k 1^8

SIR GEORGE BIDDELL AIRY.

^

CENTHAL PARK,
A NEW YORK. a-

POPULAE SCIENCE

MONTHLY.

CONDUCTED BY E. L. YOUMANS.

VOL. III.

MAY TO OCTOBER, 1873.

NEW YORK:

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY,

549 & 551 BROADWAY.
1873.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in tiie year 1873,
By D. APPLETON & CO.,

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.

A 3 5 L>

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

MAY, 1873.

WAVE -ACTION IN NATURE.

THE waves upon water are always objects of pleasing interest.
From the ripples of the pond to the billows of the ocean, their
beauty and their sublimity are sources of perennial inspiration to the
poet and the painter. But there is an invisible realm of air- waves
of a far subtler and more wonderful order. The water-waves belong
to the sensuous eye and to art, but the aerial pulsations belong to the
eye of the imagination and to science, the great revelator of the super-
sensuous harmonies of the universe. Water-waves afford an agreeable
spectacle, and have little further concern for us ; but the waves of air
take hold of our highest life, for the multitudinous sounds of Nature
by which we are soothed and exhilarated, all the delights of music,
the pleasures of speech, and the sweet experiences of social intercourse,
are made possible only through their agency. Besides, air-waves form
one link in the chain of agencies by which we pass from the material to
the spiritual world. The first is the capacity by which matter may be
thrown into vibration; second, the properties of air by which it can
take up the impulses of vibration in the form of waves ; third, those
properties of the mechanism of hearing by which it can take up the
motion of air-pulses ; and, fourth, those properties of nerves by which
they can take up the tympanic vibrations and translate them into
feeling or consciousness. How the last step is effected we do not
know, but many of the preliminary conditions to it are understood,
and to some of these we ask the reader's attention.

All sound begins in those collisions and attritions among material
things by which their parts are thrown into tremors. These are al-
most as various in quality as the properties of material substances.
The sounds we hear are but indices to the vibrations of bodies from
which they proceed, and the multitude of such terms as splash, roar,
ring, thud, crack, whiz, squeak, crash, illustrate the marvellous diver-
sity of characters which material vibrations may take. In the pro-
tol. in. 1

2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

duction of noise, the thrills of matter are transient and irregular, but,
when prolonged and regular, they give rise to musical sounds. Vibra-
tion depends upon elasticity, and bodies which are capable of the pro-
tracted and measured pulsations of music must, of course, be highly
elastic. We have said that bodies vibrate differently, and this de-
pends upon the nature, form, and magnitude of the mass in motion.
The vibrations of bells differ with their sizes and the metals and alloys
which compose them; while wooden and metallic tubes, strained
strings, and stretched membranes, illustrate the same thing. If a
tense wire be plucked aside, it executes lateral vibrations which differ
with its varying length, strain, and density. It may vibrate as a
whole (1), Fig. 1, while, by relaxing the tension, or by touching or
damping it at different points, it may be made to break up into differ-
ent systems of vibration as shown in (2), (3), (4), Fig. 1. The points
of rest in such cases are called nodes. Rods and tubes of wood or
glass may be made to vibrate longitudinally by rubbing them length-
wise with the rosined fingers or a damp cloth. Fig. 2 represents a
glass tube, six feet long and two inches in diameter, which, by being
vigorously rubbed in this way, was set into such violent vibration that
it went to pieces.

Fig. 1.

A String in Different Phases of Vibration.

If thin plates of glass or metal be clamped in the centre, and fine
sand scattered over the surface, they may be set into vibration, and
the sand will be tossed away from certain parts of the surface and col-
lected in other parts, forming regular geometrical figures. The sand
collects at the lines of rest, which are called nodal lines. Fig. 3 rep-
resents this experiment, the vibration being produced by a fiddle-bow,
while the application of the fingers at different points determines the
lines of rest and the geometrical figures. Fig. 4 represents a number
of the beautiful patterns that were obtained by Chladni, who first
drew attention to this interesting phenomenon.

WAVE-ACTION IN NATURE.

Fig. 2.

Now, in order that all these multifarious and diversified tremblings
of natural objects may be brought into relation with animate creatures
a common medium of communication is necessary. The air around us
is such a medium. It possesses the marvellous power of taking up
the numberless and ever-varying thrills of material
objects, and conveying them through space with all
their peculiarities. The sensitiveness of the air (if
we may so speak) to the faintest tremors in material
objects, and its power of transmitting their indi-
vidual qualities, are most wonderful. It drinks up
the infinitesimal motions of things, and diffuses them
swiftly, simultaneously, and in countless myriads in
all directions around.

That air is the medium of sound is proved by the
fact that, when vibrations occur in space void of air,
the silence is not broken. If a bell suspended by a
string in a vacuum be struck, nothing is heard, al-
though, if it is in contact with the jar, the vibra-
tions are communicated to the outer air, and sounds
produced. That air transmits the kind of motion
that it receives is also proved by the fact that it will
take up vibrations at one point and communicate
them to a distant object that is capable of vibrat-
ing in the same way.

The velocity of impulses in the air which pro-
duce sound has been well established, and all kinds
of shocks the firing of a gun, notes of a musical
instrument, or the voice, whether high or low, harsh
or soft all move at the same rate. The velocity
is not affected by changes in atmospheric pressure or
moisture, or by rain or snow, but it is affected by wind
and by temperature. The speed of sound is 1,090
feet per second at the freezing-point, and increases
about one foot per second for each degree of ascent
on the Fahrenheit scale. It, therefore, takes longer
to hear in winter than in summer. In many parts
of the country the change of temperature is so great that the velocity
of sound will vary more than 100 feet a second in the different seasons.
Sound moves in air with about the speed of a cannon-ball, and at a
rate ten times greater than the swiftest motion of air in a hurricane.
The sound produced in the open air tends to move in all directions
with equal speed, but this tendency may be disturbed by various con-
ditions. If the whole mass of air is moving in one direction, sound
will travel faster with it than against it. In still air the sound of a
musket-shot will be heard farthest in the direction of the impulse. Ex-
periments have shown that a person speaking in the open air can be

Tube fracttteed bt
Vibration.

4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

heard about equally well at a distance of 100 feet in front, 75 feet on
each side, and 30 feet behind. When an obstacle checks a sound in
one direction it can be heard farther in others, because, as a given
amount of force produces a given amount of motion, if the motion is
arrested in some directions, it is increased in others.

We have now seen that air is the common vehicle of sound, and
that the sound-impulse moves in all directions at a high speed/ But
what is it that actually moves ? The particles of air are certainly not
shot from the vibrating body to the ear, for then we should live in the
midst of storms ten times more violent than tropical cyclones. The
wonderful elastic properties of gases here come into play. The vibra-
tions of bodies produce waves or pulses in the air. It is the same in
effect as with water-waves. When we throw a stone into a quiet pool,
the ripples chase each other in circles to the shore, but the water itself

Fig. 3.

Vibrations or a Clamped Plate.

does not move forward. The floating straw is not borne along, but
merely rises and falls in its place, and so the particles of water only
oscillate uj;> and down in circles, and, communicating their motion to
the adjacent particles, there is an outward transference of force by
wave-action, and the water-particles move up and down while the wave
moves forward. Air-waves exemplify the same principle, but in a dif-
ferent way. A vibrating body throws the contiguous air into move-
ment, and produces the wave. But the air-particles oscillate backward
and forward or in the same direction as the advancing wave. The
oscillations in water are transversal ; in air, they are said to be longitu-
dinal. The mode of movement may be rudely illustrated by a row of
glass balls such as are employed in the game of " Solitaire." If a
dozen of them are placed in a groove in contact (Fig. 5), and One of
them be withdrawn with the hand and lightly struck against its neigh-
bor, the motion imparted to the first ball is delivered up to the second,

WAVE-ACTION IN NATURE.

Fig. 4

Chlajdni's Figuees of Yibkating Plates.

that to the third, and so on, while the last ball only of the row flies
away. The balls being elastic, the first one struck is not pushed from
its position, but is slightly compressed, and then expanding it com-
presses the second, which, again expanding, compresses the third ;
and so there is propagated a series of compressions and expansions

6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

*

through the row. In a similar way the action of a vibrating body
upon the air is to produce a series of condensations and rarefactions
which are sent successively forward through the atmosphere, and each
condensation, with its associated rarefaction, constitutes a sonorous
wave. This is illustrated in Fig. 6, where A B represents a tuning-
fork in vibration. As the prong, , strikes against the air, its particles
are driven together or condensed in front of it, and, as the prong re-
' treats, it leaves a partial vacuum behind. Each vibration thus gen-

Fig. 5.

Propagation of Impulses through Balls.

erates a wave. The oscillations of the air-particles are communicated
to the adjacent particles, and the impulse is sent forward. In Fig.
6, b c d represent the condensations, and b' c d' the accompanying
rarefactions in the propagation of impulses through the air.

If, now, we imagine these dark and light spaces prolonged in cir-
cles round the tuning-fork, we shall have an idea of the way sound
moves in all directions. We are to conceive of air- waves as bubbles
or spheres, which rapidly expand from the point of vibration, and
chase each other outward with the speed of musket-balls.

"We have said that the waves of sound take place in an invisible
realm, yet it is in the power of science to bring them into view. This
triumph of experiment is due to a German named Toepler. Prof.
Rood has given an account of it in his admirable lecture on the " Mys-
teries of the Voice and Ear." It depends upon the principle that,
" when light which is travelling through the atmosphere meets with a
denser or rarer layer, it is usually turned a little out of its straight
path a very little but enough, sometimes, to render the layer actu-
ally visible, if proper optical means are employed." But, how is a
wave to be made visible, if it moves with the speed of a cannon-ball,
" which goes so fast we cannot see it ? " It is by getting a glimpse
of it so quickly that it has no time to move, and appears as if at rest.
Those who have seen a railway-train at high speed illuminated by a
flash of lightning, will remember that it appeared as if standing still.
So, if a cannon-ball were passing through a darkened room, and could
be illuminated by an electric flash, it would seem to be at rest in mid-
air. By suitable arrangements, and the use of the electric spark, Prof.

WAVE-ACTION IN NATURE. 7

Toepler caught the air-waves on the instant, and got a glimpse of their
circular, and even their shaded aspect.

We have said that "the difference between noise and music is, that
in noise the waves strike the ear irregularly, while in music they are
regular, and so rapid as to blend together. Any sound which becomes
continuous by rapid periodic strokes is said to be musical. " If a watch,
for example, could be caused to tick with sufficient rapidity say one
hundred times a second the ticks would lose their individuality, and
blend to a musical tone. And, if the strokes of a pigeon's wings could
be accomplished at the same rate, the progress of the bird through
the air would be accompanied by music. In the humming-bird, the
necessary rapidity is attained ; and, when we pass on from birds to
insects, where the vibrations are more rapid, we have a musical note
as the oi'dinary accompaniment of the insect's flight."

Sounds vary in pitch, and the pitch depends upon the rate of vibra-
tion. The greater the number of vibrations in a second, the shorter
and quicker are the waves, and the higher the tone. It has been de-
termined, in various ways, exactly how many vibrations there are in

Fig. 6.

a a

Constitution of Ate-Waves

each musical note. Savart employed a toothed wheel, which could be
set in motion at any desired rate of speed, and which had attached a
small recording apparatus that gave the number of revolutions in a
second. Fig. 7 represents the mechanism, and the mode of using it.
While the wheel is in revolution, a thin visiting-card, or a piece of
pasteboard, is held against its toothed edge. The card is bent a little
by each tooth, as it goes by, and springs back to its first position as
soon as it is released. When the wheel is turned slowly, there is heard
only a succession of taps, distinctly separable one from another; but, as
the rapidity of the rotations increases, the number of strokes increases
also, and they soon unite to form a musical sound, while, exactly as
the motion is accelerated, the sound rises in pitch. In this way it is
possible to count the number of vibrations in producing every note in
the musical scale.

8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The usual range of hearing lies between 16 vibrations in a second
and about 38,000 vibrations per second. Starting with 16 vibrations
per second, as the number is increased we have a series of rising mu-
sical notes, until the number is doubled, and an octave is produced
with 32 vibrations per second. Increasing them from this point, the
notes rise in pitch until they are again doubled, and we have the sec-
ond octave with 64 vibrations per second. By thus ascending through
11 octaves, the number of vibrations reached would be 32,768 per sec-
ond ; but all the notes comprised within these limits cannot be em-
ployed in music. Tyndall states that the practical range of musical

Fig. 7.

SaVABT'8 APPARATUS FOE NUMBERING VIBRATIONS.

sounds is comprised between 40 and 4,000 vibrations per second, which
amounts, in round numbers, to seven octaves. Helmholtz says that
the deepest tone of orchestra instruments is the E of the double bass
with 41|- vibrations. The new pianos and organs generally go down
to 33 vibrations. In height, the piano-forte reaches to 3,520 vibrations,
or sometimes to 4,224 ; while the highest note of the orchestra is that
of the piccolo flute, with 4,752 vibrations per second. The limits of
hearing vary in different persons. The squeak of the bat, the sound
of the cricket, and even the chirrup of the sparrow, cannot be heard
by some persons. The limit of sensibility often varies by as much as
two octaves.

' Waves of water, as everybody knows, vary greatly in magnitude ;
the riplets of the pool may be not more than an inch in length, while
the sea-waves may measure a hundred feet from crest to crest. Sound-

WAVE-ACTION IN NATURE. 9

waves also vary greatly in magnitude, though to each rate of vibration
there corresponds a definite length of wave. Knowing the rate of vi-
bration per second, and the velocity of sound per second, lengths of
waves are easily calculated. Take, for example, a tuning-fork that
Sounds the lowest note of the common D-flute, and it gives 288 vibra-
tions per second. If, now, it be struck in still air, at the freezing-point,
the foremost wave will reach a distance of 1,090 feet, at the end of a
second, while the chain of waves which connects it with the vibrating
fork will be 288 in number: each wave-link will therefore be about 3
feet 9 inches long. With few vibrations and deep tones, waves are
long, while, with rapid vibrations and shrill tones, waves are correspond-
ingly short. Within the limits of hearing, sound-waves vary in length,
from 70 feet to a half an inch. " The waves generated by a man's or-
gans of voice in common conversation are from 8 to 1 2 feet ; those of
a woman are from 2 to 4 feet in length. Hence, a woman's ordinary
pitch, in the lower sounds of conversation, is more than an octave
above a man's ; in the higher sounds it is two octaves."

But, because the numbers of their oscillations are exactly deter-
mined, we must not suppose that the motions are so simple, for, as
Prof. Rood remarks, smooth and clean-cut waves but seldom reach the
ear. There are compound vibrations which give complexity to wave-
figures. The large waves at sea are often covered by smaller waves,
so that the water-particles obey double impulses, and swing in double
oscillations. It was illustrated, in Fig. 1, that a string may vibrate as
a whole, or in various subdivisions. When a string or any other body
vibrates as a whole, it produces its lowest note, which is called the
fundamental note. But the fundamental note is never perfectly pure.
It is not possible to sound the string as a whole, without at the same
time causing the vibrations of its parts. But, as these shorter vibra-
tions are quicker, they yield notes of a higher pitch, which mingle
with the fundamental note, and alter its quality. These accompanying
higher notes may be in harmony with the fundamental note (when
they are called harmonics), or they may not harmonize with it. The
sounds emitted by the parts of a vibrating body are called overtones,
and it is possible for a string to furnish as many as 20 or 30 of these.
The mingling of the overtones with the fundamental one determines
the timbre of sound. It is this which gives their peculiar character to
different musical instruments, and enables us to distinguish them. A
clarinet and a violin may give the same fundamental note, but their
overtones are so different that the instruments are never confounded.

Sound-waves are not only transmitted by the air, but also by liquids
and solids. That water will convey musical sounds is shown by the
following experiment : Fig. 8 represents a tube a yard long, set upon
the wooden tray A B, with a funnel at the top, and filled with water.
A tuning-fork is attached to a little wooden foot, set into vibration,
and the foot is then dipped into the water without touching the sides

io

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the funnel. The vibrations are transmitted by the liquid to the
tray below, which is thrown into tremors, and a swelling musical sound
is the result.

Vibrations conveyed through Water.

The following beautiful experiment, described by Prof. Tyndall,
shows how music may be transmitted by an ordinary wooden rod. In
a room two floors beneath his lecture-room, there was a piano upon
which an artist was playing, but the audience could not hear it. A
rod of deal, with its lower end resting upon the sounding-board of the
piano, extended upward through the two floors, its upper end being
exposed before the lecture-table. But still no sound was heard. A
violin was then placed upon the end of the rod, which was thrown into
resonance by the ascending thrills, and instantly the music of the piano
was given out in the lecture-room. A guitar and a harp were substi-
tuted for the violin, and with the same result. The vibrations of the
piano-strings were communicated to the sounding-board, they traversed
the long rod, were reproduced by the resonant bodies above, the
air was carved into waves, and the whole musical composition was de-
livered to the listening audience.

The instrument of hearing in man consists of an external orifice
about an inch and a half deep in adults, which is closed at the bottom
by the circular tympanic membrane. This membrane, though mod-
erately strong, is quite thin, and almost transparent. It is made up

WAVE-ACTION IN NATURE. n

of fine fibres, some radiating from the central part to the circumfer-
ence, and others arranged in concentric rings. It is kept gently on
the stretch by two small muscles, one of which draws it tighter, and
the other loosens it, by acting upon a chain of small bones. We shall
not undertake to describe the cui'ious and complicated anatomy of the
inner ear the drum, containing air, the curious chain-work of minute vi-
brating bones, the labyrinth filled with water containing little crystalline
particles and fine elastic bristles, and where the delicate fibres of the
auditory nerve commence. " There is also," says Tyndall, " in the laby-
rinth a wonderful organ discovered by the Marchese Corti, which is, to
all appearance, a musical instrument, with its chords so stretched as to
accept vibrations of different periods, and transmit them to the nerve-
filaments which traverse the organ. Within the ears of men, and
without their knowledge or contrivance, this lute of 3,000 strings (as
Kolliker estimates) has existed for ages, accepting the music of the outer
world, and rendering it fit for reception by the brain. Each musical
tremor which falls upon this organ selects from its tensioned fibres the
one appropriate to its own pitch, and throws that fibre into unisonant
vibration. And thus, no matter how complicated the motion of the
external air may be, those microscopic strings can analyze it, and reveal
the constituents of which it is composed." By this wonderful apparatus
are all the tremulous movements of the outer world translated to the
world within. How the auditory nerve transmits its impressions is
not a matter of demonstration, but the probability is great that it
transmits them as it receives them as impulses of motion waves of
force that are conveyed to the brain and expended in the production of
those physical motions which are the material conditions and accompani-
ments of consciousness. That the organ of feeling and thought is itself
a sphere of vibrations and wave-actions traversing in all directions the
millions of microscopic fibres which pervade the encephalon, will be
thought absurd by many : but we know that wave-action is a part of
the method of Nature ; that it produces the most wonderful effects in
all the common forms of matter ; that the brain is a material instru-
ment in the closest physical relation with the outward order; and that
material changes of some kind within it are the concomitants of its
exalted functions. That there should be unity in the whole scheme does
not appear irrational.

Be this as it may, the marvels of what is known are inexhaustible.
Could we see what takes place in a room when a tuning-fork is in
vibration, giving out a single note, we should behold all the particles
of the air agitated in tremulous sympathy, and filling the space with
swiftly-expanding spheres of spectral beauty. Or, were the effect pro-
duced by several instruments concurrently played, we should see the
forms in countless variety carving the air into ever-changing figures
of geometrical harmony, and creating the perfect music of geometrical
form. Such a revelation is impossible, from the swiftness of movement,

12 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

which would foil the eye ; but it would be also impossible, because the
complications of movement would confuse it. But, where the optical
sense fails, the auditory sense succeeds. The membrane of the ear re-
ceives the torrent of motion, and transmits it with all its harmonies.
In an orchestra, where scores of instruments are playing through the
whole compass of the scale, the air is cut into waves by every com-
plexity of vibration grave tones mingle with shrill, soft with harsh,
fundamentals are merged in overtones, and the storm of impulses is
shot with the speed of rifle-bullets against the tympanum ; and yet
there is no confusion. In all their infinite diversity of qualities the
waves are legible to the little membrane. It vibrates to the lowest
and to the highest, to each and all, and telegraphs the whole per-
formance with incomprehensible exactness to its cerebral destination
and an exquisite work of art is produced in the sphere of pleasurable
feeling and critical intelligence.

Our glance at this fascinating subject has been very imperfect, but,
if any care to pursue it, we recommend them to the admirable book
of Prof. Tyndall, " On Sound," to which we are indebted for the fore-
going illustrations, and for many of the facts stated.

INSTINCT IN INSECTS.

By GEORGE POUCHET.

TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH, BY A. R. MACDONOUGH, ESQ.

I.

WHAT is instinct ? In what does it differ from intelligence ?
What explanation can be given of it in the present state of
the sciences of life ? All these are questions to which a positive an-
swer is asked for the first time in our day. Philosophers and moralists
do not in our time concern themselves with the relations or the differ-
ences between instinct and intelligence; for they have no means of
solving problems that particularly concern biology. Without going
farther back, we remember Descartes's strange notion of animal ma-
chines, adopted by Bossuet, and the whole seventeenth century ; but
at this time biologists in their turn attack the problem ; anatomy and
physiology will perhaps give us the solution sought in vain at the
hands of philosophic and religious systems since the days of Aristotle
and St. Thomas.

George Cuvier was the first to draw a clear distinction between
instinct and intelligence, in the second edition of the "Animal
Kingdom" (1829), in which he digests the works published during the
course of several years, by his brother Fredei'ic. The latter, placed
in control of the menagerie of the museum, believed that it pertained

INSTINCT IN INSECTS. 13

to the duties of his post to make a course of connected studies upon
the animals committed to his charge : he thought, as Geoffroy Saint-
Hilaire did, that such is the sole purpose of establishments of that kind.
li There exists in animals," Cuvier tells us, " a faculty distinct from intel-
ligence, which we term instinct. It makes them do acts which each in-
dividual performs without ever having seen them done, and which are
repeated, from generation to generation, invariably the same. Without
having learned, the animal knows ; it knows from its birth, and knows
so well, that it never makes a mistake, even in acts of extreme complex-
ity, the secret of which it seems to bring with it into the world. Young
ducks hatched under a hen go straight to the nearest piece of water,
and boldly plunge and swim, in spite of their foster-mother's cries and
distress. The squirrel lays up its winter stock of hazel-nuts and fil-
berts ; before it knows what winter is. The shepherd's dog and the
pointer know how to do the duties expected of them, through a gift
at birth. The bird hatched in a cage and reared a captive, if set free,
will build a nest like that its parents built, on the same tree, of the
same materials, in the same shape. The spider, more amazing still,
weaves without any lessons the geometric net-work of its web ; and
the untaught bee builds its comb. Man too has his instinct, as animals
have. By instinct the new-born child feels for and finds its mother's
breast ; but instinctive phenomena in man are less easy to determine,
and their discovery demands careful research, because intelligence
usually veils them. And yet intelligence is not wanting in animals
either, only with them instinct has that predominance which intelli-
gence takes in man."

With the exception of a few mistakes in details, Cuvier marked
very accurately the line between the instinctive and the intellectual
faculties, but he went no further. His character and disposition gave
him but little taste for penetrating into problems of that kind. With a
lofty disdain to which posterity has done justice, he left to his rival
Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire the care of inquiring into the origins of vital
manifestations. Cuvier affirmed simply that every species received
at its beginning a certain share of intelligence, with a certain provi-
sion of instinct, so wisely proportioned as to insure the permanence of
that species till the end of time, or at least till the next revolution in
our globe. The intelligent race does its part with its faculties as it
can ; they must suffice for it. The race without intelligence, to make
up for its want, brings into the world a supply of instinct which aids
it to make its way. This odd theory of compensation, instinct and
intellectual faculties respectively complementing each othei", misled
Cuvier ; it agreed with the general scope of his doctrine ; but it does
not agree with facts. Those among animals that present the most
highly-developed instinct are, unquestionably, the insects ; the silky
tissues of cocoons, the structures wrought by wasps, the beautiful
works that are treasured in cabinets, bear witness to astonishing in-

i 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

stinctive faculties ; every thing seems to be instinct with the insects,
and, if Cuvier's idea be adopted, it ought in general to be very poorly
endowed as regards intelligence. "We shall presently see that the truth
is completely the reverse.

Besides, Cuvier had no very accurate knowledge of insects, which
in his classification he degraded to a place below molluscs. We cannot
address the same reproach to M. Emile Blanchard, who pursues the
natural history of articulated animals, at the Jardin des Plantes. We
regret keenly that in his late work on the " Transformations, Habits,
and Instincts of Insects," he has not thought fit to follow the sugges-
tions of such a title, and to dwell a little on that twofold subject of
intelligence and instinct which would gain by being clearly stated.
His usual studies and the direction of his labors enable M. Blanchard
better than any one else to complete a blank which must be supposed
one of choice only, in his work. The learned professor of the museum
goes on from Cuvier's starting-point with him, and, with Flourens in his
last work ("Comparative Psychology," 1865), M. Blanchard distin-
guishes instinct from intelligence, but he stops there. He makes no at-
tempt whatever to measure the reciprocal influence of these two kinds
of faculties in the very complex acts of insect-life ; and, above all, he
refrains from the study of their intelligence, full of interest as it is.
" Individuals of the same species," he says, " always perform the same
works without having learned any thing ; instinct alone guides them."
Yet, together with this instinct, as M. Blanchard himself admits, there
are faculties of intellect, which offer greater difficulties of study by
reason of the existence of those instinctive faculties. These very dif-
ficulties make the study more worthy of attention. How are the two
classes of faculties combined ? If that winged mite had nothing but
the instincts that urge it, those alone would make it interesting ; how
is that interest increased, when in that tiny body instinct is paired
with reflection that analyzes sensations, and will that determines move-
ments ! what a study might we find in these intellectual faculties
used by so perfect an instinct ! Does it not become indispensable to
measure these faculties exactly in the case in which instinct is most
developed ? Suppose we were to find, contrary to Cuvier's opinion,
that instinct, far from being inversely proportioned to the degree of
intelligence, is just the reverse, and is greater, according as intelli-
gence is more active.

This really is the truth, and it is important to fix this first point
clearly in the study of instinct. Human inferiority in point of instinct
is perhaps only apparent, since education hardly allows us to guess
what we should be without it. We know from the history of more
than one child found wild in the woods, especially from that of the
idiot boy so well studied by Itard, what amazing instincts may be dis-
played by a human creature, even one absolutely without understand-
ing, when abandoned to itself. Among all animals, insects are assuredly

INSTINCT IN INSECTS. 15

those in which instinct is most developed; we except neither birds with
their nests, nor beavers with their dams. Among insects, those in
which the highest expression of instinct is noted are bees, that build
cells like the work of profound geometry ; and particularly ants, acting
with instincts yet higher, which seem to approach those perhaps
smothered by education in man. A Genevese, Peter Huber, -made
these known to lis. His book (1810) crowns a period of remarkable
studies upon insects. Before his time, as far back as 1705, a woman,
Mile. Sybille de Merian, crossed the ocean and made a voyage to
Surinam, to paint the caterpillars of the tropics ; then after her come
Reaumur, Da Geer, Bonnet, who watches night and day his flea, the
daughter of five virgin generations, and, when it dies, writes to all
Europe to disclaim any responsibility for the event. The pursuit
grows a passion. Lyonnet passes his life in describing, drawing, and
engraving the anatomy of the willow-caterpillar. Enthusiasm works
miracles ; Francis Huber, the father of the man of ants, although blind,
performs the marvel of making wonderful discoveries as to things tak-
ing place in the inner darkness of beehives. Peter Huber, the son, is
lost and absorbed in those societies of the ants to which he devotes
his studies. While all Europe is agitated by coalitions, nothing from
without reaches him.

Peter Huber observes and experiments with rare sagacity. No
fact escapes him ; he may remark upon it or explain it ill, but he notes
it most accurately. His observations have not been contradicted ; his
experiments still remain patterns of care and patience. He peopled
with ants, his garden, the terrace of his house, his study, his tables,
which were turned into a kind of hives, and, lest this new dwelling
might be unsatisfactory to the ants, and in order that they might keep
at work in it, he made rain and fair weather for them ; his rain-making
consisting in rubbing his hand for hours at a time over a wet brush.
In brief, he supplied them so richly with tempting dainties and weath-
er-contrivances, that at last they wanted nothing better than their
chance home, a bureau-drawer. Did he not even one day cherish the
fantastic notion of bringing up the larvas of his ants by feeding . by
hand ? We cannot resist loving him for his attachment to these little,
thinking beings. He meditated long over one decisive experiment
nothing less than the question of setting two colonies of ants at war
on the floor of his study. He hesitated and lingered to awake the
casus belli which should be the signal of slaughter ; he devised pre-
texts to adjourn the dreadful scene. " I thought over this experiment
for a long time," he says, " and I constantly postponed it, because I
had grown to be very fond of my captives." This recalls one of
Reaumur's sayings. He observes with what celerity humble-bees re-
build their nest of moss after it has been opened to examine the in-
side, an intrusion which these insects allow much more patiently than
honey-bees do, and he adds : " If the moss from above is thrown down

\6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

pretty near to the foot of the nest, as one would naturally do without
even thinking that it ought to be done to save the insects some trouble,
they very soon busy themselves with putting it back in its place." To
save the insects some trouble ! What a love for Nature the eighteenth
century had, and how differently things are done nowadays ! Our
entomologists study their ant-hills spade in hand; a stroke of the pick
into the mysteries of that underground dwelling costs their feverish
passion for inquiry nothing, and yet what a spectacle rewards such
barbarity ! If the spade uncovers a house of tawny ants ( Formica
fused), we see under the arched top a labyrinth of low rooms, of gal-
leries and passages, which penetrates the ground and leads to spacious
chambers full of nymphae in their cocoons, or of larvae almost as mo-
tionless. That ant, larger than the others, which is busily coming and
going, is a female; for the common ants, the workmen, have no sex;
naturalists call them neuters. The female lays eggs, and some work-
ers, surrounding her, take these, one by one, and pile them in little
heaps. The worms, when hatched, would perish without the workers,
being able only to lift their heads to show their want of food ; a work-
er comes up and lets them take from between its mandibles such nour-
ishing juices as it has brought from its quest in the fields. When the
hour comes for carrying all these papooses into the sun, they carry
them up and spread them out on the arched top. If the heat is too
strong, or if it rains, they bring them back again at once into rooms
of suitable temperature. When the time of their transformation comes,
the larva has spun itself a cocoon, but is quite unable to get out of it
alone. It is the duty of the workers again to extract it ; they cut the
silk, tear the shell, release the weak, new-grown creature, and then the
old empty cocoons are stored away in a remote chamber. Thus are
produced males, females, and neuters. The males and females fly off;
some females will come back to lay eggs in the ant-hill ; the neuters
do not leave it. As soon as they have gained a little strength, they
set about all those labors that instinct teaches them the repair and
keeping in order of the ant-hill, inside and without, carrying of useful
materials, pursuing plant-lice, and gathering stores of all kinds. As-
suredly, these instincts alone are very wonderful ; but there remains
still another to be spoken of, peculiarly conferred on certain species,
and which is indisputably the highest of all those we know among
animals.

Peter Huber discovered it on the afternoon of the 17th of June,
1804. The date is a memorable one for biology. He was walking in
the environs of Geneva, between four and five o'clock in the evening,
when he saw a regiment of great red ants crossing the road. They
marched in good order, with a front of three or four inches, and in a
column eight or ten feet long. Huber followed them, crossed a hedge
with them, and found himself in a meadow. The high grass plainly
hindered the march of the army, yet it did not disband; it had its ob-

INSTINCT IN INSECTS.

17

ject, and reached it. This was the nest of another e pedes of ants,
blackish-gray ones, whose hill rose in the grass twenty steps from the
hedge. A few blacldsh-gray ones were scattered about the hill ; as
soon as these perceived the enemy, they darted upon the stranger?,
while others hurry into the galleries to give the alarm. The besieged
ants come out in a body. The assailants dash upon them, and, after a
very short but very spirited sti - uggle, drive the black-gray ones back
to the bottom of their holes. One army corps presses after them into the
galleries, while other groups labor to make themselves an opening with
their teeth into the lateral parts of the hill. They succeed, and the
remainder of the troop makes its way into the besieged city by the
breach. Peter Huber had seen battles and exterminations of ants be-
fore this ; he supposed they were slaughtering each other in the depths
of the caverns. What was his amazement, after three or four minutes,
when he saw the assailants issue hurriedly forth again, each holding
between its mandibles a larva or a nympha of the conquered tribe !
The aggressors took exactly the same road again by which they had
come, passed through the hedge, crossed the road, at the same place,
and made their way, still loaded with their prey, toward a field of ripe
grain, into which the honest citizen of Geneva, respecting another's
property, refrained, with regret, from following them.

This expedition, worthy of the annals of barbarian piracy, inspired
Huber with an amazement easy to understand. He examined, and
discovered, to his great surprise, that some ant-hills were inhabited in
common by two kinds of ants, forming two castes. He designates
one of these by the name of " amazon or legionary ants; a name
strongly suggesting their martial character," he says. The others he
calls, very justly, " auxiliaries." The amazons do not work ; their duty
is fighting and carrying off" the nymphce and larvse. They choose the .
hour toward sunset for their warlike raids against the industrious and
peaceable tribes of the neighborhood. Whenever the weather is fine,,
they sally out thus, and levy their .tribute of flesh. The auxiliaries,,
for their part, are employed in all internal duties, and in keeping up
and repairing the dwelling. They alone open and close the entrance*
to the ant-hill, night and morning ; they alone (in the species observed
by P. Huber) go after provisions, for they feed the whole establish-
ment, even the legionaries, which are idle except when on their forays ;
they rear with equal care the larvse of the legionaries and those that
are stolen ; they alone, in fine, seem to decide upon the material inter-
ests of the community, the requisite enlargements, the need of emigra-
tion, and the place suitable for it. Peter Huber made one experiment
that shows very plainly the absolute dependence of the amazons upon
their associates. These fierce warriors do not understand any house-
hold work. Huber put thirty amazons into a glazed drawer, covered,
with earth on the bottom, with a certain number of larvse and of
nympha?, both of their own kind and of the auxiliary species.. A little-
vol. in. 2

i3 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

honey in a corner was provided for the support of the colony. At first,
the amazons seemed to pay some attention to the larvae, carrying them
about here and there, but they soon left them. They did not know
how to provide themselves with food. At the end of two days some
had already died of hunger close alongside the honey-drops, all were
languishing, and they had not even built a chamber. " I was sorry for
them," says Huber. He put an auxiliary into the drawer. This soli-
tary one restored order, made a house in the earth, gathered the larvae
into it, released several nymphae of both kinds that were ready to leave
the cocoon, and at last saved the lives of those among the amazons that
still had breath. ,

Peter Huber refrains from any comments in describing all these
wonders ; he leaves each one, as he says, at liberty to draw any con-
clusions he pleases. This one conclusion is inevitable : We do, then,
find among animals artificial societies, communities of beings strangers
in race, yet living together, contributing, toward one common end, their
different qualities and their individual efforts. The hive is always one
family only. A mixed ant-hill is inhabited by individuals belonging
to species at least as different as the horse, the ass, the zebra so dif-
ferent sometimes that zoologists have classed them in distinct genera
( Polyergus formica). Like provinces subject to the same form of
government, every ant-hill has, nevertheless, its local history, explained
by external circumstances, by conditions of neighborhood and boundary.
Each one has only the principle of its organization in common with
the rest. The same legionaries have sometimes one species of auxilia-
ries and sometimes another, the black-grey or the mason ant, which-
ever is within their reach, sometimes both together; or there may be
two kinds of legionaries, the " polyergus " and the dark-red, living in
the same hill, with one or two species of auxiliaries. Some naturalists,
Darwin among others, call these frankly " slave-holders," and the others
" slaves." These names are unfair. We must guard against any mis-
take as to the very peculiar nature of the relations existing between
the two castes.' Each fills a special part in the community, and nei-
ther exercises control or despotism in it. If the association, at the
outset, rests on violence and abduction, nothing has ever given rise to
a suspicion that there is any thing else in a mixed ant-hill than a collec-
tion of individuals kept together by special instincts. These names
of " slavery " and " republic," applied to such a form of life, are quite
void of meaning. Any allusion to politics, to systems, or doctrines of
equality, is wholly out of place here ; biology alone has the right of
giving a name to a social state which is its peculiar subject of study ;
this territory belongs to it alone.

We have selected these instances because they furnish the most
striking proof both of the perfection that instinct may reach, and
of the degree of intelligence of which animals are capable which are
placed by their nature at an immeasurable distance from man. Peter

INSTINCT IN INSECTS. i 9

Huber did not clearly draw the distinction, nor could he do so in his
time, between that which is instinct and that which is the share of in-
telligence in those acts which he witnessed. It is clear that these two
orders of faculties are constantly combined. It is by reason of their
perfection in instinct that intelligence appears so clearly in these little
beings. The construction of the ant-hill is an act of instinct : the
choice and distribution of its materials partake of intelligence. A
thousand traits reveal the thought which perceives, deliberates, wills,
executes. We may cite the observed fact of a crowd of ants dragging
with great effort a beetle's wing toward their hole. The opening is
too small, the wing will not go in. The workers drop it a moment,
tear down a piece of the wall, and renew their attempt. Some push
it from outside, others drag it from within. Fruitless effort ! The su-
perb spoil, which will make an entire ceiling, will not pass yet ; they
drop it once more ; the breach is widened, and the wing at last is
swallowed up in the cavern, where perhaps ten partitions must be torn
down to carry it to the proper place. The wing once got in, they re-
build the wall, and restore its former dimensions to the entrance. We
cannot cite, in the case of monkeys watched in captivity in menageries,
a single instance so clearly showing deliberation and common judg-
ment.

The social phenomena presented by the higher animals are unfor-
tunately very little known. We know scarcely any thing of what goes
on in a habitation of beavers ; we know nothing of the habits of the
republican sparrow, which builds a city for its nest ; the insect com-
munities are the most perfect ones that have been studied hitherto. So
soon as a society exists, there are understanding and concurrence of all
at every moment to reach a definite object. No zoologist now doubts
that insects of the same species may communicate with each other,
under certain circumstances, by a language of which the methods elude
us. Blanchard says of the ant : " It has its ideas, and communicates
them ; " but a singular detail of the history of the sacred scarabee
shows this still more clearly. The female, as we know, wraps up her
newly-laid egg in a ball of manure, the nourishment for the coming
grub. The point now is to transport the ball into a suitable place,
where it may be buried. The insect rolls along, with its hind-claws,
or, if necessary, hoists with its head, this little world, in which the
Egyptians found an emblem for their myths. Sometimes the journey
is pretty long ; the ball, lifted to the ridge of a mole-hill, rolls down
the other side, and so much is gained. But, if a rut or a crevice is
encountered, the precious globe drops to the bottom, and would be
hopelessly lost if the scarabee had only its own strength to depend on
for mounting that steep wall. It struggles in vain, and begins again
twenty times over ; at last it seems to desert its load, and flies off.
Wait and watch ; after a little while you will see the insect coming
back, but not alone now. It is followed by two, three, four, five com-

20 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

panions, which all drop down into the place pointed out, combine their
efforts, drag out the ball, and set it on its path again. What did the
scarabee say to its comrades ? how did it make itself understood ?
how did it bring them back with it ? It is not possible to make any-
positive answer to these questions ; what is beyond dispute is, that
there was in this case a concert of intelligences knowing how to under-
stand each other and to come together. Nothing more is needed for
the assertion that the insect judges, wills, and perhaps speaks, a lan-
guage of which we know as yet neither the signs nor the organs.

Cuvier, then, was in error when he announced that instinct in ani-
mals is in an inverse ratio to their intelligence. The contrary seems
rather to be true, and it is at least probable that in those intelligences
of insects which feel, will, understand, deliberate, there are, on a finer
scale, differences similar to those we remark in the higher animals.
The faculty is common to all, but with shades as marked among the
wild beasts of menageries as among our domestic animals. One is
cross, and another jealous ; this one is good-tempered, that other quar-
relsome, faithful to the house, or a vagabond in the streets all are
more or less intelligent. In the lower animals these differences have
not been as closely observed ; in the first place, they are probably less
distinctly marked, and in any case they are much more difficult to ob-
serve for reasons of all kinds. The small size of the being, its life
wholly alien to our own, the predominance of instinct, are all so many
impediments; but, on the other hand, the acts we see them perform
under our very eyes, the admitted existence of faculties that may.be
compared with our own, and those of a relatively high order, allow
of very little doubt that not only do insects possess a remarkably-de-
veloped intelligence, but that this intelligence presents, in consequence
of its very development, individual variations, just as in the higher
animals.

This is already a great advance upon Descartes, whose strange
theory no one at this day, that we are aware of, undertakes to defend ;
but this is not all a new step has been taken in these later times. We
are beginning, with our better knowledge, to ask whether those intellec-
tual and instinctive faculties, arranged by Cuvier in two parallel series,
may not have some common bond, so that one would flow from the other,
and instinct, after all, be definitely a product of intelligence. The ques-
tion has its importance. Instinct would then no longer be one of
those essential properties of living beings which absolutely elude our
comprehension, such as thought in the brain, contraction in the mus-
cles, the electricity of the eel, or the gleam of the glow-worm ; it
would be accessible, like all dependent phenomena, to our processes of
experiment and investigation.

Darwin is entitled to the credit of having taken the question into
this entirely new region. This bold attempt to found the scientific
study of instinct is found rather indefinitely in the " Origin of Spe-

INSTINCT IN INSECTS. 21

cies." Darwin does not enter on the problem with deliberate purpose
as a physiologist. He continues to be what he is in the whole work,
the zoologist, exclusively occupied with his great theory : he foresees
and meets objections ; he has particularly anticipated those that might
be brought against him in the name of instinct ; and he gives, in a
few pages, a more complete study of instinct than any philosopher had
made before him, and the first study ever made by aid of experi-
ment. He ignores instinct as an essential property, and treats it as a
function that is, he explains it. Instinct, as he holds, is nothing but
a result from the intellectual faculties, properly so called, modified
in a particular way under the twofold power of habit and inherited
influence.

Inherited tendency, like intelligence, is one of those properties pe-
culiar to living beings of which we can prove the existence, while its
principle completely and absolutely baffles investigation. When we
attempt to pierce the mystery by which the plant that springs from
the seed, the bird that grows from the yelk, will be more like the plant
or the bird it proceeds from than like any other, we confront the im-
penetrable unknown. Hereditary tendency does not merely carry
down from one generation to another all the imaginable modifications
of form, size, coloring; it extends to the cerebral faculties, transmitted
doubtless by the help of some physical peculiarity of the organ of in-
telligence. This is what is called the spirit of race, which decides that
one people shall be born brave and crafty, like the Greeks of Homer;
industrious, like the Chinese ; traders, like the Jews ; or hunters, like
the red-skin. This is, if we choose to term it so, a kind of instinct
that education sometimes allows us to control, but never eradicates.
As the wolf, fattened in the kennel, ends by going back to his wretched
life of the woods, the child of a savage reared in the midst of civiliza-
tion preserves in his mind, as upon his features, the deep, hereditary
stamp of his origin. Habit, almost as much as hereditary tendency,
is another mysterious faculty which we recognize without being able
to explain it. Some act, most difficult in appearance, which required
on the part of our brain a considerable effort of will and all our mental
activity, at last surprises us by almost performing itself. We might
say that attention and reflection have gone down into our limbs, which
perform the most delicate tasks, and protect themselves against attacks
from without, while the mind, occupied with something else, is pur-
suing a different object. Revue des Deux Mbndes.

22 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

4

THE DOCTRINE OF NATURAL SELECTION. 1

By ALFEED E. WALLACE.

"ATTOTWITHSTANDING the objections which are still made to the
-L^l theory of Natural Selection, on the ground that it is either a
pure hypothesis not founded on any demonstrable facts, or a mere truism
which can lead to no useful results, we find it year by year sinking
deeper into the minds of thinking men, and applied, more and more
* frequently, to elucidate problems of the highest importance. In the
works now before us we have this application made by two eminent
writers, one a politician, the other a naturalist, as a means of working
out so much of the complex problem of human progress as more espe-
cially interests them.

Mr. Bagehot takes for granted that early progress of man which
resulted in his separation into strongly-marked races, in his acquisition
of language, and of the rudiments of those moral and intellectual
faculties which all men possess ; and his object is to work out the steps
by which he advanced to the condition in which the dawn of history
finds him aggregated into distinct societies known as tribes or na-
tions, subject to various forms of government, influenced by various
beliefs and prejudices, and the slave of habits and customs which often
seem to us not only absurd and useless, but even positively injurious.
Now, every one of these beliefs or customs, or these aggregations of
men into groups having some common characteristics, must have been
useful at the time they originated ; and a great feature of Mr. Bage-
hot's little book is his showing how even the most unpromising of
these, as we now regard them, might have been a positive step in ad-
vance when they first appeared. His main idea is, that what was
wanted in those early times was some means of combining men in so-
cieties, whether by the action of some common belief or common
danger, or by the power of some ruler or tyrant. The mere fact of
obedience to a ruler was at first much more important than what was
done by means of the obedience. So, any superstition or any custom,
even if it originated in the grossest delusion, and produced positively
bad results, might yet, by forming a bond of union more perfect than
any other then existing, give the primitive tribe subject to it such a
relative advantage over the disconnected families around them as to
lead to their increase and permanent survival in the struggle for ex-

1 " Physics and Politics ; or, Thoughts on the Application of the Principles of ' Nat-
ural Selection ' and ' Inheritance ' to Political Society." By Walter Bagehot. (King &
Co., 1872.)

" Histoire des Sciences et dea Savants depuis deux Siecles, suivie d'autres Etudes sur
1.2S Sujets Scientifiques, en particulier sur la Selection dans l'Espece Humaine." Par Al-
phonse de Candolle. (Geneve : H. Georg, 1873.)

THE DOCTRINE OF NATURAL SELECTION. 23

istence. In those early days war was perhaps the most powerful
means of forcing men to combined action, and might therefore have
been necessary for the ultimate development of civilization. Freedom
of opinion was then a positive evil, for it would lead to independent
action, the very thing it was most essential to get rid of. In early
times isolation was an advantage, in order that these incipient societies
might not be broken up by intermixture, and it was only after a large
number of such little groups, each with its own idiosyncrasies, habits,
and beliefs, had been formed, that it became advantageous for them to
meet to intermingle or to struggle together, and the stronger to drive
out or exterminate the weaker. Out of the great number of petty
tribes thus formed, only a few had the qualities which led to a further
advancement. The rest were either exterminated or driven out into
remote and inaccessible or inhospitable districts, and some of those
are the " savages " which still exist on the earth, serving as a measure
of the vast progress of the human race. Yet even these never show
us the condition of the primitive man ; they are men who advanced up
to a certain point and then became stationary :

"Their progress was arrested at various points; but nowhere, not even in
the hill-tribes of India, not even in the Andaman Islands, not even in the sav-
ages of Terra del Fnego, do we find men who have not got some way. They
have made their little progress in a hundred different ways; they have framed
with infinite assiduity a hundred curious habits ; they have, so to say, screwed
themselves into the uncomfortable corners of a complex life, which is odd and
dreary, but yet is possible. And the corners are never the same in any two
parts of the world. Our record begins with a thousand unchanging edifices,
but it shows traces of previous building. In historic times there has been but
little progress, in prehistoric times there must have been much."

Again our author shows how valuable must have been the institu-
tion of caste in a certain stage of progress. It established the divis-
ion of labor, led to great perfection in many arts, and rendered gov-
ernment easy. Caste nations would at first have a great advantage
over non-caste nations, would conquer them, and increase at their ex-
pense. But a caste nation at last becomes stationary ; for a habit of
action and a type of mind which it can with difficulty get rid of are
established in each caste. When this is the case, non-caste nations
soon catch them up, and rapidly leave them far behind.

This outline will give some idea of the way in which Mr. Bagehot dis-
cusses an immense variety of topics connected with the progress of so-
cieties and nations, and the development of their distinctive peculiarities.
The book is somewhat discursive and sketchy, and it contains many
statements and ideas of doubtful accuracv, but it shows an abundance
of ingenious and original thought. Many will demur to the view that
mere accident and imitation have been the origin of marked national
peculiarities; such as those which distinguish the German, Irish,
French, English, and Yankees : " The accident of some predominant

24 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

person possessing certain peculiarities set the fashion, and it has been
imitated to this day." And again : " Great models for good or evil
sometimes appear among men who follow, them either to improvement
or degradation." This is said to he one of the chief agents in " na-
tion-making," hut a much better one seems to be the affinity of like
for like, which brings and keeps together those of like morals, or reli-
gion, or social habits ; but both are probably far inferior to the long-
continued action of external Nature on the organism, not merely as it
acts in the country now inhabited by the particular nation, but by its
action during remote ages and throughout all the migrations and in-
termixtures that our ancestors have ever undergone. We also find
many broad statements as to the low state of morality and of intel-
lect in all prehistoric men, which facts hardly warrant, but this is too
wide a question to be entered upon here. In the concluding chapter,
" The Age of Discussion," there are some excellent remarks on the
restlessness and desire for immediate action which civilized men in-
herit from their savage ancestors, and how much it has hindered true
progress; and the following passage, with which we will conclude the
notice of Mr. Bagehot's book, might do much good if, by means of
any skilful surgical operation, it could be firmly fixed in the minds of
our legislators and of the public :

"If it had not been for quiet people, who sat still and studied the sections
of the cone ; if other people had not sat still and worked out the doctrine of
chances, the most ' dreamy moonshine,' as the purely practical mind would con-
sider, of all human pursuits; if 'idle star-gazers' had not watched long and
carefully the motions of the heavenly bodies our modern astronomy would
have been impossible ; and, without astronomy, ' our ships, our colonies, our
seamen,' all that makes modern life, could not. have existed. Ages of quiet,
sedentary, thinking people were required before that noisy existence began, and
without those pale, preliminary students it never could have been brought into
being. And nine-tenths of modern science is, in this respect, the same ; it is
the produce of men whom their contemporaries thought dreamers who were
laughed at for caring for what did not concern them who, as the proverb went,
' walked into a well from looking at the stars ' who were believed to be use-
less, if any one could be such. And the conclusion is plain that, if there had
been more such people ; if the world had not laughed at those there were ; if,
rather, it had encouraged them there would have been a great accumulation
of proved science ages before there was. It was the irritable activity, ' the wish
to be doing something,' that prevented it. Most men inherited a nature too
eager and too restless to find out things; and, even worse with their idle
clamor they 'disturbed the brooding hen, 1 they would not let those be quiet
who wished to be so, and out of whose calm thought much good might have
come forth. If we consider how much good science has done, and how much
it is doing for mankind, and, if the over-activity of men is proved to be the
cause why science came so late into the world, and is so small and scanty still,
that will convince most people that our over-activity is a very great evil."

In the second work, of which we have given the title, the veteran
botanist, Alphonse de Candolle, sets forth his ideas on many subjects

THE DOCTRINE OF NATURAL SELECTION. 25

not immediately connected with the science in which he is so great an
authority. The most important, though not the longest, essay in the
volume is that on " Selection in the Human Race," in which he arrives
at some results which differ considerably from those of previous
writers. In a section on " Selection in Human Societies or Nations,"
we find a somewhat novel generalization as to the progress and decay
of nations. Beginning with small, independent states, we see a
gradual fusion of these into larger and larger nations, sometimes vol-
untary, sometimes by conquest, but the fusion always goes on, and
tends to become more and more complete, till we have enormous ag-
gregations of people under one government, in which local institutions
gradually disappear, and result in an almost complete political and
social uniformity. Then commences decay ; for the individual is so
small a unit, and so powerless to influence the government, that the
mass of men resign themselves to passive obedience. There is then no
longer any force to resist internal or external enemies, and by means
of one or the other the " vast fabric " is dismembered, or falls in ruins.
The Roman Empire and the Spanish possessions in America are ex-
amples of this process in the past ; the Russian Empire and our Indian
possessions will inevitably follow the same order of events in a not
very distant future.

% Although M. de Candolle is a firm believer in Natural Selection, he
takes great pains to show how very irregular and uncertain it is in its
effects. The constant struggles and wars among savages, for example,
might be supposed to lead to so rigid a selection that all would be
nearly equally strong and powerful ; and the fact that some savages
are so weak and incapable as they are shows, he thinks, that the action
of natural selection has been checked by various incidental causes.
He omits to notice, however, that the struggle between man and the
lower animals was at first the severest, and probably had a consider-
able influence in determining race-characters. It may be something
more than accidental coincidence that the most powerful of all savages
the negroes inhabit a country where dangerous wild beasts most
abound ; while the weakest of all the Australians do not come into
contact with a single wild animal of which they need be afraid.

Selection among barbarous nations will often favor cunning, lying,
and baseness ; vice will gain the advantage, and nothing good will be
selected but physical beauty. Civilization is defined by the prepon-
derance of three facts the restriction of the use of force to legitimate
defence and the repression of illegitimate violence, speciality of pro-
fessions and of functions, and individual liberty of opinion and action
under the general restriction of not injuring others. By the applica-
tion of the above tests we can determine the comparative civilization
of nations ; but too much civilization is often a great danger, for it
inevitably leads to such a softening of manners, such a hatred of
bloodshed, cruelty, and injustice, as to expose a nation to conquest by

26 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

its more warlike and less scrupulous neighbors. Progress in civiliza-
tion must necessarily be very slow, and to be permanent must pervade
all classes and all the surrounding nations ; and it is because past civ-
ilizations have been too partial that there have been so many relapses
into comparative barbarism. All this is carefully worked out, and is
well worthy of attention.

In the last section, on the probable future of the human race, we
have some remarkable speculations, very different from the somewhat
Utopian views held by most evolutionists, but founded, nevertheless, on
certain very practical considerations. In the next few hundred or a
thousand years the chief alterations will be the extinction of all the
less dominant races, and the partition of the world among the three
great persistent types, the whites, blacks, and Chinese, each of which
will have occupied those portions of the globe for which they are best
adapted. But, taking a more extended glance into the future of 50,000
or 100,000 years hence, and supposing that no cosmical changes occur
to destroy, wholly or partially, the human race, there are certain well-
ascertained facts on which to found a notion of what must by that time
have occurred. In the first place, all the coal and all the metals avail-
able will then have been exhausted, and, even if men succeed in find-
ing other sources of heat, and are able to extract the metals thinly
diffused through the soil, yet these products must become far dearer*
and less available for general use than now. Railroads and steam-
ships, and every thing that depends upon the possession of large quan-
tities of cheap metals, will then be impossible, and sedentary agricul-
tural populations in w r arm and fertile regions will be the best off.
Population will have lingered longest around the greatest masses of
coal and iron, but will finally become most densely aggregated within
the tropics. But another and more serious change is going on, which
will result in the gradual diminution and deterioration of the terres-
trial surface. Assuming the undoubted fact that all our existing land
is wearing away and being carried into the sea, but, by a strange over-
sight, leaving out altogether the counteracting internal forces, which
for countless ages past seem always to have raised ample tracts above
the sea as fast as subaerial denudation has lowered them, it is argued
that, even if all the land does not disappear and so man become finally
extinct, yet the land will become less varied, and will consist chiefly
of a few flat and parched-up plains, and volcanic or coralline islands.
Population will by this time necessarily have much diminished, but it
is thought that an intelligent and persevering race may even then
prosper. "They will enjoy the happiness which results from a peace-
able existence, for, without metals or combustibles, it will be difficult
to form fleets to rule the seas, or great armies to ravage the land ; "
and the conclusion is that " such ai-e the probabilities according to the
actual course of things." Now, although we cannot admit this to be
a probability on the grounds stated by M. de Candolle, it does seem a

THE DOCTRINE OF NATURAL SELECTION. 27

probability, at some more distant epoch, on other grounds. The great
depths of the oceans extend over wide areas, whereas the great heights
of the land are only narrow ridges and peaks ; hence it has been cal-
culated that the mean height of the land is only 1,000, while the mean
depth of the sea is about 15,000 feet. But the sea is 2| times as ex-
tensive as the land, so that the bulk or mass of the land above the sea-
level will be only about one thirty-seventh of the mass of the ocean.
Now, does not this small proportion of bulk of land to water render it
highly probable that the forces of elevation and depression should
sometimes cause the total or almost total submersion of the land ?
Of such an epoch no geological record could be left because there
could be no strata formed, except from the debris of coral-islands, and
such a period of destruction of the greater part of terrestrial life may
have repeatedly occurred between the period when the several Primary
or Secondary formations were deposited. At all events, with such a
proportion of land and sea surface as now exists, with such a small
bulk of land above the enormous bulk of water, and with no known
cause why the dry land rather than the sea-bottom should be con-
stantly elevated, we must admit it to be almost certain that great fluc-
tuations of the area of the land must occur, and that, while those fluc-
tuations could not very considerably increase the area of the land they
might immensely diminish it. There is here, therefore, a cause for
the possible depopulation of the earth likely to occur much sooner
than any cosmical catastrophe.

The largest and most elaborate essay in the volume is that on the
" History of the Sciences and of Scientific Men for the last Two Cen-
turies." In this the author endeavors to arrive at certain conclusions
as to the progress of science under different conditions and in different
countries, the influence of political institutions and of heredity, and
various other phenomena, by a method which is novel and ingenious.
He takes account only of the men honored as foreign associates or
members by the three great European scientific bodies, the Royal So-
ciety of London and the Paris and Berlin Academies. By this means
he avoids all personal bias, and secures, on the whole, impartiality.
The tables drawn out by this method are examined in every possible
way, and the results worked out in the greatest detail. The main con-
clusion arrived at is the determination of a series of eighteen causes
favorable to the progress of science ; and it is shown that a large
proportion of these are present in a considerable degree in coun-
tries where science flourishes, while they are almost wholly absent
in barbarous or semi-civilized countries where science does not
exist.

Another interesting essay is that on the importance for science of a
dominant language, and it contains some very curious facts as to the
way in which the English language is spreading on the Continent. M.
de Candolle believes that in less than two centuries English will be

28 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the dominant language, and will be almost exclusively used in scien-
tific works.

There are also short hut very interesting essays on methods of
teaching drawing and developing the observing powers of children, on
statistics and free-will, and on a few other subjects of less importance,
all of which are treated in a thoughtful manner, and illustrate one of
the views on which much stress is laid in this work, viz., that the
mental faculties which render a man great in any science are not spe-
cial, but would enable him to attain equal eminence in many other
branches of science or in any professional or political career. Nature.

THE BLACK DEATH IN NEW ENGLAND.

By HEZEKIAH BUTTER WORTH, Esq.

THE ancient leprosy, the red plague, and the disease known in Eu-
rope as the Black Death, have ceased to afflict mankind. They
seem to belong to the evils of the past ; their banishment is due to
human progress, to a better knowledge of hygiene, and a clearer under-
standing of the causes that develop infection and produce contagious
and epidemic diseases. It is an interesting question to ask, " Will not
the small-pox and the cholera, whose effects science has already modi-
fied, become extinct diseases ? "

The disease known as the black death made its first appearance in
Europe at Constantinople in 1347. It was brought there from Asia,
probably from the northern coasts of the Black Sea. From Turkey it
gradually 6pread over Europe, almost depopulating w r hole districts as
it travelled north. Florence was terribly smitten. Boccaccio, in the
preface to his "Decameron," has left us an account of the sweeping
destruction of the Florentines by the scourge, which one w T ho reads can
never forget. From Florence it travelled into Spain, swept over
France, and crossed the Straits of Dover.

It made its appearance in England late in the summer of 1348.
From June to December of that year there was an almost incessant
fall of rain. The ground was continually damp, and the streams were
polluted by surface drainage. When the sun shone, it was through a
misty sky, producing a vapory heat, particularly unhealthy and ener-
vating. In August, a few cases of a disease supposed to be the black
death we/e reported. In September the plague was surely among the
people. In November it reached London, and from the capital it rap-
idly spread into all parts of the kingdom.

The symptoms of this terrible disease, which usually proved fatal,
were inflammatory boils and swelling of the glands, similar to those

THE BLACK DEATH IN NEW ENGLAND. 29

that appear in the worst eruptive fevers, with black patches all over
the skin, from which the disease received the name Black Death. The
patient was next seized with violent vomitings of blood ; he sometimes
died at once, and he seldom survived more than two days. It is stated
that, toward the end of the pestilence, many lives were saved by punc-
turing the boils.

It was a fearful time. The population of England and Wales num-
bered probably between three and four millions, and of these at least
one-half, or more than a million persons, perished. Stowe says that
the scourge " so wasted and spoyled the people that scarce the tenth
person of all sorts was left alive." Another old writer says : " There
died an innumerable sort, for no man but God only knew how many."
In six months from January 1st there died in the city of Norwich more
than 57,000 persons. In the graveyard of Spittle Croft, thirteen acres
of land, which was used for the burial of the dead, because the London
graveyards were " choke full," there were buried 50,000 persons. Par-
liament was prorogued in January, on account of the plague having
broken out in Westminster, and again in March, on account of the in-
crease of the disease. On the 16th of June, 1350, an important public
regulation was made, " because," as the law ran, " a great part of our
people is dead of the plague."

Not only the people but the cattle were infected. The disease was
highly contagious. Death was in the air. " The pestilential breath
of the sick who spat blood," says Hecker, " caused a terrible contagion
far and near, for even the vicinity of those who had fallen of the plague
was certain death, so that parents abandoned their infected children,
and all the ties of kindred were dissolved ! "

Half the population, or more than a million souls ! What a stretch
of the imagination does it require to cover such an appalling calamity !
Cities were reduced to towns ; towns to hamlets. The work of the
husbandman ceased. The dead were unburied, and lay in the fields
rotting in the sun. People stayed in their own houses, often half
clothed and half famished, waiting for the destroyer to come.

In the year 1664 a similar visitation of the plague came upon Lon-
don. The disease was perhaps not as swift and violent as had been
the black death three hundred years before, but it was of the same
general character. It broke out in Drury Lane in December. It had
been raging for a considerable period in Holland, and the minds of the
English people had been filled with apprehension for months. If De-
foe's narrative is true, the people believed that they bad supernatural
warnings of the impending catastrophe. The symptoms of this disor-
der were similar to the black death, except that it was usually preceded
by dimness of vision, and the discolored patches on the body were
livid, instead of black. At the beginning of the following summer the
disease fearfully increased. We may get an idea of the scene at the
beginning of the calamity, from some little incidents recorded in the

3 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

journal of Pepys. " June 7th," says this writer, " was the hottest that
ever I felt in my life. This day, much against my will, did I see in
Drury Lane two or three houses marked witli a red cross upon the
doors, and ' Lord, have mercy upon us ! ' writ there a sad sight to
me, being the first of the kind I ever saw." Again, on the 17th of the
same month, he says: "It struck me very deep this afternoon, going
with a hackney coach down Holborn, from the Lord Treasurer's, I
found the coachman to drive easily and easily, and the coach stood
still. He told me that he was suddenly struck very sick and almost
blind. I took another coach, with a sad heart for the poor man, and
fearing for myself also, lest he should have been struck with the
plague."

As the calamity increased, shojjs were closed, dwellings were left
empty, and the public thoroughfares were deserted. The markets
were removed beyond the city-walls, coaches were seldom seen, except
when people were fleeing from .the city ; a solemn stillness prevailed
in many districts, and grass grew in the streets. People might
be heard crying out of the windows for help, but the cry returned
echoless. Some went mad ; some rushed into the river, and ended
their tortures by suicide. On a single night in the month of Septem-
ber 10,000 people died.

Many incidents of this terrible visitation are preserved, the best
known being from the pen of Defoe. Rev. Thomas Vincent describes
some touching scenes, of w T hich he himself was a witness. " Among
other spectacles," he says, " two, methought, were very affecting ; one
of a woman coming alone and weeping by the door where I lived,
with a little coffin under her arm, carrying it to the new church-yard.
I did judge that it was the mother of the child, and that all the fam-
ily besides were dead."

An old writer thus describes an impressive scene in London during
the reign of the plague :

" O unrejoicing Sabbath ! not of yore
Did thy sweet evenings die along the Thames
Thus silently. Now, every sail is furled,
The oar hath dropped from out the rower's hand,
And on thou flowest in lifeless majesty,
River of a desert lately filled with joy !
O'er all the mighty wilderness of stone
The air is clear and cloudless, as the sea
Above the gliding ship. All fires are dead,
And not one single wreath of smoke ascends
Above the stillness of the towers and spires.
How idly hangs that arch magnificent
Across the idle river! Not a speck
Is seen to move along it. There it hangs
Still as a rainbow in the pathless sky."

John WiUon.

THE BLACK DEATH IN NEW ENGLAND. 31

These are old facts, and are generally well known to the readers of
old histories. But it may not be as well known to our readers that
the black death, or at least a most malignant form of the true plague,
prevailed in North America during the first part of the seventeenth
century, sweeping off the Indian tribes on the Atlantic coast, and es-
pecially the tribes of New England. In the charter of New England,
granted by James I., and bearing date of November 3, 1620, the king
states " tbat he had been given certainly to know, that, within these
late years, there hath, by God's visitation, reigned a wonderful plague,
etc., to the depopulation of that whole territory, so that there is not
left, for many leagues together in a manner, any that do claim or chal-
lenge any kind of interest therein."

"These late years" seem to have been 1617, 1618, and 1619. Its
ravages from the Narragansett Bay to the Penobscot were of the most
fearful character, constantly destroying one-fourth, and, according to
some authorities, one-thirtieth of the natives. The old Indians gave a
frightful account of it to the Pilgrims, saying that the victims had
" died in heaps," and that the disease swept them off so rapidly that
" the living were not able to bury the dead."

It. is stated that, of the Indians inhabiting Patuxet, Squanto only
remained. Norton, in his " New England Canaan " (Amsterdam,
1637), says : "They died in heaps, as they lay in their houses, and the
living that were able to shift for themselves would run away and let
them dy, and let their carkases ly above the ground without burill.
For, in the place where many inhabited, there hath been but one left
alive to tell what became of the rest, the living being, it seems, not
able to bury the dead. They were left for crowes, kites, and vermine,
to pray upon. And the bones and skulls, upon the several places of
their habitation, made such a spectacle after my coming into these
parts that, as I travelled in that forest near the Massachusetts, it
seemed to me a new-found Golgotha." We should add that Mr. Nor-
ton came to this country in 1622.

Sir Fernando Gorges, who sent a ship to the East Atlantic coast at
this period, tells us that, according to the reports given to him, those
of the savages who had escaped the wars had been sore afflicted with
the plague: " Notwithstanding, Vines'''' (his navigator), "and the rest
with him that lay in the cabins with those people who died, did not so
much as feel their heads ache while they stayed there."

It has been stated that the tribe of the Wampanoags was reduced
from thirty thousand to a few hundred people, which will account for
the small number of braves who appeared with Massasoit during his
early visits to Plymouth. The Massachusetts, a tribe about as large
as the Wampanoags, according to an early authority, were reduced in
like proportion.

Some have supposed that this disease was the yellow fever, because
an old Indian had told one of the early historians that the bodies of

3 z THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the deceased turned the color of his blanket, which was yellow. But,
in most allusions to it, we find it spoken of as the true plague, or the
pestilence in its worst and most destructive form.

The solitude of the forest at this time must have been most solemn
and awe-inspiring. Of villages once populous, nothing remained but de-
caying huts, tenanted by birds and beasts, who had left white and bare
the human bones scattered around. The desolations of Athens, of
Constantinople, of Florence, and of London, were all unequalled by
the spectacle of depopulation that has been presented on our very
shores.

The Indian plague becomes an interesting faet of medical science,
since it has been supposed that our climate has prophylactic virtues
which render the pestilence, that, after an interval of centuries, has
again and again ravaged Europe, impossible. We have strong reason
to hope that the progress of science has banished this swift minister
of death from the civilized races, and that even the modified forms of
the disease are gradually yielding and disappearing. Still it is by no
means certain that it may not come travelling from the East again,
and, if so, we are no more protected by territorial or climatic influ-
ences than the inhabitants of the Old World. At least, so we might
reasonably infer from this last fearful but interesting chapter of history.

-+*+-

THE NEW PSYCHOLOGY. 1

By DOUGLAS A. SPAULDING.

TO give readers some idea of the contents of a good book is very
often the most useful thing a reviewer can do. Unfortunately,
that course is not open to us in the present instance. The subject is
too vast. We cannot exhibit the grandeur; we can only in a few gen-
eral phrases express our admiration of the profound, all-embracing
philosophy of which the work before us is an instalment. The doc-
trine of evolution, when taken up by Mr. Spencer, was little more than
a crochet. He has made it the idea of the age. In its presence other
systems of philosophy are hushed ; they cease their strife, and become
its servants, while all the sciences do it homage. The place that the
doctrine of evolution has secured in the minds of those who think for
the educated public may be indicated by a few names taken just as
they occur. Mr. Darwin's works, the novels of George Eliot, Mr.
Tylor's " Primitive Culture," Dr. Bastian's " Beginnings of Life," and
Mr. Bagehot's " Physics and Politics," have hardly anything in com-

1 " The Principles of Psychology." In two volumes. By Herbert Spencer. New York :
D. Appleton & Co.

THE NEW PSYCHOLOGY. 33

mon but the idea of evolution, with which they are all more or less
imbued. In a word, we have but one other thinker with whom, in
point of influence on the higher thought of this, and probably of sev-
eral succeeding generations, Mr. Spencer can be classed ; it does not
need saying that that other is Mr. J. S. Mill.

As we cannot present such an outline of Mr. Spencer's system of
psychology as would make it generally intelligible, the purpose of di-
recting attention to the work will perhaps be best served by selecting
as the subject of remark one or two points to which the presence of
the controversial element may lend a special interest. After pointing
out that the cardinal fact brought to light, when nervous action is
looked at entirely from the objective point of view, is, that the amount
and heterogeneity of motion exhibited by the various living creatures
are greater or less in proportion to the development of the nervous
system, Mr. Spencer comes to the vexed question of the relation be-
tween nervous phenomena and the phenomena of consciousness. This
is a subject about which, in its more subtle aspects, there is much un-
certainty and some confusion of thought. It may be taken as estab-
lished, that every mode of consciousness is a concomitant of some
nervous change. Given certain physical conditions, accompanied by
a special state of consciousness, and there is every reason to believe
that physical conditions in every respect identical will always be at-
tended by a similar state of consciousness. This, and not more than
this, we think, was intended by Mr. Spencer in his chapter on iEstho-
physiology. Nevertheless, several able men have, it would appear,
been led to suppose that he countenances a kind of materialism (not
using the word to imply any thing objectionable ; for why not be ma-
terialists, if materialism be truth?), which forms no part of his philos-
ophy. To give precision and emphasis to what we say, we would take
the liberty to refer to the position taken up by Dr. Bastian in his re-
markably able and important work on the " Beginnings of Life." The
expi-ession that definitely raises the issue of which we wish to speak,
and which at the same time fixes Dr. Bastian to a view not in harmony
with the teaching of Mr. Spencer, is the following : " We have not
yet been able to show that there is evolved, during brain action, an
amount of heat, or other mode of physical energy, less than there would
have been had not the Sensations been felt and the Thouo-hts thought ; "
but he believes that this is the case. Our present object is not so
much to show that here speculation has got on the wrong track, as
that, if we understand Mr. Spencer, it is not his opinion that any thing
of this kind takes place ; though certainly some ambiguous phrases
might be held to convey this meaning. We have mentioned the sig-
nificant fact that the size of the nervous system holds a pretty constant
relation to the amount and heterogeneity of motion generated. The
implication is, that none of the motion evolved during nervous action
disappears from the object world, passes into consciousness in the same

VOL. III. 3

34 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

sense that physicists speak of momentum passing into heat ; that
whether consciousness arise or not, there will he for the molecular
motion set up in the nerve-substance exactly the same mechanical
equivalents. Whether, for example, those ganglia that in the hody
of each one of us are employed in carrying on what we call reflex ac-
tion, are so many distinct seats of consciousness, like so many separate
animals, an idea for which much has been said, or whether the nerve-
changes that go on in these ganglia have no subjective side ; in either
case the objective facts will remain the same. If consciousness is
evolved, it is not at the expense of a single oscillation of a molecule
disappearing from the object-world. No doubt it is hard to conceive
consciousness arising in this apparently self-created way; but, if any
suppose that by using phrases that would assimilate mind to motion
they ease the difficulty, they but delude themselves. It is as easy to
think of consciousness arising out of nothing, if they will, as to con-
ceive it as manufactured out of motion ; that is to say, the one and the
other proposition are alike absolutely unthinkable. On this point Mr.
Spencer writes: " Can we think of the subjective and objective activi-
ties as the same ? Can the oscillations of a molecule be presented in
consciousness side by side with a nervous shock, and the two be rec-
ognized as one ? No effort enables us to assimilate them. That a
unit of feeling: has nothing in common with a unit of motion, becomes
more than ever manifest when we bring the two into juxtaposition."
Mr. Spencer's idea is that feeling and nervous action are two faces of
the same ontological something a view that prohibits the notion of
the one passing into or being expended in producing the other. The
conclusion is, that the transformations of physical energy remain un-
affected by the presence or absence of consciousness.

Psychology has as yet been made a serious study by only a few in-
dividuals. Accordingly, it is only the more striking and easily grasped
peculiarities of Mr. Spencer's system that can be referred to with ad-
vantage. Of these, the most imposing, and the one of which the edu-
cated public have already a slight second-hand acquaintance, is the
doctrine that the brain and nervous system is an organized register of
the experiences of past generations, that consequently the intelligence
and character of individuals and of races depend much more on this,
on the experiences of their ancestors, than on their individual expe-
riences. The flood of light thrown by this conception on so many
things previously dark and unfathomable, its power of bringing about
harmony where before there was nothing but confusion and unsatis-
factory wrangling, ought to have been sufficient to have secured it a
universally favorable reception. This, however, has not been the case,
and partly, perhaps, because of the very merits that recommend it.
It may be that veterans who have won their laurels on, say, the battle-
field of innate ideas, love the old controversy, and are not anxious
to learn that both sides were right and both wrong. Moreover, it is

THE NEW PSYCHOLOGY. 35

the misfortune of this important addition to psychology, that it shows
that previous workers in this field of inquiry have at times been labor-
ing in the dark to solve problems like in kind with the famous diffi-
culty of accounting for the supposed fact that the weight of a vessel
of water is not increased by the addition of a live fish. For instance,
should Mr. Spencer be right, the celebrated theory of the Will, elabo-
rated by Prof. Baiu, the able representative of the individual-experience
psychology, becomes a highly-ingenious account of what does not
happen. Thus, the new doctrine can be accepted only at the expense
of giving up much of what has hitherto passed for mental science.

The following sentences will serve to indicate Mr. Spencer's posi-
tion : " The ability to coordinate impressions, and to perform the ap-
propriate actions, always implies the preexistence of certain nerves
arranged in a certain way. What is the meaning of the human brain ?
It is that the many establisJied relations among its parts stand for so
many established relations among the psychical changes. Each of the
constant connections among the fibres of the cerebral masses answers
to some constant connection of phenomena in the experiences of the
race. . . . Those who contend that knowledge results wholly from the
experiences of the individual, ignoring as they do the mental evolu-
tion which accompanies the autogenous development of the nervous
system, fall into an error as great as if they were to ascribe all bodily
growth and structure to exercise, forgetting the innate tendency to
assume the adult form. . . . The doctrine that all the desires, all the
sentiments, are generated by the experiences of the individual, is so
glaringly at variance with facts, that I cannot but wonder how any
one should ever have entertained it." The circumstances which ac-
count for the existence of the individual-experience psychology, and
which enable it still to hold out as a rival of the more advanced form
that Mr. Spencer has given to the science, are these : (1) the imma-
turity of the human infant at birth ; (2) the lack of precise knowledge
with regard to the mental peculiarities of the lower animals ; (3) the
still popular notion that the human mind does not resemble the mental
constitution of the animals ; that it is of a different order. Of course
this last is nowadays little more than a popular superstition, neverthe-
less it can be taken advantage of: and an argument to the effect that
the mental operations of the animals are, to all appearance, so very
different from the workings of the human mind that they can supply
nothing more than a worthless, if not a misleading analogy, has a
very specious and scientific look about it in the eyes of those who are
not very well acquainted with the subject. Our ignorance of animal
psychology may be still more boldly drawn on in defence of the theory
under consideration. With a hyper-scientific caution, its advocates
refuse to take into account any thing (incompatible with their theory)
cencerning any one species of animal that has not been proved by a
very overwhelmingly large number of very accurate observations. And

3 6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. '

they find it possible to maintain that it still remains unproved that
any species of animal possesses either knowledge or skill not wholly
acquired by each individual. A better acquaintance with the mental
peculiarities of the animals is certainly a desideratum, and we hope
that this rich field of investigation will not long remain uncultivated.
In Macmillarfs Magazine for February there is an account of a series
of observations and experiments on young animals by the present
writer, which, unless they can be discredited, may reasonably be ex-
pected to go far to establish the fact of instinct, the fact of innate
knowledge and unacquired skill ; in other words, the phenomena on
which the experience-psychology, minus the doctrine of inheritance,
can throw no light whatever. Now, had not Mr. Darwin banished
from every scientific mind the hypothesis of the miraculous creation
of each distinct species of animal just as we see it, with all its strange
organs, and, to most people, still stranger instincts, the presumption
against a system of human psychology that not only can give no ac-
count of the most striking phenomena in the mental life of the animals,
but which strongly inclines those who hold it to pronounce such phe-
nomena incredible, might not have been so apparent. But, in the
present state of our scientific knowledge, such a psychology, profess-
ing to be a complete system, is self-condemned. In its fundamen-
tal principles the science of mind must be the same for all living
creatures. Further, if man be, as is now believed, but the highest,
the last, the most complex product of evolution, a system professing
to be an analysis and exposition of his mind, yet confessing itself in-
competent to deal with the necessarily simpler mental processes of
lower creatures, must surely feel itself in an uncomfortably anomalous
position.

It is, however, on the first-mentioned circumstance, the immaturity
of the infant at birth, that most stress can be laid. The newly-born
babe cannot raise its hand to its mouth, and doubtless for a long time
after birth it has no consciousness of the axiom, " Things that are
equal to the same thing are equal to one another." The helplessness
of infancy is pointed to as furnishing ocular demonstration of the
doctrine that, whatever may be the case with the animals, all human
knowledge, all human ability to perform useful actions, must be wholly
the result of associations formed in the life-history of each individual.
But it can surely require little argument to show that this is an entirely
unwarranted assumption. It might as well be maintained that, be-
cause a child is born without teeth and without hair, the subsequent
appearance of these must be referred wholly to the operation of ex-
ternal forces. Of the several lines of argument that might here be
employed, let us, for the sake of freshness, take the analogy from the
lower animals. We are not aware that it can be asserted, as the result
of prearranged and careful observations, that any creature at the in-
stant of birth exhibits any of the higher instincts. A number of iso-

THE NEW PSYCHOLOGY. 37

lated and more or less accidental observations have been recorded ;

and apparently on the strength of these Mr. Spencer has made the fol-
lowing unqualified statement . " A chick, immediately it comes out of
the egg, not only balances itself and runs about, but picks up frag-
ments of food, thus showing us that it can adjust its muscular move-
ments in a way appropriate for grasping an object in a position that is
accurately perceived." The fact is, that, on emerging from the shell,
the chick can no more do any thing of all this than can the new-born
child run about and gather blackberries. But between the two there
is this great difference, that, whereas the chick can pick about perfectly
in lees than twenty-four hours, the child is not similarly master of its
movements in as many months. Our present point is, that it can be
shown by experiment that the performances of the chick a day old,
which involve the perceptions of distance and direction by the eye and
the ear, and of many other qualities of external things, are not in any
degree the results of its individual experiences. Let it now be remem-
bered that, in the absence of conclusive evidence to the contrary, it
has been considered a safe position to hold that the early knowledge
and intelligent action of the chicken " may be, after all, nothing more
than very rapid acquisitions, the result of that experimentation, prompt-
ed by the inborn or spontaneous activity." May we now, on the other
side, similarly presume, until the contrary is shown, that the more
tardy progress of the infant is not because its mental constitution has
to be built up from the foundation out of the primitive elements of
consciousness, which the chicken's has not, but rather because the
child comes into the world in a state of greater physical, and therefore
mental immaturity ? The progress of the infant, however, has been
so continually spoken of as if it were a visible process of unaided ac-
quisition, that it may give some surprise when it is asserted from the
other side that we have no sufficiently accurate acquaintance with the
alleged acquisitions of infancy to justify the doctrine that they are
different in kind from the unfolding of the inherited instincts of the
chicken. To give definiteness to the attitude taken up, we would say,
for example, that the facts concerning the early movements of the two
lambs and the calf observed by Prof. Bain, and which, looked at from
his point of view, were strong confirmation of the doctrine of indi-
vidual acquisition, may be just as readily interpreted as the unfolding
of inherited powers ; which, as far as we know, start into perfect
action at the moment of birth, in no single instance. From observa-
tions on several newly-dropped calves, the facts corresponding sub-
stantially with those recorded by Prof. Bain, the present writer could
draw no conclusive evidence in favor of either the one theory or the
other. One observation, however, may here be mentioned that seemed
rather to favor the doctrine of inheritance. A calf one hour old,
which had been staggering about on its legs for ten minutes, stepped
out at the open door of the byre. It no sooner found itself in the

3 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

open air than it began to frisk and dance ; it was left entirely to itself,
and, when it had been on its legs fifteen minutes, it apparently in
obedience to the feeling of fatigue deliberately lay down, folding in
its limbs after the established manner of its kind. This is all we know
about calves ; about children we know nothing at all. And it may
fairly be asked how, when called in question, the assumption that un-
derlies such statements as the following can be made good. We quote
from Prof. Bain's account of the growth of voluntary power. He
says : " The infant is unable to masticate ; a morsel put into its mouth
at first usually tumbles out. But, if there occur spontaneous move-
ments of the tongue, mouth, or jaw, giving birth to a strong relish,
these movements are sustained, and begin to be associated with the
sensations ; so that, after a time, there grows up a firm connection."
Bearing in mind that, when born, the child has no occasion for the
power of masticating solid food ; that the ability to suck, which in-
volves an equally complex series of muscular adjustments, is what it
requires, and this it has by instinct ; bearing all this in mind, the ques-
tion is, Why may not the innate ability to masticate be developed by
the time it is required quite as spontaneously as the teeth used in the
operation ? Take a parallel. The feeble nestling when it leaves the
shell is blind. One of the several very pronounced and interesting in-
stincts it exhibits at this stage is, that in response to certain sounds it
opens its mouth and struggles to hold up its head to be fed. Several
weeks later it begins to pick for itself. Now, we put the question, Is
this second mode of filling its stomach to be considered a pure acqui-
sition, while its original plan must certainly be regarded as pure in-
stinct ? No one, we think, will venture to answer in the affirmative ;
the more so as this is a case that may any day be put to the test of
experiment. Where, then, is the evidence that the analogous progress
from drawing milk to masticating solid food is of a different kind ?
Nature.

OCEAN-CABLES.

By Sir JAMES ANDEESON.

THIS is by no means a new subject for investigation, but in the
present day I am certain that it will be instructive to many
among the thousands who are now interested in this class of property
to have their attention briefly called to all that has been clone to make
submarine cables a sound property.

Eleven years ago there was a joint committee appointed by the
" Lords of the Committee of Privy Council for Trade and Atlantic
Telegraphy, to inquire into the construction of submarine cables, to-

OCEAN-CABLES. 39

gether with other evidence." Attention is called in the report to the
" remarkable fact that in almost all cases small cables had been found
liable to mishaps, while the heavier the cable had been the greater
had been its durability." The report is full and complete, and estab-
lishes principles which up to the present time have uniformly guar-
anteed success, while the neglect of them has as uniformly resulted in
partial loss or failure.

The loss of cables was found to be attributable to the following-
causes : First, and the most important of all, from imperfect manufac-
ture, resulting without doubt, prior to this date, from inexperience of
the materials for insulating the copper wire, and from ignorance of
the fact discovered by Prof. Thomson about 1856, viz., that some kinds
of copper wire were no better than iron for the purpose of conduc-
tivity, and that it required carefully-selected copper to give the desired
standard, which may be represented by a copper wire one-tenth of an
inch in diameter, being equal to an iron wire one-third of an inch in
diameter for electrical purposes. All cables manufactured previous to
this date had no advantage from this discovery.

There appear to have been mechanical difficulties in keeping the
copper conductor in the centre of the insulating medium, so that the
copper was sometimes found to be almost visible under the light film
of gutta-percha which covered it. The electric current soon weakened
this film, stronger currents were used to overcome the weakness of
the signals, and the cable was soon destroyed. Experience about this
time had established that a cable from the commencement of its manu-
facture to the time of its being laid should be tested under water and
under pressure, and kept as much as possible under all the conditions
in which it was meant to contimie.

Attempts to lay cables from sailing-ships towed by steamers was
another source of failure. The ships had not enough steerage-way
when met with strong head-winds, and too much slack was paid out.
It was difficult under such circumstances to steer a straight course,
and sailing-ships possessed no power of being readily stopped when a
fault or accident occurred.

Many accidents happened from inexperience in the method of pay-
ing out cables ; at the present day the wonder is, that they should
have succeeded so well with the rude methods and inexperience which
then existed, and not that there should have been many failures and
much recrimination. Reading the history of these first attempts to
place a net-work of cables at the bottom of the ocean fifteen and twenty
years ago, is a good deal like reading the old stories of the early voy-
ages of discovery. There are difficulties and disasters peculiar to
every attempt, and the grand result is that, one way or another, they
were overcome, or else they suggested such modifications that their
recurrence was avoided, and an accident to a well-manufactured cable
no longer constitutes a loss.

i

40 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The first Atlantic cable failed principally on account of imperfect
manufacture, in a great measure arising from undue haste and urgency,
but largely owing to insufficient experience. * The cable was not tested
under water, for fear of rusting the small steel wires of the external
covering, and small wires have never since been used ; large wires,
the larger the better, is now a principle. The copper was not all good.
It had often been coiled and uncoiled, and had been exposed to the
strong heat of the sun, and to many changes of temperature. Any of
these conditions would nowadays be regarded as enough to condemn
the most carefully-manufactured cable.

The Red Sea and Indian cables are said to have been imperfectly
manufactured and laid too taut, but they were not tested under water
from the time of manufacture until they were placed at the bottom of
the sea, and this one grand omission, largely due to inexperience, is
enough, without the recriminatory points, to condemn to loss and
failure any cable whatever.

The cables laid from Cagliari to Malta and Malta to Corfu are said
to have failed from imperfect manufacture. One experienced gentleman
in his evidence said these cables were " such as nobody should have
laid in deep water." It is sufficient at present to know that they have
failed from neglect or inexperience, and that they, among other fail-
ures, have established the principles which have since insured success.

The want of constant supervision by engineers, exclusively in the
interests of the purchasers of the cable, has been a great cause of de-
fective cables. There may often be minute defects in the core itself,
or a slightly defective splice which may reduce the electrical condition
of a comparatively short length ; this may easily be raised above the
average standard required by the contract, by the next length being
more carefully manufactured. These minute defects must, however,
kill the cable in more or less time, and the principle is established that
every inch should be tested in course of manufacture, and rejected if
there is any irregularity of condition to cause suspicion. There should
be constant supervision, and a record of all the tests kept for the
purchasers of the cable from the commencement of the contract to its
final completion, and continued ever afterward by the purchasers.

The principal sources of injury to cables are first, moving water,
either currents or tides, chafing the cables upon rocks or shingle. Ex-
perience has given many costly lessons of the effect of moving water.

Ten years ago it was generally believed that water had very little
motion below 50 fathoms, and 100 fathoms was considered a point of
great safety. "We now know that there are exceptional localities where
there is motion in the water at a depth of 500 fathoms. The Fal-
mouth cable was chafed and destroyed at this depth from this cause.
The Channel Islands cable was also destroyed from the same cause.
The first cable ever manufactured with due regard to the principle of
careful supervision, testing under water, and being retained quietly in

OCEAN-CABLES.

4

that condition until it was laid, was the Malta and Alexandria cable,
laid in 1861. This cable was submerged in too shallow water, for
many miles in less depth than 20 fathoms ; the result was the frequent
recurrence of fracture from being rolled about by the surf, and yet
this cable was only finally abandoned last year ; not because it could
not be kept in repair, but because it was too expensive to keep in
order. These and many other examples have established the principle
that no cable should be laid without first obtaining an accurate sur-
vey of the approach to the coast and landing-places, with accurate
soundings over the intended route, and as much knowledge as possible
of the nature of the bottom. Currents and anchorage should be
avoided, and, where that is impossible, the heaviest cable that can be
laid should be provided. Heavy cables should be laid out to depths
of 400 fathoms, where there are tide-ways. Where a current exists, a
position should be sought for as far removed from it as possible. A
great cause of injury to cables is the corrosion of the external wires,
caused by moving water or marine vegetation, etc., and this has
established the general practice of covering the external wires with
tarred yarn saturated with a mixture of pitch and silica. There is
still great room for improvement upon the present method of protect-
ing- the external covering; of cables, and I commend it to the further
careful study of telegraph-engineers as a subject of vital importance.

Another enemy of submarine cables is the teredo * of all kinds ; there
is one kind which has proved destructive by boring through the core,
but that has only occurred in shallow water ; there is another kind
which destroys the hemp in a few months, and is then satisfied to fix
itself upon the gutta-percha and remain there. Cables have been re-
covered from depths of 1,200 fathoms with all the hemp eaten away,
and the core pitted with these marine animals. The recovery is then
only possible by the strength of the external wires.

All the expei-ience we. have points to the value of protection, first,
of the core, then of the external covering, and, if those responsible for
the safety and maintenance of submarine cables could be allowed to
dictate the most desirable conditions of safety, they would select, be-
sides the strongest possible cable to be manufactured, and laid with
extreme care, a depth of water of about 500 fathoms, and a bottom of
sand or mud ; but, as this cannot always be secured, nothing should be
omitted in the direction of strength and quality.

Lightning is still another source of injury to cables ; this is, how-
ever, so readily guarded against that we no longer hear of injury from
this cause : it is said to have destroyed three cables. Mr. Siemens
produced before the committee a piece of the core of the Corfu cable
injured by lightning ; the land-line had been struck, and, from the ab-
sence of any lightning-guards, the cable was damaged. Mr. Preece
described the Jersey cable as having been destroyed by lightning. Mr.

See article, iu this number, on the " Borers of the Sea."

42 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Fleeming Jenkin has seen a fault 18 inches long due to this cause,
and it is asserted that the same cause destroyed the Toulon-Algiers
cable, which was connected to the land-lines without lightning-guards.

We are every now and then startled by the announcement that
light cables are to be preferred to the present iron-clad type, and the
object of this investigation has been to discover what data there are
to justify any pi'eference to one form of cable over another. I have
said already that the committee called attention to the remarkable fact
that, in almost all cases, small cables have been found liable to mis-
haps, while the heavier the cable the greater had been its durability.

Mr. Newall, in his evidence, said that the hemp-covered cable
which he attempted to lay in 1859, between Candia and Egypt, had
the hemp eaten off by the teredo in a very short time, and it was too
weak to recover for repairing. The same firm laid an unprotected core
from Varna to the Crimea, and it lasted until the winter set in ; it is
frequently said that it was cut by order of the French commander-in-
chief, but there is no proof of this, and I am not disposed to believe
it. Mr. Woodehouse, the engineer who laid this core, said in his
evidence he " should not advise anybody to lay so light a cable across
the Atlantic, because so small a strain would break it. Ifitisonce
safe at the bottom, perhaps it may rest." Mr. Newall said he thought
it folly to lay any thing excepting unprotected core. Consistently
with this conviction, he laid in 1869 several lines of unprotected India-
rubber core, connecting the Grecian islands with the main-land ; they
were protected only near the shore. The sea is quiet and tideless in
those parts; no better spot could be wished for the experiment, yet
they every one of them gave out within two years.

The Red Sea cable, covered externally with light wires, and unpro-
tected with bituminous compound, was so rusted in a short time that
it could not be lifted for repairs.

Notwithstanding, Mr. Newall's partiality for light cables, he sug-
gests at the close of his evidence what I assume he would consider
the most perfect form of cable. He would cover the copper with
India-rubber, protect this core with steel wires vulcanized, the whole
then passed through heat; thus insulating all the wires, he would make
the cable in one length, and have no joints. Mr. Fleeming Jenkin, in
his report to the International Exhibition of 1862, says :

" So long as the iron wires lasted, the cables frequently continued to work
in spite of faults, but sooner or later the iron wires of all these light cables
rusted away in parts ; so soon as this took place they one and all broke up into
short sections ; this fact has been observed in depths of 100 fathoms ; " the reasons
were not obvious to Mr. Jenkin, but he says : " Meanwhile the use of large iron
wire seems a sure guarantee against this danger, for as yet no cable covered
with wire of the large gauges has ever parted in the manner described. The
difficulty is, to find a permanent material which shall retain its strength and con-
tinue to afford protection after the cable is laid."

CEAN- CABLES. 43

Every word of this can be written at the present moment, that is,
ten years later, with exactly the same significance. All cables which
have been manufactured and laid upon the principles which were es-
tablished in 1859 are yet in good working order, and every divergence
from these principles has been at best but a costly experiment or utter
failure. There is no instance yet of a well-manufactured heavy cable
breaking or giving out in deep water after it has been carefully laid
free from defects ; but there may be much due to the external cover-
ing keeping it quiet ; there has assuredly been a great deal due to the
external covering in the successful submerging, and there is no expe-
rience whatever to justify the assumption that an unprotected core
would last, even if laid.

