations which I have presented in
this and the preceding essays, that force is not an individual thing or
distinct entity which presents itself directly either to observation or
to thought, but that, so far as it is taken as a definite and unital term
in the operations of thought, it is purely a fiction of the intellect.
The cause of motion, or change of motion, in a body is simply the
condition or group of conditions upon which this motion depends ;
and this condition, or group of conditions, as we have already seen, is
always a corresponding motion, or change of motion, in the bodies,
outside of the moving body, which are its correlates. Otherwise ex-
pressed, force is a mere inference from the motion itself under the
universal conditions of reality, and its measure, therefore, is simply
the effect for which it is postulated as a cause ; it has no other exist-
ence. The only reality of force and of its action is the correspond-
ence between physical phenomena in conformity to the principle of
the essential relativity of all material existence.

That force has no independent reality is so plain and obvious that
it has been proposed by some thinkers to abolish the term force, like
the term cause, altogether. However desirable this might be in
some respects, it is impossible, for the reason that the concept "force,"
when properly interpreted in terms of experience, is valid, and, if its
name were abolished, it would instantly reappear under another name.
There is hardly any concept which has not, in science as well as in
metaphysics, given rise to the same confusion which prevails in
regard to " force " and " cause ; " and the blow leveled at these would
demolish all concepts whatever. Xevertheless, it is of the greatest
moment, in all speculations concerning the interdependence of physi-
cal phenomena, never to lose sight of the fact that the reality of force
is purely conceptual, and that it is not a distinct and individual tan-
gible or intangible entity.

How imperfectly all this is understood by the physicists of our
time appears at once upon an examination of elementary treatises
as well as original disquisitions on physical science. Thus the re-
lation of force to mechanical motion is constantly spoken of as a
" fact " ascertained by experience and verified experimentally beyond
the possibility of question. In a learned article by J. Croll, published
in the July number, 1872, of the Philosophical Magazine ("What
determines Molecular Motion," etc., Phil. Mag.^ fourth series, vol. xl., p.
37), it is said : " In regard to the first question (what produces motion)
there is no diversity of opinion. All agree that what produces
change or causes motion is force." The obvious meaning of this is
that it might possibly admit of question whether material change or
motion is produced by force or something else, and that physicists, on
the whole, have come to the conclusion that it is produced by force.
Such a question ougbt, indeed, to be solemnly pondered by grave

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 355

philosophers ! It is like the question which Simon Sachs, in his de-
spair, propounded to the gods : ' Who will assure us that the star,
which the astronomers regard as Uranus, is Uranus in fact ? ' " *

Physicists generally, however, are in still greater confusion as to
the nature of force in another respect. Bodies are said to be endowed
with a definite quantity of force, if not with a given number of forces ;
it is assumed that to every particular body or particle belongs, or in
such body or particle in and by itself is inherent, an invariable meas-
ure of energy. This statement, besides involving the confusion just
noted as to the reality of force, implies the assumption that force can
be an attribute or concomitant of a single body or particle as such.
This assumption ignores the fact, which is otherwise well known to
physicists, that the very conception of force depends upon the relation
between two terms at least. "Every force," says Clerk Maxwell
(" Theory of Heat," p. 94), " acts between two bodies or parts of
bodies." A " constant central force," therefore, as belonging to an
individual atom in and by itself, is an impossibility.

We have now arrived at a point where it will be profitable to re-
cur for a moment to the proposition of Du Bois-Reyraond referred to
at the beginning of my first paper, that the whole problem of physical
science consists in " the resolution of all changes in the material world
into motions of atoms caused by their constant central forces." The
entire passage in Du Bois-Reymond's text, from which I extracted two
sentences, reads as follows : " Natural science — more accurately ex-
pressed, scientific cognition of Nature, or cognition of the material
world by the aid and in the sense of theoretical physical science — is a
reduction of the changes in the material world to motions of atoms
caused by central forces independent of time, or a resolution of the
phenomena of Nature into atomic mechanics. It is a fact of psycho-
logical experience that, whenever such a reduction is successfully
effected, our craving for causality is, for the nonce, wholly satisfied.
The propositions of mechanics are mathematically representable, and
carry in themselves the same apodictic certainty which belongs to the
propositions of mathematics. When the changes in the material world
have been reduced to a constant sum of potential and kinetic energy,
inhering in a constant mass of matter^ there is nothing left in these
changes for explanation.

" The assertion of Kant in the preface to the ' Metaphysical Rudi-
ments of Natural Science,' that ' in every department of physical sci-
ence there is only so much science, properly so called, as there is
mathematics,' is to be sharpened by substituting 'mechanics of atoms'
for 'mathematics,' This was evidently his own meaning wlien he
denied the name 'science ' to chemistry. It is not a little remarkable
that in our time chemistry, since it has been constrained, by the dis-

* " Das Sonnensystem, oder neue Theorie vom Bau der Welten, von Simon Sachs," p.
193, C. Fechner.

356 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

covery of substitution, to abandon the old electro-chemical dualism,
has seemingly taken a retrograde step in its advance toward science
in this sense. The resolution of all changes in the matei-ial world into
motions of atoms caused by their constant central forces would be the
completion of natural science."

How do these sentences of one of the foremost physicists of the
day now present themselves to our view in the light of the preceding
discussion ? Atoms are absolute physical constants, or constants of
mass ; and I have shown that there are, and can be, no absolute con-
stants of mass. And it is e\T.dent now, I trust, that there are similarly
no constant central forces belonging to, or inherent in, constants of
mass as such. Both the constants of mass and the constant forces
assumed to belong to them are simply parts of the scaffolding of the
intellect, when it seeks to subject the phenomena of the material world
to exact mathematical determination. They ai 9, as I have already
intimated, instrumental fictions which are, for the moment, indispen-
sable by reason of the inability of the intellect to deal with phenomena
otherwise than singly and under a definite aspect. In order to effect a
quantitative determination of material action, the mathematician is
constrained to insulate the conceptual elements of matter and to treat
them as sej^arate and distinct terms. He is constrained to represent
as discrete what is continuous, and as absolute what is relative. In
this, as he knows, or ought to know, very well, he is doing violence to
the fact. But this violence is harmless, provided he does not forget
that what appears in abstract insulation in his formula exists in con-
crete and indissoluble union in Xature, and what he exhibits as uncon-
ditioned in thought is essentially conditioned in objective reality. The
steps to all scientific knowledge consist in a series of representative
fictions. When the old Greek sought to determine the properties of
the circle, he began by constructing a polygon whose sides he sub-
divided ^^ntil they were supj^osed to become infinitely small ; and in
his view every line of definite extent and form, i. e., every line which
could become the subject of mathematical investigation, was composed
of an infinite number of infinitely small straight lines. But he speedily
found that, while this fiction enabled him to deduce a rule for calcu-
lating the area of the circle and otherwise to determine a number of
its properties, nevertheless the circle and its rectilinear diameter were
fundamentally incommensurable, and the quadrature of the circle was
impossible. The modern analyst similarly determines the " locus " of
a curve by the relation of small increments of coordinates arbitrarily
established ; but he is well aware that the curve itself has nothing to
do with this arbitrary representation, and he very emphatically asserts
the continuity of the curve by differentiating, or passing to the
" limit " of, his increments — at the same time transforming his coor-
dinates by changing their origin or their inclination, or even their
system, from bilinears to polars, whenever he finds it convenient, with-

PRIMARY COXCJEPTS OF MODERX SCIENCE. 357

out ever dreaming that thereby he is in the least affecting the nature
of the curve whose properties are under discussion. The astronomer,
in calculating the attraction of a sphere upon a " material point," be-
gins by assuming the atomic or molecular constitution of the attract-
ing sphere, establishing a series of finite differences as one of the terms
of his equation ; but thereupon he takes the series to be infinite and
the differences to be infinitely small, and very effectually dismantles
the molecular scaffolding by integrating instead of effecting a summa-
tion of a series of finite differences. Observe : the astronomer begins
with two fictions — the fiction of the " material point " (which is, in
truth, a contradiction in terms), so as to insulate the attractive force
and treat it as proceeding from the sphere alone, and the fiction of the
finite differences representing the molecular constitution of the sphere ;
but the validity of his result depends upon the eventual rescission of
these fictions and the rehabilitation of the fact. In like manner, the
chemist represents the proportions of weight in which substances com-
bine, as atoms of definite weight and figure, and the resulting com-
pounds as definite groups of such atoms ; and this mythical coinage
has, no doubt, been serviceable in some ways. But, apart from the
circumstance, avowed by thoughtful chemists themselves, that the sym-
bols have become wholly inadequate to the proper representation of
the facts, and that new representative fictions will have to be resorted
to, it is important to bear in mind always that the symbol is not the
fact, and that the fiction is very different from the reality. ISTewton
derived many of the leading optical laws from his corpuscular theory
of light and from the hypothesis of " fits of easy transmission and re-
flection." His theory for a time served a good purpose; but it proved,
after all, to be but a convenient mode of symbolizing the phenomena
with which he was familiar, and had to be discarded when the phe-
nomenon of interference was observed. In 1824 Sady Carnot de-
duced the law of thermic action, which still bears his name, from
an hypothesis respecting the nature of heat (supposed by him, as
by nearly all the physicists of his time, to be imponderable mat-
ter), which is now known, or universally believed to be, erroneous.
Since his time, Clausius, Rankine, Thomson, and Clerk Maxwell, have
shoAvn that thermic phenomena find a very convenient representation
in the hypothesis that gaseous molecules are in a state of incessant
motion ; and Maxwell has even succeeded in predicting the phenom-
enon of the gradual cessation of the oscillatory movement of a disk,
suspended between two other disks, in consequence of the friction of a
gaseous medium, whatever be the degree of its tenuity, and this pre-
diction has since been verified by experiment, just as Hamilton's pre-
diction of conical rcfi-action was verified by the experiments of Lloyd ;
but, of course, neither Clausius's and Eankine's formulfc, nor Maxwell's
experiments, are conclusive as to the real nature of a gas. In all such
cases science erects a scaffolding which is invariably kicked down as

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

soon as its work has been accomplished. And, if the scientific archi-
tects are so captivated with the scaffolding that they insist upon main-
taining it intact, its eventual demolition is none the less sure in the
progress of observation and experiment. Facts supply the ictus calcis
which the theorist refuses to administer.

Du Bois-Reymond's proposition is nothing less than this, that nat-
ural science is constrained, by the law of all its methods, to exhibit
the arbitrary scaffolding of the intellect as the real nature of the uni-
verse. He not only confounds the scaffolding of his intellect with its
own structure, but he confounds this scaffolding with the structure of
Nature. He mistakes the beams of his temporary platform for the
rafters of the permanent edifice ; the arbitrary masses of his mathe-
matical calculations (the " atoms ") for bricks of Nature's building ;
and the ropes of his scientific tackling (the " forces ") for the ingen-
erate energy of the Universe. There are, it is true, passages in Du
Bois-Reymond's lecture which may be construed as a virtual dis-
claimer of this, but his assumption that the limits of mathematical
reasoning about atoms and their constant central forces are the irre-
movable bounds of all possible knowledge respecting physical phe-
nomena, and the emphatic ^'■Ignoramus — Ignorabimus^'' with which
he concludes his lecture, utterly invalidate the disclaimer. He forgets
that the framework on which he and his compeers have thus far been
stationed is by no means the only scaffolding that can be devised.
The spectroscope has convinced the chemist that a chemical analysis
can be effected otherwise than by mixing substances in a testing-tube,
and that he can react upon the gas of a distant comet as well as upon
the hydrogen in the water which flows from a stop-cock in his labora-
tory. Modern analysis has shown that the limits of mathematical in-
sight, which the synthetical geometrician supposed to be absolute,
may be transcended indefinitely ; and Gauss's and Hamilton's new
conception which is now expanding into the calculus of operations, or
calculus of quaternions, is opening theoretical vistas which, even to
the analyst of modern times, seem next to illimitable. It is true that
no mathematical wings will ever carry us into the regions of the " Ab-
solute," and no spectroscopic vision will discern the indelible spectral
bands of the " thing per se ; " but, before we indulge in any lamenta-
tions over this fact, it may be well to examine the livery of the mes-
senger who brings us the wonderful intelligence of the existence of
these entities without all possible relation to the intellect, and to in-
quire of him how he became possessed of his message.

I must not be understood as asserting or intimating that our
knowledge can ever be other than asymptotic to the endless and
boundless fact of the universe. But there is a dogmatism of igno-
rance which is no less audacious than the dogmatism of seiolistic knowl-
edge. The ^^ Ignoramus — Ignorabimus " at the close of Du Bois-Rey-
mond's lecture is at least as presumptuous as the pretended omnis-

PRIMARY CONCEPTS OF MODERN SCIENCE. 359

cience of a giddy raetapliysician. One of the urgent needs of modern
physical science is a thorough investigation of the nature, methods,
and aids of scientific cognition, and thus of the nature of its real lim-
its, chiefly in the light of the teachings of comparative philology
and comparative psyc^.ology. Max Miiller has happily designated the
tendency to " reify " intellectual concepts (or, as Mill expresses it in
nominalist phrase, to mistake names for things), as " modern mythol-
ogy." But this mythology is not at all confined to ordinary lan-
guage ; it extends to all the formularies, including those emjiloyed in
scientific research, which serve as the intellectual net-work for the
delineation of physical phenomena and for the exact mathematical
determination of the laws of their interdependence.

The most pressing need of modern physical science, however, is
the disengagement of the facts of observation and induction from
their present theoretical complications. Most of the scientific theories
of our day have their root in the metaphysics of three centuries ago,
and some of the materialistic speculations based upon them are redo-
lent of the ancient culture of the Middle Kingdom. Both in physics
and in chemistry (not to speak of the biological sciences), the facts
have long since transcended the narrow bounds of the prevailing sci-
entific hypotheses, and have thus been either ignored or misinter-
preted. On the remaining pages of this paper I desire to direct atten-
tion to some of the facts connected with the main subject of my pres-
ent inquiry — the concept /brce.

Physical forces are distributed by modern science into two classes,
molecular and molar forces. Molecular forces are those which deter-
mine the internal changes of a body, while molar forces cause the mo-
tion of the entire mass. Molecular forces, therefore, are the agencies
which determine the particular state of the body in its physical rela-
tions, considering it as an independent whole — or, as it is termed in
modern mechanics, as an independent conservative system — while the
molar forces determine the physical relations of the body to other
bodies which, together with it, are integrant parts of a greater whole,
i e., of a more comprehensive consei^vative system.

Modern science teaches that all physical forces, molar as well as
molecular, are mutually convertible. This fact is discussed and illus-
trated in scientific ti-eatises without number, and its importance is
duly appreciated. But there is another fact connected with it,
equally well known, the significance of which is not, I think, at all
realized : all force in its physical origin is molecular. The power
which grinds the wheat in the mill on the stream, or which drives the
steam-engines in a factory ; the force which propels the cannon-ball
on its path of destruction, or the vital juices in a vegetable or animal
organism in their course of vital regeneration ; the energy which
causes the muscles of a man's arm or the vessels of his circulatory
system to expand and contract — all are alike of helio-planetary origin,

360 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

and are ultimately traceable to the " molecular " movements of the
conservative system of which our planet is a part. It would be a
work of supererogation to attempt to prove this, or to illustrate it in
detail ; it is sufficient to refer the reader to the eloquent exposition in
Tyndall's " Heat as a Mode of Motion," p. 447, et seq. (Appletons'
edition),

I need not say that I use the term " molecular force " simply be-
cause it is a generally-received term, and because I am constrained to
use it in order to be intelligible, but that I do not intend to commit
myself by this use to the theory of the constitution of matter which
it implies. In like manner I use the term " force " with the reserva-
tion that it rightfully denotes, not a substantive entity distinct from
matter, but the relation of at least two particular states of matter at
a given moment.

The molecular character of molar motion is evinced in numerous
ways, which are almost wholly neglected and ignored by the modern
physicist. To take the simplest instance : when two solids impinge,
so that an exchange or distribution of their motions takes place, they
contract and immediately expand again, according to the degree of
their elasticity. It is unnecessary to inquire whether or not a com-
munication of motion between two absolutely rigid bodies is possible ;
all bodies, of which we know any thing, are more or less elastic, and
therefore contract and expand at the instant of impact. And their
contraction is accompanied by the evolution of heat, by the conversion
of molar into molecular motion, while in the expansion we have a
reconversion of molecular into molar motion. No transfer of molar
motion ever takes place without this momentary transition through the
molecular phase.

Since the establishment of the doctrine of the conservation of en-
ergy and the correlation and mutual convertibility of forces, physicists
have repeatedly called attention to the fact that the old interpretation
of the phenomenon of an apparent destruction of force is inaccurate,
and that the true interpretation of this phenomenon consists in the
tracing of the evanescent molar motion into resulting molecular mo-
tion. But they fail to observe that the old notions respecting the
transfer of molar motion, when there is no loss, are in similar need of
rectification.

Now, what is this molecular motion, in the light of the insight
which, as I hope, has been gained in the foregoing discussion ? Sim-
ply an exhibition of the struggle involved in the formation or consti-
tution of a body as a distinct conservative system. All molecular en-
ergy is in its nature constitutive, formative, or structural. All kinetic
energy, or actual motion, represents the progress of morphological
action in periodical alternations of advancing and retrograde meta-
morphosis. And the main problem of physical science is, not to cal-
culate the play of atomic motions, under the sway of their constant

SKETCH OF DR. J. W. DRAPER. 361

central forces, but to trace the differentiation and transformation of
material forms as determined by the differentiation and transformation
of the formative energy of the universe. In this connection, observa-
tion and experiment have brought to light a number of the most sig-
nificant facts, to one of which I may be permitted to draw attention
before the conclusion of this paper. Force, or, more correctly speak-
ing, energy, is not only indestructible, like mass ; it not only passes
through a cycle of transformations corresponding to the metamorphic
round of physical forms ; it is not only specialized at even pace with
the specialization of its corresponding material structures ; but, just as
the progressive specialization of these material structures is, on the
whole, an advance in the direction of greater definiteness and more per-
fect concretion (in the case of inorganic bodies, generally accompanied
by greater condensation) : so, also, the specialization of formative ener-
gy is, on the whole, characterized by an ever-increasing intensification.
Generally speaking, the more advanced the stage of material concre-
tion, the greater the intensity of its constitutive force. Faraday has
somewhere observed that the chemical force contained in a drop of
water, if transfoiined into heat and light, would be sufiicient to illu-
minate the heavens. Of course, this intensification of force, in propor-
tion to the condensation, concretion, and diflerentiation of the forms
produced by it, is not a thickening of a substantive entity, but is sim-
ply an increasing complication in the relations in the establishment of
which all realization consists. The energy which forms and maintains
the higher and more definite forms of material existence has to over-
come and to hold its own against not only the inherent energy of the
primary physical form, but against the specialized energy of the inter-
mediate forms as well.

I ought, perhaps, to observe here that, whenever energy is seem-
ingly destructive, it is in reality reconstitutive of a conservative sys-
tem of a lower grade.

But I must not be led into discussions which belong to special
science, and are in strictness foreign to my theme ; and, so far as I am
at liberty to enter upon these discussions, especially in the field of
chemical science, they must be reserved for another article.

SKETCH OF DK. J. W. DEAPEK.

TPIE period from 1830 to 1870 is very strikingly marked in the
history of science. It opens with great discoveries in electrici-
ty, and closes with very brilliant ones in light. Its middle portion
is illustrated by the application of chemistry to physiology, which led
to a revolution in the latter science, and indeed changed the face of

362 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

medicine. It is adorned with many great inventions, such as photog-
raphy, the electric telegraph, the construction of railways, and ocean
steam navigation. The great wars it has witnessed, the Franco-Ital-
ian, the Crimean, the Prusso-Austrian, the Prusso-French, and the
American Civil War, have occasioned, as all gi'eat wars inevitably do,
much intellectual activity and profound social changes. Among the
latter are the emancipation of the vast serf population of Russia, and
of four million slaves in America. But, perhaps, most important
of all — partly through the increase and diflfusion of knowledge, partly
through more rapid and incessant national intercommunication — ideas
liberal in politics and elevated in religion have asserted their sway.

The generation that lived in this period has therefore fairly per-
formed its share in the promotion of modern civilization. There is
no European nation which has not participated in this great move-
ment— none that cannot offer a list of the names of its people who
may lay claim to a part of the honor of the success. In this respect
America is not behind others — she too has done her share, both as
regards science and industrial inventions. Among those of her citizens
who have devoted their lives to these objects, and who by their suc-
cessful pursuit have done honor to the country, and won for them-
selves an eminent name in the world of science, is the subject of our
present sketch, John William Drapee.

He was born at St. Helen's, near Liverpool, in 1811, and received
his education for the most part from private instructors. At eleven
years of age he was sent to one of the public schools of the Wesleyan
Methodists, of which denomination his father was a minister. He re-
mained there, however, only two years, and was then returned to pri-
vate instruction. When the University of London was opened, he
was sent there to study chemistry under Dr. Turner, at that time the
most celebrated of English chemists. At the instance of several of
his American relatives, he came to America, and completed his medi-
cal education at the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1836
with so much distinction that his inaugural thesis received the unu-
sual compliment of being published by the faculty of that university.
Shortly afterward he was appointed Professor of Chemistry in Hamp-
den Sidney College, Virginia, and in 1839 received an appointment to
the same professorship in the University of New York, with which
institution he has ever since been connected.

Dr. Draper's earliest scientific publications were on the chemical
action of light, a subject at that time almost completely neglected.
Eventually he published in American and foreign journals, or read
before scientific societies, nearly forty memoirs in relation to it. It
would be impossible in this short sketch to give an enumeration of
the facts contained in these papers. We shall, therefore, select only a
few of the more prominent ones for remark.

Of all the chemical actions of light, by far the most important

SKETCH OF DR. J. W. DRAPER. 363

is that of the decomposition of carbonic acid by the leaves of plants,
under the influence of sunshine. On this the whole vegetable world
depends for its growth, and the whole animal world, directly or indi-
rectly, for its food. The decomposition in question is essentially a
deoxidation, and up to about 1840 it was generally supposed to be
due to the violet rays of the spectrum, which, in accordance with the
views held at that time, were regarded as producing deoxidizing
actions, and were consequently known as deoxidizing rays. But
this was altogether an assumption unsupported by experimental
proof. Prof. Draper saw that there was but one method for the abso-
lute solution of the pi-oblem, and that was by causing the decomposi-
tion to take place in the spectrum itself. In this delicate and beautiful
experiment he succeeded, and found that the decomposition was
brought about by the yellow rays, at a maximum by those in the
vicinity of the Fraunhofer fixed line d, and that the violet rays
might be considered as altogether inoperative. The memoir contain-
ing this result was first read before the American Philosophical So-
ciety, in Philadelphia, and immediately republished in London, Paris,
and Berlin. It excited general interest among chemists. Even up
to the present year it has furnished to the German experimenters the
basis of a very interesting discussion in photo-chemistry.

In 1842 Dr. Draper discovered that not only might the Fraunhofer
fixed lines in the spectrum be photographed, but that there exists a
vast number of others beyond the violet, which up to that time had
been unknown. He also found three great lines less refrangible than
the red, in a region altogether invisible to the eye. Of these new
lines, which more than doubled in number those of Fraunhofer, he
published engravings. He also invented an instrument for measur-
ing the chemical force of light — the chlor-hydrogen photometer. This
was subsequently extensively used by Bunsen and Roscoe in their
photo-chemical researches. In their paper, read before the Royal So-
ciety, in 1856, they say, " With this instrument Draper succeeded in
establishing experimentally some of the most important relations of
the chemical action of light."

Most of the papers he had written up to 1844 were in that year
collected and published together, in a book bearing the title of a
treatise on " the Forces producing the Organization of Plants." In
this there are a great many experiments on capillary attraction, the
flow of sap, endosmosis, the influence of yellow light on plants, etc.

His memoir " On the Production of Light by Heat," published in
184V, was an important contribution to spectrum analysis ; among other
things it gave the means for determining the solid or gaseous condition
of the sun, the stars, and the nebulae. In this paper he established ex-
perimentally that all solid substances, and probably liquids, become
incandescent at the same temperature ; that the thermometric point at
which such substances are red-hot is about 977° Fahr. ; that the

364. THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

spectrum of an incandescent solid is continuous, it contains neither
bright nor dark fixed lines ; that from common temperatures up to
977° Fahr. the rays emitted by a solid are invisible, but at that
temperature they impress the eye with the sensation of red ; that
the heat of the incandescing body being made continuously to rise,
other rays are added, increasing in refrangibility as the tempera-
ture ascends ; and that, while the addition of rays so much the more
refrangible as the temperature is higher is taking place, there is an
augmentation in the intensity of those already existing.

This memoir was published in both American and European jour-
nals. An analysis of it was read in Italian before the Royal Academy
at Naples, July, 1847, by Melloni, which was also translated into
French and English.

But, thirteen years subsequently, M. Kirchhoff published, in a very
celebrated memoir, considered by many as the origin of spectrum
analysis, and of which an English translation may be found in the Lon-
don and Edinburgh Philosophical Magazine^ Julys I860, the same facts
imder the guise of mathematical deductions, with so meagre a refer-
ence to what Draper had done that he secured the entire credit of
these discoveries. In an historical sketch of spectrum analysis subse-
quently published, Kirchhoff avoided all mention of his American pred-
ecessor.

Dr. Draper was the first person who succeeded in taking portraits
of the human face by photography. This was in 1839. He published
a minute account of the process at a time when in Europe it was re-
garded as altogether impracticable. He also was the first to take
photographs of the moon, and presented specimens of them to the
New York Lyceum of Natural History, in 1840.

In 1841 the University of New York established its medical col-
lege. Dr. Draper being appointed Professor of Chemistry in it. A
very great change in medical studies and teaching was at that time
impending. The application of chemistry to physiology was about
to be made by Liebig and his school. In these new views Dr. Draper
completely coincided, and therefore soon afterward physiology was
added to his chair. He now resumed his early chemico-physiological
researches, and eventually published the result of them in " A Treatise
on Human Physiology, Statical and Dynamical." This work at once
became a standard text-book in American colleges. It has passed
through a great many editions, and was translated into several for-
eign languages. The Russian edition is used in the higher schools of
that country.

It is impossible in our limited space to give an adequate account
of the new facts and the important views, founded on extensive and
expensive series of experiments, contained in this work. Among
them, however, we may mention, an explanation of the selecting
action of membranes ; electrical theory of capillary attraction ; cause

SKETCH OF DR. J. W. DRAPER. 365

of the coagulation of the Llood ; theory of the circidatiou of the
blood ; explanation of the flow of sap in plants ; endosmosis of gases
through thin films ; measure of the force of endosmosis ; respiration
of fishes ; action of organic muscle-fibre of the lungs ; allotropism
of living systems ; new facts respecting the action of the skin ; func-
tions of nerve-vesicles and their electrical analogues ; function of the
sympathetic nerve ; explanation of the action of certain parts of the
auditory apparatus, particularly the cochlea and semicircular canals ;
new facts respecting the theory of vision and theory of muscular con-
traction. The special object of the book was, to apply physical theo-
ries in the explanation of physiological facts, to the exclusion of the
so-called vital principle of the old physicians.

Dr. Draper is a man of a philosophical cast of mind, by which he
■was drawn to the study of phenomena in their more comprehensive
aspects and relations. The wide range of his scientific acquirements,
and especially his mastery of physiology, formed an admirable prepara-
tion for studying the subjects of human development and the course
of civilization from a scientific point of view. His " Physiology " was
accordingly soon followed by a work of which the intention was to show
that societies of men advance under the government of law. This was
entitled " A History of the Intellectual Development of Europe." Few
philosophical works have attained so quickly to celebrity. Many edi-
tions of it have been published in this country, and it has been trans-
lated into almost every European language. The Westmmster He-
view, speaking of it says: "It is one of the not least remarkable
achievements in the progress of positive philosoj)hy that have yet
been made in the English tongue. A noble and even magnificent at-
tempt to frame an induction from all the recorded phenomena of
European, Asiatic, and North African history."

Though in his earlier years Dr. Draper was a skillful mathematical
analyst, he has published but few mathematical papers, the most im-
portant being an investigation of the electrical conducting power of
wires. This was undertaken at the request of Prof. Morse, at the time
he was inventing his telegraph. The use made by Moi-se of this inves-
tigation is related by him in SiUhnari's American Journal of Science
and Arts, December, 1843. The paper shows that an electrical current
may be transmitted through a wire, no matter what the length may be,
and that, generally, the conducting efiect of wires may be represented
by a logarithmic curve. Among electrical memoirs there is one on
tlie tidal motions exhibited by liquid conductors, and one on the elec-
tro-motive power of heat, explaining the construction of some new and
improved forms of thermo-electric batteries. An abstract of these im-
provements is given in the last edition of the " Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica " (Ai't, Voltaic Electricity).

Dr. Draper was the first person to obtain photographs of the dif-
fraction spectrum given by a gi-ating, and to show the singular advan-

366 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

tages which that spectrum possesses over the prismatic investigations
on radiations. In a memoir on the production of light by chemical
action (1848), he gave the spectrum analyses of many different flames,
and devised the arrangement of charts of their fixed lines in the man-
ner now universally adopted. A memoir on phosphorescence contains
the experimental determination of many important facts in relation to
that property. Among purely chemical topics he has furnished a
method for the qualitative determination of urea by nitrous acid.

In 1864, at the request of the New York Historical Society, Dr.
Draper gave four lectures before that body, which were subsequently
published under the title of " Thoughts on the Civil Policy of America."
They were respectively on the influence of climate upon man; on the
effects of emigration ; on the political force of ideas ; and on the natu-
ral course of national development. They contain discussions of sev-
eral interesting points, which since that time have largely occupied
public attention, such as the internal emigration from the Atlantic
States to the West, the Asiatic emigration to the Pacific States, the
political effects of polygamy in Utah, the tendency of democratic in-
stitutions to centralization, a comparison of the European with the
American method of government.

No account of Dr. Draper's labor and influence for the promotion
of science would be complete that did not mention the admirable series
of Introductory Lectures with which he opened his chemical courses
in Xew York from 1840 to 1850. Clear in statement, fresh and strik-
ing in their views, and lively, poetic, and witty, as well as instructive,
they were well fitted to awaken the enthusiasm of students. Those on
" Oxygen," " Atmospheric Air," " Water," and " Phosphorus," were es-
pecially brilliant. "We have repeatedly tried to induce their author to
have them collected and reprinted, but he says they were only frag-
ments designed for a transient purpose, and are not worth preserving in
a permanent form. Dr. Draper's manner as a lecturer is quiet and de-
liberate— too subdued and equal for stirring effect, but perfect for ex-
position. As a speaker, he has been rarely drawn out of the collegiate
sphere, but such efforts as his Introductory Lectures and his felicitous
address at the Tyndall banquet show that he has the elements of
humor and an art of putting things that would have given him suc-
cess in the popular field if he had cared to seek it.

From 1860 to 1870 Dr. Draper did but little in scientific research,
devoting himself mostly to historical works. During this time he pub-
lished his " History of the American Civil War," in three volumes. His
opportunities for giving accuracy to this work were very great. Mr.
Stanton, the Secretary of War, issued orders to the Adjutant-General
of the Army of the United States to "furnish him with copies of all
orders, reports, correspondence, telegraphic dispatches, or other docu-
ments on file in the War Department, as he might request, and to per-
mit him to inspect and have copies of any maps, plans, and other pa-

SKETCH OF DR. J. W. DRAPER. 367

pers necessary for the preparation of his work, and to furnish him with
statistical information respecting the armies of the United States, their
organization, and operations." This order included all the Confederate
archives in possession of the War Department. Kor was the interest
of the Secretary of War limited to this : he supplied also a large amount
of personal information of the utmost value. Access v/as not unfre-
quently given him to documents and correspondence of the most con-
fidential kind, with a view of guiding him to correct conclusions, and
many of the most decisive military operations are detailed from private
memoranda furnished by the commanding officers themselves. As was
the case with Dr. Draper's other works, this also has been largely
republished in Europe.

In the summer of ISVO Dr. Draper suffered a severe bereavement in
the loss of his wife. Of Brazilian birth, she was connected with an an-
cient and noble Portuguese family. She had rendered his domestic
life a course of unbroken happiness, and doubtless she was the exem-
plar before his eyes when he wrote that often-quoted passage in his
" Physiology," in which, after depicting the physical and intellectual
peculiarities of woman, he says : " But it is in the family and social rela-
tions that her beautiful qualities sliine forth. At the close of a long
life checkered with pleasures and misfortunes, how often does the aged
man with emotion confess that, though all the ephemeral acquaintances
and attachments of his career have ended in disappointment and aliena-
tion, the wife of his youth is still his friend. In a world from which
every thing else seems to be passing away, her affection alone is un-
changed, true to him in sickness as in health, in adversity as in pros-
l^erity, true to the hour of death."

Of their six children, one died in infancy; the survivors are three
sons and two daughters. Of the former, the eldest is Professor of
Natural History in the College of the City of New York; the second.
Professor of Physiology in the University of New York ; the third.
Director of the Meteorological Observatory in the New York Central
Park.

After the death of his wife. Dr. Draper spent the following winter
in Europe, chiefly in Rome. Since his return he has published two
short memoirs : one, on the " Distribution of Heat in the Spectrum,"
showing that the predominance of heat in the less refrangible regions
is due to the action of the prism, and would not be observed in a nor-
mal spectrum, such as is formed by a grating; and that all the rays
of light have intrinsically equal heating power. The second is an in-
vestigation of the distribution of chemical force in the spectrum. All
these scientific researches, to which so many years of his life have been
devoted, have been at his own expense ; he has never received any ex-
traneous aid, though many of them have been very costly. He has
never taken out any patent, but has given the fruits of his investiga-
tions and inventions freely to the public.

368

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

EDITOR'S TABLE.

MILL, EDUCATION, AND SCIENCE.

THE first part of Mr. Mill's autobi-
ography gives an instructive ac-
count of his early education. He had
before propounded his general views
upon this subject in a celebrated ad-
dress delivered at the University of St.
Andrew's in 1867. Mr. Mill had won
the enviable distinction of possessing
" the most elaborated mind in Europe,"
and this, together with the confessed
ability of his argument, gave it wide
influence with the public. But there
were many who thought that Mr. Mill,
on that occasion, reasoned too much
from his own exceptional experience,
and that, as an argument addressed to
the times, the performance was mis-
leading and injurious. The record of
Mr. Mill's mental history, now pub-
lished, throws important light upon
the view promulgated at St. Andrew's,
and, as the question involved is of great
practical importance, the present is a
fitting occasion to offer some remark
upon it.

There has grown up a grave conflict
between ancient learning and modern
science as means of educating the hu-
man mind. It originated in the rise
of a new order of knowledge derived
from the extensive study of Nature in
recent times. The old system was,
however, strongly intrenched in the
field of education ; it was interwoven
with the world's literature, and all its
venerated traditions; it appealed to the
generations of the great that it had
trained, and it was in possession of the
old institutions of learning, fortified by
rich endowments, and backed by state
and church. But, as modern knowl-
edge has grown in extent and influence,
and institutions have been liberalized,
and the idea of general education has

become a part of civilization, there has
been a growing demand for the right
of science to have a more decisive
voice in education, and this demand has
been partially yielded to by the modifi-
cation of old methods and the establish-
ment of new. Such changes have only
resulted from long and earnest conflict
between opposing views, and, what-
ever may be the merits of this contro-
versy, one thing would seem to be cer-
tain, that it has been a natural and in-
evitable outgrowth of the progress of
events.

At the outset of his address, Mr.
Mill recognized this struggle as "the
great controversy of the present day,
with regard to the higher education,
the difference which most broadly di-
vides educational reformers; the vexed,
question between the ancient languages
and the modern sciences and arts."
But, from Mr. Mill's point of view, the
antagonism is imreal, and the contro-
versy futile and groundless. Between
the two systems of culture he acknowl-
edged no rivalship, but said, " Why not
both?" To the obvious answer that
average students have neither capacity
nor time for such extensive mental con-
quests, he indignantly replied: "I am
amazed at the limited conception which
many educational reformers have
formed to themselves of a human be-
ing's power of acquisition." Mr. Mill,
accordingly, proceeded to outline a
system of study more consonant, as he
thought, with the powers and possibili-
ties of the human mind. The limita-
tions of capacity assigned by experi-
ence and embodied in practical plans
of education he gave to the winds, and
offered an ideal of scholarship and a
range of acquisition of most majestic
proportions. But it was so grandly

EDITOR'S TABLE.

369

his own, and so out of all relation to
the hard workaday facts of college and
university life, that it practically served
little other purpose than to confirm a
bad state of things, and to put a new
weapon into the hands of the educa-
tional obstructives. Let us see how
this result was effected.

Mr. Mill began by enforcing the
largest claims of ancient learning. He
outstripped all contemporaries in the
extent and rigor of his classical exac-
tions. He refused a place to modern
languages in the collegiate course, say-
ing that these can be best studied in
the countries where they are spoken,
while three or four of them can be ea-
sily picked up after the classical tongues
have been secured. "With the modern
languages modern literature was also
ruled out. " The only languages, then,
and the only literature," says he, "to
which I would allow a place in the or-
dinary curriculum are those of the
Greeks and Eomans, and to these I
would preserve the position in it which
they at present occupy." The reasons
which he offered for studying Greek
and Latin were far from being the stock-
reasons that we are accustomed to
hear. These languages are to be ac-
quired for the purpose of mastering
their literary contents. Not for any
such slight considerations as the bear-
ings of the classical languages upon
English, or to be able to understand
current quotations, or for the mere
discipline of lingual study, are they to
be acquired, but that the student may
enter into the spirit and breathe the
atmosphere of ancient life. He is to
be at home in Greek and Eoman thought
as he is in that of his native speech.
" We must be able in a certain degree
to think in Greek if we would repre-
sent to ourselves how a Greek thought ;
and this not only in the abstruse region
of metaphysics, but about the political,
religious, and even domestic concerns
of life." Translations are not to be ac-
cepted. Though the profoundest schol-

VOL. IT. — 24

ar, after life-long preparation, renders
an ancient author into English, the
student of the " ordinary curriculum "
must be able to translate it better for
himself. He must not trust to other
person's impressions, but must have
every thing at first hand, and go di-
rectly to the fountain-head. Greek
and Latin must be studied, that the stu-
dent may get at the original materials
of history, so as to check and correct
the historians. The modern classics,
English, German, and French, are in-
suflBcient as models; those of Greece
and Eome are more perfect, and there-
fore the student must use them to form
his style and perfect his literary taste.
Mr. Mill then went on to argue the
claims of the sciences, but his work was
superfluous. Methuselah might have
listened to him with interest, but prac-
tical men knew that the demands he
had already made were far beyond the
possibilities of realization by general
students in the usual period of study.
Already he had laid out a scheme of
professional scholarship not attainable
in its completeness by one in a; hun-
dred of those who give their lives to it.
Mr. Mill's words, to be sure, were hot
with scorn when he referred to the
" shameful inefficiency," and " wretch-
ed methods," and " laborious idleness,"
of current cMssical teaching — the con-
stant fruits of the system for centuries,
as testified to by similar denunciations
of the most eminent men. But he did
not say, " Improve these methods or
get them out of the way." On the con-
trary, he indorsed unqualifiedly Greek
and Latin studies in "the position which
they at present occupy ; " and, to carry
out his views, nothing remained but to
give them a greatly-increased attention.
The practical effect of his argument
was, to lend renewed and powerful
support to the classical system as it
now exists, and this was the general
interpretation given to the address.
It was universally hailed as a triumph
of the classical party, and thrown in

37°

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the face of the friends of scientific
education as a final refutation of their
case. It was a victory of the classi-
cists simply because it gave them every
thing they asked. If they could have
classical studies assured on such a scale
as Mr. Mill proposed, there was no
longer any fear of scientific encroach-
ment. Already in possession of the
appliances of education in existing in-
stitutions, if his programme is accept-
ed, they will always remain in posses-
sion. Mr. Mill said, " Why not both ? "
But his argument was a practical sur-
render to one side, because, on his
scale of study there is not time for both,
and the party that comes first gets
all.

The question now arises, Was this
exalted estimate of classical studies the
result of an impartial survey of the
field of knowledge and an equal appre-
ciation of science, or of an overwhelm-
ing bias produced by a one-sided train-
ing, of which Mr. Mill had been the
victim in his youth ? The Autobiogra-
phy here comes to our assistance, and
we learn from it the following extraor-
dinary facts :

Mr. Mill's father was a man of great
intellectual vigor, and a disciplined
scholar, and he determined to make
his son an example of the most thor-
ough and perfect form of education.
Critical, vigilant, and exacting, he took
entire charge of the boy's studies.
Fortunately, the lad had great native
capacity, and a fine, tenacious organi-
zation, and his proficiency equaled his
father's efforts and expectations. At
three years old he commenced the
study of Greek, and only faintly re-
members going through Esop's "Fa-
bles " in that language. He then read
the "Anabasis," and, before he was
eight years old, he had read all the nine
books of Herodotus, the first six " Dia-
logues " of Plato, all Xenophon's " Cy-
ropaedia," the " Memorabilia " of Soc-
rates, and portions of Diogenes Laer-
tius, Lucian, and Isocrates. During this

time he also learned arithmetic, and read
the histories of Pwobertson, Hume, Gib-
bon, Watson, Hooke, Rollin, Burnet,
Langhorne's Plutarch, Millar's " Histor-
ical View of the English Government,"
Mosheim's Ecclesiastical History, and
various other ponderous books ; nor
were these merely cursory or desultory
readings. His father required every day
a full account of what he had read.
Notes, abridgments, and synoptical
statements, had to be made, and in
their daily walks the father enforced
the lessons, and gave him explanations
and ideas on various questions of civili-
zation, government, mental philosophy,
and morality ; and all this the son was
required afterward to reproduce in his
own words.

Amazing as was the work done up
to his eighth year, it increased, in a
most oppressive ratio, in the next four
years. English and Greek being not
sufficient, he now went into Latin, and,
as he acquired it, taught it to his broth-
ers and sisters. Between his eighth
and twelfth year, he read Virgil, Hor-
ace, part of Livy, the whole of Sal-
lust, parts of Ovid, Terence, Lucretius,
Cicero, the "Hiad" and "Odyssey,"
one or two Greek plays, the whole of
Thucydides, Aristotle's " Ehetoric,"
Tacitus, Juvenal, Quintilian, and the
principal "Dialogues" of Plato. From
ten to eleven he wrote a " History of
Rome " that would have filled an octavo
volume. He also learned elementary
geometry, algebra, tlie differential calcu-
lus, and other parts of the higher math-
ematics. Logic, and the " Organon " of
Aristotle, had not been neglected ; and,
at thirteen, he corrected the proof-
sheets of his father's " History of In-
dia," and went through with him a
complete course of political economy,
being required to correct "the more
superficial views of Adam Smith by the
superior lights of Ricardo." Of course,
the boy was kept to the inexorable
drill, upon subjects selected by his
father ; but, in his spontaneous reading,

EDITOR'S TABLE.

371

he says that his strongest predilection
was ancient history. " A book which,
in spite of what is called the dryness
of its style, I took great pleasure in,
was the 'Ancient Univerral History,'
through the incessant reading of which,
I had my head full of historical details
concerning the obscurest ancient peo-
ple ; while, about modern history, ex-
cept detached passages, such as the
'Dutch War of Independence,' I knew
and cared comparatively little."

And so young Mill became a prodigy
of Greek, Latin, and antiquated learn-
ing. The dead languages and their
contents were fairly burned into his
organization. On his classical acqui-
sitions were superinduced history,
mathematics, metaphysics, and politi-
cal ideas — studies which he might have
pursued if he had been the son of
Plato instead of James Mill. But of
the sciences of l^ature there was noth-
ing gained worth the name. At the
mental stage in which all the foregoing
acquirements had been made he had
received not the slightest scientific in-
struction, and had only read a little in
experimental books by way of amuse-
ment. He says : " During this part of
ray childhood, one of my greatest
amusements was experimental science,
in the theoretical, however, not the
practical sense of the word; not try-
ing experiments — a kind of discipline
which I have often regretted — nor even
seeing but merely reading about them."
Mr. Mill subsequently paid more atten-
tion to science by reading ; he heard
lectures on zoology and chemistry, and
did something with botany as an ob-
server and collector. But of science in
the educational sense of the classics, as
an agency to mould the mind by its spe-
cial discipline, he was utterly destitute.
He neither pursued it in its objects, nor
mastered it in its principles, nor cul-
tivated the habit of original and inde-
pendent research. The whole spirit of
his education, indeed, was different; it
was for polemics rather than for discov-

ery. The intellectual exercise in which
he says he was most perseveringly exer-
cised by his father was the old scho-
lastic logic, which bethinks is "pecul-
liarly adapted to an early stage in the
education of philosophical students,
since it does not presuppose the slow
process of acquiring by experience and
reflection valuable thoughts of their
own." His training was fitted to make
him shine in debating societies, of
which he was a frequenter, and he or-
ganized one at the age of sixteen.
And such was his proficiency that, it
was said, " a university man, loaded
with honors and preceded by a blazing
reputation, having been induced, in an
evil hour, to cake the chair at a discus-
sion, crumbled to dust in the presence
of our Titan, and passed out of count
utterly."

The efi"ect of neglect of science in
Mr. Mill's education is seen in his re-
markable judgment of himself. In his
Autobiography he makes the astound-
ing statement that in " natural gifts I
am rather below than above par ; what
I could do could assuredly be done by
any boy or girl of average capacity,"
and he assumes to have had the start
of his contemporaries for a quarter of
a century, simply from the mode in
which he was instructed. Mind is
thus dealt with as if it were a disem-
bodied agency capable of being manip-
ulated into any state; while organic
conditions and limitations, and the in-
fluence of heredity, are discredited at a
stroke. No allowance is made for the
fact that he derived his fine organiza-
tion from a father of great intellectual
capacity ; yet, nothing is better estab-
lished by science than that traits of
character are transmissible, and that
this circumstance bears powerfully up-
on the problem of human educability.
Physiologists well know that the chil-
di'en of cultivated parents not only
inherit superior mental aptitudes and
capacities, but that they have greater
power of psychical endurance, and can

372

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

stand far greater mental exertion with-
out injury, than the children of uncul-
tivated parentage. Such a discipline
as Tonng Mill underwent would have
reduced most children to idiocy, or
killed them outright. Mr. Mill waa an
eminent student of mind, but it is very
clear that he dealt with it from the an-
cient point of view, and knew very lit-
tle of or cared very little for what mod-
ern science has had to say about it.

And even he, with his tough and
vigorous organization, barely escaped
the consequences of such gross error
reduced to practice. At twenty he
passed into a cloud of gloom and de-
spondency. He became indifferent to
his pursuits, sleep brought no relief,
and he had thoughts of suicide. He
became painfully anxious, under the
notion that, if all he had been striving
to attain could be realized, there would
be nothing left to live for. Brain-dis-
turbance from overtasking was evinced
by delusion, like that of Martyn, who,
when he had come out Senior Wran-
gler, was taken with the crazy fancy
that mathematics were an invention of
Satan, and that he had been led into a
net of destruction. Mr. Mill had evi-
dently reached the verge of a cerebral
break-down, when he changed the
course of his mental action by going
into emotional literature, and ascribed
his escape to "Wordswortirs poetry.
Had he been as deep in physiology as
he was in Greek, and made use of his
knowledge, this dangerous state might
not only have been better interpreted,
but probably quite avoided.

"When, therefore, Mr. Mill, some fifty
years later, in chalking out a system
of education for the students of St.
Andrew's, said of ancient and modern
knowledge, " Why not both ? " he was
himself a living refutation of its possi-
bility. He had worked himself up to
the very breaking-point in the enor-
mous accumulation of classical and oth-
er acquisitions, while modern thought
had not been correspondingly mastered.

The law of mental limitations, by which
one thing can only be had at the ex-
pense of another, was in as full force in
his case as in that of inferior minds ;
and his classical surcharfing involved
a correlative deficiency in science which
has vmquestionably been an element of
weakness in his own career. We do
not deny that Mr. Mill had a very con-
siderable acquaintance with science,
and only insist that it was neither up
to his own standard of thoroughness
in other departments, nor was it suffi-
cient for his own requirements as a
thinker ambitious of controlling the
mind of his age. His book on " Log-
ic," undoubtedly a great work, would
have been a greater if a part of the
effort spent upon classical history had
been given to the history of science.
But, while demanding that students
shall learn dead languages, to get at ttie
originals of political history, he was
content, or rather he was compelled,
to take scientific history at second-
hand.

Such was the deficiency of the work
in this respect that, although, as Mr.
Mill states in the Autobiography, Prof.
Bain " went carefully through the man-
uscript before it was sent to press,
and enriched it with a great number
of additional examples and illustrations
from science," yet it was exposed to
the telling criticisms of Dr. Whewell,
the eminent historian of science, for
the faulty and ill-chosen character of
the instances of discovery selected to
exemplify and confirm his methods.

Mr. Mill was at the head of a school
of thinkers which maintained what is
called the Experiential Psychology;
that is, in Mr. Mill's language, " there
is not any idea, feeling, or power, in
the human mind, which, in order to ac-
count for it, requires that its origin
should be referred to any other source
than experience." The problem of
mind, as thus conceived, is one of the
grandest openings of modern thought.
Be the doctrine true or false, it brings

EDITORS TABLE.

373

the study of mental phenomena into
more close and vital relations -with the
surrounding universe than had been
possible with the older metaphysical
views. James Mill was the author of
the ablest exposition of this doctrine
that had yet appeared; rnd his son,
therefore, througli his father's early and
able teaching, had the rarest advan-
tages for pursuing the inquiry and oc-
cupying the field. But another and a
younger man came into that field, and
took possession of it. At the age of
thirty-five, Mr. Herbert Spencer pub-
lished his "Principles of Psychology,"
of wliich Mr. Mill liimself says, "it is
one of the finest examples we possess
of the psychological method in its
full power." Subsequent criticism has
strengthened this judgment, and as-
signed to that work an unrivaled posi-
tion in the original psychological liter-
ature of its time. Mr. J. S. Mill's
greatest work upon mind is undoubt-
edly Lis polemical criticism of Sir "Wil-
liam Hamilton ; but, after this was
published, and the works of Spencer
and Mill were left to their influence
upon the British public, Prof. Masson,
in a lecture before the Koyal Institu-
tion, gave expression to the growing
conviction concerning Spencer, that,
" if any individual influence is visibly
encroaching on Mill's in this country,
it is his."

TVhat, now, was the secret by which
Mr. Spencer was enabled to beat Mr.
MiU in the field where he was most at
home, aud had every apparent advan-
tage ? It was simply the difierence in
the education of the two men. Both
were examples of great native power
of mind ; both were educated by their
fathers, and neither went to the uni-
versities. But while Mill was sent
back in childhood to the world of two
thousand years ago, and spent his force
in learning half a dozen languages, and
in loading himself down with the eru-
dition of antiquity, Mr. Spencer was
content with his English, left antiquity

to itself, and entered in childhood into
the sphere of modern thought. Mr.
Mill had spent his energies on his splen-
did scholastic preparation, and could
give only the remnant of his powers to
the profounder intellectual movement
of his own time. Mr. Spencer broke
freshly into the study of Nature and
science, unperverted by ancient ideas,
and unincumbered by antiquated learn-
ing, and was thus enabled to make
those extensive modern acquisitions by
which he has attained such power over
the thought of his own time. While
Mr. Mill was drilling with the school-
logic, which calls for no original
thought, Mr. Spencer was making dis-
coveries in experimental science, and
forming his own opinions on the basis
of the most recent knowledge ; and
while, in the study of mind, Mr. Mill
sunk into little better than a mere com-
mentator on his father's ideas, Mr.
Spencer took up the great question
from his own independent point of view,
and has given his contemporaries, per-
haps, the most original contribution
of the century to the science of mind.
Wherever the two men are brought
into comparison, the enormous advan-
tage of Spencer, through his mastery of
scientific thought, is confessedly appar-
ent. Mr. Mill wrote a formal work upon
the woman question, as he might have
written it two thousand years ago,
and as if science had contributed noth-
ing that is valuable in its elucidation :
Mr. Spencer has lately crossed the field,
treating the psychology of the sexes
incidentally, and, as a contemporary
remarks, his brief sketch makes the
"Subjection of Woman" appear "ob-
solete and antediluvian " in comparison
with it.

The question that Mr. Mill put to
the students, " Why not both ? " finds
thus a sufiicient answer in his own
career. " Both " are impossible ; and
Mr. Mill gave himself to the past, at
the expense of the future.

374

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

LITERARY NOTICES.

Report of the Geological Survey of
Ohio. Vol. I., Geology and Paleon-
tology. Part I., Geology; Part II.,
Paleontology. Published by author-
ity of the Legislature of Ohio. Colum-
bus, 1873.

These two octavo volumes, which to-
gether form the first volume of the final re-
port on the survey of Ohio, mark an im-
portant advance in the scientific knowledge
of the character, history, and resources of
our country. Since the survey was under-
taken in 1869, three preliminary reports
have appeared, giving the progress of dis-
covery and labor for each year, and con-
taining much valuable and interesting in-
formation. But here we have the beginning
of the end, the first installment of a series
which is to comprise some six volumes, and
which will be a model in many respects for
similar works in years to come.

As long ago as 1836 an attempt was
made to have a geological survey in Ohio,
and two annual reports of progress were
published under the direction of Prof. W.
W. Mather and Dr. S. P. Hildreth, together
with several other gentlemen since eminent
in geological study. The panic of 1837»
however, caused the abandonment of the
work by the Legislature, a mistaken econ-
omy which much retarded and impaired the
development of the resources of the State.
It was not until 1869 that the enterprise
was resumed, and placed in the hands of
the very able corps of gentlemen who have
60 well performed their work.

At the head of the survey was placed
Dr. John S. Newberry, whose ability has
found full scope, and whose reputation has
gathered new laurels in this honorable ser-
vice to his own State. Associated with
him are gentlemen of high standing and .
capacity, Profs. E. B. Andrews, Edward Or-
ion, and J. H. Klippart, as assistant geolo-
gists, and Dr. T. G. Wormly as chemist ;
while the work of paleontology has been
divided between Dr. Newberry and Prof.
F. B. Meek, so well and widely known in
this especial department.

The second volume, soon to appear, will
be composed, like the first, of two separate
parts, on geology and paleontology; the

third volume will treat of the economic ge-
ology of Ohio ; and the fourth, of its agri-
culture, botany, and zoology. Part I. of
the first volume has some of the mechani-
cal defects that generally appear in public
documents issued by State printers ; but
Part II. is a fine specimen of a book. A
very large edition was voted by the Legisla-
ture, for the purpose of making the work
familiar to the people of the State ; and Dr.
Newberry has been most successful in his
endeavor to render the subjects treated of
plain to all intelligent readers, so that these
reports may be not only a treasure-house
for students of science, but a means of in-
formation and instruction for the people at
large.

The first part, on geology simply, forms
an octavo of 680 pages. It opens with
some general discussions, which properly
introduce such a volume, and then passes
on to the local details by counties. To any
but specialists in geology, the general chap-
ters in the First Section will possess the
chief amount of interest ; but there are
doubtless many professional students of
the science who could derive great benefit
from these unpretending but masterly pages.
After a brief sketch of the history of the
survey. Dr. Newberry gives four chapters
treating respectively of the physical geog-
raphy of Ohio, of its geological relations
to the rest of the country, and of its geo-
logical structure through the Silurian and
Devonian formations.

Those who are acquainted with Dr.
Newberry's cast of mind and method of
treatment, will recognize these chapters as
eminently characteristic, in the wide range
and striking power of their generalizations,
and the clearness of statement which per-
vades them. The second chapter, on the
Physical Geography of Ohio, is in reality a
brief but admirable summary of the physi-
cal geography of North America. Its dis-
cussion of the important question of the
relation of forests to rainfall should be
read by every intelligent man. With few
exceptions, all students of science are
agreed as to the destructive effects pro-
duced upon climate by the removal of
woods from a country. This lesson can-
not be too soon or too earnestly pressed
upon the attention of our people and our

LITERARY NOTICES.

37S

governments, both State and national. It
has been held by some that the removal
of forests causes an actual lessening of
the annual rainfall ; but this view is hardly
borne out by recorded observations. The
same injury, however, is equally accom-
plished in a somewhat different way. The
removal of timber lays the ground open to
rapid evaporation, and, worse still, causes
the surface covering of earth, mould, etc.,
to be washed away from the unprotected
sides of hills and mountains. The conse-
quence is that the same yearly amount of
moisture, instead of being slowly and gradu-
ally discharged by the broolvs and streams,
rushes away in destructive torrents and
freshets, such as are all too familiar every
spring, when the winter's snow is melting.
The water-supply being thus lost all at
once, the steady streams and rivers of a
generation or two past dwindle in the sum-
mer to fitful and worthless rills. Such is
the harvest of disaster from "our great
lumbering interest."

Chapter III., on the " Geological Rela-
tions of Ohio," is yet more interesting in a
purely scientific aspect. It begins with a
brief outline of the characteristic features
of the several great periods of geological
history, as represented by the deposits in
North America. Here Dr. Newberry gives,
in a popular form, the gist of his discus-
sion lately presented to the American As-
sociation of Science at Portland, and more
recently to the National Academy of Arts
and Sciences, at its session in this city in
October last, on " Cycles of Deposition in
Sedimentary Rocks," a generalization un-
surpassed for its beauty, its simplicity, its
wide-reaching grasp, and its lucid explana-
tion of a multitude of details, previously in-
significant and often wearisome.

Each of the great ages of palaeozoic ge-
ology— the two Silurians, the Devonian, and
the Carboniferous — represents, in this view,
a grand invasion of the sea upon the land,
slowly spreading itself over the continent,
mainly from the west and south, and laying
down a series of sediments in a fixed and
regular order, depending on the increasing
depth of the advancing waters. No one,
it would seem, can look at the facts in a
broad and philosophical view, excluding of
course the thousand details which cause

partial modifications in every such great op-
eration of Nature, without recognizing here
a new light cast upon the hitherto unmean-
ing succession of varying kinds of deposits.
The remainder of this volume is occu-
pied with the detailed description of the
geology of twenty-one counties — nearly one-
fourth of the State — by Profs. Andrews
and Orton, Dr. Newberry, and Messrs. M. C.
Read, G. K. Gilbert, and N. H. WincheU,
assistants. While aU these accounts are
full of valuable matter, especial interest at-
taches to Prof. Orton's excellent account
of the lower Silurian formation, known in
Ohio as the Cincinnati Group, and to Mr. Gil-
bert's summary of the surface geology of
the Maumee Valley, which is rich in re-
markable illustrations of the effects of the
great sheet of ice, and afterward of the
broad expanse of water, which overspread
so much of our northern country during
the several parts of the great Glacial Epoch.
Dr. Newberry's sketch of Cuyahoga County,
the region around Cleveland, also treats of
the same fascinating subject ; and Prof.
Andrews gives quite a chapter of " Conclu-
sions, Theoretical and Practical," on the
mode of formation of different varieties of
coals.

It only remains to refer briefly to the
second volume or second part of Volume I.,
which treats of the paleontology of Ohio.
This work, somewhat larger than the first
part, comprises three divisions, as follows :
the " Invertebrate Fossils of the Silurian and
Devonian Formations," by Prof F. B. Meek ;
the "Fossil Fishes of the Devonian Group,"
by Dr. Newberry ; and the " Fossil Plants of
the Coal Period" (in part), also by Dr. New-
berry. With the exception of these last, the
present volume includes only the fossils be-
low the carboniferous rocks.

In these chapters, a great and perma-
nent work has been accomplished for sci-
ence, in the accurate description and clas-
sification of a very large number of in-
teresting fossils, heretofore either unde-
scribed, or described so imperfectly as not
to be reliable as a basis for study. The
crinoids, mollusks, brachiopods, and trilo-
bites, have been well intrusted to Mr. Meek,
whose full and careful discussions are ac-
companied with an admirable series of
plates.

376

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The most i-emarkable part of this vol-
ume, however, is that relating to the fossil
fish of the Devonian Age. This period, as
is well known, has long been called the
" Reign of Fishes," from the great variety
of singular and grotesque forms of fish-life
which then appeared and peopled the an-
cient seas. The greatest share in bringing
to light this extraordinary series of by-gone
types was borne by Hugh Miller, whose
discoveries in the " Old Red Sandstone " of
Scotland have won for him imperishable
fame in the annals of science. The con-
tinuation, on this continent, of Miller's dis-
coveries abroad, is here given to the world ;
and it is no less remarkable, perhaps indeed
more so, thaawere his. The series of fish
here described forms an extraordinary ad-
dition to our knowledge of the life of the
past. The Devonian waters that spread
over what is now the greater part of Ohio
were inhabited by a strange race of literal
sea-monsters, singular in form and gigantic
in size, plated and mail-clad, and bearing all
manner of elaborate weapons for offense
and defense. Among them we may refer
ts the tribe of Chimaroids, allied to the
sharks, now represented only by a few rare
species, and which, though well known to
have existed in later formations, has never
before been discovered in palseozoic rocks.
Dr. Newberry has described the new genus
Hhynchodus, with several species belonging
to this group. Still more singular, how-
ever, are several genera of ganoid fish, of
which only one or two can be referred to
here. One of these is Onyc/iodus, which
carried at the extremity of its lower jaws,
where the two rami meet, a vertical set of
long, radiating teeth, projecting like the
piercing prow of an iron-clad ram. This
form is wholly novel. Another is Debiich-
ihys, the giant of the period, whose tremen-
dous jaws, shaped hke sled-runners, were a
couple of feet in length; while the bony
backler that covered the back was from
one to two inches in thickness !

But time would fail us to dwell on these
interesting accounts ; and we can only ex-
press our gratification that so much impor-
tant discovery is now announced and record-
ed in a permanent form, and congratulate
both the gentlemen of the survey and the
people and government of Ohio on this

great work now so auspiciously approaching
its close.

Autobiography of John Stuart Mill.
New York : Henry Holt & Co. 313 pp.,
8vo. Price, $2.25.

This is said to be the book of the sea-
son, and it is creditable to the season that
it is so, for it is a volume of deep and va-
ried interest, as well as of important instruc-
tion. Without any dramatic incident or ex-
ternal adventure, the earnest attention of
the reader is sustained by a delineation of
the quiet career of a man of thought. After
all, there is nothing that so concerns us,
with regard to a great man, as how his
greatness was reached. Mr. Mill has con-
ducted no campaigns, explored no new
countries, guided no political administra-
tions, but through his writings he has in-
fluenced the thought of his age, in direc-
tions where thought issues in action, and
his influence may thus have been deeper than
if he had wielded the more obtrusive and
conspicuous agencies by which men are af-
fected. Obviously, in writing his own life,
Mr. Mill did not feel that he had any great-
ness to take care of, and so he gives a
faithful account of his development, taking
the reader completely into his confidence,
relating his experiences, and ofi'ering his
opinions and self-criticisms with a candor
and unreserve that are quite remarkable.
Those who have become interested in Mr.
Mill's ideas, and through them in the man,
will devour the book with eager curiosity ;
and those who have not, can hardly fail to
be incited by its perusal to the study of his
works. We by no means agree with all
that Mr. Mill has promulgated, and have giv-
en, in another place, the reasons for dissent-
ing from some of his doctrines ; but, while
holding him as not above criticism, and as
having fallen into educational error from
the very greatness of his attainments, we
do not hesitate to acknowledge our indebt-
edness to him as a great leader of liberal
thought in the present age. His autobiog-
raphy is valuable as a record of his own
mental unfolding ; but, beyond this, it has
great value as a history of the rise and
progress of liberalized opinion in England
within the last thirty years, in the promo-
tion of which Mr. Mill had so eminent a

LITERARY NOTICES.

in

Bhare. A democrat in instinct and feeling,
and holding the most radical views on grave
questions of social polity and political gov-
ernment, Mr. Mill lived under the most
compact and consolidated monarchical, aris-
tocratic, and ecclesiastical system that the
world possesses ; and the history of his war-
fare with the ideas in which that system is
embedded, while attractive as a philosophi-
cal study, has an especial interest for us,
who cut loose from that order of things a
century ago. Mr. Mill was never an ac-
tive politician, and only tried his hand at
parliamentary work for a short period, late
in life ; but he was much occupied with po-
litical and contemporaneous public ques-
tions, and was a virtual leader of a consid-
erable party of men who devoted them-
selves to active political work.

Mr. Mill's estimates and criticisms of the
thinkers of his time, and his analysis of
their influence upon himself, are by no
means the least interesting portions of his
volume. Especially what he says of his
mental indebtedness to the influence of his
wife will be eagerly perused. He had al-
ready given expression to it in terms that
have been thought to savor of exaggeration,
but all that he had said before is here reiter-
ated with increasing emphasis. In speak-
ing of Carlyle, he observes : " I never pre-
sumed to judge him with any definiteness
until he was interpreted to me by one great-
ly the superior of us both — who was more a
poet than he, and more a thinker than I —
whose own mind and nature included his,
and infinitely more." After such a eulogy
from the author of the " Logic," the ques-
tion irresistibly arises. What could have been
the preparation of so wonderful a mind ?
Mr, Mill offers his autobiography confess-
edly as a study in education, of which he re-
gards himself, as he certainly was, a remark-
able exemplification. But why did he for-
bear to utter a word in relation to the cul-
tivation and history of that extraordinary
mind which spanned and included such
intellects as his own and Thomas Car-
lyle's ? The question, moreover, will be
wonderingly asked, why Mr. Mill, with all
his chivalric feeling toward the opposite
sex, never once mentions his mother, in the
full sketch of his childhood, although his
father figures prominently throughout. Per-

haps she was not a woman of intellect, and
took no part in his early culture ; but she
had a share in his being, and, whatever may
have been the qualities or character of the
mother of John Stuart Mill, they should not
have been left out of consideration in an ac-
count by himself of his own life.

The autobiography is written in Mr. Mill's
happiest style, and deserves to be, as it un-
doubtedly will be, very extensively read.

Skx in Education ; or, a Fair Chance for
THE Girls. By Edward H. Clarke,
M. D. Boston: James R. Osgood & Co.,
181 pp. Price, §1.25.

This little volume breaks the monotony
of the woman's rights discussion, and ex-
poses one of its current fallacies — the co-
education of the sexes.

Whether or not there be sex in mind.
Dr. Clarke shows that there is a great deal
of it in body, and that this cannot be ignored
in the work of education without entailing
grave and often fatal evils upon the weaker
sex. One would think that there is suffi-
cient physiological knowledge current in the
community to prevent an educational sys-
tem that does not recognize and conform to
the radical differences of sex ; but, under
pressure of a so-called reform, which starts
from abstract assumptions rather than
physiological data, the strong tendency is
to put students of both sexes upon the same
footing, regardless of all consequences. Dr.
Clarke points out what some of these con-
sequences are. He shows that there is not
only a difference in powers of endurance,
by which the average feminine constitution
is certain to break down when brought into
prolonged competition with the average
male constitution, but, what is of far more
importance, he shows that the feminine con-
stitution is liable under these circumstances
to a whole train of derangements and per-
versions that are peculiar to itself. The
fact that women are designed to be mothers,
while men are not, is very far from being a
mere incidental circumstance that may be
left out of the account in their early train-
ing. Nor can women, by declining to be-
come mothers, escape from the peculiarities
of their nature, so as to assume the career
and encounter the discipHne of men. The
female destiny, which is to give birth to the

378

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

race is no such mere incident of humanity.
It is a great thing, and its greatness is con-
ditioned upon and attested by the serious
sacrifice of other things. Woman is organ-
ized throughout her whole nature to the end
of maternity, and, if treated in her youth
like the opposite sex, which has not this
organization, evils are liable to arise that
are often numerous, lasting, and fatal. And
that which reason says mit^t be the result,
experience says is the result, as Dr. Clarke's
book abundantly proves. In his second
chapter he makes a very clear statement of
the physiological facts and principles in-
volved in the question, and, in his third and
main chapter, entitled " Chiefly Clinical,"
he traces the morbid consequences that
have followed a false system of female edu-
cation. This part of his book is full of
startling facts, given in detail, that should
arrest the attention of some of our headlong
reformers. The book is one that ought to
have a wide circulation, and to be issued in
a cheaper form.

British Marine Alg^: being a Popular
Account of the Sea-weeds of Great Brit^
ain, their Collection and Preservation.
Illustrated. By W. H. Grattann. Lon-
don : " The Bazaar " office, 32 Welling-
ton Street, Strand, W. C.

While the collecting of algae at the
sea-side has long been a graceful and favor-
ite amusement, and many persons have very
pretty collections of them, mounted on
cards and papers, or arranged in fanciful
designs, very few have attempted to learn
their names or to study out their structure,
fructification, and the principles of their
classification. Thanks to the labors of the
two Agardhs, Kiitzing, Thuret, Harvey,
Greville, and other eminent phycologists,
the scientific knowledge of these plants now
rests on a satisfactory and logical basis,
and while the study of algae is difficult in
the extreme, there are ample results to re-
ward the patient and careful investigator.
The purpose of the little book, the title of
which is given above, is to afibrd to ama-
teurs and to students an easy introduction
to the knowledge of algae, and, if one may
judge from the first four parts of the work,
all yet received, the author has succeeded
admirably in his purpose. The wonder is,
that Mr. Grattann has been able to convey

so much knowledge about the subject he
treats of, and yet be so sparing in the use
of technical expressions.

The fact that most of the sea-weeds of
the Northern Atlantic coast of the United
States occur also about the British Islands,
renders this book nearly as available for
use here as in Great Britain. The illustra-
tions are very neatly-prepared woodcuts,
mostly on a black ground, and are inserted
in the body of the work. For advanced
students in American phycology the only
special treatise is the " H'ereis Boreali-Atneru
cana'''' of the late Dr. Harvey, of Trinity Col-
lege, Dublin, a quarto with fifty colored
plates, published by the Smithsonian Insti-
tution.

MISCELLANY.

Physical Conditions of Inland Seas. —

In the August number of the Contemporary
Review is a paper of great interest by Dr.
Carpenter, in which that scientist explains
some curious phenomena of inland seas.
It is well known that in the open ocean the
depths are uniformly colder than near the
surface, so that, while the surface-water
in some cases approaches 80° Fahr., the
temperature is near the freezing-point at
depths of one or two miles. This appears
to occur where the movement of water is
unobstructed by inequahties of the ocean's
bed. Where these are present, however,
the temperature is more uniform through-
out, as in the Sulu Sea, where the water
is at 50° at the greatest depths, but in
the contiguous but more open China Sea
it is at 37° in deep soundings.

From the cause assigned, the inland seas
show a imiformity of temperature as com-
pared with the open oceans. Wliile the
surface-waters may be of equal temperature,
the depths present great contrast. The
Straits of Gibraltar are quite shallow, and
a free interchange of waters between the
Atlantic and the Mediterranean is impossi-
ble. From local causes there is frequently
no current, or but a very slight one, either
one way or the other. As a consequence
of this, the cold waters of the deep Atlantic
are prevented from flowing in, and a com-
paratively uniform temperature prevails in
the depths of the Mediterranean.

MISCELLANY.

379

This being the case, there is little or no
circulation — the water becomes to some ex-
tent stagnant, affecting in a marked manner
the development of life in it.

Dr. Carpenter was astonished to find in
the Mediterranean very few evidences of
life at depths greater than eighteen hundred
feet. " The dredge," he says, " brought up
barren mud," and, however abundant life may
be around its margins, its deeper portions
are azoic. In the cold but freely-circulating
waters of the Atlantic, animals are found
at nearly the greatest depths — while the
dredge is often filled from soundings of one
to two miles. Whence the difference ? "I
found," says Dr. Carpenter, " the deep wa-
ters of the Mediterranean turbid, filled with
fine particles of sediment which at last
make the ooze of the bottom." The pres-
ence of this floating dust, even near the
surface, is proved by the blueness of the wa-
ter. Turbidity is known to be unfavorable
to the development of many kinds of ma-
rine life. Prof. Dana has shown that a
small quantity of sediment thrown upon a
portion of a reef kills the polyps on that
part, and the growth and distribution of
coral - reefs are largely determined by this
cause. But, another reason for the absence
of life at the bottom of the Mediterranean
is, the deficiency of oxygen in its waters in
those depths.

Deep waters from the Atlantic and Med-
iterranean have been boiled off, and in the
gases from the first there was twenty per
cent, of oxygen, from the latter only five
per cent. But of carbonic acid there was
from the first only thirty to forty per cent.,
while the latter furnished sixty per cent.
Here, then, in the abundance of carbonic
acid, and deficiency of oxygen, is a possible
cause for the paucity of life.

But whence arises the deficiency of
oxygen. Chiefly, perhaps, from the slow de-
composition of organic matters, carried in
by rivers and other agencies, and which
may add to the turbidity referred to.

This state of things in the Mediterra-
nean, and possibly in other inland seas, evi-
dently arises from absence of circulation of
the waters. Winds disturb the surface
only, and Dr. Carpenter says there is in the
Mediterranean no thermal circulation — or
circulation which arises from inequality of

temperature. It has been said that ine-
quaUty of density caused by evaporation
must produce some vertical circulation of
the water, but density from lowering of
temperature at the surface never exceeds
the density of the deeper waters, and no
circulation disturbs or mixes the superim-
posed masses.

The oxygen from the surface can only
reach the deeper waters by diffusion, hence
its deficiency at considerable depths. In
the Atlantic, and doubtless in all open
oceans, the waters are diffused, and mixed
by a wonderful system of circulation, the
dynamic agencies of which are not present,
or only in a modified form, in the inland ba-
sins.

The well - known and often - criticised
statement of Edward Forbes, that life
ceases at a depth of three hundred fath-
oms, is confirmed by the researches of Dr.
Carpenter, in so far as it relates to inland
seas, the researches of Prof Forbes being
in the JEgean. The error consisted in ap-
plying the same rule to the open oceans,
where a different one prevails, and this ap-
pears to have been the error of others rath-
er than of Forbes.

roeqnal Power of the Eyes. — Probably
there are but few persons possessed of
equal power of vision in both eyes. This
circumstance, as is observed by a writer in
Science Gossip, will doubtless account for
some people being unable to appreciate the
binocular microscope. The writer in Sci-
ence Gossip has a friend who always found
difficulty in studying with a binocular, in
that he could never get the two glasses to
blend. In 1851 he attended the Great Ex-
hibition in London, and there his eyes were
constantly ranging from short to long dis-
tances. After he had left the Crystal Pal-
ace he felt that his eyes were very much fa-
tigued, and was at a loss to understand the
meaning of it. By this and other circum-
stances he discovered that there was a. focal
difference in his eyes. One eye was far-
sighted, while the other was near-sighted.
For reading-purposes he wears a pair of
spectacles in which the one glass is made
for the far sight, while the other is a plain
glass, the left eye being n^ar-sighted, and
consequently requiring no aid from specta-

380

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

cles •with which to read. Instances are
cited of persons who, while employing both
eyes for ordinary vision, usually employ
only one in reading. If any difference of
the kind exists between the visual powers
of a pair of eyes, it may be readily detect-
ed. Hold up a piece of card before one
eye, so as to cut off its field of view, and
then look at some object before you with
the other. Then gradually bring the card
before the other eye, and view the same ob-
ject. If the object is seen with the same
distinctness in each case, then your eyes
are perfect as regards the balance of their
foci : if not, then there is focal diiference
more or less decided. It would no doubt
be advisable to take account of this very
frequent difference of focus, in selectmg a
pair of spectacles.

IVatoral Grafting. — A writer in the Gar-
dener's Montldy for August gives some in-
stances of anastomosis, or natural grafting
of plants, which came under his own obser-
vation. In The Popular Science Monthly
for March, 1873, we gave Goeppert's theory,
accounting for the continued life and growth,
in some cases, of the stumps of pine and fir
trees. Goeppert's explanation of the phe-
nomenon is, that the roots of these stumps
are nourished with sap derived from the
roots of trees in their neighborhood, with
which they are in contact. Such roots are
found deeply embedded in one another, and
so consolidated as to become practically
continuous. The writer in the Gardener's
Montldy, after briefly stating these facts, de-
scribes similar phenomena which he ob-
served last sprmg among the branches of
two apple-trees.

In one of these the limbs so crowded
one another that it was resolved to cut one
away. It was accordingly sawed off; but
still it did not fall. It was then found that
the dismembered branch was firmly united
to a limb situated beneath it. With a
hatchet the writer then cut it near the point
of union ; but the end of the branch still
lives and thrives, bearing blossoms and fruit
in season. Another tree was found, but a
few yards distant from the first, which ex-
hibited the same phenomenon of natural
grafting. " I had never before," continues
the writer, "seen or heard of such a case in

an apple-tree, but I do not think it so diffi-
cult to account for as the condition of the
coniferous trees. It is natural to suppose
that the motion of the wind may occasion
abrasion of the bark on the limbs of apple-
trees, and thus prepare them for thLs natu-
ral grafting ; but, in the case of roots under-
ground, such cause for union cannot operate.
In both these instances, it is worthy of re-
mark that the trees were of the kind called
American Pippin, or Grindstone." But
surely there is no difficulty in conceiving of
two roots from different trees growing into
contact, when compressed together into a
narrow space owing to the refractory na-
ture of the soil. Under such circumstances
they might rub away each other's bark at
the point of contact, and establish between
themselves such an exchange of living force
as would constitute a life in common.

The Qttinine-Snpplv. — The cultivation
of the cinchona-tree in India, which was
commenced in 1860, is making satisfactory
progress. Near Darjeeling are two large
plantations, one owned by the government,
and the other by an association. The three
principal varieties of the cinchona, officinalit,
calisaya, and succirubra, were all planted at
Darjeeling, with a view to find which variety
would thrive best there. The ofiScinalis, or
gray-bark variety, failed utterly ; the cali-
saya, or yellow-bark, has fairly succeeded ;
but the succirubra, or red-bark, has pros-
pered beyond all expectation. There are
now 2,500 acres under succirubra. A mod-
erate estimate gives the produce of these
plantations for the next three years at
200,000 lbs., calculated to produce 6,000 lbs.
of quinine, and an equal amount of other
valuable alkaloids.

Some years since a quinine famine ap-
peared to be inevitable, as the cinchona-
trees were fast disappearing in South Amer-
ica. " The drug," writes Berthold Seemann,
"is almost as indispensable to mankind as
air itself, and, aided by this silent agent,
Europeans have been able to establish hap-
py homes, busy factories, and flourishing
colonies, in districts which, without this in-
valuable aid, would have simply become
their graveyards. Our only wonder is, how
we could ever have done without it, and
what would become of us if the supply

MISCELLANY.

381

should ever fail. And the supply does be-
gin to fail (1863), fail rapidly. It is known
that 1,200,000 lbs. of Peruvian (or cincho->
na) bark are annually imported into Eng-
land ; and it is estimated that no less than
3,000,000 lbs., and probably a much greater
quantity, are consumed every j c-ar through-
out the world. The demand is daily in-
creasing, and the drain upon the forests of
New Granada, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia,
has now been going on for two centuries.

" Thus, what with the excessive and un-
ceasing demand for bark, and the reckless
manner of collecting it, large tracts of coun-
try, formerly famous for their abundant
yield, are now entirely denuded of almost
every trace of cinchona-vegetation."

The Caterpillar Nnisance in Philadel-
phia.— For several years the measuring-
worm preyed on the leaves of the trees in
Philadelphia to such an extent that, early
in the summer, scarcely any foliage would
be left remaining. The English sparrow
was introduced to counteract the destroyer,
and performed its work so effectually that
after a year or two no more measuring-
worms were to be seen. Put now, accord-
ing to the Medical Times, another enemy of
the trees has made its appearance, the cater-
pillar of the Orr/ygia leucostigma moth. As
long as the measuring-worm was left unmo-
lested, the caterpillar, which comes late in
the season, found the struggle for existence
a sharp one, its natural provision having
been previously consumed by the worm.
Now, however, it finds abundance of food,
and is consequently prospering and rapidly
multiplying. The sparrows will not attack
it, protected as it is by its hairy coat. Per-
haps some other feathered exterminator can
be found to destroy the tribe ; but, inas-
much as the sparrow is a very stubborn and
pugnacious little fellow, it is a question
whether he will allow any other bird to
trespass on his domain. Meanwhile, the
caterpillar pest is assuming formidable pro-
portions, as witness the following passage
from our medical contemporary : " At pres-
ent, very many trees in this city have again
put on the familiar, woe-begone look of old,
hiding their misery with the merest tatters
and shreds of leaves. ' But the new-comer
doesn't drop on you ! ' Doesn't he though ?

I If he does not drop he crawls, or gets on
some way or other ; and the man who has
felt his long hairs tickling his neck, struck
for a fly, and found in his hand a bare and
bursled carcass, on his shirt-collar a stain,
and down his back a bunch of tickling hairs,
will vote the ' survival of the fittest,' in its
latest form, an unmitigated nuisance."

Eating Alcohol. — It has been generally
supposed that the alcohol formed in the
primary fermentation of bread was all ex-
pelled by the process of baking. Mr.
Thomas Bolas, of London, has communi-
cated to the Chemical News the result of
some experiments on this point. He shows
that when about two ounces of ordinary
bread is mixed with water and distilled, and
the distillate is afterward purified, a per-
ceptible quantity of alcohol may be ob-
tained. He made quantitative analyses of
six samples of fresh bread, obtained in so
many shops in London, which gave of al-
cohol an average of 0.314 per cent. So
that, when a man has eaten 100 pounds of
fresh bread, he has consumed with it a little
more than five ounces of pure alcohol.

The Grapc-viuc Blight.— M. Planchon,
of the French Academy, an eminent bota-
nist and entomologist, visited this country
last summer to study the habits of the
phylloxera, an insect which is ravaging the
vineyards of France. Prof Planchon was
the first to discover that the blight of the
grape-vine is the work of the Phylloxera
vastatrix ; and then Prof. Riley, State ento-
mologist of Missouri, proved the American
origin of the redoubtable ravager.

M. Planchon's investigations in this
country fully corroborate Prof. Riley's ob-
servations as to the identity of the Euro-
pean and American insect, and as to the
comparative immunity of certain American
grape-vines. The Missouri entomologist's
discovery of a species of acarus, which is
the deadly enemy of the phylloxera, has at-
tracted much attention abroad, and M. Plan-
chon takes a supply of acari back with him
to France, hoping by their aid to check the
career of the destroying insect.

For five years, every remedy that ima-
gination could suggest, under the stimulus
of a reward of 20,000 francs, has been tried

382

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

in France, but hitherto without success.
The latest remedy, one from which great
results were expected, is sulphuret of car-
bon. It was held that this substance is
fatal to the phylloxera, but perfectly harmless
to the vines. As to the first point, there ap-
pears to be no reason to question the benefi-
cial effects of the sulphuret, but not so with
regard to the second, if we may put any
faith in the experiments of Lecoq de Bois-
baudrant. According to him, sulphuret of
carbon kills the Tine as well as its parasite.

Bligrations of Insects.— The following
historical facts will give an idea of the
enormous magnitude sometimes attained by
migrating swarms of insects. After the
defeat of Poltava, while retreating through
Bessarabia, Charles XII.'s army was march-
ing through a defile, when suddenly the
men and horses were brought to a halt, being
blinded by a living hail precipitated from a
thick cloud which intercepted the light of
the sun. The coming of the locusts was
heralded by a whizzing sound like that
which precedes a storm of wind, and the
noise of their wings and of their bodies as
they clashed together was greater than the
roar of breakers on the sea-shore ! Gener-
al Levaillant saw, at Philippeville, Algeria,
a cloud of locusts twenty to twenty-five
miles in length, which, when it descended
to the earth, formed a layer over an inch in
thickness.

Toward the close of 1864 the cotton
plantations of Senegal were destroyed, and
a living cloud was seen to pass over the
comitry from morning till night : the rate
at which it moved showed that it was
about fifty miles long ; and this was only
the vanguard, for when the sun went down
a still denser cloud was moving on. The
English traveller, Barrow, states that in
Southern Africa, in the year 1797, these in-
sects covered the ground to the extent of
two square miles, and that having been
driven by the wind toward the sea, they
formed a drift near the coast nearly four
feet in depth and fifty miles long! After
the wind changed, the stench of their putre-
fying carcasses was recognized at the dis-
tance of a hundred and fifty miles.

The famines produced by the voracity
of these acridians are not the only evils

they cause to men and animals ; a pesti-
lential epidemic is oftentimes the result of
the foul emanations from their rotting bod-
ies. The invasions of these insects are
veritable national calamities. In 1833 China
was ravaged by them, and the sun and
moon were obscured. Wherever they alight-
ed the finest and richest crops were instantly
devoured and the fields left bare ; even the
contents of the barns were to a great extent
consumed by them. The people fled in
alarm to the mountains. In the submerged
districts, where there were no crops to de-
vour, the locusts penetrated into the houses
and destroyed the people's clothing. These
ravages, which began in April, continued
without interruption till the season of frost
and snow.

Animal-like Functions of Plants. — In

the Biological Section of the late meeting of
the British Association, Dr. Burdon Sander-
son read a paper on the electrical phenom-
ena which accompany the contractions of
the leaf of Yenus's-Flytrap. It was re-
marked that in those structures in the
higher animals which are endowed with
the property of contracting when stimulated,
viz., nerve and muscle, this property is
associated with the existence of voltaic cur-
rents which have definite directions in the
tissue. It became suspected that such was
similarly true of the Sundew (Drosera), and
Veuus's-Flytrap {Dionoea muscipula) and
some other plants. Mr. Darwin furnished
the plants necessary for experiment to Dr.
Sanderson in the laboratory of University
College, London. The result is, that the an-
ticipations of the existence of voltaic cur-
rents in these parts have been confirmed,
particularly in the leaf of Dioncea. The
doctor has established the fact that these
currents are subject, in all respects in which
they have been investigated, to the same
laws as those of muscle and nerve. This
may be regarded as one of the most inter-
esting of recent biological discoveries.

Nataral Varieties. — Nature's best efforts
in the vegetable kingdom sometimes seem to
be reached per solium, and without any aid
from man. Recently in England a first-class
certificate was given by the Royal Horticul-
tural Society for a fine variety of gooseberry,

NOTES.

383

under the name " Kerson's Seedling Goose-
berry." It turns out to be no garden seed-
ling, but a wild one originally taken from a
common hedge in the neighborhood of Peter-
borough. In like manner, the celebrated
Bess Pool apple was originally discovered
in a wood near Nottingham. It is note-
worthy that the famous Lawton blackberry
of this country was found wild at New
Rochelle, in Westchester County, New York.
It may be remarked of all these, and similar
seedlings, that their specific excellence can-
not be propagated by seeds but only by cut-
tings, stolons, or grafts.

Malformations. — Last winter one of our
pupils at New Brunswick, N. J., communi-
cated the fact that he had purchased, the
previous autumn, of a huckster-woman in
Newark, a pair of young ducks, each having
four wings. The woman had twelve for
sale, and said that the eggs were laid by a
well-formed bird ; that she hatched a brood
of sixteen, every one of them having four
wings. The youth said that his birds used
both pairs of wings in flying, that is, in mov-
ing rapidly on the surface of the pond.
They did not live long. Whether this was
due to any defective vitality in the birds,
or to any extraneous cause, could not be
learned. But we turn from these tradition-
ary facts to a catastrophe, which our own
eyes have inspected, as having befallen a
family of cats.

About a mile and a half from Freehold,
N. J., live an intelligent family who have
had for several years an annual litter of
malformed cats. Several years ago a young
male cat was brought from Allentown, some
twenty miles distant. This cat had a de-
formity in one front-foot, which had six
toes. It coupled with a cat of normal form
and parts, and a litter of four or five was
the result, all with six-toed front-feet. The
she-cat became troublesome, getting into
the pantry, and so was sent oflf. The kit-
tens were disposed of, except one. With
this the paternal cat united, and the result
was four kittens, each having six toes on
each fore-foot, and five on each hind-foot.
This intermixing, as I understand, by this
Grimalkin Turk, has gone on for some four
years, and to-day, July 29th, I examined
one of his daughters, some three months

old, which has six toes on each of the hind-
feet, and seven toes on each of the fore-feet.
The fore-feet are bifurcated ; that is, they
have, as it were, each two paws to one foot,
the outer paw of each foot being much the
larger, and having four toes ; and the inner,
or smaller paw, on each foot, having three
toes. This kitten was one of a litter of
four, all malformed precisely alike. On
some points I could not get the exact in-
formation desired. But I should think that
the vitality of these cats is becoming less
and less, as they do not become common.
To me it seems astounding when I attempt
to conceive of the physical equation which
enters into this erratic conception — the
minuteness of the abnormal material which,
plus the normal substance as imparted by
the spermatozoon, gives the initial impulse
to a result so eccentric. If, as Goethe de-
clared, " it is in her monstrosities that
Nature reveals to us her secrets," one would
like to know something of the mode and
motive of such a distribution of the life-
force. During our inspection of Miss Tab-
bie it was all very well so long as we stroked
her back with one hand. She purred, as
expressive of true feline luxuriousness ;
and, what is not common, she even licked
the other hand as indicating affection. But,
when we meddled with her extremities, she
evidently regarded it as taking personal
liberties with unpleasant peculiarities ; and
instantly rewarded our duplicity by invest-
ing in our hand the seven talons concealed
in that duplex napkin. — Samuel Lockwood,
in American Naturalist.

NOTES.

Prof. Eaton, of Yale College, kindly
calls attention to an inaccuracy in the
sketch of Dr. J. D. Hooker published in The
Popular Science Monthly for December,
1873. It is there stated that Dr. Hooker
was an only son. Prof. Eaton writes : " In
' Filices Exoticse,' p. 36, Sir W. J. Hooker
refers to the kindness formerly shown by Dr.
McFadyen, of Kingston, Jamaica, ' to a be-
loved son who fell a sacrifice to yellow fever
while under his hospitable roof The widow
of this son, Mrs. William Hooker, is still
living at Glasgow, and I saw her several
times at Dr. Hooker's house in Kew, in
1866." Prof. Eaton adds the interesting
fact that the grandfather of Dr. Hooker
on his mother's side, Dawson Turner, Esq.,

384

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

was an excellent botanist, and the author
of " Spicilegiura MusculogiiB Hibernicfe," a
treatise on Irish mosses, published at Yar-
mouth in 1804. The earliest botanical writ-
ings of the elder Hooker were, to a great
extent, also upon mosses.

In the year ending April 1, 1873, there
were bred in the Central Park Menagerie, 2
lions, 2 pumas, 1 leopard, 1 spotted hyena
(the first born in America), 1 camel, and 1
Cape buffalo. The total number of animals
in the menagerie is now : quadrupeds, 199 ;
birds, 347 ; reptiles, 35. The additions
during the year numbered 48, viz., 25 mam-
mals, 21 birds, and 2 reptiles.

The Minnesota State Geologist is au-
thority for the statement that there is
enough iron-ore in the neighborhood of the
Black River Falls, in that State, to supply
the whole demand of the Union for the next
ten centuries.

The following extract from a letter re-
cently received in London, and sent by Dr.
Beke to the Times, gives the latest infor-
mation regarding the whereabouts and con-
dition of Dr. Livingstone :

" BoBNA, August 12, 18V3.

" I am proceeding, to-day or to-morrow,
to Munuco, Upper Congo. In a few days
we expect there the Livingstone Expedition,
which cannot proceed from St. Salvador.
Livingstone himself is a prisoner in a town,
twenty days from here, but is entirely with-
out means to pay his ransom. Assistance
has, however, been sent to him, and he may
be here in a month or so."

In the department of the Vienna Expo-
sition devoted to medical and surgical in-
struments and preparations, certain anatom-
ical specimens exhibited by Dr. Marini,
of Naples, have attracted special attention.
He has invented processes for the preserva-
tion of bodies, both in the leathery or tanned
state, and in the natural condition of the tis-
sues. In the latter case, the tissues preserve
their natural softness and even their trans-
parency. Among the specimens exhibited,
was a foot which had been prepared in 1864.
On making an incision into this, the under-
lying tissues appeared to be as fresh as in a
cadaver one day old. The tendons, liga-
ments, and fatty tissue, preserved all their
usual characters, the muscles alone being
in a slightly inferior state of preservation.
The same solutions which are used for em-
balming bodies may be employed in the
treatment of malignant ulcers. For this
purpose they are largely diluted. Dr. Ma-
rini has made experiments in the Naples
Hospital, with a view to determine the value
of his solutions in such cases, and the re-
port of the surgeons as to the efficacy of the
treatment is very favorable.

Dr. F. Grace-Calvert, the eminent chem-
ist, died, Friday, October 24th, aged fifty-
nine. He received his early education in
France, and received the appointment as
assistant chemist at the Gobelin tapestry-
works, under his master, Chevreul. In 1846
he was appointed Professor of Chemistry
to the Manchester Royal Institution, a post
which he held down to his death. As an
analytical chemist his renown was world-
wide.

During the past summer, two ship-loads
of oysters were imported into England from
Virginia for transplantation. If this ven-
ture proves a success, eight or ten steamers
will be sent from England to Hampton
Roads for oysters next season.

According to statistics collected by Dr.
T. Harrington Tuke, the number of lunatics
in England increased during the ten years
ending June, 1873, from 1.86 per thousand
of the population to 2.58. Dr. Tuke is in-
clined to attribute this increase to the ad-
vance in wages, which allows the laboring
class enlarged means of undue indulgence

The trials at Williamshaven with the
new Hertz torpedo gave the most surprising
results, the torpedoes disposing of the ob-
jects attached with the utmost punctuality
and in a strikingly summary manner. Their
construction is as yet a secret ; but there is
no doubt that the German navy is now in
possession of a most powerful and destruc-
tive weapon which will not only effectually
protect the coasts of the empire, but will
also enable the government to employ all its
resources in building ships for aggressive
purposes.

The Peruvian Amazons Exploring Com-
mission lately issued a report, from which
it appears that malarious fever prevails on
both banks of the mighty river, causing a
large mortality among the native popula-
tion. Adults and children are given to the
filthy habit of geophagy or clay-eating, a
practice productive of innumerable physical
evils. It is common to find on the Amazons
children of three years of age smoking, and
not averse to rum.

Prop. Palmieri, director of the Obser-
vatory of Mount Vesuvius, has constructed
for the Empress of Russia a metallic ther-
mometer, which gives a signal at every ap-
preciable change of temperature. The ap-
paratus is so sensitive that the indicator Is
almost always moving. When the varia-
tions of temperature reach a certain de-
gree, little bells begin to ring, and notice is
thus given of the rising or falling of the
mercury. The instrument also marks the
highest and lowest degrees of temperature
which have taken place during a certain pe-
riod.

RICHARD ANTHONY PROCTOR.

THE

POPULAR SOIENOE
MONTHLY.

FEBRUARY, 1874.

THE CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES.

By C. a. young,
professor of astbonomt in dartmouth college.

WHAT we see of the sun under ordinary circumstances is but a
fraction of his total bulk. While by far the greater portion
of the solar mass is included within the photosphere, the blazing cloud-
layer which seems to form the sun's true surface, and is the principal
source of his light and heat, yet the larger portion of his volume lies
without, and constitutes an atmosphere whose diameter is at least
double, and its bulk therefore sevenfold that of the central globe.

Atmosphere, however, is hardly the proper term ; for this outer
envelope, though gaseous in the main, is not spherical, but has an out-
line exceedingly irregular and variable. It seems to be made up not
of overlying strata of different density, but rather of flames, beams,
and streamers, as transient and unstable as those of our own aurora
borealis. It is divided into two portions, separated by a boundary as
definite, though not so regular, as that which parts them both from the
photosphere. The outer and far more extensive portion, which in
texture and rarity seems to resemble the tails of comets, and may al-
most, Mdthout exaggeration, be likened to " the stuff that dreams are
made of," is known as the " coronal atmosphere," since to it is chiefly
due the " corona " or glory which surrounds the darkened sun during
an eclipse, and constitutes the most impressive feature of the occasion.

At its base, and in contact witli the photosphere, is what resembles
a sheet of scarlet fire. The appearance, which probably indicates a
fact, is as if countless jets of heated gas were issuing through vents
and spiracles over the whole surface, thus clothing it with flame
which heaves and tosses like the blaze of a conflagration.

This is the " chromosphere " (or chromatosphere, if one is fastidi-
ous as to the proper formation of a Greek derivative), a name first
proposed by Frankland and Lockyer in 1869, and intended to signify
VOL. IV — 25

386 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

" color-sphere," in allusion to the vivid redness of the stratum caused
by the predominance of hydrogen in these flames and clouds.

Here and there masses of this hydrogen mixed with other sub-
stances rise to a great height, ascending far above the general level
into the coronal regions, where they float like clouds, or are torn to
pieces by contending currents. These cloud-masses are known as
solar " prominences," or " protuberances," a non-committal sort of ap-
pellation applied in 1842, when they first attracted any considerable
attention, and while it was a warmly-disputed question whether they
were solar, lunar, phenomena of our own atmosphere, or even mere
optical illusions. It is unfortunate that no more appropriate and
graphic name has yet been found for objects of such wonderful beauty
and interest.

Until recently, the solar atmosphere could be seen only when the
sun itself was hidden by the moon, a few minutes in a century. Now,
however, the spectroscope has brought the chromosphere and the
prominences within the range of daily observation, so that they can
be studied with nearly the same facility as the spots and faculse, and a
fresh field of great interest and importance is thus opened to science.
But the corona as yet defies the new method, and can be seen only
during the fleeting moments of a solar eclipse.

It seems hardly possible that the ancients should have failed to no-
tice, even with the naked eye, in some one of the many eclipses on
record, the presence of blazing star-like objects around the edge of the
moon, but we find no mention of any thing of the kind, although the
corona is described as we see it now. On this ground some have sur-
mised that the sun has really undergone a change in modern times, and
that the chromosphere and prominences are a new development in the
solar history. But such mere negative evidence is altogether insuffi-
cient as a foundation for so important a conclusion.

The earliest recorded observation of the prominences is probably
that of Vassenius, a Swedish astronomer, who, during the total eclipse
of 1733, noticed three or four small pinkish clouds, entirely detached
from the limb of the moon, and, as he supposed, floating in the lunar
atmosphere. At that time this was the most natural interpretation of
the appearance, since the fact that the moon is without atmosphere was
not yet ascertained.

The Spanish admiral, Don Ulloa, in his account of the eclipse of
1778, describes a point of red light which made its appearance on the
western limb of the moon about a minute and a quarter before the
emergence of the sun. At first small and faint, it grew brighter and
brighter until extinguished by the returning sunlight. He supposed
that the phenomenon was caused by a hole or fissure in the body of
the moon ; but, with our present knowledge there can be no doubt
that it was simply a prominence gradually uncovered by her motion.

The chromosphere seems to have been seen even earlier than the

CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES. 387

prominences : thus Captain Stannyan, in a report on the eclipse of
1706, observed by him at Berne, noticed that the emersion of the sun
was preceded by a blood-red streak of light, visible for six or seven sec-
onds upon the western limb. Halley and Louville saw the same thing
in 1715. Halley says that two or three seconds before the emersion a
long and very narrow streak of a dusky but strong red light seemed
to color the dark edge of the moon on the western edge where the
sun was about to reappear. Louville's account agrees substantially,
and he further describes the precautions he used to satisfy himself that
the phenomenon was no mere optical illusion, nor due to any imperfec-
tion of his telescope.

In eclipses that followed that of 1733, the chromosphere and promi-
nences seem to have attracted but little attention, even if they were
observed at all. Something of the sort appears to have been noticed
by Ferrers in 1806, but the main interest of his observation lay in a
different direction.

In July, 1842, a great eclipse occurred, and the shadow of the
moon described a wide belt running across Southern France, Northern
Italy, and a portion of Austria. The eclipse was carefully observed
by many of the most noted astronomers of the world, and so com-
pletely had previous observations of the kind been forgotten, that the
prominences, which appeared then with great brilliance, were regarded
with extreme surprise, and became objects of warm discussion, not
only as to their cause and location, but even as to their very existence.
Some thought them mountains upon the sun, some that they were so-
lar flames, and others, clouds floating in the sun's atmosphere. Oth-
ers referred them to the moon, and yet others claimed that they were
mere optical illusions. At the eclipse of 1851 (in Sweden and Nor-
way), similar observations were repeated, and, as a result of the dis-
cussions and comparison of observations which followed, astronomers
generally became satisfied that the prominences are real phenomena
of the solar atmosphere, in many respects analogous to our terrestrial
clouds ; and several came more or less confidently to the conclusion,
now known to be true {see Grant's " History of Physical Astronomy "),
that the sun is entirely surrounded with a continuous stratum of the
same substance. Many, however, remained unconvinced : Faye, for
instance, still asserted them to be mere optical illusions, or mirages.

In the eclipse of 1860, photography was for the first time employed
on such an occasion with any thing like success. The results of Sec-
chi and De La Rue removed all remaining doubts as to the real exist-
ence and solar character of the objects in question, by exhibiting them
upon their plates gradually covered on one side and uncovered on the
other side of the sun by the outward progress of the moon.

Secchi thus sums up his conclusions, which have been justified in
almost all their details by later observations ; they require few and
sliirht corrections :

388 THE POPULAB SCIENCE MONTHLY.

1. The prominences are not mere optical illusions; they are real
phenomena pertaining to the sun. . . .

2. The prominences are collections of luminous matter of great
brilliance, and possessing remarkable photographic activity. This ac-
tivity is so great that many of them, which are visible in our photo-
graphs, could not be seen directly even with good instruments.

3. Some protuberances float entirely free in the solar atmosphere
like clouds. If they are variable in form, their changes are so gradual
as to be insensible in the space of ten minutes. (Generally, but by
no means always, true.)

4. Besides the isolated and conspicuous protuberances there is also
a layer of the same luminous substance which surrounds the whole
sun, and out of which the protuberances rise above the general level
of the solar surface. . . .

5. The number of the protuberances is indefinitely great. In direct
observation through the telescope the sun appeared surrounded with
flames too numerous to count. . . .

6. The height of the protuberances is very great, especially when
we take account of the portion hidden by the moon. One of them
had a height of at least three minutes, which indicates a real altitude
of more than ten times the earth's diameter. . . .

But their nature still remained a mystery; and no one could well
be blamed for thinking it must always remain so to some degree. At
that time it could hardly be hoped that Ave should ever be able to
ascertain their chemical constitution, and measure the velocities of
their motions. And yet this has been done. Before the great Indian
eclipse of August 18, 1868, the spectroscope had been invented (it
was, indeed, already in its infancy in 1860), and applied to astronomi-
cal research with the most astonishing and important results.

Every one is more or less familiar with the story of this eclipse.
Herschel, Tennant, Pogson, Rayet, and Janssen, all made substantially
the same report. They found the spectrum of the prominences ob-
served to consist of bright lines, and conspicuous among them were
the lines of hydrogen. There were some serious discrepancies, indeed,
among their observations, not only as to the number of the bright
lines seen, which is not to be wondered at, but as to their position.
Thus, Rayet (who saw more lines than any other) identified the red
line observed with B instead of C ; and all the observers mistook the
yellow line they saw for that of sodium.

Still, their observations, taken together, completely demonstrated
the fact that the prominences are enormous masses of highly-heated
gaseous matter, and that hydrogen is a main constituent.

Janssen went further. The lines he saw during the eclipse were
so brilliant that he felt sure he could see them again in the full sun-
light. He was prevented by clouds from trying the experiment the
same afternoon, after the close of the eclipse; but the next morning

b

CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES. 389

the sun rose unobscured, and, as soon as he had completed the neces-
sary adjustments, and directed his instrument to the portion of the
sun's limb where the day before the most brilliant prominence ap-
peared, the same lines came out again, clear and bright ; and now,
of course, there was no difficulty in determining at leisure, and with
almost absolute accuracy, their position in the spectrum. He immedi-
ately confirmed his first conclusion, that hydrogen is the most con-
spicuous component of the prominences, but found that the yellow line
must be referred to some difierent element than sodium, being some-
what more refrangible then the D lines.

He found also that, by slightly moving his telescope and causing
the image of the sun's limb to take difierent positions with reference
to the slit of his spectroscope, he could even trace out the form and
measure the dimensions of the prominences ; and he remained at his
station for several days, engaged in these novel and exceedingly
interesting observations.

Of course, he immediately sent home a report of his eclipse-work,
and of his new discovery, but, as his station at Guntoor, in Eastern
India, was farther from mail communication with Europe than those
upon the western coast of the peninsula, his letter did not reach
France until some week or two after the accounts of the other ob-
servers ; when it did arrive, it came to Paris, in company with a
communication from Mr. Lockyer, announcing the same discovery,
made independently, and even more creditably, since with Mr. Lock-
yer it was not suggested by any thing he had seen, but was thought
out from fundamental principles.

Nearly two years previously the idea had occurred to him (and, in-
deed, to others also, though he was the first to publish it), that if the
protuberances are gaseous, so as to give a spectrum of bright lines,
those lines ought to be visible in a spectroscope of sufficient power,
even in broad daylight. The principle is simply this :

Under ordinary circumstances the protuberances are invisible, for
the same reason as the stars, in the daytime : they are hidden by the
intense light reflected from the particles of our own atmosphere near
the sun's place in the sky, and, if we could only sufficiently weaken
this aerial illumination, without at the same time weakening their light,
the end would be gained. And the spectroscope accomplishes precisely
this very thing. Since the air-light is reflected sunshine, it of course pre-
sents the same spectrum as sunlight, a continuous band of color crossed
by dark lines. Now, this sort of spectrum is greatly weakened by
every increase of dispersive power, because the light is spread out into
a longer ribbon and made to cover a more extended area. On the
other hand, a spectrum of bright lines undergoes no such weakening
by an increase in the dispersive power of the spectroscope. The
bright lines are only more widely separated — not in the least diffused
or shorn of their brightness. If, then, the image of the sun, formed by

390 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

a telescope, be examined with a spectroscope, one might hope to see at
the edge of the disk the bright lines belonging to the spectrum of the
prominences, in case they are really gaseous.

Mr. Lockyer and Mr. Huggins both tried the experiment as early
as 1867, but without success; partly because their instruments had
not sufficient power to bring out the lines conspicuously, but more be-
cause they did not know whereabouts in the spectrum to look for
them, and were not even sure of their existence. At any rate, as soon
as the discovery was announced, Mr. Huggins immediately saw the
lines without difficulty, with the same instrument which had failed to
show them to him before. It is a fact, too often forgotten, that to per-
ceive a thing known to exist does not require one-half the instrumental
power or acuteness of sense as to discover it.

Mr. Lockyer, immediately after his suggestion was published, had
set about procuring a suitable instrument, and was assisted by a grant
from the treasury of the Royal Society. After a long delay, conse-
quent in part upon the death of the optician who had first undertaken
its construction, and partly due to other causes, he received the new
spectroscope just as the report of Herschel's and Tennant's observa-
tions reached England. Hastily adjusting the instrument, not yet
entirely completed, he at once applied it to his telescope, and without
difficulty found the lines, and verified their position. He immediately
also discovered them to be visible around the whole circumference of
the sun, and consequently that the protuberances are mere extensions
of a continuous solar envelope, to which, as mentioned above, was given
the name of Chromosphere. (He does not seem to have been aware
of the earlier and similar conclusions of Arago, Grant, Secchi, and
others.) He at once communicated his results to the Royal Society,
and also to the French Academy of Sciences, and, by one of the curious
coincidences which so frequently occur, his letter and Janssen's were
read at the same meeting, and within a few minutes of each other.

The discovery excited the greatest enthusiasm, and in 1872 the
French Government struck a gold medal in honor of the two astrono-
mers, bearing their united effigies.

It immediately occurred to several observers, Janssen, Lockyer,
Zollner, and others, that by giving a rapid motion of vibration or rota-
tion to the slit of the spectroscope it would be possible to perceive
the whole contour and detail of a protuberance at once, but it seems
to have been reserved for Mr. Huggins to be the first to show practi-
cally that a still simpler device would answer the same purpose. With
a spectroscope of sufficient dispersive power it is only necessary to
widen the slit of the instrument by the proper adjusting screw. As
the slit is widened, more and more of the protuberance becomes visible,
and if not too large the whole can be seen at once : with the widening
of the slit, however, the brightness of the background increases, so
that the finer details of the object are less clearly seen, and a limit

CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES. 391

is soon reached beyond which further widening is disadvantageous.
The higher the dispersive power of the spectroscope the wider the slit
that can be used, and the larger the protuberance that can be exam-
ined as a whole.

Fig. 1.

HuGQiNs's First Observation op a Prominence in fitll Sunshine.

Mr. Huggins's first successful observation of the form of a solar
protuberance was made on February 13, 1869. Fig. 1, copied from
the Proceedings of the Royal Society, presents his delineation of
what he saw. As his instrument had only the dispersive power of
two prisms, and included in its field of view a large portion of the
spectrum at once, he found it necessary to supplement its powers by
using a I'ed glass to cut off stray light of other colors, and by insert-
ing a diaphragm at the focus of the small telescope of the spectroscope
to limit the field of view to the portion of the spectrum immediately ad-
joining the C line. With the instruments now in use, these precautions
are seldom necessary.

Fig. 2.

Spectroscope, with Train of Pkisms.

It may be noticed, in passing, that Mr. Huggins had previously
(and has subsequently) made many experiments with different absorb-
ing media, in hopes of finding some substance which, by cutting off all
light of other color than that emitted by the prominences, should ren-
der them visible in the telescope ; thus far, however, without success.

The spectroscopes used by different astronomers for observations
of this sort differ greatly in form and power. Fig. 2 represents the

392

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

one employed at the Shattuck Observatory of Dartmouth College, and
most of our American observatories are supplied with instruments
similarly arranged. The light passes from the collimator c, through
the train of prisms p, near their bases, and, by two reflections in a rec-
tangular prism, r, is transferred to the upper story, so to speak, of
the prism-train, and made to return to the telescope ?, finally reach-
ing the eye at e. It thus twice traverses a train of six prisms, and
the dispersive power of the instrument is twelve times as great as it
would be with only one prism. The diameter of the collimator is a
little less than an inch, and its length 10 inches. The whole instru-
ment, powerful as it is, only weighs about 14 pounds, and occupies a
space of about 15 in. x 6 in. x 5 in. It is also automatic, i. e., the tan-
gent screw m keeps the train of prisms adjusted to their position of
minimum deviation by the same movement which brings the different
portions of the spectrum to the centre of the field of view.

The spectroscope is attached to the equatorial telescope, to which
it belongs, by means of the clamping rings a, a. These slide upon a
stout metal rod, firmly fastened to the telescope in such a way that
the slit s, of the instrument, can be placed exactly at the focus of the
object-glass, where the image of the sun is formed.'

The telescope is directed so that the solar image shall fall with
that portion of its limb which is to be examined just tangent to the
opened slit, as in Fig. 3, which represents the slit-plate of the spec-
troscope of its actual size, with the image of the sun in position for
observation just touching the rectangular opening formed on widening
the slit by its adjusting screw.

Opened Slit or the Spectroscope.

If, now, a prominence exists at this part of the sun's limb (as would
probably be the case, considering the proximity of the spot shown in
Fig. 3), and if the spectroscope itself is so adjusted that the C line
falls in the centre of the field of view, then, on looking into the eye-piece,
one will see something much like Fig. 4. The red portion of the

' The writer has recently found that a so-called diffraction-grating may take the place
of the train of prisms in spectroscopes designed for simply viewing the prominences.
With a grating ruled upon speculum metal, having 6,480 lines to the inch (for which he
is indebted to the skill and kindness of Mr. Rutherfurd), he is able to observe the forms
and motions of these objects nearly as well as with the spectroscope described in the text.

CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES. 393

spectrum will stretch athwart the field of view like a scarlet ribbon,
with a darkish band across it, and in that band will appear the promi-
nences, like scarlet clouds ; so like our own terrestrial clouds, indeed,
in form and texture, that the resemblance is quite startling : one
might almost think he was looking out through a partly-opened door
upon a sunset sky, except that there is no variety or contrast of color ;
all the cloudlets are of the same pure scarlet hue. Along the edge of
the opening is seen the chromosphere, more brilliant than the clouds
which rise from it or float above it, and for the most part made up of
minute tonsfues and filaments.

Spectroscopic Aspect

If the spectroscope is adjusted upon the F line, instead of C, then
a similar image of the prominences and chromosphere is seen, only
blue instead of scarlet ; usually, however, this blue image is somewhat
less perfect in its details and definition, and is therefore less used for
observation. Similar effects are obtained by means of the yellow line
near D, and the violet line near G. By setting the spectroscope upon
this latter line and attaching a small camera to the eye-piece, it is even
possible to photograph a bright protuberance; but the light is so
feeble, the image so small, the time of exposure needed so long, and
the requisite accuracy of motion in the clock-work which drives the
telescope so difficult of attainment, that thus far no pictures of any
real value have been obtained in this manner.

Prof. Winlock and Mr. Lockyer have attempted, by using, in-
stead of the ordinary slit, an annular opening, to obtain a view of the
whole circumference of the sun at once, and have pai'tially succeeded.
Undoubtedly, with a spectroscope of sufficient power, and adjustments
delicate enough, the thing can be done ; but as yet no very satisfactory
results appear to have been reached. We are still obliged to ex-
amine the circumference of the sun piecemeal, so to speak, read-

394

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

justing the instrument at each point, to make the slit tangential to
the limb.

The number of protuberances of considerable magnitude (exceed-
ing 10,000 miles in altitude), visible at any one time on the circum-
ference of the sun, is never very great, rarely reaching twenty-five or
thirty ; perhaps during the past few years it would most commonly
lie between ten and twenty. At present, as the number of the spots
decreases, the number of the prominences seems also to be diminishing,
and within a few months there have been occasions when a careful
search revealed only three or four.

Their distribution on the sun's surface is in some respects similar
to that of the spots, but with important differences. The spots are
confined within 40" of the sim's equator, being most numerous at a
solar latitude of about 20° on each hemisphere. Xow, the protuber-
ances are most numerous precisely where the spots are most abundant,
but they do not disappear at a latitude of 40° ; they are found even at
the poles, and from the latitude of 60° actually increase in number to
a latitude of about Vo^.

Relative Frequency of Prottjberasces and Sun-Spots.

The annexed diagram, Fig. 5, represents the relative frequency of
the protuberances and spots on the different portions of the solar sur-
face. On the left side is given the result of Carrington's observation
of 1,414 spots between 1853 and 1861, and on the right the result of
Secchi's observations of 2,767 * protuberances in 1871. The length of

' The 2,767 prominences are not all different ones. If any of the prominences ob-
served on one day remained visible the next, they were recorded afresh ; and, as a promi-

CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES. 395

each radial line represents the number of spots or protuberances ob-
served at each particular latitude on a scale of a quarter of an inch to
the hundred ; for example, Secchi gives 228 protuberances as the num-
ber observed during the period of his work between 10° and 20° of
south latitude, and the corresponding line drawn at 15° south, on the
left-hand side of the figure, is therefore made fff or .57 of an inch
long. The other lines are laid off in the same way, and thus the irregu-
lar curve drawn through their extremities represents to the eye the
relative frequency of these phenomena in the different solar latitudes.
The dotted line on the right-hand side represents in the same manner
and on the same scale the distribution of the larger protuberances,
having an altitude of more than 1', or 27,000 miles.

A mere inspection of the diagram shows at once that, while the
prominences may, and in fact often do, have a close connection with
the spots, they are entirely independent phenomena.

A careful study of the subject shows that they are much more close-
ly related to the faculse. In many cases at least, faculae, when followed
to the limb of the sun, have been found to be surrounded by promi-
nences, and there is reason to suppose that the fact is a general one.
The spots, on the other hand, when they reach the border of the sun's
image, are commonly surrounded by prominences more or less com-
pletely, but seldom overlaid by them. Indeed, Respighi asserts (and
the most careful observations we have been able to make confirm his
statement) that as a general rule the chromosphere is considerably de-
pressed immediately over a spot. Secchi, however, denies this.

The protuberances differ greatly in magnitude. The average
depth of the chromosphere is not far from 10" or 12", or about 6,000
or 6,000 miles, and it is not, therefore, customary to note as a promi-
nence any cloud with an elevation of less than 15" or 20" — 7,000 to
9,000 miles. Of the 2,767 already quoted, 1,964 attained an altitude
of 40", or 18,000 miles, and it is worthy of notice that the smaller
ones are so few, only about one-third of the whole: 751, or nearly
one-fourth of the whole, reached a height of over 1', or 28,000 miles ;
the precise number which reached greater elevations is not mentioned,
but several exceeded 3', or 84,000 miles. There ai-e numerous instances
on record, by different observers, of protuberances exceeding 100,000
miles, and a single instance, observed by the writer, in which the
enormous altitude of 7' 49", or 211,000 miles, was attained.

In their form and structure the protuberances differ as widely as
in their magnitude. Two principal classes are recognized by all ob-
servers, the quiescent, cloud-formed, or hydrogenous, and the eruptive
or metallic. By Secchi these are each further subdivided into several

nence near the pole would be carried but slowly out of sight by the sun's rotation, it is
thus easy to see how the number of prominences recorded in the polar regions is so large,
notwithstanding the smaller area of each zone of 5° width, as compared with a similar
zone near the equator.

396

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

eruptrt; prominences.

Three figures, of the same prominence,
seen July 25, 1872.

^jjb^i^J^iMmi^

As SEEN AT 2.15 P. M.

Sheaf and Volutes.

SEEN AT 2.45 P. M.

As SEEN AT 3.30 p. M.

100.000 miles to the inch.

sub-classes or varieties, between which, however, it is not always easy
to maintain the distinctions.

The quiescent prominences in form and texture resemble, with al-
most perfect exactness, our terrestrial clouds, and differ among them-
selves as much and in the same manner. The familiar cirrus and
stratus types are very common, the former especially, while the cumu-
lus and cumulo-stratus are less frequent. The protuberances of this
class are often of enormous magnitude, especially in their horizontal
extent (but the highest elevations are attained by those of the erup-
tive order), and are comparatively permanent, remaining often for
hours and days without serious change ; near the poles they some-
times persist through a whole solar revolution of twenty-seven days.

CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES. 397

Sometimes they appear to lie upon the limb of the sun like a bank
of clouds in the horizon ; probably because they are so far from the
edge of the disk that only their upper portions are in sight. When
seen in their full extent they are ordinarily connected to the under-
lying chromosphere by slender columns, which are usually smallest
at the base, and appear often to be made up of separate filaments
closely intertwined, and expanding upward. Sometimes the whole
under surface is fringed with down-hanging filaments, which remind
one of a summer shower falling from a heavy thunder-cloud. Some-
times they float entirely free from the chromosphere ; indeed, as a
general rule, the layer clouds are attended by detached cloudlets for
the most part horizontal in their arrangement.

The figui'es give an idea of some of the general appearances of
this class of prominences, but their delicate, filmy beauty can be ade-
quately rendered only by a far more elaborate style of engraving.

Their spectrum is usually very simple, consisting of the four lines
of hydrogen and the orange D' — hence the appellation hydrogenous.
Occasionally the sodium and magnesium lines also appear, and that
even near the summit of the clouds ; and this phenomenon was so
much more frequently observed in the clear atmosphere of Sherman as
to suggest that, if the power of our spectroscopes were sufliciently in-
creased, it would cease to be unusual.

The genesis of this sort of prominence is problematical. They
have been commonly looked upon as the debris and relics of eruptions,
consisting of gases which have been ejected from beneath the solar
surface, and then abandoned to the action of the currents of the sun's
upper atmosphere. But near the poles of the sun distinctively erup-
tive prominences never appear, and there is no evidence of aerial cur-
rents which would transport to those regions matters ejected nearer
the sun's equator. Indeed, the whole appearance of these objects indi-
cates that they originate where we sec them. Possibly, although in
the polar regions tliere are no violent eruptions, there yet may be a
quiet outpouring of heated hydrogen sufficient to account for their
production — an outrush issuing through the smaller pores of the solar
surface, which abound near the poles as well as elsewhere.

But Secchi reports an observation (not yet, however, confirmed by
other spectroscopists, so far as we know) which, if correct, puts a very
different face upon the matter. He has seen isolated cloudlets form
and grow spontaneously without any perceptible connection with
the chromosphere or other masses of hydrogen, just as in our own
atmosphere clouds form from aqueous vapor, already present in the
air, but invisible until some local cooling or change of pressure causes
its condensation. Granting the correctness of the observation, these
prominences are, therefore, formed by some local heating or other
luminous excitement of hydrogen already present, and not by any
transportation and aggregation of materials from a distance. The

398

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

QUIESCENT PROMINENCES.
Scale. 75,000 miles to the inch.

Filamentary.

precise nature of the action which produces this effect it would not be
possible to assign at present; but it is worthy of note that the obser-
vations of the eclipse of 1871, by Lockyer and others, rather favor
this view, by showing that hydrogen, in a feebly luminous condition,
is found all around the sun, and at a very great altitude — far above
the ordinary range of prominences.

The eruptive prominences are very different, consisting usually of
brilliant spikes or jets, which change their form and brightness very
rapidly. For the most part they attain altitudes of not more than
20,000 or 30,000 miles, but occasionally they rise far higher than even

CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES. 399

the largest of the clouds of the preceding class. Their spectrum is
very complicated, especially near their base, and often filled with
bright lines, those of sodium, magnesium, barium, iron, and titanium,
being especially conspicuous, while calcium, chromium, manganese,
and probably sulphur, are by no means rare, and for this reason Sec-
chi calls them metallic prominences.

They usually appear in the immediate neighborhood of a spot,
never occurring very near the solar poles. Their form and appearance
change with great rapidity, so that the motion can almost be seen
with the eye — an interval of fifteen or twenty minutes being often
sufiicient to transform, quite beyond recognition, a mass of these
flames 50,000 miles high, and sometimes embracing the whole period
of their complete development or disappearance. Sometimes they
consist of pointed rays, diverging in all directions, like hedgehog
spines. Sometimes they look like flames ; sometimes like sheaves of
grain ; sometimes like whirling water-spouts, capped with a great
cloud ; occasionally they present most exactly the appearance of jets
of liquid fire, rising and falling in graceful parabolas ; frequently they
carry on their edges spirals like the volutes of an Ionic column ; and
continually they detac'h filaments which rise to a great elevation,
gradually expanding and growing fainter as they ascend, until the eye
loses them. Our figures present some of the more common and typi-
cal forms, and illustrate their rapidity of change, but there is no end
to the number of curious and interesting appearances which they ex-
hibit under varying circumstances.

The velocity of the motions often exceeds 100 miles a second, and
sometimes, though very rarely, reaches 200 miles. That we have to
do with actual motions, and not with mere change of place of a lumi-
nous form, is rendered certain by the fact that the lines of the spectrum
are often displaced and distorted in a manner to indicate that some of
the cloud-masses are moving either toward or from the earth (and, of
course, tangential to the solar surface) with similar swiftness.

When we come to inquire what forces impart such a velocity, the
subject becomes diflScult. If we could admit that the surface of the
sun is solid, or even liquid, as Zollner thinks, then it would be easy
to understand the phenomena as eruptions, analogous to those of vol-
canoes on the earth, though on the solar scale. But it is next to
certain that the sun is mainly gaseous, and that its luminous surface
or photosphere is a sheet of incandescent clouds, like those of the
earth, except that water-droplets are replaced by droplets of the
metals ; and it is difficult to see how such a shell could exert sufficient
confining power upon the imprisoned gases to explain such tremendous
velocity in the ejected matter.

Possibly the difficulty may be met by taking account of the enor-
mous amount of condensation which must be going on within the pho-
tosphere. To supply the heat which the sun throws off (enough to melt

400

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Scale, 75,000 miles to the inch.
Fig. 18. Fio. 01

Prominence as it appeared at half-past

TWELVE o'clock, SEPTEMBER 7, 1871.

Vertical Filaments.
Fig. 19.

As THE ABOVE APPEARED HALF AN HOUR LATER,
WHEN THE UPEUSHING HYDROGEN ATTAINED A

Height of more than 200,000 Mn-ES.

Spot near the Sttn's Limb, with accompanying
Jets of Hydrogen, as seen October 5, 1871.

each minute a shell of ice nearly forty feet thick over his entire surface)
would require the condensation of enough vapor to make a sheet of
liquid five feet thick in the same time — supposing, that is, the latent
heat of the solar vapors not greater than that of water vapors. This,
of course, is uncertain, but, so far as we know, very few if any vapors
contain more latent heat than that of water, and we may therefore
consider it roughly correct to estimate the continuous production of

CHROMOSPHERE AND SOLAR PROMINENCES. 401

liquid as measured by tlie quantity named. Now, on the surface of
the earth a rain-storm which deposits two inches in an hour is very
uncommon — in such a storm the water falls in sheets. It is easy to
see, then, that the quantity of liquid pouring from the solar clouds is
so enormous that the drops could not be expected to remain separate,
but must almost certainly unite into more or less continuous masses
or sheets, between and through which the gases ascending from be-
neath must make their way. And since the weight of the vapors
which ascend must continually equal that of the products of conden-
sation which are falling, it is further evident that the upward currents,
rushing through contracted channels, must move with enormous
velocity, and therefore, of course, that the pressure and temperature
must rapidly inci-ease from the free surface downward. It would
seem that thus we might explain how the upper surface of the hydro-
gen atmosphere is tormented by the up-rush from below, and how
gaseous masses, thrown up from beneath, should, in the prominences,
present the appearances which have been described. Nor would it be
strange if veritable explosions should occur in the quasi pipes or chan-
nels through which the vapors rise, when, under the varying circum-
stances of pressure and temperature, the mingled gases reach their
point of combination ; explosions which would fairly account for such
phenomena as those represented on page 400, when clouds of hydrogen
were thrown to an elevation of more than 200,000 miles with a velocity
which must have exceeded at first 200 miles per second, and very
probably, talcing into account the resistance of the solar atmosphere,
may, as Mr. Proctor has shown, have exceeded 500 ; a velocity sufficient
to hurl a dense material entirely clear of the power of the sun's attrac-
tion, and send it out into space, never to return.

But our limits forbid indulgence in such speculations ; nor can we
stop to discuss the interesting question concerning the relation between
these solar eruptions and magnetic storms upon the earth. It must
suffice to say that, while it is not probable that our greater magnetic
disturbances are caused directly by solar influence, it is very nearly
certain that every violent paroxysm upon the sun is distinctly and
immediately responded to by our magnetometers.

Whether these solar storms produce any other effects upon the
earth, has not been ascertained. Some are so sanguine as to expect
that iii the study of these phenomena will be found the key to
many puzzling problems of terrestrial meteorology. We cannot say
that we share the expectation ; but the subject is certainly worthy of
careful examination, and it is not possible to doubt that faithful labor
in so new and fertile a field will l?e rewarded, if not with precisely the
result anticipated, yet with some rich harvest.
VOL, IV. — 26

402 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

KEPLIES TO CRITICISMS.

By HEKBEKT SPENCER.

OBJECTIONS of another, though allied, class have been made in
a review of the " Principles of Psychology, " by Mr. H. Sidg-
-^yick — a critic whose remarks on questions of mental philosophy
always deserve respectful consideration.

Mr. Sidgwick's chief aim is, to show what he calls " the mazy in-
consistency of his [my] metaphysical results." More specifically he
expresses thus the proposition he seeks to justify : " His view of the
subject appears to have a fundamental incoherence, which shows itself
in various ways on the surface of his exposition, but of which the
root lies much deeper, in his inability to harmonize different lines of
thought."

Before dealing with the reasons given for this judgment, let me
say that, in addition to the value which candid criticisms have, as
showing where more explanation is needed, they are almost indis-
pensable as revealing to a writer incongruities he had not perceived.
Especially where, as in this case, the subject-matter has many aspects,
and where the words supplied by our language are so inadequate in
number that, to avoid cumbrous circumlocution, they have to be used
in senses that vary according to the context, it is extremely difficult
to avoid imperfections of statement. But while I acknowledge sundry
such imperfections and the resulting incongruities, I cannot see that
these are, as Mr. Sidgwick says, fundamental. Contrariwise, their
superficiality seems to me proved by the fact that they may be recti-
fied without otherwise altering the expositions in which they occur.
Here is an instance :

Mr. Sidgwick points out that, when treating of the " Data of Psy-
chology," I have said (in § 56) that, though we reach inferentially
" the belief that mind and nervous action are the subjective and ob-
jective faces of the same thing, we remain utterly incapable of seeing,
and even of imagining, how the two are related " (I quote the passage
more fully than he does). He then goes on to show that in the " Spe-
cial Synthesis," where I have sketched the evolution of intelligence
under its objective aspect, as displayed in the processes by which be-
ings of various grades adjust themselves to surrounding actions, I
"speak as if" we could see how consciousness "naturally arises at a
particular stage " of nervous action. The chapter here referred to is
one describing that " differentiation of the psychical from the physical
life " which accompanies advancing organization, and more especially
advancing development of the nervous system. In it I have aimed to
show that, while the changes constituting physical life continue to be

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 403

characterized by tlie simultaneity with which all kinds of them go on
throughout the organism, the changes constituting psychical life, aris-
ing as the nervous system develops, become more and more distin-
guished by their seriality: that with the advance of nervous integration
" there must result an unbroken series of these changes — there must
arise a consciousness." Now, I admit that here is an apparent incon-
sistency. I ought to ]>ave said that "there must result an unbroken
series of these changes," which, taking place in the nervous system
of a highly-organized creature, gives coherence to its conduct, and
along with which we assume a consciousness, because consciousness
goes along with coherent conduct in ourselves. If Mr. Sidgwick will
substitute this statement for the statement as it stands, he will see
that the arguments and conclusions remain intact. A survey of the
chapter as a whole proves that its aim is not in the least to explain
how nervous changes, considered as waves of molecular motion, be.
come the feelings constituting consciousness ; but that, contemplating
the facts objectively in living creatures at large, it points out the car-
dinal distinction between vital actions in general, and those particular
vital actions which, in a creature displaying them, lead us to speak of
it as intelligent. It is shown that the rise of such actions becomes
marked in proportion as the changes taking place in the part called
the nervous system are made more and more distinctly serial, by union
in a supreme centre of coordination. The introduction of the word
consciousness arises in the effort to show what fundamental character
there is in the physiological changes which is parallel to a fundamental
character in the psychological changes.

Another instance of the way in which Mr. Sidgwick evolves an in-
congruity, which he considers fundamental, out of what I should have
thought he would see is a defective expression, I will give in his own
words. Speaking of a certain view of mine, he says :

" He tells us that ' logic .... contemplates in its propositions certain con-
nections predicated, which are necessarily involved with certain other connec-
tions given: regarding all these connections as existing in the non-ego — not, it
may be, under the form in which we know them, but in some form.' But in
§ 473, where Mr. Spencer illustrates by a diagram his ' Transfigured Eealism,'
the view seems to be this : although we cannot say that the real non-ego re-
sembles our notion of it in ' its elements, relations, or laws,' we can say that
' a change in the objective reality causes in the subjective state a change exactly
answering to it — so answering as to constitute a cognition of it.'' Here the
' something beyond consciousness ' is no longer said to be unknown, as its effect
in consciousness 'constitutes a cognition of it.'"

This apparent inconsistency, marked by the italics, would not have
existed, if, instead of " a cognition of it," I had said, as I ought to
have done, '■'■what we call a cognition of it" — that is, a relative cog-
nition as distinguished from an absolute cognition. In ordinary lan-
guage we speak of as cognitions those connections in thought which

404 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

so guide us in our dealings witli things that actual experience verifies
ideal anticipation. There is no direct resemblance whatever between
the sizes, forms, colors, and arrangements, of the figures in an account-
book, and the moneys or goods, debts or credits, represented by them ;
and yet the forms and arrangements of the written symbols are such
as to answer in a perfectly exact way to stocks of various commodi-
ties and to various kinds of transactions. Hence we say, figuratively,
that the account-book will " tell us " all about these stocks and trans-
actions. Similarly, the diagram Mr. Sidgwick refers to illusti*ates the
way in which symbols, registered in us by objects, may have forms
and arrangements wholly unlike tlieir objective causes and the nexus
among those causes, while yet they are so related as to guide us cor-
rectly in our transactions with those objective causes, and in that sense
constitute cognitions of them ; though they no more constitute cogni-
tions in the absolute sense than do the guiding symbols in the account-
book constitute cognitions of the things to which they refer. So re-
peatedly is this view implied throughout the "Principles of Psy-
chology," that I am surprised to find a laxity of expression raising
the suspicion that I entertain any other.