It has been urged that an iron-covered cable, suspended from one
point to another, gradually becomes weaker, that rust and marine
growth or deposit accumulate and break the cable with their weight ;
but I do not know of any instance in support of the assumption, nor is
it at all certain that a simple unprotected core would exist for any
length of time, or be in any way better adapted for the supposed con-
ditions. Mr. Latimer Clark, in his evidence, says : " You want a cer-
tain degree of weight to enable your cable to sink steadily to the bot-
tom, especially when it has to fall into hollows and cavities, and not
lie loosely across elevations."

Again, it is urged that experiments with light cables have been
tried in factories or sheds, and the result proves that there are many
advantages in their favor ; but I am of opinion that no experiments
which can be made on shore will sufficiently resemble the exigencies
which may occur over a period of several days and nights at sea in
storms and darkness, and still less will they prove their fitness for the
unknown conditions which may exist at great ocean-depths. I desire to
write with great respect for the opinions of the talented men who urge
the adoption of light cables ; it is my special duty to weigh well and
without prejudice all they have to advance ; but I think a careful in-
vestigation into the experience and practice of the last twenty years
establishes conclusively that all light cables have been short-lived, and
that all heavy cables have continued working, often under most ad-
verse conditions. It is my own opinion, and I am authorized to say
that it is also the opinion of my friend Captain Halpin, who has laid
all the cables from Suez to Australia, besides the French Atlantic
cable (11,000 miles), and has also recovered and repaired cables from
a great variety of depths, that a cable should be as heavy as it can be
laid with safety, and admit of being recovered in case of accident.
Multiply every precaution which shall increase the strength and keep
that strength intact as long as possible.

The best form of light cable I have seen is the copper-covered core
invented by Mr. Siemens (No. 8). I should have anticipated that, if
any light cable could have been successful, this one would have met

44 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

all the conditions, excepting that of extreme cheapness, but it has not
been so uniformly successful as the heavy iron-clad cables. The very
light cable invented by Mr. Varley (No. 21) admits of being laid by
having the strain taken off the core by the two hempen strands, the
core itself beinGf the third strand of the cable. As a liadit cable, to be
manufactured in a great hurry, and laid to meet some emergency, it
has a good deal of merit, but for a deep-sea cable I am. of opinion that
it would be found too incomplete and unfinished, and that difficulties
would be experienced in laying which are not at once foreseen, and
that there would be no durability even if successfully laid.

Every day of my experience in watching over the permanence of
the 10,000 miles of cable under my care, confirms me in the opinion
that too great caution and vigilance cannot be exercised in the making
and laying a thread which is to be removed from all human vision for-
ever, and designed to earn dividends by continuing a perfect conductor
of electricity. Upward of 30,000 miles of cable have been laid since
the report of the committee was printed, eleven years ago, and much
experience has been gained of the exigencies incidental to submerging,
buoying, grappling, and repairing ; but no fact has resulted from all
that experience which has established that any one precaution recom-
mended in the report has been superfluous, whereas much has occurred,
which I will not particularize, proving that any attempt to disregard
any single precaution has resulted in great pecuniary loss or utter
failure.

We have many reasons to confirm the belief that a submarine
cable, manufactured and laid with strict attention to all known princi-
ples, may be regarded as a substantial property, likely to last for any
length of time; for there is no evidence whatever upon record which
shows any decay of the insulating medium or copper conductor of a
well-manufactured cable, i. e., there is no decay inherent in the nature
of a cable ; all deterioration is external ; nor is there any experience
whatever to establish that this insulated copper wire will enjoy any
durability if unprotected with an external covering.

A light cable or unprotected core must therefore be regarded at
best as an experiment, with the chances against the successful laying,
and still more against its existing as a permanent property.

I have written enough to illustrate that the present submarine
cable is not a haphazard idea, but one which has grown out of many
failures and thousands of experiments; all the principles of manufac-
ture and laying down have been established by great anxiety and re-
flection on the part of the able men who gave their energies to this
kind of enterprise prior to 1865. We who have come upon the stage
since that date have only discovered that we may not neglect one of
all the known principles, but elaborate every one of them, and even
then the duty of laying and maintaining this class of property has
enough of risks and anxieties to make one heartily dislike any experi-

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 45

merit which can only be advocated for the sake of cheapness in the
first cost. I believe this economy -would be at the expense of se-
curity, and that the cable of the future will be even heavier, more per-
fect, and more costly, than the cable of the present day. Abstract of
Address before the Statistical Society.

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY.

By HEEBEET SPENCEE.
X. The Class-Bias.

MANY years ago, a solicitor, sitting by me at dinner, complained
bitterly of the injury which the then lately-established County
Courts were doing his profession. He enlarged on the topic in a way
implying that he expected me to agree with him in therefore con-
demning them. So incapable was he of going beyond the professional
point of view, that what he regarded as a grievance he thought I also
ought to regard as a grievance : oblivious of the fact that the more
economical administration of justice, of which his lamentation gave me
proof, was to me, not being a lawyer, matter for rejoicing.

The bias thus exemplified is a bias by which nearly all have their
opinions warped. Naval officers disclose the unhesitating belief that
we are in imminent danger because the cry for more fighting-ships
and more sailors has not been met to their satisfaction. The debates
on the purchase-system proved how strong was the conviction of mili-
tary men that our national safety depended on the maintenance of an
army-organization like that in which they were brought up, and had
attained their respective ranks. Clerical opposition to the repeal of
the Corn-laws showed how completely that view which Christian min-
isters might have been expected to take, was shut out by a view more
congruous with their interests and alliances. In all classes and sub-
classes it is the same. Hear the murmurs uttered when, because of
the Queen's absence, there is less expenditure in entertainments and
the so-called gayeties of the season, and you perceive that London
traders think the nation suffers if the consumption of superfluities is
checked. Study the pending controversy about cooperative stores versus
retail shops, and you find the shopkeeping mind possessed by the idea
that society commits a wrong if it deserts shops and goes to stores
is quite unconscious that the present distributing system rightly exists
only as a means of economically and conveniently supplying con-
sumers, and must yield to another system if that should prove more
economical and convenient. Similarly with the other trading bodies,
general and special similarly with the merchants who opposed the
repeal of the Navigation Laws ; similarly with the Coventry weavers,
who like free-trade in all things save ribbons.

46 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The class-bias, like the bias of patriotism, is a reflex egoism ; and,
like it, has its uses and abuses. As the strong feelings enlisted on
behalf of one's nation cause that enthusiastic cooperation by which its
integrity is maintained in presence of other nations, severally tending
to spread and subjugate their neighbors ; so the esprit de corps, more
or less manifest in each specialized part of the body politic, prompts
measures to preserve the integrity of that part in opposition to other
parts, all more or less antagonistic. The egoism of individuals be-
comes an egoism of the class they form ; and, besides the separate
efforts, generates a joint effort to get an undue share of the aggregate
proceeds of social activity. The aggressive tendency of each class, so
produced, has to be balanced by like aggressive tendencies of other
classes. The class-feelings do, in short, develop one another ; and the
respective organizations in which they embody themselves develop
one another. Large classes of the community, marked off by rank,
and sub-classes marked off by special occupations, everywhere form
their defensive combinations, and set up organs advocating their inter-
ests ; and the reason assigned is in all cases the same the need for
self-defence.

Along with the good which a society derives from this self-assert-
ing and self-preserving action, by which each division and subdivision
keeps itself strong enough for its functions, there goes, among other
evils, this which we are considering the aptness to contemplate all
social actions in their bearings on class-interests, and the resulting ina-
bility to estimate rightly their effects on the society as a whole. The
habit of thought produced perverts not merely the judgments on ques-
tions which directly touch class-welfare, but it perverts the judgments
on multitudinous questions which touch class-welfare very indirectly,
if at all. It fosters an adapted theory of social relations of every kind,
with sentiments to fit the theory ; and a characteristic stamp is given
to the beliefs on public matters in general. Take an instance :

Whatever its technical ownership may be, Hyde Park is open for
the public benefit : no title to special benefit is producible by those
who ride and drive. It happens, however, that those who ride and
drive make large use of it daily ; and extensive tracts of it have been
laid out for their convenience : the tracts for equestrians having been
from time to time increased. Of people without cai-riages and horses,
a few, mostly of the kind who lead easy lives, use Hyde Park fre-
quently as a promenade. Meanwhile, by the great mass of Londoners,
too busy to go so far, it is scarcely ever visited : their share of the
general benefit is scarcely appreciable. And now what do the few
who have a constant and almost exclusive use of it think about the
occasional use of it by the many ? They are angry when, at long in-
tervals, even a small portion of it, quite distant from their haunts, is
occupied for a few hours in ways disagreeable to them nay, even
when such temporary occupation is on a day during which Rotten

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 47

Row is nearly vacant, and the drives not one-third filled. In this, any-
one unconcerned may see the influence of the class-bias. But he will
have an inadequate conception of its distorting power unless he turns
to some letters from members of the ruling class published in the
Times in November last, when the question of the Park Rules was
being agitated. One writer, signing himself "A Liberal M. P.," ex-
pressing his disgust at certain addresses he heard, proposed, if others
would join him, to give the offensive speakers punishment by force of
fists ; and then, on a subsequent day, another legislator, similarly
moved, writes :

"If M. P.' is in earnest in his desire to get some honest men together to
take the law into their own hands, I can promise him a pretty good backing
from those who are not afraid to take all the consequences.

" I am, sir, your obedient servant, AN EX-M. P."

And thus we find class-feeling extinguishing rational political
thinking so completely that, wonderful to relate, two law-makers pro-
pose to support the law by breaking the law !

In larger ways we have of late seen the class-bias doing the same
thing causing contempt for those principles of constitutional govern-
ment slowly and laboriously established, and prompting a return to
barbaric forms of government. Read the debate respecting the pay-
ment of Governor Eyre's expenses, and study the division-lists, and
you see that acts which, according to the Lord Chief-Justice, " have
brought reproach not only on those who were parties to them, but
on the very name of England," can, nevertheless, find numerous de-
fenders among men whose class-positions, military, naval, official, etc.,
make them love power and detest resistance. Nay, more, by rais-
ing an Eyre-Testimonial Fund, and in other ways, there was shown
a deliberate approval of acts which needlessly suspended orderly gov-
ernment and substituted unrestrained despotism. There was shown a
deliberate ignoring of the essential question raised, which was whether
an executive head might, at will, set aside all those forms of administra-
tion by which men's lives and liberties are guarded against tyranny.

More recently, this same class-bias has been shown by the protest
made when Mr. Cowan was dismissed for executing the Kooka rioters
who had surrendered. The Indian Government, having inquired into
the particulars, found that this killing of many men, without form of
law and contrary to orders, could not be defended on the plea of press-
ing danger; and, finding this, it ceased to employ the officer who had
committed so astounding a deed, and removed to another province the
superior officer who had approved of the deed. Not excessive punish-
ment, one would say. Some might contend that extreme mildness
was shown in thus inflicting no greater evil than is inflicted on a la-
borer when he does not execute his work properly. But now mark
what is thought by one who gives utterance to the bias of the govern-

4 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ing classes, intensified by life in India. In a letter published in the
Times of May 15, 1872, the late Sir Donald McLeod writes concerning
this dismissal and removal :

"All the information that reaches me tends to prove that a severe hlow has
heen given to all chance of vigorous or independent action in future, when emer-
gencies may arise. The whole service appears to have been astonished and
appalled by the mode in which the officers have been dealt with."

That we may see clearly what amazing perversions of sentiment
and idea are caused by contemplating actions from class points of
view, let us turn from this feeling of sympathy with Mr. Cowan to the
feeling of detestation shown by members of the same class in England
toward a man who kills a fox that destroys his poultry. Here is a
paragraph from a recent paper :

"Five poisoned foxes have been found in the neighborhood of Penzance, and
there is consequently great indignation among the western sportsmen. A re-
ward of 20 has been offered for information that shall lead to the conviction
of the poisoner."

So that wholesale homicide, condemned alike by religion, by equity,
by law, is approved, and the mildest punishment of it blamed ; while
vulpicide, committed in defence of property, and condemned neither
by religion, nor by equity, nor by any law save that of sportsmen, ex-
cites an anger that cries aloud for positive penalties i

I need not further illustrate the more special distortions of socio-
logical belief which result from the class-bias. They may be detected
in the conversations over every table, and in the articles appearing in
every party-journal or professional publication. The effects here most
worthy of our attention are the general effects the effects produced on
the minds of the upper and lower classes. Let us observe how greatly
the sentiments and ideas generated by their respective social positions
pervert the conceptions of employers and employed. We will deal
with the employed first.

As before shown, mere associations of ideas, especially when joined
with emotions, affect our beliefs, not simply without reason, but in
spite of reason, causing us, for instance, to think there is something
intrinsically repugnant in a place where many painful experiences have
been received, and something intrinsically charming in a scene con-
nected with many past delights. The liability to such perversions of
judgment is greatest where persons are the objects with which pleas-
ures and pains are habitually associated. One who has often been,
even unintentionally, a cause of gratification, is favorably judged ; and
an unfavorable judgment is apt to be formed of one who, even invol-
untarily, has often inflicted sufferings. Hence, where there are social
antagonisms, arises the universal tendency to blame the individuals,
and to hold them responsible for the system.

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 49

It is thus with the concejjtions the working-classes frame of those
by whom they are immediately employed, and of those who fill the
higher social positions. Feeling keenly what they have to bear, and
tracing sundry real grievances to men who buy their labor, and men
who are most influential in making the laws, artisans and rustics con-
clude that, considered individually and in combination, those above
them are personally bad selfish, or tyrannical, in special degrees. It
never occurs to them that the evils they complain of result from the
average human nature of our age. And yet, were it not for the class-
bias, they would see, in their dealings with one another, plenty of
proofs that the injustices they suffer are certainly not greater, and pos-
sibly less, than they would be were the higher social functions dis-
charged by individuals taken from among themselves. The simple
fact, notorious enough, that working-men, who save money and become
masters, are not more considerate than usual toward those they em-
ploy, but often the contrary, might alone convince them of this. On
all sides there is ample evidence having kindred meaning. Let them
inquire about the life in every kitchen where there are several servants,
and they will find quarrels about supremacy, tyrannies over juniors
who are made to do more than their proper work, throwings of blame
from one to another, and the many forms of misconduct caused by
want of right feeling ; and very often the evils growing up in one of
these small groups are greater than the evils pervading society at
large. The doings in workshops, too, illustrate in various ways the
ill-treatment of artisans by one another. Hiding the tools and spoil-
in o- the work of those who do not conform to their unreasonable cus-
toms, prove how little individual freedom is respected among them.
And still more conspicuously is this proved by the internal govern-
ments of their trade-combinations. Not to dwell on the occasional
killing of men among them, who assert their rights to sell their labor
as they please, or on the frequent acts of violence and intimidation
committed by those on strike against those who undertake the work
they have refused, it suffices to cite the despotism exercised by trades-
union officers. The daily acts of these make it manifest that the ruling
organizations formed by working-men inflict on them grievances as
great as, if not greater than, those which the organization of society
at large inflicts. When the heads of a combination he has joined
forbid a collier to work more than three days in a week when he
is limited to a certain "get" in that space of time when he dares
not accept from his employer an increasing bonus for every extra day
he works when, as a reason for declining, he says that he should be
made miserable by his comrades, and that even his wife would not be
spoken to ; it becomes clear that he and the rest have made for them-
selves a tyranny worse than the tyrannies complained of. Did he
look at the facts, apart from class-bias, the skilful artisan, who in a
given time can do more than his fellows, but who dares not do it be-

VOL. III. 4

5 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

cause he would be " sent to Coventry " by them, and who conse-
quently cannot reap the benefit of his superior powers, would see that
he is thus aggressed upon by his fellows more seriously than by acts
of Parliament or combinations of capitalists. And he would further
see that the sentiment of justice in his own class is certainly not greater
than in the classes he thinks so unjust.

The feeling which thus warps working-men's conceptions, at the
same time prevents them from seeing that each of their unions is self-
ishly aiming to benefit at the expense of the industrial population at
large. When a combination of carpenters or of engineers makes rules
limiting the number of apprentices admitted, with the view of main-
taining the rate of wages paid to its members when it thus tacitly
says to every applicant beyond the number allowed, " Go and appren-
tice yourself elsewhere ; " it is indirectly saying to all other bodies of
artisans, " You may have your wages lowered by increasing your
numbers, but we will not." And when the other bodies of artisans
severally do the like, the general result is that the incorporated work-
ers, of all orders, say to the surplus sons of workers who want to find
occupations, "We will none of us let our masters employ you." Thus
each trade, in its eagerness for self-protection, is regardless of other
trades, and sacrifices numbers among the rising generation of the ar-
tisan class. Nor is it thus only that the interest of each class of arti-
sans is pursued to the detriment of the artisan-class in general. I do
not refer to the way in which, when bricklayers strike, they throw out
of employment the laborers who attend them, or to the way in which
the colliers now on strike have forced idleness on the iron-workers ; but
I refer to the way in which the course taken by any one set of opera-
tives, to get higher wages, is taken regardless of the fact that an event-
ual rise in the price of the commodity produced is a disadvantage to
all other operatives. The class-bias, fostering the belief that the ques-
tion in each case is entirely one between employer- and employed, be-
tween capital and labor, shuts out the truth that the interests of all
consumers are involved, and that the immense majority of consumers
belong to the working-classes themselves. If the consumers are named,
such of them only are remembered as belong to the wealthier classes,
who, it is thought, can well afford to pay higher prices. Listen to a
passage from Mr. George Potter's paper, read at the late Leeds Con-
gress :

" The consumer, in fact, in so high a civilization, so arrogant a luxurious-
ness, and so impatient an expectancy as characterize him in our land and age,
is ever ready to take the alarm and to pour out the phials of his wrath upon
those whom he merely suspects of taking a course which may keep a feather
out of his hed, a spice out of his dish, or a coal out of his fire; and, unfortu-
nately for the chances of fairness, the weight of his anger seldom falls upon the
capitalists, hut is most certain to come crushing down upon the lowly laborer,
who has dared to stand upon his own right and independence."

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 51

From which it might be supposed that all skilled and unskilled
artisans and farm-laborers, with their wives and children, live upon air
need no food, no clothing, no furniture, no houses, and are therefore
unaffected by enhanced prices of commodities. However fully prepared
for the distorting effects of class-bias, one would hardly have expected
effects so great. One would have thought it manifest, even to an ex-
treme partisan of trades-unions, that a strike which makes coal as dear
again, affects, in a relatively small degree, the thousands of rich con-
sumers above described, and is very keenly felt by the millions of poor
consumers to whom, in winter, the outlay for coal is a serious item of
expenditure. One would have thought that a truth, so obvious in this
case, would be recognized throughout the truth that, with nearly all
products of industry, the evil caused by a rise of price falls more
heavily on the vast numbers who work for wages than on the small
numbers who have moderate incomes or large incomes.

Were not their judgments warped by the class-bias, working-men
might be more pervious to the truth that better forms of industrial or-
ganization would grow up and extinguish this which they regard as
oppressive, were such better forms practicable. And they might see
that the impracticability of better forms results from the imperfections
of existing human nature, moral and intellectual. If the workers in
any business could so combine and govern themselves that the share
of profit coming to them as workers was greater than now, while the
interest on the capital employed was less than now ; and if they could
at the same time sell the articles produced at lower rates than like
articles produced in businesses managed as at present, then, manifest-
ly, businesses managed as at present would go to the wall. That they
do not so to the wall that such better industrial organizations do
not replace them, implies that the natures of working-men themselves
are not good enough ; or, at least, that there are not many of them
good enough. Happily, to some extent, organizations of a superior
type are becoming possible : here and there they have achieved en-
couraging successes. But, speaking generally, the masses are neither
sufficiently provident, nor sufficiently conscientious, nor sufficiently in-
telligent. Consider the evidence.

That they are not provident enough they show both by wasting
their higher wages when they get them, and by neglecting such oppor-
tunities as occur of entering into modified forms of cooperative indus-
try. When the Gloucester Wagon Company was formed, it was de-
cided to reserve a thousand of its shares, of ten pounds each, for the
workmen employed ; and to suit them it was arranged that the calls
of a pound each should be at intervals of three months. As many of
the men earned 2 10s. per week, in a locality where living is not cost-
ly, it was considered that the taking up of shares in this manner
would be quite practicable. All the circumstances were at the outset
such as to promise that prosperity which the company has achieved.

52 THE* POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The chairman is no less remarkable for his skill in the conduct of large
undertakings than for that sympathy with the working-classes which
led him to adopt this course. The manager had been himself a work-
ing-man ; and so fully possessed the confidence of working-men that
many migrated with him from the Midland counties when the com-
pany was formed. Further, the manager entered heartily into the
plan telling me himself that he had rejoiced over the founding of a
concern in which those employed would have an interest. His hopes,
however, and those of the chairman, were disappointed. After the
lapse of a year, not one of the thousand shares was taken up ; and
they were then distributed among the proprietors. Doubtless, there
have been in other cases more encouraging results. But this case is
one added to others which show that the proportion of working-men
adequately provident is not great enough to permit an extensive
growth of better industrial organizations.

Again, the success of industrial organizations, higher in type, re-
quires in the members a nicer sense of justice than is at present gen-
eral. Closer cooperation implies greater mutual trust ; and greater
mutual trust is not possible without more respect for one another's
claims. When we find that in sick-clubs it is not uncommon for mem-
bers to continue receiving aid when they are able to work, so that
spies have to be set to check them ; while, on the other hand, those
who administer the funds often cause insolvency by embezzling them ;
we cannot avoid the inference that want of conscientiousness must
very generally prevent the effective union of workers under no regu-
lation but their own. When, among skilled laborers, we find a certain
rate per hour demanded, because less " did not suffice for their natural
wants," though the unskilled laborers working under them were re-
ceiving little more than half the rate per hour, and were kept out of
the skilled class by stringent rules, we do not discover a moral sense
so much above that shown by employers as to promise success for in-
dustrial combinations superior to our present ones. While workmen
think themselves justified in combining to sell their labor only on
certain terms, but think masters not justified in combining to buy
only on certain terms, they show a conception of equity not high
enough to make practicable a form of cooperation requiring that each
shall recognize the claims of others as fully as his own. One pervad-
ing misconception of justice betrayed by them would alone suffice
to cause failure the misconception, namely, that justice requires an
equal sharing of benefits among producers, instead of requiring, as it
does, equal freedom to make the best of their faculties. The general
policy of trades-unionism, tending everywhere to restrain the superior
from profiting by his superiority lest the inferior should be disadvan-
taged, is a policy which, acted out in any industrial combinations, must
make them incapable of competing with combinations based on the
principle that benefit gained shall be proportioned to faculty put forth.

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 53

Thus, as acting on the employed in general, the class-bias obscures
the truth, otherwise not easy to see, that the existing type of in-
dustrial organization, like the existing type of political organization,
is about as good as existing human nature allows. The evils there are
in it are nothing but the evils brought round on men by their own im-
perfections. The relation of master and workman has to be tolerated,
because, for the time being, no other will answer as well. Looked at
apart from special interests, this organization of industry we now see
around us must be considered as one in which the cost of regulation,
though not so great as it once was, is still excessive. In any indus-
trial combination there must be a regulating agency. That regulating
agency, whatever its nature, must be paid for must involve a deduc-
tion from the total proceeds of the labor regulated. The present sys-
tem is one under which the share of the total proceeds that goes to
pay for regulation is considerable ; and, under better systems to be
expected hereafter, there will doubtless be a decrease in the cost of
regulation. But, for the present, our comparatively-costly system has
the justification that it alone succeeds. Regulation is costly because
the men to be regulated are defective. With decrease of their defects
will come economy of regulation, and consequently greater shares of
profit to themselves.

Let me not be misunderstood. The foregoing criticism does not
imply that operatives have no grievances to complain of ; nor does it
imply that trade-combinations and strikes are without adequate justi-
fications. It is quite possible to hold that when, instead of devouring
their captured enemies, men made slaves of them, the change was a
step in advance ; and to hold that this slavery, though absolutely bad,
was relatively good was the best thing practicable for the time
being. It is quite possible also to hold that when slavery gave place
to a serfdom under which certain personal rights were recognized, the
new arrangement, though in the abstract an inequitable one, was
more equitable than the old, and constituted as great an amelioration
as men's natures then permitted. It is quite possible to hold that
when, instead of serfs, there came freemen working for wages, but
held as a class in extreme subordination, this modified relation of em-
ployers and employed, though bad, was as good a one as was then
practicable. And so it may be held that at the present time, though
the form of industrial government entails serious evils, those evils,
much less than the evils of past times, are as small as the average
human nature allows are not due to any special injustice of the em-
ploying class, and can be remedied only as fast as men in general
advance. On the other hand, while contending that the policy of
trades-unions, and the actions of men on strike, manifest an injustice as
great as that shown by the employing classes, it is quite consistent to
admit, and even to assert, that the evil acts of trade-combinations are
the unavoidable accompaniments of a needful self-defence. Selfishness

54 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

on the one side, resisting selfishness on the other, inevitably commits
sins akin to those it complains of cannot effectually check harsh deal-
ings without itself using harsh measures. Further, it may be fully
admitted that the evils of working-class combinations, great as they
are, are accompanied by certain benefits, and will perhaps hereafter be
followed by greater benefits are evils accompanying the transition to
better arrangements.

Here my purpose is neither to condemn nor to applaud the ideas
and actions of the employed in their dealings with employers ; but
simply to point out how the class-bias warps working-men's judgments
of social relations makes it difficult for working-men to see that our
existing industrial system is a product of existing human nature, and
can be improved only as fast as human nature improves.

The ruling and employing classes display an equally-strong bias of
the opposite kind. From their point of view, the behavior of their
poorer fellow-citizens throughout these struggles appears uniformly
blamable. That they experience from a strike inconvenience, more or
less considerable, sufficiently proves to them that the strike must be
wrong. They think there is something intolerable in this indepen-
dence which leads to refusals to work except at higher wages or for
shorter times. That the many should be so reckless of the welfare of
the few, seems to the few a grievance not to be endured. Though Mr.
George Potter, as shown above, wrongly speaks of the consumer as
though he were always rich, instead of being, in nine cases out of ten,
poor ; yet he rightly describes the rich consumer as indignant when
operatives dare to take a course which threatens to raise the prices of
necessaries and make luxuries more costly. This feeling, often be-
trayed in private, exhibited itself in public on the occasion of the late
strike among the gas-stokers ; when there were uttered proposals that
acts entailing so much inconvenience should be put down with a
strong hand. And the same spirit was shown in that straining of the
law which brought on the men the punishment for conspiracy, instead
of the punishment for breach of contract ; which was well deserved,
and would have been quite sufficient.

This mental attitude of the employing classes is daily shown by the
criticisms passed on servants. Read " The Greatest Plague in Life,"
or listen to the complaints of every housewife, and you see that the
minds of masters and mistresses are so much occupied with their own
interests as to leave little room for the interests of the men and maids
in their service. The very title, " The Greatest Plague in Life," implies
that the only life worthy of notice is the life to which servants min-
ister ; and there is an entire unconsciousness that a book with the
same title, written by a servant about masters and mistresses, might
be filled with equally-severe criticisms and grievances far more serious.
The increasing independence of servants is enlarged upon as a change

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 55

greatly to be lamented. There is no recognition of the fact that this
increasing independence implies an increasing prosperity of the classes
from which servants come ; and that this amelioration in the condition
of the many is a good far greater than the evil entailed on the few.
It is not perceived that if servants, being in great demand and easily
able to get places, will no longer submit to restrictions, say about
dress, like those of past times, the change is part of the progress tow-
ard a social state which, if apparently not so convenient for the small
regulating classes, implies an elevation of the large regulated classes.

The feeling shown by the rich, in their thoughts about and dealings
with the poor, is, in truth, but a mitigated form of the feeling which
owners of serfs and owners of slaves displayed. In early times bonds-
men were treated as though they existed simply for the benefit of their
owners ; and down to the present time the belief pervading the select
ranks (not indeed expressed, but clearly enough implied) is, that the
convenience of the select is the first consideration, and the welfare of
the masses a secondary consideration. Just as an Old-English thane
would have been astonished if told that the only justification for his
existence as an owner of thralls was, that the lives of his thralls were
on the whole better preserved and more comfortable than they would
be did he not own them ; so, now, it will astonish the dominant classes
to assert that their only legitimate raison d'etre is, that by their instru-
mentality as regulators the lives of the people are, on the average,
made more satisfactory than they would otherwise be. And yet,
looked at apart from class-bias, this is surely an undeniable truth.
Ethically considered, there has never been any warrant for the subjec-
tion of the many to the few, except that it has furthered the welfare
of the many; and, at the present time, furtherance of the welfare of the
many is the only warrant for that degree of class-subordination which
continues. The existing conception must be, in the end, entirely
changed. Just as the old theory of political government has been so
transformed that the ruling agent, instead of being owner of the na-
tion, has come to be regarded as servant of the nation; so the old
theory of industrial and social government has to undergo a transfor-
mation which will make the regulating classes feel, while duly pursuing
their own interests, that their interests are secondary to the interests
of the masses whose labors they direct.

While the bias cf rulers and masters makes it difficult for them to
conceive this, it also makes it difficult for them to conceive that a de-
cline of class-power and a decrease of class-distinctions may be accom-
panied by improvement not only in the lives of the regulated classes,
but in the lives of the regulating: classes. The sentiments and ideas
proper to the existing social organization prevent the rich from seeing
that worry and weariness and disappointment result to them indirectly
from this social system, apparently so conducive to their welfare. Yet,
would they contemplate the past, they might find strong reasons for

5 6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

suspecting as much. The baron of feudal days never imagined the
possibility of social arrangements that would serve him far better than
the arrangements he so strenuously upheld ; nor did he see in the ar-
rangements he upheld the causes of his* many sufferings and discom-
forts. Had he been told that a noble might be much happier without
a moated castle, having its keep and secret passages and dungeons for
prisoners that he might be more secure without drawbridge and
portcullis, men-at-arms and sentinels that he might be in less danger
having no vassals or hired mercenaries that he might be wealthier
without possessing a single serf; he would have thought the state-
ments absurd even to the extent of insanity. It would have been use-
less to argue that the regime seeming so advantageous to him entailed
hardships of so many kinds perpetual feuds with his neighbors, open
attacks, surprises, betrayals, revenges by equals, treacheries by infe-
riors ; the continual carrying of arms and wearing of armor ; the per-
petual quarrellings of servants and disputes among vassals ; the coarse
and unvaried food supplied by an unprosperous agriculture ; a domes-
tic discomfort such as no modern servant would tolerate : resulting in
a wear and tear that brought life to a comparatively early close, if it
was not violently cut short in battle or by murder. Yet what the
class-bias of that time made it impossible for him to see, has become to
his modern representative conspicuous enough. The peer of our day
knows that he is better off without defensive appliances, and retainers,
and serfs, than his predecessor was with them. His country-house is
more secure than was an embattled tower ; he is safer among his un-
armed domestics than a feudal lord was when surrounded by armed
guards ; he is in less danger going about weaponless than was the
mail-clad knight with lance and sword. Though he has no vassals to
fight at his command, there is no suzerain who can call on him to sacri-
fice his life in a quarrel not his own ; though he can compel no one to
labor, the labors of freemen make him immensely more wealthy than
was the ancient holder of bondsmen ; and along with the loss of direct
control over workers there has grown up an industrial system which
supplies him with multitudinous conveniences and luxuries undreamt
of by him who had workers at unchecked command.

'May we not, then, suspect that, just as the dominant classes of an-
cient days were prevented by the feelings and ideas appropriate to
the then-existing social state from seeing how much evil is brought on
them, and how much better for them might be a social state in which
their power was much less ; so the dominant classes of the present day
are disabled from seeing how the existing forms of class-subordination
redound to their own injury, and how much happier may be their fu-
ture representatives having social positions less prominent ? Occa-
sionally recognizing, though they do, certain indirect evils attending
their supremacy, they do not see that by accumulation these indirect
evils constitute a penalty which supremacy brings on them. Though

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY.

57

they repeat the trite reflection that riches fail to purchase content,
they do not draw the inference that there must be something wrong
in a system which thus deludes them. You hear it from time to time
admitted that great wealth is a heavy burden : the life of a rich peer
being described as made like the life of an attorney by the extent of
his affairs. You observe, among those whose large means and various
estates enable them to multiply their appliances to gratification, that
every new appliance becomes an additional something to be looked
after, and adds to the possibilities of vexation. Further, if you put
together the open confessions and the tacit admissions, you find that,
apart from these anxieties and annoyances, the kind of life which
riches and honors bring is not a satisfactory life its inside differs im-
mensely from its outside. In candid moments the " social tread-mill "
is complained of by those who nevertheless think themselves com-
pelled to keep up its monotonous round. As every one may see, fash-
ionable life is passed, not in being happy, but in playing at being
happy. And yet the manifest corollary is not drawn by those engaged
in this life.

To an outsider it is obvious that the benefits obtained by the regu-
lative classes of our day, through the existing form of social organiza-
tion, are full of disguised evils ; and that this undue wealth which
makes possible the passing of idle lives brings dissatisfactions in place
of the satisfactions expected. Just as in feudal times the appliances
for safety were the accompaniments to a social state that brought a
more than equivalent danger ; so, now, the excess of aids to pleasure
among the rich is the accompaniment of a social state that brings a
counterbalancing displeasure. The gratifications reached by those
who make the pursuit of gratifications a business, dwindle to a mini-
mum ; while the trouble, and weariness, and vexation, and jealousy,
and disappointment, rise to a maximum. That this is an inevitable
result any one may see who studies the psychology of the matter.
The pleasure-hunting life fails for the reason that it leaves large parts
of the nature unexercised : it neglects the satisfactions gained by suc-
cessful activity, and there is missing from it the serene consciousness
of services rendered to others. Egoistic enjoyments, continuously pur-
sued, pall, because the appetites for them are satiated in times much
shorter than our waking lives give us : leaving times that are either
empty or spent in efforts to get enjoyment after desire has ceased.
They pall also from the want of that broad contrast which arises
when a moiety of life is actively occupied. These negative causes of
dissatisfaction are joined with the positive cause indicated the ab-
sence of that content gained by successful achievement. One of the
most massive and enduring gratifications is the sense of personal
worth, ever afresh demonstrating itself to consciousness by effectual
action ; and an idle life is balked of its hopes partly because it lacks
this. Lastly, the implied absence of altruistic activities, or of activi-

5 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ties felt to be in some way serviceable to others, brings kindred evils
an absence of certain positive pleasures of a high order, not easily
exhausted, and a further falling back on egoistic pleasures, again tend-
ing toward satiety. And all this, with its resulting weariness and dis-
content, we may trace to a social organization under which there comes
to the regulating classes a share of produce great enough to make
possible large accumulations that support useless descendants.

The bias of the wealthy in favor of arrangements apparently so
conducive to their comforts and pleasures, while it shuts out the per-
ception of these indirect penalties brought round on them by their
seeming advantages, also shuts out the perception that there is any
thing mean in being a useless consumer of things which others pro-
duce. Contrariwise, there still survives, though in a weaker form, the
belief that it is honorable to do nothing but seek enjoyments, and
relatively dishonorable to pass life in supplying others with the means
to enjoyment. In this, as in other things, our temporary state brings
a temporary standard of honor appropriate to it ; and the accompany-
ing sentiments and ideas exclude the conception of a state in which
what is now thought admirable will be thought disgraceful. Yet it
needs only, as before, to aid imagination by studying other times and
other societies, remote in nature from our own, to see at least the pos-
sibility of this. When we contrast the feeling of the Feejeeans, among
whom a man has a restless ambition to be acknowledged as a murderer,
with the feeling among civilized races, who shrink with horror from a
murderer, we get undeniable proof that men in one social state pride
themselves in characters and deeds elsewhere held in the greatest de-
testation. Seeing which, we may infer that, just as the Feejeeans, be-
lieving in the honorableness of murder, are regarded by us with aston-
ishment ; so those of our own day who pride themselves in consuming
much and producing nothing, and who care little for the well-being of
their society so long as it supplies them with good dinners, soft beds,
and pleasant lounging-places, may be regarded with astonishment by
men of times to come, living under higher social forms. Nay, we may
see not merely the possibility of such a change in sentiment, but the
probability. Observe first the feeling still extant in China, where the
honorableness of doing nothing, more strongly held than here, makes
the wealthy wear their nails so long that they have to be tied back
out of the way, and makes the ladies submit to prolonged tortures
that their crushed feet may show their incapacity for work. Next, re-
member that, in generations gone by, both here and on the Continent,
the disgracefulness of trade was an article of faith among the upper
classes, maintained very strenuously. Now, mark how members of
the landed class are going into business, and even sons of peers becom-
ing professional men and merchants ; and observe among the wealthy
the feeling that men of their order have public duties to perform, and
that the absolutely idle among them are blameworthy. Clearly, then,

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 59

we have grounds for inferring that, along with the progress to a regu
lative organization higher than the present, there will be a change of
the kind indicated in the conception of honor. It will become a matter
of wonder that there should ever have existed those who thought it
admirable to enjoy without working, at the expense of others who
worked without enjoying.

But the temporarily adapted mental state of the ruling and em-
ploying classes keeps out, mere or less effectually, thoughts and feel-
ings of these kinds. Habituated from childhood to the forms of
subordination at present existing regarding these as parts of a natural
and permanent order finding satisfaction in supremacy, and con-
veniences in the possession of authority ; the regulators of all kinds
remain unconscious that this system, made necessary as it is by the
defects of existing human nature, brings round penalties on them-
selves as well as on those subordinate to them, and that its pervading
theory of life is as mistaken as it is ignoble.

Enough has been said to show that from the class-bias arise further
obstacles to right thinking in sociology. As a part of some general
division of a community, and again as a part of some special subdi-
vision, the citizen acquires adapted feelings and ideas which inevitably
influence his conclusions about public affairs. They affect alike his
conceptions of the past, his interpretations of the present, his antici-
pations of the future.

Members of the regulated classes, kept in relations more or less
antagonistic with the classes regulating them, are thereby hindered
from seeing the need for, and benefits of, this organization which
seems the cause of their grievances ; they are at the same time hin-
dered from seeing the need for, and benefits of, the harsher forms of
industrial regulation that existed during past times ; and they are also
hindered from seeing that the improved industrial organizations of the
future can come only through improvements in their own natures.
On the other hand, members of the regulating classes, while partially
blinded to the facts that the defects of the working-classes are the
defects of natures like their own placed under different conditions, and
that the existing system is defensible, not for its convenience to them-
selves, but as being the best now practicable for the community at
large, are also partially blinded to the vices of past social arrange-
ments, and to the badness of those who in past social systems used
class-power less mercifully than it is used now ; while they have diffi-
culty in seeing that the present social order, like past social orders, is
but transitory, and that the regulating classes of the future may have,
with diminished power, inci'eased happiness.

Unfortunately for the Social Science, the class-bias, like the bias
of patriotism, is in a degree needful for social preservation. It is like
in this, too, that escape from its influence is often only effected by an

6o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

effort that carries belief to an opposite extreme changing approval
into a disapproval that is entire instead of partial. Hence, in the one
case, as in the other, we must infer that the resulting obstacle to well-
balanced conclusions can become less only as social evolution becomes
greater.

THE BORERS OF THE SEA.

"A /TANY stories are current as to how inventors have borrowed or
-i-VLL stolen their ideas from Nature, and there has been much in-
genious discussion as to whether hints thus appropriated are properly
patentable. Boring is an example of natural processes that have
been thus used by art, and it is remarkable that the lowest creatures
are the most skilful mechanics in this particular. An eminent living
inventor, who has made a fortune out of a patent auger, hit upon the
method followed by the most successful insects which bore into hard
wood. And so we are assured that the celebrated engineer Brunei,
in constructing the Thames Tunnel, but imitated the shell-lined burrow
of the Teredo navalis, or Ship-worm. This mollusk in shape resem-
bles a worm, and surrounds itself with a shell open at both ends.
From the mouth it can protrude its short foot, and the other extremity
of its body; the " tail " is bifurcated, one prong being the inspirator
and the other the expirator tube of the siphon which constitutes the
animal's nutritive apparatus.

It has long been a subject of controversy among naturalists how
the Ship-worm and other mollusks of the same family bore their way
into the rocks and timbers which they penetrate. As regards the
Pholades, for instance, Mr. Robertson, who kept these animals alive in
their chalky burrows, and studied their habits with the closest atten-
tion, found that when burrowing they make a half-revolution of their
shell to the right, and then back to the left, after the manner of a car-
penter using a brad-awl. The Pholas is a bivalve, club-shaped, and
the outer surface of its shell is covered with small teeth in curves, and
resembling the face of a rasp. These teeth would naturally seem well
suited for the purpose of boring, yet all naturalists are not agreed on
this point. Tims, some hold that the animal secretes an acid sol-
vent, which causes the material in which it is burrowing to decay.
Then only is it that, securing itself with its sucker-like foot, it works
itself from right to left, and vice versa, to widen the passage. But
Mr. Gwynn Jeffreys, as stated in the December number of The Popu-
lar Science Moxthlt, is of opinion that the foot, which he says is
charged with siliceous particles, is the true boring apparatus of all the
conchifera, and acts like the leaden wheel of the lapidary.

The history of the development of the Teredo is thus given by M.

THE BORERS OF THE SEA.

61

de Quatrefages : " The larva, which is at first almost spherical and en-
tirely covered with vibratile cilia, may be compared to a very minute
hedgehog, in which every spine acts as a natatory organ. It swims
in all directions with extreme agility, and this first state continues

Fig. 1.

Bock peeforatsd by Pholades.

about a day and a half. Toward the end of this time the external
skin bursts, and, after being incrusted with calcareous salts, becomes
a shell, which is at first oval, then triangular, and at last very nearly
spherical. While the shell is being formed, the vibratile cilia disap-
pear, but the little animal is not on that account condemned to inac-
tivity. In proportion as the external cilia diminish, we observe that an-
other equally ciliated organ becomes developed, which widens and ex-
tends in such a manner as to form a lame collar or ruff margined with
fringes. This new organ of locomotion may be entirely concealed
within the shell, or may be extended from it, and acts in the manner
of the paddle-wheel of a steamboat.

" By means of this apparatus the young larva continues to swim
with as much facility as in its earlier age ; but it now, moreover, ac-
quires another organ, a sort of fleshy foot, which can be extended and
contracted at will. It has also organs of hearing similar to those of
several mollusks, and eyes analogous to those of certain annelids."
The last metamorphosis is when the Teredo takes its worm-shape, and
is ready to commence its boring operations.

The Teredo is supposed to have been originally a native of tropical

6 2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

or semitropical seas, though now it is found in high latitudes. It does
not appear to have been known to the Greeks or Romans, or at least
its ravages in ancient times could not have been very great, else the
unsheathed hulls of Greek and Roman vessels would have been per-
forated. The Pholas penetrates stone as well as wood, but the Teredo
loves most to burrow into timber.

The damage done to submerged timbers by the Teredo is enormous.

Fig. 2.

Ttmbkr honey-combed by the Teredo.

It once threatened the dikes of Holland with destruction. A portion
of the pier at Yarmouth was so honey-combed with perforations that
it might easily be crushed between the hands as though it were paper,
the partition between the various tubes being in many places as thin
as parchment. A piece broken off this pier, and measuring about 7 by
11 inches, weighed less than four ounces, including the shelly lining of
the tubes. In the space of 40 days a piece of deal was fairly riddled
by these borers, and Wood, in his " Natural History," gives an instance
of their attacking a floating block of oak. This block had a large iron
bolt passing through its centre, the rusting of which preserved the
timber for a small space all around from the attacks of the borers.
But all the block not so protected was honey-combed.

The Ship-worm always makes its perforations in the direction of the
grain of the timber, except where a knot, or the shell of another Teredo,
or hindrance of any kind is met with, and then it takes a turn accord-
ing to circumstances. The animal begins to bore long before it has
reached its full size, and it grows within the cavity which it makes.
When taken out of the tube the Ship-worm is found to be a long,
grayish-white animal, about one foot long and half an inch thick, with
rounded head and forked tail. The Giant Teredo of Sumatra attains
the length of six feet, and a diameter of three inches. This animal,
however, differs from the Ship-worm in this, that it does not penetrate
timber, but only burrows into the hardened mud of the sea-bed.

The use of copper-sheathing to protect ships from the Ship-worm is
so well known that it need but be simply referred to here. It is not
perhaps so generally known that, if timber be driven full of iron nails,
the same object is attained. Another method of protecting wood-

THE BORERS OF THE SEA. 6 3

work consists in forcing into its pores a solution of corrosive sublimate.
The only objection to this method is its great cost. Quatrefages, how-
ever, asserts that one twenty-millionth part of corrosive sublimate is
enough to destroy all the young Ship-worms in two hours. He, there-
fore, proposes that ships should be cleared of this fearful pest by
being taken into a closed dock, into which a few handfuls of corrosive
sublimate should be thrown and well mixed with the water. The salts
of copper and lead have a similar effect, but do not act so instan-
taneously.

The Teredo does not perforate rock, but the Pholas acts an impor-
tant part in bi'inging about geological changes, owing to his habit of
boring rocks. There is no doubt that the chalk-cliffs of England are
first tunnelled by the Pholades, and then gradually destroyed by the
waves of the sea.

Of the Date-shell, another very interesting borer, Wood gives the
following account : " It is truly a wonderful little shell. Some of the
hardest stones and stoutest shells are found pierced by hundreds of
these curious beings, which seem to have one prevailing instinct,
namely, to bore their way through every thing. Onward, ever on-
ward, seems to be the law of their existence, and most thoroughly do
they carry it out. They care little for obstacles, and, if one of their
own kind happens to cross their path, they quietly proceed with their
work, and drive their tunnel completely through the body of their
companion."

Of the Saxicava rugosa, another borer, "Wood gives this descrip-
tion : " It is a fiattish bivalve, symmetrical in shape when young,
but oblong when old. It burrows as rapidly as the Lithodomus, and
into rock of adamantine density. Sometimes it bores into corals, fre-
quently into limestone, and often into shells, which it penetrates as
deeply as the Date-shell. Some of the enormous stones employed in
building the Plymouth Breakwater are now much wasted by the holes
made in them by the Saxicava.'''' Like the Date-shell, too, this animal
runs its tunnels at every angle, and turns out of its course for no con-
sideration whatever.

The Razor-shell makes a burrow in the sand, and there lives with its
siphon, or recurved food-tube, appearing just above the mouth of the
burrow. It may often be seen " spouting," or sending forth small jets
of water from its hiding-place in the sand after the tide has retreated.
On examining the spot cautiously for the creature is somewhat shy
two round holes in the sand, answering to the two fringed openings
of the Razor-shell's siphon, will be seen, resembling a key-hole, and
each large enough to admit a common goose-quill. But, if the animal
be approached rudely, or if the finger be placed on the openings, the
mollusk disappears deep in the burrow. The Razor-shell is possessed
of a very muscular " foot," as it is called, but it might as well be
named a hand or a tongue. By means of this organ, which they

64

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

elongate or contract at pleasure, the animals are enabled to burrow
and to go " up and down stairs " with great rapidity. It requires
dexterous management to capture the Razor-shell alive. When they
are wanted for food or for bait, the usual plan is to shoot into the sand,
alongside of a " spout," a hooked iron rod, which must be at once
pulled out again obliquely, so as to fetch the shell.

A better way is to drop a little salt on its tail, or at least on its
siphon-orifices. If this be done, the animal will rise partly out of its
burrow for it hates undiluted chloride of sodium and may then be
captured, if you be quick. But, if you should fail to seize the creature
at the first attempt, in vain would you pour salt in the burrow ; the
mollusk now sees the artifice, and is not to be imposed upon a second
time.

The Asperc/illum, or Watering-pot Shell, derives its name from its
perforated disk, which much resembles the snout of a watering-pot. This
animal burrows into sand or bores into stone, wood, or thick shells.

Fm. S.

ASPEEGILLUM, OR WATEREJG-POT.

When in its burrow, its narrow end, containing the openings of its
siphon, protrudes. To the same group belongs the Flask-shell, which
perforates shells of every kind, attaching them to itself by means of
some natural cement. It thus often constructs around itself a casing
like a flask, and hence its name.

We will close this notice of the Borers of the Sea with some ac-
count of the Mya arenaria, or Gaper-shell, which burrows into sand,
and which derives its name, gaper, from the fact that its bivalve-shell
gapes, to allow its long, stout tube to protrude. " It inhabits sandy
and muddy shores," says Wood, " and, to an inexperienced eye, is
quite invisible. The shell itself, together with the actual body of the
mollusk, is hidden deeply in the mud, seldom less than three inches,
and generally eleven or twelve inches from the surface. In this posi-
tion it would be unable to respire were it not for the elongated tube,
which projects through the mud into the water, and just permits the
extremities of the siphons to show themselves, surrounded by the
little radiating tentacles which betray them to the experienced shell-
hunter."

CAUSES WHICH CREATE SCIENTIFIC MEN. 65

ON THE CAUSES "WHICH OPERATE TO CREATE

SCIENTIFIC MEN.

By FRANCIS GALTON.

ON more than one occasion I have maintained that intellectual
ability is transmitted by inheritance ; and, in a memoir published
last year in the " Proceedings of the Royal Society," I endeavored to
explain what ought to be understood by that word " inheritance."
Two points were especially urged ; the first, that each personality
originates in a small selection out of a large batch of wonderfully
varied elements, which were all latent and competing ; and, secondly,
that these batches, and not the persons derived from them, form the
principal successive stages in the line of direct descent. Hence fol-
lows the paradoxical conclusion that the child must not be looked
upon as directly descended from his own parents. His true relation
to them is both circuitous and complicated, but admits of being easily
expressed by an illustration. Suppose an independant nation, A, to
have been formed by colonists from two other similarly constituted
nations, B and C ; then the relation borne by the representative
government of A to that of B and of C is approximately similar to
what I suppose to be the relation of a child to each of his parents.
But the existence of a slender strain of direct descent is shown by the
fact of acquired habits being occasionally transmitted. We must
therefore amend our simile by supposing the members of the govern-
ments of B and C to have the privilege of making emigration easy and
profitable to their constituents, and also, perhaps, the governments
themselves to have the power of nominating a few individuals to seats
in the Legislative Council of A.

It appears to me of the highest importance, in discussing heredi-
ty, to bear the character of this devious and imperfect connection
distinctly in mind. It shows what results we may and may not
expect. For instance, if B and C contain a large variety of social
elements, it would be impossible, without a very accurate knowledge
of them and of the conditions of selection, to predict the characters of
their future governments. Still less would it be possible to predict
that of A. But if the social elements of B and C were alike, and in
each case simple, such as might be found in pastoral tribes, then the
character of their governments and that of A could be predicted with
some certainty. The former supposition illustrates what must occur
when the breed of the parents is mongrel ; the latter, when it is pure.
Now, no wild or domestic animal is so mongrel as man, especially as
regards his mental faculties ; therefore, w r e cannot expect to find an
invariable resemblance between the faculties of children and those of

VOL. III. 5

66 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

their parents. All that could be expected on the hypothesis of strict
inheritance we do find ; that is, occasional startling resemblances, and
much more frequently partial ones. From this we have a right to
argue that if the breed of men were more pure, the intellectual resem-
blance of child to parent would be as strict as in the forms of the
equally pure breeds of our domestic animals.

I propose to refer in this article to a volume written by M. de Can-
dolle, 1 son of the late famous botanist, and himself a botanist, and
scientific man of high reputation, in which my name is frequently
referred to and used as a foil to set off his own conclusions. The
author maintains that minute intellectual peculiarities do not go by
descent, and that I have overstated the influence of heredity, since
social causes, which he analyzes in a most instructive manner, are
much more important. This may or may not be the case ; but I am
anxious to point out that the author contradicts himself, and that
expressions continually escape from his pen at variance with his gen-
eral conclusions. Thus he allows (p. 195) that, in the production of
men of the highest scientific rank, the influence of race is superior to
all others ("prime les autres en importance ") ; that (p. 268) there is a
yet greater difference between families of the same race than between
the races themselves ; and that (p. 326), since most, and probably all,
mental qualities are connected with structure, and as the latter is cer-
tainly inherited, the former must be so as well. Consequently, I pro-
pose to consider M. de Candolle as having been my ally against his
will, notwithstanding all he may have said to the contrary.

The most valuable part of his investigation is this : What are the
social conditions most likely to produce scientific investigators, irre-
spective of natural ability, and a fortiori, irrespective of theories of
heredity ? This is, necessarily, a one-sided inquiry, just as an inquiry
would be that treated of natural gifts alone. But, for all that, it
admits of being complete in itself, because it is based on statistics
which afford well-known means of disentangling the effect of one out
of many groups of contemporaneous influences. The author, however,
continually trespasses on hereditary questions, without, as it appears
to me, any adequate basis of fact, since he has collected next to noth-
ing about the relatives of the people upon whom all his statistics are
founded. The book is also so unfortunately deficient in method, that
the author's views on any point have to be sought for in passages
variously scattered ; but it is full of original and suggestive ideas,
which deserve to have been somewhat more precisely thought out and
much more compendiously stated.

Its scheme is, to analyze the conditions of social and political life
under which the principal men of science were severally living at the

1 " Histoire des Sciences el des Savants depuis deux Siecks." Par Alphonse de Candolle
(Membre Corr. de l'Acad. Sciences, Paris; Foreign Member, Royal Soc, etc.). Geneva,
1873.

CAUSES WHICH CREATE SCIENTIFIC MEN, 6 7

four epochs 1750, 1789, 1829, and 1869. The list of names upon which
he depends is that of the foreign members of the three great scientific
societies of Europe namely, the French Academy, the Royal Society,
and the Academy of Berlin in each case about fifty in number.
There is a yet stricter selection on the part of the foreign associates
of the French Academy, who number only eight at a time, and of
whom there have been only ninety-two 1 in the last two hundred years.
It is remarkable that we find in this very select list four cases of father
and son namely, a Bernoulli and two of his sons, the two Eulers, and
the two Herschels.

From an examination of these lists the author draws a large vari-
ety of interesting deductions. He traces the nationalities and the
geographical distribution of the distinguished men of science, and com-
pares the social conditions under which they lived. He finds them to
be confined to a triangular slice of Europe, of which middle Italy
forms the blunt apex, and a line connecting Sweden and Scotland
forms the base : and then he shows that, out of a list of eighteen differ-
ent influences favorable to science, such as liberty of publication,
tolerant church, and temperate climate, a large majority were found in
the triangular space in question, and there alone. The different
nations vary at the different epochs in their scientific productiveness ;. 2
and he elaborately shows how closely the variation depends on some

1 List of the ninety-two foreign associates of the French Academy (three names of no
scientific importance having been omitted, who were elected in early days these are :
Lord Pembroke, 1710 ; Due d'Escalone, 1715 ; and Prince Lcewenstein-Wertheim, 1766).
The names are arranged in the order of their election, and a dash ( ) divides those
elected before and after the year 1800 :

Denmark: None. CErsted.

England: Newton, Sloane (Sir Hans), Halley, Folkes, Bradley, Ilales, Macclesfield
(Earl), Morton (Earl), Pringle, Hunter, Priestlpy, Banks, Black. Maskelyne,
Cavendish, Jenner, Watt, Davy, Wollaston, Young, Dalton, Brown (Robert),
Faraday, Brewster, Herschel (Sir John), Owen, Murchison.

Germany (Ancient Confederation) : Rcemer, Leibnitz, Tchirnhausen (de), Wolff,
Margraff, Herschel (Sir William). Pallas, Klaproth, Humboldt (de), Werner,
Gauss, Olbers, Blumenbach, Buch (de), Bessel, Jacobi, Tiedemann, Mitscherlik,
Lcjeunc-Dirichlet, Ehrenberg, Liebig, Wohler, Kummer.

Holland: Huyghens, Hartsoeker, Ruysch, Boerhaave, Van Swieten, Camper. None.

Italy : Guglielmini, Cassini (Dom), Viviani, Poli, Bianchini, Marsigli, Manfredi, Mor-
gagni, Cervi, Poleni, La Grange (de). Volta, Scarpa, Piazzi, Plana.

Poland: Jablonowski. None.

Russia : Euler (the son). None.

Sireden : Linnaeus, Bergmann, Wargentin. Berzelius.

Switzerland : Bernoulli (Jacques), Bernoulli (Jean), De Crousaz, Bernoulli (Daniel),
Haller (de), Euler (Leonard), Tronchin, Bernoulli (Jean II.), Bonnet (Charles),
Saussure (Hor. Ben. de). Candolle (Aug. Pyr. de), Rive (de la).

United States : Franklin. Rumford.

2 The author's tables of the scientific productiveness per million, of different nations
at different times, are affected by a serious statistical error. He should have reckoned
per million of men above fifty, iustead of the population generally In a rapidly-increas-

68 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

or other of the eighteen influences becoming favorable or unfavorable.
The author, himself descended from the Huguenots, lays just stress on
the influence of religious refugees, whose traditions were to work in a
disinterested way for the public good, and at the same time to avoid
politics. The refugees rarely had their property in land, of which the
oversight occupies time, but in movable securities ; thus they had
leisure for work. Then, again, as they were debarred from local poli-
tics, the ambition, especially of those who had taken refuge in small
countries, was to earn the approval of the enlightened men all over
Europe, and this could most easily be effected by doing good work in
science. Out of the ninety-two foreign associates of the French Acad-
emy, no less than ten were descended from religious refugees, usually
in the third or fourth generation. Switzerland had eight out of the
ten, and we may thence easily gather how enormously she is indebted
to the infusion of immigrant blood. Similarly, the only two American
associates Franklin and Rumford were descended from Puritans.

The blighting effect of dogmatism upon scientific investigation is
shown both in Catholic and Protestant countries. The Catholics are
the more dogmatic of the two, and they supply, in proportion to their
population, less than one-quarter as many of the foremost scientific
men as the Protestants. There is not a single English or Irish Catho-
lic among the ninety-two French foreign associates. Austria contrib-
utes no name, and the rest of Catholic Germany is almost barren.
In Switzerland, the scientific productiveness of the Catholics is only
j that of the Protestants. Again, the Catholic missionaries have
done nothing for science, notwithstanding their splendid opportuni-
ties. In past days, when they were absolute masters of vast countries,
as Paraguay and the Philippines, the smallest encouragement and in-
struction given at the college of the Propaganda to young and apt
missionaries -would have enriched Rome with collections of natural
history. If any city more than others deserved to have the finest bo-
tanical garden and richest herbarium, it is Rome ; but she has scarce-
ly any thing to show.

The most notable instance of the repressive force of Protestant
dogmatism is to be found in the history of the republic of Geneva.
During nearly 200 years (1535 to 1725) its laity as well as clergy were
absolutely subject to the principles of the early Reformers. Instruc-
tion was imposed on them ; nearly every citizen was made to pass
through the college, and many attended special courses at the Acad-
emy, yet, during the whole of that period, not a single Genevese dis-
tinguished himself in science. Then occurred the wane of the Calvin-
ist authority, between 1720 and 1735. Social life and education be-
ing country like England, the proportion of the youthful population to those of an age
sufficient to enable them to become distinguished is double what it is in Franco, where
population is stationary; and injustice may be done by these tables to England in some-
thing like that proportion. They require entire reconstruction.

CAUSES WHICH CREATE SCIENTIFIC MEN. 69

came penetrated with liberal ideas ; ' and, since IV 30, the date of the
first election of a Genevese to an important foreign scientific society
our own Royal Society Geneva has never ceased to produce 'mathe-
maticians, physicists, and naturalists, in a number wholly out of pro-
portion to her small population.

The author arsrues from these and similar cases that it is not so
much the character of the dogma taught that is blighting to science
as the dogmatic habit in education. It is the evil custom of continu-
ally telling young people that it is improper to occupy their minds
about such and such things, and to be curious, that makes them timid
and indifferent. Curiosity about realities, not about fictions of the im-
agination, is the motive power of scientific discovery, and it must be
backed up by a frank and fearless spirit. M. de Candolle, in spite of
his anti-heredity declarations, enunciates an advanced pro-heredity
opinion well worthy of note. He says it is known that birds original-
ly tame, when found on a desolate island, soon acquire a fear of man,
and transmit that fear as an instinctive habit to their descendants.
Hence, we might expect a population, reared for many generations
under a dogmatic creed, to become congenitally indisposed to look
truth in the face, and to be timid in intellectual inquiry.

Can, then, religion and science march in harmony ? It is true that
their methods are very different ; the religious man is attached by his
heart to his religion, and cannot endure to hear its truth discussed,
and he fears scientific discoveries which might, in some slight way,
discredit what he holds more important than all the rest. The scien-
tific man seeks truth regardless of consequences ; he balances proba-
bilities, and inclines temporarily to that opinion which has most prob-
abilities in its favor, ready to abandon it the moment the balance
shifts, and the evidence in favor of a new hypothesis may prevail.
These, indeed, are radical differences, but the two characters have one
powerful element in common. Neither the religious nor the scientific
man will consent to sacrifice his opinions to material gain, to political
ends, nor to pleasure. Both agree in the love of intellectual pursuits,
and in the practice of a simple, regular, and laborious life, and both
work in a disinterested way for the public good. A strong evidence
of this fundamental agreement is found in the number of sons of
clergymen who have distinguished themselves as scientific investiga-
tors ; it is so large that we must deplore the void in the ranks of sci-
ence caused by the celibacy of the Catholic clergy. If Protestant min-
isters, like them, had never married, Berzelius, Euler, Linnaeus, and
"Wollaston, would never have been born. But to revert to what we
were speaking about. There are some six different objects in the pur-

1 In 1*735, public opinion had become so tolerant that it was enacted that candidates
for the ministry should no longer be required to make a declaration of faith, but simply
to promise to teach and preach conformably to the Bible and to the light of their own
consciences (p. 2C4).

7 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

suit of which most men spend their energies : three of them refer to
self namely, property, pleasure, and political advancement ; the other
three imply devotion to ideas namely, religion, science, and art.
Without a doubt, as M. de Candolle says, the former three occupy
one half of the moral sphere of the human character, and the latter
three the other.

It appears that the men distinguished in science have usually been
born in small towns, and educated by imperfect teachers, who made
the boys think for themselves. Nothing is brought out more clearly
in the work than that the first desideratum in scientific education is
to stimulate curiosity and the observation of real things, and that too
much encouragement of the receptive faculty is a serious error. The
author justly laments that the art of observation is not only untaught,
but is actually discouraged by modern education. Children are apt
and eager to observe, but, instead of encouraging and regulating their
instincts, the school-masters keep them occupied solely on internal
ideas, such as grammar, the vocabularies of different languages, arith-
metic, history, and poetry. They learn about the living world which
surrounds them out of books, and not through their own eyes. One
of the reformations he proposes is, to make much more use of drawing
as a means of careful observation, compelling the pupils to draw quickly
the object they have to describe, from memory, after a short period
allowed for its examination. He is a strong advocate for the encour-
agement of a class of scientific sinecurists like the non-working fellows
of our colleges, who should have leisure to investigate, and not be
pestered by the petty mechanical work of continual teaching and ex-
amining. Science has lost much by the suppression of the ecclesias-
tical sinecures at the time of the French Revolution, for there used to
be many abbes on the lists of foreign scientific members, but they
have now almost wholly disappeared. The modern ideas of democracy
are adverse to places to which definite work is not attached, and from
which definite results do not regularly flow. This principle is a wise
one for the mass of mankind ; but how utterly misplaced when ap-
plied to those who have the zeal for investigation, and who work best
when left quite alone !

There is a curious chapter on the probability of English becoming
the dominant language of the world in fifty or a hundred years, and
being the one into which the more important scientific publications of
all nations will, as a matter of course, be translated. It is not only
that the English-speaking population will outnumber the German and
the French, as these now outnumber the Dutch and the Swedish, but
that the language has peculiar merits, through its relationship with
both the Latin and the Teutonic tongues. It also seems that, in fami-
lies where German and French are originally spoken, French always
drives out the German on account of its superior brevity. When peo-
ple are in a hurry, and want to say something quickly, it is more easi-

CAUSES WHICH CREATE SCIENTIFIC MEN. 7 i

ly said in French than in German. Precisely in the same way English
heats French. Our sentences don't even require to he finished in order
to he understood, because the leading ideas come out first ; but, as for
old-fashioned tongues, their roundabout construction would be perfect-
ly intolerable. Fancy languages, like Latin and Greek, in which peo-
ple did not say " yes " or " no." M. de Candolle is very disrespectful
to classical Latin. He says that one must have gone throuo-h the
schools not to be impressed by its ridiculous construction. Translate
an ode of Horace literally to an unlettered artisan, keeping each word
in its place, and it will produce the effect upon him of a building in
which the hall-door was up in the third story. It is no longer a pos-
sible language, even in poetry.

I have only space for one more of the many subjects touched upon
in his book that of acquired habits being transmitted hereditarily
and which has also formed the subject of a recent essay by Dr. Carpen-
ter. That some acquired habits in dogs are transmitted appears cer-
tain, but the number is very small, and we have no idea of the cause
of their limitation. "With man they are fewer still ; indeed, it is diffi-
cult to point out any one, to the acceptance of which some objection
may not be offered. Both M. de Candolle and Dr. Carpenter have
spoken of the idiocy and other forms of nervous disorder which, be-
yond all doubt, afflict the children of drunkards. Here, then, appears
an instance based on thousands of observations at lunatic asylums and
elsewhere, in which an acquired habit of drunkenness, which ruins the
will and nerves of the parent, appears to be transmitted hereditarily
to the child. For my own part, I hesitate in drawing this conclusion,
because there is a simpler reason. The fluids in an habitual drunkard's
body, and all the secretions, are tainted with alcohol; consequently
the unborn child of such a woman must be an habitual drunkard also.
The unfortunate infant takes its dram by diffusion, and is compulsorily
intoxicated from its earliest existence. What wonder that its consti-
tution is ruined, and that it is born with unstrung nerves, or idiotic or
insane ? And just the same influence might be expected to poison
the reproductive elements of either sex. I am also informed, but have
not yet such data as I could wish, that children of recent teetotallers
who were formerly drunkards are born healthy. If this be really the
case, it seems to settle the question, and to show that we must not rely
upon the above-mentioned facts as evidence of a once-acquired habit
being hereditarily transmitted. Fortnightly JSeview.

72 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE SHERMAN ASTRONOMICAL EXPEDITION.

Br EMMA M. CONVERSE.

SCIENTIFIC observers have long seen the importance of securing
a position elevated above the fogs and impurities of the atmos-
phere at the sea-level, for the purpose of making more accurate astro-
nomical and meteorological observations. Accordingly, Prof. Peirce,
the Superintendent of the Coast Survey, petitioned Congress for means
to carry out such an undertaking. Congress made an appropriation
of $2,000 for this special object, independent of the geographical and
topograjmical constants of the station.

Sherman, in Wyoming, situated on the highest point of the Union
Pacific Railway, and on the Rocky Mountain range, was agreed upon
as an eligible and convenient locality for the scene of operations ; and
the months of June, July, and August, 1872, were devoted to the work.

The party consisted of General R. D. Cutts, an experienced officer
of the Coast Survey, who had charge of the expedition, Assistant Mos-
man, Aid Colonna, Prof. Young, Prof. Emerson, and Mr. Mead, of
Dartmouth College. There were also a photographer, a mechanician,
and two servants. The party had, as an escort, about a dozen soldiers
from Fort Russell, at Cheyenne, who assisted in keeping the hourly
series of meteorological observations, and were detailed to serve as a
protection from possible attacks of hostile Indians.

It Was not until July that the members from Dartmouth College
were able to join the expedition. The trustees of the college had
loaned their valuable telescope for the occasion. It has an aperture
of 9 T 4 g- inches, and a focal length of 12 feet, with clock-work, and the
usual accompaniments, and is fitted with an automatic spectroscope,
having a dispersive power of 13 prisms. This telescope is one of the
best in the countiy in optical perfection, and in convenience and handi-
ness of mounting.

The summit of a slight elevation was chosen as an eligible locality
for occupation. It was a short distance from the railroad-station, and
about 40 or 50 feet above the track. Three shanties of rough boards
were erected as observatories, one for the transit instrument, one for
the meteorological apparatus, and one for the equatorial telescope.
The altitude of the observatory is 8,300 feet above the level of the
sea, the latitude a little more than 44, and the longitude about 28
west from Washington.

It was thought that Sherman combined unusual facilities for ac-
complishing the desired object of the expedition, which was to test the
advantages of a great elevation upon astronomic, and especially spec-
troscopic, work. The currents, impurities, and reflective power of the
atmosphere at the sea-level, interfere greatly with studies of this kind,

THE SHERMAN ASTRONOMICAL EXPEDITION. 73

while an elevation of 8,000 feet leaves more than a fourth of the atmos-
phere below it. The situation was one of remarkable natural beauty.
On the east there was little to mark the altitude except the rocky-
soil and scanty vegetation ; on the north there were picturesque piles
of granite ; on the north-west lay the Laramie Hills ; from the north-
west to the south towered the mountain-peaks, many of them covered
with perpetual snow. Long's Peak and Gray's Peak were 60 miles
away at the south ; the great mass of Medicine Bow lay at the west,
and between them, over the lower ridges, rose some of the high moun-
tains of the Colorado parks.

The party being located, and all arrangements for observation be-
ing made as systematic as possible, work was carried on during the
summer months in earnest, and attended with valuable results for the
initiatory movement of a work of such magnitude. The weather proved
to be unusually unfavorable. An old trapper, who had lived among
the mountains for twenty years, said that the amount of cloudy and
rainy weather was uncommon for the season. With the exception of
a week, when every night and a gi*eater part of ever day were fine,
clear nights were rare, and clear days less so. There were but two af-
ternoons when work upon the sun could be kept up from noon till sun-
set, though there were more than twenty cloudless mornings during
the same time. The enormous snow-fall of the preceding winter ac-
counted for the unusual weather-condition of the locality, and the
snow, in the middle of July, was still lying to the depths of eight feet
on the plateau at the base of the Medicine Bow Mount.

Notwithstanding these drawbacks, valuable scientific results were
obtained in five different departments of observation, geographical,
meteorological, telescopic, spectroscopic, and magnetic.

The geographical position of the station was completely deter-
mined, its longitude being obtained by telegraphic communication
with Salt Lake City. It will, therefore, be for the future a reference-
point and base for the numerous surveys which are being made in that
part of the country.

A complete hourly meteorological record was obtained for nearly
the whole of the months of June, July, and August, which, from the
important position of the station, cannot fail to be of great interest
and value.

The telescopic observations were full of promise for the result of
future and more thorough work in that department. When the sky
was unclouded the atmosphere possessed the most ethereal transpar-
ency. At night, myriads of stars invisible at lower elevations were
plainly discernible. Nearly all the seventh-magnitude stars of the
British Association Catalogue were clearly visible to the naked eye.
Prof. Young, to whose report we are indebted for the facts recorded
in this article, says that, in the quadrilateral forming the bowl of the
" Dipper," he could see distinctly nine stars, with glimpses of one or

74 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

two more, while at Hanover he could only perceive the three brightest
of them. The power of the telescope was correspondingly increased,
so that an instrument of 9 T 4 g- inches of aperture was as effective as one
with 12 inches at the sea-level. Some views of Saturn were exquis-
itely beautiful. The inner satellites, the details and markings of the
rings, especially a dark stripe upon the outer ring, were clearly seen
under powers ranging from 500 to 1,200. Besides the increase of
the range of the instrument, the air was vastly more steady, and faint
objects much more clearly defined.

The advantage was still greater in the careful spectroscopic obser-
vations that were made. Prof. Young had drawn up at Hanover a cat-
alogue of 103 bright lines in the spectrum of the chromosphere; at
Sherman the number was extended to 273, while, at moments of un-
usual solar disturbance, there were glimpses of at least as many more.
Sulphur, strontium, and cerium, are almost certainly proved to be con-
stituents of the solar atmosphere, and zinc, erbium, and didymium are
strongly indicated. It was hoped that at the base of the chromo-
sphere there might be seen the reversal of the dark lines of the spec-
trum, which is so wondrously beautiful at the commencement and close
of a total solar eclipse. But in this hope the observers were disap-
pointed ; the appearance, at the distance of 1" or 15* from the edge
of the photosphere, giving a spectrum principally continuous, most of
the. dark lines vanishing or being much weakened. This result con-
firms the observations of Secchi, who reports at the edge of the sun a
layer giving a continuous spectrum.

Curious observations were made upon the spectra of sun-spots, and
a catalogue was made of 155 lines more or less affected, either greatly
widened or weakened, or reversed. A number of bright lines were
found in the spectrum of the nucleus, and some peculiarly shaded, as
if they were the product of a combination of elements which, from the
reduced temperature over the spots, had been "able to exercise their
chemical affinities.

Many solar eruptions were watched moving with velocities vary-
ing from 150 to 250 miles per second, and pouring forth their whirl-
winds and torrents of ejected gas through the molten atmosphere.
The most interesting eruption was visible on the surface of the sun
itself in the vicinity of a large spot.

The magnetic observations were as satisfactory as any that were
made, and yet prove that, although our greatest magnetic storms are
only remotely connected with solar influence, every solar paroxysm
has a direct and immediate effect upon terrestrial magnetism. On
the 3d and 5th of August there were violent paroxysms of solar erup-
tion. At just the minute these eruptions took place, the record of the
vertical Magnetic Force shows marked and sudden magnetic impulses,
a peculiar shuddering of the magnetic needle for that very time. The
photographic copies of the vertical Force Curve at Greenwich and

THE BATTLE OF LIFE AMONG PLANTS. 7S

Stonyhurst show marked and characteristic disturbances at the corre-
sponding points, which, allowing for the difference in longitude, were
the very moments of time when the solar disturbances were watched
at Sherman.

The work of the last summer accomplished by the Sherman Astro-
nomical Expedition points clearly to the inference that a great national
observatory should be established without loss of time, in that posi-
tion on the American Continent most favorable to astronomical obser-
vation. Sherman is evidently not the place, on account of weather-con-
ditions, but some mountain-station must be found adapted for the
purpose, far above the fogs and impurities of the sea-level. A tele-
scope, the best and largest that scientific resources can furnish, and a
corps of observers devoted to the work, must be established on this
permanent locality. Then, from this high point, sun, planets, stars,
nebulae, comets, and meteors, may be attacked by observers armed
with the most effectual scientific weapons, until from the depths of
infinite space come answers to some of the great problems that are
puzzling the brains of thoughtful students of celestial mysteries.

A recent writer proposes that the whole civilized world shall con-
tribute for a telescope which shall cost 81,000,000. Why should not
America contribute enough from her vast resources to possess the
most powerful one that can be built, and be the first among the na-
tions to bring about great results, and make certainties of what seem
now the shadowy possibilities of the future ?

-

THE BATTLE OF LIFE AMONG PLANTS.

By MAXWELL T. MASTEES, M.D., F. E. S.

EVERY day, every hour, there is going on around us a veritable
death-struggle. It excites little attention. People would be in
no hurry to read the telegraphic dispatches concerning it from the seat
of war, even if there were any to read. Special correspondents there
are, but their letters are appreciated but by a few. Nevertheless, it
cannot be said that mankind in general is not interested in the result
of the struggle. On the contrary, little as the affair is heeded, it is of
very serious import to the human race. Our food-supplies depend on
it ; the well-being of our flocks and herds is essentially dependent on
it ; the building of our houses, the fabrication of our raiment, are to a
large extent contingent on it ; nay, the soil beneath our feet, and the
very sky above our heads, are materially, very materially, influenced
by the result of the contest of which we are about to speak. Edward
Forbes was wont to say that the movement of a periwinkle over a rock
might be of greater consequence to the human race than the progress

7 6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of an Alexander; and the results of the wars of the plants are as-
suredly of no less importance, seeing that the very existence of an
Alexander depends in no slight degree upon them. The campaigns
we speak of are real; they are not mental figments, or allegorical
illustrations. Success in the practice of horticulture, of agriculture, of
forestry, depends on the action we men take toward the combatants.
If we remain neutral, the weakest goes to the wall, overpowered by
the stronger ; if we interfere, we exert a very powerful influence for
the time ; but, immediately we cease to exert our power, the combat
begins again, and with enhanced violence. The essence of successful
cultivation often consists almost entirely in the removal of the plant
from the influence of that hostile " environment " to which, under
natural circumstances, it would be subjected. It is this that accounts,
in a great measure, though of course not wholly, for the oft-observed
fact that certain plants, flowers, and fruits, attain far greater perfec-
tion in our gardens than they ever do in their native countries.

That a war of extermination is thus going on around us may strike
some with surprise. They are so accustomed to associate flowers and
plants with peace and repose, that they are astonished to find that
other far less amiable ideas may, with even more justice, be associated
with them. And yet a moment's reflection, or a passing glance at the
nearest hedge-row or pasture, will show the reality of the struggle.
All that beautiful disorder, that apparently careless admixture of
divers forms and colors the sweeping curves of the brambles, the
entwining coils of the honeysuckle, the creeping interlacement of the
ground-ivy or the pennywort all are but indications of the fray that
is constantly going on. It would seem as if the weakest must suc-
cumb, must be overpowered by the stronger-growing plants, and so
they are at certain places and at certain times ; but, under other con-
ditions, the victory may be with the apparently weaker side, just as
the slow-going tortoise may outrun the fleeter hare. In any case, the
success is often only temporary ; the victor becomes in time the van-
quished; the vanquished, in its turn, regains its former conquest; and
so on.

It is proposed in the following notes to give a few illustrations of
the nature and effects of this conflict, of the way in which it is carried
on, and of the circumstances which favor it.

Agriculturists had long been practically conversant with the ad-
vantages derivable from the practice of not growing the same crop on
the same soil for too long a period. The advantages consequent on
this so-called rotation of crops are due to more than one cause ; but it
was Dureau de la Malle who, in 1825, called attention to the phenome-
non of natural rotation. From long observation of what takes place
in woods and pasture-lauds, he established the fact that an alternation
of growth, as he called it, occurs as a natural phenomenon. In pasture-
lands, for instance, the grasses get the upper hand at one time, the

THE BATTLE OF LIFE AMONG PLANTS, 77

leguminous plants at another ; so that, in the course of thirty years,
the author whose observations we are citing was witness of five or six
such alternations.

It follows from all this that a plant, as was pointed out by the
late Dean Herbert, does not necessarily grow in the situation best
adapted for it, but where it can best hold its own against its hos-
tile neighbors, and best sustain itself against unfavorable conditions
generally.

The sources of success in the contest are manifold ; they vary more
or less in each individual case. Probably they are never exactly the
same; nevertheless, there are certain circumstances which must always
be operative in conducing to the victory. A few illustrations must suf-
fice. It is easy to understand why first-comers, duly installed, should
have an advantage over later visitants ; why the more prolific should
outnumber the less fertile ; and how it is that a perennial plant has a
better chance on any given spot, center is paribus, than an annual, whose
progeny would find the ground occupied, and their chances of sur-
vival materially interfered with by their longer-lived neighbors.

Again, there is no difficulty in understanding why such plants as
quitch (Tritlcum repens) or bearbine {Convolvulus sepium) hold their
own so tenaciously, and so much to the prejudice of their neighbors.
The long, creeping, underground stems, rooting, or capable of rooting,
at every joint, give them an immense advantage over plants not so
favorably organized. The ends of the shoots of the convolvulus, more-
over, dilate into tubers, which are thrust into the ground, to form in
the succeeding spring fresh centres of vegetation. A great rooting-
power is obviously of great benefit ; not less so is an extensive leaf-
surface. It is not only that the copious feeding-roots absorb the avail-
able nourishment from the soil, not only that the wide leaf-surface
avails itself of every ray of sunlight, every whiff of air that plays over
it, and thus serves to build up the tissues of the plant to which the
root or leaf respectively belongs, but they practically oust other plants
less favorably circumstanced than themselves. The roots occupy the
soil, and rob the weaker plants of their share of its resources. The
tree with dense foliage shuts off from its lowlier neighbor much of the
light and air necessary for its existence; and hence, in a measure, the
absence of vegetation in pine-forests or under the shadow of dense
woods. Some plants there are specially organized to resist and over-
come these hostile conditions. Among them are the climbers, the
twining plants, and those with tendrils of one sort or another. The
bramble or wild-rose, with its slender, arching, hook-beset branches ;
the wild-hop, with its coils of cord-like sprays ; the clematis, clinging
on firmly by means of its leaf-stalks to any thing it can lay hold of;
the ivy, grappling with the trunk of a tree all these are, in some
sense, weakly plants ; they would be overweighted in the struggle with
their stronger neighbors, if it were not for the special adaptation of

78 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

their structure just alluded to, and which enables them to bear their
part bravely in the conflict.

It is easy to understand how an alteration of the conditions under
which plants grow influences veiy materially the struggle we have
been alluding to. A very slight change in climatal conditions pro-
duced, for instance, by the growth of sheltering trees, or by the drain-
age of the soil may be followed by the growth of quite a different set
of plants from those that occupied the ground previously. The altered
conditions have been advantageous to the one and disadvantageous to
the other set of plants.

As an illustration of the complexity of the checks and relations be-
tween organic beings struggling together, Darwin mentions the case
of a barren heath which fell under his observation, part of which was
left intact, while another portion had been enclosed and planted with
Scotch fir. The change in the native vegetation of the planted part
of the heath was most remarkable. " Not only the proportional num-
bers of the heath-plants were wholly changed, but twelve species of
plants, not counting grasses and carices, flourished in the plantations,
which could not be found on the heath."

This sort of change was pointedly referred to by Dureau de la
Malle, who relates how, after the felling of the timber in forests of a
particular district of France, broom, foxglove, heaths, birch-trees, and
aspens sprang up, replacing the oaks, the beech, and the ash, felled by
the woodman. After thirty years, the birch and poplars were felled
in their turn. Still very few of the original possessors of the soil, the
oaks, etc., made their appearance : the ground was still occupied with
young birch and poplar. It is not till after the third repetition of the
coppicing after an interval of ninety years that the oaks and beech
reconquer their original position. They retain it for a time, and then
the struggle begins again.

Antiquarian researches also have proved that, in the natural state
of things, without any violent change in external conditions, the na-
ture of forests becomes altered. The Hercynian forests, of which
Caesar speaks, and which then consisted of deciduous-leaved trees, are
now made up principally of conifers. A forest which, in the middle
ages, was of beech, is now stocked with oak, and vice versa. Again,
we have the evidence afforded by submerged forests and peat-bogs,
according to which certain plants, now extinct in particular localities,
once flourished there. We are not alluding to plants that may have
required a different climate from what they now experience, but to
such cases as the silver fir, the Scotch fir, Pinus 3fi(ffhus, etc., which
are found in this partially-fossilized condition in spots where there is
apparently nothing to prevent them from growing now, where, in fact,
they do grow well when planted.

Foresters in all countries are perfectly well aware of these facts,
and botanists watch with interest the appearance of a different vegeta-

THE BATTLE OF LIFE AMONG PLANTS. 79

tion, when some accident has interfered with the previously-existing
conditions. When woods are cut down, when soil from a depth is
laid on the surface, when extensive fires occur, when lakes are
drained; in fact, when any sudden alteration takes place in external
circumstances, then we may expect to find a corresponding change in
the vegetation. One set of plants profits by the change, another
suffers. It may be asked, " Where do the new arrivals come from ? "
Sometimes, no doubt, the seeds are wafted from a distance, and, find-
ing a suitable abiding-place, germinate. This is, perhaps, more espe-
cially the case with the spores of fungi, whose extreme minuteness
favors their dispersion in this way. But it often happens that the
facts of the case will not admit of such an interpretation, and then we
can only fall back on the supposition that the seeds or bulbs existed in
the soil, but under circumstances not favorable to their development.

The ground in this way is looked on by Alphonse de Candolle and
Darwin as a vast magazine of seeds, etc., capable of retaining their
vitality for a more or loss prolonged period, according to circum-
stances, and ready to avail themselves of any change that may be
beneficial to them. That this is so in some places has been proved by
results, but it seems equally clear that this does not hold good in all
places. Allusion has already been made to the apparently capricious
appearance of our British orchids. The downs or the fields that in
one summer yielded abundance of bee, of fly, or of spider orchids,
may, in another year, scarcely furnish a single one. The explanation
of this peculiarity lies in the special organization of the plant, well
described by Prillieux and other botanists, from whose observations
it appears that the plants in question naturally pass through several
stages, which, for our present purpose, it is not necessary to detail,
and these stages may be prolonged according to circumstances. The
flowering stage is thus arrived at in one season, while in another all
the energies of the plant may be taken up in forming tubers and
leaves. A very remarkable instance of the fact just alluded to was
communicated to the writer by a competent observer, Mr. George
Oxenden, of Broom Park, Kent. This gentleman had been acquainted
with a particular field for some forty years, during which time it had
been under the plough, but at the expiration of this period it was laid
down in grass, when the very next year a profusion of bee-orchids was
observed in it. In this case the time was too short for seeds to have
germinated and to have progi-essed to the flowering state. There
seems no other solution than that the tubers must have been in the
ground some time previously, but that, from the ploughing and
cropping of the soil, they had not had a fair chsnce of developing
flowers.

The facts we have mentioned are, in the main, intelligible enough.
We can see the why and the wherefore without much difficulty ; but
it is not so always. For instance, it is difficult to account for the sig-

80 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nal defeat that native plants often incur at the hands of invading
strangers.

Why does the water-cress, harmless enough in our ditches, block
up the water-courses in New Zealand to such an extent as to become
a costly nuisance ? What can there be in English ditches and canals
so propitious to the growth of the American water-weed (Anacharis)
as to have caused it to obstruct even our navigable rivers ? In Amer-
ica, whence it came, it is no more of an inconvenience than any other
water-weed. Why in other places does the white clover (Trifolium
re})ens) overcome the native grasses, and dispossess them of their ter-
ritory ? Why has a particular grass, the Stipa tortilus, invaded the
South-Russian steppes to such an extent as to displace almost every
other plant ?

There are numberless such instances from that afforded by the
island of St. Helena, in which the original vegetation is almost com-
pletely dispossessed, and its room occupied by foreign importations,
to the banks of a Surrey river, yellow with the flowers of an American
balsam and the reason is not obvious. The fact is patent, and is not
without analogies in the virulence with which epidemic diseases spread
when introduced for the first time among a population not heretofore
subjected to them.

Such cases as these recall the opinions of Humboldt and others on
the antipathies of plants. According to this notion, certain plants are
positively injurious to others, not so much by any peculiarity of struct-
ural organization as by the excretion of matters hurtful to other
plants. It has been asserted, for instance, that the darnel (Lolium
temulentum) is injurious to wheat; that a species of thistle (Serratula
arvensis) is obnoxious to oats ; that a spurge (Euphorbia Peplus) and
a scabious (Knautia arvensis) are detrimental to flax ; and spurrey
(Spergula arvensis) similarly prejudicial to buckwheat.

In so far as this detrimental influence is due to any excrementitious
product from the plant, the verdict given by modern physiologists
amounts to " not proven." Some would even say " not guilty ; " but
we do not see clearly how those who take this view can reconcile
it entirely with the existence of that natural alteration of which
Dureau de la Malle speaks, and which is admitted by all subsequent
observers.

Mere exhaustion of the soil Will not account for the phenomena in
all cases, because a crop will fail on a particular soil after a while, and
yet chemical analysis of that soil will reveal the fact that the particu-
lar elements required by a given plant are still contained in sufficient
abundance in it. Land, for instance, that is " clover-sick " on which,
that is, good crops of clover cannot be grown is by no means neces-
sarily deficient in the constituent required for the growth of the plant ;
and, indeed, in the Rothamsted experiments the constituents in ques-
tion have been supplied as manure, but without any good result.

THE BATTLE OF LIFE' AMONG PLANTS. 81

Again, root-excretions (assuming their existence) cannot be produc-
tive of injury, as we are assured by Dr. Gilbert that clover has been
grown in the same plot of garden-soil at Rothamsted for eighteen
years in succession, while only a few hundred yards off no condition
of manuring has hitherto been successful in restoring the clover-yield-
ing capabilities of the land. 1 Reverting, however, to the alleged an-
tipathies of one plant to another, we may make passing mention of the
eurious circumstance recorded by M. Paul Levi, 8 that the lianas or
climbing plants of the forests of Central America have their likes and
dislikes, and that they will not attach themselves to particular trees
even when brought into juxtaposition with them. It is significent
that the trees which are thus slighted by the twiners are just such as
are ill-adapted for the support of such plants, being such as have tall,
unbranched trunks, with smooth bark and a dense, overhanging, dome-
like canopy of foliage. It is not only the climbing plants that refuse
to grow on such trees, but to a less extent, also, the mosses, ferns,
orchids, Bromeliads, and other epiphytal plants.

It is obvious, from what has been previously said, that human in-
terference affects these internecine conflicts of plants very materially.
It is clear also that the cultivator can very often avail himself of them
to his own profit. From this point of view the experiments and
observations carried on at Rothamsted by Mr. Lawes and Dr. Gilbert
are most important, especially those relating to the struggle among
pasture-plants, and the circumstances favoring certain plants more
than their fellows. No detailed report of these particular experiments
has hitherto been published, and only a few scattered notices in the
Proceedings of the Horticultural Society (June 2, 1868) have appeared
concerning them. We can, however, give some idea of their scope
and nature by stating that a part of the park at Rothamsted, which
has been under grass for centuries, has been divided into plots of
equal size, placed side by side under conditions as nearly equal as
possible. Some of these plots have been left unmanured ; others,
some twenty in number, have, for the last ten or twelve years, been
subjected to various manures, the constitution and proportions of
which are accurately determined. The general herbage of the park,
like that of the unmanured plots, consists of some fifty species of
plants, including sundry grasses, clovers, docks, umbellifers and other
plants commonly found in such situations. In the several manured
plots a change is observable, sometimes slight, at other times vast,
and the change does not show itself so much in the superior luxuri-
ance of any one plant, or in the starved condition of another, as it does
in the more or less complete exclusion of certain plants, and in their
replacement by others. Thus, while the unmanured plots contain,
say, fifty species of plants, others comprise less than half that num-

1 Journal of the Horticultural Society. New Series, vol. iii., p. 91.

2 Cited in the Gardener's Chronicle, 1870, p. 383.

vol. in. 6

8 2 THE P OP ULAR S CIENGE MONTHL Y.

ber; from some plots the clovers and umbel lifers are banished alto-
gether, while in other cases they may be proportionately increased.
Even among the grasses the competition is very severe, and the result
in some cases is that all or nearly all have to give way to the cock's-
foot grass (Dactylu ccespitosa), the growth of which is so fostered by
certain manures as to cause it to overcome its fellows and remain mas-
ter of the situation. To the plots to which a mixed mineral manure,
consisting of salts of potash, soda, magnesia, and lime, is applied, but
little difference in the number of species is observable. On the other
hand, manures containing ammonia salts, or nitrates, cause a great
diminution in the number of species living in the plot to which they
are applied. While the unmanui-ed plots furnish by weight about 60
per cent, of grasses, the remainder, consisting of plants of other fami-
lies, the plots to which admixture of mineral and nitrogenous manures
is added, contain as much as 95 per cent, of grasses, and these belong-
ing to a comparatively very few species. Salts of potash and lime,
which are comparatively inert as regards grasses, manifest their influ-
ence in increasing the vigor and the absolute numerical proportion of
the leguminous plants.

The manner in which these results have been arrived at is worthy
of a short description in this place.

Notes are taken at frequent intervals during the season of growth,
the appearance of the plants noted, their relative luxuriance observed,
and their comparative tendency to produce flower or stem and leaf,
the abundance of flowers, etc., etc. Root-growth is studied, and also
the character of the soil in the various plots, and the way in which
its texture and its capacity for holding or transmitting water are mod-
ified according to the manure applied. When the crop is cut from
each plot, its weight is estimated, and also the amount of dry produce.
In some cases chemical analysis is pushed further, and the ashes duly
examined. In addition to these no trifling observations, three " sepa-
rations " have been carried out at regular intervals. These separa-
tions consist in the picking out, from a sample of a certain weight
taken from each plot, every fragment of every species contained in
the sample. In this way the relative quantity and weight of each of
the different plants in the several samples are accurately determined,
and the proportion in the whole plot computed. The labor is enor-
mous ; but the results, when fully brought out, must be most impor-
tant, both as regards the scientific aspect of the question, the history
of the life-struggle between plants so circumstanced, and also as re-
gards the practical hints to be derived by tie cultivator.

Some experiments of a somewhat similar character, and bearing
directly on the struggle for life among plants, have been made by Prof.
Hoffmann, of Giessen, and they are of such interest that we introduce
here a veiy condensed account of them, taken from the pages of the
Gardener's Chronicle, 1870, p. 664

THE BATTLE OF LIFE AMONG PLANTS. 83

In a previous set of experiments the Giessen professor had ascer-
tained that the particular plants under observation grew equally well
in all the varieties of soil in which they were placed, provided due
care was taken to prevent the growth of intruding weeds. Having
arrived at this result, Prof. Hoffmann next left the several plants to
themselves, with a view of ascertaining how they would comport
themselves, without assistance, against the inroads of weeds. The re-
sult was, that the weeds completely gained the upper hand, as might
have been expected from their known habit. The species which held
out longest was Asperula cynanchica. This plant, after having been
grown in a bed for three years, and protected from weed-invasion by
the use of the hoe, was then left to take care of itself. It held out for
four years, but was ultimately elbowed out by the intruders. Acting
on the principle of " set a rogue to catch a rogue," Prof. Hoffmann
then set himself to observe the results of the internecine struggle
between the weeds themselves, thinking that the ultimate survivors
would perhaps prove to have special affinities for the soil in which
they grew.

Thus left to themselves, the beds became so densely covered, that,
in a square foot, the professor counted 460 living plants, and the rem-
nants of many others, which had succumbed in the encounter. Every
year, in July, the plots were examined, and every year the number of
species was found to have diminished. Melilots, at first abundant,
gradually disappeared ; Artemisia vulgaris succumbed after two or
three years ; and so on, till at length only a few species were left, and
these not only persisted, but slowly gained ground from year to year,
and ultimately remained in possession of the plot. The plots under
observation were 2 metres 30 cents, long, 1 metre broad, and all as
nearly as possible under the same conditions, save that the soil was
varied, in some cases consisting of the ordinary soil of the garden, in
others of an admixture of lime, in others of sand, or of sand and lime,
and so forth.