To follow Mr. Sidgwick through sundry criticisms of like kind,
which may be similarly met, would take more space than I can here
aiFord. I must restrict myself now to that which he seems to regard
as the " fundamental incoherence " of which these inconsistencies are
signs. I refer to that reconciliation of Realism and Idealism consid-
ered by him as an impossible compromise. A difficulty is habitually
felt in accepting a coalition after long conflict. Whoever has es-
poused one of two antagonist views, and, in defending it, has gained a
certain compi'ehension of the opposite view, becomes accustomed to
regard these as the only alternatives, and is puzzled by an hypothesis
which is at once both and neither. Yet, since it turns out in nearly all
cases, that of conflicting doctrines each contains an element of truth,
and that controversy ends by combination of their respective half-
truths, there is an a 2>riori probability on the side of an hypothesis
which qualifies Realism by Idealism.

Mr. Sidgwick expresses his astonishment, or rather bespeaks that
of his readers, because, while I accept idealistic criticisms, I neverthe-
less defend the fundamental intuition of Common-Sense, and, as he
puts it, " fires his [my] argument full in the face of Kant, Mill, and
' metaphysicians ' generally."

" He tells us that ' metaphysicians ' illegitimately assume that ' beliefs reached
through complex intellectual processes ' are more valid than ' beliefs reached
through simple intellectual processes;' that the common language they use re-
fuses to express their hypotheses, and thus their reasoning inevitably implies
the common notions which they repudiate ; that the belief of Eealism has the
advantage of 'priority,' 'simplicity,' 'distinctness.' But surely this prior, sim-
ple, distinctly affirmed belief is that of what Mr. Spencer terms ' crude Realism,'

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 405

the belief that the non-ego is per se extended, solid, even colored (if not reso-
nant and odorous). This is what common language implies; and the argument
by which Mr. Spencer proves the relativity of feelings and relations, still more
the subtile and complicated analysis by which he resolves our notion of exten-
sion into an aggregate of feelings and transitions of feeling, leads us away from
our original simple belief — that, e. g., the green grass we see exists out of con-
sciousness as we see it — just as much as the reasonings of Idealism, Skepticism,
or Kantism."

On the face of it the anomaly seems great; but I should have
thought that, after reading the chapter on " Transfigured Realism," a
critic of Mr. Sidgwick's accuteness would have seen the solution of
it. He has overlooked an essential distinction. All which my argu-
ment implies is that the direct intuition of Realism must be held of
superior authority to the arguments of Anti-Realism, w7iere their
deliverances cannot he reconciled. The one point on which their deliv-
erances cannot be reconciled is, the existence of an objective reality.
But, while, against this intuition of Realism, I hold the arguments of
Anti-Realism to be powerless, because they cannot be carried on
without postulating that which they end by denying, yet, having
admitted objective existence as a necessary postulate, it is possible to
make valid criticisms upon all those judgments which Crude Realism
joins with this primordial judgment : it is possible to show that a
transfigured interpretation of properties and relations is more tenable
than the original interjDretation.

To elucidate the matter, let us take the most familiar case in which
the indirect judgments of Reason correct the direct judgments of
Common-Sense. The direct judgment of Common-Sense is that the
Sun moves round the Earth. In course of time. Reason finds certain
difliculties in accepting this dictum as true. Eventually, Reason hits
upon an hypothesis which explains the anomalies, but which denies
this apparently certain dictum of Common-Sense. What is the
reconciliation ? It consists in showing to Common-Sense a mode of
interpretation which equally well corresponds with direct intuition,
while it avoids all the difiiculties. Common-Sense is reminded that the
apparent motion of an object may be due either to its actual motion
or to the motion of the observer ; and that there are terrestrial expe-
riences in which the observer thinks an object he looks at is moving,
when the motion is in himself. Extending the conception thus given,
Reason shows that, if the Earth revolves on its axis, there will result
that apparent motion of the Sun which Common-Sense interpreted
into an actual motion of the Sun ; and the common-sense observer
becomes thereupon able to think of sunrise and sunset as consequent
on his position as a spectator on a vast revolving globe. Kow, if the
astronomer, setting out by recognizing these celestial appearances,
and proceeding to evolve the various anomalies following from the
common-sense interpretation of them, had drawn the conclusion that

4o6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

there externally exist no Sun and no motion at all, he would have
done what idealists do; and his arguments would have been equally-
powerless against the intuition of Common-Sense. But he does
nothing of the kind. He accepts the intuition of Common-Sense
respecting the reality of the Sun and the motion ; but replaces the
old interpretation of it by a new interpretation reconcilable with all
the facts.

Just in the same way that, here, acceptance of the inexpugnable
element in the Common-Sense judgment by no means involves accept-
ance of the accompanying judgments, so, in the case of Crude
Realism, it does not follow that, while against the consciousness of an
objective reality the arguments of Anti-Realism are utterly futile,
they are therefore futile against the conceptions which Crude Realism
forms of the objective reality. If Anti-Realism can show that, grant-
ing an objective reality, the interpretation of Crude Realism contains
insuperable difficulties, the process is quite legitimate. And, its pri-
mordial intuition remaining unshaken, Realism may, on reconsidera-
tion, be enabled to frame a new conception which harmonizes with all
the facts.

To show that there is not here the " mazy inconsistency " alleged,
let us take tlie case of sound as interpreted by Crude Realism, and as
reinterpreted by Transfigured Realism. Crude Realism assumes the
sound present in consciousness to exist as such beyond consciousness.
Anti-Realism proves the inadmissibility of this assumption in sundry
ways (all of which, however, set out by talking of sounding bodies
beyond consciousness, just as Realism talks of them) ; and then Anti-
Realism concludes that we know of no existence save the sound as a
mode of consciousness : which conclusion and all kindred conclusions,
I contend, are vicious — first, because all the words used connote an
objective activity; second, because the arguments are impossible
without postulating at the outset an objective activity; and third,
because no one of the intuitions, out of which the arguments are built,
is of equal validity with the single intuition of Realism that an
objective activity exists. But, now, the Transfigured Realism which
Mr. Sldgwick thinks "has all the serious incongruity of an intense
metaphysical dream" neither affirms the untenable conception of
Crude Realism, nor, like Anti-Realism, draws unthinkable conclusions
by suicidal arguments ; but, accepting that which is essential in
Crude Realism, and admitting the difficulties which Anti-Realism
insists upon, reconciles matters by a reinteq^retation analogous to
that which an astronomer makes of the solar motion. Continuing all
along to recognize an objective activity which Crude Realism calls
sound, it shovrs that the sensation is produced by a succession of sepa-
rate impacts which, if made slowly, may be separately identified, and
which will, if progressively increased in rapidity, produce tones higher
and higher in jiitch. It shows by other experiments that sounding

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 407

bodies are in states of vibration, and that the vibration may be made
visible. And it concludes that the objective activity is not what it
subjectively seems, but is proximately interpretable as a succession of
aerial waves. Thus Crude Realism is shown that while there unques-
tionably exists an objective activity corresponding to the sensation
known as sound, yet the facts are not explicable on the original sup-
position that this is Tke the sensation ; while they are explicable by
conceiving it as a rhythmical mechanical action. Eventually this re-
interpretation, joined with kindred reinterpretations of other sensa-
tions, comes to be itself further transfigured by analysis of its terms,
and reexpression of them in terms of molecular motion ; but, how-
ever abstract the interpretation ultimately reached, the objective
activity continues to be postulated : the primordial judgment of
Crude Realism remains unchanged, though it has to change the rest
of its judgments.

In another part of his argument, however, Mr. Sidgwick implies
that I have no right to use those conceptions of objective existence
by which this compromise is elFected. Quoting sundry passages to
show that, while I hold the criticisms of the Idealist to be impossible
without "tacitly or avowedly postulating an unknown something
beyond consciousness," I yet admit that " our states of consciousness
are the only things we can know," he goes on to argue that I am
radically inconsistent, because, in interpreting the phenomena of con-
sciousness, I continually postulate not an unknown something, but a
something of which I speak in ordinary terms, as though its ascribed
physical characters really exist as such, instead of being, as I admit
they are, synthetic states of my consciousness. His objection, if I
understand it, is, that, for the purposes of Objective Psychology, I
apparently profess to know Matter and Motion in the ordinary real-
istic way; while, as a result of subjective analysis, I reach the con-
clusion that it is impossible to have that knowledge of objective
existence which Crude Realism supposes we have. Doubtless there
seems here to be what he calls " a fundamental incoherence." But I
think it exists, not between my two expositions, but between the two
consciousnesses of subjective and objective existence, which we can-
not suppress and yet cannot put into definite forms. The alleged
incoherence I take to be but another name for the inscrutability of the
relation between subjective feeling and its objective correlate which
is not feeling — an inscrutability which meets us at the bottom of all
our analyses. An exposition of this inscrutability I have elsewhere
summed up thus :

" See, then, our predicament. "We can think of Matter only in terms of Mind.
We can think of Mind only in terms of Matter. When we have pushed our
explorations of the first to the uttermost limit, -we are referred to the second for a
final answer; and, when we have got the final answer of the second, we are re-
ferred back to the first for an interpretation of it. "We find the value of x in terms

4o8 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

of y ; then we find the value of y in terms of x ; and so on we may continue
forever without coming nearer to a solution." — {Principles of Psychology^
§ 272.)

Carrying a little farther this simile, will, I think, show where lies
the insuperable difficulty felt by Mr. Sidgwick. Taking x and y as
the subjective and objective activities, unknown in their natures and
known only as phenomenally manifested, and recognizing the fact
that every state of consciousness implies, immediately or remotely,
the action of object on subject, or subject on object, or both, we may
say that every state of consciousness will be symbolized by some
modification of x y — the phenomenally-known product of the two
unknown factors. In other words, xy\ cc'y, a-'y'? ^'Vj ^Vj ^tc, etc.,
will represent all perceptions and thoughts. Suppose, now, that
these are thoughts about the object ; composing some hypothesis
respecting its character as analyzed by physicists. Clearly, all such
thoughts, be they about shapes, resistances, momenta, molecules,
molecular motions, or what not, will contain some form of the sub-
jective activity x. Now, let the thoughts be concerning mental pro-
cesses. It must similarly happen that some mode of the unknown
objective activity, y, will be in every case a component. Now, suppose
that the problem is the genesis of mental phenomena, and that, in the
course of the inquiry, bodily organization and the functions of the
nervous system are brought into the explanation. It will happen, as
before, that these, considered as objective, have to be described and
thought about in modes of x y. And when by the actions of such a
nervous system, conceived objectively in modes of x y, and acted
upon by physical forces which are conceived in other modes of x y,
we endeavor to explain the genesis of sensations, perceptions, and
ideas, which we can think of only in other modes of x y, we find
that all our factors, and therefore all our inteqiretations, contain the
two unknown terms, and that no interpretation is imaginable that
will not contain the two unknown terms.

What is the defense for this apparently circular process? Simply
that it is a process of establishing conrjruity among our symbols. It
is the finding a mode of so symbolizing the unknown activities sub-
jective and objective, and so operating with our symbols, that all our
acts may be rightly guided — guided, that is, in such ways that we
can anticipate when, where, and in what quantity, one of our symbols
will be found. Mr. Sidgwick's difficulty arises, I think, from having
insufficiently borne in mind the statements made at the outset, in
" The Data of Philosophy," that such conceptions as " are vital, or can-
not be separated from the rest without mental dissolution, Biust be
assumed ivwQ provisionally ;''"' that "there is no mode of establishing
the validity of any belief except that of showing its entire congruity
with all other beliefs," and that "Philosophy, compelled to make
those fundamental assumptions without which thought is impossible,

I

REPLIES TO CRITICISES. 409

has to justify them by showing their conyridty witli all other dicta of
consciousness." In pursuance of tliis distinctly-avowed mode of proced-
ure, I assume as true, provisionally, certain modes of formulating the
manifestations of the unknown objective activity, certain modes of
formulating the manifestations of the unknown subjective activity, and
cei'tain resulting modes of conceiving the operations of the one on the
other. These provisional assumptions having been carried out to all their
consequences, and these consequences proved to be congruous with one
another and with the original assumptions, these original assumptions
are justified; and, if, finally, I assert, as I have repeatedly asserted,
that the terms in which I express my assumptions and carry on my
operations are but symbolic, and that all I have done is to show that,
by certain ways of symbolizing, perfect harmony results — invariable
agreement between the symbols in which I frame my expectations
and the symbols which occur in experience — 1 cannot be blamed for
incoherence. Lastly, should it be said that this regarding of every
thing constituting experience and thought as symbolic has a very
shadowy aspect, I reply that these w^hich I speak of as symbols are
real relatively to our consciousness, and are symbolic only in their
relation to the Ultimate Reality.

That these explanations will make clear the coherence of view^s
which before seemed "fundamentally incoherent," I feel by no means
certain ; since, as I did not perceive the difficulties presented by the
exposition as at first made, I may similarly fail to perceive the diffi-
culties in this explanation. Originally, I had intended to complete
the "Principles of Psychology " by a division showing how the results
reached in the preceding divisions, physiological and psychological,
analytic and synthetic, subjective and objective, harmonized with one
another, and were but different aspects of the same aggregate of phe-
nomena. But the work was already bulky; and I concluded that this
division might be dispensed with, because the congruities to be
pointed out were sufficiently obvious. So little was I conscious of
the alleged "inability to harmonize difierent lines of thought." Mr.
Sidgwick's pei-plexities, however, show me that such an exposition of
concords is needful.

I have reserved to the last one of the first objections made to the
metaphysico-theological doctrine set forth in "First Principles," and
implied in the several volumes that have succeeded it. I refer to one
urged by an able metaphysician, the Rev. James Martineau, in an essay
entitled "Science, Nescience, and Faith," and which, effective against
my argument as it stands, shows the need for some further develop-
ment of my argument. That Mr. Martineau's criticism may be under-
stood, I must quote the passages it concerns. Continuing the reason-
ing employed against Hamilton and Mansel, to show that our con-
sciousness of that which transcends knowledge is positive, and not, as
they allege, negative, I have said :

410 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

" Still more manifest will this trutli become when it is observed that our
conception of the Eelative itself disappears, if our conception of the Absolute is
a pure negation. It is admitted, or rather it is contended, by the writers I have
quoted above, that contradictories can be known only in relation to each other —
that Equality, for instance, is unthinkable apart from its correlative Inequality ;
and that thus the Relative can Itself be conceived only by opposition to the
Non-relative. It is also admitted, or rather contended, that the consciousness
of a relation implies a consciousness of both the related members. If we are
required to conceive the relation between the Eelative and Non-relative without
being couscious of both, ' we are in fact (to quote the words of Mr. Mansel dif-
ferently applied) required to compare that of which we are conscious with that
of which we are not conscious; the comparison itself being an act of conscious-
ness, and only possible through the consciousness of both its objects,' "What,
then, becomes of the assertion that 'the Absolute is conceived merely by a ne-
gation of conceivability,' or as ' the mere absence of the conditions under which
consciousness is possible ? ' If the Non-relative or Absolute is present in
thought only as a mere negation, then the relation between it and the Eelative
becomes unthinkable, because one of the terms of the relation is absent from
consciousness. And if this relation is unthinkable, then is the Eelative itself
unthinkable, for want of its antithesis : whence results the disappearance of all
thought whatever." — {First Principles, § 26.)

On this arguraent Mr. Martineati comments as follows ; first re-
Btating it in other words :

"Take away its antithetic terra, and the relative, thrown into isolation, is
set up as absolute, and disappears from thought. It is indispensable, therefore,
to uphold the Absolute in existence, as condition of the relative sphere which
constitutes our whole intellectual domain. Be it so; but, when saved on this
plea — to preserve the balance and interdependence of two co-relatives — the
' Absolute ' is absolute no more ; it is reduced to a term of relation ; it loses
therefore its exile from thought; its disqualification is canceled; and the
alleged nescience is discharged.

, " So, the same law of thought which warrants the existence, dissolves the
inscrutableness, of the Absolute."' — (Essays, Philosophical and Theological, pp.
186, 187.)

I admit this to be a telling rejoinder ; and one which can be met
only when the meanings of the words, as I have used them, are care-
fully discriminated, and the implications of the doctrine fully traced
out. We will begin by clearing the ground of minor misconceptions.

First, let it be observed that, though I have used the word Abso-
lute as the equivalent of N'on-relative, because it is used in the pas-
sages quoted from the writers I am contending against, yet I have
myself chosen for the purposes of my argument the name Non-relative,
and I do not necessarily commit myself to any propositions respecting
the Absolute, considered as that which includes both Subject and Ob-
ject. The Non-relative, as spoken of by me, is to be understood rather
as the totality of Being mi?ius that which constitutes the individual
consciousness, present to us under forms of Relation. Did I use the
word in some Hegelian sense, as comprehensive of that which thinks

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS. 411

and that which is thought ahout, and did I propose to treat of the
order of things, not as phenomenally manifested but as noumenally
proceeding, the objection would be fatal. But, the aim being simply
to formulate the order of things as present under relative forms, the
antithetical Non-relative here named as implied by the conception of
the Relative is that which, in any act of thought, is independent of
and beyond it, rather than which is inclusive of it. Further, it should
be observed that this Non-relative, spoken of as a necessary comple-
ment to the Relative, is not spoken of as a conception but as a con-
scious7iess ; and I have in sundry passages distinguished between
those modes of consciousness which, having limits, and constituting
thought proper, are subject to the laws of thought, and the mode of
consciousness which persists when the removal of limits is carried to
the uttermost, and when distinct thought consequently ceases.

This opens the way to the reply here to be made to Mr. Martineau's
criticism, namely : that while by the necessities of thought the Rela-
tive imi^lies a Non-relative; and while, to think of this antithesis
completely, requires that the Non-relative shall be made a conception
proper; yet, for the vague thought which is alone in this case possible,
it suffices that the Non-relative shall be present as a consciousness
which though undefined is positive. Let us observe what necessarily
happens when thought is employed on this ultimate question.

In a preceding part of the article criticised, I have, in various
ways, aimed to show that, alike when we analyze the product of
thought and when we analyze the process of thought, we are brought
to the conclusion that invariably " a thought involves relation, differ-
ence^ likeness;'^'' and that, even from the very nature of Life itself,
we may evolve the conclusion that, " thinking being relationing, no
thought can ever express more than relations." What now must hap-
pen if thought, having this law, occupies itself with the final mystery ?
Always implying terms in relation, thought implies that both terms
shall be more or less defined ; and, as fast as one of them becomes in-
definite, the relation also becomes indefinite, and thought becomes in-
distinct. Take the case of magnitudes. I think of an inch ; I think
of a foot ; and, having tolerably definite ideas of the two, I have a
tolerably definite idea of the relationship between them. I substitute
for the foot a mile ; and, being able to represent a mile much less defi-
nitely, I cannot so definitely think of the relation between an inch and
a mile — cannot distinguish it in thought from the relation between an
inch and two miles, as clearly as I can distinguish in thought the rela-
tion between an inch and one foot from the relation between an inch
and two feet. And now if I endeavor to think of the relation between
an inch and the 240,000 miles from here to the moon, and the relation
between an inch and the 92,000,000 miles from here to the sun, I find
that while these distances, practically inconceivable, have become little
more than numbers to which I frame no answering ideas, so, too, have

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THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

the relations between an inch and either of them become practically
inconceivable. Now, this partial failure in the process of forming
thought-relations, which happens even with finite magnitudes when
one of them becomes immense, becomes complete failure when one of
the magnitudes cannot be brought within any limits. The relation
itself becomes unrepresentable at the same time that one of its terms
becomes unrepresentable. Nevertheless, in this case it is to be ob-
served that the almost blank form of relation preserves a certain
qualitative character. It is still distinguishable as belonging to the
consciousness of extensions, not to the consciousnesses of forces or
durations ; and in so far remains a vaguely-identifiable relation. But
now suppose we ask what happens when one term of the relation has
not simply magnitude having no known limits, and duration of which
neither beginning nor end is cognizable, but is also an existence not
to be defined ? In other words, what must happen if one term of the
relation is not only quantitatively but also qualitatively unrepresenta-
ble ? Clearly in this case the relation does not simply cease to be
thinkable except as a relation of a certain class, but it lapses com-
pletely. "When one of the terms becomes wholly unknowable, the law
of thought can no longer be fulfilled ; both because one term cannot
be present, and because at the same time relation itself cannot be
framed. That is to say, the law of thought, that contradictories can
be known only in relation to each other, fails when thought attempts
to transcend the Relative ; and yet, when it attempts to transcend the
Relative, it must make the attempt in conformity with its law — must
in some dim mode of consciousness posit a Xon-relative, and, in some
similarly dim mode of consciousness, a relation between it and the
Relative. In brief, then, to Mr. Martineau's objection I reply, that the
insoluble difficulties he indicates arise here, as elsewhere, when thought
is applied to that which transcends the sphere of thought; and that,
just as, when we try to pass beyond phenomenal manifestations to the
Ultimate Reality manifested, we have to symbolize it out of such
materials as the phenomenal manifestations give us, so we have simul-
taneously to symbolize the connection between this Ultimate Reality
and its manifestations as somehow allied to the connections among the
phenomenal manifestations themselves. The truth Mr. Martineau's
criticism adumbrates is, that the law of thought fails where the ele-
ments of thought fail ; and this is a conclusion quite conformable to
the general view I defend. Still holding the validity of my argument
against Hamilton and Mansel, that in pursuance of their own principle
the Relative is not at all thinkable as such, unless in contradistinction
to some existence posited, however vaguely, as the other term of a
relation conceived, however indefinitely, it is, I think, consistent on
my part to hold that, in this effort which thought inevitably makes to
pass beyond its sphere, not only does the product of thought become
a dim symbol of a product, but the process of thought becomes a dim

REPLIES TO CRITICISMS.

413

symbol of a process; and hence any predicament inferable from the
law of thouglit cannot be asserted.

I may fitly close this reply by a counter-criticism. To the direct
defense of a proposition, there may be added the indirect defense that
results from showing the unteuability of an alternative proposition.
This criticism on the doctrine of an unknowable existence, manifested
to us in phenomena, Mr. Martineau makes in the interests of the doc-
trine held by him, that this existence is, to a considerable degree,
knowable. We are quite at one in holding that there is an indestruc-
tible consciousness of Power behind Appearance ; but, whereas I con-
tend that this Power cannot be brought within the forms of thought,
Mr. Martineau contends that there can be consistently ascribed cei-tain
attributes of personality — not, indeed, human characteristics so con-
crete as were ascribed in past times ; but still, human characteristics
of the more abstract and higher class. Regarding matter as inde-
pendently existing; regarding, as also independently existing, those
primary qualities of Body " which are inseparable from the very idea
of Body, and may be evolved a priori from the consideration of it as
solid extension or extended solidity ; " and saying that to this class
" belong Triple Dimension, Divisibility, and Incompressibility ; " Mr.
Martineau goes on to say that as these

" cannot absent themselves from Body, they have a reality coeval with it, and
belong eternally to the material datum objective to God ; and bis mode of ac-
tivity with regard to them must be similar to that which alone we can think of
his directing upon the relations of space, viz., not Yolitional, to cause tbem, but
Intellectual, to think them out. The Secondary Qualities, on the other hand,
having no logical tie to the Primary, but, being appended to them as contingent
facts, cannot be referred to any deductive thought, but remain over as products
of pure Inventive Eeason and Determining "Wih. This sphere of cognition a
posteriori to us — where we cannot move a step alone, but have submissively to
wait upon experience — is precisely the realm of Divine originality : and we are
most sequacious where He is most free. 'V\'hile on this Secondary field his Mind
and ours are thus contrasted, they meet in resemblance again upon the Primary ;
for the evolutions of deductive Eeason there is but one track possible to all in-
telligences ; no merum ariitrium can interchange the false and true, or make
more than one geometry, one scheme of pure Physics for all worlds ; and the
Omnipotent Architect himself, in realizing the Cosmical conception, in shaping
the orbits out of immensity and determining seasons out of eternity, could but
follow the laws of curvature, measure, and proportion." — (Essays^ PhilosopMcal
and Theological, pp. 163, 164.)

Before the major criticism which I propose to make on this hy-
pothesis, let me make a minor one. Not only of space relations, but
also of primary physical properties, Mr. Martineau asserts the neces-
sity : not a necessity to our minds simply, but an ontological neces-
sity. What is true for human thought, is, in respect of these, true
absolutely : " the laws of curvature, measure, and proportion," as we
know them, are unchangeable even by Divine power ; as are also the

414

THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

Divisibility and Incompressibility of Matter. But, if, in these cases,
Mr. Martineau holds that a necessity in thought implies an answering
necessity in things, why does he refrain from saying the like in other
cases? Why, if he tacitly asserts it in respect of space-relations and
the statical attributes of Body, does he not also assert it in respect
of the dynamical attributes of Body ? The laws conformed to by
that mode of force now distinguished as " energy " are as much neces-
sary to our thought as are the laws of space-relations. The axioms
of Mechanics lie on the same plane with the axioms of pure Mathe-
matics. Xow, if 3Ir. Martineau admits this, as he cannot but do — if
he admits, as he must, the corollary that there can be no such mani-
festation of energy as that displayed in the motion of a planet, save
at the expense of equivalent energy which preexisted — if he draws
the further necessary corollary that the direction of a motion cannot
be changed by any action, without an equal reaction in an opposite
direction on something acting — if he bears in mind that this holds not
only of all visible motions, celestial and terrestrial, but that those
activities of Body which aifect us as secondary properties are also
known only through other forms of energy which are equivalents of
mechanical energy — and if, lastly, he infers that none of these deriv-
ative energies can have given to them their characters and directions,
save by preexisting forces, statical and dynamical, conditioned in
special ways — what becomes of that "realm of a Divine originality"
which Mr. Martineau describes as remaining within the realm of
necessity ? Consistently carried out, his argument implies a univer-
sally-inevitable order, in which volition can have no such place as that
he alleges.

Xot pushing Mr. Martineau's reasoning to this conclusion, so
entirely at variance with the one he draws, but accepting his state-
ment just as it stands, let us consider the solution it offers us. We
are left by it without any explanation of Space and Time ; we are not
helped in conceiving the origin of Matter ; and there is afforded us no
idea how Matter came to have its primary attributes. All these are
tacitly assumed to exist uncreated. Creative activity is represented as
under the restrictions imposed by mathematical principles, and as hav-
ing for datum (mark the word) a substance which, in respect of certain
characters, defies modification. But surely this is not an interpreta-
tion of the mystery of things. The mystery is simply relegated to a
remoter region, respecting which no inquiry is to be made. But the in-
quiry must be made. After every such solution there arises afresh the
question, What are the origin and nature of that which imposes these
limits on creative power? what is the primary God which dominates
over this secondary God ? For, clearly, if the " Omnipotent Architect
himself" (to use Mr. Martineau's somewhat inconsistent name) is
powerless to change the "material datum objective" to him, and
powerless to change the conditions under which it exists, and under

MODERN OPTICS AND PAINTING. 415

which he works, there is obviously implied a power to which he is sub-
ject. So that, in Mr. Martineau's doctrine also, there is an Ultimate
Unknowable ; and it differs from the doctrine he opposes only by
intercalating a partially Knowable between this and the wholly
Knowable.

Finding, as explained above, that this interpretation is not con-
sistent with itself, and finding, as just shown, that it leaves the
essential mystery unsolved, I do not see that it has an advantage
over the doctrine of the Unknowable in its unqualified shape. There
cannot, I think, be more than temporary rest in a proximate solution
which takes for its basis an ultimate insolubility. Just as thought
cannot be prevented from passing beyond Appearance, and trying to
conceive the Cause behind, so, following out the interpretation Mr.
Martineau offers, thought cannot be prevented from asking what Cause
it is which restricts the Cause he assigns. And if we must admit that
the question under this eventual form cannot be answered, may we
not as well confess that the question under its immediate form cannot
be answered? Is it not better candidly to acknowledge the incompe-
tence of our intelligence, rather than to persist in calling that an expla-
nation which does but disguise the inexplicable ? Whatever answer
each may give to this question, he cannot rightly blame those who,
finding in themselves an indestructible consciousness of an Ultimate
Cause, whence proceed alike what we call the Material Universe and
what we call Mind, refrain from affirming any thing respecting it,
because they find it as inscrutable in nature as it is inconceivable in
extent and duration.

MODEEX OPTICS AJS^D PAmTING.'

Bt 0. N. EOOD,

PEOFES8OB OF PHYSIOS IS COLUHBIA OOLLEGE.

LECTUEE I.

MODERN science has taught us that the portion of the material
universe with which we are acquainted is swept from end to
end by vibrations, that we are immersed in a sea whose very substance
is constantly pulsating under the influence of systems and counter-
systems of waves, and that even our very sensations are largely de-
pendent on the action of these undulations upon ourselves, Kow, the
laws which rule these waves, comparatively speaking, are few and
simple ; the waves, taken by themselves, are modes of motion which
are moderately intelligible ; they obey well-known mechanical laws,
and can be subjected to ordinary methods of computation. Rut, when
we come to consider their action on living beings, the case is quite
' Two lectures delivered before the National Academy of Design.

41 6 THE POPULAR SCIE^''CE MONTHLY.

alterefl ; the effects are strange, uuexpected, and the metbod of their
production involved in mystery.

Let me take some examples, and the first shall be a coarse, rough
one, involving powerful efiects and sensations. If, by the aid of prop-
erly-contrived machinery, we communicate merely to the hand fifty or
sixty energetic vibrations in a second, a peculiar and powerful sensa-
tion is produced, resembling that of a prolonged electric shock, and at
the same time the hand becomes clinched, and cannot be opened by
an effort of the will. In this experiment the vibrations are communi-
cated to the hand by direct contact with a solid piece of metal. Let
us select a more refined case, and employ as the exciting cause twenty
or twenty-five vibrations per second, not of metal, but of air. Helm-
holtz found that, when vibrations of this kind, or, what is the same
thing, when aerial waves, forty or fifty feet in length, were presented
to the ear, the result was not sound, but an unbearable tickling sensa-
tion ; as he shortened the waves, the efiect altered gradually, until at
last, when their length had been reduced to about thirty feet, he per-
ceived a low, deep, musical note. If we undertook to extend his ex-
periment, we should find that shortening the length of the wave raised
the pitch of the note ; that waves, five or six inches in length, furnished
quite shrill notes ; and that, finally, upon diminishing the wave-length
to three or four tenths of an inch, the sound would become inaudible.
It is quite certain that vast multitudes of still shorter waves exist, but
we are deaf and blind to them; in us they excite no sensation. At this
point there begins for us a great blank, in which, as Prof. Peirce once
remarked, there is room for the play of not less than a dozen new"
senses, each as extensive as that of sight. Crossing, in imagination,
this vast, unknown chasm, let us still pursue the shortening waves,
and endeavor to trace their presence in a new region. We began
with the heavy vibrations, the hammer-like strokes of a rod of melal,
and exchanged them for the gentler aerial pulses, but now the air it-
self has become too coarse to transmit tlie far more delicate and mi-
nute waves which we next encounter : this is a feat which can only be
accomplished by the all-pervading ether. Our new waves are very
short ; an army of ten thousand, marching in single file, would find
room in an inch ; but, though small, they are swift in motion : they
will travel seven times around the earth in a second, and then be pre-
pared for an interstellar journey. When they impinge on us, compen-
sating for small size by vast number, they still produce a powerful
sensation — we call it heat. Their efiect upon the ear or eye is about
the same as upon any other portion of the body ; our ears are deaf,
our eyes blind to them. But the state of the case alters when their
length has been reduced to about the thirty-thousandth of an inch ; they
now become capable of acting on the eye, and with its aid we begin
to perceive a faint red-brown color. Always shortening our wave-
length, we find that the tint brightens into a pure red hue, changes

MODERN OPTICS AND FAINTING. 417

gradually into an orange tint, and, gaining greatly in luminosity, be-
comes pure yellow ; passing thence by gradations into green and blue,
it gently fades out in a violet and faint violet-gray or lavender. Be-
yond this point are yet more minute waves, but, in pursuing them, we
enter once more what is for us a region of silence and darkness, and
we are compelled to feel our way with the help of photographic plates.

The series of tints just mentioned is now on the screen, and, were
it worth while, the existence of systems of invisible waves upon either
side could easily be demonstrated. The statements that I have made
lead us, however, a little unexpectedly to a remarkable conclusion.
They show that the beautiful colors now displayed have no existence
outside of ourselves — that, outside of ourselves, there are merely waves,
longer or shorter. Color is a sensation existing merely in ourselves.
On the other hand, our eyes might have been made quite insensible to
color while still preserving the power of vision, and it is not impossi-
ble for us to conceive the existence of beings to whom the luminous
waves might only be what to us are the breakers on a sea-beach.

But, to resume : if we allow all these luminous waves to act simul-
taneously upon the eye, we obtain, not, as might perhaps be expected,
a still richer and more gorgeous tint, but simply the sensation called
white — brightness without color.

Now, it happens somewhat remarkably that all the color sensations
I have mentioned, and all intermediate ones, can be approximately re-
produced by the mixture in various proportions of merelj' three pow-
ders : when viewed by ordinary daylight one of the powders must be
capable of reflecting red light, the others yellow and blue light re-
spectively, that is to say, they must reflect abundantly the waves ca-
pable of producing these three sensations ; the rest of the waves fall-
ing on them they must absorb and destroy, to a greater or less extent ;
or, finally, in common language, out of the mixture of red, yellow, and
blue pigments, all the colors can be produced. This fact has been
known for ages — it was old in the time of the Greeks, and probably
dates back to that early period when the first serious attempts at
painting were made by the human race. What could be more natural
than that it should lead to the theory of the existence of only three
primary/ colors, red, yellow, and blue, out of which all the others could
be compounded: thus, orange out of a mixture of red and yellow,
green by blue and yellow, and violet from red and blue. This theory
was firmly established before Newton's time. During the present cen-
tury it was the glory of one of England's greatest physicists that he
had strengthened its foundations (it is found in most text-books on
physics and art), and is to-day almost universally credited by paint-
ers. We have here upon the screen its well-known typical expression :
three overlapping circles, the red one producing orange where it crosses
VOL. IT. — 27

41 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the yellow, and violet where it overlies the blue, the yellow and blue
giving a bright green, while the central space, under the action of all
the colors, is white (Fig. 1). As I said, the diagram now on the screen
is the typical expression of the old theory, and is constructed so as to
humor as much as possible the ideas of its supporters. If I had se-
lected three pigments, and honestly worked the diagram out by their
mixture, the result would have been much less brilliant and attractive.

Let me make an actual experiment on this point : I throw upon
the screen the image of three plates of stained glass ; their colors are
red, yellow, and blue ; they are also rich and intense. These pieces
are arranged so as to cori-espond to our three colored circles, and, in
fact, where the blue crosses the yellow, a green hue is actually pro-
duced, but it is darker than either of its constituents ; the violet is
much darker than the red or blue, and, where all the plates cross at
the centre, we have, instead of white light, complete darkness (Fig.
2). These peculiar strides in each case toward blackness would have
been observed, if a corresponding experiment had been made with any
three pifjments^ but this at present is a minor matter, and I leave it
for the consideration of a vastly greater difficulty under which the old
theory labors.

Let us inquire how the superimposed yellow and blue glasses came
to produce green. The white light of the lantern contains all the dif-
ferent luminous waves, and it so happens that the yellow and blue
glasses both agree mainly in transmitting only waves of a medium
length, or, what is the same thing, green light. This can be proved
by an examination with the spectroscope, which also reveals the fact
that their agreement in this respect is by no means perfect, and that
the green rays are also compelled to pay toll for their passage, though
in a less proportion than the others. Exactly the same reasoning ap-
plies to blue and yellow pigments, and, from the efiects produced by
their mixture, it does not in the least follow that yellow and blue
light make green light. This important point I now propose to test
by what may be considered a fundamental experiment. For this pur-

MODERj^ OPTICS AND PAINTING.

419

pose, the superposition of the blue and yellow tints furnished by po-
larized light has lately sometimes been used, but, though the result
obtained is quite correct, it may be objected that this experiment was
perfectly well known to Sir David Brewster, the great modern de-
fender of the old theory, as well as to all the physicists who were his
followers ; and this knowledge does not seem in the least, for more
than a quarter of a century, to have weakened their confidence. Nor

I

would it be perfectly satisfactory if I should bring about the union of
blue and yellow light by the method of revolving colored disks, as is
so often done; for, when we come to analyze this latter plan, we find
that it consists, essentially, in presenting yellow and blue light to the
eye, not simultaneously, but by a distinct succession of alternate acts.
It is true that in this convenient mode of experimenting the results
are the same as in that of simultaneous presentation, but just this
point again would require proof, and, in a fundamental experiment like
the present, ought not to be passed over in silence. To avoid these
difficulties, I have contrived another plan, which will admit of our
readily grasping the whole process, and inspecting its quite simj^le de-
tails. We have now upon the screen two large squares of blue liglit,
and near them are two corresponding squares of yellow light (Fig. 3),
and I can readily contrive matters so that the portion of the screen
which is illuminated by one of the yellow squares shall also receive
the light of a blue square. This we now have, and the result, as you
see, is not the production of green light, or of light whose hue at all

420

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

approaches green ; the light is white^ with a slight tint of pink (Fig 4)_
Now, in this experiment, I have obtained our white light by the
actual mixture on the screen of yellow and blue light, furnished by
the samQ two glasses which, a little while ago, when superimposed,

gave us green light. The apparatus is so contrived that the glasses
send toward the screen yellow and blue beams of light, but, before
traveling far from the lantern, these beams are caught by this large
crystal of cale-spar, and each, as you see, is duplicated. Let us pursue
this matter a little further, and, to facilitate our judgment of the tints,
I throw on the screen, near the colored squares, a circle of unaltered
white light, for comparison. Perhaps we have failed to produce green
light from the circumstance that our yellow squares were too bright;
with a simple contrivance I can diminish their luminosity without al-
tering their tint, and the rate of diminution you can easily watch in

the uncombined yellow square. This apparatus is now acting, but
though under its influence the tint of the central square changes, pass-
ing from white by a series of gradations into blue, you see that it
manifests no tendency to become green. Restoring the yellow squares
to their original brightness, in the same way I gradually cut down the
brightness of the blue squares, and yet fail to generate any hue ap-
proaching green.

A result like this ought to shake, if not entirely destroy, our confi-
dence in the old theory, but Helmholtz has pursued the investigation
still further, and has proved, in addition, that the union of the pure yel-

SAI^ITARY SCIENCE, ETC. 421

low and blue light of the spectinim itself furnishes not green but white
light. There are also other points of almost equal importance where
the old theory is at variance with the facts of Nature ; some of them
will be noticed further on, but, for the present, in summing up this
matter, we may say that, while the old theory answers tolerably —
only indifferently well for mixture of pigments on the painter's pal-
ette— it quite fails when applied with any exactitude to the explana-
tion or study of effects of color in Nature.

SANITAEY SCIENCE AND PUBLIC INSTKUCTION.'

Bt ANDREW D. WHITE, LL. D.,

PEESIDENT OF CORNELL TJNIVEE8ITY.

YOU are well aware that it is not by virtue of any special claims
as an investigator in sanitary science, or as a student in it to
any great extent, that I now address you. But, when I was invited
to speak, it seemed a good opportunity to make one more point in be-
half of certain great, manly studies in our system of public instruc-
tion, and especially in our institutions for advanced instruction, and
therefore an opportunity not to be neglected.

The generations that come after us will doubtless wonder at what this
age has done, but I think they will wonder far more at what it has not
done. There will be wonder at discoveries, inventions, reforms — at all
our conquests in the realms of mind and matter ; but I think the won-
der will grow when notice is taken of the utter neglect, in great sys-
tems of education, of the most important subjects which occupy us,
either for material purposes or for mental and moral advancement.
Look, first, at the neglect of political studies. Here is a great Repub-
lic, dependent, as all confess, upon the knowledge of those who live
beneath its sway. And yet you may go from one end of the country to
the other and hardly find the slightest provision for any real instruc-
tion in Political Science, whether it be in political economy or political
history. If, during the war of our rebellion, any thoughtful American
wished to find out what that history was in which the germs of that
great struggle were planted and developed, he had to go for such
knowledge to the public lecture-room of Laboulaye at Paris, or the
private lecture-room of Neumann at Berlin.

The case is still worse in regard to that great class of studies com-
prehended under the designation of Social Science. Every year our
national Legislature and some forty State and Territorial Legislatures,
and a vast number of county and town boards, are brought face to
face with the most vital social problems. They are called upon to

1 Read at the recent meeting of the American Public Health Association.

422 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

make great expeuditures for the prevention and cure of pauperism, for
the repression and punishment of crime, for the treatment of lunatics
of various sorts, for the care of idiots of various grades, for the special
treatment of inebriates, for the cure of the sick in hospitals, for gen-
eral measures of prevention, as regards epidemics, and yet no one
will gainsay my assertion that on no subject are our Legislature, and
all our various public bodies, so utterly blind as on this. If we look
at the result of this as regards expenditure, the case is bad enough.
The amount annually expended in all our States for this purpose is
enormous. The only approach which we have to the palaces of the
Old World are in the various hospitals and prisons and asylums
of the New. I can speak of this want of knowledge from personal
experience. I can stand in the confessional on this subject. It has
been my lot more than once to vote on such appropriations in a legis-
lative body. I remember especially one case where the Legislature of
this State was called upon to establish a great asylum, at vast expense,
for a certain class of lunatics. The case was very pressing. A care-
ful report from a commission showed that some provision of this sort
must be made. A bill was passed, the buildings were erected, and
yet, when all was done, we were assured by an expert, who had no inter-
est one way or the other in the matter, that all our well-meant benev-
olence had, perhaps, resulted in almost as much evil as good, and that
the whole institution was a failure as regards the immediate pui-poses
for which it was erected. The simple cause for this was that in that
whole Legislature, in the lower House, in the upper House, in the Ex-
ecutive Department, there was not one person who had ever given any
close attention to subjects of this kind, and we had been obliged to
trust entirely to those who could give us scraps of information, no
matter how crude. But, if the immediate results are unfortunate, the
remote results are still more so.

If any one wishes to see what vicious methods of dealing with
great social questions will produce, he has only to look at the great
harvest of evil Avhich England is now reaping from seed sown 300
years ago, especially as regards the treatment of her pauper and crim-
inal classes. I have said that there is no provision for thorough in-
struction. The reason is twofold. The first is the reluctance of edu-
cators to take up new subjects of study, or, at least, to present them
thoroughly. But the other and far more effective reason is the fact
that we have so few institutions for advanced education which have
the means to make provision for such teaching. The last report of the
Commissioners of Education at "Washington shows that we have in
this country about 400 establishments calling themselves colleges or
universities. You may count on your fingers all those which really
have any claim to either title. In obedience to the demands of sect
or of locality, we have gone on multiplying institutions insufficiently
endowed, wretchedly wanting in every thing necessary to scientific

SANITARY SCIENCE, ETC. 423

investigation, until we have now hardly three or four, in possession of
the means to present any new subject of study involving any outlay
for investigation or for demonstration. The time has come when such
provision should be made. Whether it is to be made by the munifi-
cence of private individuals, or by State endowments, is not here the
question.

The proposition to which I shall speak especially is this : that pro-
vision should be made for instruction in Human Physiology, Hygiene,
and Sanitary Science, in all departments of public instruction in our
public schools, by providing fundamental instruction, especially in the
simple principles of physiology and hygiene ; in colleges and univer-
sities, by presenting this general instruction in a more extended way,
and by promoting investigation ; in medical colleges, by giving more
special instruction in matters relating to public and international hy-
giene ; and that, in our departments of engineering and polytechnic and
technological schools, especial provision should be made for instruction
in sanitary engineering.

In regard to the first of these provisions, that for popular instruc-
tion, few probably are aware of the need of them. Take, for example,
the revelation made within the past year, at the outbreak of yellow
fever in a Southern city. Two things in relation to that revealed very
clearly the evils of which I speak : First, the cause assigned to the
disease shows the utter want of sanitary knowledge in the people at
large ; and, secondly, the real cause, since revealed, shows the absolute
blindness to the simplest principles of sanitary science on the part of
those immediately concerned. When the yellow fever broke out at
Shreveport, it was telegraphed all over the country that it was caused
by the removal of the obstructions in the river above the city. That
statement went all over the country unchallenged. So far as I know,
no one thought of expressing doubt publicly as to the statement that
the yellow fever was caused by a more plentiful supply of water at the
wharves of that city — the fact being that this would conduce rather
to the removal of the causes of the disease than to the prevention of
them. At last came information as to the real cause, and it was found
that in that hot climate men had been allowed to heap up the material
in which disease-germs arise abundantly ; that the simplest truths of
sanitary science had been ignored, and that the consequence was per-
fectly simple and natural.

But it is not merely in sucli outstanding parts of the nation that
such ignorance exists. It is spread throughout our own country dis-
tricts, even the most enlightened districts, and you will find prevailing
in many of our country towns traditions and superstitions in regard to
this matter that are most sui'prising. You will find some of these
things which are known to be absolutely deadly considered on the
whole as healthful. Strange as it may seem, you may hear people who
take the papers, who are supposed to be within reach of the great

424 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sources of information — you may hear such people, I say, maintaining
that, after all, the emanations of the cesspool are rather conducive to
health than to disease ; that their fathers lived and throve in such an
atmosphere, and that, therefore, it has a healthy influence. I can
point you to an exceedingly pleasant village which I have sometimes
to visit, where, with a plentiful supply of water, there is an absolute
want of any system of sewerage. Typhoid and typhus go zigzag
through that town every year or two, making victims, yet you can't
induce the people of that village to believe that their unsewered con-
dition has any thing to do with it.

But it is not merely in the country districts that this state of things
has existed. Up to a very recent period at least this same ignorance was
manifested in a very surprising degree in this metropolis. It is now about
five years since, with two other membei's of our State Senate, I visited
this city, and sat in the Commission for examining into certain branches
of the city administration, and especially into the conduct of that
branch which had the care of the public health. The state of things
revealed was such as could only exist under a great and wide-spread
ignorance on the part of citizens of the first princij^les of Sanitary
Science. To give an idea of this ignorance, let me recall, as nearly as
I can, a little episode in the investigation : It happened that the late
Judge Whiting, who had charge of the investigation on the part of the
Citizens' Association, put on the stand a young physician, who testified
that the Health Ofiicers, or Wardens, or Inspectors, were men utterly
ignorant of the first principles relating to the public health which
they were appointed to preserve. In order to refute this, the head of
the Health Department at the time brought on the stand, in perfect good
faith, several of these Health Ofiicers. Toward the close of the exam-
ination of the first (one) of these gentlemen, Judge Whiting asked
this question : "Did you have a case of small-pox in your ward?"
and he answered, "Yes, sir." Judge Whiting: "Did you visit the
patient?" Witness: "No, sir." Judge Whiting: "Why not?"
Witness : "For the same reason that you would not; that I was afraid
of taking it myself." Judge Whiting: "Did the family have any
care ? " Witness : " Yes, sir ; they were ' highjinnicks ' (hygienics) ;
they doctored themselves." As the other witnesses came in. Judge
Whiting used this as a sort of test question — as a sort of key to un-
lock the system, and show the utter ignorance that prevailed in every
department of it. Every witness was asked : " Well, have you any
' highjinnicks ' in your ward ? " Some of the witnesses thought they
had; some thought they had not; some thought they "had them
pretty badly ; " some thought they had them in some parts of the
ward, some thought they had them in other parts of the ward. At
last the Judge asked a witness, who had been answering his ques-
tion in this way: "Do you know what the word 'highjinnicks'
means ? " and he replied : " Yes, sir, I do ; it means a bad smell aris-

SAXITARY SCIENCE, ETC. 425

ing from dirty water." Of course the exhibition was vastly amus-
ing, but, after all the gufiaw was over, a sad after-thought necessarily
came to every thinking man as to the condition of the great metropo-
lis which allowed all its dearest material interests to be placed in such
hands as this. It may be said that this was the result of a political
system, but it was not. Had there been a tithe of the instruction
which should have prevailed — of that simple knowledge that should
have existed on this subject — such a thing would have been impos-
sible, no matter what the political exigencies or arrangements were.

So much for the need of popular enlightenment on this subject.
Look, now, at a higher range. It is only a few years since the country
was startled by the outbreak of a malignant type of fever in one of
the leading boarding-schools in New England. The result was, that
several ladies from the most respectable families in the country lost
their lives. The school had always been considered an admirable one.
It was under the charge of a principal and instructors in every way
worthy of their calling ; but an investigation by competent persons
showed that causes of zymotic disease lurked at every corner of the
edifice, and that the only wonder was that the disease had not come
earlier and spread even wider.

Look now at the want of special and technical instruction. It is
little over ten years since the International Commission on Quarantine
Matters sat in Paris. They did a great and noble work, but their
labors have taken no such hold upon the policy of various States as
they ought to have taken. What is the reason of this ? There are
admirable sanitarians in our own country and in others. We have
several of whom the country may justly be proud ; but the difficulty
is, that our institutions have not given us enough of them to create
and spread a healthy public opinion on this subject. One or two, or
half a dozen, cannot, in so great a country as this, accomplish so great
a work, and especially they cannot if they are burdened with the la-
borious duty of a metropolitan physician. There is a great want of
special instruction in our medical colleges in public hygiene — liygiene
in its relation to quarantine matters, in regard to the prevention of
epidemics, in regard to sanitary provision for the wants of great cities
and districts. Again, if you go into any of our interior States, you
will find that any thing like a thorough or carefully-thought-out or
wrought-out system of sewerage is a very rare exception to a very
wide-spread rule. Nothing can be more inadequate than the system
of sewerage of nine-tenths of our cities ; and, indeed, until recently,
the city of New York, with all its magnificent provision of water-
supply, and in spite of its splendid position for drainage, was very
improperly provided for in this respect. So much for the want of
these different branches of instruction in this great science, and now
as to the remedy which I would propose.

First, as regards Public Schools, I would make provision for simple

426 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

instruction in the elements of Physiology and Hygiene, either by the
use of some short and plain text-book, or, what is still better, by
lectures from some competent resident physician. I confess that I
greatly prefer the latter method. Not only theory, but experience,
leads me to prefer it. Were it not that we have made a very great
mistake in our systems of public instruction, by severing our common-
school instruction from advanced instruction, we should by this time
have a body of teachers in our common schools abundantly able to
lecture to the pupils without a text-book. I trust the time will come
when provision will be made just as thoroughly for advanced instruc-
tion as for primary and common-school instruction, when all will be
connected together ; when the present illogical separation that exists,
under which primary and common-school education is provided for by
the State, and advanced education is left very inadequately provided
by various religious denominations, will be done away with. But at
present we have comparatively few teachers in our public schools who
are competent, without text-books, to teach a subject of this kind;
therefore it is that I would have provision made, in our larger schools
especially, for lectures by resident physicians. That the interest of
pupils can be roused in this way I know, for I have seen it fully tried.
It is one of those subjects in which, with a little care, the great body
of school-children can be greatly interested, and this without the
slighest detriment to other subjects. The very change of method will
make them come back to other subjects of study with renewed vigor.
Next, as to instruction in our Colleges and Universities. I would
have instruction in physiology and hygiene more advanced, systematic,
and thorough. Those who have read Herbert Spencer's work on "Edu-
cation," no matter what they may think of some minor ideas, must
have been greatly struck by that part in which he gives his esti-
mate of the comparative value of diflerent branches of knowledge.
Among those which should be placed first he names Human Physiol-
ogy. The reason is very simple. Human Physiology is simply the
study of a machine which we are to run, nay, which is to run us for three-
score years and ten. Certainly it is a study which falls very directly
to us. The study of hygiene naturally comes in connection with it,
and it was in obedience to this idea that, in framing the general course
of instruction for the Cornell University, careful provision for physi-
ology and hygiene was made. An extensive series of models was
purchased, diagrams from Paris and London were obtained, and what
was far better, a young professor, who had already begun to obtain a
reputation not only as a close investigator, but as an impressive lecturer,
was set at the work. The result has been most satisfactory. I am
persuaded that study of this kind forms an admirable relief from
other studies, pursued in a diiferent way, and for a difierent purpose.
In this case, the study of Physiology and Hygiene has been made
very thorough. Frequent and close examinations have been demanded,

SANITARY SCIENCE, ETC. 427

and it has been made not merely a study for information, but a study
for discipline. And here let me say that, as a starting-point for sci-
entific studies, the study of Hygiene and of Sanitary Science seems
to me to have great value. It is not, perhaps, the best point theoreti-
cally from which to start, but practically it has been found to be as
good as any other.

Next, as to instruction in our Medical Colleges, I speak here with
great diffidence, for there are those about me more competent to dis-
course on this subject than I am. I am well aware that all the effec-
tive knowledge that is given to sanitary science in the country, so far
as its advanced branches are concerned, is now given in the medical
colleges. But it seems to me that not yet is sufficient place given
for good instruction in Public Hygiene — sufficient study of that kind
which gives to town authorities, county authorities. State authorities,
the national authority, a body of experts who can be relied upon in
various public emergencies, or, indeed, for ordinary care of public
health.

Next, as to instruction in Departments of Engineering, and in our
Scientific, Polytechnic, and Technological institutions. Within the
past twenty-five years there has been created a science of Sanitary
Engineering. I say within the past twenty-five years, although I
know that engineering, even in ancient times, had frequent reference
to sanitary considerations. Any one who has Vv'alked along the Tiber
at Rome, as far as the mouth of the Cloaca Maxima, is well aware of
that; but it is within the past twenty-five years that the science has
been placed on solid foundations. Vital statistics have shown the ef-
fects of the introduction of sunlight, of pure water, and air, into our
dwellings and cities, and engineering has shown us the best methods
of introducing them. Any one who will take up the recent work on
this subject by Mr. Baldwin Latham will see what great conquest has
here been made. The statistics show that, of seven leading towns and
districts in England, such as Croydon, Ely, Salisbury, and others,
where careful and thorough modes of sewerage prevail, the percentage
of deaths has been reduced from forty to twenty per cent. I also see,
from calculations made on the basis of Dr. Allen's tables, that there is
a saving to these districts pecuniarily. Taking into view the fact that,
for every death prevented, about twenty cases of disease are prevented,
I will say that, judged even from a cold financial point of view, the
result has been magnificent. What the result would be by good
modes of sanitary engineering may be judged from the statement in
Dr. Lionel Beales's book on "Disease Germs," which is, that by a
good system of sewerage 100,000 lives might be saved annually in
England.

But I am aware of the opposition that will be made to any attempt
to introduce these studies. First, it will be said that there is little
material in this subject for advanced instruction, and that we know

428 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

very little regarding the causes or the nature of diseases. That is
partly true and partly not true. Unquestionably, the true theory of
disease is yet to be wrought out, although every thing leads us to sup-
pose that science is at last upon the right track ; but, unquestionably,
in relation to the germ of disease, great conquests are yet to be made,
and it is a matter of great satisfaction to me, and, I doubt not, to all
of you, that one of the most careful of American investigators is to
speak on that subject this evening.* So, too, the relations of ozone
to various diseases is a matter in which conquests are still to be made.
There are multitudes of questions yet to be solved, but still many
have been solved already. And a very great conquest was made
when it was found that zymotic diseases had relation to physical
causes, and that the causes were ascertainable and removable. So, too,
we have made conquests, as I have stated already, in sanitary engi-
neering. There is material for study. We have made great advances
in the study of vital statistics — there is another object of study. I
think that this objection, feeble as it is at present, should rapidly be-
come more feeble as science advances, and it can have but little weight
among thoughtful men.

But there is another class of objections which are more constantly
made — the same objections that have been made to every change in
the curriculum of study, from the days of Erasmus until now, and to
any liberty in the choice of studies. Those objections are on the score
of Discipline and Culture. I remember once that, when this objection
was made in the presence of the late Horace Greeley, he cried out,
" Discipline ! I hate the word." Nor was this exclamation unnatu-
ral. Few words have done more harm to the progress of education
than this. I am the last to say any thing against what is now known
as the older system of education, or of classical education in general.
I prize it; I love it; but, if there were no other argument to show
that it is by no means the only mode of discipline or study, the return
made by the Commissioners of the English Government, after their
examination of the English public schools, is certainly proof on this
point. It is there shown that seventy per cent, of the students under
the old system, carried out as it is to its very highest point, failed to
make any worthy use of their advantage.

What are disciplinary studies ? I maintain simply that they are
those which for any reason whatever a man takes hold of, and which
take hold of him. It matters not whether the study be in obedience
to natural tastes, or whether it be forced upon the student. This is
the thing — that the study be taken hold of, and that it take hold of
the mind of the person studying. Now, in our primaiy instruction,
the studies which I here advocate take hold of great numbers of pu-
pils ; take hold of them by virtue of their being a relief from other

^ President Barnard, of Columbia College, presented a paper on " The Germ Theory
of Disease in its Relations to Hygiene."

SANITARY SCIENCE, ETC. 429

studies — by virtue of their appealing to natural objects. Any teacbei-
will bear me out in saying that, as regards pupils of an early age,
there is no difficulty in this respect. As regards colleges and univer-
sities, there are but two things on which we can rely to make studies
take hold upon the minds of students, and to receive thorough atten-
tion. The first is, love for them on the part of the student. The other
is, their value to the student as regards his direct aims and purposes in
life. We cannot in colleges and universities do what was formerly
done in England — take the student and whip him. We have to trust
to one or the other of these two classes of incentives. Now, the num-
ber is considerable of those who, from one motive or the other, would
take up this great subject of study. All would not do it ; the major-
ity, probably, would not do it ; but, if an opportunity were offered,
I am satisfied that from every college and every university would go
out a body of men not only well instructed in the great principles
which underlie sanitary matters, but well disciplined in the obtaining
of such instruction.

And now, as to the other branch of the objection — the objection
on the score of Culture.

I prize all literary study as highly as any person ought, but yet I
maintain that there is, after all, a higher culture. The very ideal, the
very god of literary culture, is Goethe ; and yet, splendid as he was,
there is a higher culture which he lacked, even from a purely earthly
point of view. I maintain that, in the studies I now urge, there comes
a culture of high purpose, a culture of thought for our fellow-men, a
culture involving the idea of duty, which certainly is worth any other
sort of culture.

And, if any one objects that these studies are based upon Physiol-
ogy, which has led man into dangerous paths, that it is, in fact, an un-
safe study, I would simply point to these words, uttered so long ago,
and from which, certainly, these objectors will make no appeal : " The
fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom," There is a great truth
in these words. We all feel them. But what is that truth ? what is
that fear ? Is it the mere selfish fear which the African native feels
for the madness of his fetish ? Is it the mere groveling fear which the
Turkish slave feels for the tyranny of the satrap placed over him ?
Certainly not. The only wholesome fear is that fear based not on
mystic dread of tyranny, but fear to violate those great laws by which
the Divine power which maintains and regulates this universe governs
all. That is the fear which lies at the beginning of wisdom, and among
those studies, calculated to impress upon us the existence of laws, the
violation of which is followed by penalties strictly imposed, stand fore-
most those to which this Association is now so worthily devoting its
attention — studies sure to make the earth more beautiful ; sure to make
mankind more reverent and noble.

430 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE DISSIPATIOIS' OF EIS'EKGT.'

Bx n. r. WALLLS^G.

THE dissipation of energy is a continuous process, quite familiar to
mankind in its main features and results, since the days of the
ancient philosophers. It was recognized by them that all mechanical
motions, being dissipated by friction, gi-adually diminish, and must
finally cease unless maintained by external power. In the language
of modern science, the motion which thus disappears is converted from
molar into molecular motion.

It may be added that molecular energy, existing mainly in the form
called heat, tends to equalization of dynamic equilibrium, after the
attainment of which it is powerless to produce molar or mechanical
motion, a reconversion from the condition of equilibrium being impos-
sible.

Accordingly, the power to produce mechanical motion, exerted by
the heat of the sun, which is being lavished with such prodigious
prodigality, can only last while the sun continues to be hotter than the
other bodies in space. At present it is well understood that all ter-
restrial motive power is derived from this source with the single
unimportant exception of that obtained from the tides, at the expense
of the earth's energy of rotation. Among the more obvious processes
of conversion of the sun's molecular into terrestrial molar motion, are
the expansion and contraction of the atmosphere, the evaporation and
condensation of water, and the less direct method by restoration of
potential chemical energy accomplished in vegetation, whence are
produced food and fuel.

But it is supposed that the sun will finally grow cold, and that the
resistance of the ethereal medium, the evidence of whose existence is
found in the demonstration of the undulatory theory of light, will
cause satellites to fall into planets, planets into suns, and suns into one
common centre, after which, unless by special interposition of divine
power, darkness, silence, and death, will forever prevail.

This gloomy prediction is of course inconsistent with the theory of
continuous evolution, which obviously excludes from cosmical economy
catastrophes or extensive destructive efiects.

A careful consideration, however, of the circumstances which will
be likely to accompany the falling of a satellite into its planet may
lead to the conclusion that this occurrence will not necessarily be
catastrophic. The process must certainly be an exceedingly sloic one,
no progress in it having been detected throughout all the recorded
observations of the moon's motion extending over thousands of years.

' The Relation of the Dissipation of Energy to Cosmical Evolution. Read at the
Portland meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

THE DISSIPATION OF ENERGY. 431

The only practical evidence which has been adduced to prove the
resistance of a medium, namely, a very slight diminution in the period
of that nearly evanescent body, Eucke's Comet, is very far from being
definite and satisfactory. The mass of the moon being enormously
greater, it is probable tliat many millions of years will pass before a
diminution of her orbital period from this cause will be perceptible.
The immense periods of time attributed to the past processes of
geological evolution, and to the supposed metamorphoses of organic
life, ax-e therefore very bi'ief when compai-ed with those required for the
returns of satellites to their parent orbs, admitting, as theoretical con-
siderations seem to require, that such retui-ns are ultimately inevitable.

The eccentricity being diminished by the resistance of a medium,
the moon's orbit would eventually become, and afterward continue,
circular, so that final contact would be unaccompanied by violent col-
lision. But, before the time of actual contact, changes of form would
be induced both in planet and satellite by mutual attractions, exem-
plified in the production of daily terrestrial tides. The investigations
of Hopkins, Thomson, and recently of Barnard, in regard to tidal and
precessional influences, indicate that, even at the present distance of the
moon, they must cause elongations and contractions of the solid mate-
rials of the earth, which are quite appreciable. A considerable dimi-
nution of the distance between the earth and moon would give rise to
changes in the form of the earth, and hence to bendings to and fro of its
external shell even if the earth were solid throughout. This would be
accompanied by earthquakes and kindred disturbances far exceeding
in magnitude and destructiveness any thing of the kind now known to
man. The frequency of these occurrences would be the same as that
of the moon's meridian passage.

Resistances to this tidal action, however, would be developed, in
consequence of which the molar motion of rotation would be converted
into molecular motion, so long as the angular naotion of rotation in
either body was different from that of the moon's revolution, until the
rotations became synchronous with the revolution, a condition already
arrived at in the case of the moon. Synchronism once attained would
be permanent, acceleration both of revolution and rotation occurring
as the distance diminished, and both at the expense of the potential
energy of gravity between the two bodies. Each body presenting
the same face to the other, no meridian passage could take place, and
hence no tidal action.

But there yet remains to be considered a continually increasing
tendency to distortion of form consequent upon approach. This effect
would be produced very gradually, being spread over such enormous
durations of time. The curious and complicated foldings of the rocks
in the Appalachian regions indicate that the solid materials of the
earth are sufficiently plastic to allow it to take on any form toward
which forces of sufficient magnitude direct it, provided the times be

432 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

very greatly extended. Hence, considering the extreme slowness of the
process, it may be reasonable to conclude that the forms ultimately
developed would be identical with those which would be assumed by
liquid masses having the same relative positions and velocities.

The determination of these forms is a problem for the mathema-
ticians. In the absence of analysis, no reason is manifest for sup-
posing that the forms of equilibrium would be materially different
just before and just after contact. May it not be that the order of
.change would be a partial reversal of certain supposed processes of
the nebular hypothesis ? Thus the moon may be gradually elongated
into a closed ring which will slowly contract upon the earth as the
energy of angular velocity is gradually dissipated by the friction of
the medium. In any event there seems to be no good reason to sup-
pose that there will be such a sudden leap in the final osculation or
embrace as would result in a catastrophe.

The same considerations apply to the gravitational relations be-
tween planets and suns. Other very important relations between
these bodies, however, with which organic life is more especially con-
cerned, require attention. One fundamental requisite to all known
terrestrial organic life is the conversion, within living bodies, of
molecular energy, either into molar motions, or into potential energy
which may afterward be thus converted. All living animals and
plants, therefore, depend for their existence upon the passage through
their bodies, in the movement toward distribution and equalization,
of heat, light, and other molecular forces originating in the sun.

The integrity of cosmical evolution in relation to organic life,
accordingly, seems to require the maintenance of great central
laboratories where molecular disturbances of sufficient intensity and
quantity can be continually generated, and their effects distributed
throughout the universe. Notwithstanding the enormous expenditure
of heat by the sun, its temperature is supposed to have been main-
tained about the same as at present for a very long period of time in
the past, and no reason is manifest why this fixed temperature will
not continue for a very long time in the future. Doubtless, opera-
tions are going on in the sun which it would be impossible to imi-
tate in terrestrial laboratories. May it not be that the conditions
of materials and the circumstances of pressure, chemical affinity,
etc., are such, that substances more elementary than our so-called
chemical elements are uniting with an energy far exceeding that of
any chemical combination we can efiect, and so prodigious as to
maintain, at comparatively small expenditure of material, the sun's
temperature at that enormous degree which marks the dissociation
point of the tremendously energetic combination ? The duration of
the combination or combustion would thus be prolonged to an enor-
mously remote period. At last, when all the potential energy due to
this particular reaction became exhausted by the combination of all

NEWS FROM JUPITER. 433

the special materials required for it, new materials, whose dissociation
point had a lower temperature, and which had consequently been pre-
vented fi-om combining previously, would commence upon a similar
process of combustion. And so we may suppose combination to follow
combination, until, finally, perhaps at a time when the planets, freighted
with their living inhabitants, have begun to arrive at the sun's sur-
face, long after the fires of the last combustion have expired, it has
itself become a habitable globe, lighted and heated or served by other
molecular forces from distant orbs where new conditions cause new
chemical combinations, and conversions of newly-developed potential
energies.

Finally, giving play to the imagination, may we not suppose fur-
ther, that, in a universe extended throughout infinite space, processes
of concentration similar to those supposed in the nebular hypothesis
and supplemented by processes like tliose here indicated will go on
forever, evolving worlds of continually-increasing magnificence, per-
haps inhabited by living occupants of inconceivably transcendent and
ever-expanding faculties ?

NEWS FROM JUPITER.

By EICHAED A. PEOCTOE, B. A.

THE planet Jupiter has passed during the last year through a singu-
lar process of change. The planet has not, indeed, assumed a
new appearance, but has gradually resumed its normal aspect after
three or four years, during which the mid zone of Jupiter has been
aglow with a peculiar ruddy light. The zone is now of a creamy-
white color, its ordinary hue. We have, in fact, reached the close of
a period of disturbance, and have received a definite answer to ques-
tions which had arisen as to the reality of the change described by
observers. Many astronomers of repute were disposed to believe that
the peculiarities recently observed were merely due to the instruments
with which the planet has been observed — not, indeed, to any fault in
those instruments, but, in fact, to their good qualities in showing
color. A considerable number of the earlier accounts of Jupiter's
change of aspect came from observers who used the comparatively
modern form of telescope known as the silvered-glass reflectors, and it
is well known that these instruments are particularly well suited for
the study of color-changes. Nevertheless, observations made with
the ordinary refracting telescope were not wanting ; and it had begun
to be recognized that Jupiter really had altered remarkably in appear-
ance, even before that gradual process of change which, by restoring
his usual aspect, enabled every telescopist to assure himself that there
had been no illusion in the earlier observations.
VOL. IV.— 28

434 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

I propose now to discuss certain considei-ations which appear to
me to indicate the nature and probable meaning of the phenomena
which have recently been observed in Jupiter. It seems to me that
these phenomena are full of interest, whether considered in themselves
or in connection with those circumstances on which I had been led to
base the theory that Jupiter is a planet altogether unlike our earth iu
condition, and certainly unfit to be the abode of living creatures.

I would first direct special attention to the facts which have been
ascertained respecting the atmosphere of Jupiter.

It does not appear to have been noticed as a remarkable circum-
sta'nce, that Jupiter should have an atmosphere recognizable from our
distant station. Yet, in reality, this circumstance is not only most
remarkable, but is positively inexplicable on any theory by w^hich Ju-
piter is regarded as a Avorld resembling our own. It is certain that,
except by the efiects produced when clouds form and dissipate, our ter-
restrial atmosphere could not bo recognized at Jupiter's distance with
any telescopic power yet applied. But no one who has studied Jupi-
ter with adequate means can for a moment fail to recognize the fact
that the signs of an atmosphere indicate much more than the mere
formation and dissipation of clouds. I speak here after a careful study
of the planet during the late opposition, with a very fine reflecting
telescope by Browning, very generously placed at my disposal by Lord
Lindsay; and I feel satisfied that no one can study Jupiter for many
hours (on a single night) without becoming convinced that the cloud-
masses seen on his disk have a dej^th comparable with their length and
breadth. Now, the depth of terrestrial cloud-masses would at Jupiter's
distance be an absolutely evanescent quantity. The span of his disk
represents about 84,000 miles, and his satellites, which look little more
than points in ordinary telescopes, are all more than 2,000 miles in di-
ameter. I am satisfied that any one who has carefully studied the
behavior of Jupiter's cloud-belts will find it difficult to believe that
their depth is less than the twentieth part of the diameter of the least
satellite. Conceive, however, what the depth of an atmosphere would
be in which cloud-masses a hundred miles deep were floating !

It may be asked, however, in what sense such an atmosphere would
be inexplicable, or, at least irreconcilable w^ith the theory that Jupiter
is a world like our earth. Such an atmosphere would be in strict pro-
portion, it might be urged, to the giant bulk of the planet, and such
relative agreement seems more natural than would be a perfect cor-
respondence between the depth of the atmosphere on Jupiter and the
depth of our earth's atmosphere.

But it must not be forgotten that the atmosphere of Jupiter is at-
tracted by the mass of the planet ; and some rather remarkable con-
sequences follow when we pay attention to this consideration. Of
course a great deal must be assumed in an inquiry of the sort. Since,
however, we are discussing the question whether there can be any re-

NEWS FROM JUPITER. 435

semblance between Jupiter and our earth, we may safely (so far as our
inquiry is concerned) proceed on the assumption that the atmosphere
of Jupiter does not difter greatly in constitution from that of our
earth. We may further assume that, at the upper part of the cloud-
layers we see, the atmospheric pressure is not inferior to that of our
atmosphere at a height of seven miles above the sea-level, or one-fourth
of the pressure at our sea-level. Combining these assumptions with
the conclusion just mentioned, that the cloud-layers are at least 100
miles in depth, we are led to the following singular result as to the
pressure of the Jovian atmosphere at the bottom of the cloud-layer :
The atmosphere of any planet doubles in pressure with descent through
equal distances, these distances depending on the power of gravity at
the planet's surface. In the case of our earth, the pressure is doubled
with descent through about 3|- miles ; but gravity on Jupiter is more
than 2|- times as great as gravity on our earth, and descent through
If mile would double the pressure in the case of a Jovian atmosphere.
Now, 100 miles contain this distance (If mile) more than seventy-one
times ; and we must therefore double the pressure at the upper part
of the cloud-layer seventy-one successive times to obtain the pressure
at the lower part. Two doublings raise the pressure to that at our sea-
level ; and the remaining sixty-nine doublings woiild result in a press-
ure exceeding that at ou.r sea-level so many times that the nmifber
representing the proportion contains twenty-one figures.' I say would
result in such a pressure, because in reality there are limits beyond
which atmospheric pressure cannot be increased without changing the
compressed air into the liquid form. What those limits are we do not
know, for no pressure yet applied has changed common air, or either
of its chief constituent gases, into the liquid form, or even produced
any trace of a tendency to assume that form. But it is easily
shown that there must be a limit to the increase of pressure which air
will sustain without liquefying. For the density of any gas changes
proportionately to the increase of pressure until the gas is approaching
the state when it is about to turn liquid. Now, air at the sea-level has
a density equal to less than the 900th part of the density of water ; so
that, if the pressure at the sea-level were increased 900 times, either
the density would not increase proportionally, which would show that
the gas was approaching the density of liquefaction, or else the gas
would be denser than water, which must be regarded as utterly impos-

* The problem is like the well-known one relating to the price of a horse, where
one farthing was to be paid for the first nail of 24 in the shoes, a half-peuny for the
next, a penny for the third, two pence for the fourth, and so on. It may be inter-
esting to some of my readers to learn, that if we want to know roughly the proportion
in which the first number is increased by any given number of doublings, we have
only to multiply the number of doublings by vVths, and add 1 to the integral part of the
result, to give the number of digits in the number representing the required proportions.
Thus multiplying 24 by V'rths gives 7 (neglecting fractions) ; and therefore the number
of farthings in the horse problem is represented by an array of 8 digits.

436 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sible. Or, if any one is disposed, for the sake of argument, to assume
that a gas (at ordinary temperatures) may be as dense as water, then
we need proceed but a few steps further, increasing the pressure about
18,000 times instead of 900 times, to have the density oi platinum in-
stead of that of water, and no one is likely to maintain that our air
could exist in the gaseous form with a density equaling that of the
densest of the elements. We are still an enormous way behind the
number of twenty-one figures mentioned above ; and, in fact, if we sup-
posed the pressure and density to increase continually to the extent
implied by the number of twenty-one figures, we should have a den-
sity exceeding that of platinum more than ten thousand millions of
millions of times !

Of course this suj^position is utterly monstrous, and I have merely
indicated it to show how difficulties crowd around us in any attempt
to show that a resemblance exists between the condition of Jupiter
and that of our earth. The assumptions I made were sufficiently
moderate, be it noticed, since I simply regarded (1) the air of Jupiter
as composed like our own ; (2) the pressure at the upper part of his
cloud-layer as not less than the pressure far above the highest of our
terrestrial cumulus clouds (with which alone the clouds of Jupiter are
comparable) ; and (3) the depth of his cloud-layer as about one hun-
dred miles. The first two assumptions cannot fairly be departed from
to any considerable extent, without adopting the conclusion that the
atmosphere of Jupiter is quite unlike that of our earth, which is pre-
cisely what I desire to maintain. The third is, of course, open to at-
tack, though I apprehend that no one who has observed Jupiter with
a good telescope will question its justice. But it is not at all essential
to the argument that the assumed depth of the Jovian atmosphere
should be even nearly so great. We do not need a third of our array
of twenty-one figures, or even a seventh part, since no one who has
studied the experimental researches made into the condition of gases
and vapors can for a moment suppose that an atmosphere like ours
could remain gaseous, except at an enormoxisly high temperature, at a
pressure of two or three hundred atmospheres. Such a pressure would
be attained, retaining our first two assumptions, at a depth of about
fourteen miles below the upper part of the cloud-layer. This is about
the six-thousandth part of the diameter of Jupiter ; and, if any student
of astronomy can believe that that wonderfully complex and change-
ful cloud-envelope which surrounds Jupiter has a thickness of less
than the six-thousandth part of the planet's diameter, I would recom-
mend as a corrective the careful study of the planet for an hour or
two with a powerful telescope, combined with the consideration that
the thickness of a spider's web across the telescopic field of view would
suffice to hide a breadtli of twenty miles on Jupiter's disk.

But we are not by any means limited to the reasoning here indi-
cated, convincing as that reasoning should be to all who have studied

]Vi:WS FROM JUPITER. 437

the aspect of Jupiter with adequate telescopic power. We have in
Jupiter's mean density an argument of irresistible force against the
only view which enables us even hypothetically to escape from the
conclusions just indicated. Let it be granted, for the sake of argu-
ment, that Jupiter's cloud-layer is less than fourteen miles in depth, so
that we are freed for the moment from the inference that at the lower
pai't of the atmosphere there is either an intense heat or else a density
and pressure incompatible with the gaseous condition. We cannot, in
this case, strike off more than twenty-eight miles from the planet's
apparent diameter to obtain the real diameter of his solid globe —
solid, at least, if we are to maintain the theory of his resemblance to
our earth. This leaves his real diameter appreciably the same as his
apparent diameter, and as a result we have the mean density of his
solid globe equal to a fourth of the earth's mean density, precisely as
when we leave his atmosphere out of the question. Now, I apprehend
that the time has long since passed when we can seriously proceed at
this stage to say, as it was the fashion to say in text-books of astron-
omy, " Therefore the substance of which Jupiter is composed must be
of less specific gravity than oak and other heavy woods." We know
that Brewster gravely reasoned that the solid materials of Jupiter
might be of the nature of pumice-stone, so that, with oceans resem-
bling ours, a certain latitude was allowed for increase of density in
Jupiter's interior. But, in the presence of the teachings of spectro-
scopic analysis, few would now care to maintain, as probable, so pre-
posterous a theory as this. Every thing that has hitherto been learned,
respecting the constitution of the heavenly bodies, renders it quite
unlikely that the elementary constitution of Jupiter differs from that
of our earth. Again, it was formerly customary to speak of the pos-
sibility that Jupiter and Saturn might be hollow globes, mere shells,
composed of materials as heavy as terrestrial elements. But, what-
ever opinion we may form as to the possibility that a great intensity
of heat may vaporize a portion of Jupiter's interior, we know quite
certainly that there must be enormous pressure throughout the whole
of the planet's globe, and that even a vaporous nucleus would be of
great density. For it is to be remembered that all that I have said
above respecting the possibility of gases existing at great pressures
applies only to ordinary temperatures — such temperatures, for example,
as living creatures can endure. At exceedingly high temperatures
much greater pressure, and therefore much greater density, can be at-
tained without liquefaction or solidification. And, in considering the
effect of pressure on the materials of a solid globe, we must not fall
into the mistake of supposing that the strength of such solid materials
can protect the material from compression and its effects. We must
extend our conceptions beyond what is familiar to us. We know that
any ordinary mass of some strong, heavy solid — as iron, copper, or
gold — is not affected by its own weight so as to change in structure to

438 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

an appreciable extent. The substance of a mass of iron forty or fifty-
feet high, would be the same in structure at the bottom as at the top
of the mass; for the strength of the metal would resist any change
which the weight of the mass would (otherwise) tend to produce. But
if there were a cubical mountain of iron twenty miles high, the lower
part would be absolutely plastic under the pressure to which it would
be subjected. It would behave in all respects as a fluid, insomuch
that if (for convenience of illustration) we suppose it inclosed within
walls made of some imaginary (and impossible) substance which would
yield to no pressure, then, if a portion of the wall were removed near
the base of the iron mountain, the iron would flow out like water *
from a hole near the bottom of a cask. The iron would continue to
run out in this way, until the mass was reduced several miles in
height. In Jupiter's case a mountain of iron of much less height
would be similarly plastic in its lower parts, simply because of the
much greater attractive power of Jupiter's mass. Thus we see that
the conception of a hollow interior, or of any hollow spaces through-
out the planet's globe, is altogether inconsistent with what is known
of the constitution of even the strongest materials.

How, then, are we to explain the relatively small mean density of
Jupiter's globe ? On the supposition that his atmosphere is less than
fourteen miles deep, we cannot do so ; for there is nothing hypothet-
ical in the above considerations respecting a solid globe as large as
Juf>iter's, excepting always the assumption that the globe is not
formed of substances unlike any with which we are familiar. Even
this assumption, though it is one which few would care to maintain in
the present position of our knowledge, amounts after all to an admis-
sion of the chief point which I am endeavoring to maintain : itis one
way — but a very fanciful way — of inferring that Jupiter is utterly dis-
similar to the earth. Rejecting it, as we safely may, we find the small
density of Jupiter not merely unexplained, but manifestly inexplicable.

All our reasoning has been based on the assumption that the at-
mosphere of Jupiter exists at a temperature not greatly difiering from
that of our own atmosphere. If we assume instead an exceedingly
high temperature, abandoning of course the supposition that Jupiter
is an inhabited world, we no longer find any circumstances which are
self-contradictory or incredible.

To begin with, we may on such an assumption find at once a par-
allel to Jupiter's case in that of the sun. For the sun is an orb at-
tracting his atmospheric envelope and the material of his own solid
or liquid surface (if he has any) far more mightily than Jupiter has
been known to do. All the difficulties considered in the case of Jupi-
ter would be enormously enhanced in the case of the sun, if we forgot
the fact that the sun's globe is at an intense heat from surface to cen-

* The effect of pressure in rendering iron and other metals plastic has been experi-
mentally determined. Cast-steel has been made to flow almost like water, under pressure.

NEWS FROM JUPITER. 439

tre. No-w, we know that the sun is intensely hot because we feel the
heat that he emits, and recognize the intense lustre of his photosjihere ;
so that we are not in danger of overlooking this important circum-
stance in his condition. Jupiter gives out no heat that we can feel,
and assuredly Jupiter does not emit an intense liglit of his own. But,
when we find that difficulties, precisely corresponding in kind, though
not in degree, to those which we should encounter if we discussed the
sun's condition in forgetfulness of his intense heat, exist also in the
case of Jupiter, it appears manifest that we may safely adopt the con-
clusion that Jupiter is intensely heated, though not nearly to the same
degree as the sun.

We have thus been led by a perfectly distinct an independent
line of reasoning to the very conclusion which I have advocated else-
where on other grounds, viz., that Jupiter is in fact a miniature sun
as respects heat, though emitting but a relatively small proportion of
light. I would invite special attention to the circumstance that the
evidence on which this conclusion had been based was already cumu-
lative. And now a fresh line of evidence, in itself demonstrative I
conceive, has been adduced. Moreover, I have not availed myself of
the argument, very weighty in my opinion, on which Mr. Mattieu
Williams has based similar conclusions respecting the temperature of
Jupiter, in his interesting and valuable work called " The Fuel of the
Sun." I fully agree with him in regarding it as a reasonable assvimp-
tion, though I cannot go so far as to regard it as certain, that every
planet has an atmosphere whose mass corresponds with, or is even
perhaps actually proportional to, the mass of the planet it surrounds.
If we make such an assumption in the case of Jupiter, we arrive at
conclusions closely resembling those to which I have been led by the
above process of reasoning.

Thus many lines of evidence, and some of them absolutely demon-
strative, in ray opinion, point to the conclusion that Jupiter is an orb
instinct with fiery energy, aglow it may well be with an intense light
which is only prevented from manifesting itself by the cloudy envel-
ope which enshrouds the planet.

But, so soon as we regard the actual phenomena presented by
Jupiter in the light of this hypothesis, we find the means of readily
inteipreting what otherwise would appear most perplexing. Chief
among the phenomena thus accounted for, I would place the recent
color-changes in the equatorial zone of Jupiter.

What, at a first view, could appear more surprising than a change
aifecting the color of a zone-shaped region whose surface is many times
greater than the whole surface of our earth. It is true that a brief
change might be readily explained as due to such changes as occur in
our own air. Large regions of the earth are at one time cloud-covered,
and at another free from clouds. Such regions, seen from Venus or
Mercury, would at one time appear white, and at the other would

440 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

show whatever color the actual surface of the ground might possess
when viewed as a whole. But it seems altogether impossible to ex-
plain in this way a change or series of changes occupying many years,
as in the case of the recent color-changes of Jupiter's belt. Let me
not be misunderstood. I am not urging that the changes in Jupiter
are not due to the formation and dissipation of clouds in his atmos-
phere. On the contrary, I believe that they are. What seems to me
incredible is, the supj^osition that we have here to deal with such
changes as occur in our own air in consequence of solar action.

I do not lose sight of the fact that the Jovian year is of long dura-
tion, and that whatever changes take place in the atmosi^here of
Jupiter through solar action might be expected to be exceedingly
slow. Nay, it is one of the strongest arguments against the theory
that solar action is chiefly in question, that any solar changes would
be so slight as to be in effect scarcely perceptible. It is not commonly
insisted upon in our text-books of astronomy — in fact, I have never
seen the point properly noticed anywhere — that the seasonal changes
in Jupiter correspond to no greater relative change than occurs in our
daily supply of solar heat from about eight days before to about eight
days after the spring or autumn equinox. It is incredible that so
slight an effect as this should produce those amazing changes in the
condition of the Jovian atmosphere which have unquestionably been
indicated by the varying aspect of the equatorial zone. It is manifest
that, on the one hand, the seasonal changes should be slow and slight
so far as they depend on the sun, and, on the other, that the sun can-
not rule so absolutely over the Jovian atmosphere as to cause any par-
ticular atmospheric condition to prevail unchanged for years.

If, however, Jupiter's whole mass is in a state of intense heat — if
the heat is in fact sufficient, as it must be, to maintain an effective re-
sistance against the tremendous force of Jovian gravitation — we can
understand any changes, however amazing. We can see how enor-
mous quantities of vapor must continually be generated in the lower
regions to be condensed in the upper regions, either directly above
the zone in which they were generated, or north or south of it, ac-
cording to the prevailing motions in the Jovian atmosphere. And,
although we may not be able to indicate the precise reason why at
one time the mid zone or any other belt of Jupiter's surface should ex-
hibit that whiteness which indicates the presence of clouds, and at
another should show a coloring which appears to indicate that the
glowing mass below is partly disclosed, we remember that the diffi-
culty corresponds in character to that which is presented by the phe-
nomena of solar spots. We cannot tell why sun-spots should wax
and wane in frequency during a period of about eleven years ; but
this does not prevent us from adopting such opinions as to the con-
dition of the sun's glowing photosphere as are suggeste,d by the be-
havior of the spots.

NEWS FROM JUPITER. 441

It may be asked whether I regard the ruddy glow of Jupiter's equa-
torial zone, during the period of disturbance lately passed through, as
due to the inherent light of glowing matter underneath his deep and
cloud-laden atmosphere. This appears to me on the whole the most
probable hypothesis, though it is by no means certain that the ruddy
color may not be due to the actual constitution of the planet's vapor-
ous atmosphere. In either case, be it noted, we should perceive in
this ruddy light the inherent lustre of Jupiter's glowing mass, only in
one case we assume that that lustre is itself ruddy, in the other we
suppose that light, originally white, 'shines through ruddy vapor-
masses. It is to be remembered, however, that, whichever view we
adopt, we must assume that a considerable portion of the light re-
ceived, even from these portions of the planet's disk, must have been
reflected sunlight. In fact, from what we know about the actual
quantity of light received from Jupiter, we may be quite certain that
no very large portion of that light is inherent. Jupiter shines about
as brightly as if he were a giant ciamulus-cloud, and therefore almost
as white as driven snow. Thus he sends us much more light than a
globe of equal size of sandstone, or granite, or any known kind of
earth. We get from him about three times as much light as a globe
like our moon in substance, but as large as Jupiter, and placed where
Jupiter is, would reflect toward the earth ; but not quite so much as
we should receive from a globe of pure snow of the same size and
similarly placed. It is only because large parts of the surface of
Jupiter are manifestly not white, that we seem compelled to assume
that some portion of his light is inherent. But the theory that Jupiter
is intensely hot by no means requires, as some mistakenly imagine,
that he should give out a large proportion of light. His real solid
or liquid globe (if he have any) might, for instance, be at a white
heat, and yet so completely cloud-enwrapped that none of its light
could reach us. Or, again, his real surface might be like red-hot
iron, giving out much heat but very little light.

I shall close the present statement of evidence in favor of what I
begin to regard as in eflTect a demonstrated theory, with the account
of certain appearances which have been presented by Jupiter's fourth
satellite during recent transits across the face of the planet. The a]>
peara^ices referred to have been observed by several telescopists, but
I will select an account given in the monthly notices of the Astro-
nomical Society, by Mr. Roberts, F.R. A. S., who observed the planet
with a fine telescope by Wray, eight inches in aperture. " On March
26, 1873," he says, "I observed Jupiter about 8 p. m., and found the
fourth satellite on the disk. I thought at first it must be a shadow ;
but, on referring to the JVcnttical Almanac, found that it was the
fourth satellite itself. A friend was observing with me, and we both
agreed that it was a very intense black, and also was not quite round.
We each made independent drawings, which agreed perfectly, and
consider that the observation was a perfectly reliable one. We could

442 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

not imagine tlint svicli an intensely black object would be visible when
oflf the disk, and waited with some impatience to see the emersion, but
were disappointed by fog, which came on just at the critical time."
Another obserA'er, using a telescope only two inches in aperture, saw
the satellite when off the disk, so that manifestly the blackness was
merely an effect of contrast.

In considering this remarkable phenomenon, we must not forget
that the other satellites do not look black (though some of them look
dark) when crossing Jupiter's disk, so that we have to deal with a
circumstance peculiar to the fourth or outermost satellite. Neverthe-
less, we seem precluded from supposing that any other difference ex-
ists between this satellite and the others than a certain inferiority of
lio-ht-reflecting power. I might indeed find an argument for the view
which I have suggested as not improbable, that Jupiter is a heat-sun
to his satellites, since the three innermost would be in that case much
better warmed than the outermost, and therefore would be much more
likely to be cloud-encompassed, and so would reflect more light. But
I place no great reliance on reasoning so ingenious, which stands much
as a pyramid would stand (theoretically) on its apex. The broad fact
that a body like the fourth satellite, probably comparable to our moon
in light-reflecting power, looks perfectly black when on the middle of
Jupiter's disk, is that on which I place reliance. This manifestly in-
dicates a remarkable difference between the brightness of Jupiter and
the satellite ; and it is clear that the excess of Jupiter's brightness is
in accordance with the theory that he shines in part with native light,
or, in other words, is intensely heated.

This completes the statement of the evidence obtained during the
recent opposition of Jupiter in favor of a theory which already had
the great advantage of according with all known facts, and account-
ing for some which had hitherto seemed inexplicable. If this theory
removes Jupiter from the position assigned to him by Brewster as the
noblest of inhabited worlds, it indicates for him a higher position as a
subordinate sun, nourishing with his heat, as he sways by his attrac-
tive energy, the scheme of worlds which circles round him. The theory
removes also the difiiculty suggested by the apparent uselessness of the
Jovian satellites in the scheme of creation. When, instead of consid-
ering their small power of supplying Jupiter with light, we consider
the power which, owing to his great size and proximity, he must pos-
sess of illuminating them with reflected light, and warming them
with his native heat, we find a harmony and beauty in the Jovian
system which before had been wanting ; nor, when we consider the
office which the sun subserves toward the members of his family, need
we reject this view on account of the supposition —

" That bodies bright and greater should not serve
The less not bright."

— Popular Science Review.

THE SPANG COLLECTION OF MINERALS. 443

THE SPANG COLLECTION OF MINEEALS.

Bt ALBEKT E. LEEDS,

PEOFESSOK OF CHEMISTEY IN THE STEVEX8 POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE.

THE increasing taste for the pursuit of natural science in tliis
country" is strikingly exhibited by the rapid increase in the num-
ber of gem and mineral collections. The taste is not confined to men
of any one profession, but is cultivated by lawyers, physicians, artists,
engineers, iron-masters and persons in every rank and walk of life.
Some of the collections thus formed are valuable in a scientific point
of view, on account of their being receptacles for specimens obtained
in the prosecution of mining enterprises, or from local discoveries
arising in the opening of quarries, the development of farm-lands, or
cutting of canals and road-ways; thus preserving material which other-
wise would be lost, and which ultimately must be handed over to the
skilled mineralogist for accurate description and analysis. Other pri-
vate collections are of deep interest on account of containing speci-
mens of such exceeding rarity and costliness as to surpass aught that
our colleges with their hitherto meagre endowments can display.
This is especially true of the magnificent cabinet, some few of whose
wonders I desire cursorily to describe in the present sketch, and which,
by very general consent, is regarded as one of the finest collections
in existence at the present time. This result has been achieved by
an unsparing expenditure of money, time, and energy, not only in this
country and Europe, but in every part of the world ; extending to
the sending out of paid collectors, the blasting of rocks in remote
mountain-districts, tlie outbidding of all rivals when cabinets were
offered for sale, and an unceasing watch over the fate of every unique
specimen known to mineralogists. In some instances entire collections
were purchased in order to secure a few remarkable specimens. To
the man of science the collection affords the gratification of examining
fine specimens of bodies so extremely rare that few persons have ever
beheld them. The resources of the cabinet are most generously placed
at the disposal of those engaged in any special mineral research ; and,
finally, the munificent owner proposes eventually to endow some insti-
tution of learning in this country with the perfected cabinet.

It is difficult to begin where so many objects worthy of study pre-
sent themselves, and I shall not attempt a systematic description of
this accumulation of minerals, which, though crowded together, can
barely find room in eleven cases of drawers, a fire-proof safe and six
glass show-cases. In the inclosed cases are more than 300 drawers,
averaging about 25 specimens to the drawer.

But in the first place the toux-malines attract our attention. Of

444 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

these, a variety found near Gouverneur, in the State of New York, is
distinguished by its peculiar brown color and internal structure.
There is a suite of at least one hundred specimens of this variety
alone, each one having been selected on account of some characteristic
difference, and presenting together all the known and probably some
yet uudescribed crystalline faces. Some of the specimens are aggre-
gates of crystals, one mass displaying fifty distinct terminations ;
others are individual crystals, frequently doubly terminated and show-
ing the different arrangement of the planes upon the analogous and
antilogous poles. The dimensions of one of these single crystals,
reputed to be the largest ever found at Gouverneur, deserve a perma-
nent record. It is four inches in height and four and a half inches
through, with the rhombohedral faces of one termination almost per-
fectly developed, and with one rhombohedral face of the other termi-
nation four inches in width, the two other corresponding planes hav-
ing been points of attacliment to the rock. It is bounded by eighteen
prismatic faces, all of which are perfect in form and polish.

Of the black tourmalines, there is one from Springfield, New Hamp-
shire, which has a termination remarkable for the extreme development
of the basal plane. It is A^ x 3f inches across, and almost extinguishes
the primary rhombohedron. Among entirely unique specimens from
Greenland, Bovey Tracey, in Devonshire, England, Haddam, Connect-
icut, Norway and Sweden, we might mention a group from Green-
land, of fifty or sixty crystals, mostly doubly terminated, and from
four to six inches in length, forming a rosette with divergent crys-
tals.

To the finely colored red tourmalines, M'hich are frequently cut and
polished as gems, the name of rubellite is given; those from Siberia be-
ing mostly violet red, the Brazilian rose-red ; the specimens from Ches-
terfield and Goshen, Massachusetts, are pale rose-red and opaque; those
from Paris, Maine, fine ruby-red. Among these rubellites there are
six from Elba, of exquisitely delicate pink-color. They are hexagonal
prisms, one of which is one and a quarter inch in height and three
quartets of an inch in diameter, all implanted on a base that is itself
very beautiful from the contrasted groups of rock-crystal, adular, and
rosettes of mica, of which it is made up. Of rubellites from Elba
there are more than fifty specimens, some of them reposing upon the
native rock ; others are terminated detached crystals of various shades
of pink — also crystals on the gangue and fine detached rubellites from
Siberia. TThen it is remembered that the slightest imperfection in
the sharpness of an edge or angle, the scratching of a single face, ex-
cludes a specimen from this cabinet, and that none are admitted which
are not at the same time remarkable for size, beauty, and perfection of
crystalline form, the brilliant effect of a drawer filled with these natu-
ral gems can be imagined.

More than usual interest attaches to the mineral of which I am

THE SPANG COLLECTION OF MINERALS. 445

now about to speak, the Columbite, on account of the derivation of
its name and the history of its discovery. The rare metallic element
columbium, or niobium as it has subsequently been called, was first
discovered in 1802, by Hatchett, in a specimen of this mineral sent
out by Governor "Winthrop, of Connecticut, to Sir Hans Sloane, then
president of the Royal Society, and the original analysis was made
by Wollaston, with an accuracy truly surprising, upon only four gi-ains
of the specimen, so long ago as the year 1809. It is highly probable
that Governor Winthrop's mineral came from Middletown, Connecti-
cut, at which locality some very large crystals have since been found ;
among many such in the Spang collection, there is one composed ot
twenty-five crystals compounded together, and showing the terminal
planes at the summit of each crystal. Two of the prismatic faces of
one of these crystals are three inches in length.

There is a genus of minerals termed zeolites, from a Greek word
signifying to boilf for the reason 'that when heated the large percent-
age of water which they contain escapes with intumescence, and of
these one of the most remarkable species is scolecite, so called because,
on touching it with the tip of a blow-pipe flame, it curls up like a
worm. I find elsewhere the record of some crystals, which were
found in the Berufiord, Iceland ; and which exceeded two inches in
length and were a quarter of an inch thick. There is a radiated mass
of scolecite crystals in this collection, brought from Poonah, Hin-
dostan, the largest being three inches in length, and compounded of
two twins, each of which is one-quarter of an inch in diameter. The
beauty of this group is still further enhanced by clusters of transpar-
ent tabular apophyllites attached to the sides of the crystals.

There is another species of zeolite, which, on account of its brill-
iant, pearly lustre, has received the name of stilbite. Usually its
color is white ; in this collection there is a specimen of stilbite from
Poonah, that is compounded of a great number of individual crystals,
the terminations of which together make up an octahedral summit
with planes two inches wide. The color is a deep, rich salmon.

Of the apophyllites from the same locality, one of the most beauti-
ful is a tabular square prism with the angles replaced by octahedral
planes, all of which are perfect in lustre and surface polish. The
crystal measures two and a quarter inches across, and is one and a
quarter inch in height. There are remarkable suites of jjink apo-
phyllites from the Hartz, transparent green crystals, highly modified,
from Nova Scotia, and some of the finest of those crystals which
made the Erie tunnel through the trap-rock of Bergen Hill, New
Jersey, at one time so famous among mineralogists. It is from such
wonderful works as these that we are enabled justly to appreciate the
transcendent skill with which Nature performs her task when she
tries her hand at the plastic arts ; for example, what piece of statuary
could be so faultless, in grouping and finish, as one of these specimens,

446 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

which coDsists of thousands of apophyllite crystals, many of them an
inch and averaging half an inch in size, festooned about a cluster of
pendant stalactites ?

Tv>-o uncut diamonds of gfeat brilliancy are remarkable for the
perfection of their forms ; one is an octahedron with dodecahedral
planes, the other is an elliptic twin, in shape closely resembling a
heart. Each stone is of one carat weight, and entirely limpid and
without a flaw — fit, in fact, for setting, though never touched by the
lapidary. Less costly, but hardly less beautiful than these, are some
Aragonites from Sicily, which are strikingly thrown into relief by the
pedestal of lemon-yellow crystals of sulphur upon which they are
mounted. They are six-sided prisms, measuring two and a quarter
inches along the vertical, and two and a half inches along the lateral
axis. Their bases and summits are perfectly plane.

At the time of its pui-chase and incorporation into the museum of
Harvard University, I had the pleasure of critically examining the
collection of minerals which had been accumulated by Herr Liebner,
a mining-captain in the Tyrol. The finest specimens were a suite of
Tyrolese epidotes, and I imagined that Kature could not surpass them,
until I saw those in the possession of Mr. Spang. Among others of
still larger dimensions, there is one prism of epidote which is eight
inches in length, and three-quarters by one half an inch in thickness.
It is perfectly straight, and all its sides and terminal planes are of a
smoothness and lustre indescribable. The light transmitted through
the crystal in one direction is a magnificent ruby-red, almost identical
in tint with that exhibited by light-red silver-ore. Another crystal
might faii-ly be entitled a gem of immense size ; it is three inches in
length, and exhibits thirteen terminal planes. On revolving it into
different positions, the light passing through it changes in color from
a delicate hair-brown to cherry and then to deep ruby-red.

Before concluding this sketch, some bodies of extreme rarity should
be mentioned, among them the chloro-carbonate of lead, termed phos-
genite. Most mineralogists are rejoiced to obtain minute crystals of
this mineral, the large crystals from Crawford, near Matlock, in Derby-
shire, having sold for from fifteen to twenty pounds sterling each. This
cabinet contains a perfect prism, of strong adamantine lustre on all
its faces, which is one and a half inch in height, one and a quarter
broad, and one and an eighth in thickness. Still more rare is a min-
eral, of which singularly enough we possess as yet no satisfactory anal-
ysis, known as Turnerite, from the Tavetsch Yalley in the Alps. In
.this collection there is a number of perfect crystals, five if I remember
correctly, each of which displays many highly-lustrous facets, and oc-
curring both isolated and embedded in a rock made up of quartz and
albite. The largest crystal is three-quarters of an inch long and five-
eighths of an inch thick. It is a doubly-terminated hexagonal prism,
the basal edges being regularly replaced by twelve small planes. The

THE SPANG COLLECTION OF MINERALS.

447

color is a translucent green — in most other recorded cases it is yellow
or brown.

One of the most curious specimens is a natural amalgam of silver.
It is a dodecahedral crystal, one-half an inch by three-eighths in size,
which communicates, by a solid rod of the same material passing
through the interior of the rock and nearly concealed from view, with
a similar crystal of amalgam. When placed in such a position that
one crystal is vertically above its mate, and allowed to stand for a
short time, tlie mercury finds its way downward and distends the
lower crystal until its faces are quite obliterated. In fact, it is con-
verted into a pear-shaped drop, and looks as if it were about to fall
from the crystal. When the specimen is inverted and allowed to re-
main so for half an hour, the mercury percolates through the solid
mass of amalgam, the distended crystal acquiring its former definite
outlines, and settles into a drop depending from the apex of crystal
No. 1. This lusus naturae^ an hour-glass of metallic crystals, is, I be-
lieve, without parallel.

Then there is a resj^lendent crystal of axinite from Switzerland,
among multitudes of others, which is three inches upon one of the
faces and four inches measured along its greatest dimension ; and a
cluster of stibnite crystals from Hungary, weighing perhaps five
pounds, of whicli the largest crystal is a prism three inches long and
three-eighths of an inch thick, perfectly terminated.

In conclusion, the emeralds deserve our admiration, as they
would that of persons least sensible of natural beauty. Of these,
there is a number of large crystals, some mounted upon the rock in
which they occur, others detached. Some of the latter from Bogota
have highly-modified terminations. Although not so large as the
others, being but one-half an inch in length and three-eighths of an
inch in thickness, by far the finest emei-ald is one which is implanted,
along with smaller crystals, upon a piece of rock from the Ural Moun-
tains. It has a perfect termination, presenting very many rhombohe-
dral and pyramidal planes. Without a flaw, absolutely limpid, and of
wonderful purity and depth of color, it is a natural gem, in the eyes
of a mineralogist incomparably more beautiful than any cut and
polished jewel could be. Its history might suggest to the wi-iter of
fictions some features of a romance, it having been given by a Czar
of Russia to Taglioni, and subsequently placed by her in pawn with a
wealthy gentleman in Paris.

448

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

A FREAK OF NATURE.

TPIERE were recently exliibited in Berlin and Paris two individ-
uals who attracted much attention among scientific men, owing
to a very singular development of hair upon the face and neck. In
Paris they received the appellation of honmies-chiens (dog-men), from
the resemblance of the adult's face to that of a Skye terrier. The por-
trait here given of Andrian Jeftichjew hardly does justice to this
striking resemblance, though in other respects it is a faithful represen-
tation of the man's curiously hirsute countenance. Andrian is about
fifty-five years of age, and is said to be the son of a Russian soldier. In
order to escape the derision and the unkind usage of his fellow-villagers,
Andrian in early life fled to the woods, where, for some time, he lived

Andeiah Jeftichjzw.

in a cave. During this period of seclusion he was much given to
drunkenness, and even yet he is said to live chiefly on sauer-kraut and
sc/mapps. His mental condition, however, observes a medical journal,
does not seem to have suffered, and he is, on the whole, of a kindly
and atifectionate disposition to his son and those about him. It may
be of interest to state that Andrian is an orthodox member of the
Russo-Greek Church, and that, degraded as he is intellectually, he has
very definite notions about heaven and the hereafter. He hopes to

A FREAK OF NATURE.

449

introduce his frightful countenance into the court of heaven, and his
present tour may be regarded as a sort of preparation for death, as he
devotes all the money lie makes, over and above his outlay for creature
comforts, to purchasing the prayers of a devout community of monks
in his native village, Kostroma, after his mortal career is ended.

Andrian is of medium stature, but very strongly built. His exces-
sive capillary development is not true hair, being simply an abnormal
growth of the down or fine hairs which usually cover nearly the entire
surface of the human body. Strictly speaking, he has neither head-
hair, beard, mustache, eyebrows, nor eyelashes, their place being
taken by this singular growth of long, silky down. In color this is of
a dirty yellow ; it is about three inches in length, all over the face,
and feels like the hair of a Newfoundland dog. The very eyelids are
covered with this long hair, while flowing locks come out of his nos-
trils and ears. On his body are isolated patches, strewed, but not
thickly, with hairs one and a half to two inches long. Dr. Bertillon,
of Paris, compared a hair from Andrian's chin with a very fine hair
from a man's beard, and found that the latter was three times as thick
as the former; and a hair from Andrian's head is only one-half as thick
as an average human hair.

Fig. 2.

Fedor Jeftichjetv.

When these strange beings were exhibited in Berlin, Prof Virchow
was much interested in them, and gathered all accessible information
about their life and ancestry. He states that Andrian is, so far as
known, the first of his line to present this wonderful hirsuteness.
Neither his reputed father nor his mother presented any peculiarity of

VOL. IV.— 29

450 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

this kind, and a brother and sister of his who are still living are in no
wise remarkable for capillary development. Andrian married and had
two children, who died young ; one of these was a girl, who resembled
her father ; but of the other, a boy, nothing can be ascertained.

Fedor, whose portrait we give, is Andrian's illegitimate son, and
is about three years of age. He is a sprightly child, and apparently
more intelligent than his father. The growth of the down on his face
is not yet so heavy as to conceal his features, but there is no doubt
that when the child comes to full maturity he will be at least as hir-
sute as his parent. The hairs " are as white and as soft as the fur of
the Angora cat, and are longest at the outer angles of the eyes ; there
is a thick tuft between the eyes, and the nose is well covered. The
mustache joins the whisker on each side, after the English fashion,
and this circumstance gives to accurate portraits of the child a ludi-
crous resemblance to a well-fed Englishman of about fifty. As in the
father's case, the inside of Fedor's nostrils and ears has a thick crop
of hair.

It is remarkable that both Andrian and Fedor are almost toothless,
the former possessing only five teeth, one in the upper jaw and four in
the lower, while the child has but four teeth, all in the lower jaw.
These four teeth are, in both cases, the incisors. To the right of An-
drian's one upper tooth there still remains the mark of another which
has disappeared. That beyond these six teeth the man never had any
others is evident to any one who feels the gums with the finger.

Bufibn, in the supplement to his "Natural History" (1'774) men-
tions a native of Russia, whom he had seen, and whose entire face was
covered with hair. But a more exact counterpart of Andrian is found
in a Burmese family living at Ava, and first described by Crawford, an
English traveler, in 1829. At the time of Crawford's visit to Ava, Shwe-
Maoiig, the head of this family, was about thirty years of age. His
whole body, except the hands and feet, were covered with silky hairs,
which, on the shoulders and along the spine, attained the length of
five inches. Shwe-Maong arrived at puberty at the age of twenty years,
and it was only then that he lost his milk-teeth, which were replaced
by five teeth in the upper jaw, one canine and four incisors, and four
incisors in the lower jaw. He had four daughters, one only of whom
resembled her father. She was found living at Ava by a British
officer in 1855, who states that her son was hairy like his grandfather,
Shwe-Maong.

In " Animals and Plants under Domestication," Darwin mentions
Julia Pastrana, a Spanish dancer, or opera-singer ; she was " a remark-
ably fine woman, but she had a thick, masculine beard, and a hairy
forehead; she Avas photographed, and her stufied skin was exhibited
for a show. . . . From the redundancy of her teeth, her mouth pro-
jected, and her face had a gorilla-like appearance." A writer in the
French journal Vlllvstration gives us a fuller account of this woman.

A FREAK OF NATURE.

451

" She was of very dark complexion," says he, " short of stature and
well proportioned ; her hands and feet were small, her nails yellow ;
she had a beautiful breast. Her tresses were very long, deep black,
and coarse as horse-hair, and she had a strong beard. Her forehead
was overgrown with hair, down to the bushy eyebrows, which over-
shadowed her soft, humid eyes within their border of black lashes.

Julia Pastrana.

Her face was made specially hideous by the excessive development of
the half-open lips ; she spoke with difficulty, and sang mezzo-soprano
in Spanish. The parts having the heaviest covering of hair were the
shoulders and the hips, the breast and the spinal column. On the
limbs the hairiness was greatest on the inner side."

Mr. Darwin recognizes the existence of a constant relation between
the hair and the teeth, and cites the deficiency of teeth in hairless
dogs. He says that in those exceptional cases in which the hair has
been renewed in old age, this has " usually been accompanied by a re-
newal of the teeth." According to him, the great reduction in the
size of the tusks in domestic boars probably stands in close relation
with their diminished bristles. Then, after referring to the Burmese
family and Julia Pastrana, Mr. Darwin says : " These cases forcibly
call to mind the fact that the two orders of mammals— namely, the
Edentata and Cetacea— which are the most abnormal in their dermal
covering, are likewise the most abnormal by deficiency or redundancy
of teeth."

452 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

COKUNDUM.

WITHIN the past two years, the attention of the scientific world,
especially, has been directed to the above mineral, from the
fact of its discovery, in place, in this country. A number of commu-
nications on the subject hare been published by prominent men, the
most important of which are those from Profs. Genth and Lesley, of
the University of Pennsylvania ; Prof. Charles TJ. Shepard, of Amherst
College ; Dr. A C. Hamlin, of Bangor; and Dr. J. Lawrence Smith, of
Kentucky. These papers are mostly of value to men of scientific pur-
suits. Our readers will be interested in more detailed information as
to this mineral, and the locality where first in the historj^ of the world
it is legitimately mined.

Although corundum has been in use, as an abrasive, from an early
age, and under various names, it was not until near the commence-
ment of the present century that its localities were found and examined
by scholars, and its true place in mineralogy determined. For thou-
sands of years the Chinese had used it, under the name of adaman-
tine spar ; the Persians, as Armenian whetsone ; the Hindoos, as
corundum ; and the Egyptians, as the iron-stone of the Red Sea.
The natives of these countries had gathered it from the beds of
mountain-torrents, or in the alluvium of the valleys, after the annual
rains had washed it down, freeing it, in the transit, from its associate
minerals and impurities ; but no attempt at its legitimate mining had
ever been made until within the past two years, in the United States,
in the State of Xorth Carolina. The mineral, from whatever locality it
comes, is now known in science and commerce as corundum — the name
given it by the Hindoos, and meaning cinnamon-stone, from the re-
semblance in color to that article, of the variety found in their coun-
try. It is pure crystallized clay or alumina, and is the next hardest
substance in Nature to the diamond, reducing to powder all sub-
stances save that gem.

Until the researches of Haliy, the distinguished French savant^
about the commencement of this century, the three forms of alumina,
known as sapphu-e, corundum, and emery, were supposed to be dis-
tinct species. His analysis made them three varieties of one species ;
a decision confirmed by chemists since, and now imiversally accepted.
The earliest extended reference to corundum, of any value to science
or trade, appears in a joint paper by Count Boumon, of Paris, and
Sir Charles Greville, of London, prepared for the Royal Historical
Society of London, in 1798 ; which was soon followed by a more
careful mineralogical treatise, by the first-named scientist, prepared
by him for the same society. Sir Charles Greville's observations were

CORUNDUM.

453

based on data collected by him at a point in the alluvium in India
where the natives had for ages gathered the mineral. Those by Count
Bournon were the results of his studies of the mineral at Paris, from
specimens brought him from several points, especially in India and
Ceylon. At a later date, we have interesting information from Sir
Alexander Burnes as to the celebrated ruby locality of ancient Bac-*
tria ; and from Sir James Tennent and Sir Samuel Baker, as to the
famed sapphire districts of Ceylon, which were carefully examined by
them during a protracted residence there. A most interesting ac-
count of these localities was also published in the Ceylon Observer
for June, 1855, by Mr. William Stewart, of Colombo. In the Ameri-
can Journal of Science for the years 1850, 1851, and 1866, are three
papers on granular corundum, or emery, by Dr. J. Lawrence Smith,
of Kentucky ; the first two descriptive of the emeries of Asia Minor,
and localities on the islands of the -^gean Sea ; the third, on the mine
in Western Massachusetts, known as the Chester mine. These papers
are of the first importance in all questions concerning the commercial
emeries of our own or foreign countries, and cover the ground of in-
vestigation to the date of the North Carolina discovery, and the com-
munications thereon, enumerated in the opening paragraph of this
article.

Up to the date of 1871, corundum, or its gems, had never been
found in situ. Both were looked for in mountain-torrents, or beds of
gravel at their base. Emery had for many years been mined in the
islands of the -^Egean Sea, but had not been scientifically studied in
position, until the researches of Dr. Smith, alluded to ; since which
date, however, it has been found in place at various points in our own
and other lands. About the year 1800 it became known that corun-
dum existed, in small quantities, all along the mountain-line of sea-
coast, from Maine to Georgia ; and, twenty-five years since, it was
found in bowlders, in considerable quantities, in Southeastern Penn-
sylvania. Near the same time a large fragment of massive sapphire
was picked up in Western North Carolina, and elicited much attention
from mineralogists ; but, careful further search in the locality for it
being fruitless, there has been since but little efibrt to find it at any
point in the Appalachian range. Whatever efibrt was made, however,
settled the point that corundum existed, in considerable quantity and
different degrees of purity, at twenty-five or more localities scattered
from New York to Northern Alabama.

In the spring of 1871 Colonel C. W. Jenks, of St. Louis, being in
want of an abrasive more powerful than Naxos emery, started out into
the mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina in search of corundum,
in suflicient quantity to mine profitably. From many localities where
the mineral showed itself, he selected one near the head-waters of the
Tennessee, in Southwestern North Carolina, nine miles east from
Franklin, the county-seat of Macon, and commenced his work. A

454

TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

large price was paid for mouutaiu-land, at a site where the mineral
had been found on the surface in considerable quantities. A canal
was cut from a mountain near, that furnished hydraulic power ; a gang
of a dozen mountaineers were engaged as miners, and ground was first
broken in the search for corundum in position. There being no pre-
cedent or guide in mining for corundum, experience was the teacher,
and a dear one, for nearly a year of energetic and toilsome explora-
tion. The question to be solved was, whether the mineral in any
quantity lay beneath the surface, upon which, all former supplies had
been gathered ; and, if so, whether it would show itself in bowlders,
segregated masses, pockets, or true veins. The country rock is gran-
ite and gneiss ; the spur or ridge, where the mineral showed itself, a
trap of chromiferous serpentine, or chrysolite formation. The strata
developed is chrysolite rock, mixed with anthophyllite — a layer of
micaceous rock — a seam of chalcedony — a stratum of chlorite, of the
variety ripidolite, and a gaugue of the same, which proves to be the
usual matrix of the corundum. Eight months of hard labor settled
the question that corundum was there in immense quantity, and that
it would Jdc found in veins varying, as is usual in other minerals, from
a few inches to several feet in width. These should be termed, what
they are, embedded veins, between hanging and foot walls of chryso-
lite, the gangue being of various minerals — generally, however, of
ripidolite, as stated ; but sometimes that mineral running into mica
schist, talc, spinel, jefieresite, and feldspar. In one of these veins, in a
pocket of jefferesite — a golden-yellow mica — there was found much the
largest and finest crystal of corundum known, of a fine sapphire and
ruby color, weighing 312 pounds, and now the property of Prof. Shep-
ard, of Amherst College. This unique specimen would undoubtedly
command one thousand dollars, were it for sale, various collectors of
Europe being anxious for its possession. Corundum from this mine
proves to be of excellent quality. Taking sapphire as the standard at
100, the product of the mine has a power of from 90 to 97 as an abra-
sive, while that of the best emery, the Xaxos, numbers from 40 to 57,
The veins, five of which have been opened, run northeast and south-
west, dip under at an angle of 45°, and are, at the deepest point
reached, seven to ten feet wide. There is also remarkable association
of other interesting minerals of tourmaline, spinfel, zerkon, etc., while
the corundum itself shows almost every shade of color from white to
black. It is also remarkable that the mine contains all the varieties
in color, texture, and crystallization, found in the aggregate corundum
localities of the globe. Association of two colors in the same crystal
is spoken of by the best writers as a somewhat rare matter, even in
Ceylon. One crystal was shown us from this mine, weighing two
pounds, with blue, ruby, pink, yellow, and green colors of great brill-
iancy and transparency ; and a small hand-collection, which con-
tained a variety in form, perfection, and purity of coloi-, not equaled

CORUNDUM. 455

by any collection of corundum in the known cabinets of Europe — for
from no other locality have such specimens been found, excejjting in
the perfect gems from Ceylon and Buimah.

We now come to the most interesting feature of the mine. It was
natural that, with so much of purity in the amorphous mineral, and per-
fection and beauty in tlie crystals found with it, Colonel Jenks should
conclude that there might be gems in the mine. But from no quarter
but his own observations did he get any encouragement in this direc-
tion. The best English authority on gems and their localities, Prof.
King, of Trinity College, Cambridge, says : " The corundum gems
have never been found in place, but always in the alluvial or sands
of the rivers." After eight years of residence in Ceylon, the source
from which the best sapphires of the world have come from an early
period, and much acquaintance with the best gem-localities of the
island, Sir Samuel Baker remarks : " The sapphires were created in
the peculiar secondary formation, where they are always found, which
is composed of water-worn pebbles, in a conglomerate of blue and
white clay, buried ten to twenty feet beneath the surface of the val-
leys," etc. This was the opinion of Buflbn, and other eminent scholars.
The ruby localities of Bactria, visited by Sir Alexander Burnes, are
said by him to be of similar character. Sir James Tennent, in his
elaborate work upon Ceylon, expresses similar views, yet ventures
the opinion, from a survey of the whole subject, that gems might be
found in place in the island. He says, in confirmation of this view, that
he saw in one of the mountain-ranges " a stratum of gray granite, with
iron pyrites and molybdena, which contained great quantities of very
small rubies." Whether he ascertained the nature of the gems he calls
rubies by analysis, or only from casual observation, he does not say ;
but garnets of great beauty so often occur in such a matrix that it would
not be safe to rely on those stones he saw — unless analyzed — as the
ruby corundum. Seeking information from a later, and perhaps we
are justified in saying, on this matter, the most eminent authority,
that of Dr. J. Lawrence Smith, of Kentucky, he says, in substance :
"The gems of corundum cannot be expected to appear where the
amorphous masses of the mineral abound, and, vice versa, that corun-
dum, for commerce, will not be found with the precious gems," etc.,
his conclusion being based upon "the diverse composition of the two
forms of the mineral, shown by analysis, and which would require for
their formation difierent geological and mineralogical conditions," etc.

Not dismayed by this array of scientific opinion and experience,
however. Colonel Jenks made careful examination of the material as it
came from the miners' hands, and the results led him to give them
special instructions as to the nature of their operations. As the geodes
in the formation of silica have been found to contain the finest quartz
crystals, he hoped to find in the mine something of the same character,
of alumina. He was rewarded by one or more large pockets of geodes

456 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of dark-green chlorite, from the size of a walnut to that of a fifty-pound
shot, within which were one or more crystals of corundum, sometimes
blue and white, and, in few instances, of ruby color. None of them
were entirely transparent; none of tbe geodes had cavities, as is the
case in those of quartz formation ; yet the prospect in this direction is
most promising. The result thus far, however, is most encouraging
in the rock-strata itself, which is the proper gangue of the corundum.
With the hundred tons the mine has yielded for abrasive purposes,
the workmen have taken fi'om the place of their birth — a solid, undis-
turbed matrix of ripidolite — beautiful specimens of the nine corundum
gems knov>ai by lapidaries by the prefix " Oriental," because of their
superior hardness and brilliancy ; and also because those of this char-
acter, in lustre and composition, v>'ere first brought from the East.
These are known by name as Oriental sapphire, ruby, emerald, topaz,
asteria, amethyst, chatoyant, girasol, and white or colorless sapphire,
this last often used in place of the diamond. The general characteris-
tics of these stones, such as color, lustre, hardness, etc., are, by the first
lapidaries of this country and Europe, pronounced as not inferior to
those of the best localities of the Old "World. One of them was sold to
a lapidary of Amsterdam, Holland, for $4,000, Others of much beauty
have been cut, and are owned in this country and Europe. In this
connection it is of value to note that Count Bournon, during his inves-
tigations, made a list and analysis of the associate minerals found, in
transitu^ with the sapphires of Ceylon. Colonel Jenks has had a sim-
ilar list and examination made of those found in situ with the gems of
his mine. All the minerals found in the Ceylon gem-deposits are
found in the North Carolina locality.

There can be no doubt, therefore, that Colonel Jenks has made
the discovery, in America, of the most precious gems next to the
diamond, where they have been sought for in vain elsewhere, iti a mat-
rix of solid rock-formation. We look for further interesting develop-
ments at this unique and thus far unparalleled alumina deposit.

ATMOSPHEEIC ELECTRICITY AND OZONE: THEIR
RELATION TO HEALTH AND DISEASE.^

By GEOEGE M. BEAED, M. D,

AMONG the published list of questions at the civil service exami-
nation of the Board of Health of New York last summer I ob-
served this : " What is the composition of pure air ? "

^ Read before the American Public Health Association, in Neiv York, November 13,
1873. It was voted by the Society to publish this paper in their " Transactions," but,
through the courtesy of the Secretary, the author is allowed to publish it independently.

ATMOSPHERIC ELECTRICITY AND OZONE. 457

As I laid down the paper I asked myself this question, or, rather,
I put to myself the same question in another form: "Is there among
the sons of men any one who really knows the composition of pure
air?"

Still further I queried with myself what answer I should have
given to the question had I been one of the applicants for a position
on the Board of Health, and it seemed to me that, after stating what
almost every school-girl knows about the relative proportions of oxy-
gen and nitrogen, I should have added this codicil : " The question
of the composition of pure air is one that is too complicated to ad-
mit of an answer." What I have to say this morning on atmos-
pheric electricity and ozone will serve, so far as it goes, to enforce
this view.

Hoio the Subject of Atmospheric Electricity and Ozone has been
investigated. — During the past quarter of a century regular daily ob-
servations of atmospheric electricity have been made in Brussels,
Munich, and for the past ten or fifteen years in St. Louis. The diffi-
culties in the study of the subject are very great, but, from the accu-
mulated observations of the different investigators, some few interest-
ing and important general facts have been secured.

A2)23aratics for studying Atmospheric Electricity / Measuring Apjm-
rattis. — Prof. Dellman, of Kreuznach on the Rhine, for several years
made three regular observations each day of the atmospheric electri-
city. The electrometer that he used in these observations is a torsion
balance. A small thread of glass going vertically through a glass
tube has on its lower extremity a small needle of brass fastened to it.
This light brass needle, when influenced by any force, can move over
a metallic disk with a graduated scale. Below this light brass needle
is another light brass needle, which is fixed and isolated from the me-
tallic disk, and connected with a metallic wire which receives the elec-
trical charge from outside. By means of a micrometer screw the up-
per needle can be lowered and raised so as to touch the lower needle,
or be kept above it.

The whole instrument rests on three iron legs, which can be
screwed up and down so as to give it the level required. When
the wire outside receives a charge of electricity, it communicates
this charge to the lower needle. If, now, the upper needle be low-
ered and brought in contact with the lower one, it also receives a
charge of electricity. But, as like electricities repel each other, the
other needle will be at once driven off over the graduated scale. The
number of degrees that it is driven will depend on the strength of the
charge. To determine whether the electricity is positive or negative,
subsequently charge the wire with electricity of known quality. If
they are alike — that is, if the first charge be of the same quality as
the second — the needle will be repelled still farther; if unlike, the
needle will return toward the fixed needle.

458 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Collecting Apparatus. — Dellman's apparatus for collecting atmos-
pheric electricity is a hollow brass or copper ball about six inches in
diameter, with a stem of metal. The metallic stem rests in a metallic
tube, but is isolated from the tube by shellac. This appai-atus is at-
tached to a pole almost thirty feet long. This pole is drawn by a
windlass up the walls of a house to the top of the roof. The operator
then touches the stem of the ball with a piece of brass in the shape of
a half-moon. This charges the ball with electricity. The pole is now
let down at once, and the collecting apparatus is brought in control
with the measuring apparatus. The electricity which is thus collected
in the ball is developed in it by induction. The natural electi'icity of
the ball is separated by the surrounding atmospheric electricity into
positive and negative electricity. One of these goes to the lower part
of the ball, the other remains in the upper part. Atmospheric elec-
tricity is usually positive. The natural electricity of the ball being
decomposed, the negative is attracted to the upper and the positive to
the lower part. When the operator touches the stem of the ball with
the piece of brass, the positive electricity is conducted through his
body to the ground, and the negative remains in the ball.

When^ therefore^ the electrometer shows negative electricity^ it indi-
cates 2)osltive electricity in the atmosphere^ and vice versa.

It has been shown that there are two daily tides of positive atmos-
pheric electricity — the high tides between 9 and 12 a. m. and be-
tween 6 and 9 p. m. ; the low tides between 2 and 5 p. m. and 1 and 5
A. :^. The annual variations are fully as marked as the diurnal; the
quantity of positive atmospheric electricity being greatest in the win-
ter, least in the summer. Dr. Wislizenus found that, in 2,124 obser-
vations made at regular hours, the atmospheric electricity was 2,046
times positive and but 78 times negative. Of the 78 times, 30 were
connected with thunder or hail storms, or by thunder and lightning,
23 by common rains, and 20 by high v\'inds and gales without rain,
thunder, or lightning, 4 by snow, and 1 by fog.'

According to Herschel, out of 10,50u observations at the Royal
Observatory, only 364 showed negative electricity. The remainder,
10,176, all showed positive electricity. Negative electricity was usu-
ally attended with rain.

It seems, therefore, that the chief cause of a condition of negative
atmospheric electricity is storm, and especially thunder-storms, and
that at all other times positive atmospheric electricity prevails. In
very many cases this change to negative electricity takes place shortly
before the storm approaches ; during its progress there may be — espe-
cially in thunder-storms — rapidly-repeated alternations of positive and
negative conditions, followed by an equilibrium, or by positive elec-
tricity.

Dr. "Wislizenus, of St. Louis, also found that snow-storms and fog
1 Dr. A. Wislizenus, in Transactions of St. Louis Academy of Medicine.

ATMOSPHERIC ELECTRICITY AND OZONE. 459

were usually accompanied by an increase of positive electricity ; this
observation is of interest, because it accords with the fact that the ap-
proach of snow-storms and the presence of simple fog do not cause
the exacerbations of rheumatic and neuralgic pains that are experi-
enced on the approach of storms of rain, or thunder and lightning.

Ozone- History. — From the earliest recorded ages a peculiar odor
has been observed during thunder-storms and other electrical disturb-
ances, and especially in connection with flashes of lightning. The
peculiar odor of thunder-bolts has been referred to by Homer, both in
the " Iliad " and the " Odyssey." Jupiter is said to strike a ship with a
thunder-bolt, " Iv 6\ dteiov Tr/.fjTO,^'' full of sulphurous odor, and to
hurl a bolt into the ground "with the flame of burning sulphur."
This jjeculiar sulphurous odor has been observed not only during
thunder-storms, but also, it is said, during displays of northern and
southern aurorae.

So long ago as 1785, Van Marum, of Holland, observed that electric
sparks passed through oxygen gas (that had been discovered by
Priestley only eleven years before) gave rise to a peculiar sulphurous
or electrical odor ; and, at the beginning of the j)resent century, Ca-
vallo, a prominent name in the history of electricity, called attention
to the fact that this " electrified air," as it was termed, had an anti-
septic eflect on decomposing matter, and was a salutary application
for fetid ulcers. In 1826 Dr. John Davy, in a measure anticipating
Schonbein, recognized this peculiarity of the atmosphere, and devised
tests for detecting it.

The real scientific history of ozone dates from 1839, when Prof.
Schonbein, of Basle, the renowned inventor of gun-cotton, observed
that the electrolytic decomposition of water was attended by a pecul-
iar odor resembling that evolved during the working of a frictional
electric machine. In 1840 Schonbein called the attention of the scien-
tific world to the newly-discovered substance, to which he gave the
name of ozone, from the Greek o^w, to emit an odor. He showed that
this odor appeared at the positive pole during the electrolysis of
water. He furthermore pointed out that ozone may be produced by
the slow oxidation of phosphorus in moist air or oxygen, and that the
odor was similar to that which is observed during flashes of light-
ning. Schonbein studied hard on the subject for many years, and ar-
rived at the conclusion that oxygen is capable of division into a nega-
tively polar state, ozone, and a positively polar state, which he called
antozone. During the past quarter of a century the subject of ozone
has been studied by some of the most eminent scientists of the age,
among whom we may mention the names of Berzelius, De la Rive,
Marignac, Becquerel, Faraday, Fremy, Meissner, Houzcau, Scout-
teten, Odling, Andrews, Tait, Fox, Fischer, Boeckel, Zeuger, Moflat,
Nasse, Engler, Erdmann, Angus Smith, Poey, A. Mitchell, Soret, Bau-
mert, Williamson, and very many others.

46o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The Nature of Ozone and Antozone. — The result of this quarter
of a century of research is the present conchxsion that ozone is con-
densed allotropic oxygen.^ In regard to antozone there is much dif-
ference of opinion among scientists. There are those who declare
that it is a myth. The original hypothesis has recently been losing
its hold on the scientific mind, and fui'ther researches ai'e necessary to
determine what it is and what it is not. The present opinion of the
German philosophers is, that antozone is the peroxide of hydrogen
diffused through the air.

Preparation of Ozone. — Ozone is prepared in various ways — by
passing electric sparks, or electricity without sparks, through oxy-
gen or air, by the electrolysis of acidulated water, by oxidizing
phosphorus in moist air, by the action of strong sulphuric acid (three
parts) on permanganate of potash (two parts), by sending water in
the form of spray through air, by introducing hot glass rods into ves-
sels filled with the vapor of ether, and by the slow oxidation of ethers
and oils, etc., when exposed to light.

Properties of Ozone. — Ozone is a colorless gas, with a powerful and
peculiar odor. Like oxygen, it is an oxidizing agent of great power.
It changes indigo into isatin, the black sulphate of lead into the white
sulphate of lead. It oxidizes antimony, manganese, arsenic, iron,
zinc, tin, silver, lead, bismuth, and mercury. Many of the lower
oxides it transforms into peroxides. It corrodes India-rubber and de-
colorizes blue litmus-paper. It acts with great rapidity on iodide of
potassium, liberating the iodine. It quickly consumes ammonia, chan-
ging it into nitrate. It decomposes hydrochloric acid, liberating the
chlorine. It is insoluble in acids, alkalies, alcohol, ether, the essential
oils, and water. The odor of ozone is very penetrating ; air contain-
ing but one millionth of it is said to be perceptible to the olfactories.
The peculiar odor of sea-air is in part the result of ozone. All air,
even the purest, has more or less ozone ; but so accustomed do we
become to it that it is only by sudden change into it that we perceive
it. Visitors at the Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, report that, on emerg-
ing, the air has a peculiar and vivid odor such as they never before
realized. That we can in a half-hour become so used to the foul air
of a closed room that we do not perceive its odor until we leave it for
a few moments and then return to it, is the experience of every one.
The peculiar odor of ozone can be obtained very easily indeed by
touching a metallic electrode of a galvanic battery of a number of
cells against one of the plates of the batteries so as to make a con-
nection of the current, or by touching the metallic ends of the poles
for a moment with the spark thus produced.

Ozone in the Atmosphere. — Ozone, like electricity, exists normally
in the atmosphere, but varies in amount in different localities at difier-

1 " Ozone and Antozone : their History and Nature." By Cornelius B. Fox, M. D.
London, 1873.

ATMOSPHERIC ELECTRICITY AND OZONE. 461

ent seasons and in different hours of tbe day, and is considerably de-
pendent on vai'ious meteorological conditions.

It varies with the Locality. — It is more abundant in the country than
in the city ; by the sea-side than inland ; among moimtains than in val-
leys ; in well-drained neighborhoods than in those where such sanitary
provisions are disregarded. The opposite results of different observa-
tions in different localities are accounted for in pai't by the fact that the
amount of ozone is not everywhere constant. Ozone is not often found
in closed rooms or chambers. Those who stay in-doors are deprived
both of atmospheric electricity and ozone. Like electricity, it increases
with the altitude ; hence we may in part explain the beneficial effects of
mountain-air. The air of the sea is richer in ozone than the air of the
land, because evaporation is attended with the simultaneous develop-
ment of oxygen and ozone. Hence it is that tests applied over the sur-
face of the sea or of lakes, ponds or rivers, show a deeper tint than tests
applied over the land. An excess of sea-air will blight vegetation in
the vicinity of the ocean ; delicate fruits, as the peach and the plum,
are cultivated only with difficulty. It has been observed that a pro-
longed storm coming from the sea will blight vegetation. Possibly
the excess of ozone may be a factor in this destruction.

It varies icith the Seasoji. — Ozone, like electricity, is more abundant
in the winter than in the summer. Atmospheric ozone is not measured
with the same accuracy as atmospheric electricity, and therefore the
regular gradations during the spring and autumn have not been estab-
lished as in the case of the latter agent. For the same reason there
is much discrepancy among different observers. It is believed that
the relatively small amount of ozone in the summer and early fall is due
partly to the fact that it is consumed in oxidizing the impurities of
the air, and partly to the fact that there is less atmospheric electricity
at that time.

It varies with the Hour of the Day. — There is considerable difference
in the conclusion of different observations, but the average results
seem to show rather more ozone in the atmosphere during the night
than during the day. Like atmospheric electricity, ozone rises and
falls in pretty regular tides twice during the twenty-four hours. The
maximum periods are between 4 and 9 a. m. and 7 to 9 p. ar.
The minimum periods are between 10 a. m. and 1 p. m. and be-
tween 10 p. M. and midnight. It will be seen that ozone is at its
minimum when the sun is at the zenith, and its maximum about sun-
rise and sunset. It varies with atmospheric conditions, as electricity,
rain, fog, thunder-storms, snow, wind, clouds, halos, and auroras,
eclipses, etc. There is a certain correspondence between the tides
of electricity and of ozone ; they seem to rise and fall together.
This will be apparent on comparing the statements made above. A
comjDarison between atmospheric ozone and electricity has been made
by Quetelet, who has given the subject special attention. His obser-

462 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

vations, which were made with Peltier's electrometer in August,
1842, are represented in the following table :

Hours.
6 A JI

Electric!
... +17
27

■

J

■

1

Ozone.
... 4.10

7 " ..

Maximum.

4.60 1

4.88 '

4.45 ]

.31 \

... .41

80

8 " ..

9 " ,.

36

27

■ Maximum.

10 » ..

11 " ..

12 M

20

14

12

10

0

1 P.M..

2 " .

Minimum.

.96
1.17
1.31
1.40
1.33
... 1.33

> Minimum.

3 " ..

3

4 " .

. ... 5

5 " ..

11

6 " ..

18

24

30

32

7 " ..

8 " ...

9 " ..

Maximum.

1.41
1.06 ,
1.70 y
1.00
... 1.15

» Maximum.

10 " ...

11 " ..

30

19

Ozone, like electricity, seems to depend in a measure on the humid-
ity of the air. The relation of fog to atmospheric ozone is not yet
determined, but it seems to be agreed that during snow-storms it is
increased. Thus, "Wolf gives the following comparison :

Amount of atmospheric ozone in fine days, 4.186.

Amount of atmospheric ozone in rainy days, 11.40.

Amount of atmospheric ozone in snowy days, 14.15.

It will be remarked that snow-storms also favor atmospheric elec-
tricity. The direction of the wind has a certain influence, as is well
recognized, on ozone. According to Lowe, ozone is most abundant
during a southwest or south-southwest wind, and least abundant when
the wind is north or northeast. There is a maximum when the barom-
eter is low, and a minimum when it is high. Other inland observers
agree with Mr. Lowe. At the sea-side, winds blowing from the sea
bring with them abundant ozone.

When the sky is darkened with clouds, there is more ozone than
when it is clear. Before thunder-storms, or while they are at a dis-
tance, ozone, like electricity, increases, and various changes and fluctu-
ations may occar during the progress of the storm.

Summing up in a few words, we may say that atmospheric ozone is
more abixndant during the winter and spring, because in those seasons
there is much rain, snow, hail, and wind, a low temperature, and a
maximum of electricity. During these seasons, also, there is little de-
composition going on in the vegetable world. In the summer and
autumn, atmospheric ozone is least abundant, because, during these
seasons, there is no snow, or hail, less wind, rain, high temperature, a
minimum of electricity, and a great amount of decomposition of ani-
mal and vegetable matter, by which the air becomes polluted, and is
neutralizing and purifying while the ozone is consumed.

ATMOSPHERIC ELECTRICITY AXD OZONE. 463

Average Quantity of Ozone in the Atmos2ohere. — The quantity of
ozone in the atmosphere is exceedingly minute. The proportion varies
with the locality, the season, the hour, etc., as we have already seen,
and it also varies with the altitude, for it is with this agent as with
electricity — it increases as we rise above the earth. According to
Houzeau, air of the country, about six feet above the earth, contains
about xTinrro of its weight of ozone, or , q (,^0 ^ „ of its volume. The
quantity is so minute that it may probably be increased several fold
without perceptible injury to man or animals.

Origin of Atmospheric Electricity and Ozone. — The sources of
ozone in the atmosphere are almost innumerable. Like atmospheric
electricity, it results from a wide variety of countless and ever-chan-
ging influences ; it is one of the grand resultants of the ceaseless chem-
istry of the earth and sky. The evidence is now pretty clear that one
prominent source of atmospheric ozone is in vegetable life. The oxy-
gen that plants evolve from their leaves is more or less ozonized. It
is claimed that ozone is developed with the perfume of flowers. The
most odorous flowers, as the heliotrope, hyacinth, and mignonette, are
the most prolific generators of ozone. This ozonic property of flow-
ers is most manifest under the direct influence of sunlight. Lavender,
fennel, mint, clove, and cherry-laurel, evolve ozone with special abun-
dance when exposed to the solar rays. It is believed that the oxida-
tion of essential oils, as anise-seed, bergamot, etc., under exposure to
the light and air, develops ozone, and that in all flowers the source of
the ozone is the essence ; hence it is that the most odorous are the
most ozoniferous.

If we accept these conclusions, we must also concede that the cus-
tom, now almost forgotten, among physicians, of providing the han-
dles of their canes with vinaigrettes, with the fancy that the fumes
would protect them against infectious* disease, has a certain scientific
basis. The aroma of snufi" is said to develop ozone, and for years
snuflf has been regarded as a disinfectant.

Electricity, as is well understood, is generated by any kind of
chemical change or action. Even friction and pressure cause elec-
tricity to be evolved, as was shown by Armstrong's experiments with
jets of condensed air, liberated under high pressure. It was shown
by Faraday that the friction of water dropping against bodies gives
rise to electricity, and it is probable that the same efiect follows the
friction of water against air.

Yolta showed, nearly a century ago, that the spray of a fountain
furnishes negative electricity. Trolles, and afterward Humboldt, ob-
served that a cascade or water-fall filled the air for some distance with
negative electricity, and Bell thinks he has proved that a cascade is
negative at the top, and positive at the bottom ; that the positive
electricity passes into the earth, leaving the negative in the spray.

We are then to look for the sources of ozone, as of electricitv, in all

464 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the infinite play of the terrestrial powers: in the falling away of
the rocks, and the springing forth of plants; in the oxidation of metals,
and the emission of the perfume of flowers ; in the deposition of dew,
in the falling rain, the rattling hail, and the drifting snow; in the rush-
ing of the wind, and the conflict of the storm ; in the friction of the
clouds as they pass in the sky, or rest on the summits of the moun-
tains ; in the ceaseless evaporation on sea and on land; in the rush-
ing torrents of the hills and the dashing breakers on the shore. ^

Ozone a Disinfectant. — The disinfecting powers of ozone have
long been noted. It is one of Nature's great purifiers. It is some-
times generated artificially in hospitals and public buildings. It acts
both on animal and vegetable matter. According to Sch5nbein, air
containing but ^^xoVoo- o^ ozone is capable of disinfecting its own
volume of air filled with the efiiuvia, evolved in one minute, from four
ounces of highly-putrid flesh.

Ozone, in disinfecting and purifying decaying and putrid matter,
is itself destroyed. It dies, that others may live. Hence it is that
there is so little of ozone in the air of towns and cities and villages,
and in hospitals. The ozone is consumed in the process of oxidizing
the products of combustion and decay.

Dr. Richardson has noticed that oxygen, that has been repeatedly
passed over decomposing animal matter, loses its power of oxidation.

Physiological Effects of Ozone. — The physiological efiects of ozone
have been studied both on man and on animals. It is believed that
the bracing and inspiring efiect of a clear, c»isp, and sparkling morn-
ing, is due in part to the great amount of ozone in the atmosphere.
When it is held in combination with oxygen or common air, it acts
much like oxygen, but more powerfully. It afiects the pulse, the
respiration, and the circulation, in various ways, according to the
quantity taken, and the temperament of the individual. In this re-
spect, it behaves like electricity. It has been thought that ozone is
formed in the body from the contact of oxygen gas with the blood,
and there are those who believe that it is absorbed with the ozone in
the air, and is carried into the blood, where it takes part in the process
of oxidation.

Thei-e is a possibility, if not indeed a probability, that electricity,
in its passage through the body, generates ozone in very minute quan-
tities, through the electrolytic and other changes that it produces,
and the theory, that the beneficial efiects of electrization are in part
due to the ozone thus generated, has some plausibility. But on all
these subjects very little is known. Experiments made in the labo-
ratory with ozone, artificially prepared, are highly suggestive. Ca-
tarrhal symptoms and attacks, much resembling epidemic influ-
enza, are produced by long breathing air laden with ozone. It is
stated that it would be difficult to distinguish between the symp-
^ Vide Fox, above quoted.

ATMOSPHERIC ELECTRICITY AND OZONE. 465

toms of influenza and the symptoms of an over-dose of ozone. Ex-
periments on animals have shown that irritation of the mucous lining
of the throat and nostrils, with febrile symptoms and congestion of
the lungs, may be quickly excited by breathing air containing a large
percentage of ozone. If animals are, for a long time, subjected to
ozone, they perish. In their susceptibility to it, however, they vary
widely. A rabbit, breathing air mingled with ^ViJ ^f its weight in
ozone, has died in two hours. Mice, breathing air about -^-^^ of
ozone, have died immediately. Rats are more susceptible than Guinea-
pigs, and Guinea-pigs are more susceptible than rabbits. Pigeons are
quite tolerant of ozone, and frogs are proof against it, provided they
have abundance of water. Birds are specially tolerant of this agent,
as might naturally be inferred, since, in the higher strata of the air,
where they fly, ozone is more abundant than near the earth.

It has been stated that there is a relation between ozone and inter-
mittent and remittent fevers; that rheumatism is prevalent when
ozone is deficient ; that, when ozone is in excess, diphtheria, quinsy,
small-pox, herpes, measles, scarlatina, and other cutaneous afiections,
prevail ; and that, during the visitation of the cattle-plague in Eng-
land, ozone was below the usual standard.

There is considerable more of evidence to show that visitations of
cholera are accompanied with a diminution in the atmospheric ozone.

Experiments have shown that germs, sporules, bacteria, vibriones,
and small monads, with other low forms of life, are destroyed by
ozone. On the accepted view that epidemic and infectious diseases
are caused by spores, bacteria, etc., we can understand how a de-
ficiency of ozone in the air may invite disease.

The only conclusions on this subject of the relation of atmospheric
ozone to disease, that at present seem justifiable, are these :

1. A deficiency of ozone in the air probably has a certain relation
to epidemic and chronic disease.

2. Deficiency of ozone invites disease, by debilitating the system,
and thus making it less capable of contending with morbid influences.

Tests for Ozone. — Of the various tests for ozone, those which are
most used are starch and iodide of i^otassium. Fox prefers the
iodized litmus and the simple iodide of potassium test. The litmus-
paper and the iodide of potassium must both be pure. The Swedish
filtering-paper is the best. Blue litmus is purified by boiling, etc.,
until it is of a vinous red color. The strips of filter-paper are plunged
for one-third of their length into a solution of neutral iodide of potas-
sium, made by dissolving 15| grains in 321 grains of distilled water.

These tests are exposed to the air for twelve or twenty-four hours
beneath a plate. If ozone be present in the air, the iodized part be-
comes blue, and the non-iodized part is unchanged. Sometimes the
test-paper is placed in ozone-boxes, so constructed that a current of
air passes through them.

VOL. IV. — 30

466 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

The practical "bearings of atmospheric electricity and ozone are
manifold :

1. Many nervous and other diseases and very many nervous sen-
sations are perceptibly affected by changes in the quantity of electri-
city and ozone. Making the necessary concession that the subject of
the relation of atmosphere to health is one of many complications,
still "we are now in a jiosition to claim with considerable positiveness
that a part of the benefit or injury that is derived from change of
climate, or from the various atmospheric changes, is the result of vari-
ations in the amount of ozone and electricity. After eliminating the
factors of heat and cold, which are the most obvious and best under-
stood of all atmospheric qualities; of moisture and dryness, the po-
tency of which is everywhere recognized ; of carbonic and nitric acid ;
of oxygen pure and simple, there remains much that only ozone and
electricity can well account for.

2. Not a few sensitive and impressible organizations experience
variations of strength and debility, of vigor and malaise^ that very
well correspond to the variations in atmospheric electricity, or ozone,
or both. There are thousands of jjeople who are at their maximum
of strength in the cold months of winter, who begin to decline in
the spring, who, in the summer, are at their minimum, and who regu-
larly rally during the autumn. There are those who, almost every
day, pass through tides of feeling, which, if they do not mathemati-
cally correspond to the daily tides of ozone and electricity in the air,
do certainly follow so closely as to make us suspect, to say the least,
a certain relation between the variable states of the system and the
variable states of the air. From 8 to 12 a. m. is the golden time
for brain-work, as all students know ; from 1 to 4 p. ir. there are fre-
quently a dullness and lassitude that make hard toil a task. Many —
even those who take but a lunch in the middle of the day — are sleepy
at this time, and, unless they are kept awake by business, are disposed
to take a nap. The latter part of the afternoon the spirits revive,
and betAveen four and eight or nine o'clock is what might be called
the silver period of the day for all mental labor. The night is given
to sleep, but those who rise very early do not usually labor to so great
advantage as those who defer their severest exertions until the fore-
noon. In these statements we but give the experience of the major-
ity of brain-workers whose temperament is of the susceptible order,
and who therefore appreciate the varying moods of the system.

The chief complication that enters into these calculations is the
fact that there is least ozone and least electricity in the air when there
is most heat, and that heat is of itself debilitating.

3. Irregular disturbances in the electrical condition of the atmos-
phere, in storms, and especially in thunder-storms, and, in our climate,
northeast storms, unquestionably affect the nervous system of impres-
sible temperaments unpleasantly, and bring on or aggravate neuralgic.

ATMOSPHERIC ELECTRICITY AND OZONE. 467

rheumatic and other pains, as well as incite mental distress and dis-
couragement.

This fact, concerning which some have been skeptical, is as demon-
strable as any general fact of the kind can be, and the opportunities
for testing it among the nervous patients in this country are excep-
tionally abundant. Sensitive patients are oftentimes prophets of the
weather; without error they can predict, even twenty-four hours be-
forehand, an aj^proaching northeast storm, and, before a rising thun-
der-squall, they are sometimes excessively miserable. There are those
who are utterly prostrated before and during a thunder-storm, thrown
into vomiting and convulsions ; and these spasmodic disruptions are
followed by hours or days of exhaustion.'

Now, it is just before thunder-storms that the atmospheric electri-
city is so apt to be negative, and during a thunder-storm the changes
in the electrical condition are very rapid.

At the Sussex County Insane Asylum, in England, the chaplain of
the institution made for several years a series of experiments which
showed very clearly that attacks of epilepsy and mania correspond,
in a very large number of instances, to changes in electrical and other
conditions of the air, and he believes that electricity is the main factor.

There is nothing strange in all this, for all naturalists know that
many plants predict storms with wonderful precision hours before
they appear. Man, with his exalted and complex nervous system, and
especially civilized man, is far more impressible than any animal or
flower.

It is not wise nor scientific nor humane to despise these subtile,
storm-anticipating pains from which our patients sufier. If these are
not real, nothing is real, and all existence is a delusion and a sham.
They are as truly realities as sraall-pox, or typhoid fever, or a broken
leg, and should be considered accordingly. When, therefore, the
Danhury News man dedicates his almanac to that distinguished col-
laborator and weather predicter, the inflammatory rheumatism, he is
as scientific as he is funny.

4. The beneficial efiects of sea and mountain air on invalids may
be explained in part, if not largely, by the fact that there is more
ozone in the sea-air than in the land-air, and more ozone and more
electricity in high than in low altitudes.

In elevated regions the air is, of course, rarer than in low-lying re-
gions, and the quantity of oxygen inhaled must, of necessity, be less

' These nervous perturbations, in their various degrees, have seemed to me to be
sufficiently frequent and distinctive to entitle them to be regarded as a separate disease.
To this disease I have given the name Astraphohia. A brief description of this disease,
with eases and remarks, can be found in Beard & Rockwell's " Medical and Surgical Elec-
tricity," p. 604. Strictly speaking, it comes in the category of afiections allied to hysteria,
like agoraphobia that Westphal has described. Astraphobia is more common in women
than in men, though I have seen it in both sexes. The tendency to the disease appears
to run in families.

468 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

than when the air is dense; but ozone and electricity both increase as
we rise, and very likely this fact will explain the exhilaration and in-
vigoration which not only consumptives but nervously exhausted pa-
tients experience on removing to the mountains. The benefit that
consumptives find, by residence in elevated districts, is almost entirely
of a general, stimulating tonic character, that could very well be
explained by the ozone and electricity which they inhale far more
abundantly than in the lowlands. The benefit derived from a change
of residence from the city to the country may be, in part, similarly
explained.

The influence of atmospheric electricity and ozone must always be
taken into consideration in estimating the eflects of medical treatment.
Exacerbations of neuralgia, or rheumatic pain, or general malaise^ or
attacks of melancholia, or mania, may be excited by low atmospheric
conditions, when, perchance, we suppose that the treatment we em-
ploy is working badly ; and, conversely, the exhilaration that patients
feel at various times should sometimes redound to the credit, not of the
physician, but of the electricity or ozone in the air. There are days
when all our patients seem to be depressed — all appear to be going
down — and there are days when all appear to be doing well. We can-
not be too cautious in attributing these changes to other factors be-
sides the treatment we employ. "We are justified in encouraging dis-
heartened patients, who are ready to perish, with the hope that, not
unlikely, they may be sufiering from low atmospheric conditions that
will in time correct themselves.

In order to settle some of the questions raised in this paper, I
would offer these four suggestions :

I. Let daily observations in atmospheric electricity and ozone be
undertaken under the patronage of the governments of different coun-
tries at all meteorological and astronomical stations. These observa-
tions, carried on for a number of years, would helj} to answer many
important queries, and, among others, whether there is more or less of
atmosphei'ic ozone in America than in Europe. The data derived from
such comparative researches would help, perhaps, to explain the pecul-
iar and unparalleled nervousness of the people of the United States.
They might help to explain the extraordinarily stimulating character
of the climate of California. They might help to explain the fact
that, on the Pacific coast, sunstroke is not apt to occur, even under
very high temperature ; while, in the East, prostration from ex-
posure to heat not very excessive is, almost every summer, a common
affection.

II. Let comparative observations be made of the atmospheric elec-
tricity and ozone of low and elevated regions. The data derived from
such observations might help to explain the great benefit that con-
sumptives and nervous patients so often find by a residence among
the mountains. They might help to explain the absolute relief or cure

ATMOSPHERIC ELECTRICITY AND OZONE. 469

of autumnal catarrh or hay-fever that is found in regions lying all the
way from five hundred to twenty-five hundred feet elevation above
the level of the sea.* It has already been shown by the experiments
of Becquerel on the plateau of St. Bernard, and by other observers, that
there is more of atmospheric electricity as we rise above the earth,
and the same has been proved also of ozone. If these results shall be
confirmed by a larger induction, by observations among the Catskill
and White Mountains, then we should have a potent and suggestive
explanation, so far as it would go, of the powerful hygienic efiect of
mountain residence.

III. In times when certain epidemics are abroad, such as cholera,
throat- distemper, scarlatina, etc., let observations made of the at-
mospheric ozone be compared with observations made at the same
season and same place in other years. Of course, whatever the facts
may be, we cannot rush to conclusions in this matter. If ozone be
absent, may not its absence be due to the fact that it has all been con-
sumed in deodorizing the impurities of the air, which impurities may
be the cause of the epidemic ?

IV. Let the physiological and therapeutic efiects of ozone on the
human system be studied by a large and copious induction from a
wide variety of temperaments and diseases.

The criticisms that you will make on this paper I can easily fore-
see. You will say — and not unjustly — that in all these researches,
and especially in those that relate to ozone, there is much of vague-
ness, little of precision — that an enormous margin yet remains wherein
we may study or conjecture.

All this I admit freely and fully, but is it not so with the incipi-
ence of every science and of all forms of knowledge whatsoever?
Shall we wait until our knowledge becomes absolute before we reveal
it ? Does it not rather become those of us who are seeking truth, as
often as may be, to take account of stock of our discoveries ? Is it not
well, now and then, to take an inventory of our ignorance, and see
how little we know ? In this grand and long campaign against the
kingdom of darkness we must forage on the enemy's country, and sus-
tain ourselves for the toils of the future by the best we can get as we
go along. I would be inspired -by the words of Confucius : " "What
we know, to know that we know it ; what we do not know, to know
that we do not know it, that is knowledge." I would be inspired by
the example of Lessing, who preferred to seek after truth, than to
find it.

' Blakeley, in his work on " Hay Fever," has shown by experiments that more spores
and pollen, by far, are found a thousand feet or so above the earth than at the ordinary
breathing level. These experiments would indicate that the cure of this disease, by re-
movel to elevated regions, must at least be explained in some other way than by the the-
ory that the mountain air contains less irritating substances. This subject I hope to be
able to investigate at the White Mountains during the coming summer.

470 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE GREAT CEMETERY IN COLORADO.

By EEV. SAMUEL LOCK WOOD, Pn. D.

IN" the composition of his ecclesiastical history, an erudite historian
chaptered the narrative into centuries. Perhaps for his subject
these divisions Avere sufficiently generous. Still, as measurements of
time they were but puny epochs ; and yet they were vast enough for
the treatment of that ephemeral worker, man. But He, " who work-
keth hitherto " — who, as the true Earth's Biographer, wrote on the
stony rocks — made his divisions the Ages ! Indeed, caii those
epochs be reduced to years ? What a scope must the record of his
doings have with whom a thousand years are as a day ! Accepting
these life-cycles with a significance so grand, we revei-ently look into
this great volume. Its opening chapter is the Cambrian age. But —
amazing ! — the stony laminae that make up its leaves are scarcely less
than one hundred thousand feet in thicJcness ! It was a time of dreary
wildness, and its primeval life-forms were few, and huge rock-masses
were tilted up from that sea, and worn down for the bed of the waters.
Next came the Silurian age, singing the weird music of its one world-
encircling sea. Its forms of life were innumerable. Then flourished
the Brachiopods, or shell-bearing worms, and Mollusca, Crustacea,
corals, and a few fishes. Then comes the Devonian age. Now it is
that what seemed a monotonous, watery waste becomes as a weary
Sahara, with many a green-fringed oasis cheered. The late universal
sea is dotted with low-lying islands. Very beautiful, though lowly
in rank, and not over-luxuriant in numbers, were the plant-forms that
fringed those shores. Then the fishes composed the nobility of life.
Their patterns were grotesque ; and they were clad in mighty plate-
armor, massive osseous tiles, of quaintly sculpture. It was an arma-
ture that spoke unmistakably of crimson conflicts; for, in sooth, these
were not " piping times of peace." Next came the Carboniferous age.
The area of land is greatly increased ; and it is beautified with a new
and amazingly luxuriant vegetation. In this plant r'egime the queen-
liest being is the arborescent fern. And this luxuriant vegetation
stores up the solar force, a rich legacy for the far-ofif but "coming
man." At this time a few air-breathers occupy the land. With frog-
like affinities, they are of very low reptilian rank.

Passing the Permian and the Jui'assic, next comes the Cretaceous
age, with the culmination of that reptilian race of monsters of amaz-
ing size and most singular aspects. It was, indeed, the companionship
of " Beauty and the Beast ; " for at this time, also, the nautilus, and
the ammonite, those peerless structures of the molluscan life,
reveled in beauty and vastness of numbers. But a sad change came,
and the gay nautilus tribe was reduced to the merest representation

THE GREAT CEMETERY IN COLORADO. 471

in the animate scale ; while the star of the resplendent ammonite
went down in utter death. And there must have been peculiar condi-
tions of both land and sea, in that Cretaceous day, or those strange
reptiles of Brobdingnagian altitude could not walk on the land ; nor
could their aquatic congeners of cetacean bulk, the huge sea-reptiles,
move in their briny homes ; so with the Ammonites, and the great
selachian fishes. But these — the beauties and the monsters — all died,
for there came in new conditions of the land, the sea, and the air.

And with these new conditions came the Eocene age, or dawn of
the Tertiary epoch of Earth's lifetime. So decided was this physical
change, that all things were ready for its reception of a new race of
living creatures. The very surface was newly and lavishly garnished,
like a table awaiting the expected guests. And the atmosphere had a
balmier vigor, a sort of climatal ripeness, like the aroma of an autum-
nal orchard whose fruit has matured. Now came the true grasses,
and the grains ; and the Rosaceas plants with the strawberry, black-
berry, apple, cherry, and plum, etc. And Nature's guests arrived,
and entered upon the enjoyment of an unrestrained existence in her
grand domain. And they were welcome guests ; for leading the train
came the (as yet) noblest of her begettings, beings of true mammalian
rank. They were of new forms and new appetencies. Some were
petite in size, and some were of more than leviathan proportions, and
many were bizarre in form ; and all were diverse from every thing
that had lived before, or that should ever come after. And so each in
its own way, as disposition or convenience prompted, enjoyed life.
Some preferred the banks of the great rivers, others the grassy meads
of the green valleys, and others the sides of the densely-wooded hills.
And the timid rodents hid themselves in their burrows at the roar of
the carnivores, while both were startled by the beastly bellowing of
the great terrestrial behemoths. And these beings, at least some of
them, have left their relics in the far West, in places where, until
lately, only the red-man had trod.

The geological age just mentioned is called the Tertiary. It was
for the first time with true significance sectioned off by Sir Charles
Lyell. This learned geologist noticed that this age opened with ani-
mal life more like that of the present than any thing that had been
before, and that in respect to the molluscs there were many forms
identical with existing shells ; and he noticed that, as we ascended in
this age, the percentage of forms tlius similar very rapidly increased.
He, therefore, named the bottom section the Eocene, meaning the
dawn ; and the middle section the Miocene, meaning less of it* dawn, -^/l£>
that is, farther on in the day ; and the highest section he called the Pli-
ocene, meaning still more advanced. To these has been added
another, namely, the Pleistocene.

There are three American nameg which, in respect to the most
recent results in vertebrate paleontology, deservedly stand as its

472 THE POPULAR SCIEXCB MONTHLY.

great lights— Prof. Joseph Leidy, Prof. E. D. Cope, and Prof. O. C.
Marsh. The last two, with an enthusiasm that has triumphed over
great difficulties, have especially produced startling results in their
individual explorations of the great graveyards of the ancient dead
in our "Western Territories. Of the labors of Prof. Cope, as con-
ducted under government auspices, it is proposed here to offer a few
results. We shall simply give some details of his work done last
summer, as the vertebrate paleontologist in behalf of Prof. F. V.
Haydon's " Seventh Annual Report of the United States Geological
Survey of the Territories." Prof. Cope found himself literally in a
crowded'cemetery of a quadrupedal race long extinct.

The list which now immediately follows is limited almost exclu-
sively to the Miocene fossils of " the Bad Lands " of Colorado. It
tells a marvelous story of rich and formidable fauna tliat existed on
our virgin continent in that Middle-Tertiary age. The Rodents, or
gnawing animals, were well represented. Five genera seem to be es-
tablished, embracing eighteen species. The predecessors of the squir-
rels were there. One, named Paramys, was a little larger than our
chickaree. One little creature, called Ileliscomys, had four teat-like
cusps on the crown of each molar in the lower jaw. This was the
tiniest thing of them all, and stood, probably, among the Miocene ro-
dents, as the common mouse does among the gnawers of to-day. If,
indeed, Heliscomys be the ancestral mouse, our Mus musculus has a
very ancient pedigree. The rabbits were represented by the genus
Palceologus.

There are eleven species of Insectivora, arranged under five genera,
with the names Domnina, Embasis^ Miothen, Herpetotheriuniy and
Isacis. Except the last one, all these are allied to the mole. They
had doubtless the same burrowing habits and food appetencies as the
Talpa tribe that to-day follows and annoys the gardener at his work.
It is an item gained of real knowledge as respects animal habits, to
learn that the earthworms and the subterranean larval insects were
kept in check in the same manner then as now. And, if these are the
predecessors of the Talpa race, we would like to know if the primitive
stock were as clever engineers at constructing subterranean earth-
works, for the mole to-day is a genius in that line. There are six spe-
cies in the list, and they differ quite a good deal in size ; and would
seem also to differ in some more important aspects, as the name of the
Herpetotherium signifies the " crawling beast." It is worthy of re-
mark that these ancient moles, like the modern, were very small ani-
mals. Necessarily, then, the fossil bones must have been very minute.
They are, however, preserved with wonderful perfection.

As to that other insect-eater, Isacis, it represented the existing
hedgehog, as shown by its anatomical structure. And as snakes
abounded then, probably, like its congeners now, it made many a meal
of them, utterly regardless even of those poison fangs, if such they

THE GREAT CEMETERY IN COLORADO. 473

had. But the gi'eat carnivores had a covetous eye on Isacis, when
it probably rolled itself up in its bristling armature, and, in full con-
sciousness of a noli me tangere security, invited its enemy " to kick
against the pricks " — in fact, to do his worst. And, doubtless, many
a hungry feline, after recklessly accepting the invitation, got very
badly worsted. As we shall see, there were little keen-toothed tigers
then ; but their acquaintance with Isacis always ended in disgust, as
futile must have been each effort to get a dinner of hedgehog raw.
Similar is the experience of our Adirondack catamounts in their at-
tempts on the Canada porcupine. These fierce cats sometimes perish
terribly from inflammation caused by the spines of the porcupine,
which they are unable to extract.

The carnivorous animals were largely represented. Prof. Cope gives
at least ten species. There are five genera of felines, or cats. One of
these is quite small, being only half as large as the domestic species ;
another one, called Stibarus, for a cat, seems to have been a rather
stout animal. Of these felidte there are three genera which possessed
remarkable saw-edged teeth, painfully suggestive of the carcharodont
sharks. Accordingly, one of these is named Daptojyhilus sqxialidens^
which, in plain though somewhat clumsy English, means tlie " shark-
like-devouring lover." We are not from this to think of the grand
Mogul, who loved his wives so well that he carved them up ; but in
metaphysical parlance the phrase must be taken subjectively, as of
that absorbing passion where the subject loves to take his victim in —
that is to say — one who is as voracious as a shark.

Another of these sabre-toothed tigers had its teeth very strong as
well as sharp. " The incisors are very stout, and exhibit slightly
curved conic crowns, with a serrulate edge on the inner face." These
teeth are more suggestive of the trenchant cutlass than the fine sabre.
Though not larger than the existing Canada lynx found in the Adi-
rondack Mountains, this terrible tiger well deserves its fearful name —
Machirodus oreodontis — the "mountain-like sword-toothed." Another
of these carnivores, a new genus, is called Tomarctus. It had some
relationship to the canines, but, if a dog, it was of very large size, as it
probably equaled in this respect our native black bear. There were,
however, true dogs then ; and some of their remains were secured in
the expedition. Their bones, associated with those of the rodents and
insectivora, are quite numerous. One species, called Lippincott's
Canis, was about the size of the coyote, or wolf of the plains. Other
species obtained were larger than this ; and others again were smaller.
A Pliocene mastodon is mentioned, which carries the true Probo-
scidia far back in time. It is named Mastodon proavus^ the specific
name meaning " before one's grandfather."

Among these Colorado fossils, the ungulates, or hoofed animals, are
very prominent. In the advanced classifications of the mammals, the
ungulates are divided into the Perissodactyles, or those ungulates which

474 '^HE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

have an uneveu number of toes — as the horse with one toe, and the
rhinoceros with three — and the Artiodactyles^ or the ungulates with
an even number of toes — as the hippopotamus with four toes, and the
hog with its two functional toes. Now, of these fossil ungulates it is
remarkable that the expedition has brought home from the Miocene
twenty Perissodactyles, and the same number of Artiodactyles ; and
from the Pliocene nine Perissodactyles, of which four are new, and
six Artiodactyles, of which three are new ; thus making fifty-three
ungulates. Of these there are several horses, and all of them, includ-
ing Anchitherium and FrotoMppm^ have three toes to each foot.
These cloven-footed beasts were some of them strange, comprehensive
types, possessing in the same individual structural resemblances to both
swine aud deer; "like the latter, these had no horns; they were
about as large as sheep. Others were about the size of gray squirrels,
being the smallest of this class of animals ever discovered " {American
Naturalist). Indeed, an important paleontological result has been
Prof. Cope's determination of the correct relationship of five species
(three new, and one new genus, Kypertragulus) to the musk family.
The general reader should perhaps be told that the order Ungidata^
or hoofed quadrupeds, really absorbs three of the orders in the older
classifications, namely, the Fachydermata^ the Solidungida^ and the
Bicminantia. This mentioned, we would say, with no irreverence,
that in the Colorado fauna of Tertiary times Xature seemed to indulge,
as respects the animals of this order, in the most eccentric extremes
of structure, both as to form and size ; for some of these hoof-footed
ones are scarcely larger than a squirrel, while some are as large as the
elephant ; and there is a seeming oddity of structure. Though a fact
before every one's eyes, yet many are not aware of its existence, viz.,
that the ox and cow have no teeth in the front part of the upper jaw.
When this animal grazes, the tongue makes a curl, or twist, and pulls
in the grass, then the lower front teeth are made to meet the firm pad
of the front part of the upper jaw, and the grass is then severed.
Such is the mode common to the ruminating animals, that is, those
which chew the cud. Xow, in the natural group Ruminantia, comes
a sub-group, the Camelidce^ which includes the camels and the llamas.
The dentition of these animals is very aberrant. The upper incisors
are not entirely wanting, " there being two canine-like upper incisors,
and upper canines as well." In the Pliocene strata of Colorado are
found the remains of two species of camels, of enormous size, and
which, strange to say, are furnished with complete upper incisors, or
front-teeth. These ancient camels, then, did not graze like the ox,
but like the horse.

And, among these hoofed creatures, the Fhinocerotidm are repre-
sented by three genera. Two of them belong to the Miocene, and the
third, the last discovered, to the Pliocene. This is the new genus
Aphelojys, a monster of immense proportions. The other two genera

THE GREAT CEMETERY IX COLORADO. 475

are Hyracodon^ and Aceratherium. It is remarkable that Prof. Cope
has made out seven species of these fossil Rhinocerotidce^ which, until
the recent discovery of the living hairy-eared rhinoceros (i?. casio-
tis) at Chittagong, the northern extremity of the Bay of Bengal, was
the precise nuinher of the living species known. It amounts to a cer-
tainty, then, that our great Western Tertiary was much richer in
species, and immensely richer in individuals of these enormous beasts,
than is the whole living fauna of the entire world to-day. And what
singular relationships did these Bhinocerotidce hold in those Tertiary
times ! For there were other animals that held structural alliances
with them. One of these the professor has named JTlobasileus, the
Miocene King. This the learned man doubtless did in respectful
deference to a notable personage that had died some time before. It
was in fact in the Eocene reign that this individual flourished. So the
professor refers to him as Uobasileus ; while another savant, deep in
the lore of those times, contends that it belongs to a different family.
That its place is in the new order Dlnocerata seems undisputed.
What the true dynasty was is not for " the likes of us to say." Be-
sides, we would shudder at any personal attempt to wade this paleon-
tological marsh ; and would frankly confess a lack of strength where-
withal to cope with a subject so grave as the one which has grown
out of these exhumed remains. But, whatever ground there may be
as to specific identity or distinction, on these words of Prof. Cope, in
his diagnosis of the genus EohasUeus, there is full accord: It "in-
dicates a remarkable combination of structure not before known to
naturalists. The gigantic size of the typical species {E. cornidus)
adds to its interest, and shows it to have been the monarch of the
remarkable fauna disclosed by recent researches in Wyoming." The
genus is " established on remains of five individuals of the average
size of the Mastodon Ohioticus. . . . From the manner of the occur-
rence of the relics, this animal probably went in families, or herds," as
do the existing elephants.

But it is time to return to his Miocene majesty. It was even with
l^obasileus much as it has been with other ancient monarchs. He had
a wicked way of lifting up his horn. Nay, he lifted them twain ; for,
owing to an ophthalmic difficulty which seems to have been constitu-
tional— like some modem patriarch, who, when he wants to look upon
his household with aspect of authority, doth push his spectacles high
up on his head — so this king of the beasts ! when he wished to feel,

" I am monarch of all I survey ;
My right (who shall dare) to dispute ? '' —

that is, when he desired to look up and around, like a king, with brow
austere — he tossed those spectacular horns on high, and backward.
The fact was, his supremacy lay in his horns. And herein were some
disadvantages. "Uneasy is the head that wears a croAvn." Each

476 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

horn was a magnificent affair. But, as sometimes happens with the
leading ornament, it was a little awkward in the setting. It was fixed
right over the eye ! Still, queer as this was, it had its uses. Hereby
was achieved a huge bony arch, or cavern, for the protection of the
kingly orb beneath — an important provision in case some sturdy old
recalcitrant should stand in the way when his majesty went out on a
regulation inspection of the royal domain ; for, unlike some of his
post-relations in Africa and Asia, who are content to take one horn
at a time with their compeers, he never took less than two at a bout.
In fact, the EhinocerotldcB of the Tertiary age had their horns in
pairs ; and without doubt they were used in many a pell-mell fight —
contests that likely had but little thinking as to the method of the
conflict. From this arrangement of the horns in pairs on these
creatures, so nearly related to the rhinoceros, the professor with a
keen sagacity claims to disprove the statement that horns in pairs
show relationship to the ruminants. His own words are : " They pre-
sent no special marks of affinity to the artiodactyles, and show that
the paired horns of the Eohasileid(B have no significance in the same
direction."

A luminous body, if unobstructed, ^jtrews its rays in all directions.
And a scientific fact or principle, could our eyes follow the emana-
tions, would be found illuming many if not all other facts in science.
It was but lately that the above generalization was reached, when it
came forth full-blown from the working out of the new genus Syyn-
horodon. Of these very remarkable animals the professor gives us six
or seven species. And strange beings, even among their contem-
poraries, must the Symhorodontes have been. There was Symhorodon
bucco — the last word meaning "the cheeky" — and the fellow had
" plenty of cheek." It was certainly so anatomically, and " we " are
not speaking metaphorically now. The cheek-bones were enormously
developed, so much so that they formed immense osseous masses on
each side of his head. Indeed, a blow on the side of his caput would
have been simply a capital joke; for how could so unimpressible a
skull ever have seen the point ? And this same individual comported
himself with a ludicrously lofty air, for his eyes were set almost verti-
cally in his head. Perhaps it was the Miocene fashion in the upper
ranks to look for something to come down, unlike our Micawber mode
of waiting for something to turn up. And this being was nearly as
large as an adult elephant. As to what, and how much was his intel-
lectual endowment, we know not. We don't think he was very sharp.
But we had forgotten to add this attribute — he had two horns, and
they were flat.

Perhaps the Caliban of those strange creatures was Symhorodon
altirostris ; not that he was a dwarf among his compeers, for, though
not the largest, he was an individual of great weight in his own day.
Nor was it that he had a " forehead villainously low ; " but because,

THE GREAT CEMETERY IN COLORADO. 477

on the contrary, he carried a forehead most rascally high, and sur-
mounted by a pair of horns that were murderously straight and sharp.
Prof Cope speaks of this species as the most formidably armed, and
as presenting a most outr^ appearance in life. It can be scarcely
doubted that his eminence was held in great consideration by the
Symborodon people, and that they gave him a wide berth when he
went out to take a constitutional.

Another of these beasts enjoys the name of Symborodon trigono-
cerus. His horns were three-sided, like a bayonet. To be sure, they
were short, and rolled outward, which made them harmless in com-
parison with the former. This was a large beast, but not so large as
Symborodon hucco.

The smallest of these creatures was Symborodon acer. Poor little
fellow ! How they must have looked down upon him ! He was not
as big as the Indian rhinoceros. But he had liis own revenge for this
condition of sub-mediocrity. His horns were very long and round.
Indeed, he could boast of this accomplishment. And it was notable
that he always kept the fact plainly before his eyes. He had the
longest horns of them all, and carried them one on each side of his
nasal extremity ; and it was generally understood that, when Symbo-
rodon acer turned up his nose, he meant mischief.

Speaking of the above group, says Prof Cope : " Thus it is evident
that Symborodon is a true perissodactyle, allied to the MhinoceridcB.'''*
To have discovered and worked out this one group alone should give
a man glory enough for one lifetime. And yet we are far from having
exhausted the list of ungulates. There are Oreodon^ two species;
Poebrotherium^ two species ; Septomeryx, and many others, all cloven-
footed beasts ; and about these we have said nothing.

But there is still one mammal to be mentioned ; and thereby hangs
a tail, for it is a monkey. It is a little fellow, but with a big name you
may depend, as witness — Menotherium lemiirimim. Unless his name
mislead, he was a nimble beast, and, with the lemur instinct, a night-
prowler at that ; for his anatomy connects him with the Lemurs, the
lowest of the monkeys, and, if we mistake not, there were Nasuan re-
lations also,' as with those fossil monkeys obtained by Cope, in the
Eocene strata in the Bridger beds on Black's Fork, Wyoming.

Thus much for these new mammals, so remarkable in numbers and
character. But the reptiles were largely represented also ; for there
were serpents, lizards, and turtles, found in those Colorado beds. Of
the snakes, one, a Keurodromicus^ was as large as the black snake ;

^ Both Profs. Marsh and Cope have collected fossil quadrumana from these great
Western graveyards. For a remarkable confirmation thus afforded of a generalization
made by the present writer, see article " Coaii-Mundi," Popular Science Monthly, De-
cember, 1872, page 136, in connection with "Fossil Monkeys," in idem for August, 1873,
page 519. It is worthy of remark, also, that recent anatomical studies of the Lemurs,
by the younger Milne Edwards, afford additional confirmation.

478 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

another, a Calamagras, was the size of our water-snake; while an-
other, of the same genus, was about as large as a garter-snake. Of
these ophidians, all the species and three of the genera are new to sci-
ence. One thing is observable in Nature — the provision made for
sustaining the proper balance, by keeping in check that which might
become in excess. It is plain that the moles were very numerous.
But these and their congeners were not relished by the mammalian
carnivores. The bad smell of the shrew prevents the cat from eating
it. Probably the snakes were less dainty, and herein, perhaps, lay
their utility in the animal economy. It might seem that Prof.
Cope had assigned to the ophidia a similar task, as he names one
species Aphelopis taljnvorus, which simply means the mole-eating
Aphelopis.

The Lacertilia, or lizards, furnish some interesting traits. Prof.
Cope gives six characteristically separated genera, and all are new.
JExostinus and Peltosaurus were lizards with bony shields, and sym-
metrical bony tubercles on the head. Here comes in an interesting
fact for science, namely, that this is the first time that tlie ophidia
and lizards have been found in the Miocene strata of America.

The turtles are represented by several species, which, although
new, present no features of popular interest.

We will now give some facts pertaining to this work of the Geolo-
gists in the Territories.

There were really three expeditions made last summer, one to the
" Bad Lands " of Colorado, one to the " Bad Lands " of Wyoming,
and the third to the Cretaceous formation of Kansas.

As respects the " Bad Lands " of Colorado : three distinct geologi-
cal formations were found superimposed, or lying in sequence. First,
at the base was a series of strata containing fossil wood. This was
Cretaceous, and was known as the " Lignite Division." Next came
strata known as the "White River Division." This was Miocene.
The next was the " Loup Fork Division," and this was Pliocene. Of
course, speaking geologically, this was top of all.

In the Pliocene the fossils found were twenty-four species, of
which ten were new to science. They embraced four carnivora, one
proboscidian, a mammoth, seventeen ungulates, of which two were
great camels. With these ungulates were a number of Pliocene
horses. Two interesting facts were obtained : one, that all the horses
had three toes to one foot, and the other that the camels had full sets
of incisor teeth in both jaws. In this formation was found the large
rhinoceros, Aphelops.

From the Miocene were obtained : rodents, eighteen species ; in-
sectivora, eleven ; carnivora, ten ; perissodactyles, twenty ; artiodac-
tyles, twenty — thus making forty ungulates ; quadrumana, one ;
lacertilia, or lizards, seven ; ophidia, five ; turtles, five. Prol^ably
the following may be set down as the chief results growing out of the

THE GREAT CEMETERY IN COLORADO. 479

Miocene harvest: The fii'st is the discovery of monkey remains; the
discovery of snakes and lizards in American Miocene, and related to
the corresponding genera of the Eocene of Wyoming Territory ; the
settlement of the correct relations of five species, of which three spe-
cies and one genus, Hypertragulus^ were new, the relation being to
MoschidcB^ or the musk-deer family; the determination of the genus
Symhorodon^ as allied to the rhinoceros on tlie one side, and to Eoba-
sileus on the other ; the discovery of numerous insectivora, allied to
the mole. Such is an epitome of the results of the summer's work in
Colorado.

In Wyoming Territory occurred the fact so highly important to
strategraphical geology — the discovery of the Bridger strata of fossils
just above the coal at Evanston. This fixed the age of the deposit
geologically, a fact of primary importance to the geologist ; the dis-
covery of the new genus, Anchaenodon^ an animal near to the swine
animals of the genus Elotherium^ also allied to Anthracotherium of
Europe ; the discovery of the large animal A. itisoki^s ; also of long
canine tusks of Bathmodon.

In Kansas numerous fishes and reptiles were discovered. One of
these was the saurodont (lizard-toothed) fish, Portheus gladms. This
creature was terrible. He had a pectoral spine which he could elevate
at pleasure, and it was four feet long.

Thus we have for a summer's work, by Prof. Cope, not less than
150 species of vertebrate animals alone, of which 100 are new. This
makes no account of the collections of the invertebrates. " There is
a view generally entertained by naturalists and geologists, that genera
and species of animals and plants are greatly more numerous at the
present age of the world than in any previous geological period. This
seems to me an entire misconception of the character and diversity of
the fossils which have been discovered in the difierent geological for-
mations." So wrote the lamented Agassiz just twenty years ago.
Surely there can be no uncertain opinion on that subject now. " Prof.
Cope has obtained from the ancient sea and lake deposits of Kansas,
Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, etc., about 350 species of vertebrated ani-
mals, of which he has made known to science for the first time more
than 200 species!"

Profoundly and alike wonderful, then, to philosopher and natural-
ist is this story of the irrevocable extinction of entire races of animals.
And the same earth-area of that wellnigh fabulous land has seen even
greater things than these ; for, both before and since the historic age
began, it has beheld the passing away, into the darkest dimness of
tradition, whole tribes and languages of men.

48o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND ARISTOCRACY.^

THERE could be no doubt that, in the age in which it was their lot
to live, the tendency of education ran toward science and abstract
science, and every man who was interested in the fortunes of his gen-
eration would naturally ask himself the question what the eftect of
such scientific teaching was likely to be, what it would be still more
likely to produce, if it rose to absolute predominance, and whether
it would raise or lower, soften or harden, those upon whom it was
brought to bear. As he said before, no reasonable man could doubt
that the tendency of the age was to make scientific teaching the pre-
dominant study. The greatest of philosophical writers would admit
that was so. That which followed the main teaching of former times
— the great arts of sculpture, painting, writing, oratory, and the like —
all comparatively sank before the abstract science of the present day.
Compare for one moment the range of teaching in the middle ages
with the present circles of learning. In the tenth century Pope
Gebert was said to embrace within himself all the knowledge of the
time ; but let any one contrast his attainments, great as they were,
with the correlation of arts now practised, and the enlarged field over
which modern science ranged. There was imdoubtedly a vast differ-
ence between the two states of things. When they looked at the
present state of scientific education they might fairly distinguish three
different classes of persons to whom it might be applied. First, there
were those like the late Mr. Brassey, great captains of labor, who led
men not only over Europe, but over every quarter of the globe, and
changed the whole face of the earth by their vast engineering power
and skill. Secondly, there were those among them at the present day
who saw only through the eyes of material philosophy, who accepted
that material philosophy and scientific teaching as their surest and
safest standard and guide, who reduced most things to it and judged
most things by it, but whose minds were nevertheless open to other
considerations, and who did not feel that it was the sole and exclusive
standard of their lives. To both those classes what he was about to
say did not apply. There was, however, a third class who were
tempted to reduce every thing to the one standard of science — who
knew no other law and applied no other rule, not only to science
itself, but to all the other conditions of life and action. To such a
class, though he alluded to no one in particular, his observations would,
he thought, apply. When science was pushed to that extreme its
professors would not be the best rulers for mankind, and he, for one,
should regret to see the affairs of men regulated solely by such a

1 Extract from an address of Lord Carnarvon before the London Birkbeck Institu-
tion, Tvith comments thereupon by "J. H. L.," of the London Examiner.

SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND ARISTOCRACY. 481

standard as they would apply. If such views as they held were
pushed to an extreme, he could scarcely imagine a Pharisee more
arrogant, a Sadducee more sell-opinioned, a fanatical monk of the
middle ages more intolerant than they who practised them were
likely to be.

He might he asked the reason for all this. Some might say it was
a reaction from the extreme dogmatism of past times ; and it was
undoubtedly true, as every careful student of history would admit,
that there had been an excess of dogmatism in former days. The-
ology, for instance, had encroached upon the fair and reasonable
domain of science, had sometimes thrown obstacles in its way, and
had subordinated, science to most mistaken and unreasonable interpre-
tations of Scripture. On the other hand, there was now a risk that
science might possibly encroach a little on the domain of theology.
At all events, it seemed to him there were reasons why what he had
just now said should be the case. In the first place, unlike other
studies, it must always be remembered that the conclusions of abstract
science were demonstrable. Those who dealt in them were so satisfied
of their certainty that they could not accept any conjecture or doubt
on the point. There were branches of science in which that was per-
fectly true, as in the case of mathematics, where in certain propositions
no reasonable man, applying the ordinary laws of thought, could
doubt certain results — such, for instance, as that two and two were
four. There were other branches to which that did not equally apply,
but one thing was certain — that those who would carry that frame of
mind into the complex relations of human life, into political and social
philosophy, and into all the relations which aifect men one toward
another, were applying a standard which was wholly impracticable,
and which would ultimately lead to mere confusion.

In the next place, he would again say that, unlike other studies,
mere hard, abstract science did divorce itself from literature, and
almost repudiated religion ; and he thought no man who looked back
over the varied course not only of the middle age history, but of the
whole history of the world and of mankind, could doubt that, what-
ever might have been their shortcomings, defects, and excesses, men
owed to the influence of literature and religion far more than they
could express, far more than they were likely to admit, and far more
than he could attempt to describe on that occasion. At all events,
they had exercised the softest and most refining influence upon man-
kind. Undesirable as it was for men that any one intellectual power,
so to speak, should exert an exclusive rule over them, or enjoy a mo-
nopoly of authority, he freely admitted that he would prefer the
authority of literature and the arts to that of mere pure, hard, abstract
science. Art had been well termed " the handmaid of religion," and
literature had formed a republic of letters; and their rule, though
variable, unjust, and even unequal, would not be the grinding, rigid

TOL. IT. — 31

482 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

despotism, and would not impose that yoke, which hard, abstract sci-
ence would.

He might be asked why he entertained that great dread of scien-
tific men as the ultimate rulers of a community. He was not blind to
their great merits, or to the vast intellectual power which they wielded
daily more and more, and he was neither out of sympathy with them
nor were their subjects uncongenial ; but, as he dreaded a monopoly
of power by any one class, so he especially dreaded it in their hands.
He believed that abstract science, so to speak, was very often devoid
of the milk of human kindness and sympathy, and he would quote an
illustration of what he meant from one of the most remarkable and
touching books he had ever read — " The Autobiography of John Stu-
art Mill." He should be sorry to take Mr. Mill as a representative of
hard, abstract science, for throughout his nature there ran veins of
feeling softer and more tender than he was willing himself to allow.
But he quoted that book for the moment as one of the fairest illustra-
tions of the action of the philosophical mind in these matters. Those
who had read it would remember how carefully Mr. Mill, partly under
the influence of his father and partly through his self-education,
endeavored not merely to suppress but to trample down and to crush
out every thing approaching to feeling in his nature. In that
respect he was utterly unlike Bishop Butler, who held that the feelings
were of the best and most indispensable parts of the human system.
He remembered that so far did Mr. Mill carry his theory into practice
that he took the opportunity of stating that in his opinion it would be
indefensible for an educated man to enter the same room as an unedu-
cated man except he were the apostle of some creed that he was about
to propagate. He could conceive nothing more selfish or more sub-
versive of all the principles on which all society existed than that doc-
trine. He remembered the story of a conversation related by Southey
between Sir Humphrey Davy and Faraday, in which the latter, then a
young man, told Davy that he was anxious to join in the pursuits of
science because its professors were more likely than others to be of a
liberal cast of mind. Davy smiled mournfully, and replied that,
whatever science might be, it did not of itself convey that liberality
of mind which Faraday so fondly imagined for it. Lord Carnarvon
objected to the application of those rules, which naturally and rightly
governed abstract science, to legislation, morals, social life — in fact, to
every thing which concerned the existence of man. Some would
remember that in the years 1848 and 1849, when all the Continent
was disturbed, when thrones were laid in the dust and kingdoms
shaken, a group of all the most eminent philosophers of the time met
in Frankfort to review the condition of affairs, and they would recol-
lect the very unsatisfactory conclusions at which they arrived.

Auguste Comte, whose name was so great abroad, founded a phi-
losophy which contemplated the transfer of all those powers hitherto

SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND ARISTOCRACY. 483

exercised by priests and sacerdotal parties to the philosophical class,
but he was obliged, in constructing his theory, to form a sort of cor-
porate hierarchy and invest them M'ith the very powers taken from
those whom he had so strongly denounced. In so doing, as Mill in an
early book had said, he had furnished " a monumental warning " to
those who dealt with such matters. Science itself, however speculative
a range it might take, could not naturally be j^regnant with the tender
and softer feelings unless it was coupled with altogether different
principles, which would enable it to be applied to the affairs of man-
kind. Look back for a moment on the different forms which science
had sometimes taken. In the middle ages " Italian cruelty " was a
proverb. Italy, which could then count more men of science than the
rest of Europe, was not hindered on that account from also claiming
a monopoly of cruelty. Chaiacer threw out the same sneer at scien-
tific men of his day, and during that time there arose that curious and
mysterious combination of poisoners in Europe who united science
with no tenderness of heart. Science, therefore, he thought, was no
safeguard or guarantee of itself for tenderness and affection, but when
joined with something higher in the human system it would call into
play all the highest qualities of the mind, and assert an intellectual
and moral domain in which the greatest of men could serve.

The speech delivered on December 6, 1873, by the Earl of Carnar-
von, at the Birkbeck Institution, is a very significant indication of the
progress of public opinion, at all events in one direction, during the
last half-century. Fifty years have passed away since the late Dr. Birk-
beck, aided by a small band of the ultra-Radicals of his day, founded
the Mechanics' Institute in Southampton Buildings. The work was
begun and carried on amid the howls, and execrations, and sinister
prophecies of those " upper " classes whose lordly representative came
down, a week ago, to smile his approval upon its success, and to hal-
low it with a patrician benediction. No words were too hard for the
revolutionist and heretic whose profanity had reached such a pitch
that he dared to encourage working-men to learn something besides
the Church Catechism. Here was a man — and, strange to say, a gen-
tleman— acting on the assumption that the horny-handed and ill-smell-
ing laborer had a mind which ought to be cultivated, bad a life which
ought to be lived for some other purpose than that of making his
" betters " comfortable. Worse still, he did not hold it as a theory to
be dilated upon on Sundays from a pulpit, and to be realized on
the other side of the grave ; but, to the horror of the Newdegates
and Tomnoddies of 1823, he actually went and set up an institution in
which science — " hard, abstract science " — might be taught to the
" great unwashed." No wonder that a noble-minded aristocracy held

484 'TU^E POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

their faces half averted and their eyes half closed at the contemplation
of such enormity. Xo wonder that our established clergy raised their
smoothly-shaven chins in meek abhorrence of such impiety, and dis-
played their white neckcloths, the emblems of the pure sentiments
which surged beneath. Perhaps the strangest thing in the whole
of this history— and it shows that there must be something radically
wrong in the constitution of the imiverse — is that this wicked en-
terprise weathered the storm, and that the parent institution is by
far the most important educational establishment for adults in the
metropolis, while its progeny may be found thriving in almost every
provincial town of any size throughout Great Britain. Tell it not in
Gath, publish it not in the streets of Askelon. Here is an educa-
tional institution which, without any help from nobleman or priest —
save that which they conferred by staying away — is not only suc-
ceeding, but getting over the " religious " difficulty by leaving the-
ology to be taught elsewhere, and solving the problem of female
education by simply opening its doors on equal terms to men and
women. This "godless" college is now educating 2, '712 students of
both sexes; its cumculum is as wide and its teaching as thorough
as that of any institution with which we are acquainted; and so
completely have the bogies which frighten the outside educational
world been exorcised, that even a thought of them never seems to
cross the minds of the students who, after their day's toil, come down
to instruct themselves in literature, science, and art, and to take part
in the management of their alma rnater.

How was it that Lord Carnarvon cast his benignant smile on
such an institution ? Times, it is said, change ; and we change with
them. Has the leopard of obscurantism, then, changed his spots ?
His lordship's speech furnishes a complete answer to this. It shows
that the Tory oligarchs are as thoroughly opposed as ever they were
to the work of education. They are acting over again the old fable
of the sun and the wind. Force has failed, and they are trying to
gain the same end by persuasion. The difference is purely one of
engineering. They have tried the granite wall of direct resistance
only to find it shattered by the heavy artillery of the democracy,
and their hope is now in the pelding earthwork of patronage. Lord
Carnarvon and his compeers love popular education as the Due
de Broglie loves parliamentary government. They will resist giving
it at all as long as possible ; and, when this cannot be done, they will
push themselves to the front and undertake the supply of the article,
taking care to do as fraudulent tradesmen do with their milk, skim-
ming as much of the cream off, and adding as much water, as they
can without being detected.

The whole gist of Lord Carnarvon's address was an .attack on sci-
entific education. Xot that he objects to science if kept within
proper bounds. He does not find fault with " those like the late Mr.

SCIENCE, EDUCATION, AND ARISTOCRACY. 485

Brassey, great captaijis of labor, who led men not only over Europe,
but over every quarter of the globe, and changed the whole face of
the earth by their vast engineering power and skill." Not being a
" materialist," this is the kind of science his lordship likes best. Next,
there is a class of scientific men who accept " material philosophy and
scientific teaching as their surest and safest standard and guide ....
but whose minds were nevertheless open to other considerations, and
who did not feel it was the sole and exclusive standard of their lives."
As science tempered by " other considerations " would be acceptable
to Pope Pius himself, we need not be surprised that to this Lord Car-
narvon has no objection. It is for a third class of scientific men he
reserves his denunciation. There is, it aj)pears, a class — if, indeed, so
small a body of men can be called a class — who carry the scientific
frame of mind " into the complex relations of human life, into politics
and social philosophy, and into all the relations which afiect men
toward one another." The influence of this little class is growing,
Lord Carnarvon tells us ; and we are convinced that he is right.
Now, at this he is very much terrified. If only those naughty scien-
tific men would keep to engineering and physics, his lordship would
not care ; but what he objects to is " the application of those rules,
which naturally and rightly govern abstract science, to legislation,
morals, social life." In other words, scientific men may settle the dis-
tance of the sun from the eai-th at what figure they like, and they may
build bridges and construct railroads ; but, if they apply the same logi-
cal processes which they have found serve them so well in the ma-
terial world to the solution of social and political problems, this is
really too much for patrician nerves. There is a hardness about the
scientific method which Lord Carnarvon does not like. If it were not
for this diabolical device, we might come to any conclusions on social
matters which fit in with our predilections or interests ; but, with the
"grinding, rigid despotism" of logic, this is imjDOssible. All that
manly independence of our premisses which occasionally characterizes
our conclusions on political matters would be gone forever, and " one
intellectual power " would " exert an exclusive rule over " us.

Lord Carnarvon did not content himself with a mere depreciation
of social and political science, but attempted to point out its short-
comings. It is, he thinks, " devoid of the milk of human kindness."
This is quite true, and a much wider truth than stated. It is as true
of the multiplication-table as of scientific politics. But, when Lord
Carnarvon, showing a little of that individual freedom which he
despairs of keeping, argues that, because science is " no safeguard
or guarantee of itself for tenderness and afibction," therefore, those
who are thoroughly imbued with the scientific spirit trample on and
despise affection and tenderness for their fellow-creatures, be is appeal-
ing to one of the most foolish of prejudices in support of one of the
most disingenuous of arguments. The love of truth, for its own sake,

486 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

which is popularly confounded with " hardness," is in no way bound
up with want of sympathy or kindness ; but people are so used to
carry their sentiments into the decision of questions of fact, that when
they find any one does not do so, they conclude that he is without
feeling, Nothing could be a clearer proof of this than the instance
brought forward by Lord Carnarvon. Mr. Mill, he says, " endeavored
not merely to suppress but to trample down and to crush out every
thing approaching to feeling in his nature." That this should be said
of the most tender of husbands, the kindest of friends, the man whose
sympathies were as wide as the animal creation, whose depth of feeling
was such that there was not a noble or a beautiful thing in Nature
but it mirrored itself on his heart — is convincing evidence of the utter
blindness of Lord Carnarvon in the discernment of sentiment in others
which takes a different direction from his own. What Mr. Mill did
with vmequaled success was that which we have already indicated.
He endeavored, when engaged in the investigation of truth, to avoid
the bias of sentiment ; but it needs no prophet to tell us that in this
he was impelled by a loyalty to truth springing out of his conviction
of its importance to the interests of his kind. Indeed, if thoroughly
scientific men were as devoid of feeling as Lord Carnarvon represented
them, his fear of them would be ludicrous. They are a mere handful
of men. They have arrayed against them the prejudices of mankind,
the interests of the ruling classes all over Europe, and a powerful and
well-paid ecclesiastical organization. "What reason is there to be in
" great dread " that a few men without feeling or devotion will triumph
over such great odds ? The truth is, that what is making the wearers
of coronets and mitres tremble is, not the absence of religious feeling
from social philosophy, but the union of the two. Mr. Mill has done
more than any one in modern times to efiect that union. It shines
through his works on even the most abstract of subjects as a halo,
and deep in the hearts of the most powerful intellects of our country
are to be found the sentiments which he did so much to rouse and to
direct. Hence these tears.

SKETCH OF E. A. PKOCTOE.

IN making use of the sciences for purposes of intellectual cultiva-
tion, a distinction has been drawn between those that are fixed, or
established, and those that are progressive, and it has been maintained
that the former alone ai-e to be admitted for the purposes of mental
training. Foremost among these are Mathematics, Astronomy, and
Molar Physics, or the laws of the motion of masses. These may be
introduced as means of scientific education, while Molecular Physics,
Chemistry, and Biology, from their unsettled character, are alleged

SKETCH OF R. A. PROCTOR. 487

to be unfit for such emj^loyment. There are no doubt reasons for this
distinction, whether conclusive or not, but the classification is by-
no means above criticism, for within our own time Astronomy has
been taken out of the category of the established or perfect sciences,
and may be now cited as one of the best illustrations of a progressive
science. Of course, there are established truths in Astronomy, and so
there are in Chemistry and Physics, but Astronomy has now assumed
a new character of progressiveness, and within the present generation
it has surpassed all the other sciences in the rapidity and splendor of
its advancement.

Not so many years ago it seemed as though astronomy were ap-
proaching, if it had not already reached, its final stage. The Sun and
his family had been measured and weighed, the Moon tracked in all
her motions, and the paths of comets determined. The younger Her-
schel had completed the survey of the heavens, which his father com-
menced, and, to all seeming, little remained to be ascertained about
the universe. And yet, in the presence of the astronomy of our day,
that of a few years ago looks crude and elementary. Newton made
an epoch by bringing the movements of the planetary bodies under
the demonstrated laws of terrestrial force ; KirchhoflT and the spectro-
scopists have made a new era by subordinating stars, comets, and
nebulae, to the laws of terrestrial chemistry. The recent physical ex-
plorations of the sun constitute one of the most thrilling chapters in
all science. Nor have astronomers been content with the unques-
tioned acceptance of the older views respecting the planetary scheme.
Not Ptolemy alone, or Hipparchus, Galileo, Kepler, and Newton,
but even the elder and younger Herschel, would stand aghast at the
change of opinion that has been wrought regarding the members of
the solar system. Jupiter and Saturn, so long considered as merely
large specimens of habitable worlds, have taken their place in a
higher order of orbs, while satellites, formerly thought to be set as
lights to illumine their primaries, have been raised almost to the
dignity of planets. Even more surprising have been the discoveries
made respecting comets and meteors, while modern inquiries have
not stopped short of the domain of the so-called fixed stars, so that
the whole scheme of the stellar universe begins to present a new
aspect.

Astronomical science, in short, has been enlarged and reshaped in
the nature and scope of its problems, and has entered into a new epoch
in our own time which opens to us even a grander future than was dis-
closed either to Copernicus or to Newton.

As was quite unavoidable, this recent revolution or extension of
the science has left behind the old teachers, and created a demand for
new men, who can deal with the subject in its more novel and ex-
tended aspects. And, as supply follows demand in the intellectual as
well as the commercial world, the expounders of the new dispensation

488 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

are forthcoming as required. Eminent among these is the subject of
the present sketch, who has come over from England to lecture upon
astronomical subjects. Ten years ago he was unknown, but within
that time he has won a prominent position both as an investigator of
celestial phenomena, and as an eloquent and instructive writer upon
the most modern phases of the science. Of his wonderful industry
and remarkable versatility the following sketch will furnish abundant
evidence, but we were hardly prepared to expect that Mr. Proctor
would sustain his eminent reputation in the new field of popular lect-
uring, yet such is the fact. He is an easy and fluent extemporaneous
speaker, enthusiastic over his themes, and wielding his large resources
of knowledge with the utmost facility and readiness. Dealing with
the sublimest of all subjects in its latest and most novel aspects, he
carries his audience with him, and occupies their attention so com-
pletely that they lose the sense of time, and reach the close of a long
lecture under the impression that it is but fairly begun.

Richard Akthony Peoctor was born at Chelsea, March 23, 1837,
and is consequently not yet thirty-seven years of age. He was edu-
cated in his boyhood chiefly at home, being delicate in health. He
was a diligent reader, his tastes inclining to history, literature, and
theology, more than to mathematics or the sciences. He showed a
great liking for the construction of maps, and still regards charting
not only as an important aid in scientific investigation, but as a very
instructive mental exercise. At the age of twelve he began to read
Euclid in school, and at once took to geometrical study. At thirteen
his father died, and the boy soon after left school. He was now a
ward in chancery; and it afibrds a good illustration of the system
attacked by Dickens in " Bleak House " that, although there was not
any "suit" properly so called, Mrs. Proctor was engaged for three or
four years in an expensive series of legal processes, the sole object
of which was to assign to her formally on behalf of her children the
proceeds of a certain estate of which they were heirs.

In 1854: young Proctor obtained a clerkship in a bank to aid him
in getting the means of going to the university, as he was designed
for a clergyman in the English Church. But little time was allowed
for study; but when, in 1855, he went to King's College, London, he
succeeded in taking first place in seven subjects — classics, mathemat-
ics, history, literature, divinity, French, and German. In 1856 he en-
tered St. John's College, Cambridge, where he distinguished himself in
mathematics. In 1857 he lost his mother, for whose sake alone he had
valued college successes ; and he no longer pursued his mathematical
studies, though he remained at Cambridge, and took the degree of
B. A. in 1860.

Although he went into the Cambridge Senate House for examina-
tion, after two years of mathematical idleness, and without any ac-
quaintance with the higher and more important branches of mathemati-

SKETCH OF R. A. PROCTOR. 489

cal reading, Mr. Proctor is reported as standing high in the university
among the "wranglers." We have wranglers in this country, and keep
a whole Congress of them for public exliibition, as gladiators were ex-
hibited at the Roman shows. But in the English universities this
term is applied to a limited group of first-class students or honor-men
who go in on the final scramble for the highest places in a numerical
gradation. He who beats all the rest is called " senior wrangler."
This is the highest position of university honor, and the struggle to
reach it is so long and severe that it is said to " use up " the success-
ful candidate, so that the " senior wrangler " is rarely heard of in after-
life. Then come second, third, and fourth wrangler, and so on, and
even tenth wrangler is regarded as a highly-honorable rank, as in fact
it is to be a wrangler at all. Fortimately for astronomy and American
lecturing. Proctor did not win the headship in the wrangle of his year,
but he is quoted as being close on the heels of the leadei-s.

Mr. Proctor's first literary efibrt, a nine-page article on " Double
Stars," appeared in the Cornhill Ifagazhie for December, 1863, ten
years ago. His next attempt was an "Essay on the Rings of Saturn,"
Avhich was declined, as not sufliciently popular for the readers of the
Cornhill 3fagazine. This led to the writing of his first book, "Saturn
and its System," a work chiefly remarkable for the fullness of the
relations presented by a single planet, which are discussed in almost
every conceivable aspect. The construction of maps to illustrate
Saturn led Mr. Proctor to form his " Gnomonic Star Atlas," planned
on an altogether original system. The sphere is supposed to be in-
closed in a dodecahedron, on whose twelve pentagonal faces the stars
are projected. A third work, called " The Handbook of the Stars,"
was also ready for the press in 1866. In this year an event occurred
which rendered literary and scientific labor, hitherto pursued as an
amusement, a necessity of existence. The bank in which he had all
his fortune broke and left him worse than bankrupt, for he was liable
for many thousand pounds, and from this liability he has but very
recently obtained release. The three years following were marked
with struggles, difficulties, and severe domestic bereavements, which
interrupted literary work. In 1867 " Constellation-Seasons" (now out
of print), and "Sun Views of the Earth," were produced, as well as
charts of the planetary orbits, projections of Mars, and other maps.
In 1868 appeared " Half-Hours with the Telescope," and in 1869 "Half-
Hours with the Stars." But the chief occupation of Mr. Proctor's
time for the three years consisted in essay-writing for the magazines,
and in the preparation of works which publishers rejected at the time,
but which have since met with a success altogether unusual in scien-
tific literature.

In 1868 Mr. Proctor commenced writing popular science essays for
the London Daily Neics, and has continued to do so until the present
time. In 1870 appeared "Other Worlds than Ours," which had a

490

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

prompt and remarkable success, and in the same year his large " Star
Atlas " was published. Early ia 1871 "The Sun "was pi'inted, and
was also well received. In the same year appeared " Elementary Les-
sons in Astronomy," and the first series of " Light Science for Leisure
Hours ; " in 1872 the " School Atlas of Astronomy," " Essays on As-
tronomy," " Orbs around Us," and " Elementary Lessons in Physi-
cal Geography." Much of his time this year was devoted to the
construction of a chart, showing all the stars visible in the north-
ern heavens with the telescopes 2f inches in aperture — in all, 324,198
stars. This chart exhibits relations having an important bearing on
our ideas respecting the constitution of the heavens. During the
past year Mr. Proctor has published the second series of " Light
Science," " The Moon," " The Border-land of Science," " The Expanse
of Heaven ; " and a new work, entitled " The Universe and the Coming
Transits," is now passing through the press.

Such a rapid multiplication of books cannot of course be otherwise
than unfavorable to the promotion of science by original research.
This Mr. Proctor recognizes, and he has described it as one of the
principal hardships occasioned by the loss of his property, that he was
compelled to give but a limited portion of his time to original investi-
gations. But, although driven to write about science for a livelihood,
or to forsake it altogether for more remunerative employment, he is
very far from having neglected the more serious work of research.
Few know what can be accomplished by industry and perseverance.
It is only necessary to look over the index of the Proceedings of the
Royal Astronomical Society to see that Mr. Proctor has been a large
contributor to its work. Indeed, although its pages are limited to the
record of such work, from 1868 to 1873 Mr. Proctor contributed to
these proceedings more freely than any fellow of the Astronomical
Society. His papers have related chiefly to the stellar system, the
laws of distribution of stars, their motions, the relations between stars
and nebuloe, and the general constitution of the heavens. But the sub-
ject of the solar corona has occupied a considerable space among Mr.
Proctor's papers, while even a larger amount of labor has been given
to the investigation of the opportunities which will be presented
during the transits of Yenus, on December 9, 1874, and December 6,
1882.

The subject of that mysterious connection between meteors and
comets which forms one of the most surprising of the results of mod-
ern observation has also been largely dealt with by Mr. Proctor.
His investigation of the rotation-period of the planet Mars, resulting
in a value certainly within one-tenth of a second of the true period,
may also be mentioned among his original researches.

It is but just to say that Mr. Proctor has been singularly fortunate
in enunciating theories which have been subsequently confirmed, und
in some cases demonstrated by new observations. His confident tone

SKETCH OF R. A. PROCTOR. 491

respecting the solar theory of the corona in 1870 and 1871 -was blamed
by some and misunderstood by many, who failed to perceive his rea-
son for urging arguments so strongly on a matter seemingly theoreti-
cal. That reason was stated by Mr. Proctor in the preface to the first
edition of the " Other Worlds," where he expresses his anxiety lest
doubt and confusion, prevailing as to a matter really demonstrated,
might cause the opportunities presented by the great solar eclipses of
1870 and 1871 to be frittered away. Mr. Proctor's confidence on the
one hand and his anxiety on the other were fully justified by the
event. Every astronomer now accepts the solar theory of the corona,
and few are ignorant how, at the eclipse of 1871, two-thirds of the
observers were set by the chief believer in the terrestrial theory to
make observations which proved nothing, and which, but for faith in
that exploded theory, would never have been thought of.

The controversy respecting the transits of Yenus, begun in 1869,
and brought to a close quite recently, led to unpleasant relations be-
tween Ml'. Proctor and the Astronomer Royal. Indeed, it must be
admitted that in conducting this controversy after February, 1873,
Mr. Proctor exhibited a zeal which at times seemed uncalled for. But
some explanation may be found in the "fact that, having remained qui-
escent, at the Astronomer Poyal's special request, for a long time, his
renewal of the discussion led immediately to the statement that it was
now too late for any change of plan. Fortunately, the results of the
inquiries of American, Russian, and German astronomers, as well as
the nature of the schemes proposed by them, fortified Mr. Proctor's
position ; and, even while the Astronomer Royal was proclaiming his
conviction that no other nation would adopt the same opinions as Mr.
Proctor, news reached England that America, Russia, and Germany,
were in accord in these matters. It cannot be wondered at that, at
the Greenwich Board of Visitation, Prof. Adams proposed, and the
Board unanimously voted, the point which Mr. Proctor had urged in
1869, viz., that it was desirable to apply Halley's method (respecting
which Airy had said, in December, 1868, that it " failed totally "). In
this matter, as in the controversy respecting the sun's corona — the
only controversies in which Mr. Proctor has engaged — there was this
obvious reason for pressing the discussion, that eclipses and transits
will wait for no man. In his main subject of original investigation —
the constitution of the heavens — Mr. Proctor has wisely avoided con-
troversy, contenting himself with advancing and advocating his views,
collecting evidence, weighing objections, and endeavoring to progress
toward the solution of the difficult but interesting problems associ-
ated with the subject.

492

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

CORRESPONDENCE.

ME. GLADSTONE C0EEECT3 ME. SPEXCEE.

IX reply to Herbert Spencer's last paper
on the " Study of Sociology " (in Popc-
LAB Science Monthly for December, 1873,
p. 134:), Mr. Gladstone sent the following
letter to the editor of the Contemporary
Review :

10 DowxiNG Street, Whitehall, I
Xoamber 3, 18T3. f
My dear Sir: I observe in the Con-
temporary Eeview for October, p. 670, that
the followmg words are quoted from an ad-
dress of mine at Liverpool :

" Upon the ground of what is termed
evolution, God is relieved of the labor of
creation: in the name of unchangeable
laws. He is discharged from governing the

world." .

The distinguished writer in the Review
says that by these words I have made my-
self so conspicuously the champion (or ex-
ponent) of the anti-scientific view, that the
words may be regarded as typical. -

To go as directly as may be to my point,
I consider this judgment upon my declara-
tion to be founded on an assumption or be-
lief that it contains a condemnation of evo-
lution, and of the doctrine of unchangeable
laws. I submit that it contains no such
thing. Let me illustrate by saying, AVhat
if I wrote as follows :

" Upon the ground of what is termed
liberty, flagrant crimes have been com-
mitted : and (likewise) in the name of law
and order, human rights have been trodden
under foot."

I should not by thus writing condemn
liberty, or condemn law and order; but
condemn only the inferences that men
draw, or say they draw, from them. Up to
that point the parallel is exact : and I hope
it will be seen that Mr. Spencer has inad-
vertently put upon my words a meaning
they do not bear.

Using the parallel thus far for the sake
of clearness, I carry it no farther. For
while I am ready to give in my adhesion to
liberty, and likewise to law and order, on

evolution and on unchangeable laws I had
rather be excused.

The words with which I thmk Madame de
Stael ends " Cormne," are the best for me :
" Je ne veux ni la bldmer, ni Vabsoudre," Be-
fore I could presume to give an opinion on
evolution, or on unchangeable laws, I should
wish to know, more clearly and more fully
than I yet know, the meaning attached to
those phrases by the chief apostles of the
doctrines : and very likely, even after ac-
complishing this preliminary stage, I might
find myself insufficiently supplied with the
knowledge required to draw the line be-
tween true and false.

I have, then, no repugnance to any con-
clusions whatever, legitimately arising upon
well-ascertained facts or well-tested reason
ings: and my complaint is that the func-
tions of the Almighty as Creator and Gov-
ernor of the world are denied upon grounds,
which, whatever be the extension given to
the phrases I have quoted, appear to me to
be utterly and manifestly insufficient to
warrant such denial.

I am desirous to liberate myself from a
supposition alien, I think, to my whole habit
of mind and life. Bnt I do not desire to
eflFect this by the method of controversy ;
and if Mr. Spencer does not see, or does not
think, that he has mistaken the meaning of
my words, I have no more darts to throw ;
and will do myself, indeed, the pleasure of
concluding with a frank avOwal that his
manner of handling what he must naturally
consider to be a gross piece of folly is as
far as possible from being offfensive.
Believe me, most faithfully yours,

"W. E. Gladsioke.

ME. SPEXCEE ON THE COEEECTIOX.
To the second edition of Mr. Spencer's
" Study of Sociology," he appends the fore-
going letter, and remarks as follows (page
425):

Mr. Gladstone's explanation of his own
meaning must, of course, be accepted ; and,

CORRESPONDENCE.

493

inserting a special reference to it in the
stereotype-plate, I here append his letter,
that the reader may not be misled by my
comments. Paying due respect to Mr.
Gladstone's wish to avoid controversy, I
■will say no more here than seems needful
to excuse myself for having misconstrued
his words. " Evolution," as I understand
it, and " creation," as usually understood,
are mutually exclusive : if there has been
that special formation and adjustment com-
monly meant by creation, there has not
been evolution ; if there has been evolu-
tion, there has not been special creation.
Similarly, unchangeable laws, as conceived
by a man of science, negative the current
conception of divine government, which im-
plies interferences or special providences :
if the laws are unchangeable, they are
never traversed by divine volitions sus-
pending them : if God alters the predeter-
mined course of things from time to time,
the laws are not imchangeable, I assumed
that Mr. Gladstone used the terms in these
mutually-exclusive senses ; but my assump-
tion appears to have been a wrong one.
This is manifest to me on reading what he
instances as parallel antitheses ; seeing
that the terms of his parallel antitheses are
not mutually exclusive. That which ex-
cludes " liberty," and is excluded by it, is
despotism ; and that which excludes " law
and order," and is excluded by them, is
anarchy. Were these mutually-exclusive
conceptions used, Mr. Gladstone's parallel
would be transformed thus :

" Upon the ground of what is termed
liberty, there has been rebellion against
despotism : and (likewise) in the name of
law and order, anarchy has been striven
against."

As this is the parallel Mr. Gladstone
would have drawn had the words of his
statement been used in the senses I sup-
posed, it is clear that I misconceived the
meanings he gave to them; and I must,
therefore, ask the reader to be on his
guard against a kindred misconception.

I have not, however, thought it need-
ful to change the description given of Mr.
Gladstone's position, or to suppress the
comments made upon it ; because the sub-
stantial truth of this description is shown
by the other passage quoted, the manifest
meaning of which he does not disclaim.

By characterizing Science as having " gone
to war with Providence " — by displaying
an unhesitating belief that great men are
providentially raised up at the needful
times, and by speaking with alarm and
reprobation of the belief that their rise is
due solely to natural causes, Mr. Gladstone
does, I think, give me adequate warrant for
taking his view as typical of the anti-scien-
tific view in general — at any rate, in so far
as the Social Science is concerned. Though
this view may not be incongruous with the
conception he entertains of Science, yet it
is certainly incongruous with the concep-
tion entertained by scientific men ; who
daily add to the evidence, already over-
whelming, that the Power manifested to
us throughout the Universe, from the move-
ments of stars to the unfolding of individual
men and the formation of public opinions,
is a Power which, amid infinite multiformi-
ties and complexities, works in ways that
are absolutely uniform.

NOTE ON THE PHYSICAL CONSTITUTION

OF MATTER.
To the Editor of the Popular Science MontJdy :

I HATE read, with much interest, the elab-
orate articles, by Judge Stallo, on " The Pri-
mary Concepts of Modem Physical Science,"
hoping, from the scholarly manner in which
the author discusses the subject, that he
would conduct us to some more acceptable
conclusion than has hitherto been arrived
at. I was disappointed, however, to find
him surmounting the difficulties of the sub-
ject by assuming that the " tyjncal and
primary state of matter is a gas," which
" is not a group of absolute solids, but is
elastic to the core."

I do not propose to review nor criti-
cise these learned articles of Judge Stallo,
though there are various portions that I
think quite vulnerable to criticism ; but I
must confess that the idea of an unparticled
elastic body is to me an utter impossibility.

The subject presents very grave difficul-
ties under any view of the case. For, if we
assume the existence of an ultimate solid
particle, universal force cannot be con-
served, because the interference of solid
particles must destroy motion, and there-
fore force. Hence, in that view of the
case, we must have a continual destruction,

494

THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

and therefore a continual creation of force.
This conclusion I am not willing to accept,
as I fuUy believe in the indestructibility of
both matter and force.

The least objectionable view that I have
been able to arrive at is, that all ideas are
sensations excited primarily by material
impressions, and hence that we can have
absolutely no idea of space independent of
matter.

And, as a stellar system in the universe
of matter consists of millions of aggre-
gated masses which are individually very
small in proportion to the inter-spaces, so I
believe that the chemical molecule is very
small in proportion to the space between
the molecules. And as each sun has (prob-
ably) various attendants (the planets), so
each chemical molecule consists in general
of several different bodies that may be
easily separated (in consequence of the
space between them being of the same
order as the spaces between the mole-
cules). But, like the different bodies of
the solar system, or of a stellar system,
each of these bodies is a compound mass
consisting of millions of units of a diflFerent
order, holding probably the same relation
to the chemical molecule that the chemical
molecule does to the matter of the solar
system ; and so on, both upward and down-
ward, to infinity.

There is, therefore, as I conceive, abso-
lutely no limit to the division of matter,
physically as well as mathematically ; but
our organization is such that, of the infinite
series of terms in which it manifests itself,
we can know, experimentally, only two :
viz., the stellar universe, constituting the
first order, of which the stars and the plan-
ets are the units ; and, secondly, the chemi-
cal molecule, which constitutes the second
order.

According to this view, the material
universe might be represented, in orders,
by the following series: d~^x, . . . d—%
d-\ d-\ d\ dz, d\ d\ ...d'^-'x,
c?°ar, in which z is the unknown quantity,
which we call matter, and m and n are both
infinitely great.

In this series, d°x, or simply x, would
represent all tangible matter ; and dx,
which is the next term descending, would
represent chemical molecules and their con-

stituents, the atoms of all known and un-
known elementary bodies.

As in the analogous expression used in
mathematical investigations, d'^z is infi.
nitely small in respect to dx, which in its
turn is infinitely small in respect to d\
and so on ; yet each represents the ele-
ments of which the next preceding order is
constituted. So in the physical world, as
represented by the above series : the units
in X, which are represented by the visible
worlds in space, are infinitely large when
compared with the units in dx, which are
represented by the chemical molecules ; the
units in each preceding order, in both series,
being aggregations of the units in the next
succeeding order.

This view of the constitution of matter,
though it necessitates the assumption of its
actual infinite division, yet, to my mind, in-
volves much less absurdity than to suppose
it imparticled, and yet " elastic to the core,"
or to suppose that the chemical molecule,
or even the chemical atom, is an absolute
solid. J. E. Hexdricks.

Des Moes-es, Iowa, November 21, 1873.

MATTER, FORCE, ANT) INERTIA.
To the Editor of the Popular Science Monthly :

Judge Stallo's valuable contributions
to the Popular Science Monthly, on the
" Prinaary Concepts of Modern Science," can
scarcely fail to give the reader a clearer
conception of elementary being. But it
seems to me that his criticism of Mr. Fara-
day's " complex forces," and Baine's asser-
tion that "matter, force, and inertia, are
substantially three names for the same
fact," is clearly illogical.

On the ground that the existence of all
reality lies in relation and contrast, the
author assumes that inertia and force are
ever coexisting contrasts. He says : " We
know nothing of force except by its con-
trast with mass, or (what is the same thing)
inertia ; and, conversely, as I have already
pointed out in my first article, we know
nothing of mass, except by its relation to
force. Mass, inertia (or, as it is sometimes
though inaccurately called, matter per se)
is indistinguishable from absolute nothing,
ness ; for matter reveals its presence, or
evinces its reality, only in its action, its

EDITORS TABLE,

495

force, its tension or motion. ... It is im-
possible, therefore, to construct matter by
a mere synthesis of forces."

Now, as all conceptions result from
motion in the brain, it is self-evident that
motion is the primordial reality whence
all concepts arise, and that diflerent con-
ceptions of realities are solely difierent
modes of motion, each distinct attribute
being a distinct mode, and modified attri-
butes are modified modes. Therefore a
conception of matter, mass, inertia, or mo-
mentum, being solely a product of motion
in the brain, and a conception of color
being solely a product of motion in the
brain, it is again self-evident that the only
possible difference, between the primordial
realities we call inertia and color, is differ-
ence in modes of motion.

Hence it is seen that the idea — almost

universal — that inertia, or momentum, ne-
cessarily coexists with motion, may have
no foundation in fact ; its error being fur-
ther evidenced by our non-perception of
their coexistence in the invisible, or molec-
ular motions. In fact, inertia or momen-
tum is only perceived in that single mode
of motion which produces the sensation of
touch ; and which we designate as mechani-
cal or mass-motion.

But whether or not momentum neces-
sarily accompanies motion, it was shown
above that the same reason for conceiving
color to be solely a mode of motion equally
obtains in our conception of matter, mass,
or inertia, as a mode of motion ; and that
" all the reality we know " exists, primarily,
in changing, but ever-existing, relations and
contrasts of modes of motion.

A. Aexold.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

A GASSIZ.

OUE great naturalist has finished
his work and passed away. His
loss will be felt throughout the scientific
world, and will be deeply lamented be-
yond the circles of science in all parts
of our own country. Although he had
accomplished much during a long and
active life, he entertained no thought
of rest, but was still full of hope, am-
bition, and large plans of labor, such as
belong to the prime of manhood. But
his physical powers at last gave way,
and his career terminated, we might
almost say prematurely, at the age of
sixty -six. Of Prof. Agassiz's more
strictly scientific labors we shall take
an early opportunity to speak ; we can
here only briefly refer to some of the
leading features of his career and char-
acter.

Prof. Agassiz was by descent a
Frenchman, his family being among
the Huguenots who were driven from
France by the revocation of the Edict
of Nantes, in the year 1685, and took
refuge in Switzerland. He came of a

theological stock, being derived from
six lineal generations of clergymen.
He was born in 1807, the year that the
first steamboat started on the Hudson,
and when Humboldt, Cuvier, and Ka-
poleon, were thirty-eight years of age.
It has been Prof. Agassiz's fortune
to take a very conspicuous part in the
scientific work of the present time.
The Old World gave him his education,
and the New World the best opportu-
nity of using it. He was early and
powerfully attracted to the study of
Nature, while his mind was moulded
and matured through intimate inter-
course with the most illustrious men
of science in Europe. He did his chief
original work, and developed the views
with which his name will be mainly
associated, in his youth and middle life,
and at the age of thirty-nine he left the
continent, where scientific men abound-
ed, and took up his residence in a new
country where they were wanted, and
where the opportunities, both of enter-
ing unexplored fields of investigation
and of drawing men and institutions

496

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

into the work, were alike unparalleled ;
while the course he pursued has turned
out as wise for his own fame as it has
proved favorable to the interests of
advancing knowledge.

It is well known that Prof. Agassiz
was a man of strong personality. He
had great enthusiasm and impulsive-
ness, and the whole fervor and inten-
sity of his nature was spent in the sin-
gle-minded pursuit of science. Not
content with what he could himself
know, and do, and enjoy, he was pow-
erfully impelled to make others the
sharers of his knowledge, his activity,
and his pleasures. He not only won
them to him by his geniality, and his
cordial and unaffected manners, hut he
inspired them with his own purposes,
and moved them to his own ends.
Sympathetic with all who were inter-
ested in science, he especially fascinated
young men, and tlie i*anks of our nat-
uralists are full of those who were re-
cruited to the work by his agency,
among whom may be mentioned Ver-
rill, Stimson, Clark, Hyatt, Putnam,
Packard, Scudder, Hartt, Tenney,
Morse, Niles, and Bickmore. One of
his students writes of him as follows :

"A^assiz's entlauslasm did not consist
merely in scientiflo investigation and in ear-
nest words, but also in earnest deeds in re-
lation to others, and especially in relation to
young men. Wherever lie saw a student
who would study Nature, lie opened the way
for him, took him into liis laboratory, spread
his treasures before Mm and directed his
studies, and this too without any expectation
or thought of a pecuniary reward as a return.
Indeed, I do not know of a single student
who ever paid him a dollar as tuition for his
instruction in natural history studies. Young
men came and staid and studied as long as
they would, and, as far as tuition was con-
cerned, without money and without price.
To the present writer he said, twenty years
ago : ' "Whenever you get ready to study
natural history, come to Cambridge, and
remember it will not cost you a cent of
money.' "

But Prof. Agassiz's influence was
far from being confined to a small class

of congenial students ; it was very
powerful upon the general public. A
republican by nativity, and a republi-
can by adoption, he was also a republi-
can in sympathy and in principle, by
association and habit. Although com-
ing to this country as a great man from
Europe, he had no factitious dignity to
sustain, and no scruples to overcome,
in plunging at once into the work of
popular teaching. Entering early and
fully into the spirit of our institutions,
he went among the people at large,
gave courses of lectures upon zoology
in all the chief towns of the country,
and was indefatigable in the diffusion
of knowledge, and in awakening a
higher appreciation of science among
the people. In this he was wise and
sagacious to the specitic ends'he had in
view, for he well understood that in
this country the prosperity of science
is ultimately bound up with its public
appreciation. In this field of effort too
he was preeminently successful. As
Mr. Beecher remarks, in the Christian
Union :

*' Agassiz stepped upon the lecture plat-
form in Boston, and day after day fascinated
a great audience with the fairy tales of sci-
ence and the long result of time. That
appreciation might have been predicted of
Boston culture, perhaps. But when the
master took his black-board and his prob-
lems to the smaller cities, drawing his queer
diagrams, and unfolding their vast meaning
before lyceum associations, normal schools,
colleges, high-schools, those benches, too,
were crowded with eager and intelligent
listeners. It was Agassiz who made straight
the path of Tyndall last winter, created the
demand for Huxley's lectures, and made The
PopuLAE Science Monthly as much a ne-
cessity as Harper or the Atlantic. It was
Agassiz whose large intent laid the comer-
stone of our institutes of techology, and
scientific schools in colleges."

But no estimate of Prof. Agassiz's
real work among the American people
will be just that stops here. True, he
gave his best powers to the instruction
of teachers, farmers, mechanics, and
artisans, but it was not merely as a

EDITOR'S TABLE.

497

scatterer of his own stores of knowl-
edge. He had a profound interest in
popular education, but the soul of that
interest was for improvement in its
methods. In the matter of public in-
struction he was a revolutionist and a
propagandist. He warred with current
ideas and consecrated practices. He
condemned in the most emphatic way
the wretched lesson-learning routine
that prevails in the schools. He de-
nounced our wordy and bookish edu-
cation as baseless and unreal, and de-
manded such a change in our systems
of instruction as shall bring the pupils
face to face with Nature herself, and
call out the mind by direct exercise
upon phenomena — the facts, laws, rela-
tions, and realities of the world of ex-
perience. He was at times inclined to
take discouraging views of the educa-
tional future, from this enslavement of
the schools to vicious methods of study,
but he never wearied in the endeavor
to propagate more rational opinions,
and we cannot doubt that the seed thus
sown will yet ripen into most valuable
fruit. It is questionable, indeed, if his
earnest exertions in this direction will
not tell in the final promotion of sci-
ence even more powerfully than all his
attempts to attain immediate results.

Anotlier feature of Prof. Agassiz's
scientific character remains to be no-
ticed. Science was to him not merely
the knowledge of animals, rocks, and
glaciers, but it was a method of thought,
rising into the proportions of a philos-
ophy, and embracing the interests of
humanity. By the vulgar-minded he
was looked upon as a very wonderful
man, whose genius spent itself upon
crabs and their kindred, and who would
give the world for a new fish. This
was regarded as an amiable and an ad-
mirable eccentricity, and everybody
was pleased when he had got a new
donation to buy more curious things for
his museum. And it was freely said,
" If men of science would only imitate
Agassiz, and be content with their dis-
voi.. IV— 32

sections and collections, and keep in
their sphere, and not encroach upon
departments of thought which belong
to politicians, theologians, historians,
and philanthropists, the world might
get on in peace." But this is a very
mistaken conception of Agassiz's views
of science. He saw in it not only
a disclosure of the laws of physical
nature, and an interpretation of the
principles of life, but a revelation of
correlated truths of all orders indis-
pensable to the progress of man. This
he ever maintained, and this he affirmed
in the last essay perhaps that he ever
wrote, and which was published in the
Atlantic Monthly but a few days after
his death. In that article there occurs
the following passage, which our read-
ers will attest might have been a fit mot-
to for The Populae Science Month-

" It cannot be too soon understood that
science is one, and that whether we investi-
gate philosophy, theology, history, or phys-
ics, we are dealing with the same problem,
culminating in the knowledge of ourselves.
Speech is known only in connection with
the organs of man, thought in connection
with his brain, religion as the expression of
his aspirations, history as the record of his
deeds, and physical sciences as the laws un-
der which he lives. Philosophers and theo-
logians have yet to learn that a physical fact
is as sacred as a moral principle. Our own
nature demands from us this double alle-
giance."

We had intended to say nothing at
the present time about Agassiz and
Evolution, thinking it most suitable to
forget all diff"erences in the lieart-felt
acknowledgment of what we owe to
his noble and disinterested life. But
the occasion of his death has been so
widely used in the interest of prejudice
and error that a few words upon this
subject become unavoidable.

Prof. Agassiz was an opponent of
Darwinism, but his opposition gave no
excuse for the amount of stupid rant
upon the question which has been late-

498

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ly poured forth. The following passage
from an elaborate article on Prof. Ag-
assiz, ill one of our leading morning
papers, is a fair example of a good deal
of the talk that has been latterly in-
dulged in by the press : " His views of
the development of animal species, op-
posed entirely to the gloouiy theory of
Darwin, which has fallen so oppressive-
ly upon the world, while they neglect no
fact and break no link in the chain of
progress, are marked by a recognition
of a distinct humanity and a high crea-
tive purpose in the Divine origin of all
things which elevate and cheer and
relieve us of the sickening conscious-
ness that man, 'the paragon of ani-
mals,' is merely a growth from some
shapeless, loathsome jelly."

We have here a moral estimate of
"jelly," and a vehement denial of its
fitness to be the material from which
the*" paragon of animals" originates;
the bare idea being declared sufficient
to shroud the universe in gloom, and
fairly to make one sick. But perplex-
ing questions here arise. Omnes vivum
ex ovo, and the substance of all eggs
is jelly; but, if this substance was not
fit to use at the primal start of life,
why is it so extensively employed
now? If not fit for the elaboration
of the lowest creatures, how came it
to be employed in unfolding the "par-
agon?" and, if not always used, pray
when and why was it introduced ?
One would think, from the writer's
horror of "jelly," that he regarded
it as a diabolical invention of Darwin ;
threatening a kind of gelatinous " fall of
man," from which Prof. Agassiz has had
the happiness of rescuing the world, and
restoring it to cheerfulness. But really
Mr. Darwin is responsible for neither
the existence nor the office nor the ex-
tent of "jelly" in Nature; and of all
men Prof. Agassiz is the last to lead a
crusade against it. As an eminent era-
bryologist, he might properly be called
the high-priest of "jelly." He was
never weary of explaining that all liv-

ing things — each man, as well as every
inferior animal — is actually evolved
from a httle mass of "jelly;" and,
while he would probably have agreed
as to its shapelessness, he would cer-
tainly have protested against its
"loathsomeness." He who said that
" our philosophers and theologians '
(and, he might have added, our editors)
require to be taught that " a physical
fact is as sacred as a moral principle,"
would hardly have sickened over the
"loathsomeness" of that plastic mate-
rial which we know to be the starting-
point of all organic development.

Agassiz held that Nature is to be re-
garded as the material embodiment of
divine ideas, and, after dwelling with
delight upon the curious forms and con-
stitutions of creatures composed almost
wholly of "jelly," he would say, " These
are the thoughts of the Almighty,"
On his view, "jelly " was the chosen
and specially honored material for the
expression of the divine conceptions.
Prof. Agassiz would certainly have con-
sidered the little protoplasmic speck,
which, in the course of natural opera-
tions, can evolve in a few years into a
Newton, a Shakespeare, or even a
President of the United States, as an
exceedingly interesting portion of the
divine order. If the germ contains
potentially the future being, and if a
highly-developed race transmits its ap-
titudes and capacities from generation
to generation, then is "jelly" an insti-
tution of God for the conservation of
perfected man, and the civilization that
he carries with him.

With such evidences as this of the
prevailing state of mind, no wonder
that the great naturalist was vehement
almost to fanaticism in his advocacy of
scientific education. In old prescientifio
times. Nature was held accursed ; and
that such stuff as we have here quoted
could find entrance into a widely-cir-
culated organ of public opinion, is
proof to how great an extent we are
stUl dominated by middle-age ideas.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

499

Since his death, Prof. Agassiz has
been much and ardently lauded as a
Christian scientist, and a champion of
the faith against scientific skepticism.
It is gratifying to be assured that he
■^as neither a Mohammedan, nor a
Buddhist, nor a Sun-worshiper, but a
good Christian, as he ought to have
been ; and here, perhaps, it would he
as well to let the matter rest. But,
when we are told that Agassiz was a
Christian lecause of his op2?ositio?i to
Darwinism, we decidedly object. Prof.
Agassiz was a Theist, who ascribed the
universe to a Divine Mind ; Darwinians
do the same. That Prof. Agassiz has
attempted to show the incompatibility
of the Christian system of doctrine with
Darwinian ideas, we are not aware ;
but, on the other hand, there are many
Christian theologians who take the op-
posite view. As we show in another
place, a literature of reconciliation is
springing up, and we are beginning to
hear of Christian evolutionists, as we
have long heard of Christian astrono-
mers and Christian geologists. But be-
cause Agassiz was a Theist, it by no
means follows that his theories of Nat-
ural History were specially religious,
and the attempt to make them so, so far
as influential at all, will be doubly mis-
chievous. It will prejudice scientific in-
quiry by favoring the idea that the re-
sults of investigation may be irreligious ;
and it will injure Christianity by iden-
tifying it with physical doctrines and
interpretations of Nature, which it is
the business of scien6e to investigate,
and which investigation is liable to
change. He who insists upon linking
religion to any view of natural phe-
nomena, puts it in grave peril. The
attempt, long ago made, to identify it
with the belief in the flatness and fix-
ity of the earth was a serious error ;
and the subsequent attempt to identify
it with the doctrine of the recent crea-
tion of the earth was another mischiev-
ous mistake. To try the experiment a

third time, in the domain of Biology,
cannot fail to be still more injurious.
It is believed by great numbers of the
most intelligent students of the subject
that the old opinions regarding the
origin of living things upon earth are
certainly doomed to pass away. At
all events, the subject is unsettled, and
it is therefore unwise to make Chris-
tianity a partisan to any of its theories.
It is well also to bear in mind that, if
Agassiz fights Darwinism, he accepts
Evolution. Forty years ago he wrote
of the life upon the globe, "An invisible
thread in all ages runs through its im-
mense diversity, exhibiting as a general
result the fact that there is a constant
progress and development ending in
man ; " and, in his very last article, to
the question, " Is there any such pro-
cess as evolution in Nature ? " he an-
swers, " Unquestionably, yes." He
was of opinion that little as yet has
been contributed toward the scientific
solution of this great problem ; but,
however that may be, evolution in Na-
ture he conceded as a fact which be-
longs to the future of science. If,
therefore, Agassiz was a Christian, be-
lief in evolution is not inconsistent
with Christianity. This is the ground
now taken by many eminent theolo-
gians, who, like Dr. McCosh, maintain
that Christianity has no interest in
holding by the question one way or
the other. Dr. Peabody, in his sermon
at the funeral of Agassiz, took a simi-
lar position, and is reported to have
said: "His repugnance to Darwinism
grew in great part from his apprehen-
sion of its atheistical tendency, an ap-
prehension which, I confess, I cannot
share ; for I forget not that these theo-
ries, now on the ascendant, are main-
tained l)y not a few devout Christian
men, and while they seem to me un-
proved and incapable of demonstra-
tion, I could admit them without part-
ing with one iota of my faith in God
and Christ."

qoo

TRE POPULAR SCIEXCE MOXTHLY.

LITERARY NOTICES.

IXTEEXATIOXAL SCIEXTIFIC SERIES.

The New Chemistry. By J. P. Cooke, Pro-
fessor of Chemistry in Harvard Univer-
sity. 326 pages. D. Appleton & Co.
Price, 82.00.

It is well known that chemical science
has been recently undergoing a great change
in its theory of the constitution of bodies.
The Lavoisierean chemistry, or the dual
chemistry, by which all compounds were
supposed to be simply paired, as metal with
metalloid, acid with base, may be fairly said
to have passed away. Xew ideas have been
introduced which were but partially and re-
luctantly received at first, and were indeed
sharply resisted by the masters of the old
method, but which have at length forced
their way and grown into a definite system.
"With the breaking up of the old method the
old nomenclature has been shattered, and a
new nomenclature has taken its place. In
chemistry, therefore, the present is a time
of transition and discomfort. What was
long settled, and upon which we reposed in
the confidence that it would never be dis-
turbed, has proved an insecure result of
imperfect knowledge, but which has served
the important ofiiee of bringing us up to
higher and more perfect views. There is a
sadness in parting with old familiar ideas, as
with old friends, but changes must come.
In chemistry, the facts had outgrown the
theories that expressed them. New facts
•were discovered for which the old system
could find no place, and these accumulated
mntil at length a new method of interpreta-
tion was attained, by which chemical phi-
losophy has been placed upon a broader and
it is hoped a more enduring basis. But,
whatever may be its permanence, it is now
fairly established, and so marked is its con-
trast with past theories, and so distinct are
its features, that it has become fully recog-
nized as " The New Chemistry."

The new chemistry has been fully adopt-
ed by various authors in their text-books,
and partially adopted by others ; but only
with subdued satisfaction, as in the first
cases students have been frightened by the
formidable array of strange terms, defini-
tions, and ideas, and in the latter case they

have been confused by the intermixture of
different systems. The great need, there-
fore, was for a new and compendious work
that should be simply devoted to an expla-
nation of the new system. Prof. Cooke, of
Cambridge, has undertaken this task in the
book before us, and most successfully and
admirably has he accomplished it. He had
already published a large collegiate text-
book of " Chemical Philosophy," on the
new method, which he has taught for years
to the classes of Harvard University. But
the demand was so urgent for a separate
volume, that should present in a clear and
popular manner the new aspects in which
chemical facts and principles are now re-
garded, that he was induced to undertake
it, in the interest of general education. He
prepared his views first as a course of lect-
ures, which were deUvered at the Lowell
Institute, in Boston. It was there shown
that " The New Chemistry " may be made
attractive to a general audience, as these
lectures excited much interest, and were lis-
tened to with earnest attention throughout.
After being thus tested, they were thorough-
ly revised by their author, and are now
published, with illustrations, in a neat and
convenient form. No book in the whole
range of science was so greatly needed as
this, and it is fortunate for the public that
the want was supplied by such an able hand.
Not only the chemical student, but all who
are interested in this fascinating science,
and all who are concerned with the advance-
ment of scientific ideas, wUl find that this
volume bridges over the gap between the
old and the new, and wiU prove a most
valuable introduction to the larger treatises
which represent the present state of the
science.

This is the first American volume con-
tributed to the International Scientific Se-
ries, and, as it is unquestionably the best
book in any language upon the subject, it
will be sure to increase the already high
reputation of these publications.

The Interxatiokal Review. Six Times a
Tear. Januarv, 1874. 144 pages. Price,
85.00 a Year.' A. S. Barnes & Co.

The first number of this periodical con-
tains six articles, as follows : I. Our Late
Panic. II. Fires in American Cities, by

LITERARY NOTICES.

501

Prof. A. P. Peabodt, D. D., Cambridge,
Mass. III. Deep-Sea Exploration, by Prof.
Wm. B. Cakpenter, M.D., LL. D., F. R.S.,
London. IV. Universal Education, by Ray
Palmer, D. D., New York. V, The Prus-
sian Church Law, by Baron Franz ton
HoLTZENDORFF, LL. D., Munich. VI. In-
ternational Arbitration, by Theodore D.
WooLSEY, D. D., LL. D., New Haven.

It is always unfair to judge a periodical
enterprise like this by its first number ; for,
although, in the present case, there has
been long .preparation, nothing can com-
pensate for want of experience and the ad-
vantages of public criticism. The present
number contains much good reading, al-
though it is rather the opposite of lively.
Half its articles are by D. D.'s, which gives
promise that it is to be safely and conserva-
tively conducted. This is important, as we
must have ratchet-gear to hold what the
driving impulses of advancing thought have
gained. Yet it is very easy to pass from
conservation to obstruction ; and the some-
what spiteful kick given to Prof. Bain for
his little book on " Mind and Body," while
it seems to indicate the whereabouts of the
International, suggests also that its editor
may be in danger of overlooking the above
distinction. The position taken being im-
portant as a symptom of the future course
of the Review, it is worthy of some re-
mark.

The school of mental philosophy, of
which Bain is a leading representative,
differs from the old metaphysical school in
considering mind and body together, in
their connections, interactions, and depend-
encies ; and in maintaining that there can
be no true mental philosophy without taking
both factors into account. The old meta-
physicians attended to the one and neglect-
ed the other ; and what was worse, they
magnified the one and decried the other,
drawing perpetual contrasts between spirit-
ual mind and " mere brute matter." An
undoubted and very important step forward
has been made in the scientific study of
both orders of phenomena, as we find them
related in Nature and in fact. Modern psy-
chology, indeed, differs from the old meta-
physics simply in couquering its prejudices,
in taking into account all the elements of
the problem, and treating them by the sci-

entific method. Very naturally, the special
work to be done has been to bring forward
and assign its proper place to the neglected
element, matter ; whereupon the partisans
of the old view make an endless ado about
the encroachments of Materialism. When
Prof. Bain refers to the structure of the
brain, in the albuminous tissues and cor-
puscles of which all our natural and ac-
quired aptitudes are stored up, the writer
in the International is offended at such a
" gross form of expression," and sighs for
the good old times of Reid and Stewart,
who " seem like intellectual giants when
compared with the Professor of Aber-
deen."

The writer observes that "nothing is
more certain than our ability to separate
mental and physical phenomena," and he
might have added that bullets, strychnine,
and lightning, are the most effectual means
of doing it. But, when the separation is
effected, mental phenomena disappear, and
there is, therefore, an end to the study of
mind. Of mental phenomena dissociated
from physical phenomena we know abso-
lutely nothing. If the writer means that
" nothing is more certain than our ability
to separate mental and physical phenom-
ena " for the purpose of inquiring into their
nature and laws, then we say that nothing
is more false than the statement. We
know nothing of mind, except as Umited
and conditioned by association with matter.
The mode of union is a mystery, but the
fact of union and of unity is undeniable.
The very essence of the mystery is the one-
ness of that which exhibits such widely-dif-
ferent effects. The animate organism mani-
fests at the same time psychical and mate-
rial properties. We may confine our at-
tention to either, or to parts of either, but
we cannot separate them. Theory after
theory has been oifered for thousands of
years to explain the relation. Science
takes things as it finds them, and occupies
itself in tracing the relations and dependen-
cies among the phenomenal effects. This
is Prof. Bain's method, and he has made it
his great task to bring forward the long-
neglected corporeal side of the inquiry, and
to include the body in the study of the
mind. Metaphysics does not require this,
but science does require it, and the later

502

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

psychology recognizes it. It is futile to
talk of going back to Eeid and Stewart, or
to look for the coming genius who is to re-
store them ; their period is gone by.

Religion and Science. A Series of Sun-
day Lectures, on the Relation of Nat-
ural and Revealed Religion ; or, the
Truths revealed in Nature and Scripture.
By Joseph Le Coxte, Professor of Geol-
ology and Natural History in the Uni-
versity of California. 3 24 pages. D.
Appleton & Co.

The rapid multiplication of works at the
present time which aim to bring the views
of modern science into harmony with re-
ligious doctrines, is at once an attestation
of the increasing interest generally taken in
scientific subjects, and of the growth of a
catholic and more tolerant spirit in regard
to scientific and theological diversities of
opinion resulting in more earnest efforts to
harmonize them. The necessity for such
reconciliations has arisen from time to time
from the fact that theology has lent its sanc-
tion to given interpretations of natural
things, while it has been the general work
of science to revise and often to set aside
such interpretations in the course of its
progress. The main difficulty in this work
of reconciliation has been the want of
minds great enough to grasp and to master
both spheres of inquiry. The efforts at
harmonization have generally come from
partisans of opposing views, who aimed at
agreement by demanding great concessions
from the opposite side. The scientists
often ask theologians to renounce the main
pretensions of theology for the sake of
peace, and the theologians request the sci-
entists to eschew three-fourths of what they
believe as mere pseudo-science, that con-
cord of opinion may be reached. And so
they have alternated between treating and
fighting, until at last a peace is conquered.
Mean time, as the battle subsides in one
field, it breaks out in another. In the field
of Astronomy, where once the conflict raged
with the greatest fury, all is now serene,
anif the Geological struggle has also become
a memory. In the field of Evolution, there
is still a kind of warfare, much din and
smoke, and some bruises, if little slaughter.
But the conflict is now undoubtedly more
mild and restrained, as it will probably be

more brief. In reviewing the past epochs of
the conflict, it would be unwise to forget that
both parties to the strife have often cared
more for the combat than the cause, and,
as in street-brawls, have often turned upon
the peace-maker, for human nature is pug-
nacious, and dislikes to be interrupted in a
good fight. But it is one of the grand
offices of science to substitute truth for
victory in the mental conflicts of men,
and therefore to reduce the virulence of
polemics. This is one of the ways in which
science exerts a liberaUzing influence, and,
as the acerbities of controversy abate, and
the passions are less enlisted, the harsher
points of disagreement may be expected
gradually to drop away.

Prof. Le Conte's admirable little book
is bom of the best spirit of conciliation,
and goes over the whole ground of con-
flict, in its latest aspects, between Religion
and Science. In his preface he says : " The
series of lectures contained in this little vol-
ume is the result of an earnest attempt to
reconcile the truths revealed in Scripture
with those revealed in Nature, by one who
has, all his active life, been a reverent stu-
dent of both ; " and he adds ; " I may not
entirely please either the mere scientist on
the one hand, or the mere theologian on the
other, but I have no apology to make for
this. Perhaps my views may be all the more
rational on that very account'"

Prof. Le Conte's book has the rare
advantage of having been produced by a
man not only of profoundly earnest convic-
tions, but of thorough intellectual prepara-
tion. His high position in the world of sci-
ence has been long assured through his ori-
ginal contributions to some of its highest
questions. He was one of the pioneer ex-
positors of the doctrine of the correlation
of forces in its application to life and its
organization, and shows a wide and clear
understanding of the various bearings of re-
cent scientific inquiry. On the other hand,
he holds to the great fundamental tenets of
orthodox Christianity, and is therefore thor-
oughly prepared to consider the mutual re-
lations of these systems of thought. Hold-
ing that all truth is one, and ever consistent
with itself, he points out the past grounds
of misappreheniion, and shows how they
may be removed, and reconciliation attained.

J

LITERARY NOTICES.

503

Of the success of his attempt there will be
various estimates, but there can be but one
opinion upon the point that he has greatly
enriched the discussion by new and ingen-
ious arguments for the removal of past an-
tagonisms. We may add that, on its scien-
tific side, the book abounds in clear and
instructive statements of facts and laws that
are now established, while the accompany-
ing philosophical discussion brings them
out in clearer light and more impressive as-
pects.

The Theory of EvoLnios of Living
Things, and the Application of the
Principles of Evolution to Religion.
Considered as Illustrative of the " Wis-
dom and Beneficence of the Almighty."
By the Rev. George Henslow, F. L. S.
Macmillan k, Co.

We noticed, last November, a book
called the "Philosophy of Evolution," by
B. Thompson Lowne, which we explained
to be an Actonian Prize Essay. It was stated
that Hannah Acton had left a lot of money
to the Royal Institution, the income of
which was to be spent as prizes for scientific
essays, illustrating the wisdom and goodness
of God. We stated that seven years ago
the Solar Radiations were proposed for a
prize, but that, no volume appearing to claim
it, the money was left to accumulate, so that
this year there were two prizes. But we
were mistaken : the Solar Radiation man
furnished his essay, and got his money.
Nevertheless, such has been the good man-
agement of Widow Acton's funds, that there
were two prizes this year ; Lowne got one,
and Henslow the other, for the book now
before us. It is a volume of most excellent
intentions, and not without some merit. It
is, however, mainly significant from the evi-
dence it affords that theologians are begin-
ning to regard the situation calmly, and to
adjust themselves to the new circumstances.
Professor Henslow is not only a clergyman,
but a man of science, a cultivated bota-
nist, and son of the late eminent Professor
of Botany in Cambridge. His opinions will,
therefore, be entitled to weight from those
of his own class. We published an inter-
esting chapter from his book last month,
under the title of "Genesis, Geology, and
Evolution."

The Bible and the Doctrine of Evolu-
tion. Being a Complete Synthesis of
their Truth, and giving a sure Scientific
Basis for the Doctrine of Scripture. By
William Woods Smtthe. 390 pages.
London : H. K. Lewis.

We have here another volume of the
same scope as Prof. Henslow's, but a far
abler book. The author's argument is close
and searching, and the case he makes out is
very strong. The point of view from which
it is written is illustrated by the following
passage from the Dean of Canterbury :
"Possibly to our views of the nature of
Christianity, and in our exegesis of Script-
ure, we have arrived only at partial truth ;
and do not distinguish with sufBcient accu-
racy between what is certainly revealed
and what is nothing more than a possible
explanation of the divine word." The book
exemplifies not only a thorough acquaint-
ance with the doctrine of Evolution, and the
extent and grounds of its proofs, but it ex-
emplifies an equal mastery of biblical eru-
dition. Nor is it offered as a mere ingeni-
ous attempt to ascertain the points of cor-
respondence between Scripture statement
and recent scientific speculations. The au-
thor is a profound believer in the principle
of Evolution, which he maintains to be the
fundamental law alike of Nature and Chris-
tianity, and he holds that " the plain and
obvious interpretation of Scripture is the
most congruous with the principles of Evo-
lution." He recognizes his work as but
the opening outline of an inquiry wliich
must be carefully filled up, " the intention
being to place stepping-stones, however un-
hewn, across a troublesome and heretofore
impassable stream, which in the future may
grow into a highway that the fool cannot
err therein." The author acknowledges in-
debtedness for assistance and advice to a
large number of clergymen whom he has
consulted in the preparation of his work.

It is gratifying to observe that the au-
thor, who has thus far gone most thorough-
ly into the investigation he undertakes,
shows also the most intelligent appreciation
of the minds that have contributed to the
working out of the great doctrine with
which he is dealing. He says : " It does
not seem to be sufficiently understood that
Evolution owes much more to Mr. Spencer
than to Mr. Darwin. The latter only do-

^04

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

veloped part of the doctrine ; never per-
ceived its relation to the whole, nor its
purely scientific interpretation. The works
of the former are, therefore, most referred
to here."

" The doctrine of Evolution, as devel-
oped by Mr. Herbert Spencer, is not an
empty hypothesis excogitated as a plausible
account of the phenomena of the universe,
but a great philosophic system, founded
solidly on carefully-corrected experience of
the things and forces of the universe. And
it becomes a subject of the deepest interest
to compare the priori theory of the uni-
verse, contained in Scripture, with the pos-
(oriori doctrine formulated from the facts
of our uniform experience."

We cordially recommend this volume to
all who are interested in that aspect of the
question to which it is devoted.

Descriptive Sociology. Part I. The So-
ciological History of England. By
Herbert Spencer, assisted by James
Collier. Price, $5. D. Appleton & Co.

It has been repeatedly explained in the
columns of the Monthly that Herbei-t Spen-
cer has been engaged for some years in the
formidable undertaking of collecting and
classifying the data required of the scien-
tific study of human society. For this pur-
pose he divided the races of mankind into
three great groups, or divisions : I. The
Savage Races ; II. The Extinct, or Decayed
Civilizations ; and III. The Existing Civil-
ized Races. The part now published be-
longs to the third division, and in it Mr.
Spencer applies his method to the Social
History of England. If it be asked why he
did not begin with Division I., presenting
the simpler phenomena of uncultivated so-
cieties first, the reply is, that, while the
publication of the whole series is by no
means certain, and will be contingent upon
the reception of the earlier parts, it was de-
sirable to begin with a branch of the sub-
ject on which there cannot fail to be the
most general interest, while it, moreover,
subjects Mr. Spencer's method to the se-
verest test. Besides, it is quite immaterial
at what point the exposition is commenced,
as it is perfectly simple and complete in
each case.

The present work is free from all hy-

pothesis and speculative views. Only the
facts are given, and the authorities for the
facts. Mr. Spencer expresses no opinion,
and draws no inferences ; he only classifies
his materials in such a way that at one view
we can take in all the great social facts of
any epoch, and compare them with the
phenomena that precede them, and out of
which they grew, and those which follow
them, and to which they give rise. In the
" Principles of Sociology," upon which Mr.
Spencer has now entered, he will work out
the inductions and generahzations from this
vast body of social facts in his own way ;
but, meantime, they have an independent
value for all students who choose to draw
their owrn conclusions.

The work is in a folio form, which was
made necessary by the structure of the
tables, the very first condition of which is,
to bring into convenient comparison many
series of facts. For all his statements made
in the tables the authorities are given in a
corresponding classification, the text con-
sisting of quotations and extracts, which
constitute the chief portion of the work.
The material here published would form a
large octavo volume of eight or nine hun-
dred pages.

We consider this work one of very great
pubhc importance, as it is undoubtedly a
large step forward in the direction of that
knowledge which is more needed than any
other. The question, What are the natural
laws by which human societies have origi-
nated, been developed to their present state,
and must still further advance ? — the laws,
therefore, by which their destiny is gov-
erned— is supreme at the present time. Our
ideas upon the subject have hitherto been
chaotic, and, for want of any fixed princi-
ple, the social field has been given over to
quacks, dreamers, and swindlers of every
quality. If science has any light to shed
upon this matter that can help in the prac-
tical guidance of affairs, the world is in de-
plorable want of it. The work before us is
only preliminary, but we think no candid
mind can examine it without being con-
vinced that it opens a new dispensation of
social study, and paves the way to a more
scientific consideration of social phenomena
than we have ever before had. If in this
it may be thought that we are writing under

LITERARY NOTICES.

505

a " bias," let us see what others say about
it. The British Quarterly Review observes :
" No words are needed to indicate the im-
mense labor here bestowed, or the great
sociological benefit which such a mass of
tabulated matter, done under such compe-
tent direction, will confer. The work will
constitute an epoch in the science of com-
parative sociology."

The able London correspondent of the
Irihum says of the work : " The arrange-
ment of the whole is so clear that the least
scientific student in search of a fact will
have no difficulty in putting his finger on
what he wants. . . . The work is a gigantic
one ; its value, when complete, will be im-
measurable ; and its actual influence on the
study of sociology, and help to that study,
greater perhaps than any book yet pub-
lished. It is a cyclopaedia of Social Sci-
ence, but a cyclopEedia edited by the great-
est of sociologists."

Mr. E. B. Tylor, author of " Primitive
Culture," and one of the highest English
authorities upon the study of the early de-
velopment of society, writes, in Nature of
October 30th : " So much information en-
cumbered with so little rubbish, has never
before been brought to bear on the devel-
opment of English institutions. There is
hardly a living student but will gain some-
thing by looking thi'ough the compilation
which relates to his own special subject,
whether this be law or morals, education or
theology, the division of labor, or the rise
of modern scientific ideas."

We can give no better general account
of Spencer's work than to quote more fully
from this review of it by Mr. Tylor :

" This first section is a methodical sum-
mary of the development of England, intel-
lectual and moral, from the begiiming of its
history in Caesar's time, to about a. d. 1850.
At the first glance, it suggests a question
which may disconcert not a few of the lect-
urers and tutors engaged in training stu-
dents in history at our universities. This
question is, whether the ethnological record
of national life ought any longer to be treated
as subordinate to the political record of the
succession of rulers and the struggles for
supremacy of ruling families, or whether the
condition of society at its successive periods
is for the future to be considered as the

main subject, only marked out chronologi-
cally by reigns, battles, and treaties. This
question has, it is true, been already raised.
It is, in fact, the issue between historical
chronicle and the philosophy of history as
rival subjects of study. But Mr. Spencer's
work brings it more clearly and practically
into view than any previous one, as wiU be
seen from the following outline of his
scheme. It consists of two parts.

" The first part is a series of tables, ar-
ranged in thirty to thirty-five columns, each
with a heading of some department of so-
cial life or history, which again are com-
bined into groups. Thus the group of col-
umns relating to the structure of society
takes in political, ecclesiastical, and cere-
monial departments, under which again we
find separately given the laws of marriage
and inheritance, the regulation of tribes and
castes, the military and ecclesiastical organ-
ization, and the ceremonies and customs of
daily life. Next, the group of columns de-
voted to the functions of society, regulative
and operative, contains particulars of the
morals, religion, and knowledge of each
age, the state of language, and the details
of industry, commerce, habitations, food,
clothing, and artistic products. Three spe-
cial columns at the beginning, middle, and
end of this long colonnade, contain the skel-
eton of ordinary history : namely, the prin-
cipal dates, names of rulers, and political
events. Thus, by glancing across any one
of the huge double pages, we see the whole
condition of England at any selected period.
Thus, in the century after the Norman Con-
quest, the influence of the invaders is ob-
served in the growth of architecture, paint-
ing, music, poetry, the introduction of new
food and more luxurious living, the importa-
tion of canonical law and of mathematics
from the East, and so on through all the man-
ifold elements which made up the life of no-
ble and villain in our land. If the page be
turned to the sixteenth century, the picture
of English life is not less distinct. The scho-
lastic philosophy is dying out, men's minds
are newly set to work by the classical re-
vival, by voyages into new regions, the
growth of mercantile adventure and politi-
cal speculation ; chivalry ceases, archery de-
clines; judicial torture is introduced, the
'Italian' crime of poisoning becomes fre-

5o6

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

quent ; the ancient belief in witchcraft and
pervading demons holds its ground, as do
the miracle-plays and local festivals ; but a
highway act is passed, new roads are being
made, the new houses have chimneys, their
furniture and fare become more luxurious ;
the power of the old feudal families is de-
stroyed, the Star-Chamber is new-modeled ;
church-fosts are still observed under pam
of imprisonment, and high offices of state
are still in the hands of churchmen, but
among the signs of momentous change come
the dissolution of monasteries, and the dis-
tinct appearance of a sect of Protestants.
Thus the tabulated record goes on till it
ends near the present day, among such
items as Trades-Unions, Divorce Courts, the
Manchester School, County Courts, Free
Thought, Railways, Rifled Cannon, Pre-Ra-
phaelitism. Chartism, Papal Aggression, and
the crowding events of modern manufacture
and science.

" It is by following the several columns
downward, that the principle of Evolution,
the real key to Mr. Spencer's scheme, is
brought out into the broadest light. It seems
most strange, however, that he should not
have placed in its proper niche the evidence
of prehistoric archceology. Mr. Spencer can
hardly doubt that the stone implements found
in England prove the existence of one, or
probably two, stone-age populations before
the Celts, who, under the name of Ancient
Britons, begin his series. If he acknowl-
edges this, why should a first link so im-
portant in his chain of evolution have been
dropped ? Otherwise the chain is carefully
stretched out so as to display it from end
to end. In many matters, simple and direct
progress is the rule. From the ancient
Briton's bow with its bronze-tipped arrows,
to the cross-bow, the matchlock-gun, and
thence through successive stages to the rifled
breech-loader ; from the rude arithmetic be-
fore the introduction of the 'Arabic' nu-
merals, through the long series of importa-
tions and discoveries which led to the infini-
tesimal calculus in its highest modern de-
velopment ; from the early English astron-
omy, where there was still a solid firmament
studded with stars, and revolving on the
poles about the central earth, to the period
when the perturbations of planets are cal-
culated on the theory of gravitation, and the

constitution of the fixed stars examined by
the spectroscope — these are among the mul-
titude of cases illustrating the development
of culture in its straightforward course.
Harder problems come before us, where we
see some institution arise, flourish, and de-
cline within a limited period, as though re-
sulting from a temporary combination of so-
cial forces, or answering only a temporary
purpose in civilization.

" To take an instance from Mr. Spencer's
table, English history has seen the judicial
duel brought in at the Conquest, flourishing
for centuries, declining for centuries more,
till its last formal relic was abolished in
1820. Again, in the Old Enghsh period,
marriage appears as a purely civil contract,
on the basis of purchase of the wife ; then
with Christianity comes in the religious
sanction, which by 1076 had become so ab-
solute that secular marriages were prohib-
ited : with a strong turn of the tide of pub-
lic opinion, the English Marriage Act of
1653 treated marriage as a civil contract,
to be solemnized before a justice of the
peace ; till, after a series of actions and re-
actions, in our own day the civil and ecclesi-
astical solemnization stand on an equal foot-
ing before the law. Closely similar has been
the course of English society on the larger
question of a National Church, which, soon
after the introduction of Christianity, claimed
an all but absolute conformity throughout
the nation, practically maintained the claim
for ages, and then was forced back to tol-
eration, which has at last left it with a
supremacy little more than nominal. This
is not the place to discuss these subjects
for themselves, but to show how the table
before us, by its mere statement of clas-
sified events in chronological order, must
force even the unwilling student to recog-
nize processes of evolution in every de-
partment of social hfe. The writer of the
present notice once asked an eminent Eng-
lish historian, a scholar to whom the records
of mediEeval politics are as familiar as our
daily newspaper is to us, whether he believed
in the existence of what is called the phi-
losophy of history. The historian avowed
his profound distrust of, and almost disbelief
in, any such philosophy. Now, it may seem
a simple matter to have tabulated the main
phenomena of English social and political

MISCELLANY.

507

history in parallel columns, as Mr. Collier
has here done under Mr. Spencer's direction,
but his tables are a sufficient answer to all
disbelievers in the possibility of a science of
history. Where the chronicle of individual
lives often perplexes and mystifies the schol-
ar, the generalization of social principles
from the chronicler's materials shows an
order of human affairs where cause and
eflfect take their inevitable course, as
Physics or Biology."

MISCELLANY.

New Material for Dental Plates. — Among
the novelties exhibited at the American In-
stitute Fair is a new base for artificial teeth,
the invention of a Xew York dentist. It
consists mainly of fish-scales, which, dis-
solved and combined with certain fibrous
and adhesive substances, form a compound
that is said to be well adapted for use as
dental plates. Greater strength, durability,
and lightness, and freedom from all taste,
are the advantages claimed for it over the
materials in common use. It is capable of
receiving a fine polish, and may also be
readily colored to any desired tint, qualities
which adapt it to a great variety of pur-
poses outside of dentistry. It is also said
to be an excellent material for waterproof-
ing cloth.

Meteorological. — In his report for 18'72,
Mr. Daniel Draper, Director of the Meteo-
rological Observatory in Central Park, con-
siders the following points :

1. " Has the summer temperature of the
Atlantic States undergone any modifications?

2. " What is the direction in which at-
mospheric fluctuations cross the United
States ?

8. " Is it possible to trace the passage
of American storms across the Atlantic,
and predict the time of their arrival on the
European coast ? "

By carefully-arranged tables, he shows
that no change has taken place in summer
temperature, and concludes that " the mean
heat of summer and the mean cold of win-
ter are the same now as they were more
than a century ago."

These conclusions are from observations
made in Boston, New Haven, New York,

Philadelphia, and Charleston. It may be
added that, in his former reports, it was
shown that over the same areas the annual
rainfall has neither increased nor diminished.