Of the 107 species under observation, all, or nearly all, found the
most essential requisites of their existence equally well in all the vari-
eties of soil ; so that, other conditions being equal, the nature of the
soil was indifferent. The species which remained victors, all the
others being ultimately dispossessed, were Tritieum repens (couch),
Poa prate?isis, Potentilla reptans, Acer Pseado Platanus (sycamore),
Cornus sanguinea, native plants ; and Aster salignits, A. parviflorus,
.Euphorbia virgata, and Prunus Padus, derived from other portions
of the garden.

It may, therefore, be inferred that the district in which these ex-
periments were made would, in process of time, if no obstacle were
afforded, become covered with meadows and woods meadows in the
low ground and woods in elevated places. Again, the experiments
show that the survival of certain plants has not been influenced by the

84 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nature of the soil ; thus the couch-grass was ultimately spread over
all the plots, whether of sand, or of loam, or of lime, whether drained
or undrained. So also with Poa pratensis and Potentilla reptans. So
that the chemical and physical nature of the soil, as has been so often
shown in similar investigations, plays only a secondary part.

As to the action of shade, it was found by Prof. Hoffmann that low-
growing plants, especially if annuals, disappeared rapidly, while taller-
growing plants, such as couch, Prunus Paclus, etc., survived. The
survival of certain plants, then couch, Aster, Potentilla, etc. is due
much less to external conditions than to the " habit " of the plant it-
self ; that is to say, to the facility the plant has of adapting itself to
varying external conditions, and thus of triumphing over others less
favorably endowed in this wise.

The immediate source of victory lies in the powerful root-growth
Of the survivors, including under the general term " root " not only
the root proper, but the offshoots and runners which are given off just
below, or on the surface of the ground. Indeed, the latter habit of
growth is more advantageous to plants in such a struggle than the de-
velopment of the true root downward would be. Among those plants
where the roots were equally developed there were, nevertheless, ine-
qualities of growth, dependent, probably, on the greater need for light
in some species than in others, etc.

It is clear from Prof. Hoffmann's experiments that, but for the con-
tinual use of the hoe, and the diligent extirpation of the weeds in our
fields, the stronger-growing ones would not only destroy our crops,
but also other weeds less vigorous than themselves. But they are not
sufficient to explain all the conditions of this complicated problem ; as
is shown by the fact that, in the district adjoining the locality where
Prof. Hoffmann's experiments were carried on, the predominant plants
are not the same as those which ultimately proved victors in the ex-
perimental beds.

We may add that for two years a series of observations was car-
ried on in the gardens of the Royal Horticultural Society, at Chiswick,
with a view to ascertain how certain selected plants, twelve in num-
ber, and naturally growing in pastures, would be affected when grow-
ing by themselves, by the addition of manures of five , different de-
scriptions, and similar to those used at Rothamsted. In some cases the
results of these experiments were unsatisfactory, from circumstances
that need not be detailed here ; still a large body of facts was ac-
cumulated, and, with reference to the property by which certain plants
prove victorious in the struggle for life, it was clear that the natural
habit or organization of the plant was, cceteris paribus, the mainspring
of its success over its competitors. The several manures intensified or
deteriorated this peculiar organization, as the case might be, and thus
favored or impeded its growth accordingly. Popular Science Review.

THE HIPPOPOTAMUS AND HER BABY. 8 S

THE HIPPOPOTAMUS AND HER BABY.

By FEANK BUCKLAND.

ON the 5th of November, 1604, two hundred and sixty-eight years
ago, the whole of London was in a state of commotion at hearing
of the discovery of " Guy Fawkes" sitting ina cellar under the Houses
of Parliament, on a powder-barrel, with a match in his hand, his inten-
tion being to blow up James I. and the House of Lords.

On the 5th of November, 1872, London was again put in a state of
commotion by the appearance of another " Guy Fawkes ; " this time,
however, not in the cellar under the Houses of Parliament, but in the
straw by the side of his mother in her den at the Zoological Gardens.
In the engraving on page 86, you can now, kind reader, see the portrait
of this celebrated animal, " Guy Fawkes," so called on account of the
date of his birth. The father hippopotamus came over here in the year
1851, and was accompanied in his journey by the well-known captain
of the " Rob Roy Canoe," who happened to be a fellow-passenger in
the steamer with him. The female hippopotamus was sent over to
England, by my friend Consul Petherick, at a later date. From these
parents three young ones have been born at the Zoological Gardens ;
unfortunately, two of these interesting infants died. I made two casts
of the first Baby Hippo : one cast is in the giraffe-house at the Zoologi-
cal Gardens, the other is in my Fish Museum at South Kensington.
The first two young ones remained by the head of the mother, evidently
not knowing where the udder was. Mr. Bartlett, the talented and
ever-obliging superintendent of the Zoological Gardens, tells me that,
before these two hippopotami were born, the people at Paris and
Amsterdam had written to him to advise him " never, on any account,
to let the baby hippopotamus go into the water." He took their ad-
vice on the former occasions, but at the birth of " Guy Fawkes" he
was determined to try the very reverse plan. He therefore allowed
the young one to accompany its mother into the big bath. It is to
Mr. Bartlett that must be ascribed the honor of the discovery that the
young hippopotamus certainly sucks under water. It would seem,
therefore, that the young hippopotamus has some peculiar anatomical
structure which enables it to remain a much longer time under water
than its parents.

A few days after the birth of the young one, Mr. Bartlett was
watching it swimming about the tank. It then suddenly dived, but
did not reappear for such a long time that he thought it had had a
fit, and was lying drowned at the bottom of the tank. He therefore
made arrangements to have the large plug pulled out this plug had
been fixed expressly for this purpose and lo run off the tank quickly,
so as to resuscitate the little beast if possible. They were just going

85

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

to do this, when Muster " Guy Fuwkes " suddenly reappeared, shaking
liis funny little horsedike ears, from the bottom of his tank, with a
hippopotamic grin on his face, as much as to say, "Don't be fright-
ened, I am all right; you don't know all about me yet ! " The little
beast had remained, without blowing or taking breath, actually under
water for nearly twenty minutes. The parents have never been known
to be under much over three minutes. I suspect Nature has given this

THE HIPPOPOTAMUS AND HER BABY. 87

wonderful power of remaining so long under water to the young hip-
popotamus, first of all, to enable it to suck when the water has been
clear, Mr. Bartlett has frequently seen it sucking under water and,
secondly, in order that it may be concealed from its enemies, though
I am not at all certain but that a large crocodile would seize and
swallow a young hippopotamus as a jack would swallow a roach.

Master Guy Fawkes, nevertheless, had one day a narrow escape
of his life. In order to clean out the tank, one fine sunny morning the
mother and child were let out into the pond outside. They both re-
mained in the water as long as it suited them, and then the mother
walked out with that peculiar stately gait which distinguishes this
gigantic animal. The little one attempted to follow, but, unfortunate-
ly, he chose a landing-place at the corner nearest the giraffes' enclosure,
just at the very point where there were no steps. The poor little fel-
low struggled and fought hard to get out, but could not, tailing back
exhausted into the water. His mother, seeing the distress of her
child, immediately went back into the water, and, diving down,
brought him up from the bottom. She then supported his head above
water, in order to give him time to breathe. For nearly half an hour
Mr. Bartlett and the keepers were in agonies. Of course, they dare
not go to help Guy Fawkes, and there was no form of life-buoy they
could throw to the struggling creature. At last the young one made
a more vigorous effort than ever, when simultaneously the old >ue
gave him a push with her tremendous head, and the little animal's life
was thus saved. So we see that the hippopotamus is no fool ; her in-
stinct mind, rather told her how to save her young one.

It would be superfluous in me to attempt to describe this little ani-
mal, because every one ought to go and see it. It is about the size
and shape of an ordinary bacon pig, but the color is something of a
pinkish-slate. He knows his keeper very well : and when he has had
his dinner is as playful as a kitten, popping and jumping about his
den, and throwing up mouthfuls of hay, like a young calf. When first
born he was small enough to come through the bars on to the straw
outside his den, but soon he had grown so much that he could not get
through. He used to put his head through the bars, and allow Pres-
cott, the keeper, to rub his gums. The tusks of the lower-jaw were
just beginning to cut the gum. His back teeth have not come yet ;
but they are obliged to be very careful about his diet, for he has al-
ready (when I write, in January) begun to pick a bit at the food pre-
pared for him. I am pleased to be able to record that the council oi
the Zoological Society so fully appreciate Mr. Bartlett's cleverness in
rearing this little beast, that they have voted him a silver medal and a
purse, with a check in it. Prescott and the other keeper have also
received a silver medal and a douceur from the society.

I now proceed to make some general remarks about hippopotami.

The hippopotamus is of some value commercially. The skin is

88 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

made by the natives into whips, which, I believe, are used to beat
delinquents in Egypt ; and I am told that they are exceedingly for-
midable weapons. To make the whip, the skin is cut into triangular
slips, about five or six feet long, one end being pointed, the other
broad ; it is then coiled upon itself, and afterward dried in the sun,
and, when finished, is light, dry, and elastic. The teeth of the hippo-
potamus are also of commercial value. Their structure is very pecul-
iar. I have a tooth now before ; it is hollow at one end, like the tusk
of an elephant. When the animal was alive, this hollow was filled
with soft pulp. The tooth is always growing forward as the pulp
solidifies behind. The reader can easily see how this is, by examining
the front tooth of the lower jaw of the next boiled rabbit he has for
dinner. The outside of the tooth of the hippo is formed of a glass-
like, hard enamel; it is exceedingly dense, hard, and flint-like. I have
just taken down my old regimental sword, and find that, by striking
it at the proper angle, a shower of sparks fly away from the tooth, like
the sparks from a boy's " fire-devil " made in form of a pyramid with
wet gunpowder. The teeth of the hippopotami, as in the rabbit, are
sometimes liable to deformity. In the College of Surgeons there is
the tooth of a hippopotamus which has grown nearly into the form of
a circle. These teeth are, I believe, much sought after by dentists
for making artificial teeth; and when a piece can be had of such a
loi. i as that the teeth can be worked in enamel, they preserve their
color almost as in the natural teeth. The price of hippopotami-teeth
is about thirty shillings a pound. Artificial teeth are also made from
the tusks of the walrus, the sword of the narwhal, and also the teeth
of the cachelot whale.

Not long ago, the old male hippopotamus at the Gardens suffered
much from a decayed tooth. In former times he would have been
shot, as was poor " Chunee," the elephant at Exeter 'Change. Mr.
Bartlett, superintendent of the Zoological Gardens, with his ever-ready
talent in meeting all emergencies, determined to pull out the tooth.
He ordered the blacksmith to make a pair of " tooth-forceps," and a
tremendous pair they were. The " bite" of the forceps just fitted the
tooth of the hippo. By skilful management, Bartlett managed to seize
Master Hippo's tooth as he put his head through the bars. The hippo,
roaring frightfully, pulled one way, Bartlett and the keepers pulled
the other, and at last out came the tooth, and Hippo soon got well
again.

No animal in this world is made without a purpose, and we always
find that the structure of an animal is admirably adapted to its mode
of life. I believe that one of the principal duties which the elephant
and rhinoceros unconsciously perform, is to cut paths through the
dense forests and jungles in which they live. The home of the hippo-
potamus is among the aquatic forests at the bottoms of large rivers
such as the Upper Nile. It is probable that, in the days of Moses, these

THE HIPPOPOTAMUS AND HER BABY. 89

animals abounded in Lower Egypt. I believe now they do not occur
in any part of the Nile below the cataracts, the headquarters being
the central and southern parts of Africa only ; but I am afraid that, as
civilization increases, so will the hippopotamus retreat. This huge
animal spends most of its time in the water, and it comes out to feed
at night. Above the cataracts of the Nile they are very destructive
to the crops, as they eat an immense quantity, and trample down much
more than they eat. The stomach contains as much as five or six
bushels, and the large intestine is eight inches in diameter. They do
not grind their food much, but rather munch it up. The reader should
be curious to notice this at the Zoological Gardens. When the old
hippo opens its mouth, a good-sized baby could as easily be put in as
one puts a letter into a letter-box. As the elephant makes passes in
the jungles, so it appears to me that one of the chief offices of the
hippopotamus is to keep in check the dense vegetation in tropical
climates, which, if allowed to accumulate, would block up the long
reaches of rivers, and ultimately turn the flat lands into useless, fever-
breeding swamps: so that we see this gigantic animal is of very con-
siderable economic importance. This living machine for the destruc-
tion of fresh-water vegetation is admirably adapted for its work.
Nature has not given him any hair, as that would be an incumbrance
to it, and would not well conduce to its comfort when wallowing in
the mud. The skin is, therefore, somewhat like that of a pig. If the
animal had not some protection against the sudden changes of temper-
ature induced by his going in and out of the water so frequently, he
would always be either shivering or else unbearably hot. Nature,
therefore, has given him a thick layer of fat between the skin and the
muscles. The Dutchmen in Southern Africa call the hippopotamus the
" Zee-coe," or " Sea-cow." My friend Mr. Mostyn Owen, who has
travelled a great deal in Africa, tells me that they also call him the
" Umzivooboo ; and should the reader happen to visit the Dee, near
Ruabon, he would be exceedingly likely to see a coracle floating
down the river with a gentleman sitting in it fishing for salmon, and
he would also probably observe the name " Umzivooboo " painted on
the coracle in laro-e letters.

In the water, the hippopotamus, though a gigantic beast, shows
very little of his carcass. On referring to the engraving, it will be
observed that the nostrils, eyes, and ears, are on the same level. The
nostrils are each provided with a wonderful valve, by means of which
he can open his nostrils to breathe, or shut them up to exclude the
water. This beautiful mechanism is worked by what is called a
" sphincter muscle." Reader, your own eyes are worked by a sphinc-
ter muscle. Stand opposite the looking-glass and wink at yourself,
you will then see a sphincter muscle in operation. You do not re-
quire a sphincter muscle to your nose, because you are not amphibious.
We find, however, that the seal, like the hippopotamus, can close his

9 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nose at will with a sphincter muscle. Go and look at the seal in the
Zoological. The valve which works the blow-hole of the whale and
porpoise is of an analogous character. Strange to say, we find an ani-
mal that is not amphibious has his nostrils protected by this curious
and beautiful valve. But you will probably never guess what animal
this is. Well, it is the camel the " ship of the desert." In the des-
ert, where the camel lives, there are often " sand-storms," and the
Creator has provided the poor camel with this wonderful structure to
save him from suffocation when these terrible sand-storms occur.

Shortly after the little hippopotamus was born in the Zoological, a
young rhinoceros was born on board a ship in the Victoria Docks, and
this poor little animal, whose value was very great, unfortunately died
his mother lay on him and crushed him with her great carcass.
Never mind, better luck next time. Leisure Hour.

-*-

EUTHANASIA.

THERE is a small knot of thinkers in Birmingham who come to-
gether to discuss philosophical topics, and call themselves The
Speculative Club. In 1870 they published a volume of seven essays,
which were written with much ability, and some of them with great
boldness. The sixth article of this volume is by Samuel D. Williams,
and is entitled " Euthanasia," which being interpreted means an easy
or desirable mode of death. The writer begins by referring to the op-
position which was made to the administration of chloroform for relief
of pain, and more especially in cases of childbirth, which was regard-
ed as a revolt against the divine decree, " In sorrow shalt thou brinsr
forth." This prejudice having passed away, the writer raises the ques-
tion of the application of chloroform to a relief of the sufferings which
often attend the approach of death, and observes : " It is difficult to
understand why chloroform should be rightly recurred to, to render
less painful the natural painful passage into life ; and yet, that it should
be almost an offence to so much as suggest a like recurrence to it in
the still more painful passage out of life." Why, he asks, should the
patient about to be operated upon by the surgeon always have a refuge
from suffering open to him, and yet the patient about to suffer at the
hands of Nature the worst she has to inflict, be left without help or
hope of help ? Mr. Williams lays down and defends the following
proposition : " That in all cases of hopeless and painful illness it
should be the recognized duty of the medical attendant, whenever so
desired by the patient, to administer chloroform, or such other anaes-
thetic as may by-and-by supersede chloroform, so as to destroy con-
sciousness at once, and put the sufferer at once to a quick and painless

EUTHANASIA.

9i

death ; all needful precautions being adopted to prevent any possible
abuse of such duty and means being taken to establish, beyond the
possibility of doubt or question, that the remedy was applied at the
express wish of the patient.' 1 ''

After describing the tortures of lingering disease leading to inevi-
table death, the writer remarks :

" Cases such as this abound on every hand ; and those who have
had to witness suffering of this kind, and to stand helplessly by, long-
ing to minister to the beloved one, yet unable to bring any real respite
or relief, may well be impatient with the easy-going spirit that sees in
all this misery so long as it does not fall upon itself nothing but
' the appointed lot of man ; ' and that opposes, as almost impious or
profane, every attempt to deal with it effectually.

" AVhy, it must be asked again, should all this unnecessary suffer-
ing be endured ? The patient desires to die ; his life can no longer be
of use to others, and has become an intolerable burden to himself; the
patient's friends submit to the inevitable, but seek the means of rob-
bing death of its bitterest sting protracted bodily pain ; the medi-
cal attendant is at the bedside with all the resources of his knowledge
and his skill ready to his hand ; he could, were he permitted, bring to
his patient immediate and permanent relief. Why is he not allowed
to do so, or, rather, why should not his doing so be a recognized and
sovereign duty ? "

To the objection that such a course would be a violation of the
sacredness of life, the author rejoins :

" It may well be doubted if life have any sacredness about it, apart
from the use to be made of it by its possessor. Nature certainly knows
nothing of any such sacredness, for there is nothing of which she is so
prodigal ; and a man's life, in her eyes, is of no more value than a
bird's. And, hitherto, man has shown as little sense of the value of
man's life as Nature herself, whenever his passions or lusts or interests
have been thwarted by his brother man, or have seemed likely to be
forwarded by his brother man's destruction. A sense of the value of
his own individual life to himself, man has, indeed, seldom been defi-
cient in ; and, by a kind of reflex action, this sense has slowly given
birth to, and alway underlies, the sense, such as it is, of the value of
other men's lives. But even to-day, and amid the most civilized coun-
tries of Europe, ' the sacredness of man's life ' is thrown to the winds,
the moment national or political passion grows hot, or even when mere
material interests are seriously threatened. And, indeed, seeing that
life is so transitory a thing, and that, at the best, it has to be laid aside
forever, within the brief space of its threescore years and ten, it is
hard to understand the meaning of the word ' sacred ' when applied to
it, except in so far as the word may signify the duty laid on each man
of using his life nobly while he has it.

" The objection, then, based on the sacredness of life, may be dis-

92 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

missed ; life is a thing for use, and is to be used freely and sacrificed
freely, whenever good is to be won or evil avoided by such sacrifice or
use ; the man who is ever ready to face death for others' sakes, to
save others from grinding pain, has always been reckoned a hero ; and
what is heroic if done for another, is surely permissible, at least, if
done for one's self; the man who could voluntarily give up his life to
Bave another from months of slow torture, would win everybody's good
word : why should he be debarred from taking a like step when the
person to be rescued is himself? "

It is furthermore urged that the sacredness of life is violated by
existing medical practice, where, in cases of extreme and hopeless suf-
fering, physicians administer drugs which give present relief, at the
expense of shortening the patient's life.

To the objection that submission to the will of Providence forbids
the shortening of pain in this way, the writer replies that " by the same
principle we should submit to the will of Providence, and not seek to
escape any pain. Not submission to surrounding circumstances
another term for God's will but successful effort to bend them to his
purposes, is man's chief business here ; and every useful thing he does
is a successful attempt to change, for his own or others' benefit, some
of the conditions of life which surround him."

And thus the author of " Euthanasia " goes on attacking current
ideas, and taking his own view of the economy of the world. Nature
is to him not a mighty, beneficent mother, any more than she is a dread

and relentless power

" Red in tooth and claw
With ravine."

" Death by disease is always death by torture, and the wit of man
has never devised torture more cruel than are some of Nature's meth-
ods of putting her victims to death.

" One of the main facts, then, that men have to make familiar to
their thoughts and to adjust their lives to, is, that they are born into a
world on the painful riddle of which speculation can throw no light,
but the facts of which press hard against them on every hand ; and
from these facts the truth stands out clear and harsh, th^t not enjoy-
ment, but, in the main, struggle and suffering, is what they have to
look for, and that, to bring this suffering into bearable proportions,
should be one of the chief aims of their lives."

The publication of this essay made but little stir at first. But it
was separated from the volume, and published in a pamphlet with
preface by Rose Mary Crawshay, and in this shape went to the third
edition. The subject has been lately taken up in the Fortnightly
Hevietc, by Mr. Tollemache, under the title of " A NeAv Cure for In-
curables." Planting himself on Mr. Williams's ground, he reproduces
his chief arguments, and adds others, with a view of strengthening the
case. To illustrate how far pain reconciles us to death, he says:

EUTHANASIA. 93

" It is probably from surgical cases that the strongest arguments
for euthanasia may be drawn. One of the highest authorities respect-
ing such cases, the late Sir Benjamin Brodie, said that a very moder-
ate amount of pain, if continued for a long time, would make any one
heartily tired of life. He remarked also, that during his whole life he
had known only two dying persons who showed any fear of death ;
and that both those died of bleeding. One cause of this singular cir-
cumstance probably was, that in these two cases there was hardly any
pain to distract the mind ; and the fact is curious, as showing how
rare, in Sir Benjamin's experience, such painless deaths must have
been."

The publication of this paper gave the discussion a fresh impulse,
and numerous articles and letters have appeared in the English press,
a few in favor of Euthanasia, but most of them decidedly against it.
The Saturday Review, which had at first coquetted with Mr. Williams's
theory as a novelty, upon sober reflection condemned it. The follow-
ing is a part of its argument :

" It is of primary importance to inculcate a regard for the sanctity
of human life. The reluctance to take life is indeed often pushed to
an extreme by the opponents of capital punishments. But nobody
can say that the mass of the population have as yet pushed their ten-
derness to the verge of effeminacy. A little story, related for a differ-
ent purpose in the Fortnightly Hevieto, illustrates very prettily a sen-
timent which is not so uncommon as might be desired. A sensible
Scotchman watching by the bedside of his dying wife became impa-
tient at the poor woman's anxiety to express her last wishes, and
civilly requested her to ' get on wi' her deeing.' Now, among the
poorer classes, where the inconvenience inflicted by people who ' take
an unconscionable time in dying ' is necessarily felt much more keenly
than with people in a different rank, it is to be feared that this deli-
cate hint is frequently followed up by some practical remonstrances.
i They pinched his nose beneath the clothes,' as Barham says, on the
authority of a real occurrence, ' and the poor dear soul went off like
a lamb.' Suppose, in fact, the case of a small cottage, where the in-
valid has become a heavy burden upon his family instead of a support,
where the expense of providing medicine and attendance is most seri-
ously felt, and where the sick-room is also the only dwelling-room,
must there not frequently be a strong temptation to give him a quiet
push or two along the downward path ? If it were understood to be
the law that invalids might be finished off when the case was hopeless,
would not the temptation be frequently overpowering? Yes, it is
replied, but the doctor and the parson must be present. That is all
very well, but, if the practice became common, the people would
quickly learn to take the law into their own hands. For it is to be
observed that this is one of the cases where nobody could tell tales.
A man on the verge of death does not require to have his throat cut

94 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

or a dose of arsenic administered. A judicious shake, an omission to
cover him properly, or the exhibition of an over-dose of laudanum, will
do the business eifectually, and no possible proof remains. Once
allow that such things may be done with due precautions, and the pre-
cautions will soon be neglected as troublesome formalities. . Why
bother the doctor and the parson, why ask the sick man's consent,
when the case is so clear ? Of course the system need not be openly
mentioned, but it would be speedily understood to be a highly con-
venient practice. The advocates of the scheme admit that the precau-
tions of which we have spoken are absolutely necessary to prevent
abuse ; and we may add that it is simply impossible to enforce their
observance. The practice itself once sanctioned, nothing is clearer
than that people could, if they chose, cai*ry it out in their own meth-
ods. No practice, again, could be more directly destructive of any
strong persuasion of the sanctity of life. We need only read a few
police reports, to understand how great is the existing tendency to
violence of all kinds. Infanticide, as we know, prevails to a terrible
extent, and wife-killing is not much less popular. Admit that the
slaughter of invalids is also right under certain limitations, and it is
easy to guess the consequences. The devotion which the poor display
in cases of sickness is often among the most touching and amiable
features of their character. In spite of the temptations we have no-
ticed, thev will often make noble sacrifices for the comfort of their
dying relatives. Tell them plainly that they are rather fools for their
pains than otherwise, and that they had better suggest suicide to the
sufferer at the eai'liest opportunity, and you do your best to encourage,
not merely suicide, but the cruel murder of a helpless man. A death-
bed, instead of being the scene for calling forth the tenderest emotions
and the noblest self-sacrifice, will be haunted by a horrid suspicion ;
the sick man fearing that his departure is earnestly desired, and his
friends inclining to the opinion that killing is not murder, but kind-
ness. The agitation of the question, what is the proper moment for
smothering your dying father instead of soothing him, is not favorabie
to the development of those sentiments and the inculcation of those
lessons which we generally associate with a sick-bed. In fact, the
plan which certain eccentric philanthropists have advocated with such
queer enthusiasm has a direct tendency to make men greater brutes
than they are, and they are quite brutal enough already."

The Spectator objects that "'the gravest of the merely rational
objections we can bring against Mr. Tollemache is, that the ideas of
which he is the advocate would plainly lead to two entirely new
phases of feeling impatience of hopeless suffering instead of tender-
ness toward it, where there was any legal difficulty in the way of get-
ting rid of it by the proposed new law and further, a disposition to
regard people as ' selfish ' who continued burdens upon others without
any near and clear chance of the complete restoration of their own

EUTHANASIA. 95

powers. Suppose it were permitted, as Mr. Tollemache wishes, that,
on receiving the testimony of two or three physicians that a man's
case is hopeless, he might, if he chose, elect to die, and that popular
feeling came to sanction that choice as the right choice ; what can be
clearer than that, in the absence of any relations to whom such pa-
tients were dear, and who took pleasure therefore in prolonging their
life, there would spring up a tone of habitual displeasure and irritation
toward all who chose to go on giving unnecessary trouble to the
world, and that veiy soon the standard of ' unnecessary ' trouble
would begin inevitably to become lower and lower, so that all the
organized charity which now expresses itself in our hospital system
would gradually suffer ' a sea-change ' into something by no means
' rich or strange ' a sort of moral pressure, on poor invalids with any
thing like a prospect of long-continued helplessness, to demand the
right of ridding the world of themselves ? We say that it is in this
reflex effect of the new code of feeling upon our thoughts of disease,
in the transformation it would certainly make of pure pity into impa-
tience and something like reproachful displeasure, that the extreme
danger of arguing out this sort of question, on the superficial consider-
ations of the balance of pain and pleasure for each individual case, is
best seen."

In a letter to the same paper, Mr. F. A. Channing says : " It is odd
that men whose thought is mainly an outcome of modern science should
fail to apply what is, perhaps, the most striking conception of modern
science that of time in relation to growth to questions such as this
of Euthanasia. If the central human instincts on which morality rests
are the slowly-won product of ages of moral growth, a practice out of
harmony with the most fundamental of those instincts, however spec-
ulatively excellent, could not be introduced without mischief. It would
sacrifice too much of human feeling before it had time to put itself on
a rational footing. Even in the individual philosopher it may be
doubted whether reason could remodel instinct so as to make the
sense of duty in such a case really complete. In most men the over-
ridden instincts would merely be replaced by selfishness and cruelty to
the helpless. They would lose the gentleness of strength, without
gaining the least glimpse of the new morality.

" In Euthanasia we are offered a refined copy of the customs of some
savage tribes, among whom life is more difficult to maintain, and so
less valuable. But, then, their instincts are on the level of their cus-
toms. There is no jar between calculation and sentiment, such as we
should have. Such a jar would make the practice, if adopted among
us, spring from an estimate of personal advantages, and not from the
half-thought-out sense of what is best, which is duty to most men.
And, where such imperative instincts as the desire to keep life for our-
selves and our friends at all costs are directly repressed in forming and
acting on this estimate, the result must be moral loss to all except the

96 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

philosopher who has had time to think his soul to oneness under the
rule of reason. Euthanasia might become a wholesome doctrine if
time should dissolve our present, perhaps animal, feelings, and replace
them by more economical sentiments. But, as we are, it could only be
an esoteric doctrine for the few who might have opportunities of end-
ing hopeless misery by chloroform without giving needless pain to their
friends. That is, it would be applicable only in the way Prof. Newman
deprecates.

" It may, of course, be urged that there has been a latent change in
men's notions of life and death which only needs expression, and that,
if men talked freely, many would be found to talk Euthanasia. But
facts like the growing aversion to capital punishment seem to point
the other way. It is not because we feel less keenly the horror of mur-
der, but because we are more scrupulous about taking even the least
worthy life. Take the growing leniency toward infanticide. It is not
because there is a change of opinion as to the duty of keeping even
superfluous babies alive, but because we are more reluctant to take a
woman's life in vengeance for a child's. Again, the sense that under
certain circumstances it would be better for us or those dear to us to
die, is surely far from being the true wish for death overwhelming the
passionate impulse to keep up life to the last.

" It might be said, too, that the apology of Euthanasia stands on
the same footing as the apology of cowardice, such as those French
towns showed whose people did not think it worth while to hold out.
Was it, or was it not worth while ? " .

+

FREEZING OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS.

By Prof. FE. MOHK.

TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN, BY J. FITZGERALD, A. M.

IT is a fact, as yet unaccounted for, that, whereas the thawing-point
of ice is constant, the freezing-point of water may, under certain
conditions, be brought 'considerably below the temperature at which
ice begins to melt. In glass vessels, with free access of air, pure water
may be reduced to a temperature of from 15 to 17 Fahr. below the
thawing-point, or, in a vacuum, from 18 to 20 Fahr. without freez-
ing. A slight concussion, or contact with any rough surface, but espe-
cially with ice or snow, causes congelation at once, and the tempera-
ture ascends to the thawing-point. This rise of temperature is usually
explained by the transition from the liquid to the solid form ; but this
is, after all, no true explanation, but merely a putting together of two
facts which are apparently very nearly related.

FREEZING OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS. 97

The greater fall of the freezing-ppint in vacuo, as compared with
its fall in the atmosphere, would appear to be ascribable to the absence
of small corpuscles (spores ?). The melting of ice, as also the freezing
of water, is a purely chemical process, though commonly called physi-
cal. Here heat is converted into a chemical effect ; and, conversely, a
chemical effect into heat. The phrase, " heat becomes latent," can no
longer satisfy us, for latent heat is no heat at all. Here centre some
facts belonging to the organic kingdom, to which my attention has
been called by a letter received from Herr Fr. Donhoff, of Orsoy.

The humors of butterfly-pupa?, which pass the winter in the open
air, remain fluid in the coldest climate. If we cut in two such pupa?,
at a temperature of 15 to 13 Fahr., the two halves quickly congeal
and become as hard as stone. Juices of plants which do not freeze
during winter, remain fluid, as is shown by the flexibility of the cab-
bage-leaf ; while wet frozen linen may be broken, but refuses to bend.
If you crush the leaves of green or red cabbage at a temperature be-
low the freezing-point, they freeze at once ; and, if you cut in pieces
the ribs of a cabbage-leaf, you cannot press water out of the ends, for
it freezes the moment they are cut up. Here the question arises how it
is that watery fluids remain liquid in the tissues of animals and plants,
whereas they at once freeze when the tissues are injured. A constant
supply of heat is not to be thought of in pupa? or in eggs, such as is
found in animals. Here I will bring forward two facts which throw
some degree of light upon this question.

If you throw upon a glass plate a thin layer of flower of sulphur,
and melt it by the application of heat, you will find that the larger
particles are the first to become dry and solid on cooling, and to as-
sume the yellow color. The smaller particles, on the other hand, re-
main fluid at common temperatures. Under the microscope they are
transparent, and may be spread out with the dry finger ; a fact which
proves them to be viscous. Hence it follows that minute particles of
sulphur may be cooled 170 below their melting-point without solidify-
ing, but not so with larger particles.

Once, in preparing phosphuretted hydrogen, I suffered the mixture
of phosphorus and caustic alkali to cool in the retort. On taking the
apparatus apart on the next day, the phosphorus was found to be still';
molten at a common temperature, though its melting temperature is
115 Fahr. On repeating the experiment, it was found that the phos-
phorus might be cooled to 38 Fahr. before it solidified. Thus it re-
mained fluid 11 below its melting-point.

Another observation was made, as follows : One night, at ten,
o'clock, with the temperature at 4 Fahr., a dense fog lay over, the
Moselle, through which, however, the brighter stars were visible.. A
cold current of air was coming from the direction of a neighboring
hill, some 350 feet in height. The mist advanced steadily from the
hill over the valley, but was constantly renewed, as the cold . blast..

TOL. III. 7

Q 8 the popular science monthly.

came in contact with the moist .air over the stream. The following
morning all the trees, especially the pines, were covered with a heavy-
hoar-frost, but on the land-side only, not on the water-side. On ex-
amining the ice-spicules, they were found to be perfectly crystalline,
with angles of from 60 to 120, and the long needles were made up
of minute crystals set one upon another, and on one side resembling a
flight of stairs. The particles of water floating in the air were, of
course, of the temperature of the atmosphere, and consequently below
the thawing-point. So soon as they came in contact with the points
of the ice-spicules, they solidified, just as very cold water will when it
is touched with ice. If the particles of mist had been changed into
ice while still floating in air, they would have gathered upon the
spicules of the pines in the shape of irregular pulverulent conglomer-
ates, but would not have formed crystals. The plainly crystalline
form of the ice-spicules shows, beyond a doubt, that the particles of
mist were fluid at 4 Fahr. From these facts it follows that the
minuter the particles of a liquid body are, the further they can be
brought beneath their thawing-point without freezing.

If, now, we make an application of these facts to the above phenom-
ena of organic Nature, we find that the reason why watery. humors of
pupa?, eggs, leaves and shoots, do not freeze, is because the cells con-
taining these humors are very minute : in other words, the larger the
cells the more quickly will plants freeze. It is well known that the
young sprouts of vines, potatoes, and other plants, very readily freeze
under a light frost, as was the case on May 12th of last year. Now,
these young sprouts of vines are extremely juicy, containing a great
quantity of water, and consequently but little cellulose. And, al-
though the vines of the preceding year stood a winter temperature of
2 Fahr. without freezing, the sprouts of the self-same plants were
frosted at 21 Fahr. Freezing expands the water and bursts the cells,
and the break-up of the texture stops the process of growth. The
buds of vines are more watery than the ligneous vines themselves.
Hence, too, last winter, on the night of December 7th, many buds
were frozen, while the vines were unhurt. On a vine eight feet in
length, one of the latest of the buds rested on a wall covered with
snow, and this shot forth in the spring, though all the other buds on
the vine failed." It was the coming of the frost so early in December
'that made it so destructive, for the vines grow ever drier, and the sap
tends toward the roots, from the beginning of autumn. This process
had not gone so far in December as it would have gone in the first
'half ef January, when usually the heavy frosts set in. Those branches
whose buds are destroyed by frost, afterward die of their own accord,
"because the sap is unemployed, and the work of the leaf has ceased.
Several of the vines remained green, and flourished toward the end of
April on being pruned, but afterward dried up, as their buds were
without life.

FREEZING OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS.

99

Hence we might draw the general conclusion, that all southern
plants which are unable to endure our winter have large cells, and
that, at the North, only such plants can be naturalized as answer to
the requirement of small cells. As in Nature there are no aims, but
only necessity, we may also hence conclude that a low temperature is
favorable to the development of small cells. We have here, further-
more, an explanation of the hairy coats of animals. Animals which
live in the North have all a thick coat, while those living in the south
have a thin one. The mammoth was covered with hair 12 inches long,
while his descendant, the elephant, who lives only in southern climates,
is almost naked. Animals coming from the south, and acclimatized in
the north, acquire hair, and vice versa. At the poles the fox wears his
winter-coat the whole year through. In Sweden his coat remains for
10 months ; in Germany, for 6 months ; farther south, 3 months until
at last it is entirely dropped. No one will here discover an aim, but
rather this necessary consequence, that a lower temperature produces
a growth of hair in some way unknown to us. The same is true as to
the development of cells. If, as a general rule, a warmer temperature
necessitates larger cells, then the plants of southern regions will perish
from the frost of northerly latitudes. The leaf of the potato-vine can
never endure frost ; but it is only in early spring that the plant can
be visited by frost in temperate climates, and there is no frost in sum-
mer, while in autumn the tubers ai*e protected by the soil. The young
branches of the oak and beech (two trees belonging, indeed, to our
climate) are quite as little able to endure the frost, and suffer from it
severely during the night in spring. On the other hand, the spicules of
the pine and the sword-shaped leaves of the yucca stand the severest
cold of our winters.

As regards the temperature of those portions of plants (sprouts of
vines, potatoes, etc.) which are killed by the spring frosts, we have no
definite knowledge. It is probable that these parts become, by radia-
tion, considerably colder than the shining bulb of the thermometer,
and that they do not share in the temperature of the air, but fall to a
lower temperature by radiation. In cloudy nights, when the ther-
mometer shows 30 or 31 Fahr., nothing freezes, though the contrary
takes place on bright nights. But here, too, the smallness of the cells
appears to lower the freezing-point of water some few degrees.

Yet, in thus bringing into very probable relation two different
facts, viz., the non-congelation of pupa? and leaves, and the fluidity of
molten sulphur and of mist-particles, we have no complete explanation
of the phenomenon. Such an explanation would show why it is that
small particles have a different freezing-point from large ones of the
same substance. This would require a very profound acquaintance
with the nature of the molecular motion of heat, as also of chemical
affinitv. Gaea.

loo THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

PROFESSOR TYNDALL'S DEED OF TRUST.

I JOHN TYNDALL, Professor of Natural Philosophy in the Royal
) Institution of Great Britain, having, at the solicitation of my
friends, lectured in various cities of the United States, find the receipts
and disbursements on account of these lectures to be as follows :

I. RECEIPTS.

From Boston, for six lectures $1,500 00

" Philadelphia, for six lectures 3,000 00

" Baltimore, for three lectures 1,000 00

" Washington, for six lectures 2,000 00

" New York, for six lectures 8,500 00

" Brooklyn, for six lectures 6,100 00

" New Haven, for two lectures . 1,000 00

Total receipts $23, 100

II. DISBUESEMEjSTTS.

Before leaving England : wages of assistants during the preparation of the lect-
ures ; work of philosophical-instrument maker ; new apparatus ; sundry
items for outfit ; travelling expenses of myself and two assistants from
London to New York make a total of 671 6s. 8d. which, at the rate of
$5.60 per pound, amounts to 3,692 31

In the United States : hotel and travelling expenses for myself and two as-
sistants ; other expenses incidental to lectures in Boston, Philadelphia, 1
Baltimore, Washington, New York, Brooklyn, and New Haven covering
a period of four months plus travelling expenses of myself and my
assistants from New York to London make a total of 4,749 35

Present to Yale Scientific Club 250 00

Salaries to assistants for four months, 250, which, at $5.50 per pound,

amounts to 1,375 00

Making the total disbursements $10,066 66

rii.

The total receipts are $23,100 00

The total disbursements 10,066 66

Making the net proceeds of lectures $13,033 34

As an evidence of my good-will toward the people of the United
States, I desire to devote this sum of $13,033 to the advancement of
theoretic science, and the promotion of original research, especially in
the department of physics, in the United States.

To accomplish this object, I hereby appoint Prof. Joseph Henry,

1 At Philadelphia I had no hotel expenses, but was most comfortably lodged at the
house of my kinsman, General Hector Tyndale. He, I may add, paid his own hotel ex-
penses wherever he accompanied me.

SKETCH OF SIR G. B. AIRY. 101

Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington City, D. C,
Dr. E. L. Youmans of New York, and General Hector Tyndale, of
Philadelphia, to act as a Board of Trustees to "take charge of the
above sum, to carefully invest it in permanent securities ; and I fur-
ther direct that the said Board shall, for the present, appropriate the
interest of the fund in supporting, or in assisting to support, at such
European universities as they may consider most desirable, two (2)
American pupils who may evince decided talents in physics, and who
may express a determination to devote their lives to this work. My
desire would be that each pupil should spend four years at a German
university, three of those years to be devoted to the acquisition of
knowledge, and the fourth to original investigation.

If, however, in the progress of science in- the United States, it
should at any time appear to the said Board that the end herein pro-
posed would be better subserved by granting aid to students, ox for
some special researches in this country, the Board is authorized to
make appropriations from the income of the fund for such purposes.

I further direct that vacancies which may occur in said Board of
Trustees, by death or otherwise, shall be filled by the President of the
National Academy of Sciences.

If in the course of any year the whole amount of the interest which
accrues from the fund be not expended in the manner before men-
tioned, the surplus may be added to the principal, or may be expended
in addition to the annual interest of another year,

If at any time any organization shall be established, and money
provided by other persons for the promotion of such original research
as I have in view, I authorize the said Board of Trustees to exercise
their discretion as to cooperating in such work from the income of this
fund.

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal this 7th
of February, 1873, in the city of New York.

(Signed) Join* Tyndall (l. s.)
In presence of

(Signed) C. Bttrritt Watte,

(Signed) L. E. Fuller.

SKETCH OF SIR G. B. AIRY.

IR GEORGE BIDDELL AIRY, the Astronomer Royal, was born
on the 27th of June, 1801, at Alnwick, in Northumberland. His
education was first cared for at two private academies, now at Here-
ford, now at Colchester. From the Colchester Grammar-School, when
eighteen years of age, he went, in 1819, to Trinity College, Cambridge.

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io2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Three years afterward he was elected to a scholarship. In 1823, oh
his graduating B. A., young Airy came out as Senior Wrangler. In
1824 he obtained his Fellowship at Trinity. His degree of M. A. w T as
taken in 1826, and he was simultaneously elected, though only then
in his twenty-fifth year, as Lucasian Professor at Cambridge. Illus-
trious philosophers bike Barrow and Newton had preceded him in the
occupation of that historic chair. Latterly, however, the office had
become, in a great measure, purely honorary, and might almost be said
to have degenerated into a sinecure.

Prof. Airy, once elevated to that position, determined to avail him-
self of Ids professorship to the advantage alike of himself and the
university. Consequent upon this determination, he for nearly ten
years together namely, from 1827 to 1836 delivered, with admirable
effect, a series of public lectures on experimental philosophy, by which
his scientific "reputation was very considerably advanced. The series
was all the more remarkable, inasmuch as it was one of the earliest
means of effectively illustrating the marvellous phenomena constitut-
ing the now almost universally adopted undulatory theory of light.
Two years after Prof. Airy's induction into the chair established by
Lucas, the estimation in which he was held at the university was still
further signalized by his election to the Plumian Professorship. Nom-
inated to that post of authority and honor, he at once obtained, by
right of his position, the supreme command of the Cambridge Ob-
servatory.

Already, even then, he began those remarkable improvements in
the method of calculating and publishing the observations which event-
ually became the law at Greenwich and at all the other great observa-
tories. As indicative of the energy and daring of his innovations at
Cambridge, he superintended the construction and mounting, one
after another, of a series of renowned astronomical instruments. In
that observatory, he brought into use a noble specimen of the
equatorial, being that peculiar description of telescope which has
its fixed axis so directed to the pole of the heavens that the tube may
be readily made to follow any star by a single motion. There, more-
over, he brought into effective employment a mural circle of admirable
construction, bearing a telescope which revolves in the plane of the
meridian, the whole being rigidly bound into some immovable struct-
ure of ponderous masonry. Prof. Airy, in his thirty-fourth year, be-
came Astronomer Royal. Thirty-eight years have since elapsed.
Under his directions, it is hardly too much to say that the organization
of the establishment at Greenwich has been completely transformed.
He has given great regularity to its minute and multiform proceedings.
He has contrived to establish newer and sounder methods of calcula-
tion and publication. He has introduced, constructed, mounted, and
employed, a series of novel instruments for the advancement of as-
tronomic research. Perhaps the finest transit-circle at present any-

SKETCH OF SIR G. B. AIRY. 103

where to be found is the one he there constructed in 1860, the circles
being no less than six feet in diameter, and the telescope affixed be-
tween the two graduated disks being twelve feet long, and having an
object-glass of as many as eight inches in aperture. Through this
splendid apparatus the altitude of the stars, as well as the time of
meridian passage, is now unerringly marked at the great national ob-
servatory. But the greatest of all the instruments established by him
at Greenwich is a large, first-class equatorium, well known among
astronomers.

During Sir George Airy's rule at the observatory he has, in the
midst of his other labors, reduced the Greenwich observations of the
moon and of the planets from 1750 down to the present tfme. Inci-
dentally he has thrown considerable light on ancient chronology by
his ingenious calculation of some of the most renowned of historical
eclipses. Thrice the Astronomer Royal has taken occasion to visit the
European Continent for the purpose of making more accurate observa-
tions upon the solar eclipse then eagerly anticipated. In 1854 he ap-
proximated more nearly than any previous investigation had done to
the weight of the earth, through a series of experiments on the relative
vibration of a pendulum at the top and bottom of Harton Coal-pit.

Sir George Airy has been repeatedly called into council on matters
of grave difficulty by the government. He was chairman of the royal
commission empowered to supervise the delicate process of contriving
new standards of length and of weight, the old standards having been
destroyed in 1834 in the conflagration of the Houses of Parliament.
He was consulted some years afterward by the government in respect
to the bewildering disturbance of the magnetic compass in iron-built
ships-of-war. Thereupon he contrived an ingenious system of mechan-
ical construction, through a combination of magnets and iron. The
result was successful, and the system generally adopted. He conducted
the astronomical observations necessary to the drawing of the boun-
dary-line now traceable on the map of the New World between the
Canadas and the United States. During the battle of the gauges in
the railway world Sir George Airy strenuously advocated the narrow
gauge, and he just as energetically advocates the adoption of a decimal
currency. The writings of the Astronomer Royal are numerous. He
has contributed largely to the Cambridge Transactions and the Philo-
sophical Transactions. His pen has notably illustrated the memoirs
of the Astronomical Society. He has written abundantly for the
Philosophical Magazine, and still more abundantly, under his reversed
initials, A. B. G., in the columns of the Athenceum. His principal
works, however, are those which may be here rapidly enumerated :
" Gravitation," published in 1837, was written originally for the " Penny
Cyclopaedia." " Mathematical Tracts" have reached a fourth edition,
as have also his " Ipswich Lectures on Astronomy." In 18G1 appeared
his treatise on "Errors of Observation;" in 1869 his treatise on

io 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

" Sound ; " and in 1 870 his treatise on " Magnetism." Sir George Airy's
well-known work on "Trigonometry " was published in 1855. Another
work of his, entitled "Figure of the Earth," has yet to be named, as
well as the luminous paper on " Tides and Waves," contributed by
him, first of all, to the " Encyclopaedia Metropolitana." Even while
simply Professor of Astronomy at Cambridge his " Astronomical Ob-
servations," issuing from the press between 1829 and 1838, extended
to nine quarto volumes, and were adopted at once as models for that
class of publication.

Sir George Airy has received the Lalande Gold Medal of the French
Institute in honor of his important discoveries in astronomy. For his
successful optical theories he has had awarded to him the Copley Gold
Medal of the Royal Society. The Royal Gold Medal of the same so-
ciety has been given to him in recompense for his tidal investigations.
Twice the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society has been
his first, for his discovery of an inequality of long period in the
movements of Venus and the earth ; secondly, in return for his reduc-
tion of the planetary observations. He has been enrolled among the
most honored members of the Royal Astronomical Society, of the
Cambridge Philosophical Society, and of the Institute of Civil Engi-
neers. For many years past he has been among the foreign corre-
spondents of the Institute of France, as well as of several other scien-
tific academies on the Continent. He has received honorary degrees
of D. C. L. and LL. D. from each of the three great universities Ox-
ford, Cambridge, and Edinburgh. On May 17, 1872, Sir George was
gazetted a Knight of the Bath. His claim upon the remembrance of
posterity, however, will be that of having occupied with distinguished
ability the post of Astronomer Royal of Great Britain during consid-
erably more than the lifetime of a whole generation.

The Illustrated Iievieic, a London biographical and literary pe-
riodical, to which we are indebted for the preceding statements, re-
marks that, since the death of Sir John Herschel, on the 11th of May,
1871, Sir George Airy, the Astronomer Royal, is the admitted master
of the sublime science. There are other eminent English astronomers
as John Hinde, the discoverer of many asteroids, and John Adams,
also a Cambridge Senior Wrangler and the rival of Urban Leverrier,
who groped his way by mathematical calculation to the discovery of
the position of the hitherto unknown planet Neptune. If incidents as
brilliant and remarkable as these are wanting in the history of Sir
George Airy, his claims to respect are equally valuable, solid, and en-
during.

CORRESP ONDENCE.

105

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE SPIIEKE AND LIMITS OP SCIENCE.
To the Editor of the Popular Science Monthly:

AS you have done my brief after-dinner
speech (a kind of performance that
usually perishes with the occasion) the
honor of an elaborate criticism, which I
think a little one-sided and unfair, I ask
the privilege to reply.

You say that I used tbe occasion of the
Tyndall banquet " to give a lesson to the
scientific gentlemen present as to the proper
limit of their inquiries." But that is hard-
ly a just representation. Neither in matter
nor manner did I pretend " to instruct " any-
body; but, assuming that the Press, on
which I was invited to speak, was a kind
of universal reporter, I simply asked a few
questions of an audience so competent to
give the answer, as to the validity of cer-
tain speculative opinions confidently put
forth in the name of science. That the
mode of doing so was neither presumptuous
nor offensive, I infer from the cordial ap-
proval given to my remarks by eminent sci-
entific gentlemen, both at the time and
since.

You seem to resent the speech as an im-
pertinence in saying that " it has ever been
a favorite occupation of outsiders to in-
struct the investigators of Nature where
they must stop," etc. But does Science set
up any pretension to the character of an
exclusive church ? It is true I am an out-
sider; i. e., I have made no discoveries in
science ; I have cultivated no special branch
of it as a pursuit ; all that I know of it I
have learned from others, by diligent though
somewhat desultory reading, for thirty years
past; but may I not, therefore, have an
opinion of what I am taught ? Is it te-
merity to endeavor to distinguish what is
real science from what is not, particular-
ly at a time when there is so much put
forth that is likely to confuse the careless
mind?

Be that as it may, what I complain of is,
that you class me among the bigots, who
in every age have protested against the

progress of knowledge, alleging that I pre-
sented myself as " the champion of imper-
illed faith," whereas my protest was merely
in behalf of true science against fahe. And,
in order to make out your case, you sup-
press all reference to the first part of my
speech, in which I uttered, as fully as the
occasion allowed, the highest estimations of
Science and my almost unbounded hopes of
its future. Permit me to revive what I said :
After hailing Science as the "King of the
Epoch," to which all other forms of intel-
lectual activity were doing homage, and a3
the "mighty Magician," that by its brill-
iant and fertile researches surpassed what-
ever the imagination had depicted in fable,
I continued : " Science is to me not only a
proof of man's intellectual superiority, and
the seal of his emancipation from the tyr-
anny of ignorance, but the pledge of an
unimaginable progress in the future. By
the beautiful uniformities of law, which it
discovers in Nature, it discharges the human
mind of those early superstitions which saw
a despot god in every bush, whose wanton
will paralyzed the free flight of our intel-
lect, and debauched our best affections.
Neither the tempests nor frowns of Nature
are terrible to us, now that we may bend
her most hostile forces into willing obe-
dience, and find her full, not of malice, but
of good-will. For, out of that benignity,
and our supremacy over it, will yet come a
power that will enable us to transform these
poverty-smitten, sordid, unjust, and crimi-
nal civilizations, into happy and harmonious
societies, when every man shall be glad in
the gladness of his fellows, and, for the first
time, feel the assurance of a universal Di-
vine paternity. Science, moreover, in wrest-
in" from Creation her final secrets, will fur-
nish to the philosophic mind the means of
a more effulgent and glorious solution of the
dark problems of life and destiny than it is
possible to reach by unaided conjecture.
She will prove what the spiritual insight of
the seers has only dimly discerned, that Na-
ture, which now seems so inscrutable to us,
so hard and unfeeling toward human hopes

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THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY

and desires, is the most kindly and gener-
ous of helpmates, and not a tyrannic lord ;
that these outward appearances are but the
shows of an inward reality which is entirely
human; that these phenomenal forms and
events are but the symbols of an eternal
Love and Truth, which the great spiritual
Sun of the Universe projects and photo-
graphs upon the sensitive plates of our
finite human intelligence."

Thus, while I ascribed to science a po-
tent and beneficent efficacy, first, in dis-
charging the mind of its fears of Nature
and of other superstitions ; second, in per-
fecting civilization ; and, lastly, in promis-
ing the surest groundwork for speculative
generalizations, both naturalistic and theo-
logical, you represent me as deprecating its
influences, and as even questioning its util-
ity. That was scarcely fair. How, indeed,
could I do so ? Holding profoundly to the
conviction (how derived is not here the
question) that there is but one real Life in
the Universe, whose infinite Love is the
ground of all Force, and whose infinite
truth is the ground of all Law, and that phe-
nomenal Nature is but the varied manifes-
tation of that life to and through the human
mind, it would be intellectual suicide in
me to attempt imposing fetters upon any le-
gitimate search of Nature's methods. Every
step we make in unfolding her secrets is a
new revelation of an adorable goodness and
wisdom, and a new help toward a nobler
future.

But then I said and it was the whole
purport of my speech, made in the inter-
ests of science as well as religion that we
can only expect these results from true
science, which investigates what Nature
really is, and not from a hasty and pre-
sumptuous science, which pretends to give
us what Nature may be supposed to be. And
my criterion of true science, suggested in a
phrase, was, that the methods and results
of it bear the impress of exactitude or cer-
tainty. You remark, as if you did not re-
ceive these simple and fundamental prin-
ciples, that the " exact sciences " are exact,
while others are not. There, I think, we
differ or misunderstand each other. I am
aware that none of the sciences are exact
in the mathematical sense of the word, save
the ideal or abstract sciences ; but it is

none the less true that the real or con-
crete sciences are exact, in the usual sense
of the word, both in their methods and
products. If they are not exact, where does
the inexactness come in ? In the observation
of facts ? Then the induction is vitiated.
In the induction itself? Then the law arrived
at is imperfect. In the deductive verifica-
tion or proof? Then we have no reason for
trusting our process. Biology, psychology,
and sociology, you say, are sciences and
certain sciences ; to which my reply is, that,
to the extent in which they are not precise,
they are not sciences. Indeed, saving in a
popular and convenient sense, I should be
disposed to doubt whether they are yet to
be ranked as more than inchoate sciences.
They belong to the domain of science, have
gathered some of the richest materials for
science, and have attained to some extent a
scientific value ; but there is yet so much
uncertainty hanging over broad regions
in each that we must await the future for
the resolution of many unresolved ques-
tions, which may give a new aspect to the
whole. Biology is the most advanced, but
rather in its natural history and classifica-
tion, than in its knowledge of the profound-
er laws of life, that are yet to be found.
Psychology is so little of a science, that the
teachers of it hardly agree on the funda-
mental points ; or, if it be a science, whose
exposition of it are we to accept, Sir "William
Hamilton's or Mr. Mill's, Herbert Spencer's
or Dr. Porter's, who all profess to be ex-
perimental and inductive, and all disagree ?
As to Sociology, the name for which was in-
vented only a few years since by Comte, it
is still in a chaotic condition ; and, unless
Mr. Spencer, whose few introductory chap-
ters are alone made public, succeeds in giv-
ing it consistency and form, it can hardly
be called more than a hope. But, be the
truth what it may, in respect to these par-
ticular branches of knowledge, I still insist
that certainty is the criterion of true sci-
ence, and that, if we give that criterion up,
science loses its authority, its prestige, its
assurance of march, and its sovereign posi-
tion as an arbiter in the varying struggles
of doctrine.

Well, then the examples I gave, without
mentioning names, of what I considered
false science, were, first, the gross material-

CORRESP ONDENCE.

107

ism of Biichner, who derives all the phe-
nomena of life from simple combinations of
matter and force ; second, the atheism of
Comte, whose scientific pretensions Mr.
Huxley ridicules, and whose results Mr.
Spencer impugns ; third, the identification
of mind and motion by Mr. Taine, which
Tyndall, in one of his most eloquent pas-
sages, says explains nothing, and is, more-
over, utterly " unthinkable ; " and, fourthly,
Mr. Spencer's evolutionism, which, in spite
of the marvellous ingenuity and information
with which it is wrought out, seems to me,
after no little study, as it does to others
more capable than I am of forming a judg-
ment, after greater study, to be full of un-
supported assumptions, logical inconsisten-
cies, and explanations that explain nothing,
while in its general character it tends to the
sheerest naturalism. Now, was I right or
wrong in regarding these systems as specu-
lative merely, and not scientific ? Am I to
infer, from your objections to my remarks,
that The Popular Science Monthly holds
materialism, atheism, and naturalism to be
the legitimate outcome of science ? Else
why am I arraigned for designating them
as unworthy of science, and as having no
rightful claims to the name, under which
their deplorable conclusions are commended
to the public ?

My object in these allusions was to indi-
cate two capital distinctions, which it is al-
ways important to keep in view when esti-
mating the scientific validity of a doctrine.
The first is, that many questions determin-
able by science are not yet determined by
it ; and, until they are so determined, are
to be regarded only as conjectural opinions,
more or less pertinent or impertinent. Of
this sort I hold the Nebular, the Darwinian,
and the Spencerian views to be, i. e., hypoth-
eses entirely within the domain of scien-
tific theory, and capable, to a certain ex-
tent, of explaining the phenomena to which
they refer ; highly plausible and probable
even at the first glance; but disputed by
good authority, and not at all so verified as
to be admissible into the rank of accredit-
ed science. They are suppositions to which
the mind resorts to help it in the reduction
of certain appearances of Nature to a gen-
eral law ; and, as such, they may be simple,
ingenious, and even beautiful ; but thus far

they are no more than suppositions not
proved, and therefore not entitled to the
authority of scientific truth. You are prob-
ably too familiar with the history of scien-
tific effort which, like the history of many
other kinds of intellectual effort, is a history
of human error not to know that, while
hypothesis is an indispensable part of good
method, it is also the part most liable
to error. The records of astronomical, of
geological, of physical, of chemical, and of
biological research, are strewn with the de-
bris of abandoned systems, all of which once
had their vogue, but none of which now sur-
vive and many of which are hardly remem-
bered. Recall for a moment the Ptolemaic
cycles and epicycles ; recall Kepler's nine-
teen different hypotheses, invented and dis-
carded, before he found the true orbital mo-
tion of Mars ; recall in geology Werner and
Hutton, and the Plutonians and the Neptuni-
ans, superseded by the uniformitarians and
the catastrophists, and now giving place
to the evolutionists ; recall in physics the
many imponderable fluids, including La-
mark's resonant fluid, that were held to be
as real as the rocks only a few years ago ;
recall in chemistry, not to mention the al-
chemists and phlogistion, a dozen different
modes of accounting for molecular action ;
recall in biology the animists and the vital-
ists, the devotees of plastic forces, of archei,
of organizing ideas, and of central monads,
all of them now deemed purely gratuitous
assumptions that explained nothing, though
put forth as science.

Even in regard to the question, so
much discussed at present, of the gradual
progression and harmony of being, the old
monadology of Leibnitz, which endowed
the ultimate units with varying doses of
passion, consciousness, and spontaneity, and
which built up the more complex structures
and functions of organisms, from the combi-
nation of these this theory, I say, some-
what modified and stripped of its mere
metaphysical phases, could be made quite
as rational and satisfactory as the more
modern doctrines of development. Indeed,
some eminent French philosophs Renou-
vier, a first-class thinker, among the rest
have gone back to this notion ; Darwin's
suggestion of pangenesis, and Mr. Spencer'a
physiological units, look toward it ; and

loS

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

its adherents maintain that, beset with diffi-
culties as it is, though not more so than
others, it has yet this merit, that it leaves a
nay open to speculative thought, alike re-
moved from the vagaries of mere ontologi-
cal abstraction and the entire subjection
of mind to a muddy and brute extraction.
They might add, also, that this theory
shows that, in the interpretation of the se-
rial progress of being, we are not altogether
shut up to a choice between specific and
spasmodic creations and his own theory of
evolution, as Mr. Spencer triumphantly as-
sumes throughout his argument. Indeed,
nothing is more easy than to make theories ;
but the difficulty is to get them adopted in-
to Nature as the satisfactory reason of her
processes. But, until they are so adopted,
they are no more than the scaffolding of sci-
ence by no means the completed structure.
Now, have the Darwinian and the Spencerian
hypotheses been so adopted ? Can we say
that any questions on which such cautious
observers and life-long students as Darwin,
Owen, Huxley, Wallace, and Agassiz, still
debate, are settled questions ? Prof. Tyn-
dall, for example, says : " Darwin draws
heavily upon the scientific tolerance of the
age ; " and again, that " those who hold the
doctrine of evolution are by no means ig-
norant of the uncertainty of their data, and
they yield no more to it than a provisional
assent." With what propriety, then, can a
merely provisional conclusion be erected into
an assured stand-point whence to assail tra-
ditionary beliefs as if they were old wives'
fables ?

More than that, a theory may be far
more advanced than any of those ; may be
able to account satisfactorily for all the phe-
nomena within its reach, as the Ptolemaic
theory of the sidereal appearances did, even
to the prediction of eclipses, or as the ema-
nation theory of light did, up to the time
of Dr. Young, and yet turn out altogether
baseless. Nature is a prodigious quantity
and a prodigious force ; with all her out-
ward uniformities she is often more cunning
than the Sphinx ; and, like Emerson's Brah-
ma, she may declare to her students

" They know not well the subtle ways
I keep, and pass and turn again."

We have looked into her face a little,

measured some of her ellipses and angles,

weighed her gases and dusts, and unveiled
certain forces, far and near all which are
glorious things to have done, and some of
them seemingly miraculous ; but we are still
only in her outer courts. Humboldt's " Cos-
mos," written thirty years ago, is said to
be already an antiquated book ; and Conitc,
who died but lately, and whom these eyes
of mine have seen, could hardly pass a col-
lege examination in the sciences he was sup-
posed to have classified forever. Let us
not be too confident, then, that our little
systems of natural law will not, like other
systems of thought spoken of by Tennyson,
" have their day."

The other distinction I had in mind, in
my speech, was that, while there are some
problems accessible to scientific methods,
there are others that are not ; and, that any
proffered scientific solution of the latter,
either negative or affirmative, is most
likely an imposition. What I meant was
that science, according to its own confes-
sion, that is, according to the teachings of
its most accredited organs, pretends to no
other function than to the ascertainment of
the actual phenomena of Nature and their
constant relations. The sphere of the finite
and the relative, i. e., of existence, not of
essence, and of existence in its mutual and
manifested dependencies in time and space,
not in its absolute grounds, circumscribes
and exhausts its jurisdiction. Was I wrong-
ly taught, Mr. Editor ? Does science assert
for itself higher and broader pretensions ?
Does it propose to penetrate the supernatu-
ral or metaphysical realms, if there be any
such ? Does it intend to apply its instru-
ments to the measurement of the infinite,
and its crucibles to the decomposition of
the absolute ?

You, as a man of excellent sense, will
promptly answer, No ! But, then, I ask, is
thought, whose expatiations are so restless
and irrepressible, to be forever shut up to
the phenomenal and relative ? Is it to be
forever stifled under a bushel-measure, or
tied by the legs with a surveyor's chain ?
May it not make excursions into the field
of the Probable, and solace itself with moral
assurances when physical certainties fail ?
May it not, mounting the winged horse of
analogy, when the good old drudge-horse
induction gives out, fly through tracts of

CORRESP ONDENCE.

109

space and time, not yet laid down on the
map ? May not some men have insights
into the working of laws yet unexplored,
such as Mozart had into the laws of music,
and Shakespeare into the laws of the hu-
man heart ? Assuredly you cannot say nay,
in the name of science, which, as we agree,
being confined to the phenomenal and rela-
tive, has no right to pronounce either one
way or the other, as to what, by supposi-
tion, lies beyond the phenomenal and rela-
tive. That supposed beyond may be wholly
chimerical ; but it is not from science that
we shall learn the fact, if it be a fact. In
other words, I contend and here I hit upon
the prime fallacy of many soi-disant scien-
tists that science has no right to erect what
it does contain into a negation of everything
which it does not contain. Still less has it a
right to decide questions out of its confessed
province, because it cannot reach them by
its peculiar methods, or subject them to its
peculiar tests ?

Fortunately for me, though you take me
especially to task for it, I am sustained in
this position by some of the most eminent
men of science of the day, and I may say,
by great numbers of them, as I have reason
to know. You yourself published, only a
little while since, Dr. Carpenter's address,
as President, to the British Association for
the Advancement of Science, in which, after
expounding very clearly man's rightful func-
tion as " the interpreter of Nature," he said :
" The science of modern times, however, has
taken a more special direction. Fixing its
attention exclusively on the order of Nature,
it has separated itself wholly from theology,
whose function it is to seek after its cause.
.... But, when science, passing beyond its
own limits, assumes to take the place of the-
ology and sets up its own conception of the
order of Nature as a sufficient account of
its cause, it is invading a province of
thought to which it has no claim, and not
unreasonably provokes the hostility of those
who ought to be its best friends."

In the same number you published Dr.
Gray's address, as President of the Ameri-
can Association, wherein, after quoting Miss
Cobbe's remark, that " it is a singular fact,
that when we find out how any thing is done,
our first conclusion is, that God did not do
it," he adds, that such a conclusion is "pre-

mature, unworthy, and deplorable," aud
concludes with the hope " that, in the fu-
ture, even more than in the past, faith in an
order which is the basis of science will not
(as it cannot be reasonably) be dissevered
from faith in an ordainer which is the ba-
sis of religion." And, my old friend, and
honored teacher, Dr. Dlenry, from whose en-
thusiasm for natural studies I imbibed what-
ever taste for them I have retained, in a
letter addressed to this Tyndall banquet,
and published in your last number, wrote :
" While we have endeavored to show that
abstract science is entitled to high appreci-
ation and liberal support, we do not claim
for it the power of solving questions belong-
ing to other realms of thought. . . . Much
harm has been done by the antagonism
which has sometimes arisen between the ex-
pounders of science on the one hand, and
those of theology on the other, and we
would deprecate the tendency which exhib-
its itself in certain minds to foster feelings
antagonistic to the researches into the phe-
nomena of Nature, for fear they should dis-
prove the interpretations of Holy Writ made
long before the revelations of physical sci-
ence, which might serve for a better ex-
egesis of what has been revealed ; and also
the tendency in other minds to transcend
the known, and to pronounce dogmatically
as to the possibility of modes of existence
on which physical research has not thrown,
and we think never can throw, positive light."
Now, here is precisely, though not all, my
meaning, and yet you rap me over the
knuckles for it, while you publish the praises
of Carpenter, Gray, and Henry.

All these illustrious men admit the lim-
its of Science, and also the possibility of
passing beyond them. As men of good
common-sense, and no less as philosophers
and scientists, they are perfectly aware that,
while the scope of Science lies within the
contents of experience, and of the induc-
tions drawn from that experience, it is haz-
arding the character of it to go further.
They feel too, no doubt, what I certainly
do, that there are certain broad, deep, in-
eradicable instincts of the human mind,
which, however they originated, whether
implanted there by creative act, or formed
by the slow growth of thousands of years,
are now become the inexpugnable basis of

no

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

all human credence and all human action.
The convictions of the reality of Nature,
of the independence of Mind, and of the
being and authorship of God, in spite of
every effort of Philosophy to get rid of
them, either by declaring them unthinka-
ble, or by merging one in the other, always
return as the final no less than the initial
postulates of thought. Any scheme of the
universe, therefore, which leaves any of
them out, declares itself impotent, like the
project of an edifice which makes no pro-
vision for the corner-stones. Innumerable
such schemes have gone before, and floated
as bubbles for a while, but the first touch
of these Realities broke them into thin air.

What the relations of these grand pri-
mal factors of the problem of existence
are, or how they are to be harmonized with
each other, we do not know ; perhaps we
never shall know; but, I think we shall
learn more and more of them, and, in due
time, by the instrumentalities that are given
us. We shall learn of Nature, and of Man,
so far as he is a dependant and denizen of
Nature, by that digesting of experience
which is the peculiar work of science. We
shall learn of Man, so far as he has a
deeper spring of life than observation
reaches, from its wellings-up into conscious-
ness at those rare moments of insight
which often seem so mysterious ; and we
shall learn of God through both ; i. e., as
he works with the stupendous forces of
time and space, which symbolize him, and
as he inspires our feeble loves and wisdoms,
which are no less symbols of him, with an
intenser sense of his own supernal love and
wisdom.

But, we 6hall learn little of either if we
haughtily and peremptorily dismiss any of
the elements out of the inquiry. Neither Na-
ture nor Man is to be understood without
God, nor can God be apprehended by pure
intuition alone, or, save as be writes his
hieroglyphics in objects and events, or im-
parts new impulses of goodness to the in-
nermost soul. Tvndall, doubtless, caught a
glimpse of the inseparableness of these
elements when he said, " The passage from
facts to principles is called induction, which,
in its highest form, is inspiration," ' nor

1 " Fragments of Science," p. 60.

was he free from the same overshadowin"
truth, when, speaking of the possible solu-
tion of the ultimate physical problem, he re-
marks that, when it comes, " it will be one
more of spiritual insight than of observa-
tion." 1 For, if deity be, as it is some-
times said, the Spiritual Sun, the intellectual
Light, he may evade scrutiny, as the com-
mon light evades vision. It is the condi-
tion of vision, " the light of all our seeing,"
in which all objects are seen, though itself
unseen. Besides, we know that, even in
the common light, there are rays which the
physical eyes do not see, which the inward
eyes of reason alone behold, but which,
if the physical eyes could be made sensitive
to their swift pulsations, might disclose, ac-
cording to Tyndall's exquisite suggestion,
a new heaven and a new earth, immediate-
ly around us, and " as far surpassing ours
as ours surpasses that of ' the wallowing
reptiles which once held possession of this
planet."

Science must not deny the finer rays
which she cannot see ; she may remain in-
different to them if she pleases, and is,
indeed, largely obliged to remain indifferent
because of the very conditions under which
she works ; but, while delving in matter,
there is no reason for getting suffocated by
its gases, or stifled in its mud. For, in that
event, the narrowness and dogmatism you
impute to "the classes still called edu-
cated," to " the cultivators of sentimental
literature," and to " college-bred people,"
would be most unquestionably hers ; the
opposition to freedom and progress of
thought that you deplore would be hers ;
and she would lose at once that devotion
to truth, whithersoever it may lead, which
is now her proud boast. Indeed, as I ob-
serve the world, pretension and bigotry are
not confined to the circles where you dis-
cover them; there are so-called men of
science who partake the fault ; and who
set up their own little area of outlook for
the sum of God's measureless world. There
are those who, because they may have at-
tended a course of lectures on mechanics,
or compiled a treatise on heat, or performed
a few simple experiments in chemistry,
assume, not that wisdom will die with them,

1 Ibid., p. 100.

CORRESP ONDENCE.

11 1

but that it was born with them. On the
strength of these superior qualifications,
they waive aside all the struggles of man
after truth, in the past, as so many distem-
pered dreams, which are about to be dis-
pelled forever, because they have lit up a
few farthing candles. Or, as a Buddhist
poet says, " they are like infants born at
midnight, who, because they see a sunrise,
think there was never a yesterday." Let
you and I, Mr. Editor, not be of the num-
ber. Let us be assured that som'e truth
has come a good while ago, that it is com-
ing still, in many ways, and will come in
broader and rosier flashes in the future,
though not to him who ostrich-like buries his
head in the sand, or muffles his eyes against
any of its illuminations.
I have the honor to be

Your obedient servant,

Parke Godwin.

HOUMSEN'3 niSTORY AND THE STONE
AGE IN ITALY.

Mr. Editor : In Mommsen's " History
of Rome " one of the greatest intellectual
productions of the age vol. i., p. SO, Ameri-
can edition, occurs the following passage :
" Nothing has hitherto been brought to
light to warrant the supposition that man-
kind existed in Italy at a period anterior
to the knowledge of agriculture and of the
smelting of metals ; and, if the human race
ever within the bounds of Italy really oc-
cupied the level of that primitive stage of
culture which we are accustomed to call
the savage state, every trace of such a fact
has disappeared."

Surprised at such a passage in such a
book, I read it repeatedly, to be sure of its
meaning. It seems to be plain enough.
The statement is unwarranted ; and, seeing
that it is a negative one, it could hardly
have been justifiable at the time it was
written probably twenty years ago. But,
however that may be, it is certainly an over-
sight to retain it in the later editions with-
out explanation.

Traces of early peoples who were savage
in the extreme are plenty in many parts of
Italy, even in the vicinity of Rome. Primi-
tive stone weapons abound at Ponte Molle,

Torre di Quinto, and Acqua Traversa, on the
right bank of the Tiber. They are found
in Liguria, and everywhere in what was
Middle Etruria. Flint weapons of the rudest
type are found in the lowermost beds of
lava in ancient Latium. The like traces of
a savage population are found at Imola,
Casalvieri, and Alatri, in the neighborhood
of Naples ; at Ascoli, near Ancona ; on
Mount Brandon, in the vicinity of Ascoli,
and on an island near Monticelli ; in the ter-
ritory of Borgo Ticino, on the plain of
Yercelli-Borgo, and in the turf-pits of Mer-
curago .and San Giovanni ; in the region
of San Germano, near Pinerolo, between
the Tarnaro and Barrido, and on the right
bank of the Agogna, in the territory of
Briga ; and in many other localities.

These relics consist mostly of hatchets
and arrow or javelin points of flint and com-
mon greenstone. They are of all grades
of workmanship, from the most rude to the
most polished, and such is the variety in
this respect that B. Gastaldi, who has thor-
oughly studied the specimens, believes that,
if the usual division of the Stone Period
into the Paleolithic and Neolithic (rough
and polished stone) Ages be admissible,
these relics would justify a further division
of the Neolithic into two ages, according to
the grade of workmanship.

Prof. Issel believes the evidence quite
sufficient to show that the Ligurians re-
mained stone-using savages, without knowl-
edge of the metals, up to the time of their
subjugation by the Celts and Romans.

It is trite to observe that unqualified
statements resting wholly on negative sup-
port are unsafe. Still the learned continue
to make them. This of Mommsen's reminds
one of Renan's archaeologico-poetic assump-
tion that the Egyptian civilization had no
foreground of preparation. This appears
very funny in the light of evolution. Wheth-
er the Egyptians were autochthones of the
Nile or not, their civilization had a long pe-
riod of beginnings just as certainly as
the Hellenic had ; and late discoveries, of
what are believed by some of the highest
authorities to be flint implements, indicate
that Egypt was once inhabited by the
rudest of savages. It is not safe to affirm
of any spot on earth which has been long
enough above water, that it has not been in-

112

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

aabited by people in the stone-using phase
jf life. J. S. Patterson.

Beelin Heights, Onio.

"A SPIDEK'S ENGINEERING."

Mr. Editor : The inquiry respecting the
way in which 6piders bridge chasms and
streams, which is made in the note with
the above heading, upon page 635 of the
March number of this journal, has been
often and satisfactorily answered by Eng-
lish writers, 1 and the following is given
merely as a confirmation of their more ex-
tended observations :

In March, 1866, I had taken a living
male and female JSFephila plumipes (some-
times called the " silk-spider of South Caro-
lina") to the photographic establishment
of Mr. Whipple, of Boston ; while waiting
for the taking of their pictures, and stand-
ing about six feet from the wire frame upon
which was extended the female's web, I saw
the little male suddenly cease climbing about
the frame, and take position upon its upper
margin; in a few seconds a silken thread
floated near me ; I allowed it to adhere to
my sleeve ; the spider then turned about,
and made several vigorous pulls upon the
line, as if to ascertain its fixity of attach-
ment ; when satisfied of this, he rapidly
made his way toward me, but, in order to
observe the act again, I hung my end of the
line over the frame, so that he was left
where he started ; after a few turns he took
position as before, with his abdomen ele-
vated and directed toward the spot I had
occupied ; presently a fine line shot out
from his spinners, and pursued an undulat-
ing course until it reached beyond the spot
I had occupied, and began to rise toward
the large ventilating cupola in the centre of
the room ; the spider would occasionally
turn and try the line as before, but it did
not become attached, and he did not em-
bark upon it.

Feeling now quite sure that the current
of air toward the ventilator both deter-
mined the spider's preparatory action and
the progress of the line, I removed this line,

1 Blackball, " Spiders of Great Britain and Ire-
land" (Introduction, p. 11); Journal of Proceedings
of Linnajan Society, vol. vii. ; Transactions of Lin-
na;an Society, vol. xv., p. 455.

and blew gently upon the spider in the op-
posite direction ; he immediately turned
about, elevated the abdomen as before, with
the wind, and soon a line was carried in this
direction for as long and as far as my breath
could reach, and no farther. This was
repeated with the same result in various
directions. The extremity of the line
appeared blunt and a little enlarged, which
is in accordance with the view of Black-
wall respecting the way in which it is start-
ed :

"The extremities of the spinners are
brought into contact, and viscid matter is
emitted from the papillae; they are then
separated by a lateral motion, which ex-
tends the viscid matter into filaments con-
necting the papillae; on these filaments the
current of air impinges, drawing them out
to a length which is regulated by the will
of the animal, and, on the extremities of
the spinners being brought together, the
filaments coalesce, and form one compound
line. ... If placed upon rods set upright
in glass vessels with perpendicular sides, and
containing clear water, they in vain attempt
to escape from them in a still atmosphere. . . .
" The lines produced by spiders are not
propelled from the spinners by any physical
power possessed by those animals, but are
invariably drawn from them by the mechan-
ical action of external forces."

It is not so very strange that an Ameri-
can journal should reproduce the note which
suggested this communication, without in-
corporating the desired information, since
very few papers upon spiders have appeared
in this country; but the conductors of
Ilardwicke's Science Gossip, in which it first
appeared, must have been strangely ob-
livious of the already-quoted English ac-
counts of the subject.

But this oversight is pardonable when
compared to what occurred in Scribner's
Monthly for May, 1872, in an account of
spiders, evidently a compilation. The com-
mon garden spider is represented head up-
ward in the centre of a web composed of
concentric circles. Now, every one that has
really examined a so-called geometrical web
knows that it consists of a spiral line, and
never of circles ; and also knows that the
Epeiridai are as averse to reposing head up-
ward as human beings are to assuming the

EDITORS TABLE.

"3

reverse position ; they invariably hang in
the web head downward.

Surely it is a little incongruous that a
magazine which lectures The Popular Sci-
ence Monthly for occupying too much space
with such " pseudo-science " as that " most

high-flown speculation," Evolution, should
expend money as well as space for an en-
graving which is not only controverted by
every accurate observation, but which might
have been corrected by a glance into Web-

ster's Unabridged.

Burt G. "Wilder.

EDITOR'S TABLE.

SCIENTIFIC NORMAL SCHOOLS.

THE idea suggested by this title has
long been with many a matter of
vague and distant anticipation ; but
there is promise that something of the
kind may soon become a realized fact.
Eather, perhaps, we are to have a high-
class Teachers' Institute on a strictly
scientific basis. Professor Agassiz is
expected to open, next summer, a
school of natural history for the
benefit of teachers during their vaca-
tion. He has associated with him
twenty professors of high character to
carry out the plan, and the object is, to
afford ample facilities for studying spe-
cimens and becoming familiar with the
actual properties and relations of living
things. In an address before a com-
mittee of the Massachusetts Legislature
on the claims of the Cambridge Mu-
seum of Comparative Zoology, Prof.
Agassiz explained the nature and pur-
pose of the contemplated project, which
is kindred to the object for which the
museum itself was founded. Educa-
tion must have its storehouses of im-
plements. For philosophy, history, and
literature, public libraries are estab-
lished, because these subjects are to be
studied by means of books. But, in
science, books are not sufficient ; speci-
mens are indispensable. "We want,
said Prof. Agassiz, to educate men who
shall be able to read Nature, and this
can only be done by studious familiarity
with natural objects. The school is to
carry out this plan. Nantucket Island
has been selected as the location, and
provision is made for-a very thorough
vol. in. 8

and comprehensive course of instruc-
tion.

This idea is certainly capable of ex-
tension, and the time, we think, has
come when it should be taken up and
carried out in different parts of the
country. The Nantucket scheme could
not be copied in the interior, because
one-half of its subjects pertain to the
natural history of the sea. The scheme
is constructed from Prof. Agassiz's
point of view, and is devoted mainly to
zoology. The botany of land-plants is
not included ; entomology gets but lit-
tle attention, and physics none at all.
This is not intimated as a deficiency of ,
the programme, which is sufficiently
broad, and lays out more work than
there will be time to do it in. It is
evidently designed for the advantage
of professors and teachers of science in
educational institutions who already
know something of the subjects, and
desire the opportunity of perfecting
their knowledge of natural history un-
der the ablest instructors.

But the time has come for entering
upon similar arrangements in behalf
of the multitude of teachers in our
common schools. "We have normal
schools for their preparation, but they
are fashioned upon the old academic
and collegiate pattern, and furnish only
a book-education. The little science
they pretend to give is book-science,
and not the knowledge of things.
Throughout nearly all of the common
schools of the country, physics, chem-
istry, botany, and zoology, are taught,
if taught at all, by the same method as

u 4

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

history or Latin that is, by committing
and reciting lessons from books. It is
universally admitted that this is ab-
surd, but what to do about it is the
difficulty. The system is self-perpetu-
ating. The normal schools go on in
the old ruts, and continue to furnish
teachers of the old type. Higher
standards of attainment may be ex-
acted in the routine branches, and there
is unquestionably some improvement in
methods; but little is done to bring
the minds of pupils into familiar rela-
tions with Nature. Scarcely any thing
is done for the thorough cultivation
of the observing powers by exercising
them upon objects and experiments. In
response to the demand for studying
Nature, we have only the rude expe-
dient of object-lessons for children, ad-
ministered by teachers who know noth-
ing of physical science on the one
hand, nor the science of the growing
mind on the other.

What we want in every State in the
Union is what Prof. Agassiz is prepar-
ing to supply in Massachusetts, an op-
portunity for teachers to come together,
where there are cabinets, laboratories,
specimens, and experiments, and an
able corps of instructors who are at
home with all these resources, and can
teach directly from Nature herself. If
the vacation-weeks only are to be de-
voted to this work, the scheme of
studies will require to be drawn up
with strict reference to their urgent
and practical requirements. Nantucket
will be favorable for studying the zoo-
logical productions of the sea ; but Na-
ture is an inexhaustible museum, and
every place abounds with the material
for the illustration of scientific study.
The air, the fields, the woods, and the
streams, swarm with life ; the rocks
are uncovered, minerals abound; the
earth is carpeted with vegetation, the
forces of Nature are ever playing
around us, while every family, school,
church, factory, poor-house, jail, neigh-
borhood, and village, affords materials

for the scientific study of social phe-
nomena and laws. What is needed is,
to teach teachers to bring their minds
to bear directly upon those things, to
observe, compare, and analyze them,
so that their knowledge may be real,
positive, and worthy the name of sci-
ence. It may not be easy to found a
proper curriculum for a scientific teach-
ers' institute, selecting just the proper
subjects, and assigning them their
due proportions ; yet the work is
entirely practicable, and experience
would soon fix the adjustments. As a
preliminary step to such a movement,
nothing could be better than a national
convention of teachers, professors, and
school superintendents, called for the
distinctive purpose of laying down the
plan and organizing the means for the
promotion of scientific education. Prof.
Agassiz has broken the ice, and will
show us what it is possible to do in this
direction during a single vacation. His
enterprise is a national movement, and
at once raises the important question
as to how similar advantages may be
gained for the general ^education of the
country.

Since the above article was put into
type, an important change has taken
place in Prof. Agassiz's programme.
He has been presented with an island
as a location for his school, and with a
$50,000 endowment to assist in defray-
ing its expenses. The donor is Mr.
John Anderson, of New York, and the
island of 100 acres, known as Penikese,
is one of the Elizabeth group, near
New Bedford, four miles from the
main-land, and twenty-four miles from
Newport. It has been the summer
residence of Mr. Anderson, and con-
tains such buildings and improvements
as a wealthy occupant would construct
for purposes of residence. What the
effect of this change will be upon the
original plan is yet problematical, but
it can hardly fail to be considerable.
We see it stated that $30,000 addi-

EDITOR'S TABLE.

"5

tional is required to erect suitable
buildings, and $200,000 more to raise
the endowment to the point necessary
for carrying out Prof. Agassiz's plans.
If these arrangements be consummated,
a Natural History school of high char-
acter and large usefulness cannot fail
to be the result. How far it will be
organized in the interest of original
scientific investigations, or in the gen-
eral interests of education, or to what
degree both objects will be combined,
remains to be seen. It is to be hoped
that Mr. Anderson's generosity will
prove contagious, and that not only
will Prof. Agassiz be furnished with
the funds he requires, but that men of
wealth in different parts of tho coun-
try will contribute to kindred enter-
prises in their own localities. For the
organization of such Scientific Teach-
ers' Institutes as we have suggested,
large sums of money would not be re-
quired. Buildings can be found suit-
able for school sessions, lectures, and
demonstrations, and no care or outlay
would be necessary to provide for the
living of students and professors. The
expenses to be incurred would be only
for the liberal remuneration of the pro-
fessorial corps, and for the various
scientific appliances needed to illus-
trate the teaching. The project is
feasible, if there i3 sufficient interest
in the subject to carry it out.

MR. G0DWI2TS LETTER.

We publish an able communication
from Mr. Parke Godwin, called forth
by our strictures, in the April Monthly,
on his speech at the Tyndall Banquet,
and restating, with more fulness, the
views there expressed. With much
that he says we cordially agree, and,
had the position to which we mainly
objected been originally stated as it is
now, there would have been less occa-
sion for criticism. In his address, after
some remarks on the great results of

modern science, Mr. Godwin said :
"But it is real science, with its rigid
restrictions to its own sphere and its
exact methods, and not any pseudo-
science, that will accomplish these
grand results." He then gave exam-
ples, and classed among them the doc-
trine of Evolution as interpreted by
Herbert Spencer. But, in his present
communication, Mr. Godwin admits
that " the nebular, the Darwinian, and
the Spencerian views are hypotheses
quite within the domain of scientific
theory, and capable, to a certain ex-
tent, of explaining the phenomena to
which they refer." He allows their
legitimacy, which is what we contend-
ed for; but he denies that they are
fairly-accredited scientific truths, and
here we suspect he is again mistaken.

What, then, are we to understand
by scientific truth ? Mr. Godwin inven-
tories the chimeras of the past, and,
pointing to the debris of abandoned
theories which strew the road of sci-
ence, admonishes us not "to be too
confident that our little systems of nat-
ral law will not, like other systems of
thought referred to by Tennyson, have
their day." The lesson is a wholesome
one ; but are scientists the parties that
most need it ? Is it they that are for-
ever affirming "finalities," "absolute
verities," and " eternal principles ? "
In what school are men so trained to
distrust themselves, and to hold their
views subject to constant revision, as
in the school of science ? Is it not ever
seeking to supersede existing truth by
larger truth ? Chemistry reposes upon
its ascertained elements, but chemists
are prepared to see them at any time
abolished or resolved into a single one,
and in that case the gentlemen of the
laboratory would be the first to throw
up their hats in exultation. Even the
principle of gravity is not held as a
finality : Faraday labored for its rein-
terpretation, and, should it disappear
in some larger generalization of dy-
namical law, physicists will not go in-

n6

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

to mourning. In science, the passing
away of systems is generally an absorp-
tion of lesser into more comprehen-
sive laws. The question of the truth
of a new scientific theory is not as to
its everlastingness, but as to its supe-
riority to the views it seeks to super-
sede. Does it involve fewer assump-
tions ? Does it account for more facts ?
Does it harmonize conflicting opinion?
Does it open new inquiries and incite
to fresh research ? These are the tests
that determine the acceptance of the
theory, and, if it fulfils these condi-
tions, it is held to be true.

Now, how does the doctrine of
Evolution answer to these tests? It
has arisen as an outgrowth of the latest
and highest knowledge, has steadily
made its way, in the teeth of inexo-
rable criticism, to a large acceptance
among the most disciplined thinkers
of the period. It has been simmering
in the minds of men of science for a
century, and has now reached a point
where it is capable of being formu-
lated ; where it is of great and ac-
knowledged value for the guidance of
scientific exploration, and it thus an-
swers to the highest uses of theory.
It is, moreover, becoming every day in-
creasingly consonant with facts in the
various branches of science, and is now
far more congruous with the state of
knowledge than any other hypothesis
yet applied to the range of facts which
it attempts to explain. The proof of
the theory is unquestionably incom-
plete, but all theories are accepted un-
der the same conditions. At the worst,
it stands to-day where the theory of
gravitation stood in the time of New-
ton, which, as Baden Powell remarks,
"was beset by palpable contradictions
in its results till many years after New-
ton's death."

On a complex and difficult scientific
question of this kind, authority goes for
something, and Mr. Godwin recognizes
it. He remarks : " Can we say that any
questions, on which such cautious ob-

servers and life-long students as Dar-
win, Owen, Huxley, Wallace, and Ag-
assiz, still debate, are settled ques-
tions?" Certainly not ; but, when their
fundamental principles are accepted by
four out of five of the eminent authori-
ties which are cited as differing about
them, we must acknowledge that the
weight of authority is very strongly on
one side. Nor is this all. The eminent
scientific men who have adopted the
view of Evolution, and that, too, against
the powerful pressure of public preju-
dice, are to be numbered by scores and
hundreds. In fact, the movement among
naturalists, for the last ten years, tow-
ard a general doctrine of development,
has amounted almost to a "stampede."
This is not mere unsupported assertion.
Here comes the latest scientific book
of the season, " The Depths of the
Sea," by the eminent Professor of Nat-
ural History in the University of Edin-
burgh, Wyville Thompson, and he says :
" I do not think that I am speaking too
strongly when I say that there is now
scarcely a single competent general
naturalist who is not prepared to ac-
cept some form of the doctrine of Evo-
lution." Prof. Agassiz, indeed, still
clings to his long-cherished opinions;
but it is notorious that, on this ques-
tion, his old students are running away
from him, and his hypothesis, that
there is an epidemic aberration upon
this subject among the naturalists of
the age, will hardly be held as a suffi-
cient explanation of the phenomena.
On the basis, therefore, of the judgment
of the great body of those most compe-
tent to form an opinion, we cannot help
thinking that Mr. Godwin was not
only in error when he characterized
the theory of Evolution as counterfeit
science ; but that he is also in error
when he declares it to be a fugitive
speculation, and not an accredited
principle, entitled to the weight of
valid scientific authority.

But, aside from the question of au-
thority, Mr. Godwin argues against the

EDITOR'S TABLE.

117

validity of biological and psychological
sciences on the intrinsic ground that
they lack exactitude. It would have
been a point gained for his argument
to enforce the test of exactness, as then
these sciences would pass under a cloud
of discredit. But the test cannot be
accepted. His method of criticism
would throttle every science in its
growing stages before completeness of
demonstration had been attained. He
insists upon a criterion which would
abolish half the sciences and strip the
remainder of all validity and authority
except in their perfected forms. Re-
ferring to his address, he remarks :

" But then, I said and it was the whole
purport of my speech made in the interests
of science as well as religion that we can
only expect these results from true science,
which investigates what Nature really is, and
not from a hasty and presumptuous science,
which pretends to give us what Nature may
be supposed to he. And my criterion of true
science, suggested in a phrase, was, that the
methods and results of it bear the impress
of exactitude or certainty."

Now, nothing is more certain than
that we can never arrive at what Na-
ture really is except through the path-
way of " what Nature may be supposed
to 5e." All science begins with guesses
and conjectures, and its most valid laws
were at first but suppositions. The
evidence by which scientific truth is
determined necessarily involves suppo-
sitions to which it has been applied,
and these have to be gradually con-
firmed; hence, if exactitude is demand-
ed at the outset, all science becomes
impossible.

To get at the full bearing of this
matter we quote the original passage
as it stands in the revised address of
the proceedings at the Tyndall Banquet.
It reads :

" Science is exact and certain, and author-
itative, because dealing with facts, and the
systematic coordination of facts only. She
does not wander away into the void inane.
She has nothing to do with questions of pri-
mal origin, nor of ultimate destinies ; -not

because they are unimportant questions or
insoluble, but because they transcend her
instruments and her methods. You cannot
measure love by the bushel, as the children
say; you cannot catch fancy in a forceps
to analyze its elements; you cannot fuse
thought in a crucible to detect what may be
dross, and what sound metal."

We think that Mr. Godwin here
lends countenance to a prevailing fal-
lacy. Science is perpetually bidden to
keep within her sphere, and the popu-
lar notion of her sphere is that of ex-
perimentation. To most people the
word science connotes physical or ex-
perimental science. On this tacit as-
sumption Mr. Godwin declares that
cubic measure, forceps, and crucibles,
are not applicable to love, fancy, and
thought. Most true; but will he main-
tain that these are therefore not ame-
nable to scientific scrutiny? As we
understand it, science is a knowledge of
the constitution of things ; of the uni-
formities of the phenomena of Nature.
Whatever, in the universe around us,
or in the world within us, is open to
cognition, which can be examined and
known, and reexamined and verified,
is the proper subject-matter of science,
and the term is applied to all the knowl-
edge that has been arrived at in this
way. An emotion may be analyzed
and understood as well as a mineral.
Love, fancy, and thought, cannot be
subjected to laboratory processes, but
they may be known in their laws and
relations as mental phenomena, and in
this aspect they belong as strictly to
science as metals or gases. That they
cannot be weighed makes no difference,
because exactness is not the criterion
of science. Mr. Godwin asks, Where,
then, does the inexactness come in ? To
which we reply, wherever the instru-
ments, by which exactness is reached,
are inapplicable, or can only be imper-
fectly applied. The best criterion of
science is derived from the fact of or-
der and uniformity in Nature by which
one thing implies another, and we in-

ll8

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

fer from what has heen what will be
again. It is prevision, that is, such a
perception of the properties and rela-
tions of things as will enable us to see
beforehand what effects will be pro-
duced in different times, places, and
circumstances. Phenomena that elude
measurement may yet occur with such
regularity as to be foreseen with cer-
tainty. There is, in fact, a qualitative
science which precedes quantitative, for
properties must be known before they
can be measured, but the test of pre-
vision applies to the lower or qualita-
tive stage as well as to the higher.
Because biology, psychology, and soci-
ology are not, and never can be, exact
sciences, is therefore no reason for im-
pugning their results as untrustworthy
or without authority.