The movement of atmospheric fluctua-
tions is illustrated by diagrams founded
on observations at the Observatory, and
the daily maps published at Washington.
It appears that these movements are not
all cyclonic — many are like waves of the
ocean, long and straight, and have a for-
ward motion. This motion over the United
States is eastward. The velocity of this
motion has been determined in a great
number of instances for the years 1869,
18Y0, 18V1, and 1872. During the last
year the highest forward velocity was 569
miles in twenty-four hours ; the lowest
velocity, 82 miles in twenty-four hours.
The highest velocity recorded was about
29 miles an hour, or 690 miles in twenty-
four hours ; this occurred on the 28th of
March, ISYO. The time required to cross
the Atlantic varied from ten to twenty
days. It sometimes happens that storms
which leave our coast three and four days
apart arrive on the coast of Europe to-
gether, and, in such cases, the storm is
usually severe. The observations made
show that, out of eighty-six storms expected
to cross the Atlantic, only three seem to
have failed. Moreover, it is shown that the
direction of the movement is maintained, so
that it may be known several days in ad-
vance what part of the coast of Europe will
be covered by the advancing storm.

The great practical value of these obser-
vations and reports will be at once recog-
nized, and the conclusions they suggest and
confirm are among the most interesting of
the results of modern scientific research.

Sewage Fertilization.— The following,
from the report of the committee of the
British Association on the " Purification
and Utilization of Sewage," effectually dis-
poses of some of the more important ob-
jections that have been urged against the
use of sewage for fertilizing purposes :

" By properly-conducted sewage irriga-
tion a solution is afforded to the question
of sewage utilization. It has already been
stated that a precipitation process, or some
clarifying process, may be found useful : in

5o8

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

all instances it is essential that the land
should be well underdrained, and that the
sewage should all pass through the soil,
and not merely over it ; otherwise, as has
been shown, it will only occasionally be sat-
isfactorily purified. The catch-water, or,
as the committee has termed it, the " super-
saturation" principle, is not defensible either
on agricultural, chemical, or sanitary prin-
ciples. An irrigation farm should therefore
carry out intermittent downward filtration
on a large scale, so that the sewage may be
always thoroughly purified, while at the
same time the maximum of utilization is
obtained.

" It is certain that all kinds of crops
may be grown with sewage, so that the
farmer can grow such as he can best sell.
Nevertheless, the staple crops must be cat-
tle-food, with occasional crops of corn ; and
it is also certain, from the analysis of the
soil, that it has become very much richer,
and that the manurial constituents of the
sewage accumulate in it. Cattle should be
fed on the farm, which leads to a vast in-
crease in the production of meat and milk,
the great desiderata of the population pro-
ducing the sewage. Thus the system of
farming must be specialized and capital
concentrated, the absence of which condi-
tions has proved a great barrier to the sat-
isfactory practical solution of the sewage
question.

"The committee has not been able to
trace any ill effects to the health of the
persons living around sewage farms, even
when badly conducted ; nor is there any
proof whatever that vegetables grown there-
on are in any way inferior to those grown
with other manure. On the contrary, there
is plenty of evidence that such vegetables
are perfectly suited for the food of man and
beast, and that the milk given by cows fed
on sewaged grass is perfectly wholesome ;
thus Mr. Dyke, Medical Officer of Health
of Merthyr Tydfil, states that, since the
abundant supply of milk from the cows fed
on irrigated grass, the children's mortahty
has decreased from 48, 50, and 52 per cent,
of the total deaths, to only 39 per cent.,
and that so far from diarrhoea having been
made more prevalent by the use of sewaged
cabbages, ' last year the Registrar-General
called attention to the fact that diarrhoea

was less prevalent in Merthyr than in any
place in England and Wales ; ' and he ex-
pressed his belief in ' the perfect salubrity
of the vegetable food so grown.'

" With regard to the assumption which
has been made that entozoic diseases would
be propagated by irrigation, all the evidence
that the country has been able to collect,
and more especially the positive facts ob-
tained by experiments, are against such an
idea ; and the committee is of opinion that
such disease will certainly not be more
readily propagated by sewage irrigation
than by the use of human refuse as manure
in any other way, and probably less if the
precaution be taken of not allowing the
animals to graze, but always having the
grass cut and carried to them."

Length of Thread of the Silk-worm.—

Prof. Riley, of St. Louis, informs us that
the calculation, on page 663 of the last
volume, as to length of thread and weight
of cocoon spun by the mulberry silk-worm,
is altogether exaggerated. Instead of the
thread being 11 miles in length, it averages
not much more than half a mile, and seldom
exceeds 1,000 yards ; while a single mile,
instead of 28 miles of it, would weigh about
15^ grains.

The Constitation of Carbouiferons Strata.

— A.t a general meeting of the British Asso-
ciation, Prof. W. C. Williamson delivered
an interesting discourse on " Coal and Coal
Plants." The speaker said that most men
are now agreed as to the vegetable origin of
coal, and the drift theory of its accumula-
tion. It was once a vegetable soil, which
accumulated under the shade of primeval
forests, growing on areas of depression. In
time the land sank beneath the sea, and the
vegetable elements were buried under layers
of sand and mud, accumulations of which
again restored the area to the sea-level,
when spores of plants once more germi-
nated in a blue mud, and the succession of
phenomena which had previously occurred
was again renewed. The frequent repeti-
tion of these changes, finally, resulted in the
accumulation of the thousands of feet com-
posing the vertical series of rocks which are
tei-med the carboniferous strata. Attention
had been called by Prof. Huxley to some

MISCELLANY.

509

minute coin-like bodies which are very abun-
dant in some coals, and which had been pre-
yiously noticed by Witham, Dawson, and
others. The larger of these bodies Huxley
regarded as spore-cases, and the smaller as
spores, while he considered that their dis-
integration had led in most cases to the
formation of the bulk of what we call coal.

Prof. Williamson showed in detail that
these were not spore-cases, but two kinds
of spores — microspores and macrospores —
such as severally occur in the upper and
lower portions of the fruits of many living
club-mosses. Their sizes and structure de-
monstrate the truth of this conclusion, which
is further sustained by the fact that spore-
cases are not deciduous, but spores are ;
and these objects, having fallen in such vast
myriads from gigantic club-mosses, can on-
ly have been deciduous organs. The lect-
urer then gave reasons for concluding that
these spores had played a much more limited
part in the origin of coal than Huxley had
assigned to them. According to Huxley,
coal is composed of mineral charcoal and
coal proper — the latter term being equiva-
lent to spores altered or unaltered. Prof.
Williamson, on the other hand, recognized
three such elements : mineral charcoal, that
is, fragments of fossil wood retaining its
structure ; coal proper, that is, mineral char-
coal disorganized; and spores in various
states.

We now distinguish in coal three groups
of fossil plants : 1. Those of which we have
the form but not the organization: 2. Those
of which we have both form and organiza-
tion ; 3. Those of which we know the struct-
ure, but are ignorant of the outward form.
What has yet to be done is the correlation
of the first and last of these three groups,
Brogniart long ago showed that most of the
coal-plants were cryptogamic — chiefly cala-
mites (allied to living horse-tails); lepido-
dendra (represented by the club-mosses) ;
ferns, and plants supposed to represent
pines and firs of the group known as gym-
nospermous exogens.

Leathcd Ashes as a Fertilizer. — In a

report to the Connecticut State Board of
AgTiculture, Prof. S. W. Johnson gives the
results of some analyses made by himself
of specimens of leached ashes used for fertil-

izing purposes. By these analyses leached
ashes are found to contain : less than one
per cent, of potash ; a large proportion of
water (not less than 35 per cent.) ; consider-
ablesa?ic? or soil, and unhurried coal, amount-
ing to from 6 to 15 per cent., when not in-
tentionally or largely adulterated ; about 45
per cent, carbonate of lime, which is the
chief fertilizing element in leached ashes ; a
little more than 1 per cent, of phosphoric
acid, and 3 to 4 per cent, of magnesia.
They contain no nitrates, but the carbonate
of lime in them favors the development of
nitrates when they are incorporated with
the soil, especially in conjunction with ani-
mal manures.

Prof. Johnson states that the price of
this material is 35 cents per 100 lbs., or
SY.OO per ton. Its fertilizing value lies ex-
clusively in the 20 or 30 lbs. of lime, 3J of
magnesia, \^ of phosphoric acid, and 1 or
2 lbs. of potash in each 100 lbs. But these
materials may be procured in other forms,
as follows : 35 lbs. of fresh-burned oyster-
shell, or stone-lime, will furnish the lime ;
15 lbs. of any good superphosphate will sup-
ply the phosphoric acid; the magnesia and
potash together may be obtained in 40 lbs.
of German potash salts, and there will then
be 4 or 5 lbs. of potash and 6 lbs. of sul-
phuric acid extra.

If the lime be slaked with water in
which the superphosphate and potash salts
have been soaked and partially dissolved,
the resulting mass will contain not only all
the fertilizing elements of 100 lbs. of leached
ashes and more, but these elements will be
in such a state of tine division as to render
the mixture in all respects equal to the ashes
themselves.

From these data any one can readily
calculate the cost in his own locality of a
substitute for leached ashes. " It must not
be forgotten," adds Prof. Johnson, " that a
mixture made of fresh-burned lime should
be allowed to become mild by exposure to
the air, or its peculiar effects on the soil
should be anticipated and provided for."

Age of Mctaraorphic Rocks. — " The

Metamorphism of Rocks " is the title of a
paper read at the Association meeting, by
Prof. T. Sterry Hunt. The author briefly
noticed the changes produced in ro'cks by

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the action of water, air, and various gases.
While some geologists had supposed that
many of these, such as gneiss, greenstone,
serpentine, talcose, and chloritic rocks, were
igneous products, more or less modified by
subsequent chemical action, others main-
tained that they were the result of aqueous
sedimentation, and subsequently crystallized.
This was the teaching of Button ; and when
early in the present century the crystalUne
rocks of the Alps were shown to rest on
uncrystallme fossiliferous strata, it was
suggested that the overlying crystalline
strata were newer rocks which had under-
gone a metamorphism, to which those just
beneath had not been subjected. This view
spread until the great crystalline centre of
the Alps was considered to be in part of
secondary and even of tertiary age.

The author detailed the course of study
by which he was led to question this view,
and showed that there is no evidence in the
Alps to support it ; that Sedgwick and
Nicoll had discredited the palaeozoic age of
the crystalline schists regarded by ilurchi-
son as Cambrian and Silurian ; and, finally,
gave the observations by which he had
satisfied himself that the crystalline rocks
of the Green and White Mountains, and
their representatives in Quebec, New Bruns-
wick, and on the Blue Ridge, were more
ancient than the oldest Cambrian or primor-
dial fossiliferous strata.

Tests for Glycerine. — The so-called pure
glycerine of commerce, according to the
Journal of Applied Chemistry, is often con-
taminated with metallic chlorides. Traces
of ammonia are also sometimes present;
and it not unfrequently contains oxalic acid
or soda. The first-named impurity may be
detected by diluting the glycerine with twice
its volume of water and adding nitrate of
silver. If the glycerine only becomes opa-
lescent, the quantity of chlorides is not great
enough to be injurious, but, if a flaky pre-
cipitate is produced, it indicates that the
glycerine is unfit for medicinal use. To de-
tect ammonia, mix the glycerine with its own
volume of caustic potash, and bring a glass
rod previously dipped in dilute muriatic acid
over the mixture. If ammonia is present in
injurious quantity, whitish vapors of chlor-
ide of ammonium will be formed. Oxalic acid

may be detected, by adding lime-water, ace-
tate of lime, or a mixture of chloride of cal-
cium and acetate of soda. If the glycerine
becomes turbid withm five minutes after the
reagent is added, it should be rejected.
Traces of soda can only be revealed by
evaporating the glycerine to dryness, and
testing the residue.

Ameriean Origin of the Garden Rasp-
berry. — Although the garden raspberry
{Rubus Idceus) was imported from Europe,
yet Dr. Asa Gray has lately made known
some facts that would seem to make it cer-
tain that this plant, which is not indigenous
to Europe, is a native of Japan and North
America. Wild specimens from British
America and the Rocky Mountains, it seems,
must be referred by the botanist to the culti-
vated species, Rubus Idceus. Prof. Ares-
choug, who has devoted special study to the
Rubi of Europe, concludes that this species
did not originally have its home in Europe,
but that its origin is to be found in the east
of Asia, namely, Japan and the adjacent
countries, and perhaps in Xoi-th America.
He also thinks that " the Asiatic and North
American floras have reciprocally mixed
with each other by passing Behring Straits
and the islands which in its neighborhood
form a bridge between the two continents."

Sapidity of TegetaWe Growth.— A writer
in the Gardener's Chronicle gives some il-
lustrations of the prodigious activity mani-
fested in the growth of plants during a few
weeks. The process of growth, being grad-
ual and noiseless, and moreover of every-
day occurrence, is generally disregarded.
And yet, what a quantity of water must be
absorbed and exhaled, bow much air inhaled
and exhaled, how much carbon fixed during
the process ! The writer gives some meas-
urements of an ordinary plant, the Abiis
nordmanniana, a species of silver-fir, which
will give a good idea of the rapidity of
growth.

The shrub was only two feet six inches
in height, and the number of young shoots
of this year's growth on it 585. These
shoots vary in length from half an inch to
six inches, and their aggregate length is
1,1*71 inches, or nearly 98 feet. Dividing
the aggregate of the shoots (1,1'i'l inches)

NOTES.

511

by their number (585), we find the mean
length of the shoots to be about two inches.
The average number of leaves on each inch
of a number of shoots, taken at random,
was 34, so that the total number of leaves
on these 585 shoots may be set down at
39,814. Assuming each leaf to be only one
inch in length — which is considerably under
the mark, even when all the small, undevel-
oped leaves are taken into consideration —
we should have for the leaves a length of
about 3,501 feet, so that, in round numbers,
we may say that, including the shoots and
leaves, the growth in length alone of this
very moderate-sized young tree, during this
season, has amounted to the prodigious
number of 3,600 feet ; and, if the shoots
and the leaves could all be placed end to
end in a continuous line, they would extend
considerably more than half a mile.

Action of the Sand-blast.— At a recent
meeting of the British Microscopical Soci-
ety, Mr. Wenham exhibited a piece of glass
" ground " by the sand-blast process, which,
under the microscope, presented a very
different appearance from common ground
glass. It is found that the glass or other
material, worn away by the sand-blast, is
not ground away at all, but broken up by a
battering action, similar to that of leaden
bullets against a block of granite. Hence
it is that, although, by the usual grinding
process, ordinary sea-sand can make no im-
pression on corundum, a blast with a press-
ure of 300 pounds to the square inch will
perforate it in a short time. Nay, even the
diamond itself may thus be speedily worn
away.

A polished glass surface, exposed for an
instant to the sand-blast, shows an aggrega-
tion of points of impact, from which scales
of fractured glass have broken away in an
irregular radial direction. It appears as if
a pellet of glass had been driven in by the
collision of the sand, and the wedge-hke
action thus set up had driven away the sur-
rounding glass. All these spots, or inden-
tations, when tested by the polariscope,
show a colored halo round each, proving
that the glass surface is under strain and
ready to yield to further fracture. The ac-
tion, therefore, is not so much due to the
hardness of the striking particles as to the

force and velocity of impact. This is suffi-
ciently great to destroy the cohesion of the
material operated upon. The external layer
is carried against the under stratum, and
the material is crushed and disintegrated
by a portion of its own body.

NOTES.

Dk. Charles P. Russell gives a tabu-
lated statement of the mortality of the vari-
ous States of the Union, from which we
borrow the following regarding the death-
rates of various cities : The highest death-
rate in 1872 was exhibited by Memphis,
where the deaths were 46.6 in each 1,000
inhabitants. Other cities followed in this
order : Savannah, 39.2 ; Vicksburg, 36.5 ;
Troy, 34; Hoboken, 32.9; New York,
32.7; Newark, 31.6; New Orleans, 30.6;
Boston, 30.5. The rate for Philadelphia
was only 26.1; Brooklyn, 28.1; St. Louis,
20.1; Chicago, 27.6; Baltimore, 25.1; Cm-
cinnati, 20.5; San Francisco, 17.2. This
compares not unfavorably with the mortuary
statistics of British cities, where the lowest
rate was 21.4 ; that of London, Bombay,
and Calcutta, show only 29.2 and 25, re-
spectively. The highest known death-rate
prevailed in Valparaiso, Chili, 66.9.

Inoculating the vine with pure essence
of Eucalyptus glohulus is said to be an ef-
fectual remedy for the phylloxera or grape-
vine disease. The mode of applying the
remedy is this : a broad incision is made
through the bark at the neck of the vine,
in which a few drops of the essence are de-
posited by means of a small camel's-hair
brush. In about three days the phylloxera
insect entirely disappears, while the vine is
not in the least injured by the operation.

The practice of ringing and tolling bells
by swinging the clapper or tongue violently
against the side of the bell while the latter
is stationary, is said to be a very frequent
cause of fracture. The bell itself should
always be in motion when struck by the
object that is intended to set it vibrating.

Pine-leaves, says the Minivg and Scien-
tific Press, are largely utilized in Europe,
They are converted into a kind of wool or
wadding, which is used for upholstery in-
stead of hair. A kind of flannel is also
made from this fibre, which is said to be
very superior for many hygienic uses, as for
rheumatism and skin-diseases. Tests, draw-
ers, loose shirts, etc., are also made of this
material. In the process of manufacture an
ethereal oil is obtained, very useful as a sol-
vent, and as a curative agent. Gas is made
from the refuse, and used for lighting the
manufactories ; or the entire refuse may be

512

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

pressed into the form of bi'icks, when it be-
comes an excellent fuel.

The material used for capping cham-
pagne, beer, and mineral-water bottles, sup-
posed to be simply tin-foil, turns out on ex-
amination to consist almost entirely of
lead. Dr. Wittstein, after analyzing a great
many of these capsules, states that the
proportion of tin in their composition varies
from one to ten per cent., all the rest being
lead; and that the prevalent habit of clos-
ing the top of the bottle with the cap after
the cork has once been drawn is a danger-
ous one, as the acid contents of the bot-
tles even in minute quantities, in contact
with the cap at the mouth of the bottle
will rapidly dissolve the lead, and thus give
rise to a poisonous solution.

One of the most distressing, because
rarely remedial forms of chronic mania, says
the London Lancet^ is that produced by the
mental shock of tire. The patient wears a
peculiar aspect, in which suspicion is one
element, and a settled look of panic another.
Photogi-aphs of such inmates of asylums are
remarkably uniform in their representation
of this expression. The great tire at Chi-
cago has produced a large number of luna-
tics, no fewer than 250 sufferers from it
having been adjudged insane by the courts
of Illinois. Considering the privations,
however, to which the houseless victims
of that conflagration were in many cases
exposed, other causes than fire-panic may
be credited with a share of the result.

According to Van Beneden, as quoted
in the American Naturalist, an excellent
method of preparing for preservation and
study such jelly-like and perishable organ-
isms as medusae, ctenopbora, noctilucje,
etc., is to immerse them for from fifteen to
twenty-five minutes, when fresh, in a weak
solution of osmic acid, when, after washing
several times in water, they may be kept,
for weeks or months without impairment, in
alcohol. The acid colors a portion of the
tissues bron-n, but this rather facilitates
than hinders study, as it brings into view
certain structures that are otherwise less
clearly visible. The agent also hardens the
substance of the animal, so that it may be
handled without danger of disorganization,
and readily cut into sections if desired.

Fever is the most prolific cause of death
in India, and, in ordinary years, carries off
many more victims than all other diseases
together. The returns, exclusive of Bengal
and the northwest provinces and Burmah,
give upward of 900,000 deaths from fever
in 1871, and the total number in all India
cannot be far short of 1,500,000. At least
half of these lives might be saved by put-
ting quinine in every native druggist's shop
at one rupee per ounce.

The United States Light-house Board
have under charge 179 sea and lake coast
lights, 394 river and harbor lights, 22 light-
ships, and 33 fog-signals, that are operated
by steam or hot-air engines.

The Gazette des Campagnes recommends
i dipping the end of plant-slips in collodion

before setting them out. The collodion
I should contain twice as much cotton as

the ordinary material used in photography.

Let the first coat dry, and then dip again.

After planting the slip, the development of
[ the roots will take place very promptly.
! The method is said to be particularly effi-
j cacious with woody slips, geraniums, fuch-
j Bias, and similar plants.

1 Chloride of cobalt, sometimes used as
i the basis of a sympathetic ink, is, accord-
, ing to Siegen, a powerful poison. A grain

killed a frog in half an hour. Four and a
\ half grains killed a strong rabbit in three
I hours. The poison acts directly upon the
j muscles of the heart. Xitrate of cobalt is

equally poisonous, and acts in a similar

way.

I Camphor-wood promises to become, at
no distant day, an important article of com-
merce. It grows freely in tropical coun-
tries, without cultivation. The tree attains
large proportions, being sometimes found
fifteen feet and upward in diameter, and of
proportionate height. It is very valuable for
carpenter's work, being light, durable, and
not liable to injury from insects. Its aro-
matic perfume is well knofl-n. The wood
is strong and very durable, and is especial-
j ly serviceable in ship-building. Camphor-
i wood piles have been known to remain in a
; good state of preservation over a hundred
I years.

IxTLE-FiBRE, which grows abundantly on
the southern shores of the Gulf of Mexico,
is remarkable for its lustre, strength, and
flexibility. Within the thin envelope which
forms the leaf, there is a perfect skein of
thread of extraordinary tenacity, length,
and fineness. The outer covering can be
easily removed by a chemical process, and
the whole fibre made available without fur-
ther expense. The plant, it is said, can be
brought to Xew York for less than fifty
dollars per ton.

In a French industrial establishment,
employing 630 men, chiefly vegetarians,
the sick fund was constantly in debt. The
director of the establishment took measures
for the introduction of butcher's meat into
the food of the men, and the effect was
such that the average loss of time per man,
on account of illness or fatigue, was re-
duced from fifteen to three days per an-
num. Thus the animal food saved twelve
days' work a year per man.

LOUIS JEAN RUDOLPH AGASSIZ.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

MARCH, 1874.

THE WOELD BEFOEE THE HSTTKODUCTION OF LIFE.

By CHARLES H. HITCHCOCK, A. M., Ph. D.,

PROFBSaOB OF GEOLOGY IN DABTMOUTH COLLEGE.

THE few hints aiforded by geology respecting the earliest stages
of the earth's history, when compared with studies into the na-
ture of nebulje, comets, and suns, suggest the existence of a series of
mutations through which worlds destined for the occupation of intel-
ligent beings must pass, in order to be properly fitted for the residence
of mind. There is, first, existence as a nebula, or comet ; second, the
condition of a burning sun ; third, a stage of refrigeration ; fourth, a
period of habitation by the brute creation ; fifth, a time of occupancy
by reasoning, moral beings ; and, perhaps, sixth, a stage of frigidity,
impoverishment, and extinction of life. Our planet seems to have
passed through four of these stages of gi'owth, with the fifth well ad-
vanced toward its meridian.

The history of the world might be correlated with a certain species
of organic cycle, the growth of grain. There is presented to us a ker-
nel of corn containing within itself the elements of vital action. So
long as it is stored in a granary it is quiescent, but when planted in
the soil it germinates, producing first the tender blade, then the tas-
seled tops, the silky ears, and, finally, rows of mature kernels upon
the spike, inclosed by a sheathy covering. As soon as the seed is
properly situated for development, an inward impulse urges onward
the growth till the process is completed.

Alike fraught with instinct has been the serial progress of the
earth. It first presents itself to view simply as a mass of inorganic
material, a heterogeneous mixture of elements, inert and motionless,
the " chaos " of theological writers. But this material is endowed
with activity ; the atoms possess afiinities for one another, and the
mass cannot remain motionless in space, surrounded by worlds and
systems. Gravitation causes the mass to rotate upon its axis and to
VOL. IV.— 33

51 +

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

revolve about other bodies, and chemical affinity unites the atoms into
compounds. Henceforth there will be no cessation of activity till the
mature condition, it may be of eternal desolation, has been attained.

O B

A— Size of Eaeth when in the Nebulous Pebiod, compabed with its Present Diameter,

A3 SHOWN BY B.

Bernard von Cotta styles these successive phases of development
stadia, and reduces their number to seven. He conceives that during
the first stadium only one agency — gravitation — acted upon matter,
the results being a spherical aggregation of the particles and the pro-
duction of an intense degree of heat. The second stadium adds to
gi-avitation the agency of heat and other physical forces. In the
third, chemical affinities are developed, and a cooling globe is the
sphere of their action. The fourth stadium brings to view water,
with its ability to accumulate formations by deposition of detritus.
In the fifth, life and the power of organization are introduced. In
the sixth, ice first appears. Last of all comes Mind, the other activi-
ties being present also with it.

This theory is beautifully elaborated in his interesting memoir ;
but its consistency with the following statement is not readily per-
ceived : " Since the history of the development of matter is for us ab-
solutely an infinite sei-ies, it is impossible to recognize, or even to con-
ceive, a real beginning of things. We must enter arbitrarily iiilo the
infinite series of events, and follow it from that point down to the
present time." The organic cycle commencing with the kernel of
corn may repeat itself endlessly ; but we demand, eventually, whence
came the first seed ? So we can follow back the grand cosmical series
of mutations to a point antecedent to which there is nothing rational
but the presence of the Infinite Mind, the same that sustains all Nature
in its present activity. Progress implies a beginning. Following out
the argument to its legitimate extent, we are forced to the conclusion
that the Almighty actually created the material of the solar system
out of nothing. Matter could not have existed from eternity, else the

THE WORLD BEFORE LIFE.

515

phases of growth had all been completed, and we should have passed
beyond the period of organic activity. The New-Zealander would
have leaped over the ruins of London, and the " last man " of Ho-
garth would have tinished gazing upon the ruins of intellectual ac-
tivity.

SpiRAi Nebula in Canes Venatici (H

CosMicAL Anaxogies. — Space is full of bodies resembling our earth
in all stages of its growth. The earlier stages are displayed in nebulae,
comets, and suns. The former, by the improved methods of modern
investigation, are clearly shown to be in a gaseous condition, intensely
heated, though not so hot as the sun, and so tenuous that the bright-
ness of the stars behind is hardly dimmed.

There has been great progress in the study of the nebulse. Alany
had been resolved into clusters of small stars by the more powerful
instruments of recent manufacture, so that astronomers doubted the
existence of any unresolvable forms. But, in 1866, Mr. William Hug-
gins showed that nineteen out of the sixty nebulae seen through the
great reflecting telescope of the Earl of Rosse presented spectra ex-
hibiting the bright bands indicative of heated luminous gas. Hence
the world could no longer doubt the settlement of the question whether
any of the nebulae are composed of vapors. Prof. Young says that
the majority of the nearly 8,000 known nebulae are luminous clouds of
heated gas, with minute solid and liquid particles scattered through
them. In a recent number of The Popular Science Monthly, Mr.
F. W. Clarke has classified these bodies, suggesting that there may
1)6 a law of development among them. The most distinct are com-
posed of nitrogen and hydrogen, possessing a temperature beneath
that of the sun. He propounds the hypothesis whether nebula may
not pass by degrees into suns, the sixteen elements known to exist in

5i6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the latter class having been evolved by degrees from the original
simple gases of the nebulae. This is a problem well worthy the study
of chemists.

The comets differ from nebulae by possessing a bright, star-like
nucleus, apparently more solid than the surrounding coma or brush
trailing behind. The spectroscope indicates that the entire material
of comets is similar to the gaseous nebulae. Possibly their nuclei are
centres of attraction around which the heavier atoms are gradually
falling, " granulating into star-dust," in the process of transition from
nebulae to suns.

Foremost among the worlds comparable with our planet, when in
the condition of igneous fluidity, is the centre of our own solar system.
Though fourteen hundred million times larger than the earth, the
sun possesses only one-fourth the density of our world, being a trifle
heavier than water. The hourly radiation of heat from each square
foot of his surface is equal to the combustion of 130,000 pounds of
bituminous coal. This is abundantly adequate to heat and illuminate
all bodies in space within hundreds of millions of miles from his sur-
face. Suns like this are to be enumerated by the thousand in the
heavens, all of them doubtless the centres of other star-systems, im-
parting light and heat to numberless planets.

It is less easy to determine the character of Avorlds in the former
condition of ours, just incrusted after' igneous fluidity, no longer a sun,
but shining by borrowed light reflected from some greater sphere, be-
cause they are wrapped in an opaque envelope. The moon, whose
proximity enables us to inspect her hills, craters, and valleys, appears
to have been thoroughly cooled from fusion. She is solid to the core,
and has approximated to that final period of barren desolation not yet
attained by the earth. Most of the outer planets, Jupiter, Saturn,

Transition from the Spiral to the Annitlab Form.

Uranus, and Neptune, have a small specific gravity ; but we cannot
tell whether they have advanced beyond us in the cycle of progress,
or whether they are yet immature. The adjacent planets, Venus and

THE WORLD BEFORE LIFE. 517

Mars, may be more like the earth, and fitted to support animal and
vegetable life. If not inhabited by human beings, they may be pass-
ing through their preliminary Paleozoic, Mesozoic, or Ceuozoic stages.
And there are, probably, though their names are unknown to us, in
the distant regions of space, deriving light and heat from suns seem-
ing mere points to us, worlds where the early Eozoon rears its cal-
careous reefs, the gigantic Labyrinthodon croaks amid the primeval
quagmires, and the Connecticut birds are leaving upon the marine
mud the imprints of their tridactyle feet. Nor is it unlikely that
other species of men inhabit some of these scattering orbs, and are as
curious about us and our institutions as we are about them.

The Nebulous Period. — The usual geological argument for nebu-
losity is derived from the attempt to understand the origin of the con-
dition of igneous fluidity. If the earth has been cooling from fusion,
perhaps this is a cooler condition than the still earlier hotter state of
fiery gas. Solids expand into liquids when heated, and liquids may
become gases for the same reason. This gas, however, may not neces-
sarily have been hotter than when condensed. The particles of matter
must be the same when volatilized, as in both the liquid and solid states.
Every substance now existing beneath the atmosphere must have
been present — the compact ledges of the firmly-seated hills — the
stone-walls of ancient cities — the water of the ocean — the oily fluid
spouting from the bore-holes of Western Pennsylvania — the very par-
ticles of the paper containing this sentence printed upon it — and even
the elemental constituents of our bodies, so fearfully and wonderfully
made — all these and every thing material may have been commingled
with the atmosphere, hovering about in a vaporous form, the compo-
nents of a nebula, or comet.

In the attempt to surmise the actual condition of the elements at
the beginning of the nebulous period, two views may be held, accord-
ing as we prefer to adopt a chemical or mechanical theory of their
origin. If one does not care to imagine the atoms called into exist-
ence in a heated condition, he may suppose that matter first appeared
with the common frigid temperature of space, or about one hundred
degrees Fahrenheit below the freezing-point of water, and that the ele-
ments were uncombined. Newly born, these particles would imme-
diately commence to display their affinities, and the result would be
explosive combinations, giving oft' intense light and heat. The latter
force permeating the elements, would soon reduce them, first to igneous
fluidity, and then into heated vapors. Every atom flying away from
every other one, on the principle of " dissociation," would give rise to
a nebula of enormous dimensions in a comparatively short time from
these cosmic materials. After the formation of the nebula, the series
of changes about to be described would commence its rounds.

A mechanical theory is presented by the distinguished philosopher,
Dr. J. R. Mayer, author of a treatise upon " Celestial Dynamics."

518

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

He assumes that our globe was once very much smaller than it is at
present, and that independent masses of matter, perhaps other planets,
have fallen upon it, the shock of collision generating an enormous de-
gree of heat. This is an effect of the " crush of worlds " not common-
ly apprehended. If two bodies, conjointly equal to the bulk of the
earth, were rapidly traveling through space, and should violently
come together, their collision would evolve enough heat to convert the
united mass into lava, or heated vapor. An asteroid falling upon the
sun would generate from 4,600 to 9,200 times as much heat as would
come from the combustion of an equal mass of bituminous coal, the
force of velocity changing into caloric. This view, though adequate
to explain the origin of the nebula, does not account for the existence
of the colliding bodies. It might be consistent with the doctrine of
the eternity of matter, in which case the colliding planets may have
been coursing about the sun for myriads of ages as aggregations of
matter corresponding to the last term of the great cosmic cycle — in-
organic sterility. Could we understand how all the planets migiit
eventually fall into the sun, we might suppose the present series of
changes is only one of several cycles, in agreement with the specula-
tions of certain writers.

Dr. Mayer carries his theory much farther. He does not confine
these cataclysmic unions to the ante-nebulous periods. It is suggested
that there may have been similar accretions to the surface of our planet
after the introduction of life. A luxuriant vegetation, or a thickly-
peopled continent, may have been often buried beneath the fiery d'ehrls
resulting from the conflict. There are frequent occurrences of a simi-
lar character at the present day, but of trifling influence upon the gen-
eral temperature. Every solid meteor that falls from the sky develops
heat ; and it cannot be denied that, were these bodies of large size,
the calamitous occurrences depicted by Dr. Mayer would be expe-
rienced. Each one of these cataclysms would interrupt the cycle of
progress as set forth above, and carry the order of the mutations back
to the beginning.

When we study the scheme of worlds revolving around the sun,
we discover that they all rotate on their axes in the same direction ;
that they all proceed from west to east, their orbits being nearly cir-
cular, and in almost the same plane, which is nearly coincident with
that of the sun ; that the sun moves on his axis in less time than any
of the planets, and each planet rotates more quickly than its satellite.
These and other facts point out a community of origin and develop-
ment inexplicable by chance or the law of gravitation. We suppose,
then, that the sun and all the planets and their satellites composed
originally a single mass of luminous fog, with a diameter exceeding
that of the orbit of Neptune, the remotest planet, or not less tlian
three thousand million miles. This would correspond well with the
supposed dimensions of the smaller nebulae now seen in the skies. The

THE WORLD BEFORE LIFE.

519

history of the earth at this early period was, therefore, merged in that
of the solar system.

The centrifugal force produced by rotation would cause rings of
gaseous matter to separate themselves one after another from the cen-
tral mass, the latter turning on its axis more rapidly after the removal
of the exterior. The separated ring would then have been an annular
nebula. As many as six rings must have been cooled before the earth-
mass separated itself from the interior sphere carrying the substance
of the sun, and the inferior planets.

The next stage of growth would naturally consist in the breaking
up of each ring by itself, perhaps in consequence of inequalities in dif-
ferent parts, and condensation into a sphere of greater specific gravity.
The falling of the particles would add heat, and perhaps quickly in-
duce the fluidity of the mass. While still gaseous, other rings may
fly off, to become satellites. All the nebulse, by constant rotation,
may have given freedom to the contained particles to arrange them-
selves according to their relative densities, the heaviest atoms falling
to the centre, and the lightest remaining at the surface. The process
of separation into zones must have been analogous to the cooling of
liquids. As fast as their superior density caused particles to descend,
the lighter atoms would be displaced and sent to the surface, either
to be cooled, or to remain permanently in a higher stratum. But, at
the close of this period, there must have been, outside of the fluid, an
enormous thickness of gases which did not liquefy till after the crust
had formed to a considerable amount.

Period of Igneous Fluidity. — At the commencement of this
period the earth seems to have been a flattened sphere, composed of
melted matter like lava, encircled by steam and easily-volatilized
liquids and solids, but girdled externally by an atmosphere ; rotating
upon its axis and revolving round the central sun. It was a sun of
itself, emitting light and heat, thus forbidding the distinction of day
and night, though the planetary movements inducing the alternations
of position were as well marked as now. The several compounds
constituting the material of the earth were probably arranged in con-
centric zones according to their relative gravities, just as we now ob-
serve the settlings in a copper or iron furnace. A general mixture of
rich and poor ores, fluxes and fuel, is put into the receiving-vault ;
when ignited, the solids mix together, melt into a fluid, the heavier
metals sinking to the bottom, and the slags rising to the surface to be
skimmed off. So the metals would naturally gravitate to the centre
of the fluid earth, and around them might be several zones of succes-
sively lighter compounds, the exterior being the least heavy of all, and
answering to the slags of the furnace. The specific gravity of the
whole earth is now 5.65, when compared with water, as determined
from astronomical sources ; but that of the surface-rocks is less than
half this amount : hence we have abundant reason to believe that the

520

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

same general relation of light and heavy zones still exists, and that
the deeper we descend the more abundant the proportion of the denser
metals. The germ of this arrangement was undoubtedly induced in
the nebulous age. The compression of the surface-elements into a
quarter or half their known bulk cannot explain the great weight of
the interior, for experiments indicate that a limit to the capacity of
reduction of volume is soon reached. So far as we know, the reduc-
tion of bulk by pressure becomes less and less in proportion to the
pressure exerted.

Fig. 4.

Annular Nebula in Lyba.

Some interesting observations have recently been made by Prof.
Daubr6e, of Paris, upon the analogy between certain terrestrial rocks
and the heavy meteoric stones which occasionally fall from the sky.
Some of the meteorites are nearly pure iron ; others either contain
grains of minerals like olivine, or consist chiefly of the olivine, with
only occasional particles of iron. This latter class are silicates of mag-
nesia and the protoxide of iron, allied to the minerals olivine or peri-
dote, and a granular compound of anorthite and pyroxene. Patrin, so
long ago as 1809, called the attention of observers to the identity be-
tween the composition of certain meteors and substances ejected from
volcanoes; and, in 1858, Von Reichenbach sketched theoretically
some of the conclusions just arrived at experimentally by Daubiee.
Reichenbach showed that most of the mineral species found in meteors
existed also in the trap called dolerite ; hence he inferred that masses
of material allied to the stony meteors are located deep down under
the volcanoes whence the lava was derived. Daubree has manufact-
ured in the furnace masses apparently identical, both with the metal-
lic and stony meteors. The latter were most successfully imitated by
melting down the mineral compounds peridote, Cherzolite, hypersthene,
basalt, and melaphyre. Allied to them is the dumite of New Zealand,
an aggregate of olivine and chromite.

THE WORLD BEFORE LIFE.

521

The Clierzolite, a volcanic aggregate of peridote, eustalite, and py-
roxene, from the Pyrenees, in Spain, presented, after fusion, specimens
the most like the meteorites. These experiments suggest that the
meteors had once been fused, as is commonly believed, and that the
slight diiferences existing between them and the peridotic rocks may
be explained by supposing the latter to have cooled in the presence of
oxygen (or air), while the former may have solidified where the supply
of oxygen was limited. When melted, the two mixtures are precisely
alike, and we may conceive of the existence beneath us, in the great
caldron whence the volcanoes derive their lava, of a zone of meteor-like
mixtures, both the peridotes which are now melted and occasionally
brought to the siirface, and the heavier metallic masses, too deeply
seated to be ejected by any convulsive throb of our planet. For aught
we can say, the heavier meteors may indicate the exact character of
the interior nucleus, just as those black stones falling from the sky
have revealed the composition of other worlds. Their weight would
correspond well with that of the interior mass. The specific gravity of
granite is from 2.64 to 2.76 ; of basalt, 2.9 to 3.1 ; the peridotes, 3.3 to
3.44 ; and the heavy meteors from 7 to 8. Hence, while the granitic

Fia. 5.

Zones in the Earth and Atmosphere.

A. Solid Nucleus of Heavy Metals or Meteors; B. Region of Stony Meteors: C. Region of Lava;

D. Region of Basalt and Pophyry; E. Region of Granite, and Surface of the Solid Crust;

F. Region of Acid Gases; G. Region of Carbonic Acid; H. Region of Nitrogen and Oxygen;

I. Steam. = j= >

materials may have cooled near the surface, and the basalts lower
down, the stony meteors would form a zone beneath the second, and
the metallic masses, if present, may constitute the central nucleus.
We must not forget the trachytes, and most modern lavas, which
would underlie the basalts. It would be easy to calcixlate the thick-
ness required for these different zones, whose general average should
be the density of the earth. When water is added to the peridotes
and stone-meteorites, tlie rock is analogous to serpentine. Wo may

522 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

remark that the crust abounds most in the oxides of those metals
which have the strongest affinity for oxygen, as the alkalies and alka-
line earths ; while in the peridotic and lower zones the proportion of
these elements is much less, and that of the earths and metals is much
greater. The minerals composing the superficial crystalline rocks, as
well as water, are generally absent from the meteorites. This is espe-
cially noticed in respect to the mineral quartz or silica, so common at
the surface. According to these views, the granites must once have
been in a melted condition, and the excess of silica present in them
have assumed the amorphous form. Many geologists have supposed
the silica ought to have crystallized first, if the rock cooled from fu-
sion. It may be that our ideas of the intense heat have been ex-
aggerated ; yet the Labrador granites of Xew Hampshire have recently
been shown by us to be situated in sheets over a plain, precisely like
the erupted lava of the present day.

We have dwelt upon the present concentric structure of the earth,
because it was probably the same with that existing in the igneous
period, at that time fused, but now largely solid. The order of the
alternations has always been the same. It corresponds also with that
observed in furnaces, where the metal sinks to the bottom, and is over-
laid by one or more successive layers of slag.

This complex sphere, when molten, with its fiery billows and igne-
ous currents, being situated in a fearfully cold region, could not fail to
radiate heat ; and, like other melted bodies, become covered with a
congealed crust. A pot of melted iron taken out of the fire loses heat,
and a crust speedily forms over it, shrinking as it cools ; and, if the
exterior be broken, the red liquid may be poured out. The same thing
may be seen on the dumping-heaps connected with melting-works.
Masses of slag, with their entire surface congealed, are placed upon
the car and wheeled to the end of the pile ; but, when thrown down
the slope, they are fractured, and the liquid interior flows out like
water. When a stream of lava flows down a slope, the surface and
sides of the molten river are soon covered by a thick crust, the result
of cooling. This will become so firm that men may walk upon it, as
upon ice over lakes in the winter. During one of the eruptions from
Vesuvius, when lava covered the town of Resina — the old Hercula-
neum — some of the inhabitants, driven to the tops of the houses,
escaped by walking over the stifiened crust, before the flow had ceased.
Whenever the lateral walls of the stream are broken, the lava will flow
out and change its course. In this way, a current threatening to en-
gulf a village may be averted and directed elsewhere. This is a prac-
tical mattei*, and has been turned to account in Sicily, in warding ofl"
from Catania the threatened calamity rolling down the slopes of Etna.

Our entire experience, therefore, of analogous phenomena, leads us
to believe that a crust will be formed, and that the several zones will
cool in natural order in later periods. Not till the last melted layer

THE WORLD BEFORE LIFE. 523

between the crust and solid nucleus has solidified, will eruptions of
lava cease to flow from volcanoes.

As time progressed this congealed crust would increase in thick-
ness. Being unyielding, there would be stamped upon it, as plainly
as the form of a pitcher by the moulder, the peculiar flattening of the
earth, as determined by the rate of rotation. As soon as the internal
fires were concealed, the rotation of the earth would give rise to the
alternation of day and night — not, certainly, of the same length as
now, since the bulk of the sphere was greater, and with a reduction
of size the tendency is to an increase in the rate of rotation. But,
with the thick atmosphere, the days must have been dark and gloomy.

At the present day the attraction of the sun and moon produces
the phenomena of the tides. As the crust is rigid, only the water
upon it can now be moulded into difl*erent shapes. But, when the
whole earth was pliable, its form must have varied daily, much more
symmetrically than at present. As the outer envelope stifiened by
cooling, tidal waves Avould form with great difficulty, and eventually
the crust would become too rigid to be affected. Pei'fect rigidity was
not attained during the whole inorganic period. While thin, the crust
may have been broken by the attraction, and the liquid oozed out
through the crevices, overflowing the surface, and returning at low tide.
So great is the power of tidal attraction that a rigid envelope, hundreds
of miles in thickness, would be fractured by it. The rents formed were
like the faults observed in the strata of the organic periods. More
or less fracture probably attended every tidal attraction, until the
ocean covered the surface, and presented a material easily modulated.

Age of Chemical Changes. — Following the age of igneous fluidity
there succeeded another of great interest. It opens with the surface dry,
rough, and slaggy ; the interior in intense fusion, and the atmosphere
containing all the water of the ocean with numerous volatile com-
pounds. Before its close an ocean is formed, most of the gases have
left the atmosphere, and chemical agencies acted with great intensity,
and so universally as to characterize the period. The falling of the
primeval rain dissolved acids in the air, and poured upon the elements
never exposed to moisture streams of acidulous waters, well fitted to
dissolve out large portions of the original crust.

In order to ascertain the character of this primitive rock, we must
adopt the method suggested by Sterry Hunt, in his lecture before the
Royal Institution of Great Britain, and consider what changes would
result if intense heat should now act upon the crust. The water
everywhere would be evaporated, leaving behind its saline impurities.
All the carbon in living plants, and the immense supplies of coal
stored up in the earth, would become converted into carbonic acid ;
the siliceoiis parts, fused with limestones and other rocks, would make
silicates of lime, magnesia, etc., and expel the carbonic acid. The
sulphur would form sulphurous acid with oxygen, changing eventually

524 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

into sulphuric acid as the temperature moderated. Inasmuch as sea-
salt, water and silica, when heated together in a confined space, form
hydrochloric acid and sodium silicate, it is probable that in these early
times the saline residues were decomposed, and the chlorine set free to
combine with the hydrogen, and thus manufacture hydrochloric acid
on a large scale. The solid bases, therefore — lime, magnesia, soda,
potash, and the metals — would be combined into a great slag, and va-
rious minerals would crystallize out from it while cooling. By loss
of heat the slag would contract ii-regularly, and there would be ine-
qualities upon the surface, hills and valleys without system or order.

Some authors think the salt would be volatilized, and form a zone
at the base of the atmosphere. The papers of Hunt, Forbes, Wurtz,
Winchell, and others, show that authors cannot yet agree upon the
details of those wonderful changes. The sources of our information
are meagre, and the opportunity for diverse views is easy, where such
immense periods of time are concerned, so that this discordance is not
strange. We cannot regard Dr. Hunt's illustration as perfect, since
the earth may never have been a fused mass of equal density through-
out, the concentric zones having been essentially segregated in the
nebulous period.

The atmosphere may possibly have been arranged in zones. Con-
taining the present gases encircling the crust, the carbonic acid de-
rived from coal and the carbonates, the sulphurous and hydrochloric
acids, water converted into steam, and possibly volatilizable com-
pounds, it would constitute an atmosphere of extraordinary density
and insalubrity, perhaps six or seven times heavier than at present.
We may suppose that the law of diiFusion of gases is subordinate to
that of gravitation ; whence there would result four zones, viz., sul-
phuric and hydrochloric acids at the base, surmounted first by carbonic
acid, and then by a mixture of nitrogen and oxygen ; and, lastly, by
steam. This dense gaseous covering would prevent much of the ra-
diation of heat from the earth, and produce a universal tropical climate.

As the steam lies nearest the cooling influences of space, it would
be the first to be affected by radiation. Drops of water would aggre-
gate and descend, which would be vaporized again explosively, when
brought in contact with hot surfaces. The cooling influence increasing
its power, the number of falling drops increases, but they continuously
return to the outer envelope, till the crust is sufficiently thick and cool
to retain them. Thus, at the beginning of this age, there was a terri-
ble conflict between the clouds and the earth, the former pouring down
streams of water, which the latter refuse to receive ; but the clouds
eventually gain the mastery, and the earth sullenly evolves simmering
masses of vapor from a hot-water bath.

Imagine, now, the earth capable of holding the falling drops. The
water will descend in torrents, for there is to be a transference of the
entire ocean from the upper atmospheric zone to the solid earth, where it

THE WORLD BEFORE LIFE.

525

properly belongs ; the waters above are to be separated by the " firma-
ment " from the seas beneath. Next, we may observe chemical reac-
tions. The condensed steam, in falling through the lower zones, would
dissolve the sulphuric and hydrochloric gases, and convert the rain into
powerful acids. When these fall upon the slaggy crust, the excrescences
will not only be removed, to be deposited as sediment in the hollows,
but a large percentage of the surface will enter into solution, giving
rise, not to an acid ocean, but one containing sulphates and chlorides.
The more soluble silicates would be converted into chlorides, leaving
upon the slaggy floor piles of silica. The sulphates may have been
largely of the heavier metals, not excluding the others.

Primeval Rain.

Prof. Wurtz thinks the first ocean would be characterized by the
predominance of sulphates. Granting this, we can understand the
conversion of the sulphates into sulphurets in subsequent periods, as
well as into gypsum. Aqueous deposits of sulphurets of copper, iron,
lead, antimony, etc., are common in Eozoic and Paleozoic strata. The
action of carbonic acid must not be overlooked. The liquid acids may
have disintegrated the silicates of the alkalies and alkaline eartlis;
but the compounds of silica, with alumina and iron, are not so easily
decomposed. As soon as the carbonic acid could act upon feldspar com-
pounds, we should have the potash and soda dissolved out as carbon-

526 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ates, leaving behind heaps of kaolin clays, such as now form, for the
same reason, from the decomposition of granite. This reaction is one
peculiar to di*y land, and would therefore be subsequent in time to the
changes already mentioned. Now, the potassium and sodium carbon-
ates, when brought into contact with calcium chlorides, change their
composition, and there result calcium carbonates and sodium and po-
tassium chlorides. These carbonates, being insoluble, will be precipi-
tated to the bottom, and thus will be formed the primitive travertines
and limestones, while the sodium chlorides remain in solution to this
day, save what has been converted into beds of rock-salt.

With the removal of the bulk of the acids and possible volatile
compounds from the atmosphere, only carbonic acid would remain to
render it impure at the close of the era of chemical changes. In later
periods this part of the atmosphere has also been removed. The world
is not yet ready for life, as there must be further chemical and me-
chanical changes.

The Formation op Sediments. — The next era brings into play a
phase of action destined to be the chief agent of change in the world —
the erosion of existing ledges to form new rocks. The era opens with
a continuation of the atmospheric decompositions, whereby we find
silica and alumina remaining in irregular heaps of sand and clay, and
the accumulation of calcareous deposits beneath the ocean.

The formation of thick deposits of inorganic limestone is extremely
interesting. Scientists have been wont to ignore altogether the exist-
ence of any deposit of this character, since microscopic researches into
the structure of many of the calcareous masses exposed at the surface
indicate an organic origin. So many shells and coral fragments aid in
building up fossiliferous limestone that its mode of growth is very clear.
But, after one has spent months in searching vainly for traces of organ-
isms among the marble layers of Western Vermont, or the auroral lime-
stones of Eastern Pennsylvania, he is tempted to suspect that some of
the Silurian limestones even were chemical deposits, though wanting
the concentric structure of stalagmite and travertine. But, barring
these, and the calcareous dikes in the Laurentian of Northern New
York, and in the Silurian beds of Northern Vermont, all the phenom-
ena are best explained by the presence of an inorganic limestone be-
fore the origin of life. Whence came the materials for the stony
habitations of marine animals ? There must have existed great masses
of the crude material, stored up in the rocks and in the waters of the
sea, to provide with coverings all the testacea of eveiy age, and to
furnish the thousands of feet thickness of the Eozoic, Paleozoic, and
Mesozoic limestones. This primitive source of supply is now con-
cealed, but much of its material has been used over and over again.

We have suggested how three of the principal rock-materials have
been formed — the quartz, clay, and limestone. We have them yet as
rude piles of rubbish, neither arranged in layers nor possessing any

THE WORLD BEFORE LIFE. 527

determinate form. Next comes the history of the processes by which
system is induced. There were hollows and valleys in tliose early
times, most probably vast and deep, but not irregular. The constant
fall of rain must originate brooks and streams, coursing their down-
ward way toward the lowest levels. Animated with this descending
impulse, they remove barriers at the outlets of lakes and pools, exca-
vate gorges through ridges of impediment, and wear off numerous frag-
ments from every projecting point. This eroded material would be
urged forward by the current till the lowest possible level was reached,
probably the bottom of an arm of the sea or bay, and remain there
while the basin was filling up. Thus we should have a formatlo^i^
composed of layers of the sand, clay, and limestone, originally a chem-
ical precipitate, but now altered into sedimentary deposits. When
the first accessible hollows had been filled up, a great interval of
time had elapsed, and the external envelope of the earth would
shrink, on account of its refrigeration, and fall upon the collapsed nu-
cleus. Hence new valleys would be formed, and the streams would
carry the detritus into them, and another set of strata lying upon the
edges of the first formation would be deposited. This process has
been going on uninterruptedly from that day to the present, and the
face of the earth has been changed a hundred times. How long this
process went on before the introduction of life it is impossible to say,
for the oldest strata known to exist contain the remains of the Eozoic
reef-building colonies, in the formations known as the Laurentian.

As some of the older Laurentian beds are composed of pebbles, it
is obvious that earlier formations exist, from which the sedimentary
material has been derived. Possibly we may be able ultimately to
separate from the various systems of the age under consideration those
characterized by the presence of the first existing plants — since in the
order of Nature there must have been plants before animals. If we
follow the analogy of the duration of the earlier periods, we may be-
lieve that this Eophytic age exceeded the Eozoic in length ; and, fur-
thermore, that the time before the introduction of life was far greater
than what has lapsed subsequently. If the law admits of universal
application, that the simpler the organism the longer it has lived, then
we may perhaps claim that the earlier the period the greater has been
its duration. The extent of work performed in these early ages has
certainly far exceeded any thing yet known of the operations in the
Zoic periods.

The series of changes prior to the introduction of life may therefore
be registered as distinct ages, as well marked by special features and
a natural order of succession as the periods defined by Paleontology.
The minute details of the history are wanting, but, with such sub-
stantial bases of probability as have been set forth, human thought
will construct theoretical systems that will command universal ac-
ceptance.

528 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

As now understood, the following titles may express the character-
istic features of all the great ages of the world, from the birth of mat-
ter to the advent of man :

Matter coj^verted into Vapors.

Nebula composed of the entire Solar System.

The Earth-Nebula.

Period of Igneous Fluidity.

Age of Chemical Changes.

Beginning op the Sedimentary Period.

Introduction of Vegetation ; or, Eophytic Period.

Introduction of Animal Life; or, Eozoic Period.

Pai.eozoic Era.

Mesozoic Era.

Cenozoic Era, completed by the advent of Man.

WALKING, SWIMMING, AND FLYING.

By E. lewis, Jb.

THROUGHOUT the realms of Nature motion is indispensable to
physical stability and organic existence. It is everywhere
present, and equally among molecules and masses the mind searches
in vain for evidence of absolute rest. It has been declared that " or-
ganic life is a result of motion ; " certain it is that motion is a con-
dition of life. It appears in the endless manifestations of beauty and
utility, in the world of living creatures of which ourselves are a part.
The heavens are more beautiful when clouds are drifting, and the motions
of animals give a charm to a landscape which disappears in the soli-
tude of a desert. Stillness to the eye, like silence to the ear, becomes
at last painfully oppressive. We scarcely realize, perhaps we seldom
consider, how much of the joy and value of existence depends upon
the movement of beings, and the marvelous perfection of the means
by which it is effected. Walking, swimming, and flying, are the
means by which we traverse the three great highways of Nature —
the land, the water, and the air. K we change our position, it is in
one or other of these. There is no more fascinating chapter of science
than this. The mere fact of animal locomotion is felt to be an ex-
pression of beneficence, and of adaptation of means to ends which
surpasses human ingenuity.

What laws of motion are revealed, what principles of mechanics
are brought into action, when animals walk, swim, or fly, has been
discussed by many writers, but by none in a more able or interesting
manner than by Dr. Pettigrew, who, in a volume soon to appear in

WALKING, SWIMMING, AND FLYING.

529

the International Series, has given the results of a long course of
observations and study upon the subject,'

The three modes of progression, apparently so unlike, are never-
theless essentially the same. The limbs of the quadruped, the wings
of the bird, and the fins of the fish, are built upon the same general
plan of structure, and are applied fundamentally to the same uses.
They are traveling surfaces, and their wide range of modification is in
direct relation to the media in which they are used. The one treads
the solid ground, another the water, and another the yielding and
elastic air. " But walking merges into swimming, aud swimming into
flying, by insensible gradations ; and these modifications result from
the fact that the earth affords a greater amount of support than the
water, and the water than the air."

Most terrestrial quadrupeds can swim as well as walk, and some
can fly. Many marine animals both walk and swim, and birds and
insects walk, fly, and swim, indiscriminately. It is not surprising,
therefore, that, between the typical foot, wing, and fin, innumerable
modifications in structure and form occur ; indeed, so graduated are
they that it may be difficult to determine where one form ends and
another begins.

In Fig. 1 wc have several illustrations of the traveling surfaces of

A— Extreme form of compressed foot, as seen in the deer, ox, etc., adapted specially for land
transit.

B— Extreme form of expanded foot, as seen in the ornithorhynchus, etc., adapted more particu-
larly for swimming.

C— Intermediate form of foot, as seen in the otter.

D — Foot of frog. Here the foot is equally serviceable in and out of the water.

E— Foot of the seal, which opens and closes in the act of natation.

animals. The small feet of the quadruped, the webbed feet of the
ornithorhynchus, the otter, the walrus, and the triton, indicate with
certainty the media to which they are adapted, and perhaps in nothing
is modification of structure and form to habits more apparent than in
the locomotive appendages of animals. The webbed structure between
the toes of animals which live partially on the land, and of some ter-
restrial animals, as the water-dog, is wonderftilly significant.

The wing of the penguin. Fig. 2, is scarcely more than a flipper,
and the same is true of the auk.

Sir John Lubbock describes a species of insect whose wings are

' "Animal Locomotion ; or, Walking, Swimming, and Flying." By J. Bell Pettigrew,
F. R. S. International Scientific Series. New York : D, Appleton & Co.
VOL. IV. — 34

53°

THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

used as fins only. '' Every variety of motion peculiar to land, air, and
water-navigating animals, as such, is imitated by others which take to
the elements in question, secondarily or at intervals." It is probably
true, however, that no animal which lives indiscriminately in two me-
dia attains the highest development for traveling in or upon either.
In such cases the maximum speed is not attained. Those animals,
says the author, which swim the best, walk, as a rule, with difiiculty,
and vice versa, as the movements of the auk and the seal, in and out
of water, amply testify. It is evident that all the supposed gaps be-
tween typical forms for locomotion are bridged by forms intermediate,
and the author's position is fully sustained, that walking, swimming,
and flying, are essentially the same.

The Little Penguin, adapted exclusively for smmming and diving. In this quaint bird the
wing forms a perfect screw, aad is employed as such in swimming and diving.

Before entering upon the question of the movement and functions
of specialized organs for locomotion, attention is invited to the inter-
esting statement that, however wonderful and beautiful, in its way,
the bony skeleton maybe, it is after all only an adjunct to locomotion,
and of motion in general — that all the really essential movements of
an animal occur in the soft parts. " The osseous system is therefore to
be regarded as secondary in importance to the muscular, of which it
may be considered a diiFerentiation. Instead of regarding the muscles
as adapted to the bones, the bones ought to be regarded as adapted
to the muscles. Bones have no power either of originating or perpet-
uating motion. This begins and terminates in the muscles."

The bones are the passive organs of locomotion, in the movement
of which muscular force is expended. In land animals, as a rule, the
bones are harder and more elastic than in aquatic species. The carti-
laginous and spongy bones of many fislies would be ill suited to bear
the strains and shocks of terrestrial progression.

The velocity with which a limb may be moved will depend upon
tho acuteness of the angles of its several bones. Hence the fleetness
of many animals, in which the angles formed by the bones are acute.
This is well shown in the skeleton of a deer, of which Fig. 3 is an ex-

WALKING, SWIMMING, AND FLYING.

531

cellent illustration. Here we have not only the sharp angles, but lever-
like adjustment of the several bones.

From these arises the power possessed by many animals to bound
or leap enormous distances. The kangaroo has been known to leap
twenty feet. The jerboa, when pursued, will pass over nine feet at a
bound, and repeats so rapidly that a swift horse can scarcely overtake
it. The greyhound and the hare will pass over sixteen feet at a stride.
Animals of great weight and moderate speed have nearly straight
limbs. Those of the deer are more angular than those of a horse, and
those in the wing of a bird more angular than those of the fleetest
quadruped.

Skeleton op the Deer (after Pander and crAlton). The bones in the extremities of this, the
fleetest of quadrupeds, are inclined very obliquely toward each other, and toward the scapular
and iliac bones. This arrangement increases the leverage of the muscular system, and confers
great rapidity on the moving parts. It augments elasticity, diminishes shock, and indirectly
begets continuity of movement.

The forms of joints which predominate in the animal kingdom are
the hinge and the ball and socket. The latter gives to the extremities
their extraordinary range of motion, and a power of rotation so indis-
pensable, as we will see, to the eifectiveness of all the organs of loco-
motion.

It has been shown that a spiral configuration occurs in the bones
and joints of the wing of the bat and the bird, and in the extremities
of most quadi-upeds. " The bones of animals are, as a rule, twisted
levers, and act after the manner of screws." Thus it is that their
traveling surfaces in progression may be turned at almost any angle,
getting from the resisting media in which they move as much pro-
pelling power as possible, with a minimum of slip or waste.

It is because the traveling surfaces of animals " are screws struct-

532

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

urally and functionally " that they can seize and let go the fulcra on
whicli they act ; particularly is this the case in the water and in the
air, the form and movement being such that the greatest results are
secured with the least expenditure of force. The muscles cover the
bones, in layers or strata, and run longitudinally with them, and with
each other, but also at every degree of obliquity. The spiral struct-
ure and movement of bones of animals have been carefully analyzed
by Dr. Pettigrew, and some of his conclusions are illustrated in Fig. 4.

WiNQ OF Bird.— Shows how the bones of the arm (a), forearm (6\ and hand (c), are twisted,
and form a conical screw.

Akterioe Extremity op Elephant.— Shows how the bones of the arm iq), forearm {q'x), and
(o), are twisted to form an osseous screw. Cast or mould of the interior of the left ventricle of
the heart of a deer. Shows that the left ventricular cavity is conical and spiral in its nature.

The voluntary muscles of the wing, he finds, are upon the same
pattern as are those of the involuntary muscles of the heart. He
compared the bones removed from the forelimb of a quadruped or
bird, with a cast obtained from the cavity of a hollow muscle, the
left ventricle of the lieart of a mammal, and found that the bones
and the cast are twisted upon themselves, and form elegant screws,
the threads of which run in the same direction.

Diagram, showing the figure-of-8 or double waved track produced by the alternating of the extrem-
ities in man in walking and running.

The movement of the limbs of a quadruped is in curves, which,
continued, form a figure-of-8, or a series of them ; a fact in progression
first pointed out by Dr. Pettigrew. Quadrupeds, says the author,
walk ; fishes swim ; insects, bats, and birds, fly by figure-of-8 move-

WALKING, SWIMMING, AND FLYING.

533

ments ; and, in human locomotion, the same phenomenon is observed.
The diagram, Fig. 5, shows the curved track made by man walking.
The accuracy of this is easily verified by observation. As the limbs
swing forward, they move in the arc of an ellipse ; that is, in a slight
curve outward, and with the arms form the double curves, as shown
in the figure. In the movement of the horse, walking or trotting, the
same phenomenon appears, as the figure shows.

Horse in the Act of trotting.— In this, as in all the other paces, the body of the horse is
levered forward by a diagonal twisting of the trunk and extremities, the extremities describing
a figure-of-8 track {s, w, r, t).

The wings of birds, bats, and insects, describe similar curves. They
are produced by the rotation of the wing, as it rises and falls, so that
it twusts, screw-like, on its long axis, one-half of the figure being formed
in the ascent, the other in the descent of the wing.

Imitation op Wing Movestent by a Rebd with Flexible Sail moving on a Ball-and-
SocKET Joint, showing the Double Curves.

The double curves or figure-of-8 lines which thus occur are not
mere coincidences, nor in any sense accidental, but the expression of a

534- THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

law of movement of vertebrated animals, and, from a most extended
series of observations, Dr. Pettigrew concludes :

" That quadrupeds walk, and fishes swim, and insects, bats, and
birds fly, by figure-of-8 movements.

" That the flipper of the sea-bear, the swimming wing of the pen-
guin, and the wing of the insect, bat, and bird, are screws structurally^
and resemble the blade of an ordinary screw-propeller.

" That those organs are screws functionally, from their twisting
and untwisting, and from their rotating in the direction of their length,
when they are made to oscillate.

"That they have a reciprocating action, and reverse their planes
more or less completely at every stroke.

" That the wing describes a Jigure-of-S track in space when the fly-
ing animal is artificially fixed.

" That the wing, when the flying animal is progressing at a high
rate of speed in an horizontal direction, describes a looped and then a
wave track, from the fact that the figure-of-8 is gradually opened out
and unraveled as the ayiimal adva?ices.''^

He constructed artificial fish-tails, fins, flippers, and wings — flexible
and elastic — slightly twisted upon themselves, and applied them re-
spectively to the water and air by a sculling or figure-of-8 motion.
The curved surfaces and movements peculiar to the living organs
were reproduced. The purely mechanical movement shown in this
application of traveling structures to their environment scarcely ad-
mits of doubt.

Man is enabled to travel in two of the three great highways of
Nature. He can progress upon the land, swim in the water, but fly
he cannot ; nor has he yet invented a means by which flying is possi-
ble. By his applications of natural laws he has " outraced the quad-
ruped on the laud and the fish in the sea," and the conclusion from the
analogy and nature of things is, that the " tramways of the air will yet
be traversed by man's ingenuity."

A balloon floats, it does not fly. It floats because it is lighter than the
air ; a bird is enabled to fly because it is heavier than the air, and weight
is an important element in all, but especially in aerial and land loco-
motion. It is that by which the extremities of animals seize and hold
their position in the media in which they move. If a man were no
heavier than the air, the movement of his limbs would avail him noth-
ing. The earth is his fulcrum, as the air is that of the bird, and water
that of the fish. Progression, therefore, implies gravity and the power
of resistance, which gravity afibrds. A body which floats is carried
along with the media in which it is ; having lost its weight, it has lost
its power of self-control. A man who cannot swim is at the mercy of
tlje slightest current or wave, if in depth at which the lifting power of
the water makes his foothold insecure.

A man standing still commences to progress by throwing his body

WALKING, SWIMMING, AND FLYING. 535

slightly forwai'd. Some momentum is thus obtained, the limb be-
ing simultaneously advanced. " The throwing forwai'd of the body
may be said to inaugurate the movement of walking." The same
occurs with a horse, but, if attached to a load, great impetus is attained
by the body before either of the limbs is lifted. Momentum thus
relieves muscular strain in the limbs and economizes force. How com-
pletely this princij^le is applied in swimming and flying will be pres-
ently noticed.

In ordinary walking of man or quadruped, the limbs swing forward
without muscular effort. According to Prof. Weber, they swing by
the force of gravity as a pendulum, and obey the same laws. If sus-
pended they oscillate freely, and gravity brings them to a position of
rest. How much the muscles are saved from exhaustion in ordinary lo-
comotion, by gravity, becomes obvious when we attempt to overcome it
by climbing or leaping. The foot being uj^on the ground, the limb
rotates upon it as an axis, carrying the body forward and slightly ele-
vating it, but the elevation is in the arc of a circle, and when the
other foot reaches the ground the body is slightly lowered. Thus in
progression the trunk continually rises and falls ; it really undulates
along a given line.

But other motions than those referred to are developed in the act
of walking. The movements of the arms and feet are complementary ;
the right foot and left arm advance together, and vice versa. This
begets a diagonal movement which produces oscillation or twisting of
the trunk, which is excessive in awkward walkers. To repress this
oscillatory swing is indispensable, if great velocity is to be attained.
Trained runners flex their ai-ms and hold them steadily at their great-
est speed, and every school-boy does the same instinctively, without
considering why the act is important. The swiftest-running birds
have small wings; those of tlie ostrich are scarcely more than nuli-
mental.

Swimming of the Fish— (After Borelli.;

The diagonal twist or movement referred to is expressed in a
spiral wave of motion which traverses the trunk in the direction of its
length. This motion is obvious in fishes in the act of swimming. It
is a i-esultant of motions, which ai-e in all vertebrates essentially the
same. In the walking of a cat or panther, this wave of curvature is
continuous along the sjiine. It is really a lateral undulation. We will

536 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

follow this curved motion in the swimming of aquatic animals. The il-
lustration of Borelli (Fig. 8), shows only a single curve of the body.

Prof. Owen, commenting on this figure, says the tail of the ani-
mal moving from a to i causes the centre of gravity to move forward,
and turns the head of the fish in the direction c to h. This implies
but a single curve of the body, whereas there are two, the one com-
plementary of the other, as is shown to be the case by Dr. Petti-
grew. He says : " Observation and experiment have convinced me
that when a fish swims it never throws its body into a single curve,
as represented in Boi-elli's figure, but always in a double or figure-of-8
curve, as shown in Fig. 9.

SwrstMixG OF THE Stcbgeon.

In swimming, the body of the fish describes a waved track along
a medial line. The two curves of the body act as fulcra for each
other, as occurs in the movement of a snake, by its usual lateral un-
dulations when swimming. In fishes and swimming reptiles of great
length, there may occur more than two curves, as four, but never
three, each curve having its complementary one. "The fish lashes its
tail from side to side, and a figure-of-8 track is formed by the move-
ment," both strokes propelling, but with unequal power during the
course of the stroke. There is a feature in this movement which is
equally obvious in the movement of the wings of birds in the air, that
is, a current is formed, as the tail is carried to one side, against which
the return-stroke is given ; thus, as the author observes, " the tail may
be said to work without slip, and to produce the precise kind of cur-
rents which afford it the greatest leverage."

And this is true, whether the swing of the tail in swimming is
sideways, as with the salmon, or vertically, as occurs with the whale
or the porpoise. The fins act as balancers of the body, but the equi-
poise is impaired if they are injured ; and the removal of the tail, as
Owen observes, destroys the power of locomotion.

The specific gravity of aquatic animals is nearly that of the water
they inhabit, or is made so in many cases by the gaseous contents of
their air-bladders. Nevertheless, momentum is an important element
in swimming. It originates in the movement of the fins and tail, and
not from throwing the body forward, as occurs in the initial move-
ment of walking. The momentum and velocity attained by some

WALKING, SWIMMING, AND FLYING. 537

fishes are astonishingly great. A blow from the head of a sperm-whale
may endanger a strong ship, and the sword of a sword-fish has been
driven through the oak-planks of a vessel more than twelve inches in
thickness.

-Here the tail is priiieip;illy engaged in Bwimming, the anterior extremities being
rudimentary, and resembling the pectoral fine of fiehes.

When the flying-fish rises in the air, it is by the momentum it at-
tains in the water by the lashing of its fins and tail. Fairly in the
air, its wings give it support, and, in the opinion of Dr. Pettigrew,
act as true pinions within certain limits, but are too small to sustain
the creature indefinitely.

The transition from swimming to progression m the air is natural
and easy. The method by which the flying-fish rises from the water
is similar to that of the albatross, that prince of flying-birds, and, in-
deed, to perhaps all other birds, when in the act of taking flight upon
the water. Momentum is obtained by rushing forward with both feet
and wings. The albatross frequently goes in this way many rods be-
fore it is fairly launched upon the air. Then, with powerful strokes,
it rises above the waves. Its expenditure of force is chiefly in rising,
when, without further effort, except to screw and unscrew its pinions
upon the wind, it floats facing the gale. For more than an hour it
will sail with wings apparently motionless, and it seems most at rest
when the winds are highest. In this case it is sustained by the mo-
mentum it attained, and the wonderful kite-like position and adjust-
ment of its wings. But, it manifestly could not maintain its position
in this way, if moving before the wind, or in a perfectly calm atmos-
phere. The wings must then be called into play to aflbrd lifting as
well as propelling power. The momentum must be supplied.

Birds rise from the ground most readily facing the wind, but usually
run or leap, and the wings, by vigorous strokes, contini;e the impulse
secured. "With the first down-stroke of the wings the body is lifted,
and some velocity attained ; when the wings rise, the body falls some-
what, but is at the same time advancing. This rise and fall of the
body in flying continue, and the body, in progressing, undulates
above and below a given line. In the flight of birds with large wings
and slow stroke, it is easily observed. The illustration, Fig. 11, shows

538

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the positions of the wiugs of the gull iu the course of a complete oscil-
lation :

Fig. 11.

; i

Shoving the moke or less Pebpen-diculae Dikectiox of the Stroke of the Wing in the
Flight of the Guix.

When the down-stroke is completed the bird has been raised, but
is lowered again when the wings have attained their maximum eleva-
tion. Thus it is seen how directly gra\dty aids in flight. The body
is the weight ; the wings are long levers attached to it at one end ;
the air is the fulcrum. Fig. 12 shows the undulatory track of a flying-
bird :

Fig. 12.

Bird at a ; down-stroke of the wing, ft, lifts the bird to c — the track of the bird being in direc-
tion of (he arrows.

The instant the descent of the wing begins, the body moves up-
ward and forward ; but it is shown by the author that some forward
motion results also from the up-stroke. Certain it is that the upward
movement must not counteract the other. There is no provision for

Left Wing of the Albatross.— tf, e, /, Anterior or thick marirfn of pinion ; 5, a, c, Posterior or
thin margin, composed of the primary (i), secondary (a), and tertiary (c) feathers.

waste of energy. The form of the upper surface of the wing is con-
vex, the under surface being concave. The value of this will be ap-
parent, as the Duke of Argyle suggests, if we attempt to move the

WALKING, SWIMMING, AND FLYING.

539

concave or convex side of an umbrella against tlie wind ; one side
holds the air, the other discharges it. The wing of the albatross shows
how completely the feathers are adjusted, on the upper side, to avoid
any hold upon the ai .

This arrangement, with the flexibility and screw-like motion of the
wings of the gull, shown in Fig. 14, explains the exceedingly small re-
sistance experienced in the upward movement, and also the forward
impetus which it communicates.

Shows the Twisted Lbvebs or Screws formed bt the Wings of the GutL.

It is in the down-stroke, or, as Dr. Pettigrew insists, in the begin-
ning of the down-stroke, that force is chiefly expended. This move-
ment is essentially a muscular act, and by this force alone no bird
could sustain long-continued flight. The lark, whose flight is upward,
soon descends to the earth. It lifts itself against gravity, simply by
expenditure of vital force. But, the moment forward motion is attained,
other forces relieve the strain upon the pinions, and their inclined sur-
faces convert gravity into a propelling power. It is obvious, however,
that flight is attended with considerable muscular exertion. Migrat-
ing birds alight in unsuitable positions for rest, but the swallow will
fly 1,000 miles in a single journey, and the condor attains an altitude
of six miles.

The heron will strike the air 60 times in a minute, which, w^th 60
up-strokes, gives 120 movements, and this is continued through long

W^^i4''^'^iS^J^{ti^^^

The Gray Heron in Full Flight.

flights ; and the same is true of many ducks and land-birds which
strike the air with extreme and appai-ently exhausting i-apidity. So
swift are the motions of the wings of the humming-bird that they
produce only a blurred spot before the eye.

That wings act as true kites, when in motion, is a familiar obser-

540 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

vation, but they are kites which continually change their surfaces and
position in respect to the air, which artificial kites do not. An im-
portant difference between them is the rigidity of the one and the
wonderful flexibility of the other. The kite rises as its oblique surface
is pressed against the elastic air ; the same is true of the wing. But
the wing rotates, so that the proper obliquity of its parts is continually
maintained ; it rolls on and off tlie wind ; it rotates not only through-
out its length, but in each of its parts. The quills, which are convex,
rotate, and present closed or oblique surfaces, which hold or discharge
the air.

We have space for but one more of the numerous diagrams and
figures which Dr. Pettigrew has prepared, illustrating the j)henomena
of flight. Fig. 16 is of the extended wing of a partridge, seen from
beneath and from behind.

Curves in the Wing of a PABTRroGE m Fught.

The wings, when flexed and extended in flight, assume curved sur-
faces, which change at each instant and carve the aii', as does the tail
of the fish the water, into complex wave-lines ; and such is the struct-
ure of the wing that these results are inevitable when it is put in
motion. " The muscles, bones, ligaments, and feathers, are so adjusted
with reference to each other that, if the wing is moved at all, it must
move in the proper direction." The bird no more thinks of its mo-
tions in flying than we do of ours in walking ; the actions are mechan-
ical and instinctive. An opinion long prevailed that heated air in the
hollow bones of the bird gave it buoyancy and power of flight. This
is shown to be a fallacy.

Three principal forces are expressed in flight : muscular and elastic
force of the wing, weight of the body, and recoil of the air. By the
mechanical structure of the wing, these forces act, react, and combine.
Thus birds traverse the aerial ocean ; the wild-goose drives his ti*ain
along invisible tracks ; the albatross and petrel are at home in the
gale, undisturbed by its clamor ; and the condor, with easy motion,
treads with his pinions the elastic floors of the upper air.

The more rapid the strokes of the wing the greater the achieve-
ment. Not so with one of the most ingenious of human contrivances
for progression. The screw, if urged beyond a certain velocity, holds
and carries with it the water, and its propelling power is lost. It
wants the flexibility of the wing and the fin — the adaptation is not
complete.

REPLIES TO THE QUARTERLY REVIEWERS. 541

EEPLIES TO THE QUARTEKLY REYIEWEES.

bt heebekt spencer.

WITH the concluding paragraph of the previous article replying
to criticisms I had hoped to end, for a long time, all contro-
versial writing. But, while it was in the printer's hands, two criti-
cisms, more elaborate than those dealt with above, made their appear-
ance ; and, now that the postponed publication of this latter half of
the article affords the opportunity, I cannot, without risking misinter-
pretations, leave these criticisms unnoticed.

Especially do I feel called upon by courtesy to make some response
to one who, in the Quarterly Mevieio, for October, has dealt with me
in a spirit which, though largely antagonistic, is not wholly unsympa-
thetic, and who manifestly aims to estimate justly the views he op-
poses. In the space at my disposal, I cannot of course follow him
through all the objections he has urged. I must content myself with
brief comments on the two propositions he undertakes to establish.
His enunciation of these runs as follows :

" "We would especially direct attention to two points, to both of which we
are confident objections may be made ; and, although Mr. Spencer has himself
doubtless considered such objections (and they may well have struck many of
his readers also), we nevertheless do not observe that he has anywhere noticed
or provided for them.

" The two points we select are :

" 1. That Ms system involves the denial of all truth.

"2. That it is radically and necessarily opposed to all sound principles of

On this passage, ending in these two startling assertions, let me
first remark that I am wholly without this consciousness the reviewer
ascribes to me. Remembering that I have expended some little labor
in developing what I conceive to be a system of truths, I am some-
what surprised by the supposition that " the denial of all truth " is an
implication which I am " doubtless " aware may be alleged against
this system. Remembering, too, that by its programme this system is
shown to close with two volumes on " The Principles of Morality,"
the statement that it is " necessarily opposed to all sound principles
of morals " naturally astonishes me, and still more the statement
that I am doubtless conscious it may be so regarded. Saying thus
much by way of repudiating that latent skepticism attributed to me
by the reviewer, I proceed to consider what he says in proof of these
propositions.

On those seeming incongruities of Transfigured Realism com-
mented on by him, I need say no more than I have already said in
reply to Mr. Sidgwick, by whom also they have been alleged. I

542

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

will limit myself to the corollary he draws from the doctrine of the
Relativity of Knowledge, as held by me. Rightly pointing out that
I hold this in common with " Messrs. Mill, Lewes, Bain, and Huxley,"
but not adding, as he should have done, that I hold it in common with
Hamilton, Mansel, and the long list of predecessors through whom
Hamilton traced it, the reviewer proceeds to infer from this doctrine
of relativity that no absolute truth of any kind can be asserted — not
even the absolute truth of the doctrine of relativity itself. And then
he leaves it to be supposed, by his reader that this inference tells espe-
cially against the system he is criticising. If, however, the reviewer's
inference is valid, this "denial of all truth" must be charged against
the doctrines of thinkers called orthodox, as well as against the doc-
trines of those many philosophers, from Aristotle down to Kant, who
have said, the same thing. But now I go further, and. reply that,
against that form of the doctrine of relativity held, by me, this allega-
tion cannot be made with the same effect as it can against preceding
forms of the doctrine. For I diverge from other relativists in assert-
ing that the existence of a non-relative is not only a positive deliver-
ance of consciousness, but a deliverance transcending in certainty all
others whatever, and is one without which the doctrine of relativity
cannot be framed in thought. I have urged that, " unless a real Non-
relative or Absolute be postulated, the Relative itself becomes abso-
lute, and so brings the argument to a contradiction ; " ' and else-
where I have described this consciousness of a Non-relative mani-
fested to us through the Relative as " deeper than demonstration —
deeper even than definite cognition — deep as the very nature of
mind ; " ^ which seems to me to be saying as emphatically as possible
that, while all other truths may be held as relative, this truth must be
held as absolute. Yet, strangely enough, though contending thus
against the pure relativists, and holding with the reviewer, that
" every asserter of such a (purely-relative) philosophy must be in the
position of a man who saws across the branch of a tree on w hich he
actually sits, at a point between himself and the trunk," ' I am singled
out by him as though this were my own predicament. So far, then,
from admitting that the view I hold " involves the denial of all truth,"
I assert that, having at the outset posited the coexistence of subject
and object as a deliverance of consciousness which precedes all reason-
ing*— having subsequently shown, analytically, that this postulate is
in every way verified,^ and that in its absence the proof of relativity
is impossible — my view is distinguished by an exactly-opposite trait.

The justification of his second proposition the reviewer commences
by saying that " in the first place the process of Evolution, as under-
stood by Mr. Spencer, compels him to be at one with Mr. Darwin in

" " First Principles," § 26. ^ jbij,^ g 62.

3 Compare "Principles of Psychology," §§ 88, 95, 391, 401, 406.

* " First Principles," §§ 39, 45. ^ u Principles of Psychology," part vii.

I

REPLIES TO THE QUARTERLY REVIEWERS. 543

his denial of the existence of any fundamental and essential distinc-
tion between Duty and Pleasure," Following this by a statement
respecting the genesis of moral sentiments as understood by me (which
is extremely unlike the one I have given in the " Principles of Psy-
chology " (§ 215, §§ 503-512, and §§ 524-532), the reviewer goes on
to say that " we yield with much reluctance to the necessity of affirm-
ing that Mr. Spencer gives no evidence of ever having acquired a
knowledge of the meaning of the term ' morality,' according to the
true sense of the word."

Just noting that, as shown by the context, the assertion thus made
is made against all those who hold the Doctrine of Evolution in its
unqualified form, I reply that, in so far as it concerns me, it is one the
reviewer would scarcely have made had he more carefully examined
the evidence — not limiting himself to those works of mine named at
the head of his article. And I cannot but think that, had the spirit
of fairness, which he evidently strives to maintain, been fully awake
when these passages were written, he would have seen that, before
making so serious an allegation, wider inquiry was needful. If he
had simply said that, given the doctrine of mental evolution as held
by me, he failed to see how moral principles were to be established, I
should not have objected ; provided he had also said that I believe
they can be established, and had pointed out what I hold to be their
bases. As it is, however, he has so presented his own inference from
my premises as to make it seem an inference which I also must draw
from my premises. Quite a different and much more secure founda-
tion for moral principles is alleged by me than that aiforded by moral
sentiments and conceptions, which he refers to as though they formed
the sole basis of the ethical conclusions I hold. While the reviewer
contends that " Mr. Spencer's moral system is even yet more pro-
foiindly defective, as it denies any objective distinction between right
and wrong in any being, whether men are or are not responsible for
their actions," I contend, contrariwise, that it is distinguished from
other moral systems by asserting the objectivity of the distinction,
and by endeavoring to show that the subjective distinction is derived
from the objective distinction. In my first work, " Social Statics,"
published twenty-three years ago, the essential thesis is that, apart
from their warrant as alleged Divine injunctions, and apart from their
authority as moral intuitions, the principles of justice are primarily
deducible from the laws of life, as carried on under social conditions.
I argued throughout that these principles so derived have a supreme
authority, to which considerations of immediate expediency must
yield, and I was for this reason classed by Mr. Mill as an anti-utili-
tarian. More recently, in a letter drawn from me by this misappre-
hension of Mr. Mill, and afterward published by Prof. Bain in his
" Mental and Moral Science," I have restated this position. Already,
in an explanatory article entitled " Morals and Moral Sentiments,"

544 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

published in this Bevieio for April, 1871, I have quoted passages from
that letter ; and here, considering the gravity of the assertions made
by the Quarterly reviewer, I hope to be excused for requoting them :
" Morality, properly so called — the science of right conduct — ^has for its ob-
ject to determine how and wTiy certain modes of conduct are detrimental, and
certain other modes beneficial. These good and bad results cannot be acci-
dental, but must be necessary consequences of the constitution of things ; and I
conceive it to be the business of Moral Science to deduce, from the laws of life
and the conditions of existence, what kinds of action necessarily tend to pro-
duce happiness, and what kinds to produce unhappiness. Having done this, its
deductions are to be recognized as laws of conduct, and are to be conformed to
irrespective of a direct estimation of happiness or misery,"

" If it is true that pure rectitude prescribes a system of things far too good
for men as they are, it is not less true that mere expediency does not of itself
tend to establish a system of things any better than that which exists. While
absolute morality owes to expediency the checks which prevent it from rush-
ing into Utopian absurdities, expediency is indebted to absolute morality for all
stimulus to improvement. Granted that we are chiefly interested in ascertain-
ing what is relatively right, it still follows that we must first consider what is
absolutely right; since the one conception presupposes the other."

And the comment I then made on these passages I may make now,
that " I do not see how there could well be a more emphatic assertion
that there exists a primary basis of morals independent of, and in a
sense antecedent to, that which is furnished by experiences of utility,
and consequently independent of, and in a sense antecedent to, those
moral sentiments which I conceive to be generated by such expe-
riences." I will only add that, had my beliefs been directly opposite
to those I have enunciated, the reviewer might, I think, have found
good reasons for his assertion. If, instead of demurring to the doc-
trine that " greatest happiness should be the immediate aim of man,"*
I had indorsed that doctrine — if, instead of explaining and justifying
" a belief in the special sacredness of these highest principles, and a
sense of the supreme authority of the altruistic sentiments answering
to them," ' I had denied the sacredness and the supreme authoi'ity —
if, instead of saying of the wise man that " the highest truth he sees
he will fearlessly utter, knowing that, let what may come of it, he is
thus playing his right part in the world," ' I had said that the wise
man Avill not do this — the reviewer might with some truth have de-
scribed me as not understanding " the term ' morality ' according to
the true sense of the word." And he might then have inferred that
the Doctrine of Evolution, as I hold it, implies denial of the " distinc-
tion between Duty and Pleasure." But, as it is, I think the evidence
will not generally be held to w^arrant his assertion.

1 quite agree with the reviewer that the prevalence of a philosophy

2 " Social Statics," chapter iii. "^ " Principles of Psychology," § 531.

3 " First Principles," § 34.

REPLIES TO THE QUARTERLY REVIEWERS. 545

" is no mere question of speculative interest, but is one of the highest
practical importance." I join him, too, in the belief that " calamitous
social and political changes " may be the outcome of a mistaken phi-
losophy. Moreover, writing as he does under the conviction that
there can be no standard of right and wrong save one derived from a
Revelation interpreted by an Infallible Authority, I can conceive the
alarm with which he regards so radically-opposed a system. Though
I could have wished that the sense of justice he generally displays
had prevented him from ignoring the evidence I have above given, I
can understand how, from his point of view, the Doctrine of Evolu-
tion, as I understand it, " seems absolutely fatal to every germ of
morality," and " entirely negatives every form of religion." But I
am unable to understand that modified doctrine of Evolution which
the reviewer proposes as an alternative. For, little as the reader
would anticipate it after these expressions of profound dissent, the
reviewer displays such an amount of agreement as to suggest that the
system he is criticising might be converted, " rapidly and without vio-
lence, into an ' allotropic state,' in which its conspicuous characters
would be startlingly diverse from those that it exhibits at present."
May I, using a diflerent figure, suggest a different transformation,
having a subjective instead of an objective character? As, in a stereo-
scope, the two views, representing diverse aspects, often yield at first
a jumble of conflicting impressions, but after a time suddenly combine
into a single whole which stands out quite clearly, so, may it not be
that the seemingly-inconsistent Idealism and Realism dwelt on by the
reviewer, as well as the other seemingly-fundamental incongruities he
is struck by, will, under more persistent contemplation, unite as com-
plementai-y sides of the same thing ?

My excuse, for devoting so much space to a criticism of so entirely
different a kind as that contained in the British Quarterly Review for
October, must be that, under the circumstances, I cannot let it pass
unnoticed without seeming; to admit its validity.

Saying that my books should be dealt with by specialists, and
tacitly announcing himself as an expert in Physics, the reviewer takes
me to task both for errors in the statement of physical principles and
for erroneous reasoning in physics. That he discovers no mistakes I
do not say. It would be marvelous if, in such a multitude of propo-
sitions, averaging a dozen per page, I had made all criticism-proof.
Several are inadvertencies which I should have been obliged to the
reviewer for pointing out as such, but which he prefers to instance as
proving my ignorance. In other cases, taking advantage of an imper-
fection of statement, he proceeds to instruct mc about matters which
either the context, or passages in the same volume, show to be quite
familiar to me. Here is a sample of his criticisms belonging to this
class :

VOL. IV. — 35

546 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

"Xor should we counsel a man to venture upon physical speculations who
converts the proposition ''heat is insensible motion'' into '■ insensible motion is
heat,'' and hence concludes that when a force is applied to a mass so large that
no motion is seen to result from it, or when, as in the case of sound, motion
gets so dispersed that it becomes insensible, it turns to heat."

Respecting the first of the two statements contained in this sen-
tence, I will observe that the reader, if not misled by the quotation-
marks into the supposition that I have made, in so many words, the
assertion that " insensible motion is heat," will at any rate infer that
this assertion is distinctly involved in the passage named. And he
will infer that the reviewer would never have charged me with such
an absurd belief, if there was before him evidence proving that I have
no such belief. What will the reader say, then, when he learns, not
simply that there is no such statement, and not simply that on the
page referred to, which I have ascertained to be the one intended, there
is no such implication visible, even to an expert (and I have put the
question to one), but when he further learns that, in other passages,
the fact that heat is the one only of modes of insensible motion is dis-
tinctly stated (see "First Principles," §§ 66, 68, 171), and when he
learns that elsewhere I have specified the several forms of insensible
motion ? If the reviewer, who looks so diligently for flaws as to search
an essay in a volume he is not reviewing to find one term of an incon-
gruity, had sought with equal diligence to learn what I thought about
insensible motion, he would have found in the " Classification of the
Sciences," Table II., that insensible motion is described by me as hav-
ing the forms of heat, light, electricity, magnetism. Even had there
been, in the place he names, an unquestionable implication of the belief
which he ascribes to me, fairness might have led him to regard it as
an oversight, when he found it at variance with statements I have
elsewhere made. "What, then, is to be thought of him when, in the
place named, no such belief is manifest, either to an ordinary reader
or a specially-instructed reader ?

No less significant is the state of mind betrayed in the second
clause of the reviewer's sentence. By representing me as saying that,
when the motion constituting sound " gets so dispersed that it becomes
insensible, it turns to heat," does he intend to represent me as thinking
that, when sound-undulations become too weak to be audible, they be-
come heat-undulations ? If so, I reply that the passage he refers to
has no such meaning. Does he then allege that some part of the
force difiiised in sound-waves is expended in generating electricity,
by the friction of heterogeneous substances (which, however, eventu-
ally lapses from this special form of molecular motion in that general
form constituting heat), and that I ought to have thus qualified my
statement ? If so, he would have had me commit a piece of scientific
pedantry hindering the argument. If he does not mean either of
these things, what does he mean ? Does he contest the truth of the

REPLIES TO THE QUARTERLY REVIEWERS. 547

hypothesis which enabled Laplace to correct Newton's estimate of
the velocity of sound — the hypothesis that heat is evolved by the
compression each sound-wave produces in the air? Does he deny that
the heat so generated is at the expense of so much wave-motion lost ?
Does he question the inference that some of the motion embodied in
each wave is from instant to instant dissipated, partly in this way
and partly in the heat evolved by fluid friction ? Can he show any
reason for doubting that, when the sound-waves have become too fee-
ble to affect our senses, their motion still continues to undergo this
transformation and diminution until it is all lost ? If not, why does
he implicitly deny that the molar motion constituting sound eventu-
ally disappears in producing tlie molecular motion constituting heat ? *
I will dwell no longer on the exclusively-personal questions raised
by the reviewer's statements, but, leaving the reader to judge of the
rest of my " stupendous mistakes " by the one I have dealt with, I
will turn to a question worthy to occupy some space, as having an
impersonal interest — the question, namely, respecting the nature of
the warrant we have for asserting ultimate physical truths. The con-
tempt which, as a physicist, the reviewer expresses for the metaphysi-
cal exploration of physical ideas, I will pass over with the remark that
every physical question, probed to the bottom, ends in a metaphysical
one, and that I should have thought the controversy now going on
among chemists, respecting the legitimacy of the atomic hypothesis,
might have shown him as much. On his erroneous statement that I
use the phrase " Persistence of Force " as an eqiiivalent for the now-
generally-accepted phrase " Conservation of Energy," I will observe
only that, had he not been in so great a hurry to find inconsistencies,
he would have seen why, for the purposes of my argument, I inten-
tionally use the word Force : Force being the generic word, including
both that species known as Energy, and that species by which Matter
occupies space and maintains its integrity — a species which, whatever
may be its relation to Energy, and however clearly recognized as a

' Only after the foregoing paragraphs were written, did the remark of a distinguished
friend show me how certain words were misconstrued by the reviewer in a way that had
never occurred to me as possible. In the passage referred to, I have said that sound-
waves " finally die away in generating thermal undulations that radiate into space;"
meaning, of course, that the force embodied in the sound-waves is finally exhausted in
generating thermal undulations. In common speech, the dying away of a prolonged
Bound, as that of a church-bell, includes its gradual diminution as well as its final cessa-
tion. But, rather than suppose I gave to the words this ordinary meaning, the reviewer
supposes me to believe, not simply that the longitud'mal waves of air can pass, without
discontinuity, into the transverse waves of ether, but he also debits me with the belief that
the one order of waves, having lengths measurable in' feet, and rates expressed in hun-
dreds per second, can by mere enfeehlcment pass into the other order of waves, having
lengths of some fifty thousand to the inch, and rates expressed in many billions per second !
Why he preferred so to interpret my words, and that, too, in the face of contrary impli-
cations elsewhere (instance § 100), will, however, be manifest to every one who reads
his criticisms.

548 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

necessary datum by the theory of Energy, is not otherwise considered
in that theory. I will confine myself to the proposition, disputed at
great length by the reviewer, that our cognition of the Persistence of
Force is a priori. He relies much on the authority of Prof Tait,
whom he twice quotes to the effect that —

" Natural philosophy is an experimental, and not an intuitive science, No
a priori reasoning can conduct us demonstratively to a single physical truth."

"Were I to take an hypercritical attitude, I might dwell on the fact
that Prof. Tait leaves the extent of his proposition somewhat doubt-
ful, by speaking of " Natural philosophy " as one science. Wei-e I to
follow further the reviewer's example, I might point out that " Natural
philosophy," in that Newtonian acceptation adopted by Prof. Tait, in-
cludes Astronomy ; and, going on to ask what astronomical " experi-
ments " those are which conduct us to astronomical truths, I might
then " counsel " the reviewer not to depend on the authority of one
who (to use the reviewer's polite language) " blunders " by confound-
ing experiment and observation. I will not, however, thus infer from
Prof. Tait's imperfection of statement that he is unaware of the differ-
ence between the two ; and shall rate his authority as of no less value
than I should had he been more accurate in his expression. Respect-
ing that authority I shall simply remark that, if the question had to
be settled by the authority of any physicist, the authority of one who
is diametrically opposed to Prof Tait on this point, and who has been
specially honored, both by the Royal Society and by the French In-
stitute, might well counterweigh his, if not outweigh it. I am not
aware, however, that the question is one in Physics. It seems to me a
question respecting the nature of proof. And, without doubting Prof
Tait's competence in Logic and Psychology, I should decline to abide
by his judgment on such a question, even were there no opposite judg-
ment given by a physicist, certainly of not less eminence.

Authority aside, however, let us discuss the matter on its merits.
In the " Treatise on Natural Philosophy," by Profs, Thomson and
Tait, § 243, I read that, " as we shall show in our chapter on ' Expe-
rience,' physical axioms are axiomatic to those only who have sufficient
kiiowledge of the action of physical causes to enable them to see at
once their necessary truth," In this I agree entix'ely. It is in Physics,
as it is in Mathematics, that, before necessary truths can be grasped,
there must be gained, by individual experience, such familiarity with
the elements of the thoughts to be framed that propositions about
those elements may be mentally represented with distinctness. Tell a
child that things which are equal to the same thing are equal to
one another, and the child, lacking a sufficiently abstract notion of
equality, and lacking, too, the needful practice in comparing relations,
will fail to grasp the axiom. Similarly, a rustic, never having thought
much about forces and their results, cannot form a definite conception

REPLIES TO THE QUARTERLY REVIEWERS. 549

answering to the axiom that action and reaction are equal and oppo-
site. In the last case, as in the first, ideas of the terms and their rela-
tions require to be made, by practice in thinking, so vivid that the
involved truths may be mentally seen. But when the individual ex-
periences have been multiplied enough to produce distinctness in the
representations of the elements dealt with, then, in the one case, as in
the other, those mental forms, generated by ancestral experiences,
cannot be occupied by the elements of one of these ultimate truths
without perception of its necessity. If Prof. Tait does not admit this,
what does he mean by speaking of " physical axioms,^'' and by saying
that the cultured are enabled " to see at once their necessary truth ?"

Again, if there are no physical truths which must be classed as a
priori, I ask why Prof. Tait joins Sir W. Thomson in accepting, as bases
for Physics, Newton's Laws of Motion ? Though Newton gives illus-
trations of prolonged motion in bodies that are little resisted, he gives
no proof l\\2it a body in motion will continue moving, if uninterfered
with, in the same direction at the same velocity ; nor, on turning to
the enunciation of this law, quoted in the above-named work, do I find
that Prof. Tait does more than exemplify it by facts which can them-
selves be asserted only by taking the law for granted. Does Prof.
Tait deny that the first law of motion is a physical truth ? If so, what
does he call it ? Does he admit it to be a physical truth, and, denying
that it is a priori, assert that it is established a posteriori — that is, by
conscious induction from observation and experiment ? If so, what is
the inductive reasoning which can establish it ? Let us glance at the
several conceivable arguments which we must suppose him to rely on.

A body set in motion soon ceases to move if it encounters much
friction, or much resistance from other bodies struck. If less of its
energy is expended in moving, or otherwise affecting, other bodies, or
in overcoming friction, its motion continues longer. And it continues
longest when, as over smooth ice, it meets with the smallest amount
of obstruction from other matter. May we then, proceeding by the
method of concomitant variations, infer that were it wholly unobstruct-
ed its motion would continue undiminished ? If so, we assume that the
diminiition of its motion observed in experience is pi'oportionate to
the amount of energy abstracted from it in pi-oducing other motion,
either molar or molecular. We assume that no variation has taken
place in its rate, save that caused by deductions in giving motion to
other matter ; for, if its motion be supposed to have otherwise varied,
the conclusion, that the diiferences in the distances traveled result from
differences in the obstructions met with, is vitiated. Thus the truth
to be established is already taken for granted in the premises. Nor is
the question begged in this Avay only. In every case where it is re-
marked that a body stops the sooner, the more it is obstructed by
other bodies or media, the law of inertia is assumed to hold in the ob-
structing bodies or media. The very conception of greater or less

55°

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

retardation so caused, implies the belief that there can be no retarda-
tions without proportionate retarding causes ; which is itself the as-
sumption otherwise expressed in the first law of motion.

Again, let us suppose that, instead of inexact observations made on
the movements that occur in daily experience, we make exact experi-
ments on movements specially arranged to yield measured results ;
what is the postulate underlying every experiment ? Uniform velocity
is defined as motion through equal spaces in equal times. How do we
measure equal times ? By an instrument which can be inferred to
mark equal times only if the oscillations of the pendulum are isochro-
nous ; which they can be proved to be only if the first and second
laws of motion are granted. That is to say, the proposed experimen-
tal proof of the first law assumes not only the truth of the first law,
but of that which Prof. Tait agrees with Xewton in regarding as a
second law. Is it said that the ultimate time-measure referred to is
the motion of the Earth round its axis, through equal angles in equal
times ? Then, the obvious rejoinder is, that the assertion of this simi-
larly involves an assertion of the truth to be proved ; since the undi-
minished rotatory movement of the Earth is itself a corollary upon the
first law of motion. Is it alleged that this axial movement of the Earth
through equal angles in equal times is ascertainable by reference to
the stars ? I answer, that a developed system of Astronomy, leading-
through complex reasonings to the conclusion that the Earth rotates,
is, in that case, supposed to be needful before there can be established
a law of motion which this system of Astronomy itself postulates.
For, even should it be said that the Newtonian theory of the Solar
System is not necessarily presupposed, but onW the Copernican, still
the proof of this assumes that a body at rest (a star being taken as
such) will continue at rest ; which is a part of the first law of motion,
regarded by Xewton as not more self-evident than the remaining part.

Xot a little remarkable, indeed, is the oversight made by Prof.
Tait, in asserting that "no a priori reasoning can conduct us demon-
stratively to a single physical truth," when he has before him the fact
that the system of physical truths constituting Xewton's " Princii)ia,"
which he has joined Sir "William Thomson in editing, is established by
a priori reasoning. That there can be no change without a cause, or,
in the words of Mayer, that " a force cannot become nothing, and just
as little can a force be produced from nothing," is that ultimate dictum
of consciousness on which all physical science rests. It is involved
alike in the assertion that a body at rest will continue at rest, in the
assertion that a body in motion must continue to move at the same
velocity in the same line if no force acts upon it, and in the assertion
that any divergent motion given to it must be proportionate to the
deflecting force ; and it is also involved in the axiom that action and
reaction are equal and opposite.

The reviewer's doctrine, in support of which he cites against me

REPLIES TO THE QUARTERLY REVIEWERS. 551

the authority of Prof. Tait, ilhistrates. in Physics that same error of
the inductive philosophy which, in Metaphysics, I have pointed out
elsewhere (" Principles of Psychology," Part VII.). It is a doctrine
implying that we can go on forever asking the proof of the proof,
without finally coming to any deepest cognition which is unproved
and unprovable. That this is an untenable doctrine I need not say
more to show. Nor, indeed, would saying more to show it be likely
to have any effect, in so far at least as the reviewer is concerned ; see-
ing that he thinks I am " ignorant of the very nature of the principles "
of which I am speaking, and seeing that my notions of scientific rea-
soning "remind" him "of the Ptolemists," who argued that the
heavenly bodies must move in circles because the circle is the most
perfect figure.*

Not to try the reader's patience further, I will end by pointing out
that, even were the reviewer's criticisms all valid, they would leave
unshaken the system he contends against. Though one of his sen-
tences (page 480) raises the expectation that he is about to assault,
and greatly to damage, the fabric of propositions contained in the
second part of " First Principles," yet all those propositions which
constitute the fabric he leaves not only uninjured but even untouched,
contenting himself with trying to show (with what success we have
seen) that the fundamental one is an a posteriori truth, and not an
a priori truth. Against the general Doctrine of Evolution, considered
as an induction from all concrete phenomena, he utters not a word ;
nor does he utter a word to disprove any one of those laws of the re-
distribution of matter and motion by which the process of Evolution
is deductively interpreted. Respecting the law of the Instability of
the Homogeneous, he says no more than to quarrel with one of the
illustrations. He makes no criticism on the law of the Multiplication
of Effects. The law of Segregation he does not even mention. Nor
does he mention the law of Equilibration. Further, he urges nothing
against the statement that these general laws are severally dcducible
from the ultimate law of the Persistence of Force. Lastly, he does
not deny the Persistence of Force, but only differs respecting the na-

* Other examples of these amenities of controversy, in which I decline to imitate my
reviewer, have already been given. What occasions he supplies me for imitation, were I
minded to take advantage of them, an instance will show. Pointing out an implication
of certain reasonings of mine, he suggests that it is too absurd even for me to avow ex-
plicitlj, saying: "We scarcely think that even Mr. Spencer will venture to claim as a
datum of consciousness the Second Law of Motion, with its attendant complexities of
component velocities," etc. Now, any one who turns to Newton's "Principia " will find
that to the enunciation of the Second Law of Motion nothing whatever is appended but
an amplified restatement — there is not even an illustration, much less a proof. And
from this law, this axiom, this immediate intuition or " datum of consciousness," Newton
proceeds forthwith to draw those corollaries respecting the composition of forces which
underlie all dynamics. What, then, must be thought of Newton, who explicitly assumes
that which the reviewer thinks it absurd to assume implicitly ?

552 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ture of our warrant for asserting it. Beyond pointing out here a
cracked brick, and there a coin set askew, he merely makes a futile
attempt to show that the foundation is not natural I'ock, but concrete.
From his objections I may, indeed, derive much satisfaction. That
a competent critic, obviously anxious to do all the mischief he can,
and not over-scrupulous about the means he uses, has done so little,
may be taken as evidence that the fabric of conclusions attacked will
not be readily overthrown.

PHYSIOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS.

By FEKNAND PAPILLON.

TEAN8LATED FROM THE FEENOH, BT J. FITZGEEALD, A. M.

IF there is to-day a fact demonstrated by reason reflexly contem-
plating itself no less than by attentive observation of the entire
development of human knowledge, it is the close interdependence of
all natural forces and operations — a solidarity so firmly knit that it is
impossible to study any one point of detail without reference to the
sum total of the phenomena. The sciences, long kept apart from one
another, now all tend to come together, to fuse into one another, for
the explication of facts. It is the exigencies of the science of man
that, above all, have determined this irresistible attraction, this sys-
tematic confluence of branches of knowledge the most diverse toward
one centre, where they attain their full value and their full signifi-
cance. Man brings together within himself, as Buffon says, all the
powers of Nature : he is the centre to which all things are referred —
a world in miniature ; no amount of analysis can come amiss, if we
are to resolve the endless complexity of this so multiple being; and
we need all the light we can get, in order to illumine the darkness
that surrounds this mysterious creature. If, as Leibnitz thinks, one
single monad — an imperceptible atom — is a miiTor of the total beauty
of the universe, how much more truly may this be said of that singu-
lar and diversified assemblage of monads, man ! Surely it would ill
become us to disparage the psychologist, whose study has been to get
at a knowledge of man solely by observation of the phenomena of
consciousness ; or the physiologist, who has attempted to find an ex-
plication solely in organic phenomena. Both of these have, with
much toil, broken the ground and prepared a field where investigation
may henceforth bear fruit; but, precisely because the soil is now
ready, it is to be hoped that the controversies and antagonisms of the
past will give way to a good understanding, more conducive to a true
knowledge of man's nature ; and that inquiry, instead of diverging

PHYSIOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 553

and so losing itself, shall be regulated and coordinated to the attain-
ment of one end.

These reflections are addressed neither to those who imagine that
psychology has done all its work already, nor to those who think that
work never can be done ; we submit them to those who, following at-
tentively the double movement of physiology and of psychology, find
that, at least, the progress made by each of these sciences is correla-
tive with that made by the other, and inseparable from it. Philoso-
phers, whose position and whose previous inquiries seemed very un-
likely to invite them to the study of physical man, now devote them-
selves to this study with enlightened ardor. Experimenters, whose
reputation and whose habits might appear very unapt to incline them
toward the study of moral man, now- pursue that study with conscien-
tious diligence. The result is, a' profounder and more precise science
of the relations between the physical and the moral — a science that is
full of revelations and surprises.

The ancients had a theory with regard to the passions which, at
bottom, diifers not much from that countenanced in these later times,
by experimental physiology and pathology. They erred v\dth regard
to the role of the humors and the physiological mechanism in the pro-
duction of passional phenomena; but they had closely observed, and,
with rare precision, defined the influence exerted by these on the vis-
cera of the abdominal region. Their poetry and their medical writ-
ings are full of expressions which show how ancient is the knowledge
of this relation between the soul's sentiments and the movements of
heart, lungs, stomach, and liver.* The ancients even went so far as
to localize the passions in the viscera; and their theory on this sub-
ject is expressed in the aphorism, " Splene rident,/e/^e irascunt, Jecore
amant, pulmone jactantur," where the spleen^ the gall-bladder, the
liver, and the lungs, are represented as the seat respectively of mirth,
anger, love, and vaingloiy. The physiology of the passions, so far as
it could be and was studied by the authors of ancient times, was, from
the stand-point of description, a science of such exactitude that there
is now little to be added to it. Still, they mistook the real seats of
those states of the soul ; and Descartes, in his famous work on the
passions, was the first to hold that their seat is in the brain. He lo-
calized all passional states in that organ. " The soul," he says, " can
Bufier directly only through the brain ; " and, in another place, " The

* "Reason sits arbitress within the breast;
For there it is our conscious being dwells ;
There fear and dread anxiety creep chill,
And soothing joys play flattering round the heart,
AYhich shows the soul is there that joys and fears."

Lucretius, C. F. Johnson's translation.

554

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

soul does not receive impressions from all parts of the body, but only
from the brain." This truth, which now seems so elementary, was
nevertheless demonstrated only by the physiology of recent times.
The greatest physiological theorist of the passions, Bichat, did not
accept it, as we shall see from an exposition of his doctrine.

The first physiological character recognized in the passions, by
Bichat, is intermittency. Whereas our thoughts may be continued —
prolonged over a considerable period of time — and whereas a habit of
making the same reflections and judgments strengthens and perfects
them, the passions, on the other hand, have no persistence. With the
exception of that pleasure and pain which we might denominate abso-
lute, and which depend on direct nerve-excitation, it may be asserted
that a habit of the same sentiments will soon blunt and weaken them.
A prolonged sensation, be it pleasant or painful, at last gives neither
pleasure nor pain. The perfumer, who is ever surrounded by an od(jr-
ous atmosphere, does not enjoy the sweet scents. All that delights the
eye or charms the ear becomes indifferent when the impression has
lasted for some time. The same holds good for disagreeable sensa-
tions. " Happiness, therefore," says Bichat, " consists only in incon-
tinuousness. Pleasure is but a comparative sentiment, that ceases to
exist where you have uuiformity betvreen present and past sensations.
Were the forms of all women cast in one mould, that mould were the
grave of love,"

This profound" difference between thought and passion Bichat ex-
plains by the theory that the former is dependent on that side of our
being which we call animal life, while the latter proceeds from the
organic life. Every thing that has to do with intellectual opera-
tions, properly so called, has its seat in the brain, which is the
centre of animal life. Every thing that has to do with the passional
states has its seat in the viscera. The effect of passion of every kind
is to produce some change, some alteration in the organic life, that is
to say, in the organs of circulation, of respiration, and of nutrition.
This fundamental difference between intelligence and passion, as re-
gards the organs which seem to be their respective seats, has long
been remarked by popular sagacity and incorporated into language.
Such expressions as " a good head," " a fine-shaped head," have al-
ways been employed to express perfection of understanding ; and " a
good heart," " a tender heart," to express the perfection of sentiment.
It has also been a current phrase to say that the blood " boils " with
anger, or that indignation " moves " the bile, or that the heart " leaps "
with joy. Our gestures accord with our words : thus, when we would
in dumb show indicate some state having to do with memory, imagi-
nation, perception, or judgment, we bring the hand up to the head.
But, when we would express love, joy, hate, disgust, we bring the
hand up to the region of the heart or of the stomach.

A close observation of facts proves the correctness of the instincts

PHYSIOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 555

that have given rise to these phrases and gestures. It is evident that
anger accelerates the circulatory movement, and that J03' lias the same
effect, while grief and fear produce the opposite results. Extreme
emotions are sometimes followed by fatal syncope. Profound grief
causes a difficulty of respiration. Sudden fright checks the secretion
of bile. Independently of these palpable phenomena, the passions
modify profoundly the nutritive processes, and give rise to disordered
conditions, of a more or less grave nature. Here, again, language ac-
cords with physiology. To pine atcay with envy., or xoitli remorse., to
waste mcay with grief., are expressions that attest the influence of the
passions on the organic life. Again, Bichat ingeniously notes the rela-
tion subsisting between the passions and the temperament. The indi-
vidual whose lungs are highly developed, and whose circulatory
system is specially vigorous, will naturally be of very impetuous dis-
position, choleric, passionate, and courageous. Where the biliary
system predominates, enviousness and hate seem to be more habitual.
The lymphatic temperament gives to the passions a quiet and indo-
lent character. Thus every thing, according to Bichat, goes to show
that the organic life is the terminus to w^hich the passions tend, and
the centre from which they start, and that the animal life only suffers
from the rebound consecutively. If the focus of the animal life is the
brain, then what is the focus of the organic life ? What is the appa-
ratus specially concerned in producing emotions and passional mani-
festations ? Bichat holds that there is no one organ on which this
office devolves exclusively, and he localizes the passions in what he
calls the epigastric centre ; that is to say, in the heart, the lungs, the
liver, the gall-bladder, and the ganglionic nerve-system, distributed
throughout these organs. Each of these is, according to him, the seat
of a distinct passion, and the movements that are determined by this
passion are perfectly involuntary.

Such is Bichat's doctrine of the passions ; it is the ancient doctrine,
only developed and elucidated, reasoned out with greater precision, and
fortified with fi-esh proofs. It is correct in its analysis of the visceral
disturbances produced by the passions, but erroneous in that it regards
the viscera as their main-spring and origin. To Gall belongs the honor
of having proved that the passions primarily affect the brain, and not
the viscera. It was the experiments made by that great man which
showed that the brain is the organ of sentiments no less than of ideas.
His argument against Bichat's theory may be reduced to these funda-
mental observations : The heart and the diaphragm are only muscles,
the stomach and the liver only secretory apparatus, the kidneys only
an excretory apparatus, and the spleen only a sanguineous gland. Sev-
eral of these organs may suffer lesion or be removed and still the pas-
sions remain ; hence we cannot localize the passions in them. Gall,
in the next place, examines all the parts of the nervous system outside
of the brain, viz., the plexuses, the ganglia, the nerves, and the sensory

556 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

apparatus, and shows that here too it is impossible to find the source
of our propensities, instincts, aifections, or passions. Finally, he ex-
amines the brain itself, and in it discovers the exclusive seat of all
these activities. That the passions depend essentially on the brain is
proved from the fact that any impairment of that viscus determines a
perturbation of the passional no less than of the intellectual phenomena.
When Tve see physicians of half a century ago, who were profoundly
versed in the study of insanity — a Pinel or an Esquirol, for instance —
hesitate about locating in the brain the immediate cause of dementia
and the various forms of mania, we can appreciate the importance of
the service done by Gall to the science of man, when he rigorously
demonstrated the ill-understood functions of the brain, and proved the
correctness of Descartes's doctrine of the passions.

The experiments of modern physiologists, those of Claude Bernard
in particular, show that all sensations act primai'ily on the nerve-
centres, through the nerves reaching from the periphery of the body
to those centres. The excitation thus determined in the brain, or in
the spinal cord, is then transferred to the nerve-tilaraents which extend
to the viscera and members, and hence the latter are affected only
secondarily. Of all the organs, the heart is the one which earliest and
most profoundly experiences the influence of the sensitive excitations
produced in the nerve-centres. So soon as any modification whatso-
ever is produced in the central nerve-substance, the nerves transmit
this vibration to the heart, and at once the movements of the latter suffer
a perturbation which is expressed in various ways. At one time the
nervous action is sufficiently energetic to at once stop the working of
the heart ; and, as the blood is no longer discharged into the vessels,
syncope (fainting) is the result, the skin assuming the pallor and liv-
idness of death. Again, the reverse effect takes place, the beating of
the heart being accelerated, instead of being stopped ; in this case the
blood is forced through the distended vessels to the brain, and there
is ovei--excitation of that organ's activity. The heart is no more the
seat of the sentiments than the hand is the seat of the will, but it is a
reactive which is modified by the sentiments, with the utmost nicety and
with infallible certainty. Not only does the heart betray, by the very
disturbance of its normal rhythm, the nature of the initial brain-ex-
citation, but it also produces throughout the whole organism disor-
dered actions, the sum of which constitutes, as it were, the physical
image, the palpable externals of passion. But it produces this disor-
dered action only by reacting on the brain, which is the organ of all
the demonstrations and of all the movements of the nerves, and conse-
quently of the muscles. Thus it is that the heart and the brain, the
blood-system and the nerve-system, conspire in the production of pas-
sional phenomena, by a series of alternate actions and reactions.

Such, are at least, the chief points of Claude Bernard's doctrine, as
set forth at a famous Sorbonne conference^ in 1864. At that period the

PHYSIOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 557

nature of the nerve-connections of the heart with the brain were as yet
unknown, and a Russian physiologist, E. Cyon, has, for some years
past, labored successfully to fill up this gap. The heart is provided
with a number of little self-acting nerve-ganglia, without relations to
the brain, from which spring, under the influence of the blood, a cer-
tain number of motor impulsions. These ganglia govern the usual
normal action of the cardiac apparatus ; but the rhythm and the force
of the beatings are every instant modified by excitations having their
origin in the brain. The latter organ sends out to the ganglia of the
heart two sets of nerves — the pneumogastric, or retardator, and the
accelerator nerves. Excitation of the former diminishes the frequency
and augments the force of the heart's movements. The accelerator
nerves produce the opposite result, increasing the number and lessen-
ing the force of the heart's contractions. These two sets of nerves
accommodate the activity of the heart to that of the rest of the organ-
ism, and hold it in equilibrium with the continual oscillations of the
various functions of body and soul. Besides these filaments, extending
from the brain to the heart, there are others from the heart to the
brain, which M. Cyon calls depressors. The ofiice of these nerves is
to notify the brain, and consequently the soul, of the changes occur-
ring in the rhythm and energy of the cardiac contractions. Thus, in
virtue of the pneumogastric and the accelerator nerves, the heart is an
organ whereon is reflected, immediately and with precision, every pas-
sional state, with its nicest shades of distinction. And, on the other
hand, in virtue of the depressor-nerves, our consciousness notes the
infinitely-diverse oscillations of the heart's beatings attendant on pas-
sional states. The mechanism of the heart's motions under passion
depends on these two inverse nerve-currents.

Every agreeable or joyous emotion of the soul excites the accel-
erator nerves of the heart, and causes that organ to beat with great
rapidity, lessening at the same time the force of its contractions. The
phrases, the heart leaps tcith joy, or flutters with joy, admirably char-
acterize this action of the accelerator nerves. The facility with which
the heart drives the blood into the arteries, under such circumstances,
produces that feeling of comfort and pleasure which is expressed by
the words, a light heart. On the other hand, all sad or painful feel-
ings act chiefly on the retardator fibres of the pneumogastric nerves.
Emotions of this description diminish the rapidity of the heart's beat-
ings, and so increase the amount of blood discharged from that organ
at each diastole ; hence the contractions by which it drives the blood
into the vessels are laborious and protracted. These contractions, at-
tended as they are with pain, give rise to an ensemble of sensations,
expressed in common language by such phrases as oppression of the
heart, the heart is agonized, etc. That other phrase, the heart is ready
to hurst, expresses, with great exactitude, the sensation of stricture
one feels when suffering from pent-up anguish. The news of some

558 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

painful loss, when suddenly conveyed, oftentimes produces wild, irreg-
ujar contractions, owing to a paralysis of the retardator nerves, and it
is not rare to find this disordered excitation followed by a total stop-
page of the heart's action, and syncope. Hence, says Claude Bernard,
when we have to communicate to a person some heart-breaking piece
of intelligence, we must use great precaution. The intensity of the
effects produced on the heai-t by the soul's emotions depends, above
all, on the excitability of the nerves connecting heart and brain. The
greater the excitability of these nerves, the more pronounced are the
heart's motions, and the finer, too, and the more delicate are the con-
secutive impressions. It is because the nerves of women and children
are more excitable than those of men, that their hearts also are more
profoundly affected by the emotions ; or, in common language, their
hearts are more tender, more sensitive.

While the heart seems to be more directly under the influence of
the feelings, the lungs appear to have some connection with thought.
When absorbed in some profound meditation, or when listening to
some orator whose discourse rivets our attention, we suspend the re-
spiratory movements. Darwin offers an ingenious explanation of this
phenomenon, attributing it to the habit we have contracted of not
breathing when we are listening attentively, so as not to disturb by
the sound of the breath the silence necessary for catching every syl-
lable.

From the fact that the real affections of the soul, and consequently
of the brain, are always accompanied by disturbance of the respira-
tory and circulatory functions, we may conclude that the heart and
the artei'ial tension are the true index of the passional states. Hence
it is that the actor, when he would prove that some perilous situation
inspires him with no fears, seizes the hand of the one he seeks to reas-
sure or to convince, and places it over his own heart, in order to show
that the beatings of that organ keep up their usual rhythm. Hence,
too, it is that we must not regard outcries and gestures as positive in-
dices of passion. When you see a woman weeping and agitated on
hearing some painful news, you have only to feel her pulse ; if that
is normal, you may pronounce the emotion simulated. On the other
hand, if you see a woman whose distress is manifested by no outward
signs, but whose heart beats with unwonted irregularity, you may be
sure that she feigns a calm that is not in her soul. There is yet
another mode of ascertaining, and even of measuring accurately, the
strength of emotions. This we may do by applying either to the pulse
or to the heart one of those delicate apparatus invented by M. Marey,
which trace on a sheet of blackened paper curves of greater or less
sinuosity, representing the number, the force, and the form of the
beats of the pulse, or the contractions of the heart. Just as these
apparatus give us tracings which at once indicate the nature of the
heart's motions in various diseases, for instance, fever, typhus, or pneu-

PHYSIOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 559

monia, they might in like manner give us graphic representations of
its motions under the influence of the various passions, such as love,
fear, grief, joy, anger, etc. Indeed, each of these states of the soul
produces, in the order of the heart's beatings, a modification so pecul-
iar and characteristic that we may regard each of the passions as
having a curve of its own. M. Cyon, who has recently suggested this
ingenious idea of applying graphic apparatus to the physiology of the
passions, gives some illustrations of the bearings such experiments
might have. Among the heirs gathered round the bed of a dying man
there is one whose grief causes his heart to beat slowly but violently.
In some of the others, who impatiently await the end, the heart beats
quickly but feebly. The graphic apparatus, which describes, with
marvelous precision, the rhythm of cardiac contractions, and which is
called the cardiography could in this case exhibit the real feelings of
the heirs. This is not at all an exaggeration, and we have no doubt
that an instrument of great sensibility could be got to note the differ-
ences here referred to. Perhaps the case would be different under cir-
cumstances of greater complexity. The modifications of the heart's
beating intervene in a twofold manner, in the determination of our
inclinations and in the acts which proceed from them, either by pro-
ducing sudden changes in the quantity of blood diffused through the
nerve-centres, or by giving us agreeable or painful sensations through
the depressor nerves. Now, a sudden afilux of blood to the brain, and
extremely painful sensations, may produce, in a man not suffering from
any mental disease, the craziest notions, and may betray him into the
commission of the most serious offenses. Suppose a man commits a
crime under circumstances but ill understood ; the question arises,
Was he moved to the act xmconsciously and by physiological causes,
or did he do it designedly and after calm reflection ? M. Cyon thinks
he can resolve this problem as follows : The soul possesses the faculty
of experiencing, on the recollection of a past act, emotions of a like
kind with those it experienced at the moment of its commission. The
detailed history of a crime must produce in the accused who listens to
it — supposing that he had committed the crime knowingly — emotions
of this kind, as also the cardiac motions necessarily correlative to them.
Hence the judge may, by means of the cardiograph, inform himself as
to the presence or absence of these motions, and so decide whether the
accused has or has not a recollection of the crime, i. e., has committed
the crime whether with or without consciousness. This instance is
rather ingenious than plausible, rather theoretic than practical. Of
course, an individual who has committed a crime in a state of delirium
cannot, on hearing the history of that crime, experience the same
emotions, nor consequently the same modifications of the heart's move-
ment, as he would if he had committed it with a full knowledge of
w^hat he was doing ; still, it would be as hard for him in the one case
as in the other, to maintain an absolute sang-froid. A man who is

560 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

accused of having committed a crime, and who knows that he has
committed it, is alarmed at the sight of the judge who questions him,
and at the thought of the accusation which stands against him, even
though the crime was committed in a moment of delirium. On the
other hand, it may easily happen that a hardened malefactor, who has
committed a crime with full deliberation, will be so far master of him-
self as to feel but insignificant emotion when the circumstances of his
crime are brought up before him. Yet this idea of M. Cyon's merits
the attention of psychological physiologists, and we may venture to
hope that the day will come when treatises on psychology will con-
clude their descriptions of passional states with graphic tracings show-
ing the rhythm of heart-contractions which answers to each passion.
These tracings will be trustworthy and precise, for, if the will be mis-
tress of movements and demonstrations that apj)ear at the sm-face, it
has but very little power over viscera that are concealed, like the
heart, and these are truthful witnesses, ever at hand to rectify lying
testimony.

But we must bear in mind that muscles which are subject to
the will are not always employed to dissemble passion, but that very
often, by their almost automatic attitude, they betray the real state of
the feelings. In vain would a man in a furious passion strive to stand
still. All his members are agitated with violent movements. Aston-
ishment produces a relaxation of the muscles, and hence the French
phrase, les bras tomhent (the arms fall), to denote the effects of this
emotion. Fear causes one's legs to fail him ; one is said to he petrified
by fear. But there are none of the muscles that are so influenced, so
modified by the passions, as those of the face. The physiognomy is
indeed a betrayer of the soul's inner states. "When the soul is agi-
tated," says Buffon, " the face becomes a living picture, wherein the
passions are given with equal delicacy and force ; where every move-
ment of the soul is expressed by a dash of the pencil, and each act by
a character, the rapid, living impress of which outstrips the will, thus
unveiling and manifesting, by passionate signs, our most secret emo-
tions."

It seems impossible to subject to physiological analysis appearances
so complex, so varied, and so fickle. And yet an accomplished experi-
menter has recently succeeded in partially ordering this chaos, and in
precisely determining the muscular mechanism of the human physiog-
nomy as related to the various passions. Having first ascertained, by
minute dissections, the position and separate function of the numerous
muscles situate between the skin and the facial bones, and having
learned how the nerve-filaments of the seventh pair (the facial nerves)
are distributed through these muscles and animate them, M. Duchenno,
of Boulogne, has determined, bv means of the electric current, or of

PHYSIOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 561

various excitants, the coutractiou of each particular one of these little
muscles. Again, by observing those ready-made experiments which
we call diseases, he learned what takes place when some of these
muscles contract while others are inactive. In this way he has been
enabled to see, most clearly, that the contraction of each muscle of
the face determines a certain invariable expression ; that is to say,
that each passion seems to have at its command a facial muscle
which contracts so soon as the soul is moved by this passion. M.
Duchenne discourses as follows about the muscle of suffering {sovf-
france)^ as he calls the muscle whose contraction indicates pain.
" From the very outset I had observed that the partial movement of
one of the motor muscles of the eyebrow always produced a complete
expression in the human face. For instance, there is one muscle
which expresses pain — the superciliary muscle. On causing this to
contract by electricity, not only did tlic eyebrow assume the form ex-
pressive of i^ain, but the other parts and features of the countenance,
particularly the mouth and the naso-labial line, seemed also to undergo
a profound modification, so as to harmonize with the eyebrow, and,
like it, to give expression to this painful state of the soul." So, then,
other muscles appear to share with the superciliary in the expression
of suffering. M. Duchenne, however, believes that he is authorized
by his experiments in holding that the muscular region of the face
directly modified by a single passion is very circumscribed. But this
modified region acts by a sort of sympathy on the fidjacent regions
precisely as one color modifies the tint of the colors all around it ;
and, just as, in the latter case, there is caused an optical illusion, the
result of what Chevreul calls the simultaneous contrast of colors, so
with the muscular movements of the face there is produced a kind of
mirage which modifies, complicates, and seems to dilate a movement
whose real sphere is very restricted. However this may be, M. Du-
chenne has succeeded in reproducing, by contractions called forth in
a certain number of the facial muscles, nearly all those expressions
which answer to the inner states of the soul, and he has thus been
enabled to assign to each muscle a psychological in addition to its
physiological name. Thus, the frontal muscle is the muscle of atten-
tion, surprise, wonder, and alarm, and each of these emotions excites
it in a different way. The great zygomatic and the inferior orbicular
muscles are the muscles of joy, while the pyramidal muscle of the
nose is the muscle of aggression, and so on. In general, the muscles
of the eye are adapted to expressions of the higher order, and those
of the mouth to expressions of a more gross and material kind. The
purely self-satisfied and sensual smile calls into play only the zygo-
matic muscle. It is the contraction of the inferior orbicular that gives
to the expression of contentment and pleasure a character of good-
nature and benevolence. Besides the primary expressions resulting
directly from the play of one muscle, M. Duchenne finds that several

562 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

passional states of the physiognomy may be resolved into a number
of simple movements.

And, just as he produces simple passional expressions by artificial
means, so, too, he effects the synthesis of the complex exjjressions.
Attention^ which is produced by the contraction of the frontal muscle,
and/oy, which is due to the conjoint activity of the great zygomatic
and the inferior orbicular, are primary expressions. Whenever we
determine simultaneously on one face the contraction of these two
muscles, we get the physiognomy of a person who has a lively impres-
sion of some pleasing and unexpected news. If, together with these
muscles, we excite that which serves to express lechery — i, e., the
transverse nasal muscle — we get the type of attention directed toward
some lascivious object. If we associate the lines indicating pleasure
with those denoting pain, we recognize at once the melancholy smile.
When we combine the smile (by contracting the great zygomatic)
with gentle grief (by contracting the minor zygomatic), or, better still,
with a slight contraction of the muscle of suffering — the superciliary —
we have an admirable and touching expression of pity and compassion.

These fine physiological dissections, and the masterly syntheses
they suggested to M. Duchenne, are nearly in full accord, as concerns
their results, with the most ancient observations of empiricism, with
the intuitions of painters and sculptors, as also with the teaching of
psychologists and moralists. Results of this kind add nothing to our
knowledge of the body or of the mind, but they will, perhaps, be of
service to artists who desire to be exact in the anatomical reproduc-
tion of the passional movements of the physiognomy. No doubt the
genius of superior artists is a sure and potent instinct, which leads
them to follow rules they know not ; and it is probable that neither
Raffaelle, nor Correggio, nor Titian, would have been a greater painter,
had he known, as modern physicists do, the laws of harmony and the
simultaneous contrast of colors. Nevertheless, this sure and potent
instinct, the germ of which exists in the elite of the artist-world, may
be to some extent acqiaired by laborious study, and hence the consci-
entious artist will understand all the advantage to be derived from a
science which, by giving him precise and certain directions, will save
him much preliminary labor and much fruitless experiment.

Why is one special muscle of the face affected by pain, another by
fear, and a third by anger? In short, why is every passion inter-
preted in the physiognomy by regular, determinate movements, just
as the I'hythm of the heart is modified? To give the question a
more general form, is there a logical relation (between gesture and
emotion ? This is a difficult question, recently put by Mr. Darwin,
and which he strives to answer in accordance with his usual doc-
trines. For him, instincts are habits oi'iginally acquired purposely,
voluntarily-, and afterward fixed in the race by heredity. The in-
stinctive movements of the physiognomy, considered as passional ex-

PHYSIOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 563

pressions, have the same origin. Thus, the habit of praying with
the hands joined palm to palm comes, according to him, from the
fact that in past times captives testified their entire submission by-
holding up their hands to be bound by the victor. The captive as-
sumed the kneeling posture, in order to make this operation easier.
Thus, the gesture and the attitude, which are now the instinctive
expression of adoration, of devotion, would be merely vestiges of the
savage usages of primitive man. When we are angry with a person,
we involuntarily close our fists, so that they may be ready for use,
even when we have no intention of striking the one who has angered
us. If, under the action of similar feelings, the lips contract so as to
show the teeth, as though we were preparing to bite, the reason is,
says Darwin, that we are descended from animals who used their teeth
as weapons of ofiense. Why do the eyebrows assume an oblique po-
sition when a person is suffering pain ? For this reason : when chil-
dren cry from hunger or from pain, the act of ci'ying profoundly modi-
fies the cii'culation ; the blood flows to the head, and particularly to the
eyes, and this produces an unpleasant sensation. The muscles around
the eyes then contract so as to protect them, and this action has become,
under the influence of selection and heredity, an instinctive habit.