"We quite agree with Mr. Godwin
that Science is inexorably shut up in
the finite and the phenomenal the
sphere of relation and law : but she
must have the liberty of the whole do-
main. Nor do we think there is much
danger of Science wasting her energies
in trying to transcend these bounds,
for she has plenty to do to get even
partial possession of what confessedly
belongs to her. She has won her
ground, inch by inch, by hard fighting
from the beginning, and even yet it is
conceded to her only in name. Every-
body will admit that it is the right of
Science to inquire into all changes and
effects in physical Nature. Yet, for
suggesting that a given class of alleged
physical effects be inquired into in the
same manner as are other effects, Prof.
Tyndall has been posted through Chris-
tendom as a blasphemer. Mr. Godwin
yields to Science the realm of the finite
and the relative, and in the same breath
he speaks of the relations of Mozart to
the laws of music, and of Shakespeare
to the laws of the human heart, as ex-
amples of the trans-phenomenal. But
we thought laws and relations had been
made over to science. No reservation
will here be tolerated. Science is pro-

viding for its ever-increasing army of
research through a long future. Half
a thousand years have been spent in
getting on the track ; another thousand
will suffice to get under headway ; she
stipulates now only for room. Her
sphere is the finite, but the nebulosities
of ignorance must not be mistaken for
the walls of the infinite. If mystics
will lose themselves in the tangled re-
cesses of unresolved phenomena, they
must expect to be hunted out and have
the place reclaimed to order and an-
nexed to the provinces of all-harmon-
izing law. Nor can any pretext that
they are nested in the unapproachable
essences and subtleties of being, and
ensphered in the absolute, and guarded
by cunning sphinxes, avail them. The
thing must inexorably be inquired of.
It is the destiny of Science to pierce the
unknown ; if her spear is blunted upon
the unknowable, she will of course ac-
cept the results of the experiment.

But, though scientists are hopelessly
closed in, Mr. Godwin does not despair
of others getting out, and he asks: "Is
thought, whose expatiations are so rest-
less and irrepressible, to be forever shut
up to the phenomenal and relative ?
Is it to be forever stifled under a bushel-
measure, or tied up by the legs with a
surveyor's chain ? " But the phenom-
enal and the relative go a great ways.
Mr. Godwin talks as if "God's meas-
ureless world " were a stifling prison.
We have been reminded that "Nature
is a prodigious quantity," and we are
so strongly impressed with this truth
that we do not like Mr. Godwin's fig-
ure, of a "bushel-measure" to symbol-
ize its extent, any more than we like
his favorite figure of " mud " to sym-
bolize its quality. As to his question
whether thought is to be tied by the
legs with a surveyor's chain, we suspect
that it is " tied " by something a good
deal stronger tlian that : namely, by
the laws of its own nature. He is
skeptical about the science of psychol-
ogy, and asks for its agreements. The

EDITORS TABLE.

119

question we are now considering may
be taken as an example. It is pretty
well agreed by the latest schools that,
as the universe exists in relations, so
thought is carried on in relations, and,
by its very constitution, cannot tran-
scend them. It is agreed that as music
in all its inexhaustible complications is
still made up by the combination of
simple wave -pulses, so intelligence, in
all the range of its complications, is
made up of the combination of per-
ceived relations ; and we might as well
talk of the higher exploits of musical
art as transcending the vibrations of
which they are constituted, as of the
"restless expatiations" of thought tran-
scending the relations of which mind
is constituted. Sir William Hamilton
is fair authority, and he says : "Limi-
tation is the fundamental law of the
possibility of thought. For, as the
greyhound cannot outstrip his shadow,
nor the eagle outsoar the atmosphere
in which he floats, and by which alone
he may be supported ; so the mind can-
not transcend that sphere of limitation
within and through which exclusively
the possibility of thought is realized."
We therefore fear that, should any
adventurer break bounds on a winged
horse, and take his flight through the
ultra - phenomenal tracts, the tidings
wafted back would prove altogether
unintelligible.

Mr. Godwin says : " Am I to infer
from your objections to my remarks
that The Popular Science Monthly
holds materialism, atheism, and natu-
ralism, to be the legitimate outcome of
science ? " Exactly the contrary. We
do not believe that the legitimate out-
come of science is materialism or athe-
ism, and our attempt was to show that
certain problems and procedures, which
Mr. Godwin declared to be spurious
science and obnoxious to these charges,
were genuine science, and not obnox-
ious to them. We objected, in order to
rescue a portion of science from an as-
persive charge to which all science is

equally liable. Buchner may bo a ma-
terialist, and Comto an atheist, and
Taine may be both, although it does not
follow, because he affirms the correla-
tion of mind with nervous motion, that
he is either. What moved us to pro-
test was the gross injustice of branding
Mr. Spencer's expositions of the doc-
trine of Evolution as sham science, and
then loading it with the opprobrium
which its associations and the argu-
ment implied. Of Spencer's system,
Mr. Godwin says, on his own and
higher authority, that it is "full of
unsupported assumptions, logical in-
consistencies, and explanations which
explain nothing, while in its general
character it tends to the sheerest natu-
ralism." We do not deny that it con-
tains defects it would be, indeed, sur-
prising if so vast and original a dis-
cussion did not ; but to say that it is
"full" of the vices alleged, or that
they characterize it, is a reckless ex-
aggeration. As a set-off to this opin-
ion, we refer the reader back to page
32, where he will find the latest esti-
mate of Mr. Spencer's philosophy by a
man who is an authority upon the
question he discusses.

As to the religious "tendencies" of
the system, although they are charged
with being all that is bad, and although
the charge would undoubtedly be sus-
tained by a popular vote, we are of
opinion that it is bound to be very dif-
ferently viewed in the future. Mr.
Spencer is a profound believer in re-
ligion, and at the very threshold of his
system he has shown the ultimate har-
mony of science and faith. Yet he
has not tried merely to patch up a
transient truce between religion and
science ; but, foreseeing the intenser
conflicts that are inevitable as science
advances, he has labored to place their
reconciliation upon a basis that no
extension of knowledge can disturb.
When tho method of science is raised
to its rightful supremacy in the human
mind, and the rule of science is reeog-

120

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nized as supreme throughout the sphere
of the phenomenal, and when the dis-
tractions of theology become unbear-
able, it will then be found that Mr.
Spencer has proved that science, so far
from being its destroyer, is itself the
promoter of the profoundest faith,
while the central truth of all religion
is saved to humanity. Malignant zeal-
ots will probably continue to secrete
their vitriolic criticism, as, if stopped,
they would probably die of their own
acridities ; but there are not wanting
indications that many religious men of
candor and discernment are already
recognizing the claims of Mr. Spencer's
system upon the serious consideration
of their class. For example, a late
number of the Nonconformist, the or-
gan of the English dissenters, and an
orthodox paper of high influence, says
of Spencer: " He is not an idealist, nor
is he a materialist. Like Goethe, he
believes that man is not born to solve
the problem which the universe pre-
sents." Yet the writer holds his views
to be of very great importance, and
speaks of it as " an importance, in our
opinion, so great, that the future, not
only of English philosophy, but of prac-
tical theology, will be determined by
its acceptance or rejection."

As for ourselves, differing widely
from Mr. Godwin in his estimate of
Spencer's system of philosophy, we
record our opinion that, as it becomes
more fully known, it will be recognized
as an unequalled performance in its rig-
orous conformity to scientific method,
and as the first grand alliance of sci-
ence and philosophy; that it will exert
an all-reconciling influence upon the
chaos of doctrine ; that, while based
upon progress, it will prove powerfully
conservative, and will leave all other
systems behind in its value for guid-
ance, both to the individual and the
state. We believe that the time is not
greatly distant when even theologians
will seek it as a shelter against the ris-
ing tide of "materialism" and "athe-

ism ; " and, finally, we predict that,
if Mr. Spencer lives to complete his
" Principles of Sociology," with the
accompanying tabular scheme of " De-
scriptive Sociology," that which Mr.
Godwin says is now only a "hope"
will become an assured and authori-
tative science which is certainly one
of the most imminent desiderata of
civilization.

LITERARY NOTICES.

Education in Japan. A Series of Letters
Addressed by Prominent Americans to
Arinori Mori. New York: D. Apple-
ton k Co., 1873. 255 pages.

And now Japan comes forward to con-
found the theories of publicists, and give a
new problem to political philosophers. An
ancient Oriental nation, with a history
stretching over 2,500 years, and claiming
the oldest dynasty in the world, containing
34,000,000 people, and which has long been
shut out from the world by its exclusive
system, now throws open its gates to inter-
course with other nations, and raises the
great question as to how it may best ac-
quire the highest benefits of civilization.
Its youths are sent away to be educated
(there are some 300 in this country),
and learned foreigners are sent for, that
the modern arts and sciences may be ac-
quired, and there are even indications that
this proud and exclusive people meditate
a change of language, and the adoption of
English in place of their native speech.
The Japanese envoy at Washington, Mr.
Arinori Mori, a liberal and well-educated
young gentleman twenty seven years of age,
has addressed a circular letter to a large
number of the distinguished men of this
country, asking their views and advice as
to how the Japanese can best gain the ad-
vantages of education, free commerce, and
enlightened industry, and best improve the
social, moral, and physical condition of the
Japanese people. The present volume em-
bodies the replies which he received from
Presidents Woolsey, Stearns, Hopkins,
McCosh, Eliot, Profs. Seelye, Henry, Mur-
ray, Northrup, Whitney, the Bev. O. Pe-
rinchief, and the Honorables G. S. Bout-

LITERARY NOTICES.

121

well, J. A. Garfield, and Mr. Peter Cooper.
Their replies are not only interesting as fur-
nishing the information required for its
practical objects, but they are also interest-
ing as illustrating the way American scholar-
ship engages with this novel and curious
sociological problem. Mr. Mori has pre-
pared an introduction to the volume, giving
an historical sketch of Japan, and some ac-
count of the present condition of its govern-
ment, religion, language, and people.

Diseases op the Urinary Organs, includ-
ing Stricture of the Urethra, Affections
of the Prostate, and Stone in the Blad-
der. By John W. S. Gopley, M. D.
With One Hundred and Three Wood
Engravings. New York : William Wood
& Co., 1873.

Amid the flood of medical works an-
nually poured out for the doctor's guidance,
it is a pleasure to find occasionally one that
deals, in a clear and straightforward way,
with the subject in hand, and is not encum-
bered with the endless theories and specu-
lations of which medical writers are so pro-
lific. The book before us is one of these
exceptional productions in medical litera-
ture. It is in no sense a compilation, but
embodies the results of an extended expe-
rience, both in private practice and in the
hospitals of this city. Yet, while thus
mainly founded on personal observation,
the claims and teachings of the many emi-
nent men who have illustrated this depart-
ment of surgery have not been overlooked.
The author does not undertake to go over
the whole of this important department of
medicine, but modestly limits himself to a few
of the graver surgical affections of the male
urinary organs, giving the pathology, clin-
ical history, and treatment of each, with full
and explicit directions for the various op-
erations involved. Whenever the use of in-
struments is called for, he urges, with em-
phatic earnestness, the necessity for the ut-
most care in their employment ; and this, to
our minds, is not the least valuable feature
of the book, since it is well known that
these and other diseases are often seriously
aggravated, and not unfrequently put be-
yond the reach of cure, by the bungling
manipulations of over-confident and care-
less operators. Dr. Gouley's abilities as a
practitioner are unquestioned, his success

as a teacher has also been amply proved,
and the present work gives evidence, both
in matter and style, that he is entitled to
rank equally high as a clear and instructive
writer.

The Microscope and Microscopical Tech-
nology. A Text-Book for Physicians
and Students. By Dr. Heinrich Fret.
Translated from the German, and edited
by George R. Cutter, M. D. New York :
William Wood & Co., 1872.

We welcome the appearance, in an Eng-
lish dress, of Frey's excellent work. It
covers a far wider field than Martin's book,
noticed in a recent number of The Popular
Science Monthly ; indeed, the entire sub-
ject of microscopy and microscopical instru-
ments is treated by Dr. Frey. The author
devotes one-third of his work to the descrip-
tion of microscopic instruments, the testing
of them, and their uses. To the section on
" Testing the Microscope," the translator
appends a few pages of original matter, giv
ing the history of microscope-manufacture
in the United States. He shows that micro-
scopes of American manufacture possess all
the excellences of foreign instruments, plus
certain mechanical simplifications the prod-
uct of American inventive genius.

The "Preparation of Microscopic Ob-
jects " has nearly 250 pages devoted to its
treatment. This is a very important branch
of the technique of microscopy, and the stu-
dent will find here all the practical directions
he needs, derived from the experience of the
most eminent microscopists. The purpose
of this portion of the work, as also of the
section on " Mounting," is to save the student
countless mortifying failures. Every micro-
scopist may discover for his own use the
best processes for preparing and mounting ;
but the time so spent is better spared, and
devoted to practical investigation. The
work of the microscopist is at all times ex-
ceedingly laborious, requiring a degree of
patience and application that is almost in-
credible. The author aims in this part of
his book to smooth away some of the diffi-
culties attending the first approaches to
this fascinating study ; but, if any dilettante
expects to find here a royal road to micro-
scopy, he will be most assuredly disap-
pointed. Of this branch of knowledge, it is
preeminently true that only by hard work

122

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

can any progress be made. This portion of
the work is of high value, and the informa-
tion it contains is nowhere else accessible,
at least in the English language.

The remaining 400 pages are devoted to
explaining the mode of investigating the
fluids and tissues of organisms, etc. The
author's method here is, first, to ascertain
the normal conditions of tissues, organs, etc.,
and then to study diseased conditions, the
pathological structure always more or less
repeating the normal. As far as we have
had an opportunity of judging, the trans-
lator's work appears to be well done.

The Depths of the Sea. By C. Wyville
Thompson, LL. D., etc. London and
New York: Macmillan & Co., 1873.

Certain new and very interesting re-
sults, in regard to the distribution of life,
have been arrived at within the last few
years, by dredging the bottom of the sea.
Twenty years ago it was believed that at
certain depths the greatness of the pressure,
the lowness of the temperature, and the de-
ficiency of light and aeration, made it impos-
sible for life to subsist. The alleged cases of
living creatures being drawn up from these
great depths were discredited. The opera-
tions of cable-laying and cable-raising have,
however, increased our familiarity with the
bottom of the sea, and the improved ma-
nipulations have been turned to account in
exploring its life. The result was, the es-
tablishment of the truth that there is an
order of life belonging to the sea-bed in the
profound abysess of the ocean. The rec-
ognition of this fact led to systematic at-
tempts to carry on deep-sea explorations.
In 1868 the steamer Lightning was placed
by the British Government at the disposal
of Dr. Carpenter and Mr. Wyville Thomp-
son for the express purpose of submarine
research, and the Porcupine was afterward
assigned, for a more extensive series of sur-
veys, to the same gentlemen, with the addi-
tion of Mr Gwyn Jeffreys, in the summers
of 1869 and 1870. In the first of these
cruises the greatest depth reached was 1,500
fathoms, but in the second they went to the
depth of 2,500 or 3,000 fathoms. The pres-
ent volume is a record of the results attained
in these expeditions. It gives an account
of the apparatus and instruments employed,

of the forms of organization discovered,
and much information regarding the physics
of the ocean. It is splendidly illustrated
and popularly written, with much humor,
and the treatment, like the subject, is any
thing but dry; it is a volume altogether
worthy the interest and importance of its
subject.

Van Nostrand's Eclectic Engineering
Magazine. New York : D. Van Nos-
trand, 23 Murray Street.

We call the attention of mechanics, en-
gineers, manufacturers, and scientific stu-
dents, to this able and valuable periodical,
now in its eighth volume. It treats of the
applications of science, constructions, min-
ing, and technical processes, and gives the
solid literature of these subjects from all
sources. It is edited with excellent dis-
crimination, and the bound volumes of the
series would form a most useful cyclopaedia
of recent authentic information upon the
subjects to which it is devoted.

Historical Statement of the Business

AND CONniTION OF THE MCTCAL LlFE

Insurance Company, of New York,
for Thirty Years, from 1843 to 1872.

The company did well to state, in the
beginning of this pamphlet, that its matter
is important ; since, owing to the style in
which it is presented, few will be likely to
discover that fact in any other way. Its
contents are put in the shape of a fac-
simile of the original statement, signatures
and all, a form to which probably not one
in a hundred will attach any special value,
and that involves a useless waste of time
and patience on the part of the reader.
What policy-holders and the public want is
clear and explicit information that is readily
accessible, and this appears to be just what
the insurance companies are unable or un-
willing to furnish.

Hygiene : a Fortnightly Journal of Sanitary
Science. New York : Putnam. Two
dollars per year.

This is a publication that was much
needed, for the first of all our interests, that
of health, is the one concerning which peo-
ple are most careless and indifferent. It is
amazing the amount of ignorance displayed,
even by cultured people, with regard to the

MISCELLANY.

123

most evident precepts of sanitary prudence.
This journal will, no doubt, do a good work
in helping to diffuse abroad something like
rational views as to the conditions of health.
This periodical has nothing directly to do
with medicine, nor will it attempt to make
doctors of its readers. Hygiene is hand-
somely printed and carefully edited.

MISCELLANY.

Meteor-Showers on the Night of Novem-
ber 27, 1872c In all quarters of the heav-
ens, says an astronomical periodical, the
Leipziger Slernwarle, the meteors were very
numerous, especially in the Southwest and
the Northeast. An observer looking tow-
ard the South counted within 54 minutes,
soon after seven p. m., 700 meteors ; another
observer 807 meteors in 40 minutes. Be-
tween eight and nine o'clock 899 meteors
were counted in 42 minutes, 304 in 19 min-
utes between nine and ten o'clock, 291 in
30 minutes between ten and eleven o'clock.
Now, as the observer could view about one-
fourth of the heavens, and as over 20 mete-
ors per minute were observed at about
eight o'clock, we must set down the num-
ber falling between seven and eight, and
between eight and nine, at 5,000 per hour.
The phenomenon began to fail at ten o'clock,
and, between that hour and eleven, only
2,000 meteors fell. About one-sixth of
these meteors were brighter than stars of
the first magnitude, and many of them left
a train which was luminous for several sec-
onds. The majority of them were, however,
between the second and fourth magnitudes.
In color most of them were yellow, though
some were green, some blue, some red ;
those of feebler lustre were white. Prof.
Galle, of Breslau, and Prof. Klinkerfues, of
Gottingen, agree in attributing this meteor-
shower to the meeting of the earth with
Biela's comet. "Without doubt," writes
the former, " these meteors consist of scat-
tered particles of Biela's comet, meeting
the earth, as that comet in its septennial
period passed that point in its career in the
beginning of September, and was at its peri-
helion at the beginning of October. Schia-
parclli's discovery of the connection be-
tween comets and meteoric showers thus
obtains fresh confirmation."

Professor Agassiz's School of Natural Ills-
tory. This establishment, which was at
first designed for Nantucket, but is now in-
tended for Penikese Island, had the follow-
ing programme of subjects and instruc-
tions :

" 1. Zoology in general, and embryol-
ogy of the vertebrates, by L. Agassiz, Di-
rector of Museum. 2. The extinct animals
of past ages compared with those now liv-
ing, and the methods of identifying them,
by N. S. Shaler, Professor of Paleontology
at the Lawrence Scientific School. 3. Com-
parative anatomy and physiology of the
vertebrates, by Dr. B. G. Wilder, Professor
of Anatomy and Physiology at Cornell Uni-
versity, Ithaca, N. Y. 4. The animals and
plants living in deep waters, and the pecul-
iar conditions of their existence, by L. P.
de Pourtales, of the United States Coast
Survey. 6. Embryology of the radiates, by
A. Agassiz, of the Museum of Comparative
Zoology. 6. Natural history of embryology
of the mollusks, by Prof. E. S. Morse, of
Salem. 7. How to make biological collec-
tions illustrative of the history of insects
injurious to vegetation, by Dr. H. A. Ha-
gen, Professor of Entomology at Harvard
University. 8. Natural history and embry-
ology of the articulates, by Dr. A. S. Pack-
ard, Jr., Curator of Articulates at Peabody
Academy of Science, Salem, and Lecturer
on Entomology at Bowdoin College. 9.
Natural history of the fishes and reptiles,
by F. W. Putnam, Director of Museum of
Peabody Academy of Science, Salem, and
Permanent Secretary of the American Asso-
ciation for the Advancement of Science
10. Natural history of birds and mammals.
by J. A. Allen, of the Museum of Compara
tive Zoology. 11. On breeding, and nests
and eggs of birds, by Dr. Thomas W. Brew-
er, chairman of Committee on Birds, Nests.
and Eggs, of the Boston Society of Natural
History. 12. Practical exercises in the use
of the microscope, by Mr. Bicknell. 13.
Instruction in drawing and painting of ani-
mals, by Paulus Roetter, Artist at Museum
of Comparative Zoology. 14. On the pres-
ervation of our sea-fisheries, by Prof. Spen-
cer F. Baird, United States Commissioner
of Fisheries, and Assistant Secretary of
Smithsonian Institute. 15. On fish-breed-
ing, by Theo. Lyman, of the Museum of

124

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Comparative Zoology. 16. The fauna of
the North Atlantic, compared with one an-
other, and with that of other parts of the
world, by Prof. Verrill. 17. The plants of
the sea, by Prof. Eaton. 18. The physics
of the sea, by Prof. Joseph Lovering, Pro-
fessor of Natural Philosophy, Harvard Uni-
versity. 19. Physical hydrography, by
Prof. Mitchell, of the United States Coast
Survey. 20. Chemistry of feeding and
breathing, by Prof. W. Gibbs, Rumford-
professor of Physics, Harvard University.
21. Chemistry of the sea and air, by Prof.
James Crafts, Professor of Chemistry at
the Boston Technological Institute."

The Causes of Typhus. As causes pre-
disposing to typhus, medical writers usu-
ally enumerate mental depression, anxiety,
fear of contagion, intemperance, insufficient
nutrition, and overcrowding. Now, dur-
ing the sieges of Paris and Metz, the inhab-
itants of those two cities were subject in
an extraordinary degree to all these condi-
tions, if in the case of Metz we except the
fourth; and yet not a single case of the
disease occurred among either the citizens,
the refugees, or the soldiers. The belea-
guering armies of the Germans, on the con-
trary, whose sanitary condition was infinite-
ly better, were constantly ravaged by ty-
phus. This conflict of facts with theory
has led Dr. Chauffard, of the Paris Acad-
emy of Medicine, to investigate the sub-
ject of typhus anew, and we here give the
chief results of his inquiry. According to
him, the epidemics of typhus which have
broken out in France had always a foreign
origin, and the disease has never been able
to become endemic in that country. The
epidemic of 1814 was brought in by the
defeated armies of the North, on their
return from Russia and Northern Germany,
and that of 1855-56 was imported by the
troops returning from the Crimea. But
soon they died out on French soil, and
hence the author conjectures that in the
French race and on French soil there is
something which is antagonistic to typhus.
He inclines to regard this disease as local-
ized, so far as its origin is concerned, just
like cholera, or yellow fever. Then, to show
that his conjecture as to race immunity is
not without foundation, he states that in

New Orleans the yellow fever commits it3
greatest ravages among the whites, the chol-
era among the negroes. Then, too, the ne-
gro race can better resist the morbid influ-
ences of marshy soil, than can the white.
To show how different may be the effects
of the same morbific influences on diverse
races of men, the author cites the case of
an Egyptian vessel entering the port of
Liverpool in the worst possible sanitary
condition. The crew were all sick but no
typhus. But the Englishmen who visited
the ship were nearly all seized with that dis-
ease. On the high table-lands of Mexico,
typhus is endemic and frequent, typhoid
fever very rare. On the contrary, at an
altitude of less than 2,000 feet above the
sea-level, typhoid is abundant, typhus rare.
Even on the table-lands, however, newly-
arrived French soldiers were attacked by
typhoid ; but, when they had become accli-
mated, they were seized only by typhus.
The author replies to the objection that
might be drawn from the occurrence of
typhus in prisons and among convicts con-
demned to the galleys, by claiming that
such outbreaks of supposed typhus are
really only typhoid fevers of an unusual
character. In fact, ever since French phy-
sicians had, after the Crimean War, an op-
portunity for more closely studying true
typhus, prison epidemics are not often char-
acterized as outbreaks of that disease. The
author then examines certain cases where
undoubted typhus has made its appearance
spontaneously, as it might be supposed, on
French soil, and explains the occurrence by
importation from foreign countries. Our
brief abstract is far from doing justice to
this highly-important paper, and we com-
mend the entire essay, as found in the
Revue Scientijique, to the attention of our
medical readers.

Habits of Right and Sperm Whales.

In the American Naturalist, Prof. N. S. Shaler
notes some of the prominent characteristic
habits of right and sperm-whales, on the au-
thority of an old whaler, Captain John Pease,
of Edgartown, Massachusetts. The calving-
time for the right-whale, he says, never be-
gins until July 1st, and by the 3d or 4th of
the month every female is accompanied by
her calf. The affection of the right-whale

MISCELLANY

125

and of the humpback for their young is
very strong, but the sperm-whale gives no
evidence of such fondness. Among sperm-
whales there is strict subordination of every
herd to its leader, but each right-whale ap-
pears to be independent. The male right
is smaller than the female, but the reverse
is the case for the sperm-whale. The males
of the sperm-whale engage in furious con-
flicts with each other, and Captain Pease
has often found clear evidence of these
fights in the scarred bodies of captured
whales. In the Nantucket Museum may
be seen two specimens of the lower jaw
damaged in conflict, one of them being bent
laterally into one turn of a spiral. Captain
Pease has often witnessed the attack of the
sperm on the right and humpback whale.
Fifty or more of them will join in the attack,
leaping many feet out of the water and fall-
ing on their victim. Squid forms the prin-
cipal food of the sperm-whale, and Captain
Pease once saw the head of a squid, as
large as a sugar hogshead, which had been
chopped off by the closure of the sperm-
whale's jaws.

The captain is positive that a trace of
hair is to be found within the skin of the
right-whale, and says that, if the fresh skin
be scraped, the inner section will show a
trace of hair. If this whale is the descend-
ant of a land-mammal, we should expect to
find just such a trace of hair. Then, too,
there is a sperm-whale's tooth at Nantucket
which has two fangs, and it is stated that
the other teeth of the animal to which this
belonged had likewise two fangs. The au-
thor suspects here a case of reversion. Ac-
cording to Captain Pease, right -whales
attain adult size in three years, though he
admits that they may grow very slowly for
some years longer.

Cruelties of the Seal-Fishery . The cruel
and useless destruction of young seals, re-
sulting from the way in which the seal-
fisheries are at present conducted, has called
out a vigorous protest from Mr. Frank
Buckkind, coupled with a recommendation
that the governments concerned unite in a
system of regulations that shall in future
prevent the barbarities and wastefulness
which, if continued, must soon put an end
to an important industry. On the authority

of Captain David Gray, commander of the
screw-steamer Eclipse, of the Scottish seal-
ing-fleet, we are told that operations begin
about the 20th of March, or within a few
days after the young are born. The har-
pooner chooses a place where a number of
young seals are lying, knowing that soon
the mothers will make their appearance.
Of these, as many as 40,000 were killed last
year, not to speak of those that were
wounded and scared away. Thus tens of
thousands of young seals are left mother-
less. " It is horrible," says Captain Gray,
" to see the young ones trying to suck the
carcasses of their mothers, their eyes start-
ing out of the sockets, looking the very
picture of famine. They crawl over and
over them until quite red with blood, poking
them with their noses, no doubt wondering
why they are not getting their usual feed,
uttering painful cries the while. The noise
they make is something dreadful. If one
could imagine himself surrounded by four
or five hundred thousand human babies all
crying at the pitch of their voices, he would
have some idea of it. Their cry is very
like an infant's. These motherless seals
collect into lots of five or six, and crawl
about the ice, their heads fast becoming the
biggest part of their bodies, searching to
find the nourishment they stand so much in
want of. The females are very affectionate
toward their young." Immense numbers
of young seals are in this way starved to
death ; and, even if slaughtered on the spot,
are comparatively worthless, as their bodies
contain little or no oil, and their skins bring
but a very low price. According to Mr.
Buckland, if the commencement of the
work were postponed for only three or four
weeks, the young would then be old enough
to take care of themselves, and, even if
killed, which he strongly objects to, at this
early period of their lives, their bodies
would have a greatly increased value.

The Failure of Car-Axles. The fracture
of car-axles, and the frequent accidents
arising therefrom, are due, it appears, in
the majority of cases, to imperfect con-
struction, which may be readily detected
by applying the proper tests. As an ex-
ample of the kind of work that manufac-
turers sometimes turn out to railway com-

126

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

panies, we are told by Mr. James E. Whit-
ney, in the Railway 2vnes, that, of a lot of
axles furnished to the Mobile & Ohio
Railroad Company, but one-fourth were ca-
pable of meeting the required test, and the
other three-fourths were returned to the
manufacturer. Mr. Whitney also says that
the duty of making these tests belongs to
the railway companies themselves, which
leaves them no valid excuse for the employ-
ment of defective materials.

Besides the use of poor iron, the resist-
ing power of the axle may also be lessened
by the method of manufacture. " The
ideal axle," says Mr. Whitney, " would have
its metal as dense as possible, and hence
would be shaped mainly by hammering. Its
fibres would run unbroken throughout its
length, and the tough outer skin, which in
wrought as in cast iron is much stronger
than that within, would be preserved in its
integrity." As now manufactured, a por-
tion of this is removed by turning, and the
axle proportionally weakened. The turn-
ing process is also carried to the formation
of sharp corners, which, as shown by Ran-
kin, eventually become the starting-points
of annular or circumferential grooves that
continue to deepen until the central por-
tion is too much diminished to bear the
shock of the unusual jar : " The ordinary
'tapping' will, in aggravated cases, enable
such a flaw to be detected, but no skill and
no care will guard against the slow but
sure approach of danger, because of the un-
necessary removal of a few annular chips
at the shoulder of the wheel-bearing, to
gratify the whim of the turner."

But, however strong originally, car-axles
always deteriorate with use, the constant
succession of jars to which they are subject
gradually impairing the strength of the iron.
The character of this change is not well
understood, and the only effective method
now known, of guarding against the danger
arising from it, is to throw the axle aside
after it has been run a certain number of
miles.

Bowlder-like Masses of Clay in Drift.

Masses of stratified gravel, similar in shape
to the clay-bowlders mentioned in the March
number of this monthly as occurring in the
drift of Long Island, were found during the

excavation of the Chicago Tunnel in the
drift under Lake Michigan. In the Ameri-
can Journal of Science for January, 1867,
Prof. E. Andrews thus describes tbem :
" They lay in all imaginable positions, some-
times with their strata set up at high an-
gles. They were from a few inches to a
few feet in diameter, and were embedded in
the solid, impervious clay nearly 80 feet
below the surface of the lake. The gravel
was water-worn, and often so clean that it
would scarcely soil a handkerchief. The
interstices commonly contained a few gal-
lons of water in the lower part, and some
air or gas in the upper. The gas was in
many instances inflammable. The pockets
scarcely leaked a drop when once emptied,
and the cavities looked exactly, in many
instances, like casts of rounded bowlders."
Prof. Andrews believes they were de-
posited as frozen masses which thawed after
they were embedded in the clay. This view
is corroborated by an experiment made two
years ago by Mr. E. Lewis, of Brooklyn.
During a period of cold weather he selected
an inlet of the sea through which the tidal
flow was rapid, and in which the water was
several degrees below freezing. The bot-
tom was frozen where the water was 10 feet
deep, but there was no ice on the surface.
A mass of frozen earth weighing about 50
pounds was sunk, by means of a cord, at the
deepest part of the inlet. Six days after-
ward this mass was unchanged, except that
its extreme surface was slightly soft and
moist. At the expiration of 30 days it was
again examined, and found to be somewhat
wasted. The temperature of the water
was then 3 above freezing. "If," says
Mr. Lewis, " this mass had been covered by
a quantity of sand or gravel, thrown down
upon it while frozen, it would have retained
its form ; and enormous masses of such ma-
terial are sometimes deposited suddenly
from floating ice and glaciers."

Marked Case of Heredity in Mastiffs.

Mr. Darwin communicates to Nature a let-
ter from Mr. Huggins on the hereditary
transmission, in a breed of mastiffs, of a
strong antipathy to butchers and butchers'
shops. Mr. Huggins owns a dog, " Kepler,"
whose sire was a celebrated mastiff, " Turk."
When " Kepler " was six months old he fol-

MISCELLANY

127

lowed a servant out on the street, and then
for the first time saw a butcher's shop. The
animal threw himself down, and could not
be induced to pass the place. The dog is
now nearly three years old, and the antipa-
thy has diminished somewhat, but not dis-
appeared. Mr. Huggins lately found that
" Kepler's " ancestor, " Turk," manifested
the same antipathy, and his former owner
was asked for information on the subject.
It now appears that this curious dislike for
butchers' shops and butchers was shown
equally by " Turk's " sire, " King " (in
whom it probably originated), and by
"Punch" and "Paris," sons of "Turk."
The antipathy is most marked in " Paris,"
who will hardly enter a street containing a
butcher's shop, and runs away after he has
passed it. If a butcher's cart comes to the
place where the dogs are kept, they are
filled with fright even though they do not
see the object of their fears. " Turk's "
owner, Mr. Nichols, then tells of two in-
stances where " Paris " gave evidence of
the most extraordinary sagacity in recog-
nizing a butcher under any circumstances.
One evening a boss-butcher, in ordinary
clothes, called to see " Paris," but had
scarcely entered the house when the dog
became unmanageable, and the visitor had
to leave without seeing him. On another
occasion tl Paris " sprang at a gentleman,
and, as it was the first exhibition he ever
had made of such viciousness, his owner
apologized, and said that the dog had never
before attacked any but butchers. The gen-
tleman was a butcher !

Since the publication of Mr. Huggins's
letter, several other communications have
appeared in Nature, showing that all the
dogs of this line inherit this instinctive
antipathy. Mr. H. G. Brooke writes of a
grandson of " Turk : " " Ever since he was
a pup he has evinced " this antipathy. A
brother of this dog of Mr. Brooke's shows
the same feeling, according to Mr. Arthur
Ransom, his owner.

Mr. Russel Wallace is inclined to think
that these dogs distinguish butchers from
other men by the sense of smell, which is
very acute in all dogs. He also thinks that
it it this sense which enables a dog to find
his way back from a distance, though on
first making the journey he had been blind-

folded, and so prevented from seeing his
way. Another correspondent of Nature,
writing in confirmation of Mr. Wallace's
view, tells of a cat's antipathy to dogs.
This animal would " swear," if only stroked
by a hand which had directly before touched
a dog. Mr. Darwin's purpose in calling at-
tention to the present case of heredity is,
to illustrate his theory of instinct as an ac-
quired and transmitted habit.

Changes in River-Bcds. In a report on
the subject of a water-supply for the village
of Tonkers, New York, published in the Jan-
uary number of the American Chemist, Prof.
J. S. Newberry furnishes some interesting
facts on the geology of river-beds, that will
be of general interest. He says : " It is prob-
ably known to you that most of the drain-
ing streams of all the region between the
Mississippi and the Atlantic are now ruu-
ning far above their ancient beds. This
fact was first revealed to me by the borings
made for oil in the valleys of the tributaries
of the Ohio. All these streams were found
to be flowing in valleys, once deeply exca-
vated but now partially filled, and, in some
instances, almost obliterated. Further in-
vestigation showed that the same was true
of the draining streams of New York and
the Atlantic slope. For example, the val-
ley of the Mohawk, for a large part of its
course, is filled with sand and gravel, to the
depth of over two hundred feet. In the
Hudson the water surface stands now prob-
ably five hundred feet above its ancient
level the old mouth of the Hudson and
the channel which leads to it being distinct-
ly traceable on the bottom nearly eighty
miles south and east of New York The
excavation of these deep channels could
only have been effected when the continent
was much higher than now. Subsequently
it was depressed so far that the ocean-
waters stood on the Atlantic coast from one
hundred to five hundred feet higher than
they now do. During this period of sub-
mergence the blue clays in the valley of the
Hudson the ' Champlain clays ' were de-
posited, and the valleys of all the streams
were more or less filled."

Dimensions of IVcw-England Glaciers.

The Glacial and Champlain Epochs in New

128

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

England is the subject of a learned paper,
by Prof. Dana, in the American Journal of
Scie?ice for March. From it we learn that
in Northern New England the glaciers were
from 5,000 to 6,500 feet in thickness. At
the White Mountains the ice-surface was
6,000 feet above the sea-level, and the mass
had a depth of nearly a mile. On Central
Long Island the surface of the glacier was
2,100 feet above the surface of the sea, and
in the Connecticut Valley 3,200 feet. The
slope of the ice-surface from the White
Mountains southward was about 24 feet to
the mile, and about 19 feet to the mile in
the Connecticut Valley. The glacier ex-
tended beyond the present coast-line, possi-
bly some 90 miles southward of Long Isl-
and. Its forward movement is thought to
have been one foot in a week, or about 100
miles in 10,000 years. The crushing and
erosive power of such an enormous mass
of ice may be appreciated when it is known
that, if 6,000 feet thick, it would lie upon
the earth with a pressure of about 300,000
pounds to each square foot.

NOTES.

A monument is to be erected in Bir-
mingham, England, to the memory of Dr.
Joseph Priestley. In his lifetime his heter-
odoxy disqualified him for a berth in one
of Captain Cook's ships, though he would
have been a most valuable aid to the com-
mander. The time has at length come
when England and America can do honor
to the man who " embraced what is called
the heterodox side of every question."

Five living sea-fish were recently sent by
mail from Naples to London, the journey
consuming a little over four days. The fish
were each about two inches in length, and
were packed in damp sea-weed, from which
all but one came out in good condition,
and, soon after being placed in their natural
element, became as lively as ever.

Prof. Leidt is of opinion that conta-
gion is frequently transferred from one sub-
ject to another by the agency of the com-
mon house-fly, and his observations in mili-
tary hospitals have led him to the conclu-
sion that flies should be carefully excluded
from wounds, particularly if gangrene is any-
where about.

Weltwitsch tells of a plant, an oxalis,
growing in Angola, Africa, which is so sen-
sitive that it closes its leaves on hearing (so
to speak) a footfall in its neighborhood.

A dying pauper in Ireland willed his
body to a surgeon for dissection. The
poor-law guardians are indignant, and de-
mand that the surgeon, who is medical
officer to the Board of Charities, resign.
The ground on which it is sought to annul
the pauper's will is, "undue influence."
This is probably the first case in which a
pauper's last will and testament is brought
into dispute.

Berlin has grown rich by war, but her
poor are growing poorer. About half of
the population live in dens which have usu-
ally two chalk-lines crossing each other on
the floor. A room is thus divided into four
compartments, one for the sleeping-place,
another for the nursery, the third is hired
to a lodger, and the fourth is kitchen, liv-
ing-room, and workshop.

A San Francisco paper says that oys-
ters can be imported into California from
Mexico at a cheaper rate than from New
York. The coast of Mexico, from Guaymas
to Acapulco, abounds in oysters of large
size and excellent flavor. They can be put
on board the Mexican steamers at Mazat-
lan, at less than $15 per ton, and the
freight thence to San Francisco would not
be over $10.

The following is in striking contrast to
the " devil-may-care " policy of our laws in
regard to the safety of railway -passengers :
In England it is against the law to attempt
to get on or off" a railway-train while in
motion, and, more than that, the law is en-
forced. Recently a young man nearly lost
his life in the attempt to board a train
which was slowly moving out of a station.
He was brought up for trial, and fined five
shillings with costs. A woman who stepped
off a moving train was also convicted, and,
having no money, was sent to jail for ten
days. Americans, about to travel in Eng-
land, may save some of their loose change
and perhaps their personal liberty, by mak-
ing note of this.

Prof. Voght records an instance of
what may be called self-cannibalism. He
cut in two a male cricket, and immediately
the fore part, probably experiencing a sen-
sation of emptiness in the ventral region,
turned upon the hinder part and devoured
it!

A French apothecary has discovered an
excellent and very cheap substitute for qui-
nine, in powdered laurel-leaf. The leaves
of the laurel (Laurvs nobilis) are slowly
dried over the fire in a close vessel, and
then powdered. One gramme (15| grains)
is a dose, and is taken in a glass of cold
water. The drug so taken produces no bad
effects, and soon, it is said, breaks up the
most obstinate intermittent fevers.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

JUNE, 1873.

THE CONSTITUTION OF NEBULAE.

By De. H. SCHELIsEN.i

WHEN the starry heavens are viewed through a telescope of
moderate power, a great number of stellar clusters and faint
nebulous forms are revealed against the dark background of the sky
which might be taken at first sight for passing clouds, but which, by
their unchanging forms and persistent appearance, are proved to be-
long to the heavenly bodies, though possessing a character widely dif-
fering from the point-like images of ordinary stars. Sir William Her-
schel was able, with his gigantic forty-foot telescope, to resolve many
of these nebula? into clusters of stars, and found them to consist of
vast groups of individual suns, in which thousands of fixed stars may
be clearly separated and counted, but which are so far removed from
us that we are unable to perceive their distance one from the other,
though that may really amount to many millions of miles, and their
light, with a low magnifying power, seems to come from a large, faint-
ly-luminous mass. But all nebulse were not resolvable with this tele-
scope, and, in proportion as such nebulae were resolved into clusters
of stars, new nebulse appeared which resisted a power of 6,000, and
suggested to this astute investigator the theory that, besides the
many thousand apparent nebulas which reveal themselves to us as a
complete and separate system of worlds, there are also thousands of
real nebulae in the universe composed of primeval cosmical matter out
of which future worlds were to be fashioned.

Lord Rosse, by means of a telescope of fifty-two feet focus, of his
own construction, was able to resolve into clusters of stars many of the
nebulae not resolved by Herschel ; but there were still revealed to the
eye, thus carried farther into space, new nebulae beyond the power
even of this gigantic telescope to resolve.

1 Abridged from Schellen's " Spectrum Analysis."
vol. m. 9

i 3 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Telescopes failed, therefore, to settle the question whether the un-
resolved nebulae are portions of the primeval matter out of which the

Fig. 1.

The Great Nebula in Orion.

existing stars have been formed ; they leave us in uncertainty as to
whether these nebulae were masses of luminous gas, which in the lapse
of ages would pass through the various stages of incandescent liquid

North.

Central and Most Brilliant Portion of the Great Nebula en the Sword-handle of
Orion, ab observed by Sir john Herschel in ma Twenty-foot Reflector at Feld-
. hausen, Cape of Good Hope (1834 to 1837).

THE CONSTITUTION OF NEBULjE. 131

(the sun and fixed stars), of scoriae or gradual formation of a cold and
non-luminous surface (the earth and planets), and finally of complete
gelation and torpidity (the moon), or whether they exist as a complete
and separate system of woi'lds; telescopes have only widened the
problem, and have neither simplified nor solved its difficulties.

That which was beyond the power of the most gigantic telescopes
has been accomplished by that apparently insignificant, but really
delicate, and almost infinitely sensitive instrument the spectroscope ;
we are indebted to it for being able to say with certainty that lumi-
nous nebulae actually exist as isolated bodies in space, and that these
bodies are luminous masses of gas.

The splendid edifice already planned by Kant in his " Theory of
the Heavens " (1755), and erected by Laplace forty-one years later, in
his " System of the Universe," has received its topmost stone through
the discoveries of the spectroscope. The spectroscope, in combina-
tion with the telescope, affords means for ascertaining even now some
of the phases through which the sun and planets have passed in their
process of development or transition from masses of luminous nebulae
to their present condition.

Great variety is observed in the forms of the nebulae : while some
are chaotic and irregular, and sometimes highly fantastic, others ex-

Fro. 3.

The Large Magellanic Cloud.

hibit the pure and beautiful forms of a curve, a crescent, a globe, or a
circle. A number of the most characteristic of these forms have been
photographed on glass at the suggestion of Mr. Huggins ; to these
have been added a few others, taken from accurate drawings by Lord

132 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Rosse; and they may all be projected on to a screen by means of the
electric or lime-light lantern, and made visible to a large audience.

The largest and most irregular of all the nebulae is that in the con-
stellation of Orion (Figs. 1, 2). It is situated rather below the three
stars of second magnitude composing the central part of that magnifi-
cent constellation, and is visible to the naked eye. It is extremely
difficult to execute even a tolerably correct drawing of this nebula ;
but it appears, from the various drawings made at different times, that
a change is taking place in the form and position of the brightest
portions. Fig. 2 represents the central and brightest part of the

Fig. 4.

Nebula of the Form of a Sickle.

nebula. Four bright stars, forming a trapezium, are situated in it,
one of which only is visible to the naked eye. The nebula surround-
ing these stars has a flaky appearance, and is of a greenish- white
color; single portions form long curved streaks stretching out in a
radiating manner from the middle and bright parts.

Much less irregularity is apparent in the great Magellanic or Cape
clouds (Fig. 3), which are two nebulae in the Southern Hemisphere, one
of them exceeding by five times the apparent size of the moon. They
are distinctly visible to the naked eye, and are so bright that they
serve as marks for reconnoitring the heavens, and for reckoning the
hour of the night.

THE CONSTITUTION OF NEBULAE.

33

The interest aroused by these irregular and chaotic nebulous forms
is still further increased by the phenomena of the spiral or convoluted
nebula? with which the giant telescopes of Lord Kosse and Mr. Bond
have made us further acquainted. As a rule, there stream out from

Fig. 5.

Spiral Nebula in Canes Venatici.

one or more centres of luminous matter innumerable curved nebulous
streaks, which recede from the centre in a spiral form, and finally lose
themselves in space. Fig. 4 represents a nebula in the form of a sickle
or comet-tail, and Fig. 5 shows the most remarkable of all the spiral
nebula?, situated in the constellation Canes Venatici.

Fig. 6.

Transition from the Spiral to the Annclar Form.

It is hardly conceivable that a system of such a nebulous form
could exist without internal motion. The bright nucleus, as well as
the streaks curving round it in the same direction, seems to indicate

134

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

an accumulation of matter toward the centre, with a gradual increase
of density, and a rotatory movement. But, if we combine with this
motion the supposition of an opposing medium, it is difficult to har-
monize such a system with the known laws of statics. Accurate meas-
ures are, therefore, of the highest interest for the purpose of showing

Annulab Nebula in Lyba.

whether actual rotation or other changes are taking place in these
uebulse; but, unfortunately, they are rendered extremely difficult and
uncertain by the want of outline, and by the remarkable faintness of
these nebulous objects.

Pio. 8.

Nebula with Seveeal Rings.

The transition state from the spiral to the annular form is shown
in such nebulae as the one represented in Fig. 6 ; and they then pass

THE CONSTITUTION OF NEBULJE.

135

into the simple or compound annular nebula of a type which is given
in Fig. 7.

The space within most of these elliptie rings is not perfectly dark,
but is occupied either by a diffused nebulous light, as in Fig. 1, or, as

Fig. 9.

Elliptical Annulab Nebula.

in most cases, by a bright nucleus, round which sometimes one ring,
sometimes several, are disposed in various forms. In Fig. 8 a represen-
tation is given of a compound annular nebula, with very elliptic rings
and bright nucleus.

Pig. 10.

Elongated Nebula.

According as the ring has its surface or its edge turned toward us,
or according as our line of sight is perpendicular or more or less
obliquely inclined to the surface of the ring, its form approaches that

3 6

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of a circle, a ring, an ellipse, or even a straight line. Nebulas of this
latter kind are represented in Fig. 9 and in Fig. 10. When an ellip-
tical ring is extremely elongated, and the minor axis is much smaller
than the major one, the densitj 7 and brightness of the ring diminish a&
its distance from the central nucleus increases ; and this takes place
to such a degree sometimes, that at the farthest points of the ring, the
ends of the major axis, it ceases to be visible, and the continuity seems
to be broken. The nebula has then the appearance of a double nebula,
with a central spot as represented in Figs. 11, 12.

Fig. 11.

Pig. 12.

Double Nebula.

Annular Nebula with Centre.

Those nebulas, which appear with tolerably sharply-defined edges
in the form of a circle or slight ellipse, seem to belong to a much higher
stage of development. From their resemblance to those planets which
shine with a pale or bluish light, they have been called planetary neb-
ulae ; in form, however, they vary considerably, some of them being

Fig. 13.

Planetart Nebula with Two Stars.

spiral and some annular. Some of these planetary nebulas are repre-
sented in Figs. 12, 14, 15. The first has two central stars or nuclei,
each surrounded by a dark space, beyond which the spiral streaks are
disposed ; the second has also two nuclei, but without clearly separable

THE CONSTITUTION OF NEBULAE.

137

dark spaces ; the third is without any nucleus, but shows a well-defined
ring of light.

The highest type of nebulae are certainly the stellar nebulae, in
which a tolerably well-defined bright star is surrounded by a com-
pletely rounded disk or faint atmosphere of light, which sometimes fades
away gradually into space, at other times terminates abruptly with

Fig. 14.

Fig. 15.

PLANETARY ANNULAR NEBULA WITH Two STAE8.

Planetary Nebula.

a sharp edge. Figs. 16 and 17 exhibit the most striking of these very
remarkable stellar nebulae : the first is surrounded by a system of rings
like Saturn, with the thin edge turned toward us; the second is a veri-
table star of the eighth magnitude, and is not nebulous, but is sur-
rounded by a bright luminous atmosphere perfectly concentric. To
the right of the star is a small dark space, such as often occurs in
these nebulae, indicating, perhaps, an opening in the surrounding at-
mosphere.

We have now passed in review all that is at present known of the
nebulae, so far as their appearance and form have been revealed by the
largest telescopes. The information as yet furnished by the spectro-
scope on this subject is certainly much less extensive, but is neverthe-

Fig. 16.

Fig. 17.

Planetary Nebula.

Stellar Nebula.

less of the greatest importance, since the spectroscope has power to
reveal the nature and constitution of these remote heavenly bodies.
It must here again be remembered that the character of the spectrum
not only indicates what the substance is that emits the light, but also

*3*

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

its physical condition. If the spectrum be a continuous one, consisting
of rays of every color or degree of refrangibility, then the source of light
is either a solid or liquid incandescent body ; if, on the contrary, the
spectrum be composed of bright lines only, then it is certain that the
light comes from luminous gas / finally, if the spectrum be continu-
ous, but crossed by dark lines interrupting the colors, it is an indica-
tion that the source of light is a solid or liquid incandescent body, but
that the light has passed through an atmosphere of vapors at a lower
temperature, which by their selective absorptive power have abstracted
those colored rays which they would have emitted had they been self-
luminous.

Fig. 18.

Spectrum of Nebula. 1

When Huggins first directed his telescope in August, 1864, to one
of these objects, a small but very bright nebula, he found, to his great
surprise, that the spectrum, instead of being a continuous colored
band, such as that given by a star, consisted only of three bright lines.

This one observation was sufficient to solve the long-vexed ques-
tion, at least for this particular nebula, and to prove that it is not a
cluster of individual, separable stars, but is actually a gaseous nebula,
a body of luminous gas. In fact, such a spectrum could only be pro-

Fio. 19.

Speotbum of Nebula compared with the Sun and some Teebestkial Elements.

duced by a substance in a state of gas ; the light of this nebula, there-
fore, was emitted neither by solid nor liquid incandescent matter, nor
by gases in a state of extreme density, as may be the case in the sun
and stars, but by luminous gas in a highly-rarefied condition.

In order to discover the chemical nature of this gas, Huggins fol-
lowed the usual methods of comparison, and tested the spectrum with

1 From Herschel's Catalogue, No. 4,374.

THE HYGIENE OF THE EAR. i 39

the Fraunhofer lines of the solar spectrum, and the bright lines of ter-
restrial elements. A glance at Fig. 19 will show at once the result of
this investigation. The brightest line (1) of the nebula coincides ex-
actly with the brightest line (N) of the spectrum of nitrogen, which is
a double line. The faintest of the nebular lines (3) also coincides with
the bluish-green hydrogen Hue H0, or, which is the same thing, with
the Fraunhofer line F in the solar spectrum. The middle line (2) of
the nebula was not found to coincide with any of the bright lines of
the thirty terrestrial elements with which it has been compared ; it
lies not far from the barium line Ba, but is not coincident with it.

THE HYGIENE OF THE EAR.

By JAMES HINTON,

AUBAL SURGEON TO GUY'S HOSPITAL, LONDON.

IT is natural that we should regard with an intense curiosity all the
faculties with which our bodily frame is gifted, and that we should
desire to preserve them as perfectly as possible. The following re-
marks are designed to do something toward gratifying that curiosity
with regard to one of the most important of our powers, and to give a
few hints in respect to things that are hurtful to it.

Our popular physiologies teach us that there is a tube leading from
the drum of the ear into the throat, called, from its discoverer Eus-
tachius, the "Eustachian tube." The use of this tube is twofold.
First, it supplies the drum with air, and keeps the membrane exactly
balanced, and free to move, with equal air-pressure on each side ; and,
secondly, it carries off any fluid which may be in the drum, and pre-
vents it from being choked by its own moisture. It is not always
open, however, but is opened during the act of swallowing, by a little
muscle which is attached to it just as it reaches the throat. Most per-
sons can distinctly feel that this is the case, by gently closing the nose
and swallowing ; when a distinct sensation is felt in the ears. This
sensation is*due to a little air being drawn out of the ears through the
open tube during swallowing ; and it lasts for a few minutes, unless
the air is again restored by swallowing with the nose unclosed, which
allows for the moment a free communication between the ear and the
throat. We thus see a reason for the tube being closed. If it were
always open, all the sounds produced in the throat would pass directly
into the drum of the ear, and totally confuse us. We should hear
every breath, and live in a constant bewilderment of internal sounds.
At the same time the closure, being but a light contact of the walls of
the tube, easily allows a slight escape of air from the drum, and thus
not only facilitates and regulates the oscillations of the air before the

140 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

vibrating membrane, but provides a safety-valve, to a certain extent,
against the injurious influence of loud sounds.

The chief use of the Eustachian tube is to allow a free interchange
of air between the ear and the throat, and this is exceedingly impor-
tant ; and it is very important also that its use in this respect should
be understood. Persons who go down in diving-bells soon begin to
feel a great pressure in the ears, and, if the depth is great, the feeling
becomes extremely painful. This arises from the fact that in the
diving-bell the pressure of the air is very much increased, in order to
balance the weight of the water above ; and thus it presses with great
force upon the membrane of the drum, which, if the Eustachian tube
has been kept closed, has only the ordinary uncompressed air on the
inner side to sustain it. It is therefore forced inward and put upon
the stretch, and might be even broken. Many cases, indeed, have
occurred of injury to the ear, producing permanent deafness, from
descents in diving-bells, undertaken by persons ignorant of the way in
which the ear is made; though the simple precaution of frequent swal-
lowing suffices to ward off all mischief. For, if the Eustachian tube is
thus opened, again and again, as the pressure of the outside air in-
creases, the same compressed air that exists outside passes also into
the inside of the drum, and the membrane is equally pressed upon from
both sides by the air, and so is free from strain. The same precaution
is necessary in ascending mountains that are lofty, for then there is
the same effect of stretching produced upon the membrane, though in
the opposite way. The outside air becoming less and less condensed
as a greater height is gained, the ordinary air contained within the
drum presses upon the membrane, which is thus insufficiently sup-
ported on the outside, and a similar feeling of weight and stretching is
produced. The conjurer's trick of breaking a vase by a word rests on
the same principle. The air is exhausted from within, and the thin,
though massive-looking sides of the vase collapse by the pressure of
the air outside ; and, just as ever so small a hole, made at the right
moment in the side of the vase, would prevent the whole effect, so does
swallowing, which makes a little hole, as it were, for the moment in
the drum of the ear, prevent the in-pressing or out-pressing of the
membrane. Mr. Tyndall, in his interesting book " On Soifhd," tells us
how he employed this precaution of swallowing, and with entire suc-
cess, when, in one of his mountain excursions, the pressure on his ears
became severely painful.

Deafness during colds arises very often, though not always, from a
similar cause. For, when, owing to swelling of the throat, the Eu-
stachian tube cannot be opened by its muscle, and so the air in the
drum is not renewed, the air that is contained in it soon diminishes,
and the outer air presses the membrane in, so that it cannot vibrate as
it should. This is what has been sometimes called " throat-deafness."

There are several things very commonly done which are extremely

THE HYGIENE OF THE EAR. 141

injurious to the ear, and ought to be carefully avoided. Those who
have followed the previous description will easily understand the
reason.

And first, children's ears ought never to be boxed. We have seen
that the passage of the ear is closed by a thin membrane, especially
adapted to be influenced by every impulse of the air, and with nothing
but the air to support it internally. What, then, can be more likely
to injure this membrane than a sudden and forcible compression of the
air in front of it ? If any one designed to break or overstretch the
membrane, he could scarcely devise a more effective means than to
bring the hand suddenly and forcibly down upon the passage of the
ear, thus driving the air violently before it, with no possibility for its
escape but by the membrane giving way. And far too often it does
give way, especially if, from any previous disease, it has been weak
ened. Many children are made deaf by boxes on the ear in this way.
Nor is this the only way : if there is one thing which does the nerve
of hearing more harm than almost any other, it is a sudden jar or
shock. Children and grown persons alike may be entirely deafened by
falls or heavy blows upon the head. And boxing the ears produces
a similar effect, though more slowly and in less degree. It tends to
dull the sensibility of the nerve, even if it does not hurt the membrane.
I knew a pitiful case, once, of a poor youth who died from a terrible
disease of the ear. He had had a discharge from it since he was a
child. Of course his hearing had been dull : and what had happened
was that his father had often boxed his ear for inattention! Most
likely that boxing on the ear, diseased as it was, had much to do with
his dying. And this brings me to the second point. Children should
never be blamed for being inattentive, until it has been found out
whether they are not a little deaf. This is easily done by placing them
at a few yards' distance, and trying whether they can understand
what is said to them in a rather low tone of voice. Each ear should
be tried, while the other is stopped by the finger. I do not say that
children are never guilty of inattention, especially to that which they
do not particularly wish to hear; but I do say that very many children
are blamed and punished for inattention when they really do not hear.
And there is nothing at once more cruel and more hurtful to the char-
acter of children than to be found fault with for what is really their
misfortune. Three things should be remembered here: 1. That slight
degrees of deafness, often lasting only for a time, are very common
among children, especially during or after colds. 2. That a slight
deafness, which does not prevent a person from hearing when he is
expecting to be spoken to, will make him very dull to what he is not
expecting ; and, 3. That there is a kind of deafness in which a person
can hear pretty well while listening, but is really very hard of hearing
when not listening.

The chief avoidable cause of deafness is catching cold, and what-

142 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ever keeps us from colds helps us to preserve our hearing. We should
do, therefore, those things that help to keep colds away: for which
the first is taking plenty of fresh air; the second using enough, but
not too much, cold water all over us, taking especial care to rub our-
selves thoroughly dry, and never to let it chill us ; and the third is to
avoid draughts, and wet, especially sitting in wet clothes, or being in
close or very heated rooms. But there are some kinds of cold espe-
cially hurtful to the ear. One is sitting with the ear exposed to a side
wind, as too many people do now on the roofs of omnibuses, and so
on. We should always face the wind ; then, if we are not chilled, it is
hard to have too much of it. Another hurtful thing is letting rain or
sleet drive into the ear, against which, if it were not that people do
sometimes suffer from this cause, it would seem as if it could hardly be
necessary to caution them.

Another source of danger to the ear, however, arises from the very
precautions which are sometimes taken against those last mentioned.
Nothing is more natural than to protect the ear against cold by cover-
ing it by a piece of cotton-wool ; and this is most useful if it is done
only on occasions of special exposure, as when a person is compelled
to encounter a driving storm, or has to receive on one side of the head
the force of a cutting wind. But it is astonishing in how many cases
the cotton-wool thus used, instead of being removed from the ear
when the need for it has passed, is pushed down into the passage, and
remains there, forming itself an obstruction to hearing, and becoming
the cause of other mischiefs. Three separate pieces have sometimes
been found thus pushed down, one upon the other. Paper rolled up,
which is also used for protecting the ear when cotton-wool is not at
hand, is still more irritating when it is thus left unremoved. The way
to avoid this accident, besides being careful not to forget, is to use a
large piece of wool, and to place it over, rather than in, the passage.

It should be remembered that constantly covering up the ear is
adapted to injure it. On the whole, men in whom the ear is habitually
exposed, suffer if any thing less from ear-disease than women, in whom
it is so often covered. Nor can the " hat " be held an unsafe head-
dress in this respect for the latter sex. But it is important that there
should not be frequent changes, especially in cold weather, from a
head-dress which covers to one which exposes the ear. It is better
that the air should always have free access to it ; but if this has not
been the case, the summer should be chosen to make the change.

All sorts of substances are sometimes put into the ear by children,
who do it to themselves or to each other in ignorant play. If every
parent and teacher warned his children against doing this, it would not
be a useless precaution. When the accident happens, the chief danger
is that of undue haste and violence. Such bodies should be removed
by syringing with warm water alone, and no attempt should be made
to lay hold of them or move them in any other way. It is enough to

THE HYGIENE OF THE EAR. 143

reflect, again, that the passage of the ear is closed by a delicate mem-
brane to show the reason for this rule. When no severe pain follows,
no alarm need be felt. It is important that the substance should be
removed as speedily as is quite safe, but there need never be impa-
tience ; nor should disappointment be felt if syringing needs to be
repeated on many days before it effects its end. It will almost in-
variably succeed at last in the hands of a medical man, and is most
effective if the ear is turned downward and syringed from below.

Now and then an insect gets into the ear and causes great pain ;
the way to get rid of it is to pour oil into the ear. This suffocates the
insect.

There is another danger arising from boyish sports. Snowballs
sometimes strike the ear, and the snow remaining in it sets up inflam-
mation. This danger is increased by a practice which should be inad-
missible, of mixing small stones with the snow, which thus effect a
lodgment in the ear.

Among the causes of injury to the ear must unfortunately be
reckoned bathing. Not that this most healthful and important pleas-
ure need, therefore, be in the least discouraged ; but it should be wisely
regulated. Staying too long in the water certainly tends to produce
deafness as well as other evils ; and it is a practice against which
young persons of both sexes should be carefully on their guard. But,
independently of this, swimming and floating are attended with a cer-
tain danger from the difficulty of preventing the entrance of water
into the ear in those positions. Now, no cold fluid should ever enter
the ear ; cold water is always more or less irritating, and, if used for
syringing, rapidly produces extreme giddiness. In the case of warm
water its entrance into the ear is less objectionable, but even this is
not free from disadvantage. Often the water lodges in the ears and
produces an uncomfortable sensation till it is removed : this should al-
ways be taken as a sign of danger. That the risk to hearing from
unwise bathing is not a fancy, is proved by the fact, well known to
lovers of dogs, that those animals, if in the habit of jumping or being
thrown into the water, so that their heads are covered, frequently be-
come deaf. A knowledge of the danger is a sufficient guard. To be
safe it is only necessary to keep the water from entering the ear. If
this cannot be accomplished otherwise, the head may be covered. It
should be added, however, that wet hair, whether from bathing or
washing, may be a cause of deafness, if it be suffered to dry by itself.
Whenever wetted, the hair should be wiped till it is fairly dry. Nor
ought the practice of moistening the hair with water, to make it curl, to
pass without remonstrance. To leave wet hair about the ears is to run
great risk of injuring them. In the washing of children, too, care
should be taken that all the little folds of the outer ear are carefully
and gently dried with a soft towel.

But I come now to what is probably the most frequent way in which

i 4 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the ear is impaired : that is, by the attempt to clean it. It ought to
be understood that the passage of the ear does not require cleaning
by us. Nature undertakes that task, and, in the healthy state, fulfils it
perfectly. Her means for cleansing the ear is the wax. Perhaps the
reader has never wondered what becomes of the ear-wax. I will tell
him. It dries up into thin fine scales, and these peel off, one by one,
from the surface of the passage, and fall out imperceptibly, leaving
behind them a perfectly clean, smooth surface. In health the passage
of the ear is never dirty ; but, if we attempt to clean it, we infallibly
make it so. Here by a strange lack of justice, as it would seem,
which, however, has no doubt a deep justice at the bottom the best
people, those who love cleanliness, suffer most, and good and careful
nurses do a mischief negligent ones avoid. "Washing the ear out with
soap and water is bad ; it keeps the wax moist when it ought to be-
come dry and scaly, increases its quantity unduly, and makes it absorb
the dust with which the air always abounds. But the most hurtful
thing is introducing the corner of the towel, screwed up, and twisting
it round. This does more harm to ears than all other mistakes together.
It drives down the wax upon the membrane, much more than it gets it
out. Let any one who doubts this make a tube like the passage,
especially with the curves which it possesses ; let him put a thin mem-
brane at one end, smear its inner surface with a substance like the ear-
wax, and then try to get it out so by a towel ! But this plan does
much more mischief than merely pressing down the wax. It irritates
the passage, and makes it cast off small flakes of skin, which dry up,
and become extremely hard, and these also are pressed down upon the
membrane. Often it is not only deafness which ensues, but pain and
inflammation, and then matter is formed which the hard mass prevents
from escaping, and the membrane becomes diseased, and worse may
follow. The ear should never be cleaned out with the screwed-up corner
of a towel. Washing should extend only to the outer surface, as far
as the finger can reach.

Ear-pjlcks, again, are bad. If there is any desire to use them, it
shows that the ear is unhealthy ; and it wants soothing, not picking.
And there is another danger from introducing any solid thing into the
ear. The hand may^get a push, and it may go too far. Many is the
membrane that has thus been broken by a bodkin. Sportsmen some-
times have their membrane pierced by turning suddenly while getting
through a hedge. And it even happens that a boy at school may put
a pen close to another's ear, in play, and call to him to make him turn
his head ; and the pen pierces the membrane. Very loud sounds may
cause deafness, too. Artillerymen, and also eager sportsmen, and very
zealous volunteers, incur a danger from this cause. It is well to stop
the ears when exposed to loud sounds, if possible ; also to avoid bel-
fries when the bells are about to ring. A man who was once shut up
in one became stone-deaf before the peal was done. The sound of guns

THE HYGIENE OF THE EAR. 145

is more injurious to those who are in a confined space with them, and
also if the mouth be open. Injury from loud sounds, also, is much
more likely to occur if they are unexpected ; for, if they are anticipated,
the membrane is prepared for them, without our knowledge, by its
muscles. At certain points on the Rhine, it is, or was, the custom of
the captain of the steamboat to fire a small cannon, to exhibit the echo.
When this has been done without due warning, it has proved more
than once a cause of lasting deafness. Sometimes these loud sounds
rupture the membrane ; sometimes they deaden the nerve : the former
is the least evil.

It is a bad practice, also, to put cotton-wool soaked in laudanum or
chloroform into the ear for the relief of toothache. It may be some-
times effectual, for the nervous connection between the teeth and the
ear is very close. But the ear is far too delicate and valuable an organ
to be used as a medium for the application of strong remedies for dis-
orders of other and less important parts ; and laudanum, and more
especially chloroform, is a powerful irritant. The teeth should be
looked after in and for themselves, and, if toothache spreads to the ear,
that is the more reason for taking them thoroughly in hand ; for pro-
longed pain in the head, arising from the teeth, may itself injure the
hearing. When a child's ear becomes painful, as it so often does,
every thing should be done to soothe it, and all strong, irritating appli-
cations should be avoided. Pieces of hot fisc or onion should not be
put in ; but warm flannels should be applied, with poppy-fomentation,
if the pain does not soon subside. How much children suffer from
their ears, unpitied because unknown, it would probably wring the
hearts of those who love them suddenly to discover. It is often very
hard, even for medical men, to ascertain that the cause of a young
child's distress is seated in the ear, and frequently a sudden discharge
from it, with a cessation of pain, first reveals the secret of a myste-
rious attack which has really been an inflammation of the drum. The
watchfulness of a parent, however, would probably suffice to detect the
cause of suffering, if directed to this point, as well as to others. If
children cry habitually when their ears are washed, that should not be
neglected ; there is, most likely, some cause of pain. Many mem-
branes are destroyed from discharges which take place during " teeth-
ing." Whenever there is a discharge of matter from the ear, it would
be right to pour in warm water night and morning, and so at least to
try and to keep it clean. But into the treatment of diseases of the ear
it would not be suitable to enter here. Abridged from the People's
Magazine.

VOL. III. 10

146 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ECONOMY OF RAILWAY LOCOMOTION.

By J. W. GROVER, C. E.

THE primary conception of a railway is a perfectly smooth, level,
and straight road, upon which friction is reduced to the minimum,
so that heavy loads may be propelled with the least possible resist-
ance, and at the highest rate of speed.

The earliest type of locomotive-engine was designed to run upon
such straight and level roads, and it was supposed for many years that
locomotives could not climb hills, or be made to go round corners.

The first railway-carriages were a simple modification of the stage-
coaches, names and all. It is interesting to look at the curious three-
bodied "Marquis of Stafford" with yellow panels and windows,
filled with ladies in large coal-scuttle bonnets as shown in one of
Ackermann's early engravings of the Liverpool and Manchester Rail-
way, the only substantial diiference being that, inasmuch as the rail-
ways of those days were made nearly straight, no arrangement was
provided for allowing the axles of the carriage to radiate as they do
partially in common road-vehicles, but both axles were rigidly fast-
ened so as to be immovable.

Again, as all road-vehicles have to turn abrupt corners, their wheels
are made to turn independently upon their axles, but, so soon as flanges
were employed to keep the wheels of the railway-carriages between
two straight rails, this arrangement was found unnecessary, and, to
obtain greater strength and security, the wheels were rigidly fastened
to the axle, and both were compelled to revolve together.

Now, since the primary conception of the perfectly smooth, straight
road, a great degeneracy has been of necessity taking place ; with
greatly increased demands, less capital than ever has been forthcom-
ing ; consequently the great cuttings and embankments of early days
are being abandoned as precedents, and it becomes necessary that rail-
ways should approach more closely to the form of ordinary roads,
which follow the surface of the ground only, at small cost.

Hence it follows that the rolling-stock itself must revert more
nearly to its original pattern, readopting those contrivances which,
under altered circumstances, were discarded.

Let lis keep to the most elementary principles, for it is these which
are forgotten and misunderstood, and yet should be engraven on brass
and hung up in every railway board-room in the world. On a com-
mon road, a horse can pull a ton weight in a cart behind him on
the level at 4 to A\ miles an hour, or, which is the same thing, if a
weight of 70 lbs. were hung over a pulley and lowered down a well,
he could pull it up at the speed mentioned. It is necessary to be a

ECONOMY OF RAILWAY LOCOMOTION. i 47

little explicit, as the remarks in this paper are intended for non-tech-
nical readers particularly. Now, if two strips of iron called rails are
laid upon the aforesaid road, the friction is reduced sevenfold ; that is
to say, the same horse at the same speed could draw 7 tons, the differ-
ence between macadam and iron being as 70 lbs. to 10 lbs. This im-
mense advantage, however, disappears when gradients have to be en-
countered, because the resistance due to gravity becomes so greatly in
excess of the resistance due to friction, and is constant in both cases.
For instance, if on a common road, up a slope of one foot in ten, the
horse takes 5 cwt. in a cart over the macadam, if rails be laid down up
the same hill, he could only increase the burden behind him by a little
more than 1 cwt., or, in all, Q\ cwts. ; hence, in this case, the value of
the rails is nearly lost. Hence the small use of tramways where hills
occur.

Upon a very good macadamized road the resistance due to friction
is usually taken at about one-thirtieth of the whole load carried ; that
is to say, if the vehicle were put upon a road sloping 1 in 30, it would
just begin to move of itself. But, upon a railway, under the most fa-
vorable conditions, the resistance due to friction has been reduced to
the two-hundred-and-eightieth part of the whole load carried ; that is
to say, the vehicle will begin to move of itself on a gradient of 1 in
280. In considering the work which a horse can perform on a tram-
way, it is important to bear in mind the question of speed ; for, accord-
ing to the experiments of Tredgold, he can draw exactly four times as
much at two miles an hour as he can at five, and it appears that, at
three miles an hour, be does the greatest amount of actual useful work,
whereas, at ten miles an hour, only one-fourth of his actual power is
available, and he cannot exert that for an hour and a half; whereas, at
two and a half miles an hour, he can continue working for eight hours.
Having these data before us, it is easy to compare the values of steam
and horse-flesh : Suppose coals to cost in the midland districts 18s. 8c?.
a ton only, or one-tenth of a penny per pound, and, assuming that an
average locomotive-engine will not consume more than 5 lbs. of conl in
the hour per horse-power, the cost of fuel per horse-power will be a
halfpenny per hour. Taking the value of the horse's provender at
Is. 9d. a day only, and supposing he works for six hours, that would
cost Z\d. an hour against a halfpenny in the case of steam, or, as 7 to 1
in favor of steam; and this result is obtained on the supposition that
the horse travels only at three miles an hour.

Now, to sum up the combined advantages, therefore, of an engine
on a level railway against a horse on a level common road at 10 miles
an hour, we shall find that the former gives an economy over the latter
of nearly 300 to 1 ; at 5 miles an hour, it would stand as 115 to 1 ;
and, at 2^ miles an hour, as 64 to 1.

Such are the enormous advantages of steam and rails, and with
them does it not seem astonishing that better financial results have

148 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

not been obtained? There must be something wrong somewhere. As
Art emus Ward says, " Why is this thus, and what is the reason of
this thusness ? "

Speed is the delinquent, and the cause of the loss of the great pri-
mary advantages : the vehicles on railways are propelled very fast ;
hence they involve great strength in their construction, and enormous
w T eight in proportion to the paying load carried.

An old stage-coach, according to Nicholas Wood, weighed only 16
to 18 cwts., and would carry upward of 2 tons of paying passengers
with their luggage, or about T % of a hundred-weight of dead load to
every hundred-weight of paying load. Now, a third-class carriage
with four compartments would represent 2.8 cwts. of dead weight to
every 1 cwt. of paying load. Therefore, the stage-coach has the ad-
vantage over the third-class railway-carriage of 6^ to 1.

It becomes impossible to institute any absolute comparison between
roads and railways at speeds above 10 miles an hour, because such
speeds are impossible on the former for any considerable distance.
Again, the question of a gradient has to be noticed, for in the preced-
ing remarks a level road and a level railway have only been con-
sidered.

As has been explained, where steep gradients occur, the resistance
due to gravity so much outweighs that due to friction that rails afford
a comparatively insignificant advantage, and one which is entirely lost
if the stock has to be increased in weight 6^ times.

It may easily be shown that, on a gradieut of 1 in 10, for instance,
taking the foregoing figures, the advantages of a steam-worked rail-
wav over a horse-worked road would be little more than one-fourth,
if the stock on the former be only 6^ times heavier in proportion than
the latter would require. Hence it follows that no railway having
gradients of 1 in 10 could be worth making (assuming such to be pos-
sible) unless the stock upon it were assimilated to that of the ordinary
omnibus or stage-coach type.

In former times calculations were made by Nicholas Wood of the
comparative costs of conveyance on ordinary roads by horses; he
showed that on an average a stage-wagon could carry at the rate of
2 miles an hour profitably at 8c?. a ton per mile ; that a light van or
cart at 4 miles an hour could take for Is. a mile a ton of goods. Pas-
sengers in stage-coaches were charged 3c?. a mile each, or 3s. 6c?. a ton,
at 9 miles an hour. Now, let us consider what railways actually do.
At the present moment coals are conveyed at -fc?. per ton per mile, at
an average speed of 20 miles an hour; and this low rate actually
leaves a profit. Excursion-trains take passengers at less than \d. each
per mile, at twenty miles an hour, or at Id. a ton a mile.

Now, bearing in mind the relative proportions of paying and non-
paying loads involved in carrying passengers and coals, a simple cal-
culation will show that a ton of passengers could be carried for

INSTINCT IN INSECTS.

149

something less than id. a mile, or T ^ part of a penny each. For,
although passengers require station accommodation, they unload
themselves, which coals do not.

In the autumn of 1869, the Times took up the railway problem,
and, in a series of very able articles, endeavored to show the errors of
the present state of things. Although advocated by so powerful a
pen, the reforms still remain unaccomplished indeed, uucommenced.
It was then shown that in practice every passenger on a railway in-
volved over 2 tons of iron and timber to carry him. Or, according
to Mr. Haughton, no more than 30 per cent, of the load which is
hauled by a goods-train represents paying weight, the remaining 70
per cent, being dead weight. This seems astonishing truly, but it is
nothing to the passenger-trains, where only 5 per cent., or even less,
of the load pays, the remaining 95 per cent, being made up of ap-
parently dead and unprofitable material. It is well to keep this clearly
in view. In talking about a passenger, with relation to a railway, one
must not picture to one's self a respectable English country gentleman,
riding perhaps some 14 stone, but some Homeric giant, magnified into
prehistoric proportions, weightier than an ordinary Ceylonese elephant,
and representing about 20 to 25 full sacks of coal, or 2^ tons. Ab-
stract from Quarterly Journal of Science.

INSTINCT IN INSECTS.

By GEORGE POUCHET.

TRANSLATED BY A. R. MACDONOUGH, ESQ.
II.

LET us now dwell a little on two grand facts presented to us by
the animated world, these two properties of living beings equally
undeniable and unintelligible in their essence habit, and hereditary
tendency ; and let us see how, in Darwin's theory, they will combine
with intelligence. As the theory is well known, we need not state it.
Cuvier believed in the unchangeableness of the animal forms placed
on the globe by the Creator after each of the great convulsions through
which, as he held, our planet has passed. Modern geology questions
these violent commotions, and Darwin, taking up in his turn Lamarck's
ideas, after fifty years of scientific progress, maintains, by almost irre-
sistible arguments, that animal forms, instead of being unchangeable, as
Cuvier supposed, are slowly modified, under the control of time, of cir-
cumstances, and of the energies with which each individual and each
race "fight the battle of existence." That individual which brings
into life a slight yet advantageous modification of its organs will sue-

150 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ceed better in life than another. It will have every chance, then, of
leaving a more numerous posterity. If the advantageous modification
is transmitted, which may occur through hereditary tendency, the de-
scendants of this individual will have, in their turn, the chance of suc-
ceeding better than their contemporaries. The modification, then, in
all probability, will go on becoming more general, by the same law of
fatality that causes a strong people to absorb a weak one: so that,
after a longer or shorter time, the whole race will end by presenting
the modification which was only individual at the outset. And since
there was no reason why the same phenomenon, so natural and so
simple, should not be repeated indefinitely, with all imaginable varia-
tions, we understand how it may result, in the infinite lapse of time, in
that multiplicity of forms and characters which distinguishes animal
species to our eyes.

Darwin says, in those pages in which he treats of instinct, that, if it
were possible to prove that a habit might become hereditary, all distinc-
tion between habit and instinct would absolutely vanish. Darwin's lit-
erary procedure is that of always urging his reader further than he
seems to go himself. He suggests the best arguments in the world with
a doubtful air, and one is every moment surprised to find one's self so
strongly convinced when the author seems convinced so little. And,
in fact, we cannot deny that young puppies often come to a point the
very first time they are sent out hunting, and that even better than
others after long training. The habit of saving life is hereditary in
some breeds, just as the shepherd's dog has the habit of walking around
the flock. All these acts are performed, without the aid of experience,
by the young as well as the old, and certainly apart from any notion
of the object at the first time, at least. The objection is idle that
only those habits imposed by men on brutes are transmitted in this
way. More than one instance, taken from wild animals, proves the
contrary. The best is perhaps that which we see clone by a bird of
our own country, the oriole. It has a very peculiar cradle-shaped nest,
hung from the fork of a branch, sewed at the edges with flexible grass,
and always with bits of string, shreds, or packthread. There is no
oriole's nest without some fastening worked by man's hand. If this is
a habit, it is hereditary ; if it is an instinct, it will be admitted at least
that it does not go back to the beginning of the world.

From birth, one individual, or several individuals of the same spe-
cies, placed in similar conditions,. have had some habit. One of two
things : this habit is injurious, or it is useful ; it is either good or bad,
from the point of view of the preservation of the individual, and con-
sequently of the species. If it is injurious, it necessarily tends to dis-
appear, either with the individual which has taken it on, or with the
descendants which will inherit from it. If the habit is favorable, it
has the chance of transmitting itself under the form of an instinct.
This instinct, at first confined to a few individuals of the same blood,

INSTINCT IN INSECTS. l$l

tends to become general, since it is advantageous, and we thus fall
back into a particular case of the great principle of natural selection
formulated by Darwin. Let us go on. Thus far this instinct is but
little complicated, since it has only the significance of a habit that one
individual may have been able to take up with its share of intelli-
gence. Now that it is seen rooted under the form of instinct, each in-
dividual in its turn, with its own share of intelligence, may be able to
add something to it of its own accord. If that addition is still favor-
able, and again gets transmitted, it will tend in the same way to be-
come general ; the acquired instinct will grow so much the more com-
plex ; and, exactly as organic modifications scarcely perceptible, but
accumulated successively, to a sufficient number, have been able to
multiply animal forms infinitely, so instinct, by almost imperceptible
but continuous additions, may be able to end by reaching that state of
perfection in which philosophers had supposed they saw the convincing
proof of a preestablished harmony.

Some naturalists even now are not, very fortunately, inspired when
they attempt to prove to us that the corporeal organization of every
animal is conceived and framed with regard to its instincts. We need
not go far to learn, as indeed we might expect from what has gone be-
fore, that instinct is in many cases independent of external forms. All
birds, whether they are masons, like the swallow ; weavers, like the
warbler; carpenters, like the crow ; mound-builders, like the megapode
have the same beak, the same claws, and forms almost the same.
The European beaver, inhabiting the affluents of the Rhone and the
Danube, is scarcely to be distinguished from the American beaver, yet
he has quite a different kind of work to do. The American beaver,
on his lakes and great, lonely rivers, builds the famous houses so well
known ; the European beaver burrows long galleries underground in
the manner of moles. If he has always done so, what becomes of that
supposed necessary correlation between the organs and the instinct of
a burrowing animal on one continent, a building animal on the other,
with the same members for two objects so different ? If the European
beaver did once build huts, where shall we find more decisive testimony
in favor of the theory of mutability in instincts ? Pursued for his
warm covering and his flesh, he has changed his instincts, before in-
vading civilization, more rapidly than his external form. It is a point
well established at this day that the contact with man has had a deci-
sive effect on the instinct of many animals. It is thus that in inhabited
countries large birds take flight at his approach, while they still allow
him to come close to them in countries visited by travellers for the
first time. Wherever they have been hunted like a prey that is worth
the trouble of pursuit for their flesh or their feathers, they have formed
the habit, and then have had the instinct of taking flight.

Let us return to insects. Two instincts, the most remarkable among
all, are presented by them ; that of the bee, with its mathematical

i 5 2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

architecture, and that of the ant, with its mixed societies. Before in-
quiring whether it might not be possible to explain even such amazing
instincts by habit and inherited tendency, it is important at the outset
to remove an objection that might be supposed unanswerable. Those
individuals that have these instincts in the hive or in the ant-hill are
neuters that is to say, they are neither male nor female, and must
consequently die without posterity. How explain the way in which a
habit acquired by a neuter can be transmitted, can grow into an in-
stinct, in the neuters of following generations, which will not descend
from that first one? Yet the difficulty is not so great as it seems, and
Darwin points it out very well. Indeed, it is not the instincts of the
neuters which concern him, but it is the special organic modifications
that these present, in connection with their social duties with some,
labor, and with others, fighting ; but the reasoning he employs can be
applied as well to instincts, behind which there always apj>ears, as we
see by a little reflection, that latent modification of the cerebral organ
through which the transmission has taken place.

Darwin begins with a reminder that the principle of natural selec-
tion is true as well for communities as for individuals. The strength of
a single male in a wild herd, the extraordinary fecundity of a single fe-
male, will be the elements of prosperity. The herd will succeed better
than the rest. The qualities of the individual from which it draws its
advantage will have a chance of being transmitted at first to all the
herd, and this, more and more favored in the struggle against the
outer world, will absorb the rest. The modification, at first individual,
will become general. It would be the same if the member of the herd
benefited in the beginning had been a neuter. We are still speaking
of external forms. Let us suppose that a certain number of neuters
may have brought from birth a favorable organic modification into a
community of insects, and that by this the community has prospered ;
the males and females who have produced these neuters will then have,
by them, the greatest possible chances of posterity. It may happen
thenceforward that they transmit to their descendants what they had
themselves that is to say, the property of procreating neuters having
the same favorable organic modification and we thus fall back into
the common process of natural selection. Such is Darwin's explana-
tion ; he is well aware, when he gives it, complex as it is, that it is the
touchstone of his theory, the side whence attack will come ; therefore,
how he strengthens his arguments ! He is no longer satisfied with ex-
plaining, he demonstrates ; he is supposed to have exhausted his rea-
sons, and this is the very moment he chooses for an appeal to experi-
ment, and to the proof of that kind of paradox that might be called
"hereditary tendency in sterility." There are oxen with horns a little
longer than those of the bulls and heifers that produced them. " Well,"
says Darwin, "pair together, by attentive selection, the fertile de-
scendants of the bulls and heifers that produced the oxen w 7 ith longer

INSTINCT IN INSECTS. 153

horns, and before long you will have a race of oxen in which length
of horns will he hereditary, although the animal is sterile." The ex-
periment has yet to be made, and is worthy of being a temptation to
some one of the great English lords who know so well how to spend
their fortunes for the advance of science. There is every reason to
believe that it would succeed; and, if this striking instance ever comes,
to justify Darwin's theories in their points most difficult of explana-
tion, how can we avoid accepting them in their completeness, as well
for external forms as for instinct ?

Neuters in a community bring at their birth an intellectual dispo-
sition, a special tendency. The community benefits by it, and pros-
pers ; but the parents of these neuters have produced, besides, males and
females, who will be able to inherit in their turn the property of giving
life to neuters having the same disposition or the same tendency with
the first. This becomes hereditary ; it fixes itself in the race ; it is
thenceforward an instinct ; and it will be able to continue developing
itself thus by a sort of collateral inheritance. The source of it will
continue in the parents without its being necessary that they should
have it themselves, exactly as the reason for the long horns of the
oxen is in the parent bull and heifer which have only short ones them-
selves.

Even after confuting this great objection of the neuters, the prob-
lem of explaining the architecture of bees by natural conditions seemed
still to defy every attempt. -Yet Darwin undertook to solve it. Aided
by the experiments of his countryman Waterhouse, he shows that all
this labor, worthy of the most practised geometrician, can be reduced, in
the last analysis, to a certain number of very simple habits, taken in
succession, so that by a linking together of facts, hypothetical, it is
true, yet all perfectly plausible and possible, we arrive at the discovery,
in the biological laws already known, of a natural explanation of that
instinct which seems to share in the miraculous. We know the subject
in question. The cells of the bee are six-sided prisms of perfect regu-
larity. The most interesting point is the bottom of the cell ; it is
formed of a hollow pyramid of three equal sides, and arranged in such
a manner that each contributes its share, on the other side of
the comb, to make the bottom of a distinct cell ; the bottom of each
cell thus rests on three cells on the other side of the comb. Buffon
did not remark this combination ; he only spoke of the regular hex-
agonal design of the whole, and on this subject he had a singular idea.
"The bees," he said, " all want to make a cylindrical chamber for them-
selves in the wax, but room is wanting ; on the comb, which is too
small, each one attempts to settle itself in the way most convenient
for itself, at the same time that all are equally in each other's way.
The cells are hexagonal only on account of reciprocal obstacles. For
the same reason," he adds, " as, if we fill a vessel with peas or cylin-
drical grains, shut it tightly after pouring in as much water as the

i 5 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

intervals between these grains can receive, and set the water boiling,
all these cylinders will become six-sided columns." Buffon's com-
parison has been a good deal laughed at, yet it is not altogether bad.
He understood that each cell with its sides cut at regular angles was
not an individual work, nor the direct execution of the original plan ;
that it was a kind of resultant brought about by the forced neighbor-
hood, the mutual crowding and hindering of constructions conceived
on a simpler plan, and one more usual among insect^, the cylindrical
chamber.

The humble-bees, which are hymenopterous insects, like honey-
bees, put their store of honey away in their old cocoons. When the
vessel is too small, they add to it at the opening a prolongation of wax.
It may even occur that they build single cells, of an irregular globular
form ; this is a first step, the primitive wax-working. There is noth-
ing very remarkable yet in this ; but the next step becomes more im-
portant. Between this rude simplicity and the work, so finished, of
the bee, we find something intermediate, the honey-cells of the domes-
tic melipone, of Mexico. The insect itself forms a transition, by its
external mai-ks, between the honey-bee and the humble-bee, and is
nearer to the latter. To preserve its honey, it builds a pile of large
spherical cells, all placed at equal distances apart, only that this dis-
tance is everywhere less than twice the radius of the spheres, so that
they all encroach on each other, and are kept apart by a perfectly flat
partition, having exactly the same thicknjess as the curved wall that
bounds the free and spherical portion of each cell. If three are found
to adjoin, the lines of separation cross at equal angles, and their com-
mon meeting-point rests on the top of a pyramid with three walls
formed by the three cells, exactly as in a honeycomb. Reflecting on
all this, Darwin says the thought occurred to him that, if the melipone,
which already builds its spheres at equal distances apart, were to come
to disposing them symmetrically and back to back upon two opj>osite
sides, there would result from this fact a construction as admirable as
the bottom of a double rank of cells in the hive.

Has the constructive genius of the wasp and the bee passed through
theee transitions ? It is impossible to assert it ; but the evidence
shows, and calculation confirms it, that some modifications, slight
enough definitely, occurring in the instincts of the melipone, might
lead it, after an indefinite number of ages we must always calculate
on such periods of time to build those three-angled pyramids which
are already found in its constructions, in two or three ranks ; then to
build upon those pyramids, on each side, prolongations cylindrical in
principle, like those which the humble-bee puts on its cocoons, and
prism-shaped from their nearness to each other. Besides, such a con-
struction upon a flat surface of its honey-cells by the melipone would
be nothing very extraordinary ; in this way it builds the little cham-
bers where it deposits its grubs.

INSTINCT IN INSECTS. 155

In the general effort that produces the honey-comb, it is important
to make allowance for that supreme law of necessity which Buffon
refers to, and which compels each insect, if it makes a mistake in its
measurements, to begin its work again, under penalty of seeing it de-
stroyed by its neighbors. The bee's cell is no more an individual
work than it is a work finished all at once. At the beerinniner, the
six-sided plan is scarcely indicated ; the original wall is clumsy, often-,
times too thick ; it is attempted a second time, made thinner at the
bottom, thickened at the top, crowded by force into its right place,
and worked over and over constantly to the last perfection. The geo-
metric regularity of the whole is the result of long tentative work. A
multitude of bees are laboring on it at once, each for a time at one
cell, then at another, and so on ; twenty insects at least busy them-
selves with the first chamber, which at the outset is very irregular;
new chambers are added, and the first remade. On all these points
Darwin and other English naturalists have made very curious experi-
ments, which deserve to be cited along with the observations of
Francis Huber. He observed, to learn ; they experimented, to explain.
By dealing with swarms or individuals properly isolated, by modify-
ing their conditions of labor, by deceiving their instinct, we should
doubtless succeed in decomposing it by a kind of physiological analy-
sis, at the same time that we should ascertain more clearly the toler-
ably large share that intelligence probably has in this industry of the
bee. This is an aspect of the problem that is perhaps too much neg-
lected by Darwin, but indicated by Mdlle. Clemence Royer in the
notes added by her to the French translation of the " Origin of Spe-
cies." We may ask, Why should not the bee itself be sensitive to that
harmony of lines which strikes our eye in its work? Why deny so
simple an impression as that which springs from regularity, to that
brain which is of tiny dimensions, it is true, but which is quick to
seize relations of far greater complexity between cause and effect,
quick to choose the best place, to avoid an obstacle, to pursue with
eye and sting the enemy of the hive ? We have seen how the ant un-
derstands when an object is too large to pass through the entrance to
its cave. The bee, to which we would attribute sensitiveness to regu-
larity of lines, certainly has the notion of relations of length. There
is a large moth, the death's-head sphinx, very fond of honey, and
which asks nothing better than to make its way into the hive; its
body, hairy and covered with horny plates, defies the sting. The bees,
dreading this unwelcome visit, know very well how to protect them-
selves from it in regions where the sphinx abounds. As soon as the
earliest ones begin to show themselves in the evenings of the longest
days, as M. Blanohard relates, the bees narrow the opening of the hive
in such a way that the robber can no longer get in. When the season
for this moth has gone by, they desti'oy the new construction, and re-
build the passage of its original size. Certainly these are creatures

156 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

that have a measuring eye ! Is there, then, so wide a distance be-
tween this power of eye and the sense of symmetry, which the lowest
savage has who is sensitive to the harmony in the lines of a carving or
a tattooing ? Is it not simpler to suppose that the bee has something
of the same sensibility, rather than a sort of mathematical instinct,
such as is sometimes attributed to it? The whole cerebral physiology
of insects remains to be created. While we are no further advanced,
it is perhaps rash to allow much to their intellectual faculties, but it is
certainly unreasonable to degrade them too much. And, besides,
there is still in us that old sin of pride, on which Montaigne rallies us
so delicately, just with respect to the reason of animals. He under-
stood animals much better than Descartes ; he loves them, he plays
with his cat, and this intercourse enlightens him ; he speaks with
sound judgment of the too narrow share of intelligence allowed to
animals by man, while he himself" goes soaring in imagination beyond
the orbit of the moon."

As to the legionary ants, the connection of the successive phenom-
ena serving to explain the appearance and development of their in-
stinct was far more difficult to conceive. We might well have despaired
of any reasonable deduction, had not certain facts, here and there in
Nature, come to our aid and put us on the right track, by showing us
elsewhere the same instinct, less developed, or modified in different
ways. These observations, coordinated by Darwin, have been like
flashes of light, and have allowed us to conceive the evolution of these
singular habits in a manner at least plausible. Thus, it is not uncom-
mon that certain ants, which do not usually take auxiliaries, carry away
to their hills nymphae that are found by chance in their neighborhood.
It is not unlikely that some of these nymphae may have happened to
come out, and may have performed the functions of their special in-
stinct in their adopted city. If, now, it is admitted that these services
may be of some use to the hill, then it will thrive better, and afterward
it may happen that the same chance captives and chance comings-out
of nymphaB may be repeated. At last, the habit will be formed
then the instinct will supervene, of carrying off stolen nympha?. At
the same time the presence of these strangers will almost necessarily
react upon the robber-ants. Their instincts and their organs will be
simultaneously modified, always upon the same principle, in the direc-
tion most favorable to the special duty that they perform in the com-
munity. From step to step, by a succession of scarcely-perceptible
modifications, accumulating through centuries and ages, we shall ar-
rive at races of legionaries as dependent on their comrades' labors as
the species studied by Peter Huber.

Each instinct that we study displays itself to us, in a manner, under
an absolute form ; we never see it change ; therefore it is said to be
unchangeable. This is the illusion common to all phenomena that are
too slow for their progress to be measured by the life or the memory

INSTINCT IN INSECTS. i 57

of man. Yet the European beaver and the oriole give us examples of
instincts that go back to a date relatively not very ancient. We
know now, too, that the nests of the same species of birds sometimes
present remarkable enough variations in different countries. That
Darwin should point out with great care these instincts, varying with
latitudes, is very natural ; but we should less naturally expect to find
a similar fact, in the book of a partisan, of the unchangeableness of
instincts. The leaf-cutter, another hymenopterous insect, lays its eggs
in little chambers made of bits of leaves which it has rapidly cut. In
our country it is always a rose-leaf. Yet, "we are assured," says M.
Blanchard, "that our cutter of rose-leaves, finding itself in some place
in Russia where there are no rose-bushes, makes its nest with willow
or osier leaves." Therefore, instinct must vary in space as it has va-
ried in time ! It is not at all the case that the same legionaries are
everywhere as dependent on their comrades as those that Peter Huber
saw in the environs of Geneva. In England, as in Switzerland, the
auxiliaries reared by the dark-red ants take complete care of the larvae,
while the legionaries alone go on expeditions ; but in Switzerland the
two castes together busy themselves about all works of construction
or supply, while in England the legionaries alone go out to gather
provisions and materials ; the auxiliaries remain shut up within ; they
thus render less service to the community than they do in Switzerland.
It will be said, perhaps, that these differences are a very trifling
matter. They are, at least, enough to show how the ancient doctrine
of Cuvier has been shaken, and how, in the infinite lapse of time,
those instincts may have become developed, which mere geographical
accidents suffice to modify slightly. The grand solution of instinct is
Time ; that immeasurable duration of those geological epochs which
our mind holds in contemplation, but of which it can no more form an
idea than of the measure of the heavenly spaces. Modern science be-
gins to be amazed at those figures of ages which it must count since
the rude attempts at primitive human industry. What shall we think
of those times, measured by the planet's growth, through which the
instinct of the legionary ants may have been originated, defined, and
perfected ? The ant not only saw the epoch of the reindeer and the
mammoth, and the glaciers of the Jura creeping down the valley of
the Rhone it was a contemporary of that period which geologists
mark by the lifting of the Alps. The ant is older on the earth than
Mont Blanc. They existed already in the Jurassic period, very little
different from what they are in our own times. While an inland sea
still flowed over the site where later Paris was to stand, they were
multitudinous in the central regions of Europe that were out of water.
We may judge of this by the mass of their remains ; they fill thick
layers of territory at Oeningen, on the shores of Lake Constance, and
at Radoboj, in Croatia ; the rock is black with ants, all wonderfully,
preserved, with their claws and delicate antennae. Entomologists now

158 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

count fifty species in Europe. More than a hundred have been found
by Ileer, of Zurich, and Mayr, of Vienna, in the cantons of Oeningen
and Radoboj alone; several seem identical with existing species. Most
of them have wings ; these are males and females. Workers are rare ;
and that is explained by the nature of the rock, deposited at the bot-
tom of still waters. The winged insects fell into it by thousands; the
workers, more lowly in existence, attached to earth, have left fewer
victims in the streams that preserve the record of that age. For the
same reason, those sepulchres, so rich in species, teach us nothing of
the habits or abodes of the ants of that time. What we do know is,
that there were also plant-lice in the country, and that the larvae of
phryganes made for themselves even then, as they do now, those cases
in which they live, and which they carry about everywhere with them.
Some of these have been found at Oeningen. We have butterflies'
wings of that era with their marks, if not with their coloring. Who
knows whether we shall not some day discover a wasps'-nest dropped
from a bough, and a trifle less regular than those of to-day ? Even
were it just as perfect, that would in nowise weaken the hypothesis of
progressive development in the instinct by which it was built. Should
we not have, beyond the Jurassic epoch, an enormous past, beside
which the actual age now of the deposits of Oeningen and Radoboj is,
perhaps, like a day or an hour in the history of man ?

The grand result which the introduction of Darwin's ideas into bio-
logical science has had is, beyond question, to have transformed a sub-
ject hitherto deemed unapproachable and insolvable into a question of
development that may be attacked by our investigations. Instinct,
like the outward forms of animals, has always been made dependent
on those first causes too high for man to raise his look to them. The
observations of the English naturalist have brought the problem upon
new ground ; his logic, his science, have forced the world to accept at
last the ideas formerly defended by Cuvier's opponents, by Lamarck
and Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire. The doctrine of the immutability of ani-
mal forms has had its time, and that of the invariability of instinct is
falling into ruin. Darwin proves, in fact, that it suffices to admit the
principle of intelligence, which no one now denies to animals, and then
the twofold influence of habit and hereditary tendency, and last that
law, stated by himself, of absorption of the poorly-endowed races by
these better endowed, to reach the conclusion that the finely-perfected
instinct of the bee or the ant is nothing more than a purely natural
phenomenon, a necessary consequence of life. The most complex in-
stinct is merely an hereditary accumulation of very simple habits, of
which the first source was always in the spontaneous intelligence of
the individual. Instinct, then, including that of neuter animals, may
be defined, "a group of habits, slowly acquired, and fixed by inheri-
tance." Then it appears to us as independent, in some degree, of the
forms of the animal ; the variations it presents find their explanation ;

A SCIENTIFIC HOME MISSIONARY.

*59

it is contingent, it originates, it is modified, through circumstances,
aided by time, and through ages helped by scarcely-perceptible acci-
dents. In its turn, it insensibly leads the organs to become perfect in
the direction conformed to the use made of them by the animal. Re-
garded in this way, connected in the last analysis with other first prop-
erties from which it results, instinct, instead of baffling investigation
by the human mind, as they do, becomes a possible and proper object
of research by experimental science. It is a new horizon opening be-
fore the physiologist for the discovery of the laws of life. Revue des
Deux Mondes.

-*-

Professor Henslow.

A SCIENTIFIC HOME MISSIONARY. 1

JOHN STEPHENS HENSLOW is described as having been a
beautiful boy with brown curling hair, a fine straight nose, a
brilliant complexion, soft eyes, and a smile that reached everybody's

1 The subject of the present sketch, who became an eminent clergyman, botanical pro-
fessor, and scientific philanthropist, was born in Kent, England, in 1796. For the prin-
cipal facts of the present article we are indebted to his biography by Rev. Leonard
Jenyns, Henslow's brother-in-law, published by Van Voorst, of LondoD, and we hare
made free use of his statements. Ed.

160 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

heart. He was active, observant, and intelligent, a favorite partner at
childish parties, and danced elegantly. This beautiful boyhood un-
folded into a noble manhood, which took a turn so original and in-
structive, that we cannot do better than give some account of it to the
readers of the Populab Science Monthly.

Young Henslow early developed a taste for the study of natural ob-
jects, and for making collections and experiments. His scientific future
was symbolized by an adventure made while yet a child in a frock,
and which consisted in dragging all the way home from a field, a con-
siderable distance off, an enormous fungus which was dried and long
preserved in the family. The lad had good blood and a good chance ;
his grandfather, Sir John Henslow, Chief Surveyor of the Navy, was a
man of scientific attainments and much ingenuity ; his mother was an
accomplished woman, fond of natural history, and an assiduous col-
lector of natural and artificial curiosities. His father had a great taste
for birds, kept an extensive aviary, and had an ample library of nat-
ural history. The drawing-master at his school was a good entomol-
ogist and introduced the boy to some of the eminent naturalists of
the day, who gave direction to his studies. He collected insects in the
woodsof Kent, and Crustacea and shells from the bed of the Medway .
many of his specimens were new and valuable, and found their way
into the drawers of the British Museum. At the age of eighteen
he entered St. John's College, Cambridge, and four years later took
his degree of B. A. A year subsequently, in 1819, he accompanied
Prof. Sedgwick to the Isle of Wight, where he took his first practical
lessons in geology. He had been elected Fellow of the Linnaean Society
in 1818, became a Fellow of the Geological Society in 1819, and made
his first essay in authorship by a contribution to its proceedings in 1821,
when twenty-five years of age. Mr. Henslow had paid much atten-
tion to mathematics in college, was a thorough student of mineralogy
and chemistry, and took a leading part in founding the Cambridge
Philosophical Society, in 1819. In 1822 he was elected Professor of
Mineralogy in the Cambridge University. He was not an eloquent
lecturer, but he had a good voice, and a remarkably clear way of ex-
pressing himself. He cultivated the art of explanation and adapting
his language to the capacity of his hearers, and thus became one of
the very best lecturers of the day. But the chair of Mineralogy was
not what Prof. Henslow wanted. His favorite study was botany, and,
a vacancy occurring in this professorship, Prof. Henslow was elected
to the position in 1823. This science, and natural history generally,
were in a low state in the university at that time. 1 His predecessor

i " In a low state," the reader must remember, not merely from neglect, but from hos-
tility on the part of the classicists and mathematicians who had possession of the estab-
lishment. Even years afterward, when, mainly under Prof. Henslow's influence, natural
history studies began to receive attention, Edward Forbes spent a couple of days in
Cambridge and wrote : " I was greatly pleased with my visit, except in one thing to

A SCIENTIFIC HOME MISSIONARY. 161

had held the professorship for sixty-three years, and was a very old
man. In fact, there had been no lectnres on botany given in Cambridge
for at least thirty years. Prof. Henslow took hold of the work with
great zeal, improved the Botanical Gardens, rearranged and extended
the Botanical Museum, and established one of the most perfect collec-
tions of plants to be anywhere found. He made his lectures extremely
interesting by always having large numbers of specimens on hand
which the students were required to study directly. He often took
his class on botanizing excursions, which tended greatly to rouse their
interest in the subject. Entomologists and mineralogists often ac-
companied them, and Prof. Henslow's extensive acquaintance with
all branches of natural history, and the delight he took in imparting
information to all who sought it, served to kindle an enthusiasm which
aided very much to raise the position of science in the university.

Prof. Henslow married in 1823. His parents had always been
desirous that he should go into the Church, and, as the salary from his
professorship was less than a thousand dollars a year, and insufficient
to support his family, he took orders and accepted a curacy which
yielded him some additional income. His engaging manners and sym-
pathetic disposition, combined with his intellectual accomplishments,
gave him great influence over the students, which was felt not only in
directing their tastes and pursuits, but in the formation of character.
As soon as he became settled in Cambridge as a married man, he in-
stituted the practice of receiving at his own house, one evening in the
week, all who took the slightest interest in scientific, and especially
natural history studies. At these gatherings all might learn some-
thing, and every one went away pleased. He would seek out any of
the students that were reported to him as attached to natural history,
and made converts to his favorite science of not a few who were
thrown accidentally in his way. If any young man through timidity
or reserve shrank from going to the professor's house, the open-hearted
welcome which he received soon inspired confidence and put him at
his ease. There are many now among the first naturalists of England
who were then students at Cambridge, and who gratefully acknowl-
edge the encouragement and assistance they received from Prof. Hens-
low, and bear testimony to his rare excellences, both of head and
heart. Among these is the now world-renowned naturalist Mr. Charles
Darwin, who furnished to Prof. Henslow's biographer the following
reminiscences, which will interest the reader as well on account of the
writer as of their subject. Mr. Darwin says :

find that natural history is discouraged as much as possible, and regarded as idle trifling
by the thousand-and-one mathematicians of that venerated university." It was a life-long
struggle of Prof. Henslow to raise natural history to a coordinate place with other sub-
jects of university study, and it was but a short time before his death, in 1861, that he
saw the triumph of his efforts. Degrees were then first granted to those who had ob-
tained "honors" in natural history studies.
vol. in. 11

162 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

"I went to Cambridge early in the year 1828, and soon became acquainted,
through some of my brother entomologists, with Prof. Henslow, for all who
cared for any branch of natural history were equally encouraged by him. Noth-
ing could be more simple, cordial, and unpretending, than the encouragement
which ho afforded to all young naturalists. I soon became intimate with him,
for he had a remarkable power of making the young feel completely at ease
.with him; though we were all awe-struck with the amount of his knowledge.
Before I saw him, I heard one young man sum up his attainments by simply say-
ing that he knew every thing. When I reflect how immediately we felt at perfect
ease with a man older and in every way so immensely our superior, I think it
was as much owing to the transparent sincerity of his character, as to his kind-
ness of heart ; and, perhaps, even still more to a highly-remarkable absence in
him of all self-consciousness. One perceived at once that he never thought of
his own varied knowledge or clear intellect, but solely on the subject in hand.
Another charm, which must have struck every one, was that his manner to old
and distinguished persons and to the youngest student was exactly the same :
to all he showed the same winning courtesy. He would receive with interest
the most trifling observation in any branch of natural history ; and, however
absurd a blunder one might make, he pointed it out so clearly and kindly, that
one left him no way disheartened, but only determined to be more accurate
the next time. In short, no man could be better formed to win the entire con-
fidence of the young, and to encourage them in their pursuits.

" His lectures on botany were universally popular, and as clear as daylight.
So popular were they, that several of the older members of the university
attended successive courses. Once every week he kept open house in the even-
ing, and all who had cared for natural history attended these parties, which,
by thus favoring intercommunication, did the same good in Cambridge, in a
very pleasant manner, as the scientific societies do in London. At these parties
many of the most distinguished members of the university occasionally attended ;
and, when only a few were present, I have listened to the great men of those
days, conversing on all sorts of subjects, with the most varied and brilliant
powers. This was no small advantage to some of the younger men, as it stimu-
lated their mental activity and ambition. Two or three times in each session
he took excursions with his botanical class ; either a long walk to the habitat
of some rare plant, or in a barge dow T n the river to the fens, or in coaches to
some more distant place, as to Gamlingay, to see the wild-lily of the valley,
and to catch on the heath the rare natter-jack. These excursions have left a
delightful impression on my mind. He was, on such occasions, in as good spirits
as a boy, and laughed as heartily as a boy at the misadventures of those who
chased the splendid swallow-tail butterflies across the broken and treacherous
fens. He used to pause every now and then, and lecture on some plant or other
object ; and something he could tell us on every insect, shell, or fossil collected,
for he had attended to every branch of natural history. After our day's work we
used to dine at some inn or house, and most jovial we then were. I believe all
who joined these excursions will agree with me that they have left an enduring
impression of delight on our minds.

" x\s time passed on at Cambridge, I became very intimate with Prof. Hens-
low, and his kindness was unbounded. He continually asked me to his house,
and allowed me to accompany him in his walks. He talked on all subjects, in-
cluding his deep sense of religion, and w r as entirely open. I owe more than I
can express to this excellent man. His kindness was steady. "When Captain

A SCIENTIFIC HOME MISSIONARY. 163

Fitzroy offered to give up part of his own cabin to any naturalist who would
join in the expedition in II. M. S. Beagle, Prof. Henslow recommended me as
one who knew very little, hut who, he thought, would work. I was strongly
attached to natural history, and this attachment I owed, in large part, to him.
During the five years' voyage, he regularly corresponded with me, and guided
my efforts. lie received, opened, and took care of all the specimens sent home
in many large boxes; but I firmly believe that, during these five years, it never
once crossed his mind that he was acting toward me with unusual and generous
kindness.

" During the years when I associated so much with Prof. Henslow, I never
once saw his temper even ruffled. He never took an ill-natured view of any
one's character, though very far from blind to the foibles of others. It always
struck me that his mind could not be even touched by any paltry feeling of
vanity, envy, or jealousy. "With all this equability of temper and remarkable
benevolence, there was no insipidity of character. A man must have been
blind not to have perceived that beneath this placid exterior there was a vigor-
ous and determined will. When principle came into play, no power on earth
could have turned him one hair's-breadth.

"After the year 1842, when I left London, I saw Prof. Henslow only at long
intervals ; but, to the last, he continued in all respects the same man. I think
he cared somewhat less about science, and more for his parishioners. When
speaking of his allotments, his parish children, and plans of amusing and in-
structing them, he would always kindle up with interest and enjoyment. I re-
member one trifling fact which seemed to me highly characteristic of the man :
In one of the bad years for the potato, I asked him how his crop had fared, but,
after a little talk, I perceived that, in fact, he knew nothing about his own po-
totoes, but seemed to know exactly what sort of crop there was in the garden
of almost every poor man in his parish.

"In intellect, as far as I could judge, accurate powers of observation, sound
sense, and cautious judgment, seemed predominant. Nothing seemed to give
him so much enjoyment as drawing conclusions from minute observations. But
his admirable memoir on the geology of Anglesea shows his capacity for ex-
tended observations and broad views. Eeflecting over his character with grati-
tude and reverence, his moral attributes rise, as they should do in the highest
character, in preeminence over his intellect. 0. Darwin."

The moral heroism, here testified to by Mr. Darwin, was an emi-
nent trait of Prof. Henslow's character, and a key to his career; but
there was one instance of it, in Cambridge, which may be mentioned
in passing. In politics, Prof. Henslow was originally a Conservative
or Tory. Lord Palmerston had long represented the university on
the same side. But when the Duke of Wellington, who was at the
head of the government, declared against reform in any shape what-
ever, there came a revolution which overthrew his administration, and
Lord Palmerston went over to the Liberal side and joined the re-
formed ministry. Prof. Henslow, like many others, fell in with the
movement, and, of course, made himself obnoxious to the chai'ge of
being a " turn-coat." He did not flinch from these attacks, and was at
any moment ready to do his duty regardless of popular reprobation, and
he soon had an opportunity of incurring it. In the borough election

164 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of 1835, the " Tory agents " had notoriously resorted to bribery. The
Liberals wanted to bring the offenders into court, but no one would
incur the odium of " informing " against them. Under these circum-
stances Prof. Henslow readily offered himself as the nominal prosecu-
tor. The storm of abuse and persecution that broke upon him for
this is still well remembered in Cambridge. His biographer remarks :
" Not only was the cry raised of ' Henslow, common informer ! ' when-
ever he appeared in the streets, but the same obnoxious words were
placarded upon the walls in such large and enduring characters, that,
even to this day (1861), more than a quarter of a century after the
transaction, they are still distinctly legible in some places. They
were seen, and smilingly pointed out to a friend, by the professor him-
self, within a year of his death, and I have, since his death, seen and
read them myself. His services were, however, deeply appreciated at
the time, for he received three handsome testimonials : one from the
town of Cambridge; another from the town committee for the sup-
pression of corruption ; and the third from a committee of noblemen
and gentlemen." The rule that Prof. Henslow laid down for the
guidance of conduct in such circumstances, and which he rigorously
conformed to himself, was expressed in the following noble words : " I
would have every Tory consistent, and every Radical consistent, and
every Whig consistent, until either of them shall have become convinced
that he has been in error, and then I would have him change his poli-
tics, regardless of every risk, and despising the shame which the world
will heap upon him. But what I would have every man strive to
possess is c moral courage,' sufficient to declare his own opinions un-
hesitatingly in the face of the world, and adequate to maintain them
unflinchingly against all influence whatever."

The position of Prof. Henslow at Cambridge was every thing that
would satisfy the usual ambition of a man of science. He was pro-
foundly appreciated in the institution, he was beloved by the students,
and he had given a new life to the class of studies to which he was
devoted. Yet all this did not satisfy him, and he seized the first op-
portunity to leave Cambridge, and enter a field of labor of a very
different kind, and for which, as the result proved, he was remarkably
endowed. As his talents and high character became known, the Gov-
ernment sought his influence for some of the responsible trusts in its
gift, and it was in contemplation to offer him the See of Norwich. It
is a terrible temptation in England to get the place of bishop, and
while many sigh, labor, and intrigue for it, those who decline it when
offered are exceedingly few. Prof. Henslow, when he heard of the
danger, fled to his chamber, and prayed fervently to be delivered from
the temptation. His prayers were answered, and, instead of the bish-
opric, he received the crown living of the parish of Hitcham, with an
income of a thousand pounds a year. The place is in Suffolk, not far
from Cambridge, and he entered upon the charge of it in 1837. His

A SCIENTIFIC HOME MISSIONARY. 165

first intention was to continue his relation with the university, and
divide his work between Cambridge and Hitcham; but, finding that
the duties of the latter place did not permit his absence, he took up
his residence there in 1839. How different was the sphere of exertion
upon which he had now entered will be apparent when we glance at
the condition of the inhabitants of the parish when he first went among
them.

The village of Hitcham consisted of one long, straggling street, and
the parish contained rather more than a thousand persons, scattered
over some 4,000 acres of land. The property of the parish was assessed
at $30,000 a year, yet there was only a dame-school in the place. The
unemployed and vagabond laborers were so numerous that the poor-
rate in 1834 amounted to $5,000 equal, it was said, to over $6 for
each man, woman, and child, in the village. The people were sunk to
almost the lowest depths of moral and physical debasement. Igno-
rance, crime, and vice were rife, and the worst characters were addicted
to poaching, sheep-stealing, drunkenness, and all kinds of immorality.
The less vicious were more fond of idleness than work, and lolled about
the road-sides, dead to all sense of moral shame, so long as they could
live at the parish expense. Parish relief or charity was .not unfre-
quently levied by bands of forty or fifty able-bodied laborers who had
been in the habit of intimidating the previous rector into instant com-
pliance with their demands. The houses of the poor were described as
having been many of them little better than hovels, in which the com-
mon decencies of life could hardly be carried out. The church was
almost empty on Sunday, and but little respect was paid to its ordi-
nances. The previous rector had been satisfied with discharging his
usual Sunday duties, and left the people to themselves during the week.

Such was the field which Prof. Henslow left Cambridge to culti-
vate. He went there as a missionary, to reclaim it from inveterate
heathenism, which still passed under a Christian name. His difficulties
were of the most formidable kind, and he had to grapple with them
single-handed, for there were no influential persons in the parish either
to cooperate in his work, or to encourage him in pursuing it. The
parties with whom he had to deal were the farmers who rented the
land from the landlords, and the laborers whom the farmers employed.
The farmers are represented as having been intellectually raised but
little above their laborers, as ignorant, obstinate, and prejudiced, and
they doggedly opposed the new rector in all his schemes, and threw
every possible obstacle in his way. But he was not a man to flinch
from what he had undertaken, and, coolly estimating the difficulties
of the situation, he set himself to work to reclaim his flock from their
degradation, to industry, sobriety, independence, and self-respect. It
was obvious enough that the inculcation of moral and religious lessons
would have been utterly lost upon them would have been like throw-
ing pearls before swine because men must be civilized before they

166 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

can be effectually Christianized. Prof. Henslow therefore commenced
by gaining the confidence of those whom he wished to influence, and
to do this he had to adapt himself to them, and utilize whatever forces
lie could find available. lie began by amusing them. He got up a
cricket club, and encouraged various manly games. He introduced
ploughing-matches, and competitive exhibitions. His acquaintance
with chemistry enabled him to construct fireworks, which he would let
off upon the rectory lawn, and which were a great attraction to the
people. He brought out various natural and artificial curiosities,
which were at first vacantly stared at, but, with his extraordinary fac-
ulty of adapting his language and illustrations to the commonest ca-
pacity, he gradually kindled an interest in the minds of many which
grew into a desire to learn. Other recreations and incitements fol-
lowed, which will be presently referred to. Prof. Henslow resorted to
many measures of amelioration and improvement, and carried them all
along together ; but, in our brief sketch of his labors, we must con-
sider them separately ; and we will take up first what he did for the
laborers, next for the farmers, and lastly, what he accomplished for the
education of the children :

One of the first evils which he attacked was the degradation and
dependence of the laborers. The Hitcham farmers held their men in
brutal subjection, viewing them as little better than slaves, for whose
concern they felt no interest. They were, therefore, the enemies of
every measure for the improvement of the laboring-class. Prof. Hens-
low considered the lack of an independent home as one of the great bar-
riers to the elevation of the working-men, and he therefore urged the
adoption of the " allotment system," by which the laborers might be-
come the owners or tenants of small pieces of ground, to be cultivated
by themselves for their own benefit. This encountered the fiercest
opposition from the farmers, and led to a long and determined struggle.
All sorts of objections were raised. It was said the laborers would
steal the farmers' seed to sow their own ground ; they would give their
masters slack work in order to reserve their strength for their own
patches at the end of the day. But the worst difficulty was the pro-
found class or caste spirit which pervades English society, and which
impelled the farmers to fight the change, because it would raise the
laborer, and bring him one step nearer to themselves. It was in 1845
that Prof. Henslow made his first public appeal upon this subject, in
which he pointed out the many advantages that would result from
the allotment system to the laboring-class. He urged the reform
energetically, and initiated it by granting portions of his own land
for the purpose. He pushed the project until he had got fifty more
of one-quarter of an acre each. The farmers here made a stand, and
determined to crush the whole system. They went into cooperation,
and gave mutual pledges that they would "refuse all employment
and show no favor to any day-laborer who should hold an allotment."

A SCIENTIFIC HOME MISSIONARY. 167

The storm raged about the rector, who persevered without losino-
either his patience or his temper. He denounced the selfish action
of the farmers, and gave them to understand that he would submit
to no dictation, and was determined to carry out his intentions. For-
tunately, his salary and position did not depend upon them, as they
would quickly have dismissed him ; but, finding that the rector's pur-
pose was not to be shaken, their opposition at length abated. The
measure was extended, and the most salutary consequences followed
in the general conduct of the people. Many instances were known in
which " an allotment has been the means of reclaiming the criminal,
reforming the dissolute, and of changing the whole moral character
and conduct." At the time of Prof. Henslow's death the allotments
in his parish amounted to nearly 150 in number, and their advantages
were no longer denied.

Nor did Prof. Henslow encounter much less difficulty in his efforts
to improve the condition of the farmers themselves. A good chemist,
botanist, and geologist, and a close student of scientific agriculture, he
was prepared to help the agriculturists with applied and available
knowledge, yet they strenuously resisted his efforts to teach them.
But he was not to be baffled in his exertions. He took up the practical
subject of the economy of fertilizers, in a series of popular letters to a
country newspaper, and treated it with such familiarity and skill as
to arrest the attention of the farmers. He spoke to them in the farm-
ers' club upon the same subject, and the address, together with the
letters, was printed and widely distributed. Having at length
aroused their attention, he pressed them into the work of testing the
proposed views, by observations and experiments of their own. The
relative value of different kinds of organic and inorganic manures, their
adaptation to special crops, how they should be applied, and the ex-
tent to which manure-heaps should be allowed to ferment and decom-
pose, were open questions, and he showed the farmers that they were
the parties to settle them. Liebig had suggested the addition of gyp-
sum to the manure-heap, to fix the ammonia, and Henslow suggested
that the farmers of Suffolk should try the experiment ; and, to get as
many enlisted as possible, he circulated printed forms to be filled up
by the experimenters with the results to which they might arrive.
But few at first responded to the call, and all kinds of objections were
urged; but at length 69 farmers sent in applications for the printed
forms, and consented to undertake the experiments. The result of
these efforts was the stirring up of the farmers to a more methodical
and scientific way of conducting their agricultural operations. Prof.
Henslow did not expect to make them philosophers, but to make them
think, and to do something toward converting the art of husbandry
into the science of agriculture ; and he received many communications
which showed that his letters and lectures had exerted a wide and
wholesome influence.

168 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

It was in connection with these efforts to aid the farmers that Prof.
Henslow made the memorable discovery of the agricultural value of
the so-called coprolites, or phosphatic nodules, found in the red crag at
Felixstowe, in Suffolk. They were shown to contain 56 per cent, of
phosphate of lime, and therefore to be capable of replacing bones in
fertilization. He called attention to the similar concretions abundantly
distributed in the upper greensand of Cambridgeshire, which were
even richer in phosphate, and which have since yielded immense profits
both to the proprietors of the pits and the farmers who used the
product.

Prof. Henslow had paid much attention to entomology ; and his
knowledge of plants, and the parasitic insects which infest them and
destroy the crops, enabled him to instruct the farmers upon this sub-
ject. He closely investigated the diseases of wheat, potatoes, and
clover, and diffused the results of his inquiries in lectures, tracts, and
newspaper correspondence.

As he lived in an agricultural community, in which all were inter-
ested in farm products and processes, Prof. Henslow resorted to ether
means of quickening the general interest in these matters, and of en-
listing the sympathy of laborers as well as farmers. For this purpose
he instituted horticultural shows, at which there was a distribution of
prizes for such products as wheat, fruit, flowers, vegetables, and honey,
and sometimes for works of mechanical ingenuity calculated to en-
courage the laborers to spend their long winter evenings profitably.
There were two of these shows in each season, in July and September.
They began in 1850, and were kept up until the time of his death.
Tents were pitched for receiving the productions of the cottagers'
gardens, and the allotment-tenants received premiums for the best
management of their pieces of ground. Besides the tents for the
more special purposes of the show, there was always one assigned to
a miscellaneous collection of specimens in natural history animals,
birds, reptiles, insects' nests, etc., with various specimens from the do-
mestic arts and antiquities. This the professor called his " Marquee
Museum." On one occasion the dimensions of the trunk of the great
mammoth tree ( Wellingtonia) were traced out on the lawn with a dia-
gram, showing its size in comparison with other trees. There was
much to gratify the eye ; but sight-seeing is always wearisome, and
Prof. Henslow alleviated the routine of the day, and gave an intellect-
ual turn to the proceedings, by summoning as many of the company
as chose to come to the museum, and delivering to them little lectures,
or " lecturets," as he termed them. He would talk to the women
about textile fabrics or domestic operations, and to the different
groups on processes of manufacture, or local specimens of natural his-
tory, or the diseases of vegetation. Nor were amusements neglected ;
swings and poles were set up for gymnastic exercises, and foot-ball
and other games were encouraged on the grounds. The scene was

A SCIENTIFIC HOME MISSIONARY. 169

one of entertainment and instruction, and promotive of good feeling
on the part of all who participated in it. The influence of these exhi-
bitions was so beneficial, and became so well known, that large num-
bers flocked to them from a distance, and similar shows were got up in
other places.

One of the schemes devised by Prof. Henslow for alleviating the
hard, monotonous life of the laboring population, and combining recrea-
tion with improvement, was the arrangement of excursions to neigh-
boring places of interest. Knowing that those who always stay at
home are apt to become narrow and prejudiced, he sought to afford
them the opportunity of observing the ways and habits of other
places, and to open to them not merely agreeable sights, but sources
of knowledge from which they had been previously shut out. From
one to two hundred persons usually accompanied him, and his prepara-
tions for these excursions were always very methodical ; for he aimed
to combine moral discipline with healthful amusement. A " recreation
fund" was raised, and the poor always contributed something toward
the expenses. Tickets were issued, limiting the number of those at-
tending, and printed circulars were sometimes prepared with plans of
the route, regulations for the party, and often copious notes concerning
the place and objects to be visited. An eleven-page pocket-guide was
got uj) on one occasion for the use of the visitors at Cambridge, giving
an account of the colleges, museums, and libraries of the university.
Sometimes they went to the neighboring towns, to manufacturing'
places, or to the sea-shore. But the professor was always ready with
his interesting " lecturets " to explain every thing to his flock of eager
listeners. The impression left by these holiday excursions upon the
minds and hearts of the simple laborers was most gratifying, and, as
one of them remarked to Prof. Henslow, " Our heads would not be so
full of drink if we had such things to occupy our minds."

The task which Prof. Henslow had undertaken was one of imme-
diate and practical social amelioration, and this compelled him to
grapple with the adult ignorance and the indurated prejudices of the
community. But he did not forget the children. "When he went to
Hitcham, there was but a single, very poor school in the parish, but
he lost no time in establishing a better one. Meeting with but little
support from his parishioners, he had to bear the greater part of the
expense himself in the erection of a school-house and the payment of
a teacher. He had to deal with the children of an ignorant and stolid
peasantry, yet he brought his scientific resources to bear upon them
with such success that his humble parish-school acquired a national
reputation, was visited by people from all parts of the country, and
was inquired into by Parliament when settling the policy of its public
schools.

Prof. Henslow struck boldly out from the traditional method, and
did a thing unheard of in England, which was, to introduce his favorite

\yo THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

science of botany into a school for the children of the lowest classes.
Prof. Ilenslow's object was to break in upon the slavish and stupefying
routine of the schoolroom, and to substitute, for the endless drudgery
of mere lesson-learning from books, the exercise of the childish facul-
ties upon Nature itself. His object was to awaken the mind to spon-
taneous action, to open the observant faculties, and expand the reason-
ing powers, rather than to impart second-hand knowledge, and to load
the memory with the contents of books. And this he succeeded in
doing. He introduced a study which excited their interest, and " fur-
nished them with innocent and rational amusement in those leisure
hours which so many servants and poor idly throw away when their
required work is done;" which "tends to raise their thoughts to the
contemplation of the Creator, and to make them mindful as well as
observant of that infinite wisdom and goodness of which they see
everywhere around them such abundant proofs," and which, moreover,
taught them the use of their minds in inquiring, comparing, judging,
and thinking for themselves.

It is to be observed that Prof. Henslow did not, by any means, un-
dertake to establish a botanical school ; in fact, but a very small por-
tion of the time was given to the subject. His habit was to attend
the school regularly every Monday afternoon, for the purpose of giving
a lesson in botany from an hour and a half to two hours in length, the
main work of the pupils being by themselves and out of school. The
pupils varied in age from eight to eighteen, and the class was limited
to 42 in number. Into the details of his teaching we have no
space here to enter. The whole essence and value of it consisted in
the regular and constant study of plants themselves. The pupils
ranged the woods and fields of Hitcham for specimens, and their work
consisted in dissecting, analyzing, and classifying them. The class
was graded ; the older jjupils became teachers, and the younger were
promoted as they became proficient in their work. The children made
herbariums of dried plants, and one pupil-teacher " actually collected
in rural strolls, and afterward dried and correctly named, more than
250 specimens of plants." The children brought their botanical ac-
quirements to bear to enrich the horticultural show, to which reference
has been made. They brought their dried collections and fresh, wild-
flower nosegays, and competed for the prizes offered for the largest
collections, the most tasteful arrangements, and the most accurate de-
scriptions. In 1858, at the July show, 50 children competed for the
" wild-flower nosegay," and 26 received prizes.

It is almost superfluous to say that this invaluable experiment in
education was not an example of " compulsory education." Compul-
sion implies resistance ; a resort to brute force, when higher forces fail,
or are not tried. But the coercive system forces the question upon us,
Is anybody fit to teach who cannot wield the higher agencies of con-
trol ? Should not the very first qualification of a teacher of the young

A SCIENTIFIC HOME MISSIONARY. 171

be a love of children? This, at all events, was a prime qualification
of Prof. Henslow. His biographer says : " He had a playful way with
children, which won their affections, as well as their attention to what
he was teaching them, and which was one secret of their success. He
would always speak kindly to them, and encourage them in their dif-
ferent little ways. All who competed for the wild-flower nosegay
prizes, though they did not succeed in getting a prize, were allowed a
pinch of ' white snuff,' as he jokingly called it, or sugar-plums. He
generally had a snuffbox full of these sugar-plums in his pocket when
he went into the village, offering a pinch to any of the little children
whom he happened to meet." Of course, his botanical pupils were
all volunteers. They entered with spirit into their work, took it home
with them, pursued it in their rambles, recurred to it in hours of play,
compared notes among themselves, and needed no " compulsion. 5 '
How eager was their delight, was shown by their grief whenever the
lessons were interrupted. In a public address, Prof. Henslow said :
"No one who had heard the lamentations uttered upon my announ-
cing, at our last lesson before Easter, the necessity of six weeks' ab-
sence at Cambridge duties, could possibly have doubted the great in-
terest the children took in these exercises."

As to the educational value of this teaching, although it occupied
but a small fraction of regular school-time, it was of the highest im-
portance. It was not merely that the children got a knowledge of
botany, but that they mastered its rudiments in such a way as to gain
the most important intellectual benefits. There is plenty of unmis-
takable evidence upon this point ; we have space only for an extract
from the cautious statement of one of her Majesty's inspectors of
schools, who says: "That the botanical lessons, as handled by the
professor in his own national school, did draw largely upon the in-
telligent powers of his little pupils' minds, there can be no question.
The simple system to which he had reduced his plan of making the
children break up the various specimens into their component parts,
arrange those parts, observe their characters and relations to each
other, and thence arrive at conclusions for themselves, was very far
from being the mechanical process which many, before witnessing it,
might have supposed ' botany in the national schools ' to represent.
And I think it is not at all unfair to say that these children, who, out
of school, were (as I had many opportunities of judging) much more
conversable than the generality of children in rural parishes, owed a
considerable share of the general development of their minds to the
botanical lessons and the self-exercise connected with them."

Prof. Henslow's method of teaching botany to the young was one
of his great successes, and is a permanent contribution to education.
He commenced a little book embodying the plan, but did not live to
finish it ; and he got along with printed lists, forms, and schedules,
all being directed by his lectures and by his constant supervision of

i 7 2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the plant-studies of his pupils. The fame of his success went abroad,
and he was- solicited to lecture in many places, and to assist in organ-
izing the botanical work in various schools and colleges. Like Fara-
day, he was invited by Prince Albert to lecture to the royal children,
whom he interested in the same way that he had done the pupils of
his Hitcham classes.

Other points of great interest in Prof. Henslow's career and char-
acter we should be glad to dwell upon, but our sketch is already over-
done. Sufficient, however, has been said to show how science may
increase the usefulness of a clergyman, and prepare the way for his
higher work and that higher work was not neglected by Prof. Hens-
low. He not only labored hard and perseveringly for the temporal
good of his parishioners, but he discharged toward them with fidelity
the duties of a Christian minister. In the twenty-four years of his
residence at Hitcham there was a period of twelve years when he was
not absent from the parish on a single Sunday. The secret of so much
varied work was a strong constitution, unremitting industry, and strict
method in the disposal of his time. But the strongest constitutions
have their limits, and a false security tends to their being often
overpassed. Prof. Henslow was under a constant strain, and the ill-
ness that terminated his life was probably brought on by his " inces-
sant mental and manual labor." He passed away May 14, 1861, and
his loss was deeply felt in the world of science, in his university, and
in the parish to which he had devoted so much of his unselfish life.

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY.

By HEEBEET SPENCEE.

XI. The Political Pias.

EVERY day brings events which, showing the politician what the
events of the next day are likely to be, serve also as materials
for the student of Social Science. Passing occurrences may have their
special meanings sought, as by the many, or may have their general
meanings sought, as by the few. Scarcely a journal can be read, that
does not supply a fact which, beyond the proximate implication seized
by the party-tactician, has an ultimate implication of value to the
sociologist. Thus d propos of political bias, I am, while writing, fur-
nished by an Irish paper with an extreme instance. Speaking of the
late Ministerial defeat, the JNation says:

"Mr. Gladstone and his administration are hurled from power, and the ini-
quitous attempt to sow broadcast the seed of irreligion and infidelity in Ireland
has recoiled with the impact of a thunder-bolt upon its authors. The men who

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. t 73

so long beguiled the ear of Ireland with specious promises, who mocked us with
sham reforms and insulted us with barren concessions, who traded on the griev-
ances of this country only to aggravate them, and who, with smooth profes-
sions on their lips, trampled out the last traces of liberty in the land, are to-day
a beaten and outcast party."

Which exhibition of feeling we may either consider specially, as show-
ing how the " Nationalists " are likely to behave in the immediate
future ; or may consider more generally, as giving us a trait of Irish
nature tending to justify Mr. Froude's harsh verdict on Irish conduct
in the past ; or may consider most generally, after the manner here
appropriate, as a striking example of the distortions which the politi-
cal bias works in men's judgments.

When we remember that all are thus affected more or less, in esti-
mating political antagonists, their acts and their views, we are re-
minded what an immense obstacle political partisanship is in the way
of Social Science. I do not mean simply that, as all know, it often
determines opinions about pending questions ; as shown by cases in
which a measure, reprobated by Conservatives when brought forward
by Liberals, is approved when brought forward by their own party.
I refer to the far wider effect it has on men's interpretations of the
past and of the future ; and therefore on their sociological conceptions
in general. The political sympathies and antipathies fostered by the
conflicts of parties, respectively upholding this or that kind of institu-
tion, become sympathies and antipathies drawn out toward the allied
institutions of other nations, extinct or surviving. These sympathies
and antipathies inevitably cause tendencies to accept or reject favor-
able or unfavorable evidence respecting such institutions. The well-
known contrast between the pictures which the Tory Mitford and the
Radical Grote have given of the Athenian democracy, serves as an
instance to which many parallels may be found. In proof of the per-
verting effects of the political bias, I cannot do better than quote some
sentences from Mr. Froude's lecture on " The Scientific Method applied
to History : "

"Thucydides wrote to expose the vices of democracy ; Tacitus, the historian
of the Cassars, to exhibit the hatefulness of imperialism." x

" Read Macaulay on the condition of the English poor before the last cen-
tury or two, and you wonder how they lived at all. Eead Cobbett, and I may
even say Hallam, and you wonder how they endure the contrast between their
past prosperity and their present misery." s

" An Irish Catholic prelate once told me that to his certain knowledge two
millions of men, women, and children had died in the great famine of 1846. I
asked him if he was not including those who had emigrated. lie repeated that
over and above the emigration two millions had actually died ; and added, ' we
might assert that every one of these deaths lay at the door of tbe English Gov-
ernment.' I mentioned this to a distinguished lawyer in Dublin, a Protestant.

1 Froude, "Short Studies on Great Subjects," Second Series, 1871, p. 4S0.

2 Ibid., p. 483.

i 7 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

His gray eyes lighted up. lie replied: 'Did lie say two millions now did he?
Why, there were not a thousand died there were not five hundred.' The true
number, so far as can he gathered from a comparison of the census of 1841 with
the census of 1851, from the emigration returns, which were carefully made,
and from an allowance for the natural rate of increase, was about two hundred
thousand." 3

Further insistance on this point is needless. That the verdicts which
will be given by different party journals upon each ministerial act may
be predicted, and that the opposite opinions uttered by speakers and
applauded by meetings concerning the same measure may be foreseen
if the political bias is known, are facts from which any one may infer
that the party politician must have his feelings greatly moderated be-
fore he can interpret, with even approximate truth, the events of the
past, and draw correct inferences respecting the future.

Here, instead of dilating upon this truth, I propose to draw atten-
tion to kindred truths that are less conspicuous. Beyond those kinds
of political bias indicated by the names of political parties, there are
certain kinds of political bias transcending party limits. Already in
the chapter on " Subjective Difficulties Emotional," I have com-
mented upon the feeling which originates them the feeling drawn out
toward the governing agency. In addition to what was there said
about the general effects of this feeling on sociological speculation,
something must be said about its special effects. And first, let us con-
template a common fallacy in men's opinions about human affairs,
which pervades the several fallacies fostered by the political bias.

Results are proportionate to appliances see here the tacit assump-
tion underlying many errors in the conduct of life, private and public.
In private life every one discovers the untruth of this assumption, and
yet continues to act as though he had not discovered its untruth. Re-
consider a moment, under this fresh aspect, a familiar experience lately
dwelt upon.

" How happy I shall be," thinks the child, " when I am as old as
my big brother, and own all the many things he will not let me have ! "
" How happy," the big brother thinks, " shall I be when, like my
father, I have got a house of my own and can do as I like ! " " How
happy I shall be," thinks the father, " when, achieving the success in
prospect, I have got a large income, a country-house, carriages, horses,
and a higher social position ! " And yet at each stage the possession
of the much-desired aids to satisfaction does not bring all the happi-
ness expected, and brings many annoyances.

A good example of the fallacy, that results are proportionate to ap-
pliances, is furnished by domestic service. It is an inference naturally
drawn that, if one servant does so much, two servants will do twice as
much ; and so on. But when this common-sense theory is tested by

1 Froude, "Short Studies on Great Subjects," Second Series, mi, pp. 483, 484

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY 1;5

practice, the results are quite at variance with it. Not simply does
the amount of service performed fail to increase in proportion to the
number of servants, but frequently it decreases : fewer servants do
more work and do it better.

Take, again, the relation of books to knowledge. The natural
assumption is, that one who has stores of information at hand will be-
come well informed. And yet, very generally, when a man begins to
accumulate books he ceases to make much use of them. The fillino;
of his shelves with volumes, and the filling of his brain with facts, are
processes apt to go on with inverse rapidities. It is a trite remark
that those who have become distinguished for their learning have
often been those who had great difficulties in getting books. Here,
too, the results are quite out of proportion to the appliances.

Similarly, if we go a step further in the same direction not think-
ing of books as aids to information, but thinking of information as an
aid to guidance. Do we find that the quantity of acquirement meas-
ures the quantity of insight ? Is the amount of cardinal truth reached
to be inferred from the mass of collected facts that serve as appliances
for reaching it ? By no means. Wisdom and information do not vary
together. Though there must be data before there can be generaliza-
tion, yet ungeneralized data, accumulated in excess, are impediments
to generalization. When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more
of it he has the greater will be his confusion of thought. When facts
are not organized into faculty, the greater the mass of them the more
will the mind stagger along under its burden, hampered instead of
helped by its acquisitions. A student may become a very Daniel Lam-
bert of learning, and remain utterly useless to himself and all others.
Neither in this case, then, are results proportionate to appliances.

It is so, too, with discipline, and with the agencies established for
discipline. Take, as an instance, the use of language. From his early
days, the boy whose father can afford to give him the fashionable edu-
cation, is drilled in grammar, practised in parsing, tested in detecting
errors of speech. After his public-school career, during which words,
their meanings, and their right applications, almost exclusively occupy
him, he passes through a university where a large, and often the larger,
part of his attention is still given to literary culture models of style
in prose and poetry being daily before him. So much for the prepa-
ration ; now for the performance. It is notorious that commentators
on the classics are among the most slovenly writers of English. Read-
ers of Punch will remember how, years ago, the Provost ,and Head-
master of Eton were made to furnish food for laughter by quotations
from a letter they had published. Recently the Head-master of Win-
chester has given us, in entire unconsciousness of its gross defects, a
sample of the English which long study of language produces. If from
these teachers, who are literally the select of the select, we turn to men
otherwise selected, mostly out of the same highly-disciplined class

176 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

men who are distilled into the House of Commons, and then redistilled
into the Ministry, we are again disappointed. Just as, in the last gen-
eration, royal speeches, drawn up hy those so laboriously trained in
the right uses of words, furnished for an English grammar examples
of blunders to be avoided ; so, in the present generation, a work on
style might fitly take, from these documents which our government
annually lays before all the world, warning instances of confusions,
and illogicalities, and pleonasms. And then on looking at the per-
formances of men not thus elaborately prepared, we are still more
struck by the seeming anomaly. How great the anomaly is, we may
best see by supposing some of our undisciplined authors to use expres-
sions like those used by the disciplined. Imagine the self-made Cob-
bett deliberately saying, as is said in the last royal speech, that

" I have kept in view the double object of an equitable regard to existing cir-
cumstances, and of securing a general provision more permanent in its charac-
ter, and resting on a reciprocal and equal basis, for the commercial and mari-
time transactions of the two countries." '

Imagine the poet, who had " little Latin and less Greek," directing
that

"No such address shall be delivered in any place where the assemblage of
persons to hear the same may cause obstruction to the use of any road or walk
by the public." 3

a passage which occurs, along with half a dozen laxities and super-
fluities, in the eighteen lines announcing the ministerial retreat from
the Hyde Park contest. Imagine the ploughman Burns, like one of
our scholars who has been chosen to direct the education of gentle-
men's sons, expressing himself in print thus :

" I should not have troubled you with this detail (which was, indeed, need-
less in my former letter) if it was not that I may appear to have laid a stress
upon the dates which the boy's accident had prevented me from being able to
claim to do." 3

Imagine Bunyan the tinker publishing such a sentence as this, written
by one of our bishops :

"If the 546 gentlemen who signed the protest on the subject of deaconesses
had thought proper to object to my having formally licensed a deaconess in the
parish of Dilton's Marsh, or to what they speak of when they say that ' recog-
nition had been made' (I presume on a report of which no part or portion was
adopted by resolution of the Synod) ' as to sisters living together in a more
conventual manner and under stricter rule,' I should not have thought it neces-
sary to do more than receive with silent respect the expression of their opin-
ion," etc., etc. 4

Or, to cite for comparison modern self-educated writers, imagine such
a sentence coming from Alexander Smith, or Gerald Massey, or the

1 Daily papers, February 7, 1873. 3 Times, November 25, 1872.

2 Times and Post, February 11, 1873. 4 Times, November 27, 1872.

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. i 77

" Norwich Weaver-boy " (W. J. Fox), or the " Journeyman Engineer."
Shall we then say that, in the case of literary culture, results are pro-
portionate to appliances ? or shall we not rather say that, as in other
cases, the relation is by no means so simple a one.

Nowhere, then, do Ave find verified this assumption which we are so
prone to make. Quantity of effect does not vary as quantity of means.
From a mechanical apparatus up to an educational system or a social
institution, the same truth holds. Take a rustic to see a new machine,
and his admiration of it will be in proportion to the multiplicity of its
parts. Listen to the criticism of a skilled engineer, and you will find
that from all this complication he infers probable failure. Not elabo-
ration but simplification is his aim ; knowing, as he does, that every
additional wheel and lever implies inertia and friction to be overcome,
and occasional derangement to be rectified. It is thus everywhere.
Up to a certain point, appliances are needful for results ; but, beyond
that point, results decrease as appliances increase.

This undue belief in appliances, joined with the general bias citi-
zens inevitably have in favor of governmental agencies, prompts the
multiplication of laws. It fosters the notion that a society will be the
better the more its actions are everywhere regulated by artificial in-
strumentalities. And the effect produced on sociological speculation
is, that the benefits achieved by laws are exaggerated, while the evils
they entail are overlooked.

Brought to bear on so immensely complicated an aggregate as a
society, a law rarely, if ever, produces as much direct effect as was ex-
pected, and invariably produces indirect effects, many in their kinds
and great in their sum, that were not expected. It is so even with
fundamental changes : witness the two we have seen in the constitu-
tion of our House of Commons. Both advocates and opponents of the
first Reform Bill anticipated that the middle classes would select as
representatives many of their own body. But both were wrong. The
class-quality of the House of Commons remained very much what it
was before. While, however, the immediate and special results looked
for did not appear, there were vast, remote, and general results fore-
seen by no one. So, too, with the recent change. We had eloquently-
uttered warnings that delegates from the working-classes would swamp
the House of Commons ; and nearly every one expected that, at any
rate, a sprinkling of working-class members would be chosen. Again
all were wrong. The conspicuous alteration looked for has not oc-
curred; but, nevertheless, governmental actions have already been
much modified by the raised sense of responsibility. It is thus always.
No prophecy is safer than that the results anticipated from a law will
be greatly exceeded in amount by results not anticipated. Even sim-
ple physical actions might suggest to us this conclusion. Let us con-
template one.

vol. in. 12

i 7 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

i

You see that this wrought-iron plate is not quite flat : it sticks up
a little here toward the left " cockles," as we say. How shall we
flatten it? Obviously, you reply, by hitting down on the part that is
prominent. "Well, here is a hammer, and I give it a blow as you ad-
vise. Harder, you say. Still no effect. Another stroke ? Well, there
is one, and another, and another. The prominence remains, you see
the evil is as great as ever. But this is not all. Look at the warp
which the plate has got near the opposite edge : where it was flat be-
fore it is now curved. A pretty bungle we have made of it. Instead
of curing the original defect, we have produced a second. Had we
asked an artisan practised in " planishing," as it is called, he would
have told us no good was to be done, but only mischief, by hitting
down on the projecting part. He would have taught us how to give
variously-directed and specially-adjusted blows with a hammer else-
where : so attacking the evil not by direct but by indirect . actions.
The required process is less simple than you thought. Even a sheet
of metal is not to be successfully dealt with after those common-sense
methods in which you have so much confidence. What, then, shall
we say about a society ? " Do you think I am easier to be played on
than a pipe ? " asks Hamlet. Is humanity more readily straightened
than an iron plate ?

Many, I doubt not, failing to recognize the truth that, in proportion
as an aggregate is complex, the effects wrought by an incident force
become more multitudinous, complicated, and incalculable, and that,
therefore, a society is, of all kinds of aggregates, the kind most difficult
to affect in an intended way and not in unintended ways many such
will ask evidence of the difficulty. Hesponse would perhaps be easier
were the evidence less abundant. It is so familiar as seemingly to
have lost its significance ; just as perpetually-repeated salutations
and prayers have done. The preamble to nearly every act of Par-
liament supplies it ; in the report of every commission it is pre-
sented in various forms ; and, for any one asking instances, the di-
rection might be Hansard passim. Here I will give but a single
example which might teach certain rash enthusiasts of our day, were
they teachable. I refer to measures for the suppression of drunken-
ness.

Not to dwell on the results of the JVIaine Law, which, as I know
from one who lately gave me his personal experience, prevents the ob-
tainmcnt of stimulants by travellers in urgent need of them, but does
not prevent secret drinking by residents not to dwell, either, upon
the rigorous measures taken in Scotland in 1617, "for the restraint of
the vile and detestable vice of drunkenness daily increasing," but
which evidently did not produce the hoped-for effect I will limit my-
self to the case of the Licensing Act, 9 George II., chapter 23, for the
arresting the sale of spirituous liquors (chiefly gin) by prohibitory li-
censes :

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. i 79

" Within a few months after it passed, Tindal tells us, the commissioners of
excise themselves became sensible of the impossibility or unadvisableness of
carrying it rigorously into execution. . . . Smollett, who has drawn so dark a
picture of the state of things the act was designed to put down, has painted in
colors equally strong the mischiefs which it produced: 'The populace,' he
writes, ' soon broke through all restraint. Though no license was obtained, and
no duty paid, the liquor continued to be sold in all corners of the streets ; in-
formers were intimidated by the threats of the people ; and the justices of the
peace, either from indolence or corruption, neglected to put the law in execu-
tion.' In fact, in course of time, 'it appeared,' he adds, 'that the consumption
of gin had considerably increased every year since those heavy duties were im-
posed.' " '

When in 1743 this Act was repealed, it was shown during the de-
bates that

"The quantity of gin distilled in England, which in 1684, when the business
was introduced into this country, had been 527,000 gallons, had risen to 948,000
in 1694, to 1,375,000 in 1704, to 2,000,000 in 1714, to 3,520,000 in 1724, to
4,947,000 in 1734, and to not less than 7,160,000 in 1742. . . . Retailers
were deterred from vending them (spirituous liquors) by the utmost encourage-
ment that could be given to informers. . . . The prospect of raising money
by detecting their (unlicensed retailers') practices incited many to turn informa-
tion into a trade; and the facility with which the crime was to be proved en-
couraged some to gratify their malice by perjury, and others tbe'ir avarice ; so
that the multitude of informations became a public grievance, and the magis-
trates themselves complained that the law was not to be executed. The perju-
ries of informers were now so flagrant and common, that the people thought all
informations malicious ; or, at least, thinking themselves oppressed by the law,
they looked upon every man that promoted its execution as their enemy ; and
therefore now began to declare war against informers, many of whom they
treated with great cruelty, and some they murdered in the streets." 2

Here, then, with absence of the looked-for benefit, there went pro-
duction of unlooked-for evils, vast in amount. To recur to our figure,
the original warp, instead of being made less by these direct blows,
was made greater ; while other distortions, serious in kind and degree,
were created. And beyond the encouragement of fraud, lying, malice,
cruelty, murder, contempt of law, and the other couspicuous crooked-
nesses named, multitudinous minor twists of sentiment and thought
were caused or augmented. An indirect demoralization was added to
a direct increase of the vice aimed at.

Joining with the prevalent fallacy that results are proportionate to
appliances, the general political bias has the further effect of fostering
an undue faith in political forms. This tendency to ascribe every
thing to the visible proximate agency, and to forget the hidden pow-
ers without which the agency is worthless this tendency which makes
the child gazing at a steam-engine ascribe every thing to the combina-

1 Craik, in " Pictorial History," vol. iv., p. 853.

1 Ibid.

180 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

tion of parts it sees, not recognizing the fact that the engine can do
nothing without the steam-generating boiler, and the boiler nothing
without the water and the burning fuel, is a tendency which leads citi-
zens to think that good government can be had by shaping public ar-
rangements in this way or that way. Let us frame our state-machinery
rightly, they urge, and all will be well.

Yet this belief in the innate virtues of constitutions is as baseless
as was the belief in the natural superiorities of royal personages.
Just as, of old, loyalty to ruling men kept alive faith in their powers
and virtues, notwithstanding perpetual disproofs, so, in these modern
days, loyalty to constitutional forms keeps alive this faith in their
intrinsic worth, spite of ever-recurring demonstration that their worth
is entirely conditional. That those forms only are efficient which have
grown naturally out of character, and that, in the absence of fit charac-
ter, forms artificially obtained will be inoperative, are well shown by
the governments of trading corporations. Let its contemplate a typi-
cal instance of this government.

The proprietors of a certain railway-company (I am here giving my
personal experience as one of them) were summoned to a special meet-
ing. The notice calling them together stated that the directors had
agreed to lease their line to another company ; that every thing had
been settled ; that the company taking the lease was then in posses-
sion ; and that the proprietors were to be asked for their approval on
the day named in the notice. The meeting took place. The chairman
gave an account of the negotiation, and the agreement entered into.
A motion approving of the agreement was proposed, and seconded,
and to some extent discussed no notice whatever being taken of the
extraordinary conduct of the board. Only when the motion was about
to be put, did one proprietor protest against the astounding usurpa-
tion which the transaction implied. He said that there had grown up
a wrong conception of the relation between boards of directors and
bodies of proprietors ; that boards had come to look upon themselves
as supreme, and proprietors as subordinate, whereas, in fact, boards
were simply agents appointed to act in the absence of their principals,
the proprietors, and remained subject to their principals ; that, if, in
any private business, an absent proprietor received from his manager
the news that he had leased the business, that the person taking it was
then in possession, and that the proprietor's signature to the agree-
ment was wanted, his prompt return would be followed by a result
quite different from that looked for namely, a dismissal of the mana-
ger for having exceeded his duty in a very astonishing manner. This
protest against the deliberate trampling down of principles recognized
by the constitution of companies met with no response whatever : not
a solitary sympathizer joined in the protest, even in a qualified form.
Not only was the motion of. approval carried, but it was carried with-
out any definite knowledge of the agreement itself. Nothing more

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 181

than the chairman's verbal description was vouchsafed : no printed
copies of it had been previously circulated, or were to be had at the
meeting. And yet, astonishing to relate, this proprietary body had
been already once betrayed by an agreement with this same leasing
company! had been led to undertake the making of the line on the
strength of a seeming guarantee, which proved to be no guarantee !
See, then, the lesson. The constitution of this company, like that of
companies in general, was purely democratic. The proprietors elected
their directors, the directors their chairman; and there were special
provisions for restraining directors and replacing them when needful.
Yet these forms of free government had fallen into disuse. And it is
thus in all cases. Save on occasions when some scandalous misman-
agement or corruption, bringing great loss, has caused a revolutionary
excitement among them, railway-proprietors do not exercise their pow-
ers. Retiring directors beinsr reelected as a matter of form, the board
becomes practically a close body; usually some one member, often
the chairman, acquires supremacy ; and so the government lapses into
something between oligarchy and monarchy. All this, observe, hap-
pening not exceptionally but as a rule, happens among bodies of men
mostly well educated, and many highly educated people of means,
merchants, lawyers, clergymen, etc. Ample disproof, if there needed
any, of the notion that men are to be fitted for the right exercise of
power by teaching.

And now to return : Any one, who looks through these facts and
facts akin to them for the truth they imply, may see that forms of
government are valuable only where they are products of national
character. No cunningly-devised political arrangements will of them-
selves do any thing. No amount of knowledge respecting the uses of
such arrangements will suffice. Nothing will suffice but the emotional
nature to which such arrangements are adapted a nature which,
during social progress, has evolved the arrangements. And wherever
there is want of congruity between the nature and the arrangements
wherever the arrangements, suddenly established by revolution, or
pushed too far in advance by reforming change, are of a higher type
than the national character demands, there is always a lapse propor-
tionate to the incongruity. In proof I might enumerate the illustra-
tions that lie scattered through the modern histories of Spain, of South
America, of Mexico. Or I might dwell on the lesson (before briefly
referred to) presented us in France ; where the recurring political cycle
always shows us that new Democracy is but old Despotism differently
spelt where now, as heretofore, we find Liberty Egalite, Fraternite,
conspicuous on the public buildings, and now, as heretofore, have for
interpretations of these words the extremest party-hatreds, vitupera-
tions and actual assaults in the Assembly, wholesale arrests of men
unfriendly to those in power, forbiddings of public meetings, and sup-
pressions of journals ; and where now, as heretofore, writers, professing

i8 2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

to be ardent advocates of political freedom, rejoice in these acts which
shackle and gag their antngonists. But I will take, instead, a case
more nearly allied to our own.

For less strikingly, and in other ways, but still with sufficient
clearness, this same truth is displayed in the United States. I do not
refer only to such extreme illustrations of it as were at one time fur-
nished in California ; where, along with that complete political freedom
which some suppose to be the sole requisite for social welfare, most
men lived in perpetual fear for their lives, while others prided them-
selves on the notches which marked, on the hilts of their pistols, the
number of men they had killed. Nor will I dwell on the state of so-
ciety existing under republican forms in the West, where a white
woman is burnt to death for marrying a negro, where secret gangs
murder in the night men w r hose conduct they dislike, where mobs stop
trains to lynch offending persons contained in them, where the carry-
ing of a revolver is a matter of course, where judges are intimidated
and the execution of justice often impracticable. I do but name these
as extreme instances of the way in which, under institutions that nomi-
nally secuie men from oppression, they may be intolerably oppressed
unable to utter their opinions and to conduct their private lives as
they please. Without going so far we may find in the Eastern States
proof enough that the forms of liberty and the reality of liberty are
not necessarily commensurate. A state of things under which men
administer justice in their own cases, are applauded for so doing, and
mostly acquitted if tried, is a state of things which has, in so far, ret-
rograded toward a less civilized state ; for one of the cardinal traits
of political progress is the gradual disappearance of personal retalia-
tion, and the increasing supremacy of a ruling power which settles
the differences between individuals and punishes aggressors. And, in
proportion as this ruling power is enfeebled, the security of individuals
is lessened. That security, lessened in this general way, is lessened in
more special ways, we see in the bribery of judges, in the financial
frauds by which many are robbed without possibility of remedy, in
the corruptness of New York administration, which, taxing so heavily,
does so little. And, under another aspect, we see the like in the do-
ings of legislative bodies in the unfair advantages which some indi-
viduals gain over others by " lobbying " in Credit-Mobilier briberies,
and the like. While the outside form of free government remains,
there has grown up within it a reality which makes government not
free. The body of professional politicians, entering public life to get
incomes, organizing their forces, and developing their tactics, have,
in fact, come to be a ruling class quite different from that which the
Constitution intended to secure ; and a class having interests by no
means identical with public "interests. The worship of the appliances
to liberty, in place of liberty itself, needs continually exposing. There
is no intrinsic virtue in votes. The possession of representatives is*

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 183

not in itself a benefit. These are but means to an end ; and the end
is the maintenance of those conditions under which each citizen may
carry on his life without further hindrances from other citizens than
are involved by their equal claims the securing to each citizen all
such beneficial results of his activities as his activities naturally bring.
The worth of the means is measured by the degree in which this end
is achieved ; and a citizen nominally having complete means, and but
partially securing the end, is less free than another who uses incom-
plete means to more purpose.

But why go abroad for proofs of the truth that political forms are
of worth only in proportion as they are vitalized by national charac-
ter ? "We have proofs at home. I do not mean those furnished by
past constitutional history I do not merely refer to those many facts
showing us that the nominal power of our representative body became
an actual power only by degrees ; and that the theoretically indepen-
dent House of Commons took centuries to escape from regal and aris-
tocratic sway, and establish a practical independence. I refer to the
present time, and to actions of our representative body in the pleni-
tude of its power. This assembly of deputies chosen by constituencies
now so greatly extended, and therefore so well fitted, as it would
seem, for guarding the individual, of whatever grade, against trespasses
upon his individuality, nevertheless authorizes new trespasses upon
his individuality. A popular government, just made more popular,
has established, without the slightest hindrance, a law and an official
organization that treat with contempt the essential principles of con-
stitutional rule. Here is a brief account of the process :

On the 20th June, 1864, just before two o'clock in the morning, there
was silently read a first time an act giving, in some localities, certain
new powers to the police. On the 27th of that month, it was read a
second time, also without comment at what hour Hansard does not
show. Just before two o'clock in the morning, on June 30th, there
was appointed, without remark, a select committee to consider this
proposed act. On the 15th July the report of this committee was re-
ceived. On the 19th the bill was recommitted, and the report on it
received all in silence. On the 20th July it was considered still in
silence as amended. And, on the 21st July, it was read a third time
and passed equally in silence. Taken next day to the House of
Lords, it there, in silence equally profound, passed through all its
stages in four days (? three). This act not proving strong enough to
meet the views of naval and military officers (who, according to the
testimony of one of the select committee, were the prompters of it),
was in 1866 "amended." At one o'clock in the morning, on March
16th of that year, the act amending it was read a first time ; and it
was read a second time on the 22d, when the Secretary of the Admiralty,
describing it as an act to secure the better health of soldiers and sail-
ors, said: "It was intended to renew an act passed in 1864, with ad-

i8 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ditional powers." And now, for the first time, there came brief adverse
comments from two members. On April 9th there was appointed a
select committee, consisting mainly of the same members as the pre-
vious one predominantly state-officers, of one class or other. On
the 20th, the report of the committee was received. On the 26th, the
bill was recommitted, just before two o'clock in the morning ; and on
the report there came some short comments, which were, however,
protested against on the ground that the bill was not to be publicly
discussed. And then, to end this brief history, observe the reception
given to the only direct opposition raised. When, to qualify a clause
defining the powers of the police, it was proposed to add, " that the
justices before whom such information shall be made shall in all cases
require corroborative testimony and support thereof, other than that
of the members of the police force," this qualification was negatived
without a word.

And now, what was this act, passed the first time absolutely with-
out comment, and passed in its so-called amended form with but the
briefest comments, made under protest that comments were inter-
dicted ? What was this measure, so conspicuously right that discus-
sion of it was thought superfluous ? It was a measure by which, in
certain localities, one-half of the people were brought under the sum-
mary jurisdiction of magistrates, in respect of certain acts charged
against them. Further, those by whom they were to be charged, and
by whose unsupported testimony charges were to be proved, were
agents of the law, looking for promotion as the reward of vigilance
agents placed under a permanent temptation to make and substantiate
charges. And yet more, the substantiation of charges was made
comparatively easy by only requiring a single local magistrate to be
convinced, by the testimony, on oath, of one of these agents of the law,
that a person charged Avas guilty of the alleged acts acts which,
held to be thus proved, were punished by periodic examinations of a
repulsive kind, and forced inclusion in a degraded class. A House of
Commons, elected by large constituencies, many of which are now
chiefly composed of working-men, showed the greatest alacrity in
making a law under which, in sundry districts, the liberty of a work-
ing-man's wife or daughter remains intact only so long as a detective
does not give evidence which leads a magistrate to believe her a pros-
titute ! And this bill, which, even had there been something like ad-
equate reasons (which we have seen there were not) for dispensing
with precautions against injustice, should, at any rate, have been passed
only after full debate and anxious criticism, was passed with every
effort to maintain secrecy ; and this on the pretext that decency for-
bade discussion of it all the while that Mordaunt-cases and the like
were being reported with a fulness proportionate to the amount of ob-
jectionable details they brought out ! Nor is this all. Not only do
the provisions of the act make easy the establishment of charges by

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 185

men who are placed under a temptation to make them, but these men
are guarded against penalties apt to be brought on them by abusing
their power. A poor woman who proceeds against one of them, for
making a groundless accusation ruinous to her character, does so with
this risk before her : that, if she fails to get a verdict, she has to pay
the defendant's costs (not taxed costs hut full costs) ; whereas a ver-
dict in her favor does not give her costs : only by a special order of
the judge does she get costs ! And this is the "even-handed jus-
tice " provided by a government freer in form than any we have ever
had ! " '

Let it not be supposed that in arguing thus I am implying that
forms of government are unimportant. While contending that they
are of value only in so far as a national character gives life to them, it
is consistent also to contend that they are essential as agencies through
which that national character may work out its effects. A boy cannot
wield to purpose an implement of size and weight fitted to the hand
of a man. A man cannot do effective work with the boy's implement :
he must have one adapted to his larger grasp and greater strength.
To each the implement is essential ; but the results which each achieves
are not to be measured by the size or make of the implement alone,
but by its adaptation to his powers. Similarly with political instru-
mentalities. It is possible to hold that a political instrumentality is
of value only in proportion as there exists a strength of character
needful for using it, and at the same time to hold that a fit political
instrumentality is indispensable. Here, as before, results are not pro-
portionate to appliances ; but they are proportionate to the force for
due operation of which certain appliances are necessary.

One other still more genei*al and more subtle kind of political bias
has to be guarded against. Beyond that excess of faith in laws and in
political forms which is fostered by awe of regulative agencies, there

1 When, in dealing with the vitiation of evidence, I before referred to the legislation
here named, I commented on the ready acceptance of those one-sided statements made
to justify such legislation, in contrast with the contempt for those multitudinous proofs
that gross abuses would inevitably result from the arrangements made. Since that pas-
sage was written, there has been a startling justification of it. A murder has been com-
mitted by a gang of sham-detectives (one of them a government employe) ; and the trial
has brought out the fact that for the last three years the people of Lille have been sub-
ject to an organized terrorism which has grown out of the system of prostitute-inspec-
tion. Though, during those three years, five hundred women are said by one of these
criminals to have fallen into their clutches though the men have been blackmailed
and the women outraged to this immense extent, yet the practice went on for the
reason (obvious enough, one would have thought, to need no proof by illustration) that
those aggrieved preferred to submit rather than endanger their characters by complain-
ing ; and the practice would doubtless have gone on still but for the murder of one of the
victims. To some this case will carry conviction : probably not, however, to those who,
in pursuance of what they are pleased to call " practical legislation," prefer an induction
based on a Blue Book to an induction based on universal history.

i86 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

is, even among those least swayed by this awe, a vague faith in the im-
mediate possibility of something much better than now exists a tacit
assumption that, even with men as they now are, public affairs might
be much better managed. The mental attitude of such may be best
displayed by an imaginary conversation between one of them and a
member of the Legislature.

" Why do your agents, with no warrant but a guess, make this
surcharge on my income-tax return ; leaving me to pay an amount that
is not due, and to establish a precedent for future like payments, or
else to lose valuable time in proving their assessment excessive, and,
while so doing, to expose all my affairs? You leave me to choose
between two losses, direct and indirect, for the sole reason that your
assessor fancies, or professes to fancy, that I have understated my in-
come. Why do you allow this ? Why in this case do you invert the
principle which, in cases between citizens, you hold to be an equitable
one the principle that a claim must be proved by him who makes it,
not disproved by him against whom it is made ? Is it in pursuance
of old political usages that you do this ? Is it to harmonize with the
practice of making one whom you had falsely accused pay the costs of
his defence, although in suits between citizens you require the loser to
bear all the expense ? a practice you have but lately relinquished.
Do you desire to keep up the spirit of the good old rulers who im-
pressed laborers and paid them what they pleased, or the still older
ones who seized whatever they wanted ? Would you maintain this
tradition by laying hands on as much as possible of my earnings and
leaving me to get part of it back if I can : expecting, indeed, that I
shall very likely submit to the loss rather than undergo the worry,
and hindrance, and injury, needful to recover what you have wrong-
fully taken ? I was brought up to regard the Government and its
officers as my protectors; and now I find them aggressors against
whom I have to defend myself."

" What would you have ? Our agents could not bring forward
proof that an income-tax return was less than it should be. Either the
present method must be pursued, or the tax must be abandoned."

" I have no concern with your alternative. I have merely to point
out that betw T een man and man you recognize no such plea. When a
plaintiff makes a claim but cannot produce evidence, you do not make
the defendant submit if he fails to show that the claim is groundless.
You say that, if no evidence can be given, nothing can be done.
Why do you ignore this principle when your agents make the claim ?
Why from the fountain of equity comes there this inequity ? Is it to
maintain consistency with that system of criminal jurisprudence under
which, w r hile professing to hold a man innocent till proved guilty, you
treat him before trial like a convict as you did Dr. Hessel ? Are
your views really represented by these Middlesex magistrates you
have appointed, who see no hardship to a man of culture in the seclu-

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 187

sion of a prison-cell, and the subjection to prison-rules, on the mere
suspicion that he has committed a murder ? "

" The magistrates held that the rules allowed them to make no
distinctions. You would not introduce class-legislation into prison-
discipline ? "

" I remember that is one of the excuses ; and I cheerfully give
credit to this endeavor to treat all classes alike. I do so the more
cheerfully because this application of the principle of equality differs
much from those which you ordinarily make as when, on discharging
some of your well-paid officials who have held sinecures, you give them
large pensions, for the reason, I suppose, that their expensive styles
of living have disabled them from saving any thing ; while, when you
discharge dock-yard laborers, you do not give them compensation, for
the reason, I suppose, that out of weekly wages it is easy to accumu-
late a competence. This, however, by the way. I am here concerned
with that action of your political system which makes it an aggressor
on citizens, whether rich or poor, instead of a protector. The instances
I have given are but trivial instances of its general operation. Law is
still a name of dread, as it was in past times. My legal adviser, being
my friend, strongly recommends rne not to seek your aid in recover-
ing property fraudulently taken from me ; and I perceive, from their
remarks, that my acquaintances would pity me as a lost man if I got
into your Court of Equity. Whether active or passive, I am in danger.
Your arrangements are such that I may be pecuniarily knocked on the
head by some one who pretends I have injured his property. I have
the alternative of letting my pocket be picked by the scamp who
makes this baseless allegation in the hope of being paid to desist, or
of meeting the allegation in Chancery, and there letting my pocket be
picked, probably to a still greater extent, by your agencies. Nay,
when you have, as you profess, done me justice by giving me a verdict
and condemning the scamp to pay costs, I find I may still be ruined
by having to pay my own costs if he has no means. To make your
system congruous throughout, it only needs that, when I call him to
save me from the foot-pad, your policeman should deal me still heavier
blows than the foot-pad did, and empty my purse of what remains
in it."

" Why so impatient ? Are we not going to reform it all ? Was
it not last session proposed to make a Court of Appellate Jurisdiction
by appointing four peers with salaries of 7,000 each ? And has there
not been brought forward this session, even quite early, a Government-
measure for facilitating appeals ; so that the final judgments may not
be postponed from year to year ? Give us a little time, and we will
make these renewals of litigation much easier."

" Thanks in advance for the improvement. When I have failed to
ruin myself by a first suit, it will be a consolation to think that I can
complete my ruin by a second with less delay than heretofore. Mean-

i38 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

while, instead of this reform which you seem to think of primary im-
portance, I should be obliged if you would diminish the occasion for
appeals, by making your laws such as it is possible for me to know, or,
at any rate, such as it is possible for your judges to know ; and I
should be further obliged if you would give me easier remedies against
aggressions, instead of remedies so costly, so deceptive, so dangerous,
that I prefer suffering the aggressions in silence. Daily I experience
the futility of your system. I start on a journey expecting (foolishly,
I admit) that, in conformity with the advertised times, I shall just be
able to reach a certain distant town before night ; but the train, being
an hour late at one of the junctions, I am defeated am put to the
cost of a night spent on the way, and lose half the next day. I paid
for a first-class seat that I might have space, comfort, and unobjec-
tionable fellow-travellers ; but, stopping at a town where a fair is
going on, the guard, on the plea that the third-class carriages are full,
thrusts into the compartment more persons than there are places for,
who, both by behavior and odor, are repulsive. Thus in two ways I
am defrauded. For part of the fraud I have no remedy ; and, for the
rest, my remedy, doubtful at best, is practically unavailable. Is the
reply that, against the alleged breach of contract as to time, the com-
pany has guarded itself, or professes to have guarded itself, by dis-
claiming responsibility ? The allowing such a disclaimer is one of your
countless negligences. You do not allow me to plead irresponsibility
if I give the company bad money, or if, having bought a ticket for the
second class, I travel in the first. On my side you regard the contract
as quite definite ; but, on the other side, you practically allow the con-
tract to remain undefined. And now see the general effects of your
carelessness ! Scarcely any trains keep their times ; and the result
of chronic unpunctuality is a multiplication of accidents and loss of
life."

" How about laissez-faire? I thought your notion was, that the
less Government meddled with these things the better ; and now you
complain that the law does not secure your comfort in a railway-car-
riage, and see that you are delivered at your journey's end in due time.
I suppose you approved of the proposal made in the House last ses-
sion, that companies should be compelled to give foot-warmers to sec-
ond-class passengers."

" Really, you amaze me. I should have thought that not even or-
dinary intelligence, much less select legislative intelligence, would
have fallen into such a confusion. I am not blaming you for failing to
secure me comfort or punctuality. I am blaming you for failing to en-
force contracts. Just as strongly as I protest against your neglect in
letting a company take my money, and then not give me all I paid
for, so strongly should I protest did you dictate how much con-
venience should be given me for so much money. Surely I need not
remind you that your civil law in general proceeds on the principle

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 189

that the goodness or badness of a bargain is the affair of those who
make it, not your affair ; but that it is your duty to enforce the bar-
gain when made. Only in proportion as this is done can men's lives
in society be maintained. The condition to all life, human or other, is
that effort put forth shall bring the means of repairing the parts Avasted
by effort shall bring, too, more or less of surplus. A creature that
continuously expends energy without return in nutriment dies ; and a
creature is indirectly killed by any thing which, after energies have
been expended, habitually intercepts the return. This holds of asso-
ciated human beings as of all other beings. In a society, most citizens
do not obtain sustenance directly by the powers they exert, but do it
indirectly : each gives the produce of his powers exerted in his special
way in exchange for the produce of other men's powers exerted in
other ways. The condition under which only this obtaining of sus-
tenance, to replace the matter wasted by effort, can be carried on in so-
ciety, is fulfilment of contracts. Non-fulfilment of contract is letting
energy be expended in expectation of a return, and then withholding
the return. The maintenance of contract, therefore, is the maintenance
of the fundamental principle of all life under the form given to it by
social arrangements. I blame you because you do not maintain this
fundamental princijile ; and, as a consequence, allow life to be impeded
and sacrificed in countless indirect ways. You are, I admit, solicitous
about my life as endangered by my own acts. Though you very in-
adequately guard me against injuries from others, you seem particu-
larly anxious that I shall not injure myself. Emulating Sir Peter Lau-
rie, who made himself so famous by threatening to " put down suicide,"
you do what you can to prevent me from risking my limbs. Your
great care of me is shown, for instance, by enforcing a by-law which
forbids me to leave a railway-train in motion ; and, if I jump out, I
find that, whether I hurt myself or not, you decide to hurt me by a
fine. 1 Not only do you thus punish me when I run the risk of punish-
ing myself, but your amiable anxiety for my welfare shows itself in
taking money out of my pocket to provide me with various conven-
iences baths and wash-houses, for example, and free access to books.
Out of my pocket, did I say ? Not always. Sometimes out of the
pockets of those least able to afford it ; as when, from poor authors
who lose by their books, you demand gratis copies for your public li-
braries, that I and others may read them for nothing Dives robbing
Lazarus that he may give alms to the well-clad ! But these many
things you offer are things I do not ask ; and you will not effectually
insure me the one thing I do ask. I do not want you to ascertain for
me the nature of the sun's corona, or to find a northwest passage, or
to explore the bottom of the sea; but I do want you to insure me
against aggression, by making the punishment of aggressors, civil as
well as criminal, swift, certain, and costless to those injured. Instead

1 See case in Times, December 11, 1872.

190 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of doing this, yon persist in doing other things. Instead of securing
me the bread due to my efforts, you give me a stone a sculptured
block from Ephesus. I am quite content to enjoy only what I get by
my own exertions, and to have only that information and those pleas-
ures for which I pay. I am quite content to suffer the evils brought on
me by my own defects believing, indeed, that for me and all there is
no other wholesome discipline. But you fail to do what is needed.
You are careless about insuring to me the unhindered enjoyment of
the benefits my efforts have purchased ; and you insist on giving me,
at other people's expense, benefits my efforts have not purchased, and
on saving me from penalties I deserve."

" You are unreasonable. We are doing our best with the enormous
mass of business brought before us : sitting on committees, reading
evidence and reports, debating till one or two in the morning. Ses-
sion after session we work hard at all kinds of measures for the public
welfare devising plans for educating the people ; enacting better ar-
rangements for the health of towns ; making inquiries into the impurity
of rivers; deliberating on plans to diminish drunkenness ; prescribing
modes of building houses that they may not fall ; deputing commission-
ers to facilitate emigration ; and so on. You can go to no place that
does not show signs of our activity. Here are public gardens formed
by our local lieutenants, the municipal bodies ; here are light-houses we
have put up to prevent shipwrecks. Everywhere we have appointed
inspectors to see that salubrity is maintained ; everywhere there are
vaccinators to see that due precautions against small-pox are observed ;
and, if, happening to be in a district where our arrangements are in
force, your desires are not well controlled, we do our best to insure
you a healthy "

" Yes, I know what you would say. It is all of a piece with the rest
of your policy. "While you fail to protect me against others, you insist
on protecting me against myself. And your very failure to do the
essential thing results from the absorption of your time in doing non-
essential things. Do you think that your beneficences make up for
the injustices you let me bear? I do not want these sops and gratui-
ties ; but I do want security against trespasses, direct and indirect
security that is real, and not nominal. See the predicament in which
I am placed. You forbid me (quite rightly, I admit) to administer
justice on my own behalf; and you profess to administer it for me. I
may not take summary measures to resist encroachment, to reclaim
my own, or to seize that which I bargained to have for my services :
you tell me that I must demand your aid to enforce my claim. But
demanding your aid commonly brings such frightful evils that I prefer
to bear the wrong done me. So that, practically, having forbidden
me to defend myself, you fail to defend me. By this my life is viti-
ated along with the lives of citizens in general. All transactions are
impeded; time and labor are lost; the prices of commodities are

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. lgl

raised. Honest men are defrauded, and rogues thrive. Debtors out-
wit their creditors ; bankrupts make purses by their failures, and re-
commence on larger scales ; and financial frauds that ruin their thou-
sands go unpunished."

Thus far our impatient friend. And now see how untenable is his
position. He actually supposes that it is possible to get government
conducted on rational principles ! His tacit assumption is that, out of a
community morally imperfect, and intellectually imperfect, there may
in some way be had legislative regulation that is not proportionately
imperfect ! He is under a delusion. Not by any kind of government,
established after any method, can the thing be done. A good and
wise autocrat cannot be chosen or otherwise obtained by a people not
good and wise. Goodness and wisdom will not characterize the suc-
cessive families of an oligarchy, arising out of a bad and foolish peo-
ple, any more than they will characterize a line of kings. Nor will
any system of representation, limited or universal, direct or indirect,
do more than represent the average nature of citizens. To dissipate
his notion that truly-rational government can be provided for them-
selves by a people not truly rational, he needs but to read election-
speeches, and observe how votes are gained by clap-trap appeals to
senseless prejudices, and by fostering hopes of impossible benefits,
while votes are lost by. candid statements of stern truths and endeav-
ors to dissipate groundless expectations. Let him watch the process,
and he will see that when the fermenting mass of political passions
and beliefs is put into the electoral still, there distils over not the wis-
dom alone, but the folly also sometimes in the larger proportion.
Nay, if he watches closely he may suspect that not only is the corpor-
ate conscience lower than the average individual conscience, but the
corporate intelligence too. The minority of the wise in a constituency
is liable to be wholly submerged by the majority of the ignorant ;
often ignorance alone gets represented. In the representative assem-
bly, again, the many mediocrities practically rule the few superiorities:
the few superior are obliged to express those views only which the
rest can understand, and must keep to themselves their best and far-
thest-reaching thoughts, as thoughts that would have no weight. He
needs but to remember that abstract principles are pooh-poohed in the
House of Commons, to see at once that, while the unwisdom expresses
itself abundantly, what of highest wisdom there may be has to keep
silence. And, if he asks an illustration of the way in which the intelli-
gence of the body of members brings out a result lower than would
the intelligence of the average member, he may see one in those mud-
dlings of provisions and confusions of language in Acts of Parliament,
which have lately been calling forth protests from the judges.

Thus the assumption that it is possible for a nation to get in the
shape of law something like embodied reason, when it is not itself
pervaded by a correlative reasonableness, is improbable a priori and

i 9 2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

disproved a posteriori. The belief that truly good legislation and ad-
ministration can go along with a humanity not truly good, is a chronic
delusion. While our own form of government, giving means for ex-
pressing and enforcing claims, is the best form yet evolved for pre-
venting aggressions of class upon class, and of individuals on one
another, yet it is hopeless to expect from it, any more than from other
forms of government, a capacity and a rectitude greater than those of
the society out of which it grows. And criticisms like the foregoing,
which imply that its shortcomings can "be set right by expostulating
with existing governing agents or by appointing others, imply that
subtlest kind of political bias which is apt to remain when the stronger
kinds have been got rid of.

Second only to the class-bias, we may say that the political bias most
seriously distorts sociological conceptions. That this is so with the
bias of political party, every one sees in some measure, though not in
full measure. It is manifest to the Radical that the bias of the Tory
blinds him to a present evil or to a future good. It is manifest to the
Tory that the Radical does not see the benefit there is in that which
he wishes to destroy, and fails to recognize the mischiefs likely to be
done by the institution he would establish. But neither imagines that
the other is no less needful than himself. The Radical, with his im-
practicable ideal, is unaware that his enthusiasm will serve only to
advance things a little, but not at all as he expects ; and he will not
admit that the obstructiveness of the Tory is a wholesome check.
The Tory, doggedly resisting, cannot perceive that the established
order is but relatively good, and that his defence of it is simply a
means of preventing premature change ; wdiile he fails to recognize in
the bitter antagonism and sanguine hopes of the Radical the agencies
without which there could be no progress. Thus neither fully under-
stands his own function or the function of his opponent ; and, by as
much as he falls short of understanding it, he is disabled from rightly
understanding social phenomena.

The more general kinds of political bias distort men's sociological
conceptions in other ways, but quite as seriously. There is this peren-
nial delusion, common to Radical and Tory, that legislation is omnipo-
tent, and that things will get done because laws are passed to do them;
there is this confidence in one or other form of government, due to the
belief that a government once established will retain its form and
work as was intended ; there is this hope that by some means the col-
lective wisdom can be separated from the collective folly, and set over
it in such way as to guide things aright all of them implying that
general political bias which inevitably coexists with subordination to
political agencies. The effect on sociological speculation is to main-
tain the conception of a society as something manufactured by states-
men, and to distract attention from the phenomena of social evolution.

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL.

193

While the regulating agency occupies the thoughts, scarcely any
thought is given to those astounding processes and results due to the
energies regulated. The genesis of the vast productive and manufac-
turing and distributing agencies which has gone on spontaneously,
often hindered, and at best only restrained, by governing powers, is
passed over with unobservant eyes. And thus, by continually con-
templating the power which keeps in Order, and contemplating rarely,
if at all, the activities that are kept in order, there is produced an ex-
tremely one-sided theory of society.

Clearly, it is with this as it is with the kinds of bias previously con-
sidered the degree of it bears a certain necessary relation to the
tempory phase of progress. It can diminish only as fast as society
advances. A well-balanced social self-consciousness, like a well-bal-
anced individual self-consciousness, is the accompaniment of a high
evolution.

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL.

By Captain DOUGLAS GALTON, C.B., F. E. S.

MY endeavor will be, to show that there may be obtained, from a
much-diminished consumption of coal in fireplaces used for
domestic purposes, all the advantages which have hitherto resulted
from the wasteful expenditure which has prevailed.

I have no expectation of stating any thing that is actually new,
because the functions and the attributes of heat and combustion have
long been thoroughly discussed in their application to industrial ob-
jects. I hope, however, to draw attention to important considerations
which govern the application of heat, and which are very generally
neglected in fireplaces, in kitchen-ranges, and in most warming ap-
paratus.

I think I may say, without hesitation, that the quantity of fuel now
absolutely wasted in our houses amounts to at least five-sixths of the
coal consumed. That is to say, if the greatest care and the best meth-
od of applying the heat were in all cases adopted, we could eifect in
heating and cooking all that we now effect, with one-sixth of the coal
we now use ; and, if, in the construction of our fireplaces and cooking
apparatus, simple principles were recognized and ordinary care was
used, we might without difficulty save from two-thirds to half of the
coal consumed.

In my remarks on this question I intend to confine myself rather
to the enunciation of the principles which should govern the applica-
tion of heat for domestic purposes, than to give descriptions, except
in a general way, of special appliances.

VOL. III. 13

i 9 4 TIIE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The inventors of apparatus for warming and cooking are so nu-
merous, and the merits of a large number of inventions which have
come into common use are of so negative a value, that it would not
be fair to single out some individual instance for condemnation, and
leave unnoticed other apparatus which possess equal defects and may-
be in equally extensive use. Mr. Edwards's very interesting and in-
structive treatise on domestic fireplaces clearly shows with what per-
sistent perverseness the inventions which possess real merit have been
almost invariably passed by. This result, I fear, is due mainly to the
fact that architects and builders have not been penetrated with sound
principles on the warming of our dwellings, and have encouraged the
adoption of showy grates, based on false principles, instead of taking
the trouble to make new designs of pretty grates based on sound prin-
ciples of warming.

The question of the consumption of coal for domestic purposes
divides itself into two branches :

1. The quantity required for warmth.

2. The quantity required for cooking.

The former is required only for the winter months, the latter is a
permanent quantity during the year.

The waste of coal in domestic fireplaces is, however, no new ques-
tion. It is quite eighty years since the subject was most fully treated
of by Count Rumford, and afterward by Mr. Sylvester. They showed
conclusively what enormous savings in fuel, for heating, cooking, and
drying, were possible. Count Rumford' s principles have never been
generally applied, because the price of coals has ruled so low that
householders have not much cared for economy. "We hear Count
Rumford's axioms now and then quoted by rival manufacturers in sup-
port of their newly-devised grates or kitchen-ranges ; but, in many
cases, the manufacturer, in the article he supplies, seems to be endeav-
oring to violate, rather than to follow, every axiom which Count Rum-
ford ever laid down.

I do not mean to say that improvements have not taken place since
Count Rumford's time, but the progress in the direction of economy
has been very small, when we consider the great ingenuity displayed
in devising new forms of apparatus. In respect of our fireplaces, our
chief talent has been expended in providing a means of warming the
outside air, and of polluting it by the smoke and soot we project
into it.

The methods which have been adopted for warming houses fall
under the several heads of

1. Open fireplaces.

2. Close stoves (the German plan).

3. The Roman hypocaust, or floors warmed by direct action of fire.

4. Hot-water pipes, without ventilation.

5. Hot air warmed by a cockle, or by hot-water pipes.

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL, i 95

The class of apparatus to be adopted in any country will vary with
the climate. In England the climate is of so very changeable a nature,
that the amount of heat required for comfort in a house varies from
day to day. There are many days in the middle of winter when it is
quite possible to sit in an unwarmed room ; or, sometimes a warm
morning is followed by a cold afternoon, when the sudden application
of heat is desirable. It is probably for this reason that in England
the open fireplace has, as a rule, held its own against all the proposals
for warming houses by means of one central fire.

The open fireplace in ordinary use warms only by means of the
direct radiation of the flame into the air of the room. It is the most
primitive mode of warming, derived from the days when our ances-
tors inhabited caves. But these ancestors, by placing the fire in the
centre of the floor of the cave, derived from it a larger portion of heat
than we generally do, who place it against the wall of the room, and
carry off the greater part of the heat up a flue separated from the
room. The earlier fireplaces consisted of a large square brick opening,
with a chimney carried up for the escape of smoke. The large square
fireplace was adverse to the direct radiation into the room of the heat
generated, and the large chimney removed from the room a very con-
siderable quantity of air, which had necessarily to be replaced by cold
air flowing into the room through all available apertures, and this
created strong draughts.