Most of Mr. Darwin's ingenious explanations thus tend to refer
movements of the physiognomy, that are now involuntary and in-
stinctive, to movements that once were volimtary and intentional.
Many of these explanations seem plausible, but it is nevertheless true
that the physiognomy betrays the emotions and passions by means of
signs entirely independent of the will. That some of the muscular
movements of the face arose in the manner described by Darwin we
might admit, but still we cannot see how that accomplished naturalist
can reduce under his fundamental hypothesis those complex move-
ments which are expressed by laughtei-, lachrymal secretion, blushing,
pallor, turgescence or flaccidity of the flesh, and the flashing and dim-
ming of the eyes. All these phenomena are entirely independent of
the will, nor can they be explained on the theory put forward by Dar-
win to account for the eyebrow contracting under the influence of pain-
ful emotions, or for the lips contracting in anger. Therefore, we are
forced to the conclusion that the agitation of the cephalic centres, pro-
duced by the passions, calls forth, in virtue of the anatomical relations
of those centres with the facial nerves and muscles, reflex phenomena
that never were under the control of the will. The habit of seeing
such and such an expression associated with such and such a passion
leads us to jvidge of the one by the other ; but yet the habit is not the
efficient cause of the expression.

There still remains to be considered one more series of physiologi-
cal phenomena which bear the impress of passion, viz., vocal phe-
nomena. The inflections of the voice, as related to the passions, are as
varied as the expressions of the physiognomy. Each passion has its

564 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

own language, its own tones, its own note, just as it has its own nerve
and its own muscle. Physiological analysis, however, is far more
difficult here than in the case of the physiognomy. How shall we
analyze the complex mechanisms that cause the lungs and the larynx
to produce the various sounds of moaning, crying, groaning, sobbing,
and sighing ? We are acquainted with the ensemble of muscular func-
tions which give rise to these different expressions of the soul's states,
but why does laughter express gayety, and sighing express sadness ?
We cannot tell.

To sum up : a profound disturbance of the circulatory and respira-
tory acts ; a more or less violent agitation of the members ; changes
of the attitude of the body ; diversified movements in the physiog-
nomy ; infinitely-varied inflections and modulations of the voice — all
these phenomena are the consequence of what takes place in the brain
when that organ receives impressions of such a nature as to agitate it.

Hence we see that the main-spring of passion is the sense-impres-
sion. But what is this impression ? In order to answer this ques-
tion, let us analyze some passional state. We shall there find four
principal elements : a more or less distinct initial sensation of pleasure
or pain ; voluntary or involuntary movements, more or less pronounced ;
and, finally, a recurrent sensation consecutive to these movements.
It is clear that if there were no sensation there wo aid be no passion.
On the other hand, if the sensation were but a motion, we might say
tliat passion consists of a series of motions originating in the agitation
of the sensorium produced by the internal or external causes of emo-
tion ; but, then, we never could understand why this agitation, being
purely vibratory, should afiect us at one time agreeably, at another
painfully, or why it should act in so many diflerent modes. Hence
the power of discerning, immediately, in the sensorial perception, dif-
fei*ences that have no mechanical equivalent, cannot be explained on
mechanical grounds, and it is absolutely necessary to recognize here a
psychic faculty, whose function it is to ascertain and to conceive the
causes of emotions, and to regulate, according to a .certain harmony,
the consecutive physiological movements. Passion, therefore, resides
in a something that is neither the brain, nor the nerves, nor the mus-
cles ; a something which perceives, and joys, and suffers, and which
moves the entix'e body m unison with its own feelings. Now, this
conscious faculty, this faculty of perceiving causes in no wise mechani-
cal, is the soul. The more deeply we study the physiology of the pas-
sions, the more are we convinced that the agitation of the nervous and
motor energies is but the external manifestation of deeper causes,
which we denominate psychic. So, too, the more we study into mat-
ter, the better we see that it is only an external form, a vesture that
clothes the activity of an invisible principle. Thus does Science ever
lead us back to that eternal and mysterious thing, force, and, beyond
force, to spirit. — Revue des Deux Mondes.

THE GOOSE QUESTION. 565

OUE AI^CESTOES ON THE GOOSE QUESTION.

LET us consider the views entertained by our ancestors for centu-
ries on the goose question : we may gather lessons from it that
will be very applicable to-day. They believed for five hundred years
that a cei-tain kind of goose was of vegetable origin, and grew on trees.
The story is ancient and obscure, and much ingenuity has been spent
in explaining it. Without attempting to reconcile its contradictions,
or account for its origin, we will only here give a brief outline of the
tradition.

Belonging to that division of the animal kingdom known as articu-
lates or jointed animals, there is a class called crustaceans, from the
crust-like shell with which the body and legs are covered, and of which
lobsters, crabs, and shrimj)S, are examples. Among these is a group
known as " Cirripedia," from the cirri, or curls of hair, in which their
long and slender feet terminate. They are inclosed in a more or less
conical shell, and some of them are pedunculated ; that is, their main
body hangs from a stalk, pedicle, or peduncle, of varying length, which
permits of some degree of motion. They attach themselves to floating
objects, as plank, worm-eaten fragments of wreck, ships' sides, and
sometimes to the cuticle of the whale. These creatures are more
familiarly known as barnacles, and Fig. 1 represents a pendent group
of common ship-barnacles, which are described as having " a flesh-
colored, translucent, wrinkled stem, possibly more than a foot long,
and from this stem there dangles a triangiilar, pearly-shelled fish, the
valves of which, bordered with the most lovely orange, from time to
time open and disclose several pairs of curling feelers." The soft part
within this shell, in old times, used to be mistaken for a little bird.

There is in England a well-known species of goose called the
barnacle-goose. " It is a winter migrant on the east coast ; its
summer home, where it breeds, being the high latitudes of Northern
Europe. It is a very handsome species, a vegetable-feeder, and excel-
lent eating." Now, it would seem to be a very simple matter to end
the story by saying that it was long believed that barnacle-geese had
their origin in the barnacle-shells we have just referred to, but the
case is more complex ; the shells bearing the geese were believed to
grow on trees. This belief, that the barnacle-shell is transformed into
the barnacle-goose, was well established, as early as the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries, and was referred to and contradicted by both
Albertus Magnus and by Roger Bacon. That the opinion was held
as a firm reality is sufficiently proved by the fact that barnacle-geese
Avere allowed to be eaten during Lent, under the idea that they were
not fowl, but fish — an elastic zoology that served to widen ecclesiasti-
cal dietetics, although to the scandal of the more strict, as the practice

566

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

was inveighed against with great unction by Sir Giraldus Cambrensis,
who treated the subject, in the twelfth century, in his "Topographia
Hibernia?." Michel Drayton refers to it, in his " Polyolbion : "

" The barnacles with them, -u-hicli, wheresoe'er they breed —
On trees or rotten ships— yet to my fens for feed
Continually they come, and chief abode do make,
And very hardly forced my plenty to forsake."'

LEPAS AXATIFEEA— COIEMON SHIP-BaKNACLES.

Baptista Porta refers to it, about the year 1500, and Count Meyer
devoted a volume to it — " Yolucris Arborea." The earliest jiublished
statement, hy an eye-witness, is contained in the " Cosmograph and
Description of Albion," of Hector Boece, while the earliest pictorial
illustration of the goose-tree, and its animal fruiting, is contained in
the " Cosmographia Universalis " of Sebastian Muuster, printed at
Basel, 1572.

In the middle of the sixteenth century, Turner, the English orni-
thologist, wrote as follows : " Nobody has ever seen the nest or egg
of the barnacle ; nor is this marvelous, inasmuch as it is without par-
ents, and is spontaneously generated in the following manner : When,
at a certain time, an old ship, a plank, or a pine mast rots in the sea,
something like fungus at first breaks out thereupon, which at length puts
on the manifest form of birds. Afterward, these are clothed with
feathers, and at last become living and flying fowl. Should this ap-

THE GOOSE QUESTION.

567

pear to any one to be febulous, we might adduce the testimony not
onl^ of the whole people who dwell on the coasts of England, Ireland,
and Scotland, but also that of the illustrious historiographer Gyraldus,
who has written so eloquently of the history of Ireland, that the bar-
nacles are produced in no other way. But since it is not very safe to
trust to popular reports, and as I was, considering the singularity of

Toe Goose-Tree.
' They Bpawi\e, as it were, in March and Aprill ; the Geese are found in Maie and June, and
come to fulnesee of feathers in the moneth after. And thus haumg, throusrh God s at^bist-
ance, discoursed somewhat at lar^e of Grasses, Herbes, Shrubs, Trees, Mosses, and certaiue
excrescences of the earth, with other things moe incident to the Historic thereof, we con-
clude and ende our present volume, with this woonder of England. For which God 8 u.inie
be eucr honoured and praised." — (Gerarde, "Herball," 1633.)

the thing, rather skeptical even with respect to tlie testimony of Gy-
raldus— while I was thinking over the subject — I consulted Octavian,
an Irish clergyman, whose strict integrity gave me the utmost confi-
dence in him, as to whether he considered Gyraldus worthy to be
trusted in what he had written. This clergyman then professed him-
self ready to take his oath upon the Gospels, that what Gyraldus had

568 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

recorded of tlie generation of this bii'd was most true ; for he himself
had seen with his eyes, and also handled those half-formed birds ; and
he said further that, if I remained a couple of months longer in Lon-
don, he would have some sent to me." — (Tuexee's " Avium Prsecip.
Hist.," art. " Ansr.")

But the writer to whom we are most indebted for authentic infor-
mation upon this interesting subect is Gerarde, the father of English
botany, and author of the '• Herbal," a ponderous work of 1,500 pages,
from which the cut Fig. 2 is taken. He sr^s : " What our eyes have
seen, and hands have touched, we shall declare. There is a small
island in Lancashire, called the Pile of Flounders, wherein are found
broken pieces of old and bruised ships, some whereof have been cast
thither by shipwreck, and also the trunks and bodies, with the branches,
of old and rotten trees, cast up there likewise ; whereon is found a
certain spume, or froth, that in time breedeth unto certain shells, in
shape like those of the mussel, but sharper pointed, and of a whitish
color, wherein is contained a thing in form like a lace of silk finely
woven, as it were, together, of a whitish color ; one end whereof is
fastened unto the inside of the shell, even as the fish of oysters and
mussels are ; the other end is made fast unto the belly of a rude mass
or lump, which in time cometh to the shape and form of a bird. When
it is perfectly formed the shell gapeth wide open, and the first thing
that appeareth is the aforesaid lace or string ; next come the legs of
the bird hanging out, and as it groweth greater it openeth the shell
by degrees, till at length it has all come forth, and hangeth only by
the bill. In short space after it cometh to full maturity, and falleth
into the sea, where it gathereth feathers, and groweth to a fowl bigger
than a mallard and lesser than a goose, having black legs, and bill
or beak, and feathers black and white, spotted in such manner as our
magpie, called in some places pie-annet, which the people of Lanca-
shire call by no other name than tree-goose ; which place aforesaid,
and of all those places adjoining, do so much abound therewith, that
one of the best is bought for threepence. For the truth thereof, if any
doubt, may it please them to repair to me, and I shall satisfy them by
the testimony of good witnesses."

Again says Gerarde : " The historie whereof to set foorth accord-
ing to the woorthiness and raritie thereof, woulde not onely require a
large and peculiar volume, but also a deeper search into the bowels
of Xature than my intended purpose wil suffer me to wade into, my
insufficiencie also considered, leaving the historie thereof rough-hewen
unto some excellent men, learned in the secrets of Nature, to be both
fined and refined ; in the mean space take it as it falleth out, the naked
and bare truth, though unpolished."

When the Royal Society of England had been established fifteen
years, this fable was accepted, and described in the philosophic trans-
actions, in 1677, by Sir Robert Murray, who says : " Being on the

ALTERNATIONS IN DISEASES. 569

island of Uist (East) I saw lying upon the sliore a cut of a large fir-
tree, about two and half feet in diameter, and nine or ten feet long,
which had lain so long out of the water that it was very dry, and most
of the shells that had formerly covered it were worn or rubbed oflT,
Only on the parts that lay next the ground there still hung multitudes
of little shells. This barnacle-shell is thin about the edges, and about
half as thick as broad. Evei-y one of the shells has some cross-seams
or sections, which, as I remember, divide it into five jjarts. These
parts are fastened one to another with such a film as mussel-shells
have. These shells are hung at the tree by a neck, longer than the
shell, of a kind of filmy substance, round and hollow, and curved not
unlike the windpipe of a chicken, spreading out broader to where it is
fastened to the ti-ee, from which it seems to draw and convey the mat-
ter which serves for the growth and vegetation of the shell and little
bird within it. In every shell that I opened I found a perfect sea-
fowl : the little bill, like that of a goose, the eyes marked, the head,
neck, breast, wings, tail, and feet formed ; the feathers everywhere
perfectly shaped, and blackish-colored ; and the feet like those of other
water-fowl, to my best remembrance."

Many conjectures have been offered as to the origin of this strange
myth, and Max Mliller suggests the hypothesis that it came from the
early misapplication of terms. He remarks : " No man would have
suspected Linnaeus of having shared the vulgar error, nevertheless he
retained the name Atiatifera, or duck-bearing, as given to the shell,
and that of Bernicula, as given to the goose." •

ALTEENATIONS IN THE INTENSITY OF DISEASES.

FROM THE FRENCH OF ALPHONSE DE CANDOLLE.
TRANSLATED BY H. H. W.

THE diminution of the efficacy of vaccination, as a preservative
fi-om the small-pox, has been the subject, at first of incredulity,
and afterward of surprise, to the medical world, and even to the non-
professional public. The causes of this change have been sought in
the nature of the vaccine matter. But it has not been demonstrated
that taking the matter anew from the cow is to restore the primitive
efficacy of the remedy.

Without wishing to call in question with the profession the chances
of discovering an explanation, drawn from the domain of medical and
physiological facts which they occupy, I desire to point out a conse-
quence of the fundamental law of heredity, as applied to the phe-
nomenon in question. In order to understand the subject in its true

570

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

aspects, it will be well, in the first place, to recall a fact iu relation
to epidemics.

Medical history proves, on the subject of epidemic and contagious
maladies, a marked fatality at the time of their first appearance, fol-
lowed by slowly-decreasing violence from generation to generation.
In our own memory the epidemic visits of cholera have diminished in
frequency and intensity within a short period of time. Previously to
our day, syphilis and varioloid, two infective diseases, difiering in
their nature, and in their modes of transmission, had presented the
same phenomenon — Extreme intensity at the beginning, diminution
from period to period.

If this diminution belonged to the nature of the maladies, popula-
tions infected for the first time in the nineteenth century should have
suffered less than those infected in previous centuries. But this is not
what has occurred. When a savage population has recently been
visited, for the first time, by the infection of small-pox, it has sufifered
as much as the Europeans at the beginning of the malady in Europe,
It is the fact of invading a new field which renders epidemics de-
structive. Upon a little reflection, the reason of this is easy to com-
prehend.

When an epidemic falls upon a population for the first time, the
greater part of the individuals disposed to receive the disease are at-
tacked. They die in great numbers. Subsequent births are the ofi"-
spring of persons who did not contract the disease, or, at the least,
who contracted, yet survived it ; that is to say, of persons better con-
stituted than others to resist the disease. By virtue of the ordinaiy
resemblance of children to their parents, the new generation will be
less disposed to sufier from the epidemic. There will be then a dimi-
nution of the violence of the disease, or a temporary disappearance.
For the most part I presume a diminution, because that the resem-
blance of children to their grandparents (which is called atavism) is
not very rare, and tends to reproduce certain forms or physiological
conditions in families. At the end of two or three generations, that
special cause for the return of the epidemic is less felt, the resem-
blance to a great-grandfather, or ancestor still moi'e removed, being
more rare than the resemblance to a grandfather. But then the bulk
of the population will no more have been exposed, by itself, or by its
fathers and mothers, to the malady in question, or will have been but
slightly exposed. Thus is constituted anew, by the very purity of the
disease, a proportion of individuals who have not been submitted to
the proof of the infection, or of wliom the parents have not been sub-
mitted to the test ; a proportion on whom the malady will be severe,
and among whom the law of selection will recommence to operate.

The law of events {force des choses) introduces then a variation in
the intensity of every disease, except that it does not act upon dis-
eases of which people rarely die, or which fall principally upon the

ALTERNATIONS IN DISEASES. 571

aged. The more fatal a disease among youth, the quicker is the work
of the law of selection, and the more prompt the diminution of the
malady. If a first invasion, for instance, destroys a moiety of the
population below marriageable age, the survivors should be very
little liable, in their physical or physiological conditions, to the dis-
ease, and the children born to them will profit by their immunity. If
the disease is less fatal, the purification will be less. We thus dis-
cover, I do not say the cause, but a cause why pestilences and other
very serious maladies attack populations at intervals, and are, as it is
said, epidemic ; while certain diseases less serious, even among mala-
dies which attack youth, rule from year to year in a mode more con-
tinuous.

Such are the clear laws — one might add the rigid laws — which rule
in diseases, to produce aggravation or diminution, independently of
all these natural circumstances. Without doubt there may be other
circumstances, physical or physiological, and physicians may discover
preventive or curative means which exert influence lapon them. But
the incessant efiect of heredity, and of the law of selection, exists, not-
withstanding ; and, when other influences cannot be demonstrated, we
may be assured that heredity and selection perform their pait.

We now see that the eflicacy of preventive means, such as vaccina-
tion, should also vary. When Jenner discovered the utility of vac-
cination, the small-pox had in a slight degree lost, in Europe, its
primitive intensity. Tlie peojjle who then existed proceeded from
many generations which could, thanks to the process of selection, pass-
ably resist the epidemic. Individuals were not so readily afiected as
at the origin of the disease, or, if they had the disease, they succumbed
to it in a smaller proportion ; or, yet again, those who survived
rarely contracted the disease a second time. It was supposed that
those who had the disease by inoculation were sheltered from a repe-
tition, and the dangerous practice of inoculation would not have con-
tinued, but for this opinion. Vaccination, then, came at an epoch
when the European population found itself in ameliorated conditions
with regard to epidemic small-pox. Practised with ardor, it had the
effect to render small-pox very rare. But, precisely because it had
become rare in the generation which immediately succeeded Jenner,
in the generation which issued from that was found a majority com-
posed of persons who had not been exposed to the epidemic. Among
them must have been some persons who naturally, or by atavism,
were disposed to take the infection. From that cause arose a certain
renewed sensitiveness {recrudescence), which vaccination could less
easily control.

In other words, after two or three vaccinated generations, the
Eux'opcan population having been slightly exposed to the small-pox,
found itself approximating to the conditions of a population in which
the disease appears for the first time. The attack is not altogether so

572 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

violent, but the return is evident. All means of resisting it, which
would have sufficed fifty years since, have become less efficacious.

To sum all in general terms : heredity and selection must produce
an alternation of intensity and relief in diseases. That variation must
be more marked, when the disease in which it takes place is more
fatal, and especially when it attacks youth. Curative or preventive
means, which are sufficient in periods of light visitation, lose a portion
of their efficacy at the aggravated periods. And this rule applies par-
ticularly to the use of vaccine as a preventive of small-pox.

The works of Dai'win being now familiar to physicians, it is prob-
able that many among them have considered the effect of the law of
selection upon the vai'iation of intensity in maladies. I doubt, how-
ever, whether they have given attention to the consequences relative
to vaccination. It is this which has led me to bring within the range
of medical investigation an application (perhaps novel) of the ideas
of the celebrated English naturalist.

MODER]Sr OPTICS AXD PAINTIXG.

Br 0. N. EOOD,

PEOFESSOR OF PHTSIC3 VS COLUilBIA COLLEGE.

LET us now pass to the examination of a theory which was
proposed in 1807 by the now justly-celebrated Thomas Young
who seems to have been gifted with a scientific insight much too
keen for the age in which he lived. His views being opposed to the
common notions of the day, commanded but little attention, and it
was reserved for Helmholtz, almost half a century later, to call atten-
tion to this nearly-forgotten theory, and to show that it accounted
for all tliC' ascertained facts in a most satisfactory manner. In this
work he has been ably seconded by Maxwell, and more lately by the
German physicist J. J. Miiller, who with improved apparatus care-
fully repeated Helmholtz's original experiments, and corrected them
in some minor details.

According to our new theory, then, there are in the retina of the
eye, where the pictures of external objects fall, three sets of nerves,
adapted for the production of three separate, distinct sensations, which
we call red, green, and violet. When, owing to any cause whatever,
one of these sets of nerves is excited into action, the result is the
corresponding sensation ; if, for example, we act upon the last set by
electricity, pressure, or by the luminous waves, the result will be the
sensation of seeing violet light, even though not a ray of light of any

MODERN OPTICS AND PAINTING.

S7Z

kind has actually reached the eye. I think you will admit that the
theory is modest in demanding only three sets of nerves, for in the
ear, as it seems, there are three thousand nerve-fibrils for the percep-
tion of the separate notes. In the eye it would not have been practi-
cable to have employed a sej^arate nerve-fibril for each difierent tint,
for a reason which a moment's thought will render manifest.

But to resume : according to our theory, the first set of nerves re-
sponds powerfully to the action of the longer waves, or to that kind
of light which we call red ; the second set is arranged for waves of
medium length, it is strongly set in action by what we call green
light ; and, finally, the third set is stimulated into action by the short-
est waves, or by violet light. Let us for the present call them the
red, gi-een, and violet nerves. Tliis diagram shows their relation to
the colors of the spectrum [see Fig. 1). As I have just intimated,

RED

ORANGE

YELLOW

GREEN

BLUE

INDIGO

VIOLET

these nerves can be set into action by electricity or pressure, and other
causes besides light. Taking this into consideration, the next point
in the theory will not seem so singular to you : it is, that each set of
nerves is capable of being acted on, to a lesser extent, by waves of
light not properly belonging to it; so, for example, the set adapted
for green light can, to some extent, be stimulated by red light. In a
case like this, the seysation will still remain that which we call green,
though actually produced by red light. The theory demands this,
and the results of experiments on persons who are color-blind to red
light are in accordance with it, and presently I hope to give some ex-
perimental illustrations of it. The red and violet nerves also have
this property, and can be partially set into action by light which does
not belong to them, but in each case the sensation remains the one
that properly appertains to them.

The last point of the theory is, that, when by any cause all three
sets of nerves are excited into action with about the same intensity,
the resulting sensation is that which we call white.

We are now in a condition to take up the explanation of the
sensations which we call yellow, orange, and blue. Let us suppose
for a moment that the eye is acted upon by waves of light shorter

57+

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

than those that produce the sensation of red, but longer than those
that give us that of green ; referring to Fig. 1, we see that no espe-
cial set of nerves has been provided for this case, but a moment's reflec-
tion will suggest that these intermediate waves, according to our the-
ory, ought to set into moderate action both the red and green nerves,
that the stimulation of the former should predominate as the length
of our intei-mediate waves is made longer ; the green set, on the other
hand, coming more into play as it is shortened. This accounts, then,
for the mode in which waves of a certain length, or light of a certain
kind, gives us the sensation of yellow or orange. The light may be
simple, and of only one kind, but it produces a compound sensation,
made up of the two simple sensations, red and green. From all this
it follows that, on the other hand, if we actually present to the same
eye mixtures of red and green light, the sensations of yellow or
orange ought, according to our theory, to be produced. This is a
matter that we can easily test by experiment. With the same appa-
ratus used a moment ago for combining blue and yellow light, I
throw upon the screen a large square of red light, and superimpose on
it one of green, and, as you see, the result is a fair yellow ; on redu-
cing the brightness of the green component, the yellow passes into
orange (Fig. 2). I call your attention, in passing, to the circumstance

PED

L-

YELLOW

GREEN

that, according to the old theory, the result ought not to have been
yellow, but rather an approach to white, all the colors, according to
its doctnnes, being present. Restoring the green squares to their
original brightness, and reducing the intensity of the red Hglit, we
easily obtain a greenish yellow, completing thus this series of tints.

And now to account for the blue : pure blue light has a wave-
length intermediate between that of green and violet light, and hence
sets both the green and violet nerves into action, and, thoiigh the
light itself may be simple, it produces a compound sensation which
we call blue. Corresponding to this, I ought to be able to reproduce
on the screen blue light by mixing together green and violet light.
The experiment is now arranged, and, as you see, we actually do ob-
tain a quite good blue in this way, and can cause it to run through all

MODERN OPTICS AND PAINTING.

S7S

the changes from greenish bhie to violet blue, by altering the inten-
sity of the original components (Fig. 3).

It is easy for us now to understand why, in what I some time ago
called our fundamental experiment, yellow and blue light, when min-
gled, gave not green, but white light; the yellow light stimulated into
action the red and green nerves, the blue light the green and violet
ones ; thus, all three sets of nerves being called into play, the result
was of course the sensation of white.

GREEN

BLUE

V

OLET

As it will be desirable hereafter to mingle light by the method
of revolving disks, it may be well at this point to repeat our funda-
mental experiment after this fashion, so as to be assured of the cor-
rectness of this mode of experimenting. I have placed in front of
the lantern a small circular card-board disk, provided with openings
over which are fastened pieces of yellow and blue glass (Fig. 4) ; its

^^^

magnified image now covers pretty much the whole screen, and, on
causing it to revolve, the colors as you see vanish, and we have in
their place a broad circular band of white light (Fig. 5). With a con-
cave mirror, I throw beside it on the screen a direct beam of white
light from the lantern, and, if there is any difference, it is in the
light from the disk being a little whiter than that of the lantern.
The method with revolving disks gives, then, the same result with
the more direct one formerly applied, and we can now very conven-
iently use it for a final test of the new and old theories. Here is

576

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

a disk cut like the last with open spaces, and armed with red, yel-
low, and blue glasses. You can predict the result beforehand; it
must be white light with added red light — and, as you see, we act-
ually do obtain a broad circular band of red light. Replacing this
disk by one provided with glasses capable of transmitting red, green,

and violet light, we find that their mixture actually gives us white
light. In all these experiments we have been content with the col-
ored light furnished by stained glasses, but Helmholtz has pushed
the investigation much further, and has obtained corresponding re-
sults by the use of the pure colored rays of the spectrum.

I called your attention some time ago to the typical mode of
expressing the old theory by three intersecting circles of red, yellow,
and blue ; we have now again on the screen three intersecting cir-
cles ; the colors are red, green, and violet, with white at the centre

(Fig. 6). It expresses in a condensed form some of the main points
of the theory of Young and Helmholtz, and gives us at the same
time some of the chief laws of Nature's palette, showing, in a kind
of short-hand way, the changes which the tints of surfaces undergo

MODERN OPTICS AND PAINTING. S77

when exposed to a double illumination, or when illuminated by light
having a hue different from that of the surface itself Applications
of it will be given at a later stage.

Before leaving this part of the subject, I wish to show a very sim-
ple apparatus, with which you can easily repeat for yourselves many
of the experiments made to-night, as well as add greatly to their num-
ber. It consists merely of a plate of window-glass, of good quality,
set up on edge, and fastened on a blackened board (Fig. T). If the

eye is placed at e, light will come to it directly from the blue square
of paper, J?, but also at the same time light will reach it from the yel-
low square of paper, T; and these two masses of colored light, being
mingled on the retina of the eye, will produce the same etFects which
I have just exhibited to you with much more costly apparatus. You
will also find that you can vary the brightness of either of your squares
by adjusting them at a greater or less distance from the plate of glass.
When they are near to it, the yellow will predominate ; the blue, when
they are farther fi'om it. Great use was made by Helmholtz of this
contrivance in his experiments on this subject, and you will easily be
able to prove for yourselves that the red light from paper painted
with vermilion, when combined with the green light from the water-
colored pigment known as " emerald-green," gives a yellowish or orange
tint, according as the apparatus is arranged. Chrome-yellow (the
pale variety) and ultramarine-blue give an excellent white. It is
somewhat difficult to obtain a good representative of violet from
among the colors in use by artists. I find that some samples of the
dyeing material known as " Hofi'mann's violet BB " answer better
than any of the ordinary pigments. If a deep tint of its alcoholic so-
lution be spread over paper, and combined in the instrument with
emerald-green, a blue, greenish-blue, or violet-blue, can be readily
produced. It is evident that a multitude of experiments of this char-
acter can be made, the number of colors united at one time being
limited to two. For certain purposes I have modified the apparatus
so that three tints can be combined. A second plate of glass is added
at P, Fig. 8 ; this allows the compound beam of light from the first

YOL. IV. — 37

57

THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

plate to pass, but in addition it reflects to the eye a beam of light from
a third slip of colored paper at Y ; and, by revolving the second glass
plate slightly, the intensity of the third beam is easily regulated.
This arrangement can be used to produce white light, by the mixture
of three colors, for example, vermilion, emerald-green, and the violet
just mentioned.

Let us pass, in the next place, to the consideration of another class
of facts, which have an important bearing on our subject. If you illu-
minate some such object as a sheet of paper with a very moderate
light, then, upon doubling the amount of light falling on it, it is possi-
ble that the paper, in the second case, may appear to you twice as
bright as it did at first. But, if this process be for some time con-
tinued, you will soon come to a point where doubling the actual illu-
mination produces very little effect, and finally a stage will be reached
where a very great increase of actual illumination produces no addi-
tional effect on the eye at all, your paper looking no brighter than in a
much feebler light. Let me make an experiment, to at least partially
illustrate this : We have now upon the screen four large squares of
white light, and they are, as you see, all of equal brightness. But, by
turning this Iceland-spar prism, I sujierimpose one of the squares upon
its neighbor ; the central square now seems rather brighter than its
companions, but I think no one in this room would suspect that its
actual illumination was twice as great as that of the others. To take a
still more striking example out of your own experience: you have
often noticed the reflection of the gas-flames in the streets against the
four panes of glass used to protect them, and have seen that the real
flame looks brighter than the reflected one ; but who would suppose
that its actual luminosity was more than eleven times greater than
that of its companion ? In point of fact, sensation does not, for the
most part, increase as rapidly as the actual intensity of the light ex-
citing it, and a point can finally be reached where sensation does not
increase at all, even though the actual brightness of the light is greatly
multiplied. Our nervous organization is, in this direction, limited and
finite, just as it is in all others.

The next matter to which your attention is called is really allied

MODERN OPTICS AND PAINTING.

579

to the preceding, though, at first sight, the connection is not very-
evident. Any color, if very luminous, seems paler than it really
is. This simple piece of apparatus, where a bat-wing gas-flame is
placed between a sheet of card-board and a plate of stained glass,
will serve for experimental demonstration. The glass is red, and the
paper seen through it appears of a deep-red hue, but the gas-flame
itself, being much more luminous than the paper, does not look red at
all ; its tint is orange (Fig. 9). Replacing the red glass by green,

we have the paper appearing with a deep-green hue, while the flame
seems greenish-yellow. Let us see if we can explain these curious
changes of tint by Young's theory. The red glass used in the first
experiment transmits to the eye only red light, or light capable of
stimulating mainly the red nerves ; but, if we increase its intensity
beyond a certain point, its action on the red nerves begins to flag,
and we soon have a state of things where a further increase of the
red light produces no effect at all on the red nerves, they being
already stimulated up to the maximum point. But, according to our
theory, this red light has all along been acting, to some extent, on
the green, and to a less extent on the violet nerves ; and, as we add
to its intensity, it acts still more powerfully on them, so that espe-
cially the green nerves come more and more into play, and a green is
added to the original red sensations ; the result, of course, is the sen-
sation of orange.

The explanation of the tint obtained in the other experiment is
quite similar. The green nerves are first stimulated up to their maxi-
mum point by green light of a certain strength, a further increase
of its intensity brings into play the other two sets of nerves, particu-
larly the red, and the tint quite naturally becomes greenish-yellow.
You remember that, in a previous experiment, we found that a mix-
ture of much green with a little red light gave a greenish-yellow.
The nerves for violet light always lag behind the others, as will after-
ward be shown by a particular experiment.

The general effect, then, of a very bright illumination on natural
objects is to cause their colors to appear paler than they otherwise

58o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

would. This is, indeed, to the painter, a precious resource, for repre-
senting, in his pictures, high degrees of luminosity, and is often em-
ployed with most happy effect. According to the careful experiments
by Aubert, white j^aper is only fifty-seven times lighter than black
paper, and the painter is in the predicament of being obliged to repre-
sent the vast range of natural illumination within these very narrow
limits ; hence the desirability of employing an artifice of this kind to
overcome a difficulty which, if fairly met, would prove insuperable.

The considerations that I have just presented explain to us, quite
readily, fcie curious circumstance that light of any color, if very bright,
is at last accepted by the eye for white, all three sets of nerves finally
reaching, in the order indicated, their point of maximum stimulation.
You can repeat for yourselves a simple experiment of Helmholtz's, in
this connection: hold before the eyes, for some little time, a plate of
stained glass ; the color may be red, yellow, blue, or green ; after a
while you will come to consider the brightest objects in your field of
view white; as, for example, a gas-flame, the sky, or white paper.
In point of fact, to be quite frank, white is only a relative sensation,
and, if any thing like equality of stimulation is produced in the three
sets of nerves, we finally accept the tint for white. I have especially
arranged an experiment to illustrate this point : We have now upon the
screen two large squares of light ; one is deep red, the other green : I
remove from the lantern a large plate of green glass ; the red square
has retained its color, and is now brighter, but the other square has
become white or almost v^'hite. On removing the red glass, the red
square on the screen is replaced by a white one, and we now for the
first time see that its companion, which a moment ago we were ready
to take for white, has a decidedly green hue ; in fact, all the while the
light producing it has been passing through a plate of pale-green glass,
which was behind the others. Let me take away this plate, and now
at last we have both our squares illuminated with pure white light. Is
this light really white ? ISTot at all ; it has been tinged decidedly yel-
low, by passing through a pale-yellow glass, which has been concealed
in the apparatus all the time as a reserve, and, on removing this glass,
we find that the light we were ready to accept for white looks yellow,
when compared with the purer light of the lantern. Finally, if we
could throw a sample of daylight on the screen, we should again see
that the light of the lantern itself is not white, but yellowish. White
is evidently only a relative sensation.

In some of the preceding experiments it has been seen that, as we
increase the actual brightness of any colored light, red for example, so
does the sensation produced also increase, but usually at a slower rate.
Now, it happens that some of the sensations increase more rapidly
than others ; for example, the sensation for red or yellow increases

ELECTRIC SIGNALS ON ENGLISH RAILROADS. 581

more rapidly than that for blue or violet. In fact, as I said some time
ago, the violet nerves always lag behind. From this it happens that,
if we place side by side a quantity of blue and red light, arranging
matters meanwhile so that they appear to the eye to be of equal bright-
ness, then, upon adding considerably but equally to their actual lumi-
nosity, it will turn out that the red light will quite outstrip in apparent
brilliancy its rival. We have now two such squares of red and blue,
side by side on the screen, and it is difficult to say which is the
brighter ; but, when I greatly increase their illumination, it becomes
evident that the blue one has been beaten ; or, better still, wlien I re-
verse the experiment, starting with red and blue squares, of equal and
considerable brilliancy, then, upon turning down the light of the lan-
tern, and rendering them both dark, the blue square remains visible
after its red companion has vanished. As another example, I may
mention the blue color of the sky, which still continues plainly percep-
tible at night, when the illumination is so feeble that other colors have
disappeared. Dove has pointed out that, in picture-galleries, as the
light of day fades out, the blue colors in draperies and skies retain
their power longer than the reds and yellows.

It is owing to this circumstance that, in actual landscapes, seen
under the comparatively feeble light of the moon, there is a prevailing
tendency to blueness. This also explains the circumstance that a
landscape, illuminated by bright white clouds, appears more yellow in
general hue than when the clouds are not bright, though still retain-
ing their whiteness, the strong white light stimulating more power-
fully the sets of nerves concerned in the production of yellow. I think
we all know that, on dark, dull days, there seems to be a tendency to
blueness in the coloring, even though we may not have paid much
attention to the reverse phenomenon. All this is prettily illustrated
by a very simple experiment of Helmholtz's, who noticed that the im-
pression of a bright day was produced by merely holding a pale-yel-
low glass before his eyes, the tint of the glass being so faint as hardly
to disturb the natural colors of the objects ; the use of a very pale-
blue glass seemed, on the other hand, to darken up the landscape, as
though a cloud were passing over the scene.

ELECTRIC SIGNALING ON ENGLISH EAILROADS.

By C. E. PASCOE.

I TAKE it for granted that most Americans who have traveled in
England know of, if they don't actually know, Clapham Junction.
It is a marvelous place is that Clapham Junction — a half-dozen or
more naked-looking gi-aveled platfoi-ms, destitute of almost every con-

582 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

venieuce in the shape of waiting and refreshment rooms, forming alto-
gether one of the most important, not to say intricate, railway-depots
in the United Kingdom. One arrives at a platform by a train belong-
ing to one company going in one direction, and by tnrning right
about, or walking three yards on the same platform, one may seciire a
seat in another train belonging to an entirely different company going
no one knows whither. Once give way, or lose your head at this par-
ticular junction, and you may find yourself, should you happen to be
wanting to go to the west of England, suddenly whirled away to the
south, and vice versa. Even your traveling Londoner has an instinc-
tive dread of " the Junction," as he familiarly terms it. Should you
ever take up that indispensable requisite of English traveling, a Brad-
shaw, and stumble upon Clapham Junction in the list of stations your
train is timed to stop at, go no farther. Don't tempt Fate. Rather
court resignation. Throw yourself upon the cushions of your car-
riage, pitch Bradshaw out of the window, and in a moment of leisure
work out this sum: If upon the average eight hundred trains (to say
nothing of specials, excursions, and stray locomotives) pass through
Clapham Junction in the course of twenty-four hours, allowing just
about two minutes' interval of time between train A going out and
train B coming in, what should be the chances of train B dashing into
tlie tail of train A ?

So remote as scarcely to be thought of, the reason being that
the "block" system is in full force. What is this " block " system ?
To endeavor to answer that inquiry is the very object of this article.

To understand thoroughly what railway traveling in England
really means, one should bear in mind a few facts now given for the
purposes of this article, in the order of their importance.

At the beginning of last year there were in the United Kingdom
about 15,500 miles of railway, distributed as follows: England and
Wales, 11,000 miles; Scotland, 2,500 miles; Ireland, 2,000 miles; and
290 companies shared these miles of railroad between them. The total
number of depots, or stations, as they are termed in England, includ-
ing junctions and sidings, is about 10,000 for the whole kingdom; of
these 6,000 are passenger-stations, giving approximately one station
to about every two miles of railway, but not in reality, because
there are no less than 150 stations in London and the suburbs alone.
As a matter of course the great centre of the railway system of the
L^nited Kingdom is London. Every company which can by any pos-
sible means find a way to the capital does so, and strives to provide
the route which will be most attractive to the public. To do this the
majority of the companies must, of necessity, make use of the lines of
the great companies having their termini in London. Only imagine
the number of branch lines, junctions, and sidings, this must involve ;
what "shunting" of trains and adjusting of points there must be;
what an efficient system of signaling must be required ; what care,

ELECTRIC SIGNALS ON ENGLISH RAILROADS. 583

steadiness, and application to work must be demanded of tlie men Avho
look after the signals and points at the branch lines, junctions, and
sidings. Take the Great Westei-n line of England, for instance, with
its 1,387 miles of road. Besides its own system, it falls in with the
principal systems of the Bristol and Exeter, South Devon, North Wales,
and ever so many more minor systems for the traffic of which it has
in a measure, of course, to provide as well as for its own. Over all
these lines trains ai*e traveling daily at express speed, their ulti-
mate destination being London. Now, express speed in England
means an average rate of 47f miles an hour, a pace which is probably
greater by ten miles than that attained on any other railroads in the
world. Indeed, on the Great "Western and Great Northern lines even
this rate of traveling is exceeded. On the first-mentioned system a
train runs 11^ miles (from London to Swindon) without stopping, in
87 minutes, giving a uniform pace of 53^ miles an hour: on the Great
Northern a train completes the journey from London to Peterborough
(76^ miles) in 90 minutes. Just one little error on the part of the
signal man, one omission to adjust the points on the part of his mate,
and down swoops the express on to the wrong line, and the result is an
appalling catastrophe such as happened at Wigan the other day.

In the above little sum, which I suggested to be worked out, I
mentioned that about 800 trains passed through Clapham Junction
regularly every day. You take your stand upon the platform. Whish-
h-h — Bang — Rattle — a train has passed you. Take out your watch,
mark the second-hand going round, and before it gets to 60 — Whish-
h-h — Bang — Plunge — a second train has rushed out into the open, to
catch the first one up. But it can't. The line is blocked by the sharp-
sighted man in the signal-box yonder, who has no fear even if a train
per minute were to work through. He has nothing to do with time.
His duties are to maintain a certain and invariable interval of space
between two trains, and he does it. How does he do it ? If the reader
will be good enough to follow me into the signal-box, he shall see.

Not much of a place certainly. On the whole rather like a second-
rate sea-shore shanty, stuck upon four posts, so placed it seems that
every train going into the station, and every train coming out from it,
shall rush full tilt against the box and smash it and its occupants to
atoms. In reality, the signal-box is so situated to command for a cer-
tain distance a full view of one line just where it joins to another.
Interiorly our box is not unlike an unfurnished private box at a
theatre, into which some of the machinist's properties have been put
by mistake. Regarding a printed notice on the wall that strangers
are particularly requested not to distract the attention of the signal-
man from his duties, we take a look round, and the general im-
pression to be got from a cursory glance is that it must be rather
jolly to be a signal-man. Every thing looks so clean and neat ; there
is plenty of excitement to be had in watching the trains from the win-

584 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

dow ; the work does not appear to be very laborious, and what there
is of it (which, truth to tell, is a great deal) would seem to be espe-
cially interesting and not unconnected with the gaining a full and ac-
curate knowledge of the working of the electric telegraph. On the
left-hand wall of the box as you enter, and on a level with the eye, are
a number of little ebony handles, technically known as " keys," but
variously termed in English railroad parlance " piston-keys " or
" plungers." They are on the principle of the little " pea " bell fitted
to the bedrooms of most large American hotels, and communicate
telegraphically between the stations — " up " and " down." Over each
of these " plungers " is an electric bell, which rings to give notice of
the approach and departure of a train, its nature — that is, whether it
is a passenger or goods, express or special — and to which company it
belongs, when two or moi'e companies have running powers over the
same line. The custom universally adopted by English railroad com-
panies to distinguish trains, and I believe it is the case with our own,
too, in addition to the particular disks and lights carried upon the
buffer-plank of the locomotive, is to blow the whistle a certain number
of times when approaching a junction or station. The same system is
adopted with the electric signals in the signal-box, only, in place of
blowing the whistle, a bell is sounded. Every depression of the
" plunger " transmits a current of electricity to the other station " up "
or " down," as the case may be, which there sounds a bell or gong,
and by varying the number of cui'rents sent a code of signals is formed.
For instance :

1 Depression of the "key" Acknowledgment.

2 Depressions Passenger-train.

3 " Goods.

4 " Special.

5 " Obstruction-signal,

and so on. This code may, of course, be varied at pleasure ; and it is
possible to give fifteen distinct and unmistakable signals upon a bell
by varying the number of beats and repetitions. By means of these
bells, then, a perfect means of communication is kept up between two
stations, signal-boxes, or gate-houses, on a railroad.

The fundamental principle of the " block " system which Ave are
now endeavoring to explain is, that no train traveling in the same
direction shall ever approach nearer to another than the distances
which the signal-men's boxes are apart. These distances vary on Eng-
lish roads according to circumstances, but, so long as the signals are
properly made by the signal-man, and attended to by the driver of the
locomotive, it becomes simply impossible for one train to rixn into an-
other. For sake of illustration, let us take three signal-boxes, which
we shall call B, and C, and D, on a line of railroad between B and E.
We will suppose that the express from a station A has arrived at B,

ELECTRIC SIGNALS ON ENGLISH RAILROADS. 585

and is about to proceed on its journey to E, and that an ordinary
train has preceded it a quarter of an hour, which would allow about
time enough for it to " shunt " or go ofl" into the siding at D. When
the train has passed the signal-box at C, the signal-man there telegraphs
to the one at B that the line is clear, which means that there is no
train on the " up " line between stations B and C. Directly the ex-
press referred to arrives at B, the signal-man there, if he has received
the signal " all clear," allows the train to pass him, and at once tele-
gi'aphs to C that there is a train on the " up " line. The C signal-man,
if he has received a signal from D of line clear, allows the express to
pass him also, but, if not, he exhibits his signal accordingly. We will
now suppose that the express is yet between B and C, and that another
train, approaching in the same direction, whistles to the man at B for
leave to go on. This is refused until the C signal-man telegraphs that
the line is c ear. The same plan is carried out at every signal-box
the train has to pass, of whatever nature it may be, whether " ex-
press," running at the rate of tifty-five miles an hour, or " goods,"
steaming along easily at a pace of twenty-five. It will thus be seen
that, however great the traffic, it can be conducted with almost abso-
lute safety, the only dilFerence being that, with a very large number
of trains per hour, the signal-boxes are placed nearer together, as on
the Metropolitan or Underground Railroad of London, which has as
near as possible one thousand trains passing over its system in the
course of every twenty-four hours. No accident of any importance
has ever occurred on this line.

But there are other objects in our signal-box besides plungers and
little bells to attract attention. Four very noticeable toys — I use the
term advisedly, for they struck me at once as being particularly sug-
gestive of liliputian railroads, and dolls' houses, and toy signal-men —
are the miniature electric semaphores used for instructing the sig-
nal-man as to setting the semaphore-signals on the line for the guid-
ance .of drivers of locomotives. Having stated the jDrinciple of
the " block " system to be that no two following trains are to be al-
lowed to proceed in the same direction upon the same section of line
at the same time, it follows that a danger-signal must be exhibited
and maintained at the station or depot from which a train has de-
parted until it has been cleared out of the section of the line over
which it is traveling. To do this effectually necessitates that this
signal should be under the control of the signal-man toward whom the
train is approaching; and no accident, mechanical or electrical, should
be allowed to remove this signal until the train has arrived. The sig-
nals used on most of the English lines of railroad to guide the driver
are, the raising and lowermg of a semaphore arm to denote " danger "
and " all clear." If it were possible to work these huge out-door sig-
nals by electricity, the system would be perfect ; but, inasmuch as the
power of electricity is circumscribed, the production of force sufficient

586 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

to actuate, with any degree of certainty, tliese exposed signals, lias not
yet been attained. It has become necessary, therefore, to rely upon
small electrical instruments, miniatures of the out-door semaphores,
which direct the signal-man in the box how to exhibit his out-door sig-
nals by displaying the signals which tliey themselves ought to give.
The same principle which produces a blow upon the bell-signal lowers
the semaphore arm on the miniature to " all clear." A current of
electricity, flowing through the wii'e of an electro-magnet, converts
the iron core into a magnet, and exerts precisely the same action upon
a rocking lever that a pull or strain of a signal-wdre does upon the
large rocking lever of a signal-post. A counter-weight, when the cur-
rent ceases, restores the arm to " danger," as it does in ordinary rail-
road-signals. So that the miniature semaphore will remain at " all
clear" so long as a current flows, but, the moment the current ceases,
the arm by the action of gravity flies up to " danger." It is impossi-
ble to lower the signal at one station except by the action of an elec-
tric current, and to maintain that signal at " all clear " except by the
persistent efiect of the battery at the other station. The signal, there-
fore, is under the sole control of the signal-man toward whom the train
is approaching. The instrument employed to raise and lower this
miniature signal is called a " swdtch," from the similarity of its ap-
pearance and construction to the switch-handles or levers employed to
raise and lower the larger signals on the line. Its electrical construc-
tion is precisely similar to that of the " plunger." By removing the
handle over from one side to the other, it places the battery in connec-
tion with the line wire, and thereby causes a current of electricity to
flow which lowers the signal.

There were four of these miniature " switches " in our signal-box,
and this was the w^ay they appeared to us to work : When the switch-
handle was placed so as to be nearest us, or On, no current was trans-
mitted, and the little signal stood at " danger ; " when, however, it
was pushed over farthest from us to Ofi", a current flowed, and the lit-
tle arm was lowered to " all clear." As the arm could only be low-
ered when a current was flowing, it was only when the switcli-handle
was pushed over to Off that the "all-clear" signal could be given.
Similarly, when the switch-handle was at On, the flow of electricity at
once ceased, and the signal flew to " danger." The signal " all clear "
could therefore only be given when the little switch was intentionally
placed over to Ofi", and there was no other means of accomplishing
this object by willfulness or accident. No accident, mechanical or
electrical, could alter the miniature danger-signal. The man at our
signal-box had the sole and complete control over the signal at the
next box, and it was simply impossible for him to interfere with or
alter the signal in his own box. This in effect is the " block " sys-
tem, which answers so admirably on the principal lines of English
railroad. The instructions given to signal-men who work the signals

FACIAL ANGLE. 587

we have been describing are as follows, and we give them that the
reader, when next traveling upon an English line of railroad and
passing a signal-box, may give a passing thought of thanks to the in-
ventor of the " block " system, and the gentleman who framed these
rules. Ml-. William Henry Preece, of the Institute of Civil Engineers,
and to the individual, let us hope, who follows them closely — the sig-
nal-man :

IXSTKUCTIOiSrS.

1. No train or engine is to be allowed to pass your box unless the electric
signal for the section into which it is about to proceed stands at all cleae.

2. When a train has entered the section of line which you have protected
(under Eule 4), j'ou will signal to the next station, two beats on the bell twice^
to signify " Train coming; be ready."

3. On the approach or arrival of the train or engine at your box, you will,
provided tlje electric signal stands at all cleae, at once signal it on the bell
to the next station in advance, thus :

If a passenger-train . . by 2 beats.

" goods-train " 3 "

" special or engine. " 4 ^'

4. This signal will be acknowledged by the corresponding station, by throw-
ing his switch-handle over to "ox," thereby placing the electric signal at your
station at daxgee, and protecting the line from any train following that already
in the section.

5. You will acknowledge this signal by returning one beat of the bell.

6. On the arrival of the < p > train at ■< [■ , the signal-
man at that station will pull his switch-handle over to off, thereby removing
your danger-signal, intimating the arrival of the train and clearing the line.

7. This you will acknowledge by one beat on the bell.

8. In case any obstruction exists upon the line to necessitate its being
blocked, give five sharp beats on the bell (which must be repeated), and raise
the electric signal to Banger^ which must be maintained as long as the obstruc-
tion lasts.

9. JlTo signal is to be considered complete until it has been acknowledged.

I beg leave to state that this article is written without being at all
acquainted with the system of signaling on American lines of railroad,
so that I am unable to say how far our own bears comparison with the
English system.

THE FACIAL AKGLE.

By ransom DEXTEK, A. M., M. D.,

PROFESSOR OF ZOOLOGY AND PHYSIOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OP CHICAGO.

THE methods of estimating the facial angle hitherto adopted by-
naturalists are all mere modifications of that proposed by Peter
Camper, and consist in describing an angle with one line passing along
the base of the skull, intersected by another which passes from the an-
terior portion of the upper jaw over the forehead.

Prof. Owen's definition is : " If a line be drawn from the occipital
condyle along the floor of the nostrils, and be intersected by a second,

588 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

toucliiiig the most prominent parts of the forehead and upper jaw, the
intersected angle is called the facial angle" (vol. ii., p, 572, "Anatomy
of Vertebrates ").

The relation of the face is not to the base of the skull, or the plane
from the floor of the nostrils to its articulation to the backbone, but to
the axis of the body ; for the face, in the lowest class of animals that
have a backbone, the fish, is in line with the base of the skull, the
axis of the body, and the dorsal surface of the animal ; and in man,
the highest class, the face is in line with the abdominal surface, and
axis of the body. But the base of the skull does not keep in harmony,
but varies irregularly. Then, there are numerous other elements than
the bones at the base of the skull, that are factors in the aspect of the
face, as, the modified development of other bones of the skull, peculiar
development of bones of the face, and relation of the bones of the face
that are not attached to the sJcull, but to other facial hones.

To make the subject more clearly comprehensible, it will be neces-
sary to trace more in detail the development of the division of ani-
mals to be considered.

The subject of the facial angle has occupied the attention of phi-
losophers from the earliest antiquity. Their theories, though vague,
unsatisfactory, and uninteresting in themselves, yet tend conclusively
to show that some patent general principle underlies the whole domain
of the subject. Confined, as they were, to the narrow limits of the
varieties of the human race, they would get only a part of the evi-
dence that is so beaixtifully illustrated, when we include the whole
sub-kingdom of animals to which we belong.

At the beginning of the present century, Cuvier, Von Baer, and
others, discovered and established the great laws of evolution. The
laws thus elucidated were : 1. That the entire animal kingdom origi-
nates from an ancestral egg ; eggs, too, though difiering in jDhysical
appearance, that are quite similar in structure. 2. That every animal,
in its evolution, had to pass through the several stages of ovulation,
fertilization, germination, and development, before it could maintain
an independent existence. 3. That in their development they assumed
but few primary structural patterns or types.

After the promulgation of the above doctrines, a series of investi-
gations ensued, which brought naturalists to approximate a general
agreement that thei'e are only five general morphological or form-
types of animals. Every animal, then, of the entire animal kingdom,
must be classed in one or the other of these five sub-kingdoms, and
each division thus classed has one fundamental plan of structure. The
only way in which the animals of each sub-kingdom can difier is in
the manner of executing their physiological functions.

In considering, then, any of the great physiological and philosophi-
cal questions that are based upon a uniformity of primitive type-devel-
opment, we find that many useful lessons may be learned by including

FACIAL ANGLE.

589

in our considerations every class of animals in which the specialization
to be considered appears. For example, every animal belonging to the
vertebrate sub-kingdom of animals agrees Avith every other animal of
%;he same sub-kingdom in the following distinctive characteristics —
characteristics, too, that we shall find involved in our considerations of
the subject of the facial angle : In all, the head and vertebral column
are composed of a number of definite segments, arranged along a longi-

_^V_

tudinal axis ; each segment of this framework is normally composed of
a body and two diverging, ring-like formations; the dorsal containing
the brain and spinal cord, the ventral, or abdominal, containing the or-
gans of nutrition, as the alimentary canal, circulating and eliminating
organs. Every vertebrate animal, then, is possessed of two tubes of
framework : the one, to protect the brain and spinal cord ; the other,
the organs of nutrition. These tubes are subject to very great varia-
tion, and are modified, as by a master's hand, to meet the necessities
that their various specializations of function may demand. The great
modification in the calibre of the dorsal tube in different classes of the
vertebrates, as well as the great variation in shape of the elements
which compose that arch, is apparent to every one. In the region of
the spine, the elements that compose the segments of the arch are
rounded, and at some distance apart, while in the cranial (skull) re-
gion they are flattened, spread out, so as to unite and form sutures,
thus making a solid brain-case, for the protection of the softer and
more massive nerve-matter.

590

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The elements composing the mitritive ease are the jaws, ribs, and
pelvic girdle. These, like the spinal elements, are subject to great
modification, owing to the immense range of variation to which their
specializations are subjected. The difference in the facial develop-*

ments can well be imagined by calling to mind the various coun-
tenances of animals, from the fish to man. The angle of the face is
simjjly and properly, I think, indicated by the relation expressed by
two lines : the first, or base line, corresi^onding to the axis of the
body; the other, diverging, or face line, drawn from, the anterior
margin of the upper jaw, over the centre of the forehead. The rela-
tion and angles formed by these two lines, and their intersections thus
indicated, express the relation and comparative development at the
union of the two primitive tubes, the neural^ or skull, and hemal (face),
at the anterior extremity or head of a vertebrate animal.

As before stated, authors have hitherto established the base-line
from the floor of the nostrils, to the articulation of the occipital bone
to the vertebrae. This is a grave error, and one, no doubt, that has
contributed its share to depreciate the subject as an index to the men-
tal caste of a vertebrate animal. For, by adopting this method, we
are subject to the enormous error of ninety degrees in passing through
the sub-kingdom, all of which we lose, little by little, as we ascend the
scale of animals of this type, or form of structure. And yet they make
this application through the entire vertebrate series. Yet, by referring
to tlie cut, we find the face of the lowest class of the type, the fish, to be
in direct line with the dorsal surface of the animal, and hence the base
and diverging lines are parallel ; while, in the highest of the type,
that of man, the face is in line with the ventral or abdominal surface.
Again, after effecting a grand variation of one hundred and eighty
degrees, or the half of a circle, the two lines are once more parallel.

What, then, are the factors in the phenomena of the great change
of the aspect of the face, with such a modification of its constituents,
from a line of the dorsal to that of the abdominal surface, all of Avhich
is effected by almost imperceptible gradations, as we ascend the series
from the fish to man? It is by the modification of the anterior ex-
tremities of these cranio-vertebral canals in the development and in-
crease of the cerebral hemispheres, which is that part of the brain that
is recognized as the seat of thought, and their influence iipon other

FACIAL ANGLE. 591

structures, that the whole change is wrought from a complete domi-
nant power of the physical over the mental, to the reverse, viz., an
entire dominant ascension, in some instances, of the moral and intel-
lectual over the physical. In every vertebrate animal^ then^ there are
txDo factors^ the physical and mental ; the facial angle is the typical
expression or exponent of the relative strength or condition of each.

It may be observed that, with the ascension of these animals, the
relative size of the brain-case, or skull, increases with a proportion-
ate diminution of the bones of the face, and of the projection of the
jaws in front of the orbits.

In the cold-blooded fish, the serpent, and the crocodile, the cavity
for the brain is small, but little more than a prolongation of the canal
for the spinal cord, with a disproportionate development of the organs
of mastication, thus enabling them to execute the strongest instinct
01 the lower animals, namely, to slay and devour. In the bird class,
the brain is somewhat larger, but is contained in the posterior part
of the cranium, they manifesting but a slight mental superiority over
the reptile. In the dog, over whom man is lord, and the noble horse,
the brain is much larger ; the facial line intersects at about a right
angle with the base line, or vertebral axis. In these animals we begin
to discover the rudiments of some of those more noble motives which
are so abundantly lavished upon some of the higher animals.

The monkey and the anthropoid, or man-like apes, express in a
very characteristic manner many of the mental attributes of the lower
varieties of the human species. Nor is this to be wondered at, when
we consider the close anatomical relation which subsists between the
two, and the enormous development of the cerebral hemispheres as
compared with the lower classes of the same type.

The profile of the idiot is the next introduced in the cut, to illus-
trate the influence upon the size and shape of the cranium., or skull,
that an arrest of brain-development has wrought, and which corre-
sponds to the mental manifestations of its subject.

The other three profile views represent the savage, the half-civil-
ized, and the cxUtivated races of man. The first of the three, the one
next to the view of the idiot, is a drawing from a correct engraving
of the celebrated North American Indian chief Black Hawk, and cor-
responds in brain capacity, facial angle, and mental powers, very
nearly to the other savage races, viz., the Malayan and Ethiopian.
The next that is represented in the cut is the half-civilized Mongolian
race, illustrating very nicely the ratio of the two factors, physical and
mental. The last is a representation of the highly-cultivated Cauca-
sian race, and is a correct profile view of one of the most illustrious
statesmen that this or any other nation ever possessed — that of Daniel
Webster.

In the lowest of the type, the fish, we find the brain least devel-
oped, and the cerebral hemispheres, or instrument of thought, bearing

;;; "^ n n- j'Or'uLAR SClJiXC^ MOXxslLY.

- - rtion, Other to its own concomitani structures, or

.>dy. Tlie actual weight of a common codfish was
"—"'13 w^ghed only &|^ grains; thus making the
: '^an, the aTerage weight of the braLu is abont

-i, i : ._.l;^. :L ■_• t of the body 150 poonds, making a ratio

of 1 to 50. T :rrect statement of the relative weight

of the btain - lowest of the type, the fi&h, and the

highe^ mar ; . : the weight of the brain in man,

to that of tL: -'^--s greater than the same ratio

intbefish. I portionate weight of merely

the««rgferaZA.v.>.. .. .... .. .... L„;:...:^cats of thought, to that of the

body in the fish and man, we obtain a difference of 124, which ex-
presses the number of times the cerebral hemispheres of man are
greater than those of the fish ; in other words, if the body of a fish
and that of man were of equal wdght, the cerebral hemispheres of the
latter would weigh 134 times more than those of the former. Further.
the relaliTe w^eight of the cerebral hemispheres, as we ascend from.
the fish tdirough the Teitebrate sub^mgdom of animals, will be found
to correspond to the Taiiation of the fece-line from a parallel with
the dorsal snr&ceL

To recapitulate: 1. The size and weight of the brain will be
found to increase with the angle of the face to the axis of the body.
2. The expan^on of the brain-case, with a proportionate diminution
of the facial bones, is an invariable accompaniment of an increased
facial angle throughout the rertebrate sub-kingdom of animals. 3.
The mental manifestati<m and power hare a direct relation to the
ang^ above indicated. 4. The position assumed by the body of the
swimal in its change from the horizontal to the perpendicular attitude,
also very generaDy agrees with the &cial angle of its subject. 5. The
projection of the jaws, in front of the ocular orbits, is also a correla-
tire index to the above data. 6. The relative ascendency of the two
&ctoTS, the phy^cal and mental, with their numerous phenomena, is
an index to all of the above relations, and shows very conclusively the
gradual turning friom the lowest instincts of the brute to the most
complex mental powers ef ti?3i?.

A

DISPOSAL OF THE LEAD.

Br SIB HESTET THOilr-^'Vy.

OF CXIXICiUL SCSEESSCT IS CSTrTESarrT OOUJESE, IXKSTDOS'.

1! The last £unt bre:"'. \:..\ ^ -:. roted, and an-

led for so long, but i:. T iy lies there,

xcept only that the jaw sinks slowly but per-

"isibly increases, becomes more leaden in hue.

DISPOSAL OF THE LEAD. 593

and the prof-:':m<i. tranqTiil sleep ■:■: Deii:L reigi:s -srhere jost now were
life asi imovement. Here, then, oejins lie e:er:ial rest.

Rest I no. not for an izitant. Xerer was there greater actirity
than at tliis momer.t exists in that still corpse. ActiTirT, but of a
different kind to that which was before. Already a tiionsand changes
have commenced. Forces imrameiable hare attacked the dead. Tlie
rapidity of the vnlture, with its keen scent for animaJ decay, is
nothing to that of Xature's ceaseless agents now at foil work before
us. That marvelously complex machine, but this mom^it the
theatre of phenomena too subtile and too recondite to be compre-
hended ; denotable only by phraseology which stands for the tm-
known and incomputable — ^vital, because more than physical, more
than chemical — is now consigned to the action of physical and chemi-
cal agencies alone. And these all operating in a direction the reverse
of that which they held before death. A synthesis, then, developing
the animal being. The stages of that synthesis, now, retraced, with
another en<i. still formative, in view. Stages of decomposition, of de-
cay, with its attendant putrescence ; process abhorrent to the living,
who therefore desire its removaL " Bury the dead ont of my sight,"
is the wholly natural sentiment of the survivor.

But Xature does nothing without ample meaning ; nothing with-
out an object, desirable in the interest of the body politic* It may,
then, be useful to inquire what must of necessity happen if, instead
of burying or attempting to preserve the dead, Xature follows an
unimpeded course, and the lifeless animal is left to the action of laws
in such case provided.

It is necessary first to state more exactly the conditions supposed
to exist- Thus, the body must be exposed to air ; and must not be
consumed as prey by some living animal. K it is closely covered
with "earth or left in water, the same result is attained as in the con-
dition first named, although the steps of the process maybe dissimilar.

The problem which Nature sets herself to work in disposing of
dead animal matter is always one and the same. The order of the
universe requires its performance; no other end is possible. The
problem may be slowly worked, or quickly worked; the end is
always one.

It may be thus stated : The animal must be resolved into —

a. Carbonic acid (CO^), water (HO), and ammonia (XH^).

b. Mineral constituents,, mote or less oxidized, elements of the
earth's structure : lime, phosphcwus, iron, sulphdr, magnesia, etc.

The first group, gaseous in form, go into the atmosphere.

The second group, ponderous and solid, remain where the body
lies, untQ dissolved and washed into the earth by rain.

Xature's object remains still unstated : the constant result of her
work is before us ; but wherefore are these ch.^nges ? In her won-
derful economy she must form and bountifully nourish her vegetable

TOL. IT. SS

594

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

progeny ; tTvin-brother life, to her, with that of animals. The perfect
balance between plant existences and animal existences must always
be maintained, while " matter " courses through the eternal circle, be-
coming each in turn.

To state this more intelligibly by illustration : K an animal be re-
solved into its ultimate constituents in a period according to the
surrounding circumstances, say, of four hours, of four months, of
four years, or even of four thousand years — for it is impossible to
deny that there may be instances of all these periods during which
the process has continued — those elements which assume the gaseous
form mingle at once with the atmosphere, and are taken up from
it without delay by the ever-open mouths of vegetable life. By a
thousand pores in every leaf the carbonic acid which renders the
atmosphere unfit for animal life is absorbed, the carbon being sepa-
rated and assimilated to form the vegetable fibre, which, as wood,
makes and furnishes our houses and ships, is burned for our warmth,
or is stored up under pressure for coal. All this carbon has played
its part, " and many parts," in its time, as animal existences from
monad up to man. Our mahogany of to-day has been many negroes
in its turn, and before the African existed was integral portions of
many a generation of extinct species. And, when the table, which has
borne so well some twenty thousand dinners, shall be broken up from
pure debility and consigned to the fire, thence it will issue into the
atmosphere once more as carbonic acid, again to be devoured by the
nearest troop of hungry vegetables — green peas or cabbages in a Lon-
don market-garden, say — to be daintily served on the table which now
stands in that other table's place, and where they will speedily go to
the making of " lords of the creation." And so on, again and again,
as long as the world lasts.

Thus it is that an even balance is kept — demonstrable to the very
last grain if we could only collect the data — between the total
amounts of animal and of vegetable life existing together at any in-
stant on our globe. There nxuU be an unvarying relation between
the decay of animal life and the food produced by that process for the
elder twin, the vegetable world. Vegetables first, consumed by ani-
mals either directly or indirectly, as when they eat the flesh of animals
who live on vegetables. Secondly, these animals daily casting off
effete matters, and by decay after death providing the staple food for
vegetation of every description. One the necessaiy complement of
the other. The atmosphere, polluted by every animal whose breath
is poison to every other animal, being every instant purified by plants,
which, taking out the deadly carbonic acid and assimilating carbon,
restore to the air its oxygen, first necessary of animal existence.

I suppose that these facts are known to most readers, but I require
a clear statement of them here as preliminary to my next subject; and
in any case it can do no harm to reproduce a brief history of this mar-

DISPOSAL OF THE DEAD.

595

velous and beautiful example of intimate relation between the two
kingdoms.

I return to consider man's interference with the process in question
just hinted at in the quotation, " Bury the dead out of my sight."

The process of decomposition affecting an animal body is one
that has a disagreeable, injurious, often fatal influence on the living
man if sufficiently exposed to it. Thousands of human lives have
been cut short by the poison of slowly-decaying and often diseased
animal matter. Even the putrefaction of some of the most insignifi-
cant animals has sufficed to destroy the noblest. To give an illustra-
tion which comes nearly home to some of us — the graveyard pollu-
tion of air and water alone has probably found a victim in some social
circle known to more than one who may chance to read this paper.
And I need hardly add that in times of pestilence its continuance
has been often due mainly to the poisonous influence of the buried
victims. •

Man, then, throughout all historic periods, has got rid of his dead
kin after some fashion. He has either hidden the body in a cave
and closed the opening to protect its tenant from wild beasts, for the
instinct of affection follows most naturally even the sadly-changed re-
mains of our dearest relative ; or, the same instinct has led him to
embalm and preserve as much as may be so preservable — a delay
only of Nature's certain work — or the body is buried beneath the
earth's surface, in soil, in wood, in stone, or metal — each mode an-
other contrivance to delay, but never to prevent, the inevitable change.
Or, the body is burned, and so restored at once to its original ele-
ments, in which case Nature's Avork is hastened, her design antici-
pated, that is all. And, after burning, the ashes may be wholly or in
part preserved in some receptacle in obedience to the instinct of the
survivor, referred to above. All forms of sepulture come more or less
under one of these heads.'

One of the many social questions waiting to be solved, and which
must be solved at no very remote period, is. Which of these various
forms of treatment of the dead is the best for survivors ?

This question may be regarded from two points of view, both pos-
sessing importance, not equally perhaps ; but neither can be ignored.

A. From the point of view of Utility ; as to what is best for the
entire community.

B. From the point of view of Sentiment ; the sentiment of affec-
tionate memory for the deceased, which is cherished by the survivor.

I assume that there is no point of view to be regarded as belonging
to the deceased person, and that no one believes that the dead has
any interest in the matter. We who live may anxiously hope — as I
should hope at least — to do no evil to survivors after death, whatever

' " Burial at sea " is a form of exposure, the body being rapidly devoured by marine
animals.

596 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

we may have done of harm to others during life. But, being de-
ceased, I take it we can have no wishes or feelings touching this sub-
ject. What is best to be done with the dead is then mainly a ques-
tion for the living, and to them it is one of extreme importance.
Wlien the globe was thinly-peopled, and when there were no large
bodies of men living in close neighborhood, the subject was an incon-
siderable one and could afford to wait, and might indeed be left for
its solution to sentiment of any kind. But the rapid increase of
population forces it into notice, and especially man's tendency to live
in crowded cities. There is no necessity to prove, as the fact is too
patent, that our present mode of treating the dead, namely, that by
burial beneath the soU, is full of danger to the living. Hence intra-
mural interment has been recently forbidden, fii-st step in a series of
reforms which must follow. At present we who dwell in towns are
able to escape much evil by selecting a portion of ground distant — in
this year of grace 1873 — some five or ten miles from any very popu-
lous neighborhood, and by sending our dead to be buried there — lay-
ing by poison nevertheless, it is certain, for our children's children,
who will find our remains polluting their water-soui-ces, when that
now distant plot is covered, as it vrill be, more or less closely by hu-
man dwellings. For it can be a question of time only when every
now waste spot will be utilized for food-production or for shelter,
and when some other mode of disjjosing of the dead than that of
burial must be adopted. If, therefore, burial in the soil be certainly
injurious either now or in the future, has not the time already come
to discuss the possibility of replacing it by a better process ? We
cannot too soon cease to do evil and learn to do well. Is it not indeed
a social sin of no small magnitude to sow the seeds of disease and
death broadcast, caring only to be certain that they cannot do much
harm to our own generation ? It may be granted, to anticipate objec-
tion, that it is quite possible that the bodies now buried may have lost
most, if not all, their power of doing mischief by the time that the
particular soil they inhabit is turned up again to the sun's rays,
although this is by no means certain ; but it is beyond dispute that the
margin of safety as to time grows narrower year by year, and that
pollution of wells and streams which supply the living must ere long
arise wherever we bury our dead in this country. Well, then, since
every buried dead body enters sooner or later into the vegetable king-
dom, why should we permit it, as it does in many cases, to cause an
infinity of mischief during the long process?

Let us at this point glance at the economic view of the subject, for
it is not so unimportant as, unconsidered, it may appear. For it is
an economic subject whether we will it or not. No doubt a senti-
ment repugnant to any such view must arise in many minds, a senti-
ment altogether to be held in respect and sympathy. Be it so ; the
question remains strictly a question of prime necessity in the economic

DISPOSAL OF THE DEAD. 597

system of a crowded country. Nature will have it so, whether we
like it or not. She destines the material elements of my body to enter
the vegetable world on purpose to supply another animal organism
which takes my place. She wants me, and I must go. There is no
help for it. When shall I follow — with quick obedience, or unwill-
ingly, truant-like, traitor-like, to her and her grand design? Her
capital is intended to bear good interest and to yield quick return ;
all her ways prove it — " increase and multiply " is her first and con-
stant law. Shall her riches be hid in earth to corrupt and bear no
present fruit, or be utilized, without loss of time, value, and interest,
for the benefit of starving survivors ? Nature hides no talent in a
napkin ; we, her unprofitable servants only, thwart her ways and
delay the consummation of her "will.

Is a practical illustration required ? Nothing is easier. London
was computed, by the census of 1871, to contain 3,254,260 persons, of
whom 80,430 died within the year. I have come to the conclusion,
after a very carefully-made estimate, that the amount of ashes and
bone-earth — such as is derived by perfect combustion — belonging to
and buried with those persons, is by weight about 206,820 pounds.
The pecuniary value of this highly-concentrated form of animal solids
is very considerable. For this bone-earth may be regarded as equiva-
lent to at least six or seven times its weight of dried but unburned
bones, as they ordinarily exist in commerce. The amount of other
solid matters resolvable by burning into the gaseous food of plants,
but rendered unavailable by burial for, say fifty or a hundred years or
more, is about 5,584,000 pounds, the value of which is quite incalcu-
lable, but it is certainly enormous as compared with the preceding.

This is for the population of the metropolis only; that of the
United Kingdom for the same year amounted to 31,483,700 i:)ersons,
or nearly ten times the population of London. Taking into considera-
tion a somewhat lower death-rate for the imperial average, it will at
all events be quite within the limit of truthful statement to multiply
the above quantities by nine in order to obtain the amount of valuable
economic material annually diverted in the United Kingdom, for a
long term of years, from its iiltimate destiny by our present method
of interment.

The necessary complement of this ceaseless waste of commodity
most precious to organic life, and which must be replaced, or the pop-
ulation could not exist, is the purchase by this country of that same
material from other countries less populous than our own, and which
can, therefore, at present spare it. This we do to the amount of much
more than half a million pounds sterling per annum.'

Few persons, I believe, have any notion that these importations

' Value of bones imported into the United Kingdom, of which by far the larger part
is employed for manure, has been in 1866, £409,590; 1869, £600,029; 1872, £753,185.
— Statistical Abstract, No. 20. — Spottiswoode, 1878, *

598 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of foreign bones are rendered absolutely necessary by the hoarding
of our own some six feet below the surface. The former we acquire
at a large cost for the original purchase and for freight. The latter
we place, not in the upper soil where they would be utilized, but in
the lower soil, where they are not merely useless, but where they often
mingle with and pollute the streams which furnish our tables. And,
in order to eflfect this absurd, if not wicked result, we incur a lavish
expenditure! I refer, of course, to the enormous sums which are
wasted in effecting burial according to our present custom, a part of
the question which can by no means be passed over. For the funeral
rites of the 80,000 in London last year, let a mean cost of ten pounds
per head be accepted as an estimate which certainly does not err on
the side of excess,' Eight hundred thousand pounds must therefore
be added as absolute loss, to the costs already incurred in the main-
tenance of the system. Thus we pay every way and doubly for our
folly.

What, then, is it proposed to substitute for this custom of burial ?
The answer is easy and simple. Do that which is done in all good
work of every kind — follow Nature's indication, and do the work she
does, but do it better and more rapidly. For example, in the human
body she sometimes throws off a diseased portion in order to save
life, by slow and clumsy efforts, it is true, and productive of much
suffering ; the surgeon performs the same task more rapidly and bet-
ter, follows her lead, and improves on it. Nature's many agents,
laden with power, the overaction of which is harmful, we cannot stop,
but we tame, guide, and make them our most profitable servants. So
here, also, let us follow her. The naturally slow and disagreeable
process of decomposition which we have made by one mode of treat-
ment infinitely more slow and not less repulsive, we can, by another
mode of treatment, greatly shorten, and accomplish without offense to
the living. What in this particular matter is naturally the work of
weeks or months, can be perfectly done in an hour or two.

The problem to be worked is : Given a dead body, to resolve it
into carbonic acid, watei-, and ammonia, and the mineral elements,
rapidly, safely, and not unpleasantly.

The answer may be practically supplied in a properly-constructed
furnace. The gases can be driven off without offensive odor — the

1 Items comprised in tlie calculation :

1. Cost of shroud, coffin, labor of digging a grave — essential now in all burials.

2. Cost of funeral-carriages, horse?, trappings, and accoutrements.
Ornamental coffins in wood and metal.

Vaults and monumental art — more or less employed in all funerals above the rank of

pauper.
The cost of simple modes of transit is not included in the calculation, because neces-
fiary in any case, whatever the destination of the body. The above-named items are only
necessary in the case of interment in a grave ; and not one would be required, for ex-
ample, in the case of cremation, or burning of the body.

DISPOSAL OF THE DEAD. S99

mineral constituents will remain in a crucible. The gases -will, ere
night, be consumed by plants and trees. The ashes or any portion of
them may be preserved in a funeral-urn, or may be scattered on the
fields, which latter is their righteous destination. No scents or bal-
sams are needed, as on Greek and Roman piles, to overcome the nox-
ious effluvia of a corpse burned in open air. Modern science is equal to
the task of thus removing the dead of a great city without instituting
any form of nuisance; none such as those we tolerate everywhere
from many factories, both to air and streams. Plans for the accom-
plishment of this have been considered ; but discussion of the subject
alone is aimed at here. To treat our dead after this fashion would
return millions of capital without delay to the bosom of Mother Earth,
who would give us back large returns at compound interest for the
deposit.

Who can doubt now that the question is one of vital economy to
the people of this country ? This is still no reason why it should not
be considered from the point of view of sentiment. And what has
sentim'fent to urge on behalf of the present process ? Let us see what
the process is.

So far as I dare ! for, could I paint, in its true colors, the ghastly
picture of that which happens to the mortal remains of the dearest we
have lost, the page would be too deeply stained for publication. I
forbear, therefore, to trace the steps of the process which begins so
soon and so painfully to manifest itself after that brief hour has passed,
when " she lay beautiful in death." Such loveliness as that, I agree,
it might be treason to destroy, could its existence be perpetuated, and
did not Nature so ruthlessly and so rapidly blight her own handy-
work, in furtherance of her own grand purpose. The sentiment of
the survivor on behalf of preserving the beauty of form and expression,
were it possible to do so, would, I confess, go far to neutralize the ar-
gument based on utility, powerful as it is. But a glimpse of the reality
which we achieve by burial would annihilate, in an instant, every sen-
timent for continuing that process. Nay, more, it would arouse a
powerful repugnance to the horrible notion that we too must some day
become so vile and offensive, and, it may be, so dangerous ; a repug-
nance surmountable only through the firm belief that after death the
condition of the body is a matter of utter indifference to its dead life-
tenant. Surely if we, the living, are to have sentiments, or to exercise
any choice about the condition of our bodies after death, those senti-
ments and that choice must be in favor of a physical condition w^hich
cannot be thought of either as repulsive in itself or as injurious to others.

There is a source of veiy painful dread, as I have reason to know,
little talked of, it is true, but keenly felt by many persons, at some
time or another, the horror of which to some is inexpressible. It is
the dread of premature burial ; the fear lest some deep trance should
be mistaken for death, and that the awakening should take place too

6oo THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

late. Happily, such occurrences must be exceedingly rare, especially
in this country, where the interval between death and burial is con-
siderable, and the fear is almost a groundless one. Still, the convic-
tion that such a fate is possible, which cannot be altogether denied,
will always be a source of severe trial to some. "With cremation, no
such catastrophe could ever occur ; and the completeness of a properly
conducted process would render death instantaneous and painless, if
by an unhappy chance any individual so circumstanced were submitted
to it. But the guarantee against this danger would be doubled, since
inspection of the entire body must of necessity immediately precede
the act of cremation, no such inspection being possible under the pres-
ent system.

In order to meet a possible objection to the substitution of crema-
tion for burial, let me observe that the former is equally susceptible
with the latter of association with religious funereal rites, if not more
so. Never could the solemn and touching words, " ashes to ashes,
dust to dust," be more appropriately uttered than over a body about
to be consigned to the furnace ; w^hile, with a view to metapftor, the
dissipation of almost the whole body in the atmosphere, in the ethe-
real form of gaseous matter, is far more suggestive as a type of another
and a brighter life, than the consignment of the body to the abhorred
prison of the tomb.

I do not propose to describe here the processes which have been
employed, or any improved system which might be adopted for the
purpose of insuring rapid and perfect combustion of the body, although
much might be said in reference to these matters. There is no doubt
that further experiments and research are wanting for the practical
improvement of the process, especially if required to be conducted on
a large scale. Something has been already accomplished, and with
excellent results. I refer to recent examples of the process as prac-
tised by Dr. L. Brunetti, Professor of Pathological Anatomy in the
University of Padua. These were exhibited at the Exposition of Vi-
enna, where I had the opportunity of examining them with care.
Prof. Brunetti exposed the residue from bodies and parts of bodies
on which he had practised cremation by difierent methods, and the
results of his latest experience may be summarized as follows : The
whole process of incineration of a human adult body occupied three
and a half hours. The ashes and bone-earth weighed l.TO kilometre,
about three pounds and three-quarters avoirdupois. They were of a
delicate white, and were contained in a glass box about twelve inches
long, by eight inches wide, and eight deep. The quantity of wood used
to eiFect absolute and complete incineration may be estunated from
its weight, about 150 pounds. He adds that " its cost was one florin
and twenty kreuzers," about two shillings and fourpence English. The
box was that marked No. IX. in the case, which was No. 4,149 in
the catalogue : Italian.

DISPOSAL OF THE DEAD. 601

In an adjacent case was an example of mummification, by the
latest and most successful method. By a series of chemical processes
it has been attempted to preserve in the corj)se the appearance natural
to life, as regards color and form. Admirable as the result appears
to be, in preserving anatomical and pathological specimens of the body,
it is, in my opinion, very far from successful when applied to the face
and hand. At best, a condition is produced which I'esembles a badly-
colored and not well-formed waxen image. And the consciousness
that this imperfect achievement is the real person and not a likeness,
so far from being calculated to enhance its value to the survivor, pro-
duces the very painful impression, as it were, of a debased original ;
while, moreover, it is impossible not to be aware that the substitution
of such an image for the reality must in time replace the mental pict-
ure which exists, of the once living face lighted by emotion and in-
telligence, of which the preserved face is wholly destitute.

To return to the process of cremation. There are still numei'ous
considerations in its favor which might be adduced, of which I shall
mention only one ; namely, the opportunity it offers of escape from the
ghastly but costly ceremonial which mostly awaits our remains after
death. How often have the slender shares of the widow and orphan
been diminished in order to testify, and so unnecessarily, their loving
memory of the deceased, by display of plumes and silken scarfs about
the unconscious clay ! And, again, how pi'olific of mischief to the liv-
ing is the attendance at the burial-ground, with uncovered head, and
damp-struck feet, in pitiless weather, at that chilling rite of sepulture !
Not a few deaths have been clearly traceable to the act of offering
that " last tribute of respect."

Perhaps no great change can be expected at present in the public
opinions current, or ratlier in the conventional views which obtain, on
the subject of burial, so ancient is the practice, and so closely asso-
ciated is it with sentiments of affection and reverence for the deceased.
To many persons, any kind of change in our treatment of the dead will
be suggestive of sacrilegious interference, however remote, either in
fact or by resemblance to it, such change may be. Millions still cherish
deep emotions, connected both with the past and the future, in relation
to the " Campo Santo," and the annual " Jour des Morts." And many
of these might be slow to learn that, if the preservation of concrete
remains, and the ability to offer the tribute of devotion at a shrine be
desired, cremation equally, if not better than burial, secures those
ends. On the other hand, I know how many there are, both in this
country and abroad, who only require the assurance that cremation is
practically attainable to declare their strong preference for it, and to
substitute it for what they conceive to be the present defective and
repulsive procedure. A few such might, by combination for the pur-
pose, easily examine the subject still further by experiment, and would
ultimately secure the power, if they desired, to put it in practice for

6o2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

themselves. And the consideration of the subject which such exam-
ples Avould afford, could not fail to hasten the adoption of what I am
fairly entitled to call, the Natural, in place of the present Artificial
Treatment of the body after death. — Contemporary Beview.

THE FUTURE OF ALCHEMY.

By CHAKLES FEOEBEL.

THERE are few ideas more fatal to the exercise of that prophetic
sight, by which we hope to penetrate the uncertainty of the
what-is-to be, and distinguish the dark forms of the future, than the
two notions : that history repeats itself, and that any form of feeling,
of thought, or of motive, when once extinguished, must forever remain
so. Though widely accepted, these two notions evidently contradict
each other, and this contradiction is in itself a sufficient proof of their
necessary mutual limitation. Yet, when limited by comparison, the
two ideas find a joint expression in the moral law, that while infalli-
bility is not of the human mind, and while all our views and forms of
mental activity enshrine biit a spii'it of verity in a clay of illusion, it is
only this body of error which the scythe of Time consigns to the grave,
while the immortal soul of truth lives on.

Some centuries ago, the system of ideas known to history as Al-
chemy held universal sway over the minds of men ; now there are
none, among the cultivated at least, who dare to defend its assertions.
And yet we may inquire what there was in these ideas that so com-
mended them to men's minds, that at a time their authority was almost
beyond dispute. What, we may ask, was the soul of truth, the im-
mortal part, in the day-dreams of wealth, of power and of beauty, of
magic and mystery, which formed the erroneous body of alchemistic
belief?

The opinion most widely and poinilarly entertained at the present
time ascribes to the alchemistical pursuits of the middle ages a mixed
character : it holds the aim of alchemy to have mainly consisted in
the transmutation of the baser metals into gold ; it regards the alche-
mist as a man who, intensely selfish in his purpose, bore either the
character of the unreasoning, visionary dreamer, of the magician mov-
ing among the phantoms of superstition, or of the charlatan and cheat
living upon the credulity of the avaricious, and who sought, in the
application of an exceedingly limited stock of scientific knowledge,
the means for the accomplishment of his ends.

But, to the thoughtful student of history — not the history of po-
litical events, it is true, nor the history of science, or of any other iso-
lated and abstract phase of human activity, but of history in its
highest conception ; a history which seeks and finds, in each of the

THE FUTURE OF ALCHEMY. 603

phases of life, the determining influences of all the others — the face of
alchemy wears a difierent aspect.

At the time when alchemistic views were most widely disseminated
and accepted, and alchemistic pursuits most widely, frequently fol-
lowed, alchemy had one chief central object — the production of the
philosopher's stone, a substance of marvelous properties and power.
By those who claimed to possess it, it was generally described as a
red, glass-like powder. When it was projected, that is to say, inclosed
in wax, and thrown upon any base metal in a state of fusion, it in-
stantly ennobled it, converting it into gold. When it was taken as a
medicine, it was not only productive of perfect health, but even effaced
the effects of time, bestowing all but eternal youth. And, even more
than this, it was held to purge its fortunate possessor of all sin and
moral evil. The transcendent value of such a substance is readily un-
derstood, and it is not to be wondered at that philosophical voyages,
undertaken in its search, formed at a time the favorite enterprise of
the alchemistic adventurer. But these attempts at its preparation
were fraught with innumerable diflSculties, beset by untold obstacles.
The philosopher's stone was not held to be obtainable from any and
every substance, but only from the peculiar material known in those
days as primeval matter. Where this material was to be found no one
could clearly state ; the alchemists refer to its origin in dark, myste-
rious, unintelligible language. Hence it was sought far and near ; in
all countries ; in the mineral, the vegetal, and the animal world ; in
the earth, the air, and the waters. According to the statement of the
alchemist, he converted this peculiar material into another — the philo-
sophical mercury or pure spirit of metallicity. Joining this with
philosophical gold — that is to say, the pure spirit of goldenness — he
placed the strange mixture in a certain vessel, the philosopher's egg,
heated it in the philosopher's furnace, and hatched the philosopher's
stone. It is scarcely necessary to say that the substances named do
not exist. The process of making the stone was expressed in dark,
enigmatical language. The open communication of the secret was held
to be sinful, and liable to be punished by the instantaneous annihila-
tion of the offender. These were the means and purposes of alchemy
in the most exalted stage of its development, which it had attained
toward the middle of the fourteenth century. Before the thirteenth it
was immature ; after the fifteenth it fell into decay.

The current of alchemistic opinions and pursuits issued from the
dark ground of the Egyptian temple. Gathering the influences of
Oriental Christianity, and taking in those of the Mohammedan torrent,
it flowed away to the bleak shores of culture in the Christianized North.
Egypt endowed it with its veil of mystery and its sacred character.
The philosophy of antiquity bestowed upon it its fatal birth-gift of
theoretical error. In Egypt it had been combined with astronomy and
astrology, and, when that country passed under the sway of the Moham-

6o4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

medan conquei-ors, the alliance of these pursuits was further strength-
ened by the fatalism of the Ai-ahian. Seeking for the philosopher's
stone an ideal of material perfection, and uniting with this pursuit that
of the physician, the alchemist was led to regard the imperfection of
the baser metals as a disease, the supposed operation of the stone as a
process of healing, and to ascribe to it the properties of a universal
medicine. Transferred to northern soil, at the time when mediaeval
Christianity attained its most exalted development, alchemy became
thoroughly infused with the religious spirit of the period and its ten-
dency to regard things material as analogous to and symbolical of
things spiritual. Passing into the shadow of the cloud and mist-born
Northern deities, still hovering over the thrones from which they had
been hurled by the Christian angelic host, alchemistic pursuits became
involved with the belief in magic and witchcraft. And then the great
spiritual revolution which struck at the power of Catholic Rome also
weakening the authority of ancient alchemistic views, they became
the adroitly-wielded weapons of swindler and charlatan, who were
only disarmed when the calm criticism of chemical science disproved
the assertions of fraud.

But, at the time when the belief in the reality of the philosopher's
stone was general among the cultivated as well as the ignorant, al-
chemistic hypocrisy was not common. More frequenth*, then, the
alchemist was either an excited enthusiast, led astray by the mirage
of his hope, or the cautious commentator who lent the weight of his
name merely to give currency to the reports of older authorities. Nor
was covetousness always the leading motive of the alchemists. Some
of the most illustrious of them apparently persevered in their search
for the philosopher's stone without a single sordid thought; many
sought to make their pursuit tributary to the healing art ; many also
regarded their labor as one of the duties of a life of religious devotion.

Alchemy is often represented as immature chemical science, but
even this view is only partially correct. The essence of science con-
sists in experimental investigation ; but, though many of the alchemists
made discoveries, and some of them were investigators, the greater
number, and some of the most illustrious, were rather men who, born
to the habit of religious enthusiasm, and led by a beacon-light from
the ideal world across the threshold of reality, only now and then
stumbled over a new fact. Closer by far is the relationship subsisting
between the alchemy of the past and the chemical technics of to-
day. Most generally, the aim of the alchemist was not to discover,
but to create. Indeed, alchemy had a constant purpose — the produc-
tion of a perfect agent of chemical change — the philosopher's stone.
It was a purpose which was never accomplished, an aim which could
not possibly be attained — at least, not in the way and time dreamt of
by the alchemistic enthusiast, nor by the means at his command.

Most of the arts reward the laborer, who engages in their pursuit,

THE FUTURE OF ALCHEMY. 605

with the attainment of his aim. But, though most of the arts do so,
all do not. For, among that vast group of human activities to which
the name of " arts " is applied, there are certain forms, the very essence
of which consists in the seemingly unattainable character of their ends.
And these activities, constantly striving for the absolute — for ideals
of the many forms of beauty and of strength — are those known as the
" Fine Arts."

But all the forms of the ideal world are a part of the religious sys-
tem of a time, and for this reason all the line arts have ever been in
such close relation with religious belief. And, consequently, when we
consider the essential and persistent characteristics of alchemy, such
as its intimate connection with religion, and its endeavors to realize
chemical ideals, we are compelled to regard alchemy as a primitive
fine art, which fell into decay on account of the extreme inadequacy
of its means, and the despondency of the artist. The true artist-hero,
when he perceives that the absolute perfection he aims at is unattain-
able, save by the moral, intellectual, and technical education of suc-
cessive generations, undismayed persists in creating, though not the
ideal, yet at least beauteous forms, adumbrations of its image. The
alchemist, when he saw that the prize was not to be attained in his
day, ignominiously abandoned the field of action.

These facts point to a probability of the revival of alchemy in the
future. But the conception of the perfectibility of matter is closely
united to that of its tran smut ability. And when we inquire, " Has
the chemical science of our time, by the unceasing toil of the last two
centuries, not already developed the means which might enable us to
successfully resume the great work of alchemistic art ? " we receive
not a favorable answer. Chemistry has taught us to resolve com-
pounds into elements and to unite elements to compounds, but it
knows naught of transmutation ; all its inductions seem to disprove
the existence of any reality corresponding to the idea. Year by year
the belief that definite, specific forms of matter, such as water or iron,
though resolvable or combinable, are yet in themselves absolutely
fixed and invariable, has become more firmly rooted. And, if we
would therefore hope to see the transmutation of imperfect forms of
matter into others more perfect realized, it is not on the inductions
and theories of chemistry that our hopes may be founded. It is
among chemical conditions, and with the aid of chemical knowledge,
that the future alchemist must resume his pursuit; but, before he
may do so with any promise of success, these conditions and that
knowledge must undergo a change, and chemical science, unleavened
as yet by the thought which shall work it, must receive it from
without.

The source whence this thought may be derived is the current of
organic science, now distributing far and wide the fertilizing influence
of the theory of evolution, a view of creation which, though not new,

6o6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

was not victorious until, within the last decades, Charles Darwin led
upon the hard-fought logic-field an array of facts glittering in their
strength. Before a victory had been conquered by the Darwinistic
school, the specific forms of vegetal and animal life were held to he im-
mutable. While it was known that among the individuals of any one
species certain differences, justifying their being classed as distinct
varieties, might arise in the course of successive generations, all such
variations were held to be bounded by certain more or less narrow
limits of possibility. The facts adduced by the new school of biolo-
gists have led to difierent conclusions, culminating in the assertion
that all organic forms are changeable without limit — transmutable
without end — capable of a physical, intellectual, and moral elevation,
which knows no boundaries.

According to the theory of evolution, the modifications of structure
and capability which organic forms are liable to undergo, in the course
of generations, may be traced back to three principal causes. The
first of these is the influence of physical forces, as, when the strength
of the muscles is enhanced by exercise, the mind invigorated by
thought, or, inversely, their function impaired by long-continued dis-
use. The second cause consists in the transmission of these results of
individual life to a line of descendants, the effects being compounded^
as they pass, with others of the same order. The third cause is to be
found in the competition of the forms so produced under circumstances
not equally well adapted to their capacities nor sufficient for their co-
existence, leading necessarily to the preservation of those races which
are best, and the extinction of those which are least, fitted to endure
adversity. To this last cause, constantly active in the organic world,
the term " natural selection " has been applied, to distinguish it from
the artificial selection of the stock-breeder and gardener. The changes
wrought in organic forms by the influence of inorganic forces are gen-
erally spoken of as variation. But this variation is in reality merely
an extension of the principle of competition. Organized beings are
brought face to face with the forces of Nature, with the earthquake,
the flood, the lightning, and the storm. Often they meet in mortal
conflict. The living form sinks to the earth before the power of the
thunder-bolt, or the thunder-bolt is conquered by the invention of ge-
nius. Death is but a victorious alliance of inorganic forces triumphing
over the organic form laid low on the battle-field ; life is but the vic-
tory of the organic forces over the inorganic hosts. But, do we not
also behold a competition taking place between, a struggle for exist-
ence and a natural selection occurring among, inorganic forms ?
Cast water upon fire ; either the water disappears as vapor or the fire
is extinguished. A mixture of salt and gravel is brought in contact
with water ; the salt is dissolved, the gravel remains unaltered. Heat
a mixture of salt and sal-ammoniac ; the salt persists, while the sal-
ammoniac is vaporized.

THE FUTURE OF ALCHEMY. 607

And here we may ask : " Is the distinction between that which is
living and that which is not — between the organic and the inorganic
worlds around us — properly drawn?" If the changes undergone by
the forms of both are due to the same causes, wherein lies their differ-
ence ? Both forms are capable of assimilating material from without ;
the organic by nourishment, the inorganic directly, as when a crystal
grows by the assimilation of material from a solution in which it is
placed. Both also are capable of producing offspring — at least by
division if not by sexual genesis. Are we then justified in assuming
the gap of distinction between these two orders of existence to be as
wide and deep as it is generally considered ? Life is the gradual modi-
fication of material forms by the action of physical forces ; the con-
tinuity in time of the changes thus wrought ; the competition of the
forms thus evolved. It is the projection of the past into the future.
It is the persistence of history.

And we may well question whether it were not better to extend
our idea of life. Even if that wide gap which we imagine to open be-
tween the organic and the inorganic does exist, we may still ask: " Is
the organic form the only living one, and the inorganic form so abso-
lutely dead ; or do they not rather both constitute forms of life radi-
cally and polarily opposed — vast alternate generations of existence,
majestic in their mystery ? " The power which fashioned this earth
wrote not only upon the bark of the tree and the brow of man, but
also upon the cold and passionless rock and the wide expanse of the
deep, blue sea, their history. That which is seemingly so inanimate,
as well as that which throbs with a warm consciousness of being,
obeys the commanding influences of the past, and transmits them
to the future. The biologist and the geologist have read the story ;
where they have not — the letters await but the riper wisdom of the yet
unborn sage. «

But the chemist has not yet acquired a knowledge of his historic
alphabet. To him specific forms of matter are still immutable, unva-
rying, constant. He knows naught of differences wrought by the in-
fluences of the past, or of their transmission to the future. He is not
aware of a competition or struggle for existence 'taking place between
individual and specific forms of matter. The idea that substances, as
we find them, are the result of a process of natural selection has been
expressed, but it is as yet unsupported by experiment or interpretation
of facts observed.

But, where a natural selection takes place, artificial selection is also
possible ; and, when chemistry shall develop before us the spectrum
of the law of inorganic creation, the artistic spirit will seize upon the
individual colors of truth, and once more endeavor to paint the image
of the chemical ideal. The recognition of the law of evolution com-
pels the acceptance of the inexorable conclusion that the competition
of races must, in the course of infinite ages, inevitably lead to the ab-

6o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

solute perfection of the enduring forms. Xatural selection this Lope
has been called, because the hand of Nature bestows the warrant of
nobility. But man is himself only a part of that great, that bountiful,
that all-generous Natui-e, and it is wrong to speak of the selections he
has made among the flowers which embower his dwelling, and the
half-mute companions of his home, as artificial. In making these he
is but executing the commands of Xature, as the most skilled work-
man in her earthly palace of labor, and the approximations to perfec-
tion which she initiates by the intellectual and moral lever of his mind
distance all others known to us.

The chemistry of to-day is, in part a science searching for forms
of truth ; in part an art pursuing the objects of the useful. The
scientific chemist seeks and discovers realities of fact; the technical
chemist produces realities of matter ; neither of them endeavors to give
existence to material ideals. But though man may thus unconsciously
serve the inscrutable power through which all is that is, and all is
what it is, yet of nobler mood is he who, feeling his heart swell in
sympathy with her purpose — the creation of ultimate universal per-
fection— persists in constant faith to work her ends. Of such noble
mood, and of such conscious purpose, must be the future alchemist.
His -work — the reformation of the crude earth, and air, and waters,
that surround us, in the image of his chemical ideals, the production
of untold varieties of the i^hilosopher's stone — is not to be accomplished
in a lifetime, or a century, but demands the continued labor of infinite
generations. We shall never behold it, but —

" On the day when, drawn on paths of duty,
The last worlds — eternity-begun —
Eest, embraced in ever-glorious beauty,
On the heart of the All-Central Sun "—

shall most surely be witnessed nts completion !

PEOFESSOE LOUIS AGASSIZ.

By EICHAKD BLISS, Je.,

OF THE CA3IBEIDGE MUSEril OF COStPAEATIVE ZOOLOGY.

LOUIS JEAN EODOLPHE AGASSIZ, whose death occurred the
14th of last December, was bom May 28, 1807, in Mottier, Switz-
erland. From his earliest childhood he evinced a remarkable fond-
ness for the study of natural science, and before he had left school be-
gan to collect and study into the habits of fishes. Having finished his
course at the Gymnasium of Bienne, he chose for his profession that
of medicine, and commenced to study at the Academy of Zurich.
Thence he went to Heidelberg, where he made a special study of

PROFESSOR LOUIS AGASSIZ. 609

anatomy. He next entered the University of Munich, where, in com-
pany with Martins, Okeu, Dollinger, and Schelling, he devoted himself
eagerly to the pursuit of natural history. At that time Martius was
publishing his great work on the "Natural History of Brazil," and,
upon the death of Spix, who was editing the zoological portion, Mar-
tius intrusted to Agassiz the description of the fishes. In this M'ork,
which was admirably well done, Agassiz characterized nine genera,
embracing forty-two species new to science.

For some time Agassiz had contemplated a monograph on the
" Fresh-water Fishes of Central Europe," but pecuniary embarrass-
ment rendered this impossible, till a bookseller by the name of Cotta,
to whom Agassiz showed the material he had collected, furnished
him the means necessary for its completion. Meanwhile he studied
and obtained the degree of Doctor of Medicine at Munich, and of
Doctor of Philosophy at Erlangen. After his examination, Agassiz
went to Vienna, and ajiplied himself closely to the study of actual
and fossil ichthyology. From Vienna he went to Paris, where he
made the acquaintance of Cuvier and Humboldt, both of whom
warmly welcomed this expert young naturalist. Here he lived on
the most intimate terms with Cuvier till the death of that naturalist,
in 1832, when he returned to Switzerland and established himself at
Neufchatel, where he was appointed Professor of Natural History, a
position he held till his departure for America.

Through the influence of Humboldt, between whom and Agassiz
there existed the warmest friendship, he was enabled to begin the pub-
lication of his " Poissons Fossiles," a work evincing such careful and
profound research, and such a wondei-ful power of generalization, as to
obtain for him a place among the very first naturalists of the day.
This work, which appeared in parts, between the years 1833 and 1845,
comprises five volumes, of about 1,700 quarto pages, with an atlas of
400 folio plates, and contains descriptions of nearly a thousand species
of fossil fishes. Aside from the great number of species, genera, and
families established, Agassiz adopted an entirely new system of classi-
fication. In the classification proposed by Cuvier, fishes were divided
into two orders, according to the nature of the skeleton, viz., cartilagi-
nous and osseous. Agassiz — looking upon the external covering of the
animal as a reflex of the connection existing between the being and
its surroundings, bearing the imprint of all the peculiarities of its ex-
istence, and consequently of its organization — deemed that the true
principle of the classification of fishes was to be found in the scales.
In view of this he proposed a division of the families of fishes into four
orders, viz., Placoids, in which the seales are represented by plates of
enamel, as in the sharks ; Ganoids^ in which the scales consist of an-
gular bony plates covered with a thick layer of enamel, as in the gar-
pikes ; Ctenolds, or fishes with true scales, in which the posterior edges
of the laminae are toothed ; and Cycloids, in which the scales are com-

VOL. IV. — 39

6io THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

posed of simple laminae "^ith smooth posterior edges. This last order
Agassiz subdivided into Acanthopterygian and Malacopterygian Cy-
cloids, or fishes having two dorsal fins, one spiny and the other soft, and
those having one soft dorsal fin. Agassiz found that the study of fos-
sil fishes exhibits a remarkable parallelism between the development
of the individual and that of the class in geologic time. During part of
the embryonic life of fishes, and even in some adult forms, the dorsal
cord exists as a simple gelatinous cylinder, surrounded by a fibrous
sheath, in which, after a time, there is found a cartilaginous and then
an osseous deposit, which goes to form the vertebrae, the ossification
taking place first in the apophyses. This embryonic character Agassiz
found to be peculiar to the fossil fishes of the earlier geologic ages.
There is no trace of a vertebra, but the apophyses, usually ossified,
rest directly on the spinal cord.

Regarding the permanence of type, the author found the species of
one formation specifically distinct from those of anotlier, and, while it
is impossible to say that the species pass from one into another, as
they appear and disappear suddenly without direct connection with
their predecessors, yet, as a whole, they present a continual progress
of development, from the lowest to the highest, and demonstrate most
palpably the existence of an ever-present directive intelligence.

Up to the end of the Jura epoch there exists among fishes a uni-
formity of type as well as a uniformity in the difierent parts of the ani-
mals themselves. The Placoids and Ganoids were the only fishes then
inhabiting the seas ; but, as we approach the Jurassic period which be-
came preeminently the age of reptiles, we find a remarkable abundance
of Sauroids, which, in their osteological character, the organization of
their soft parts, and their dermal integuments, approach so nearly the
reptile Saurians. At the end of the Jura period we find the Ganoids
and Placoids giving way to the Ctenoids and Cycloids, which at present
constitute the majority of our fishes. In the chalk-group, two-thirds of
the species belong to extinct genera ; in the inferior tertiary, one-third.
In the Norfolk clay and Molasse formations the genera, for the most
pai-t, approach those of the tropical seas of the present day ; and in the
Geodian clay of Greenland there is foimd a species identical with one
now living. In addition to the description of the species, which occu-
pies the bulk of the work, a chapter is devoted to a critical review of
the fishes of Monte Bolca, and another to those of collections in Eng-
land and Scotland.

Agassiz next turned his attention to the study of jMollusca and
Echinoderms, and in 1836 published a prodromus of the Echinoderms,
and in 1837 a treatise on the fossil Echinoderms of Switzerland. In
1839 he began a more elaborate work, entitled " Monographies d'Echi-
noderms vivant et fossile," a most important contribution to modern
zoology. This work comprises five parts : the first and second, on the
Salenies and Scutellce^ by Agassiz ; the third and fourth, on the Galerites

PROFESSOR LOUIS AGASSIZ. 611

and Dysaster, by Desor ; and the fifth, on the Anatomy of Echinus, by-
Valentin. Among the Scutellse Agassiz found well-marked differences
between the living and fossil species, and that all the species of the
genera Mellita, Rotula, and JEncope, belong to the existing epoch.
He found, moreover, that the species increase in size as they approach
the present period. While he was publishing his work on the Echino-
derms, this indefatigable naturalist also described and figured a lai'ge
collection of fossil shells from the Oolite and Cretaceous formations, in
a work entitled " ^fitudes critique sur les Mollusques de Jura et de la
Craie," besides an annotated German translation of Buckland's " Ge-
ology," and French and German translations of Sowerby's "Mineral
Conchology."

Notwithstanding the immense amount of work on his hands, Ag-
assiz found time to prosecute his investigation upon the fresh-water
fishes of Europe. The first part of this work, issued in 1839, is de-
voted to the genera Salmo and Thymallus. It appears as a folio of
twenty-seven excellent plates, with descriptions illustrating six species
of Salmo and one of Thymallus, one plate of each species being colored
according to life, the others representing differences of age, sex, and
locality. The second part, which did not appear till 1842, consists of
a folio of plates and a volume of text on the "Embryology of the
Salmons," by Carl Vogt, whom Agassiz had associated with him in his
work. M. Vogt has given the most detailed descriptions and figures
of the different organs, and the changes they undergo from the for-
mation of the cellules, out of which the organs are developed, to the
adult state. In regard to cell-formation, M. Vogt differs from Schwann
in affirming that the germinative vesicle is formed prior to the nuclei
and nucleoli. The volume closes with a history of the daily develop-
ment of the embryo, from the exclusion of the egg to the birth of the
young. This excellent work was never completed ; Agassiz's depart-
ure for the United States shortly after, and his increasing responsi-
bilities, prevented the perfection of his orignal plan.

In 1842 Agassiz began the publication of his " ISTomenclator Zo-
ologicus," an alphabetical list of every genus, with the name of the
author, the work in which it originally appeared, the derivation of the
name, and the family to which the genus belongs ; the list embracing
upward of seventeen thousand names. In the introduction the author
examines the rules proposed by the British Association and those of
the British Committee. He agrees with the rules proposing that the
name given by a founder of a group, or the first describer of a species,
should be retained, and that priority is to be conceded only to a
name published in some universally accessible work. On the other
hand, he objects to the restriction of priority to LinucTus and to the
rule that would change a name previously in use in connection witli
some other genus in zoology or botany, as this would result in the
sacrifice of half the names of recent times. He does not think it wise

6i2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

to discard barbarous names, and, when a species becomes the type of a
new genus, he would retain the former specific name as the generic ap-
pellative. He objects to the use of small initial letters for substantives
borrowed from persons or places, to the uniform restriction of family
and sub-family terminations to idee and ince, and strongly condemns
the proposition that the name of the original propounder of a species
should be retained when the species is transferred to a different genus.
He likewise condemns those who would change the authority for a
genus when the name is changed through faulty orthograj^hy, and
censures the use of vernacular names in scientific works to the ex-
exclusion of the systematic ones.

The " Fossil Fishes " was now approaching completion, but, in con-
sequence of additional material, Agassiz determined to publish a sup-
plement; and accordingly there appeared, in 1844, the "Fossil Fishes
of the Old Red Sandstone." It was accompanied by an atlas of
thirty-nine folio plates illustrative of the seventy-six species described.
The author, after discussing the relative rank of the members of the
various classes of the animal kingdom, and showing how closely the
time of their appearance on the earth corresponds to their relative
standing in their respective classes, announces the conclusions to
which a study of the fishes of the Devonian system had led him.
These fishes actually represent the embryonic age of the Reign of
Fishes, undergoing " phases of development analogous to those of the
embryo, and similar to the gradations which the present creation
shows us in the ascending series it presents when viewed as a whole."
The members of the five families whose species he describes, are char-
acterized by the absence of distinct vertebrae, the apophyses resting
on the spinal cord, and by the absence of ossification in the internal
case of the cranium. In these characters, as well as in the peculiar
development of the vertical fins, the heterocercal tail, the flattened
form of the head, and inferior or sub-inferior mouth, we see peculiari-
ties of structure common to the embryo and the lower forms of exist-
ing as well as paleozoic fishes. This affords us a key to the relative
rank of these fishes, for we find the Cephalaspides, which recede most
from the existing forms, confined to the Devonian. The Sauroids,
which are represented only by a particular group — the Dipterians —
are likewise confined to the Devonian. The Acanthodia?is become
extinct at the end of the Chalk, while the Ce$tracio)ites persist to the
present epoch. The same year Agassiz also read before the British As-
sociation a " Report on the Fossil Fishes of the London Clay."

Of all Agassiz's investigations, perhaps none made his name more
popularly known than his studies on glaciers — studies which were pur-
sued through a long course of years, and conducted with the same
painstaking care that had heretofore characterized all his labors.

About the year 1834, M. Charpentier advanced the theory that
the erratic blocks, and certain dikes of peculiar shape found in the

PROFESSOR LOUIS AGASSIZ. 613

Alpine regions, were the result of the action of former glaciers de-
scending from the Alps and reaching even the upper portions of the
Jura. This theory Agassiz deemed improbable, till, having visited
Charpentier and investigated the phenomena, he not only became con-
vinced of the correctness of Charpentier's views, but deduced from
these and other phenomena a theory which, at the time (1837), was
startlingly novel. It was that, previous to the elevation of the Alps,
the globe experienced a very great reduction of temperature, and
that the appearance of those mountains found the surface of the
globe, from the north-pole to the Mediterranean Sea, covered with an
immense sheet of ice. An elevation of temperature, consequent upon
the upheaval of the Alps, caused this ice slowly to disappear, remain-
ing longest in the valleys, where it gradually retreated to its present
limits, leaving behind it, as a record, the peculiar phenomena which
have attracted the attention of so many observers.

Of course a theory so novel at once raised a storm of opposition,
and it became necessary for Agassiz, if he would prove the correct-
ness of his views, to make the most careful and thorough investigations
on living glaciers. For this purpose Agassiz, in company with Desor
and several others, made visits in 1838 and 1839 to the glaciers of
Mont Blanc and the Bernese Oberland, and in 1840 established him-
self for the summer on the glacier of the Aar. That year he published
his " ifitudes sur les Glaciers," giving the results of his investigations up
to that time. He also visited England, Scotland, and Ireland, and
studied the evidences of ice-action in those countries.

But his labors were not finished. Doubting the sufficiency of the
theory of De Saussure — that the cause of the motion of the glacier
depends upon gravity — and inclined to accept the dilatation theory
of Schenchzer, it became necessary for him to examine with care the
structure, form, distribution, and rate of motion of the glacier. Thus
it was that, in 1841, he began a second, series of observations for the
purpose of detei-mining these points. He chose, for the theatre of his
investigations, the glacier of the Aar, which, by its extent and acces-
sibility, promised the most favorable results. In 1845 he had com-
pleted his work, and in 1847 appeared his "Systeme Glaciaire," which
embodied the final results of his researches upon the structure of
glaciers, and their effects upon the soil. The results at which he
arrived may be summarized as follows : The glacier is a mass of ice
reclining on the side of a mountain-ridge, or inclosed in a mountain-
valley ; it is always descending, and, while wasting away from heat at
its lower extremity, is continually augmented at its source. The pri-
mary material of glacier-ice is the snow which falls in the high regions of
the mountain. The yearly addition of snow in the higher cold regions
gradually forces the snow down the valley ; here, subject to alternate
thawing and freezing, it undergoes a second crystallization into what
is called neve snow, and still fiirther down, under increased pressure, be-

6 14 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

comes transformed into a granular, opaque, bulbous ice, called n'evi'e ice^
which at last changes into the compact blue ice of the glacier proper.

During the summer, when the snow-fall is at its minimum, the sur-
face of the snow in the high regions becomes covered with dirt and
sand, which the next winter covers with another snow-sheet. In
summer these layers of snow, from a partial melting and subsequent
freezing, become changed to ice on their surfaces, so that we have
three kinds of deposits — beds of snow, sheets of dust, and layers of
ice. As the whole is pushed down into the valley, these layers tend
to assume a vertical position from the bottom of the mass, moving
faster than the top ; and, the snow in summer melting from the sur-
face as far as the snow-line, the edges of the layers are found passing
transversely across the glacier. The middle of the glacier being
deeper, moves faster than the sides, and, the lower layers advancing
more rapidly than the upper ones, the strata become curved for-
ward, the lower layers being more sharply arched. The arch thus
becomes the measure of the rate of movement in the different parts of
the glacier. From this it will be seen that Agassiz dissents from the
theory of Tyndall, which represents the stratified lines as due to ice-
cascades, or breakages of the glacier in passing over sharp angles.

All glaciers exhibit numerous blue bands, which are parallel to the
planes of stratification, and are formed by thawing and freezing, and
by the vertical pressure of snow in the nevL Moreover, there are found
certain veined structures of the ice which appear to be bands of in-
'filtration, and intersect the planes of stratification at every possible
angle. As they are most numerous at the sides of the glacier, it is
probable that Tyndall's theory of internal liquefaction of ice by press-
ure may account for them.

In the progress of the glaciei", its rate of movement is not uniform,
the differences between the centre and the sides being about as ten to
one. Neither is the motion uniform along the axis ; the advance being
greatest about half-way down the region of the nev^, and diminishing
in rapidity both above and below. Agassiz found that it was from
20 to 50 feet per year in the higher portions, about 250 feet in the
nhve, and diminishing again lower down.

The causes of the movement of the glacier are several. The weight
of the glacier alone is not sufiicient to propel it, as in this case the
greatest movement would be in the winter, which is not the case. The
principal agent is the infiltration of water, which is greatest when the
winter snows are melting. The granular snow of the ?ieve incloses nu-
merous particles of air, which, when the snow is' compressed into ice,
form a net-work of capillary fissures that serve as canals of infiltration,
the water in which, freezing, aids in propelling the glacier. Added to
this may be such other causes as the weight of the mass, the pressure of
accumulated snow above, the weight of infiltrated water, and the soft-
ening of the ice by water, and a consequent sliding along the surface.

PROFESSOR LOUIS AGASSIZ. 615

The sides as well as the bottom of the glacier are studded with
bowlders, pebbles, and sand, forming a gigantic rasp. As the glacier
moves forward, this rasp grinds, furrows, and polishes the rocks over
which it moves, the furrows trending in the direction in which the
glacier moves. These furrows and polished surfaces, which are often
observed on rocks remote from any living glaciers, are the record of
the former existence of glaciers in such places. When the ground is
uneven, the eminences being small, and the hollows too deep and
wide to be bridged over by the glacier, the ice-rasp rounds and pol-
ishes these knolls, forming those rounded elevations which have re-
ceived the name of roches moutonnees. In consequence of the rocky
walls above the sides of the glacier becoming warmed by the sun, the
ice is melted near them, and hence the glacier becomes convex. Into
these troughs the debris from the walls fall and form long lines of bowld-
ers, pebbles, and sand, which are called lateral moraines. When two
glaciers flow together, the two lateral moraines on the adjoining sides of
each unite and form what is called a medial moraine. A third form,
the terminal m.oraine, is the accumulation of sand and rocks which
the glacier pushes before in its progress down the valley. In conse-
quence of the increased rate of progression of the centre of the gla-
cier, these terminal moraines assume a semicircular form, which, when
the glacier retreats, consequent upon an excess of liquefaction over the
snow-supply, leaves a crescentic Avail across the valley, usually cut in
two by the river flowing from the glacier. The erratic blocks which
are found over most of the globe, accompanying scratched and poK ' ' " ^'
ished rock-surfaces, are simply the bowlders of the surface of the glacier "'■ ^S^
left on or near the spot where they stood when the glacier disappear, "- "

In the fall of 1846 Agassiz sailed for the United States, on a mk- ' \
sion from the Prussian Government. The warm reception which. ^ ■ -'-^^
greeted him here, and especially the rare field for scientific research^'*' '^*f*
which this country afibrded, determined him, the next year, to make
America permanently his home. The professorship of Natural His-
tory in the Lawrence Scientific School at Harvard College being
ofiered him that same year, he accepted it, and held the position till
his death, with the exception of two years when he occupied the chair
of Natural History in the University of South Carolina, at Charleston.
In 1848, in connection with H. E. Strickland, he began the publication
of a " Bibliographia Zoologize et Geologise." This work, which com-
prises a list of all the periodicals devoted to zoology and geology, and
an alphabetical list of authors and their works in the same departments,
was completed in four volumes, the fourth being published in 1854.

Agassiz's studies on the glaciers of Switzerland led him to expect
to find in the United States many traces of former ice-action. Nor
was he disappointed. He explored the country from the Atlantic to
the Rocky Mountains, from the great lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, and
everywhere, north of the thirty-fifth parallel of latitude, found evi-

6i6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

deuces of glacial action, in erratic blocks, polished and striated rock-
surfaces, and terminal moraines. Naturally this served to confirm him
in his belief in the universality of the ice-period ; and, upon his depart-
ure for Brazil, in 1865, he announced his confident expectation of find-
ing records of the former existence of glaciers in that country ; for,
according to his belief, not only most of the Northern, but also most
of the Southern Hemisphere was, during the glacial epoch, encased in
ice. The evidences of glacial action in the United States are fully
discussed by Agassiz in his "Lake Superior," a work on the physical
character, vegetation, and animals, of Lake Superior, compared with
those of other and similar regions.

Agassiz was a firm believer in the diversity of origin of the human
race, and his views on this point are ably presented in the Christian
Examiner for July, 1850, and in an introduction to Nott and Giiddon's
" Types of Mankind." While denying the unity of origin of the races
of mankind, he by no means denies their essential unity as one brother-
hood. He regards all races of men as possessing in common the moral
and intellectual attributes of humanity Avhich raise them above the
brutes. But intellectual relationship does not imply community of
origin. The geographical distribution of animals shows that distinct
zoological provinces are each characterized by peculiar fauna, and that
therefore animals did not originate from a common centre nor from a
single pair. The races of men, in their natural distribution, cover the
same ground as the zoological provinces, and he believes there is every
reason to suppose that these races originally appeared as nations in
the regions they now occupy. That the differences at present observed
between various races are primitive, and have not been the result of
modification from one common ancestral type, he believed is evidenced
by the monuments of Egypt, which show that, for 5,000 years, there
has been no physical change in the negro and Caucasian.

In 1850 there appeared in the Transactions of the American Acad-
emy of Arts and Sciences an article on the naked-eyed Medusae, being
Part L of Agassiz's " Contributions to the Natural History of the
Acalephge of North America." He includes all the naked-eyed Me-
dusae in one family, and shows that the number of tentacles and the
position of the ovaries alone cannot be considered as family char-
acters. The true characters consist in a gelatinous disk, with a re-
entering margin, along which passes a submarginal tube connecting
with the circulatory tubes proceeding from a central digestive cavity.
Upon the margin are the tentacles and eye-specks. The reproductive
organs are situated along the circulatory tubes. The generation is
alternate, one form being polyp-like, the other medusoid. The nervous
cord follows the circular submarginal tube, and consists of several rows
of nucleated cells, alternating one with another. It passes into the
bulbs at the base of the marginal tentacles, in which are situated the
eye-specks. A branch of nerve-thread passes also along each of the

PROFESSOR LOUIS AGASSIZ. 617

I'adiating circulatory tubes to the digestive cavity. The circulatory
fluid is chyme, and not chyle, as it is in the Articulata and Mollusca.
The author describes four species, and distinguishes a new genus —

Ever since his arrival in America, Agassiz had been collecting ma-
terial for a series of " Contributions to the Natural History of the
United States." In 1857 appeared two volumes of these contributions ;
the first containing an " Essay on Classification " and the history of the
North American Testudinata ; the second on " the Embryology of the
Turtle."

In the essay on Classification, Agassiz aflirms that Nature is but
the expression of the thought of the Creator, and that a true classi-
fication will be found to be but an unfolding of the plan of creation, as
expressed in living realities ; that these realities do not exist in con-
sequence of the continued agency of physical causes, but appear suc-
cessively by the immediate intervention of the Creator. We find in
Nature a progressive series, from lower to higher forms ; but it is not
a uniform progress for the animal kingdom as a whole ; neither is it a
linear progress for the branches or classes, but a progress in which
each type has usually been introduced by the creation of species be-
longing to one of its higher groups, for the earliest repi'esentatives of
a class do not always seem to be the lowest. Yet, notwithstanding
these downward steps, the progress has continually tended toward the
production of higher and higher types, culminating at last in Man.

We find a parallelism between the geological succession of animals
and the embryonic growth of their living representatives, as well as
a parallelism between the geological succession of animals and their
relative rank. The earlier types of animals were synthetic or pro-
phetic, foreshadowing a future group. Types likewise culminated and
disappeared in past ages — a feature parallel with the fact that in em-
bryological development parts fulfill their end and then disappear.

Regarding Nature as the embodiment of a certain divine plan, Ag-
assiz sought for a classification that should be the expression of this
plan. Accordingly he based his classification on the following divisions,
which he deemed covered all the categories of i-elationship, as far as
their structure is concerned : Branches^ or types characterized by
their plan of structure ; of these, he admitted four, Vertebrates, Ar-
ticulates, Molluscs, and Radiates. Cla8ses, which are characterized by
the mode of execution of the plan. Orders, by the degree of complica-
tion of structure. Families, by the form as determined by structure.
Genera, by the details of execution ; and Species, by the relation of the
individuals to one another, and to the world in which they live.

In Part II., Agassiz believes that the Testudinata constitute an
order among the class of reptiles ; that their essential character lies
not so much in the shield as in the special development of diSerent
regions of the body, thus giving them the highest rank in the class.

6i8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The shield is partly a portion of the skeleton, and partly an ossifica-
tion of the skin or of the walls of the body.

The second volume treats entirely of the embryology of the turtle,
and is illustrated with thirty-four plates. The egg originates from
between the cells of the stroma, and is in itself the animal in the first
stages of development. The eggs are laid once a year, and grow a
long time before they are fecundated. From the first copulation to
the laying, four years elapse, during which time eight copulations
take place. The segmentation of the yolk takes place during the
passage of the ^^g through the oviduct. From the segmentation of
the yolk to the period of hatching, the egg passes through thirty-one
stages of devel6praent.

The third volume of the "Contributions" appeared in 1860, and
■was devoted to the class of Acalephae, the author treating specially
of the order Ctenophorce. The Ctenophorm Agassiz divided into
three suborders : the Eurystomce, embracing three families, the Sac-
catcB^ with three families, and the Lohatce., with five families. The
fourth volume of the "Contributions," in 1862, concluded the Aca-
lephse, treating of the Discoplioroe^ Sydroidce, and the Homologies of
the Radiata.

Of the more recent labors of Agassiz in connection with the Mu-
seum of Comparative Zoology at Cambridge — of which he was the
director, and to which, in later years, he devoted his whole attention —
it is not necessary to speak. With his journey to Brazil in 1865, and
his later expedition from Boston to San Francisco" on the United States
Coast Survey steamer Hassler in 1872, the public is already sufficiently
familiar. His last days were devoted to the cause of education, in the
establishment of a school of natural history at Penikese Island.

Of the man himself but a word is necessary. As a naturalist,
Prof. Agassiz was unwearied in his devotion to his favorite pursuits.
He worked early and late, often denying to himself the most necessary
rest and recreation ; and his remarkably strong constitution sustained
him under a strain that would quickly have proved fatal to a man of
less vigor. His mind was preeminently great ; gifted with a "wonder-
fully retentive memory, he combined with it a jDOwer of generalization
and quick perception that places him next to Cuvier, whose disciple
he was, and whom he seemed to imitate. In his methods of investiga-
tion he was perfectly honest, and, though many might diiFer from him
in his conclusions, none could deny the absolute integrity of his con-
victions. In his intercourse with his fellow-men he was extremely
affable and genial, and especially so toward the young. With inex-
perience he was most patient and painstaking, never wearying in his
efforts to aid. Tolerant of ignorance where associated with modesty,
he had but little patience with arrogance and ignorance combined.
His students will all bear witness to the unvarying cheerfulness and
ready sympathy in him they had learned to look up to as their master.

EDITORS TABLE.

619

EDITOR'S TABLE.

INFLUENCE OF SCIENCE UPON PHI-
LOSOPHY.

IX his thoughtful little work on " Ee-
cent British Philosophy," Prof.
Masson, of the University of Edin-
burgh, has the following suggestive
passages upon the subject indicated in
the present title :

" However earnestly we may contend for
Buch a notion of Philosopliy as shall keep up
the tradition of it as something more than
Science, yet the perpetual liability of Phi-
losophy to modifications, at the hands of
Science, is a fact obvious to all. Not a new
scientific discovery can be made, not a new
scientific conception can get abroad, but it
exercises a disturbing influence on the pre-
vious system of thought, antiquating some-
thing, disintegrating something, compelling
some readjustment of the parts to each other,
some trepidation of the axis of the whole.
Sometimes the action is almost revolution-
ary. What a derangement in men's ideas
about every thing whatsoever, what a com-
pulsion to new modes of thinking, and to
new habits of speech, must have been caused
by the propagation of the Copernican As-
tronomy ! What a wrench to all one's
habits of thought, to be taught that the lit-
tle ball which carries us rotates on itself, and
is one of a small company of celestial bodies
that perform their periodical wanderings
round the sun, in lieu of the older astro-
nomical faith, according to which the earth
was fixed in the centre, and the limitless
azure with its fires was one vast spectacular
sphere, composed of ten successive and in-
dependent spherical transparencies, made to
wheel round the earth diurnally for her soli-
tary pleasure ! Man's thoughts, even about
himself and his destinies, could not but be
changed in some respects by this compul-
sion of his imagination to a totally new way
of fancying physical immensity and our
earth's share in its proceedings. . . ,

" It is not every day, indeed nor every
century, that there occurs such a vast com-
pulsory shifting of the very axis of men's
conceptions of the physical universe as that
■which our ancestors had so reluctantly to
submit to only a century or two ago. But

every generation, every year brings with it
a quantum of new scientific conceptions, new
scientific truths. They creep in upon us on
all sides. Is Philosophy to stand in the
midst of them haughtily and superciliously,
taking no notice? She cannot do so and
live. Whether she knows it or not, these
are her appointed food. She must eat them
up or perish. They do not constitute her
vitality, any more than the food that men
eat constitutes the life that is in them ; but,
just as men, in order merely to continue
alive, must refresh themselves continually
with food, so Philosophy, that she may not
fall down emaciated and dead by the way-
side, must not only not hold aloof from Sci-
ence, but must regard what Science brings as
her daily and delicious nutriment. Whatever
definition of Philosophy we adopt — whether
we call it simply and beautifully, with Plato
in one passage, ' a meditation of death,' or
adopt some of the more labored definitions
that have been given expressly to indicate its
relations to Science— it is equally certain
that a philosophy that should be out of ac-
cord with any ascertained scientific truth or
tendency to truth, or that should not in some
efficient manner harmonize for the reason
all the conceptions and informations of con-
temporary science, would be of no use for
educated intelligences, and would exist as a
refuge for others only by sufi"erance. Shall
Philosophy pretend to regulate the human
spirit, and not know what is passing within
it — to supervise and direct man's thinkings,
and not know what they are ?

"In no age so conspicuously as in our
own has there been a crowding in of new
scientific conceptions of all kinds to exercise
a perturbing influence on Speculative Phi-
losophy. They have come in almost too fast
for Philosophy's powers of reception. She
has visibly reeled amid their shocks, and has
not yet recovered her equilibrium. Within
those years alone which we are engaged in
surveying there have been developments of
native British science, not to speak of in-
fluxes of scientific ideas, hints, and proba-
bilities from without, in the midst of which
British Philosophy has looked about her
scared and bewildered, and has felt that
some of her oldest statements about herself,
and some of the most important terms in
her vocabulary, require reexplication."

620

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The truths here enunciated cannot
be too carefully pondered. In its mod-
ern progress Science has been con-
stantly warned off from the field of
Philosophy, as having no concern what-
ever with its issues or interests. But
Science has no more choice or respon-
sibility in regard to the results of its
work than it has with regard to the
phenomena which it investigates. If
it is to be suffered to exist at aU, it
must proceed with its labor of investi-
gating facts and establishing principles;
to what conclusions these wiU lead de-
pends upon nobody's preference, but
upon the constitution of the universe
itself. If the scheme of being around
us is a harmonized and unified order,
where all the parts are in reciprocal
sympathy, then he who strikes an im-
pulse is not to be called to account for
the sweep and compass of the undula-
tions which follow. Science may be
occupied in her legitimate duty with
simple laboratory experiments, and es-
tablish results that will thrill through
all spheres of thought, and reach to the
very core of philosophy.

Such a step was taken in the last
century in establishing the indestructi-
bility of matter. The problem that had
baffled philosophy, for thousands of
years, was settled by the experimenters.
The truth which was inaccessible to
speculation was arrived at by the phys-
icists and chemists. It had been be-
lieved, for centuries, that in the changes
of form — the appearances and disap-
pearances of Nature — existence itself
was implicated, and matter, the sub-
stratum of being, was continually cre-
ated and destroyed. The poetic divina-
tion—

" The eternal Pan,

Bideth never in one shape,

But forever doth escape

Into new forms " —

only became a demonstrated truth
when the mechanics had perfected
the chemical balance and made it pos-
sible to pursue the course of material

transformations. It was then found
that the old belief in the destructibility
of matter was without foundation, and
that the persistence of material elements
through aU changes of form was de-
monstrated by every particle of evidence
that bore upon the case. Philosophy,
which aims at the deepest explanation
of the order of things around us, if it
has any aim worth pursuing, thus de-
rived a new datum from the work-
shop ; but how foolish to assume that,
in elaborating it, the chemists were in-
spired with any purpose to trench upon
the domain of Philosophy !

But this research, which ended in
the establishment of the law that mat-
ter is indestructible, was but an appren-
ticeship for deeper and more delicate
investigations of the same kind. The
use of the balance led to the discovery
of quantitative chemistry, the highest
phase of the science, and strengthened
the mental habit of regarding phenom-
ena in their quantitative relations.
Matter is not only associated with
forces, but it is manifested and known
through its essential and inseparable
activities. It is not only determined
by its forces, but it is measured by
them. The very instrument by which
matter was proved to be indestructible,
was but a device for showing the con-
stant relation of material bodies to the
force of gravity. Cohesion, affinity,
heat, light, and magnetism, are but dy-
namic affections of matter, which are
involved in all its changes, and it was
simply inevitable that when one ele-
ment of things was proved to be es-
sentially indestructible, through every
mutation of form, the same inquiry
should be pressed in regard to this
character of the other forces. Nat-
urally, and quite necessarily, the dis-
ciplined scientific thinkers of differ-
ent countries, with no knowledge of
each other's purposes, and proceeding
from different points of view, were led
to engage with the experimental prob-
lem of the quantitative interactions of

EDITOR'S TABLE.