Franklin, Count Rumford, and Sylvester, are the most prominent
names of those who at an early period contributed improvements to
the warming of our houses. The main principle of fireplace construc-
tion advocated by Count Rumford, eighty years ago, was, that the
heat radiated from the fire directly into the room should be developed
to the utmost. He brought the back of the fireplace as prominently
forward as possible ; he sloped the sides so as to reflect heat into the
room ; he advocated the use of fire-brick backs and sides instead of
iron ; he reduced the size of the chimney opening, so as to prevent the
chimney carrying off the large quantity of warmed air it used to re-
move in his time. Our manufacturers of fireplaces have continued
in the same groove. They have, undoubtedly, in some cases, largely
developed the use of radiant heat. There are fireplaces, eminently
successful as radiators of heat, of a circular or concave form, with pol-
ished iron sides, the fire being placed against a fire-brick back forming
the apex of the concavity. So long as the concave surfaces are bright,
the heat thrown out by them when a clear flame is burning is very
great, but the gases from the flame pass directly off into the chimney
while they are still at a very high temperature. The heat of the flame
at that part will often be between 1,200 and 1,300 Fahr., and a
very large proportion of this heat, to the extent of at least nine-tenths
of that generated by the combustion of the fuel, is carried directly up
the chimney.

196 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

One pound of coal is capable, if all the heat of combustion is util-
ized, of raising the temperature of a room, twenty feet square and
twelve feet high, to ten degrees above the temperature of the outer
air. If the room were not ventilated at all, and the walls were com-
posed of non-conducting materials, the consumption of fuel to maintain
this temperature would be very small, but, in proportion as the air
of the room was renewed, so would the consumption of fuel necessary
to maintain that temperature increase. If the volume of air contained
in the room were changed every hour, one pound of coal additional
would be required per hour to heat the inflowing air, so that, to main-
tain the temperature at ten degrees above that of the outer air during
twelve hours, would require twelve pounds of coal.

The principle of the ordinary open fireplace is that the coal shall
be placed in a grate, by which air is admitted from the bottom and
sides to aid in the combustion of coal ; and an ordinary fireplace, for
a room of twenty feet square and twelve feet high, will contain from
about fifteen to twenty pounds at a time, and, if the fire be kept up
for twelve hours, probably the consumption will be about one hundred
pounds, or the consumption may be assumed at about eight pounds
of coal an hour.

One pound of coal may be assumed to require, for its perfect com-
bustion, 150 cubic feet of atmospheric air; 8 lbs. would require 1,200
cubic feet ; but, at a very low computation of the velocity of the gases
in an ordinary chimney-flue, the air which would pass up the chimney
at a rate of from 4 to 6 feet per second, or from 14,000 to 20,000 cubic
feet per hour, with the chimneys in ordinary use, and I have often
found a velocity of from 10 to 12 feet per second giving an outflow of
ah* of from 35,000 to 40,000 cubic feet per hour this air comes into
the room cold, and when it is beginning to be warmed it is drawn
away up the chimney, and its place filled by fresh cold air. A room
20 feet square and 12 feet high contains 4,800 cubic feet of space. In
such a room, with a good fire, the air would be removed four or five
times an hour with a moderate draught in the chimney, and six or
eight times with a blazing fire ; the air so removed would be replaced
by cold air. The atmosphere of the room is thus being cooled down
rapidly by the continued influx of cold air to supply the place of the
warmer air drawn up the chimney. The very means adopted to heat
the room produces draughts, because the stronger the direct radiation,
or rather the brighter the flame in open fireplaces, the stronger must
be the draught of the fire and the abstraction of heat. The only way
to prevent draughts is to adopt means for providing fresh warmed air
to supply the place of that removed.

The most natural way of providing warmed air is to utilize the ex-
cess of heat which passes up the chimney, beyond what is required for
creating an adequate draught, and to use this heat to warm fresh air ;
and the warmed air should be admitted into the room in such places

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL. lg7

as will enable it to flow most easily into the currents prevailing in the
room. These considerations led to the construction of the ventilating
fireplace, which has been so extensively used in barracks. This fireplace
will keep a room at a given temperature with one-third of the quantity
of fuel usually required in most ordinary fireplaces, and with less than
one-half the quantity required in the very best-constructed radiating
fireplaces. ,

The open ventilating fireplace, if properly constructed, is the sim-
plest and most effectual means of warming and ventilating a single
room, because it absorbs all spare heat from the chimney beyond what
is necessary to create a draught ; and, while it admits warmed air into
the upper part of the room in an imperceptible current, the action of
the fire draws air from the lower part of the room, and thus provides
for a circulation of the warmed air toward the floor of the room.

The ventilating fireplaces invented by me, and now called by my
name, but which have never been the subject of a patent, were a con-
sequence of the efforts made by the late Lord Herbert and Miss Night-
ingale to improve the health of the army. The death-rate of the sol-
diers, when this question was taken up, was found to be larger than
that of many unhealthy civil populations. Soldiers are, however, a
body of men picked out as the healthiest members of the nation ; they
should, therefore, have had an exceptionally low death-rate in peace-
time. A main element in the improvement of their health lay in im-
proving the ventilation of their barrack-rooms. But soldiers, when-
ever they became aware of the existence of any fresh-air currents, in-
sisted on closing the inlets. It was also made a sine qua non by the
Government that the barrack-rooms should be warmed by open fire-
places ; and, moreover, the Government required that the increased
amount of ventilation declared to be necessary on medical grounds
should be provided without any increase in the amount of fuel allowed.
By the adoption of these fireplaces, and by the introduction of simple
and improved arrangements for cooking the soldiers' food, the Govern-
ment were enabled to effect a saving on the fuel supplied, instead of
being obliged to incur a large increased expenditure on account of the
additional ventilation introduced into the barrack-rooms. The manu-
facturer of these fireplaces informs me that he has supplied between
9,000 and 10,000 to the military departments up to this time.

The principle of warming by means of an open fireplace, or by
means of a German stove or a Gill stove, is applicable to single rooms,
that is to say, each room must have its own appliance, and each room
may be self-contained as far as regards its heating and ventilation.

The close stoves employed in Germany use less fuel in warming
the room than any open fireplace, but they are economical because the
heat generated is not removed by the frequent renewal of the air.
This element of their efficiency in warming, however, makes them
most unhealthy.

198 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The most recent improvements in the use of the German stove for
warming have been introduced by Dr. Bohm, in the Rudolf Hospital
at Vienna. He there warms fresh air by means of passages con-
structed in the fire-clay stoves, placed in the ward, and the fresh
warmed air passes into the ward from the top of the stove. He pro-
vides flues of a large size, and proportioned to the size of the ward,
from the level of the ward floor to above the roof, and the difference
of temperature between the air in the ward and the outer air causes a
sufficient current in these flues to ventilate adequately the ward. By
this means the fresh warmed air, instead of passing off to the upper
part of the ward and then away by flues there, is made to circulate
toward the floor of the ward, thus bringing into action the principle
by which the open fireplace is useful in ventilation. But this arrange-
ment destroys one element of economy in the German stove, because
the heat generated, instead of being left to pass slowly off into an un-
ventilated room, is removed rapidly by the fresh air passed into the
ward, and has, therefore, to be renewed at intervals, instead of, ac-
cording to usual custom, the stove being left shut irp for twenty-four
hours to give off its heat slowly. The larger the supply of warmed
air, the larger must be the consumption of fuel ; and, if the heat is to
be supplied economically, it must be through a good conducting me-
dium ; but the material of the German stove is a bad conductor of
heat.

The old Roman system of warming by means of a fire under the
floor produced a most agreeable and equable temperature, but it did
not assist the ventilation, and' it was not economical, in that the floor,
being of tiles, was of a bad conducting material, and much of the heat
was absorbed in the ground or surrounding flues. According to Pliny,
the smoke was carried to the wood-house to be used in drying the
wood for burning. I recently made an experiment to compare the
effect of warming by means of a heated floor with the heating effect
of a ventilating fireplace ; the experiment lasted, with each mode of
warming, for two days. It showed that, in the case of the warmed
floors, the room was maintained at a temperature of about 18 above
the temperature of the outer air with an expenditure of 56 lbs. of coal
and 112 lbs. of coke, while with the ventilating fireplace the expendi-
ture was only 75 lbs. of coal; the cost being 35. Ad. for the warmed
floor as compared with Is. Ad. for the ventilating fireplace.

A more complete plan of warming a building is by means of a fire
from which the heat is conveyed, either by hot-water pipes or hot air,
to the various parts of the building.

Warming by means of air conveyed by flues to various parts of
the building, will answer, as a rule, in ordinary existing houses, best in
connection with open fireplaces, which draw in the warmed air to the
various rooms, because there must be some means of forcing or draw-
ing the warmed air into the house, and it would not be convenient to

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL. i 99

keep a steam engine in an ordinary house to pump in the warmed air.
These open fireplaces would then, however, be wasting the spare heat
which each fireplace sends up its own chimney; but, on the other
hand, very much smaller fires would be needed, to keep the rooms
warm, than when the rooms are not supplied with fresh warmed air.
Theoretically, however, it can be shown that if we. are prepared to
give up open fireplaces, and arrange our houses on the plan of having
flues which would draw off the air from near the floors of our rooms,
and which would also warm fresh air, heated from a central fire, to be
constantly admitted near the ceilings, and if the climate were such as
to make us desire to have the system in continuous operation, such a
system would probably be by far more economical of fuel than open
fireplaces, because the fuel used could then be made to do its full duty.
The variations of our climate and the low price of fuel, which have
hitherto prevailed, have prevented such systematic arrangements from
being adopted in this country.

The plan of carrying the heat from the fire to the air to be warmed
by means of hot-water pipes affords also a very economical method of
warming air, because the best-constructed hot-water apparatus will
enable the full heating value to be got out of the fuel. Fuel may be
consumed to far greater advantage in a close furnace than in any open
grate, because the admission of air for the combustion of the fuel can
be regulated to any required extent. The heating surface of the boiler
may also be so arranged as to absorb a very large proportion of the
heat generated by the fire.

But in deciding on the amount of heat in hot-water pipes which is
most favorable to economy, the following considerations occur : At
least twice the quantity of air which is strictly necessary by theory
passes through the fire in the best-constructed furnaces. In an ordi-
nary grate this consumption is enormously increased. Each part of
oxygen supplied by the air and necessary for combustion is accom-
panied by four parts of nitrogen, which is of no value for combustion.
Consequently, if twice as much oxygen passes through the fire as is
strictly necessary, we have one part which combines with carbon and
produces combustion, and nine parts which, being inert, must act, in
the first place, to lower the temperature of the fire, and, secondly, to
carry a larger amount of unutilized heat up the chimney. Moreover,
when water is heated sufficiently to generate steam, each particle of
water converted into steam absorbs or makes latent 960 Fahr. of tem-
perature. In experiments on the evaporation of water, the tempera-
ture of the gases passing off in the chimney was ascertained to vary
from 430 to 530, diminishing to 415 at the top of a flue 35 feet high,
with the dampers open ; and about 380 at the bottom of the flue with
the dampers closed. With a boiler of which the temperature of the
water is maintained at 200 without evaporation, the temperature of
the flue need not exceed from 230 to 240.

2oo THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

It is clear from these considerations, that, in order to insure the
maximum effect from the fuel, the heating surface of the pipes should
be sufficiently large to warm all the air required without its being
necessary to raise the temperature of the water in the boiler to any
great extent, and the proportion between the boiler-surface and the
pipe-surface, that is to say, between the surface which absorbs heat,
and the surface which gives out heat, should be such as to render it
unnecessary for the fire to be forced, because, the lower the tempera-
ture at which the gases from the fire pass off up the chimney, the
greater will be the economy.

In order to show the waste which results from forcing the boiler,
i. e., from passing the gases into the flue at a high as compared with a
low temperature, I will give an instance of one experiment. The pro-
portion of heating surface in the boiler to the heating surface of the
pipes is assumed by some manufacturers as 1 to 100, or, when great
heat is required, 1 to 40. An experiment made on 4,000 feet of pipe,
heating certain greenhouses by a wagon-shaped boiler with 40 square
feet of heating surface, showed that a certain temperature was kept up
for 8 hours with 8 bushels of coal ; but when, by the addition of an-
other boiler, the heating surface of the boiler was increased to 80 square
feet, the temperature could be maintained for the same period with 4
bushels of coal. The outer temperature was the same on the two days.

On these grounds it is not so economical, so far as the consumption
of fuel is concerned, to use steam instead of water, either water heated
to a high temperature under pressure, or to heat air for warming pur-
poses, because the gases from the fire employed to produce the higher
degree of heat will pass off at a high temperature, and the heat they
contain be wasted. On the other hand, the capital outlay required,
where highly-heated pipes are used, is smaller than with hot-water
pipes, because a smaller heating surface, and therefore smaller pipes,
will suffice when the temperature is high ; and, moreover, a very small
pipe will convey steam to any required place, whereas with hot water,
at a relatively low temperature, much larger pipes are required. It
follows that where the price of fuel makes it necessary to reduce the
permanent annual expenditure, the original capital outlay must be in-
creased. There is a further consideration in regard to economy with
hot-water pipes, steam-heating, and all appliances for warming buildings
from a central fire, viz., that if the heat has to be conveyed for long
distances before its useful application comes into force, very much heat
is lost, and consequently fuel is wasted. On the other hand, against
the saving which would result from a more immediate application of
the heat to the place to be warmed, there is to be weighed the dimin-
ished expense of attendance consequent upon the use of one fire instead
of several fires, each with its attendance and supply of fuel. There
remains one source of economy to be applied to close grates used for
heating water, which has not yet been adopted. I mean the applica-

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL. 201

tion of some of the heat which is passing into the chimney to warm
the air which feeds the tire. Theoretical considerations show that an
advantage of from six to nine per cent, might be obtained from this
source, and the experiments which I have made bear out this result.

But, after we have designed the most effective arrangements for
economizing the fuel which warms our dwellings, if that object is to
be fully secured, we must arrange to retain the heat in our houses.
The architect should devote to these considerations the same care
which he now is frequently satisfied with bestowing upon the beauty
of the design for a building. The arrangements of the plan should be
adapted to the retention of heat. All portions of houses exposed to
the air should be formed of materials which are found to be the slow-
est conductors of heat. Whatever may have been the mistakes of the
manufacturers of fire-grates or kitchen-ranges, the nation has latterly
very much disregarded the means of retaining heat in the house. The
uniform model house of the speculating builder is constructed with
thin walls, thin glass windows, ill-fitting casements, and a roof of slates,
with nothing under them. The old half-timbered house was warm,
because it had an air space between the inner and outer skin ; the
brick-built, stone-faced house is warm because it has, so to say, a double
wall. In modern houses it has long been shown that, without much
increased expense, the use of walls built hollow will keep the rooms
effectually warm and dry, and yet this mode of building is the excep-
tion rather than the rule, possibly because it gives the architect or the
builder a little additional trouble. A slated roof, if ill-constructed, is
a material agent in allowing of the escape of heat, because there is
necessarily an inlet for air where the slates overlap. The old thatched-
roof, although most dangerous in cases of fire, was a great preserver
of heat. In well-built modern houses the slates are laid on felt, which
is laid on close boarding, and this arrangement keeps the house warm
in winter and cool in summer. As regards the windows, glass ranks
high as a non-conductor of heat, and the effect of using thick glass, in-
stead of the very thin glass so often seen, is very largely to economize
the heat. Evidence of the cooling effect on the air of a room of a win-
dow of thin glass is afforded by the cold draught which any one per-
ceives when sitting on a cold day near a closed window of thin glass.
Proposals have been often made to glaze a window with double panes,
and no doubt such a plan is a good means of retaining heat in the room,
but the inside of the glass between the panes will in time become dirty,
and then it can only be cleansed by removing one of the panes. A
more convenient, but more expensive, plan is to adopt the system,
which prevails universally in the northern parts of Europe, of a double
casement.

It is not, however, my object here to give a treatise on building.
The conclusion which I would draw from these various considerations
is, that, if we desire to economize to the utmost the daily expenditure

202 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of fuel, we must increase our outlay of capital. So long as coal was
cheap, it may have been better worth the while of the individual con-
sumer to employ coal wastefully rather than spend money upon the
arrangements for economizing heat. On the other hand, when coal is
dear, the daily expense from the waste of fuel will induce a capital
outlay to secure economy of heat. Journal of the Society of Arts.

-++-

THE DKIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NOETHWEST.

By N. H. WINCHELL,

STATE GEOLOGIST OF MINNESOTA.

I. Nature of the Drift.

IN the March number of this journal, Mr. Elias Lewis calls atten-
tion to the occurrence of bowlder-like masses of clay in strati-
fied gravel, at Brooklyn, N. Y. In the progress of the geological sur-
vey of Ohio, similar masses of gravelly clay were met with in the
northwestern portion of the State, lying in the stratified gravel and
sand that constitute the long ridges which have often been pronounced
" lake-beaches." These occurrences, and a great many others that
militate against the popular theory that those ridges are attributable
to the action of the waters of Lake Erie, and the stratification of the
drift generally over the "interior continental basin" to the action of
a wide-spread lake, or of the ocean, made it necessary to reinvestigate
the drift-deposits thoroughly, for the purpose of deducing from the
drift itself such a theory of its origin as would stand the application of
all the facts. Such reexamination has resulted, in the ojfinion of the
writer, in the confirmation of the glacier theory of Prof. L. Agassiz, and
the consequent abandonment of the iceberg theory of Peter Dobson. It
has also shown the baselessness of the assumption of some who would
extend the Champlain epoch of Prof. J. D. Dana, so as to bring on,
after the period of the glacier, a submergence of the continent beneath
the ocean. It is proposed to review, in a non-technical way, the phe-
nomena of the drift of the Northwest, and to offer a few thoughts on
the glacier theory, and its application to the explanation of those phe-
nomena.

In general, the term drift applies to whatever lies on the surface
of the rocky framework unconsolidated, whatever be its origin or
lithological character. Glacial drift is that which has been transport-
ed by the agency of ice, or by ice and water, from regions farther
north, and spread over the surface of the country. It may embrace
bowlders, gravel, and clay. These substances may be arranged in
stratification, and nicely assorted, or they may be confusedly mixed.

THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 203

When stratified and assorted, they have sometimes been denominated
modified drift ; when not assorted, unmodified drift. But these terms
require considerable caution in their use, since they have been differ-
ently applied by different writers, depending somewhat on the sup-
posed cause of the assortment witnessed in modified drift, and since
the assorted and non-assorted portions of the drift are not uniform,
either in their positions in the great mass of the deposit, or in the char-
acters they generally possess.

The character and nature of the drift in the Northwest are very
largely misapprehended. This is true, not only among those who
might not strictly be regai'ded as geologists such as surveyors, engi-
neers, lecturers, and public literati but even among those who have
given considerable attention to the study of fossils and rocks. These
misapprehensions, so generally spread among the people, are largely
due to the industry of the authors of certain theories concerning its
origin, in spreading their views before the public. A plausible theory,
moreover, has a great influence in its own favor.

A pretty careful study of the drift in this State, 1 and in others em-
braced in what may be called the continental basin, east of the Missis-
sippi, has shown it to consist, in general, of the following parts, in de-
scending order :

N~o. 1. Surface Soil. This, of course, presents all the varieties due
to local influences. Over large portions of the Northwest it is a fertile
black loam, highly arenaceous, and supplied with a considerable propor-
tion of carbon in a state of minute subdivision. This arenaceous loam
passes into a more gravelly loam on the brows of knolls and in rolling
land. It is also sometimes replaced by a gravelly clay. This is the
case in large portions of the State of Michigan, and in Central and
Southern Ohio. This is the fact in Northern Indiana and in Central
Minnesota. The gravel prevails in wooded and rolling districts. In
treeless districts the sandy element is more common, making a black
loam. In valleys and along streams the soil is alluvial. It is invari-
ably fine, nearly free from stones and bowlders, and very fertile. It is
what is popularly known as " made land," and comprises those parts
of the drift of the highlands that are susceptible of transportation by
running water. That which is known as the " bluff-formation," lining
the Mississippi, both in Minnesota and in the States farther south, con-
sists of alluvium, washed into the great valley by innumerable sti-eams
from the adjoining country, at a time when the volume of the river
was immensely greater than now. The same materials are now spread
over the farms of Southern Minnesota, over much of Iowa and Illinois,
over Northern Missouri and all the Far West, to the Rocky Mountains.
It lies there also in the form of fine sand, and constitutes the loam
already described. Its thickness at points remote from the river is
dependent on the facilities for natural drainage and wash. It may be

1 Minnesota.

2o 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

six inches, or it may be six feet. Along the hanks of the Mississippi
it presents, not infrequently, perpendicular sections of six hundred
feet. Its firmness in maintaining its position in such exposed bluffs is
due to the infiltration of the cements of lime and iron while in the
process of deposition, or subsequently. It is more largely developed
along the Missouri than along the Mississippi. There are other places
where the surface-soil may be peaty, from the preservation of dead
vegetation. Extensive level tracts, that are submerged a large part
of the year, may present a peaty soil. Very often also in such peaty
places there will be found patches of highly-calcareous soil, resulting
from the accumulation of fresh-water shells, or from the precipitation
of the carbonate of lime from waters that enter the marsh from lime-
stone districts.

But, whatever the character of the surface-soil, it must be borne in
mind that it is accidental, and is always superinduced by causes that
have operated since the advent of the drift. Its influence is strictly
superficial, rarely exceeding three feet below the natural surface.

No. 2. We come now to consider that which lies below the sur-
face-soil. If we omit from this enumeration the " blufl-formation," and
the alluvium of other streams which sometimes has a considerable
thickness, we shall have two different substances, equally pertaining to
the drift, and occupying the same relative position in different locali-
ties, that claim notice :

1. A clay subsoil.

2. A gravel or sand subsoil.

Now, although these are mentioned as appearing first beneath the
surface-soil, it must not be understood that they appear there invari-
ably, nor even usually. It is probably true that throughout the greater
portion of the Northwest they are entirely wanting, and that feature
of the drift prevails which will next be considered. They are men-
tioned here because they constitute an essential part of the drift, and
must not be overlooked in giving its character and composition.

By the first, here denominated a clay subsoil, is not meant a grav-
elly clay, or one in which stones are present. It is, rather, a close,
plastic, fine clay, with little observable sand. It is impervious to
water, and is benefited by artificial drainage. It prevails in much of
Southwestern Michigan and Northwestern Ohio. It occupies a large
tract in Northeastern Illinois and Northwestern Indiana. It also proba-
bly underlies the Red River flats in Minnesota, and perhaps a belt of
land rudely conforming to the shore of Lake Superior at its western
extremity. When shafts are sunk through this clay subsoil, so as to
reveal its composition and arrangement, it is seen to be handsomely
laminated horizontally. The individual layers are separated by thin-
ner layers of fine sand. Those of clay are usually about two inches in
thickness, but may be no more than one-eighth of an inch ; the layers
of sand are rarely more than half an inch in thickness, and are apt to

THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 205

be less than an eighth. The aggregate thickness of these alternating
layers of clay and sand is sometimes a hundred feet or more. Let it
be noticed that these areas of clay subsoil are those in which there is a
gentle descent, and drainage to the north or northeast into some one
of the rreat interior lakes of fresh water. The relation this fact bears
to the origin of this clay subsoil will be considered farther on.

The gravel or sand subsoil is that which is found in some tracts of
rolling land where the drift is heavy, and at points more remote from
the valleys of northward drainage, or in the upper portions of those
valleys. As a general rule, when present, it will be found on a higher
level than that in which the subsoil is clay. It pertains to the interior
country like the central part of the southern peninsula of Michigan, the
central and southern portions of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, and some
parts of Central and Northern Minnesota. The area and location of this
kind of subsoil are more irregular and more uncertain than the areas of
clay subsoil. Such gravel and sand deposits often lie in belts traceable
for a great many miles, especially where the general surface is smooth,
and the underlying rock of uniform hardness, the country adjoining be-
ing, on either side of the belt, one of a clay subsoil, or one formed by
No. 3. Such belts are sometimes three or four rods wide, or they may
be much wider, and are rolling and slightly raised above the adjoining
clay land. Sometimes, instead of lying in belts, such rolling, gravelly
land is spread out over areas of no definite shape or limit. The sand
or gravel constituting the subsoil in these rolling tracts is, like the
clay of the clay subsoil, stratified and assorted. But the layers here
are rarely horizontal. They show the most various alternation and
change of dip. No two sections could be taken that would give the
same succession of parts. The sand sometimes lies in heavy deposits
fifteen or twenty feet thick, with lines of deposition running in curving
and vanishing layers in all directions. Sudden transitions occur from
sand to gravel, or from gravel to bowlders. Sometimes, also, bowlders
are found embedded in the gravel ; again, nests of bowlders are seen
isolated from the rest, and packed closely by themselves. There is
also very often a mingling of gravel and sand, with no clay, without
stratification, as if the two had been dumped together, after having
been first thoroughly washed and assorted. Occasionally, also, in this
stratified gravel and sand, may be seen irregular masses of gravelly
clay or hard-pan, comparable to those mentioned by Mr. Lewis at
Brooklyn. Such gravelly clay sometimes embraces stones of consid-
erable size. Near the bottom of this stratified gravel and sand there
are also, often, upward protrusions of the underlying member of the
drift (No. 3), somewhat wedge-shaped or oblique, so as to embrace on
the lower side a portion of the stratified gravel and sand. Again, the
Hue of junction between the gravel and sand, and the hai-d-pan of No.
3, may be marked by an unusual accumulation of coarse drift materi-
als, such as stones and bowlders. These may be mostly surrounded by

206

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the gravel and sand of No. 2, or they may be mostly embedded in
No. 3. The thickness of No. 2 is exceedingly variable. It is usually
less than forty feet in level tracts, but it may be more than a hundred,
depending on the duration of the cause that brought it there, and its
operation at that point. It sometimes probably entirely replaces No.
3 and No. 4, and lies on the rock. The bowlders found within it are
generally not scratched, but sometimes they are scratched, evidently
by glacier-action. A great number of glaciated bowlders in this mem-
ber of the drift have been seen at an excavation near the Falls of St.
Anthony.

The following diagrams, Figs. 1 and 2, will express more fully the
arrangement of the strata in this member of the drift, and give an idea
of the manner of union with the succeeding member below. Fig. 1 is
sketched from Nature, and shows a section of the laminated clay ex-
posed in a railroad-cut near Toledo, Ohio :

Fig. l.

NATURAL SURFACE.

Section of the Laminated Clay (Clay Subsoil), Toledo, Ohio, showing its Junction with the

HAitD-rAN op the Drift.

a. Horizontal laminations of tine clay and sand.

b. Oblique laminations of fine clay and sand.

e. Detached masses of hard-pan clay, variously mingled and united with the laminated clay.
d. The upper portion of the great hard-pan sheet.

Fig. 2 is also sketched from Nature, and represents the alterna-
tion of parts as seen in No. 2, and manner of junction with No. 3 at
the Falls of St. Anthony. No. 2 here consists of the stratified gravel
and sand which constitutes the surface of the drift (immediately be-
low the soil) in large portions of the State of Michigan, Central and
Southern Ohio, Northern Indiana, and Central Minnesota. It also
forms the principal component of the well-known ridges in Northwest-
ern Ohio, popularly but erroneously styled " lake-beaches." The ma-
terials are usually much water-worn, but, at the Falls of St. Anthony,
many of the bowlders embraced in No. 2 are conspicuously glacier-
marked, a circumstance which plainly indicates the agency which
transported and deposited the whole mass in which they occur.

THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 207

JVb. 3. The great deposit that follows No. 2, whether it be of clay
or of gravel and sand, is that designated in common usage " hard-
pan." It constitutes the chief member of the drift throughout the
Northwest. It is rarely found entirely wanting, whereas the foregoing
are very often wanting. It seems to be the parent member of which
the former two are offshoots, or modifications. It sometimes has a
thickness of more than two hundred feet, and rises to the surface form-
ing the basis of the soil. It consists of a heterogeneous mixture of
clay and gravel-stones, with bowlders of northern origin. It is nearly
impervious to water, and occasionally, but rarely, shows a rude ar-
rangement in alternating bands, as if, in a plastic state, it had been
folded upon itself. Such arrangement discloses no assortment of the

Fig. 2.

NATURAL SURFACE.

ZvW&&c

-ttXsVv-:-- r-

Section of the Drift at the Falls of St. Anthony.

a. " Bluff- formation," alluvial, unstratified, mostly sand 6- 8 feet.

b. Stratified, fine sand 6-20 do.

c. Gravel and stones, in isolated pockets, unstratified.

d. Bowlders and gravel, the former distinctly glaciated.

e. Hand pan, or " unmodified " drift seen 10 do.

/. Massive, fine sand.

g. Rude arrangement within the hard-pan.
h. Sandy and stony, with rude stratification.
i. Hid from view by sliding sand.

materials that can be likened to the assortment seen in No. 2. The
bowlders embraced in this member of the drift almost invariably show
glaciated surfaces. Although apt to be more abundant near the bot-
tom of the deposit, they are not confined to it, as is sometimes stated,
but occur throughout the whole. This deposit of hard-pan sometimes
encloses lenticular masses of assorted materials. It has even been seen
to overlie a considerable thickness of fine stratified sand the extent of
which could not be ascertained. In general, however, it is one com-
pact, uniform mass, varying slightly in the proportions of its different
parts, from State to State, according to the readiness of supply of any

203

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

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THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 209

one of them. For example, in Ohio (Northwestern Ohio) it is very-
close and clayey, the upper part being free from bowlders and stones.
In Minnesota (Central Minnesota), the stones and bowlders are more
generally disseminated throughout the whole, and it shows much more
sand. Hence, in the latter State it will allow the slow passage of water
through it a fact exceedingly fortunate for the agricultural capacity
of the soils that are based on it.

Perhaps there should be added to this description of the drifts an-
other member, which may be denominated No. 4.

No. 4. This, however, is so inconstant and so often runs into the
last, that it is hardly worthy of special designation. When present,
it lies below No. 3, and immediately over the rock. It consists of
gravel and bowlders, more or less mingled with clay. It is the great
water-reservoir that supplies deep wells, and through it there is a con-
stant slow drainage into deep valleys and excavations. It gives rise
to springs at the base of the river-bluffs, and to artesian wells, when
the confining stratum of hard-pan above is penetrated in regions of
favorable slope. In Northwestern Ohio is a most wonderful series of
artesian wells that depend entirely upon this fortunate combination
of circumstances. This member of the drift sometimes consists largely
of assorted materials, as sand and gravel. This is indicated by the
issuing of considerable quantities of such sand from artesian wells
that penetrate it, when the force of the current of water is sufficient
to bring it to the surface. Instances have occurred of the collapse of
the overlying clay and hard-pan, on the removal in this way of large
quantities of sand. Along the upper side of this member, the mate-
rials are apt to be firmly cemented by iron and carbonate of lime, into
a very firm, even rocky crust. Such cemented gravel and sand is sel-
dom over two feet thick, yet well-borers, on reaching it, often mistake
it for the bed-rock. They pass through it, and usually find a copious
flow of excellent water. The announcement is then promulgated that
that well was drilled through the rock . Hence it is a popular error
that, in order to obtain water of the purest quality, it is necessary to
sink a well "through the rock." This member, though, is not always
found in penetrating the drift to the rock. It may be here stated,
also, that, when No. 4 is present, the bed-rock does not show so plainly
the marks of glaciation ; but, when No. 3 extends to the rock, the sur-
face of the bed-rock is almost invariably marked with the well-known
crlacier-etchings.

Having taken this survey of the component parts of the drift, it
will be well to bring them into a general view, as illustrated by the
preceding diagram (Fig. 3), in which the figures represent the same
members as in the previous illustrations. It shows a general section
of the drift, from Toledo to Shelby County, Ohio, and is based on ex-
tended observations, the results of which are to appear in the forth-
coming reports of the " Geological Survey of Ohio." The six ridges

VOL. III. 14

2io THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

here represented in profile can be traced from 30 to 130 miles, running
into Indiana. Toward the north, in Michigan, they unite by conver-
gence, but one or two being visible in that State. Another article will
treat the interesting question of the origin of the drift.

-----

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON NIAGARA. 1

Br Prof. JOHN TYNDALL, IX. D., F.K.S.

IT is one of the disadvantages of reading books about natural
scenery that they fill the mind with pictures, often exaggerated,
often distorted, often blurred, and, even when well drawn, injurious to
the freshness of first impressions. Such has been the fate of most of us
with regard to the Falls of Niagara. There was little accuracy in the
estimates of the first observers of the cataract. Startled by an exhi-
bition of power so novel and so grand, emotion leaped beyond the
control of the judgment, and gave currency to notions regarding the
water-fall which have often led to disappointment.

A record of a voyage in 1535, by a French mariner named Jacques
Cartier, contains, it is said, the first printed allusion to Niagara. In
1603 the first map of the district was constructed by a Frenchman
named Champlain. In 1648 the Jesuit Rageneau, in a letter to his
superior at Paris, mentions Niagara as " a cataract of frightful height." 2
In the winter of 1678 and 1679 the cataract was visited by Father
Hennepin, and described in a book dedicated " to the King of Great
Britain." He gives a drawing of the water-fall, which shows that
serious changes have taken place since his time. He describes it as
" a great and prodigious cadence of water, to which the universe does
not offer a parallel." The height of the fall, according to Hennepin,
was more than 600 feet. " The waters," he says, "which fall from
this great precipice do foam and boil in the most astonishing manner,
making. a noise more terrible than that of thunder. When the wind
blows to the south, its frightful .roaring 'may be heard for more than
fifteen leagues." The Baron la Hontan, who visited Niagara in 1687,
makes the height 800 feet. In 1721, Charlevoix, in a letter to Madame
de Maintenon, after referring to the exaggerations of his predecessors,
thus states the result of his own observations : " For my part, after
examining it on all sides, I am inclined to think that we cannot allow
it less than 140 or 150 feet" a remarkably close estimate. At that
time, viz., a hundred and fifty years ago, it had the shape of a horse-
shoe, and reasons will subsequently be given for holding that this

1 A lecture before the Royal Institution, delivered April 4, 1873.

2 From an interesting little book presented to me at Brooklyn by its author, Mr.
Holly, some of these data are derived : Hennepin, Kalm, Bakewell, Lyell, and others, I
have myself consulted.

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON NIAGARA. 211

has been always the form of the cataract from its origin to its present
site.

As regards the noise of the cataract, Charlevoix declares the ac-
counts of his predecessors, which, I may say, are repeated to the pres-
ent hour, to he altogether extravagant. He is perfectly right. The
thunders of Niagara are formidable enough to those who really seek
them at the base of the Horseshoe Fall ; but on the banks of the river,
and particularly above the fall, its silence, rather than its noise, is
surprising. This arises, in part, from the lack of resonance, the sur-
rounding country being flat, and therefore furnishing no echoing sur-
faces to reenforce the shock of the water. The resonance from the sur-
rounding rocks causes the Swiss Rouss at the Devil's Bridge, when
full, to thunder more loudly than the Niagara.

On Friday, the 1st of November, 1872, just before reaching the
village of Niagara Falls, I caught, from the railway-train, my first
glimpse of the smoke of the cataract. Immediately after my arrival,
I went with a friend to the northern end of the American Fall. It
may be that my mood at the time toned down the impression pro-
duced by the first aspect of this grand cascade ; but I felt nothing like
disappointment, knowing, from old experience, that time and close
acquaintanceship, the gradual interweaving of mind and Nature, must
powerfully influence my final estimate of the scene. After dinner we
crossed to Goat Island, and, turning to the right, reached the southern
end of the American Fall. The river is here studded with small
islands. Crossing a wooden bridge to Luna Island, and clasping a
tree which grows near its edge, I looked long at the cataract, which
here shoots down the precipice like an avalanche of foam. It grew
in power and beauty as I gazed upon it. The channel, spanned by
the wooden bridge, was deep, and the river there doubled over the
edge of the precipice like the swell of a muscle, unbroken. The ledge
here overhangs, the water being poured out far beyond the base of the
precipice. A space, called the Cave of the Winds, is thus enclosed
between the wall of rock and the cataract.

Goat Island terminates in a sheer dry precipice, which connects
the American and the Horseshoe Falls. Midway between both is a
wooden hut, the residence of the guide to the Cave of the Winds, and
from the hut a winding staircase, called Biddle's Stair, descends to
the base of the precipice. On the evening of my arrival I went down
this stair, and wandered along the bottom of the cliff. One well-
known factor in the formation and retreat of the cataract was imme-
diately observed. A thick layer of limestone formed the upper portion
of the cliff. This rested upon a bed of soft shale, which extended
round the base of the cataract. The violent recoil of the water against
this yielding substance crumbles it away, undermining the ledge above,
which, unsupported, eventually breaks off, aud produces the observed
recession.

212 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

At the southern extremity of the Horseshoe is a promontory,
formed by the doubling back of the gorge, excavated by the cataract,
and into which it plunges. On the promontory stands a stone build-
ing, called the Terrapin Tower, the door of which had been nailed up
because of the decay of the staircase within it. Through the kind-
ness of Mr. Townsend, the superintendent of Goat Island, the door
was opened for me. From this tower, at all hours of the day, and at
some hours of the night, I watched and listened to the Horseshoe
Fall. The river here is evidently much deeper than the American
branch; and, instead of bursting into foam where it quits the ledge,
it bends solidly over and falls in a continuous layer of the most vivid
green. The tint is not uniform, but varied, long stripes of deeper
hue alternating with bands of brighter color. Close to the lede;e over
which the water rolls, foam is generated, the light falling upon which,
and flashing back from it, is sifted in its passage to and fro, and
changed from white to emerald green. Heaps of superficial foam are
also formed at intervals along the ledge, and immediately drawn
down in long white striae. 1 Lower down, the surface, shaken by the
reaction from below, incessantly rustles into whiteness. The descent
finally resolves itself into a rhythm, the water reaching the bottom
of the fall in periodic gushes. Nor is the spray uniformly diffused
through the air, but is wafted through it in successive veils of gauze-
like texture. From all this it is evident that beauty is not absent from
the Horseshoe Fall, but majesty is its chief attribute. The plunge of
the water is not wild, but deliberate, vast, and fascinating. From the
Terrapin Tower, the adjacent arm of the Horseshoe is seen projected
against the opposite one, midway down ; to the imagination, therefore,
is left the picturing of the gulf into which the cataract plunges.

The delight which natural scenery produces in some minds is
difficult to explain, and the conduct which it prompts can hardly be
fairly criticised by those who have never experienced it. It seems
to me a deduction from the completeness of the celebrated Thomas
Young, that he was unable to appreciate natural scenery. " He had
really," says Dean Peacock, "no taste for life in the country; he was
one of those who thought that no one who was able to live in London
would be content to live elsewhere." Well, Dr. Young, like Dr.
Johnson, had a right to his delights ; but I can understand a hesita-
tion to accept them, high as they were, to the exclusion of

"That o'erflowing joy which Nature yields
To her true lovers."

To all who are of this mind, the strengthening of desire on my part
to see and know Niagara Falls, as far as it is possible for them to be
seen and known, will be intelligible.

1 The direction of the wind, with reference to the course of a ship, may be inferred
with accuracy from the foam-streaks on the surface of the sea.

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON NIAGARA. zi

j

On the first evening of my visit, I met, at the head of Biddle's
Stair, the guide to the Cave of the Winds. He was in the prime of
manhood large, well built, firm and pleasant in mouth and eye. My
interest in the seene stirred up his, and made him communicative.
Turning to a photograph, he described, by reference to it, a feat which
he had accomplished some time previously, and which had brought
him almost under the green water of the Horseshoe Fall. " Can vou
lead me there to-morrow ? " I asked. He eyed me inquiringly, weigh-
ing, perhaps, the chances of a man of light build and with gray in his
whiskers in such an undertaking. " I wish," I added, " to see as much
of the fall as can be seen, and where you lead I will endeavor to fol-
low." His scrutiny relaxed into a smile, and he said, " Very well ; I
shall be ready for you to-morrow."

On the morrow, accordingly, I came. In the hut at the head of
Biddle's Stair I stripped wholly, and redressed according to instruc-
tions drawing on two pairs of woollen pantaloons, three woollen
jackets, two pairs of socks, and a pair of felt shoes. Even if wet, my
guide urged that the clothes would keep me from being chilled, and
he was right. A suit and hood of yellow oil-eloth covered all. Most
laudable precautions were taken by the young assistant of the guide
to keep the water out, but his devices broke down immediately when
severely tested.

We descended the stair; the handle of a pitchfork doing in my
case the duty of an alpenstock. At the bottom my guide inquired
whether we should go first to the. Cave of the Winds, or to the Horse-
shoe, remarking that the latter would try us most. I decided to get
the roughest done first, and he turned to the left over the stones.
They were sharp and trying. The base of the first portion of the cat-
aract is covered with huge bowlders, obviously the ruins of the lime-
stone ledge above. The Avater does not distribute itself uniformly
among these, but seeks for itself channels through which it pours tor-
rentially. We passed some of these with wetted feet, but without dif-
ficulty. At length we came to the side of a more formidable current.
My guide walked along its edge until he reached its least turbulent
portion. Halting, he said, " This is our greatest difficulty ; if we can
cross here, we shall get far toward the Horseshoe."

He waded in. It evidently required all his strength to steady him.
The water rose above his loins, and it foamed still higher. He had to
search for footing, amid unseen bowlders, against which the torrent
rose violently. He struggled and swayed, but he struggled success-
fully, and finally reached the shallower water at the other side.
Stretching out his arm, he said to me, " Now come on." I looked down
the torrent as it rushed to the river below, which was seething with
the tumult of the cataract. De Saussure recommended the inspection
of Alpine dangers with the view of making them familiar to the eye
before they are encountered ; and it is a wholesome custom, in places

214 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of difficulty, to put the possibility of an accident clearly before the
mind, and to decide beforehand what ought to be done should the ac-
cident occur. Thus wound up in the present instance, I entered the
water. Even where it was not more than knee-deep its power was
manifest. As it rose around me, I sought to split the torrent by pre-
senting a side to it ; but the insecurity of the footing enabled it to
grasp the loins, twist me fairly round, and bring its impetus to bear
upon the back. Further struggle was impossible ; and, feeling my
balance hopelessly gone, I turned, flung myself toward the bank I had
just quitted, and was instantly swept into shallower water.

The oil-cloth covering was a great incumbrance ; it had been made
for a much stouter man, and, standing upright after my submersion,
my legs occupied the centres of two bags of water. My guide ex-
horted me to try again. Prudence was at my elbow, whispering dis-
suasion ; but, taking every thing into account, it appeared more im-
moral to retreat than to proceed. Instructed by the first misadven-
ture, I once more entered the stream. Had the alpenstock been of iron
it might have helped me ; but, as it was, the tendency of the water to
sweep it out of my hands rendered it worse than useless. I, however,
clung to it by habit. Again the torrent rose, and again I wavered ;
but, by keeping the left hip well against it, I remained upright, and at
length grasped the hand of my leader at the other side. He laughed
pleasantly. The first victory was gained, and he enjoyed it. "No
traveller," he said, " was ever here before." Soon afterward, by trust-
ing to a piece of drift-wood which seemed firm, I was again taken off
my feet, but was immediately caught by a protruding rock.

We clambered over the bowlders toward the thickest spray, which
soon became so weighty as to cause us to stagger under its shock.
For the most part nothing could be seen ; we were in the midst of be-
wildering tumult, lashed by the water, which sounded at times like
the cracking of innumerable whips. Underneath this was the deep,
resonant roar of the cataract. I tried to shield my eyes with my
hands, and look upward ; but the defence was useless. My guide con-
tinued to move on, but at a certain place he halted, and desired me to
take shelter in his lee and observe the cataract. The spray did not
come so much from the upper ledge as from the rebound of the shat-
tered water when it struck the bottom. Hence the eyes could be pro-
tected from the blinding shock of the spray, while the line of vision to
the upper ledges remained to some extent clear. On looking upward
over the guide's shoulder I could see the water bending over the ledge,
while the Terrapin Tower loomed fitfully through the intermittent
spray-gusts. We were right under the tower. A little farther on, the
cataract, after its first plunge, hit a protuberance some way down, and
flew from it in a prodigious burst of spray; through this we staggered.
We rounded the promontory on which the Terrapin Tower stands, and
pushed, amid the wildest commotion, along the arm of the Horseshoe,

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON NIAGARA. 215

until the bowlders failed us, and the cataract fell into the profound
gorge of the Niagara River.

Here my guide sheltered me again, and desired me to look up ; I
did so, and could see, as before, the green gleam of the mighty curve
sweeping over the upper ledge, and the fitful plunge of the w T ater as
the spray between us and it alternately gathered and disappeared.
An eminent friend of mine often speaks to me of the mistake of those
physicians who regard man's ailments as purely chemical, to be met
by chemical remedies only. He contends for the psychological ele-
ment of cure. By agreeable emotions, he says, nervous currents are
liberated which stimulate blood, brain, and viscera. The influence
rained from ladies' eyes enables my friend to thrive on dishes which
would kill him if eaten alone. A sanative effect of the same order I
experienced amid the spray and thunder of Niagara. Quickened by
the emotions there aroused, the blood sped exultingly through the ar-
teries, abolishing introspection, clearing the heart of all bitterness, and
enabling one to think with tolerance, if not with tenderness, on the
most relentless and unreasonable foe. Apart from its scientific value,
and purely as a moral agent, the play, I submit, is worth the candle.
My companion knew no more of me than that I enjoyed the wild-
ness ; but, as I bent in the shelter of his large frame, he said, " I should
like to see you attempting to describe all this." He rightly thought it
indescribable. The name of this gallant fellow was Thomas Conroy.

We returned, clambering at intervals up and down so as to catch
glimpses of the most impressive portions of the cataract. We passed
under ledges formed by tabular masses of limestone, and through some
curious ojjenings formed by the falling together of the summits of the
rocks. At length we found oiirselves beside our enemy of the morn-
ing. My guide halted for a minute or two, scanning the torrent
thoughtfully. I said that, as a guide, he ought to have a rope in such
a place ; but he retorted that, as no traveller had ever thought of
coming there, he did not see the necessity of keeping a rope. He
waded in. The struggle to keep himself erect was evident enough ;
he swayed, but recovered himself again and again. At length he
slipped, gave way, did as I had done, threw himself flat in the water
toward the bank, and was swept into the shallows. Standing in the
stream near its edge, he stretched his arm toward me. I retained the
pitchfork handle, for it had been useful among the bowlders. By wad-
ing some way in, the staff could be made to reach him, and I proposed
his seizing it. " If you are sure," he replied, " that, in case of giving
way, you can maintain your grasp, then I w r ill certainly hold you." I
waded in, and stretched the staff to my companion. It was firmly
grasped by both of us. Thus helped, though its onset was strong, I
moved savely across the torrent. All danger ended here. We after-
ward roamed sociablv anions: the torrents and bowlders below the
Cave of the Winds. The rocks were covered with organic slime which

2i 6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

could not have been walked over with hare feet, hut the felt shoes
effectually prevented slipping. We reached the cave and entered it,
first by a wooden way carried over the bowlders, and then along a
narrow ledge to the point eaten deepest into the shale. When the
wind is from the south, the falling water, I am told, can be seen tran-
quilly from this spot ; but, when we were there, a blinding hurricane
of spray was whirled against us. On the evening of the same day, I
went behind the water on the Canada side, which, I confess, struck
me, after the experience of the morning, as an imposture.

To complete my knowledge it was necessary to see the fall from
the river below it, and long negotiations were necessary to secure the
means of doing so. The only boat fit for the undertaking had been
laid up for the winter ; but this difficulty, through the kind interven-
tion of Mr. Townsend, was overcome. The main one was, to secure
oarsmen sufficiently strong and skilful to urge the boat where I wished
it to be taken. The son of the owner of the boat, a finely-built young
fellow, but only twenty, and therefore not sufficiently hardened, was
willing to go ; and up the river I was informed there lived another man
who could do any thing with the boat which strength and daring
could accomplish. He came. His figure and expression of face cer-
tainly indicated extraordinary firmness and power. On Tuesday, the
5th of November, we started, each of us being clad in oil-cloth. The
elder oarsman at once assumed a tone of authority over his companion,
and struck immediately in among the breakers below the American
Fall. He hugged the cross freshets instead of striking out into the
smoother w T ater. I asked him why he did so, and he replied that they
were directed outward not downward. At times, the struggle to pre-
vent the bow of the boat from being turned by them was very
severe.

The spray was in general blinding, but at times it disappeared, and
yielded noble views of the fall. The edge of the cataract is crimped
by indentations which exalt its beauty. Here and there, a little below
the highest ledge, a secondary one jets out ; the water strikes it, and
bursts from it in huge, protuberant masses of foam and spray. We
passed Goat Island, came to the Horseshoe, and worked for a time
along the base of it, the bowlders over which Conroy and myself had
scrambled a few days previously lying between us and the base. A
rock was before us, concealed and revealed at intervals, as the waves
passed over it. Our leader tried to get above this rock, first on the
outside of it. The water, however, here was in violent motion. The
men struggled fiercely, the elder one ringing out an incessant peal of
command and exhortation to the younger. As we were just clearing
the rock, the bow came obliquely to the surge; the boat was turned
suddenly round, and shot with astonishing rapidity down the river.
The men returned to the charge, now trying to get up between the

SOME OBSERVATIONS OX NIAGARA. 217

half-concealed rock and the bowlders to the left. But the torrent set
in strongly through this channel. The tugging was quick and vio-
lent, but we made little way. At length seizing a rope, the principal
oarsman made a desperate attempt to get upon one of the bowlders,
hoping to be able to drag the boat through the channel ; but it bumped
so violently against the rock, that the man flung himself back, and re-
linquished the attempt.

We returned along the base of the American Fall, running in and
out among the currents which rushed from it laterally into the river.
Seen from below, the American Fall is certainly exquisitely beautiful,
but it is a mere frill of adornment to its nobler neighbor the Horse-
shoe. At times wc took to the river, from the centre of which the
Horseshoe Fall appeared especially magnificent. A streak of cloud
across the neck of Mont Blanc can double its apparent height, so here,
the green summit of the cataract shining above the smoke of the spray
appeared lifted to an extraordinary elevation. Had Hennepin and
La Hontan seen the fall from this position, their estimates of the height
would have been perfectly excusable.

From a point a little way below the American Fall, a ferry crosses
the river in summer to the Canadian side. Below the ferry is a sus-
pension bridge for carriages and foot-passengers, and a mile or two
lower down is the railway suspension bridge. Between the ferry and
the latter the river Niagara flows unruffled; but at the suspension
bridge the bed steepens and the river quickens its motion. Lower
down the gorge narrows, and the rapidity and turbulence increase.
At the place called the " Whirlpool Rapids " I estimated the width of
the river at 300 feet, an estimate confirmed by the dwellers on the
spot. When it is remembered that the drainage of nearly half a con-
tinent is compressed into this space, the impetuosity of the river's es-
cape through this gorge may be imagined. Had it not been for Mr.
Bierstiidt, the distinguished photographer of Niagara, I should have
quitted the place without seeing these rapids ; for this, and for his
agreeable company to the spot, I have to thank him. From the edge
of the cliff above the rapids, we descended, a little I confess to a
climber's disgust, in an " elevator," because the effects are best seen
from the water-level.

Two kinds of motion are here obviously active, a motion of trans-
lation, and a motion of undulation the race of the river through its
gorge, and the great waves generated by its collision with, and re-
bound from, the obstacles in its way. In the middle of the river the
rush and tossing are most violent ; at all events, the impetuous force
of the individual waves is here most strikingly displayed. Vast
pyramidal heaps leap incessantly from the river, some of them with
such energy as to jerk their summits into the air, where they hang sus-
pended as bundles of liquid spherules. The sun shone for a few miu-

218 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

utes. At times, the wind, coming up the river, searched and sifted the
spray, carrying away the lighter drops, and leaving the heavier ones
behind. Wafted in the proper direction, rainbows appeared and dis-
appeared fitfully in the lighter mist. In other directions the common
gleam of the sunshine from the waves and their shattered crests was
exquisitely beautiful. The complexity of the action was still further
illustrated by the fact that in some cases, as if by the exercise of a
local explosive force, the drops were shot radially from a particular
centre, forming around it a kind of halo.

The first impression, and, indeed, the current explanation of these
rapids is, that the central bed of the river is cumbered with large
bowlders, and that the jostling, tossing, and wild leaping of the water
there are due to its impact against these obstacles. This may be true
to some extent, but there is another reason to be taken into account.
Bowlders derived from the adjacent cliffs visibly cumber the sides of
the river. Against these the water rises and sinks rhythmically but
violently, large waves being thus produced. On the generation of
each wave there is an immediate compounding of the wave-motion
with the river-motion. The ridges, which in still water would proceed
in circular curves round the centre of disturbance, cross the river ob-
liquely, and the result is that, at the centre, waves commingle which
have really been generated at the sides. In the first instance we had a
composition of wave-motion with river-motion ; here we have the coa-
lescence of waves with waves. Where crest and furrow cross each
other, the motion is annulled ; where furrow and furrow cross, the
river is ploughed to a greater depth ; and, where crest and crest aid
each other, we have that astonishing leap of the water which breaks
the cohesion of the crests, and tosses them shattered into the air.
From the water-level the cause of the action is not so easily seen ; but
from the summit of the cliff the lateral generation of the waves and
their propagation to the centre are perfectly obvious. If this explana-
tion be correct, the phenomena observed at the Whirlpool Rapids
form one of the grandest illustrations of the principle of interference.
The Nile " cataract," Mr. Huxley informs me, offers examples of the
same action.

At some distance below the Whirlpool Rapids we have the cele-
brated whirlpool itself. Here the river makes a sudden bend to the
northeast, forming nearly a right angle with its previous direction.
The water strikes the concave bank with great force, and scoops it
incessantly away. A vast basin has been thus formed, in which the
sweep of the river prolongs itself in gyratory currents. Bodies and
trees which have come over the falls are stated to circulate here for
days without finding the outlet. From various points of the cliffs
above, this is curiously hidden. The rush of the river into the whirl-
pool is obvious enough ; and, though you imagine the outlet must be
visible, if one existed, you cannot find it. Turning, however, round

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON NIAGARA. 219

the bend of the precipice to the northeast, the outlet comes into
view.

The Niagara season had ended ; the chatter of sight-seers had
ceased, and the scene presented itself as one of holy seclusion and
beauty. I went down to the river's edge, where the weird loneliness
and loveliness seemed to increase. The basin is enclosed by high and
almost precipitous banks covered, when I was there, with russet
woods. A kind of mystery attaches itself to gyrating water, due per-
haps to the fact that we ai*e to some extent ignorant of the direction
of its force. It is said that at certain points of the whirlpool pine-
trees are sucked down, to be ejected mysteriously elsewhere. The
water is of the brightest emerald-green. The gorge through which it
escapes is narrow, and the motion of the river swift though silent.
The surface is steeply inclined, but it is perfectly unbroken. There are
no lateral waves, no ripples with their breaking bubbles to raise a
murmur; while the depth is here too great to allow the inequality of
the bed to ruffle the surface. Nothing can be more beautiful than this
sloping, liquid mirror formed by the Niagara in sliding from the
whirlpool.

The green color is, I think, correctly accounted for in the " Hours
of Exercise in the Alps." In crossing the Atlantic I had frequent op-
portunities of testing the explanation there given. Looked properly
down upon, there are portions of the ocean to which we should hardly
ascribe a trace of blue ; at the most a hint of indigo reaches the eye.
The water, indeed, is practically blach, and this is an indication both
of its depth and its freedom from mechanically-suspended matter. In
small thicknesses water is sensibly transparent to all kinds of light ;
but, as the thickness increases, the rays of low refrangibility are first
absorbed, and after them the other rays. Where, therefore, the water
is very deep and very pure, all the colors are absorbed, and such water
ought to appear black, as no light is sent from its interior to the eye.
The approximation of the Atlantic Ocean to this condition is an indi-
cation of its extreme purity.

Throw a white pebble into such water; as it sinks it becomes
greener and greener, and, before it disappears, it reaches a vivid blue-
green. Break such a pebble into fragments, each of these will behave
like the unbroken mass ; grind the pebble to powder, every particle
will yield its modicum of green ; and, if the particles be so fine as to
remain suspended in the water, the scattered light will be a uniform
green. Hence the greenness of shoal water. You go to bed with the
black Atlantic around you. You rise in the morning and find it a
vivid green ; and you correctly infer that you are crossing the bank
of Newfoundland. Such water is found charged with fine matter in a
state of mechanical suspension. The light from the bottom may some-
times come into play, but it is not necessary. A storm can render the

220 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

water muddy by rendering the particles too numerous and gross. Such
a case occurred toward the close of my visit to Niagara. There had
been rain and storm in the upper-lake regions, and the quantity of sus-
pended matter brought down quite extinguished the fascinating green
of the Horseshoe.

Nothing can be more superb than the green of the Atlantic waves
when the circumstances are favorable to the exhibition of the color.
As long as a wave remains unbroken, no color appears, but, when the
foam just doubles over the crest like an Alpine snow-cornice, under
the cornice we often see a display of the most exquisite green. It is
metallic in its brilliancy. But the foam is necessary to its production.
The foam is first illuminated, and it scatters the light in all directions ;
the light which passes through the higher portion of the wave alone
reaches the eye, and gives to that portion its matchless color. The
folding of the wave, producing, as it does, a series of longitudinal pro-
tuberances and furrows, which act like cylindrical lenses, introduces
variations in the intensity of the light, and materially enhances its
beauty.

We have now to consider the genesis and proximate destiny of
the Falls of Niagara. "We may open our way to this subject by a few
preliminary remarks upon erosion. Time and intensity are the main
factors of geologic change, and they are in a certain sense convertible.
A feeble force, acting through long periods, and an intense force, act-
ing through short ones, may produce, approximately, the same results.
Here, for example, are some stones kindly lent to me by Dr. Hooker.
The first examples of the kind were picked up by Mr. Hackworth on
the shores of Lyell's Bay, near Wellington, in New Zealand, and de-
scribed by Mr. Travers in the Transactions of the New Zealand Insti-
tute. Unacquainted with their origin, you would certainly ascribe
their forms to human workmanship. They resemble flint knives and
spear-heads, being apparently chiselled off" into facets with as much
attention to symmetry as if a tool guided by human intelligence had
passed over them. But no human instrument has been brought to
bear upon these stones. They have been wrought into their present
shape by the wind-blown sand of Lyell's Bay. Two winds are domi-
nant here, and they in succession urged the sand against opposite
sides of the stone ; every little particle of sand clipped away its infini-
tesimal bit of stone, and in the end sculptured these singular forms. 1

1 " These stones, which have a strong resemblance to works of human art, occur in
great abundance, and of various sizes, from half an inch to several inches in length. A
large number were exhibited, showing the various forms, which are those of wedges,
knives, arrow-heads, etc., and all with sharp cutting edges.

" Mr. Travers explained that, notwithstanding their artificial appearance, these stones
were formed by the cutting action of the wind-driven sand, as it passed to and fro over
an exposed bowlder-bank. He gave a minute account of the manner in which the varie-

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON NIAGARA. 221

You know that the Sphinx of Egypt is nearly covered up by the
sand of the desert. The neck of the Sphinx is partly cut across, not,
as I am assured by Mr. Huxley, by ordinary weathering, but by the
eroding action of the fine sand blown against it. In these cases Na-
ture furnishes us with hints which may be taken advantage of in art ;
and this action of sand has been recently turned to extraordinary ac-
count in the United States. When in Boston, I was taken by Mr. Jo-
siah Quincy to see the action of the sand-blast. A kind of hopper
containing fine silicious sand was connected with a reservoir of com-
pressed air, the pressure being variable at pleasure. The hopper ended
in a long slit, from which the sand was blown. A plate of glass was
placed beneath this slit, and caused to pass slowly under it ; it came
out perfectly depolished, with a bright opalescent glimmer, such as
could only be produced by the most careful grinding. Every little
particle of sand urged against the glass, having all its energy con-
centrated on the point of impact, formed there a little pit, the depol-
ished surface consisting of innumerable hollows of this description.
But this was not all. By protecting certain portions of the surface,
and exposing others, figures and tracery of any required form could
be etched upon the glass. The figures of open iron-work could be
thus copied, while wire gauze placed over the glass produced a reticu-
lated pattern. But it required no such resisting substance as iron
to shelter the glass. The patterns of the finest lace could be thus re-
produced, the delicate filaments of the lace itself offering a sufficient
protection.

All these effects have been obtained with a simple model of the
sand-hlast devised for me by my assistant. A fraction of a minute
suffices to etch upon glass a rich and beautiful lace pattern. Any
yielding substance may be employed to protect the glass. By imme-
diately diffusing the shock of the particle, such substances practically
destroy the local erosive power. The hand can bear without incon-
venience a sand-shower which would pulverize glass. Etchings exe-
cuted on glass, with suitable kinds of ink, are accurately worked out
by the sand-blast. In fact, within certain limits, the harder the sur-
face, the greater is the concentration of the shock, and the more
effectual is the erosion. It is not necessary that the sand should be
the harder substance of the two ; corundum, for example, is much
harder than quartz ; still, quartz-sand can not only depolish, but act
ually blow a hole through a plate of corundum. Nay, glass may be

ties of form are produced, and referred to the effect which the erosive action thus indi-
cated would hare on railway and other works executed on sandy tracts.

" Dr. Hector stated that, although, as a group, the specimens on the table could not
well be mistaken for artificial productions, still the forms are so peculiar, and the edges,
in a few of them, so perfect, that, if they were discovered associated with human works,
there is no doubt that they would have been referred to the so-called ' stone period.' "
Extracted from the Minutes of the Wellington Philosophical Society, February 9, 18C9.

222 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

depolished by the impact of fine shot ; the lead in this case bruising
the glass before it has time to flatten and turn its energy into heat.

And here, in passing, we may tie together one or two apparently
unrelated facts. Supposing you turn on, at the lower part of this
house, a cock which is fed by a pipe from a cistern at the top of the
house, the column of water, from the cistern downward, is set in mo-
tion. By turning otf the cock, this motion is stopped ; and, when the
turning off is very sudden, the pipe, if not strong, may be burst by
the internal impact of the water. By distributing the turning of the
cock over half a second of time, the shock and danger of rupture may
be entirely avoided. "We have here an example of the concentration
of energy in time. The sand-blast illustrates the concentration of en-
ergy in space. The action of flint and steel is an illustration of the
same principle. The heat required to generate the spark is intense,
and the mechanical action, being moderate, must, to produce fire, be in
the highest degree concentrated. This concentration is secured by
the collision of hard substances. Calc-spar will not supply the place
of flint, nor lead the place of steel, in the production of fire by collision.
With the softer substances, the total heat produced may be greater
than with the hard ones, but, to produce the spark, the heat must be
intensely localized.

But we can go far beyond the mere depolishing of glass ; indeed,
I have already said that quartz-sand can wear a hole through corun-
dum. This leads me to express my acknowledgments to General
Tilghman, 1 who is the inventor of the sand-blast. To his sponta-
neous kindness I am indebted for these beautiful illustrations of his
process. In this plate of glass you find a figure worked out to a
depth of f- of an inch. Here is a second plate & of an inch thick, en-
tirely perforated. Here, again, is a circular plate of marble, nearly
half an inch thick, through which open-work of the most intricate and
elaborate description has been executed. It would probably take
many days to perform this work by any ordinary process ; with the
sand-blast it was accomplished in an hour. So much for the strength
of the blast ; its delicacy is illustrated by this beautiful example of
line-engraving, etched on glass by means of the blast.

This power of erosion, so strikingly displayed when sand is urged
by air, will render you better able to conceive its action when urged
by water. The erosive power of a river is vastly augmented by the
solid matter carried along with it. Sand or pebbles caught in a river-

1 The absorbent power, if I may use the phrase, exerted by the industrial arts in the
United States, is forcibly illustrated by the rapid transfer of men like Mr. Tilghman from
the life of the soldier to that of the civilian. General McClellan, now a civil engineer,
whom I had the honor of frequently meeting in New York, is a most eminent example
of the same kind. At the end of the war, indeed, a million and a half of men were thus
drawn, in an astonishingly short time, from military to civil life. It is obvious that a na-
tion with these tendencies can have no desire for war.

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON NIAGARA, 223

vortex can wear away the hardest rock ; " pot-holes " and deep cylin-
drical shafts being thus produced. An extraordinary instance of this
kind of erosion is to he seen in the Val Tournanche, above the village
of this name. The gorge at Handeck has been thus cat out. Such
water-falls were once frequent in the valleys of Switzerland ; for hardly
any valley is without one or more transverse barriers of resisting ma-
terial, over which the river flowing through the valley once fell as a
cataract. Near Pontresina, in the Engadine, there is such a case, the
hard gneiss being now worn away to form a gorge through which the
river from the Morteratsch Glacier rushes. The barrier of the Kirchet,
above Meyringen, is also a case in point. Behind it was a lake, de-
rived from the glacier of the Aar, and over the barrier the lake poured
its excess of water. Here the rock, being limestone, was in great part
dissolved, but, added to this, we had the action of the solid particles
carried along by the water, each of which, as it struck the rock,
chipped it away like the particles of the sand-blast. Thus, by solution
and mechanical erosion, the great chasm of the Fensteraarschlucht was
formed. It is demonstrable that the water which flows at the bottoms
of such deep fissures once flowed at the level of what is now their
edges, and tumbled down the lower faces of the barriers. Almost
every valley in Switzerland furnishes examples of this kind ; the un-
tenable hypothesis of earthquakes, once so readily resorted to in ac-
counting for these gorges, being now, for the most part, abandoned.
To produce the canons of Western America, no other cause is needed
than the integration of effects individually infinitesimal.

And now we come to Niagara. Soon after Europeans had taken
possession of the country, the conviction appears to have arisen that
the deep channel of the river Niagara below the Falls had been exca-
vated by the cataract. In Mr. BakewelPs " Introduction to Geology,"
the prevalence of this belief has been referred to : it is expressed thus
by Prof. Joseph Henry in the Transactions of the Albany Insti-
tute : " In viewing the position of the Falls, and the features of the
country round, it is impossible not to be impressed with the idea that
this great natural race-way has been formed by the continued action
of the irresistible Niagara, and that the Falls, beginning at Lewiston,
have, in the course of ages, worn back the rocky strata to their pres-
ent site." * The same view is advocated by Mr. Hall, by Sir Charles
Lyell, by M. Agassiz, by Prof. Ramsay indeed, by almost all of those
who have inspected the place.

A connected image of the origin and progress of the fall is easily
obtained. Walking northward from the village of Niagara Falls by
the side of the river, we have, to our left, the deep and comparatively
narrow gorge through which the Niagara flows. The bounding cliffs
of this gorge are from 300 to 350 feet high. We reach the whirlpool,
trend to the northeast, and, after a little time, gradually resume our

1 Quoted by Bakewell.

22^ THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

northward course. Finally, at about seven miles from the present
Falls, we come to the edge of a declivity which informs us that we
have been hitherto Avalking on table-land. At some hundreds of feet
below us is a comparatively level plain, which stretches to Lake On-
tario. The declivity marks the end of the precipitous gorge of the
Niagara. Here the river escapes from its steep, mural boundaries,
and, in a widened bed, pursues its way to the lake, which finally re-
ceives its waters.

The fact that, in historic times, even within the memory of man,
the fall has sensibly receded, prompts the qitestion, How far has this
recession gone ? At what point did the ledge which thus continually
creeps backward begin its retrograde course ? To minds disciplined
in such researches the answer has been, and will be, at the precipitous
declivity which crossed the Niagara from Lewiston, on the American,
to Queenstown, on the Canadian side. Over this transverse barrier the
united affluents of all the upper lakes once poured their waters, and
here the work of erosion began. The dam, moreover, was demon-
strably of sufficient height to cause the river above it to submerge
Goat Island ; and this would perfectly account for the finding by Mr.
Hall, Sir Charles Lyell, and others, in the sand and gravel of the isl-
and, the same fluviatile shells as are now found in the Niagara River
higher up. It would also account for those deposits along the sides
of the river, the discovery of which enabled Lyell, Hall, and Ramsay,
to reduce to demonstration the popular belief that the Niagara once
flowed through a shallow valley.

The physics of the problem of excavation, which I made clear to
my mind before quitting Niagara, are revealed by a close inspection
of the present Horseshoe Fall. Here we see evidently that the great-
est weight of water bends over the very apex of the Horseshoe. In a
passage in his excellent chapter on Niagara Falls, Mr. Hall alludes to
this fact. Here we have the most copious and the most violent whirl-
ing of the shattered liquid ; here the most powerful eddies recoil
against the shale. From this portion of the fall, indeed, the spray
sometimes rises, without solution of continuity, to the region of clouds,
becoming gradually more attenuated, and passing finally through the
condition of true cloud into invisible vapor, which is sometimes repre-
cipitated higher up. All the phenomena point distinctly to the centre
of the river as the place of greatest mechanical energy, and from the
centre the vigor of the fall gradually dies away toward the sides. The
horseshoe form, with the concavity facing downward, is an obvious
and necessary consequence of this action. Right along the middle of
the river the apex of the curve pushes its way backward, cutting along
the centre a deep and comparatively narrow groove, and draining the
sides as it passes them. 1 Hence the remarkable discrepancy between
the widths of the Niagara above and below the Horseshoe. All along
1 In the discourse this action was illustrated by a model.

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON NIAGARA.

225

its course, from Lewiston Heights to its present position, the form of
the fall was probably that of a horseshoe ; for this is merely the expres-
sion of the greater depth, and consequently greater excavating power,
of the centre of the river. The gorge, moreover, varies in width as
the depth of the centre of the ancient river varied, being narrowest
where that depth was greatest.

The vast comparative erosive energy of the Horseshoe Fall comes
strikingly into view when it and the American Fall are compared to-
gether. The American branch of the upper river is cut at a right
angle by the gorge of the Niagara. Here the Horseshoe Fall was the
real excavator. It cut the rock, and formed the precipice over which
the American Fall tumbles. But, since its formation, the erosive action
of the American Fall has been almost nil, while the Horseshoe has cut
its way for 500 yards across the end of Goat Island, and is now doub-
ling back to excavate a channel parallel to the length of the island.
This point, I have just learned, has not escaped the acute observation
of Prof. Ramsay. 1 The river above the fall bends, and the Horse-
shoe immediately accommodates itself to the bending, following im-
plicitly the direction of the deepest water in the upper stream. The
flexibility of the gorge, if I may use the term, is determined by the
flexibility of the river-channel above it. Were the Niagara above the
fall far more sinuous than it is, the gorge would obediently follow its
sinuosities. Once suggested, no doubt geographers will be able to
point out many examples of this action. The Zambesi is thought to
present a great difficulty to the erosion theory, because of the sinuosity
of the chasm below the Victoria Falls. But, had the river been ex-
amined before the formation of this sinuous channel, the present zigzag
course of the gorge below the fall could, I am persuaded, have been
predicted, while the sounding of the present river would enable us to
predict the course to be pursued by the erosion in the future.

But, not only has the Niagara River cut the gorge, it has carried
away the chips of its own workshop. The shale being probably crum-
bled, is easily carried away. But at the base of the fall we find the
huge bowlders already described, and by some means or other these
are removed down the river. The ice which fills the gorge in winter,
and which grapples with the bowlders, has been regarded as the trans-
porting agent. Probably it is so to some extent. But erosion acts
without ceasing on the abutting points of the bowlders, thus with-
drawing their support, and urging them gradually down the river.
Solution also does its portion of the work. That solid matter is car-
ried down is proved by the difference of depth between the Niagara
River and Lake Ontario, where the river enters it. The depth falls

1 His words are : " Where the body of water is small in the American Fall, the edge
has only receded a few yards (where most eroded) during the time that the Canadian Fall
has receded from the north corner of Goat Island to the innermost curve of the Horse-
shoe Fall." Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, May, 1859.
vol. in. 15

226 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

from 12 feet to 20 feet, in consequence of the deposition of solid mat-
ter caused by the diminished motion of the river. 1

In conclusion, we may say a word regarding the proximate future
of Niagara. At the date of excavation assigned to it by Sir Charles
Lyell, namely, a foot a year, five thousand years will carry the Horse-
shoe Fall far higher than Goat Island. As the gorge recedes, it will
drain, as it has hitherto done, the banks right and left of it, thus leav-
ing a nearly level terrace between Goat Island and the edge of the
gorge. Higher up it will totally drain the American branch of the
river, the channel of which in due time will become cultivable land.
The American Fall will then be transformed into a dry precipice, form-
ing a simple continuation of the cliffy boundary of the Niagara. At
the place occupied by the fall at this moment we shall have the gorge
enclosing a right angle, a second whirlpool being the consequence of
this. To those who visit Niagara five millenniums hence, I leave the
verification of this prediction ; for my own part, I have a profound
persuasion that it will prove literally true.

-+++-

STATE GEOLOGICAL SURVEYS.

By Pkof. ALBERT E. LEEDS,

OF THE STEVENS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY.

A STRENUOUS effort is being made at the present time to reor-
ganize the Geological Survey of Pennsylvania. It promises to
be successful. The legislators of that State, in voting upon the measure,
will be mainly influenced by considerations relating to the pecuniary
value of a geological survey in locating beds of coal, building-mate-
rials, and ores. But the educated public will desire to know, in addi-
tion to these matters, what influence such a geological survey will
have upon the intellectual activity of the community at large, and how
great an amount of scientific bustle it will create in the museums and
laboratories of institutions of learning.

A very satisfactory answer can be given to the first of these
queries, after reviewing the scientific periodicals and journals of
learned societies in this country, during the last half-century. It will
be seen that the desultory descriptions of plants, birds, and the ex-
ternal characters of minerals, which constituted a large portion of the
scientific literature at the beginning of this period, gave place to
laborious analyses, and to elaborate articles on geological phenomena.
Many of the most valuable contributions to science during this epoch
consisted in reports of the geological surveys then in progress, or in-

1 Near the mouth of the gorge at Queenstown, the depth, according to the Admiralty
Chart, is 180 feet ; well within the gorge it is 132 feet.

STATE GEOLOGICAL SURVEYS. 227

vestigations connected with and growing out of them. Much of the
best talent of the time was engaged upon these stupendous labors, and
around the eminent chiefs were gathered bands of enterprising stu-
dents, whose methods of scientific work were formed beneath the eyes
of masters. The assistants of earlier surveys are the directors of those
now in progress, and the crude sketches of former times are replaced
by huge volumes filled with exhaustive details and magnificent gen-
eralizations.

Great as has been the work accomplished, the question may never-
theless be asked, whether the State geological surveys are, or have
been, organized in such a manner as to exert the greatest possible in-
fluence upon the scientific progress of their respective States. As here-
tofore constituted, they have consisted of a director and a number of
assistants, who have drawn their salaries and prosecuted their labors
until the State appropriations have been exhausted. In some instances
the work of the assistants has been appropriated by the director in
such a manner that the geological survey has appeared to the public
to be entirely represented in the person of its presiding officer. Grant-
ing that this officer is better qualified than any one else, it is evident,
nevertheless, that a geological bureau, thus constituted, must reject a
large part of the available talent of a State. Still worse, by taking
possession of the field, and by closing the columns of the report to all
but the paid officials of the survey, many whose labors might be of
great value are rendered indifferent or hostile to the work. A bureau
framed in the manner above described is proper enough in the survey
of Territories still largely occupied by Indians, but it is by no means
suited to the condition or needs of a densely-populated State. When
a dozen flourishing colleges exist within the boundaries of a State, is
it well that a general geological survey should be made in such a
manner as to apportion little if any of its work specifically to them?
A survey so constituted tends to encourage a disposition, unfortunately
only too prevalent among our collegiate professors, to regard their
entire duty as performed when the labor of teaching is accomplished.
A few days ago an eminent civil engineer, who in his moments of lei-
sure has collected one of the finest cabinets of minerals in this country
and has made himself a practised mineralogist, complained that, after
twenty years of disappointments, he had grown wearied of sending
doubtful specimens to professors in colleges for determination, and
of receiving no answers after the lapse of many months. As a final
resort, he has determined new species himself, and had the chemical
analysis performed by a hard-worked chemist in a manufacturing
establishment. A large part of the work of a geological survey should
be assigned to the colleges in a State, and should be voluntarily per-
formed by their professors. Every State from Maine to Florida should
be divided up into collegiate districts, the scientific development of
which should be more immediately under the care of the particular

22 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

college in the midst of each. There is no reason why a system of joint
effort, which from time immemorial has accomplished such wonderful
things for religion and social order, should not be equally efficacious in
scientific matters. A feeling of honorable pride should induce the of-
ficers and students of each institution to illustrate the flora and fauna,
the mineralogy and geology of its collegiate district, more perfectly
than any stranger could. The amount of intellectual labor Avhich is
utilized, and the number of valuable data collected each year, form
but a small proportion of what is annually lost to the community
through lack of organized effort. In a tersely-written letter to the
Governor of Pennsylvania, urging the need of a new survey, Prof.
Lesley says : " A most important function of a geological survey is, to
preserve knowledge for future use. Science is cumulative. It makes
slow and painful advances. It is obliged to collect an abundance of
facts before it comes to true conclusions. Pennsylvania has lost enor-
mously during the last twenty years by having no bureau of statistics,
no corps of observation and publication, to observe and preserve, col-
late and relate, the facts of its geology and mineralogy, as they have
successively made their appearance. No commonwealth can afford to
be without such an apparatus for preserving from loss and forgetful-
ness the discoveries and investigations of private persons, even for one
single year of its existence. Thousands of most valuable facts have
been lost to us, during an interval, which cannot be recovered. How
many openings on coal-veins are now covered up, no one being able to
give any reliable information about them. Twenty thousand oil-
borings have been made, and not one hundred of them are on record,
if discoverable. Hundreds of gangways have been driven and aban-
doned, and cannot now be studied, many of which woidd disclose the
nature of faults and disturbances which affect neighboring properties,
and overlying and underlying beds not yet worked, where certain
knowledge is preserved to govern the future mining-engineer in his
plans for getting at the mineral. He must work as completely in the
dark as if his knowledge had never been got, and often paid for at a
ruinous expense. The sooner a geological survey is established, the
better for the future interests of the State, as well as for its present
necessities." At the height of the oil-fever in Pennsylvania, appreciat-
ing the wonderful opportunity which the sinking of innumerable wells
afforded for obtaining complete geological sections of a vast area, I
spent a long time in endeavoring to obtain from the superintendents
engaged in boring, by personally visiting hundreds of wells in succes-
sion, the records of their work, and specimens of the penetrated strata.
Printed circulars, asking for copies of such records in the interests of
science, were sent to the secretary of every oil-company within our
knowledge. Partly from the disgusting greed which possessed the
oil-speculators to the exclusion of every higher feeling, and partly
from an insane dread that the possession of such knowledge would be-

STATE GEOLOGICAL SURVEYS. 229

stow an infallible talisman for striking oil, these attempts were in but
half a dozen instances successful. Is it wonderful that such crass
ignorance should have entailed ruin upon thousands ? Nothing but
the publication of exhaustive geological reports, continued year after
year, and printed both in full and summarized into short popular
forms, can save the community at large from the repetition of similar
follies. One single mining-fever costs the State more than all the ap-
propriations needed to discover and universally diffuse the truths of
geology. The ignorance spoken of above finds a parallel only in the
methods which were pursued in treating the crude petroleum after it
had been sent to market. The director of the principal chemical man-
ufactory in Western Pennsylvania informed the writer that they first
attempted to refine crude petroleum by throwing hundreds of pounds
of bergamot and other perfumes into it, to take away the smell. If
the reader says that this story is incredible, I can only repeat, " Yes,
it is incredible."

It may be urged that few men are placed in such positions, or pro-
vided with such appliances, or possessed of sufficient leisure, to con-
tribute any thing of value to the general stock of geological knowl-
edge. But there are hundreds who would shrink from publishing a
lengthy article or reading a paper before a learned body, and yet are
acute reasoners and accurate observers, and whose abilities could be
made available by a good system of collecting and collating their frag-
mentary labors. I have met many school-teachers and pastors in
Switzerland whose parochial duties confined them to obscure valleys
among the mountains, and who still had found time to collect the fos-
sils, plants, and minerals, of their poverty-stricken hamlets, and to
make careful maps of the rock-strata. They did so for two reasons :
In the first place, the topographical map of General Dufour, on a scale
of 1 to 100,000, previously accomplished by national aid, rendered it
possible for them to locate their observations of strata, etc., with pre-
cision ; and, secondly, because their contributions were utilized by the
professors at Zurich, Bern, Geneva, and elsewhere, and incorporated
in their published geological reports. A State survey, so organized as
to make every intelligent school-teacher, every country-surveyor, every
civil and mining engineer, chemist, amateur or collector, one of its
working corps, would, we believe, do the work better, more cheaply,
and with vastly more benefit to the material and intellectual prosperity
of the State, than any present organization. This would be a school
of science indeed, unincumbered by the dead weight of expensive
school-buildings, whose laboratory and museum would cover every
square foot of the State's surface.

230 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

NATURAL SELECTION IN POLITICS. '

Br Prof. D. II. WIIEELEE.

WHATEVER may become of Darwin's theory of natural selec-
tion, its worst foes must at last concede it the rare honor of
being reckoned the most fertile hypothesis ever proclaimed. It has
created a library of books on species, selection, and evolution, and it
enters more or less into most attempts at serious writing. It was to
be expected that it should turn up in politics ; but we were hardly
prepared for so brave an entry on that field as it makes in Bagehot's
" Physics and Politics."

It is refreshing to know that Darwinism puts a more cheerful as-
pect upon physics in the social life of man than has been given to it
by Draper and Buckle.

To Mr. Bagehot, the principle of natural selection applied to poli-
tics suggests the hopeful and beneficent side of law ; Dr. Draper's books
were preachments upon its awful and relentless aspects.

There is a valuable truth in natural selection applied to politics ;
for it is conceded that history shows us a struggle of races, and we
who survive are ready enough to believe that the sti'ongest survive
because they are the best.

The earlier attempts to put physical forces into their place in man's
social institutions, claimed a monopoly for them. The Gulf Stream
wrote "Paradise Lost " and Newton's " Principia." The new attempt
to trace these lines of law seems to promise success by leaving a little
for Newton and Milton to do.

Physics work in harmony with morals. Morality is not a base and
ragged accident, nor is it a fated product of temperature ; it has rela-
tions to the weather, but the most important of these is its power to
make, through industry and thought, a pleasant summer in an ice-
bound city, and a grateful coolness in the torrid zone.

The moralists are fertile in all forms of social power ; that is an old
truth, too stubborn to be talked down. Religion has value every-
where, even in making fighters. God-fearing armies are hard to beat ;
and a man with an honest faith in him is as ugly a customer to face in
fight as thirty degrees below zero. I hope nobody supposes that poli-
tics are without law. I know nothing so absurd as to believe in God
and deny law to history, unless it be to be atheist and deny it. In
truth, all of us shiver a little when we remember that God is just, or
take account of the consequences that attend our public errors.

But the value of a truth is generally to be measured by its relation
to hope. The best conquer, the best live ; what an inspiration to
courageous effort to be the best nation !

All the moralities, decencies, cultures, worships, lift up, and strength-

NATURAL SELECTION IN POLITICS. 231

en, and vitalize a people ; and the purer they are, the more they are
worth as factors of nationality.

It is worth while to try to be decent, to reform bad habits, and
fortify exposed places in our public life ; for the best is the longest-
lived.

This is not very new ; a good deal of such preaching was wasted
upon the Jews ; but, after being sickened upon the doctrine that a fall
of temperature produces a given number of suicides, and that morals
have no influence in civilization, it is worth the cost of listening to a
sermon, to get back again, under a disciple of Darwin, to the old truth,
that it is well with the good, and ill with the evil, evermore on the
earth.

The hopeful aspect given to change in national life by Darwinian
Politics deserves special notice, and seems timely.

We are all afraid to change born conservatives; and we all want
something changed born radicals ; and we do change. All human
life varies incessantly; the new generation sees life in new aspects, and
rejoices in other colors. The variation comes in constantly; and it is
our safety. Our inborn conservatism would kill us off if the variation
did not help our inborn radicalism in the else unequal struggle. That
which is, like the bird in the hand, is worth two reforms in the bush,
for a contest. In short, nations grow, progress, thrive, through the
law of variation from inheritance.

" One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new
idea;" the consolation is, that only in pain does progress get birth,
and that the things born are, on the whole, like the babies of any year,
a little stronger and better than the things which die to give them room.
Nor is this so because the moon is not made of green cheese, but be-
cause a beneficent law underlies human existence. The exceptions are
numerous ; so too are the small graves at Rose Hill, and yet there are
more men on the earth, on the whole, happier than their ancestors,
than there were fifty years ago. We must change ; it is our cowardice
or indolence that makes change a danger. The law deals generously
with virtue and strength.

It is curious to mark how slowly we learn some of these simple les-
sons. A century ago, we respected, envied, the noble savage. The
contemptible creature was semi-divine to first-rate poets and states-
men. They bewailed society, and longed for nakedness in the woods.

The same men knew that one Roman soldier had outmatched fifty
semi-barbarians in every struggle, and that noble savages fell into the
toils of the meanest civilized men in the slave-trade.

Civilization is strength and happiness. Miss Fragilla may not get
all the new bonnets she wants ; but that pain is easier borne than the
" sound belashing " her ancestor got at her age, two centuries ago.
She may not be all we could wish, but no young man of our blood
would pass her by for a Choctaw princess.

232 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The function of liberty in politics deeply interests us. Its power
to promote healthful change is obvious. It is really liberty, with its
discussion, its free thinking, and free speaking, that makes good poli-
tics. Crcsarisni is a thief, robbing free times of their ideas and social
results. It can live just as long as the loot holds out ; but, when the
stock on hand is exhausted, free men must be set to producing a new
crop. The Northwestern Review.

-*-

BAKON LIEBIG-.

JUSTUS VON LIEBIG, the famous German chemist, who died at
Munich, April 18th, was born at Darmstadt, May 12, 1803. Hav-
ing graduated from the gymnasium of his native place at the age of
sixteen, his taste for the study of natural science led him first to accept
a situation in an apothecary's shop, where he expected to have abun-
dant opportunity for experiment and research.

After six months' service in the apothecary's shop, Liebig set out
for the University of Bonn, where he studied for a while, and then
went to Erlangen. At the latter university he attracted notice by the
zeal with which he devoted himself to the study of chemistry, and he
received from the Grand-duke of Hesse a " travelling stipend," which
enabled him to spend two years (1822-'24) in Paris. There he had the
advantage of association with Alexander von Humboldt, Gay-Lussac,
and other eminent scientists. During his stay in Paris he read before
the Academy of Sciences a paper on "Fulminic Acid" which at once
stamped him as an able chemist. He was then only twenty-one
years of age. In 1824 he was, through the influence of Humboldt,
appointed Adjunct Professor of Chemistry in the University of Giessen,
and two years later he succeeded to the full dignity of professor. The
laboratory which he established at Giessen was the best-appointed
school of chemistry in Germany, and thither flocked students from
all parts of Europe, but especially from England, and also from this
country. Leipsic and Gottingen set up chemical laboratories on
Liebig's model, and the Giessen school became a kind of scientific
focus, a centre of discovery, whose influence was felt everywhere.

Prof. Liebig visited England in 1838, attending a meetiug of the
British Association for the Advancement of Science. He there brought
forward the discovery made by his associate, Wohler, of a process
for obtaining urea artificially. This announcement of the first suc-
cessful step toward the synthesis of compounds in the laboratory,
which had been supposed producible only under the influence of the
mysterious forces of life, was received by the Association with pro-
found interest. At the urgent request of the Association he wrote

PROFESSOR LIEBIG.

SKETCH OF BARON LIEBIG. 233

his work on " Organic Chemistry, in its Application to Agriculture "
(Brunswick, 1840), which was translated into most European lan-
guages, and had an enormous circulation both in Europe and America.
In 1845 he received from his sovereign the honor of an hereditary bar-
ony. Seven years later, in 1852, he accepted the position of Professor
of Chemistry in the University of Munich, and director of the chemical
laboratory of that city.

His principal works, besides those already mentioned, are : " Ani-
mal Chemistry, or Chemistry in its Applications to Physiology and
Pathology" (1842); and "Familiar Letters" (1844), which brought
his views on applied chemistry before a very wide public, in a style so
simple and popular that practical agriculturists could understand and
profit by the instruction there conveyed.

In 1848 he commenced the publication of his " Annalen" or, "An-
nual Report of the Progress of Chemical Science." He published his
"Researches on the Chemistry of Food" in 1849. His " Dictionary
of Chemistry," in which he had the assistance of other writers, ap-
peared in parts between 1837 and 1851.

In estimating the relation of Baron Liebig to the thought of his
age, we are not to regard him as simply a chemist ; he was much more
he was, in its broadest sense, a philosophical chemist, a man of
ideas. Since the death of Berzelius, no man has appeared who had the
weight of universal authority in chemical science. The subject has
developed into such vastness of detail, that men can only become
great by limiting themselves to special branches of it. Liebig devoted
himself to organic chemistry, and even here there are other men who
have probably surpassed him in the number and importance of their
immediate contributions to the science. Yet, since Berzelius closed his
career, no savant has appeared in the chemical field who has achieved
so brilliant and conspicuous a position as Liebig.

He had in an eminent degree the traits of a successful pioneer in
the world of thought. He was a man of impulse, sympathy, and en-
thusiasm, as well as of intellect. He could not give his life to simple,
quiet laboratory investigation, content to make a few additions to the
stock of scientific truth. Although trained to the strict methods of
investigation, and competent to bend his energies to specific research,
yet his manly interest in his fellow-beings, and the welfare and prog-
ress of society, determined the course of his studies, and led him
constantly to the development of large practical results. When he
began with organic chemistry, it was in its infancy, and chiefly con-
fined to the production of a few organic compounds by laboratory
decomposition. As for the chemical interpretation of the living organ-
ism, it was hardly thought of. The mystery of the vital forces reigned
supreme, and barred the way to true inductive investigation. So also
with agricultural chemistry. Davy had originated the name early in
the century, and presented some of its elementary facts ; but they did

234 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

not reach to practical results, and amounted to nothing in their influ-
ence upon the public. The work of Licbig was nothing less than to
erect both these sciences into recognized branches of study, to direct
the scientific thought of his age to these fields of inquiry, and to
arouse the interest of the public in their practical applications ; and
this great work it is his lasting honor to have accomplished. That he
should have committed errors, was inevitable. The first bold original
speculations upon complex subjects cannot fail to be always imperfect.
And, besides, that order of temperament which fitted him to be a
reformer and a leader, and to stimulate and urge on other men, was
favorable to rashness of generalization and a sanguine anticipation of
conclusions. And yet Liebig's leading doctrines, to whatever degree
requiring modification, were steps in the right direction of investiga-
tion ; while their amendment and revision have made the reputations
of other men.

Prof. Liebig's name will always be intimately and honorably asso-
ciated with the rise of biological science in the nineteenth century.
He stands at the beginning of one of the great epochs of knowledge,
to which his genius has assisted to give development and direction,
and he illustrates in an eminent degrree that hio-hest trait of modern
character devotion to scientific truth to the end of a large and noble
utility.

It remains to be stated that Prof. Liebig entertained large and
liberal political views. Although working under the European system
with great success, ennobled by it, and appreciating its advantages,
he nevertheless condemned its repressions and interferences, and
looked beyond the ocean for the realization of his hopes and ideas.
He was an enthusiast in regard to America, where he had many more
readers than in any other country, and he expected great things from
freedom, intelligence, and active enterprise in the United States. He
even entertained serious notions of taking up his residence in our
country. Like Agassiz, he saw that there were great possibilities
for the future of science on this continent, and he indulged the idea,
which was much more than a fancy, of establishing a great agricult-
ural institution in one of the States. He would have been welcome
here with a cordiality beyond his anticipation ; for he was not only
universally known and highly respected, but the most numerous class
of the community the agriculturists recognized him as benefactor.

CORRESP ONDENCE.

23>

CORRESPONDENCE

THE QUESTION OF COMPULSORY AT-
TENDANCE ON SCHOLASTIC EXER-
CISES IN COLLEGES.

To the Editor of the Popular Science Monthly:

THE press has recently occupied itself
to an unusual degree with matters
which concern our system of higher educa-
tion ; and a poiut on which the widest di-
versity of views has been expressed, and
on which the argument on both sides has
been maintained with the greatest ability
and earnestness, is the question whether
mental training is a process which can only
be successfully conducted by assuming that
its subjects will not in general receive it
voluntarily, and whether, therefore, it is or
is not necessary to proceed upon the plan
of coercing them to their own good. This
discussion originated in an intimation
thrown out by President Eliot, of Harvard
University, in his last annual report, to the
effect that it might possibly be thought ex-
pedient in that institution hereafter to abol-
ish the rules which make the attendance of
students upon scholastic exercises compul-
sory, holding them, nevertheless, to rigorous
examination upon the subjects taught, and
conferring degrees in arts only upon satis-
factory evidence of proficiency. This sug-
gestion encountered a prompt and vigorous
response and expostulation from the Rev.
President McCosh, of Princeton, in a com-
munication addressed, in January last, to
the New - York Evening Post. Other writers
took up the argument at greater or less
length on both sides of the controversy ;
but nowhere has there appeared a more
able or conclusive vindication of the wisdom
of the principle involved in President Eliot's
suggestion than that which was put forth in
the March number of The Popular Science
Monthly. I cannot but thank you for your
bold and free treatment of a subject in re-
gard to which prescriptive usage, and the
bias in the public mind which long prescrip-
tion always carries with it, are against you ;
but which concerns in a very high degree
the influence of our svstems of education

on the formation of the moral no less than
the intellectual character of the youth who
are subjected to it.