621

the molecular forces. The consequence
of this was another step forward, of
the greatest possible importance. It
was shown that the physical forces
are as obedient to quantitative laws as
matter itself had been proved to be,
and that, while they are mutually con-
vertible into each other, force, like mat-
ter, is indestructible in its nature. The
various forms of energy by which ef-
fects are produced in the surrounding
world, although changiiag incessantly,
were discovered to be never created and
never annihilated. "With the evidence
that every form of force is derived from
some preexisting form of it, the hope
of a mechanism generating its own
power perpetually, passed away among
impossibilities, and the science of forces
became limited to problems of trans-
formation. It was much to have ex-
ploded the fallacy of the perpetual
motion, upon which the ingenuity and
wealth of generations had been wasted,
but it was far more to have seized upon
a principle of Nature which Dr. Fara-
day could pronounce to be the highest
law in physical science which our facul-
ties permit us to perceive. And are the
discoverers of this principle to be held
accountable for the reach and play of
its applications? No doubt a law of
Nature's activities, thus supreme and
far-extending, cannot be limited to
the field of physical phenomena. The
probabilities are strong that, wherever
effects are produced in degrees of more
or less, they are strictly conformable
to quantitative conditions, although the
proof of it may be indirect and difBcult,
and exact results quite unattainable.
But with this point we have here no
concern, and only say that it is no
business of Science if the law be found
to pervade domains of thought which
Philosophy has hitherto claimed to be
exclusively her own. Nor is there any
just ground for arraigning men of sci-
ence as transgressing the proper limits
of their inquiries by pursuing the prin-
ciple of the conservation of energy into

tlie spheres of life, mind, and social ac-
tivity. Science could not evade the
necessity of entering upon the earlier
steps of the investigation, any more than
it can now evade the necessity of pur-
suing it ; and it would be a worthier
proceeding on the part of philosophers,
gratefully to accept what she contri-
butes for their use, rather than to raise
an outcry against the scientists for in-
terfering with matters which, it is as-
sumed, do not belong to them.

ANOTHER "■ SPEWCER-CBUSHERr

The work of putting down Herbert
Spencer, which has been going on these
dozen years, still flourishes and threat-
ens to become a regular occupation.
Obscure men are making reputations
right and left, and famous men are add-
ing to their laurels by taking down the
great philosopher on all sides. If they
do not succeed in getting him out of
the way, this branch of criticism may
grow into a thrifty business. Who shall
be greatest in this little but increasing
kingdom of criticism, it is as yet prema-
ture to say, although symptoms of gra-
dation in the honors of the work are
beginning to be disclosed. We explained,
some time since, in the Monthly,
that our friend Liefchild had brought
forth a big book, which was evidently
designed to interrupt Mr. Spencer's
philosophical career. He did not, how-
ever, himself aspire to the distinction of
wiping him out, but assigned that high
function to President Porter, of Yale,
whom he ranked as the great " Spen-
cer-crusher." Mr. Liefchild would
probably accord to others the minor
grades of extinguishers, upsettcrs, de-
pressors, etc. Meantime the work may
be expected to proceed vigorously. Al-
though we often hear that Mr. Spencer
has at last been quite demolished and
put an end to, he seems to be still alive
and in a very vigorous condition, as
the article replying to the Quarterly
Eeviewers in our present number will

622

THE POPULAR SCIEA^CE MONTHLY.

attest. The last aspirant for glory, in
the Spencer-crushing line, is one Alex-
ander Gibson, hitherto guiltless of fame,
whose onslaught is contained in a late
number of the London Academy. This
periodical, it may be remarked, was
started a few years ago, with an Oxford
parentage, as an organ of old rubbishy
scholarship and useless lore generally,
and, having been knocked about among
different publishers as a bad specula-
tion, now turns up in new hands, and
the transition is signalized by the pres-
ent essay at the use of the critical scalp-
ing-knife.

Conscious, perhaps, of the trouble he
has been causing to the critical frater-
nity, Mr. Spencer has lately changed
his tactics. In his former works he
expressed his own opinions very freely
on various subjects, and it is these that
have been the objects of attack by the
increasing crowd of his assailants.
They have shown, in a manner perfect-
ly conclusive to themselves, tliat his
views are weak, foolish, erroneous, false,
absurd, dangerous, and wicked. And
so he has now made a book containing
no opinions of his own at all. It is a
work simply of facts and authorities,
and, as if scrupulously to avoid rousing
the ire of his enemies, he hired a man to
write out the facts and copy the au-
thorities. His own agency was limited
barely to drawing up a plan of presen-
tation, which his assistant was to fol-
low, and he indulges in not a woi'd of
comment upon the statements that are
made. But all in vain. Alexander
Gibson hunts him out, even in this city
of refuge, and is bound to crush him all
the same. Let us gather up the frag-
ments, and see what remains after this
last assault.

In reviewing the "Descriptive Soci-
ology " in the Academy^ Mr. Gibson
makes two points, which are — -first^ that
the compilation of facts by Spencer's as-
sistant, Mr. Collier, is badly done ; and,
second^ that, if it had been well done, the
work would stiU be good for nothing.

Mr. Gibson begins by a represen-
tation that is quite misleading. He
says: "It is clear at a glance that
the work thus undertaken is one of
great magnitude and difficulty; and,
when one considers the high reputa-
tion Mr. Spencer has acquired by his
sociological theories, it acquires a pe-
culiar interest, as it will serve to show
the nature and value of the material
which he has used for constructing or
testing his speculations." The implica-
tion here is, that Mr. Spencer has first
theorized and speculated upon social
questions, and then sought for facts to
support his views. But Mr. Spencer's
social philosophy has never yet been
developed, and the collection of socio-
logical data which was commenced five
years ago is designed as the foundation
for general principles yet to be derived
from them. The relation of these ma-
terials to the uses for which Mr. Spencer
himself proposes to employ them cannot
therefore be judged until his principles
of sociology are worked out. Mr. Gib-
son inverts the truth of the case, for
Mr. Spencer's extensive collection and
classification of facts were not made to
sustain past speculations but as a guide
to future theories.

In judging of his undertaking, it is
important to remember that Mr. Spen-
cer published first that division of it
which is most open to criticism ; that
is, he deals first with the social ele-
ments of his own country, the history
of which is generally familiar. It is
also not to be forgotten that his aim
was to bring forward just that order
of facts for which historians have cared.
the least, and concerning which their
statements have been most loose, care-
less, and conflicting. Added to this,
the work of collection and arrangement
had never before been attempted, and
Mr. Spencer had to work as a pioneer
in the field. It is also noteworthy that
the plan of the work precluded all ex-
planatory comment. That such a work
— a work of " great magnitude and

EDITOR'S TABLE.

623

difficulty," as Mr. Gibson allows — can-
not be free from errors is obvious, and
from all the foregoing causes it is pe-
culiarly exposed to unscrupulous criti-
cism. When these considerations are
taken into account, Mr. Gibson's case
of alleged errors in the tabular state-
ments on the part of Mr. Collier is
simply pitiful. His six-column search
for flaws and defects yields the follow-
ing outcome.

Mr. Collier enters his numerous and
varied facts in their proper relations
in the tables in the most condensed
language possible, as he was compelled
to do by the nature of the presenta-
tion; but this, of course, affords Mr.
Gibson an opportunity, which he duly
improves, to complain of the want of
explanations. For the classified facts
Mr. Collier gives in the accompany-
ing text the exact words of tlie au-
thorities which he has followed, and
Mr. Gibson has no admiration for
disjointed "scraps." Mr. Collier has
made quotations from about one hun-
dred and seventy works, which were
of course sought as the best, and
which the intelligent reader will see
comprehend the great mass of authen-
tic English history. Mr. Gibson im-
peaches none of these authorities, but
sublimely discredits the whole, declar-
ing that they " are not, in the histori-
cal sense of the word, authorities at
all." This, of course, is mere asser-
tion. The "historical sense" can be
nothing else than common-sense ap-
plied to history, and that can only re-
quire the compiler to seek the best
possible sources of information. If the
regular historians have failed to fur-
nish it, it must be gathered from other
and scattered sources. Mr. Spencer's
tables give strong evidence of being a
faithful reflex of the social state. They
are full of gaps where information
could not be supplied; and the best
authorities extant have been diligently
searched for the statements, names and
pages being carefully given ; what more

can be reasonably asked? Although he
does not attempt to show wherein the
authorities are untrustworthy, he tries
to make out three or four instances in
which the quotations are iusuflicient to
justify the statements based upon them
in the tables. Again, he says there is no
clear trace that he (Mr. Collier) has any
perception of the relative value of the
different facts he has come across in
the one hundred and seventy volumes
which he has consulted. It is but just
to Mr. Collier to say that, while he
has quoted one hundred and seventy
volumes, he has consulted a far larger
number, and it is a sufficient reply to
Mr. Gibson's insinuation regarding Col-
lier's defective "perception" of the
relative values of his facts, that their
valuation was not his business, and if
some are more valuable than others he
could not very well help it. Mr. Spen-
cer has pointed out in his preface the
difficulty of reducing such multifarious
details to a tabular statement in paral-
lel columns, while the advance of soci-
ety constantly gives rise to new ele-
ments. The exigencies of the classifi-
cation required that, to a certain ex-
tent, diverse though kindred facts
should be grouped together. But this
does not protect him from the hyper-
critical Gibson, who carps at the dis-
tributions, and thinks that "most of
the information under the head ' Mor-
als' ought to be transferred to the head-
ing of ' Law and Politics ; ' " while the
diversity of objects that Mr. Collier
has included under the head of " Tools
and Implements" is gravely pointed
out in the array of objections. Of
Mr. Collier's omissions this keen-eyed
critic has discovered one which he
duly chronicles : it is the failure to
mention " dramatic poetry." Mr. Gib-
son is captious over the deficiency of
the statements, and thinks that more
facts are wanted. He says : "It would
be the merest impertinence for Mr.
Spencer's sociological student to draw
conclusions from such miserable data

624

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

as, for example, are afforded, in the
case of English religions ideas and su-
perstitions from the Druids to the Gor-
ham controversy, within the limits of
seven columns an inch wide." Yet, in
these seven long columns of compressed
statements, with the copious authenti-
cating extracts, there is a vast amount
of valuable (though we suspect to Mr.
Gibson), of unpalatable information, as
he returns to them again and again with
unhappy comments. But it is to be re-
membered that Mr. Spencer is far from
proposing to formiilate a sociological
science on the basis of English experi-
ence alone. The plan of his work em-
braces all types and grades of the
social state, and is so comprehensive
that its complete publication is still a
matter of question. Mr. Gibson's com-
plaints at the paucity of the materials
are, therefore, quite gratuitous.

Such is the quality of Mr. Gibson's
critical work. It is approached in an
ugly temper, and, a few petty inaccura-
cies and defects being found, the most
absurd charges are made and the whole
work declared unworthy of confidence.
The complete break-down of his case,
so far as Mr. Collier is concerned, af-
fords excellent evidence of the judg-
ment and fidelity with which the task
has been executed.

Mr. Gibson's second point is that,
" even supposing that Mr. Spencer had
got them (the tables) done with a-s great
accuracy and intelligence as possible,
they would still be useless." But why
expend so much vicious ingenuity in
finding defects in an intrinsically worth-
less thing? One wouldnaturally suppose
that this second point would have been
taken up first, because, if established,
the former inquiry would be super-
fluous. But, if we ask for the reasons
of this position, Mr. Gibson wisely
declines to give them ; only remark-
ing that "w^e have had too much al-
ready of the tendency, on the part of
framers of social and other sciences, to
deal superficially with history." By

the framers of sciences, we suppose that
Mr. Gibson can only mean those culti-
vators of science who originate and or-
ganize this kind of knowledge, and the
upshot of his charge, therefore, is that
the scientific method of studying his-
tory is superficial. This raises the
question, "What are the depths, and
what the shallows, of history?" Of
the descriptive sociology, one of the
most eminent authorities in England,
Mr. E. B. Tylor, writes in Nature:
"So much information, encumhered
with so little rubbish, has never he-
fore been brought to bear on the de-
velopment of English institutions." Is
it the information concerning the "de-
velopment of English institutions " that
is the superficial element? and is it the
" rubbish " that constitutes the pro-
found element wanting in Mr. Spen-
cer's plan ? There are two methods of
dealing with history : the old method
of chronicle, narration, and story-tell-
ing, which was in vogue before science
arose ; and the later or scientifi c meth od,
which aims at the discovery of natural
laws among historic phenomena. The
old method occupied itself with the
registration of surface effects, and what-
ever happened to be uppermost and
obtrusive in any place or period. It
was a biography of the conspicuous
figures that chanced to emerge and oc-
cupy passing public attention. It was
full of the doings and sayings of sover-
eigns, generals, diplomatists, and poli-
ticians ; full of their gossip, rivalries,
and crimes; the details of war, the
quarrels of factions, and the intrigues
of ambitious families ; and it has con-
sisted of so chaotic and incoherent and
interminable a mass of details of this
sort, that its cultivators scout the idea
that there is or ever can be any thing
like a science of history. This, we sup-
pose, is to be taken as the deep part
of the subject — its profundity being
due to the fact that it cannot be re-
duced to order? On the other hand,
science, which has disclosed the opera-

EDITOR'S TABLE.

625

tion of law throughout all tho work-
ings of Nature, has entered with its
new method upon the study of society.
In what does the social structure con-
sist? what are the nature and laws of
its activities ? what are the conditions
of its development ? These are its prob-
lems. Science always begins with the
observation, determination, and classi-
fication, of facts. This is its first so-
licitude. To get at the facts with the
highest certainty and the greatest ex-
actness and fullness that are possible,
is the primary and inexorable duty of
the true scientific inquirer. To put
these facts in their proper relations, so
as to draw from them the principles
and laws by which they are governed,
is the essence of scientific method, and
to this Mr. Spencer has rigorously con-
formed by devoting a separate and ex-
tensive work to the systematized data
that are necessary for valid reasoning
upon social subjects. All this, says
Mr. Gibson, is of no use, because, if it is
"done with as great accuracy and intel-
ligence as possible," it is still worthless
from its superficiality. And so, court
frivolities and the trumperies and trivi-
alities of personal incident are the deep
things for which the "historical sense"
must make research, while the inves-
tigation of principles and laws is the
worthless work of shallow scientists!
That will do for Mr. Gibson. Let him
return to his dust-holes and rubbish-
bins, and enjoy their obscurities and
confusions as the profundities of his-
tory. We should not have meddled
with him on his own account, but Mr.
Spencer's work is a challenge to his
party, and we were interested in seeing
what they would do about it. Their
champion has done the best and the
only thing that he could, and that is to
merge his attack upon Spencer into a
final assault upon science itself.

We reproduce on another page the
brief but suggestive address of Mr.

VOL. IV. — 40

George Ripley, upon laying the corner-
stone of the new Tribune building, ft
was fitting that the paper which was
founded by Mr. Greeley, and devoted
to progressive ideas, and which has
had so wide an influence in educating
the American people, now that its
founder and master-spirit has passed
away, should be solemnly rededicated
to the continued advance and diftusion
of liberal thought and growing knowl-
edge. A political partisan press we
must, undoubtedly, continue to have,
just as we must have war, pestilence,
crime, corruption, and other evils ; but
it is coincident and will be coterminous
with public ignorance, shortsighted-
ness, and the general reign of dema-
gogism. We accordingly hail with
pleasure every indication of revolt
against party domination, and the in-
creasing recognition of those wider
and deeper interests with which the
permanent prosperity of society is in-
volved. In the diff'usion of science in
cheap popular forms, the Tribune has
always taken a leading part ; and its re-
cent efi"orts in this way add strength
to the pledge now offered, that the
same policy will be pursued in the fu-
ture. In a few compressed sentences
Mr. Ripley happily sketches the recent
movements of philosophic thought, and
discerns the full significance of that
latest and largest synthesis of ideas to
which scientific inquiry has brought the
foremost minds of the age. Nothing
is more significant of positive intellect-
ual advance than to see a great news-
paper, immersed as it must be in the
practical concerns of daily life, yet
holding its course in the world of
thought by the higher lights of science
and philosophy. The career and char-
acter of this journal have undoubtedly
been, in a large measure, determined
by the active mind of Mr. Greeley ; but
no estimate of its public influence
would be just that should omit the
prolonged and distinctive labors of its
able literary editor, now president of

626

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the Tribune Association. For twenty-
five years Mr. Eipley has interpreted
the intellectual work of the age through
its columns to millions of his country-
men ; and this has not only been done
with conscientious fidelity and rare
discrimination, but with a broad and
courageous liberality and a catholic
sympathy -with all that seemed true
and excellent, whatever its source.
May the paper, in the new epoch upon
which it has entered, have all the suc-
cess that shall be commensurate with
its nobleness of aim, and its honorable
and high-toned management!

DEATH OF DR. LIVINGSTOXE.

TiDDfGS of the death of Dr. David
Livingstone, the celebrated African ex-
plorer, have been received, and are
generally credited. The particulars are
meagre and uncertain, but it is said he
died of dysentery after severe exposure,
returning from Ujiji to Unyanyembe.
The expedition of the British Govern-
ment, under Lieutenant Cameron, is
supposed to have met him in an en-
campment where he breathed his last,
and embalmed his body to be taken to
Zanzibar.

He was born in 1817, of poor Scot-
tish parents, and, having a taste for
books, his fatlier helped him to attend
the Glasgow University in the winter,
while he helped himself by working in
the cotton-mills in vacation. He stud-
ied medicine, and was admitted to gen-
eral practice in surgery and physic in
1838. He desired to go to China as a
missionary, but, hearing that a medical
agent was wanted for the African mis-
sions, he applied, was accepted, or-
dained to preach, and in 1839 left for
JTatal. He here met the missionary,
Eev. Mr. MoflTatt, and married his
daughter, by whom he had two sons
born in Africa. His first efi"ort at ex-
ploration was in the great Kalahari
Desert in 1849, when he discovered the

Zonga River, and floated down its cur-
rent into Lake Ngami, the most south-
erly of that great chain of lakes which
occupies the centre of Africa. The
next year he returned to this lake with
wife and children, who suffered greatly.
He afterward discovered the great Zam-
bezi Eiver, the chief stream of Southern
Africa. He now formed the scheme of
opening np the Zambezi by means of
light steamers, and of evangelizing the
inhabitants of the region. His family
were sent to Europe, and he undertook
a formidable search of this country in
1852. His wanderings, adventures, and
discoveries, were continued imtil the
latter part of 1856, when he returned
to Europe, and was received with the
greatest honors. In 1857 he published
a narrative of his travels, and in 1858
returned to Africa to explore the Zam-
bezi with steam-launches. During this
expedition he discovered Lakes Xyassa
and Shirvan, lost his wife, and the ex-
pedition was recalled by the Govern-
ment in 1863, and he again reached
England in 1864. In 1865 he left his
native country for the last time, and
his object was thns stated in the pref-
ace to liis book on the Zambezi and its
tributaries: "I propose," he wrote, "to
go inland north of the territory which
the Portuguese in Europe claim, and
endeavor to commence that system in
the East which has been so eminently
successful on the west coast — a system
combining the repressive efi"ects of her
Majesty's cruisers with lawful trade
and Christian missions — the moral and
material results of which have been so
gratifAing. I hope to ascend the Ro-
vnma, or some other river north of
Cape Delgado, and, in addition to my
other work, shall strive, by passing
along the northern end of Lake Ny-
assa, and round the southern end of
Lake Tanganyika, to ascertain the wa-
ter-shed of that part of Africa. In so
doing I have no wish to unsettle what,
with so much toil and danger, was ac-
complished by Speke and Grant, but

LITERARY NOTICES.

627

rather to confirm their illustrious dis-
coveries."

Of his travels, explorations, suffer-
ings, and adventures, during the last
nine years, not much is yet known, but
it is hoped that records will be found
giving additional information concern-
ing the geography of interior Africa.

DEATH OF FERN AND PAPILLON.

The readers of the Monthly will
be pained to learn of the recent and
sudden death of this brilliant young
writer, with several of whose masterly
papers they have become acquainted in
the pages of this periodical. He died
January 2d, at the age of twenty-six,
of an attack of acute peritonitis, the
result of a cold contracted by attend-
ing the funeral of a friend. The son
of a distinguished physician, he was
born at Belfort, in 1847. He studied
at the Oolmar Lycee, and there acquired
a taste for chemistry. He attended
the chemical lectures of Wiirtz at the
College de France ; and, at the age of
sixteen, he made full abstracts of the
course, which were so well done, that
"Wurtz sent the copy to the printer
with scarcely any alteration. He was
recommended by Prof. Wurtz to the
editor of the Moniteur Scientifique^ and
had been employed upon that journal
since 1864. He pursued original worls
in chemical physiology, and discovered
the possibility of substituting, in the
bones of animals, phosphate of mag-
nesia and of strontia for phosphate of
lime. He has published several im-
portant papers besides those that have
been reproduced in the Monthly, the
most interesting of which will continue
to appear in our pages. He was of
very amiable disposition, strongly at-
tached to his friends and teachers, and
much beloved by all who knew him.
His short career was in a remarkable
degree successful, as he had attained a
reputation and influence in France
which is usually reached only by men

in the riper years of life. His papers
are being prepared for the press in
Paris, and will be also separately re-
published in this country.

LITERARY NOTICES.

INTEENATIONAL SOIENTIFIO SEEIE8, NO.
VII.

The Conservation of Energy. By Dr.
Balfour Stewart. With an Appendix
on the Vital and Mental Applications of
the Doctrine. 236 pages. Price, $1.50.
D. Appleton & Co.

We speak, in another place, of the im-
portance of the great principle of the con-
servation of energy as a fundamental truth
of modem science. The literature of this
subject has hitherto been copious, but, as it
has been mainly the product of minds en-
gaged with the original research, it has of-
ten been so technical and complicated as to
be difficult to popular apprehension. The
writers have generally been too busy with
the investigation to give the needed atten-
tion to the art of familiar statement. No
subject was in greater need, of thorough
simplification and careful elementary treat-
ment. Dr. Balfour Stewart, the distinguished
physicist of Kew Observatory, and Professor
of Owens College, was solicited to undertake
this task for the " International Scientific
Series." This he consented to do, and, al-
though master of the philosophy, and entitled
to a place among its original investigators, he
has shown that he can enter into the spirit
and do the indispensable work of the pure
teacher. His book has been written in the
simplest language, with abundant and fa-
miliar illustrations, so that the ordinary
reader, by its perusal, can get a complete
understanding of the elements of the sub-
ject. His volume is quite remarkable for
its clearness and the success with which it
explains many of the hitherto difficult parts
of the subject.

Dr. Stewart, as we have said, is a physi-
cist, and he has wisely limited himself to the
operations of the law, as disclosed in physi-
cal phenomena. But, to give completeness
to the volume, an appendix has been added
incorporating two able essays, by distin-
guished men who have studied the question
in its vital and mental relations. Prof. Le

62i

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Conte has revised the essay, which appeared
in the November Monthly, on the " Correla-
tion of the Vital with the Physical and
Chemical Forces," which is here reproduced ;
and an able lecture by Prof. Bain, on the
" Correlation of the Nervous and Mental
Forces," gives an instructive view of this
branch of the subject. This little volume
will therefore afford a fresh and complete
exposition of the elements of the subject
for the use of general readers.

On the Origin and Metamorphoses of In-
sects. By Sir John Lubbock, M. P.,
F. R. S. Illustrated. New York : Mac-
millau & Co. 18'74. 108 pp., crown Svo.
Price, $1.50.

Sir John Lubbock is well known to the
world as an archteologist and anthropolo-
gist, and perhaps less well as an entomolo-
gist. Yet he has contributed no less than
thirty-five papers to the Royal Society, and
to various magazines, on entomology, dur-
ing the last twenty years ; and, as he is not
yet forty, we perceive that he must have
studied the subject at a very early age. His
first paper, " On Labidocera," appeared in
the Annals and Magazine of Natural His-
tory for 1853.

The httle work before us embodies, in a
popular form, many of the more interesting
results of his observations, condensed from
the above-mentioned memoirs. The articles
have already appeared in Nature, and the
work forms the second volume of the " Na-
ture Series " of books, which Messrs. Mac-
millan are now publishing.

The main subjects discussed are the
classification, origin, and the nature of the
different metamorphoses of Insects ; various
views are traced, from the old standard
" Entomology " of Kirby and Spence, one
of the Bridgewater Treatises, to the more
recent memoirs of Miiller, Agassiz, and
Packard. The intelligence of insects comes
out in a remarkable light. Many of our
readers will remember Sir John's tame wasp
at a recent meeting of the British Associa-
tion. He remarks : " We are accustomed to
class the anthropoid apes next to man in
the scale of creation, but, if we were to judge
animals by their works, the chimpanzee and
the gorilla must certainly give place to the
bee and the ant." For example (page 2),
the larvae of certain insects require animal

food as soon as they are hatched, and the
mother-insect consequently provides them
with caterpillars and beetles, by burying
them in a cell, side by side with the un-
hatched larva. But here a difiiculty arises :
" If the Cerceris were to kill the beetle be-
fore placing it in the cell, it would decay,
and the young larva, when hatched, would
only find a mass of corruption. On the
other hand, if the beetle were buried unin-
jured, in its struggles to escape it would be
almost certain to destroy the egg." Look,
then, at the wonderful, but diabolical, in-
stinct of the creature. " The wasp has the
instinct of stinging its prey in the centre of
the nervous system, thus depriving it of mo-
tion, and let us hope of suffering, but not
of life ; consequently, when the young larva
leaves the egg, it finds ready a sufficient
store of wholesome food." A certain spe-
cies of ants keeps Aphides in bondage, just
as we do cows, for the sake of the honey-dew
which they collect ; a certain kind of red
ant is indolent, and keeps black ants to do
work for it. Once more, there is a kind
of beetle which is blind and helpless, usu-
ally found in ants' nests ; the ants care for
all their wants and nurse them tenderly.
These things, and much more, of the lives
of insects, are told us in popular language
in Sir John's book, which we recommend,
not alone to the entomologist, but to the
general reader. — Quarterly Journal of Sci-

Henslow's Botanical Charts. Revised
and adapted for Use in the United
States. By Eliza A. Yocmans. Mount-
ed on Rollers. Six in Number. Price,
$18.00.

The botanical diagi-ams of the late Prof.
J. S. Henslow, of Cambridge University,
have long had a high reputation in England
for their scientific accuracy, their complete-
ness of illustration, and their skillful ar-
rangement for educational purposes. They
consisted of nine large sheets, and were
published by the Science and Art Depart-
ment of the English Educational Council.
After bringing out her method of element-
ary botany in the First and Second Books,
Miss Youmans felt the need of large colored
illustrations of the subject ; and, as Hens-
low's series was the most valuable yet pre-
pared in any country, and too expensive to

LITERARY NOTICES.

629

import, her publishers were induced to
bring out a revised edition of them here.
The English edition was defectiv^e from ex-
cessive compression, the figures often over-
lapping so as to produce a confused effect.
In the American edition they are spread
over twice the original surface, giving them
much greater clearness for class-room use.
Several American specimens have been sub-
stituted for English species which do not
occur in this country, and the whole ar-
rangement has been much improved.

These charts illustrate the principles of
the whole science of botany. They repre-
sent twenty-four orders, and more than
forty species of typical plants with all their
details of structure, in such a way as to ex-
emplify the complete organization of the
science. Each specimen is first shown of
its natural size and colors, then a magnified
section of one of its flowers is given, show-
ing the relations of the parts to each other.
Separate magnified views of the different
floral organs, exhibiting all the botanical
characters that belong to the group of which
it is a type, are also represented. All va-
rieties of botanical structure, in leaf, stem,
root, inflorescence, flower, fruit, and seed,
are thus exhibited. The charts contain
nearly 500 figures, colored to the life, and
their purpose is not to supersede the study
of living plants, but only to facihtate it.
Minute parts which are often difficult to
find are represented upon an enlarged scale,
and thus become a guide to the study of
the plant.

In her Second Book, Miss Youmans
says : " Besides this special assistance in
object-study, the charts will be of chief
value in bringing into a narrow compass a
complete view of the structures and rela-
tions of the leading types of the vegetable
kmgdom. In fact, they are designed to
present, fully and clearly, those groupings
of characters upon which orders depend in
classification, while, in several cases of large
and diversified orders, the characters of
leading genera are also given by typical
specimens. The charts will thus be found
equally valuable to the beginner, the inter-
mediate pupil, and the advanced student."
A key accompanies the charts, ana they
can be used with any botanical text-books ;
and, during the season of plants, they

should be upon the walls of every school-
room where botany is studied.

On Intelligence. By H. Taine, D. C. L.,
Oxon. Translated from the French by
T. D. Haye, and revised with Additions
by the author. New York : H. Holt &
Co. Pp. 553. Price, $5.
The writings of M. Taine on art, litera-
ture, and science, have taken a high rank
in Europe and in this country. Though his
genius may, in strictness, be said to be ar-
tistic rather than purely scientific or philo-
sophical, yet, in the work before us, he has
shown not only a varied knowledge of the
details and specialties of the sciences, but
an admirable aptitude in collocating and
generalizing their doctrines.

All speculation, to have any permanent
value, must be based upon the natural order
of things : it must be interwoven with mat-
ter, motion, and force. When the intelli-
gence becomes a faithful mirror, and reflects
the universe as it is, "weighing and measur-
ing it, real progress in thought is inevitable.
Well-observed and well-digested facts, thor-
ough and patient experiments, drawn along
the varied lines of Nature, generate new and
recast old ideas which open out a fresh in-
tellectual life between the two great factors
of science, man and the cosmos.

We do not claim for M. Taine any no-
ticeable discoveries in the realm of natural
facts, through either observation or experi-
ment ; but we claim that he has enriched us
with many new ideas and a wealth of ex-
pression very rarely equaled. His recondite
thoughts are clothed in beauty by a most
exquisite imagination.

M. Taine has divided his labor into two
parts, containing eight books and eighteen
chapters. The first two books, on " Signs and
Images," are relieved of much of their neces-
sary subtilty by the picturesque and realis-
tic manner of their treatment. His words
are never void of the kernel of the con-
crete, which is never overshadowed by
abstractions. The various objects of the
external world and their permanent rela-
tionships are physiologically gathered up
by the five senses, and require to bo properly
named or labeled before entering into the
laboratory of thought. For this purpose
signs are deftly woven together and become
indispensable as servants of the mind. This

630

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

may be called the art of naming. The accu-
mulated materials of the senses are, through
a certain chemistry of the nerves and brain,
photographed as images on the mind, and
these enable us, through the means of signs,
to dissect and put into logical sequence the
whole order of Nature. What we have in
our minds, says M. Taine, when we conceive
general qualities and characters of things,
are signs and signs only. Signs or words,
therefore, branch out of sensations, and, to
be of real value in the organization of knowl-
edge, these must originate from healthy and
well-regulated senses and sound cerebral
functions. The immutability of the external
order of things in Nature is the only sure cor-
rective of all the aberrations and errors to
which the internal condition of man, as a
reflecting medium, is subject.

Books III. and lY., concluding the first
part, treat of sensations and of the physical
conditions of mental events. In the discus-
sion of these topics M. Taine is fortified
by the leading writers of France, England,
and Germany, to whose important authority
he adds much original thought, and unties
many a perplexing knot by his well-directed
and practised ingenuity. In the second
part of his work, M. Taine treats, in the first
book, of the general mechanism of knowl-
edge ; in the second, of the knowledge of
bodies ; in the third, of the knowledge of
mind ; and in the fourth book, of the knowl-
edge of general things.

Men and Apes ; an Exposition of Structural
Resemblances and Differences, bearing
upon Questions of Afl3nity and Origin.
By St. George Mitart. New York:
D. Appleton & Co., 1874. Price, $1.50.

Mr. St. George Mitart, best known as
an opponent of Darwinism, strictly so called
(but not of evolution), has iu this work ex-
amined into the relations of man and the
apes as well as other primates. In a first
chapter, he gives a summary of the " exter-
nal forms, habits, geographical distribution,
and classification," of the primates ; in a sec-
ond, the " external skeleton (skin and hair)
and internal skeleton (the bones) " are ex-
amined ; and the last or third chapter is
devoted to the consideration of the " ner-
vous system, visceral anatomy, summary of
characters, and questions of affinity and
origin." He admits, with all competent

naturalists, that man is most nearly allied
to the apes, that is, the group composed
of the gorilla, chimpanzee, orang-outang,
and gibbons : the difference, then, between
Mr. Mivart and others is as to the special
form of apes that man is most allied to. In
order to solve this question, he successively
recapitulates the characters common to man
and the several forms referred to, as well
as the main points of difference. His re-
sults are rather negative than positive : he
entirely rejects the claim made on behalf
of the gorilla to nearest kinship, but does
not positively claim such rank for any of
the other forms, although evidently disposed
to regard the afiinity at least as great be-
tween the gibbons and man as with any of
the other forms ; he is more reserved, how-
ever, in this respect than on a former occa-
sion. Adopting the general theory of evo-
lution, he applies it, so far as the body is
concerned, to man, but he claims that in his
case a specific creation has been manifested
by the endowment of that body with a soul.

A Dictionary of Medicax Science, with
THE Accentuation and Etymology of
the Terms, and the French and Other
Synonyms. By Eobley Dunglison, M.
D., LL. D. Enlarged and thoroughly
revised edition, by Richard J. Dungli-
son, M. D. Philadelphia : Henry C. Lea,
1874.

For forty years this work has been an
accepted authority in the hands of the pro-
fession, both here and in England. It was
originally made in obedience to the demand
created by the rapid advance of medical
science, and how well it fulfilled its intended
purpose is attested by its long and steady
popularity. The present edition — the
preparation of which was begun by the
author, but, owing to his death, was fin-
ished by his son — is much enlarged, includ-
ing more than six thousand subjects and
terms not embraced in the last, and making
altogether over a hundred pages of new
matter. The book is something more than
a dictionary. Besides the derivation, pro-
nunciation, synonymy, and technical defini-
tions of medical terms, it gives, under the
appropriate heads, a large amount of valu-
able practical information which, from its
conciseness and ready accessibility, cannot
fail to be of great service to the physician.
The typographical arrangement has also

MISCELLANY.

631

been somewhat changed, heavy type being
employed for the leading terms, while syn-
onyms and subordinate words are put in
small capitals^- a modification which af-
fords greater facility of reference. Taken
as a whole, the work is much superior to
any other of the kind we know of in the
language, and no medical library can be
considered complete without it.

Schem's Statistics of the World. Edited
by Prof. Alexander J. Schem. New
York : G. J. Moulton, IS'JS.
This is a semi-annual publication, giving
the facts and figures of the world's afiairs,
boiled down even to the point of desiccation.
The matter is arranged in the form of ta-
bles, giving, for each country, its area, the
name of its present ruler, population, debt,
army and navy, imports and exports, prod-
ucts, coin values, weights and measures,
capitals, and principal cities, together with
railway, educational, and religious statistics.
The facts, we are told, are collated from the
latest reports, and the method of presenta-
tion, so far as convenience is concerned,
appears to be a good one. With all its
concentration, however, we notice some ap-
parently needless repetitions. For example,
after giving a list of the successful presi-
dential candidates in the United States, from
the foundation of the government, with the
vote cast for each, their names are given
over again on another page, with the State
they were from, and the time of service of
each, information which might more prop-
erly have gone into a single table. An excel-
lent feature is the comparison of the weights
and measures of each country with the
French and English standards ; their coin-
values are also given in dollars and cents.

PUBLICATIONS KECEIVED.

On the Early Stages of Terebratulina Sep-
tentrionahs. By Edward S. Morse, Ph. D.
10 pages, with Illustrations.

Transactions of the American Society
of Civil Engineers. November, 18*73. 48
pages.

A Description of New Instruments for
making Examinations and Applications to
Cavities of the Nose, Throat, and Ear. By

Thomas F. Rumbold, M. D. St. Louis,
18*73. 16 pages, with Illustrations.

Bulletin of the Buffalo Society of Natu-
ral Sciences, vol. i.. No. 3, pages 129-184.
Illustrated.

The Function of the Eustachian Tube.
By Thomas F. Rumbold, M. D. St. Louis,
18*73. 40 pages.

Second Biennial Report of the San Fran-
cisco Park Commissioners for 1872-'*73. San
Francisco, 1874. 94 pages. Illustrated.

On the Structure and Affinities of the
Brontotheridaj. By Prof. C. C. Marsh. 8
pages. Illustrated.

Johnston's Dental Miscellany. A Month-
ly Journal of American and Foreig-n Dental,
Surgical, Chemical, and Mechanical Litera-
ture. New York, January, 1874, vol. i..
No. 1, 38 pages.

On the Geology of Western Wyoming.
By Theo. B. Comstock, B. S. 8 pages.

Transactions of the Michigan State
Medical Society. Lansing, 1873. 170 pages.

The Larynx the Source of the Vowel
Sounds. By Thomas Brian Gunning. New
York, 1874. 29 pages.

MISCELLANY.

England and America.— Prof. Tyndall
writes as follows to the editor of the London
Daihj Telegraph : Sir — You have given me
a challenge, to which I willingly respond.
In a speech, to which I had the honor of
listening just before my departure from
America, Hon. William M. Evarts used these
words : " There is a generous and perfect
sympathy between the educated men of
England and the educated men of the United
States. The small matters of difference and
political interests which divide these two
great countries are nothing to the immense
area of uniform and common objects and
interests which unite their people."

On the same occasion. Dr. John W.
Draper, celebrated alike as an historian and
scientific discoverer, concluded a speech in
these words : " Nowhere in the world are to
be found more imposing political problems
than those to be settled here — nowhere a
greater need of scientific knowledge. I am

632

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

not speaking of ourselves alone, but of our
Canadian friends on the other side of the
St. Lawrence. We must join together in
generous emulation of the best that is done
in Europe. In her Majesty's representative,
Lord Dufferin, they will find an eager appre-
ciation of all that they may do. Together
we must try to refute what De Tocqueville
has said about us, that communities such
as ours can never have a love of pure sci-
ence. But, whatever may be the glory of
our future intellectual life, let us both never
forget what we owe to England. Hers is
the language which we speak, hers are all
our ideas of liberty and law. To her litera-
ture, as to a fountain of light, we repair.
The torch of science that is shining here
was kindled at her midnight lamp."

The President of Cornell University, to
which Mr. Goldwin Smith belongs, used, on
the same evening, these remarkable words :
" We are greatly stirred, at times, as this
fraud or that scoundrel is dragged to hght,
and there rise cries and moans over the cor-
ruption of the times ; but, my friends, these
frauds and these scoundrels are not the cor-
ruption of the times. They are the mere
pustules which the body politic throws to
the surface. Thank God that there is vi-
tality enough left to throw them to the sur-
face. The disease is below all this, infinitely
more wide-spread. What is that disease ?
I believe that it is, first of all, indifference ;
indifference to truth as truth ; next, skepti-
cism, by which I do not mean inability to
believe this or that dogma, but the skepti-
cism which refuses to believe that there is
any power in the universe strong enough,
large enough, good enough, to make the
thorough search for the truth safe in every
line of investigation ; next, infidelity, by
which I do not mean want of fidelity to this
or that dominant creed, but want of fidelity
to that which underlies all creeds, the idea
that the true and the good are one ; and,
finally, materialism, by which I do not mean
this or that scientific theory of the universe,
but that devotion to the mere husks and
rinds of good, that struggle for place and
pelf, that faith in mere material comfort and
wealth, which eats out of human hearts all
patriotism, and which is the very opposite
to the spirit which gives energy to scientific
achievement. ... I believe that the little

army of scientific men furnish a very pre-
cious germ, from which better ideas may
spring ; . . . and I trust that love, admira-
tion, and gratitude, between men of science
on both sides of the Atlantic, may add new
cords and give strength to old cords which
unite the hearts of the two great English-
speaking nations."

On the same occasion, in reference to
the question of international amity, I ven-
tured to say this much : "Among the motives
which prompted me, at the time of accepting
your invitation, was this : I thought, and
friends of mine here thought, that a man
withdrawn from the arena of politics, who
had been fortunate enough to gain a meas-
ure of the good-will of the American people,
might do something toward softening po-
litical asperities. I referred to this point
in Boston, but my references to it have
grown more and more scanty, until, in the
three cities last visited, they disappeared
altogether. And this not because I had
the subject less at heart, but because, as
your great countryman, Emerson, might ex-
press it, any reference of the kind would be
like the sound of a scythe in December, en-
tirely out of place. During my four months'
residence in the United States I have not
heard a single whisper hostile to England."

This, sir, will sufficiently indicate to you
my experience of the feeling of the people
of the United States toward this country.
Either they do not hate us, as alleged ; or,
if they do, the manner in which they sup-
pressed this feeling, out of consideration for
a guest, proves them to be the most conr-
teous of nations.

I am, sir, your obedient servant,

John Tyndall.
Athen^tim Club, Saturday, Jan. 11th,

Population of New Guinea.— Captain C.

J. Moresby, of the British Navy, who visited
New Guinea during the past year, to com-
plete the unfinished survey of the late Cap-
tain Owen Stanley, reports that the whole
coast country of the eastern half of that
island is well peopled with a copper-colored
race, quite distinct from the black Papuans
of the western portion. This lighter-colored
race are a friendly and intelligent people.
They gladly received their strange visitors
at their villages, and the crew of Captain

MISCELLANY.

633

Moresby's vessel mixed freely with them.
They practise several useful arts, such as
pottery, and possess extensive well-fenced
plantations.

Several attempts were made to reach
the mountainous interior, by ascending the
rivers emptying into Redscar Bay, but the
boats were in every case brought to a stand
by the increasing velocity of the current,
after the first thirteen or fourteen miles.
Farther east a fine port and inner harbor
were discovered, and named Port Moresby
and Fairfax Harbor. The southeastern ex-
tremity of New Guinea was found to have
the form of a fork, off the lower tine of
which lies a group of islands, but leaving a
deep navigable channel between them and
the main-land. Captain Moresby doubled
the northern extremity of the fork, and
found the northern coast of New Guinea
washed by a grand, clear, reefless sea. The
natives here were of the same Malayan or
Polynesian race as those of Redscar Bay,
and the hill-slopes near their villages were
terraced and cultivated to a great height, in
a manner that even a Chinaman might envy.
With these people the intercourse of Cap-
tain Moresby's men was of a most satisfac-
tory, pleasant nature. Pieces of hoop-iron
were the medium of exchange, with which
the crew purchased food and curiosities,
including specimens of their handsome stone
hatchets.

Pr<^. E. L. Towmwm—

My dear Sir: Be so kind as to allow
me room for a word in relation to the ar-
ticle " The Great Cemetery in Colorado," in
the last number of this magazine. It was
already in print when my attention was
called to Prof. 0. C. Marsh's article in the
American Journal of Hcience and the Arts,
"On the Structure and Affinities of the
Brontotheridoe," in which the professor says
of Sifmborodon and Miohasileim : " Both
names should be regarded as synonyms of
BroTitotkerium." While I would avoid as
sheer oflSciousness the intrusion of one word
as arbiter, yet I cannot permit the apparent
discourtesy to rest upon me of even so
much as seeming to ignore the professor's
statement. I suppose that Prof. Marsh is
entitled to be regarded as the discoverer, in
18Y0 — and pioneer explorer then and in 1872
—of that wonderful burial-place, whose dry

bones you did me the honor to assign the
task of imbuing with enough of life to make
them presentable to your many readers.
Hence any thing from Prof. Marsh on that
theme is worthy of far more than ordinary
consideratiou.

Let me here correct a typographical
error. In my article, on page 475, the first
word in line twelve from the bottom of the
page, " Eobasileus " should read " Mioba-
sileus."

Very respectfully yours,

Samuel Lockwood.
January 24, 1874.

Autopsy of Agassiz. — Autopsy by Drs.
R. H. Fitz and J. J. Putnam ; present, Drs.
J. B. S. Jackson, J. Wyman, C. Ellis, M.
Wyman, S. G. Webber.

Frame large. Fatty tissue abundant.
Cranium, brachycephalic, falling off abrupt-
ly from the middle of the sagittal suture.
Greatest antero - posterior diameter, 197
millimetres; greatest lateral diameter, 163
millimetres — these measurements made be-
fore the removal of the skin. Depth of
frontal bone, measured externally at the
median line, 5 1^ inches = 135 millimetres;
length of sagittal suture, 5 inches = 128
millimetres. The walls of the skull were
thick and heavy ; the dura mater exceed-
ingly adherent to the bone and remarkably
thick. The pia mater moderately transpar-
ent. Along the arachnoid veins were white
lines indicating chronic thickening ; the
veins themselves rather more injected than
usual. The cerebral sulci were deep and
wide. On each side of the median line,
near the anterior ascending convolution on
the left, and the posterior ascending convo-
lution on the right, was a depression which
might have held a prune-stone or a little
more. The brain-tissue around was dimin-
ished without evidence of disease. The ar-
teries at the base of the brain showed evi-
dence of extensive chronic disease of their
lining membrane, with narrowing of the
calibre of the carotids. The basilar artery
was apparently a continuation of the left
vertebral alone, the right vertebral being
represented by an exceedingly small vessel
which united the basilar with the inferior
cerebellar, the latter being merely the pro-
longation of the exceedingly small right
vertebral. The left vertebral v/as larger

634

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

than usual — larger even than the basilar. ]
In these unusually-arranged arteries were
very important changes. Commencing at I
an inch below the anterior edge of the pons j
Varolii and extending downward, the walls
of the left vertebral artery were stiff, in
part calcified, and its linings loose. At
half an inch from the point just mentioned,
immediately over the left olivary body, was
a reddish - yellow, opaque, friable plug
(thrombus), completely obstructing the ves-
sel ; still lower was another more recent,
but probably ante-mortem plug. The first
was one quarter of an inch long, the second
four inches long. A third plug, an inch
long, was above the first, and touching it.
Opposite the middle of the pons there was
atheromatous degeneration of the basilar
artery. The walls of the internal carotids
were also in part calcified. The posterior
part of the right cerebellar lobe (the side
on which the vertebral artery was exceed-
ingly small) was softer than usual, the cor-
responding foliations swollen and indis-
tinctly defined, indicating disease of this
part, probably consequences of the changes
in the arteries.

The weight of the entire brain was 53.4
avoirdupois ounces = 1,495 grammes ; al-
lowing a diminution in the weight of the
brain, from the age of thirty-five or forty
years, at the rate of one ounce avoirdupois
for each ten years elapsed, the greatest
weight of the brain may be estimated at
56.5 avoirdupois ounces.

Weight of right anterior lobe (separated
with the fissure of Rolando for a guide),
234 grammes ; weight of left anterior lobe,
233 grammes. Heart large, muscular fibre
firm and of good color. The attached por-
tion of the aortic valves rigid, the mitral
opening large. In the left ventricle, at the
lower third, a firm, organized clot of the
size of a peach-stone, attached to the wall
at the anterior portion near the septum ;
around this clot a more recent one had
formed, its centre softened and granular.
From this, probably, some small portions
had been carried by the blood to the ar-
teries in the base of the brain, doing their
part in obstructing them and causing the
fatal changes above described. The lining
membrane of the heart, where the clot was
attached, was much thickened, and the

muscular layer at the same part very thin,
near the apex not visible to the naked eye.
The lungs were adherent to the ribs on
both sides of the chest — the evidence of old
inflammations. The other organs were
healthy. — New York Tribune^ Dectmher 10,
1873.

A Good Hedge-Plant.— The Gardener's
Monthly thinks that the white-thorn {Ela-
agnus parvifolivs) complies with all the
conditions of a good hedge-plant, much bet-
ter than the Osage orange or any of the
other plants employed for that purpose in
this country. This plant does not grow
more than a few inches high the first year
from seed, and is then thornless ; but there
are large numbers of short branches from
a quarter of an inch to two inches in length,
and these become sharp spines the next
year. The older the plants the spinier they
become — an excellent feature in a hedge-
plant. The second and third years branches
are produced from three to five feet long,
thus soon reaching a good height for a
hedge. "When the plants are massed to-
gether, they rarely show any disposition to
exceed the height of six or eight feet.
When they reach that height, they grow by
sending strong shoots out from the stems
near the ground; and thus the hedge is
ever growing thicker — another excellent
feature. If pruned, they make a first-class
hedge ; if totally neglected, they are still
protective. Plants three or four years old
seed, so that in a few years, with moderate
encouragement, plants in abundance could
be obtained.

Besides its protective value, the plant
has a very beautiful appearance. The un-
der side of the leaf, as well as the young
growing branches, are silvery ; and hence
its common name. South of the Potomac
it would probably be an evergreen. In
Pennsylvania it holds its leaves to Christ-
mas. The flowers are greenish white, not
showy, but resemble in fragrance the Eng-
lish hawthorn. The berries which succeed
are of a mottled red. The writer in the
Gardeyur's Monthly is unable to determine
what is the extreme degree of cold to which
the plant may be exposed without injury.
He states, however, that it has remained
entirely uninjured in one situation when

MISCELLANY.

635

the last year's shoots of the Osage orange
and the honey locust were destroyed, the
thermometer being 14° Vjelow zero. The
Elseagnus is a native of the Himalaya Moun-
tains.

Technical Edaeation. — Dr, Lyon Play-
fair, in his " Lecture on Technical Educa-
tion," dwells upon the success which has
attended the technical institutions of
Switzerland and Holland. He says : " What
has enabled this little nation (Switzerland),
so remote from the pathways of commerce,
and so poor in the mineral resources of in-
dustry, to carry on manufacturing produc-
tion by the aid of a prosperous and con-
tented people, while England, washed by
the ocean and abounding in mineral wealth,
is burdened with an ever-increasing propor-
tion of the unproductive poor? There is
only one answer; that Switzerland has a
highly-educated people." And of Holland
he adds: "Despite her natural poverty in
the raw materials of industry, Holland sends
to this country alone exports of food to the
annual value of £5,000,000, and manufact-
ured products worth £6,000,000 more. The
law compels every town of 10,000 inhab-
itants to erect technical schools." Among
Dr. Playfair's conclusions, he states that " a
higher education, in relation to the indus-
tries of the country, is an essential condi-
tion for the continued prosperity of the
people ; for intelligence and skill — as factors
in productive industry — are constantly be-
coming of greater value than the possession
of native raw material or local advantages."
— Iron.

Science and the Press. — Remarks of
George Ripley at the laying of the comer-
stone of the new Tribune building :

" Friends and Fellow-Laborers : "We
have assembled to-day in commemoration
of the past, and for consecration of the fu-
ture. The ol-iglnal foundation of the Trib-
une was laid in sentiment and ideas. Hor-
ace Greeley was a man of no less profound
convictions than of lofty aspirations. The
tenderness of his emotional nature was
matched by the strength of his intellect.
He was a believer in the progress of thought
and the development of science, in the prog-
ress of society and the development of hu-

manity. Under the influence of this inspi-
ration, the Tribune was established more
than thirty years ago. At that time its
basis was spiritual, and not material, strong
in ideas, but not powerful in brick and mor-
tar, in granite or marble, in machinery or in
money. We have come to-day, not to re-
move this foundation, but to combine it
with other elements, and thus to give it re-
newed strength and consistency. It is our
purpose to clothe the spiritual germ with a
material body, to incorporate the invisible
forces which inspired the heart of our found-
er in a visible form, in the shape of a
goodly temple, massive in its foundation,
fair in its proportions, and sacred in its
purposes. The new Tribune of to-day, like
the old Tribune of the past, is to be conse-
crated to the development of ideas, the ex-
position of principles, and the promulgation
of truth. The ceremony which is now
about to be performed typifies the union of
spiritual agencies with material conditions,
and thus possesses a significance and beau-
ty which anticipate the character of the
coming age. The future which lies before
us, it is perhaps not presumptuous to af-
firm, will be marked by a magnificent syn-
thesis of the forces of material Nature and
the power of spiritual ideas.

" Allow me one word in illustration of
this prophecy, and I will yield the place to
the fair hands and the fair spirit whose
presence on this occasion crowns the scene
with a tender grace.

"About ten years before the establish-
ment of the Tribune, dating from the death
of Hegel, in 1831, and of Goethe in the fol-
lowing year, the tendency of thought on
the continent of Europe, which had been
of an intensely ideal, or spiritual character,
began to assume an opposite direction.
Physical researches rapidly took precedence
of metaphysical speculation. Positive sci-
ence was inaugurated in the place of ab-
stract philosophy. The spiritual order was
wellnigh eclipsed by the wonderful aciiieve-
ments of the material order. A new dy-
nasty arose which knew not Joseph, and
the ancient names of Plato, and Descartes,
and Leibnitz, were dethroned by the stal-
wart host that took possession of the do-
main of physical science. I need not re-
hearse the splendid discoveries which have

636

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

signalized this period. Such acquisitions
to the treasury of positive humaa knowl-
edge have never been made in an equal
time in the history of thought. More light
has been thrown on the material conditions
of our existence on earth than has been
enjoyed before since the morning stars first
sang together. But the signs of the times
indicate the commencement of a reaction.
The age accepts the results of physical re-
search, but refuses to regard them as the
limit of rational belief. In resolving matter
into molecules, and molecules into atoms,
the most illustrious cultivators of physical
science cheerfully confess that they arrive
at invisible forces which no crucible can
analyze, no microscope detect, no arithme-
tic explain. The alleged materialism of
Tyndall and Huxley thus affords an unex-
pected support to the idealism of Berkeley.
" The Tribune, it may be predicted, will
continue to represent the intellectual spirit
of the age. Faithful to its past history, it
will welcome every new discovery of truth.
Free from the limitations of party in phi-
losophy or religion, in politics or science,
it will embrace a wider range of thought,
and pursue a higher aim in the interests
of humanity. Watching with its hundred
eyes the events of the passing time, it will
wait for the blush of the morning twilight
which harbingers the dawn of a brighter
day. As we now place the votive tablet on
its rocky bed, let it symbolize the radiant
scroll of human knowledge reposing on the
foundation of eternal truth."

A Swarm of Locnsts. — Dr. B. A. Gould,
in a letter published in the December num-
ber of the American Journal of Science, de-
scribes a swarm of locusts at Cordova
(in the north of the Argentine Republic),
which, for extent, rivals those which have
been sometimes witnessed in Eastern coun-
tries. He says : " I saw to the eastward
what was apparently a long trail of dense
black smoke extending over 160° of the
horizon, from which it extended to an alti-
tude of about 5°. The appearance differed
in no respect from that of a black smoke
drifting from a large conflagration. The in-
sects were evidently transported by the wind,
and passed within about three or four miles
of us. Certainly twenty miles of its length

were visible over the far-stretching pampas.
They were seen before ten o'clock in the
morning, and continued to pass with appar-
ently undiminished numbers until daylight
failed."

In about eighteen days the phenome-
non was repeated. They again appeared to
move before the wind, and passed through
the space between the traveler and the
mountains, which were twelve miles dis-
tant, during many hours. The height of
the dense nucleus seemed to be not less
than 2,000 feet, its width about six or seven
miles. "Since I began this page," says
Dr. Gould, " they have come upon us in full
force, literally darkening the sun, and there
is probably not a square inch of our grounds
unoccupied by them."

Asphaltam Deposit in West Virginia. —

Prof. W. M. Fontaine published, in the
December number of the American Journal
of Science, an interesting account of a de-
posit of asphalt in Ritchie County, W. Va.,
which is extensively mined, and is valuable
as an addition to the coal used in produ-
cing gas.

It occurs in an enormous fissure in the
rocks, apparently filling it, and has been
worked vertically through a depth of 300
feet, and horizontally through a distance of
3,315 feet. The fissure is seldom more than
four feet wide, in many places much less,
and narrows, in one direction, so much as
to be unworkable. In another direction it
ends abruptly at the valley of McFarland's
Run,

The geological position of this fissure
and deposit is in the " Upper Barren Meas-
ures," above the Pittsburg Bed, which con-
tains no coal. These barren measures are
of sandstones and shales, and are horizon-
tal. They show no break except at the mines.

About seven miles in the direction of
the crevice is the line of upheaval in which
occur the oil-wells of West Virginia. And,
as Prof. Fontaine observes, the bituminous
deposits, which lie far beneath the surface,
are doubtless the source of both the oil and
the asphaltum.

In the cleft the mineral closely resem-
bles ordinary bituminous coal, but at the
sides adjoining the walls it is jet black, and
has a brilliant lustre. The walls of the

MISCELLANY.

637

crevice are seldom discolored more than an
inch in depth, and the mineral adheres but
slightly.

The dry dust of the mine is very in-
flammable, and two accidents from explo-
sion have occurred. The asphalt contains
about 76 per cent, of carbon, and yields
about 100 gallons of oil per ton.

Agassiz's Successor. — It is rare that the
mantle of the father sits worthily on the
son. Especially is this true when the father
has been signally eminent in pure science.
Happily, indeed, is it for America, and for
biological science, that the vast plans of the
late Agassiz are to be continued, as far as
possible, on the grand scale upon which his
great mind projected them. The worthy
successor of Prof. Agassiz is his son Alex-
ander, whose name, in zoological investiga-
tion, is already acknowledged as a bright
light in the Old World and the New. One
of the most thoroughly worked-out mono-
graphs, so far as it is carried, and the most
sumptuously gotten up, is the one recently
published by Mr. Alexander Agassiz, con-
taining his researches and memoirs on the
Echinoderms, and which won for him the
first award of the Walker prize of $1,000,
by the Boston Society of Natural History.
Mr. Alexander Agassiz is to succeed his
father in the conduct of the Penikese Nor-
mal School of Natural History. That great
institution, the pride of Massachusetts, and
the envy of the savants of the Old World,
" The Museum of Comparative Zoology," at
Cambridge, Mass., has been placed under
the direction of Alexander Agassiz and Mr.
Gary, " both of whom are thoroughly con-
versant with Prof. Agassiz's plans with re-
gard to the museum, and familiar with the
collections." Thus, while all must lament,
as a great loss, the demise of that wonder-
ful man, yet a deep solicitude has been re-
moved from many minds as to the fate of
the professor's plans.

Lime-Soils and the Potato-Rot. — ^A writer
in the Chemical News is led, by analysis of
diseased and sound potato - tubers, to as-
cribe the potato-rot to a deficiency of lime
and magnesia in the soil. Different observ-
ers state the percentage of magnesia in the
ash of sound tubers at from five to ten per

cent. ; in the diseased tubers analyzed by
the author it was only 3.94 per cent. Anal-
ysis of sound tubers shows over five per
cent, of lime, but in the ash of diseased tu-
bers the author found only 1.77 per cent.
A similar observation was made some years
ago by Prof. Thorpe with regard to dis-
eased and healthy orange-trees ; in the for-
mer there was a deficiency of lime and mag-
nesia.

It was shown, by the late Dr. Crace
Calvert, that lime is one of the few known
substances that are capable of altogether
preventing the development of fungi in or-
ganic solutions. He does not give any ex-
periments relating to the action of caustic
magnesia on fungi ; but doubtless that ac-
tion will be found to be similar.

" Here, then," observes the author, " is
a curious and significant fact. Diseased po-
tatoes are deficient in lime-salts, and lime
prevents the development of fungi. May
not the development of fungi in the vessels
of plants be furthered by this deficiency ?
The circumstances are such as scarcely to
leave room for doubt. So far, then, theory
and practice agree : lime has been found by
experience to be useful in preventing the
disease, and it is likely that magnesia will
be found to have a similar effect."

Clay Wasp-Nests. — All the American spe-
cies belonging to the genus Polistes (wasps)
have been considered paper-nest builders ;
but P. R. Uhler, at the Portland meeting of
the American Association, described a spe-
cies which build nests of clay. This wasp
is of dark-brown color, with yellow bands
across the abdomen, and with yellow feet.
The insect builds a nest of cylindrical shape ;
and a number of these cylinders were found
in the stump of a decayed tree, in Charles
County, Md. The central cavity of the
stump — which was about five inches in di-
ameter— contained thirty-three of these pe-
culiar structures. They were of yellow
clay, generally about half an inch in diame-
ter, and varying from two to five inches in
length.

The nest, or more properly the recep-
tacle for the egg and young, is constructed
in the following manner: The adult wasp
works some wet clay into an oval pellet,
and carries it to the place where the nest is

638

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

to be made. The pellet is then laid ob-
liquely and pressed down by the fore-feet
and head of the insect, so as to cause it to
adhere firmly to the surface on which it is
building. As it proceeds, it smoothes the
inside of the cylinder by working with its
jaws and pushing the front of its flat head
against the plastic clay. The first section
being thus finished to its satisfaction, it flies
off to secure small spiders. It seizes a
spider with its fore-feet, stings it in just such
a way as to paralyze, without destroying its
life, and then deposits it in the bottom of
the cylinder.

An egg is then laid beside the spider,
and the wasp flies off to secure other spi-
ders. This is continued until the cavity,
which holds from twelve to fifteen of the
smaller kinds, is full. The wasp then
covers the open end with a cap of the same
material as before, after which it adds other
sections to the number of three or four, fill-
mg each with spiders and depositing one
egg in each. The young larva feeds on
these paralyzed spiders, and, as it seems,
requires from twelve to fifteen of them to
nourish it imtil it is ready to become a
pupa. Unlike some other clay-nest build-
ers, this wasp does not nurse its young, but
they are securely sealed up in the sections,
and feed themselves. When ready to come
forth, the wasp gnaws a round hole in the
wall of its cell, and issues forth as a perfect
insect.

The Uses of Baryta. — Barjrta is an alka-
line earth of a gray color, not easily fusible,
and poisonous. Its various salts are exten-
sively used in the arts, as will be seen from
a paper read by Df. Lewis Feuchtwanger,
before the Polytechnic Club, of which we
present a synopsis. The sulphate of baryta,
66 per cent, of baryta and 34 of sulphuric
acid, is the only baryta-salt that is not poi-
sonous. It is abundant in England, France,
Germany, and the United States, where it
usually occurs in connection with beds or
veins of metallic ores, as gangue, or vein-
stone. Sometimes, however, it forms dis-
tinct veins, in company with the secondary
limestone, and very often in fine crystals,
along with calcite and celestine. Connecti-
cut and Missouri have long furnished abun-
dant material for the arts. Next come

I Virginia, New York, Xew Hampshire, Mas-
sachusetts, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, and
Tennessee. The variety known as " Bologna
spar " is an ornamental stone, of a brown
color, and concentric rings, originally found
in a bed of clay near Bologna. The sul-
phate of baryta also often occurs associated
with lime, and some silica and alum, and is
then called calcareobaryte ; when associated
with strontia it is called baryto-celestine.

Witherite is a carbonate of baryta, con-
sisting of 78 per cent, baryta and 22 car-
bonic acid. It is found, in considerable
quantities, in England, Silesia, Hungary,
Sicily, and Chili, but not much in the United
States. It is largely used in plate-glass
manufacture in France, as also in the man-
ufacture of beet-root sugar, and permanent
while. Latterly, it has come into use for
paint, in combmation with soluble glass and
white oxide of zinc. The metallic base of
these salts is barium. It is a white, malle-
able, and fusible metal, readily oxidizing
in air, and decomposing water at common
temperature. The pure baryta, oxide of
barium, is used for the production of per-
oxide of hydrogen, which is much recom-
mended as a medicinal reagent, and employed
in the arts for bleaching animal tissue, and
converting brown into blond hair. The
oxide, or caustic baryta, rivals, in caustic
properties, potash, soda, and ammonia.

The chloride of barium is got by fusing
the sulphate of baryta with chloride of cal-
cium, in a reverberatory furnace, and then
extracting with hot water, leaving the sul-
phate of lime imdissolved. Chlorate of ba-
ryta, used in pyrotechny, and which bums
with a green flame, is prepared by dissolving
artificial carbonate of baryta in chloric acid
solution. Nitrate of baryta, likewise used
in pyrotechny, may be got by dissolving the
native carbonate in nitric acid and evaporat-
ing the solution, octahedral crystals being
deposited. The native sulphate of baryta
is used to adulterate white lead, often to
the extent of 25 to 50 per cent.

The artificial sulphate, permanent white,
is much used in the manufacture of a paper
of the purest white, for collars, cards, etc.
In copper metallurgical operations, the sul-
phide of barium has latterly been employed
for the purpose of precipitating from an
ammoniacal copper solution the copper as a

NOTES.

639

sulphide. The artificial carbonate of baryta,
produced by passing carbonic acid through
a sulphide of barium, is much used in
Europe in the manufacture of achromatic
glass.

Snbterranean Fish. — For the purpose of
supplying water to a new wharf at Point
Hueneme, southeast of San Buenaventura,
Cal., an artesian well was sunk not five feet
from high-water mark. At the depth of
143 feet a strong flow of water was ob-
tained, which spouted 30 feet high. A
goose-neck was fitted on the bore so as to
reverse the flow. One day while the agent
was absent, the men noticed fish in the
waste-water. On his return attention was
given to the fact, and the well was found to
be filled with young trout, thousands of
them being thrown out at every jet. These
trout were all the same size (about two
inches long), and perfectly developed. They
had perfect eyes. There is no stream nearer
than the Santa Clara River, several miles
distant. There are no trout in the lower
portions of the river. The temperature of
the water is the same as that of the wells
of this country (64° Fahr.), too warm, of
course, for trout to live long in. — American
Journal of Science.

Xew Refrigerating Machine. — A refriger-
ating apparatus, invented by Captain Fred-
erick Warren, British Navy, is described as
follows : It consists of a small steam-engine,
to which is attached a second cylinder for
condensing ether -vapor. The cold pro-
duced by the expansion of this condensed
ether is utilized by being communicated to
brine contained in pipes, around which the
ether circulates. The brine thus cooled is
used in its turn either to freeze water or to
cool air, the water being contained in reser-
voirs immersed in a vessel of cold brine,
and the air being conveyed in pipes which
wind backward and forward in the brine.
The ether employed, being contained entire-
ly in closed apparatus, is scarcely at all
wasted, and little more than its first cost
need be taken into account.

In the experiments made with the ma-
chine, the moisture on the outside of the
pipes leading to the refrigerator was rap-
idly frozen, and the air of the room, after
being withdrawn at a temperature of 62°

Fahr., was almost immediately returned to
it at 45°. As this process continued, the
temperature of the room was rapidly re-
duced, and might easily have been brought
to the freezing-point and so maintained.
Captain Warren claims that the tempera-
ture of any limited space can be thus kept
down to almost any required degree, and
he proposes to apply the method to the
construction of cold chambers on board
ships, to be used for storing fresh provi-
sions, or, in the case of merchant-ships, for
the conveyance of perishable freight. He
does not, however, think it possible to
freeze a whole cargo of meat, so as to re-
sist putrefaction in a long voyage, as from
Australia to England. He proposes to cool
railway-carriages, to provide cool vases for
the conveyance of meat and other provi-
sions in India, to cool the air admitted into
hospital wards, and to provide an unlimited
supply of pure ice at almost nominal cost.

NOTES.

The latest application of the sand-blast
is for cleaning the fronts of buildings, by
removing the soot, dust, and other sub-
stances therefrom. The impact of the
sand on the surface removes the dirt from
all the crevices and indentations, without
perceptibly affecting the sharpness of the
architectural ornamentation.

In the course of a lecture on mercury
recently delivered at Vienna, the leg-bone
of a man was exhibited, whose death had
undoubtedly been hastened by mercury.
On striking the bone heavily on the table,
out fell thousands of httle glittering glob-
ules, which rolled about on the black sur-
face before the lecturer, collecting here and
there into drops. This mercury had been
absorbed during life, and proved the death
of the absorbent.

In 1871 the census of Ceylon was taken,
it being the first attempt of the kind in that
island. When this measure was first talked
of, a belief prevailed in the minds of the
Cinghalese that it was but a preparation for
the levying of a new tax. In many districts
the natives said that the object was to dis-
cover the number of unmarried youths,
with a view to their being deported to Eu-
rope, whose male population, they said, had
been destroyed by a great war. This led
to an unusual number of marriages being
celebrated. The population of the islands
is 2,500,000. Their religion is looked after
by 5,345 Buddhist priests, 1,078 Sivite

640

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

priests, 449 Mobammedan priests, 862 devil
dancers, 217 Protestant missionaries, and
87 Catiiolic priests. Over 1,600,000 of the
people are Buddhists, nearly 500,000 Sivites,
and about 183,000 Catholics, while 35,406
are parceled out between four varieties of
Protestantism.

Ix the January Popular Science Month-
ly we gave the State Geologist of Minnesota
as authority for the statement that iron-ore
exists in vast quantities in the neighbor-
hood of Black River Falls in that State.
Prof. X. H. Winchell, the State Geologist
referred to, has since written us that he
never made the statement, and is not aware
that iron-ore, in any quantity, is found in
that locality. The item and the authority for
it were taken from the Journal of the Society
of Arts, an esteemed contemporary, which
had evidently been misled like ourselves.

The yield of gold in New Zealand up to
the end of the year 1872 was 6,718,218
ounces, valued at £25,814,260, of which
the north island furnished 734,269 ounces,
worth £2,563,307. This gold is obtained
by lode-mining in igneous rocks of the
Neozoic epoch. The south island furnished
5,983,979 ounces, value £23,250,953, chiefly
obtained from the metamorphic rocks by
alluvial washing.

In the competition last October for the
8100,000 prize offered by the State of New
York for a satisfactory application of steam-
power to canal navigation, one of the com-
peting boats, the Baxter, carrying 200 tons
of cargo, and drawing 5 feet 8+ inches
water, traveled about 55 miles in a little
over 18 hours, consuming only 830 pounds
of hard coal. None of the performances,
however, were deemed satisfactory by the
commissioners, and the prize was again
withheld.

A CORRESPONDENT of the London Times
communicates to that journal some interest-
ing notes on the Eucah/plus as a house-
plant. He says that he has several of the
young trees, grown from seeds, in his
house ; that they grow remarkably well, are
very pretty, and emit a very pleasant odor,
much resembling that of the black currant.
They retain their green leaves through the
winter. The only objection to them as
house-plants is that they become too large ;
but it is easy to have a succession of them
by sowing seeds again. There are several
varieties of the Eucalyptus, three of which
— wattle gum, blue gum, and scented gum
— the correspondent has growing, and he
says that they are very much alike in all
respects.

At the recent meeting of Italian men of
science at Rome, the alienist physicians —
that is, those who make a specialty of men-

tal disorders — held sessions of their own,
under the presidency of Prof. Girolami.
After a long and interesting discussion, pro-
tracted through several sessions, they
founded a Societa Freniatrica Jtaliana, or
Association of Alienists. This body is to
assemble every third year, each time in a
different city of Italy, the first meeting to
take place at Imola next year. Among the
subjects for discussion we notice the two
following, viz. : " Uniform Classification of
Mental Disorders," and " The Founding of
Insane Asylums for Criminals."

Benjamin Disraeli, in a late speech at
Glasgow, made the significant admission
that the revolutions of science within the
last fifty years have had " much more ef-
fect" in moulding the world than any po-
litical causes ; and that they " have changed
the position and prospects of mankind more
than all the conquests, and all the codes,
and all the legislators that ever lived ! "

Before Bessemer's invention, the yearly
production of steel in England was 51,000
tons; it is now 481,000 tons, or nearly ten
times as much. The production of Besse-
mer steel in the United States for the year
1873 is estimated at 140,000 tons.

The great work of the De CandoUes, fa-
ther and son — namely, the "Prodromus
Systematis Xaturalis Yegetabilium," which
contains a description of every known spe-
cies of dicotyledonous flowering plant — has
been just completed. The publication of
the work was commenced in 1824 by the
elder De Candolle. To commemorate the
completion of the " Prodromus," the Horti-
cultural Society of Belgium has awarded M.
de Candolle a special medal.

Prof. Anstead thus estimates the coal-
supply of the world : In the British Islands
there are 12,800 square miles ; in France,
2,000 ; in Belgium, 520 ; Spain, 4,000 ; in
Prussia, 12,000; in Bohemia, 1,000; in
the United States, 113,000 ; in British
North America, 18,000, making a total of
152,520 square miles, nearly six-sevenths
of which is found in America, and over
five-sevenths in the United States. This
does not include the 250,000 square miles
said to exist in the Rocky Mountain dis-
trict through which the North Pacific Rail-
road passes.

The Silber light Is simply an improve-
ment in lamps and burners,.-which secures
the most perfect combustion of the lighting
materials yet attained. Air-currents are
admitted both into the centre and around
the circumference of the flame, and by this
means the same amount of oil or gas is
made to yield a much stronger and steadier
light than that afforded by the appliances
in common use.

THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

APRIL, 1874.

THE AGE OF ICE.'

THjL within a comparatively recent time, geologists regarded
the climate of the prehistoric periods as ti-opical or warm tem-
perate. Those who first sought to explain the presence of certain
scratches upon ledges, by the action of moving ice in continental
masses scouring the surface, were met by ridicule and skepticism. The
Avriter has now before him a caricature devised to illustrate the no-
tions of the literary world upon this subject thirty years since in Eng-
land. The excellent Dr. Buckland appears clad in furs, such as are
required in Greenland, with a map of ancient glaciers under his arm,
showing markings made on the rocks 33,333 years ago. On one side
is represented a bridge with a scratched paving-stone at the entrance,
and an inscription like this : " Scratches made day before yesterday
by a cart-wheel passing over Waterloo Bridge." It is said that the
learned doctor was greatly amused by the sketch, and sent copies of
it to all his scientific fi'iends. The one before us bears his autograph.

But within the last three decades numerous observers have carried
oiat the suggestions of the earlier geologists to a very extensive appli-
cation. Forbes and Agassiz explored the glaciers of Switzerland in
order to learn the laws of ice-motion ; Lyell, Murchison, Ramsay, and
others, have ransacked the fields of Great Britain in search of facts
from which to generalize ; and, in our country, Hitchcock, Mather,
Whittlesey, Newberry, Dana, and a score of younger men, have made
the investigation of the drift period a matter of enthusiasm. The ex-
istence of an immense era when all of Northern America and Europe
was enveloped by enormous thicknesses of solid ice, crunching frag-
ments of rocks beneath its massive tread, and transporting square
miles of moraine rubbish upon its back, is now universally accepted.
Some have gone so far as to believe that the entire globe was encircled

' The Great Ice Age, and its Relation to the Antiquity of Man. By James Geikie,
F. R. S. E., F. G. S. 575 pages. D. Appleton & Co.

VOL. IT. — 41

642 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

in these arctic fetters — as illustrated by the Brazilian researches of the
lamented Agassiz.

One of the latest and most extensive works relating to the Ice
period is given to the world by James Geikie, of the Royal Geologi-
cal Survey of Scotland. The subject is treated of with special refer-
ence to the phenomena exhibited in the north of Europe. lie subdi-
vides the Ice age as follows :

1. Fteglacial Period. — This is seen best in the " Xorwich crag,"
where remains of the elephant and mastodon are found in peat-beds,
and these are indications of approaching cold.

2. First Cycle of Cold. — This exhibits intense glacial conditions,
with great confluent glaciers ; intermediate mild and warm periods ;
arctic and southern mammalia visit Britain alternately, according as
climatal conditions become suited to their needs. This is followed by
an arctic climate with the mountains covered by snow and ice, the gla-
ciers ceasing to be confluent. The era terminates with local glaciers.
The deposits laid down are chiefly the "till" and "bowlder-clay,"
with a few stratified sands.

3. La&t Interglacial Period. — In this Britain is at first insular, with
cold climate ; next continental, Avith climate changing from cold to
temperate and genial, and again to temperate. In early stages of the
continental condition, the arctic mammalia invade Britain, Subse-
quently these disappear, and are succeeded by the hippopotamus, etc. ;
afterward submergence ensues, and the islands are again insulated,
perhaps before the climate became again suited to arctic mammalia.
At the close of this period the land sinks, reaching the depth of
2,000 feet below its present level in Wales. The deposits of this
era are cave - accumulations, river - gravels, and high level beaches.
The human implements found with the extinct mammalia are of stone,
and of the rudest construction.

4. Last Glacial Period. — This was a time of floating ice, compar-
able with the conditions imagined by the earlier writers for the whole
drift period. The climate was arctic, icebergs floated over most of
the land, enormous blocks of stone got stranded upon the hill-tops,
moraines clogged up valleys, and toward the termination of the pe-
riod local glaciers manifested the final effort of the ice to gain the
mastery. Remains of boreal shells and the mammoth occur for the
last time in the frozen sands and ancient beaches.

5. Preglacial Period. — The land has regained its present level, ter-
races are formed by immense rivers, arctic forms of life have disap-
peared, and the era of bronze and iron implements shows what prog-
ress man has made in the arts.

Till. — Throughout the length and breadth of Scotland occur scat-
tered heaps and ragged sheets of sand, gravel, and coarse debris, to-
gether with wide-spread deposits of clay largely obscuring the solid
ledges. In the Highland and iipland districts these deposits seem to be

THE AGE OF ICE,

643

iiilliijllliiil -^:^f^^JX' W

644

THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MOXTHLY.

largely restricted to the valleys, while in the Lowlands they spread in
broad sheets, continuous over wide tracts. The very bottom earth is
a strong clay or till, much like our hard-pan, which is therefore older
than any of the overlying deposits. Their relations are shown in the
accompanying figure.

Fig. 2.

«" . ^ ,-

r

DlAGRAKMATIC SECTION, SHOWING RELATIVE POSITION OF TlLL tt X. AND OVEBLTIXG SaSD AND

Gravel Series S S y.. W. = River Vallet.

This till is so tough that engineers would much rather excavate
the most obdurate rocks than attempt to remove it from their path.
Hard rocks are more or less easily assailable with gunpowder, and the
numerous joints and fissures by which they are traversed enable the
workmen to wedge them out often in considerable lumps. But till has
neither crack nor joint ; it will not blast, and to pick it to pieces is a

Scratched Stone (Black Shale), from the Tixl.

very slow and laborious process. Should streaks of sand penetrate it.
water will readily soak through, and large masses will then run or col
lapse, as soon as an opening is made into it.

THE AGE OF ICE.

645

The percentage of stones present is variable. They are most
common in the hilly districts, while in the lowland region the clay
may predominate. Most of them show markings all over. They vary
in size from grains to blocks several feet or even yards in diameter.
Their shape is peculiar. They are neither round nor oval like the
pebbles in river-gravel, or the shingle of the sea-shore ; nor are they
sharply angular like newly-fallen debris at the base of a cliif ; but
seem to be like the latter in general shape with the sharp corners and
edges smoothed away.* They are to the geologist what hieroglyphics
are to the Egyptologist — the silent but impressive records of an age
long passed away.

In narrow valleys the till often accumulates in such amount as to
cover the solid floor many yards in depth. In such cases, the surface
may be level, and, in the subsequent periods, the streams have made
excavations in the mass, leaving the till in the terrace-form. Its un-
stratified character will be determined by examining the earth along

Glii-^h-IN BlUN, DLMHULb-IIIl.i, — MKtAM CLTlINt. TllKOlOlI Tll.hlCL UF 1 ILL

the sides of the escarpment, as, superficially, it is difficult to distin-
guisli the material from the terraces of later age.

When the till is removed from the underlying rocks, their upper
surface almost invariably shows a smoothed and often highly-polished
appearance, and the whole pavement is marked with those peculiar
scratches or striae that form so characteristic a feature of the embedded
stones. The extent to which the polisliing is carried depends very
much upon the nature of the rock. As the best-preserved stones of
the bowlder-clay consist of close-grained limestone and clay iron-stone,
so the same materials in the ledge-condition preserve most perfectly

646 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

the fine lines of striation. The soft sandstones and highly-jointed
rocks are much less finely marked, and often show a broken and shat-
tered surface.

Gbeexxaxd. — To understand the appearance of Northern Europe
in the Ice period, we may consider the features presented by a similar
ice-covered country in modern times, and no country will better illus-
trate this phase of geological condition than Greenland. This island
is almost continental in its dimensions, containing not less than 750,000
square miles, and is all a bleak wilderness of ice and snow, save a little
strip extending to 74° north latitude along the western shore.

The coasts are deeply indented with numerous bays and fiords or
firths, which, when traced inland, are almost invariably found to ter-
minate against glaciers. Thick ice frequently appears, too, crowning
the exposed sea-cliffs, from the edges of which it droops in thick,
tongue-like, and stalactitic projections, until its own weight forces it to
break away and topple down the precipices into the sea. The whole
interior seems to be buried beneath a great depth of snow and ice,
which loads up the valleys and wraps over the hills. The scene open-
ing to view in the interior is desolate in the extreme — nothing but one
dead, dreary expanse of white, so far as the eye can reach — no living
creature frequents this wilderness — neither bird, beast, nor insect.
The silence, deep as death, is broken only when the roaring storm
arises to sweep before it the pitiless, blinding snow.

This represents perfectly the state of the northern part of our con-
tinent in the Ice age. We have a slight inkling of what it must have
been universally, from the heroic messages sent down in the winter
from the meteorological observatory stationed upon the summit of
Mount "Washington.

Some of the Greenland glaciers attain a vast size. Dr. Kane re-
ports the great Humboldt glacier {see Fig. 1) as sixty miles wide at its
termination. Its seaward face rises abruptly from the level of the
crater to a height of 300 feet, but it is not known how deep it may
extend under the sea. Another important ice-stream is the Glacier of
Eisblink, on the northwest part of the island. It projects seaward so
as to form a promontory thirteen miles in length. It comes from an
unknown distance in the interior, and plunges deeply into the sea.

Since ice is lighter than water, whenever a glacier enters the sea
the dense salt-water tends to buoy it up. The great tenacity of the
frozen mass enables it to resist the pressure for a time. By-and-by,
however, as the ice reaches sleeper water, its cohesion is overcome, and
large segments are forced from its terminal part, and floated up from
the bed of the sea, to sail away as icebergs. The glacier evidently
crops under the water to considerable depths, or, so long as the force
of cohesion is able to resist the tendency of the salt-water to press it
upward. The annexed diagram will show how the ice pushes down
into the sea, carrying moraiuie materials at its base, which accumu-

THE x\GE OF ICE.

647

late at m ; th may show the origin of the block ^, which is now going
to sea as a buoy. In many cases the icebergs must carry with them
stones frozen on the under side, as well as blocks perched on their
backs. Dr. Kane speaks of ice-rafts, floating many miles out to sea —
tables 200 feet long covered with large angular blocks and bowlders.

Fig. 5.

Gbeenland Glaciee sheddikg an Iceberg.

Though Greenland is said to be inhabited only upon the south and
west coast, there is a record of an early settlement upon the side
toward Iceland, with which there has been no communication for 400
years. The colony was planted about 1000 a. d., which flourished,
and maintained intercourse with its mother-country till the beginning
of the fifteenth century. Since that time, owing to the setting in of
the arctic current, and the consequent gradual increase of ice upon
the coast, the colony became inaccessible, and the records of it disap-
pear from history. At various intervals between, 1570, 1751, etc.,
down to our own time, the intrepid Danes have striven in vain to re-
open communication with their lost colony. This emerald coast, with
valleys well stocked, with reindeer and verdant glades, is now shut in
by the pitiless ice-pack, and the fate of its inhabitants ought to excite
the interest of the Avorld. It would be very interesting to be informed
of the condition of this colony : whether the increasing cold has en-
larged the glaciers so as to push the dwellings out to sea, or whether
the habitations are still standing, and a population has sprung up who
know of the outside world only by tradition.*

Lake-Basins. — A strong argument for the former existence of gla-
ciers over the northern regions comes from the excavation of basins
from the solid rock for the reception of lakes. The country most
traversed by the ice agency abounds in these rock-hollows. It is very
evident that the glacier is the only agency which can well be called
upon to explain these phenomena. Running water excavates only on
a descending plane. Sea-water acts upon its level, while the glacier
requires only a pressure from behind to enable it to ascend mountains.
The upward movement of the ice is shown by the stria? to have been
exceedingl}^ common.

The glacier grinds hardest where the steeper slope is exchanged for
a less inclination of its rocky bed ; the tendency of this action is to
' Geological Magazine, vol. x., p. 541.

648 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

THE AGE OF ICE.

649

increase the length of the greater in elevation, or, in other words, to
scoop out material from the ledges, in a part of the course, and, after
the sti'ength of the graver has exhausted itself, the ice will move up a
slope with little energy. This process will excavate hollows that may
ie filled Avith water in later times. Such are the basins of the great
American lakes. The dimensions of the lakes are areally proportion-
ate to the extent of the drainage-system in which they occur.

Till Overlaid with Bowlder-Clat, River Stinchak. r, Kock ; t. Till ; g. Boulder-clay.
X , Fine Gravel, etc.

JiO wider- Clay. — There is a distinction to be drawn, in Scotland,
between the " till " and " bowlder-clay." The two deposits pass into
each other on the Highlands, and Mr. Geikie proposes to limit the lat-
ter to the maritime districts. The bowlders of the clay are more
rough and angular than those found in the till. The annexed section
shows w^here the two deposits come into juxtaposition. This clay has
not been met with mox-e than 260 feet in vertical height above the sea.
It contains an abundance of shells of Arctic mollusca. Possibly it is
the " Champlain clay " of America.

Antarctic Ice-t$heet. — From a study of the ice of the Antarctic
Continent, it is possible to understand the origin of icebergs, and the
transportation of large blocks of stone, in " erratics." The water is
deep, and thus buoys, of enormous size, may float northerly for hun-
dreds of miles.

Sir J. C. Ross attained the highest southern latitude on record, but
found all his attempts to penetrate farther frustrated by a precipitous
wall of ice, frequently 180 feet in height. For 450 miles he found this
cliff unbroken by a single inlet. While coasting along this barrier his
ships were often in danger from stupendous icebergs and thick pack-
ice, extending in masses too compact to be penetrated. At one point
the ice descended sufficiently low to allow Ross to look down upon it
from the mast-head. The upper surface appeared to be a smooth plain,
shilling like frosted silver, and stretching away as far as eye could
reach into the illimitable distance. In principle, the sheet is the same
with that figured in the north, but more extensive. Like this must
have been some portions of the glacial sheet in Scotland, when the
land was mantled in ice-covering, filling up the intervening straits and
channels of the sea, and ternunating far out in the Atlantic Ocean, in
aflat-topped vertical clifl" of blue ice.

650 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

i

THE AGE OF ICE. 651

Erratics. — These are of all shapes and sizes, occasionally reacliing
colossal proportions, and containing many hundred feet. Some ai-e
rounded, others are angular, and not a few exhibit marks of scarifica-
tion. They may rest on base-rock, and, if carefully poised, may be
made to oscillate by the form of the land, or these large blocks may
appear on the till, angular debris^ and hills of gravel. As a general
rule, they prove to have been carried from higher to lower levels in
Scotland, though many excei^tions are recorded. There is one at the
height of 1,020 feet on the Pentland Hills, which may have traveled
westerly as much as eighty miles. It probably passed from one moun-
tain across a wide valley before attaining its final resting-place. This
is not so striking as the blocks lying nearly over the recently-com-
pleted Hoosic Tunnel, in Western Massachusetts, one of which weighs
610 tons, and has been transported from Oak Hill across a valley 1,300
feet deep. It has hundreds of lusty comrades, scattered in a south-
easterly course for thirty miles.

Sometimes a large block is revealed by the washing away of the
till around it. Those on the surface of gravel may have been carried
by floating ice. To such blocks it is not easy to assign limits of the
distance traveled, since icebergs may float for thousands of miles with-
out melting.

Oeigin of the Cold CLruAXE. — ^The question of the cause of the
glacial cold has been discussed warmly for a long time. The opinion
seems to be gaining ground that purely geological causes are not
sufficient to account for the magnitude of the glacial distribution. The
precession of the equinoxes, changing the times of the seasons, and the
eccentricity of the earth's path around the sun, lengthening the win-
ters and increasing j^recipitation of moisture, when combined with
certain changes in the courses of ocean-currents, and some elevation
of land in the north, may have together been instrumental in bringing
around a i^eriod of intense cold. If it be possible to use the orbital
changes as a guide to a chronological date for this term of cold, we
can say it began about 240,000 years since, and continued for 160,000
years, terminating 80,000 years before a. d. 1260. The cold would
have culminated about 30,000 years after its beginning.

Granting sucli figures, we can understand that the glacial must
have been the dark age in the earth's history — a terrible blight upon
the flourishing faunas and floras existing in tertiary times in northern
latitudes. The presence of warm temperate plants in Greenland has
always excited interest, even to the proposal of very wild theories to
account for the genial climate there of j^reglacial days. It may be
that the American Sequoia traveled across the bridge anciently con-
necting Greenland with Iceland and Scotland, and that the renowned
cedars of Lebanon ai'e the cousins of their famed relations in Cali-
fornia ; but the connection has been severed by the ruthless ice-flow,
and is not likely to be reestablished, unless our sun shall carry his sys-

65:

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

lllllliilli;!|l!llil!i|!liii!i'!'ii!lli'!»'i!!i! l!I'Tlll[t!llllllUil

THE AGE OF ICE,

653

tern of planets through a much warmer region than the space now en-
circling us.

Centres of Dispersion. — All existing glaciers flow from higher to
lower levels as a rule — the only exception being that already stated,
when the ice may be forced up-hill for a short distance. This may be
well exemplified in the Alpine glaciers of the present day. These
streams of ice all flow from the siimmits and axes of particular moun-
tains along the valleys, and spread over the neighboring plains. The
action is radial — proceeding from a central point or line outward.

Ainvfc OiAPiFR— (II AI

The geologists have concluded tliat most of the ancient ice-move-
ments in Northern Europe have been from centres of dispersion, like
those in Switzerland. Examples are numerous. One of the most in-
teresting is exhibited in Switzerland. The traveler finds there two
prominent centres of glacial radiation— the Bernese and the Mont
Blanc regions. Glaciers now flow westerly into the great valley of
Switzerland and toward the Rhone from the former, and in the latter
group the streams discharge upon the Italian plains on the south,
and toward the vale of Chamouni on the north. A careful study of
the vale of Chamouni shows that ice once filled it to the brim, for
the embossed rocks carry strife even to the height of 6,000 feet.

654 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Search for the sources of bowlders proves that large blocks on the
southern flanks of the Jura Mountains must have been derived from
Mont Blanc, sixty or eighty miles distant. Instead of passing down
the Arne at Chamouni, the blocks proceeded northerly toward the
Rhone, and thus across the great valley of Switzerland to the Jura.
The magnitude of this ancient action equals much of the wonderful
glacial phenomena of other districts in Europe, though hardly equal to
what may be seen on this continent. But, being satisfied of the for-
mer enormous extension of the Alpine glaciers from examination of the
striations and the dispersion of blocks, it is easy to generalize and
refer similar phenomena in other countries, Avhose glaciers are extinct,
to the same mighty cause.

In Scotland there may have been a centre of dispersion for glaciers
from Ben Nevis, another in the south part of the province. In Eng-
land, one in the Cumberland region ; in Wales, one from Mount Snow-
don. ' It is easy to discover the evidence of radial dispersion.

A combination of the glacial and iceberg agencies may be dis-
cerned in a map in Mr. Geikie's work, showing the courses of the
strijB marked upon the rocks of Scandinavia. They diverge from the
central water-shed between Xorway and Sweden — part pushing toward
Iceland and Scotland, and part directed toward Lapland and the Bal-
tic Sea. The distribution of the bowlders corresponds with these
marks. Furthermore, these ice-masses seem to have come in contact
with the water of the Baltic, and part have floated over Germany till
high land obstructed farther movement, and a part may have been
caught by the outflowing Baltic current, carried over the North Sea
to the south part of England, and perhaps Iceland. At least, bowl-
ders of Scandinavian origin are common in these regions, and have
probably migrated in the way described. On the east shore of Scot-
land they are plenty ; but, between these and those south of the
Thames, none have been found, which fact has given rise to the theory
of dispersion by means of icebergs through the Baltic.

In years past the prominent topic of discussion in scie<ntific associ-
ations has been the character of the ice-movements in the Glacier pe-
riod. One school has stoutly defended icebergs as the active agent,
the other has vigorously insisted npon land glaciation. The example
before us seems to require both these agents to account for all the
phenomena of this period. Both classes seem to be right, though nei-
ther can explain all the facts. Nature's domain is so vast that human
intellects do not seem to be capable of grasping the whole truth at
once. We are like the mariners who seek to penetrate to the north-
pole. They have penetrated a little way beyond Spitzbergen — they
have gone nearer the goal through the straits west of Greenland, and
have made great exertions in some other quarters. Each party has its
theory of the character of the unknown region, as derived from a par-
tial survey. By-and-by the whole of this area will be known, and it

THE AGE OF ICE.

655

6<;6

THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

will then appear that each theory had its element of truth. In like
manner we are endeavoring to attain to the proper conception of the
condition of the earth in the Age of Ice. The whole truth has not
yet been discovered. When fully revealed, it will appear far moi-e
magnificent and glorious than has now been surmised.

THE PATHOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS.

By FEEXAXD PAPILLOX.

TEA X SLATED FROM THE FRENCH, BY J. FITZGERALD, A.M.
III.

IN the former part of this essay we considered the general physi-
ology of the passions : their pathology is no less interesting, and
to that we now ask attention. When we reflect that the nervous sys-
tem of the animal life and the system of the great sympathetic govern
all the vital operations, and that the regularity of these latter is abso-
lutely dependent on the orderly performance of their functions by the
centres wherein are found the prime springs and the fundamental
activities of the animal economy, we conceive at once how countless
diseases may arise out of disturbances produced by an abuse or an
excess of the passions. Physicians have in all ages reckoned the pas-
sions among the predisposing, determining, or aggravating causes of
the majority of diseases — especially chronic diseases ; for it is a pecu-
liarity of the nerve-substance that it is impaired, and that it spreads
abroad the consequences of its impairment, only little by little, and by
imperceptible degrees. The work of the passions might be compared
to the operations by which an army approaches a beleaguered city :
they set about overmastering health and life circumspectly and slowly,
but their advance is always sure. A few observations concerning
the psychological and physiological disturbances produced by the pas-
sions of the moral order, which are the most disastrous in their effects,
viz., love, melancholy, hate, anger, etc., will give some idea of the
material working of these poisons of the soul.

We may regard love as a neurosis of the organs of memory and
imagination, in so far as these two faculties are related to the object
of love. The memory in particular seems here to acquire an intensity
that is truly extraordinary. In illustration of this point, Alibert states
a fact which he observed at Fahlun. As some laborers were one day
at work making a connection between two shafts in a mine, they foimd
the remains of a young man in a complete state of preservation, and
impregnated with bituminous substances. The man's features were
not recognized by any of the workmen. Nothing further was known

THE PATHOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 657

than that the accident by which he had been buried alive had occurred
upward of fifty years before. The people had ceased to make inquiries
as to the identity of the body, when a decrepit old woman came up
supported on crutches. She approached the mummified corpse, and
in it recognized the body of the man to whom she had been betrothed
more than fifty years previously. She threw herself upon the rigid
corpse — which was like a bronze statue — wept over it, and manifested
intense joy at seeing again the object of her early aflection.

As for the imagination, it transcends all bounds, and loses all char-
acter of exactitude. The will is no longer mistress of the vital acts.
Says Romeo at the tomb of Juliet :

" Here, here will I remain
With worms that are thy chambermaids.

Ob, my love ! my wife !
Death, that hatli sucked the boney of tliy breath,
Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty ;

.... beauty's ensiyn yet
Is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks.
And Death's pale flag is not advanced there."

" I am drawn toward you," writes Mdlle. de Lespinasse to M. de
Guibert, " by an attraction — by a feeling which I abhor, but which
has all the power of malediction and fatality." The English poet
Keats, when dying of consumption, writes thus to a friend: "I am in
that state wherein a woman — as woman — has no more power over me
than a stock or a stone, and yet the thought of leaving N. is something
horrible to me. I am ever seeing her form, which is ever disappear-
ing." This latter fact pertains to the history of hallucinations, and
this in turn borders on the history of ecstasies, which are so frequent
in religious life ; so true is it that love, even mystical and divine, if
not confined within the bounds of reason, turns to a kind of mania,
which, as we shall see, is full of danger for the general functions of
the mind.

Thought draws the sketch of life, but passion adds the coloring of
the picture. When this passion is a happy one, the coloring is brill-
iant and cheerful, and then life is a bright vernal season. But oftener
the passion is a painful one, and the color given by it to life is dark-
some. Melancholy is one of those passions which throw a gloom over
a man's life. There is one form of melancholy which is plainly a va-
riety of dementia, and which often comes under the notice of the phy-
sician. It is characterized by an incurable sadness, an irresistible
love of solitude, absolute inaction, and a belief in a host of imaginary
evils that are ever haunting the patient. " My body is a burning
fire," wrote a melancholic subject to his medical man ; " my nerves
are glowing coals, ray blood is boiling oil. Sleep is impossible. I
endure martyrdom." — " I am bereft of mind and sensibility," writes
another ; " my senses are gone — I can neither see nor hear any thing ;
VOL. IV. — 42

658 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

I have no ideas — I feel neither paiu nor pleasure ; all acts, all sensa-
tions, are alike to me ; I am an automaton, incapable of thinking, or
feeling, or recollecting — of will and of motion." This form of melan-
cholia is a disease, and not a passion. It is a species of dementia akm
to those strange aberrations which go by the name of lycanthropy,
lypemania, etc.

The true passional melancholy is that reflex, profound, painful
feeling of the imperfections of our nature, and of the nothingness of
human life, which seizes on certain minds, torturing them, dishearten-
ing them, and making their life one long sigh. This feeling is ex-
pressed by the gentle poet Virgil, when he says, " Sunt lacrimae re-
rum " (everywhere tears). This is the gloomy thought that haunts the
mind of Hamlet, the hallucinatory despair of Pascal, the sadness
which broods over Oberman and Rene, the bitter, heart-rending cry
of Childe Harold, the grand desolation of Manfred, the inquietude
and the agony represented by Albert Dtirer's graver and by Feti's
pencil. Melancholy so defined has a place in the depths of the heart
of every man that philosophically contemplates Destiny, nor need we
seek elsewhere an explanation of the sombre humor which distin-
guishes men of this kind, and which is witnessed to by those books
wherein they convey to us the history of their souls' troubles. If such
a humor as this had its source in the common ills of life — in its suffer-
ings, its miseries, and its deceptions — we might understand it perhaps
in the case of such men as Swift, Rousseau, Shelley, and Leopardi ;
but, when we meet with it in such favored geniuses as Byron, Goethe,
Lamartine, and Alfred de Vigny, we are forced to acknowledge that,
in men of the higher stamp, its cause must be the pain they feel on
seeing that they cannot slake their ideal thirst.' Such is the melan-
choly which we may call the philosophic.

Besides this, there is another form of melancholy which proceeds
from better-defined causes, i. e., from the common griefs and vexa-
tions of life. Reverses of fortune, balked ambitions, and disappoint-
ments in love, are usually the causes of this kind of sadness, which,
being far more active than purely philosophic sadness, often gives
rise to organic disorders of the most serious kind. Albert Diirer suc-
cumbed to the vexations caused him by his wife. Kepler died the
victim of the afflictions heaped upon him by Fate. Disappointment
in love is one of the most frequent causes of melancholy. This it is
which harassed and tortured Mdlle. de Lespinasse — which troubled
and worried the chaste soul of Pamela : it was the death of the beau-
tiful Genoese, Tommasina Spinola, when she heard of Louis XII.'s ill-
ness, and of Lady Caroline Lamb, when she went home after the fu-

' " What from this barren being do we reap ?
Our senses narrow and our reason frail,
Life short, and truth a gem which loves the deep."

— " Childe Harold;' iv., 93.

THE PATHOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 659

neral of Byron. "These two women had lived years and years, the one
preserving in the depths of her heart the calm despair of an impos-
sible love, the other the bitter recollection of a love that was spurned ;
but neither of them could outlive the affliction of seeing the object of
her affection taken away by death. There are some cases in which
the resistance is not of so long duration, and where the ravages of
passion are such that the organism becomes dislocated with fearful
rapidity. Indeed, it is no rare thing for a physician to be summoned
to a patient who is wasting away with sadness and dejection. No
organic cause can be discovered to account for the malady ; the usual
remedies are of no avail ; the patient does not mend, and usually
keeps the secret of his griefs to himself. In such cases the physician
should always strive to discover whether there is any passion of the
soul which produces this disorder of the functions, and makes his
remedies of no effect. Usually such a passion exists. Thus it was
that the physician Erasistratus discovered that Antiochus loved his
step-mother, Stratonice. Boccaccio likewise tells of a physician who
by chance detected the true cause, previously unknown, of the com-
plaint with which a certain young man was suffering ; whenever a
young female cousin of the patient entered his room, his pulse beat
quicker. It often happens that the melancholic becomes incapable
of bearing his afflictions, or of waiting for death to relieve him. This
is the origin of suicide. The history of medicine and literature is
full of narratives, real or fictitious, of suicide determined by an unfor-
tunate passion. While we admire what is touching and dramatic in
such narratives, we cannot fail to see that suicide is in se a fact of the
morbid kind. Its cause is a total aberration of the instinct of self-
preservation ; and, as the latter has its seat in a certain part of the
brain, we are authorized in locating the cause of suicide in a cerebral
disorganization, brought about more or less rapidly by certain more
general changes in the economy.

Similar changes are produced sooner or later under the influence
of resentment, hate, and anger. Resentment is a secret passion which
draws its plans in silence. Hate is taciturn, or finds utterance only in
imprecations. Anger has its crises. Whereas resentment is disquiet-
ing, hate painful, and anger distressing, revenge is a kind of pleasure.
It has been compared to the feel of silk, to indicate at once its impe-
rious nature and our gratification in appeasing it. When anger and
the desire of revenge distend the veins, flush the face, stiffen the arms,
brighten the eyes,* bewilder the mind, and lead it to the commission
often of criminal acts, the soul feels a sort of delight, but it is of
short duration ; and the momentary excitement is followed by a pro-

' In his admirable studies on the " Expression of the Emotions," Mr. Darwin notes a
characteristic expression of fear, rage, and anger, not found in man, though it appears in
all animals — viz., the erection of the hair and feathers. This phenomenon, which is
analogous to that of goose-skin in man, is produced not only by passional influences, but

66o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

found depression whose eftects, if oftentimes repeated, differ not from
those of concentrated resentment or pent-up hate. The man who is
given to outbursts of anger is sure to experience a rapid change of the
organs, in case he does not die in a fit of rage.

Death under such circumstances is of frequent occurrence. Sylla,
Valentinian, Nerva, Wenceslas, and Isabeau of Bavaria, all died in
consequence of an access of passion. The medical annals of our own
time recount many instances of fatal effects following the violent
brain-disturbance caused by anger. The symptoms usually are pul-«
monary and cerebral congestions. Still such fatal accidents as these
are exceptional : as a rule, the passions of hate and anger deteriorate
the constitution by slow degrees, but surely.

How, then, do we explain those morbid phenomena which have
their origin in misplaced affection, in disappointed ambition, in hatred,
or in anger, and which culminate either in serious chronic maladies, or
in death or suicide ? They all seem to start from an impairment of
the cerebro-spinal centres. The continual excitation of these by ever-
present emotions determines a paralysis of the central nerve-substance,
and thus affects its connections with the nerves extending out to the
various organs. These nerves next degenerate by degrees, and soon
the great functions are compromised. The heart and the lungs cease
to act with their normal rhythm, the circulation grows irregular and
languishing. Appetite disappears, the amount of carbonic acid ex-
haled decreases, and the hair grows white, owing to the interruption
of the pigmentary secretion. This general disturbance in nutrition
and secretion is attended with a fall of the body's temperature and
anaemia. The flesh dries up and the organism becomes less and less
capable of resisting morbific influences. At the same time, in conse-
quence of the reaction of all these disturbances on the brain, the psy-
chic faculties become dull or perverted, and the patient falls into a
decline more or less complicated and aggravated by grave symptoms.
Under these conditions he dies or makes away with himself.

Two organs, the stomach and the liver, are often affected in a pe-
culiar and characteristic way in the course of this pathological evolu-
tion. The modifications produced in the innervation, under the influ-
ence of cephalic excitement, cause a disturbance of the blood-circula-
tion in the liver. This disturbance is of such a nature that the bile,
now seci-eted in lai-ger quantity, is resorbed into the blood instead
of passing into the biliary vesicle. Then appears what we call jaun-
dice or icterus. The skin becomes pale, then yellow, owing to the

also by cold. Darwin explains this horripilation — as it is called — by the action of the
nervous system on certain minute involuntary muscles called arredores pili, recently dis-
covered by Kolliker, in connection with the capsules at the base of the separate hairs
and feathers. The excitation of these little muscles, which are very numerous over the
entire body, determines, by reflex contraction, the erection of which we speak, and af-
fords one of the most characteristic signs of fright, rage, and anger, in animals.

THE PATHOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 661

presence in tlie blood of the coloring matter of the bile. This
change in the liver is usually developed slowly : sometimes, however,
jaundice makes its appearance suddenly. Villeneuve mentions the
case of two youths who brought a discussion to an end by grasping
their swords; suddenly one of them turned yellow, and the other,
alarmed at this transformation, dropped his weapon. The same author
speaks of a priest who became icterical (jaundiced) on seeing a mad
dog jump at him. Whatever may be said of these cases, we must
reckon painful aifections of the soul among the efficient causes of
chronic diseases of the liver.

The digestion, says the author of a work published some years
ago, is completely subjected to the influence of the moral and intellect-
ual state. When the brain is wearied by the passions, appetite and
digestion are almost gone. Whatever causes grief or fright afiects
the stomach more or less. In times of epidemic, or of civil wai-, and
in all social conjunctures when any extraordinary peril threatens the
masses, dyspepsia becomes more frequent, and assumes a more serious
aspect. This aftection commonly prevails amid the various symptoms
of depression and decline produced by moral sufiering. The direct
pathological consequences of disordered nutrition, whose chief symp-
tom is dyspepsia, are of the most serious nature, and there is no
doubt that among them we must reckon cancer. Hence it is that An-
toine Dubois located the cause of cancer in the brain.

As a vibrating chord determines vibration in a neighboring chord,
so a passion produces in those who are the witnesses of it a passion or
a tendency to a passion of the same kind. The infant by a smile re-
sponds instinctively to its mother's smile, and it is difficult to contem-
plate attentively the portrait of a smiling person, especially if we ob-
serve that the face wears a smile, without our own faces assuming a
like expression. "We cannot," says Leon Dumont, "reflect on any
mode of expression, but our countenances will have a certain tendency
to conform itself to it." A fortiori it will so conform itself wdien,
instead of merely reflecting on the expression, we see it. Yawning,
hiccoughing, and sighing, are as contagious as laughter.

All passions, whether good or bad, are contagious. Esquiroi
seems to have been the first to discern and characterize moral conta-
gion, which he defines to be that property of our passions whereby
they excite like passions in others who are more or less predisposed to
them. The contagion of good example is manifest, and it is certain
that the worship of the saints is one of the wisest and most powerful
instrumentalities devised by the Catholic religion. Unfortunately,
depraved passions too have their imitators, and in this case the imita-
tion is so prompt, so thorough, and in some sort so automatic, as often
to appear irresistible. An able psychological physician, M. Prosper

662 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Despine, who has bestowed profound study on this subject, shows,
from a very large number of instances, that when a crime surrounded
with dramatic circumstances is published abroad, and made matter of
general comment, a certain number of similar crimes will be committed
soon afterward. Minds that are not fortitied, by a strict morality and
a good education, against the allurements of such examples, and
whose slumbering passions only await the occasion that will stir them
up, are spurred on and decided to act by the bustle and the parade
made about the hero of a criminal trial. M. Despine's statistics on
this painful subject are exceedingly curious and conclusive. Now it
is some peculiar form of murder, again a new process of poisoning,
anon, some original way of disposing of a corpse, that gives occasion
to grim plagiarisms with all the circumstances identical. In a word,
all criminal acts proceeding from hate, revenge, and cupidity, always
summon forth in certain individuals a spirit of emulation. Hence it
were advisable absolutely to forbid the publication, in popular prints,
of criminal trials whether real or imaginary, and to interdict the per-
formance of plays wherein wickedness and crime are portrayed for
the gratification of the spectator's morbid curiosity. M. Despine's
suggestion with regard to this matter will be approved by physicians
and hygienists, who are all agreed that writings and plays of a cer-
tain class are to be reckoned among the causes which conduct so many
wretches to the galleys, the morgue, and the mad-house. When we
disseminate examples of outrage and disorder, we must not be surprised
if we find a harvest of crime and insanity. Let us then heartily sec
ond the suggestion we speak of, and which M. Bouchut authoritative-
ly formulates when he says that, instead of feasting the public with
recitals and plays so dangerous to the commonweal, we should rather
found a moral pest-house to which should be committed, so soon as
they make their appearance, those rascalities whose contagiousness is
now beyond question.

Besides the contagion of those passions which end in crime, there
is also the contagion of those passionate states which terminate in
suicide. Epidemics of suicide are frequent in history. The instance
of the young women of Miletus, as told by Plutarch, is familiar. One
of them hung herself, and immediately several of her companions
made away with themselves in the same manner. To stay the prog-
ress of this redoubtable frenzy, the order was given to expose the
naked bodies of the suicides in the market-place of the city. An an-
cient historian of Marseilles records an epidemic of suicide whicli
raged among the young women of that place. In 1793 the city of
Versailles alone offered the spectacle of 1,300 voluntary deaths. In
the beginning of the present century a suicidal epidemic destroyed
large numbers of people in England, France, and Germany, the vic-
tims being young persons who had conceived a disgust for life, from
the reading of melancholy romances, coupled with precocious over-in-

THE PATHOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 663

dulgence in pleasures. A still stranger epidemic is that of infanti-
cide, which prevailed in Paris at the beginning of this century, after
the newspapers had published the history of the Cornier case. Ma-
dame Cornier, under the influence of infanticidal monomania, had mur-
dered her child under circumstances of such a kind as to make an im-
pression on a certain number of mothers, so that, though excellent
women and sincerely attached to their children, they were seized with
a desire to get rid of them. They did not yield to the temptation,
but the circumstance of their being attacked with such a mania ex-
cited much surprise among medical men.

It will not be uninteresting, if to these curious phenomena we ap-
pend the facts of nervous contagion to which M. Bouchut called the
attention of physicians some years ago. It had long been known, es-
pecially since the time of the famous convulsionnaires of the St.-Medard
Cemetery, that some neuropathic states are multiplied by instinctive
imitation ; but M. Bouchut shows that facts of this kind are far more
common than has been supposed, and the work wherein he describes
them adds a new and a dramatic chapter to the strange history of
nervous aberrations. One of the first cases given by M. Bouchut is
as follows — it was observed at Paris in 1848, in a shop where 400
work-women were employed : One day one of these work-women turned
pale, lost consciousness, and fell to the floor, her limbs convulsed, and
her jaws set. Within the space of two hours 30 of the women were
seized in the same way. On the fourth day 115 were affected, the
symptoms in all cases being the same, viz., suffocation, prickling sen-
sation in the limbs, vertigo, dread of sudden death, followed by loss
of consciousness in the convulsions. A similar epidemic was observed
in 1861 among the young girls of the parish of Montmartre, who were
preparing for the first communion. On the morning of the first day
of the retraite — or preparatory season of religious seclusion — while at
church, three of them became unconscious, and were seized with gen-
eral convulsions. The following day the same symptoms appeared in
three other girls. Still others were attacked on the third day. On
the fourth, the communion-day, 32 were seized in the same way. On
the fifth, confirmation-day, as the archbishop approached, 15 girls
were seized with convulsions, uttered a shriek, and fell to the floor
unconscious, when the prelate was about to confirm them. Thus, in
the space of 75 days, 40 girls out of 150 manifested identical nervous
disorders.

The various hallucinational, ecstatic, and spasmodic states, trans-
mitted and multiplied by example, play an important role in mediaeval
history, particularly among the religious orders. There is the closest
analogy between the accounts handed down to us by the writers of
those times and the observations of physicians published in our own
day. As concerns the question of treatment, we possess hardly any
save moral remedies ; and the success attending the employment of

664 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

these shows well the purely nervous character of these singular affec-
tions. We read of Boerhaave staying an epidemic of hysterical con-
vulsions in a boarding-school by threatening to burn, wuth a red-hot
iron, any of the girls who should be attacked. Practitioners in our
own time adopt analogous processes and artifices to conquer those pas-
sions which degenerate into morbid states. They strive to inspire
the patient with a passion different from that which possesses him,
and to fix his attention on subjects disconnected with those which
occupy his mind.

This style of physic — this moral therapy — requires infinitely more
tact and discernment than the application of the usual remedies of the
pharmacopoeia. Nor is it in our medical schools that young men, who
intend to practise the healing art, can learn to diagnose and to treat
those maladies wherein the soul wrecks the body. This is a vocation
which requires profound personal study and observation, and wherein
the student would do well to draw on a source too much overlooked
in our times, viz., those old authors who treat questions of this kind.
The young physician will find equal profit and delight. in studying
those profound connoisseurs of the human mind, La Chambre, Stahl,
Pinel, Hoffmann, Bichat, Tissot, Richerand, Alibert, Georget. From
them the student will not only learn how to judge wisely of the pas-
sions of others and of the best means of treating them, but will also
get sage counsels for the government of his own. There he will see
that there is nowhere perfect health, save when the passions are well
regulated, harmonized, and equipoised, and that moral temperance is
as indispensable to a calm and tranquil life as physiological tem-
perance. He will see that, without going the lengths of stoicism —
in which there is more pride than wisdom, more ostentation than
virtue — the noblest and the most desirable state for the mind and
body alike is equidistant from all extreme passions, i. e., situated in
the golden mean. And this conviction that regular living and mod-
eration in material as in emotional life are the secret, not, indeed,
of happiness — which is nowhere in this world — but of serenity and
security, he will strive to spread abroad as being the most useful
precept of the medical art. If it is your desire that your circulatory,
respiratory, and digestive functions, should be discharged properly,
normally, if you want your appetite to be good, your sleep sound,
your humor equable, avoid all emotions that are over-strong, all pleas-
ures that are too intense, and meet the inevitable sorrows and the
cruel agonies of life with a resigned and firm soul. Ever have some
occupation to employ and divert your mind, and to make it proof
against the temptations of want or of desire. Thus will you attain
the term of life without overmuch disquiet and affliction. — Kevue cles
Deux Mondes.

IMAGES AND SHADOWS.

bb%

IMAGES AND SHADOWS.

By W. J. YOUMANS, M. D.

SO much has been said lately of the wonders of spectrum analysis,
that we are very apt to forget the other and equally marvelous
properties of the agent by which it is produced. Spectrum analysis
is a rare and curious experiment, but the more familiar elFects of light
which we daily experience are really just as wonderful, if we will but
pause to reflect upon them. Science means knowledge, and the
science of optics embodies our knowledge of light ; but how much,
after all, do we know of it ? A great deal, undoubtedly, of its modes
of action, but very little, if any thing, of its nature. We have an hy-
pothesis or supposition about it, and work out ingenious conclusions,
logically and experimentally, and say that they are proved ; but how
far are we from comprehending them.

That light moves at an amazing velocity, is shown in several
ways ; and all the methods bring ns to about the same results which
are expressed in numbers and are demonstrably true ; but what finite
mind can enter into the meaning of the statement that the luminous
ray moves forward at the rate of 185,000 miles in a second of time ?
Between tlie two ticks of a second's pendulum, we are told that light

Rectillneaii I'kopagation or Light.

would pass round our globe seven and a half times. But who has a
notion even of the dimensions of our globe? The number of thou-
sands of miles through it and around it have been calculated, and the
calculations harmonize with the whole body of astronomical knowl-
edge ; but we can form no adequate conception of such magnitudes.
We patch together different shreds of our mental experience of large

666 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

things, and construct a symbolic idea which represents our planet, but
we never grasp the reality in the immensity of its proportions.

Light is a force, and science holds that it is made up of impulses.
Nature has been shown to conform all kinds of dynamical effects to
rhythmical pulsing, or wave-like action and the impulses of light are
held to be of the same kind. There are, at any rate, measurable
effects which ai-e unequal in the different colored lights, and the scale
has been determined. In an inch of violet light it is shown that there
are no less than 57,000 waves, a statement in which there is nothing
extraordinary or impossible, as Nobert, the German optician, is in the
habit of ruling his microscopical test-glasses at rates all the way from
100,000 to 200,000 per inch. But, when we are told that the ray
enters the eye at the rate of 185,000 miles per second, and — as each
inch contains 5Y,000 waves — that when we are looking at a violet ob-
ject there are 699,000,000,000,000 beats upon the retina each second,
the statement baffles all imagination : we may accept, but cannot under-
stand it. In the attempt to penetrate the nature of light we are lost
in the mysteries of the infinite. Yet the modes of its action have been
determined, and they furnish the most splendid example we know ol
the inflexibleness and exactitude of what are called the laws of Na-
ture.

Fig. 2.

Image fobmbd by a Hole m a Card.

Man is placed in the midst of the universe, and is designed to have
knowledge of it. He is impressible to outward agencies, and possesses
a grand cerebral treasury-house for storing up these external impres-

IMAGES AND SHADOWS.

667

sioiis. Touch, taste, smell, and hearing, are the senses by which he
becomes acquainted with many properties of things immediately
around hira ; but tlie universe is reported to him through the sense of
vision and by the agency of light. Somehow, in their mysterious na-
ture, the luminous rays from all sources, distant and remote, effect a
change in the nerve-structure of the eye by which impressions ai-e
transmitted to the brain. Into that mode of action we cannot now
enter, but will confine our attention at present to the property of light
by which luminous images are produced. For it is, after all, the im-
ages of things we have to deal with. We know the external world in
its distances, forms, and colors, because its visible objects are all du-
plicated in the eye. The cloud, the landscape, the cathedral, that
excites our thought and kindles our feeling, is, in each case, but a pict-
ure recreated from the external object by the agency of light.

Inverted Lsiage of Landscape.

The first property, or law, of light, upon which the production of
images depends, is simply that it moves in straight lines through any
uniform medium that it can traverse. We are all familiar with the
general fact that the path of light is rectilinear, but it may be accu-
rately proved by a very simple experiment.

Two screens. A, B (Fig. 1), each pierced with a minute hole, are
so arranged that the apertures are in a line with the flame of a candle,
C. An eye, placed in this line behind the screens, is then able to see

668

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the flame ; but, if the eye, the candle, or either screen, be slightly dis-
placed to the right or left, the ray is interrupted, and the flame be-
comes invisible.

This propagation of light in straight lines, though the first condi-
tion of the production of images, is not the only condition ; for, in that
cas^e, the images of illuminated objects would be repeated everywhere,
and, when the blinds were opened, a picture of the landscape might be
thrown, through the window, upon the opposite wall of a room. For
the formation of an image, the rays of an object must be collected and
passed through an aperture. This is shown by a simple experiment
illustrated in Fig. 2. A card is pierced with a large pin-hole and
held between a candle and screen, when an image of the candle will
be formed upon the screen in an inverted position. That the image
must be upside-down is evident, if the i-ays take a straight course. A
line from the top of the candle-flame through the puncture is pro-
longed to the bottom of the image, and another, from the bottom of
the flame, crosses the first at the aperture, and strikes the top of the

Image of Sux upon the Flikjh.

image. A line from the centre of the candle passes straight through
and strikes the centre of the image, while lines from the two sides of
the flame cross again, and are pi'olonged to the opposite sides of the
image. Thus, as each point upon the screen receives only the light
from a corresponding point of the flame, the image repeats the object
in outline, color, and brightness, though in a reversed position.

This principle may be applied on a larger scale. Let a room be
made quite dark, and a white screen be placed opposite a small hole

IMAGES AND SHADOWS.

669

in the shutter. There will then be formed upon the white surface an
inverted picture of the external objects, as shown in Fig. 3, They
will appear of the natural colors, and the outlines will be sharper in
proportion as the hole is smaller.

When the sun shines through a small orifice into a darkened room,
a cone of rays is produced, as everybody has observed, by lighting up
the particles of dust which are scattered in its course ; for, if the air
were quite clear, the track of the rays would be invisible. In this
case an image of the sun is foi-med upon the floor or opposite wall by

Images of Sun formed by Foliage.

the crossing of the rays through the aperture, exactly in the manner
of the production of the candle-image and the landscape-picture just
described. The best condition for tlie formation of such an image is
when the sun is low, and there is a white wall opposite to receive it ;
the image is then perfectly circular. But if the light falls upon the
floor, as represented in Fig. 4, the cone of rays produces an oblong or
elliptical image ; the deviation from an exact circle depends upon the
angle which the cone of rays makes with the floor. Such an image

670

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

may often be made instructive in observing solar phenomena. By
closely examining it, it is sometimes possible to detect the presence of
spots on the solar surface. Solar eclipses may be watched in the same
way. As the moon gradually encroaches upon the sun's disk its prog-
ress can be traced by a corresponding change in the form of the image,
which resembles that of the uneclipsed portion of the solar surface.
In such observations, however, it will be remembered that the course
of the movement is always reversed. It was in this way that tlie
transit of Venus was first observed by Jeremiah Horrocks, November
24, 1639. He had calculated the time, which fell upon Sunday
morning. He arranged his room for the observation, and then went
to church, as he did not wish any secular interests to interfere with
religious devotion. It is very probable, however, that Venus was
mixed up with his devout meditations, for he hurried back from ser-
vice, and was delighted to find that his calculations were verified, as
the planet was already far advanced in its passage across the sun's face.
We are all familiar with similar images of the sun, of a round or
oval outline, formed upon the ground where his rays shine through
small openings in the foliage of trees, as illustrated in Fig. 5.

Formation op a Shadow.

The same property, that is, the rectilinear propagation of light,
gives rise to a reverse effect, or a sort of dark image or shadow, al-
though a shadow depending upon the absence of light is of course
not properly an image. " Let the source of light be a luminous
point, and let an opaque body be placed so as to intercept a portion ol'
its rays (Fig. 6). If we construct a conical surface touching the body
all round, and having its vertex at the luminous point, it is evident
that all the space within this surface on the farther side of the opaque

IMAGES AND SHADOWS. 671

body is completely screened from the rays. The cone thus constructed
is called the shadow-cone, and its intersection with any surface behind
the opaque body defines the shadow cast upon that surface. In tlie
case which we have been supposing — that of a luminous point — the
shadow-cone and the shadow itself will be sharply defined."

Actual sources of light are not, however, mere points ; they have
finite and variable dimensions, and this complicates the efiect in the
geometi-y of shadows. These effects are well illustrated by the dia-
gram (Fig. 7). Let the central sphere represent a source of light
placed between two opaque spheres, one larger and the other smaller
than itself. We shall then have two kinds of shadow, the total
shadow or utnbra, and the partial shadow or penumbra. If the
opaque sphere, seen at the right in the diagram, be smaller than the
luminous body, the umbra terminates at a finite distance depending
upon the relative magnitudes and the proximity of the two bodies.
If the opaque body is larger than the source of illumination, as illus-
trated in the left portion of the diagram, the cone of the umbra is
projected to an infinite distance. The penumbral cones represented

Ujlbra and Penujebka.

by a lighter shading, it is seen, are wider than the cones of total
shadow, and include them. It will be noticed that all points Ivino-
within the penumbral cones are excluded from the view of some por-
tion of the luminous body, and are thus partially shaded by the
opaque bodies. Points that are very near the outer boundaries are
very slightly darkened, if near the total shadow they are almost com-
pletely shaded. The penumbra is, therefore, not a uniform shadow,
but gradually fades into darkness from its outer limit to the total ob-
scuration of the umbra. It follows from this that the shadow of an
opaque body falling upon a screen will not have a sharply-defined^
edge, but will show a transition from total shadow to the complete
absence of shadow. To have the shadow clean and sharp at its edge,

672 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

it would be necessary to have the source of illumination a mere point.
Of course the effect of such abrupt transitions from perfect illuraiii.i-
tion to total darkness, if it were the plan of JSTature, would be most in-
convenient and painful, if not destructive to the eyes. We are pro-
tected from this by the phenomena of double shadows, and the grad-
ual passage from darkness to light, although each luminous ray moves
undeviatingly in its straight line. Light cannot turn corners like
sound. This is explained by the excessive shortness of the lumi-
nous as compared with sonorous waves. Sound-waves are so large
that they flow around objects in the air, and consequently cast but
feeble shadows, although Deschanel (from whose admirable work on
" Natural Philosophy " our cuts are borrowed) states that CoUodon,
in his experiments on the transmission of sound through the water ox
the Lake of Geneva, established the presence of a very sharply-de-
fined sound-shadow in the water behind the end of a projecting wall.
It is necessary to say, however, that tlie foregoing statement that
light cannot turn corners is only true in the common and general ex-
perience of it. If we carry our experiments with light down to
so fine a point that we reach the dimensions of its waves, it is then
found that they are capable of bending round obstacles. If sunlight be
allowed to pass through an exceedingly fine slit, and then to fall on a
screen of white paper, colored bands appear, called diffraction fringes ;
that is, the white light, in its passage through the minute opening, has
been interfered with and broken up into its component colors. We
have here, however, a new order of eflects which will require to be
separately considered.

YIYISECTION.

By MICHAEL FOSTEE, M. D., F. R. S.

PROFESSOR OF PHYSIOLOGY IN THE UXIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE.

IN the following pages I propose to inquire whether it is desirable
that physiologists should continue the pi-actice of what is common-
ly called vivisection, to which they have hitherto been accustomed. By
vivisection I understand the operating with cutting instruments or by
other means on the still living bodies of animals. The word " living "
requires, perhaps, some further definition. In the long series of
changes through which the body of a living animal passes, from full
functional activity to complete decomposition, there are three chief
stages, each of which may be arbitrarily taken as the end of life.
There is the time at which consciousness is lost, the time at which the
breath stops and the heart ceases to beat, and the time at which the
muscles become rigid with the death-stiflening. The succession of the
three events is always in the same order, but the interval of time be-

VIVISECTION. 673

tween any tvro of them varies within very wide limits. For our piir-
poses it will perhaps be best to take the second as marking the end of
life, to say that an animal is still alive bo long as the heart is beating,
and air enters into and issues from the chest.

It is very desirable that a discussion, the decision upon which must
be of the utmost importance to physiology at least, should not be
turned aside to any false issues. The question whether vivisection is
a bad thing is in no wise settled by asserting tl)at there are many
things equally bad. Thus, to say that the evil wrought upon animals
in the name of science is but a flea-bite compared to that done in the
name of sport, is simply to bring forward a tu quoque argument of no
real worth, except to stop the mouths of particular opponents. When
an ardent sportsman, or when one, no sportsman himself, but having
a theoretical admiration of the pleasures of the field, declaims against
vivisection, it may be worth while to remind such a one of some of
the agonies of sport — of the scenes which accompany a battue or a
pigeon-match ; of wounded birds dragging their maimed bodies to
some hidden covert, there to die a lingering death ; of the piercing
squeals of the hunted hare ; of the last moments of the brave fox,
when, after a fruitless struggle, the time comes for his living body to
be torn by the pursuing hounds ; to ask him how often a living object
of sport is by some purposeful, sudden blow, humanely killed " to put
it out of its misery ; " to suggest to him, as a matter of reflection, that,
had we any satisfactory measure of pain, it would be found that all
the pain which physiologists have caused, since their science began, is
less than that which the animal creation has sufiei-ed in the field from
the hands of the members of the two Houses of Parliament since the
last general election. It may be of use to say this to a sportsman ;
but vivisection is not thereby justified. It is no use saying it at all to
those who are now agitating this question. They are equally opposed
to cruelty in sport as to cruelty in science ; but they are also wise in
their generation. They see that there is far more hope of putting
down the one than the other. Biologists and physiologists are at
the present moment clearly in disrepute. To call them atheists, is
to show one's self a man of spirit and intelligence. Following out
their own science, along the path Nature has pointed out to them,
they have run counter to many established opinions and cherished
views. Divorced by the divergence of their i-espectiA'e methods in
large measure from the mathematicians and physicists, to whom ortho-
doxy is easy, accused of materialism, active in the support of Darwin-
ism and evolution theories, believed by the many to have no faith —
their position not a little resembles that of the Jews in the middle
ages ; they are just in the condition in which the accusation of cruelty
is most tellingly made and most readily credited against them by a
vulgar public. This the opponents of vivisection know full well ; and
therefore it is against the physiologists and not against the pigeon-

TOL. IV. — 43

674 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

shooters that they make their complaint. They are even willing, at
the present, to use the latter against the former. By-ancl-by, if they
are successful in this, they will move against sport, on the ground
that it is far more cruel and has far less justification than the vivisec-
tion which has been done away with.

Nor is it any use to tell a far larger class, the eaters of meat, that
the pain which physiology has caused since the time of Galen is far
less than that which in any one week is caused in butchers' shambles
in px-oviding flesh to fill the mouths of the people of London.

Nor is it, on the other hand, any use to say that because many
physiologists are kindly, humane men in private life, therefore the ac-
cusation of cruelty brought against them must be false. I know a
physiologist who, after a day spent in experimental work, may be
seen sitting in the evening with a favorite cat on his lap, an old dog
by his side, and a new one at his feet ; but I would not therefore guar-
antee that he had not been cruel in the morning. He might be an
angel in the bosom of his family, but a demon in the laboratory. I
know a physiologist, of whom his friends have said that, had he not
been so amiable, he might have made a noise in the world, and yet
who at the present moment is being accused of brutal cruelties. I feel
that the accusation might be true.

Nor is it of any use to say, though it may be said with perfect
truth, that a great deal of the present agitation against vivisection is
one of the many fruits of a mawkish sentimentalism which is stealing
over the present generation, and by a lessening of manliness is cur-
tailing the good efiects of increased enlightenment. The foolish of
this world are often used to correct the wise ; and actions brought
about by a wrong sentimentalism may be in themselves right and
good.

The question whether it is desirable that man should continue to
inflict the pains of death, or pains without death, on other animals,
and, if so, within what limits, is one which must be argued out on its
own merits alone, and the discussion of it will not be advanced by
irrelevant considerations such as these on which we have dwelt.

There are two aspects of the inquiry — one from the side of man,
the other from the side of the animal. Let us first consider the ques-
tion from the point of view of the animal.

TVe have to determine the principles which govern or should gov-
ern the conduct of man toward animals. One broad principle may
be briefly stated : Unless man destroys animals, animals would soon
destroy man. Mr. Tennyson has told us —

" I^fature is one with rapine, a harm no preacher can heal ; "

and Mr. Darwin has shown that the lives of all living beings are shaped
by " the struggle for existence." Man's life is a struggle for exist-
ence with his fellow-men, with living animals and plants, and with

vivisection: 675

the lifeless forces of the universe. The very conditions of his exist-
ence lay upon him the burden, and in so doing give him the right, to
use the world around him, the lives of animals included, to aid him
in his strife. Imagine the results of forbidding man to take away the
lives of animals. Suppose, for instance, the whole human race were to
form itself into a Society for the Prevention of the Destruction of Ti-
gers. How many generations would pass before " the last man " pro-
vided a tumultuous crowd of tigers with the last human meal ? — pos-
sibly the indefatigable secretary of the Society sealing with his death
his loyalty to the cause. Or, since tigers, like man, are carnivorous,
and might therefore be supposed more worthy of death than herbiv-
orous creatures, let us suppose the efforts of the Society to be directed
toward the preservation of sheep. How many generations would
pass before the face of the earth were covered with woolly flocks, and
man were driven to lead a laborious, frugivorous, arboreal life on the
tree-tops, or to earn a scanty subsistence on resuscitated Ffahlhaitten^
as being the only places where the necessities of the sheep would per-
mit him to dwell ? Did the reader ever by chance descend, at early
dawn, into the kitchen and watch the convulsive agonies of a writhing
heap of cockroaches drowning in the watery trap set for them by the .A^'^'^^ .^
cook overnight? What a scene of unutterable woe is that wh^^.. . ^ -^gl^ ^
judged from the stand-point of the cockroach ! But, if man were 'fS-, ■}(#':; ^'
deny himself the right of vivisection or vivipression over the vermfn • ' '
which infest his home and bed, what would come of it ?