Immediately on the appearance of the
article of Dr. McCosh, it was my design to
offer a slight contribution to the literature
of this subject, founded on my own per-
sonal observation of different educational
methods during a thirty years' connection
with the administration of colleges ; but,
owing to unforeseen interruptions, my labor
remained unfinished on my hands until the
favorable moment had passed by. My at-
tention has been recently drawn to the sub-
ject again by the publication (also in the
Evening Post) of a letter from Prof. Yen-
able, Dean of the Faculty of the University
of Virginia, describing the educational sys-
tem of that institution, of which compul-
sory attendance is an essential feature, but
referring in respectful terms to the plan
proposed by President Eliot. This letter is
presented by the Post as one of unusual im-
portance and interest ; yet it adds nothing
to what has been universally known of the
Virginia system for the past forty years,
although it sets forth the leading features
of this system with clearness and concise-
ness. In commending it, I understand the
Post to be once more commending, though
indirectly, the compulsory system ; and this
brings back to me my nearly-forgotten pur-
pose above referred to, to have my word in
this matter also.

I will commence, therefore, by remark-
ing that all that Dr. McCosh has said, or
that anybody may say, as to the importance
of regular drill to the efficiency of any sys-
tem of mental discipline, will be readily ad-
mitted by every experienced educator of
youth. Whether, as that learned gentleman
assumes, the undergraduate student is to
be regarded as being too immature to be in-
trusted with a freedom which he may pos-
sibly abuse, or whether, with President Eliot,
we suppose that he is as likely to attend
to his collegiate exercises from a just ap-
preciation of their value to himself, and a

236

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

proper sense of duty, as through any spe-
cies of coercion, in either case there can be
no doubt that this regularity of attendance
is of indispensable importance, and that, in
one way or another, it must be secured. It
is supposed by Dr. McCosh that Harvard
University may have been influenced in her
views as to this subject by the presumed
usages of foreign institutions of similar
grade, or by the known practice of the pro-
fessional schools of our own country ; and,
in regard to the colleges of Great Britain
and Ireland, he hastens to correct the im-
pression, if it exists, that attendance upon
scholastic exercises is not made compulsory
in them. It seems to me, nevertheless, to
be unnecessary to go beyond the reason as-
signed by President Eliot himself as indicat-
ing the expediency of the change, in order
to discover his motive for proposing it. This
reason is, that the average age of the un-
dergraduate students in Harvard University
(and it may be added in all our colleges at
present at least in all those of the Atlan-
tic States) is three or four years more ad-
vanced than it was in the earlier part of
this century. Dr. McCosh admits the truth
of this statement. He does not even seem
to deprecate the fact that mature young
men seek to avail themselves of the educa-
tional advantages which colleges offer. But
he hardly attempts to disguise his convic-
tion that the college was not designed for
this class of students, nor that their actual
predominance in it in numbers is evidence
to him that it has been perverted from the
original object of its institution. This is
apparent from his remark that, " if there be
a diminution in the number of young men
attending colleges in relation to the popula-
tion, it is very much owing to the circum-
stance that certain of the colleges have
been practically raising the age of entrance,
so as to prevent persons from entering upon
their professional business until some of the
best years of their life are spent." In his
view, therefore, the existing state of things
is an evil, and the blame of it is directly
chargeable upon the colleges themselves. I
do not, I confess, find the evidence to sus-
tain this view of the case. The colleges
have not raised the age of entrance by le-
gislation. The minimum age in Columbia
College is fifteen years. In Yale College it

is fourteen, as it has been for the past half-
century. In Harvard University there is
no minimum at all. If there is any mode
of " practically " raising the standard ex-
cept by arbitrarily rejecting the younger
class of applicants, notwithstanding that,
by the published regulations, they are legally
admissible, it does not occur to me to con-
jecture what it can be ; yet this is not a
practice which I have ever heard imputed
to any American college. But it may be
said that the colleges have brought the
observed result to pass by increasing the
severity of the entrance tests. This hy-
pothesis can certainly not be sustained, so
far, at least, as the classics are concerned
(and it is here that the great labor of prepa-
ration lies), if we take as our guide the
published entrance conditions. As a rule,
the reverse is even the case, the amount
exacted, measured by quantity if not by
quality, being materially less than it was
fifty years ago. Some little addition has
been made to the amount of exaction in the
mathematics, but not enough to make it
difficult for a lad to prepare himself for col-
lege as early as fourteen, or earlier. To
these statements, Harvard College may pos-
sibly present an exception, but the in-
creased entrance exactions there have not
been in operation long enough to have had
any influence in producing the phenomenon
in question. If it is a fact, therefore, that
the average age of undergraduate students
has risen and I believe there can be no
doubt about that it is a fact which is not
imputable to the colleges, nor one which
they could control if they would ; unless,
indeed, instead of legislating about mini-
mum ages, they should think proper to es-
tablish a maximtim age, above which no
applicant should be admitted, and should
place this low enough to exclude every in-
dividual who has passed the years of boy-
hood. Such a measure would probably
meet with few advocates. If it were im-
portant that we should explain the re-
markable fact above mentioned, it would
be quite sufficient to point to the immense
improvement which has taken place within
the century in the training-schools cf grade
inferior to the colleges schools admirably
and precisely fitted to the wants of boys
of tender age, and armed with a coercive

CORRESP ONDENCE.

'37

power to hold them to their tasks tenfold
as great as any college possesses, or can
possess. For such striplings, it is well that
they are at school, and that they are not in
college ; and to an intuitive perception of
this truth on the part of parents it is un-
questionably owing that so many remain
there.

However this may be, we must take the
facts as we find them, whether we would
have them so or not, since it does not ap-
pear that we can very well make them other
than they are. What is true in the present
is likely to be permanently true in the
future, viz., that the average age of under-
graduate students in American colleges is,
and will be, several years more advanced
than it was three-quarters of a century ago,
and even much more recently. And this
important truth implies a very material
change in the character of the student-body
a change marked by a large advance in
maturity of judgment, an increased power
of self-control, and a sensible diminution of
the levity and volatility which distinguish
the period of boyhood. To place such a
community of young men under a system
of restraints in nowise different from that
which was originally devised for boys but
a step removed from childhood, is to check
the development of character in the direc-
tion of manly sentiment which should ac-
company this age, by tempting or compel-
ling the student to govern his conduct not
in accordance with the principles of pro-
priety or right, but in obedience to an arbi-
trary, sometimes, in his judgment, an un-
reasonable, and often to his belief a need-
lessly oppressive rule.

The hope which President Eliot thinks
it not unreasonable to entertain in regard
to Harvard College, viz., " that it will soon
get entirely rid of a certain school-boy
spirit," which used to prevail there, but of
which the traces are continually growing
less, is a hope in which many similar insti-
tutions, with good reason, participate. It
is a hope of which every judicious educator
will do all that lies in his power to promote
the fulfilment. The most unnecessary of
the evils with which our colleges are at
present afflicted are, those that grow out
of such traces as still linger of this frivolous
spirit. And if the rigorous rules which

subject mature young men to a severe ac-
count of the disposition made of every mo-
ment of their time, or which place them
under an irritating and annoying surveil-
lance, are necessary (as it must be pre-
sumed they are supposed to be, or they
would not be maintained), to assure their
proper mental training, then certainly it is
much to be lamented that these same neces-
sary rules should be as prejudicial to their
moral culture as they are said to be health-
ful to their mental. Is it not time, then,
that we should begin to consider whether
there are not influences capable of being
brought to bear upon the undergraduate
youth of our colleges, which will prove
nearly, if not absolutely, as effectual in
securing their regular attendance upon
their scholastic exercises as any system
of pains and penalties can be ? Does the
abandonment of the system of positive co-
ercion involve necessarily the disastrous
consequences apprehended by Dr. McCosh,
of a neglect of faithful daily effort, and an
attempt to satisfy the tests of proficiency
imposed by the academie authorities, by
means of a pernicious periodical cram-
ming ?

These are questions in regard to which
no general agreement is likely to be reached
by mere discussion. They are matters of
opinion ; and, when opinions differ in regard
to what is likely to happen in hypothetical
cases, it is generally true that the advocates
of opposing views are more likely to be con-
firmed by argument in their original convic-
tions, than converted to those of their adver-
saries. The only source from which, in mat-
ters of this kind, conclusions can be drawn
which shall admit of no controversy, is act-
ual experience ; and thus far the results of
experience have not been adduced by any
of the parties to this discussion. President
Eliot puts forward his proposed measure,
not in the tone of confidence in which one
speaks of a thing which has been tried and
found to work well ; but rather apparently
as a feeler, for the purpose of trying the
temper of the public mind, and ascertaining
whether that is likely to tolerate so bold an
experiment at Harvard ; and Dr. McCosh
trembles at the very thought of such an ex-
periment in such an institution, being quite
certain in advance that it must end in igno-

2 3 8

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

minious failure, and being apprehensive that
the disastrous consecpaences which must
follow will be felt in all the other colleges
of the land. And yet, after all, this is not
entirely a question of possibilities or proba-
bilities. The experiment has been tried al-
ready, and tried until it is no longer an ex-
periment. It has been tried at least long
enough to prove that it is not surrounded
by any of the dangers which seem so formi-
dable to the distinguished president of
Princeton, and that it is truly attended by
all the advantageous consequences which
are anticipated from it by the enlightened
and progressive president of Harvard. This
identical experiment has been tried for a
period of more than four years in Columbia
College ; and it is this fact which has in-
duced me to intrude the expression of my
opinions into this discussion.

More than four years have now elapsed
since the ordinary modes of compulsion, by
which the attendance of students upon scho-
lastic exercises is commonly enforced in col-
leges, were abandoned in this institution.
As a substitute for these, the simple rule
was adopted, that any marked irregularity
of attendance on the daily exercises should
debar the student from the privilege of at-
tending the stated periodical examinations,
through which every candidate for gradua-
tion is obliged by statute to pass, and to
pass satisfactorily, before he can receive a
degree in Arts. And, in order to remove
any uncertainty which might exist as to the
amount of irregularity which should be con-
sidered sufficient to deprive an individual
of this privilege, the limit of tolerated ab-
sences from any particular department of
study was put at one-fourth of the total
number of exercises in that department.
This limit was fixed upon, because it had
been already tried, for several years, with
results entirely satisfactory, in the School
of Mines which is associated with the col-
lege, and which is carried on, on the same
grounds. Under this system, a student may
absent himself without being called upon to
assigu any reason for his absence. He may,
if he pleases, assign such a reason volunta-
rily, or he may state in advance his desire
or intention to be absent from a future ex-
ercise, and, in case he does this, a note is
made of the reason so assigned, which is

preserved for a purpose which will presently
appear. In order that he may be always
aware of the state of his absence account, a
bulletin is kept constantly posted where it
is accessible to him, exhibiting the number
of his absences from every department sep-
arately, up to the current date. The data
for this bulletin are derived from the daily
reports of the college officers made to the
president each officer presenting his report
for- the day, immediately after the close of
college hours and from these the proper en-
tries are made in the bulletin immediately.
An abstract of this record is furnished
monthly to the parent or guardian of every
student ; so that, if there be any unjustifia-
ble irregularity, it is referred to the au-
thority most suitable to investigate the
causes and to apply the proper correction.
If, at the close of the session, any student
appears, from the record, to have exceeded
his limit, in any department, he is notified
that he is debarred from examination in
that department ; and the loss of an exam-
ination, in any single department, deprives
him of his standing as a candidate for a
degree. He is not on that account com-
pelled to leave college. He may continue
to attend as before ; but, if, on account of
growing irregularity, or inattention to study,
his attendance should be deemed unprofit-
able to himself, or prejudicial to others, he
may be required to withdraw. In this event,
he retires silently, and without censure.

In case a student, whose absences for
the session exceed the limit of tolerance,
should be able to make it appear that all
these absences were occasioned by causes
beyond his control, or were otherwise justi-
fiable, the faculty are at liberty, in their
discretion, to raise the ban, and to admit
him to examination. But, if a single one
of these absences appears to have been
wanton or unwarranted, it is of no avail to
him that all the others were unavoidable
he loses his standing as a candidate for a
degree.

Under this system an appeal is made to
a higher motive than the fear of censure.
It is inculcated on the student continually
that to attend the college exercises is a
privilege and a duty ; to be absent a loss
and a wrong to himself. And, when this
idea becomes familiar, he will not only be-

CORRESP ONDENCE.

2 39

come habituated to attend from choice, but
he will profit more by his attendance, and
will less frequently be found endeavoring to
beguile the weary hours of his imprison-
ment in the class-room, by petty frivolities
out of harmony with the character for man-
liness which he should at this period of his
life be forming.

As to the results of this system in prac-
tice, the following remarks, taken from the
annual report of the president of the col-
lege to the trustees, in 1869, which repre-
sent the facts as they apeared then, may be
applied without any important modification
to the experience of the more recent years :
" The effects of the change have proved a
very interesting subject of observation. Af-
ter the lapse of four entire months, it may be
said, of a large majority of the students,
that no perceptible difference can be dis-
covered at all in the degree of the regularity
of their attendance upon scholastic exer-
cises, as it was rendered before and after
the adoption of the new regulations. A
certain limited number have never been ab-
sent at all. A much larger number have
been absent only at rare intervals. A num-
ber larger still, while absent more frequent-
ly, have not at all increased the frequency
of their absences in consequence of the
change of regulations. Some of these re-
side at inconvenient distances, or are liable
to interruptions of their regularity from
other causes beyond their control. . , . From
an inspection of the record, it is safe to say
that there are more than three-fourths of
the entire college body, whose regularity of
attendance has been totally unaffected by
the introduction of the new regulations. In
regard to the remaining fourth, or probably
a proportion less than a fourth, it must be
admitted that their irregularity of attend-
ance has sensibly increased. This fact
shows a degree of parental indifference or
of parental indulgence which was hardly
looked for ; but the evil, so far a it exists,
admits of a simple remedy, since the cause
is obvious. The inspection of the record
makes it quite evident that there is no ne-
cessity to make so large an allowance for
occasional absences as one-fourth of the
entire number. The majority of the stu-
dents are probably not absent one-tenth of
the number. It is practicable, and may be

advisable, to reduce this latitude to one-
sixth or one-eighth, or even to a less pro-
portion, and the evil will inevitably disap-
pear."

As yet, however, it has not been thought
necessary to resort to the expedient here
indicated ; and, though, in the statutes of the
college as they stand, the power is vested
in the faculty to apply coercive measures to
enforce attendance, this power has never
been resorted to, nor has the evil increased.
In occasional and very rare instances, a
student has been obliged to withdraw from
college on account of persistent irregularity
or neglect of study ; but this by no means
more frequently than had been the case
under the system of coercion. One quite
effectual corrective, applied with us in cases
of this kind, is, to require a student deficient
in scholarship to study out of college hours
under a private tutor, while still continuing
his attendance with his classes ; and to
make his restoration to regular standing as
a candidate for a degree dependent on the
presentation of a certificate from his tutor,
attesting his faithful attention to the studies
prescribed, and his satisfactory proficiency
in them.

The expedients here described, by which
we aim to hold students in college to the
proper discharge of their duties, may be
said perhaps to partake, after all, of the na-
ture of coercion ; but they are not coercive
in the sense in which that word is usually
employed, when it implies a system of pains
and penalties which offend a young man's
self-respect, and carry with them, more or
less, a sense of disgrace. If they are coer-
cive, they are so precisely as the rules of
morality or of gentlemanly propriety are
coercive, by operating on the conscience ;
or as the suggestions of prudence in the or-
dinary affairs of life are coercive, by con-
straining men so to govern their conduct as
not to prejudice their substantial interests.
This is a kind of coercion under which we
should desire all young men, and all men of
every age, to be placed. It is in itself an
educational influence, and one of the most
salutary to which men can be subjected.
When all our colleges shall have seen their
way to the adoption of a regimen like this,
as sooner or later they inevitably will, we
may hope to see the complete disappear-

240

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

attcc of that spirit of frivolity which too
generally prevails at present among their
inmates, and which President Eliot men-
tions to deprecate a spirit already declin-
ing even in the absence of the healthful in-
fluence which the system I have attempted
to describe brings with it, and which,
though not yet wholly extinct, survives
rather as a pernicious inheritance from
other times, than because, in the conditions
of modern educational institutions, it finds
any thing properly congenial to its main-
tenance.

With one further remark I conclude. It
is experimentally proved that no system of
compulsory attendance in college is neces-
sary to secure faithful attention to their
duties and a conscientious improvement of
their opportunities, on the part of that large
proportion of undergraduate students whom
collegiate education is likely to benefit
That smaller proportion, who will always
neglect their duties if they can, will not
greatly profit under any system, whether of
absolute freedom, or of coercion, however
rigorous. I am unable to perceive the wis-
dom of adapting systems of control with
special, or, I may say, exclusive, reference
to the case of those who least deserve to be
considered, and out of whom the least is
likely to be made ; especially when this can
only be done by depriving the rest of what
soems to me to be one of the most felicitous
moral influences which can surround and
accompany them during the period of their
education.

Very respectfully yours,

F. A. P. Barnard.
Columbia College, April 2, 1S73.

THE DANGEES AND SECUEITIE3 OF SCI-
ENCE.

To the Editor of the Popular Science Monthly.

Mr. Editor : I listened, among others,
to the speech of Mr. Parke Godwin at the
Tyndall Dinner, and have been much inter-
ested both in the speech and in the discus-
sions which have grown out of it. Of
course, we cannot all expect to view the
most important subjects in the same light,
but I feel sure it is a mistake to attribute
to Mr. Godwin any thing like a spirit of op-
position or depreciation toward scientific

progress or preeminence. On the contrary,
what he said was, we believe, wholly in the
interest of science. He simply gave ex-
pression, in unusually elegant and forcible
language, to ideas which are entertained of
late by many professionally scientific men.
He did not propose to cramp scientific in-
quiry, nor to limit, in any way, its powers
or its results, but only to prevent Its con-
tamination by what would degrade and
cripple it. His speech, as we understand
it, was a protest, not against science, but in
its behalf, and against the damaging influ-
ence of pretended followers or mistaken
friends.

There is no danger now that science can
ever suffer from the attacks of its enemies,
unless it be first debauched by the folly of
its own partisans. Its progress for the last
hundred years has been a series of tri-
umphs, so numerous and brilliant that noth-
ing else is now in a position to stand against
it. And it owes this success entirely to the
fidelity with which it has pursued its le-
gitimate course, and the steady determina-
tion with which it has adhered to the
method of strict scientific observation. For
a long time we have given up the notion of
the old philosophers, that men could dis-
cover things by thinking about them ; and
have only considered it worth while to
spend our time in the investigation of actual
phenomena. What has been, for the last
half-century, the invariable demand of the
world of science upon its votaries ? When-
ever any one made his appearance with a
new claim to attention, the scientific public
said to him, in effect : " What is that you
have to tell us of this new body or sub-
stance ? We do not wish to hear what you
think about it, but only what you knoic.
How much does it weigh ? What are its
form and structure ? What are the actual
results of its chemical analysis? What
phenomena does it exhibit under special
conditions ? If it be a peculiar force or
mode of activity, instead of a material sub-
stance, what are the exact conditions of its
manifestation, and what are the results of
its action, in quantity as well as in kind ? "

This is the healthy and nutritious food
upon which science has grown to her pres-
ent proportions. In following such a track
with such unswerving patience, she can

CORRESP ONDENCE.

241

never make a mistake. But, the moment
she leaves this path, she is in danger, or
rather she is sure to go wrong, because
whatever works by other than scientific
methods is not science, and at best can only
put on a kind of scientific garb, and mas-
querade in scientific phraseology.

Are there not some indications that we
are not yet altogether beyond this danger ?
Are we not even more or less exposed to it
at this particular time? Some scientific
writers are certainly disposed to talk quite
as much about their conclusions and theo-
retical explanations as about the phenomena
they describe. There is no harm in this
(except that it occupies a good deal of time
that might be otherwise employed), pro-
vided they keep the boundary-line well
marked between what they know and what
they think on the subject in question. But
they do not always do this. The hypo-
thetical explanations are sometimes erected
into a law, or principle, or theory, which, in
the author's mind, evidently overshadows
in importance every thing else. So we are
sometimes supposed to have acquired a
valuable piece of information when we are
only, as the French say, " getting our pay in
words." How much has been said and
written for the past few years about proto-
plasm! Now, a student of physiology
would be very excusable for thinking, from
the manner in which this term is used, that
protoplasm was some newly-discovered and
important substance, with definite physical
and chemical properties, and of the highest
consequence in regard to vital organization.
He would be considerably disappointed on
finding it to be only a word representing a
certain set of ideas, or at best a group of
many various substances, each one of them
specifically different from the rest.

There is even a certain kind of authority
claimed, at least by implication, for some
of these theoretical notions ; and there is
no doubt that they are occasionally assigned
an established position as accepted truths,
to which they are very far from being en-
titled. If it were not so improbable that
Science could ever be induced to imitate in
the least degree her old theological enemy,
we might suspect even now a disposition in
some minds to frame for us a sort of scien-
tific Nicene Creed, the merit of believing in
vol. in. 16

which would not depend exclusively upon
the possession of sufficient reliable evidence.
If such a creed were drawn up just at pres-
ent, it would probably read something like
this :
I believe in the Darwinian Theory ;

In the Evolution Hypothesis ;

In the Undulation of Light and
the Luminiferous Ether ; and

In the Atomic Constitution of
Matter.
Now, we all know that theories are use-
ful in their way, if confined within a very
small compass, and employed only to stimu-
late rather than satisfy inquiry, and to sug-
gest the direction in which new facts may
be discovered. But, when they are raised
to a higher dignity, and demand our belief
in them as representing the actual constitu-
tion of Nature, then they are a misfortune
to everybody concerned. If we treat them
with any more respect than they deserve,
we shall suffer for it inevitably by the loss
of something which is infinitely more val-
uable than any of them. The records of
the immediate past show the achievements
which have been accomplished by means of
strict adherence to exact methods of in-
vestigation. Should the scientific mind of
to-day become ever so little intoxicated with
its success, and undertake to decide ques-
tions which are beyond its horizon, it will
certainly stultify itself, and lose the univer-
sal support and confidence which it has now
so fairly acquired. For that reason I think
that Mr. Godwin, in his Tyndall Dinner
speech, was doing good service for science
and scientific men, and that we are indebted
to him for placing in a very distinct light
the only source of danger for scientific in-
terests in the future. J. C. D.

A CORRECTION. LETTER FROM PROF.
TYNDALL.

It is well known that many religious
newspapers construed several of the speech-
es at the Tyndall banquet as righteous re-
bukes of the guest of the evening, on ac-
count of his irreligious science. His state-
ment below was called out by a leading
article in the Christian Intellif/encer of Feb-
ruary 13th, entitled " The Tyndall Banquet,"

242

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

from which the following is an extract : "A
more significant farewell a visitor has never
received at our hands. Prof. Tyndall was
welcomed among us as a man of science. It
was known, indeed, that he claimed, in that
character, a warrant to question some popu-
lar religious faiths ; but we may safely say
that the professors of those faiths never
supposed that he would carry his assumed
warrant upon the platform and into his lect-
ures on 'Light.' Yet he did that very
thing, attacking, in those lectures, both our
religious faith and one large class of its pro-
fessors. Moreover, when the assaults thus
made were formally complained of, he ex-
pressed no regret for them. Indeed, lest
even so significant silence might fail to be
appreciated, he now took pains to emboss
upon his farewell speech the following re-
markable sentences : ' Were there any lin-
gering doubt as to my visit at the bottom
of my mind ; did I feel that I had blun-
dered and, with the best and purest inten-
tions, I might, through an error of judg-
ment, have blundered so as to cause you
discontent, I should now be wishing to
abolish the doubt, or to repair the blunder ;
but there is no drawback of this kind.'
After this unusual assertion of his perfect
satisfaction with his course, it would have
been unjust, both to him and to a very
large part of his American audiences, to
suffer him to depart without some weighty
reminder of his mistake."

Of Dr. Hitchcock's address the writer re-
marks : " The few opening sentences which
have thus far been printed indicate the dig-
nified and manly tone in which American
Christians resented, through him, the effort
of one sort of science to disparage religion ; "
and he then says : " But Dr. Hitchcock did
not stand alone. He had sympathizers
enough among his hearers to indorse his
expressions with repeated applause; and,
what was even more significant, he found
the heartiest support in the speech of
Parke Godwin, who followed him, speaking
for the press. The fact that a clergyman
should vindicate the claims of religion, even
at a dinner given in compliment to one of
his assailants, might not seem in any way
remarkable or important. But the editor
of the Post had no professional zeal to rally
him to the same battle ; and when, after a

detail of some of the most arrogant assump-
tions of irreligious scientists, he proceeded,
with indignant eloquence, to remand their
science to its own exact sphere, and to
claim for revelation the settlement of the
questions of 'primal origin and ultimate
destinies,' Mr. Tyndall must have had a
complacency quite impervious by ordinary
weapons, if he persisted in thinking he had
' made no blunder,' and had ' caused no
discontent.' Did Mr. Godwin suppose that
the sentiments he was uttering were those
of his guest? Did not he and all the com-
pany know they were not ? Then, did he
in uttering them, and they in applauding
them, offer a gratuitous insult to the man
they pretended to honor ? No ; but they
did a loyal duty to the religion which he
had wantonly assailed. They set a stint to
their courtesy to the man, lest the excess
of it should make a betrayal of their faith."
Upon which, Prof. Tyndall remarks as
follows, in a letter to a friend :

"I confess to reading with some amaze-
ment the article on the ' Tyndall Banquet,'
in the Intelligencer. I am there charged
with attacking, in my lec'tures, both the
Christian faith and one large class of its
professors. If the telling of the truth be
a necessary entry on the passport to ' the
better land,' then, assuming the maker of
this charge to be not in a state of invincible
ignorance, I would not exchange my chances
on the frontier of immortality for his. The
fact is that, though solicited to do so, I
steadily refused to quit the neutral ground
of the intellect during my visit to the Uni-
ted States. My audiences in Boston, Phila-
delphia, Baltimore, Washington, Brooklyn,
and New Haven, can testify whether a single
word relating to religion was heard in any
lecture of mine delivered in those cities.
New York can answer whether, in five out
of the six lectures there delivered, a syllable
was uttered, pro or con, regarding religion.
And I confidently appeal to that heroic au-
dience which paid me the memorable com-
pliment of coming to hear me on the in-
clement night when the words were spoken
on which this charge is hung, whether, as
regards its substance or its tone, what I
then said could, with fairness, be construed
into an attack 'upon religious faith, and
one large class of its professors.' Put my

EDITOR'S TABLE.

2 43

words and manner before them, and I would
fearlessly trust to the manhood of any
Young Men's Christian Association in the
Union for a verdict in this matter. The
writer in the Intelligencer, moreover, fails to
see one conclusion to which his assertions
inevitably lead; for, were they true, the
perfectly unmistakable manner in which
the ' attack ' was received by the audience
would prove the state of ' religious faith' in
New York to be the reverse of creditable
to hiin and others who have the care of it.

" The head and front of my offending
hath this extent : At the conclusion of one
of my lectures, I referred, for two minutes,
in mild language, to the reported words
reported, I would add, by a Presbyterian
of the intemperate occupant of a single
Presbyterian pulpit, and this is wilfully
twisted by that occupant into an attack
upon the Presbyterian body. The charge,
as originally made, and as now echoed by

the Intelligencer, is so silly that I did not
think it worth public refutation. Why
should I care about refuting it, when the
sympathetic kindness of the very men I was
reported to have assailed assured me that
they did not believe a word of the indict-
ment ? I carried no more pleasant memory
with me from the United States than that
of my reception at the Presbyterian College
of Yale. The high-minded youths and cult-
ured gentlemen whom I met there, as in-
deed the Presbyterian body generally, a
few hot-headed fanatics excepted, knew how
to rate at its proper worth the statement of
Dr. Hall, and they will, I am persuaded,
assign to its echo in the Intelligencer the
self-same arithmetical value.

" Should you deem this letter, or any part
of it, necessary to public enlightenment, you
are at liberty to make public use of it.
" Ever yours faithfully,

"John Tyndaix."

EDITOR'S TABLE.

GEOLOGICAL SURVEYS IN TIIEIIi EDU-
CATIONAL BEARINGS.

THE proposition of Prof. Leeds, in
his article on " State Geological
Surveys," to link these undertakings to
the collegiate institutions of the country
is a novel and very important one, and
deserves the serious attention of all the
friends of scientific education. After
stating the aims and necessities of these
surveys, the writer shows how college
talent might be pressed into their ser-
vice, and points out the advantages
that would arise both in giving thor-
oughness to the work, and in dimin-
ishing its expense to the State. Prof.
Leeds confines himself mainly to the
consideration of economy, thoroughness
in the performance of the work, and
the interests of the survey itself. But
such a measure could not fail to yield
double advantages : it would be as good
for the colleges as for the exploration.
On educational grounds alone, nothing
could be more desirable than to effect

this arrangement, and give the colleges
business of the kind contemplated.

A geological survey is but a sys-
tematic scientific inquiry into the struct-
ure and resources of a given region of
country. It investigates the strata of
the earth and their mineral and or-
ganic contents, both to find out how
they are constituted, and to contribute
useful productions to the arts and wants
of society. In its full scope it inquires
into the physical features of the region,
its agricultural adaptations, its vegeta-
ble productions, its forms of animal
life in earth, water, and air, its atmos-
pheric conditions, salubrity, and gen-
eral climatology. In short, it embraces
a very full research into those facts of
Nature which it is important for the
community to know, and the business
of science to determine. But the col-
leges have, for one great object, the
teaching of those very things. A por-
tion of their professors are devoted
to it, of course under the assumption

244

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

that they are competent to carry it
on.

Now, the result of such an alliance
as is here proposed could not be other
than salutary upon the institutions
themselves. The effect of giving them
a certain definite and responsible scien-
tific work in their localities, the results
of which would be brought to the test
of public criticism, would inevitably be
to elevate and sustain the standard of
instruction in their laboratories and
lecture-rooms. It is a grave difficulty
with these higher institutions that their
work cannot be brought to judgment
and submitted to fixed and recognized
tests. They are often the places for
careless, slipshod, and aimless work.
Mental results are not easy of inspec-
tion or valuation ; sham and cram are
showy and telling, and the constant
temptation is to put them in the place
of solid attainment ; and, when college
authorities can constantly fall back
upon the pretext that their aim is dis-
cipline, and that knowledge is a quite
subordinate matter, they open a door
which allows any amount of loose and
slovenly work, and at the same time
permits the teachers to escape respon-
sibility and criticism. But if a college
were publicly placed in the scientific
charge of the region in which it is sit-
uated, and required to make such re-
ports thereof as could be accepted for
guidance by the community,and brought
into conspicuous comparison with simi-
lar work in other localities, the whole
being under the supervision of able
superintendents, a standard would be
introduced that could not fail to give
a high and authoritative tone to the
work of the place.

But the effectual carrying out of
the plan now proposed would not only
insure able and qualified men as pro-
fessors, but much more ; it would call
the students to the work, and secure
the grand object of scientific education
by bringing their minds into direct and
systematic relation with natural phe-

nomena. It would bring them out of
their dormitories and class-rooms into
the field, and, while favoring health and
cultivating a sympathy with natural
tilings, it would bring to bear the stim-
ulus of curiosity and the love of search,
while the intellectual work, being of
the nature of independent observation
and discovery, would be promotive of
self-education the best of all educa-
tion. It is as notorious as it is deplo-
rable that the scientific teaching of our
colleges is grossly defective. Geology,
botany, chemistry, physics, and zool-
ogy, are taught from books like Latin
and history, with the aid, perhaps, of
a few demonstrations by the lecturer.
The information acquired is super-
ficial and second-hand, and does not
deserve the name of scientific knowl-
edge. We believe the effect upon stu-
dents of bringing them into close men-
tal relation with surrounding Nature,
of putting them in charge of a district,
and requiring them to observe, classify,
and describe its various objects, under
the incitement that their useful work
would have fair recognition, would be
to give inspiration to study, solidity
to acquirement, and the highest possi-
bilities of usefulness to subsequent life.
An important consequence of such a
plan would be, the growth of scientific
museums which would represent the
character and resources of the locality.
As there is no educational appliance
more important than a good museum, so
there is no educational process more val-
uable than the formation of it. Those
crude, miscellaneous, rubbishy collec-
tions of curiosities, and odd things gath-
ered by accident, that are often thrown
together, without method, in some un-
appropriated corner of an institution,
are not entitled to the name of museums.
Specimens are nothing except as illus-
trating ideas, and they require to be so
arranged as to teach the science to
which they belong. As we ordinarily
find them, museums are hardly more in-
structive than so much blank space. A

EDITOR'S TABLE.

245

good local collection should represent,
in its specimens, the zoology, botany,
and geology of the district. It should
be arranged with a view to teaching,
and, instead of being crowded with a
multiplicity of objects, should consist
of carefully-selected, well-arranged, and
clearly-labelled types of the classes,
orders, families, and leading genera of
animals and plants, extant in the region,
and gathered in their fossil vestiges,
from its geological formations, which
are at the same time represented by
classified minerals.

The plan now suggested, by which
it would become the official duty of col-
lege authorities to bring together the
products of a region, so that they would
be accessible to everybody in quest of
this kind of information, and at the
same time tributary to the purposes of
science, would give us museums worthy
of the name, and secure the proper ob-
jects of their establishment.

In every aspect, therefore, the pro-
ject of establishing so close a connec-
tion between State geological explora-
tions and our higher educational insti-
tutions is to be cordially commended ;
and it is not the least of its advantages
that it coincides with the great ten-
dencies of educational reform, and offers
an efficient method of carrying it for-
ward.

SCIENTIFIC TUEORIZING.

In our correspondence for this
month will be found a letter from a
distinguished American physiologist,
approving the position taken by Mr.
Godwin in his speech at the Tyndall
dinner, as "a protest, not against sci-
ence, but in its behalf, and against the
damaging influence of pretended fol-
lowers or mistaken friends ; " and this
view expresses, we are assured, the con-
viction of many professionally scientific
men of the present time.

"We have no desire to prolong con-
troversy, but, with all respect to the

professional authorities, we must con-
tinue to. think that the efforts to limit
and confine scientific investigation in
the present age are not in the interest
of true science ; nor can we see how
they differ from attempts to obstruct
the advance of thought that have been
made in preceding ages. There has al-
ways been a party unwilling to allow
science to find its own limits. They
have forbidden each step of its prog-
ress, and demanded that it should
keep within its sphere, for the sake
of its own good. They have never
denied science, or questioned its au-
thority, but only demanded that it
should consult its own interests by
staying in its proper place. When the
work of investigating Nature was se-
riously commenced, some three or four
centuries ago, "Aristotle," "Galen,"
and " Mathematics," were terms used
to define the scope of legitimate sci-
ence; and, when the first great step
forward was taken, and men began to
question the tradition of the flatness of
the earth, they were sharply met with
the charge that they were going beyond
their sphere and damaging science it-
self. Men were as free as the wind to
pursue true science that is, to accept
Aristotelian and Galenic dicta, and to
cultivate the whole range of mathe-
matics. The ideal world was a sphere
of exact and eternal truth ; external
Nature was a mere flux of sensuous ap-
pearances, not suspected to be a sphere
of law; the attempt to study her was
therefore to invade the ancient and in-
violable limits of science. Hence, in
denying the flatness of the earth, and
affirming its sphericity, the early in-
quirers not only shocked common-
sense but were charged with violat-
ing every canon of established scien-
tific method. Exactly the same con-
siderations that are now urged were
urged then with tenfold force, and the
antagonists of the new doctrine might
well have said that they "did not
propose to cramp scientific inquiry,

246

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

nor to limit in any way its powers or
its results, but only to prevent its con-
tamination by what would degrade and
cripple it." And these tactics have
been repeated at every great step of
advancement. It is never genuine sci-
ence that breaks over the old limits of
opinion, but always " pretended sci-
ence," "pseudo-science," and "science
falsely so called."

In our correspondent's opinion, sci-
ence has now attained a position in
which it holds its destiny in its own
hands, and is in no danger save from
the folly of its own partisans. His
theory of the case is, that science is
now endangered by excess of theory.
But, if that be the case, it is threatened
by its own breath of life. A theory is
only a view taken by the mind in its
effort at explanation, and cannot be dis-
pensed with, if observation and experi-
ment are to be put to their true use. He
says that science demands of its votary,
"not what you think about it, but what
you know.' 1 '' But what is knowing
but thinking brought to the highest
certainty ? and how can this end be
reached except by the successive steps
of conjecture and hypothesis ? As
Dr. "Whewell observes, " To try wrong
guesses is apparently the only way to
hit upon right ones." It is not Science
which puts an embargo upon thinking
and theorizing, for it is by these that
all her laws have been arrived at.
Of course, science demands certainty,
demonstration, and experimental ex-
actitude, if obtainable ; and if not, then
the nearest approach to them possible ;
but these must have an ideal and a
meaning, or there can be no science.
Science is not manipulation, but the
thinking that accompanies it, and the
theory or view that is established by it.
Under the rigid rule laid down by the
writer, the giant intellects who have
made the epochs of science could never
have got a hearing. Copernicus, Gali-
leo, Columbus, Newton, Harvey, Du-
fay, Young, and Dalton, are known to

the world as thinkers, and have gained
immortality in science, and guided the
multitude of lesser men by their theo-
ries. Faraday remarks that the world
little knows how many conjectures and
hypotheses, which arise in the minds of
philosophers, are crushed by the sever-
ity of their own adverse criticism ; but
the world does know something of the
number of theories that are submitted to
the tribunal of science, and are crushed
by the adverse criticism there encoun-
tered. Are these efforts of theory,
therefore, in either case, to be inter-
dicted or discouraged ? Our corre-
spondent has little patience with the-
ories, but they are the measure of
mental activity and the essential form
of its scientific expression, as their inex-
orable testing is the measure of sound
scientific method. There may be peril
in theorizing, as there is in steam, but
it is the condition of getting on ; and,
because brakes are useful, let us not
put out the fires.

If there is more theorizing now
than ever before, it is because there is
far more extensive scientific activity.
There is, indeed, greater demand for it
now than ever, for the numbers of ob-
servers and experimenters who either
cannot think or are afraid to think
have greatly multiplied in recent years,
increasing the mass of observations and
fragmentary results, which can only t be
organized into accepted theory by the
highest order of minds. Generaliza-
tions and inductions which bind up
isolated facts in manageable form, and
which constitute the very texture of sci-
ence, are only to be arrived at by think-
ing and theorizing. And with the mul-
titude of men thoroughly trained in
all departments, and sharpened to the
work of criticism, there is certainly
less danger now than ever that worth-
less theories should gain the ascend-
ency.

The hypothesis, that in future sci-
ence can suffer no damage save from
enemies in its own household, we ven-

LITERARY NOTICES.

247

ture to think, represents but a small
portion of the pertinent facts. Much
has undoubtedly been gained by past
conflict; astronomers are no longer im-
prisoned, and physiologists no longer
roasted. But have ignorance and in-
tolerance been banished from the world ?
or, remaining in it, have they lost their
aggressiveness or their influence over
men's minds ? Have they, in fact, done
more than change weapons ? "We grant
that the antagonism to science has great-
ly diminished within recent years; but,
to say that science has now to encoun-
ter no external adverse influences which
affect its prosperity, is to talk at ran-
dom. The world is still dominated by
illiberality and prejudice; and when
science puts forth ideas that do not
square with prevailing belief, as, from
its progressive nature, it has always
been doing, and must continue to do,
it is met with anger and denunciation,
which it requires no little moral courage
to withstand. It cannot reasonably be
claimed that such a state of things is
without influence upon scientific inter-
ests. It represses the honest and healthy
expression of opinion ; it checks young
men from entering the scientific field ;
it resists scientific education ; and it
hinders men of science from obtaining
the necessary means for prosecuting
their inquiries.

Even our correspondent puts Science
upon its good behavior before a cen-
sorious world. He affirms that she
may incur damage, and is exposed to
danger from her enemies, but these
evils, it is alleged, can only come from
"contamination" and "debauchery"
by her own partisans. And what is
meant by this language, but the pro-
mulgation of doctrines that her ene-
mies regard as odious? Stop a hun-
dred men in the street, and ask them
what they consider to be the great con-
tamination and debauchery of science
at the present time, and ninety-nine of
them will reply, " Darwinism" the
first item in our correspondent's new

"Nicene Creed." This is the verdict
of public opinion. But we open the
new volume of Helmholtz, who is prob-
ably the most eminent and authorita-
tive scientist in Europe, and, in his lect-
ure on the "Aims and Progress of
Physical Science," we read that "Dar-
win's theory contains an essentially
new creative thought." This is the
verdict of science. Is the great Ger-
man one who brings discredit upon his
class by thinking instead of knowing ?
and is the party which characterizes
the creative conceptions of Nature as
degradations, to be accepted as the
arbiter of the proper limits of science ?
We remain of opinion that scientific
men are the best judges of the legiti-
macy of their own inquiries, and that
they will honor themselves most by the
bold and fearless prosecution of these
inquiries, let them lead wherever they
may.

TO THE PUBLIC.

A book entitled "Youman's Dic-
tionary of Every -Day "Wants " is being
extensively circulated by canvassers,
and I am much annoyed at finding that
it is purchased under the impression
that it is by the Editor of The Popular
Science Monthly, and the author of
the "Hand -Book of Household Sci-
ence," " Chemistry," etc. I am neither
the author of it, nor have I had any
thing to do with its preparation; and,
in so far as my name has been used to
sell it, it is a fraud. It will be an act
of justice to the public, as well as to
myself, if the press will kindly repro-
duce this card. E. L. Youmans.

LITERARY NOTICES.

Lessons in Elementary Anatomy. By Rt.
George Mivart, F. R. S., etc. Macmillan
& Co., London and New York, 1873.

This is a companion volume to Huxley's
" Lessons in Physiology " and Oliver's
" Lessons in Botany," and is devoted mainly
to a description of the human body, with

248

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

only so much of the anatomy of the lower
animals as will serve to illustrate the varia-
tions which corresponding organs exhibit
in the inferior vertebrates. The first chap-
ter begins with a general survey of the
structure of the human body. This is
followed by a brief account of the clas-
sification of animals, in which the author,
adopting the more modern views, names
seven sub-kingdoms, illustrating each with
the figure of some typical form. The char-
acters, more or less common to all animals,
man included, are next pointed out, when
leave is taken of the invertebrates, and a
consideration of the principal subdivisions
of the group or sub-kingdom to which man
belongs closes the chapter. The six suc-
ceeding chapters, or lessons, taking up in
all 218 pages of the book, are upon the
skeleton, wherein the various systems of
bones are treated, each being described,
first, as it is developed in man, and then as
it appears in homologous parts of other
vertebrates. The reasons given by the au-
thor for allotting so much space to this
dry subject are: "1. The general resem-
blance borne by the skeleton to the exter-
nal form. 2. The close connection between
the arrangement of the skeleton and that
of the nervous system, muscles, and ves-
sels. 3. The relations borne by the skele-
ton of each animal to the actions it per-
forms, i. e., to the mode of life and habits
of the various animals. 4. The obvious
utility of the skeleton in classification and
the interpretation of affinity. 5. Parts of
the skeleton or casts of such are all we pos-
sess of a vast number of animals formerly
existing in the world, but now entirely ex-
tinct ; a good knowledge of the skeleton
must, therefore, be of great utility to those
interested in pateontology." Lesson eight,
occupying the next 64 pages, is on the
muscles, which are dealt with in the same
manner as the bones that is, they are first
described as they exist in man, the more
important deviations from this type in other
vertebrate animals being afterward pointed
out. The same method is pursued in the
four remaining lessons, which are on the
nervous, circulatory, alimentary, and excre-
tory systems, respectively.

The book closes with a tabulated sum-
mary, first, of the characters which distin-

guish man from the animals belonging to
the four lower classes of the vertebrate sub-
kingdom ; and, second, of the characters
which separate him from all other mam-
mals. The volume is clearly printed, has a
very full index, and, on the whole, seems
well suited to the use of teachers and oth-
ers who already know something of the
subject. But for beginners we doubt its
utility, as it is altogether too technical to
be attractive to them, and too closely writ-
ten to be readily grasped by minds unfa-
miliar with this class of subjects.

Antiquities of the Southern Indians,
particularly of the georgia tribes.
By Charles C. Jones, Jr. New York :
D. Appleton & Co., 1873.

This work is devoted to a consideration
of the monuments, relics, and ancient cus-
toms of the aboriginal population formerly
inhabiting that portion of the United States
which is now comprised within the limits
of Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Florida,
Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Ten-
nessee. The antiquities of Georgia receive
special attention, for with them the author
is most familiar. But, as all the tribes oc-
cupying the territories indicated above had
almost identical customs and arts, what ap-
plies to one section will apply to all, as the
author well shows. We think, however,
that he ought to have made an exception
of the Natchez, who were sun-worshippers,
and, in virtue of that higher grade of fe-
tichistic religion, raised considerably above
the neighboring tribes. But the author has
no ambition to philosophize about the re-
ligious or cultural status of the extinct peo-
ples whose memorials he has exhumed. He
simply narrates what he has seen, citing
here and thei - e the notes of ancient and
modern travellers to show the purpose of an
artificial mound, 01' moat, or plateau, or the
meaning of an outlandish ceremony, etc.

The first three or four chapters of the
work give an account of the habitat, the
physical characteristics, manners and cus-
toms, and arts of the Southern Indians, at
the period when first they came in contact
with men of European race, and particular
attention is bestowed upon their costume,
manufactures, ornaments, games, festivals,
marital relations, forms of government, re-

MISCELLANY.

249

ligrous ideas, and funeral customs. The re-
mainder of the book, and its larger portion,
classifies and describes very fully the va-
rious monuments of early constructive skill,
implements, utensils, ornaments, and manu-
factures of these primitive tribes.

The illustrations consist of 31 plates and
several woodcuts of objects mostly in the
author's private collection, which are here
figured for the first time.

The Childhood of the World. By Ed-
ward Clodd. London and New York :
Macmillan, 1873.

This is, we believe, the first book of its
kind that has ever been published, at least
in English a primer of anthropology and
archaeology, giving the results of advanced
modern science, and intended for the in-
struction of young children. It is written
in attractive style, and is sure to gratify the
young folk. The author contrives to con-
vey a very large amount of information in
very small space and in very simple lan-
guage ; he can simplify without debasing,
and can instruct the young, without ever
resorting to unworthy tricks or making
drafts on their credulity, which maturer
years would lead them to discount. The
paper, print, and binding of the book, are
all that could be desired.

The Mechanism of the Ossicles of the
Ear and Membrana Tympani. By H.
Helmholtz. Translated from the Ger-
man, with the author's permission, by
.Albert G. Buck and Normand Smith.
New York : Win. Wood and Co., 1873.

In this little work Dr. Helmholtz comes
before the world bringing the results of his
own observation, and, as a matter of course,
he pours a flood of light upon the subject
which he treats. The essay is intended for
professional men, and for students familiar
with physiological science, and both these
classes of readers will find here the only
treatise in any language which discusses
fully the anatomical, physiological, and
mathematical aspects of the matter in
hand.

BOOKS RECEIVED.

Logic of Medicine. By Edward S. Dun-
ster, M. D. New York : D. Appleton & Co.
1873.

The Criminal Use of Proprietary and
Advertised Nostrums. By Ely Van de War-
ker, M. D. New York : D. Appleton & Co.,
1873.

The Short-Footed Ungulata of the Eocene
of Wyoming. By Edward D. Cope.

Criminal Responsibility of Epileptics.
By M. G. Echeverria, M. D.

New Method of preserving Tumors, etc.,
during Transportation. By Joseph G. Rich-
ardson, M. D. Philadelphia: Lippincott,
1873.

Mechanism of the Ossicles of the Ear
and Membrana Tympani. By H. Helmholtz.
New York: William Wood & Co., 1873.

The Scientific Bases of Faith. By Jo-
seph John Murphy, Author of " Habit and
Intelligence." London and New York :
Macmillan, 1873.

The Unity of Law ; as exhibited in the
Relations of Physical, Social, Mental, and
Moral Science. By H. C. Carey. Philadel-
phia : Henry C. Baird, 1873.

The Romance of Astronomy. By H.
Kalley Miller, M. A. London and New
York : Macmillan, 1873.

The Childhood of the World ; a Simple
Account of Man in Early Times. By Ed-
ward Clodd, F. R. A. S. London and New
York : Macmillan, 1873.

The Sanitarian. A Monthly Journal.
A. N. Bell, M. D., Editor. New York : A.
S. Barnes & Co., 1873. $3.00 per annum.

Prayer and the Prayer-Gauge. By Rev.
Mark Hopkins, D. D. Albany : Weed, Par-
sons & Co., 1873.

The Upper Coal-Measures west of the
Alleghany Mountains. By John J. Steven-
son. Salem, Mass., 1873.

MISCELLANY.

Action of Dronxlit and fold on Forest-
Trees. In an able paper on the manner in
which the distribution of plants and ani-
mals may be influenced by extraordinary
changes in the character of the seasons,
published in the American Naturalist for
November last, Prof. N. S. Shaler attributes
the wide-spread destruction of evergreen

250

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

trees, which became so painfully apparent
during the previous spring, to the action of
drought and cold. The year preceding
was, in New England, one of the dryest on
record, the ground, when winter set in, hold-
ing a comparatively small amount of moist-
ure. This left the roots of trees deficient
in sap. Not being well protected by snow,
the ground in winter was frozen to a great
depth, and, as the frost left the roots in
spring, they remained for some time in con-
tact with relatively dry earth, thus causing
a shock too great for their vitality to with-
stand. During the succeeding summer
Prof. Shaler also observed a remarkable
scarcity of snakes and toads, which he is
likewise inclined to ascribe to the great se-
verity of the previous winter. Concerning
the effect of such climatic accidents on the
character of our forests, he says :

" Small as the destruction of forest-trees
is, it will doubtless add several per cent, to
the deciduous trees of New England, and
remove an equal amount of conifers. The
conifers seem to be relics of an old time,
and not competent to wage a successful
war with their younger and more elastic
competitors, the oaks, beeches, and other
deciduous trees. Every gap that is made
in our forests of cone-bearing species is
filled not with their legitimate successors,
but by forms from the other class of trees.
Let us suppose that the shock of the last
season had been great enough to kill off
the whole of our pines, the result would
have been a complete change in the charac-
ter of our forests ; oaks generally would
take the vacant place. This would affect
the character of the undergrowth very ma-
terially, for the lesser plants of a pine-wood
are very different from those which 'flourish
beneath oaks. This would have had a very
great effect upon insect-life, and more or
less directly influenced the number and
character of the birds and the mammals.
Even the climate would be in some small
measure influenced, for a pine-forest retains
the snow better than one which loses its
leaves in the winter, and thus tends to secure
a more equable temperature in the region
where it lies. Thus we see that an acciden-
tal drought might bring about a change in
the assemblage of vital conditions on the
surface of the land, as great as those which,

when recorded in strata, we accept as indi-
cating distinct geological formations."

Dental Art among the Japanese. Dr. W.

St. George Elliott, formerly of this city, now
at Yokohama, Japan, sends to the Dental
Cosmos an interesting account of Japan-
ese habits in regard to teeth, and of the
state of dentistry in that empire. He says
that the teeth of the daughters of Japan
are objects of envy, and it is remarkable
that a nation who place so much value upon
their teeth should keep up the custom of
blacking them after marriage. As a race
the Japanese have not good teeth, and it Is
rare to find an old person with any at all.
Their tooth-brushes consist of tough wood,
pounded at one end to loosen the fibres.
They resemble paint-brushes, and owing to
their shape it is impossible to get one be-
hind the teeth. As might be expected,
there is an accumulation of tartar which
frequently draws the teeth of old people.
The greatest accumulation is behind the
lower orals, and these are frequently
cemented together by a dense, dark-brown
deposit, a quarter of an inch in thickness.
Their process of manufacturing false teeth
is very crude. The plates are made of
wood, and the teeth consist of tacks driven
up from the under side. A piece of wax is
heated, and pressed into the shape of the
roof of the mouth. It is then taken out
and hardened by putting it into cold water.
Another piece of heated wax is applied to
the impression, and, after being pressed into
shape, is hardened. A piece of wood is then
roughly cut into the desired form, and the
model, having been smeared with red paint, is
applied to it. Where they touch each other
a mark is left by the paint. This is cut
away until they touch evenly all over.
Shark's-teeth, bits of ivory, or stone, for
teeth, are set into the wood and retained in
position by being strung on a thread which
is secured at each end by a peg driven into
the hole where the thread makes its exit
from the base. Iron or copper tacks are
driven into the ridge to serve for masticat-
ing purposes, the unequal wear of the
wood and metal keeping up the desired
roughness. Their full sets answer admira-
bly for the mastication of food, but, as they
do not improve the looks, they are worn

MISCELLANY.

251

but little for ornament. The ordinary ser-
vice of a set of teeth is about five years,
but they frequently last much longer. All
full upper sets are retained by atmospheric
pressure. This principle is coeval with the
art. In Japan, dentistry exists only as a
mechanical trade, and the status of those
who practice it is not very high. It is, in
fact, graded with the carpenters their
word hadyikfsan meaning tooth-carpenter.

Vegetable Ivory. The kernel of the
corrozzo-nut so closely resembles ivory as
to merit the title of vegetable ivory. The
plant {Phytclephas macrocarpa) which pro-
duces this nut belongs to the palm-tribe.
It grows in South America, and possesses
extraordinary beauty. The stem is short,
and lies along the ground, but from its
crown issues a sheaf of light-green, pinnated
leaves, like ostrich-plumes, which often at-
tain a height of 30 or 40 feet. The fruit
of the plant is as large as a man's head,
and contains a number of nuts of rough,
triangular shape, each being almost as large
as a hen's-egg. When fully ripe, the kernel
of the nut is very hard and white, and hence
the name phytelephas {vegetable ivory). This
is now largely used as a substitute for ele-
phant ivory, in the manufacture of buttons
and various ornaments, and might easily
pass for the animal product. Indeed, the
best judges are often deceived by the close
resemblance between the two. Advantage
is taken of this circumstance in Germany
by dealers in bone-dust to adulterate their
wares with the waste of the factories where
the vegetable ivory is manufactured. The
best mode of detecting the adulteration is
to burn the suspected article. If it contains
any considerable amount of the vegetable
substance, the application of heat will cause
it to give out an odor much like that of
roasting coffee ; but, if it is pure bone-dust,
or nearly so, it will emit a nauseous and
very disagreeable stench.

Coloring Matter in Blood. A writer in
Virchow's Archiv finds in blood two dis-
tinct coloring-matters. One of these is
readily soluble in water and alcohol, but
not so readily in ether. When dry it has a
dark, greenish-brown color, and is carbon-
ized on the application of heat, without

ebullition. The ash is strongly colored
with iron, and contains phosphoric and
silicic acids, and a trace of alkali. It does
not yield hemin-crystals under any treat-
ment. With guaiacum-tincture and turpen-
tine-oil it gives the well-known blue color,
and under the spectroscope is found to pos-
sess the characters attributed to alkaline
oxyhematin by Preyer. It appears to be
identical with Von Wittich's hematin. The
other coloring-matter consists of dark, blue-
black microscopic crystals, insoluble in
water, alcohol, ether, chloroform, and acids,
but soluble in weak alkaline solutions, to
which they give a brownish tint. If it be
then precipitated by acetic acid, and dried,
it will, on being treated with sal-ammoniac
and glacial acetic acid, yield beautiful he-
min-crystals. When reduced to an ash, it
consists of pure oxide of iron. It seems to
be identical with Virchow's hematoidin.

Elimination of Carbonic Acid by the
Skin. The amount of carbonic acid given
out of the system through the skin in man
has been variously estimated by physiolo-
gists ; but, as their methods of determina-
tion were all more or less defective, it ia
not surprising that their results should dif-
fer very considerably from one another.
Thus Reinhard's estimate makes the av-
erage daily elimination of carbonic acid
through the skin about 35 grains, while
Gerlach makes it 120 grains ; other authori-
ties ranging* all along between these two
extremes. A special apparatus has been
devised by Dr. Aubert, of Rostock, for more
accurately ascertaining the amount of this
excretion. He seats a person within a
box, which fits lightly around the neck,
and through which a gentle current of air
is passed. Dr. Aubert, in this way, finds
that in the course of 24 hours a maximum
of 97 and a minimum of 35| grains of car-
bonic acid are eliminated by the skin of
the whole body, exclusive of the head. Va-
riations of temperature will of course affect
the amount of carbonic acid thus excreted.
In the experiment, the external temperature
wa3 about 86 Fahr.

Remarkable Diamonds. A diamond waa
recently discovered, at the Cape of Good
Hope, which weighs 288 carats. This the

252

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Builder calls enormous, and accordingly
christens the new stone " Queen of Dia-
monds." But the Builder is plainly in
error here, for there are many diamonds
which weigh far more. Thus, the Grand
Mogul is the owner of a rose-diamond
which, in the rough state, weighed 780-J-
carats. It lost very largely in the cutting,
weighing now only 136 carats. It is val-
ued at over two and a quarter millions of
dollars. A potentate in Borneo owns a dia-
mond weighing 367 carats. The " Regent "
weighed in the rough 410 carats. The " Or-
loff " weighs 19-tf, and may have weighed
thrice as much in the rough state. An Aus-
trian diamond weighs 139^, and, as the
lapidary cannot cut these stones without
depriving them of at least half their weight,
it must have been, in the rough, larger than
the Cape " Queen." But the name given to
this newly-found stone will appear still more
incongruous when we consider its quality.
A diamond is said to be of the first water
when it is perfectly limpid and colorless,
and free from flaws, and of the second or
third water in proportion as it departs from
this standard. But this Cape diamond is
of a yellow color, and marked with flaws
it is, therefore, not of the first water, and
would in all probability be classed by the
lapidary as of the third water.

Production of Sea-Salt in Portngal.

The salines of Portugal, at Setubal, Lisbon,
Aveiro, and Algarve, yield annually 250,000
tons of sea-salt. According to Prof. Wau-
klyn, in the Mechanics' Magazine, the pro-
cess of manufacture at the first-named place
is as follows : There is a vast reservoir of
about four acres in extent, eight inches deep,
and partitioned into squares of about 130
yards in surface. Roads, three feet wide,
separate the squares, and the latter all com-
municate with the main reservoir of sea-
water. In autumn the whole salt marsh is
overflowed to the depth of 20 inches. This
water evaporates in the spring, the roads
appearing above the surface in June. Then
the tanks are cleaned out, and afterward
left to themselves, and recharged from time
to time with new supplies of water. In 20
days a layer of salt over one inch thick is
found. This, the first crop, is collected,
and the tanks filled again. In 20 days an-

other crop is gathered. If the season is
favorable, three crops may thus be col-
lected before September, when the marsh is
flooded for the winter.

Controlling Sex in Butterflies. The
America?). Naturalist for March contains an
admirable essay by Mrs. Mary Treat, in
which she brings a long array of facts to
prove that the sex of butterflies depends,
in some cases at least, rather upon the ex-
ternal conditions surrounding the larva, or
caterpillar, than on its anatomical structure.
The results of the author's experiments con-
tradict the doctrine of most entomologists,
which asserts that even in the eggs of the
Lepidopiera the germs of sexual difference
may be discerned. The editor of the Natu-
ralist quotes from several authorities, to
show that, in the case of all animals which
reproduce by eggs, the sex is probably de-
termined at or about the time of concep-
tion, or at least early in the embryonic stage.
Mr. T. W. Wonfor also, writing on " Certain
Wingless Insects," in Harduiicke for March,
asserts that the very same conditions, viz.,
lack of abundant food, or alternations of
scanty and bountiful food, which, according
to Mrs. Treat's experiments, determine the
sex of the future imago, or butterfly, tend
only to " produce dwarfs or monstrosities."
The writer in Harduiicke, we may add, holds
that no sex-difference is discernible either
in the eggs or in the lame. Mrs. Treat's
observations and experiments, it will be
seen, were very thoroughgoing and very
carefully conducted, and will, doubtless, at-
tract the earnest attention of naturalists.
Some two years ago Mrs. Treat placed a
larva, which had already taken some steps
toward the chrysalis state, upon a fresh stem
of caraway, and was surprised to see it
commence eating. It then continued to
eat for some days before changing to a
chrysalis. She next placed a number of
other larvae on similar stems of caraway,
while still others she deprived of food alto-
gether. Those of the last lot which com-
pleted their transformations were all males,
and all the butterflies from the first lot were
females.

The next experiment was commenced in
June last. In July the author had about
two hundred larvae feeding at once. Im-

MISCELLANY.

253

mediately after the last moult, a number of
these were shut up in paper boxes, five to
ten in a box, and deprived of food. If, two
or three days after confinement in the boxes,
any of the larvae were found wandering
about, they were fed very sparingly. Near-
ly all of them lived to complete their trans-
formations. Another lot were, in like man-
ner, put in boxes, but supplied with abun-
dant food. From the latter came sixty-
eight females and only four males ; from
the former seventy-six males and only three
females. Five larvae that were eating vig-
orously were also taken from their food a
day or two before they would have been
sated. Of these, four turned out females.

Another experiment was this: Soon
after the last moult, twenty larvae were de-
prived of food for twenty-four hours. Then
ten of them were given abundant food again,
as long as they would eat. One of these
met its death by accident in the chrysalis
state, but all the rest became female but-
terflies. Of the other ten, two died in the
chrysalis state ; the remainder were males.

Again: Some twenty half-grown larvae
of the Vanessa antiopa were accidentally
deprived of food. Twelve of them died of
starvation, but the remainder completed
their transformations. On dissection, these
eight all proved to be males. The indefati-
gable student pushed her investigations fur-
ther still, for, having found thirty-three lar-
vae of an unfamiliar species, she fed them
abundantly, till they would eat no more.
The rare and beautiful moth Dn/ocampa
rubicunda made its appearance in due time,
and there were twenty-nine females and
only two males, the remaining two having
either escaped or died. Finally, a lot of
the same species of caterpillars were left
without food. Some of them were killed
by a parasite, others died of starvation, and
the seven which survived were all males.

Hydrophobia and the Imagination. The

period of time which elapses between the
bite of a rabid animal and the appearance
of hydrophobic symptoms varies over a
very wide range indeed. The disorder sel-
dom makes its appearance earlier than the
eighth clay after inoculation (if inoculation
there be) ; or, again, the virus may be hid-
den in the wound for weeks, months, or

even years. Physicians say that, in most
cases, hydrophobia manifests itself in from
four to eight weeks after the bite, though
there are many authentic cases where the
period of incubation extended over eight or
nine months, and in one instance even as
long as seven years. In this term incuba-
tion is implied an hypothesis gratuitously
assumed, and scarcely susceptible of direct
demonstration. It is found that a patient
bitten by a rabid animal passes a certain
length of time without manifesting hydro-
phobic symptoms, and it is supposed that
the germs of the disease have been slowly
maturing. But, as there is no other disease
whose period of incubation is so long or so
varying in duration, the hypothesis which
traces hydrophobia to animal virus finds
no foundation in analogy, and is conse-
quently very weak.

It is, therefore, very natural that medi-
cal men should begin to study the whole
question anew, and attempt other explana-
tions of this disease. Thus, Dr. D. H.
Tuke, whose paper on the " Blanching of
the Hair" appeared in our December num-
ber, has lately published a work on the
" Influence of the Mind upon the Body,"
and there supports the proposition that hy-
drophobia is produced solely by the action
of the imagination. The author cites cases
where, beyond all doubt, hydrophobic
symptoms were developed without inocula-
tion. A notable instance is that of a phy-
sician of Lyons, named Chomel, who, hav-
ing aided in the dissection of several vic-
tims of the disorder, imagined that he had
been inoculated with the virus. On at-
tempting to drink, he was seized with
spasm of the pharynx, and in this condi-
tion roamed about the streets for three
days. At length his friends succeeded in
convincing him of the groundlessness of his
apprehensions, and he at once recovered.
Rush also tells of cases of spontaneous hy-
drophobia, which arose from no other cause
but fear and association of ideas.

A German physician, too, Dr. Marx, of
Gottingen, as we learn from the Clinic, is
disposed to take this view of hydrophobia,
and to regard it as a psychical affection, the
result of morbid excitement of the imagi-
nation. He is of the opinion that the bite
of a mad dog does not, of itself, produce

25+

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the symptoms of hydrophobia, and that,
were it not for the common belief in canine
virus, the spasms and other manifestations
of the disease would not supervene. This
view is confirmed by the fact that young
children, who are not acquainted with the
common belief as to hydrophobia, may be
bitten by mad dogs and escape spasms and
madness. He adds :

" If we are able, as in olden times, and
in the case of children, to instruct or induce
men to be perfectly quiet after they are bit-
ten by a rabid dog, not to tremble or be
frightened, but to banish anxiety, to control
their imagination, and, with patience and
hope, to look forward to recovery, and also
to persuade the well to remain with the un-
fortunate one, and not to run away, but to
cheer him in the hour of trial, then the
means may have been discovered by which
the effects of the accident are to be ban-
ished, and the poison in the wound neutral-
ized."

Odorous and Liqncfiablc Gases: what
Gases may be liquefied. A writer in the
Pharmaceutical Journal notes a remarkable
relation between the odor of gases and their
reducibility to the liquid or solid state.
Thus oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen, which
have no odor, cannot be reduced either by
pressure or by cold. On the other hand,
chlorine, which has a very strong odor, is
easily condensed to a liquid. Again, the
protoxide of carbon, being odorless, cannot
be condensed, while the dioxide or carbonic
acid, which has a faint, pleasant, and pun-
gent odor, can be reduced to a liquid, and
even to a solid state. Nitrous and nitric
oxide, the latter of which is odorless, show
similar phenomena. An exception to the
general rule, that gases which are odorous
are condensible, is furnished by acetylene,
which, though having a faint garlic smell,
has never been condensed. Usually con-
densability stands in a direct ratio to the
strength of the odor possessed by a gas.
Thus, sulphurous acid, which has a most
intense odor, becomes a liquid under a
pressure of two atmospheres, at 15 Fahr.,
while nitrous oxide, which has but a faint
smell, requires fifty atmospheres, and a
temperature of 7.2 F. A few gases hav-
ing a fetid odor are exceptions to this law,

but it holds good so generally, that a list of
gases, arranged according to their reduci-
bility, and another list arranged according
to their properties of smell, will show a
rough though marked coincidence.

The Spectroscope and the Bessemer Pro-
cess. Prof. Tidy, in a lecture on the spec-
troscope, thus briefly describes its impor-
tant practical application in the Bessemer
process : " Cast-iron contains a great amount
of carbon, and in the Bessemer process this
carbon is got rid of by burning it out of the
molten iron with a blast of atmospheric air.
The fluid cast-iron is placed in a large re-
tort lined with refractory clay. This retort,
the converter as it is called, turns on a pivot.
Through the pivot a tube passes in connec-
tion with a very powerful blowing apparatus,
by which air can be blown into the molten
iron. That air burns out the carbon, the
heated gases issuing as a flame from the
converter. Now, it is very important to
stop that blowing process directly the time
arrives. Ten seconds too soon, or ten sec-
onds too late, and the charge is spoilt. Ex-
perience, I grant you, does guide the work-
er, but experience is a costly thing ; and
this I am confident of: laud experience as
you will, it will not weigh down the scale
when we have in the opposite pan exact
scientific experiment. The Bessemer flame,
as it issues from the converter, is examined
by the aid of the spectroscope. Numerous
substances are visible sodium, potassium,
iron, hydrogen, carbon, etc. All of a sud-
den, in a second, the carbon-lines disap-
pear, and that is the moment when the air-
blast must be turned off, for now the carbon
is burnt away, and the iron is converted."

New Material for Illuminating Gas. Le

Gaz, the gas-light journal of Paris, calls the
attention of the directors of gas-works to a
new illuminating material, vegetable pitch.
This material is made by the Patent Oil and
Stearine Company, of England, from the
residues of the manufacture of olive, palm,
cocoa, and other oils. In England it is
widely used, being employed in gas-works
in connection with coal, with a view to aug-
ment the volume of gas, as well as its illu-
minating power. The London Gas-light Com-
pany constantly employs it, mixing it in

NOTES.

2 55

certain proportions with the coal, and the
Gas Company of the Crystal Palace uses
this material only, to produce a rich gas.
The pitch is solid and glistening, and distils
very rapidly in the common gas-retorts,
leaving scarcely any residue. In case a large
amount of gas is required to be furnished
in a very short time, this property of rapid
distillation is of high importance. Its yield
of gas is said to be very considerable, being
765 to 850 cubic metres (830 to 930 cubic
yards) to the ton. The illuminating power
of this gas is equal to that of 33 sperm-
candles, 5 to the pound. It is too rich to
be used with the ordinary burner. It is
best employed to enrich gas made from in-
ferior coals. It contains scarcely any sul-
phur 0.87 per cent. The analysis of the
pitch is as follows : Volatile matter, 74.40 ;
fixed carbon, 21.72; ashes, 3.88.

Antiquity of Man. The following letter
from Sir John Lubbock appeared in Nature
for the 27th of March: "I have received a
letter from Mr. Edmund Calvert, in which
he informs me that his brother, Mr. Frank
Calvert, has recently discovered, near the
Dardanelles, what he regards as conclusive
evidence of the existence of man during the
Miocene period. Mr. Calvert had previous-
ly sent me some drawings of bones and
shells from the strata in question, which
Mr. Busk and Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys were good
enough to examine for me. He has now
met with a fragment of a bone, probably
belonging either to the dinotherium or a
mastodon, on the convex side of which is
engraved a representation of a horned quad-
ruped 'with arched neck, lozenge-shaped
chest, long body, straight fore-legs, and
broad feet.' There are also, he says, traces
of seven or eight other figures, which, how-
ever, are nearly obliterated. He informs
me that in the same stratum he has also
found a flint flake, and several bones broken
as if for the extraction of marrow. This
discovery would not only prove the exist-
ence of man in Miocene times, but of men
who had already made some progress, at
least, in art. Mr. Calvert assures me that
he feels no doubt whatever as to the geo-
logical age of the stratum from which these
specimens are obtained. Of course I am
not in a position myself to express any

opinion on the subject, but I am sure that
the statements of so competent an observer
as Mr. Calvert will interest your readers."

NOTES.

The population of France, as shown by
the census, was 38,067,064 in the year 1866.
The official estimate of annual increase is
130,078 or, for the seven years ending
January 1, 1873, 910,546. Total, 38,977,610.
But the actual census gave only 36,102,921,
showing a loss of 2,874,689. Deduct the of-
ficial estimate of Alsace-Lorraine, 1,595,238,
and the remainder, 1,279,451, represents
the decline of population during seven years.
The excess of females over males is now 100
per cent, greater than ever before.

The epileptiform convulsions excited by
the internal administration of essence of
wormwood, and Japan camphor, may, ac-
cording to recent experiments in France, be
effectually prevented by the use of bromide
of potassium. This is regarded as addi-
tional evidence of the value of the bromide
in the treatment of epilepsy.

The medical officer having under super-
vision the schools for pauper children in
three of the parishes of London reports that,
among those admitted, from thirty to forty
per cent, are afflicted with ophthalmia in
some of its stages, and that bringing the
children together in this way concentrates
and favors the spread of the disease. The
immediate cause of the affection in most of
these cases is held to be the dirt and dust
of the streets which is allowed to accumu-
late at the inner corner of the eye, where it
forms a semi-solid mass which irritates and
inflames the lids.

Died, in Jersey City, on Sunday, March
9th, Charles F. Dcrant, aged 68 years.
Deceased was a diligent student of science,
and some years since published a valuable
work on the " Shells and Sea-Weeds of the
Harbor of New York." He was also the
author of a work on astronomy, which was
printed for circulation among scientific men.
In 1833 Mr. Durant made the first balloon
ascension ever made in this country. His
aerial voyages numbered in all fifteen.

Petroleum has been found in large
quantities in Ecuador. Wells have been
sunk at various points between the sulphur-
ous springs of San Vicente and the sea-shore.
In some of these the petroleum is fluid, like
whale-oil, but in others it has the consist-
ence of butter. In the upper part of some
of the wells it can be seen in hard, compact
masses, which probably have been formed
by the evaporation of the more liquid por-
tions.

256

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Mr. William Yates hag made the fol-
lowing important modifications in the Davy
lamp : He dispenses with wire gauze im-
mediately around the flame, replacing it in
front with a strong lens, and behind with a
silver reflector. The miner cannot raise the
flame so high as to heat the gauze, and, if
he would open the lamp, to light his pipe,
he is foiled, for that cannot be done, with-
out extinguishing the flame.

A correspondent of the Lancet tells of a
hen laying a pair of eggs of good average
size within the space of ten minutes. The
same writer found in his poultry-yard a
double egg, or two eggs combined. This is
not a case of merely double yelk within
one shell, which is common enough, but of
two complete eggs, with separate shells en-
tire, except at the points of contact.

In Russia the sunflower is cultivated
for the oil which it yields. This oil is used
in cooking as well as for lamps, for soap-
making, and for making paints. Fifty bushels
of seed may easily be grown on an acre of
land.

At a recent meeting of the French Acad-
emy a magnet was exhibited by M. Jamin
which carries more than thirty-two times
its own weight, whereas the greatest carry-
ing power hitherto obtainable in artificial
magnets has been not above four or five
times their weight. Instead of the thick
plates usually employed, M. Jamin's mag-
net is made up of a number of very thin
plates superposed on each other, and all
thoroughly magnetized. By this contrivance
the volume and weight of magneto-electric
machines can be very considerably reduced.

It has been shown by M. Berard that,
when fruits are set in the open air or in
oxygen gas, a certain volume of oxygen dis-
appears, and at the same time a nearly equal
volume of carbonic-acid gas appears in its
place. If, however, the fruits are placed in
carbonic acid or any other inert gas, there
is still produced a notable quantity of car-
bonic acid, as though by a kind of fermen-
tation ; and, since, under these conditions,
the oxygen necessary to the change is not
furnished by the surrounding medium, it
must be supplied by the saccharine matter
of the fruits themselves, a considerable part
of which is thus transformed into alcohol.

A French horticulturist has perceived
that, wherever a fruit a pear, for instance
rested upon some branch or other sup-
port beneath it, that fruit always grew to
a large size. The support given to the fruit
permits the sap-vessels of the stem to re-
main open, and the fruit can receive abun-
dant nourishment. Mr. Thomas Meehan
made substantially the same observation
some years ago.

Eighteen men and 03 women died during
the past year in England at the age of 100
years or over. There were still living, when
the census was taken, 6 men and 22 women,
100 years old ; 1 man and 14 women, 101
years ; 3 men and 11 women, 102 years ; 2
men and 6 women, 103 years ; 5 men and
1 women, 104 years ; 2 women, 105 years.
A woman died in Huddersfield at the age
of 107, and a man in Staffordshire was 108
years old when he died.

On the American Continent, the Sequoia,
or Big Tree of California, can find a con-
genial home only in a very few localities. In
England, however, it appears to thrive ad-
mirably, and various " improved " varieties
have already made their appearance there.
The Weeping Sequoia is the latest novelty.

The ancient Egyptians possessed the
art of so tempering bronze that it would
take and keep a sharp edge. Sir Gardiner
Wilkison found in tombs bronze daggers
which were almost as elastic as steel, after
having been buried 3,000 years.

Nickel ore has been found cropping out
in the counties of Madison, Iron, and Wayne,
Missouri; and at Sand Prairie, in the same
State, a new lead-mine has been discovered.
The prospectors, says the Iron Age, took
out 4,000 pounds of the mineral three hours
after the lead was struck.

One of the chief potato-growing prov-
inces of Holland, Groningen, has thirteen
mills devoted to the conversion of potatoes
into flour. Nearly the whole crop of the
province is thus disposed of, the daily yield
of the mills being some 246 tons of potato-
flour. A large part of this, according to
the Glasgow Weekly Herald, is consumed in
the adulteration of wheat-flour in England.

According to the French chemist Du-
mas, the newly-discovered art of decorating
walls with tin-foil, bearing designs in oil-
colors, has in a somewhat modified form been
successfully practised by the Chinese for
a long time.

A vein of plumbago, eight feet thick,
has been discovered in Missouri. This is
the first deposit of this useful mineral found
in the West. The vein at Sturbridge, Mass.,
varies in thickness from one inch to two
feet. There are also plumbago-mines at
Brandon, Vt., Fishkill, N. Y., Wake, N. C,
and St. John's, N. B.

Found post mortem in a lunatic's stomach :
44 pieces of shirt, 41 do. pocket-handker-
chief, 10 do. caps, 8 do. braces, 7 do. cham-
ber-pot handle, 6 do. stick, 5 do. leather, 4
do. coal, 3 do. stocking, 2 do. rag, 1 do.
tobacco-pipe, 1 do. iron, 4 pebbles, 1
knitted cuff, 1 acorn. Total weight, over
8 lbs.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

JULY, 1873.

HOW THE SEA-DEPTHS ARE EXPLORED.

ONE of the most recent and impressive examples of the interac-
tion of science and art by which knowledge is extended, and
man's control over Nature increased, is furnished by the late remark-
able investigations into the depths and life of the sea. The taking of
soundings is, of course, as old as navigation, and is an indispensable
portion of the mariner's art. The record of these soundings was em-
bodied in charts by which sailors were guided in unknown waters.
As commerce extended, such observations became more full, and re-
sulted in systematic coast-surveys in which the depth of water, cur-
rents, magnetic conditions, temperatures, tides, and winds, were taken
into account, and the knowledge thus accumulated gave rise at length
to a great science the Physical Geography of the Sea. About
twenty-five years ago a new step was taken toward the extension of our
knowledge of sea-depths. Science had given to the world the electric
telegraph, and commerce demanded that it should be laid across the
ocean. For this purpose the bed of the North Atlantic required to be
carefully examined and mapped, and the configuration of the sea-bot-
tom and the nature of its material determined. This gave a new im-
pulse to the art of sea-sounding. The transatlantic cable was laid,
got broken, and the end of it was then fished up from a depth of
nearly two miles. A great victory was thus gained ; the bottom of
the sea was no longer inaccessible, and the possibility of its scientific
exploration became established. Hitherto, sea observations had main
reference to the advantages of navigation and commerce; but, from
this time forward, the idea was entertained of pursuing the investiga-
tion in the interest of science alone. At the instance of the Royal
Society, the British Admiralty, in 1868, granted a small government
vessel, the gunboat Lightning, to Dr. William B. Carpenter and Prof.
Wyville Thomson, to be used for dredging the bottom of the sea,
and investigating its animal life. So promising were the results of
vol. m. 17

258 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

this experiment, that a second expedition was arranged in 1869, and
the government surveying-vessel Porcupine was assigned to the nat-
uralists to carry on the work. This expedition was also so highly
successfnl, that the ship Challenger has now started out on a four
years' voyage around the world to carry out a comprehensive plan of
deep-sea observations. We noticed very briefly last month the ad-
mirable work of Prof. Wyville Thomson on " The Depths of the Sea,"
giving a history of what has been lately done in the investigation of
the subject. We propose now to lay Prof. Thomson's work under
contribution for the benefit of our readers, and especially to give some
account of the instruments of ocean-research, and the way the explora-
tion is conducted.

It may be remarked, in passing, that, when the dredging of the
deep seas was found to be feasible, questions of large scientific interest
and moment, which had been hitherto regarded as inaccessible, were
suddenly brought within the range of practical solution. It was a
popular opinion, shared also by men of science, that the bottom of the
sea was a dark and desolate waste, subject to such tremendous press-
ure as to render all life impossible. Prof. Thomson observes : " The
enormous pressure at these great depths seemed at first sight alone suffi-
cient to put any idea of life out of the question. There was a curious
popular notion, in which I well remember sharing when a boy, that, in
going down, the sea-water became gradually under the pressure heavier
and heavier, and that all the loose things in the sea floated at different
levels, according to their specific weight : skeletons of men, anchors,
and shot, and cannon, and, last of all, the broad gold-pieces lost in the
wreck of many a galleon on the Spanish Main, the whole forming a
kind of false bottom to the ocean, beneath which there lay all the
depth of clear, still water, which was heavier than molten gold. The
conditions of pressure are certainly very extraordinary. At 12,000
feet a man would bear upon his body a weight equal to 20 locomotive-
engines, each with a long goods-train loaded with pig-iron. We are
apt to forget, however, that water is almost imcompressible, and that,
therefore, the density of sea-water at a depth of 12,000 feet is scarcely
appreciably increased."

Contrary to all anticipation, it was found that highly-organized
representatives of all the invertebrate classes do live under these con-
ditions of enormous pressure. The bottom of the ocean is, therefore,
to be regarded as habitable, and is proved to be actually inhabited by
numberless forms of animal life. A new world was thus opened to
the naturalist, which, although difficult of access, was yet accessible
and must be investigated. The pioneers in the exploration of course
encountered very formidable obstacles ; but the field was too vast
and the promise too rich to be neglected, and how it was regarded by
the devotees of research may be gathered from the following words of
Dr. Thomson :

HOW THE SEA-DEPTHS ARE EXPLORED.

259

Fig. 1.

" Still the thing is possible, and it must be done again and again,
as the years pass on, by naturalists of all nations working with im-
proved machinery and with ever-increased knowledge. For the bed of
the deep sea, the 140,000,000
square miles which we have
now added to the legitimate
field of natural - history re-
search, is not a barren waste.
It is inhabited by a fauna more
rich and varied on account of
the enormous extent of the
area, and with organisms in
many cases apparently even
more elaborately ana! delicate-
ly formed, and more exquisite-
ly beautiful in their soft shades
of coloring and in the rain-
bow-tints of their wonderful
phosphorescence, than the
fauna of the well-known belt
of shallow watei*, teeming
with innumerable invertebrate
forms, which fringes the land.
And the forms of these hith-
erto unknown living beings,
and their mode of life and their
relations to other organisms,
whether living or extinct, and
the phenomena and laws of
their geographical distribu-
tion, must be worked out."

There are two principal
operations in exploring the
bottom of the ocean : first,
sounding to ascertain depth ;
and, second, dredging to bring
up materials. Although much
ingenuity has been expended
in devices to bring up samples
of the sea-bottom by the sound-
ing-apparatus, yet dredging

Brooke's Deep-Sea Sottnding-Appabattts.

contrivances are now mainly relied upon for that purpose. To deter-
mine the depth with a sounding-line, it is customary to graduate it by
attaching slips of different-colored cloths or leather which mark it off
into sections, and give the means of determining the distance to which

260

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Fig. 2.

the weight runs down. Another method of measuring the depth con-
sisted in running down a weight attached to a line, which was cut at

the surface as soon as the weight was
supposed to have reached bottom, from
a sudden change in the rate of running
out, and the depth was then calculated
by the length of cord left on the reel.

The ordinary system of sounding
fails at great depths, and cannot be de-
pended upon for more than 6,000 feet.
The weight is not sufficient to carry the
line rapidly and vertically to the bot-
tom, and, if a heavier weight be used,
the line is in danger of breaking. No
impulse is felt when the lead strikes the
bottom, and the line goes on running
out, and, if stopped, is liable to break.
Sometimes the line is carried along by
submarine currents, forming loops or
bights, and it often continues to run
out and coil itself in a tangled mass di-
rectly over the lead. These sources of
error vitiate very deep soundings, so
that the reports that have been made
of measurements in the Atlantic of
39,000, 46,000, and 50,000 feet, without
reaching bottom, are now regarded as
exaggerations. In the last charts of
the North Atlantic, on the authority of
Rear-Admiral Richards, no soundings
are entered beyond 24,000 feet, and very
few beyond 18,000 feet.

The ordinary deep-sea lead, which is
a prismatic block about two feet in
length, and from 80 to 120 pounds in
weight, has a simple provision for bring-
ing up material from the bottom, which
is called " arming " that is, the lower
end, which is slightly cupped, is covered
with a thick coating of soft tallow. If it
5 reaches the bottom, mud, shells, gravel,
21125 ooze, or sand, sticks to the tallow, and,
when drawn up, affords a sample of the
nature of the ground. As the interest
in the bottom of the sea increased, there was a more eager curiosity
to scrutinize the particles thus procured for chemical and microscopical

The Bull-dog Sounding-Machine

HOW THE SEA-DEPTHS ARE EXPLORED. 261

examination, and it became desirable to devise means of bringing up
larger amounts of matter. Many contrivances Lave been made for this
purpose. Sir John Ross, in 1818, invented a machine for this purpose,
called the " deep-sea clamm." A large pair of forceps were kept asun-
der by a bolt, and the instrument was so contrived that, on the bolt
striking the ground, a heavy iron weight slipped down a spindle and
closed the forceps, which retained within them a considerable quantity
of the bottom, whether sand, mud, or small stones. By this arrange-
ment Sir John Ross brought up six pounds of soft mud from a depth
of 6,300 feet.

Fig 3.

Mabset's Sounding-Machine.

In the year 1854, J. M. Brooke, passed midshipman in the United
States Navy, contrived the arrangemeut known as " Brooke's Deep-Sea
Sounding- Apparatus," of which all the more recent contrivances have
been to a great extent modifications and improvements, his funda-

262

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Fig. 4.

mental principle being the detachment of a weight when the bottom is
struck. The weight is a 64-pound shot (E, Fig. 1), cast with a hole
through it. An iron rod (A B) passes through this hole, with an open-
ing or chamber at the lower end " armed " with tallow. When the in-
strument strikes, the end of the rod is driven into the material of the
bottom, which fills the chamber. At the same time a pair of hinged
arms (D) at the top, which were upright in the descent, fall down and
release the cord (C), which sustains the ball by a leather collar below.
As the loops of the sling are relieved from the teeth of the arms, the
rod slips through the hole in the shot, and comes up alone with its en-
closed sample of sediment. The difficulty with this machine was the
washing out of the material in the ascent. This was remedied by
Commander Dayman, by adapting a valve, opening inward, to the ter-
minal chamber of the rod.

In 1860 the assistant engineer of H. M. S. Bull-dog contrived a
dredging-lead that combined the principle of Ross's clamm with the
disengaging weight of Brooke. It is an ingenious and well-known
machine, though hardly as simple as could be desired. Prof. Thom-
son thus describes it :

" A pair of scoops (A) close upon one
another scissors-wise on a hinge, and have
two pairs of appendages (B), which stand
to the opening and closing of the scoops in
the relation of scissor-handles. This ap-
paratus is permanently attached to the
sounding-line by the rope (F), which in the
figure is represented as hanging loose, and
which is fixed to the spindle on which the
cups turn. Attached to the same spindle
is the rope (D), which ends above an iron
ring. E represents a pair of tumbler-hooks,
fastened likewise to the end of the sound-
ing-line ; C a heavy leaden or iron weight,
with a hole through it wide enough to al-
low the rope (D) with its loop and ring to
pass freely ; and B a strong India-rubber
band, which passes round the handles of
the scoop3. In the figure the instrument
is represented as it is sent down and before
it reaches the bottom. The weight (C)
and the scoops (A) are now suspended by
the rope (D), whose ring is caught by the tumbler-hooks (E). The
elastic ring (B) is in a state of tension, ready to draw together the
scoop-handles and close the scoops, but it is antagonized by the weight
(Cj, which, pressing down into a space between the handles, keeps
them asunder. The moment the scoops are driven into the ground by

Otho Friedkioh Mclw.b's Dkedgk,
a. d. 1750.

HOW THE SEA-DEPTHS ARE EXPLORED. 263

the weight, the tension on the rope (D) is relaxed, the tumblers fall
and release the ring, and the weight falls and allows the elastic band
to close the scoops and keep them closed upon whatever they may
contain ; the rope (D) slips through the weight, and the closed scoops
are drawn up by the rope (F)."

The attempt has been often made to measure the amount of ver-
tical descent by self-registering machinery. Massey's sounding-ma-
chine is the best for this purpose, and operates upon a principle
of screw-motion as it falls through the water. As represented in Fig.
3, two thimbles (F F) pass through the two ends of the heavy oval
brass shield (A A). To the upper of these the sounding-line is at-
tached, and to the lower the weight at about a yard from the ma-
chine. The screw-motion is communicated by a set of four brass vanes
or rings (B), which are soldered obliquely to an axis in such a posi-
tion that, as the machine descends, the axis revolves by the pressure of
the water against the vanes. C represents the dial-plate as seen when
the slide (D) is withdrawn. The revolving axis communicates its mo-
tion to the indices, which are so adjusted that the index on the right-
hand dial passes through a division for every fathom of vertical de-
scent whether quick or slow, and makes an entire revolution for 15
fathoms ; while the left-hand index passes through a division on the
circle for 15 fathoms, and makes an entire revolution during a descent
of 225 fathoms. This instrument answers very well for accurate work
in moderately deep water ; but at extreme depths it has an uncertainty
which seems to be shared by all contrivances involving metal wheel-
work.

The main theatre of sounding operations has been the Atlantic
Ocean, which, from its relation to the leading commercial nations, and
for intercontinental telegraphic purposes, has been more carefully sur-
veyed than any other great body of water. Open from pole to pole,
participating in all conditions of climate, communicating freely with
other seas, and covering 30,000,000 square miles, it is believed to rep-
resent general oceanic conditions, and to contain depths nearly, if not
quite, as great as the other ocean-basins of the world, although but little
is known, it is true, in this respect, of the Indian, Antarctic, and Pacific
Seas. The general result of its soundings would indicate that the
average depth of the Atlantic bed is not much more than 1 2,000 feet,
and there seem to be few depressions deeper than 15,000 or 20,000 feet,^
a little more than the height of Mont Blanc. Dr. Thomson sums up
the general results of the Atlantic soundings as follows : " In the Arctic
Sea there is deep water, reaching to 9,000 feet to the west and south-
west of Spitzbergen. Extending from the coast of Norway, and in-
cluding Iceland, the Faroe Islands, Shetland and Orkney, Great Britain
and Ireland, and the bed of the North Sea to the coast of France,
there is a wide plateau, on which the depth rarely reaches 3,000 feet ;
but to the west of Iceland and communicating doubtless with the deep

264

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Fig. 5.

water in the Spitzbergen Sea, a trough 500 miles wide, and, in some
places, nearly 12,000 feet deep, curves along the east coast of Green-
land. This is the path of one of the great Arctic return-currents.

After sloping gradually to a depth of
3,000 feet to the westward of the coast
of Ireland in latitude 52, the bottom
suddenly dips to 10,000 feet at the rate
of about 15 to 19 feet in the 100; and
from this point to within about 200 miles
of the coast of Newfoundland, when it
begins to shoal again, there is a vast
undulating submarine plain, averaging
about 12,000 feet in depth below the
surface the ' telegraph plateau.'

" A valley about 500 miles wide, and
with a mean depth of 15,000 feet,
stretches from off the southwest coast
of Ireland, along the coast of Europe,
dipping into the Bay of Biscay, past the
Strait of Gibraltar, and along the west
coast of Africa. Opposite the Cape de
Verde Islands, it 6eems to merge into a
slightly deeper trough, which occupies the
axis of the South Atlantic, and passes
into the Antarctic Sea. A nearly similar
valley curves around the coast of North
America, about 12,000 feet in depth, off
Newfoundland and Labrador, and be-
coming considerably deeper to the south-
ward, where it follows the outline of
the coast of the States, and the Bahamas
and Windward Islands, and finally joins
the central trough of the South Atlantic off the coast of Brazil, with
a depth of 15,000 feet."

Ball's Dredge.

Until within a hundred years but little was known of the living
inhabitants of the deep sea, except the few objects that adhered to
lead-lines, or were taken accidentally by fishermen in trawls and
oyster-dredges ; and, as odd things of no market value were generally
thrown away, the knowledge from this source increased but slowly.
The first dredge used by a naturalist to collect specimens from the
sea-bottom was employed by Otho Friedrich Mtiller, who published a
quaint book about it in 1779. His dredge was a square-mouthed bag
(Fig. 4), and he does not appear to have used it beyond a depth of
180 feet. The dredges now used by naturalists are modifications of
the oyster-dredge, which is described as a light frame of iron, about

HOW THE SEA-DEPTHS ARE EXPLORED.

265

five feet long by a foot or so in width at the mouth, with a scraper like
a narrow hoe on one side, and a suspending apparatus attached to the
rope on the other. From the frame is suspended a bag, about two feet
in depth, of wide netting or hempen cord. The naturalists' dredge has
a scraper on each side, the bag is deeper, and the meshes so fine as to
allow only the water to pass through.

Fig. 6.

Dredge with Hempen Tangles.

Fig. 5 represents the dredge devised by Dr. Ball, of Dublin, and
which scraped the surface so perfectly that, when drawn along a
drawing-room floor, it would pick up the pence that had been scattered
before it. Dr. Thomson states that the most convenient size for

2 66 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

dredging from a small boat, at a less depth thaii 600 feet, is a frame 18
inches long and five inches in width. The scrapers are three inches
wide, and are so set that the distance across between their edges is
7^ inches.

The dredge used for deep-sea work was larger, the frame being
four feet six inches in length, and six inches wide at the throat
or narrowest part. The weight of the frame was 225 lbs., but Dr.
Thomson thinks it was too large and heavy. The dredge-bag was
double, the outer being of strong twine netting lined within with
" bread-bag," a light, open kind of canvas.

It was found by experience that very often, when nothing of inter-
est was brought up within the dredge, many echinoderms, corals, and
sponges, came to the surface, sticking to the outside of the bag, and
even to the first few fathoms of the dredge-rope. This suggested the
attachment of swabs, used for washing the decks, to the dredge. The
tangled hemp turned out to be very efficient, picking up great numbers
of objects that would not be otherwise secured. The bag took the
mollusks, which, from their shelly forms, could not be otherwise ob-
tained, while the echinoderms, corals, and sponges bulky objects that
could not readily enter the bag were more easily caught by the swabs,
although, unfortunately, it mutilated them, and brought them up in
fragments. So important was this expedient, that a long iron bar was
attached to the bottom of the dredge-bag, to which the hempen bundles
were suspended, as shown in Fig. 6.