To be serious: man, if he is to live and prosper, must kill other u,? iV i'^
animals. It is a duty laid upon him by the nature of things; a duty,
and therefore a right. Self-preservation demands it. But what do we
mean by self-j^reservation ? Can we draw a line and say that he is
justified in slaying an animal for this purpose and not for that ? "We
can only do so by applying the test of whether the death of the ani-
mal is useful to him or not. Whenever or wherever the death of an
animal is of advantage either to himself or to the human society of
which he is a unit, he is justified in slaying that animal.

The success of the human race in the struggle for existence depends
on man's being well fed ; man is therefore justified in slaying and
eating a sheep. The success of the human race in the struggle for ex-
istence is dependent on knowledge being increased ; man is therefore
justified in slaying a frog or a rabbit, if it can be shown that human
knowledge is thereby enlarged.

Death is in itself painful. It is only by special means that the
pangs amid which the ties of life are loosened can be done away with.
The slaughter of an animal is therefore of necessity painful, except in
the special cases where means have been taken to do away with pain.
In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, when an animal is slaughtered
by man, it is the death of the animal which benefits man, the pain
itself which accompanies the death does him no good at all. While

e-j(> THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

jxistified, tlierefore, in killing tlie animal, he is not justified in causing
it pain. He is bound, in fact, to kill the animal in such a way as to
cause as little pain as is consistent with his own interest. The death
of a sheep in a butcher's slaughter-house is painful ; but men cannot
therefore be said to do wrong in killing a sheep for food. They kill
it with as little pain as is under the circumstances possible. They
could not make the pain less, except by the introduction of elaborate
and costly methods which would probably ruin the butcher or spoil
the meat, or at least, in the present state of our knowledge and of the
market, do damage to the interests of mankind. The death of an ox,
again, is more painful than that of a sheep ; but men do not therefore
feel bound to live on mutton alone. They consider that the advantages
of a mixed diet of beef and mutton justify them in inflicting that
additional quantity of pain which is suffered whenever an ox is felled.

In short, this, under one aspect, is a selfish world. The struggle
for existence is its guiding principle. If we believe that man is to
govern the world, and he must either govern or succumb, then we
must be prepared to use animals selfishly, if you please to call it so —
to use animals for our advantage — to kill them when we have need of
their deaths — to kill them with pain when the pain is for our benefit;
and, inasmuch as the greater includes the less, to inflict pain without
death where their pain does us good.* Our good is, in fact, the rule
of our conduct toward animals. Whenever an animal is killed by
man, or suffers pain at the hand of man, without benefit to man, or
where the same benefit could be gained without the death or without
the pain, then the death or the pain can be no longer justified. The
man who inflicts them is a cruel man ; he no longer does good, but
harm, to humanity, and humanity ought to stop his hand.

I feel that I ought almost to apologize to the reader for having
spent so much of his time over what are almost truisms ; but so many
absurd statements are continually being made, and so many whimsical
ideas broached, that it seemed desirable to have a clear understonding
concerning the principles which should guide our general conduct
toward animals before discussing the special subject of vivisection.

We have now to inquire whether the deaths and pains which the
word vivisection imjjlies are, or have been, wrought for the benefit of
mankind, inasmuch as they have led to knowledge and power which
could not otherwise have been gained ; or whether they had not been
wrought for the benefit of mankind, inasmuch as they have not led to
knowledge and power, or the power and knowledge might have been
gained in some other way, or, being gained by many deaths and much
pain, have been so small that mankind could well have done without

* Some writers have urged that while man is perfectly justified in klUing any number
of animals, he is not justified in causing pain. From the point of view of the animal thig
is simply a grotesque absurdity ; from the point of view of man we shall have to speak
of it later on.

VIVISECTION. 677

them. I introduce the worcl death as well as pain, because, in spite
of the etymology of the word, and the fact that vivisection suggests
to the public mind pain only, and not death at all, the truth is, that
in at least the great majority of cases vivisection does or ought to
mean death only, and not pain at all. In the minds of those ignorant
of physiology — and they are foremost, if not alone, in blaming vivi-
section— much confusion has arisen from the different meanings at-
tached to the words " life " and " living." I alluded to these in the
beginning of this paper. To many such it is perhaps a revelation to
learn that an animal may be kept alive — that is, with its heart in full
working order, and its respiratory movements continuing with perfect
regularity — for hours and hours after all signs of consciousness have
disappeared. All operations performed on such an animal would come
under the term vivisection ; but, in the total absence of all signs of
consciousness, it would be absurd to speak of pain. It would perhaps
be a still greater revelation to such to learn that a frog, at a later
stage in the series of events which we class together as death — when
its brain and spinal cord have been instantaneously destroyed by an
operation the pain of which may be said to be infinitesimal, and its
heart removed at a time when feeling is impossible — may yet be made
by proper means to kick and jump and move its body about in almost
all possible ways. Any operation performed on the body of such a
frog would by many be still called vivisection ; but, to sj^eak of such
a mere mass of muscle and nerve as suffering pain, is about as truth-
ful and rational as to say that it is cruel to cut down a tree, though a
silly, ignorant looker-on might shriek when the leg moved, for about
the same cause and with the same reason that the African grovels
before his fetich.

Did the reader ever see a rabbit completely under the influence
of chloral ? Lying prostrate, with flaccid limbs, with head sunk back
on the limp neck, motionless and still, at first sight, it seems quite
dead and gone. But a gentle heaving of the body, a rise and a fall
every few seconds, tells you that it still breathes ; and a finger placed
on the chest may feel the quick throb of the still beating heart. You
pull it and pinch it ; it does not move. You prick with a needle the
exquisitely-sensitive cornea of its eye ; it makes no sign, save only
perhaps a wink. You make a great cut through its skin with a sharp
knife ; it does not wince. You handle, and divide, and pinch nerves
which, in ourselves, are full of feeling ; it gives no sign of pain. Yet
it is full of action. To the physiologist, its body, though poor in
what the vulgar call life, is still the stage of manifold events, and
each event a problem, with a crowd of still harder problems at its
back. He therefore brings to bear on this breathing, pulsating, but
otherwise quiescent frame, the instruments which are the tools of his
research. He takes deft tracings of the ebb and flow of blood in the
widening and narrowing vessels; he measures the time and the force

678 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

of each throb of the heart, while by light galvanic touches he stirs
this part or quiets that ; he takes note of the rise and fall of the chest-
walls, as they quicken or grow slow, as they wax or wane, under this
influence or that ; he gathers the juice which pours from one or another
gland; he divides this nerve, he stimulates that, and mai-ks the result
of each ; he brings subtile poisons to bear on the whole frame, or on
parts ; and, having done what he wished to do, having obtained, in
the shape of careful notes or delicate tracings, answers to the questions
he wished to put, he finishes a painless death by the removal of all the
blood from the body, or by any other means that best suit him at the
time. I am not exaggerating when I say that this is at the present
day one of the commonest forms of vivisectional experiment ; this is
what newspaper writers speak of as " torture," and, on the strength
of it, accuse cultivated physiologists of barbaric cruelty.

A dog under chloroform or morphia may be brought to very nearly
the same condition as a rabbit under chloral ; but, as far as my ex-
perience goes, the same long duration of complete quiescence is main-
tained with greater difliculty. Dogs sometimes howl under chloro-
form or morphia when nothing is being done to them, and under cir-
cumstances in which they can be sufiering no pain. At the moment
when the chloroform begins to take eiFect upon them, when probably
confused carnivorous visions chase through their brains, the howling
is often excessive. Any one who knows any thing about the adminis-
tration of chloroform to human beings, is well aware how frequent
cries and noises are in the stage of excitement, and how little depend-
ence can be placed on them as signs of pain.

In a large number of cases, then, where ansesthetics of one kind or
another are used, vivisectional experiments cause no pain at all ; and,
as far as I know, in this country, at least, physiologists always use
anassthetics where they can. They do so not only for the sake of the
animal, but also for the sake of the experiment itself. Unless they are
studying actual manifestations of feeling, pain, with all its conse-
quences, is a disturbing element which must by all possible means be
eliminated, if tlie experiment is to have its due value. The apparent
lifelessness of the animal is the physiologist's opportunity ; struggling
limbs would utterly defeat his aims, and a sudden start might wreck
his whole experiment. Chloroform and other anaesthetics have im-
mensely lessened human suffering, not only by simply diminishing
pain, but even still more by putting it in the power of the surgeon to
perform operations which he otherwise would not dare to attempt.
In the same way they have powerfully aided the progress of physi-
ology, by rendering possible new experiments, and by allowing the
investigator to analyze securely phenomena which otherwise would,
perhaps forever, have remained confused through the disturbances
caused by pain.

There are some experiments, however, requiring vivisection, in

VIVISECTION. Sjg

which the use of chloral or other anaesthetics is, for various reasons,
inadmissible or undesirable. These form two classes. In the first
and most numerous, the experiment is generally a short one, and
quickly carried out, and the pain slight and transient. It is, of course,
impossible for any one to judge truly of the pain felt by any other
body, and we may eiT in tAvo ways in estimating the pain felt by ani-
mals. We may over-estimate or undcr-estimate it. Perhaps a rough
but tolerably safe test of great pain or distress may be gained by
noting whether the animal is willing to eat or not. When a rabbit,
for instance, not previously starved, begins to munch carrots immedi-
ately after an operation, or even continues to munch during the
greater part of the time the operation is being performed, it is only
fair to conclude that the operation cannot be very painful. I may
add that, in the experience of experimental j^hysiologists, the skin of
the dog and the rabbit — allowance being made for individual peculiari-
ties— is not nearly so sensitive as the human skin.

The second class of experiments carried on without antesthetics —
those entailing a considerable amount of pain — are not only by far the
least numerous, hut must of necessity become less and less numerous
as physiology advances. The end which the physiologist has in view
is to analyze the life of any being into its constituent factors. As his
science advances, he becomes more and more able to disengage any
one of these factors from the rest, and so to study it by itself. He
can already, as we have seen, study the complicated phenomena of the
circulation of the blood, of respiration, of various kinds of movement,
quite apart from and independent of the presence of consciousness.
As his knowledge widens and his means of research multiply, this
power of analysis will grow more and more ; and by-and-by, if physi-
ology be allowed free scope for its development, there will come a day
when the physiologist, in his experimental inquiries, Avill cause pain
then, and then only, wlieu pain is the actual object of his study. And
that he will probably study best upon himself.

At the present day, the greatest amount of pain to animals is prob-
ably caused in experiments which perhaps hardly come under the title
of vivisection — experiments in which the effects of starvation or of in-
sufficient food, or the actions of poisons, are being studied. These,
however, lead to valuable results. The pain which is the greatest in
amount, and the least worthy in object, is the pain which comes to
animals whose bodies have been used as tests to ascertain the poison-
ous nature of some suspected material ; but this is a matter of the
witness-box, not of physiology.

We may conclude, then, that physiologists are the cause to ani-
mals of much death, of a good deal of slight pain, and of some amount
of severe pain. A very active physiologist will, for instance, in a year,
be the means of bringing about, for the sake of science, as much death
as a small village will, in a week, for the sake of its mouths and its

68o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

fun, and will give rise to about as much pain as a not too enthusiastic
sportsman in a sliort sporting-season.

We have now to ask : What justification does he plead for this death
and this pain? What good to mankind is thereby wrought which
could not otherwise be gained ?

His answer is, that the science of physiology is thereby advanced ;
that our knowledge of the laws of life has, in the main, been won by
experiments on living animals. He, of course, cannot, and no one can,
tell the " might have been." Without any such experiments, physics
and chemistry, aided by mathematics, might have synthetically re-
solved the problems of life (though even then it might be said that-
both physics and chemistry sprang from the older biologic lore, and
not so long ago a common physiological preparation, the muscle and
nerve of a frog, started a new epoch in physics) ; but, as a matter of
history, experiments on living animals have been the stepping-stones
of phyiological progress.

The great Vesalius, the founder of modern anatomy, turning his
thoughts to tlie uses of the structures he had so well described, saw
clearly that the problems opening up before him could be settled only
by vivisection. In his great work, " Do Corporis Humani Fabrica,"
may be read the evidence, not only that he performed experiments on
living animals, but that, had he not in so inscrutable a way forsaken
the arduous pleasures of learning for the gossip of a court, those ex-
periments would have led him up to and probably beyond the dis-
covery which years afterward marked an ej^och in physiology, and
made the name of Harvey immortal. He, indeed, sowed the seed
whose fruit Harvey reaped. The corner-stone of physiology, the doc-
trine of the circulation of the blood, was not built up without death
and pain to animals. To-day, it is true, much of the evidence touch-
ing the flow of blood may be shown on a dead body, yet the full proof
cannot be given even now without an experiment on a living creat-
ure ; and certainly Harvey's thoughts were guided by his study of the
living, palpitating heart, and the motions of the living arteries, quite
as much as by the suggestions coming from dead valves and veins.

After Harvey came Haller, whose keen intellect dispersed the misty
notions of the spiritualists, and by the establishment of the doctrine of
"irritability" laid the foundations of the true physiology of the nervous
system : he too, in his work, wrought death and sufiering on animals.

Another great step onward was made when Charles Bell and Ma-
gendie, by experiments on animals more painful than any of the pres-
ent day, traced out the distinction between motor and sensory nerves ;
and yet another, when Marshall Hall and others demonstrated by
vivisections the wide-spread occurrence and vast importance of reflex
actions.

What was begun with death and pain has been carried forward by
the same means. I assert deliberately that all our real knowledge of

VIVISECTION. 681

the physiology of the nervous system — compared with which all the
rest of physiology, judged either from a practical or from a theoreti-
cal point of view, is a mere appendage — has been gained by experi-
ment, that its fundamental truths have come to us through inquiries
entailing more or less vivisection. By meditating over the differences
in structure visible in the nervous systems of different animals, a
shrewd observer might guess at the use of some particular part ; but
till verified by experiment, the guess would remain a guess ; and ex-
periment shows that such guesses may be entirely wrong. Where ex-
periment has given a clew, careful observations have frequently thrown
light on physiological problems. Without the experimental clew, the
phenomena would ever have remained a hopeless puzzle, or have
served to bolster up some baseless fancy. What disease, or what
structure in what animal, could ever have made us acquainted with
that " inliibitory " function of the pneumogastric nerve which the
vivisectional experiment of Weber first detected ? What a liglit that
one experiment has thrown on the working of the nervous system !
What disease could have told us that which we have learned from the
experiments of Du Bois-Keymond and of Pfliiger? Where would
physiological science be now if the labors of Flourens, Brown-Se-
quard, Schiff, Vulpian, Goltz, Waller, and others, were suddenly wiped
away from the records of the past ? Yet each of these names recalls
long series of experiments, some of them painful in character, on liv-
ing animals.

I repeat, take away from the physiology of the nervous system
the backbone of experimental knowledge, and it would fall into a
shapeless, huddled mass.

The chemistry of living beings, one would imagine at first thoughts,
might be investigated without distressing the organisms which formed
the subjects of research. The labors of Lavoisier and Priestley, who
first made clear the chemistry of respiration, if they entailed no use
of the knife, caused at times a no less painful suffocation ; while the
great advances which have been made in this branch of the study
during the last quarter of a century, and are still being made, neces-
sitate almost daily vivisection, in order that the gases of the blood
may be studied in exactly the same condition as they are in the living
body. Even still more bloody has been the path by following which
we have gained the knowledge we now possess of the chemistry of
digestion and nutrition. I have only to mention the names of Bidder,
and Schmidt, and Bernard, to call to the mind of the physiological
student important results, nearly all reached through vivisection.
The shifts and changes of the elements within our body are too subtile
and comj^lex to be divined from the results of the chemical labora-
tory ; the physiologist has to search for them within the body, and to
mark the compounds changing in the very spot where they cliange ;
otherwise all is guess-work.

682 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Among the labors of tlie present generation, none perhaps have
already more far-reaching results, none hold out more promise of fruit
in the future, than those which hear on the influence of the nervous
system over the circulation of the blood and over nutrition. The
knowledge we are gradually acquiring of the subtile nervous bonds
which bind together the unconscious members of the animal common-
wealth, which make each part or organ at once the slave and guar-
dian of every other, and which with cords of nervous sympathy draw
each moiety of the body to work for the good of all, is putting a new
aspect on physiology, and throwing many a gleam of light into the
very darkest regions of the science. The words " inflammation " and
" fever," bandied about of old as mystery-words, sounding much but
signifying little — shuttlecocks tossed to and fro from one school of doc-
trinaire pathologists to another — now at last, through the labors of mod-
ern physiology, seem in a fair way of being understood. That under-
standing, when it is complete, will have been gained step by step
through experiments on living animals, one of the first of which was
Claude Bernard's research on vaso-motor nerves.'

There still remains the question. What good does physiology bring
to mankind ? Of the value of physiology as a not insignificant seg-
ment of the circle of universal knowledge, nothing need be said ;
where saying aught is necessary, it would be useless. Xor need much
be said concerning the practical value of physiology as a basis for the
conduct of life. So long as men refuse to learn or to listen to physi-
ology in order that they may the better use their bodies, it would be
hopeless and useless to talk of the day when they may come to it for
instruction how to form their minds and mould their natures. It will
be enough for my present purpose to point out briefly the relations of
physiology to the practical art of medicine.

These are twofold. In the first place, the medical profession is
largely indebted to physiology on account of special discoveries and
particular experimental researches. If we regard the profession sim-
ply as a body of men who possess or should possess a remedy for
every disease, this may seem an exaggerated statement. Many of the
remedies in use or in vogue at the present day have been discovered
by chance, borrowed from ignorant savages, or lighted on by blind
trials. Physiology can lay no claim to the introduction of opium or
quinine. Where specific remedies have been suggested by physiologi-

* The great importance of the vaso-motor system justly led Mr. Huxley to introduce
into his " Elementary Lessons in Physiology " Bernard's fundamental experiment with
some such words as " a rabbit may be made to blush artificially by dividmg the sympa-
thetic nerve." A writer, apparently biased by the memories of his own boyhood, has
accused Mr. Huxley of thereby dangerously inciting boys and girls to cruelty, as if the
division of the sympathetic nerve were the sort of thing a school-boy might do with a
pocket-knife and a bit of string. Is it any use to enlighten the malevolent ignorance of
such minds by telling them that many physiological experiments require such skill and
care as make ordinary surgical operations seem rough and easy proceedings ?

VIVISECTION. 683

cal results or theories, it has not seldom happened that the remedies,
though useful, have been given for a wrong reason, or have done
good in a way which was not expected.

But if we look upon the medical profession as a body of men,
cunning to detect the nature and to forecast the issues of the bodily
ills under which we suffer, skilKul in the use of means to avoid or to
lessen those ills, rich in resources whereby pain is diminished and
dangerous maladies artfully guided to a happy end, then we owe
physiology many and great debts. Did the reader ever suiFer, or
witness others suffer, with subsequent relief, a severe surgical opera-
tion ? If so, let him revere the name of John Hunter, the father of
modern surgery. But Hunter was emphatically a physiologist ; his
surgery was but the carrying into practice of physiological ideas,
many of which were got by experiments on living animals. Does the
reader know that in all great surgical operations there are moments
of imminent danger lest life steal away in gushes of blood from the
divided vessels, danger now securely met by ligatures scientifically
and deftly tied ? Does he know that there was a time when the dan-
ger was imperfectly met by hot searing-irons and other rude means,
and that the introduction of ligatures, with their proper application,
is due to experiments, cruel experiments, if you like, on dogs and
other dumb animals, experiments eminently physiological in their na-
ture, about which much may be read in the book of "Jones on Haem-
orrhage ? " Even now, year by year, the scientific surgeon, by experi-
ments on animals, is at once adding to physiological knowledge and
bettering his treatment of wounded or diseased arteries. Has the
reader seen any one once stricken by paralysis, or bowed down by
some nervous malady, yet afterward made whole and brought back to
fair, if not vigorous, health ? The advice which turned such a one
toward recovery was based on knowledge originally drawn from the
vivisectional experiments of physiologists, and made safe by matured
experience. Or has he watched any dear friend fading away in that
terrible malady diabetes, after rejoicing that for a season he seemed
to be gathering sti-ength and ceasing to fail, even if not regaining
health ? The only gleam of light into that mysterious disease which
we possess, came from the vivisectional researches of Claude Bernard
on the formation of glycogen in the liver; and by judiciously acting
upon the results of those researches the skillful physician can some-
times stay its ravages. He cannot cure it even now ; and unless
some empiric remedy be found by chance, will never cure it, until,
by the death of many animals in the physiological laboratory, the
mystery of the glycogenic function of the liver be cleared up.

But why need I go on adding one special benefit to another? They
may all be summed up in one sentence, which embodies the whole re-
lation of physiology to the medical profession.

The art of medicine is the science of jjhysiology applied to detailed

684 ^^^ POPULAR SCIE2iCE MONTHLY.

vital jjhenomena by the helj) of a wisdom which comes of enlightened
experience, and an ingenuity which is born of practice. Were there
not a single case on record in which physiology had given special and
direct help to the cure of the sick, thci-e would still remain the great
truth that the ideas of physiology are the mother-ideas of medicine.
The physiologist, unincumbered by the care of the sick, not weighted
by the burden of desiring some immediate practical result, is the pio-
neer into the dark places of vital actions. The truths which he dis-
covers in his laboratory pass over at once to the practitioner, busy in
a constant struggle with the puzzling complexity of corporeal events :
in his hands they are sifted, extended, and multiplied. The property
of the physiologist alone, they might perhaps lie barren ; used by the
physician or surgeon, they soon bear fruit. The hint given by a
physiologist of the past generation becomes a household word with the
doctors of the present, and their records in turn offer rich stores of
suggestive and corrective facts for the physiologists of the generation
to come. Take away from the practical art of medicine the theoreti-
cal truths of physiology, and you would have left a crowd of busy
idlers in full strife over fantastic ideas. The reader has laughed with
Moli^re over the follies of the doctrinaire physicians of times gone by.
He has to thank experimental physiology that he has not the same
follies to laugh over and to suffer from now. The so-called practical
man is ever prone to entangle himself in and guide his conduct by
baseless speculations. Such has been the case with medicine. The
history of medicine in past centuries is largely occupied with the con-
flicts of contending schools of pathology — schools which arose from
this or that master putting forward a fancy, or a fragment of truth,
as the basis of all medical judgment. These have given place in the
present century to a rational pathology, which knows no school and
swears to the words of no master, but is slowly and surely unravel-
ing, bit by bit, the many separate tangled knots of disease. They
have given place because men have come to see that maladies can only
be mastered through a scientific comprehension of the nature of dis-
ease ; that pathology, the science of disease, being a part of, is insep-
able from, physiology, the science of life ; that the methods of both
are the same, for in each a sagacious observation starts an inquiry,
which a well-directed series of experiments brings to a successful end.

Many, if not most, of these experiments must be made on living
beings. Hence it is that animals are killed and suffer pain, in order
that physiological knosvledge may be increased, and disease made
less.

Take away from the art of medicine all that with which physiology
has enriched it, and the surgeon or the physician of to-day would be
little better than a mystery-man, or a quack vender of chance-gotten
drugs. Take out of the present system of physiology all that has been
gained by experiments on living animals, and the whole structure

VIVISECTIOX. 685

would collapse, leaving nothing but a few isolated facts of human ex-
perience.

As far as we can see, what has been will be. The physiology of
the future, if not hampered by any ignorant restraint, will, out of the
death of animals, continue to press further and further into the mys-
tery of — and year by year bring the physician, and not the physician
only, but every one, power to prolong, to strengthen, and to purify —
the life of man. By no other way can man hope to gain this end.
He is thereby justified for the death he causes and the pain he gives.

We have yet to consider this question in its other aspect ; we have
to examine not only the eifects of vivisection as far as animals are
concerned, but also its influence on man himself. Little, however,
need be said. Necessary vivisection, we have shown, cannot be called
cruel. The question of the necessity of any particular case can only
be judged by the investigator himself. I content myself with assert-
ing that any attempt to draw up, for the guidance of others, a general
definition of necessary and unnecessary vivisection, must prove ut-
terly futile. Only he Vv^ho is making an inquiry knows his own needs.
If he experiments recklessly and needlessly, he becomes cruel, and,
being cruel, will thereby be the worse. But, if he experiments care-
fully and heedfully, never causing pain where it could be avoided,
never sacrificing a life without having in view some object, to attain
which there seemed no other way, remembering that whoever " tor-
tures " either dead or living nature carelessly will get no true re-
sponse, there is no reason why his moral nature should suffer even ever
so little tarnish. On the contrary, experience teaches us that earnest
physiologists, who have killed animals in the single hope of gaining
new truths or of making old ones plain, have grown more gentle and
more careful the longer they worked and the more experiments they
made.

The effects of vivisection on the moral nature of man may fairly be
tested by experience. There are in this country several j^hysiologists
— myself among the number — who have for several years performed
experiments on living animals. We have done repeatedly the things
which a distinguished lady has seen fit to say " are best spoken of as
nameless." I can confidently appeal to all who know us, whether
they have seen any deterioi'ation in our moral nature, as the result of
our work; whether we are to-day less careful of giving pain than we
were when we began to experiment ; whether they can trace in us any
lessening of that sympathy with dumb animals, which all men should
feel even in the very thickest of the struggle for existence. — Macmil-
lan's Magazine.

686

TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTELY.

A FEATHEE,

Bt w. k. bkooks,

OF THE AOA3SIZ M U 8 E U it .

ALTHOUGH not by a balloon, yet the Atlantic has been crossed
in the air, and " what has been can be." There are enough
well-authenticated cases of the occurrence of American wild birds on
the west coast of Europe to prove that the trip can be made by birds,
and it is probable that successful navigation of the air will be the
fruit of careful study of that natural flying-machine, a bird's wing.

Every person who has not given more than a passing thought to
the mechanism of flight is confident that he understands the whole
subject, and tells you, if you ask, that the bird rows through the air
with its wings, and that our lack of available force and of a sufficient-
ly strong and light material is the only difficulty in the way of a suc-
cessful flying-machine.

A very little study of a bird's wing and its action will show that
it is not by any means simple, and that every part and every curve
and angle has a use, and helps in the performance of the function of
the whole, which function is not yet perfectly understood, but does
not in the least resemble the action of a paddle or oar. We shall
also learn that all attempts to construct flying-machines have been made
with an utter disregard of everything that a wing might have taught.
To this sweeping assertion I know of only two exceptions ; a boy's
kite, and the little circle of card-board which runs up the kite-string in
such a mysterious way, bear a very slight resemblance to a wing, in
their mode of action, and may contain the germ of a successful flying-
machine.

To point out some of the facts already known about flying is one
of the objects of this paper; another is to show how much there is to
be learned about any natural object, and the way to set about it ; for
he who knows all that is to be learned about a wing has a good store
of useful information, but he who knows all that may be learned /rom
a wing is a wise man.

Let us examine a feather. When I say " examine a feather," I
mean, let " every one take the trouble to pull a quill-feather from an
old duster, or find an old quill-pen, or in some way get possession of
an actual feather, to see for himself what I wish to show ; for, if what
I have to say is not worth this trouble, it is not worth reading at all.

Having found your feather, notice, first, the great strength of the
shaft, compared with its lightness, and how secured by placing almost
all the material on the outer wall of the quill. Xotice, too, that the
quill, where strength is most necessary, is tubular, while the rest of
the shaft has a groove on its lower surface, and tapers toward the tip,

A FJSATHER. 687

so tliat it may "be bent downward very easily by pressure near the tip,
but'does not bend so easily the other way. Kotice, too, that the shaft
is not straight, but bent so that the upper surface of the feather is
convex, and the lower concave. We shall soon find a meaning in all
these properties.

Passing now from the shaft to the vane, we see that the two sides
are not alike : one edge, or vane — the one on the right-hand side of
every feather in the right wing, that is, the side nearest the tip of the
spread wing — is short and stiff, while the vane on the other side of the
shaft is broad and flexible ; and, by examining the feathers in their
places in the wing, we see that the broad inside edge of the first or
outside feather passes under the stiff, narrow outside edge of the
next feather, which has its own inner edge supported in the same
way by the third feather, and so on through the wing. When the
wing is flapped downward through the air, the broad edge of each
feather is pressed against the inflexible narrow edgg of the feather
next it, and the whole wing is thus made air-tight ; but, when the
wing is moved the other way, the broad edges have nothing to sup-
port them, and are pressed downward, so that the air can pass be-
tween the feathers.

The vane is also made up of separate pieces. If it is cai-efully ex-
amined, separate pieces, or " barbs," will be seen running off from
each side of the shaft at a slight angle, and parallel to each other,
united in such a way as to form two flat plates, the vanes. These
barbs are fastened to each other quite firmly, but, if part of the vane
is pulled down toward the quill, the barbs will separate at last with a
tearing sound, and if this is repeated in a few places it will give the
feather a very draggled appearance, and it will seem torn beyond pos-
sibility of restoration ; but, if it be drawn gently between the fingers two
or three times from base to tip, the broken places will unite so per-
fectly that it may be quite impossible to find them again. The work-
ing of the mechanism by which the attachment is made is so perfect
that it need only be noticed to be admired, and careful examination
will reveal the simple means by which it is accomplished.

Each barb, when examined with a lens, is seen to bear some re-
semblance to the whole feather ; like the feather, it has a shaft run-
ning longitudinally, and a vane on each side of it. These vanes are
unequal, as in the whole feather, and they are composed of separate
pieces running off from the shaft, and called " barbiets," because they
are to the barb what the barbs are to the whole feather. On the side
of the barb toward the tip of the feather the barbiets run out from
the shaft of the barb nearly at right angles, and send off from their
lower surfaces little hooks at regular intervals, all pointing down-
ward ; on the other side of the barb the barbiets have no hooks, and,
instead of being set at a large angle with the shaft, they are almost
parallel with it, so that where they meet and run under the hooked

688

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

barblets from the otlier side of the next barb they cross at right
angles, and each hook falls directly over one of the straight barblets
and fastens to it.

Part op Two Barbs from Feather op Bird-
op -Paradise, showinsr Barblets and the
Hooks which fasten them (magnified).— (From
EardwicKs Science Gossip.)

Barbs, Barblets, axd Hooks, from Feather
OP Goose (magnified).

This is a very beautiful adaptation, but what is the use of it ?
Why could not the whole vane be made in one piece ? It is com-
monly said that, its purpose is the same as that accomplished by the
overlapping of the feathers, to form valves which shall allow the air
to pass in one direction but to resist its passage in the other. Unfor-
tunately, the hooks are arranged in just the wrong way for this, for
pressure from above tightens them, while pressure from below tends
to loosen them, although they are too firmly fastened to be easily un-
fastened. The true use of the separate pieces seems to be to secure
that all-important property, the greatest strength, by the least use of
material ; and it is done in precisely the way that men have employed
for securing the same end.

A scantling of wood placed on its edge will support a much
greater weight than one placed on its side ; so, in laying a floor, in-
stead of laying all the boards on their sides, which would not be
strong enough, or placing them all on their edges, which would use
too much wood, the plan is to place on edge a sufficient number, and
on these to lay the floor of boards on their sides.

The method employed in the feather is still better than this : the
shaft of each barb is flattened vertically, but, instead of a separate floor
laid on these, the top of each rafter, or barb, is split, and these split
portions are bent down and bound to each other by the hooks already
spoken of, arching over the spaces between the barbs, in exactly the
way that the arches of masonry span the spaces between the iron
girders of a fire-proof floor.

Before we shall be prepared to understand the way the feathers
act in flight, we must examine the way in which they are placed in
the wing. The anterior edge of the wing is a firm rim of bone, and
the quills are fastened to this rim, with the flexible end of each feather
projecting backward with nothing but adjacent feathers to support it,
so that the posterior border of the wing bends very easily. The
feathers are of such a shape that the wing is convex on its upper sur-
face, and concave below.

A FEATHER. 689

When the wing is moved downward through the air, the feathers
are pressed together ; the air is confined in the concave surface of the
wing, and the bird is raised up ; but, when the wing is moved up to
repeat the stroke, the air rushes down between the feathers. This is
the paddling motion popularly supposed to be flight, but really only
a small part of it. The air, being gaseous, does not remain passive
under the descending wing, but tends to slide out, and as the front is
unyielding, while the back is flexible, the air finds this exit, bending up
the tips of the feathers, and sliding out backward and upward, while the
feathers, and with them the bird, slide forward and downward. The
bird can rotate its wings as well as flap them, and, by fixing them at
such an angle that the fall occasioned by sliding shall just balance
the lift given by the downward flap, it is able to move forward with-
out rising or falling, although the motion of its wings is up and down ;
and, by changing the inclination of the wings a little, it can go up
or down at the same time that it moves forward.

This is only an outline of what is known of the mechanism of
flight — and many parts of the process are not yet understood — but we
know enough to be able to appreciate the wonderful way in which
every part, and every curve and outline, is adapted to its use ; and the
attention of thoughtful men has long been attracted by these and the
countless similar adaptations in Nature, and many of the greatest
thinkers have occupied themselves in attempts to understand the way
in which they have been produced. Some have decided that adapta-
tion implies design ; and hence these adaptations must be the direct
work of a personal designer and creator ; but adaptation alone does
not always imply design. I may go into the woods and find a young
tree adapted for a cane, but no one will say that it was designed for
a cane ; and I once knew a very unskillful amateur carpenter, who
was asked, at the close of a very industrious day's work, what he had
made. He answered, " Well, I designed it to be a rustic chair, but I
think it will answer nicely as a saw-buck." In this case the adapta-
tion was certainly not the fruit of design.

But, even if design can be shown, it does not follow that the adajj-
tation is the fruit of direct creative interposition ; and the fact that it
is not always perfect — that, perfect as the wing is in most birds, more
than one species has become extinct in recent times, on account of the
rudimentary and useless state of the wings — has been held by many to
be sufiicient proof that the adaptation was not produced in this way.

We shall be able to take a more fair view of" this question after
we have examined the ultimate nature — the homology, as it is called
— of the organs of flight.

Feathers evidently take the place occupied by hair in mammals ;
and, in some birds which do not fly — such as the ostrich — they are
very like hair ; and examination of the microscopic structure and
mode of growth of a feather shows that it is formed in the same way

TOL. IV. — 44

690

THE POPULAR SCIUiVCB MONTHLY

with hair, claws, or finger-nails, and is only modified skin, "When
a section through a piece of skin is examined with the aid of a mod-
eratelv-powerful microscope, the lower or internal surface is seen to
be made up of little, irregularly-rounded cells, or bags, with soft semi-
fluid contents ; and, while the animal is alive, new cells are constantly
formino- under the old ones, which are pushed outward and crowded
too-ether, and gradually lose their soft contents, and are flattened out
into very small scales. The outer layer of the skin is made up of

■rjy^^^JJ^^y^^yy^..

Tkansvehse Section op Shaft of Pri-
MABT WixG-FEATHER OF A GoosE, magni-
fied to show the cellular strncture.

LoKGiTirDiNAL SECTION OF SAME, more

these scales, which are fastened to each other firmly enough to be
separated from the living layer below in a thin sheet, as happens when
a blister is raised on the hand by unusual work, but in most parts of
the body they are slowly rubbed off as new ones grow ; but at the tips
of the fingers they are so firmly united that they form horny plates,
or " nails," which are pushed forward as new cells form at the root.

In the skin of a bird where a new feather is to grow there is a
little pit, and, at the bottom of this, an elevation or pyramid ; extend-
ing up one side of this pyramid is a groove, or furrow, deepest at the
base, and gradually growing shallower until it disappears near the
top ; from each side of this furrow a great many smaller grooves ex-
tend around to the other side of the pyramid, and these also decrease
in depth, and at last disappear just as they are about to meet on the
side opposite the large furrow. The whole pyramid is covered with
skin, and the surface is made of the same scales, or flattened cells, that
are found over the rest of the surface of the body ; but, instead of
falling off when they are pushed out by the new ones below them,
they become united or welded to each other, so as to form a horny
coat over the surface of the pyramid, with ridges on its lower or inner
surface, corresponding to the grooves on the pyramid; and, as new
cells grow at the base, this coat or cast of the surface is pushed up-
ward till it breaks at its thinnest part, which is, of course, the smooth
part without ridges opposite the large furrow; and then, as it is

A FEATHER. 691

pushed outward and flattened, it assumes the form of a feather, the
ridge formed in the main furrow being the shaft, while the casts of
the side grooves form the separate barbs of the vane. When all of
the vane has been formed and pushed forward, the pyramid loses its
grooves and becomes smooth, and the wall now formed on its sur-
face, being of the same thickness in all parts, does not break, but
remains tubular and forms the quill, which is attached to what is
left of the pyramid. A finger-nail or a hair is formed from the same
kind of scales in the same way, the process differing only in those
features which give to each organ its special character. Feathers,
scales, hair, claws, and nails, all are made alike from the dead, flat-
tened cells crowded to the surface by the process of growth.

If, passing from the feather to the wing, we study that in the same
way, we shall find that it is made, part for part, on the same plan as
the arm of a man, the fore-leg of a horse, the fore-foot of a turtle or
frog, and the fin of a fish ; and, when these organs are compared in their
earlier stages of growth, the resemblance is very perfect; audit is
only as one becomes fitted for swimming, another for flying, another
for running, and another for handling and feeling, that the differences
between them begin to ajjpear. Studying now the whole body of the
bird in the same way, and comparing it with a mammal, as the horse ;
a reptile, as the turtle ; a batrachian, as the frog and a fish — w^e find
that all these animals are constructed on the same general plan, and
here, also, the resemblance is stronger in the earlier life of the ani-
mals. We find, however, that they do not all resemble each other in
the same degree, for the bird is more like the turtle than like any of
the others, and, when full grown, it preserves some resemblance to rep-
tiles ; and there is an animal, found only in the fossil state, called the
archiopteryx, which unites in itself many of the characteristics of
birds, such as the possession of feathers, with other characteristics as
unmistakably reptilian.

Such are the principal facts to be learned about the wing, and any
explanation of its origin must account for them all ; and the same or
similar facts may be learned by studying almost any organ or animal.

To recapitulate : they are, first, the wonderful adaptation of all
parts for their uses, rendered still more wonderful by the second fact,
that the parts so adapted are modified forms of what are called ho-
mologous organs, that is, organs having the same plan, but adapted
to quite different uses, and having very little superficial resemblance;
third, the fact that, when the growth of these homologous parts is
compared, it is found that in their earlier stages they are very much
alike, and differ so far as and at the same time that they acquire
those characteristics that fit them for their special uses ; fourth, is the
fact that there are or have been animals whose structiire has been so
little modified that they seem to connect animals of very different but
homologous structure.

692

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Xow, wiiat is the meaning of these relations between organs and
between animals ? For that they have a meaning must be clear to all,
and it is fair to presume that it is one that can be discovered by in-
vestigation.

The fact that two or many different animals are constructed on the
same plan seems to indicate some kind of connection between the
animals themselves, and it is the work of the zoologist to find what it
is that thus connects them.

FoBE-FooT. OE "Wing," or Embbto Yellow
Warbler.— -(From Morse.) The hand in a
Eeptile and Embryo Bird compared. U, ulna ;
E, radius; ?/, ulnare. or cuneiform bone; r,
radiale. or scaphoid bone; c. centrale. 1, 2,
3, 4. 5, first, second, third, fourth, and fifth
carpals, m^, 7n^, m^, m*, m^, corresponding
metacarpalB.

FORE-FOOT, OE "PaDDLE." OF

Snapping - Turtle. — (JFrom
Gegenbauer.)

Two theories have been proposed, each of which seems to meet
most of the points to be explained, but each seems to fail in some re-
spects. One of these is, that the connection between different groups
of animals is to be found only in the mind of their Creator; the other
is, that there is a direct genetic connection or relationship between
them.

Each of these theories is conceivable and worthy of considera-
tion, for we can find examples of the building up of systems some-
what resembling the animal kingdom in each of these ways. The
various kinds of steam-engines, for instance, are adapted each to its
special work, with an accuracy rivaling that of Nature, yet all of
them can be shown to be constructed on substantially the same plan.

If we trace the history of any form, such as the steep-grade loco-
motive, we find, as we go backward, that it loses, one by one, all of
its special adaptations, tmtil at last it is only a common locomotive
at up-hill work. Tracing the history of the locomotive in the same
way, we find that its special adaptations disappear, until it is nothing

A FEATHER. 693

but a power-engine placed on wheels — not the improved power-engine
of the present day, but an unimproved and rudimentary form. We
might trace the history of other forms in the same way, until we had
found the one source for them all.

In this case there can be no genetic connection ; each engine is
an independent thing, and the only connection is an ideal one in the
minds of the inventors; that is, the idea of the steam-engine has gone
through a process of evolution, expansion, and perfection, and most
of the steps in the process have been embodied in real engines, so
that together they form a manifestation or record of the changes that
the idea has undergone.

According to the theory of which Agassiz is the most celebrated
advocate, the phenomena of life are to be explained in a somewhat
similar way. Recognizing all the facts which seem to indicate the
evolution of the animal kingdom, and being himself the discoverer of
very many of them, he says that the evolution is simply the evolution
of an idea in the mind of the Creator, which idea has been embodied
in material form in such a way that it can be traced by the study of
the animals that form its expression.

The other theory may also be illustrated by an example : When
we compare languages which philologists tell us have descended from
one parent tongue, we are attracted by their differences only, and it
needs careful study and comparison to understand the similarity of
plan which underlies them all ; biit when their history is traced it is
seen that they were originally the same, and have become different as
the races using them have become more widely separated, and, com-
ing under new and widely different physical conditions, have diverged
in their habits, feelings, thoughts, and associations, and have required
different forms of speech to supply their need. Here, unlike the case
of the steam-engines, the language has been the same all the time, and,
although men have been the means by which the change has been
effected, they have not been the intelligent cause, but have been un-
consciously acted upon by agencies around them.

According to the theory with which Darwin is identified, although
he is not by any means the author, but has simply removed some
of the most serious objections, all the different forms of life have
been evolved from one source in substantially the same way that lan-
guages have originated ; as animals become exposed to new conditions,
new varieties adaj^ted to these conditions arise, and, as animals thus
grow different, the parent unimproved forms are unable to struggle
with their more perfect descendants and become extinct, so that the
animals which would connect dissimilar forms are no longer in exist-
ence.

The evidence necessary for the perfect establishment of either of
these theories does not seem to have been obtained as yet, and we can
only decide provisionally, according to probabilities ; but the discus-

694 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sion of the evidence already collected, or even a bare outline of it,
would lead us far beyond the limits of this article, which is simply
designed to show how much food for study even a feather will supply,
and what broad questions it will lead us into.

WHAT THE CHEMISTRY OF THE EOCKS TEACHES.
Bt c. c. mereiman.

IT is a general rule that substances can crystallize only while solidi-
fying from the liquid state of either fusion or solution. The only
exceptions are, that some few substances crystallize directly from their
vapors without passing through the intermediate liquid form. Now, the
older unstratified rocks of the geological formations, as the granites,
are unquestionably fusible, are crystalline in their structure, and are
practically insoluble. Therefore the evidence is conclusive that they
were all at one time in a molten, fluid state.

Thus far, it would appear, geologists are agreed, since they have
named these formations the igneous rocks. But, whether the melted
minerals were ever heated to a higher degree than fusion — that is, to
the condition of vaporized elements — is an inquiry either carefully
avoided by the authorities in geology, or merely mentioned as pertain-
ing to an ingenious hypothesis which, it is claimed, is unsustained by
any suflicient proof. It remains to be seen, however, if this theory of
the original gaseous form of the material elements does not follow as
a necessary consequence from the chemical constitution of the rocks
themselves ; and if it does not explain and bear testimony in geologi-
cal and cosmical sciences to such an extent as to make it absolutely
essential to them.

The question here presented resolves itself into two alternatives :
Either the materials of the earth's crust were formed, according to
chemical laws, out of the simple elements preexisting in liquid or gas-
eous form, or they were created in the condition of melted and oxi-
dized masses ready to cool into granite and limestone. The latter
supposition will hardly be seriously entertained in these days of free
inquii'y into the natural causes of things. It is now not only conceded,
but expected, that science shall have sole jurisdiction in every case
where compound bodies are the subject of investigation. To follow
them back to the primal laws and elements of their being — to reveal
the cause and manner of their birth among the atoms — is now the
highest aim of inductive research. On this border-line of inquiry,
where the known shades off into the unknown, and the finite into the
infinite, science has of late gained its most signal triumphs. And it
scarcely requires a prophetic sense to discern that the groundwork of

THE CHEMISTRY OF THE ROCKS. 695

all systems of scientific knowledge will soon be laid in molecular
physics.

In the constituents of the solid earth we have forms and conditions
of matter of remarkable composition and complexity. The original
materials of the ground, of the rocks, and of the mines, are found to
be, in every case, fully saturated chemical compounds. Many of
them, as the silicates, are adamantine acids neutralized by alkaline bases
harder than the flint. They could not be made more stable, inert, and
solid. They are materials that have apparently gone through stupen-
dous changes, activities, and combustions, and at last have settled
down to a rest that knows no waking. Science has no duty more le-
gitimate or more imperative than to inquire how these rock-masses
came to be where they are, and in the condition they are.

In pursuing this inquiry — since we find one of the alternatives to
be inadmissible — it is necessary, therefore, to accept the other, name-
ly, that the matter which composes the geological formations preex-
isted as simple elements, either in liquid or gaseous form. Oxygen,
which makes up fully one-half the weight of the solid parts of the
earth, is and always was a gas in its free state. In regard to the re-
maining elements that enter into their composition, such as silicon,
aluminum, calcium, and sodium, they could not all have existed on
the earth at the same time as melted liquids ; for the same heat which
held one in fusion would have evaporated others. Some, therefore,
must have been contained in the atmosphere as simple gaseous ele-
ments. Inasmuch as granite is the base and substratum of all the
other formations, if we show that this must originally have been in a
gaseous state, we show that every other material must have been at
the same time in like condition.

The granitic rocks are by far the most abundant terrestrial sub-
stance that we know of. Geologists assign to them a depth of not
less than thirty miles. And still below them there is the same or
nearly the same chemical substance in fusion, as the fact and analysis
of volcanic jjroducts sufficiently prove. The compound which is in
excess in all granite rocks is silica, the oxide of the element silicon.
The varieties are formed chiefly by small percentages, more or less, of
the oxides, alumina, and magnesia. This silica, or quartz, as well as
the other components of the igneous rocks, is what has been termed
" burnt material." It is the product of a most complete and tremen-
dous conflagration ; for the oxidation of silicon is as much and as
powerful a combustion as the oxidation or burning of coal. To accom-
plish this burning, every particle of the silicon must have been brought
into contact with oxygen gas. This would have been simply impos-
sible if the mineral element had always been in a melted mass of
miles in depth ; for this, if for no other reason, that the oxygen could
not get at it — certainly not, if it was covered by other solid or liquid
substances. Or, if it were conceded that silicon ever formed the sur-

696 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

face of the earth, then all other materials of what is uow the crust
must have been gases above it ; and, as nine-tenths of the elements in
vapor are heavier than oxygen — many of them more than ten times as
heavy — this gas could never have even touched this imaginary sea
of silicon. The oxidation, then, "was only possible in the regions of
the atuiosphere where oxygen existed and abounded. There only
among the free-moving gases could the incalculable amount of heat
evolved in the combination be carried off.

We confidently assume, therefore, that the whole of this most
abundant mineral element once existed in the atmosphere in the form
of a high-heated gas ; and that some time and somewhere, on the con-
fines of the enormously-extended sphere of vapors, there was found a
current sufficiently cool to condense a portion of it. If the vapor of
silicon follows the general rule — that the density of gases is in propor-
tion to their atomic weights — then it was but a fraction heavier than
oxygen, and therefore not far below it in the atmospheric strata. The
unceasing commotion of the elements would soon have brought this
first cloud-mist of silicon into contact with oxygen, to which it has a
strong affinity under high heat. Oxidized, and in molten drops of
silica, or crystals of quartz, this new-formed material commenced its
descent toward the centre of gravity — the first creation from the pri-
mordial elements. As it fell into the more heated regions below, it
was probably soon evaporated, and, the vapor rising, carried up with
it the heat taken up in the evaporation. It was again condensed, its
heat given iip, and it descended for another charge of the internal
fires. This, in all probability, is the epitome of the process of world-
cooling.

At last, the showers of melted silex reached the liquid surface of
the nucleus, which the force of gravity and compression must have
formed, at an early period of the nebulous globe, of less or greater
extent about its centre. From this period the increasing torrents of
silica, intermingled with the silicates which were forming at the same
time, poured down through the heavy vapors, and filled up the fur-
longs-deep of granite ocean. On this vast deposit, and at about this
stage of the gradual cooling of the earth, began, we must suppose, the
first hardening and crusting over of the surface, since at this point,
near the close of the granite age, first commences the division of the
earth's crust into varieties and layers more or less distinct, as also the
upbearing of the heavy metals which, without this surface-hardening,
could never have floated on any molten sea of minerals. The slow
cooling of the granite masses beneath this crust and under the enor-
mous atmospheric or other superincumbent pressure, conformed them
to all the acknowledged conditions of the formation of the igneous
rocks.

There is found in the different beds of the granitic rocks every
proportion of the admixture of silica with the silicates of alumina.

THE CHEMISTRY OF THE ROCKS. 697

It is as if chances as variable as winds and storms had regulated the
production and mixture. There is every gradation in the texture of
granite, from the fine-grained blocks of the quarry to the coarse, com-
pacted breccia so common among bowlders. It is as if the deeper
beds had slowly cooled under great compression and consequent im-
mobility of the particles, while the superficial layers had been worked
up and conglomerated at the surface. There are specimens of granite
composed of massive angular crystals, that seem as if they had been
thrown together and cemented. It is, again, as if they were the con-
gealed debris of some terrific hail-storm of quartz, mica, and feldspar.

After the greater part of the silicious minerals had been deposited,
and the cooler exterior gases had thus been let down to a nearer vi-
cinity with the heavier vapors, we find that the metals proper began
gradually to condense and fall. Those which have no active aflinities
for the other elements were deposited in their native purity. Others
took on the forms of oxides or sulphurets, according to their first ex-
posures or strongest attractions. Among the first of these cloud-pro-
ductions, the rock records tell us, were the scanty rainfalls of gold
and platinum, and the more plentiful showers of silver and copper.
Rivulets of native ores ran along the hardening crust, filling the veins
and crevices, or mingling with the liquid quartz that was seaming the
granite and gneiss.

Then from clouds of condensing iron vapor, that must have
burned and scintillated with indescribable magnificence, fell the thick
heavy storms of the black lodestone, the blood-red hematite, or the
dark-yellow pyrites. Possibly storm-centres were established, over
which the cyclones were held concenti'ated, and often repeated by
force of intense magnetic attractions which have left their traces in
almost every iron-mine.

Following these, at times and places, came on the great snow-
storms of the waxy flakes of zinc-blende, and the pearly calamine, the
red oxide or the white carbonate of lead, and the gi'ay galena, the
beautiful crystals of the tin-stone, the gray plumes of antimony, and
all the tinted and varied forms of the less abundant ores and alloys.
Meanwhile, through all the long ages of these metallic precipitations,
there was continually falling over all the earth the white, impalpable
powder of lime — the element calcium condensed into cloud-mist, and
oxidized in the upper regions of the air.

These were the great chemical periods of our world ; when the cool-
ing vapors of the swollen sphere were struggling to unite and hold
fast the embrace against the antagonist foi-ce of heat ; when the con-
joined elements were pouring down their fiery torrents, and the air
was laden with the falling cinders and ashes of aerial conflagrations ;
when the vast workshop of Nature was forming and sorting its raw
materials.

We do not, however, wish to be understood as insisting that all

698 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

these minerals and metals came down in just the form and order that
we have indicated, or that they were regularly deposited, and left the
orderly traces that perhaps our hasty sketch would seem to imply.
There were unquestionably constant and profound commotions in the
atmosphere, and the commingling of the most diverse elements.
There were doubtless repeated meltings and chemical recombinations
at the surface, and the rending and comminuting of the newly-formed
crust by internal forces. The history of the earth's irregularities and
disorders forms the greater part of geology. But what we do claim
as certain is, that all the constituents of the outer shell of our globe
existed at one time as elemental gases above a sea of matter that was
held in condensation by superincumbent pressure ; that, as the earth
gradually cooled, these gases condensed somewhat in the order, in-
versely of their volatility, and directly of their nearness to the outer
bounds of the atmosphere, and fell to the surface like rain and snow
from water-clouds ; that they formed chemical combinations at the in-
stant of their condensation, or subsequently according to the power
of their affinities or the elements that were present ; and that, except-
ing the more recent displacements by mechanical forces, they now lie
in the earth as they fell from the heavens.

The silica and silicates, which form the base, and by far the greater
part of the earth's crust, became oxides of their several elements be-
cause oxygen was the superabundant gas in its composition. There
have been worlds made up apparently without oxygen ; for the mete-
orites, which must be regarded as sample specimens from some stranger
world, however they may have been dispatched to us, are mostly com-
posed of pure crystalline and malleable iron, which could have cooled
into that condition only where there was no oxygen nor carbonic gases.
If chlorine had been our superabundant gas, the silicon would perhaps
quite as readily have united with it, and formed as stable a compound
as with oxygen. But the product, instead of being the hardest of
rocks, would have been a liquid very much resembling water, a little
heavier, and nearly as volatile, as the common ethers. In this case
there could have been no dry land, and no living beings that we can
conceive of. Eternal clouds and storms would have covered the face
of a surging boundless ocean.

Hitherto, in our accounts of terrestrial phenomena, water has
played no part. It is probable that it was early formed, and in the
condition of vapor or steam diffused through the upper air. In this
state it bears the highest degree of heat that we can produce, without
decomposition. Hydrogen is the lightest of all the gases, and un-
questionably took its place on the outer limits of the atmosphere.
There it was brought into contact with oxygen by the commotion
of the elements, and converted into steam as fast as its lowering tem-
perature allowed of the combination. As we might expect from the
respective positions of the gases, all the hydrogen which fell to the

THE CHEMISTRY OF THE ROCKS. 699

portion of the earth in the making up of its constituents was trans-
formed into watex'-vapor. Hydrogen is found in no other combina-
tion that cannot be traced directly or indirectly to the decomposition
of water.

The aqueous vapor being thus formed, and lying in the upper and
cooler regions of the air, it began after a time to condense and fall
toward the earth. Meeting with warmer strata as it descended, it
was soon evaporated and sent up with a load of heat that was set free
again by a recondensation. Then another and perhaps lower descent
for another charge of heat. Thus, on the outskii-ts of the air, water-
vapor was cooperating in the work of the heavier vapors of the inte-
rior. It was the great fire-carrier of the globe during all the time of
the contraction and consolidation of the lower elements. When
every thing else that was condensable had turned to dust and ashes,
and fallen to the earth, at last the waters reached the parched and
scorious surface, and commenced that grand series of aqueous trans-
formations which made a new earth for the indwelling of life.

In the first place, it was necessary that the upj^er crust should be
hydrated, precisely as lime is slaked by pouring water on it. The
material which had been last deposited was in reality this same caus-
tic lime. In its lower deposits it was gradually intermixed with the
silicious compounds, until these formed the masses which are now the
unstratified granitic rocks. As every one knows, the slaking of quick-
lime absorbs a large quantity of water, which is incorporated into the
solid, and great heat is evolved with enlargement of bulk. The pure
silicious rocks do not take up water in this way, being what is termed
anhydrous. All the rock-materials, then, that lie above the granite
must, at some time, have undergone this hydrating, reheating, and
swelling process. We accordingly find that all those strata which
have remained in their original position, such as the gneiss, the mica
schists, the clay-slates, and the primary limestones, have tlie appear-
ance of having been subjected to great heat and pressure, after having
been acted upon by water and steam. In some instances they have
been partially melted, in others strangely contorted, and in others
partly dissolved. Under certain circumstances, hot water and steam
will dissolve small portions of silica, and, if charged with carbonic-
acid gas, will dissolve lime quite freely.

The rainfalls of the primeval ages must have been fully saturated
with this oxide of carbon, Avhich has played such an important part in
the making up of the strata. In this form it carbonated all the lime-
stones, carried all the building-materials to the shell and coral land-
makers, and furnished the supplies for the immense magazines of the
hydro-carbons. And, after all this, there was enough carbonic-acid
gas left in the air for the enormous vegetation of the coal-beds. But
it was necessai-y that the carbon of this gas should be laid away in
the earth in some form, either burnt or unburnt, before air-breathiuo'

700

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

life could come to any perfection. The solidifying of the carbonic
oxide was the latest and the slowest of the atmospheric changes.

It appears that during the epoch of the hydration of the lime-rocks
there occurred periods when the waters were gathered into seas, and
were sufficiently cooled for the existence of marine infusoria, mollusks,
and corals. Life, in some form, has ever been ready to spring into
being the moment that conditions and surroundings were suitable for
it. After the deposition, in those temporary oceans, of considerable
thicknesses of Cambrian or Silurian strata, mixed with organic remains,
some rent or upheaval has let the waters down to new beds of unslaked
material, which have heated, and, as it is termed, metamorphosed
those first fossiliferous deposits.

The subsequent changes w^hich the earth's crust has undergone —
aqueous, volcanic, and organic — the working up of the conglomerates
and sandstones, the depositing of the deep-sea beds, the overflowing
of the traps and lavas, the storing away of the carboniferous treasures,
are all the story of every hand-book of geology, and pertain no more
to one theory than another of the origin of the rocks. When the quar-
ries were once made and opened, the after-work was merely mechanics
and masonry.

We have heretofore assumed that the gases which originally com-
posed the aerial envelope of the earth took up separate positions
therein, according to their specific gravities. This might seem to be
controverted by experiments on the diffusion of gases, in wOiich those
of very different weights, as chlorine and hydrogen, will intimately
commingle, even against gravity, when brought into contact. This
may be true in the narrow compass of a laboratory experiment, and
yet not apply to any considerable thicknesses of the gases. Such a dif-
fusion, of one mile in depth of chlorine, would be equal to lifting up to
tbe hydrogen a shell of solid iron two feet thick. Whether we explain
the distinguishing principle of the constitution of gases as a mutual
repulsion of their molecules, or, according to a late theory, as an in-
cessant motion and clashing of atoms, there is nothing in either to
warrant the supposition of the lifting or overcoming any considerable
weight in the diffusion of gases. Under the first theory, diffusion, to
a limited extent, would be accounted for by the small j-esiduum of
chemical or cohesive attraction that would remain between the atoms
when separated as they are in gases ; and, under the last theory,
by the mechanical impulsion of the molecules, through their hitting
against each other. Evidently, it is a principle which operates only
within narrow limits, and in the lower temperatures of the gases. The
sun gives no indications of such a commingling of its gaseous elements.
Spectrum analysis, when applied to its outer edges, shows first hydro-
gen, then the vapors of sodium and magnesium, and, lastly, those of
calcium and iron. The same fact and order of position are found to
exist in the more condensed layers of the sun-spots.

THE CHEMISTRY OF THE ROCKS.

701

We have also further assumed that the elements, in their gaseous
states, have specific gravities corresponding to their atomic weights.
It is well known that all gases, whether simple or compound, at the
same temperature and pressux'e, and not near to a condensing point or
other change of state, contain precisely the same number of molecules
in the same volume. Therefore, it necessarily results that the same
measures of the different gases should have weights corresponding to
the weights of the molecules of which they are composed. Thus the
atom of oxygen is sixteen times as heavy as that of hydrogen ; there-
fore a cubic foot of oxygen gas will weigh sixteen times as much as a
cubic foot of hydrogen gas. This is found to be experimentally true
of all the gases that can be measured and weighed. The apparent
but not real exceptions are that in arsenic and phosphorus two atoms
of the element unite to form one molecule of the gas, thus making it
twice as heavy as it would be, according to the general rule ; while,
in the case of mercury and cadmium, the atom divides into two in
forming their vapors. Hence we are not absolutely sure in regard to
the vapor-molecule, and therefore vapor-density, of such elements as
cai'bon, silicon, and calcium, which chemists have not been able to
volatilize. But there is every probability, both from analogy and the
position in which some of them are found in the photosphere of the sun,
that the vapors of nearly all of them correspond strictly to their com-
bining numbers. The following table, therefore, will show the relative
positions, in the atmospheric strata, of some of the most important
elements, with the weights of their atoms in hydrogen units, their va-
por-densities, compared with air, and the solid specific gravities of
some of them as compared, with water :

Hydrogen. .
Carbon. . . .
Nitrogen . . .
Oxygen. . .
Sodium . . . .
Magnesium.
Aluminum .

Silicon

Sulphur . . .
Chlorine. ..
Potassium..
Calcium. . .

Iron

Copper

Mercury . . .

Silver

Gold

Platinum. .

1
12
14
16
23
24
27.5
28.5
32
35.5
39
40
5G
63.5
200-^2
108
196.5
198

.069
.828
.972
1.105
1.59
1.66
1.90
1.97
2.22
2.44
2.69
2.76
3.86
4.39
6.97
7.47
13.57
13.66

.98
1.74
2.60
2.40
2.

1.33

.86

1.68

7.80

8.96

13.60

10.53

19.34

21.50

It will be noticed from this table that the elements were arranged
in positions most suitable for their combination and deposition, both
in the geological order, and in the probable order of tlieir condensa-

702 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tion from vapors. Oxygen and silicon, which doubtless composed
more than four-fifths of the entire bulk of the gases, were separated
from each other only by the elements that were needed to make up
the silicates. Their compound, silica, is involatile, and even infusible
by itself, under any degree of heat that we can command. The same
is true of lime and the earlier-formed silicates. Therefore it is impos-
sible to decide from their volatility which of these substances would
have first condensed and reached the surface. But, as the vapor of
silica, when formed, would still be of nearly the same specific gravity
with silicon (2.07), and would still separate by its immense volume
the oxygen from the calcium below, we may suppose that in any case
silica would have to be condensed and deposited, in greater part at
least, before lime, the oxide of calcium, could be formed.

Along with silica were formed and deposited the silicates of alu-
mina— mica and feldspar ; then the partially fusible silicates of mag-
nesia, lime, and iron — hornblende, augite, and talc. There followed a
numerous order of complex silicates, in which the above-named ingre-
dients are varied by small proportions of manganese, soda, strontia,
zirconia, and many other mineral bases. With, and after these, was
produced the lime-deposit, the last of the minerals. The metallic
vapors, which were all heavier than the mineral, were condensed and
deposited chiefly during the later silicate period, and somewhat in the
inverse order of their volatility, but locally and irregularly as results
of great perturbations, or stoi-ms in the air.

It will further be seen, from the last column of the table, that in
no respect are the materials of the earth deposited according to their
specific gravities as solids or liquids. There is, in the superincumbent
rock and ore masses, no order of position that would indicate in the
least the floating or buoyancy of the lighter substances. Therefore,
their arrangement cannot be referred to any origin from liquid con-
ditions ; and the only other theory is that of their gaseous origin.

There are many apparent anomalies in the deposition of the metal-
lic and mineral compounds, which may require much study, and per-
haps further knowledge and experiment for their explanation. Thus
there is in one place a carbonate of lime — marble — and in another a sul-
phate of lime — gypsum. There are in certain localities sulphuret-ores
of iron or copper, and in others oxide-ores ; while the metals of great-
est vapor-density, as mercury, lead, bismuth, and antimony, are found
almost exclusively in sulphuret-ores. It will perhaj^s eventually be
established that sulphur was combined wholly into sulphuric-acid gas,
as carbon was formed entirely into carbonic-acid gas ; that both were
brought to the surface of the earth in solution with rain-water ; and
that sulphur in this form united with the metals which had failed to
be oxidized upon their condensation in the air, and sulphated the
quick-lime in the earth, which had not been carbonated by the car-
bonic solution. Then there is the exceptional production in Nature

THE CHEMISTRY OF THE ROCKS. 703

of the chloride of sodium — common salt. Apparently in this one in-
stance the oxide is the less stable compound.

But if, as we have endeavored to prove, there is a necessity of ac-
counting, in accordance with this theory, for the various compounds
and phenomena with which geology makes us familiar, then it is in
the highest degree essential that experiment and research be prose-
cuted in this new field. And there must be no hesitation in accepting
the conclusions to which they lead. Should the nebulous origin of
one planet be thus established by internal and inductive evidence,
then the nebular theory of the formation of worlds, which has hereto-
fore been received as only a provisional hypothesis, must be accepted
as having a scientific basis. If the earth has once been a self-luminous
body, in all respects excepting size, like the sun of to-day, it follows
from analogy that the other planets have likewise been minor suns
which have become extinguished by the burning out of their mate-
rials. To an observer on any unseen world among the stars, our sun
should have appeared in those times as a brilliant double, or mul-
tiple star, around which nine lesser companions have shone out for
a season, and then one after the other folded themselves up in
darkness.

Furthermore, the study of this subject may throw light on many
cosmical problems — may tell us in earth-periods, if not in years, how
old the sun is when his glowing vapors begin to condense into dark
clouds ; and perhaps, too, something of his future prospects as a
luminary. It is remarkable that the spectrum has never shown any
indications of free oxygen in the atmosphere of the sun. Is not the
absence of this element further corroborated by the fact that the solar
spots, which there is evidence to believe are condensing clouds of iron
and calcium, do not glow with fierce burning, as they would if oxygen
were present ? Does not the enormous volume of the sun's uncom-
bined hydrogen indicate that it has not found, then, the element of its
strongest afiinity ? And is there not reason to believe that the heat
and light supplies of our great luminary will last all the longer for the
absence of this most extravagant fire-generator ?

Again, the four outer planets of our system have specific gravities
varying but little from that of water. Considering central condensa-
tion from pressure, it is probable that they are not so dense as they
would be if composed of the lightest compound substance that we
know of If oxygen had been there in excess, it would long ago have
burned and condensed their elements, whatever they might be, into
most stable and solid forms. This gas, therefore, cannot have formed
any considerable part of their constitution. Is it not, then, a probable
supposition that these distant planets are composed of some non-com-
bining and inactive elements like nitrogen, and that, undisturbed by
combustions or elemental agitations, they have quietly stratified into
gaseous worlds, retaining in great part their original heat ? So far

704 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

as the spectroscope gives any indications of their constitution, it shows
them to be composed of gases unknown in the earth.

As we have stated, the four outer planets ai-e very nearly of the
specific gravity of water ; then come the innumerable asteroids, filling
the place of a missing planet, and of which we know but little ; then
three planets that are five and a half times as dense as water ; and
lastly, Mercury, over eight times as dense. Does not this increasing
density of the planets, from the outer to the inner, imply that they
have become successively formed on the exterior of one great parent
globe, and received each its portion, in the main, of denser elements,
as it was later born ? That this effect should appear somewhat in
groups of the planets, is owing, probably, to the absence or excess of
oxygen among their components.

But, if this is so, what shall we say of hydrogen, the lightest of all
the gases, which seems to be most abundant the nearer to the centre
of the system ? To explain this notable exception, might we conject-
ure that hydrogen is a more recent production than the worlds them-
selves ? It has been observed time and again to burst up from the
nethermost regions of the sun with inconceivable force, as if it were
the pent-up product of a volcano, and to throw up columns of its
flaming gas, in one case 200,000 miles high. And these great out-
bursts of hydrogen are always the precursors of the dark, sunken
spots in the photosphere. How came this almost imponderable ether
to be imprisoned in the deep craters of the sun, if it is not a product
that is constantly forming in the solar caldron ?

But it is easier to ask questions than to answer them. And I will
close, in the fear of having been already thought too free with the
scientific imafjination.

THE UNITED STATES NAYAL OBSEEYATOET.

By EMMA M. CONVERSE.

THE importance of establishing a first meridian for the United
States at the seat of government, in connection with a Xational
Observatory for the purpose of systematic scientific observation, at-
tracted the attention of Congress as early as 1810. In 1813 the report of
the committee, to whom the matter had been intrusted, was read before
the House by one of its prominent members. But such were the dis-
turbed condition of the country, and the absorbing interest in its
military affairs during the war with Great Britain, that the subject
was not again revived till 1815, when the original memorial with the
several reports, hitherto presented, and the letter of the Secretary of
State, read before the House in 1813, were refeiTed to a select com-
mittee. This committee strongly advocated in its report the erection

THE UNITED STATES NAVAL OBSERVATORY. 705

of a National Observatory, furnished with suitable instruments and
apparatus for astronomical observation, and that the President should
cause such observations to be made as would determine the longitude
of the Capitol with the greatest practicable degree of exactness.

But no steps were taken at that time to carry out the resolution,
and the subject Avas not again referred to till 1818. A third memorial
was then presented, soliciting not the erection of an observatory, but
simply that additional observations be made to test the accuracy of
results already obtained, in order to insure a correct determination of
our longitude from Greenwich. Nearly three years of tedious delay
were required before the requisite resolution was passed which in-
sured the modest commencement of what is destined to become one
of the great scientific institutions of the country, and, we trust, of the
civilized world.

In 1821 Mr. Lambert, the original memorialist, was appointed by
the President " to make astronomical observations by lunar occulta-
tions of fixed stars, solar eclipses, or any approved method adapted to
ascertain the longitude of the Capitol from Greenwich." In 1823,
President Monroe submitted to Congress Mr. Lambert's final report,
in which he stated that by the diligent use of such instruments for
his work as the country afforded, by the employment of difierent
methods, and by the assistance of competent persons in various sec-
tions of the United States to test the accuracy of his work, he had
endeavored to fulfill his commission to the extent of his ability. He
gave, as the mean result, the longitude of the Capitol 76° 55' 30" 54
west from Greenwich. Thus the first step in the establishment of an
observatory was taken in determining the longitude of the Capitol ;
for, without such an institution furnished with suitable instruments
and apparatus, no accurate measarements of the positions of the
heavenly bodies could be made, and the computation of a nautical
almanac or astronomical ephemeris Avould be impossible.

The next movement that was made toward the accomplishment of
the object was in 1825, when President Adams, in his first message,
urged upon Congress the establishment of a National University.
Connected with this, he earnestly recommended the erection of an as-
tronomical observatory, to watch the jDhenomena of the heavens, and
to give periodical publications of observations. The matter was re-
ferred to a select committee, who presented an elaborate report in
1826, accompanied by a bill to establish an observatory in the Dis-
trict of Columbia. Although the location, cost of the edifice, and the
expense of carrying it on, were freely discussed, no action w\as taken in
the matter ; and Mr. Adams's recommendation, thoiigh associated with
the progress of the nation, and independent of party or personal in-
terest, was allowed to lie unnoticed.

But, after years of neglect and indifference on the part of Congress,
a few officers of the navy had the honor of taking the first direct ac-
TOL. IV. — 45

7o6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

tion in tlie creation of the institution. In 1830 the Depot of Charts
and Instruments for the Navy was established in "Washington. This
was accomplished under the orders of the Navy Commissioners, and
with the sanction of the Secretary of the Navy. Lieutenant Golds-
borough, through whose influence principally the bureau was created,
was intrusted with the charge of it. He collected from New York
and other places the chronometers, sextants, theodolites, and other
instruments and charts of the navy, and located them in a building
opposite the residence of the Attorney-General, Hon. William Wirt.
A transit instrument was afterward added, and the naval Depot of
Charts and Instruments was in working order. One duty of the offi-
cers was the careful rating of all chronometers belonging to the navy,
which was at first eifected by sextant and circle observations ; but
afterward with a thirty-inch transit instrument. This transit was
mounted within a small circular building upon a brick pier having a
base twenty feet below the surface, and is noteworthy as the first
astronomical instrument erected for the navy at Washington.

In 1833 Lieutenant Wilkes succeeded to the charge of the depot,
and obtained permission to remove the office to Capitol Hill, where it
remained until 1842. He erected here at his own expense an observa-
tory sixteen feet square, and mounted a five-foot transit. But no
regular observations were made till 1S38, on the departure of the ex-
ploring expedition, the principal use made of the transit being the de-
terminatiou of time. In 1837 Lieutenant Gilliss was left in charge of
the depot, and, during the absence of the exploring expedition, and in
connection with it, made invaluable observations on moon culmina-
tions, occultations, and eclipses. There was not a visible culmination
of the moon, occurring when the sun was an hour above the horizon,
from 1838 to 1842, nor an occultation after the loth of June, 1839, with
one exception, which he did not personally observe. He also completed
an important series of magnetic and meteorological observations.

As the work took on larger proportions under such devoted lead-
ership, and valuable and expensive instruments were added, the un-
suitableness of the building, the defects of the transit-instrument, and
the want of space to erect a permanent circle, became more evident.
Earnest solicitations were made for an appropriation for a permanent
establishment, and the subject was brought before Congress by the
Secretary of the Navy in 1841. Tedious and disheartening delay
occurred before Congress was roused to an appreciation of the imjDor-
tance of the enterprise. But, after persistent efibrt on the part of its
supporters, at the last hour of the session of 1841-'42 a bill passed both
Houses without discussion, authorizing the Navy authorities to contract
for the building of a suitable institution, and that it should be located
on any unappropriated land in the District of Columbia which the
President deemed suitable. Thus was the future observatory officially
recognize-d.

THE UNITED STATES NAVAL OBSERVATORY. 707

All obstacles to further progress being happily overcome, plans for
erecting a Naval Observatory under the best available conditions were
speedily made matter for diligent study. Visits were made to the
Northern cities to obtain assistance, distinguished astronomers were
consulted, and an accomplished architect secured to draught plans, the
whole care being intrusted to Lieutenant Gilliss. The locality chosen
for the observatory possesses an historic interest. The site assigned
to it was known as " Reservation No. 4," on the original plan of the
city. It lies on the north bank of the Potomac, in the southwestern
part of the city. When General Braddock marched against Fort Du-
qnesne in the colonial wars, his troops landed and encamped on this
hill. Washington's letters show that he crossed at this point from
Alexandria to join Braddock at Frederick. A large rock within the
grounds of the observatory is pointed out as the spot on which these
landings were made. It was here that the first President proposed to
locate a national university, and at a later date it was suggested by
President John Quincy Adams for the site of an observatory. The
base of the observatory is the second highest eminence within the
city limits, and is on a level with the floor of the Congressional Li-
brary.

In 1843 Lieutenant Gilliss reported to the Navy Department the
adoption of a plan for an observatory, and also the progress of the
erection of a building in accordance with the plan. In 1844 the new
building was ready for occupancy, and the instruments adjusted for
the commencement of active work. The central building is about
fifty feet square, raised on a firm foundation, and built of brick in the
most thorough manner. It is two stories and a basement high, with
a parapet and balustrade of wood around the top, and is surmounted
by a revolving dome resting on a circular wall. The roof is nearly
flat, and so arranged as to form a level promenade for gazing observa-
tions. On the east and west sides of the building are wings, and
also on the south. In 1870, an observing-room for the transit-circle
was added, foi-ming an extension of the west wing. A tower and
dome, to accommodate the superb new equatorial telescope recently
completed, was finished in October. The equipment of the observa-
tory in astronomical, magnetic, and meteorological instruments is now
in a fair way to become worthy of the institution and the country
it represents, and the library is increasing rapidly in the number of
volumes and their scientific value.

Among the influences that helped to bring about this auspicious
result were, in the first place, the unswerving interest and indefati-
gable zeal of Mr. John Quincy Adams. Although his suggestions
concerning the establishment of a national observatory were treated
with neglect during the term of his presidency, he did not lessen his
efforts in the cause dear to his heart. In 1838 he presented its claims
before President Van Buren, and in 1842 in his place in the House of

7o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Representatives. The report of the committee, presented at this ses-
sion by Mr. Adams, should be read by every student of astronomy,
for the fervor of its eloquence and the nobility of the truths it enun-
ciates. Lieutenant Gilliss was equally unwearied in the cause. It
was by his diligent and successful observations that he secured the
essential confidence and cooperation of the Navy Department, and of
the naval committees. He was the first person, in the United States,
who gave his whole time to practical astronomical work. He first
published a volume of observations, prepared a catalogue of the stars,
and planned and carried into eiFect the construction of a working ob-
servatory, in contrast with one intended simply to teach. For this
arduous work he was specially gifted, possessing a wondrous acute-
ness of the perceptive powers of eye and ear. Prof. Peirce, after ex-
amining his observations from 1838 to 1842, gives him the second
place in the long list of observers, living and dead, whose results were
critically and searchingly tested by the so-called personal scale.
Profs. Bartlett, Kendall, and Walker, contributed largely by their
labors to the establishment of the institution. Their series of astro-
nomical observations, their publications, and the able report on Eu-
ropean observatories, by Prof. Bartlett, in 1840, had a powerful influ-
ence in rousing public interest in the subject, and, combining with
other influences, produced the desired result.

In 1844 Commander 3Iaury was appointed superintendent of the
new observatory, assisted by the same officers who had been attached
to the Depot of Charts. Under the instruction of the Secretary of the
Navy, the most extensive astronomical work was proposed in cata-
loguing the stars. The task set before the infant observatory, said a
critic in the North American Eevieio, was "nothing less than assign-
ing color, position, and magnitude, to every star in the heavens, which
could be seen with the instruments." With the resources at the com-
mand of the officers at that time, it would have required a century to
complete it. The work was, however, commenced of making a cata-
logue of the stars down to the ninth and tenth magnitude. In 1846
the first volume of observations was issued from the press. In 1847
the observatory was first brought into prominence by the identifica-
tion of the newly-discovered planet Neptune, with a star of Lalande's
catalogue of 1V96. Astronomers thus obtained an observation of
Neptune made fifty years before, which aflforded the means of an ac-
curate determination of its orbit ; and the superintendent of the
" American Nautical Almanac " was enabled to publish an ephemeris
of the new planet two years in advance of all other parts of his al-
manac. In 1848 the institution first bore the name of "United States
Naval Observatory " instead of " National," an honor justly due to the
Navy Department which controlled it, and to the navy officers who
had charge of its interests. But the preparation and publication of
Wind and Current Charts absorbed the attention of the superintend-

THE UNITED STATES NAVAL OBSERVATORY, -jog

ent. With the exception of the equatorial and mural circle-observa-
tions, zone-observations, and several years' unpublished work of other
observers, regular astronomical work did not receive the prominent
attention demanded for the best interests of the observatory. In 1861
Lieutenant Maury left his position to join the cause of tlie Confederate
States of the Soutk

Captain Gilliss succeeded to the office in 1861. His heart and
hand were in the work. He published the volume of observations for

1861 promptly in 1862. He gave detailed statements of the volumes
of observations he found unprepared for the press, took measures for
their publication, for the regular and prompt issue of annual volumes
from the observatory, and arranged that meteorological observations
should form a part of each volume. The volume of observations for

1862 contained a discussion concerning the longitude of Washington;
a paper on Comet II., 1862, with drawings of the comet during the
period of greatest brilliancy ; and a plate illustrating the appeai-ance
of Mars, near the opposition in that year. The special work for 1863
was an investigation of the solar parallax from observations on the
planet Mars. Nearly 11,000 observations were made with four instru-
ments during this year. A transit-circle was also contracted for to
improve the defective equipment of the observatory. But, while the
field was widening before him, and when neither of his three favorite
aims had come to a successful issue. Captain Gilliss was suddenly re-
moved by death, in 1865, from the scene of his labors.

Rear- Admiral Davis was placed in charge of the observatory in
1865. During the same year the great transit-circle was completed,
and placed in position in the then west wing of the observatory. This
constituted an era in its history, and raised it to a more fitting rank
among institutions of its class. The volumes of observations for 1863
and 1864 were published in 1865 and 1866. The meteorological ob-
servations fi-om 1842 to 1867 were fully discussed, a report was made
on interoceanic canals and railroads, and the regular routine work was
diligently kept up. In 1867 Rear- Admiral Davis was ordered to take
command of the South-Atlantic Squadron.

In 1867 Rear- Admiral Sands became the foui'th superintendent,
and is the present incumbent of the office. Since that time the work
has so greatly increased in all directions, and the progress of science
demands such an amount of labor, that the limits of this article will
permit only a brief mention of a few of the most important portions
of the work accomplished. One of the recent publications of the ob-
servatory is a " Manual of its Founding and Progress," prepared by
Prof. Xourse. We refer readers, who desire more extended informa-
tion, to this able and exhaustive paper, to which we are indebted for
our facts and suggestive information. Under the present superintend-
ent, and his efficient and cooperative assistants, the observatory has
gone steadily forward, enlarging its boundaries, and widening its field

710 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of vision. The current years have been rich in results in the regular
work of the institution, as the published volumes of observations bear
testimony. A new observing-room for the transit-circle was erected
in the west wing, and the mounting of the circle was completed in
18Y0. The library was removed to the room previously occupied by
it, and now numbers more than 5,000 bound volumes. The total
solar eclipses of August 7, 1869, in America, and December 22, 1870,
iu Europe, were closely observed by parties from the observatory, and
full reports of their observations were published.

But the greatest achievement toward raising the observatory to a
higher rank among its peers was the successful completion and mount-
ing, in the new tower and dome prepared for it, of the Great Equa-
torial, in the month of October of the past year. This auspicious
event is largely owing to the persevering effort of the superintendent.
After repeated representations concerning the necessity of the instru-
ment. Congress made an appropriation of $50,000 for the purpose.
The contract was made in August, 1870, with Messrs. Alvan Clark &
Sons, of Cambridgeport, Mass. They agreed to construct a refracting
telescope, of good definition, and of 26 inches clear aperture, mounted
equatorially on the German plan, and supplied with all the appliances
that modern science has developed. They required four years to com-
plete it. But the opticians were ahead of their contract, and the ob-
servatory is now rejoicing in the absolute possession of the talismanic
instrument which has been the object of its ambition.

The future work of the institution will demand all its resources.
It is already in the full tide of preparation for the observation of the
coming transit of Venus in 1874, for which it has received an appro-
priation of 8150,000. It is looking forward to still more satisfactory
results from the transit of 1882, which will be specially favorable for
observation on American ground, while an opposition of Mars, in 1877,
will test the power of its new possession.

With this grand telescope and its equipment, with a personnel
made up of ofiicers who honor their profession, with Congress ready
to grant all needful aid, there is every reason to anticipate a future
for the United States Naval Observatory, honorable to itself, and hon-
orable to the country it represents.

THE MA^^TIS, OE PEATIXG IXSECT.

SPECIES of insects known as Mantids belong to the order Orthop-
tera, which includes crickets, grasshoppers, cockroaches, locusts,
etc. The following figure illustrates the appearance of one of these.
They are of bright, variegated colors, and are sometimes quite large,
even three or four inches in length. The mantis lays its eggs at the

THE MANTIS, OR PRAYING INSECT. 711

end of summer, in rounded, fragile shells, which it attaches to the
branches of trees, and which do not hatch till the following summer.
It differs in locomotion from its orthopterous relatives, which travel by
jumps, while the mantis crawls so slowly that its progress can only be
appreciated by careful and prolonged watching. This trait is con-
nected with another character by which the mantis differs from the
foregoing groups, for, while they are vegetarians, this insect is carniv-
orous, and its insidious movements are part of the policy by which it

Mantis Religiosa (Male;.

captures the various creatures upon w^hich it feeds. But the mantis is
not only a carnivore which lives by killing and devouring other insects,
it is also a creature of the most quarrelsome disposition ; in fact, it is a
ferocious cannibal. If two of these insects be shut up together, they en-
gage in a desperate combat ; they deal each other blows with their front
legs, and do not leave off fighting until the stronger has succeeded in
eating off the other's head. From their very birth the larvae attack
each other. In their contests, the male, being smaller than the female,
is often the victim. This pugnacity of the mantis is the source of
amusement to children in China. Two mantids are shut up together
in a bamboo cage, and the young heathen view with delight the inevi-
table battle, and the resulting cannibal feast.

And yet, while its inoffensive orthopterous brethren have got but
little credit for their virtues, and are generally reviled as nuisances,
this atrocious little savage has had the fortune to acquire a peculiar
reputation for wisdom and saintliness. For thousands of years, and in
all parts of the world, it has borne this character. The cause has been
that it habitually assumes an attitude that appears devotional, and it was
supposed to spend a large portion of its life in prayer. Settled on the
ground, it raises its head and thorax, clasps together the joints of its
front legs (see cut), and raises them as if in supplication, and remains
in this posture for hours together. To our illogical and superstitious

712 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

forefathers what could the upraised and crossed arras indicate but an
attitude of devotion ?

The name mantis (diviner) was given to this insect, it is said,
by the Greeks, in accordance with the notion that, when the creature
assumes its peculiar attitude of meditation, it is engaged in the con-
templation of futurity. Naturalists have encouraged the superstition
by giving names to the different species which imj^ly some kind of
sanctity ; thus, we have Mantis oratoria. Mantis religiosa, Mantis su-
perstitiosa, etc. With the French it is the Prega-Dieu (that prays to
God), Le Precheur (the preacher) ; with the Germans it is Gottesan-
beterin (worshiper of God), while the English-speaking nations have
dubbed it the Praying Insect. The names familiarly given to it in
Southern Europe are sufficiently expressive of the veneration with
which it is regarded — nun, saint, suppliant, mendicant, etc. " In the
eyes of the Languedoc peasants," says Figuier, " the Mantis religiosa
is held sacred, and they firmly believe that it performs its devotions."
]yir. Spicer, writing in Science Gossip), remarks : " Xor was this feeling
of veneration confined to the nations of Europe. At the present day
(and doubtless it was the same in old times also) a Mantis is an object
of worship with certain tribes of North Africa." Sparmann also tells
us (" Travels in Africa ") that " in the southern part of the same conti-
nent it is venerated by the Hottentots ; and that, should one of these
insects chance to settle on an individual, he is looked upon in the light
of a saint, and as specially favored by Heaven."

That the superstition should have gone to greater lengths than
mere inference was natural : somebody was certain to make the mantis
open his mouth and give audible expression to his devout sentiments.
Of course we should expect this in the middle ages, when credulity
was unbounded, and there was a universal belief in the semi-divine
nature of this wicked bug. " The great Saint Francis Xavier is said
to have held a conversation with one which he came across in a forest,
and to have induced it to chant a hymn ! "

Dr. James Mann, author of the " Guide to the Knowledge of Life,"
and who was for some years superintendent of education in the prov-
ince of Xatal, South Africa, has written a very interesting accoimt of
the insects of that region, which was published in the Intellectual Ob-
server^ and from that article we quote the following passage regarding
the mantis, from which it will be seen that the insect still contrives to
keep up its theological reputation : " Of orthopterous Natal insects, the
large green mantis is certainly a distinguished chief. He is a very
remarkable fellow, powerful alike upon wing and leg, but much given
to fits of lethargy and brown study. His traditional religious exer-
cise, indeed, is simply a lying in wait for what the gods may send in
the way of food. He fixes himself, as if in i-apt contemplation, upon
some convenient stalk or leaf, and then bends up his chest and shoul-
ders into an almost erect position, pressing together his arms in front,

EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE.

713

aud looking well out before him, with the palpi of his lips slightly
vibrating. In this expectant mood he allows himself to be coaxed
with the finger, merely staggering back a pace or two, and fixing his
goggle-eyes upon the biped who vouchsafes this personal attention.
If he lights upon a perpendicular window or wall when in this vein of
'religious' ecstasy, he seems to remain for hours together without
motion, but all the while he mounts imperceptibly up and up until he
reaches the ceiling or roof which limits the chamber in the upward
direction. The closest watching does not show how this most gradual
of all climbings is accomplished. Not a limb can be seen to move,
yet up, minute after minute, he glides. It is while he is in these fits
of expectant ecstasy that he seizes his prey. He is essentially a car-
nivorous feeder, and pounces stealthily upon any xinwary insect that
settles within convenient reach, seizing the victim between his upraised
legs, and fixing it there between the row of spikelets with which these
prehensile limbs are fringed. After a deliberate inspection of the
morsel held in this position, he goes to work with his jaws. . . .

" It was the author's fate upon one auspicious occasion," writes
Dr. Mann, "to watch one of these 'religious' insects engaged in a
remarkably appropriate occupation. A dignitary of the Xatal Church,
who has since made some noise in the world (Bishop Colenso), was,
one warm summer evening, with all the windows and doors of his
chapel open to the refreshing breeze, preaching by candle-light, when
a huge green mantis whizzed into the assembly and perched himself
upon the preacher's white neckerchief; and, first folding his arms into
the prayerful attitude, he raised his chest and shoulders into rapt at-
tention, turning his goggles from side to side, and following respon-
sively each motion of the spectacles, that glanced, now on this hand
and now on that, from above. He remained fixed in this convenient
position until pi-operly dismissed with the rest of the congregation at
the close of the sermon, and he did not even then depart at once, being
puzzled and staggered, in all probability, by some of the novel doc-
trines he had been listening to."

EYOLUTION AND THE OEIGKnT OF LIFE.

By II. CHAELTON BASTIAN, M.D.,F.E.S.

YEAR by year the word " Evolution " becomes difiused more
widely through our literature, and the central idea which it
implies grows familiar to an ever-increasing multitude of readers.
We have witnessed within the last few years a marvelous awakening
of interest in the minds of the public generally to questions of science,
and it so happens that a discussion of the doctrine of Evolution has

714 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

been more or less directly involved in those departments of Science
and Philosophy which have during this period received the largest
share of popular attention.

Perhaps the greatest impetus was given to the spread of the
doctrine about fourteen years ago, by the publication of Mr. Darwin's
now cele*brated " Origin of Species." This volume has been followed
by quite a library of works and memoirs on the same subject — partly
scientific and pai-tly popular. From about the same date also, Mr.
Herbert Spencer has been engaged in systematically elaborating the
principles of an all-comprehensive Evolution Philosophy, and the
resixlts of his genius and labor are now undoubtedly influencing the
thoughts of a rapidly-widening circle of readers. Both in this coun-
try and abroad, the doctrine of Evolution is gradually but surely
gaining ground among the most reflective ; and, although many other
writers have been more or less influential in determining this result, it
has been in the main brought about by the two above mentioned.

Evolution implies" continuity and uniformity. It teaches us to
looTc upon events of all kinds as the products of continuously-oper-
ating causes — it recognizes no sudden breaks or causeless stoppages
in the sequence of natural phenomena. It equally implies that natu-
ral events do not vary spontaneously. It is a philosophy which
deals with natural phenomena in their widest sense ; it embraces both
the present and the far distant past. It seeks to assure us that the
properties and tendencies now manifest in our surrounding world of
things are in all respects similar to those which have existed in the
past. Without a basis of this kind, the Evolution hypothesis would
be a mere idle dream. Uniformity is for it an all-pervading neces-
sity. Starting from facts of daily observation and from scientific
experiments, the properties and tendencies of things are noted and
grouped ; while philosophers, using the knowledge thus gained, seek
to trace back the progress of events and show how this complex
world has gradually been derived from a world of more and more
simple composition. We are taken back in imagination even much
farther. We are referred to a primal haze or nebula — as the gigantic
germ of a future Universe. This was the conception of Laplace.

But whether we follow the philosopher in his bold speculations
concerning the past, or listen to the biologist making his predictions
concerning the future stages which the germ of a given animal will
pass through in the progress of its evolution — in each case the
" uniformity of Nature " is tacitly assumed. This assumption under-
lies almost all our thoughts and actions, even in every-day life. And,
without such a belief in the Uniformity of Nature, science would be
impossible — the very idea of it, in fact, could never have arisen. In
its absence we could neither fathom the past nor illumine the future.
As Mr. Mill said ' — " Were we to suj^pose (what it is perfectly possi-
' " System of Logic," sixth edition, vol. ii., p. 98.

EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE. 715

ble to imagine) that the present order of the universe were brought
to an end, and that a chaos succeeded in which there was no fixed
succession of events, and the past gave no assurance of the future, if
a human being were miraculously kept alive to witness this change,
he surely would soon cease to believe in any uniformity, the uniform-
ity itself no longer existing."

It is true that in earlier times no absolute belief in the uniform-
ity of Nature existed, even among the select few. The Greek philos-
ophers, including Aristotle, recognized " chance " and " spontaneity "
as finding a definite place in Nature, and to this extent they were not
sure that the future would resemble the past. But as we have be-
come more familiar with a wider range of natural phenomena, and
with their mutual relations or order of appearance, so has the con-
ception of chance or spontaneity disappeared from the scientific hori-
zon— driven out of the field by the steady advance of Law and Order.
Those who embrace the Evolution pliilosophy are foremost in this
opinion — they believe that no efiects of whatsoever kind can occur
without adequate causes, and, the conditions being similar, that the
same results will always follow the action of any given cause. Their
whole creed is, in fact, preeminently based upon this assumed uni-
formity of Nature.

The present is essentially a time of transition in matters of opin-
ion. Men who have been educated in one system of beliefs are gradu-
ally being converted to another, because the new system is thought
to be more harmonious with the observed order of natural phenomena.
This has been the case even with the chief exponents of Evolution.
They have themselves had to unlearn much which they had previ-
ously learned. The doctrine of Evolution has thus been developed
only by the sacrifice of many previous early beliefs and modes of
thought. But it often happens that an old belief will — unknown, per-
haps, to the person hunself — leave decided traces of its previous influ-
ence, and thus prevent for a time the full realization of all the logical
consequences of new views. This vestige of the old state of opinion
or habit of thought is, more especially, apt to remain in directions
where unexplained facts, or strong prepossessions and prejudices, bar
the way. Some modes of this inconsistency may become obvious to
one worker or thinker, and some to another, according to the particu-
lar direction which his investigations or thoughts may have taken ;
and such inconsistencies should be pointed out as they present them-
selves. So that, with the view of strengthening an hypothesis which
I, in common with so many other workers in science, believe to be
true, I now venture to allude to certain appai-ent anomalies in the de-
clared opinions of the most prominent upholders of the doctrine of
Evolution in this country. It seems all the more desirable that this
should be done, since the inconsistencies may be easily shown to be
wholly uncalled for, and to involve sundry unscientific conceptions.

7i6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Yet the modifications of opinion which appear to be demanded, on the
gi-ound of fact as well as on the ground of reason, will necessitate very
considerable and almost revolutionary changes in the accepted code of
biological doctrines.

An examination of the facts of science generally and of various
every-day phenomena teaches us, according to the Evolutionist, that
matter of diiferent kinds, situated as it is and has been, gradually
tends within certain limits to become more and more complex in its
internal and external constitution. Coupling this conclusion with
various astronomical data, with geological data, and with facts de-
rived from the study of the past forms of Life upon our globe, the
Evolutionist essays to penetrate through the long vista of by-gone
ages, till he may rest his speculative gaze upon a vast rotating nebu-
lar mass of gaseous matter, of comparatively simple though unknown
constitution, from which he supposes our Universe to have been
slowly evolved. Without futile questionings as to the explanation or
cause of the existence of the nebula, without speculation as to what
simpler or more complex matter may have immediately preceded it, it
is obvious that we may for our own convenience take uj) its imagi-
nary existence at any stage. Though we must be free to admit that in
concentrating our attention upon this nebular stage, or upon any
other, we arbitrarily break into a mysterious cycle of existence whose
Cause is to us unfathomable. It is needless for my pui-pose, however,
to attempt to concentrate the reader's attention upon a period so re-
mote in the history of our Universe. The primordial nebula, as it
cooled and condensed, acquired a more rapid axial rotation : masses
were gradually thrown off from its circumference, and these in their
turn condensed into rotating spheroids, which continued to circulate
round the parent mass in elliptical orbits. Assuming, then, with the
Evolutionist, that ourowTi planet had a past history of this kind, we must
also assume that it gradually changed from a gaseous to a fluid state
before beginning to solidify by the formation of a superficial crust — a
crust which gradually thickened as the fervent heat of it and of the
fluid nucleus abated by heat-radiations into space. Until this stage
of the Earth's history had been far advanced, no Living Things could
have existed upon its surface. "Hence," as Sir William Thomson
said,^ "when the Earth was first fit for life there were no living
things on it. There were rocks, solid and disintegrated, water, air all
round, warmed and illuminated by a brilliant sun, ready to become a
garden." Living things must, however, have appeared upon its sur-
face at some very remote epoch, since their remains are to be found
far down in the rocks which at present constitute its crust. But how,
it must be asked, is the first appearance of living matter upon the
earth to be accounted for ?

We should not needlessly invoke an abnormal act of Creative
' Inaugural Address at Meeting of British Association, Xahire, August 3, ISVl, p. 269.

EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE.

IK

Power, we must uot even resort to a " moss-grown fragment from
the ruins of another world," unless it is really necessary to invent
some such hypothesis. Now", the Evolutionist repudiates the notion
of Creation in its ordinary sense ; he believes that the operation of
natural causes, working in their accustomed manner, was alone
quite adequate to bring into existence a kind of matter presenting a
new order of complexity, and displaying the phenomena which we
have generalized under the word "Life." Living matter is thus
supposed to have come into being by the further operation, under
new conditions, of the same agencies as had previously led to the
formation of the various inorganic constituents of the earth's crust —
such mineral and saline substances as we see around us at the present
day. What we call "Life," then, is regarded as one of the natural
results of the growing complexity of our primal nebula. So that, in
accordance with this view, we have no more reason to postulate a
mii-aculous interference or exercise of Creative Power to account for
the evolution of living matter in any suitable portion of the Universe
(whether it be on this earth or elsewhere), than to explain the ap-
pearance of any other kind ot matter — the magnetic oxide of iron, for
instance. So far, all thorough Evolutionists are quite agreed. This
is the view of Spencer, Lewes, Huxley, and others — possibly of Dar-
win. I say possibly of Darwin, because on this subject it so happens
that the language of this most distinguished exponent of Evolution
is more than usually tinctured with a previous point of view. Speak-
ing of the probable commencement of Life upon our globe, Mr. Dar-
win says ' : " I believe that animals have descended from at most only
four or five progenitors, and plants from an equal or lesser number.
Analogy would lead me one step farther, namely, to the belief that
all animals and plants have descended from some one prototype. . . .
There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having
been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms, or into
one ; and that while this planet has gone cycling on according to
the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms,
most beautiful and most wonderful, have been and are being evolved."
Taking into account the phraseology made use of in the above
quotation, we have little difficulty in recognizing the views of an
Evolutionist, dwarfed and modified though they are by an ultimate
appeal to a Creative act only a little less miraculous and singular
than the mythical origin of our reputed ancestors — Adam and Eve.
Some existing naturalists may perhaps contend that Mr. Darwin
ought to have kept more closely to the Mosaic record — replacing his
one primordial form by a dual birth of male and female, without
whose mutual influence no " biological individuals " can in their opin-
ion come into existence. Such a supposition, it is true, would be as
antiquated and unnecessary from the Evolutionist's point of view as
' "Origin of Species," sixth edition, 18'72, pp. 424, 429.

71 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

is the whole notion of life having been originally " breathed " into
one or more organic forms. Mr. Spencer's language is happily free
from both these defects : he neither uses the phraseology of the Crea-
tive hypothesis, nor does he adopt a definition of biological " indi-
viduality," at variance with the Evolution philosophy. He distinctly
teaches that living matter must have been at first formless, and that
multiplication would have taken place, as among the lowest forms of
the present day, exclusively by agamic methods — nay, more, he
teaches that living matter must have been the gradual product or
outcome of antecedent material combinations. " Construed in terms
of evolution," he says,' " every kind of being is conceived as a prod-
uct of modifications wrought by insensible gradations on a pre-
existing kind of being, and this holds fully of the supposed ' com-
mencements of organic life,' as of all subsequent developments of
organic life." But on the question whether the process of Archebiosis
(life-evolution) is likely to have occurred once only, as Mr. Darwin
seems to hint, or in multitudinous centres scattered over the earth's
surface, Mr. Spencer makes no definite statement. The latter belief
would, however, be entirely in accordance with his general doctrine ;
and we seem all the more entitled to infer that Mr. Spencer inclines
to the notion of a multiple occurrence of Archebiosis, both in space
and in time, since he does not reject the possibility of its occurrence
in our own day. Granting " that the formation of organic matter and
the evolution of life in its lowest forms may go on under existing
cosmical conditions," he believes it " more likely that the formation
of such matter and of such forms took place at a time when the heat
of the earth's surface was falling through those ranges of temperature
at which the higher organic compounds are unstable." But conclusions
which we are only able to infer from the writings of Mi'. Spencer
have been distinctly enunciated by Mr, G. H. Lewes. In a criticism
of the " Darwinian Hypothesis," he very forcibly pointed out that it
is quite compatible with the hypothesis of evolution to admit a va-
riety of starting-points for the formation of living matter, and he con-
sequently laid down in principle a very important extension of the
Darwinian doctrine, in its application to higher organisms. He
says : " " Although observation reveals that the bond of kinship does
really unite many divergent forms, and the principle of Descent with
Natural Selection will account for many of the resemblances and dif-
ferences, there is at present no warrant for assuming that all resem-
blances and difierences are due to this one cause, but, on the contrary,
we are justified in assuming a deeper principle which may be thus
formulated : All the complex organisms are evolved from organisms
less complex, as these were evolved from simpler forms : the link
which unites all organisms is not always the common bond of heri-
tage, but the uniformity of organic laws acting under uniform condi-
* " Principles of Biology," vol. ii., Appendix, p. 482. ^ Fortmghtly Review, 1868.

EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE. 719

tions. ... It is therefore consistent with the hypothesis of Evolu-
tion to admit a variety of origins or starting-points." In this paper
Mr. Lewes distinctly postulates the prohability of a repetition of the
process of Archebiosis, wherever the conditions were favorable, and
though he says nothing against the continuance of such a process in
the present day, neither does he dwell upon it as a probability.

Prof. Huxley's * opinions on the subject of Archebiosis are very
similar to those of Mr. Spencer, with the exception that he seems more
strongly opposed to the notion of its occurrence at the present day,
and it is to this aspect of the question that I would now direct the
reader's attention. Why should men of such acknowledged eminence
in matters of Philosophy and Science as Mr. Herbert Spencer and
Prof. Huxley promulgate a notion which seems to involve an arbitrary
infringement of the uniformity of Nature ?

They would both have us believe that living matter came into be-
ing by the operation of natural causes — that is, by the unhindered play
of natural affinities operating in and upon matter which had already
acquired a certain degree of molecular complexity. They believe that
the simpler kinds of mineral and crystalline matter continue to come
into being now as they have ever done; nay, more, they believe that
the higher kind of matter, originally initiated by the operation of nat-
ural causes, continues to grow both in animal and in vegetal forms,
solely under similar influences, and yet they consider themselves justi-
fied in supposing that natural causes are now no longer able indepen-
dently to initiate this higher kind of matter (protoplasm). We find
Prof. Tyndall^ also affirming, in the most unhesitating language, the
ultimate similarity between crystalline and living matter: affirm-
ing that all the various structures by which the two kinds of matter
may be represented are equally the " results of the free play of the
forces of the atoms and molecules " entering into their composition.
And he, too, would have us believe that, while diffierences in degree
of molecular complexity alone separate living from not-living matter,
the physical agencies which promote the growth of living matter are
now incapable of causing its origination.

Why, we may fairly ask, should a supposed difference be erected
by Evolutionists between Origination and Growth in the case of living
matter, while no one dreams of making any such distinction in refer-
ence to crystalline matter ? Is it true that the process of growth dif-
fers from the process of origination, and if so in what respects ? Philo-
sophically speaking there is little difference. Take the case of the
formation of the " silver tree," cited by Prof. Tyndall. A weak
galvanic current is passed through a solution of nitrate of silver, and
simultaneously, in a first increment of time, a number of molecules of

' " Inaugural Address at Meeting of British Association," Nature, September 15, ISYO,
p. 404.

"^ "Fragments of Science," fourth edition (ISV?), pp. 85-8Y, and 113-119.

720 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

oxygen and of silver begin to aggregate independently into crystals of
oxide of silver ; in a second increment of time the operation of the
same causes produces similar results, only now part ot the new crys-
talline matter forms in connection with the preexisting germs of crys-
tals, though part of it may still aggregate independently. During a
third, a fourth, and in all succeeding increments of time, in which the
same causes operate amid similar conditions, similar results must en-
sue. But, taking the process of origination which occurs in the first
increment of time, would Prof. Tyndall have us believe that it is in
any way different from that of growth which takes place in a second,
third, or fourth increment of time ? Does not the very fact that origi-
nation and growth so often occur simultaneously in the case of crys-
talline matter, and under the influence of the same causes, show us
that the two processes are intrinsically similar, and that conditions
favorable for growth are also likely to be favorable for origination ?
And if this be true for crystalline matter, may w^e not infer that it
would also be true for living matter ? These are questions neither
asked nor answered in any definite manner by those whose opinions I
have already cited. They are, however, questions by no means un-
worthy of an attentive consideration.

Although, as a general rule, conditions favorable for the growth of
any particular kind of crystalline matter are likely to be favorable for
its origination, still it must be acknowledged that the presence of a
crystal will occasionally lead to its growth in a medium in which simi-
lar crystalline matter had previously shown no tendency to form inde-
pendently— even in cases where the introduction of a non-crystalline
nucleus would not be able to determine a similar formation of crys-
talline matter. In spite of the general law, therefore, that conditions
favorable for the growth are also favorable for the origination of crys-
talline matter, we are compelled to admit that growth may be deter-
mined under certain conditions where origination does not occur, and
that the presence of preexisting crystalline matter favors the process.
Now, a distinction of the same kind undoubtedly obtains in the case
of living matter. We know, quite positively, that, although Bacteria
will not originate in a previously-boiled ammonic tartrate solution, or
" Pasteur's solution," the addition of a few of these organisms (all
other conditions remaining the same) will soon occasion a very con-
siderable growth of the living matter of which they are composed.^
We are thus reduced to ask whether the influence of the preexisting
nucleus is relatively more potent in the case of living matter than it is
in the case of crystalline matter ? This is a question which unfortu-
nately we are unable definitely to answer. But, so long as we have no
positive knowledge on this subject, we surely have little right to infer
that processes both of origination and of growth continue in the case
of crystalline matter, while the process of growth alone survives in the
* " The Beginnings of Life," vol. i., p. 325.

EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE. 721

case of living matter. There are no facts easily discoverable upon
which such an assumption can be legitimately based.

The probabilities would seem altogether in favor of the continu-
ance of a natural process like Archebiosis after it had been once initi-
ated, more especially when this natural process is so closely allied to
another which manifests itself with the utmost readiness on all parts
of the earth's surface. So that, unless very cogent reasons could be
adduced against the occurrence of Archebiosis at the present day,
looked at from an a priori point of view, there seems scarcely room
for doubt upon the subject. The properties and chemical tendencies
of material bodies seem to be quite constant through both time and
space. Speaking upon this subject in a recent discourse on " Mole-
cules," Prof. Clarke Maxwell says : ' " We can procure specimens of
oxygen from very different sources, from the air, from water, from
rocks of every geological epoch. The history of these specimens has
been very different, and, if, during thousands of years, difference of cir-
cumstances could produce difference of properties, these specimens
of oxygen would show it. . . . In like manner, we may procure hy-
drogen from water, from coal, or, as Graham did, from meteoric iron.
Take two litres of any specimen of hydrogen, it will combine with ex-
actly one litre of any specimen of oxygen, and will form exactly two
litres of the vapor of water. . . . Now, if, during the whole previous
history of either specimen, whether imprisoned in the rocks, flowing in
the sea, or careering through unknown regions with the meteorites,
any modification of the molecules had taken place, these relations
would no longer be preserved. . . . But we have another and an
entirely different method of comparing the properties of molecules.
The molecule, though indestructible, is not a hard, rigid body, but is
capable of internal movements, and, when these are excited, it emits
rays, the wave-length of which is a measure of the time of vibration
of the molecule. . . . By means of the spectroscope the wave-lengths
of different kinds of light may be compared to within one ten-thou-
sandth part. In this way it has been ascertained, not only that mole-
cules taken from every specimen of hydrogen in our laboratories have
the same set of periods of vibration, but that light having the same set
of periods of vibration is emitted from the sun and from the fixed
stars. . . . We are thus assured that molecules of the same nature as
those of our hydrogen exist in those distant regions, or at least did ex-
ist when the light by which we see them was emitted." With evi-
dence such as this before us, which could be multiplied to an enormous
extent, we should hesitate before needlessly postulating any infringe-
ment of the uniformity of natural phenomena.

What, then, are the reasons assigned for the non-occurrence, at
the present day, of the process of Archebiosis? All that Mr. Spencer
says upon the subject is, that such a process seems to him more likely

' Nature, September 25, 18*73, p. 440.
VOL. IV. — 46

72:

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

to have occurred at " a time when the heat of the earth's surface was
falling through those ranges of temperature at which the higher or-
ganic compounds are unstable," than at the present day. Why such
conditions would be more favorable than those now existing Mr. Spen-
cer does not say; and that such an alteration should suffice to put a
stop to Archebiosis, although we see living matter still growing freely
all over the earth under the most diverse conditions as regards tem-
perature, seems very difficult to believe. Yet no other suggestion is
offered in explanation of an assumption which seems essentially unsci-
entific. For the assumption that Archebiosis took place only in the
remote past puts this process on a quasi miraculous level, and tends
to assimilate it to an act of special creation, the very notion of which
Mr. Spencer, in other cases, resolutely rejects.

Again, what reason does Prof. Huxley give, in explanation of his
supposition as to the present non-occurrence of Archebiosis? He
says * if it were given to him " to look beyond the abyss of geologi-
cally-recorded time," to a still more remote period of the earth's his-
tory, he would expect " to be a witness to the evolution of living proto-
plasm from non-living matter." And the only reason distinctly im-
plied why a similar process should not occur at the present day is,
because the physical and chemical conditions of the earth's surface
were different in the past from what they are now. And yet, concern-
ing the exact natui-e of these differences, and the degree in which the
different sets of conditions would respectively favor the occurrence or
arrest of an evolution of living matter. Prof. Huxley cannot possess
even the vaguest knowledge. He chooses to assume that the un-
known conditions existing in the past were more favorable to Arche-
biosis than those now in operation. This, however, is a mere assump-
tion which may be entirely opposed to the facts. It is useless, of
course, to argue upon such a subject, but still it might fairly be said,
in opposition to his assumption of the impotency of present telluric
conditions, that the abundance of dead organic matter now existing in
a state of solution would seem to afford a much more easy starting-
point for life-evolution than could have existed in that remote past,
when no living matter had previously been formed, and consequently
when no dead organic matter, thence derived, could have been diffused
over the earth's surface.*

Prof. Huxley is, however, very inconsistent, since, in spite of his
declared expectation of witnessing the evolution of living from lifeless
matter, if it were given him " to look beyond the abyss of geologically-
recorded time," he had said, scarcely five minutes before, in reference
to experimental evidence bearing upon the present occurrence of a

^Nature, September 15, 1870, p. 404.

* This is a consideration of great importance, since those who 'believe that Archebio-
sis occurs in organic solutions at the present day have not yet professed to show that it
can occur in saline solutions free from all traces of organic matter.

EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE. 723

similar process, that, " if, in the jDresent state of science, the alternative
is offered ns — either germs can stand a greater heat than has been sup-
posed, or the molecules of dead matter, for no valid or intelligible rea-
son that is assigned, are able to rearrange themselves into living
bodies, exactly such as can be demonstrated to be frequently produced
in another "way — I cannot understand how choice can be, even for a
moment, doubtful." Having thus expressed himself, it was a little
strange that Prof. Huxley forgot to inform his audience, five minutes
afterward, what " valid or intelligible reason " he was able to assign
for the occurrence of that evolution of non-living matter into living
protoplasm in the remote past to which he alluded. A supernatural
interposition of Creative Power would explain the presence of living
things upon our eai*th, just as easily as a supernatural preservation of
living matter from the destructive effects of heat would account for
the presence of living organisms within certain experimental flasks.
But Prof. Huxley most inconsistently says that, even in the face of
scientific evidence concerning the destructive powers of heat upon
living matter, he would rather explain the presence of organisms in
certain flasks on the hypothesis of a (supernatiiral) preservation of
germs, than believe in the otherwise proved occurrence of a present
life-evolution, similar to that which he assumes to have taken place in
the past. He is willing to accept the supernatural in the present,
though he declines to interpret the past by its aid. He assumes this
attitude because no " valid or intelligible reason " is assigned in ex-
planation of life-evolution, a belief in which would render unnecessary
any appeal to the supernatural in the present ; though he himself pos-
tulates the occurrence of the same imexplained process in the past,
solely in order to avoid recourse to the supernatural. Prof. Huxley's
position in reference to this question is very puzzling, and one cannot
help wondering through what monochromatic glass he had been taking
his observations (from his "watch-tower "), in order to come to the
conclusion that " the present state of science " gives any sanction to
such vacillations, or entitles him to appeal to a supernatural preserva-
tion of germs, instead of trusting to the known uniformity of natural
phenomena.

Sir William Thomson was certainly much more consistent. He,
too, seemed inclined to explain the experiments of our own day by
resorting to the hypothesis of a supernatural preservation of germs,
and similarly, he seems not unwilling to explain the original advent
of Life upon this globe, by another assumed process of " Contagion."
He has resort neither to a creative hypothesis nor to the hypothesis
of a natural becoming of living matter, but, shelving the question of
" origin " altogether, he suggests that our earth may have become
peopled with organic forms, owing to the advent upon it, in the re-
mote past, of a " moss-grown fragment from the ruins of another
world." Sir William Thomson's hypothesis seems strangely improb-

724 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

able in itself, though it has, in comparison with the views of others,
the somewhat rare merit of being not inconsistent with his notions
concerning the experiments of to-day. He does not reject the super-
natural in the past, while resorting to it for the present — he resorts to
it in the present and in the past alike, and curiously evades the pi'ob-
lem of origin altogether.

Since so little — or, rather, nothing — is said by Prof. Huxley in
support of his supposition that living matter does not originate in the
present day, even though the process of origination is so closely akin
to that of growth ; and, though the process of growth is taking place
at every moment of our lives, in every region of the globe, and under
the most varied conditions — amid tropical heat and icy coldness, on
mountain-tops and deep down in almost unfathomable ocean-beds — it
seems only reasonable to suppose that he must have been influenced by
some prepossessions. And, so far as one can gather from his presi-
dential address before the British Association — from which I have
ah-eady quoted — he does not appear to have been powerfully biased
by theoretical considerations. One of these we shall now consider.

Much stress is laid by certain writers upon the fact that " the doc-
trine of spontaneous or equivocal generation has been chased succes-
sively to lower and lower stations in the world of organized beings, as
our means of investigation have improved." ^ So that, as another
very eminent writer says, " if some apparent exceptions still exist,
they are of the lowest and simplest forms." "^ And it is usually inferred
from this fact that further knowledge and improved means of obser-
vation will prove these apparent exceptions to be no exceptions to the
supposed general rule — omne vivum ex vivo. A consideration of this
kind seems to have powerfully influenced Prof. Huxley. But much
confusion exists in reference to the point, which needs to be removed.
In the first place, it must be freely admitted that many ancient no-
tions, dating from the time of Aristotle, on the subject of " Equivocal
or Spontaneous Generation," were altogether crude and absurd. Sec-
ondly, it is necessary to distinguish (and Prof. Huxley did so) between
two meanings of the phrase, which have often been confounded with
one another — viz., between Heterogenesis, or the mere allotropic modi-
fication of already existing living matter, and Archebiosis, or the inde-
pendent origination of living matter. Thirdly, it should be distinctly
understood that those who strictly adhere to the Evolution hypothesis
could never believe in the origination of any but the " lowest and
simplest " organic forms by a process of Archebiosis. So that, as
Prof. Huxley professes himself an Evolutionist, the objection above
indicated should have been quite pointless for him. Molecular com-
binations, giving rise to units of protoplasm far below the minimum

' Prof. Lister, "Introductory Lecture" (University of Edinburgh), 1869, p. 12.
' Mr. Justice Grove ("Presidential Address"), Report of British Association for the
Advancement of Science, 18G6, p. 71.

EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE. 725

visible stage of our most powerful microscope, would represent those
initial collocations by which alone living matter could come into being
— though the " germs " thus initiated may afterward appear as mi-
nutest visible specks growing into Bacteria, Vibriones, or Torulse.
We may, therefore, be permitted to remark that, even if it were given
to Prof. Pluxley to " look beyond the abyss of geologically-recorded
time," he would be extremely unlikely to witness an " evolution of
living protoplasm from not-living matter." At the most, he might
see (that is, if equipped with a powerful microscope) only what he
may equally well see now — viz., a gradual emergence into the sphere
of the visible of minute specks of living j^rotoplasm. But though he
might, when looking back to this remote age, be inclined to consider
such appearances as testifying to the evolution of living protoplasm
from not-living matter, he would perchance find it just as difiicult to
convince others of the absence of invisible Salamandrine germs (de-
rived, pei-haps, from the " moss-grown fragment of another world ")
as he is himself difficult to be convinced by similar appearances at the
present day. Prof. Huxley seems, for the time, to have lost sight of a
consideration justly deemed by Prof. Tyndall to be one of great im-
portance in the interpretation of evolutional phenomena — viz., the
enormous difference in point of size between the first constituent mole-
cules of protoplasm and the minutest visible organisms. As Prof.
Tyndall puts it, compared with their constituent elements, "the
smallest vibrios and bacteria of the microscopic field are as behemoth
and leviathan," even though the latter are often less than 3^^^,-^ of an
inch in diameter.

Thus it would appear that a consistent belief in the Evolution
hypothesis necessarily carries with it a belief in the continuance of
the process of Archebiosis from the remote epoch when living matter
first appeared upon this earth down to the present time. The Evo-
lutionist teaches us that living matter is not in its essence different
from other kinds of matter, and tliat it originally came into being,
like the various forms of mineral and crystalline matter, by the
operation of mere natural causes. As Prof. Huxley says : * " Carbon,
hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, are all lifeless bodies. Of these
carbon and oxygen unite in certain proportions and under certain con-
ditions to give rise to carbonic acid ; hydrogen and oxygen produce
water; nitrogen and hydrogen give rise to ammonia. These new
compounds, like the elementary bodies of which they are composed,
are lifeless. But, when they are brought together under certain condi-
tions, they give rise to the still more complex body, protoplasm ; and
this protoplasm exhibits the phenomena of life." So that, if living
matter has once arisen naturally and independently, the laws of uni-
formity alone, upon which all science is based, shoxxld lead us to expect

J " Fragments of Science," fourth edition, 18Y2, p. 151.
2 Foytnlgldly Revieio, February, 18G9.

726 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

that it would continue to have a similar " origin " so long as such
matter continued to " grow " under the most varied conditions upon
and beneath the earth's surface. And, these conditions being fulfilled,
we have a good a priori warrant for the belief that living matter is
continually coming into being by virtue of the operation of the same
" laws " or molecular properties as suffice to regulate its growth.

Let the Evolutionist attempt to deny it, and see what other diffi-
culties he plunges into, in addition to that lack of consistency which
I have already pointed out.

If an evolution of living matter occurred only far back beyond the
depths of geologically-recorded time, and if, as Mr. Darwin ' would
have us believe, " all the living forms of life are the lineal descend-
ants of those which lived long before the Cambrian epoch," how is the
Evolutionist to explain the existence of the multitudinous myriads
of lowest and almost structureless organisms which exist at the pres-
ent day ? He starts, in his argument in favor of Evolution, from
the fact that the condition of homogeneity is one of necessarily un-
stable equilibrium. All homogeneous matter inevitably tends to be-
come heterogeneous, and, of the different kinds of matter, none unites
within itself the various qualities tending to favor this passage from
the homogeneous to the heterogeneous in the same degree as living mat-
ter. These tendencies are daily exemplified to us by the phases of
embryonic development passed through by the more or less homo-
geneous germs of multitudinous complex organisms from which they
proceed. The embryonic development of one of the higher anunals —
of man himself, for instance — is a kind of highly-condensed epitome
of animal evolution in general. And the varied forms of life of higher
organization, both animal and vegetal, which have existed and still
exist upon the surface of our earth, are all supposed by the Evolution-
ist to have arisen by dint of insensible modifications wrought through
the long lapse of ages upon successive generations of organic forms.
But if living matter contains within itself the potentiality of undergoing
such mighty changes and of ever growing in complexity — if from ori-
ginally structureless protoplasm (that is, structureless, to our senses)
all the varied forms of life have been derived, how is it that some of
this very same matter should have remained through the long lapse of
ages almost in its primitive structureless condition?'' Why should
one portion of the living matter which came into being in pre-Cambrian
epochs have passed through such marvelous changes, while another
portion has continued to grow, through all the inconceivably numer-
ous generations which must have occurred between that time and the
present, without undergoing change ?

In other words, what is the meaning of the existence of Bacteria,

"'Origin of Species,'' sixth edition, p. 428.

"^ The multiplication of the lowest forms of life takes place so simply that, as Prof.
Huxley has pointed out, it is nothing more than a process of " discontinuous growth."

EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE. 727

ToruliB, Amoebas, and such simplest organisms at the present day?*
Mr. Spencer saw this difficulty, but apparently did not fully realize its
force. He attempts, as it appears to nie, very inconsistently to evade
it by supposing that living matter may escape increasing organization
so long as it can escape the influence of gross changes in external con-
ditions ; and, just as inconsistently, he assumes that living matter
could escape these changes in external conditions through that long
lapse of ages which the lowest estimate regards as a period of no less
than 100,000,000 years. Speaking of what he presumes to be ancient
though almost structureless organisms, and endeavoring to account
for their stationary condition as regards structure, by supposing that
they have succeeded through long ages in " dodging " all changes in
their environment, Mr, Spencer says : " New influences are escaped
by the survival of species in the unchanged parts of their habitats, or
by their spread into neighboring habitats which the change has ren-
dered like their original habitats, or by both."

Now, in opposition to these views of Mr. Spencer, many very co-
gent objections may be alleged. In the first place, in supposing that
the organization of living matter would not increase even through
ages of time unless it were subject to marked variations in external
conditions, Mr. Spencer makes a supposition which seems notably at
variance with his own doctrines of Evolution. Does he not for a
time ignore those internal causes of change which must ever be in
operation within living matter as within all other kinds of matter —
and Avhich, even in combination with approximately fixed external
conditions, should sufiice to produce a continually-increasing differen-
tiation (organization) in living matter ? Mr. Spencer himself says : '
" All finite forms of the homogeneous — all forms of it which we can
know or conceive — must inevitably lapse into heterogeneity. In three
several ways does the persistence of force necessitate this. Setting
external agencies aside, each unit of a homogeneous whole must be
differently affected from any of the rest by the aggregate action of
the rest upon it. The resultant forces exercised by the aggregate on
each unit, being in no case alike both in amount and direction, cannot
produce like effects on the units. And the various positions of the
parts in relation to any incident force preventing them from receiving
it in uniform amounts and directions, a further difference in the effect
wrought on them is inevitably produced." Even this is not all ; Mr.
Spencer also points out that " every differentiated part is not simjjly
a seat of fui-ther differentiations, but also a j^arent of further differen-
tiations; since, in growing unlike other parts, it Ticcomes a centre of
unlike reactions on incident forces, and, by so adding to the diversity

' Especially when Mr. Darwin says : " Judging from the past, we may safely infer
that not one living species will transmit its unaltered likeness to a distant futurity." —
"Origin of Species " (18'72), sixth edition, p. 428.

* " First Principles," second edition, pp. 429, 548.

728 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of forces at work, adds to the diversity of effects produced. This
multiplication of effects is proved to be similarly traceable tiirougli-
out Nature." Now, if causes like these are inevitably at work upon
and within the simplest forms of life, no change in external condi-
tions would be needed in order to insure an increasing complexity
of structure, through months or years, to say nothing about long
ages of time. Biit, as a matter of fact, granting that the liability of
organisms to increase in complexity of structure " arises from the
actions and reactions between organisms and their fluctuating envi-
ronments," and seeing that these changes in the environment are
enumerated by Mr. Spencer as being due to " astronomic, geologic,
meteorologic, and organic agencies," organisms never could by any
possibility shelter themselves through long ages of time even from
the influence of these external inciters of change. Mr. Spencer's ex-
planation of the cause of the existence of multitudinous almost struct-
ureless organisms at the present day, therefore, entirely falls to the
ground. The lowest organisms can neither escape the incidence of
new external conditions (such as we know from actual observation do
powerfully modify them), neither, if they could, should the progress
of organization thereby cease — since the internal causes of change
would still remain active and still continue to give rise to a " multi-
plication of effects," as Mr. Spencer has himself explained.

Thus, tlie existence of such lowest and simplest organisms as the
microscope everywhere reveals at the present day, is quite irrecon-
cilable with the position that life-evolution has not occurred since an
epoch inconceivably remote in Time. Admit the present occurrence
of Archebiosis and Heterogenesis, and both the existence and protean
variability of the lowest organisms are at once readily explained.
We may suppose them continually seething into existence afresh, en-
dowed with enormous plasticity ; so that new recruits are constantly
appearing, ever ready to fill up the gaps which would otherwise be
occasioned by promotion and death. The opposite doctrine, con-
cerning such organisms as the structureless Amoeba and the insignifi-
cant Mucor now daily appearing on decaying substances, seems op-
posed to all reason from the point of view of the Evolution Philoso-
phy. As I have elsewhere asked : * " Would the Evolutionist really
have us believe that such forms are direct continuations of an equally
structureless matter which has existed for millions and millions of
years without having undergone any differentiation ? Would he have
us believe that the simplest and most structureless Amoeba of the
present day can boast of a line of ancestors stretching back to such
far remote periods that in comparison with them the primeval men
were but as things of yesterday ? The notion surely is preposterously
absurd ; or, if true, the fact would be sufficient to overthrow the very
first principles of their own Evolution philosophy." — Author's Advance

Sheets.

^ " The Beginnings of Life," 18'72, vol. !., p. 12.

ON THE ESTHETIC SENSE IN ANIMALS. 729

O^ THE AESTHETIC SEKSE EST A^^MALS:

TEANSLATED FEOM THE FEENCH OF LOUIS VIAEDOT.

Bt a. e. macdonough.

THE mind of animals is a very old subject of discussion. Descartes
and his school regarded an animal as a mere piece of machinery,
like a clock or a turnspit. For man alone they reserved intelligence,
meaning by that, memory, feeling, will, and reason. The story of
Malebranche is well known : As he was going into his convent at the
Oratory with a friend, a little bitch ran up and fawned on him ; he
gave her a kick which sent the poor beast yelj^ing off, and when his
friend expressed surprise that so gentle, kindly, and Christian a per-
son returned kicks for caresses, he exclaimed, "What ! do you really
suppose that that animal had any feeling ? " Thus Malebranche not
merely believed he had not Avounded or grieved her; he even thought
he had caused her no physical pain. This was denying clear proof,
and pushing faith in his master's doctrine to absurdity.

On the other hand, Montaigne, Leibnitz, La Fontaine, Bayle, Con-
dillac, Madame de Sevigne, agreeing with all antiquity, from Pythag-
oras to Galen, assert that animals have all the 01-gans of sensation and
of feeling ; that they possess will, desires, memory, ideas, combinations
of ideas, and even the power of performing some moral acts, such as
entertaining attachment like that a dog feels for his master, or a hen
for her chicks; or, like "that very just equality which they practise
in dividing food or other good things among their young," as Mon-
taigne says ; and that therefore the intelligence of animals, if not
equal to man's, is at least like it, and that the diflerences between the
oyster anchored to its rock and the liomo sajyiens of Linnaeus are
merely differences between more and less, degrees of succession that
make i;p what is called the scale of being. It is the latter opinion
that has been declared triumphant by the researches of natural history
and those of comparative anatomy alike. On this point science has
reached certainty, and every one, reading the story of " the two Rats,
the Fox and the Egg," says now with La Fontaine :

"After that tale, where's the pretense
That animals are lacking sense ? "

But another dispute has just been opened on this question : " Have
aniiiials the sense of beauty, the aesthetic sense?" The famous
Charles Darwin, and his numerous followers agreeing with him, dis-
playing even greater generosity than Montaigne, Leibnitz, and La
Fontaine, answer unhesitatingly in the affirmative. In their view,
just as animals are endowed with intelligence as well as man, though
in a lower degree, so in the same way and in the same proportion they

730 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

are endowed with the sense of beauty. They find the proof of this
rather bold assertion, not in natural selection, which is a result of that
struggle for life in which the weakest individuals among species, and
the weakest species among genera, must disappear, but in sexual selec-
tion, which is a result of the struggle for reproduction, leading straight
to the same consequences, namely, to the improvement of species and
genera, which reaches, by slow elaboration through ages, even to their
transformation. Among all animals, they say, among insects, fish,
birds, mammals, the male chooses his female, and the female chooses
her mate. If strength often determines the choice, so beauty often
does too. The charm of graceful shapes, pleasing colors, fine notes,
has great weight in settling the preference. Now, this charm which
the male possesses habitually in a far higher degree than the female,
he could have no occasion for whatever in the struggle for existence ;
he can benefit by it only in the struggle for reproduction. Hence all
those displays of genuine coquetry which may easily be observed, in
pairing-time, among all animals ; hence those attractions prevailing
through vigor of form, brilliant hues, and impassioned song. This
general fact, well established under difierences of appearance among all
species and all genera, gives the Darwinian school ground for assert-
ing that animals, having the perception of beauty, have consequently
the esthetic sense.

The opposing school, including of course all who prefer metaphys-
ics to physiology, is by no means wanting in excellent answers. It
says, by the pen of Charles Leveque (in the Revue des Deux Mondes
of September 1st), "the doctrine of Darwin rests, in its last analysis,
on the capital fact that the animal, the male sometimes, the female
sometimes, often both at once, is susceptible to the beauty of its kind.
That the animal is struck with it, we admit ; but does it feel really
this beauty of color, form, and song, in so far as it is beauty, or is
it not rather the fact that those brilliant tints, that vigor, that sweet-
ness of voice, form for the animal an indication, very expressive, yet
merely brute-like, of a physiological condition which its instinct ex-
pects, which itself stimulates and answers to?" And this question,
which must involve in its solution that of the former one too, the anti-
Darwinians answer in the affirmative, which is the negative of the
first question. They point out that this process of choice, in which
beauty wins the prize, takes place only at the season of pairing, and
ceases througli all the rest of the year ; that if we concede to the ani-
mal a sense of the beautiful, within those limits, still the sense has but
one special object, finds its range within the species merely, never
reaches to a less concrete conception, does not widen, does not perfect
itself by tradition and culture, remains unchangeably set on the same
object, the same time, the same point; that admiration which grows
from the expansion of this sense of beauty can only spring from very
varied and delicate comparisons ; in one word, that the animal, being

OJS- THE ESTHETIC SENSE IN ANIMALS. 731

unable to attain general and abstract ideas, cannot rise to the aesthetic
sense. To conclude : that sense is the exclusive endowment of man.

This is a concise statement — for neither our subject nor our pow-
ers allow us to take a side in this discussion — of the interesting con-
troversy raised by Mr. Darwin's last book. We only say that, not-
withstanding the deep respect and the frank support that we give to
his general doctrine, we here adopt the opinion of his opponents.
We, too, believe that the esthetic sense, in the high and perfect ac-
ceptation of the phrase, belongs to man alone. But we must here
suggest a correction of the highest importance, which will at once
define our opinion, and lead us to a fundamental reflection upon the
arts.

"Complete the experiment," M.Charles Leveque says. "Place
your animal before a work of art representing its male or its female
with a precision that deceives the eye ; some of tliese works that
seemed to live existed in the studios of ancient painters ; they are
more frequent in modern museums and exhibition-rooms. It was
said that mares would neigh when going before horses painted by
Apelles. A dog would perhaps stop a moment in front of Oudry's
hunting-pieces, if their frames were put on the floor, within reach of
his look. He would come up, examine them, ask the canvas a single
question with his infallible scent — and that Avould be all. And yet,
what is there in the picture ? There is exactly the element worthy of
admiration, that is to say, the expression of life by means of the most
attractive colors and the most perfect forms. What does the quad-
ruped care for these as he looks at this wonder ? It is not the ex-
pression of life in general that he wants ; it is life itself, individual
life, life which speaks to his senses, and to that of smell much more
strongly than to his eyes and ears. He has no concern with the gen-
eral, the ideal, the admirable ; he understands nothing about them."

This is all strictly and absolutely true. We have never put
much faith in the stories invented by the Greeks and collected by
Pliny ; we have never remarked, in our long experience as a sports-
man, that the most intelligent of man's companions ever gave the
least attention to any object represented by painting or sculpture,
even to his master's portrait , or that he looked with any feeling of
satisfaction at one of those charming landscapes set before us at every
step by Nature, enchanting as their view is to us. That seems to us
one settled fact. But is M. Leveque quite certain that all men have
any greater faculty for that notice and that knowledge which are want-
ing in the dog? Have savages got above the level of animals in tliis
respect? A traveler, who has studied Australia thoroughly, relates
that at a gathering of some native inhabitants of that country he
brought out portraits of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, to see
what they would think of them. Almost all kept silence, seeing noth-
ing in the pictures at all Avithin their range, or that touched their

732 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

memory. But two of them, nud the most intelligent ones among the
tribe, such as can count as far as four, ventured on a remark. One
said, " It is a boat " — the other, " It is a kangaroo."

All savages would answer in the same way, yet they are men. But,
although they too love beauty after their fashion, though they have a
strong liking for ornament, a great disposition for coquetry, savages
do not go further than the special and individual object; they do not
rise to a general, abstract idea ; they know no more than the dog
knows about seeing life in the representation of a living being.
Therefore we need to correct the formula of Darwin's opponents, and
may possibly thus succeed in bringing friends and enemies into agree-
ment ; their phrase must read, " The jesthetic sense belongs to civil-
ized man alone.

In truth, it is not an innate faculty ; it is a faculty acquired by
tradition, by personal study, by the development of all the other fac-
ulties. The Australians must first learn to count as far as the number
of fingers on the hand, and something more than that, before they can
be able afterward to understand that pictures of a man and a woman,
even if disfigured with a cap or crown, are neither boats nor kangaroos.

This assertion, that the esthetic sense belongs only to civilized
man, may be proved by both philosophic methods and by arguments
which I take the liberty of stating concisely, as I have set them out at
length in a treatise on the question " How should art be encouraged ? "
The subject is worth the risk of incurring ridicule for copying one's self.
We may call it, if you choose, a second edition.

A priori^ were we to assert that equality before the law means
equality in intelligences, and that every man who has the right to be
a citizen has the power to be an artist, we should commit a funda-
mental mistake. This would be confounding the feeling of the good
in our nature with the feeling of the beautiful. The former is the in-
stinctive knowledge of good and evil, of the just and the unjust ; it is
born with us, it is conscience itself, and, as such, it is necessary for
all. The latter is a certain delicacy of sensation and of judgment
which is formed very gradually in the course of life ; it is called taste,
and is useful only to a few. The feeling of the good, which marks the
grand superiority of man over the animals, and forms the common
basis of all societies, is an essential element in our nature, a gift we
are forced to accept from the creative power. Without it, man would
not be man. On the contrary, the feeling of the beautiful, which is
less necessary, and may well be rare because it is superfluous, is an
acquisition won by intelligence, slowly, painfully, uncertainly, and is
often denied to the most honest eftbrts. One, like rank, costs nothing
but the trouble of being born : the other demands, as all acquired
knowledge does, a previous fitness, a kind of revelation, in which
chance must often lend Nature its aid, besides time, reflection, mental
labor in bodily leisure.

O.y THE uESTHETIC SENSE IN ANIMALS. 733

^•1 jjosteriori : it is plain that a man's first movement, as regards
the good, is almost always right ; as regards the beautiful, almost
always Avrong. Listen to the crowd, judging by its moral estimate of
an event that has taken place under its eyes, when no interest nor
passion misleads it : what good sense, what fairness, what insight,
what right intentions, what generous sympathies ! Then hear it dis-
coursing on the merit of works of art : what wretched taste, what
glaring mistakes, what ridiculous enthusiasm, what sad and utter
going astray ! " The people," writes Diderot to Grimm, " looks at
every thing, and gets at the meaning of nothing." But do you ask
for still more decisive and clear practical proofs of the immense dis-
tance that separates knowledge of the good from that of the beauti-
ful in the human mind? A petit jury, though it decides on the lib-
erty, life, and honor of an accused person, is drawn merely by lot, be-
cause each citizen can judge as well as every other, upon evidence
and discussion, of the truth and morality of an alleged fact. But do
we choose the jury which has to award the prize of a competition
from the same list and in the same way? No ! in that case we must
choose among the most skilled and the best qualified specialists.

But what need of demonstrating what his own experience tells
every one? Among these skilled and special jurors where is the one
who will not confess that he at first was, and long continued to be, the
dupe of his ignorance ? Which of them is not aware that taste for
the arts, and, still more, taste in the arts, came to him only after a long
time, after lucky and often casual experiences, after protracted stud-
ies, repeated comparisons, a constant exertion of the powers of see-
ing, understanding, feeling, judging? And who does not know, by
having learned it in himself, that in the arts — except perhaps in mu-
sic, which filters in unconsciously to those who hear it — emotions come
in the train of reasonings, and that the first condition of positive ad-
miration is knowledge? "I am fully persuaded," says Sir Joshua
Reynolds, in one of his "Fifteen Discourses," "that the pleasure
yielded us by the perfections of art is a taste which we acquire only by
long study and with much labor."

Those who choose to attribute too liberally to all men the sense
of the beautiful as well as that of the good, attempt to support their
opinion by a fact. They cite the instance of Athens, where, they say,
competition in the arts was open to all in the public arena, where the
whole people formed the tribunal. The instance is misleading, and I
take it the other way, to sustain my proposition. Without insisting
on the special genius of ancient Greece among the other nations
of the world, and that of the Athenian people among the other
peoples of Greece, I will merely point out that this people of Athens,
so small m its territory and population, so great in its de^ds and re-
nown, consisted of aboiat forty thousand free citizens, served by four
hundred thousand slaves. Now, the slaves, charged with all manual

734 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tasks, and practising all the trades, relieved their masters from bodily-
labor, made them men of leisure, and consecrated them to the exclu-
sive cultivation of the intellect, like the head of a body of which
they were themselves the acting and subject limbs. That Athenian
democracy, how jealous soever it might be of equality betM^een citi-
zens, was thus a real aristocracy ; and we can very well understand
how the decision on matters of art might be trusted to the multitude,
when that multitude consisted entirely of men so enlightened, by edu-
cation and experience, that all public functions and all magistracies
might be distributed among them by lot, without any great danger
to the state. The empire of the arts, though it refuses to accept any
boundaries as haughtily as that? of science does, though speaking as
well a universal language it spreads over the whole world, can be
ruled only by a strict oligarchy. Indeed, as has been justly said, good
taste is the quintessence of good sense. Therefore, whatever may be
our devotion to equality before the law, we can never admit equality
before genius, or even before that talent which the cultivation of art
requires.

Among mankind art has been, and always will be, the exclusive
share of a small minority ; in fact, a very choice and very limited aris-
tocracy. It is assuredly not that of birth, for there is nothing more
personal than genius or talent. It is aristocracy in its true and genu-
ine sense — the privilege of the best. Art belongs only to certain ex-
ceptional natures, very rare because they are highly endowed, whose
possessors must combine with the choicest moral faculties, imagina-
tion with judgment, feeling with taste, other precious physical facul-
ties, clearness of view, and precision of touch. All men may be arti-
sans ; only the best, the aristoi, can be artists.

To conclude, and still taking the phrase " aesthetic sense " in its
highest and perfect meaning, we first deny it to animals ; and next,
holding this delicate sense to be one of the noblest attributes of man-
kind, we restrict it to civilized man ; then last, even among nations
whom continued and general cultivation places in the front rank of
humanity, we allow this aesthetic sense only to some groups of select
men, on whom the nature of their minds and their taste formed by
long study confers this rare and precious privilege. Has not Sten-
dhal declared that all literary reputations are made by a choice circle
of five hundred readers ? And it is a certain truth that the number
of bachelors of arts is still smaller than the number of bachelors of
letters.

However, not to overstep the very modest part suited to mere
writers and professional critics, let us hasten to add that, if in art the
public voice is that of a very small number, but acute, practised, and
disinterestedly enthusiastic ; if this voice alone decrees to the living
the rewards of celebrity, to the dead the immortality of fame ; if,
moreover, this choice circle of connoisseurs has the sole right of

A TEAR OF GEOGRAPHICAL WORK.

735

criticism, it by no means follows thence that every one of its members
has the gift of infallibility. Far from that; it is like that aristo-
cratic democracy of Athens, in which each citizen had his personal
vote only, and could prevail only on condition of convincing. As
in the domain of the good there is but one authority — conscience, so
there is but one authority in the domain of the beautiful — taste.
Only, conscience speaks the same language to all the men of one
community ; while taste, on the contrary, even acquired and formed
taste, is as manifold as temperaments, ideas, and passions are. It va-
ries from country to country in every age, and from age to age in
every country. Still furthei-, it varies between man and man, and in
each man, at different periods of life. The bear in the fable very sen-
sibly says :

" Who tells you this shape's awkward, that one fine ?
Has yours the right to judge or censure mine ? "

Therefore it is in vain, as if in strict pursuance of a duty, to read
all books, listen to all counsels, ask advice from people supposed to be
cleverer than one's self, and prop up one's judgment by more sure and
authoritative judgments. In the criticism of art, where positive canons
are wanting, no one is suffered to deem himself an authority ; no one
is any thing more than an opinion. — Gazette des Beaux Arts.

A YEAR OF GEOGEAPHICAL WORK.

AT the annual meeting of the American Geographical Society, held
on the 13th of January, 1874, the address was delivered by the
President of the Society, Chief-Justice Daly, who gave to a large and
intelligent audience an admirable digest of geographical work and
progress during the past year. In his elaborate and most instructive
remarks, after dilating on the object and use of geograpliical societies,
and making special allusion to the great results of what might be
called the geographical society formed by Prince Henry and his asso-
ciates upon the promontory of Sagres, in Southern Portugal, viz., the
discovery of the passage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope,
the president went on to state that there is yet one-seventeenth part
of the globe of which we know nothing, except by conjecture, espe-
cially in the north and south polar regions, in Central Africa, in the
interior or northern parts of Australia, and some of the great East Indian
islands, e. g., Borneo and New Guinea. Many regions in South America,
in Asia, and even a considerable portion of our own Western country,
are not yet fully explored. These may yet be outlets for the surjjlus
population of longer-settled and overstocked countries. Geographical
research aids the progress of physical geography, especially our know!-

736 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY.

edge of the wind and ocean currents of the globe, and the mysterious
laws of terrestrial magnetism.

It was with the object of stimulating geographical inquiry that the
first geographical society was formed in Great Britain forty-three years
ago. There are now thirty-three similar societies over the globe, viz., in
England, France, Holland, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Germany, Hungary,
Russia, India, United States, Mexico, Brazil, and Buenos Ayres. These
more or less influence public opinion, governments, and wealthy indi-
viduals, willing to aid exploration, and the expeditions of the year
have been unusually numerous. Never has there been such zeal as
during the last quarter of a century, from their associated efforts. It is
only very large and wealthy societies, like those of London and St.
Petersburg, however, which can engage in distant and expensive ex-
plorations, but all can aid in pointing out suitable fields for exj^lora-
tion, and impressing on the age the necessity and value of it.

In reviewing the geographical work of the world during the year,
President Daly commenced with the Coast Survey, which Humboldt
in 1851 said would hereafter be our great scientific monument. The
valuable practical land operations of the Engineer Corps, TJ. S. A. ; the
labors of the Hydrographic Office at Washington; the United States
Geological and Geographical Survey of the Western Territories ; the
Yellowstone Expedition under General Stanley, and the less military
one under Captain Jones, with their valuable scientific results — were
in turn treated in detail ; after which the president reviewed Lieuten-
ant Wheeler's exploration of the White Mountains of Arizona. The
Yale College Expedition, instituted by Prof. Marsh, to explore be-
tween Salt Lake City and the Colorado River, gave us five tons of
fossil and other collections. The explorers received great attention
from the Mormons, owing to the discovery of fossil remains of various
species of horses. Certain events are related in the Book of Mormon
as occurring in the prehistoric period of America, in which horses are
mentioned. According to the Spanish historians, horses did not exist
in America till introduced by their countrymen, and this statement has
been taken as evidence that the Book of Mormon is a fabrication.
The Mormons, therefore, regard Prof. Marsh's discovery of fossil
horses in Oregon as a proof of the inspiration of the Book of Mormon.
The expedition and researches of Dall, in the Aleutian Islands and
Xorth Pacific, are also interesting.

The archgeological discoveries of the year were next briefly review-
ed, and more fully the voyage of the Polaris by way of Smith's Sound
to within little more than 400 miles of the north pole. A Swedish
expedition was sent out, under Prof Xordenskiold, to Parry Island ;
a Xorwegian to the east of Spitzbergen, and an Austrian to the east
of Xova Zembla. The practicability of a ship-canal across the Isth-
mus of Darien, by way of the Atrato, has been tested by an expedi-
tion under Commander Selfridge, and, by Commander Lull, of an-

A YEAR OF GEOGRAPHICAL WORK. 737

other route from Greytown, by San Juan River and Lake. Prof.
James Orton, of Vassar College, just returned from South America,
has added a great deal of valuable knowledge of the geography and
zoology of Amazonia. Hurlbut has crossed the Cordilleras from Lima
to Lake Titicaca, while Captain Musters has journeyed through Pata-
gonia. A narrative of the valuable explorations of Seiior Raimondi
in the little-known portions of Peru, to the west of the Andes, is to
be published by the Peruvian Government.

The main geographical work of Europe has been the carrying out
of those valuable national topographical surveys on which, as the re-
cent Franco-Prussian War shows, the fate of nations may depend.
The agreement of the Meteorological Congress, held at Vienna, was
unanimous as to the great importance of synchronous meteorological
observations all over the world. The scientific results of the Challen-
ger's voyage, and of Prof. Mohn's deep-sea investigations to the north
of Europe, were next alluded to.

Asia has been the scene of considerable activity in geographical
exploration. Elias has traveled, almost alone, from Peking to St. Pe-
tersburg, across Chinese Tartary. The Russian capture of Khiva will
produce important geographical and political results. Among the
most important of recent geographical expeditions is that of Mr. Jacob
Halevy, through Yemen, in the Arabian Peninsula.

Both the English and the American societies have been surveying
and exploring in Palestine, the labors of the former being nearly ended,
those of the latter only entered upon. The English expedition, under
Captain Warren, employed chiefly in exploring Jerusalem, with branch
expeditions to the plain of Philistia, and the comparatively unknown
regions east of the Jordan and Mount Lebanon, has settled disputed
questions, determined astronomically the position of many places, aided
in elucidating ancient history, and also added much to our knowledge
of local topography. The British Ordnance Survey of the Peninsula
of Sinai has, among other things, remarkably corroborated the truth-
fulness and accuracy of Biblical history, as did also the examination
of the desert of the Exodus by Prof. Palmer and Mr. Drake. By
arrangement with the English society, the country lying to the east of
the Jordan and Dead Sea has been undertaken by the American Pales-
tine Exploring Society, under Lieutenant Steever, U. S. A. This em-
braces the lands of Moab and Edom, where the celebrated Moabite
Stone was found, which illustrated so fully the origin and history of
ou;r alphabet, and the art of writing. The surveys for the various
railroad routes between London and India were then briefly alluded to.

The geographical intelligence from Africa is varied, but not so in-
teresting as during the previous year. It embraces Nachtigall's jour-
ney in the Wadai country ; that of Rohlfs from North Africa to Lagos;
the Livingstone relief expedition of Cameron ; Sir S. Baker's efforts
to suppress the slave-trade in the Upper Nile region; Miani's travels
VOL. IT. — 47

738 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

aloiifj the White Xile to the Monbutta country, where he lost his life.
A difficult journey was made by Prof. Blyden to Falaba, a little-known
country to the northeast of Sierra Leone. Marche and Compeigne
are now penetrating Equatorial Africa in the vicinity of the Ga-
boon. Besides these, it should be remembered that hundreds of
residents, living on the coast or having trading outposts in the interior,
annually contribute a rich fund to geographical knowledge by corre-
spondence or publications. Among these are Bushnell of the Gaboon,
who supjilies valuable letters, Hansell of Khartoum, and Munzinger Bey,
one of the ablest geographers and most experienced travelers, and cor-
responding member at Masswah of the American Geographical Society.
The effect of the Anglo- Ash antee War on our geographical knowledge
cannot yet be fairly estimated.

In Australasia the eastern shore of New Guinea has been explored
by Captain Moresby, of the British Navy, in H. M. S. Basilisk,
who dispels many false impressions prevalent regarding that hitherto
little-known but highly-interesting island and its inhabitants. The
island has been crossed from Geelvinks Bay to McClure Gulf by Dr.
Meyer, who, like Moresby, but unlike Beccari, who has been explor-
ing there, gives a favorable account of the island and its people. For-
mosa has been traversed from north to south by Thompson and Max-
well, who found coal. It would be premature to speak of the geo-
graphical results of the Dutch Acheen expedition.

Mr. Ernest Giles and Baron von Mtlller have been exploring
Central Australia, and gathering much accurate geographical informa-
tion. The telegraphic event of the year has been the construction of
a line across Australia, from Adelaide in the south to Port Darwin
on the north coast, a distance of 2,012 miles, which gives a continuous
line from Adelaide to Gibraltar, a distance of 12,462 miles, of which
9,146 are submarine, by which Australia has three weeks' earlier news
than by the mail-steamers. The last geographical intelligence from
Australia is the discovery of thousands of acres of the richest sugar-
growing land near Cardwell, in Northern Queensland, by a government
exploring expedition. Judge Daly's instructive address, of which we
have only given an outline, is well worth careful perusal, nor can its
fresh and valuable details fail to awaken a fresh and wider interest in
geographical science, or to give a renewed impetus to geographical
discovery, while showing that America and Americans are not behind
the age in geographical zeal and enterprise.

In an appendix we also find some valuable information regarding
the United States Geological Survey of the Territories (Montana,
Idaho, Wyoming, and Utah), in 1872, extracted from the report of the
Government geologist, J. V. Hayden.

SKETCH OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY. 739

SKETCH OF PEOFESSOR HUXLEY.^

By EENST HAECKEL,
01" the univeesitt of jena,

THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY was born at Ealing, on May 4,
1825. With the exception of two and a half years spent at the
semi-public school at Ealing, of which his father was one of the mas-
ters, his education was carried on at home, and in his later boyhood
was chiefly the result of his own efforts. In 1842 he entered the
medical school attached to Charing Cross Hospital, where, at that
time, Mr. Wharton Jones, distinguished alike as a physiologist and
oculist, was lecturing on physiology. In 1845 Mr. Huxley passed
the first M. B. examination at the University of London, and was
placed second in the list of honors for Anatomy and Physiology, the
first place being given to Dr. Ransome, now of Nottingham. After
some experience of the duties of his profession among the poor of
London, in 1846 he joined the medical service of the Royal Navy, and
proceeded to Haslar Hospital. Thence he was selected, through the
influence of the distinguished arctic traveler and natiiralist, Sir
John Richardson, to occupy the post of assistant-surgeon to H. M. S.
Rattlesnake, then about to proceed on a surveying voyage in the
Southern Seas. The Rattlesnake, commanded by Captain Owen
Stanley, with Mr, MacGillivray as naturalist, sailed from England in
the winter of 1846. She surveyed the Inner Route between the Bar-
rier Reef and the East Coast of Australia and New Guinea, and, after
making a voyage of circumnavigation, returned to England in No-
vember, 1850. During this period Mr. Huxley investigated, with a
success known to all naturalists, the fauna of the seas which he trav-
ersed, and sent home several communications, some of which were
published in the " Philosophical Transactions " of the Royal Society.
The first which so appeared, presented by the late Bishop of Nor-
wich, and read June 21, 1849, bears the title "On the Anatomy and
Aflinities of the Family of the Medusae." This was, however, not Mr.
Huxley's first scientific effort. While yet a student at Charing Cross
Hospital, he had sent a brief notice to the Medical Times and Ga-
zette, of that layer in the root-sheath of hair which has since borne the
name of Huxley's Layer. Shortly after his retui-n he was (June, 1851)
elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.

In 1853 Mr. Huxley, after vainly endeavoring to obtain the publi-
cation by the Government of a part of the work done during his voy-
age, left the naval service, and in 1854, on the removal of Edward
Forbes from the Government School of Mines to the chair of Natural

' From Nature. The first part of this sketch has been supplied by its editor.

74-0 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

History at Edinburgh, succeeded his distinguished friend as Professor
of Natural History in that institution, a post which he has continued
to hold up to the present day. Since that time Mr. Huxley has lived
in London a life of continued and brilliant labor. From 1863 to 1869
he held the post of Hunterian Professor at the Royal College of Sur-
geons. He was twice chosen Fullerian Professor of Physiology at the
Royal Institution of Great Britain, In 1869 and 1870 he was Presi-
dent of the Geological Society, having previously sei-ved as secretary.
During the same period he was President of the Ethnological Society.
In 1870 he filled the office of President of the British Association for
the Advancement of Science, and in 1872 was elected secretary to the
Royal Society. He has been elected a corresponding member of the
Academies of Berlin, Munich, St. Petersburg, and of other foreign
scientific societies, has received honorary degrees from the Universi-
ties of Breslau and Edinburgh, and last year was presented with the
Order of the Northern Star by the King of Sweden. Since 1870 he
has been one of the members of the Royal Commission on Scientific
Instruction and the Advancement of Science. From 1870 to 1872 he
served on the London School Board as one of the members for Mary-
lebone, and during that time was chairman of the Education Com-
mittee which arranged the scheme of education adopted in the Board
Schools. In 1872 he was elected Lord Rector of the University of
Aberdeen.

In this skeleton narrative of the career of this distinguished
naturalist we have purposely omitted any list or any critical estimate
of his writings ; but we have great pleasure in laying before our read-
ers, as a token of what is thought of him by those who are laboring
in the same field of science, the following communication from one
who ranks, in his own country as well as among ourselves, as one of
the very first of German naturalists.

The more general, year by year, the interest taken by all educated
people in the progress of natural science, and the wider, day by day,
the field of science, the more difficult is it for the man of science him-
self to keep pace with all the advances made — the smaller becomes
the number of those who are able to take a bird's-eye view of the
whole field of science, and in whose minds the higher interest of the
philosophical importance of the whole is not lost amid a crowd of fas-
cinating particulars. Indeed, if at the present moment we run over
the names distinguished in the several sciences into which Natural
Knowledge may be divided — in Physics, in Chemistry, in Botany, in
Zoology — we find but few investigators who can be said to have thor-
oughly mastered the whole range of any one of them. Among these
few we must place Thomas Henry Huxley, the distinguished Britisli
investigator, who at the present time justly ranks as the fii-st zoologist

SKETCH OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY. 741

among his countrymen. When we say the first zoologist, we give the
widest and fullest signification to the word " zoology " which the latest
developments of this science demand. Zoology is, in this sense, the
entire Ijiology of animals ; and we accordingly consider as essential
parts of it the whole field of Animal Morphology and Physiology, in-
cluding not only Comparative Anatomy and Embryology, but also
Systematic Zoology, Paleontology, and Zoological Philosophy. We
look upon it as a special merit in Prof. Huxley that he has a thor-
oughly broad conception of the science in which he labors, and that,
with a most careful empirical acquaintance with individual phenom-
ena, he combines a clear philosophical appreciation of general rela-
tions.

When we consider the long series of distinguished memoirs with
which, during the last quarter of a century. Prof. Huxley has enriched
zoological literature, we find that in each of the larger divisions of the
animal kingdom we are indebted to him for important discoveries.

From the lowest animals, he has gradually extended his investiga-
tions up to the highest, and even to man. His earlier labors were, for
the most part, occupied with the lower marine animals, especially with
the pelagic organisms swimming at the surface of the open sea. He
availed himself of an excellent opportunity for the study of these,
when on board H. M. S. Rattlesnake on a voyage of circumnavigation,
which took him to many most interesting parts of tropical oceans lit-
tle investigated, previously, by the zoologist ; especially the coasts of
Australia. Here he was able to observe, in their living state, a host
of lower pelagic animals, some of which had not at all been studied,
others but imperfectly. In the Protozoa, he was the first to lead us
to satisfactory conclusions concerning the nature of the puzzling Tha-
lassicollidffi and Sphaerozoida. Our knowledge of Zoophytes has been
greatly extended by his splendid work on " Oceanic Hydrozoa," in
which, chiefly, the remarkable Siphonophora, with their largely-de-
veloped polymorphism and the instructive division of labor in their
individual organs, are described with very great accuracy.

Already in his first work " On the Anatomy and Aflinities of the
Medusfe," 1849, he directed attention to the very important point,
that the body of these animals is constructed of two cell-layers — of
the Ectoderm and the Endoderm — and that these, physiologically and
morphologically, may be compared to the two germinal layers of the
higher animals. He has made us better acquainted with several in-
teresting members of the class Vermes, Sagitta, Lacinularia, some
lower Annulosa, etc. He was the first to point out the affinities of
Echinodermata with Vermes. In opposition to the old view, that the
Echinodermata belong to the Radiata, and, on account of their radial
type, are to be classted with corals, medusa?, etc., Huxley showed that
the Avhole organization of the former is essentially diflerent from that of
the latter, and th-'t the Echinoderms are more nearly related, morpho-

1\''

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

logically, to worms. Further he has esseutially enlarged our knowl-
edge of the important group of Tuuicata by his researches on the
Ascidians, Appendicularia, Pyrosoma, Doliolum, Salpa, etc.

Many important advances in the morphology of the MoUusca and
Arthropoda are also due to him. Thus, e. g., he has greatly elucidated
the controverted subject of the homology of regions of the body in
the various classes of Mollusca. He has considered the generation of
vine-fretters from quite a new point of view, based on his " genealogi-
cal conception of animal Individuality." But it is the comparative
anatomy and classification of the Vertebrata which, during the last
ten years, he has especially studied and advanced. His excellent
" Lectures on the Elements of Comparative Anatomy " afibrd abun-
dant proof of this, to say nothing of his numerous important mono-
graphs, especially those on living and extinct fish, amphibians, rejD-
tiles, birds, and mammals.

Huxley's works on the comparative anatomy of the Vertebrata are
the only ones which can be compared with the otherwise incomparable
investigations of Carl Gegenbaur. These two inquirers exhibit, par-
ticularly in their peculiar scientific development, many points of rela-
tionship. They both belong to that small circle of morphologists
which is marked by the names of Caspar Friedrich Wolif, George
Cuvier, Wolfgang Goethe, Johannes Miiller, and Carl Ernst von
Baer.

More important than any of the individual discoveries which are
contained in Huxley's numerous less and greater researches on the most
widely difierent animals, are the profound and truly philosophical con-
ceptions which have guided him in his inquiries, have always enabled
him to distinguish the essential from the unessential, and to value special
empirical facts chiefly as a means of arriving at general ideas. Those
views of the two germinal layers of animals which were published as
early as 1849 belong to the most important generalizations of compar-
ative anatomy ; they already contain in germ the idea of the "perfect
homology of the two primary germinal layers through the wliole
series of animals (except protozoa)," which first found its complete
expression, a short time since, in the " Gastraa theory ; " also his re-
searches on animal individuality, his treatment of the celebrated ver-
tebral theory of the skull, in which he first opened out the right track,
following which Carl Gegenbaur has solved in so brilliant a manner
this important problem, and, above all, his exposition of the Theory
of Descent and its consequences belong to this class. After Charles
Darwin had, in 1859, reconstructed this most important biological
theory, and, by his epoch-making theory of Natural Selection, placed
it on an entirely new foundation, Huxley was the first who extended
it to man; and, in 1863, in his celebrated three lectures on "Man's
Place in Nature," admii-ably worked out its most important develop-
ments. With luminous clearness and convincing certainty, he has

SKETCH OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY. 745

here established the fundamental law that, in every respect, the ana-
tomical differences between man and the highest apes are of less value
than those between the highest and the lowest apes. Especially
weighty is the evidence adduced, for this law, in the most important
of all organs — the brain ; and by this the objections of Prof. Richard
Owen are, at the same time, thoroughly refuted. Not only has the
Evolution Theory received from Prof. Huxley a complete demonstra-
tion of its immense importance, not only has it been largely advanced
by his valuable comparative researches, but its spread among the gen-
eral public has been largely due to his well-known popular writings.
In these he has accomplished the difficult task of rendering most fully
and clearly intelligible, to an educated public of very various ranks,
the highest problems of philosophical biology. From the lowest to
the highest organisms, from Bathybius up to man, he has elucidated
the connecting law of development.

In these several ways he has, in the struggle for truth, rendered
Science a service which must ever rank as one of the highest of his
many and great scientific merits.

No statement of the character and work of Prof. Huxley would be
complete that did not recognize his remarkable attainments as a writer.
All who have read the masterly papers contained in " Lay Sermons,"
or the " Critiques and Addresses," will acknowledge his fine and vig-
orous command of English, and the literary richness of his style. He
has a keen enjoyment of literary excellence, and " keeps up " with
poetry, fiction, and the progress of critical thought, notwithstanding
his indefatigable scientific investigations. Owing to these traits, Prof.
Huxley has a high reputation as a popular scientific teacher ; and
even his " Lectures to Working-men " are models of what such dis-
courses should be — clear, simple, and attractive, yet carefully accurate
and strictly scientific. As a public speaker he is quiet, deliberate,
fluent, and, we might almost say, colloquial ; while socially he is ge-
nial, witty, and brilliant. He is, moreover, a man of enlarged sympa-
thies, in this respect contrasting markedly with many scientific men,
who are swallowed up in their specialties, and never give a thought to
any thing beyond them. Prof. Huxley has, however, overworked
himself, and damaged his health. We hope he will regain his power,
and be able to give this country a season of lecturing, as he has long
hoped to do. He is perhaps the only scientific man in England who
could revive for us the pleasant experience we had with Prof, Tyndall
last year.

74+

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLT.

CORRESPONDENCE.

. NOTE ON THE BREEDING HABITS OF
THE MUD-MLNNOW.

OUR very common " mud - minnow "
{Melanura limi, Agassiz — Sillimari's
American Journal of Science^ 1853, vol. xvi.,
p. 135), which is found over a wide extent of
territory in America, and which, according to
Dr. Albert Giinther (" Catalogue of Fishes,"
in the British Museum, vol. vi., p. 231), is
generically the same as the Umbra crameri
of Europe, presents some features in its
breeding habits which we have thought of
particular interest, and would be greatly
pleased to know if the European Umbra
crameri, which Dr. Giinther states inhabits
the " stagnant waters of Austria and Hun-
gary— neighborhood of Odessa," has identi-
cal habits ; or, if the difference of climate,
and character of the surroundings generally,
have caused a more or less noticeable varia-
tion in its habits, especially during the
spawning-season. We have not access to
any work, on the fishes of Central Europe,
that gives any details of their habits.

As we have already described it {Ameri-
can Naturalist, vol. iv., pp. lOY, 388, Fig. 86),
this little umbra is, " pure and simple," a
mud-loving fish, and more strictly so than
any other, unless we may except the eel
{A7ig>iilla acutirostris). During the present
winter we have had unusually favorable op-
portunities for studying the fish during this
part of the year. In December, while the
weather was cool rather than cold, with but
little ice, we found that hundreds of these
fish were being thrown out with the mud
then being scooped from the ditches of the
tract of meadow on the writer's farm. On
learning this, we had the mud carefully
taken out by shovelfuls and examined, to
learn the exact condition and position of
these fish. They were, when taken from
the mud, motionless, stiff, and apparently
frozen ; they were not brittle, and an at-
tempt to bend or break them resulted in a
very prompt but partial restoration of vi-
tality (or consciousness ?). Specimens thus
roughly handled were permanently injured
by being beut, even if not in excess of a de-

gree of curvature that they can and do
readily assume when in their normal con-
dition. On placing specimens freed from
mud in water of a temperature of 60° Fahr.,
which is pretty nearly or quite that of the
ditch-water in summer, they only fully re-
vived after lying on their sides, at the bot-
tom of the vessel, for from twenty-five to
forty minutes, and seemed to be injured
permanently by the sudden change ; but, if
placed, with the mud still adhering to them,
in water at a temperature of 40° Fahr.,
which became gradually warmer, by the ves-
sel containing the fish being removed to a
warm room, the minnows would become
wholly themselves again, in from ten to fif-
teen minutes, and swim off in full vigor, as
the nmd slowly loosened from them and
settled to the bottom of the vessel. As
taken from the bottom of the ditch, the mud
in which these minnows were hibernating
was of about the consistency of cheese.
As far as we were able to determine, these
fish had burrowed tail-foremost, to a depth
of from four to nine inches, and, in every
instance, we believe the tail was deeper than
the head, the position varying from almost
horizontal to nearly or quite perpendicular.
Pursuing the investigation somewhat
further, we found that, where these fishes
had gone into winter-quarters in deep water,
i. e., from three to five feet deep, the hi-
bernating slumber was not as profound ;
and, when they were placed in clear water,
at a temperature of 46° Fahr., they almost
immediately swam about; slowly at first,
but with steadily-increasing activity, and,
in from three to five minutes, were in full
possession of all their powers, and assumed
the statue-like positions common to them,
when seen in summer, when, for many min-
utes together, they will remain immovable,
and only move when the near approach of
an insect larva ofiTers them a sure chance
for a meal, or portion of one. It should be
here mentioned that the water in the ditches
from which we first gathered specimens va-
ried from nine to fifteen inches in depth,
and was coated with ice one inch thick.

CORRESPON-DENCE.

7^S

During the past month (February),
the weather being most of the time mild
and spring-like — the smaller frogs singing
throughout the day — we watched for the
first appearance of these mud-minnows, and
saw them in scanty numbei's, first, on Sun-
day, the 15th. A week later (Monday, 23d),
we found but few specimens in the muddy
ditches, but a vast number of females, with
distended abdomens, heavy with orange-
colored masses of ripe (?) ova, in the swift,
clear, ice-cold waters of the hill-side brooks.
On the 26th there was a violent snow-
storm, with cold northeast winds, but this
did not deter the " onward " movement of
the minnows. Of the specimens taken from
the rivulets, at this time, none were males,
and it seems probable, although we could
not positively ascertain the truth, that the
male fish follow the females, and either seek
out the deposited ova and fertilize it (does
this ever happen?), or that the females wait
until the arrival of the males before depos-
iting their eggs.

We would refer, in conclusion, to one
feature of their habits again. These fish,
at the commencement of winter, by burrow-
ing deeply in the mud of the waters they
frequent, avoid the decided lowering of the
temperature, which they, at this season,
seem unable to withstand ; but, at the ap-
proach of spring, they arrive, sjTichronously
with the maturing of the ova in the females,
and milt in the males, and, after thus re-
covering their wonted activity — say in Feb-
ruary— no amount of severe weather deters
them from seeking out exceptionally cold
waters for their spawning-beds. This was
shown by the late snow-storm above re-
ferred to, after which the female minnows
were still found passing up the brooks,
forcing their way up miniature cascades,
with all the agility of a salmon, leaping
from eddy to eddy, seeking out the most
distant points from their muddy summer
haunts that they could reach ; and here,
where but little water flowed, and with the
dry grass and twigs projecting from it,
thickly coated with crystal ice and glisten-
ing frost, we found the plainly-colored, di-
minutive mud-minnows hidden among the
pebbles and sandy ridges of the brook-bed.
Charles C. Abdott, M. D.
Teenton, N. J., March 2, 1874.

ANIMAL MIGRATIONS.
To tiie Editor of the Popular Science Monthly :

I BELIEVE that grasshoppers (locusts)
migrate solely on account of an enemy — a
dipterous insect much resembling the house-
fly, but larger, quicker, and grayish in color,
owing to the white hairs at the edges of the
articulations. This insect deposits its eggs
in the upper part of the locust's abdomen,
when the latter is resting on the ground, as
it cannot do so when flying. Its favorite
moment of attack is just as the locust
alights from a flight or a hop. In a few
days the larva or maggot is about a quarter
of an inch in length. Soon the locust dies,
when the larva eats its way out and bur-
rows in the ground for transformation.
Sometimes four of these larvae will be found
in one locust. I first noticed this in the
summer of 18'71. In 18Y2, when a flight
of locusts began to arrive, the fly destroyed
nearly all that came during the first two
weeks, or until cool nights seemed to stop
its multiplication. In 1873 I had an un-
usually fine opportunity to observe the lo-
custs, as they hatched in incredible num-
bers upon my farm, and devoured my crops.
During the whole summer the fly left the
locusts no quiet, but drove them to most des-
perate straits to avoid the attacks ; so that,
as soon as the locusts acquired wings, they
flew away — that is, what were left of them,
for I estimate that not one in fifty escaped
death. In places where the irrigating ditches
prevented them from crawling forward, they
were piled two and three inches deep. The
ground during the cool of the day would
be dotted with white maggots crawling off"
to find burrows. The locusts did not leave
on account of famine, for there were ample
fields of grain and other crops untouched ;
and they would sometimes abandon a field
when only slightly eaten. Besides, I have
seen the swarm floating all day in the air
when still, and constantly alighting and
arising, as hunger impelled from above, or
the fly from below. I do not find this fly
mentioned in Tenney's work on " Entomol-
ogy." If comparatively new, there is hope
that it will work the destruction of the lo-
custs. I also believe the latter can be read-
ily destroyed by the combined efforts of
man, as they hatch in exceedingly small
areas.

746

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MOXTHLY.

The prairie-dog {Cynomes ludovicianus) \
is migratory, although it moves slowly, ac- '
complishiug hardly more than half a mile a j
year. Appareatlj-, their object is to obtain |
fresh food, for they eat root and branch as '
they go. The leaders are, invariably, the
young, who are constantly driven out by
their more mature and powerful brethren.
Their vacated holes are occupied by owls
and rattle-snakes, but whether these prove
enemies or not I do not know.

I strongly suspect that the cause of mi-
gration in the lemmings is the parasites
which infest their bodies. These, after a few
years, increase to such numbers as to be
unendurable ; then the lemmings set out and
are never known to return until they have
overcome their enemies in the flood.

S. E. Wilder.
Gkeelet, Colobado, Feb. 28, 1874

ME. SPENCER XST> THE WOMEX.

Sir: Two papers have already appeared
in your columns relating to Mr. Herbert
Spencer's " Study of Sociology : " — a direct
review of the work, January 10th, to which
Viscount Amberley has given the credit of
fairly appending to it his own name, thus
placing his comments on the author's view
of women on the true class-footing of their
being the judgment of a man; and a letter,
December 20th, confined to this point, to
which, through its being signed only with
the initial " L.," class-weight of this sort is
entirely wanting, notwithstanding the actual
force of its remarks — thus forming, as I
wish to argue, a notable instance of the un-
desirableness of that practice of signing by
mere initials which is contended for in an-
other article of the first-mentioned number,
on the ground of its being a protection to
the modest, retiring, sensitive nature of
some writers who yet feel that they have
something to say which would be well said.
My object, then, is now the twofold one, of
on the one hand repeating (with some dif-
ference) the main arguments of " L.," under
the avowed character of a woman ; and on
the other of pressing upon my fellow-women
the present necessity, as especially called
forth by Mr. Spencer's recent work, of wom-
en 7iot indulging on this occasion in the

moral timidity which the hiding of their
real names is the effect of. It is the pecu-
liarity of the case that, as all writers have
hitherto been taken for granted to be men,
there has sprung a natural desire among
actual women-writers to play a trick on the
public, which has thence caused them as
much as possible to force the matter of
their omi thoughts into the mould of those
of men. And although, perhaps, there may
be little harm in this where it is fiction
alone that is concerned, I contend that it is
really a deep injury in relation to those
practical questions with which specially all
the literature of journals must be occupied.
I share strongly with " L." the disap-
pointment which he or she expresses on the
turn which to me also appears indicated in
Mr. Spencer's design against the present
desire arisen in women to take their part in
the social regulating of their country. I
mean, chiefly, as to those appended state-
ments of his, cast as if casually into the
foot-notes at the end of his volume, which,
however, contain in this pecuhar instance
what must be taken by his readers as a sort
of a priori basis to his whole intended rea-
soning on the subject to come; the whole
statements, crowded into almost a single
page, regard matters on which it is the very
claim of women that no settled opinion is
yet possible. Mr. Spencer signifies that
whatever fruits of the higher kind of in-
tellect women possibly may produce are,
nevertheless, by a certain degree of " nor-
mal limitation," to be accounted of as mere
mental monstrosities — mere aberrations from
the true course of development which is the
only profitable course. He obviously thinks
it nothing against such course that some of
the number of men should exclude them-
selves from the ordinary duties of domestic
and social life, in order that, by strained ef-
forts at intellectual illumination, they may
guide those self-efforts of commoner men,
which, in the case of men, he asserts are
the only true means of real culture ; but
with women he impUes that all such seclu-
sion can inevitably produce nothing of any
value so long as men are at hand to afibrd
the required lights. Nothing but an abso-
lute dearth of men present to do that for
women which normally they cannot do for
themselves — the case referred to being

EDITOR'S TABLE.

IM

specially that of ascertaining their own so-
cial status — can justify the alleged wasting
of their real powers ! Surely this is a re-
versal of his plan for men, threatening a
philosophic tyranny in his future scheme
over the true instincts of women, which the
latter cannot possibly feel to be justice to
them.

Most needfully, then, in the face of such
threatened injury on the part of a writer
who is daily becoming more and more of de-
served weight in social topics, must women
look to one another ; that is, for the openly-
expressed class-feeling which manifestly is
the thing that is now called for. The best
thing that has been said for us by Mr. Mill,
and that for which I think, for one, we owe
him a debt of gratitude never to be extin-
guished, is that, after all, women must speak
for themselves. Unless they will do so, this
most generous of our advocates has said, it
must remain "impossible that any man, or
all men taken together, should have knowl-
edge which can qualify them to lay down
the law to women as to what is, or is not,
their vocation " (" Subjection of Women,"

p. 48). Let me, however, add, on the other
side, that in my own view this demand of
self-expression from women by no means in-
cludes any equal need of immediate political
action. Until the subject has been well
thought out between men and women, with
much more of careful study than is com-
patible with popular agitation, I am con-
vinced that any too eager pressing forward
toward practical arrangement of it must be
dangerously premature. And for this end
I believe truly that we need, not only all the
instruction that Mr. Spencer can give us,
both philosophic and scientific, but all the
strenuous mental effort on the part of at
least those who must take lead among us,
which he seems to condemn. I recognize
fully that we can in no way do better than
to take him as our teacher — however little
he may perhaps himself approve of this —
provided always that in learning from him
we remain true to ourselves.

I am, etc., Sara S. Hennell.

Coventry, January 20, 18'74.
— Examiner.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

TEE WORK AND INFLUENCE OF THE
MONTHLY.

THE present number closes the sec-
ond year and the fourth volume
of The Popular Science Monthly.
That it met a demand is shown by the
fact that it has been better sustained
than any other scientific magazine of
its class that has been started in any
country. That it has fulfilled its early
promise in the estimation of the pub-
lic, is shown also by the fact that it
has been increasingly commended with
each succeeding issue. We wish to
make it still better, but our power to
do so will depend upon the liberality
of its patronage; and we therefore so-
licit all who would increase its strength
and extend its usefulness, to do what
they can to make it more widely
known in their respective circles of
inquiring and intelligent readers. The

Monthly is as yet known to but very
few of those who would appreciate
and prize it, and our friends can do
much, as man}' of them have already
done, by lending their copies to
thoughtful neighbors, and inducing
them to form clubs.

In regard to the character of The
PoPTJLAE Science Monthly, we have
preferred to let it speak for itself, and
have made no parade of the numerous
and flattering commendations of it
which we have received from eminent
sources. But there come a few words
regarding the importance of our work
from a distant country, which we may
be excused for giving to our readers.

From a letter of Mr. Bancroft,
American minister at the court of Ber-
lin, to the publishers in New York,
we select the following passage : " I re-
ceive from time to time your Populak

748

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Science Monthly, whicli I think excel-
lent in itself and perfectly adapted to
its purpose of diffusing knowledge and
a right way of thinking more widely
among the people. I have done what
I could to spread the knowledge of
the periodical, and it is here very
highly esteemed. Prof. Helmholtz and
Prof. Dabois-Reymond have both
spoken to me their opinions very
much in its favor, and higher author-
ity could not be found. I should not
do justice to ray own opinions if I did
not add how well I think you deserve
of the country for the persistent and
judicious manner in which you em-
ploy your great influence through your
business to spread through the country
the important works of science as fast
as they appear. In this way you give
very material aid toward educating the
coming generation to the love of truth
and a knowledge of the world in which
they live."

In the same letter Mr. Bancroft
adds : "I send you to-day a copy of a
masterly address of Prof. Dubois-Eey-
mond, who, you know, stands among
the highest in his branch of science : I
hope you will have it translated and
published in The Popular Science
Monthly. Xo essay of the kind since
I have been in Germany has attracted
so much attention, and, as you see, it
has already arrived at its third edi-
tion." The address here spoken of is
on " The Limits of our Knowledge of
Nature." It is certainly a masterly
discussion, and will appear in our next
issue.

TEE mOHEB EDUCATION OF WOMAN.

Of the great movement of modern
culture, one of the most important
phases is that now recognized as the
" higher education of woman." That
woman requires a better education
than she has hitherto had, and that
it should also be of a higher grade,
are undeniable, although the prac-

tical questions that arise in the at-
tempt to define and attain it are seri-
ous and formidable. The prevalent
short-cut solution of the problem —
women crave a higher education, there-
fore open to them the higher institu-
tions— is as far as possible from being
an adequate or satisfactory disposition
of the case.

It is a constant complaint among
the leaders of the woman's movement,
that, in consequence of the long subjec-
tion of the sex to the domination of
men, women have not been allowed or
incited to think for themselves. They
complain that women's ideas have been
moulded by men, in conformity to the
state of subordination in which the
weaker sex has been held, and that the
first thing women have to do is to as-
sert themselves mentally, to develop
their own powers in their own way, to
form their own opinions, and not be
forever dependent upon those who by
the radical bias of an opposite consti-
tution are incapable of comprehending
woman or of doing justice to her capa-
cities. On this ground it is of course
impossible for woman to accept a mas-
culine education. For the existing col-
leges and universities have not only
been originated and developed through
centuries exclusively by men, but they
have been pervaded by the thoughts
and animated by the feelings and tastes,
and moulded by the aims and necessi-
ties, of men. If women are to free
themselves from male control in the
matter of one-sided mental influence,
it would seem that their first care
should be not to subject themselves to
the action of those institutions the
very object of which is to assimilate
and determine the intellectual charac-
ter of students into harmony with their
own policy.

We yield to no others in the ear-
nestness of our belief in the higher edu-
cation of women ; but we want to see
them take the matter in their own
hands, and work out a system of mental

EDITOR'S TABLE.

749

cultivation adapted to their own na-
tures and needs. The higher educa-
tion as embodied in existing institu-
tions cannot meet this requirement.
It is, in fact, nnder indictment for non-
adaptation to the present wants of
men ; and one of the most profound
and important of the reforms of our
age is that thorough modification of
collegiate methods of study that shall
bring them up to the demands of mod-
ern life. That they now answer to
these demands, but very few will main-
tain. There are many, and the num-
ber is increasing, who do not go to
college because the education there
obtained is thought to be of little use
to the possessor, if not indeed a hin-
drance to him in his future experience
with the world. Thousands ignore all
considerations of the usefulness of
what is to be learned, and go or are
sent to college because it is the proper
thing, a fashion of society, and has its
social benefits; and many undoubted-
ly go because they have been made to
believe that the old education is the
perfection of human wisdom for men-
tal discipline, and is, after all, the
best thing even for practical life. Yet
the distrust of the system is deep, and
has already made itself so powerfully
felt, that the colleges have been com-
pelled to yield to it, and in many cases
to modify their methods of instruction
and create supplemental schools de-
voted to modern knowledge. The
higher education of men is thus in a
state of conflict and transition ; the old
education is giving way, and a New
Education is rising in its place.

It seems to us that this is the first
fact for women to consider in their ef-
forts to attain a higher education. The
question that is forced upon men, What
shall the higher education be? has
even a graver concern for women, for
it is not only an open one, but it is an
experiment which must be submitted
to the test of time, and if mismanaged
may be full of peril. It behooves wom-

j en not to be so carried away by the
I current clamor about the advantages of
I education, that they are willing to ac-
cept any thing under that name that is
dispensed from the schools. Education,
like every thing else, may be good or
bad, worthless or valuable ; but it dif-
fers from most other things in this, that,
if bad and worthless, it cannot be got rid
of. We have yet to realize the impor-
tant fact that much so-called education
is worse than none at all ; and that it is
better to leave the mind to its spontane-
ous forces and its self-development un-
der the action of the surrounding influ-
ences of Nature and life, rather than to
meddle with it inconsiderately, to bur-
den it with worthless knowledge, or to
violate its proportions by an extrava-
gant over-culture of some faculties and
a total neglect of others. Were the
doors of all the colleges of the coun-
try to be opened to-morrow to woman,
in good faith, and in obedience to a
public sentiment that would lead her
to avail herself of the opportunity as
men do, we believe that the result
could not be otherwise than in a high
degree disastrous to woman and to so-
ciety ; and this because the education
which she would get would be not
what she requires, would be put in the
place of what she requires, and would
indeflnitely postpone the attainment of
what she requires.

It is well for woman that, in awaken-
ing to the necessity of a higher culti-
vation of her faculties, she is free in the
choice of means; but it remains to be
seen what she will do with her chance.
There is superabounding knowledge,
the ripening of all the past — wheat and
chaff; there is the world's long expe-
rience with education for help or for
warning; what, then, will woman do
toward constructing a higher education
for herself? Will she follow blindly
the old traditions, content with any
thing, and accept the culture that man
has outgrown and is rejecting ; or will
she be equal to the occasion, and form

750

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

for herself a cumculum of studies
suited to the requirements of her own
nature ?

That woman has a sphere marked
out by lier organization, however the
notion may be scouted by the reform-
ers, is as true as that the bird and the
fish have spheres which are determined
by their organic natures. Birds often
plunge into the watery deep, and fishes
sometimes rise into the air, but one is
nevertheless formed for swimming and
the other for flight. So women may
make transient diversions from the
sphere of activity for which they are
constituted, but they are nevertheless
formed and designed for maternity, the
care of children, and the aff"airs of do-
mestic life. They are the mothers of
humankind, the natural educators of
childhood, the guardians of the house-
hold, and by the deepest ordinance of
things they are this, in a sense, and to
a degree, that man is not. For woman
in these relations, education has hith-
erto done but little, and humanity has
suffered as a consequence. To the
mothers of the race, especially, belongs
the question of its preservation and im-
provement. The problem is transcend-
ent, and woman's interest in it more
immediate and vital than man's can be.
Science has furnished the knowledge
that is required, a vast mass of truth
that is waiting to be applied for the
conduct and ennobling of the domestic
sphere. Man has originated it; is it
not for woman to use it ? And now,
■when there is so much agitation to
give woman larger mental opportuni-
ties, and she is pressing for the advan-
tages of a higher education, we have a
right to expect that she will consider
the subject from her own point of
view, and supply the great educational
need that has been so long recognized
and deplored. The new departure of
higher female education should unques-
tionably be from the results of the
medical profession. We believe that
physicians have by no means yet taken

the share in general education that the
interests of society require ; but, when
the mental cultivation of women is to
become systematic and they have their
own higher institutions, the agency of
physicians will be indispensable. It is
not that all women are to be doc-
tors, but that they are to be instructed
and become intelligent first of all in
the sciences of life, with which also
the physician has to deal. If, to get
the A. M. of Yale or Harvard, would
be worth the struggle for women, as
qualifying them for the intelligent ful-
fillment of their destiny, let the doors
be battered down if necessary for their
entrance ; but, if it would not conduce
to this end, and would rather be fatal
to it, let the doors remain double-
locked. If the present aspiration is to
be utilized, the movement must not
take a false direction. New institu-
tions are called for, that shall supply a
new education on the feminine side.
The system of studies may be broad
and liberal in the best sense, but what
we insist on is that it should be shaped
with fundamental reference to the life-
needs of female students. From this
point of view our existing female col-
leges are liable to criticism ; in so far
as they are imitations of the old mas-
culine establishments, they do not meet
the wants of the sex, and rather ob-
struct than aid the true course of femi-
nine cultivation.

EXPERIMENTS UPON LIYINQ ANIMALS.

There is no element of human na-
ture more noble than that sympathy
with inferior creatures which leads to
a kindly regard for their welfare, and
protects them from wanton or careless
suffering; and it is gratifying to ob-
serve that this feeling is becoming so
definite, so strong, and so extended, as
to have embodied itself in organizations
for the systematic prevention of cruelty
to animals, "With all our boasted civ-

EDITORS TABLE.

751

ilization and enliglitenment, men are yet
very much barbarians, and the cruel in-
stiijcts of the savage still animate many
a nominal Christian. The hamaner
feelings are beginning to assert their
influence; but they encounter fearful
odds in the struggle with hereditary
impulses to violence, and that artistic
refinement of brutality which seeks en-
joyment in the suffering of inferior
creatures.

Yet, like every thing else, the kindly
sentiments toward animals may be car-
ried to extremes and run into absurd-
ity. We live in a world, or at least in
a stage of it, in which suffering is not
to be escaped. By the constitution of
things, it must be inflicted. Older than
the Decalogue, older than man, as old
as the earliest life, is the divine ordi-
nance of Nature to kill or be killed.
The necessity of mutual destruction was
instituted in the nature and with the
first appearance of living things. Not
only was death the doom of all, but
death by violence and mutual ruthless
slaughter was the necessary and normal
result of the arrangement. The world
has advanced through agony, and, in its
unfolding, the price of higher enjoy-
ment has ever been intenser pain. As
the nervous system of the animal series
has become more voluminous, delicate,
and complex, the capacity of suffering
as well as pleasure is increased ; and,
in the most perfected being, the very
flowering of genius opens new suscep-
tibilities for painful emotion of which
natures with lower gifts know nothing.
Pain, therefore, is not to be escaped.
Each sentient creature by the law of
its being strives to avoid it, and it is
incumbent upon all to lessen it as far
as possible, but it is wrought into the
inexorable economy of things, and not
to recognize and deal with it as any
other fact is irrational.

It hurts insects to be killed, but we
must kill them in self-defense. We
destroy the lower animals for our
food, but there is a deeper reason for

being rid of them, because, if suffered
to multiply unchecked, they would
put an end to us. 'It will therefore
not do to yield in this matter to the
pure dictates of sentiment. There is
an infliction of pain that is reasonable
and necessary, and one of the cases of
it is afforded by the physiologist who
makes painful experiments upon the
lower animals to extend the knowl-
edge of his science. As the exigen-
cies of diet may require us to slay an
ox, so the demands of scientific truth
may require us to sacrifice a rabbit or
a dog. In both cases the pain pro-
duced should be the least possible, but
in both the ends are reasonably held to
justify the infliction. Yet there have
been many and earnest protests against
vivisection, or experiments upon liv-
ing animals, as an inexcusable cruelty ;
and physiologists have recently been
the subjects of a fresh assault by sen-
timental writers in the London literary
press. The arguments in favor of the
practice are so convincingly stated, and
the objections to it so well refuted, in
a paper by Dr. Foster, of Cambridge,
that we reproduce it in the present
number of the Monthly. It will well
repay perusal.

LITERARY NOTICES.

English Psychology. Translated from the
French of Theodore Ribot,' Professor
of Philosophy in the Lyc6e at Laval.
New York : D. Appleton & Co. 328 pp.
Price, $1.50.

The study of the human miud is beyond
all doubt one of the most subhme and im-
portant, as it is certainly one of the most
difficult, of all studies. So great is its inter-
est that it has fascinated philosophers for
thousands of years, and so great is its diffi-
culty that of all branches of inquiry it has
proved least amenable to investigation, and
has led to the most discordant conclusions.
From the beginning of speculation it has
been pursued by a method that has failed to

» Pronounced Rebo.

752

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

yield agreement or results that have com-
pelled the general acceptance of thinkers.
Its problems were too complex, subtile, and
exaUi'd, to be effectually dealt with before
men had been trained to the work of inves-
tigation on the subordinate planes of natu-
i-al phenomena. The lower before the high-
er, the simple before the complex, must be
the law of movement where not only truths
of the highest order are to be reached, but
the methods by which they are to be ar-
rived at have also to be discovered. There
was needed a long and severe apprentice-
ship of science in the work of unraveling
phenomena before the realm of mind could
be entered with any confidence of its con-
quest. And it was not only necessary to
learn by scientific practice the difficult art
of investigation, but the solution of mental
problems was vitally dependent upon a spe-
cies of knowledge which ordinary science
alone could disclose. Of mind, as a phe-
nomenon to be investigated, we know noth-
ing whatever, except as a manifestation of
organic life. It is conditioned by organic
laws, and there can be no competent men-
tal science that does not recognize this
truth. Mind, moreover, is exhibited, with
a thousand modifications, through all the
grades of animate being, and these diversi-
ties must be regarded by any true science
of the subject. The psychical natures of
the quadruped, the bird, the fish, the insect,
may not be so dignified as that of man, and
may afford less inspiring themes for decla-
mation, but, in a scientific point of view,
they are of equal interest, and their inves-
tigation is imperative. It could not be other-
wise, therefore, than that mental philosophy
should be profoundly afiFected both by that
drill in research and that extension of
knowledge which have resulted from the
last three centuries of scientific progress.
The new phase which the subject has con-
sequently assumed is known as the Modern
Psychology or the New Psychology, and
this has given rise to a school of thought,
the most eminent representatives of which
are Englishmen. With a few exceptions,
and those of hardly the highest mark, Ger-
many clings to the old methods. France is
behind the age in every thing, our own coun-
try is crippling along after European tradi-
tions, and it is left to England to pioneer

the world in the work of psychological de-
velopment.

Prof. Ribot's book is the tribute of a
candid and unprejudiced foreigner to the
greatness of the English school of scientific
psychology, and it is an admirable analysis
of the contributions of the representative
English writers upon this subject. An en-
thusiastic student of philosophy himself,
and thoroughly imbued with the scientific
spirit, Prof. Ribot brings eminent qualifica-
tions to his task, and grasps the subject
with the power of a master, while his work
has a judicial fairness in the estimate of
men that is favored by his foreign point of
view. He writes, moreover, with a point
and clearness that are quite unusual in
treating this class of subjects. Prof. Ribot
gives us in this volume a lucid account of
the systems of Hartley, James Mill, Herbert
Spencer, Alexander Bain, George H. Lewes,
Samuel Bailey, and John Stuart Mill, and
his work altogether aflFords the best deline-
ation we have of the positions and grounds
of the New Psychological School that has
come forward into such prominence in the
present generation.

Prof. Ribot prefixes to his volume an
admirable and instructive introductory
chapter on the relations of philosophy,
science, and metaphysics, and the gradual
growth and present position of scientific
psychology. In his section considering the
several definitions of it, he remarks as fol-
lows concerning one of them:

"We are told that psychology is the
science of the human soul. That is a very
narrow and incomplete idea of it. Is bi-
ology ever defined as the science of human
life ? Has physiology ever believed, even
in its infancy, that its only object was man ?
Have they not considered, on the contrary,
that every thing which has organized and
manifested life belongs to them — the infu-
soria, as well as man ? Now, unless we ad-
mit the Cartesian opinion of animal ma-
chines — which has no longer, to my knowl-
edge, an adherent — we must acknowledge
that animals have their sensations, their
sentiments, their desires, their pleasures,
their pains, their character, just like our-
selves ; that there is a collection of psycho-
logical facts which one has no right to sub-
tract from the science. Who has studied

LITERARY NOTICES.

753

those facts ? The naturalists, and not the
psychologists. If we were to go further,
■B-e might show that ordinary psychology, in
restricting itself to man, has not even in-
cluded the whole of mankind ; that it has
taken no heed of the inferior races (black
and yellow); that it has contented itself
with affirming that the human faculties are
identical in natmre and various only in de-
gree, as if the difference of degree might
not sometimes be such as to be equivalent
to a difference of nature ; that in man it
has taken the faculties already constituted,
and rarely occupied itself with their mode
of development ; so that, finally, psychol-
ogy, instead of being the science of psy-
chical phenomena, has simply made man,
adult, civilized, and white, its object.

" We have seen how psychology under-
stands its object, let us now see how it un-
derstands its method. This consists en-
tirely in reflection, or interior observation.
Assuredly, no one believes more firmly than
we do in the necessity of this mode of ob-
servation ; it is the point of departure, the
indispensable condition of all psychology,
and those who have denied it, like Bvous-
saisand AugusteComte, have so completely
gone against evidence, and given the game
to their adversaries, that their most faith-
ful disciples have not gone so far with them.
It is certain that the anatomist and the
physiologist might pass centuries in study-
ing the brain and the nerves, without ever
suspecting what a pleasure or a pain is, if
they have not felt both.

"No testimony is so valuable on this
point as that of consciousness, and we are
always brought back to that saying of an
anatomist — ' In the presence of the fibres
of the brain, we are like hackney-coach-
men, who know the streets and the houses,
but know nothing of what takes place in-
side them.' It is also certain that the ob-
jections made to this method of observation
have been very well discussed. But is it
true that interior observation is the unique
method of psychology ? that it reveals
every thing, that it suffices for every thing?
Taken in its rigorous meaning, this doctrine
would lead to the impossibility of the sci-
ence. For, if my reflection aj^rises me of
that which passes in me, it is absolutely in-
capable of enabling me to penetrate into

TOL. IT. — 48

the mind of another. A more complicated
process is necessary for that. We are talk-
ing ; a man present at our conversatioa
joins in it with an absent manner, says a
few words with evident effort, and forces a
smile ; I conclude from all this that he is a
prey to some hidden trouble. I may soon
divine its causes if I have a penetrating
mind, and if I am acquainted with this man
and his antecedents. But this psychologi-
cal discovery is a very complex operation,
of which the following are the stages : per-
ception of signs and gestures, interpretation
of those signs, induction from effects to
causes, inference, reasoning by analogy. It
has nothing in common with interior obser-
vation except that aptitude for knowing
others better which comes from knowing
one's self better. Thus, one of two things
is the case : either psychology is limited to
interior observations, and, these being com-
pletely individual, it has no longer any
scientific character ; or else it is extended
to other men, it searches out laws, it prac-
tises induction, it reasons, and then it is
susceptible of progress ; but its method ia
to a great extent objective. Interior obser-
vation alone is not sufficient for the weak-
est psychology."

IXTEENATIOXAL SCIENTIFIC SEEIES,
NO. Till.

Animal Locomotion ; or. Walking, Swim-
ming, AND Flying. With a Dissertation
on Aeronautics. By J. Bell Petti-
grew, M. D., F. R. S. New York : D.
Appleton & Co. 264 pp. Illustrated.
Price, Sl.TS.

Locomotion by steam began but a few
years since ; its principles are simple, and
the machines by which it is accomplished
are all of one general construction ; yet we
have already whole libraries of literature
— folios, quartos, and octavos, cyclopaedias,
c?says, and catechisms, technical and popu-
lar— expounding and explaining it. Much
also has beea written in elucidation of the
principles and mechanisms of progression
that are illustrated in the animal kingdom ;
but the present volume of Dr. Pettigrew is
the first popular monograph on the subject
that we have seen, and, although not large,
it contains much curious and interesting
information upon all aspects of it. But the

754

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

c'.iief interest of Dr. Pettigrew's book for
thoughtful readers will consist in the skill-
ful way he strikes through those diversities
of movement and medium which are in-
volved in the three forms of progression,
and brings out the principles that are com-
mon to all. " We are apt," he says, " to
consider walking as distinct from swim-
ming, and walking and swimming as dis-
tinct from flying, than which there can be
no greater mistake. Walking, swimming,
and flying are, in reality, only modifications
of each other. Walking merges into swim-
ming, and swimming into flying, by insen-
sible gradations. The modifications which
result in walking, swimming, and flying, are
necessitated by the fact that the earth af-
fords a greater amount of support than the
water, and the water than the air. That
walking, swimming, and flying, represent in-
tegral parts of the same problem, is proved
by the fact that most quadrupeds swim as
well as walk, and some even fly, while many
marine animals walk as well as swim, and
birds and insects walk, swim, and fly, indis-
criminately."

The problem thus becomes interesting
from the unity of its fundamental laws, but
for the author it has more than a specula-
tive interest; it has a scientific importance
as furnishing conditions for solving the
problems of artificial progression.

Upon this point he remarks : " The his-
tory of artificial progression is essentially
that of natural progression. The same
laws regulate and determine both. The
wheel of the locomotive and the screw of
the steamship apparently greatly differ from
the limb of the quadruped, the fin of the
fish, and the wing of the bird ; but, as I
shall show in the sequel, the curves which
go to form the wheel and the screw are
found in the traveling surfaces of all ani-
mals, whether they be limbs (furnished with
feet), or fins, or wings.

" It is a remarkable circumstance that the
undulation or wave made by the wing of
an insect, bat, or bird, when those animals
are hovering before an object, and when
they are flying, corresponds in a marked
manner with the track described by the
stationary and progressive waves in fluids,
and likewise with the waves of sound.

" Of all animal movements, flight is in-

disputably the finest. It may be regarded
as the poetry of motion. The fact that a
creature as heavy, bulk for bulk, as are many
solid substances can, by the unaided move-
ments of its wings, urge itself through the air
with a speed little short of that of a cannon-
ball, fills the mind with wonder. Flight (if
I may be allowed the expression) is a more
unstable movement than that of walking
and swimming, the instability increasing as
the medium to be traversed becomes less
dense. It, however, does not essentially
differ from the other two, and I shall be
able to show, in the following pages, that
the materials and forces employed in flight
are literally the same as those employed in
walking and swimming."

These passages foreshadow the charac-
ter of Dr. Pettigrew's book. He works
out the principles of animal locomotion as
a further step in the progress of artificial
locomotion, by which the theoretical issues
in the practical. After an elaborate analy-
sis of the anatomical and dynamical condi-
tions of flight, he goes into the question of
its imitation by art, and points out the con-
ditions on which he thinks the problem may
be ultimately solved. Here, of course, he
launches into an untried field, abounding
with difficulty, and open to a diversity of
opinions. Already a brisk controversy has
sprung up in the London journals over his
theory of flight, and the question of prece-
dence in its elucidation between the French
and the English ; but, whatever may be its
merits, the interest of Dr. Pettigrew's con-
tributions to the question in the present
volume will remain unaffected. We should
not omit to state that the volume is profuse-
ly and beautifully illustrated with original
cuts and plates.

Prang's Natural History Series of Col-
ored CiiROMOS. For Schools and Fami-
lies. Classified by N. A. Calkins ; 14
large Plates ; 192 Cards. Price of full
set, $10. J. W. Schermerhorn & Co.,
Agents, 14 Bond Street, New York.

Mr. Prang, having achieved fortune and
fame in the cultivation of the chromo-litho-
graphic art in the department of fancy pict-
ures, has at length turned his attention to
education, and applied it to the illustration
of objects of natural history. A large num-

LITERARY NOTICES.

755

ber of specimens of plants and animals, se-
lected by Mr. Calkins to represent the more
interesting groups of organic forms, are
printed in colors upon cards for convenience
of handling in the class-room. It needs not
to be said that these illustrations are beau-
tifully executed, and cannot fail to prove in
a high degree attractive to children. That
they have been executed with care and cor-
rectness, under the vigilant direction of Mr,
Calkins, there can be no doubt. As to
their utility in education, that will depend
entirely upon the teacher and the policy of
the school. If employed as guides to the
study of real objects, they cannot fail to be
helpful ; but, if subordinated to the usual
system of study, and accepted in place of
the things they represent, they will have
simply the value of excellent pictures, and
will add to the already immense mass of
hindrances and stumbling-blocks which the
schools interpose between the minds of
children and the objects of Nature.

The Stone Age, Past and Present, by
E. B. Tylor ; and Theory of Nervous
Ether, by Dr. Richardson, F. R. S.
Boston : Estes & Lauriat. Price, 25
cents.

This is No. 9 of "Half-Hour Recrea-
tions in Popular Science." The first paper
is a popular account of the stone age, or, as
the author puts it, " of that period in the
history of mankind during which stone was
habitually used as a material for weapons
and tools." This period he divides into two
parts, the first of which he calls the Un-
ground Stone Age, when the implements em-
ployed were merely chipped out, and used
in a comparatively rough and imperfect
shape. Such implements are found in
greatest abundance in the Drift or Quater-
nary Deposits, and in the early bone-caves,
and consist largely of chipped flints, appar-
ently designed for spear -heads, arrow-
heads, scrapers, knives, etc. The second
or later division of the period above re-
ferred to — the Ground Stone Age — is char-
acterized by the employment of ground and
often polished instruments of stone, much
more perfect than the chipped forms, and
therefore denoting a higher stage of human
progress. Stone implements are found in
nearly every part of the world, and, what-

ever their source, show a remarkable uni-
formity of pattern. This latter feature the
author accounts for partly on the principle
that man does the same thing under the
same circumstances, and partly on the be-
lief that the art was derived by one race
from another. The evidences of the stone
age, brought to light in the countries hith-
erto explored, take up the remainder of
the paper. Any one wishing a general idea
of what is at present known on this inter-
esting subject, will be well repaid by a pe-
rusal of this essay.

The theory of a nervous ether we will
give in the author's own words : " The idea
attempted to be conveyed by the theory
is, that between the molecules of the mat-
ter, solid or fluid, of which the nervous or-
ganism, and indeed of which all the organic
parts of the body are composed, there exists
a refined, subtile medium, vaporous or gase-
ous, which holds the molecules in a condi-
tion for motion upon each other, and for
arrangement and rearrangement of form ;
a medium by and through which all motion
is conveyed ; by and through which the one
organ or part of the body is held in com-
munion with the other parts, and by and
through which the outer living world com-
municates with the living man — a medium
which, being present, enables the phenom-
ena of life to be demonstrated, and which,
being universally absent, leaves the body
actually dead ; in such condition, i. e., that
it cannot, by any phenomenon of motion,
prove itself to be alive." The paper is de-
voted to an elucidation of this theory.

Insects of the Garden : Their Habits, etc.
By A. S. Packard, Jr. Boston : Estes
& Lauriat. Price, 25 cents.

This is the first part of a volume from
the pen of Prof. Packard, entitled "Half-
Hours with Insects," to be issued in twelve
parts, of about 36 pages each, by the above
house. Beginning with some general con-
siderations on the relations of living ob-
jects to one another, the author passes
thence to the subject of agriculture, and
the manner in which its interests are affect-
ed by the incursions of insects. Numerous
instances are given of their terrible de-
structiveness to crops, which, though appar-
ently insignificant when estimated, say, for

756

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

a single township, amounts to something al-
most incredible when an entire State or coun-
try is included in the calculation. Accord-
ing to the reports of Dr. Fitch, $12,000,000
worth of wheat has been destroyed in the
State of New York, in a single year, by
the wheat-midge and Hessian-fly. An in-
teresting account is next given of the re-
production, growth, and metamorphosis, of
insects, with some remarks on their psy-
chology, their relations to each other, and
their relations to other animals. The last
twelve pages are devoted to the insects of
the garden, some of the more noxious of
which are described, their habits sketched,
and the means of combating them indi-
cated. A beautiful chromo-lithograph, show-
ing the dififerent stages of insect metamor-
phosis, heads the issue, and the succeeding
pages abound with well-executed illustra-
tions. For clearness and vigor of style, the
name of the author is sufficient guarantee.

Manual of Physical Geography and In-
stitutions OF THE State of Iowa. By
C. A. White, Professor of Geology in
the State University. Davenj5ort : Day,
Egbert & Fidlar. 1873.
This book was made for use in the
schools of Iowa, being limited to the physi-
cal geography and institutions of that State.
This has enabled the author to give a large
amount of information, locally valuable, that
would be obviously out of place in a more
general work. For convenience, the book
is divided into two parts. Part I. gives an
account of the leading natural features of
the State — its physical geography, geology,
climate, soil, minerals, and natural history.
Part II. deals with the history of the State,
and includes an account of its educational,
charitable, and penal institutions. The few
who may desire to carry the study into a
wider field, will find the mastery of this
work an excellent preparation.

The Theory and Practice of Linear Per-
spective. Translated from the French
of V. Pellegrin. New York : Putnam's
Sons. 51 pp., with colored chart.

The author claims that books of this
kind are generally too theoretical, and that
ha has aimed to make this especially prac-
tical. It was adopted by the educational
authorities of Paris, and commended by

them as a " little book which, under a mod-
est form, contains ideas of which the popu-
larization would be of great use — 'The
Practical Theory of Perspective,' a study
for the use of artists, etc., by Monsieur V.
Pellegrin, late Professor of Topography at
the Military School of St. Cyr. The author,
himself a painter, and accustomed to the
manipulation of geometrical methods, was
particularly qualified for writing this trea-
tise ; and he has been able, by dint of re-
search and ability, to condense into a small
number of pages the laws of perspective ;
and to extract, from a confused mass, rules
which are very simple and easily applicable
to every possible case ; thus placing a sure
and clear guide within the reach of all stu-
dents, artists, and amateurs. Monsieur
Pellegrin's excellent treatise will become a
standard work."

Submerged and Different Forms of Re-
taining Walls. By James S. Tate,
C. E. New York : D. Yan Nostrand.
1874. Price, 50 cents.

This is No. 7 of the publisher's " Sci-
ence Series." The simple statement of
what the author has proposed to himself to
accomplish will be the best evidence of the
value of this little manual. His object was
to furnish to engineers a certain and ready
means of ascertaining the pressures of em-
bankments, submerged or otherwise, com-
posed of different materials; also the mo-
ments of retaining walls, of different forms
of cross-section, to successfully withstand
those pressures. By having this little book
at hand, the engineer will be saved the
trouble of many a long calculation.

How TO become a Successful Engineer.
By Bernard Stuart. New York: D.
Van Nostrand. 127 pp., 18mo. Price,
50 cents.

This little work, which is designed par-
ticularly for the mechanical engineer, but,
in a more general way, also for the civil en-
gineer, is more indicative than instructive.
That is, it points out the studies to be pur-
sued without explaining their nature, and
it tells the apprentice what work he will
find in the machine-shop, without detailing
the method in which it is done. It con-
tains some practical suggestions on the im-

LITERARY NOTICES.

7S7

portance of good habits, self-reliance, and
dexterity of hand.

Legal Responsibility in Old Age. By
George M. Beard, A. M., M. D. New
York: Printed by Russell's American
Steam Printing-House ; 42 pp., 8vo.

This is an address delivered before the
Medico - Legal Society of New York, in
March, 18*73. It discusses the effects of
age on the mental faculties, as evidenced in
the works of the greatest men of all times.
The author states that his method was to
study the biographies of such men, and ob-
serve the average age at which their best
works were produced. The conclusion
reached is, that the best work is done be-
tween thirty and forty, the worst between
seventy and eighty, and that the growth,
maturity, and decay, of the mind, are co-
eval with the corresponding stages of the
body. As a corollary, it is held that the
moral faculties also decay with the down-
ward curve of life. The fact is pointed out
that one or more of the moral faculties may
decay, while the rest remain sound. The
address concludes with an earnest protest
against the prevailing mode of testing moral
I'esponsibility in courts of law, and recom-
mends, as an improvement, the appointment
by the States of an examining commission,
composed of from three to five psycholog-
ical experts. It is both interesting and in-
structive.

Physical Geography. By John Young,
M. D., L. R. C. S., etc. " New York : G.
P. Putnam's Sous. 368 pp. Price,
$1.50.

This book is a condensed statement of
the principal geological and biological
truths and such astronomical facts as re-
late to the earth. In the introductory
chapter, the author thus describes the
sphere of his subject : " Physical geogra-
phy takes up the results achieved in all
these departments — geology, biology, and
astronomy — and proceeds to higher gener-
alizations. It shows how the behavior of
the earth, as a body in space, and its rela-
tions to other bodies, determine the atmos-
pheric currents, and, through them, the
movements of the ocean ; it points out how
the ocean-currents modify and are affected
by the tides ; it detei-mines the extent to
which the character and variation of the

climate are dependent on secular changes.
The changes of sea and land, as ascertained
by the geologists, are used to explain the
movements of organized forms, and the bi-
ologist finds, in atmospheric, topographical,
and climatal influences, the key to the pres-
ence or absence, the abundance or scarcity,
of particular groups in any locality."

In connection with the composition of
the earth's crust, are described the classifica-
tion, formation, and chemical constitution
of rocks ; also the production and geologi-
cal importance of fossils. The configura-
tion of the earth's surface, or the distribu
tion of land and water, with the changes it
has undergone ; the formation of islands
and continents ; ocean and atmospheric
currents ; forms of water in the atmosphere,
as snow, rain, mist, etc. ; climate and
weather, are briefly though clearly set
forth. Apparently the only fault of the
book is that less space has been devoted
to describing the distribution of plants and
animals than the importance of the subject
demands. As may be inferred from its na-
ture, the book contains no new truths, but
its value suffers no impairment therefrom.
It has the merit of being free from the in-
fluence of particular theories, and, where
unsettled questions are discussed, the au-
thor conscientiously endeavors to give the
reader the drift of scientific opinion.

The Bir.TH of Chemistry. By G. F. Rod-
well, F. R. S., F. C. S. London : Mac-
milian & Co. 1S5 pp., 12mo. Price,
$1.60.

The origin of chemistry is herein traced
through the grotesque alchemic vagaries of
the middle ages to the natural philosophy
of the ancient Greeks and their contempo-
raries. The quaint admixture of truth and
error, constituting their so-called natural
philosophy, is first shown. The ideas of
primary elements and their transmutations ;
the metals known to the ancients and the
manner in which they were worked ; an-
cient colors and chemical compounds, are
all described in a manner calculated to
please the general reader. The origin of
alchemy is traced to Arabia about the
fourth century a. d. The mystei'ies of al-
chemy are likewise detailed, as well as the
theories of combustion and phlogiston, out

758

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

of which legitimate chemistry wa3 devel-
oped about 150 years ago, by the efforts of
Boerhaave, Lavoisier, and others.

Essays on Educational Reformers. By
R. H. Quick, M. A. Ciucinnati : Robeit
Clarke & Co. 323 pp., 12mo. Price,
$2.00.

This is a review of the principal educa-
tional doctrines, beginning with the once
fiimous schools of the Jesuits, and ending
with Herbert Spencer. The main features
of each doctrine are given and commented
on in a liberal tone. The author differs
from Mr. Spencer in some important points,
such as the worthlessness of ordinary his-
tory, the value of the sciences, and the po-
sition fine arts and belles-lettres should oc-
cupy in education. In the two concluding
chapters he gives his own views on secular
education and moral and religious trainmg.
Outlines of the lives of the earlier Reformers
are given in connection with the discussion
of their doctrines. The work possesses
value as a history of modem education.

PUBLICATIONS KECEIVED.

The Border-Land of Science. By Richard
A. Proctor, B. A. J. B. Lippincott & Co.
18Y4.

The Structure of Animal Life. By Louis
Agassiz. New York : Scribner, Armstrong
& Co. 1874.

A Manual of Inorganic Chemistry — the
Non-Metals. By T. E. Thorpe, Ph. D. New
York : G. P. Putnam's Sons,

Animal Physiology, and the Structure
and Functions of the Human Body. By
John Cleland, M. D. Putnam.

Politics and Mysteries of Life Insurance.
By Elizur Wright. Lee & Shepard. 1873.

Inorganic Chemistry. By W. B. Kem-
shead. Putnam.

Addresses and Proceedings of the Na-
tional Educational Association. Pubhshed
by the Association. 18Y3.

An Elementary Treatise on Steam. By
John Perry, B. E. Macmillan. 1874.

The Galvanometer and its Uses. By C.
H. Haskins. Van Nostrand. 1873.

Building Construction. Putnam.

Elements of Zoology. By M. Harbison.
New York : Putnam.

Bulletin of the Bussey Institution. Bos-
ton. Pp. 80.

The Progressive Ship-Builder. By John
W.Griffiths. Illustrated. New York -.The
Nautical Gazette Print. 1874. Pp. 32.

Notice of New Equine Mammals from
the Tertiary Formation. By 0. C. Marsh.
Pp. 12.

Twenty-second Annual Report of the
Detroit Water Commissioners. 1873.

Report of the Committee on the Yellow-
Fever Epidemic. Shreveport Medical So-
ciety.

Uncivilized Man. A Lecture by Bishop
Cotterill, of Edinburgh. Edinburgh : R.
Grant & Son. 1874. Pp. 30.

Bulletin of the United States Geological
and Geographical Survey of the Territories.
No. 1. Washington : Government Priuting-
Office. 1874. Pp. 28.

A Short Treatise on the Compound
Steam-Engine. By John Turnbull, Jr. New
York: Van Nostrand. 1874. Pp.43.

MISCELLANY.

Rnmford's Discoveries in Thermodynam-
ics.— In his sketch of the growth of the
science of therraodjmamics, Prof. P. G. Tait,
of the University of Edinburgh, rates the
services of Count Runiford second in im-
portance to those of Davy, and does not
apparently consider them comparable to
those of Joule. Prof. R. H. Thurston, of
the Stevens Institute of Technology, in a
note relating to Rumford's determination
of the mechanical equivalent of heat, points
out the injustice of this proceeding, on the
part of Prof. Tait, and says that " we may
claim for Rumford : 1. That he was the first
to prove the immateriality of heat, and to
indicate that it is a form of energy, pub-
hshing his conclusions a year before Davy ;
2. That he first, and nearly a half-century
before Joule, determined, with almost per-
fect accuracy, the mechanical equivalent of

MISCELLANY.

759

heat ; 3. That he is entitled to the sole
credit of the experimental discovery of the
true nature of heat. Benjamin Thompson,
of Concord, New Hampshire, commonly
known as Count Rumford, should be ac-
corded a nobler position and a higher dis-
tinction than he has yet been given by
writers on thermodynamics."

Aatiqnity of Man. — R. n. Tiddeman pub-
lishes in Nature 2CQ. interesting paper on the
"Relation of Man to the Ice-sheet in the
North of England," in which he describes,
with some detail, the fossils found in Victo-
ria Cave, in Yorkshire, now being explored
by a committee, aided by the British As-
sociation. In this cave discoveries of a most
interesting character have been made. In a
bone-bed, beneath other deposits, were found
bones, teeth, and other remains of extinct
species of animals. Prof. Burke identified
remains of the E'.ephas primigenius, rhinoce-
ros, cave-bear, hyena, bison, and others, and
among these remains was a human bone, a
somewhat clumsy fibula (small bone of the
leg). Of this Mr. Busk says : "The relic is
human ; there is no room for the slightest
doubt on the subject." And this opinion
is fully confirmed by Prof. James Flower,
of the College of Surgeons.

The position of the locality in which
this bone was found makes its discovery of
great importance. It seems to carry back
the period when man existed to glacial if
not to preglacial times.

Trout from an Artesian Well.— In the

Journal of Science and Art we find a note
from Mr. A. W. Chase, giving the following
curious information, which the author re-
ceived from Mr. Bard, agent of the Califor-
nia Petroleum Company at San Buenaven-
tura : Mr. Bard, wanting water to supply a
newly-constructed wharf at Point Hueneme,
southeast of San Buenaventura, commenced
sinking an artesian well on the sea-beach,
not five feet from high-water mark. At the
depth of 143 feet a strong flow of water was
obtained, which spouted forth to a height
of 30 feet. It was controlled with a " goose-
neck," and utilized. One day while the
agent was absent, the men around the well
noticed fish in the waste water. On his re-
turn, they called his attention to the fact.

and, on examination, the well was found to
be filled with young trout, thousands of
them being thrown out at every jet. These
trout were all of the same size (about two
inches long), and perfectly developed. The
first examination was made to see whether
they had eyes. These were found perfect.
Now, there is no stream nearer than the
Santa Clara River, several miles distant.
Could these fish, then, have come from its
head-waters by some subterranean outlet ?
There are no trout in the lower portions of
the stream. The temperature of the water
is the same as that of the wells all around,
viz., 64° Fahr., too warm, of course, for
trout to live in it long.

Atkins Charcoal Filters. —The Atkins
system of filtering water is spoken of in
terms of high commendation in Iron, from
which journal we take the following descrip-
tion of the system : The best and purest
animal charcoal is ground and pulverized
until it is brought into the finest possible
state of comminution, and, thus prepared, it
is mixed up with a definite proportion of
Norway tar, and a compound of other com-
bustible ingredients. The combined mate-
rials are then thoroughly amalgamated with
liquid pitch, and the whole kneaded up into
a homogeneous plastic mass, which admits
of being moulded into slabs or blocks of any
required dimensions and shape. Theye
blocks having been allowed to dry and
harden, are subsequently carbonized by be-
ing subjected to a process of incineration
by heat ; and, in this manner, all the com-
bustible ingredients are burnt out of the
block, leaving nothing behind but the ani-
mal charcoal in the form of a block of char-
coal, permeated throughout by innumerable
pores, admirably adapted for the mechanical
infiltration of fluids, while subjecting them,
in a minutely subdivided state, to the chem-
ical absorptive and purifying action of the
carbon itself.

These carbon-blocks are chiefly cast in
cylindrical forms, so arranged that the per-
colation is from the external periphery in-
ward, and the centre of the block is hollow,
forming a tube whence the filtered water
flows. In this way the bulk of the impuri-
ties is deposited on the outside of the block,
whence it may be removed by washing with

760

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

hot water, or by scraping. Such filters,
singly or ia numbers, are placed in the bot-
tom of a cistern, the central pipes of efflux
being all connected together, and with one
outlet. Where a large filtering capacity is
required, a diflferent principle is adopted,
viz., a series of carbon-plates. In this case
the water, in its passage from the inlet to
the outlet, is caused to pass through a num-
ber of frames, variously constructed, accord-
ing to circumstances. Thus there may be,
firstly, a frame, covered with fine wire
gauze ; then separate frames, paneled with
carbon-plates, with or without the interven-
tion of a bed of pure loose animal charcoal,
filling up the spaces between them; and
there may be also a double frame, containing
a sheet of felt compressed between two per-
forated plates, made respectively of sheet-
copper and zinc, which would exert a certain
electrical action, and aid in the chemical ac-
tion of precipitating impurities. The sys-
tem may be used for filtering the water-
supply of a town.

Apart from this hygienic use, these car-
bon-blocks may be employed for many in-
dustrial purposes. Experiments have shown
them to be efficacious in removing delete-
rious gases, and other soluble substances
held in solution in fluids. They are applied
as filters for wines, oils, and syrups ; and,
above all, they merit attention as an adjunct
to the feed-water apparatus of steam-boilers,
inasmuch as efficient filtration affords the
best, cheapest, and surest method for pre-
venting incrustation in boilers.

Crematicn. — An eccentric will, wherein
the testator requested that his body might
be consumed in a gas-retort, and thus made
to contribute to the enlightenment instead
of the poisoning of the world, has survived
the long-forgotten subject of cremation.
Without doubt, Mr. Trelawney's hideously-
graphic description of the burning of the
body of Shelley has greatly contributed to
prejudice the public mind against the clean-
est and best method of getting rid of the
" mortal coil." But the ceremony at Spez-
zia was conducted ia the most bungling
fashion, and a want of scientific appliances
contributed to the incompleteness, and,
therefore, to the horror of a simple opera-
tion. A retort gets rid of the entire diffi-

culty, and, both from a utilitarian, a scien-
tific, a sanitary, and a poetic point of view,
the mausoleum, decked with cinerary urns,
possesses immense advantages over the
damp and unwholesome graveyard, exhaling
pestiferous odors, to which modern nations,
for some inscrutable reason, are preposter-
ously wedded. — Iron.

Death of Dr. Forbes Winslow. — Dr.

Winslow was born in London in 1810. He
began his medical studies in New York ;
took the degree of M. D. at King's College,
Aberdeen, and became 9, member of the
Royal College of Surgeons, London, in 1835.
His first published works appeared in 1831,
since which time he has made numerous
important contributions to the literature of
medicine, chiefly in the department of ner-
vous and mental diseases. His most valu-
able-work in this line, "The Obscure Dis-
eases of the Brain, and Disorders of the
Mind," was published in 1860, and has since
passed through several editions. He died
in London, on March 4, 1874.

The Economy of Beer. — Prof. Max von
Pettenkofer, the eminent Munich chemist,
states that, to make a quart of good beer,
there is required, at least, a pint of good
barley, besides hops, etc. The product con-
tains not a single trace of albumen, and
only a very small percentage of alimentary
principles : in short, it is only a condiment,
not a food-stuff properly so called. The
question now arises. Would it not be better
to send this barley to the mill, and make of
it a bread-stuff, instead of brewing from it
a costly beverage, which contributes little
or nothing to the system ? Or, better still.
Would it not be advisable to grow, in place
of barley and hops, wheat and rye, either of
which would give better bread than barley ?

Prof. Pettenkofer holds that the need
of mere condiments is no less imperative
than the need of food-stufis, properly so
called. "Butter and cheese," says he, " are
neither as good nor as complete food-
stufis as milk, and yet butter and cheese
are made, and will continue to be made,
even though it were possible to transport
milk in good condition to considerable dis-
tances." The same is to be said of barley
and beer. Prof. Pettenkofer observes that

MISCELLANY

761

the consumption of beer is steadily increas-
ing in spite of tlie advance in prices, and he
is convinced that this state of things will
continue, no matter what weight of argu-
ment may be brought against it. " Condi-
ments of this kind," says he, " are often, no
doubt, the occasion of real waste, but yet
the majority of mankind can always, to their
great profit, find, by observation and self-
control, the proper amount of them to con-
sume "

Sensation and Motion in Plants.— Treat-
ing of the vital phenomena which are com-
mon to plants and animals, the eminent
French physiologist, Claude Bernard, ob-
serves that Linnaeus's criterion of animal-
ity, viz., sensibility and mobility, is not in
accord with facts. There are many plant-
forms on the boundary between the animal
and the vegetable worlds, for instance, the
zoospores of the algae, which have the pow-
er of motion. Then the antherozoids, par-
ticularly the cedogonium, studied by Prings-
heim, manifest the faculty not only of mo-
tion in general, but even of motion toward
a definite object — in other words, show all
the appearances of voluntary movement.
As instances of mobility in plants, the au-
thor further cites the movements of the
stamina of the Berberis (barberry), the Dro-
scra, the Dion<xa muscipula (fly-catcher), and
the oscillating sainfoin {Hedysarum gyrans).
Sensibility too is found in several plants.
The Mimosa pudica (sensitive-plant) is the
most prominent instance of this. This
plant reacts against any irritation by fold-
ing up its leaves, which again are spread
out soon after the exciting cause is removed.
It is a curious circumstance that most of
the agents which excite sensibility in ani-
mals have a like effect on the mimosa : thus
it is affected by sudden shock, by burning,
by the action of caustic, by electrical dis-
charges, etc. Nay, the same agents, such
^ as chloroform and ether, which deaden sen-

sibility, or assuage pain in animals, destroy
the mimosa's power of reaction. Vegetal
anajsthesia is produced by the same means
as anunal anaesthesia.

There arc other plants besides the Mi-
mosa pudica which manifest this curious
property of reacting against irritation, for
instance, the Icguminosae of the genera

Smiihia, icschynomene, desmanthus, Rolinia
pseudacacia, and the Oscalis saisitiva of
India, From all this it follows that the
power of movement and sensibility are
functional properties which cannot strictly
serve as a distinction between the vegetable
and animal woi-lds.

Is Sex determined by jVutrition ?— Mr.

Thomas Meehan exhibited to the riiiladel-
phia Academy of Natural Sciences speci-
mens of the Jufflans nigra (black walnut),
with a view to showing that sex in plants is
the result of the grade of nutrition, the
highest grades of nutrition or vitality pro-
ducing the female sex, and the lower grades
the male. Examining a black-walnut tree
at the flowering season, even the superficial
observer will perceive three grades of grow-
ing buds. The largest buds make the most
vigorous shoots. These seem to be wholly
devoted to the increase of the woody system
of the tree. Lower down the strong last-
year shoots are buds not quite so large.
These make shoots less vigorous than the
other class, and bear female flowers on their
apices. Below these are seen numerous
small, weak buds, which either do not push
into growth at all, or, when they do, bear
simply the male catkins. As some natural-
ists hold that the feeble condition of these
lower shoots is the result of their bearing
male flowers, Mr. Meehan invited attention
to the specimens themselves as conclusively
proving the cont.-ary. He was fully satis-
fied that any one, who would go out into the
woods and fields for facts fresh from Nature,
would see that there is not so great expen-
diture of vital force in the production of
male flowers as there is in that of female
flowers, and thus all he had advanced on
this subject was fully sustained.

It will be remembered that, in our June
number, we recounted the observations of
Mrs. Mary Treat on the subject of controlling
sex in butterflies, from which it appeared
that butterfly-larvae developed into male or
female butterflies according as they were
stinted in food, or liberally supplied with it.
Besides the very interesting observations of
Mr. Meehan, we have now further coufirma
t'on of Mrs. Treat's results in a paper com-
municated to the Philadelphia Academy by
Mr. Gentrv. The latter author, in the sum-

762

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

mer of ISTl, had confined the larvaj of va-
rious species of moths, and neglected to
supply them with food for four or five days.
These larvae had advanced toward their final
change, possibly within a week or ten days.
When the box was opened, the greater num-
ber were found in cocoons, while the remain-
der wandered about, as if in quest of food.
The latter the author removed to another
box, where they were provided with abun-
dance of food. After three or four days
they began to assume the chrysalis form.
The first batch proved to be males without
exception, while the last batch proved, with
but two exceptions, to be females. (The
whole number in the two batches was about
sixty.)

Mr. Gentry then details further experi-
ments made by him to decide this question,
and states that the result was always the
same. He adds the following facts, which
came under his notice in the course of his
observations and experiments : 1. That
males are the invariable result when the
lafrvse are fed on diseased or innutritions
food ; 2. That in the fall, when the leaves
have not their usual amount of sap, males
are generally produced ; 3. That more males
are produced late in the season than fe-
males ; 4. That the sexes, in early life, can-
not be distinguished, the change being
brought about, late in life, by the conditions
of nutrition.

Intensity and Patience required in Sci-
entific Worli. — Whether in original work or
in elaborating work already done, scientific
labor, when conscientiously performed, is
necessarily slow and exhausting. M. de
CandoUe, the great French botanist, has re-
cently brought to a conclusion, with the sev-
enteenth volume, his great " Prodrome of
Plants," stopping at the completion simply
of the Dicoiyledones. It was begun by his
illustrious father, Augustin Pyramus de
Candolle, about 1816, who worked at it
until his decease, in 1841. It was con-
tinued by his son Alphonse, who called to
his aid other famous botanists, his son Ca-
Bimir among them. With true naivete the
author pleads necessity of stopping at the
point now reached — " ne terdam botanicorum
generationem occideret ! '''' — lest the under-
taking should kill off a third generation of

botanists. In a supplemental pamphlet he
gives his opinion that the Phanerogams, es-
timated at 110,000 species, might, by dis-
tributing the task among twenty-five botan-
ists, be worked up in about fifteen or six-
teen years. He says that in his father's
time one could elaborate at the rate of ten
species a day, but that now a faithful mon-
ographer (or specialist), under the modern
requirements, can seldom exceed 300 or
400 species per annum — that is, about one
species a day !

Rationale of Double Flowers.— That the
tendency in plants to produce double flow-
ers is a natural one, and not exclusively
evoked by the florist, is shown by Mr.
Thomas Meehan, in a communication to
the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sci-
ences. Many of the commonest wild flow-
ers, which no one would think of cultivating,
have double flowers in cultivation, which
were no doubt originally found wild ; for
instance, various species of ranunculus.
The author had himself placed on record
the discovery, wild on the Wissahiskon,
of a double Saxifraga Virginka, and Dr.
James Darrach had found in the same loca-
tion a double-trailing arbutus. There are in
plants two methods by which double flow-
ers are produced. The axis of a flower is
simply a branch very much retarded in its
development, and generally there are, on
this arrested branch, many nodes between
the series forming the calyx, or corolla,
and the regular stamens and carpels, which
nodes are entirely suppressed. But, when
a double flower is produced, sometimes
these usually suppressed nodes become de-
veloped. In which case there is a great in-
crease m the number of petals, without any
disturbance in the staminal characters. But,
at other times, there is no disturbance of
the normal character of the axis. This was
the case with the trailing arbutus discov-
ered by Dr. Darrach.

Land-Plants in lower Silorian. — It has

hitherto been supposed that the Silurian
age was one in which an absolutely un-
broken ocean enveloped the earth. Dr.
Dawson made it probable that land-plants
existed in the Upper Silurian, or latter Silu-
rian age. Leo Lesquereux, in American

MISCELLANY.

763

Journal of Science and the Arts, has woll-
nigh demonstrated that dry land existed in
the Lower Silurian age. He communicates
the discovery of two small specimens repre-
senting branches or small stems of a species
referable to Sigillaria, and found on Long-
street Creek, near Lebanon, Ohio, in clay-
beds positively referable to the Cincinnati
group of the Lower Silurian. "With the ex-
ception of these Lebanon specimens, the
geological formations of the United States
have not afforded as yet any records of
plants earher than those of the Lower De-
vonian.

The rses of Bees' TVlngs.— At the late
Convention of Bee-Keepers at Louisville, D.
L. Adair read an essay on the various uses
of the bee's wings, in which he holds that,
besides flying, the wing of the bee serves
two or three other important ends. The
horny frame, upon which the fine membrane
of the -wings is stretched, is composed of
hollow tubes of a hard substance called
chitine. These tubes are double, being one
tube inside of another. The inner ones are
extensions of the traduce, through which
the air circulates in breathing ; between
this and the other tube is a space through
which the blood circulates. The blood is
brought in contact -with the air through the
thin walls of the air-tubes, just as the air
and blood are brought together in the hu-
man lungs, and with the same effect.

The nervous filaments in like manner
pass to the wings ; they follow the respira-
tory tubes and all the fine venations of the
v/ing, terminating in every part of its sur-
face in papillae, which in all animals are
the vehicles through which sensations are
perceived. Hence we may infer that the
wings are the organs of some sensation.
Are these nerve-filaments intended merely
for noting tactile sensations ? Mr. Adair is
of the opinion that by means of them the
bee is made conscious of odors. " Some
naturalists have suggested the antennoe as
the organs of smell ; but, as they appear to
be poorly adapted to perform such an office,
it is just about as likely that they smell
with them as that they sec with them. In-
visible particles emanating from odorous
bodies, coming in contact with the olfac-
tory nerves, produce the sense of smell.

These atoms are mixed with and floating in
the air, and, in order to collect them, a con-
siderable volume of air must be made to
pass over their surfaces — a thing which the
wings certainly accomplish in an eminent
degree."

The sense of hearing in bees has never
been localized by naturalists, though some
have supposed that the antennje are the or-
gans of this sense also. " What appendage
of the bee," asks Mr. Adair, " would be bet-
ter suited to receive sound-vibrations than
the thin, stiff membranes composing the

The Lignite-Beds of the Rctky Monn-
tains. — The opinion having been advanced
that the so-called lignite-beds of the Rocky
Mountains have been formed by the heap-
ing of drifted materials, and not by growth
in situ, Mr. L. Lesquereux replies as follows,
in Silliman's Journal, to one of the argu-
ments urged in favor of the opinion — viz.,
that the undcr-clays of the lignite-beds have
no roots : " I can say," he writes, " from
repeated and personal observations, that
most of the lignite-beds of the "West, which
have passed under my examination, have
the under-clays full of rootlets or of roots
of the floating plants, which were the first,
generally at least, to contribute to the for-
mation of the bed of corubustible materiel
by their dibvis. At the Raton Mountains,
at Cafion City, at Gehrung's, near Colorado,
at Golden, Marshall, Black Butte, etc., the
coal is everywhere underlaid by chocolate-
colored shale, often a compound of these
roots or rootlets, so compact, indeed, that
they cannot be determined, nor their forms
distinctly recognized. Of course, the un-
der-shales do not contain any roots (true
roots of trees) ; the coal of the carbonifer-
ous, too, never has any, for the good reason
that trees do not grow in water, and that
they only invade peat-bogs when the ground
is solid enough to support them. And even
then the roots grow horizontally, and do
not descend deep into the matter which,
generally impregnated by water, is to a de-
gree inaccessible to atmospheric influence.

The so-called roots of the clay-beds of
the carboniferous measures, or the Stiff-
maria, are not roots, but floating leaves.
And even their cylindrical stems are rarely

764

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

found in clay-beds ; only their leaves fill
them just as the radicles of water-plauts fill
the clay of the Tertiary lignite. It is, how-
ever, a fact that some of the lignite clay-
beds, and those of the coal-measures, too,
are clean or without admixture of vegetable
remains, even of rootlets. But when the
peat is beginning its growth at the surface
of a somewhat deep basin of water, whose
bottom has been rendered impermeable by
the deposit of clay (which always precedes
the deposit of woody materials), this sur-
face-peat is often thick and compact before
it is forced down and comes in contact with
the clay ; and, in that case, therefore, the
clay is pure, or is not penetrated by roots or
rootlets. There are, of course, some beds
of impure lignite, whose origin is due to
drifted wood, especially along large rivers.
One is known at the mouth of the Rhone,
in France. I have seen some deposits of
the kind in Southeastern Arkansas, near
the Wachita River. The great Red-River
obstructions may become in time lignite-
deposits. But all formations of this kind
show their origin by their composition, viz.,
sand mixed with carbonized matter, sandy
bottom, perforated, too, in various direc-
tions by drifted stems, etc. Nothing of this
kind has been observed in the beds of lig-
nite of the West, at least not in those which
have come under my examination."

Geology of the Land of Moalj. — Late
explorations in the land of Moab by Dr.
Tristam have disclosed some interesting
geological features in that region. The
doctor's observations were mainly confined
to the highlands, which are in reality a
set of terraces, or table-lands, rising to
the eastward from the shores of the Dead
Sea — attauiing, in a distance of 35 miles,
a heiglit of between 4,000 and 5,000 feet.
These table-lands are cut at right angles
into deep gorges or ravines, by streams
which now flow, or at some former
time have flowed, westward into the Dead
Sea. Some of the gorges are 1,800 feet
deep, wiih perpendicular walls, from which
a good idea of the geological structure of
the region may be obtained. The surface
of these highlands is composed of chalk,
which rests upon a limestone formation, re-
garded by some as nummulitie and by

others as Jurassic. The chalk and lime-
stone together are from 1,200 to 1,500 feet
thick. The limestone is supported by new
red sandstone, the line where they join being
well defined. It is from this Hne of junc-
tion that the hot springs, so celebrated in
Roman times, gush forth. The water of
these springs has a temperature varying
from 100° to 143' Fahr. The salt-hills at
the south of the Dead Sea, like the table-
lands just spoken of, have been gouged out
by the action of water, and present along
their face numerous columns and pinnacles
of salt, that are being rapidly worn down
by the action of the weatheu

Etiology of Typhoid Feyer. — Prof. I.
Buckman writes to the Gardener s Chronicle
concerning the discovery of a microscopic
fungus in water, the drinking of which was
suspected of developing cases of typhoid fe-
ver. We give the main points of this com-
munication. Some years ago Prof. Buck-
man examined the spout of a pump which
had supplied water to a family attacked by
typhoid. It was found to be lined with ge-
latinous matter. Under the microscope this
substance was seen to contain some elegant
branched confervoid or fungoid growths, in-
termixed with which were minute ovoid cells.
As these fungoids require nitrogen for their
nourishment, the author inferred that the
supply came from some neighboring cess-
pool. He next went to the exit-dram of the
town sewerage, and there found bits of
sticks, leaves of water-plants, and the like,
more or less covered with this same gelati-
nous matter.

The author next detected this fungus in
water used by his own family, some of
whose members were severely attacked with
typhoid fever. A defective drain in the
neighborhood of the dwelling having been
set to rights, and the whole of the water
pumped out, the water has since been of
excellent purity. Having cited two other
analogous cases. Prof. Buckman speculates
as follows on the mode in which this fungus
acts after having been admitted into the
animal economy: " How it acts it would be
difficult to determine, but it is at least con-
ceivable that the spores of the fungus may
get into the circulation, and bring about
changes in the fluids, after the manner of

MISCELLANY.

765

yeast in beer ; and, if so, the seeds of the
fungus would be liicely to develop rapidly,
if they came in contact with milk, or water
containing nitrogenous matter. 'A little
leaven would leaven the whole lump,' and,
as it appears to me, in this way much dis-
ease may be accounted for. The micro-
scope, then, will enable us to make out the
presence or absence of this fungoid or con-
fervoid matter in foul water, and my own
observations confirm me in the view that,
being present, it is highly dangerous, and,
if its cause can be removed, and the water
made pure, all danger from this source at
once ceases, while if it cannot it should be
at once disused, and pure water be sought
for elsewhere."

1 Snn-driren Eagine. — G. A. Bergh, writ-
ing in Poggendorff s Annalen, on the appli-
cation of solar heat as a motive power, says
that the engine which is to serve for this
purpose must employ some liquid with a
very low boiling-point. There are several
such liquids — sulphurous acid, methylic
chloride, methylic ether, etc. Of all of these,
sulphurous acid best deserves attention, as
it has several useful properties for the end
in view. It is not too difficult to condense,
and it can be got at a moderate price.
Now we have got the principle on which
we must construct our solar engine. Con-
ceive a vessel, filled with sulphurous acid,
exposed to the sun's rays ; the tension of
the sulphurous-acid vapor, if the tempera-
ture of this vessel A exceeds that of the sur-
rounding air by at least 10" to 20°, must be
from one to three atmospheres higher than
that of the sulphurous-acid vapor in another
vessel, B, similarly filled with sulphurous
acid, but which has only the temperature
of the surrounding air. We can thus arrange
an engine which agrees in principle with
the steam-engine, with merely this differ-
ence, that the water is replaced by sulphur-
ous acid, and the fuel by the solar heat ;
while the vessel exposed to the sun's rays
represents the steam-boiler, the vessel kept
at ordinary temperature may represent the
condenser. The sulphurous acid condensed,
after doing work in the vessel B, could easily
be driven back, by a force-pump, into the
vessel A. The capability of work of such
a machine must naturally increase with the

amount of heat communicated to vessel A
or be proportional to the surface exposed
to the solar rays.

An establishment, furnished with a ma-
chine like this, might carry on its work
while there was sunshine, but, in default
of this, would be brought to a stand-still.
True, the solar heat might be replaced by
the heat of the air, if the temperature of
the air were pretty high, and one had at
hand a refrigerating substance like ice.
But, as this is not always the case, the
establishment should have, besides the sun-
machine, an apparatus which might "store
up " some of the work done by this. As
such, batterer's apparatus for condensing
carbonic acid might be used. If a supply
of carbonic acid were kept in a large gas-
ometer, the Natterer apparatus might be
fed from this. In a wrought-iron vessel,
thus filled with liquid carbonic acid, we
should thus have an enormous store of me-
chanical force, which might be made to re-
place the action of solar heat in the sun-
machine, partially or wholly. After work
done, the carbonic acid, become gaseous
again, might be collected in the gasometer.
Or, again, the sun-machine, while in action,
might drive an ice-machine, and might, in
default of sunshine, profit by the ice it had
produced, for maintenance of its working.

The llICTcmcnts of Drcscra.— Prof. Asa
Gray, commenting in the American Journal
of Science on a paper by A. W. Bennett, on
the movements of the glands of Broscra
[sumleic), remarks that the author's descrip-
tion of these movements docs not do justice
to the facts, as observed by Dr. Gray him-
self. Mr. Bennett observed not only the
bending in of the glands upon the body of
the insect which lights on its leaf, but that
" the sides of the leaf had also slightly
curved forward, so as to render the leaf
more concave." With us, says Dr. Gray,
the leaves do much more than that. As
well in Drosera roiundifolia as in D. longi-
folia, the end of the leaf folds over upon
the base, or nearly Hke a .''hut hand, thus
fairly inclosing the captive insect.

He adds that, when Mrs. Treat's account
of this infolding of the leaf was published,
in 1871, the discovery was thought to be
new. But he has since found that the in-

766

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

folding of the leaf, as well as the intrusion
of the glands, was discovered by Roth in
1779. The only real addition to our knowl-
edge— this old knowledge, recently repro-
duced— is that contained in the latter part
of Mr. Bennett's communication, which is
to the efiFect that Drosera acts upon bits of
raw meat just as upon a living insect, but
is motionless toward inorganic bodies, and,
in his experiments, to bits of wood and of
worsted. la the published report of the
communication no allusion is made to the
history and record of all these discoveries,
but Prof. Gray claims for Mr. Darwin the
credit of having been the first to discover
this diflference of behavior of the drosera-
leaf to different substances. He says that
there are other still more curious observa-
tions and experiments of Darwin's upon
Drosera and Bioncea, which it is hoped will
soon be published.

Ocean-SteamsliipSt — A writer in the Evcn-
iiuf Post notes some of the principal short-
comings of the ocean-steamship of the pe-
riod, and offers some practical suggestions
as to the proper construction of a passenger-
steamer. The ocean-steamer of to-day is
simply a huge freight-boat. She is some-
what larger, and perhaps a trifle swifter,
but certainly not any safer, than when she
first crossed the Atlantic some thirty years
ago. It would seem absurd if our railroads
had no passenger-cars, and we had to travel
about the country strapped on to the roof
of a freight-car. Ocean-travel is quite as
absurd, and even more dangerous, for our
tier of state-rooms is strapped to the top of
a heavy iron bos, loaded with heavy freight,
which, in the event of a sudden blow, goes
to the bottom as if it were made of glass.
According to the writer in the Post, the
passenger-steamship should be of about the
same length as at present, but broader and
shallower, with lines adapted, not to carry-
ing capacity, but to speed ; the chief novel-
ty, however, being that the entire hull, ex-
cepting the spaces required for engines and
coal, would be filled up with very small air-
and water-tight compartments or cells —
enough to make the ship a gigantic life-pre-
server. All the slate-rooms and quarters
would be on the main-deck. The cellular
construction of the vessel would add great-

ly to her strength, while her lightness would
admit, at least in ordinary weather, of great
speed, and her model would greatly dimin-
ish the rolling so provocative of sea-sick-
ness.

As regards the question of expense,
while the first cost and daily outlay would
net exceed those of the present style of
steamer, the passenger-steamer could make
twice as many trips in the year, for she
would not only be actually faster, but would
save much time between voyages which is
now spent in discharging and receiving
cargo; for the same reason, after landing
her passengers, she could start again in a
day or two on another trip. Such a vessel
might be disabled by coUision, but it is
hardly possible that she could be sunk by
any form of accident that we are familiar
with.

Tarantism. — Tarantism is the title giv-
en by physicians to an epidemic nervous
disorder which prevailed in Italy, and more
particularly in Apulia, during the middle
ages. It was supposed to be caused by the
bite of the tarantula, a species of spider
found in Southern Europe, and very plen-
tiful in the vicinity of the city of Taranto,
whence it derives its name. The disorder,
whether caused in the first instance by the
bite of this spider or not, was capable of
passing from subject to subject by a sort of
sympathy, and thus the afiection would
spread to hundreds and thousands of the
population, without distinction of sex or
age. Analogous nervous diseases, known
as St. Vitus's dance, or St. Guy's dance,
prevailed in Germany, France, and England.
A recent writer on " Mental Disease," W. A.
F. Browne, gives the following account of
these singular affections :

" In all these affections," says he, " which
spread over great masses of the population,
Teutonic and Celtic, children and octogena-
rians alike, there were observed wild and
exuberant excitement, delusion, and antipa-
thies, with uncontrollable impulses to run
or leap, all such movements ultimately pass-
ing into dancing, which was generally aggra-
vated, though sometimes mitigated, by mu-
sic. These dancers were impelled some-
times by imitation, sometimes by fanatical
exaltation, sometimes by terror and the fear

NOTES.

7^7

of being poisoned, and it was when under
the latter emotion that harmony seems to
have been most powerful and curative.
Airs {tarantelle) have been preserved which
were employed in arresting or moderating
the frenzied rotations and leaps of those
urged on by dread of the bite of the taran-
tula, and by other causes ; and that some
interference was required is evident, for,
although large numbers of those affected
recovered, many resisted all coercion, and
danced themselves to death."

The tunes which were regarded as reme-
dial are said to have been of peculiar char-
acter, and to have contained transitions
from a quick to a slow measure, and to have
passed gradually from a high to a low key.
The sensibility to music was so great that,
at the very first tones of their favorite mel-
odies, the affected sprang up, shouting for
joy, and danced on without intermission
until they sank to the ground exhausted and
almost lifeless. Although thus excitable,
no external or audible music was requisite
to suggest or sustain such movements. Ap-
parently stimulated by some internal rhythm,
the performers danced, sometimes with in-
furiated, but always with measured steps,
wheeling hand-in-hand in circles, not mere-
ly from street to street, but from town to
town, dropping down when exhausted, but
having their places supplied by fresh re-
cruits. When under this inspiration, the
rudest of the victims exhibited gracefulness
in dancing, and manifested displeasure when
false notes were introduced into the music.

Utilization of Sewage— The following
facts, with regard to the utilization of the
sewage of the city of Paris, are taken from
the official returns: At Clichy, a bend of
the Seine forms a sandy, level peninsula, of
some 5,000 acres. The barrenness of this
peninsula is proverbial, and hence it was on
this land that a portion of the city sewage
was first directed, with a view to put the
utility of this kind of fertilization to the
severest possible test. The preliminary
works were begun in 18G8, and completed
in May, 1869. From that time between
5,000 and 6,000 cubic yards of the sewage
have been raised daily by engines of 40-
horse power and centrifugal pumps, and of
this two-thirds were received into tanks for

chemical manipulation, the remainder being
applied to a piece of land 12 or 15 acres in
extent. At the end of several months the
results of this experiment upon a naturally
poor soil were such that the neighboring
farmers asked to be included in the benefits
derived from the sewage. Owing to the
extreme permeability of the soil, 20,000
cubic yards of sewage could be annually
absorbed per acre, and the farmers obtained
crops of 70,000 lbs. of cabbages, 60,000 lbs.
of carrots, and 150,000 lbs. of turnips. All
land suitable for irrigation rose in value.
No evil effects on the health of the inhabit-
ants could be detected, and a village sprang
up around the works. A Parisian perfumer
established his manufactory on the outskirts
of the irrigated land, and obtained a supply
of the sewage-water for his gardens of aro-
matic herbs, more especially of peppermint.
It is worthy of note, in this place, that the
finest mignonette of Covent-Garden Mar-
ket, London, has long been grown from sew-
age-irrigated soil.

NOTES.

An Honor to Prof. Henry. — Prof. Jo-
seph Henry, secretary of the Smithsonian
Institution, has received from the French
Government a superb porcelain vase, as a
testimonial of his services as the United
States representative of the commission on
the international standard metre. — Journal
of the Telegraph.

New Fosstl Man. — In the Revue Scien-
tifique for December, it is stated that a
third skeleton of a troglodyte has been dis-
covered by M, Riviere, in the caves of Men-
tone. This new skeleton, judging from the
various and numerous implements by which
it was surrounded, lived at an epoch far
more remote than that assigned to the skele-
ton now in the Museum of Paris. The in-
struments of warfare and other objects
found with it, though composed of flint
and bone, are not polished. They are only
sharpened, and, by their coarse execution,
appear to belong to the palaeolithic age.
On the upper part of the skeleton was a
large number of small shells, each pierced
with a hole, which appeared to have formed
a collar or bracelets. No pottery nor any
bronze object was found. — Lancet.

In an article on " Furs and their Wear-
ers," published in the December Popiilar
Science Monthly, the fur-seal of Alaska
and the sea-otter were inadvertently con-
founded. In a letter kindly calling attcn-

768

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tion to the error, Mr. F. M. King, of White-
stone, L. I., who has been on the spot and
knows the two animals, points out a few of
their characteristic differences. The sea-
otter is rarely seen on land, but eats, sleeps,
and is said even to bring forth its young in
the water. It is provided with a tail, has
legs with webbed feet, and handles its food
with its fore-paws, and is in fact an otter.
The fur-seal breeds on shore, and is cap-
tured mostly out of the water. It has nei-
ther legs nor paws, but flippers like all the
other seah.

The death of the great German anato-
mist. Max Schultze, is announced. He was
in the prime of lite, and had just experi-
enced the satisfaction of seeing his labora-
tory at Bonn — the amplest and most ele-
gantly-constructed in Europe — finished, un-
der his direct supervision. His death is a
great loss to biological science.

A WRITER in the American Naturalist
suggests that one of the most important
uses to which the Yellowstone National
Parle can be put is, " the preservation from
extinction of at least the characteristic
mammals and birds of the West, as far as
they can be domiciled in this section."

A German engineer proposes to combine
hard ingots, or blocks of steel, in the pro-
cess of casting, with laminre of soft steel or
wrought-iron, in such a manner that the
latter, in undergoing the rolling process,
may assume an internal position, thus com-
bining a certain amount of elasticity, duc-
tility, and toughness, in the interior, with a
hard exterior to withstand wear and abra-
sion.

A CEMETERY is now being searched at
Luzarches, in the vicinity of Paris, where
articles of the times of polished stone have
been found. Hatchets, knives, scissors,
arrow-points, and delicately-worked blades,
made of flint, have been discovered ; also
awls of bone from various animals ; and, on
the remains of a female skeleton, a kind of
medallion with two holes was seen, which
probably formed part of a necklace. Sev-
eral skulls have been examined by Dr.
Broca, who will communicate the results of
his investigations to the Anthropological
Society of Paris.

It is stated that, at the recent Scientific
Congress at Rome, two Neapolitan physi-
cians submitted to the meeting a liquid
preparation for stopping instantaneously
the flow of blood from wounds of every
description. A commission of physicians
have performed experiments with it in one
of the Roman hospitals, and have reported
on it as one of the happiest of recent dis-
coveries, and as particularly serviceable on
the field of battle.

A cuRiotTS addition was lately made to
the aquarium of the Paris Jardin d'Accli-
matation, viz., a polyp of the Medusa kind.
The day after its admission to the compart-
ment assigned to it, all the other animals in
the same tank were found to be dead. An
analysis of the water showed the reason of
this strange mortality — the polyp had
changed the water to vinegar. The so-
called vinegar-polyp has the power of pro-
ducing in itself alcohol, which is soon trans-
formed into vinegar ; this, however grateful
it may be to the polyp that produces it, is
fatal to other aquatic creatures. The poi-
sonous Medusa was at once removed from
the basin and put in a tank by itself, where
it will be permitted to carry on its cheap
vinegar-manufacture as long as it pleases.

An exhibition of appliances adapted to
economize fuel is to be held in Manchester,
England. The exhibition will comprise: 1.
Appliances which may be adapted to exist-
ing furnaces, etc., whereby an actual saving
is effected in the consumption of fuel. 2,
Appliances which may be adapted to exist-
ing furnaces, etc., whereby waste heat is
utilized. 3. New steam-generators and fur-
naces, boilers and engines, specially adapt-
ed for saving fuel, and appliances whereby
waste products are utilized, the radiation
of heat prevented, etc. A variety of simi-
lar apparatus tor manufacturing, agricul-
tural, and domestic purposes, will also be
exhibited. The exhibition promises to be
interesting and instructive.

An institution of novel character was
recently founded in France. The Villa
Emilia, at Meudon, half-way between Paris
and Versailles, was thrown open on January
1st, to explorers of any nationality, to young
men who propose making scientific voy-
ages, and to all who wish and are able to
encourage them. The expenses of the in-
stitution are to be defrayed by an associa-
tion. The property already embraces insti u-
ments and laboratories, scientific books, etc.
Free courses and lessons will be given, and
travelers may leave their collections there,
to be kept till their return. Gifts of money
will be made to those who may serve the so-
ciety in certain specified ways. The associa-
tion, " Cercle des Explorateurs," as it is
called, will have its Gazette, giving news of
explorers, and there will be two meetings, in
spring and fall. Those wishing to join the
society are desired to communicate with its
originator, M. M6hedin, Meudon, Seine et-
Oise.

Dr. Ferrier has received a grant from
the Royal Society, for the purpose of en-
abling him to pursue his investigations on
the brains of monkeys, etc. The results of
his researches will, in due time, be em-
bodied in a paper which will be read before
that society.

i]srr>EX.

PACK

-Esthetic Sense in Animals 729

. Agassiz, Prof. Lonis R., his Death 495

" " " Autopsy of 633

" " " Biographical Notice. (Portrait) 008

" " " His Successor 037

Age^ The, of Ice. (Illustrated) 641

Alchemy, its Future 602

Alcohol 381

Alternations in the Intensity of Diseases 569

Ancient Well in Illinois 252

Animal-like Functions of Plants 382

Animals, The Esthetic Sense in 729

Antioch, Rebuilding of 126

Ashes, Leached, as a Fertilizer 509

Asphaltum in "West Virginia 636

Atmospheric Electricity and Ozone 456

Baryta, Uses of 038

Beer, Economy of V60

Bees' Wings, Uses of. 'i'63

Body and Mind, Relations of Ill

Books noticed :

" Civilization considered as a Science " (by Harris) 118

" Chronos : Mother Earth's Biography " (by Wood) 249

" Conservation of Energy " (by Balfour Stewart) 627

" Elements of Physical Manipulation " (by Pickering) 117

"Philosophy of Evolution " (by Lowne) 116

" Workshop Appliances " (by Shelley) 122

" Logic of Accounts " (by Folsom) 118

"Antiquities of the Southern Indians " (by Jones) 119

"Man and Apes " (by Mivart) C30

" Dictionary of Medical Science " (by Dunglison) 630

" Theory of Evolution of Living Things " (by Henslow) 503

" The New Chemistry " (by Cooke) 500

" International Review." 500

" The Bible and the Doctrine of Evolution " (by Smythc) 503

" Sex in Education " (by Clarke) 377

" Religion and Science " (l)y Le Conte) 502

" Our Common Insects " (by Packard) 247

" Descriptive Sociology " (by Spencer) 504

" Autobiography of John Stuart Mill." 376

" British Marine Alga3 " (by Grattann) 378

" Proportions of Pins used in Bridges " (by Bender) 248

" Comparative Anatomy of the Domesticated Animals " (by Chauveau). 24G
VOL. IV. — 49

770 INDEX.

Books noticed : p^ge

" Statistics of the World " (by Scliem) 631

" Geological Survey of Ohio." 374

" Origin and Metamorphoses of Insects " (by Lubbock) 628

" Henslow's Botanical Charts " (by Youmans) 628

" On Intelligence " (by Taine) G29

" The Atmosphere " (by Flammarion) 245

" English Psychology " (by Ribot) T51

" Animal Locomotion " (by Pettigrew) T53

" Prang's Natural History Series of Colored Chromos " 754

" The Stone Age " (by Tylor) 755

" Insects of the Garden " (by Packard) 755

" Manual of Physical Geography " (by White) 756

" Retaining Walls " (by Tate) 756

" Legal Responsibility in Old Age " (by Beard) 757

" Physical Geography " (by Young). 757

" The Birth of Chemistry " (by Rodwell) 757

" Essays on Educational Reformers " (by Quick) 758

Botany, Tennyson and 193

Brain and Mind •...,.. 253

Brain, A Xew Method with the 183

British Association 114

Carboniferous Strata, their Constitution 508

Caterpillars 381

Chemistry of the Rocks, what it teaches 694

Chromosphere, The, and Solar Prominences. (Illustrated) 385

Coal-Fields of China 250

Colorado, The Great Cemetery in 470

Concerning Serpents. (Illustrated) 257

Constellation, Past and Future of a. (Illustrated) 291

Constitution of Carboniferous Strata 508

Cooling and Contraction of the Earth's Crust 255

Correlation of Yital with Chemical and Physical Forces 156

Correspondence 633, 744

Corundum 452

Cremation 760

Cryptograph 125

Czermak, Professor : 115

Dead, Disposal of the 592

De CandoUe's Great Work 762

Dental Plates, l^ew Material for 507

Descent of Man 251

Disposal of the Dead 592

Dissipation of Energy 430

Draper, Dr. J. W., Sketch of. (Portrait) 861

Droserd, Movements of. V05

Education, Liberal, in the Nineteenth Century 1

Education, Scientific, Requirements of 208

Education, Higher, of Women 748

INDEX. 771

PAGE

Electric Signaling 581

Emotional Language of the Future 319

Energy, Dissipation of 430

England and America 681

Evolution and the Origin of Life 713

Evolution, Genesis, and Geology 324

Explosion of a Powder-Mill 231

Experiments on Living Animals 750

Eyes, Unequal Power of the 379

Facial Angle. (Illustrated). 587

Feather, A (Illustrated) 686

Fish, Subterranean 639

Flowers, Double, Rationale of 762

Forces, Correlation of Vital, with Chemical and Physical 156

Freak of iN^ature. (Illustrated) 448

French Association for the Advancement of Science 125

Furs and their "Wearers. (Illustrated) 143

Future of Alchemy 6-02

Genesis, Geology, and Evolution 324

Geographical Work, A Year of 735

Gladstone and Spencer ... 492

Glycerine, Tests for 510

Grafting, Natural 380

Grape-vine Blight 381

Great Cemetery in Colorado 470

Growth and Decay of Mind 328

Growth of Salmon. (Illustrated) 27

^/.:-.-, :-- a,;.--- .. ^..

Haeckel's Moners. (Illustrated) 181

Health and Comfort in House-building 69

Hedge-Plant, A Good 635

Heredity, Phenomena of 55

Heredity and Race-Improvement 170

Hooker, Dr. J. D., Sketch of. (Portrait) 237

House-building, Health and Comfort in 69

Huxley, Prof, Sketch of. (Portrait) 739

Hypnotism in Animals 75

Ice, The Age of, (Illustrated) 641

Images and Shadows. (Illustrated) 665

Improved Deep-Sea Sounding Apparatus 255

Improvements in Street-Sprinkling 124

Inertia and Force 349

Inland Seas, their Physical Conditions 878

Insects, their Migrations 382

Instincts, Survival of 88

Intelligence of the Toad 126

Jupiter, Xews from 433

Land-Plants in Lower Silurian 762

772 INDEX.

PAGE

Language, Emotional, of tlie Future 319

Leached Ashes as a Fertilizer 509

Lectures, Scientific 242

Liberal Education in the Nineteenth Century 1

Lignite-Beds of the Rocky Mountains 763

Lime-Soils and Potato-Rot 637

Livingstone's Death . . . , 627

Localization of the Faculty of Speech 125

Lockyer, J. N., Sketch of. (Portrait) 109

Locusts, A Swarm of 636

Malformations 383

Man, The Descent of 251

5L^n, Antiquity of 759

Man in the Miocene, Relics of 254

Mantis, or Praying Insect. (Illustrated) 710

Mars by the Latest Observations. (Illustrated) 187

Matter, Force, and Inertia 494

Matter, its Physical Constitution 493

Metamorphic Rocks, Age of 509

Meteorological Notes 507

Migrations of Insects 382

Mill, Education and Science 368

Mind, Brain and 253

Mind, Growth and Decay of 328

Minerals, Spang Collection of ^ 433

Modern Optics and Painting. (Illustrated) 415, 572

Moab, Land of, its Geology 764

Molecules, Theory of. 276

Moners, Haeckel's. (Illustrated) 181

Mud-Minnow, its Breeding Habits 744

Natural Grafting 380

Natural Varieties 382

New Method with the Brain 183

New Guinea, its Population 632

News from Jupiter 433

Notes 127, 25G, 383, 511, 639, 767

Observatory, United States Naval '. 704

Ocean Steamships 766

Octopus, The, and its Prey 254

Optics, Modern, and Painting. (Illustrated) 415, 572

Origin of Life, The, and Evohution 713

Origin of the Potato-Disease 123

Our Ancestors on the Goose-Question, (Illustrated) 565

Ozone and Atmospheric Electricity 456

Painting and Modern Optics. (Illustrated) 415, 572

Papillon, Fernand, his Death 627

Papyrus, An Ancient 251

Parchment, Substitute for 123

INDEX. 773

PAGE

Passions, Physiology of the 552

Past and Future of a Constellation. (Illustrated) 291

Pathology of the Passions 656

Phenomena of Heredity 55

Phylloxera Vastatrix 381

Physical Conditions of Inland Seas 378

Physical Constitution of Matter 493

Planet, the Ringed. (Illustrated) 39

Plants, Animal-like Functions of 382

Population of New Guinea 632

Potato-Disease, Origin of 123

Potato-Rot, Lime-Soils and 637

Powder-Mill Explosion 231

Praying Insect, or Mantis. (Illustrated) 710

Prediction, A Scientific, verified 253

Preparations for the Coming Transit of Venus 212

Primary Concepts of Modern Physical Science 92, 219, 349

Proctor's Lectures 116

Proctor, E. A., Sketch of. (Portrait) 486

Psychology of the Sexes 30

Public Instruction and Sanitary Science 421

Quicker than Lightning. (Illustrated) 809

Quinine 380

Race-Improvement, Heredity and 170

Radicalism, Conservatism, and the Transition of Institutions 129

Raspberry, Garden, its American Origin 510

Rats, an Episode on. (Illustrated) 344

Rebuilding of Antioch 126

Refrigerating Machine 639

Relations of Body and Mind Ill

Relics of Man in the Miocene 254

Replies to Criticisms 295, 402, 541

Requirements of Scientific Education 208

Ringed Planet, The. (Illustrated) 39

Rumford's Discoveries in Tliermodynamics 758

Salmon, Growth of. (Illustrated) 27

Sand-Blast 511

Sanitary Science and Public Instruction 421

Science, its Influence on Philosophy 619

Science, Education, and Aristocracy 480

Science and the Press 635

Science, Physical, Primary Concepts of , 92, 219, 349

Scientific Education, Requirements of 208

Scientific Lectures 242

Scientific Prediction verified 253

Scientific School, A New 241

Sensation and Motion in Plants 761

Sericulture in Brazil 250

Serpents. (Illustrated) 257

774 INDEX,

PAGE

Sewage Fertilization 507

Sewage, Utilization of 767

Sex, is it determined by Nutrition 761

Sexes, Psychology of the 30

Shadows, Images and. (Illustrated) 6G5

Shark, The Shovel-nosed. (Illustrated) 65

Signaling, Electric 581

Silk-worm's Thread, its Length 608

Solar Prominences, The Chromosphere and. (Illustrated) 385

Sounding Apparatus, Improved 255

Spang Collection of Minerals 433

Speech, Localization of the Faculty of 125

Spencer and the Women 746

" Spencer-Crusher," Another 621

Street-Sprinlding, Improvements in 124

Study of Sociology 129, 242, 295, 402, 492, 541

Substitute for Parchment 123

Subterranean Fish 639

Sun's Envelope 127

Sun-driven Engine 765

Survival of Instincts 88

Tarantisra 706

Tennyson and Botany 193

Tests for Glycerine 510

Theory of Molecules 276

Toad, Intelligence of 126

Transit of Venus, Preparations for the Coming 212

Trout from an Artesian Well 759

Tj^hoid Fever, Etiology of 764

Unequal Power of the Eyes 379

United States Naval Observatory 704

Varieties, Natural 382

Vegetable GroAvth, Rapidity of 510

Vivisection 672

Walking, Swimming, and Flying. (Illustrated) 528

Wasps' Nests of Clay 637

Water-Filters 759

" Water turned to Blood." (Illustrated) 202

Weeping-Willow, The 252

Well, An Ancient, in Illinois 252

What the Chemistry of the Rocks teaches 694

Work and Influence of The Monthly 747

Winslow, Forbes 760

World, The, before the Introduction of Life. (Illustrated) 513

Year, A, of Geographical Work 735

Yosemite Valley of Glacial Origin 122

END OF VOL. IV.

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