The arrangements for sounding and dredging from the Porcupine
are fully described and illustrated in Prof. Thomson's work. The
vessel was a 382-ton gunboat, with a steam-engine of 12 horse-power,
stationed amidships, with drums of different sizes, from which lines
were led fore and aft for working either at the bow or stern. Two
powerful derricks were rigged for sounding and dredging, one over
the stern and one over the port-bow. The block through which the
sounding-line or dredging-rope passed was not attached directly to the
derrick, but to a rope which passed through an eye at the end of the
spar, and was fixed to a "bit," a piece of timber going through the
deck. On a bight of this rope between the block and the " bit " was
a piece of apparatus shown in Fig. 7, and called the " accumulator."
This consisted of 30 or 40 strong India-rubber springs, working to-
gether, and its use was to yield by stretching, when, from any cause,
as the pitching of the ship, there was an unusual strain upon the line.
The dredge-rope of the Porcupine was of Russian hemp, 2-J inches in
circumference, with a breaking strain of 2- tons, and was 18,000 feet,
or nearly 3^- miles long. A row of about 20 large iron pins, about 2^
feet in length, projected over one side of the quarter-deck, rising
obliquely from the top of the bulwark. Upon these the rope was con-
tinuously coiled, as shown in the figure, which also represents the
dredge in position for descent.

HOW THE SEA-DEPTHS ARE EXPLORED. 267

The method of dredging at a great distance is thus graphically de-
scribed by Prof. Thomson, as it was performed in the Bay of Biscay,
July 22, 1869. The depth was first accurately ascertained by sound-

FlG. 7.

Tire Stern Derrick op the Porcupine, showing the " Accdthulator," the Dredge, and the

Mode of stowing the Rope.

ing, and found to be 14,610 feet. " At 4.45 p. m. the dredge was let go,
the vessel drifting slowly before a moderate breeze from the north-

268

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

west. The 3,000 fathoms of rope were all out at 5.50 p. m. The dia-
gram (Fig. 8) will give an idea of the various relative positions of the
dredge and the vessel according to the plan of dredging adopted by-
Captain Calvert, which worked admirably, and which appears, in fact,

Fig. 8.

dlageam op the relative positions op the vessel, the weights, asx> the dredge, in deedg-

ing in Deep Wateb.

to be the only mode that would answer for great depths. It repre-
sents the position of the vessel when the dredge is let go, and the
dotted line (A B) the line of descent of the dredge rendered oblique
by the tension of the rope. While the dredge is going down, the ves-

HOW THE SEA-DEPTHS ARE EXPLORED. 269

sel drifts gradually to leeward ; and, when the whole (say) 18,000 feet
of rope are out, C W and D might represent respectively the relative
positions of the vessel, the weight attached 3,000 feet from the dredge,
and the dredge itself. The vessel now steams slowly to windward,
occupying successively the positions E, F, G, H. The weight, to
which the water offers but little resistance, sinks from W to W, and
the dredge and bag sink more slowly from D to B. The vessel is now
allowed to drift back before the wind, from H toward C. The tension
of the motion of the vessel, instead of acting immediately on the
dredge, now drags forward the weight (W), so that the dredging is
carried on from the weight, and not directly from the vessel. The
dredge is thus quietly pulled along, with its lip scraping the bottom in
the attitude which it assumes from the centre of weight of its iron
frame and arms. If, on the other hand, the weights were hung close
to the dredge, and the dredge were dragged directly from the vessel,
owing to the great weight and spring of the rope, the arms would be
continually lifted up, and the lip of the dredge prevented from scrap-
ing. In very deep dredging this operation of stealing up to windward
until the dredge-rope is nearly perpendicular, after drifting for half an
hour or so to leeward, is usually repeated three or four times.

" At 8.50 p. m. we began to haul in. The donkey-engine delivered
the rope at the rate of rather more than a foot per second without a
single check. A few minutes before one A. M. the weights appeared,
and, a little after one in the morning, eight hours after it was cast
over, the dredge was safely hauled on deck, having in the interval ac-
complished a journey of upward of eight statute miles. The dredge
contained 1^ cwt. of very characteristic pale-gray Atlantic ooze." The
total weight brought up by the engine was :

"Weight of rope, reduced to in water . = 1,375 lbs.

Dredge and bag, " " " = 275 "

Ooze brought up, . = 168 "

Weight attached ....... 224 "

2,042

As an abundant and characteristic invertebrate life is now shown
to exist at such great depths, it is inferred to extend to all depths ;
and thus the whole ocean-bed becomes in future the domain of the in-
quisitive naturalist. But, as Dr. Thomson remarks, little more can be
said, for his work is all before him : " A grand new field of inquiry has
been opened up, but its culture is terribly laborious. Every haul of
the dredge brings to light new and unfamiliar forms forms which
link themselves strangely with the inhabitants of past periods in the
earth's history ; but as yet we have not the data for generalizing the
deep-sea fauna, and speculating on its geological and biological rela-
tions ; for, notwithstanding all our strength and will, the area of the
bottom of the deep sea which has been fairly dredged may still be
reckoned by the square yard."

2 7 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DEATH.

By FEKNAND PAPILLON.

TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH, BY A. R. MACDONOUGH.

OF old, the spoils of death fell to the anatomist's share, while the
physiologist took for his part the phenomena of life. Now we
submit the corpse to the same experiments as the living organism, and
pry into the relics of death for the secrets of life. Instead of seeing in
the lifeless body mere forms ready to dissolve and vanish, we detect
in it forces and persisting activities full of deep instructiveness in their
mode of working. As theologians and moralists exhort us to study
the spectre of death face to face at times, and strengthen our souls by
courageous meditation on our last hour, so medicine regards it as es-
sential to direct our attention toward all the details of that mournful
drama, and thus to lead us, through gloom and shadows, to a clearer
knowledge of life. But it is only with respect to medicine in the most
modern days that this is true.

Leibnitz, who held profound and admirable theories of life, had one
of death also, which he has unfolded in a famous letter to Arnauld.
He believes that generation is only the development and evolution of
an animal already existing in form, and that corruption or death is
only the reenvelopment or involution of the same animal, which does
not cease to subsist and continue living. The sum of vital energies,
consubstantial with monads, does not vary in the world ; generation
and death are but changes in the order and adjustment of the princi-
ples of vitality, simple transformations from small to great, and vice
versa. In other words, Leibnitz sees everywhere eternal and incor-
ruptible germs of life, which neither perish at all nor begin. What
does begin and perish is the organic machine of which these germs
compose the original activity : the elementary gearing of the machine
is broken apart, but not destroyed. This is the earlier view held by
Leibnitz. He has another, conceiving of generation as a progress of
life through degrees ; he can conceive of death also as a gradual re-
gress of the same principle, that is to say, that in death life withdraws
little by little, just as it came forward little by little in generation.
Death is no sudden phenomenon, nor instantaneous evanishing it is
a slow operation, a " retrogradation," as the Hanoverian philosopher
phrases it. When death shows to us, it has been a long time wearing
away the organism, though we have not perceived it, because " disso-
lution at first attacks parts invisibly small." Yes, death, before it be-
trays itself to the eye by livid pallor, to the touch by marble coldness,
before chaining the movements and stiffening the blood of the dying
person, creeps with insidious secrecy into the smallest and most hidden

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DEATH. 271

points of his organs and his humors. Here it begins to corrupt the
fluids, to disorganize the tissues, to destroy the equipoise and endanger
the harmony. This process is more or less lingering and deceitful, and,
when we note the manifest signs of death, we may be sure that the
work lacked no deliberate preparation.

These ideas of Leibnitz, like most of the conceptions of genius,
waited long after the time of their appearance for confirmation by
demonstrative experiment. Before his day, bodies were dissected
only for the sake of studying in them the conformation and normal
arrangement of the organs. When this study was once completed,
science took up the methodical inquiry into the changes produced in
the different parts of the body by diseases. Not until the end of the
eighteenth century did death in action become the subject of investi-
gation by Bichat.

Bichat is the greatest of the physiological historians of death. The
famous work he has left on this subject, his "Physiological Researches
upon Life and Death," is as noteworthy for the grandeur of its general
ideas, and its beauty of style, as for its precision of facts and nicety of
experiment. To this day it remains the richest mine of recorded truths
as to the physiology of death. Having determined the fact that life is
seriously endangered only by alterations in one of the three essential
organs, the brain, the heart, and the lungs, a group forming the vital
tripod, Bichat examines how the death of one of these three organs
assures that of the others, and in succession the gradual stoppage of
all the functions. In our day, the advance of experimental physiology
in the path so successfully traversed by Bichat, has brought to light
in their minutest details the various meehanical processes of death, and,
what is of far greater consequence, has disclosed an entire order of
activities heretofore only suspected to be at work in the corpse. The
theory of death has been built up by slow degrees along with that of
life, and several practical questions that had remained in a state of un-
certainty, such as that of the signs of real death, have received the
most decisive answer in the course of these researches.

I.

Bichat pointed out that the complete life of animals is made up of
two orders of phenomena, those of circulation and nutrition, and those
that fix the relations of the living being with its environment. He
distinguishes organic life from animal life, properly so called. Vege-
tables have only the former ; animals possess both, intimately blended.
Now, on the occurrence of death, these two sorts of life do not disap-
pear at one and the same moment. It is the animal life that suffers
the first stroke ; the most manifest activities of the nervous system are
those which come to a halt before all the rest. How is this stoppage
brought about ? We must consider separately the order of occir-

272 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

rences in death from old age, in that occasioned by disease, and in
sudden death.

The man who expires at the close of a long decline in years, dies
in detail. All his senses in succession are sealed. Sight becomes dim
and unsteady, and at last loses the picture of objects. Hearing grows
gradually insensible to sounds. Touch is blunted into dulness, odors
produce but a weak impression, only taste lingers a little. At the
same time that the organs of sensation waste and lose their excitabil-
ity, the functions of the brain fade out little by little. Imagination
becomes unfixed, memory nearly fails, judgment wavers. Further,
motions are slow and difficult on account of stiffness in the muscles;
the voice breaks ; in short, all the functions of outward life lose their
spring. Each of the bonds attaching the old man to existence parts
by slow degrees. Yet the internal life persists. Nutrition still takes
place, but very soon the forces desert the most essential organs.
Digestion languishes, the secretions dry up, capillary circulation is
clogged : that of the large vessels in their turn is checked, and, at
last, the heart's contractions cease. This is the instant of death. The
heart is the last thing to die. Such is the series of slow and partial
deaths which, with the old man spared by disease, result in the last
end of all. The individual who falls into the sleep of eternity in these
conditions, dies like the vegetable which, having no consciousness of
life, can have no consciousness of death. He passes insensibly from
one to the other, and to die thus is to know no pain. The thought of
the last hour alarms us only because it puts a sudden end to our rela-
tions with all our surroundings ; but, if the feeling of these relations
has long ago faded away, there can be no place for fear at the brink
of the grave. The animal does not tremble in the instant before it
ceases to be.

Unfortunately, death of this kind is very rare for humanity. Death
from old age has become an extraordinary phenomenon. Most com-
monly we succumb to a disturbance in the functions of our vital sys-
tem, which is sometimes sudden, sometimes gradual. In this case, as
in the former one, we observe animal life disappearing first, but the
modes of its conclusion are infinitely varied. One of the most usual
is death through the lungs ; as a restilt of pneumonia and different
forms of phthisis, the oxidation of the blood becoming impossible
on account of the disorganization of the pulmonary globules, venous
blood goes back to the heart without gaining revivification. In the
case of serious and prolonged fevers, and of infectious diseases, whether
epidemic or otherwise, which are, characteristically, blood-poisonings,
death occurs through a general change in nutrition. This is still more
the fact as to death consequent upon certain chronic disorders of the
digestive organs. When these are affected, the secretion of those
juices fitted to dissolve food dries up, and these fluids go through the
intestinal canal unemployed. In this case the invalid dies of real

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DEATH. 2 73

starvation. Haemorrhage is one of the commonest causes of death.
Whenever a great artery is opened from any cause, permitting the
copious outflow of blood, the skin grows pale, warmth declines, the
breathing is intermittent, vertigo and dimness of sight follow, the ex-
pression of the features changes, cold and clammy sweat covers part
of the face and the limbs, the pulse gets gradually weaker, and, at last,
the heart stops. Virgil describes haemorrhage with striking fidelity in
the story of Dido's death.

Sudden death, unconnected with outward and accidental causes,
may occur in various ways. "Very violent impressions on the feelings
sometimes abruptly check the movements of the heart, and produce
a mortal swoon. Instances are well known of many persons dying
of joy Leo X. is one and of persons who succumbed to fear. In
foudroyant apoplexy, if real death is not instantaneous, there is at
least the sudden occurrence of the phenomena of death. The sufferer
is plunged in profound sleep, called by physicians coma, from which
wakening is impossible; his breathing is difficult, his eyes set, his
mouth twisted and distorted. The pulsations of the heart cease little
by little, and soon life utterly vanishes. The breaking of an aneurism
very often occasions sudden death. Not less often the cause of death
is found in what is called an embolism, that is, a check to the circula-
tion by a clot of blood suddenly plugging up some important vessel.
And there are also cases of sudden death still unaccounted for, in the
sense that subsequent dissection discovers nothing that could explain
the stoppage in the operations of life.

Death is usually preceded by a group of phenomena that has re-
ceived the name of the death-agony. In most cases of disease the be-
ginning of this concluding period is marked by a sudden improvement
of the functions. It is the last gleam springing from the dying flame ;
but soon the eyes become fixed and insensible to the action of light,
the nose grows pointed and cold, the mouth, wide open, seems to call
for the air that fails it, the cavity within it is parched, and the lips, as
if withered, cling to the curves of the teeth. The last movements of
respiration are spasmodic, and a wheezing, and sometimes a marked
gurgling sound, may be heard at some distance, caused by obstruction
of the bronchial tubes with a quantity of mucus. The breath is cold,
the temperature of the skin lowered. If the heart is examined, we
note the weakening of its sounds and pulsations. The hand, placed in
its neighborhood, feels no throb. Such is the physiognomy of a per-
son in the last moments of death in the greater number of cases, that
is, when death follows upon a period of illness of some duration. The
death-struggle is seldom painful, and almost always the patient feels
nothing of it. He is plunged into a comatose stupor, so that he is no
longer conscious of his situation or his sufferings, and he passes insen-
sibly from life to death, in a manner that renders it sometimes difficult
to fix the exact instant at which a dying person expires. This is true,

VOL. III. 18

274 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

at least, in chronic maladies, and especially in those that consume the
human body slowly and silently. Yet, when the hour of death comes
for ardent organizations for great artists, for instance, and they usu-
ally die young there is a quick and sublime new burst of life in the
creative genius. There is no better example of this than the angelic
end of Beethoven, who, before he breathed out his soul, that tuneful
monad, regained his lost speech and hearing, and spent them in re-
peating for the last time some of those sweet harmonies which he
called his " Prayers to God." Some diseases, moreover, are most
peculiarly marked by the gentleness of the dying agony. Of all the
ills that cheat us while killing by pin-pricks, consumption is that
which longest wears for us the illusive look of health, and best con-
ceals the misery of living and the horror of dying. Nothing can be
compared with that hallucination of the senses and that liveliness of
hope which mark the last days of the consumptive. He takes the
burning of his destroying fever for a healthful symptom, he forms his
plans, and smiles calmly and cheerfully on his friends, and suddenly,
some morrow of a quiet night, he falls into the sleep that never
wakes.

If life is everywhere, and if, consequently, death occurs everywhere,
in all the elements of the system, what must be thought of that point
in the spinal marrow which a famous physiologist styled the vital
knot, and in which. he professed to lodge the principle of life itself?
The point which Flourens regarded as this vital knot is situated nearly
at the middle of the prolonged spinal cord that is, the middle of
that portion of the nerve-substance which connects the brain with the
spinal marrow. This region, in fact, has a fine and dangerous ex-
citability. A prick, or the penetration of a needle into it, is
enough to cause the instant death of any animal whatever. It is the
very means used in physiological laboratories to destroy life swiftly
and surely in dogs. That susceptibility is explained in the most nat-
ural way. This spot is the starting-point of the nerves that go to the
lungs ; the moment that the slighest injury is produced in it, there fol-
lows a check on the movements of respiration, and ensuing death.
This vital knot of Flourens enjoys no sort of special prerogative. Life
is not more concentrated nor more essential in it than elsewhere ; it
simply coincides with the initial point of the nerves animating one of
the organs indispensable to vitality, the organ of sanguification ; and
in living organisms any alteration of the nerves controlling a function
brings a serious risk as to its complete performance. There is, there-
fore, no such thing as a vital knot, a central fire of life in animals.
They are collections of an infinity of infinitely small living creatures,
and each one of these microscopic living points is its own life-centre
for itself. Each on its own account grows, produces heat, and displays
those characteristic activities which depend upon its structure. Each
one, by virtue of a preestablished harmony, meets all the rest in the

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DEATH. 275

ways that they require ; but, just as each lives on its own account, so
on its account each dies. And the proof that this is so is found in the
fact that certain parts taken from a dead body can be transferred to a
living one without suffering any interruption in their physiological
activity, and in the fact that many organs which seem dead can be
excited anew, awakened out of their torpor, and animated to extremely
remarkable vital manifestations. This subject we now proceed to
consider.

II.

Death seems to be absolute from the instant that the pulsations of
the heart are stopped without renewal, because, the circulation of the
blood no longer proceeding, the nutrition of the organs becomes im-
possible, and nutrition is demanded for the maintenance of physiological
harmony; but, as we have said above, there are a thousand little
springs in the organism which keep up a certain degree of activity
after the great main-spring has ceased to act. There is an infinite
number of partial energies that outlive the destruction of the principal
energy, and withdraw only by slow degrees. In cases of sudden death
especially the tissues keep their peculiar vitality a very long time. In
the first place, the heat declines only quite slowly, and the more so in
proportion as death has been quick. For several hours after death the
hair of the head and body, and the nails, continue to grow, nor does
absorption either stop at once. Even digestion, too, keeps on. The
experiment performed by Spallanzani to test this is very curious. He
conceived the idea of making a crow eat a certain quantity of food,
and killing it immediately after the meal. Then he put it in a place
kept at the same temperature as that of a live bird, and opened it six
hours later. The food was thoroughly digested.

Besides these general manifestations, the dead body is capable,
during some continued time, of different kinds of activity. It is not
easy to study these on the bodies of persons dying of sickness, be-
cause they are not permitted to be made the subject of anatomical ex-
aminations until twenty-four hours after death ; but the bodies of be-
headed criminals, which are given up to savants a few moments after
their execution, can be of use in the investigation of what takes place
immediately after the stopping of the living machine. If the heart is
uncovered a few minutes after execution, pulsations are remarked
which continue during an hour or longer, at the rate of forty to forty-
five a minute, even after the removal of the liver, the stomach, and the
intestines. For several hours the muscles retain their excitability, and
undergo reflex contractions from the effect of pinching. M. Robin
noted the following phenomenon in the case of a criminal an hour after
his execution : " The right arm," to quote his description, " being
placed obliquely extended at the side of the trunk, with the hand about
ten inches away from the hip, I scratched the skin of the chest, at

276 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. .

about the height of the nipple, with the point of a scalpel, over a space
of nearly four inches, without making any pressure on the muscles
lying beneath. We immediately saw the great pectoral muscle, then
the biceps, then the anterior brachial, successively and quickly con-
tract. The result was a movement of approach of the whole arm tow-
ard the trunk, with rotation inward of the limb, and half flexion of
the forearm upon the arm, a true defensive movement, which threw the
hand forward toward the chest as far as the pit of the stomach."

These spontaneous exhibitions of life in a corpse are trifles com-
pared with those excited by means of certain stimulants, particularly
of electricity. Aldini, in 1802, subjected two criminals, beheaded at
Bologna, to the action of a powerful battery. Influenced by the cur-
rent, the facial muscles contracted, producing the effect of horrid
grimaces. All the limbs were seized with convulsive movements ; the
bodies seemed to feel the stir of resurrection, and to make efforts to
rise. The springs of the system retained the power of answering the
electric stimulus for several hours after beheading. A few years later,
at Glasgow, Ure made some equally noted experiments on the body
of a criminal that had remained more than an hour hanging on the
gallows. One of the poles of a battery of TOO pairs having been con-
nected with the spinal marrow below the nape of the neck, and the
other brought in contact with the heel, the leg, before bent back on
itself, was thrust violently forward, almost throwing down one of the
assistants, who had hard work to keep it in place. When one of the
poles was placed on the seventh rib, and the other on one of the nerves
of the neck, the chest rose and fell, and the abdomen repeated the bike
movement, as takes place in respiration. On touching a nerve of the
eyebrow at the same time with the head, the facial muscles contracted.
" Wrath, terror, despair, anguish, and frightful grins, blended in hor-
rible expression on the assassin's countenance."

The most remarkable instance of a momentary reappearance of
vital properties, not in the whole organism, but in the head alone, is
the famous experiment suggested by Legallois, and carried out for the
first time in 1858 by M. Brown- Sequard. This skilful physiologist
beheads a dog, taking pains to make the section below the point at
which the vertebral arteries enter their bony sheath. Ten minutes
afterward he sends the galvanic current into the different parts of the
head thus severed from its body, without producing any resuli, of
movement. He then fits to the four arteries, the extremities of which
appear in the cutting of the neck, little pipes connected by tubes with
a reservoir full of fresh oxygenated blood, and guides the injection of
this blood into the vessels of the brain. Immediately irregular mo-
tions of the eyes and the facial muscles occur, succeeded by the ap-
pearance of regular harmonious contractions, seeming to be prompted
by the will. The head has regained life. The motions continue to be
performed during a quarter of an hour, while the injection of blood

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DEATH. 277

into the cerebral arteries lasts. On stopping the injection, the motions
cease, and give place to the spasms of agony, and then to death.

Physiologists asked whether such a momentary resurrection of the
functions of life might not he brought about in the human subject
that is, whether movement might not be excited and expression re-
animated by injecting fresh blood into a head just severed from a
man's body, as in M. Brown-Sequard's experiment. It was suggested
to try it on the heads of decapitated criminals, but anatomical obser-
vations, particularly those of M. Charles Robin, showed that the arte-
ries of the neck are cut by the guillotine in such a way that air pene-
trates and fills them. It follows that it is impracticable to inject them
with blood that can produce the effects noted by M. Brown-Sequard.
Indeed, we know that blood circulating in the vessels becomes frothy
on contact with air, and loses fitness for its functions. M. Robin sup-
poses that the experiment in question could be successful only if made
upon the head of a man killed by a ball that should strike below the
neck ; in that case it would be possible to effect such a section of the
arteries that no entrance of air would occur, and, if the head were
separated at the place pointed out by M. Brown-Sequard, those mani-
festations of function remarked in the dog's head would probably be
obtained by the injection of oxygenated blood. M. Brown-Sequard is
convinced that they might be obtained, if certain precautions were ob-
served, even with the head of a decapitated criminal ; and, so strong
is his conviction, that, when it was proposed to him to try the experi-
ment that is, to perform the injection of blood into the head of a
person executed he refused to do so, not choosing, as he said, to wit-
ness the tortures of this fragment of a being recalled for an instant to
sensibility and life. We understand M. Brown-Sequard's scruples, but
it is allowable to doubt whether he would have inflicted great suffering
on the head of the subject ; at most, he would only have aroused in it
a degree of very dim and uncertain sensibility. This is easily ex-
plained. In life, the slightest perturbation in the cerebral circulation
is enough to prevent thought and sensation utterly. Now, if a few
drops of blood too much or too little in the brain of an animal in full
health suffice to alter the regularity of its psychical manifestations,
much more certainly will the completeness of the brain's action be de-
ranged if it is awakened by an injection of foreign blood, a forcible
entry too, which, of necessity, cannot cause the blood to circulate with
suitable pressure and equipoise.

Corpse-like rigidity is one of the most characteristic phenomena of
death. This is a general hardening of the muscles, so great that they
lose the property of extension till even the joints cannot be bent ;
this phenomenon begins some hours after death. The muscles of the
lower jaw are the first to stiffen ; then rigidity invades in succession
the abdominal muscles, those of the neck, and at last the thoracic ones.
This hardening takes place through the coagulation of the half-fluid

278 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

albuminoid matter which composes the muscular fibres, as the solidifi-
cation of the blood results from coagulation of its fibrine. After a
few hours the coagulated musculine grows fluid again, rigidity passes
away, and the muscles relax. Something not dissimilar takes place
also in the blood. The globules change, lose shape, and suffer the be-
ginning of dissociation. The agents of putrefaction, vibrios and bac-
teria, thus enter upon their great work by insidiously breaking up the
least seen parts.

At last, when partial revivals are no longer possible, when the last
flicker of life has gone out and corpse-like rigidity has ceased, a new
work begins. The living germs that had collected on the surface of the
body and in the digestive canal develop, multiply, pierce into all the
points of the organism, and produce in it a complete separation of the
tissues and humors ; this is putrefaction. The moment of its appear-
ance varies with the causes of death and the degree of outward tem-
perature. When death is the result of a putrid malady, putrefaction
begins almost immediately when the body has grown cold. It is the
same when the atmosphere is warm. In general, in our climates, the
work of decomposition becomes evident after from thirty-eight to
forty hours. Its first effects are noticeable on the skin of the stomach ;
this takes on a greenish discoloration, which soon spreads and covers
successively the whole surface of the body. At the same time the
moist parts, the eye, the inside of the mouth, soften and decay ; then
the cadaverous odor is gradually developed, at first faint and slightly
fetid, a mouldy smell, then a pungent and ammoniacal stench. Little
by little the flesh sinks in and grows watery ; the organs cease to be
distinguishable. Every thing is seized upon by what is termed pu-
tridity. If the tissues are examined under the microscope at this mo-
ment, we no longer recognize any of the anatomical elements of which
the organic fabric is made up in its normal state. " Our flesh," Bos-
suet exclaims in his funeral-sermon on Henrietta of England, " soon
changes its nature, our body takes another name ; even that of a corpse,
used because it still exhibits something of the human figure, does not
long remain with it. It becomes a thing without a shape, which in
every language is without a name." When structure has wholly dis-
appeared, nothing more remains but a mixture of saline, fat, and pro-
teic matters, which are either dissolved and carried away by water, or
slowly burned up by the air's oxygen, and transmuted into new prod-
ucts, and the whole substance of the body, except the skeleton, returns
piecemeal to the earth whence it came forth. Thus the ingredients of
our organs, the chemical elements of our bodies, turn to mud and dust
again. From this mud and this dust issue unceasingly new life and
energetic activity ; but a clay fit for the commonest uses may also be
got from it, and, in the words of Shakespeare's Hamlet, the dust of
Alexander or Caesar may plug the vent of a beer-cask, or " stop a hole
to keep the wind away." These " base uses," of which the Prince of

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DEATH. 2 jg

Denmark speaks to Horatio, mark the extreme limits of the transforma-
tion of matter. In any case the beings of lowest order that toil and
engender in the bosom of putrefaction are really absorbing and storing
away life, since without their aid the corpse could not serve as nutri-
ment to plants, which in their turn are the necessary reservoir whence
animality draws its sap and strength. It is in this sense that BufFon's
doctrine of organic molecules is a true one.

Death is the necessary end of all organic existence. We may hope
more or less to set at a distance its inevitable hour, but it would be
madness to dream of its indefinite postponement in any species what-
soever. No doubt there is no contradiction in conceiving of a perfect
equilibrium between assimilation and disassimilation, such that the
system would be maintained in immortal health. In any case, no one
has yet even gained a glimpse of the modes of realizing such an equi-
librium, and death continues, till further orders, a fixed law of Fate.
Still, though immortality for a complete organism seems chimerical,
perhaps it is not the same with the immortality of a separate organ in
the sense we now explain. We have already alluded to the experi-
ments of M. Paul Bert on animal-grafting. He has proved that, on
the head of a rat, certain organs of the same animal as the tail, for
instance may be grafted. And this physiologist asks himself the
question, whether it would not be possible, when a rat provided with
such an appendage draws near the close of his existence, to remove the
appendage from him, and transplant it to a young animal, which in his
turn would be deprived of the ornament in the same way in his old
age in favor of some specimen of a new generation, and so on in suc-
cession. This tail, transplanted in regular course to young animals,
and imbibing at each transference blood full of vitality, perpetually
renewed, yet ever remaining the same, would thus escape death. The
experiment, delicate and difficult, as we well see, was yet undertaken
by M. Bert, but circumstances did not allow it to be prolonged for any
considerable time, and the fact of the perpetuity of an organ, periodi-
cally rejuvenated, remains to be demonstrated.

III.

Real death, then, is characterized by the positive ceasing of vital
properties and functions both in the organic or vegetative life, and in
the animal life, properly so termed. When animal life disappears with-
out any interruption occurring in organic life, the system is in a state
of seeming death. In this state the body is possessed by profound
sleep quite similar to that of hibernating animals ; all the usual ex-
pressions and all signs of internal activity have disappeared, and give
place to invincible torpor. The most powerful chemical stimulants
exert no control over the organs, the walls of the chest are motionless ;
in short, seeing the body presenting this appearance, it is impossible
not to think of it as dead. There are quite numerous states of the or-

2 8o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ganisni which may thus imitate death more or less closely ; the com-
monest one is that of fainting. In this case neither sensation nor
movements of circulation or respiration are any longer perceptible ;
the warmth is lowered, the skin pallid and colorless. Instances of
hysteria are cited in which the attack has heen prolonged for several
days, attended with fainting. In this strange condition all physiologi-
cal manifestations remain suspended ; yet they are not, as it was long
supposed, suspended absolutely. M. Bouchest has proved that, in the
gravest cases of fainting, the pulsations of the heart continue, weaker
and rarer, and harder to be heard than in normal life, but clearly dis-
tinguishable when the ear is laid on the precordial region. On the
other hand, the muscles retain their suppleness and the limbs their
pliability.

Asphyxia, which properly is suspension of breathing, and conse-
quently of the blood's revivification, sometimes passes into a serious
fainting condition followed by seeming death, from which the sufferer
recovers after a period of varying length. This state may be induced
either by drowning or by inhaling a gas unfit for respiration, such as
carbonic acid in deep wells, emanations from latrines, or the choke-
damp of mines, or by suffocation. In 1650 a woman named Ann
Green was hanged at Oxford. She had been hanging for half an hour,
and several people, to shorten her suffering, had pulled her by the feet
with all their strength. After she was placed in her coffin it was ob-
served that she still breathed. The executioner's assistants attempted
to end her existence, but, thanks to the help of physicians, she came
back to life, and continued to live some time afterward. Drowning
occasions an equally deep insensibility, during which, very singularly,
the psychical faculties retain some degree of activity. Sailors, after
timely resuscitation from drowning, declare that, while under water,
they had returned in thought to their families, and sadly fancied the
grief about to be caused by their death. After a few minutes of phys-
ical rest, they suffered violent colic of the heart, which seemed to twist
itself about in their chests ; afterward this anguish was followed by
utter annihilation of consciousness. It is very difficult, moreover, to
determine how long apparent death may be protracted in an organism
under water. It varies greatly with temperaments.

In the islands of the Greek archipelago, where the business of gath-
ering sponges from the bottom of the sea is pursued, children are not
allowed to drink wine until, by practice, they have grown accustomed
to remain a certain time under water. Old divers of the archipelago
say that the time to return and take breath at the surface is indicated
to them by painful convulsions of the limbs, and very severe contrac-
tions in the region of the heart. This power of enduring asphyxia for
some time, and resisting by force of will the movements of respiration,
has been remarked under other circumstances. The case of a Hindoo
is mentioned, who used to creep into the palisaded enclosures used for

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF I) HATH. 281

bathing, in the Ganges, by the ladies of Calcutta, seize one of them
by the legs, drown her, and rob her of her rings. It was supposed
that a crocodile carried her off. One of his intended victims succeed-
ing in escaping, the assassin was seized and executed in 1817. He
confessed that he had practised the homble business for seven years.
Another instance is that of a spy, who, seeing preparations making for
his execution, endeavored to escape it by feigning death. He held his
breath, and suspended all voluntary motions for twelve hours, and en-
dured all the tests applied to him to put the reality of his death be-
yond doubt. Anaesthetics, too, like chloroform and ether, sometimes
produce stronger effects than the surgeons using them desire, and
occasion a state of seeming death instead of temporary insensibility.

It is easy to recall persons to life who are in a state of seeming
death ; it is only needful to stimulate powerfully the two mechanical
systems that are more or less completely suspended in action, namely
those of respiration and circulation. Such movements are communi-
cated to the frame of the chest, that the lungs are alternately com-
pressed and dilated. A sort of shampooing is applied over the whole
body, which restores the capillary circulation ; chemical stimulants,
such as ammonia or acetic acid, are brought under the patient's nos-
trils. This is the mode of treatmeut for drowned persons, whose con-
dition is brought on by ceasing to breathe the air, not by taking in too
much water. A very effective method in cases of apparent death,
caused by inhaling a poisonous gas, such as carbonic acid or sulphu-
retted hydrogen, consists in making the patient draw in large quanti-
ties of pure oxygen. And, again, it has very lately been proposed, as
Halle suggested without success early in this century, to adopt the use
of strong electric currents for stimulating movement in persons who
are in a state of syncope.

In all the cases of seeming death we have just mentioned, one mark
of vitality persistently remains, that is, pulsation of the heart. Its
throbs are less strong and frequent, but they continue perceptible on
auscultation. They are regularly discernible in the deepest fainting-
fits, in the various kinds of asphyxia, in poisonings by the most vio-
lent narcotics, in hysteria, in the torpor of epilepsy, in short, in
the most diverse and protracted states of lethargy and seeming
death.

Yet, this result, now a practical certainty, was unknown to physi-
cians of old, and it cannot be denied that, in former times, seeming
death was quite often mistaken for true death. The annals of science
have recorded a certain number of errors of this kind, many of which
have resulted in the interment of unfortunate wretches who were not
dead. And for one of these mistakes that chance has brought to light
either too late, or in time for the rescue, even then, of the victim, how
many are there, pai-ticularly in times of ignorance and carelessness,
that no one has ever known ! How many live men have only given

282 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONT ELY.

up their last breath after a vain struggle to break out of their coffin !
The facts collected by Bruhier and Lallemand in two works that have
become classic compose a most mournful and dramatic history. These
are some of its episodes, marked by the strange part that chance plays
in them. A rural guard, having no family, dies in a little village of
Lower Charente. Hardly grown cold, his body is taken out of bed,
and laid on a straw ticking covered with a coarse cloth. An old hired
woman is charged with the watch over the bed of death. At the foot
of the corpse were a branch of box, put into a vessel filled with holy
water, and a lighted taper. Toward midnight the old watcher, yield-
ing to the invincible need of sleep, fell into a deep slumber. Two
hours later she awoke surrounded by flames from a fire that had caught
her clothes. She rushed out, crying with all her might for help, and
the neighbors, running together at her screams, saw in a moment a
naked spectre issue from the hut, limping and hobbling on limbs cov-
ered with burns. "While the old woman slept, a spark had probably
dropped on the straw bed, and the fire it kindled had aroused both
the watcher from her sleep and the guard from his seeming death.
With timely assistance he recovered from his burns, and grew sound
and well again.

On the 15th of October, 1842, a farmer in the neighborhood of
Neufchatel, in the Lower Seine, climbed into a loft over his barn to
sleep, as he usually did, among the hay. Early the next day, his cus-
tomary hour of rising being past, his wife, wishing to know the cause
of his delay, went to look for him, and found him dead. At the time
of interment, more than twenty-four hours after, the bearers placed
the body in a coffin, which was closed, and carried it slowly down the
ladder by which they had gained the loft. Suddenly one of the rounds
of the ladder snapped, and the bearers fell together with the coffin,
which burst open with the shock. The accident, which might have
been fatal to a live man, was very serviceable to the dead one, who was
roused from his lethargy by the concussion, returned to life, and hast-
ened to get out of his shroud with the assistance of those of the by-
standers who had not been frightened away by his sudden resurrection.
An hour later he could recognize his friends, and felt no uneasiness
except a slight confusion in his head, and the next day was able to go
to work again. At about the same time a resident of Nantes gave up
life after a long illness. His heirs made arrangements for a grand
funeral, and, while the performance of a requiem was going on, the
dead man returned to life and stirred in the coffin, that stood in the
middle of the church. When carried home, he soon regained his
health. Some time afterward, the cur'e, not caring to be at the trouble
of the burial ceremonies for nothing, sent a bill to the ex-corpse, who
declined to pay it, and referred the cur'e to the heirs who had given
orders for the funeral. A lawsuit followed, with which the papers of
the day kept the public greatly amused. A few years ago Cardinal

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DEATH. 283

Donnet, in the Senate, told his own story of the circumstances under
which he narrowly escaped being buried alive.

Besides these instances of premature burial in which the victim
escaped the fearful consequences of the mistake made, others may be
cited in which the blunder was discovered only too late. Quite a
number of such cases are known, some of which are told with details
too romantic to entitle them to implicit belief, while, however, many
of them show unquestionable signs of authenticity. There long pre-
vailed a tradition, not easily traceable to any source, which attributed
the death of the Abbe Prevost to a mistake of this kind. All his
biographers relate that the famous author of " Manon Lescaut," falling
senseless from the effect of a rush of blood, in the heart of the forest
of Chantilly, was supposed to be dead ; that then the surgeon of the
village having made an incision into his stomach, by direction of the
magistrate, to ascertain the cause of death, Prevost uttered a cry, and
did then die in earnest. But it has since been proved that the story
is imaginary, and that it was made up after Prevost's death ; nor do
any of the necrological accounts published at the time refer it to the
consequences of a j)reniature autopsy. Though the account of Prevost
dissected alive seems doubtful, that is not the case with the story told
with regard to an operation by the famous accoucheur, Philip Small.
A woman, about to be confined, fell into a state of seeming death.
Small relates that when he was summoned to perform the Cesarean
operation, the by-standers, convinced that the woman was dead, urged
him to proceed with it. " I supposed so, too," he says, " for I felt no
pulse in the region of the heart, and a glass held over her face showed
no sign of respiration." Then he plunged his knife into the body, and
was cutting among the bleeding tissues, when the subject awoke from
her lethargy.

We cite some still more startling instances. Thirty years ago, a
resident of the village of Eymes, in Dordogne, had been suffering for
a long time from a chronic disorder of little consequence in itself, but
marked by the distressing symptom of constant wakefulness, which
forbade the patient any kind of rest. Worn out with this condition,
he consulted a doctor, who prescribed opium, advising great caution
in its use. The invalid, possessed with that common-enough notion
that the efficacy of a drug is proportioned to its quantity, took at one
time a dose sufficient for several days. He soon fell into a deep sleep,
which continued unbroken for more than twenty-four hours. The vil-
lage doctor, being summoned, finds the body without warmth, the pidse
extinct, and, on opening the veins of both arms in succession, obtains
but a few drops of thick blood. The day after, they prepared for his
burial. But, a few days later, closer inquiry revealed the imprudence
the poor wretch had committed in taking an excessive quantity of the
prescribed narcotic. The report spreading among the villagers, they
insist on his disinterment, which is allowed. Gathering in a crowd, at

284 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the cemetery, they take up the coffin, open it, and are met hy a horri-
ble sight. The miserable man had turned over in his coffin, the blood
gushing from the two opened veins had soaked the shroud ; his features
were frightfully contorted, and his convulsed limbs bore witness to the
cruel anguish that had preceded death. Most of the facts of this kind
are of rather remote date. The latest instances have happened in the
country, among an ignorant population, usually in neighborhoods where
no physician was called on to ascertain the decease, that is, to distin-
guish the cases of seeming death from those of true death.

How, then, can we certainly know apparent from real death ? There
is a certain number of positive signs of death ; that is to say, signs
which, when absolutely discerned, leave no room for mistake. Yet some
physicians, and many people who know nothing of science, are still so
doubtful about the certainty of these signs as to wish that physiology
could detect others of a more positive character. A zealous philanthro-
pist, quite lately, gave a sum for a prize of twenty thousand francs to
the discoverer of an infallible sign of death. Doubtless, the intention is
excellent, but we are safe henceforward in regarding the sexton's work
without alarm ; the signs already known are clear enough to prevent
any mistake, and to make the fatal risk of premature burial impossible.

We must point out, in the first place, the immediate signs of death.
The first, and the most decisive, is the absolute stoppage of the heart's
pulsations, noted for a duration of at least five minutes, not by the
touch, but by the ear. " Death is certain," says the reporter of the
commission named in 1848, by the Academy of Sciences, to award the
prize of competition as to the signs of true death, " when positive ces-
sation of pulsations of the heart in the subject has been ascertained,
which is immediately followed, if it has not been preceded, by cessa-
tion of respiration, and of the functions of sensation and motion." The
remote signs equally deserve attention. Of these, three are recognized :
corpse-like rigidity, resistance to the action of galvanic currents, and
putrefaction. As we have already seen, rigidity does not begin till
several hours after death, while general and complete disappearance
of muscular contractility, under the stimulus of currents, and, last of
all, putrefaction, are only manifest at a still later period. These remote
signs, particularly the last, have this advantage, that they may be
ascertained by those unacquainted with medicine, and it is very well
to pay some attention to them in countries where physicians are not
charged with the verification of the disease, but they are of no impor-
tance wherever there are doctors to examine the heart with instruments,
and to decide promptly and surely upon the death, from the complete
stoppage of pulsation in that organ. At the beginning of the century,
Hufeland, and several other physicians, convinced that all the signs of
death then known were uncertain, except putrefaction, proposed and
obtained, in Germany, the establishment of a certain number of mor-
tuary houses, intended to receive, and keep for some time, the bodies

THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DEATH. 285

of deceased persons. During the whole existence of these establish-
ments, not one of the bodies transported into those asylums has been
known to return to life, as the authentic declarations of the attendant
doctors agree. The usefulness of such mortuary houses is still more
questionable in our time, when we have a positive and certain means
of recognizing real death. Those police regulations that forbid autop-
sies and interments until the full term of delay for twenty-four hours,
measured from the declaration of death, still remain prudent pre-
cautions, but they do not lessen at all the certainty of that evidence
furnished by the stopping of the heart. When the heart has definitely
ceased to beat, then resurrection is no longer possible, and the life
which deserts it is preparing to enter upon a new cycle.

Hamlet, in his famous soliloquy, speaks of "that undiscovered
country from whose bourn no traveller returns," and mournfully asks,
what must be the dreams of the man to whom death has opened the
portals of those gloomy regions. We can give no clearer answer, in
the name of physiology, than Shakespeare's prince gives. Physiology
is dumb as to the destiny of the soul after death ; of that it teaches,
and it can teach us, nothing. It is plain, and it would be childish to
deny it, that any psychical or sentient manifestation, and any concrete
representation of the personality, are impossible after death. The dis-
solution of the organism annihilates surely, and of necessity, the func-
tions of sensation, motion, and will, which are inseparable from a cer-
tain combination of material conditions, We can feel, move, and will,
only so far as we have organs for reception, transmission, and execu-
tion. These assurances of science are above discussion, and should be
accepted without reserve. Do they tell us any thing of the destiny of
the psychical principles themselves ? Again we say, No, and for the
very simple reason that science does not attain to those principles ;
but metaphysics, which does attain to them, authorizes us, nay, further,
compels us to believe that they are immortal. They are immortal, as
the principles of motion, the principles of perception, all the active
unities of the world, are immortal. What is the general characteristic
of those unities ? It is that of being simple, which means being inde-
structible, which means being in harmonious mutual connection, after
such a manner that each one of them perceives the infinite order of the
other. If this connection did not exist, there would be no world.
What is the characteristic of the psychical unities more especially ? It
is that of having, besides the consciousness of such perception, the
feeling also of the relations that bind the whole together, and those
faculties, more or less developed, which that consciousness and that
perception imply. But why should these unities be any more perish-
able than the others ? Why, if all these forces, all these activities, are
eternal, should those alone not possess eternity which have this high
privilege, that of knowing the infinite relations which the others sus-
tain without knowing that they do so ?

286 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

To form a conception of the immortality of the soul, then, we must
place ourselves at that point of view to which men rarely and hardly
rise, of the simplicity and the indefectibility of all those principles of
force that fill the universe. We must train ourselves to understand
that what we see is nothing in comparison with what we do not see.
The whole force, the whole spring, of the most complex movements,
the most magnificent phenomena of Nature, and the most subtle opera-
tions of life, thought included, proceed from the infinite commingling
of an infinity of series of invisible and unextended principles, whose
activities ascend in the scale of perfection from simple power of move-
ment up to supreme reason. Human personality, such as we see and
know it, is only a coarse and complex result from those of these primi-
tive activities which are the best and deepest thing in us. It is not
that personality which is immortal that is no more immortal than
the motive force of a steam-engine is, or the electricity of a voltaic
battery, although movement and electricity are of themselves inde-
structible. It is not that personality which can aspire to a home in
the bosom of God. Our true personality, our real J, that which may
without illusion count on a future life, is unity released from every
material bond, and all concrete alloy; it is that force, necessarily pure,
which has a more or less clear consciousness of its own relations with
the infinity of like unities, and which more or less draws near to them
by thought and by love. It is beyond our power to conceive what
will become of that unity when, quitting its prison of flesh, and soaring
into the ideal ether, it will no longer have organs with which to act ;
but what we can affirm is that, precisely by reason of this freedom, it
will rise to a clearer knowledge of all that it had only known obscurely,
and to a purer love of what it had adored only through the veil of
sense. And this certainty, which is the ennobling and elevating force
of life, is also the consolation for death. Revue cles Deux Jfondes.

---

NATURE AND ORIGIN OF TOE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF

THE NORTHWEST.

By Prof. N. H. WINCHELL,

STATE GEOLOGIST OF MINNESOTA.

II. Origin of the Drift.

THE first records of exact observations pertaining to the drift seem
to have been made in the first quarter of the present century,
and are wholly confined to the appearances and positions of the bowl-
ders, or "travelled rocks," that constitute a striking object to the sci-
entific observer throughout the northern portions of Europe and
America. In 1819 the memoirs of the Wernerian Society of Edinburgh

THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 287

announced the transportation by ice of a large piece of conglomerate
4x6x8 feet a distance of 260 yards in one night. It was deposited
in the sands on the shores of a little bay on the Mersey Firth.

A similar account is published in the American Journal of Science
and Arts, 1822, as occurring at Salisbury, Connecticut.

After the year 1820, exact observations were stimulated in this
country by the publication of the American Journal of Science and
Arts, which from time to time called attention to the various phe-
nomena of the drift. The earliest investigations of note were made
by De Saussure, Pallas, and De Luc, on the Continent of Europe, and
by Sir James Hall in Scotland. These observers coincided in the
opinion that the existence of the " travelled rocks " must be explained
by the occurrence of devastating currents of water, or d'ebdcles, from
the north, which transported them from their original places. This
theory was advocated, sometimes with slight modifications, by the re-
vered Dr. Edward Hitchcock, of Massachusetts; by Dr. Benjamin
Silliman, of Connecticut ; by Dr. Hildreth, of Ohio ; Lapham, of Wis-
consin ; J. N. Nicollet, of Minnesota ; and by Von Buch, Studer,
Buckland, and De la Beche, of Europe. Von Buch, seeing that one
debacle, proposed by De Saussure, would not account for all the phe-
nomena, supposed there were several. De la Beche believed this vast
inundation from the north was the immediate result of a sudden up-
heaval of the polar regions, turning the waters of the Arctic Ocean
southward with great violence. This cause was also accepted by Prof.
Buckland and Dr. Silliman. This theory is the same as that known as
diluvion. Hence the groovmgs on the rocks were first known as di-
luvial marks.

Contemporary with the debacle theory was that of Chabrier, who
believed the bowlders came from the atmosphere. This theory seems
not to have met with very much countenance, and soon ceased to be
regarded.

In 1828 Peter Dobson, of Connecticut, proposed the germ of what
became an important and long-lived theory, viz., that floating ice, in
the form of vast sheets, carried great quantities of gravel and stones,
and distributed them wherever they were stranded. This suggestion,
aided by the quick indorsement of Sir R. I. Murchison, grew into that
known as the iceberg theory, which survives to the present day. This
last necessitates the submergence of the continent beneath the quiet
waters of the ocean, and here diverges from the debdcle theory which
requires turbulent waters. The iceberg theory received many prom-
inent and able advocates. Among them may be named Sir Charles
Lyell, Sir Roderick I. Murchison, Peter Dobson, John L. Hays, C. T.
Jackson, Sedgwick, of England; W. C. Redfield, of New England;
Prof. Mather, of Ohio ; Dawson, of Canada ; and a great many others.

Before, however, the iceberg theory had grown into prominence,
Mr. De Kay, of New York, proposed another, which at least has the

288 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

advantage of allowing the continent to stand still instead of sinking it
several thousand feet below the ocean-level.

Mr. De Kay claimed that the bowlders originated at or near the
places in which they now lie , that they are the remains of ancient
peaks of primitive rock that have since been demolished by earth-
quakes and by atmospheric forces, the sites covered by detritus, and
concealed from the observer. This was announced in 1828, but it
made no headway, probably from the fact that these bowlders lie on
the surface not only where primitive rocks abound, but also overbroad
areas where the primitive rocks are buried thousands of feet below
later sedimentary formations, such formations being intact over the
whole area.

In 1837 Prof. Louis Agassiz propounded that theory known as the
glacier theory in a paper read before the Helvetic Society of Natural
History in his native country, Switzerland. It is thus concisely stated
by Mr. Charles McLaren : " It was deduced from a careful study of
the phenomena attending glaciers. . . . The Swiss philosopher ad-
vanced step by step. He satisfied himself that in the Alpine valleys,
where glaciers still exist, they once rose to a higher level, and ex-
tended farther down into the low country than they now do. Next he
discovered indications of their former existence on Mont Jura and over
the whole Swiss valley ; and, connecting these with similar indications
found in the Vosges, the Scandinavian mountains, and elsewhere, and
with the well-known fact of sheets of ice covering the northern shores of
Siberia, and entombing the remains of extinct species of animals, he came
to the conclusion that, at a period, geologically speaking, very recent,
all the Old World north of the 35th or 36th parallel had been enveloped
in a crust of ice. Whence the cold came which produced this effect,
and why it afterward disappeared, are questions he did not feel him-
self bound to answer." This theory had been suggested before by
Venetz, but had been applied by him only to the region of the Alps.
Prof. Agassiz afterward more fully worked out his theory, giving facts,
and careful measurements, and calculations, in his famous work entitled
" Etudes sur les Glaciers."

Prof. Agassiz supposes that the eastern Alps were upheaved when
the coating of ice was on the surface, this being the last cataclysm
that has visited Europe. By this upheaval of the Alps the ice was
disturbed, like the rocky formations. This was accompanied or fol-
lowed by a higher temperature, and the thawing of the ice, which pro-
duced torrents and consequent valleys of erosion. The floods which
followed the upheaval of the Alps were sufficient to float icebergs con-
taining blocks of rock that might be deposited in different places, the
water being at least 300 feet deep, and the agent that carried and de-
posited the fine drift in the valleys below. The catastrophe which en-
veloped the northern regions in ice was sudden, according to Prof.
Agassiz, but the retreat of the glacier was slow.

THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 289

This theory, so novel, so startling, met with various acceptance.
By some it was loudly scouted as the product of the imagination solely ;
and was classed by Prof. B. Studer, a savant of the Continent of Eu-
rope, with the poetical Indian legends, wherein the periods of heat and
life are made to alternate with periods of freezing and death. But its
force lay in the inherent evidence of candor, and honesty in the state-
ment of facts about which there could be no dispute. By the most
enlightened geologists, both of the Old World and the New, it was re-
ceived as a flood of light cast on what had befox - e been dark and un-
explained ; and it was accepted with some caution and exceptions by
such men as Prof. Buckland, Sir Charles Lyell, and Prof. Edward
Hitchcock. At the present day but few geologists can be found in
this country who do not admit the reality of the glacial epoch.

But, while it is true that but few geologists can be found in this
country who do not admit the truth of the glacier theory of Prof.
Agassiz, it is also true that a great many, perhaps the majority, also
adhere to the iceberg theory of Peter Dobson. The two theories at
first came in violent conflict. They diverged at the outset. One re-
quired the continent below the ocean, and the transportation of bowl-
ders and other drift by floating ice ; the other required it elevated
high above the ocean, and the transportation of the drift by ice in the
form of continental glaciers. How, then, can the same person hold to
both theories ?

Soon after the promulgation of the glacier theory by Prof. Louis
Agassiz, Mr. Charles McLaren attempted to make it harmonize with
the iceberg theory. He was seconded in the effort by Prof. Edward
Hitchcock, who invented the term aqueo-glacial, to express the force,
or forces, that operated to disperse the materials of the drift. In ex-
plaining the meaning of that term, he says, however, he cannot admit
the glacier theory of Prof. Agassiz, and apply it unqualifiedly to this
country ; but, while acknowledging himself greatly indebted to Agas-
siz, he thinks that icebergs were the principal agents in transporting
the drift. In the years 1841 and 1842 Sir Charles Lyell visited this
country. His observations on the drift, published in various scientific
journals, and repeated in his book of " Travels in North America," in
1845, furnish the basis for the most plausible union of these two
theories. He divides the drift epoch into four parts :

1. The period of emergence of the land, during which some of the
bold, rocky escarpments of the continent were formed.

2. A gradual subsidence and moderate submergence of the interior
portions of the continent, during which icebergs floated over the sur-
face of the ocean, grinding and marking the rocks.

3. The deposition of the clay, gravel, and sand, of the drift, with
occasional fragments of rock, the last through floating ice.

4. Period of reelevation and formation of lake-terraces.
Although not professedly aiming to reconcile the iceberg theory

VOL. III. 19

2 9 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

with the glacier theory of M. Agassiz, Mr. Lyell's eminent authority
would not permit the total extinguishment of the iceberg theory, and
his generalizations have, perhaps, had more influence in directing the
efforts of others in such reconciliation than the writings of any other
man. It required but very slight changes in Mr. Lyell's method of
dividing the history of the drift to evolve, in its present aspect, the
latest theory of geologists touching the origin of the drift-deposits.
Mr. Murchison, of England, coincides with Mr. Lyell in the sub-
mergence, or iceberg theory. Mr. J. D. Dana advocates the glacier
theory in its fullest extent ; but, although adopting also the term
Champlain, he is far from admitting the recent enlargement of that
epoch, so as to bring the continent beneath the water of the ocean as
required by the supporters of the combination theory.

Professors E. W. Hilgard, of Mississippi, and J. S. Newberry, of
Ohio, are among the most prominent advocates in this country of this
new theory, resulting from the combination of the glacier and the ice-
berg theories. Dr. A. Winchell, of New York, also advocates the same.
It is as follows :

First. The glacier epoch proper.

During this epoch the continent was considerably elevated above
its present level, especially in the north. This either produced, or was
accompanied by, a greater degree of cold, the effect of which was to
bring over the continent the vast sheets of ice in the form of con-
tinental glaciers, required by the hypothesis of Prof. Agassiz. During
this epoch the rocks were scored, and many deep valleys were exca-
vated. Large bowlders were transported to regions farther south.

Second. The submergence of the continent, attended by an ame-
lioration of the climate and the disappearance of the glaciers, or their
retreat to the far north. The assortment and stratification of the drift,
produced by the glaciers, and the deposition of the great mass known
as Erie clay, and other clayey portions of the drift-sheet. This con-
dition of the continent was attended by the appearance of numerous
icebergs which floated over the submerged land, and aided to trans-
port the coarse drift, according to the hypothesis of Peter Dobson.

Third. The emergence of the continent with a halting progress, pro-
ducing terraces and ridges marking the ancient levels of the ocean.

These three steps have been named by Prof. Dana, in their order,
the Glacial Epoch, the Champlain Epoch, and the Terrace Epoch.

The studies of Professors Agassiz and Tyndall on the glaciers of
the Alps, and of Dr. Kane on those of Greenland, have so fully demon-
strated the adequacy of glaciers to produce all the effects attributed
to them by the theory of Agassiz, that it is now very generally ad-
mitted that, wherever those phenomena are seen, glaciers must have
existed.

Geology, having demonstrated thus the necessity for a period of
cold, to account for the phenomena of the surface of the earth,, labored

THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 291

under the difficult task of accounting for such change of climate on
philosophical principles. It is here that the community of the sciences
is beautifully illustrated. Astronomy comes to the aid of her younger
sister, and Geology receives from her the solution she could not her-
self compass.

Astronomy makes known three great irregularities in the motions
of the earth, requiring thousands of years each for their recurrence.
They are

1. The "precession of the equinoxes," combined with the revolu-
tion of the line of the apsides, produces a progression in longitude, of
the aphelion place of the earth, bringing about a coincidence of the
winter-solstice with the aphelion once in 21,356 years. At the present
time our aphelion position occurs in the summer season.

2. Variation of the inclination of the earth's axis to the plane of
its orbit. This passes through a double oscillation in about ten thou-
sand years. Its effect is to carry the solstitial point through a small
variation in latitude, and to that extent prolonging or withdrawing the
influence of the sun's rays in the polar regions.

3. Change in the eccentricity of the earth's orbit. This irregu-
larity passes from maximum to maximum once in about one hundred
thousand years. Its effect is to lengthen those seasons nearest the
earth's aphelion, and to shorten those nearest its perihelion. At the
present time, our aphelion, occurring in the summer season, lengthens
the warm months to that amount that, combined with the shortening
effect of perihelion in winter, makes a difference of about eight days
between the summer and winter months of the year.

The conditions favorable for polar glaciation are as follows :

1. Winter-solstice in aphelion.

2. Obliquity of the ecliptic at rnininmm.

3. Eccentricity of orbit in maximum.

The coincidence of these three causes would produce the greatest
glaciation. The least multiple of their periods of recurrence is about
forty-two million years. The second cause may combine a great many
times with either of the others within that interval. Its effect being
quite inferior to that of either of the other two, it may be disregarded,
and the time required for the combination of the other two would
then be 4,200,000 years, which would necessarily be preceded and fol-
lowed by a number of approximations. These would occasion corre-
sponding periods of increase and diminution in the degree of cold that
would not reach the maximum cold incident to their coincidence.
Probably the most powerful of the causes enumerated is the occur-
rence of the winter-solstice in aphelion, which alone may have pro-
duced the last glacial epoch. In that case changes in the prevalence
of the ice would be due to the operation of cause No. 2, or the ob-
liquity of the ecliptic. The earth is now 622 years past its period of
south-polar glaciation in the operation of cause No. 1, and is entering

z 9 2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

upon its period of north-polar glaciation. Its last glacial epoch in the
operation of this cause occurred in the Northern Hemisphere in its
acme of intensity at a period 11,300 years ago.

The effect of these irregularities in the motions of the earth on the
climate has been ably discussed by Mr. James Croll, of the Geological
Survey of Scotland (" Transactions of the Geological Society of Glas-
gow," vol. ii., part iii., p. 1V7), and detailed calculations on the perio-
dicity of these variations have been made by Mr. Stockwell, of Cleve-
land, Ohio.

Let us endeavor to picture the recurrence of one of these coinci-
dences, and to rehearse some of the phenomena of an actual period
of continental ice.

The precipitation of the winter season is all preserved on the
ground in the form of snow and ice. It constitutes what has been de-
nominated neve. The advent of the summer season is not powerful
enough to melt the accumulations of the long winter. The neve is
simply converted into granulated ice. Another winter adds to the
thickness left by the preceding. Another summer changes it to ice.
Some water may be the result, but it is congealed in the streams, or
perhaps escapes to the ocean. This succession is continued, with a
slow increment of cold, through thousands of years. The ice-mantle
becomes continental in its extent. Its thickness reaches hundreds of
feet. Toward the pole this may be increased to thousands or tens of
thousands. It has a great weight. It presses upon itself. Its lower
portions yield to the inequalities of the rocky surface. The mass seeks
the valleys. It slides down the mountain-sides, carrying the debris
which it detaches in its descent. It covers the broad plains. The ac-
cumulations toward the north, ever increasing, press out toward the
south, the foot of the ice-sheet. A general movement is developed by
reason of the gravity of the mass, the fracturing and regelation of
its parts, and the molecular forces that allow it to yield under pressure.
Each recurring summer develops more or less water. This water per-
haps enters the openings and crevasses, and washes out some of the
obstructions, facilitating the general progress. The main water-sheds
separating valleys serve also as ice-sheds. The valleys are more rapidly
dug out by the rasping and ploughing movement of the glacier than
are the highlands. In the valleys the ice flows most rapidly. In the
valleys, also, the ice is prolonged much farther into warmer latitudes
than on the highlands. Southward, prolongations of the ice-sheet fol-
low the north-south outcropping edges of argillaceous formations.
Lake Michigan lies in one of these troughs. Lake Huron lies in an-
other. Lakes Erie and Ontario are only shallow basins dug out of
soft rocks by ice that passed southwestwardly. The shale-bed that
gave rise to Lake Ontario also determined the location of Georgian
Bay and of Green Bay. The basin of Lake Erie is much shallower
toward the west end than toward the east, and it finally runs out alto-

THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 293

gether by reason of the westward attenuation, and finally the entire
disappearance of the salina formation in which it is largely excavated.
The ice was then thrust up on to harder rocks that form the basis of
Northwestern Ohio and Northeastern Indiana. Lake Michigan was
terminated southwardly by the eastward trend of the rocky outcrops
at an angle that the ice could not follow. The Red-River flats of Min-
nesota correspond to the Winnipeg basin in the same way that the
Black-Swamp district of Ohio does to the Lake-Erie basin, or the
prairie district surrounding the southern end of Lake Michigan does
to the basin of that lake.

It must be remembered, however, that throughout the continuance
of the ice-period the motion of the ice brought it finally into a climate
where it could not exist as ice. It gave rise to countless streams of
water. The broad, level country of the Northwest was not sufficiently
irregular to gather the ice, and consequently not the water, into val-
leys having a north-south direction. The water from the ice acted all
along the ice-foot with a comparatively uniform energy. If it was ul-
timately gathered into large streams, it must have been at considerable
distances from the glacial field. It must be remembered also that the
accumulated precipitation of the entire year over broad, continental
areas was preserved from thaw till it arrived at the latitude of the
limitation of the glacier, and there its full volume was discharged. It
was as if the entire precipitation of the continent say from the lati-
tude of Chicago to the north-pole were concentrated on a belt of ter-
ritory, say of fifty miles in width, running east and west across the
continent, and having the direction of the marginal line of the ice-
foot. Thus a constant sheet of turbid, running water would act on all
objects over which the ice-foot retreated.

We must not forget, in recalling to our imagination the scenes and
events of the ice-period, to inquire what were the position and the con-
dition of the drift to which it gave origin.

In regions far to the north, the eye probably would not be able to
discern any object except that of the universal ice. The surface of
the ground would be thousands of feet below the traveller, if we may
be permitted to presume so hardy a human being. Like Dr. Kane ex-
ploring the great Humboldt Glacier of Greenland, he would meet with
countless obstacles and dangers. But those obstacles would consist
of hummocky ice, or crevassed ice, or perpendicular ice-walls. He
would see no soil, no rocks, no vegetation, no animal life. The winds
would whistle, storms would rage, snow would be drifted about, and
the ineffectual sun would rarely venture to smile on the dreary waste.
Farther to the south, the explorer would find isolated spots of bare
ground. He would see about them the accumulated debris of bowl-
ders, gravel, and dust, from constant winds, spread more or less over
the ice-field, staining its painful whiteness, and showing the more grate-
ful aspect of earth and stones. Another hundred miles farther south,

294 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

and he finds the evidences of the dissolution of the ice-sheet multiply-
ing. Occasional streams of water run on the surface of the ice, or
plunge into some of its openings. Deep gorges reveal multitudes of
fragments of rock frozen into the ice, and occasional bands of dirt and
gravel embraced in the solid ice. The surface is everywhere dirty, or
perhaps muddy, from the wasting away of the surface of the glacier.
He meets frequent openings, in which generally water may be seen or
heard. Into these gorges the debris slides down the sloping sides, in-
creasing the insecurity of his footsteps. Still farther south, the gen-
eral surface is covered with a pulpy earth, mingled with stones and
bowlders. The ice is evidently much attenuated. The areas of firm,
uncovered terra firma are wonderfully increased in size and frequency.
The ice itself is crowded into the valleys, or, if it be in a broad, level
tract, like the State of Minnesota, the surface is covered with the
debris of the conflict of ice with earth, the ice itself being visible only
in those places where crevasses reveal it, or where deep gorges are
worn by running streams. Travelling still farther south, the explorer
would come upon large areas in which he would not be able to know
whether the glacier underlay the superficial drift or not. If he were
to stop on one of those wide areas, and make his latitude and longi-
tude certain, by a series of astronomical observations, he might find to
his surprise, after a few years' residence, that his observatory and ap-
paratus had been bodily carried, by an imperceptible motion, some rods
to the south. If he were to penetrate the earth on which his foothold
seems so steadfast, he might find, equally to his surprise, that he was
still riding on the surface of a vast ice-sheet, the earth and soil of
which may have furnished him annual crops of potatoes and barley.
In other places in the same latitude he would find the ice laid pare
over considerable areas, washed clean by the drainage incident to the
dissolution of the glacier. The turbid streams would be vastly larger
than those which occupy the same beds to-day. They would run with
tenfold more violence. The drift-materials would be freed from the
clayey portions, and be spread along their channels in curious and
varying assortment. In some places the thickness of the whole sheet
of drift would be brought under this washing and stratifying process.
In others, the ice gently dies out, and lets it down on the rocky surface
without any change from the condition in which it lay on the glacier.
If, at last, the explorer travels far enough south to actually leave
the area of the glacier, what is the condition of the surface ? It is
plainly one of glacier-drift. In some places he will find the various
parts, such as gravel-stones, sand, clay, and bowlders, confusedly min-
gled, showing no assortment or stratification. The clay which has re-
sulted from the grinding action of the glacier on the surface on which
it lay, from dust blown over the ice by violent winds, as in the Alps,
and from the sediment washed on the ice from the higher knobs that
first became uncovered, fills all the interstices so closely as to make of

THE DRIFT-DEPOSITS OF THE NORTHWEST. 295

the mass an impervious and uniform hard-pan. This has generally-
been denominated " unmodified drift." It is that which escaped the
assorting action of the water issuing from the glacier. In other places,
this unmodified drift would be superficially assorted, showing the effect
of running water after its deposition or in the act of deposition. Prob-
ably very much of that portion of the drift that lay in the course of
the broad Mississippi, yet south of the limit of the glacier, would be
superficially worked over, losing much of its clay. We actually see
vast tracts on the Upper Mississippi, and even in the latitude of St.
Paul, in which the surface consists, to a considerable depth, principally
of stratified, sand and gravel. He would also find parallel ridges of
drift-materials, consisting largely of the coarser portions, and showing
stratification where water passed over or through it in being deposited.
Some such ridges would still retain the most or all of the original
clayey portions. This would be the case where the drainage was not
powerful. Such ridges mark the places at which the retreat of the ice
was temporarily stopped by a period of greater cold, the slow advan-
cing of the ice under the propulsive forces already named serving to
heap up a greater amount of detritus all along the ice-margin. These
ridges are known as moraines, and they occur in all parts of the drift-
latitudes. They are developed on a very grand scale in Northwestern
Ohio.

There is still one important point in this discussion that must not
be omitted. It is plain to see that, in some parts of the Northwest,
the advance of the continental glacier would be up gentle slopes, in-
stead of descending an incline. These slopes, of course, present ob-
structions to the movement of the ice in those directions. It is true,
also, that the continental glacier would tend to level the country and
obliterate such northward slopes. But, in the later part of the ice
period, the valleys would be the last relinquished, and would be deeper
dug by isolated branches or spurs from the main ice-sheet, which would
conform in their direction to the contour of the valleys they might oc-
cupy. All glaciers, however, whether continental or local, would avoid
an ascent if there were any other passage. Now, when a glacier, pro-
pelled by a force exerted far to the north, meets with a gentle slope
toward the north, the water which issues from its foot Will be con-
fined in a lake about the foot of the ice, and will rise to the height of
the lowest outlet. Into this lake may flow streams of considerable
size, bringing their sediment from the south, east, or west, according
to the topography. Here we should have, then, a constant accession
of drift from two sources, the chief of which would be, of course, the
glacier itself. As this drift is brought under the influence of standing
water, its fine parts are floated away by currents and waves, to be
spread over the bottom of the lake in horizontal laminations, the prin-
cipal portion, and notably the bowlders, sinking at once to the bottom
unassorted. Thus, by the continued slow withdrawal of the field of

296 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

ice, the result is a layer of unassorted drift overlaid by a thickness of
handsomely-laminated fine clay and sand. This combination of cir-
cumstances must have occurred south of Lakes Erie and Huron, pro-
ducing the Black Swamp and the Cottonwood Swamp in Ohio and
Michigan, about the south end of Lake Michigan, and over an exten-
sive fiat south of the Winnipeg basin.

All the phenomena of the drift in the Northwest are, heuce, at-
tributable to the approach, long duration, and slow disappearance of
the glacier-ice of Prof. L. Agassiz. It certainly seems unwarrantable
to propose upward and downward movements of the crust, involving
the submergence of the continent, when one simpler cause can be
shown sufficient to produce the known effects. The submergence of
the New-England coast to the depth of about seventy feet is all that
Prof. J. D. Dana finds warranted by a vigorous inspection of the drift-
deposits about New Haven, Connecticut. The four-hundred-foot
" beach," near Montreal, may have the same origin as the so-called
" beaches " that rise several hundred feet higher in the State of Ohio.
The Champlain and Terrace Epochs find no application to the drift in
the Northwest, as those terms are defined and used in the East. There
is abundant evidence throughout the West of a former higher stage
of the rivers. This higher stage may, however, be explained by re-
ferring it to the large increase of water incident to the melting of the
glacier only after reaching the latitude of a warmer climate. The ter-
races have not, moreover, in the Northwest, generally that system or
uniformity of height and arrangement necessary to warrant their ref-
erence to successive reductions in the volume of water, but are usually
due to a variable resistance offered by the banks or rocks in which
they occur, arising from their stratification.

No well-authenticated fossil remains from the hard-pan drift have
yet been met with. Statements have been published of the finding of
fossil remains in the unmodified drift in various parts of the Northwest,
but they are generally based on the reports of non-scientific observers,
and must be taken with great caution, unless verified by a geologist
who has definite ideas of what " modified " or " unmodified " drift is.
It would not be improbable that, near the southern margin of the ice-
field, the remains of vegetation, and even of animals, should be in-
volved in the drift undergoing transportation, but their structures are
too fragile to withstand the grinding incident to the general progress
of the ice, and would not bear transportation from northern latitudes.
Much uncertainty is also thrown on the true age of vegetable remains
reported from the drift in the Northwest, by the wide-spread but hardly
distinguishable clays of the Tertiary and Cretaceous formations, which
contain modern species of wood and leaves, associated with marine
fossils.

Believing, therefore, in the glacier origin, directly, of the Post-Ter-
tiary deposits of the Northwest, it is impossible to concur in the suppo-

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL. 297

sition recently expressed by an eminent authority relative to the prob-
able blending of those deposits with the marine deposits of the Tertiary :
" A careful study of these modern deposits " (meaning the Quaternary)
" will undoubtedly show consecutive links by w T hich it was united to
the Tertiary period, in the same manner as the Cretaceous and Tertiary
are connected." ' It is difficult to conceive how the sedimentary de-
posits of an epoch of submergence, like the Tertiary, which abound in
marine fossils, can show, however carefully studied, consecutive links
of connection with an epoch of debris transported and deposited
through the agency of vast continental glaciers.

St. Anthony, Minnesota, March, 1873.

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL.

By Captain DOUGLAS GALTON, C.B., F. E. S.

II.

THE question of saving fuel for cooking purposes is even more im-
portant than economy in warming ; because cooking is an opera-
tion required every day in the year, and the waste of fuel in cooking
is even more considerable than in warming.

An ordinary cooking-range in houses, which, for convenience, may
be designated middle-class houses, is derived from the time when the
same fire was used for cooking and for warming. It is interesting to
consider Count Rumford's remarks on this question. He largely de-
veloped the use of steam for cooking in large establishments, but, in
considering private kitchens, he showed that nine-tenths of the heat
produced in cooking operations were wasted, and only one-tenth utilized
in cooking, by the use of open fireplaces. He laid down the following
principles on fireplace construction :

1. Each fireplace should have its grate on which the fuel must be
placed, and its separate ash-pit, which must be closed by a door well
fitted in its frame and furnished with a register for regulating the
quantity of air admitted into the fireplace through the grate. It
should also have its separate canal for carrying off the smoke into the
chimney, whicji canal should be furnished with a damper or register.
By means of this damper and of the ash-pit door, the rapidity of com-
bustion and generation of heat is regulated, and on the proper use of
the two registers the economy of fuel will much depend.

3. In fireplaces for all boilers which are too heavy to be easily
lifted with the hand, an opening just above the level of the grate
should be made for introducing fuel to the fire, which opening must

1 Prof. F. V. Hayden, in " Geology of Wyoming."

298 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

be closed by a close-fitting stopper or door. In fireplaces constructed
for small stew-pans this opening may be omitted, and the fuel be
introduced through the opening into which the stew-pan is fitted, by
removing the stew-pan occasionally for the purpose.

4. All portable stew-pans should be circular, and suspended in their
fireplace from the circular rim. The best form for large fixed boilers
is an oblong square, broad and shallow rather than narrow, and deep,
and it should be of thin metal.

5. All boilers and stew-pans should be fitted with covers to render
them well adapted for confining the heat. The best arrangement is to
make the covers of thin sheets of tinned iron, and double, that is, with
an air space between the outer and inner cover.

We have, during the last twenty years, introduced, as a rule, close
ranges. They are certainly cleaner and more convenient for cooking,
and, if great care is exercised in the use of the dampers, they will be
found more economical than open fires. But, as a rule, they are based
on the principle of making one fire perform a variety of operations.
Independently of the question of a combined fire, as compared with
the separate fires advocated by Count Rumford, a consideration of the
form of modern kitchen-ranges will show that most of the principles
laid down by him have been entirely neglected. The doors of the
fireplace and ash-pit seldom fit close ; the boilers are rather deep and
narrow than broad and shallow ; the use of the hot-plate prevents the
stew-pans from being suspended from the rims for the fire to play
round them; the use of double covers for saucepans and boilers is
rather a rarity than a usual arrangement.

To realize the question of economy of fuel, it is necessary to con-
sider, in the first place, what a given quantity of fuel is capable of
doing. As regards hot water, if water is kept at a temperature of
200, or from that to 210, the gases from the fire can, after communi-
cating the heat to the boiler, pass off into the chimney at a tempera-
ture of little beyond that point ; but, if the water be allowed to boil,
in the first place a large amount of latent heat is absorbed by the
steam, which is lost if the steam passes off into the air or the chimney,
and, in the second place, it will be found that the gases, after they
pass off from the boiler, will have a temperature of as much as 300,
400, and even 500. Unless, therefore, water is required to be actu-
ally boiling for use, if the water is permitted to boil, a great quantity
of heat is wasted up the chimney. For household purposes it is never
necessary that the water in the boiler should exceed 200. Tea, to be
good, should be made (as clearly shown by Mr. Francis Galton in his
"Art of Travel") with water of a temperature of from 180 to 200.
Very few culinary operations require the water really to boil, and,
when boiling water is wanted, it is required in a saucepan standing on
the fire. All operations of cleaning, etc. (except washing clothes),
require water at a very much lower temperature than 212. If, however,

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL. 299

water at a higher temperature is wanted, it can be supplied up to about
230 without the generation of steam, by heating it under pressure ; this
can be attained by having a close boiler fed from a cistern placed at
the top of the house. For the preparation of preserves and some
other cooking operations, such a system is most convenient.

One pound of coal should raise from fifty to sixty gallons of water
from 45 to 212, and, when raised, very little fuel is required to main-
tain it, in a properly-constructed boiler, at that temperature. The
total amount of water, at such a temperature, used daily, in an ordi-
nary middle-class house, does not exceed thirty or forty gallons, and,
therefore, if the boiler were made so as to absorb as much heat as pos-
sible, the hot water used in an ordinary middle-class house, with a
family of ten or twelve persons, ought not, with thorough economy, to
consume more than one-sixth of a ton of coals in the year. Count
Rumford shows in his treatise that 25 lbs. of bread ought to be baked
with one pound of coal, and that 100 lbs. of meat should be cooked
with 2\ lbs. of coal. If, therefore, we fully utilized our fuel, it is clear
that, in the preparation of our food and hot water for domestic pur-
poses, -J- lb. of coal per head of the population ought to be a sufficient
daily allowance, which would be equivalent to one-twelfth of a ton per
annum, and in large households even less than that quantity ought to
suffice. I do not suppose that we should ever attain to this minimum
of consumption, but it is well to consider what the standard is, so that
we may not rest satisfied till it has been much more nearly approached
than hitherto.

Economy has, as I before observed, latterly been sought in com-
bined apparatus. "Where large numbers of persons have to be cooked
for, and where, consequently, a carefully-constructed apparatus is al-
ways worked to its full extent, the results which have been obtained
show a very moderate consumption of fuel ; but the same apparatus,
when used for smaller numbers of persons, gives results not favorable
to economy.

The boilers in use in barracks, when I first took up the question,
required from 16 ozs. to 20 ozs. of coal per head to supply water for
breakfast and tea, and washing up, and to make soup for dinner for
fifty or sixty men. The boilers I introduced would perform the same
duty with from 3 to 4 ozs. of coal for each person cooked for, provided
the number amounted to fifty or sixty persons. The ovens for roast-
ing, which I introduced into barracks, would roast and bake with 1 oz.
of coal for each person cooked for, when cooking for the full number
for which the oven was designed, and for such numbers as 200 to
400 persons ; smaller ovens would require 2 ozs. per head when cook-
ing for 50 men. Of course, to produce these effects, great care was
required.

Messrs. Benham introduced cooking apparatus which, when cook-
ing for the full number of 300 soldiers, would perform the total daily

300 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

cooking and supply of hot water in barracks, with from two to three
ounces of coal per person cooked for.

Captain Warren constructed an apparatus to boil, bake, steam,
roast, and fry, and provide hot water, which, when cooking for about
100 men, required somewhere about 2f ozs. for each person cooked for,
but, when cooking for forty men, required 6 oz. per head, and when
cooking for sixteen men the average of several days amounted to 9 ozs.
or 10 ozs. per man cooked for, but on one or two of these days the con-
sumption did not exceed 5 ozs. for each person cooked for.

These apparatus supplied to the men all the cooking and hot water
necessary. The results show what degree of economy has been reached
in ordinary practice with soldiers, who are not proverbial for care, and
what, therefore, should be the standard of economy to which we have
a right to expect to attain. No doubt, private houses containing six-
teen persons might require more hot water or more cooking, but ac-
cording to these facts, as to ascertained consumption of fuel, the ex-
penditure of fuel in the kitchen for a family consisting of sixteen
persons might easily be reduced to 1^ or 2 tons per year, and in all
these apparatus further elements of economy remain to be developed.

The conclusions, however, to which I have been led in my consid-
eration of this question, are, that with these apparatus, and, indeed,
with all kitchen-ranges in use, the waste of heat lies in the number
of functions the fire has to perform. It must warm water, it must heat
the oven, it must stew, and grill, or toast, and sometimes roast at the
open fire, and each of these processes requires a different condition of
heat. Hot water requires a temperature of 200 to 210, a roasting-
oven of about 450, a baking-oven probably 350 ; grilling is per-
formed on a clear flame, the temperature of which is probably 1,300.
Now, when the fire is in an efficient condition to perform one of these
functions, it is also in an efficient condition to perform the others, and,
although, by means of dampers, it may be somewhat checked in the
performance of its full functions in certain directions, there is no
doubt that an enormous amount of heat is wasted through the agency
of those parts which are not wanted to be in operation. When the
oven is not wanted, it is affording a means for the heat to escape rap-
idly, especially if ventilated as a roasting-oven. The boiler is supplied
with heat beyond its requirements, and generally abstracts a large
quantity of spare heat, which passes off in the shape of steam. I as-
sume that the cook closes the dampers in order, as far as possible, to
limit the action of the fire when cooking is not going on, but in prac-
tice this is difficult to insure. With these combined apparatus, the
fuel consumed will be in proportion to the various operations which
the fire is arranged to perform, and not in proportion to the limited
work required when only one or other of the operations is wanted.
When, for instance, the fire is only wanted to heat water, a great
waste of heat will be going on, from the heat passing off from the

DOMESTIC ECONOMY OF FUEL. 301

oven, hot-plate, and front of the fire. For this reason, the combined
apparatus can never be so economical in fuel as separate apparatus ;
while, however, apparatus of this class, if not very carefully worked,
waste fuel, they, to some extent, save trouble to the cook.

I have already mentioned several points of detail where fuel could
be saved in our kitchen-ranges, viz., by great attention to the close
fitting of the ash-pit and fire-grate doors, the use of double covers to
saucepans and boilers, the use of sand on the hot-plate to prevent the
escape of so much heat from that part ; and, beyond these, an impor-
tant point in securing economy is the separation of those culinary pro-
cesses which require different gradations of heat. The three main
parts of the ordinary cooking apparatus are the oven for baking and
roasting, and the bbiler, and the hot-plate. If the boiler is to be of
the form most effectual in saving fuel, the flame and gases from the
fire should play under and round every part of it ; the water should
be kept at something under 212, so that the gases, after leaving the
boiler, may not enter the flue much above that temperature, and, inas-
much as that is a higher temperature than is necessary for the purpose
of producing a sufficient draught in an ordinary chimney, the heat in
these gases should be still further utilized. In the first place, they
should be used to warm the water which will be required to replace
what is drawn off from the boiler ; and, in the second place, an econo-
my can be obtained by employing the gases, which pass off into the
chimney at a temperature above what is required for creating an effi-
cient draught, to warm the air supplied to the fire for purposes of com-
bustion. The experiments which I have made on the supply of warmed
air to feed the fire have, unfortunately, not been worked out sufficiently
to enable me to give them in a clear form with exact results ; but an
economy of from six to nine per cent, might be obtained from this
source.

Then, as regards the oven. The baker's oven, of fire-brick, in which
the fire is made inside the oven, and the whole heat retained in and
reflected back from the sides and top and bottom, is a very economical
instrument when in continual use. With iron ovens, attached to a
kitchen range, the case is different. An oven which roasts requires a
temperature of from 400 to 450 at least. Therefore, to maintain this
temperature, the gases must pass off into the flue at a temperature
even higher ; when the oven is a roaster, a considerable volume of air
is being continually passed through it to carry off the steam from the
meat. This air, if admitted cold, as is the case with many ranges, acts
so as to cool down the interior, and therefore additional fuel has to
be consumed to counteract this cooling-down process. Now, however
good may be the conducting power of the material used for ovens or
boilers, a coating of soot diminishes the conducting power very rap-
idly, and consequently the temperature of the flue conveying heat to
the oven will always exceed that of the inside of the oven. It is, there-

302 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

fore, of great importance to remove any causes which tend to lower
the inside temperature. Hence it is desirable to utilize some of the
heat which passes off, at above 450, into the flue, for the purpose of
raising the temperature of the air to be admitted into the oven. As a
general rule, however, and except in some apparatus, under present
arrangements all this heat is wasted, and it certainly cannot be utilized
properly so long as one fire is retained to perform so many separate
operations.

The hot-plate is the third important part of the modern close cook-
ing-range. Count Rumford proposed that the top of a hot-plate should
be covered with sand, and the sand cleared away only under the sauce-
pans. In its present shape, the hot-plate wastes an enormous amount
of heat. It is wasteful, because it radiates the heat largely ; because
the application of heat to the saucepans is only through the bottom of
the saucepan, and the bottom of the saucepan is not always in imme-
diate contact with the flame, but is frequently allowed to receive the
heat through the medium of the cast-iron hot-plate, which is a very
moderate conductor of heat. Just consider what the difference of
effect is. The heat of the flame, if directly acting on the bottom of
the saucepan, would be 1,200 Fahr., but, unless the hot-plate is red-
hot, probably not above 450 will pass through, but the heat in the flue
which heats the hot-plate will be at 1,200, and the spare heat from the
flame will be wasted up the chimney. The hot-plate should be dis-
pensed with, if economy is to be made paramount, and charcoal burn-
ers substituted for it. Where gas is available, the hot-plate can be
dispensed with without extra trouble to the cook. The gas-burners
should be properly j)rotected in sunken holes, with side of fire-clay,
and the saucepans should be dropped into the holes, so that the full
effect of the heat shall be concentrated on them and round their sides,
and the gas should be only kept lighted so long as the operation to be
performed is going on. It may be assumed that one pound of coal is
equivalent to from 28 to 30 cubic feet of gas ; hence, as permanent fuel,
gas would not be economical ; but the simplicity of its application
makes it a very convenient fuel in cooking, and economy is obtained
from its use, because the full effect of the combustion can be utilized
as soon as the gas is lighted, the flame can be regulated to any required
extent, and the gas be extinguished as soon as the required operation
is performed.

I have endeavored to enumerate, briefly, the economical conditions
which should regulate the consumption of fuel for domestic purposes.
By economy it is meant that, while all necessary operations of warm-
ing and cooking continue to be performed, the fuel employed should
be utilized to the utmost. In the kitchen, the daily consumption of
fuel, in small establishments, should not exceed half a pound of coal
for each person cooked for, and in large establishments the proportion
should be smaller. In the consumption of fuel for warming, so many

ON ACQUIRED PSYCHICAL HABITS. 303

conditions have to be considered that no standard can be laid down
beyond the broad fact already stated that one-sixth of the coal we
commonly now use would suffice for all our requirements if it were prop-
erly utilized. I do not, however, anticipate that much progress will
be made in economy, unless the price of coals should remain at a figure
which will induce the householder to make himself thoroughly ac-
quainted with the principles on which the apparatus for warming and
cooking should be constructed and worked ; for there is no apparatus
which can be invented which will not depend, to a considerable ex-
tent, on the manner in which it is attended to.

The principal conditions which I have enumerated have long been
known. There is an old saying in South Staffordshire, that " he who
lives longest must carry coal farthest," and, acting on this, we have,
year after year, simply wasted millions of tons of coal in our domestic
fireplaces, because the coal was provided at a small cost, and we
have had no thought for posterity.

George Stephenson once said, very happily, that coal represented
the accumulated rays of the sun laid up in store in by-gone days.
When this store is gone, the world will have lost the most convenient
and economical means of generating heat. It is, therefore, a duty,
which every man owes to posterity r to do his utmost to husband
this great store.

I have endeavored to do my part by explaining the conditions
which should govern the arrangements devised for regulating the con-
sumption of fuel for domestic purposes. It remains for the public to
insist on having these principles applied to the various apparatus
which they adopt. Journal of the Society of Arts.

4

ON THE HEREDITARY TRANSMISSION OF ACQUIRED

PSYCHICAL HABITS.

By Ds. WILLIAM B. CARPENTEE, LL. D., F. E. S.

PROCEEDING, now, to show that the tendency of modern Phys-
iology is to prove the existence of a distinct causal relation be-
tween Physical changes in the Nervous System and definite modes of
Mental action, it may be well for me to adduce, in limine, the positive
evidence that all Mental activity is dependent on a Chemical reaction
between the Blood and the Brain : for, although this is one of the best-
established facts in Physiology, it is, I believe, taken very little ac-
count of by Metaphysicians. The Brain is supplied with Blood by
four Arterial trunks, which enter the cranial cavity at no great dis-
tance from one another, and then unite into the " Circle of Willis ; "

304 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

from which are given off" the various branches that distribute arterial
blood to every part of the brain-substance. After traversing this, the
blood returns by the Veins, greatly altered in its chemical composi-
tion ; especially as regards the loss of free oxygen, and its replace-
ment by various oxy-compounds of carbon, hydrogen, phosphorus, etc.
that have been formed by a process analogous to combustion. Now
if one, two, or three of the Arterial trunks be tied, the total supply of
blood to the Brain is diminished ; but, in virtue of the " Circle of Wil-
lis," no part is entirely deprived of blood ; and the functional activity
of the Brain is still maintained. If, however, the fourth artery is com-
pressed so as to prevent the passage of blood, there is an immediate
and complete suspension of activity ; the animal becoming as uncon-
scious as if it had been stunned by a severe blow, but recovering as
soon as the blood is again allowed to flow through the artery. In
fact, the "stunned" state produced by a blow on the head is not
directly dependent upon the effect of that blow on the Brain, which
may have sustained no perceptible injury whatever ; the state of in-
sensibility being due to the paralysis of the Heart and suspension of
the Circulation, induced by the " shock : " and the like paralysis with
the same result may be produced by a blow on the Epigastrium (act-
ing on the great "solar plexus "of nerves), or some overpowering
Mental emotion. Again, there is a curious affection termed Hysteric
Coma, which consists in the sudden supervention of complete insen-
sibility, and the equally sudden and complete return of conscious in-
telligence, without any other indication of Brain-disorder. The in-
sensibility may come on while the patient is talking, so as to interrupt
the utterance of a sentence ; and, the moment that it passes off, the
series of words is taken up and completed, without the patient being
aware that it has been interrupted. With our present improved
knowledge of the action of the " vaso-motor " system of Nerves in
producing local contractions of the Arteries, and of its liability to be
influenced by those Emotional irregularities in which Hysteria essen-
tially consists, we can scarcely doubt that this affection is due to a
temporary disturbance of the Circulation through that agency. Fur-
ther, if the Blood transmitted to the Brain, though not deficient in
quantity, be depraved in quality by the want of Oxygen and the ac-
cumulation of Carbonic acid (as happens in Asphyxia), there is a grad-
ually increasing torpor of the Mental Faculties, ending in complete
insensibility.

Thus the dependence of Mental activity of even the most element-
ary kind, upon the Physical changes kept up by the circulation of
oxygenated Blood through the Brain, can be shown experientially to
be just as direct and immediate as is the dependence of the Electric
activity of a Galvanic battery upon the analogous changes taking
place between its Metals and its exciting Liquid. If we say that
Electricity is the product of Chemical change in the one case, I see

ON ACQUIRED PSYCHICAL HABITS. 305

not how we can refuse to regard Thought as the product of Chemical
change in the other; nor (in the view that all the Forces of Nature
are simply expressions of Mind) do I see that we need entertain any
repugnance to such a view. I do not say that it explains any Mental
phenomenon. No sound Physicist would say that he can " explain "
how it is that Electricity is generated by Chemical change ; but he
knows that such a relation of cause and effect exists between the two
orders of phenomena, that every Chemical change is accompanied by
an Electric disturbance ; so that, whenever he witnesses Electric dis-
turbance, he looks with assurance for some Chemical change as its
Physical Cause. And in precisely the same sense, and in no other, I
affirm that the Physiologist must regard some change in the Nervous
substance of the Brain as the immediate Physical cause of all auto-
matic Mental action. If this be admitted of Sensational conscious-
ness (and how can it be denied ?), we can scarcely help admitting it
of Emotional ; and, if of Emotional, why not of Ideational ?

There is no part of our purely Physical activity, the relation of
which to Physical conditions is more obvious and more intimate, than
that Reproduction of past states of Consciousness; which when sup-
plemented by the recognition of them as having been formerly ex-
perienced we call Memory. It is now very generally accepted by
Physiologists as (to say the least) a probable doctrine, that any Idea
which has once passed through the Mind, may be thus reproduced, at
however long an interval, through the instrumentality of Suggestive
action ; the recurrence of any other state of Consciousness with which
that Idea was originally linked by Association, being adequate to
awaken it also from its dormant or latent condition, and to bring it
within the " sphere of consciousness." And as our Ideas are thus
linked in " trains " or " series," which further inosculate with each
other like the branch-lines of a railway or the ramifications of an
artery, so, it is considered, an Idea which has been " hidden in the
obscure recesses of the mind" for years perhaps for a lifetime and
which seems to have completely faded out of the conscious Memory
(having never either recurred Automatically, or been found capable of
recall by Volitional Recollection, or been recognized as a past expe-
rience when again brought before the mind), may be reproduced, as
by the touching of a spring, through a nexus of Suggestions, which
we can sometimes trace out continuously, but of which it does not
seem necessary that all the intermediate steps should fall within our
cognizance. Such a "reproduction" not unfrequently occurs when
persons, revisiting certain scenes of their childhood, have found the
renewal of the Sensorial impressions of places bring vividly back to
their minds the remembrance of events which had occurred in connec-
tion with them ; and which had not only been long forgotten by them-
selves, but, if narrated to them by others, would not have been recog-
nized by them as having ever formed part of their own experience.
vol. in. 20

3 o6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

And it is not a little significant that the basis of such Memories ap-
pears capable of being laid at a very early period of life ; as in the two
following cases, of which the first is recorded by Dr. Abercrombie,
while the second was mentioned to me by the subject of it :

" A lady, in the last stage of chronic disease, was carried from London to a
lodging in the country. There her infant daughter was taken to visit her, and,
after a short interview, carried back to town. The lady died a few days after,
and the daughter grew up without any recollection of her mother, till she was
of mature age. At this time she happened to be taken into the room in which
her mother died, without knowing it to have been so. She started on entering
it, and, when a friend who was with her asked the cause of her agitation, re-
plied, ' I have a distinct impression of having been in this room before, and that
a lady who lay in that corner, and seemed very ill, leaned over me and wept.' "
{Inquiries concerning the Intellectual Powers, fifth edition, p. 120.)

" Several years ago, the Rev. S. Hansard, now Rector of Bethnal Green, was
doing clerical duty for a time at Hurstmonceaux, in Sussex ; and, while there,
he one day went over with a party of friends to Pevensey Castle, which he did
not remember to have ever previously visited. As he approached the gate-way,
he became conscious of a very vivid impression of having seen it before ; and he
' seemed to himself to see,' not only the gate-way itself, but donkeys beneath
the arch, and people on the top of it. His conviction that he must have visited
the Castle on some former occasion, although he had neither the slightest re-
membrance of such a visit, nor any knowledge of having ever been in the neigh-
borhood previously to his residence at Hurstmonceaux, made him inquire from
his mother if she could throw any light on the matter. She at once informed
him that being in that part of the country when he was about eighteen months
old, she had gone over with a large party, and had taken him in the pannier of
a donkey ; that the elders of the party, having brought lunch with them, had
eaten it on the roof of the gate-way, where they would have been seen from be-
low, while he had been left on the ground with the attendants and donkeys.
This case is remarkable for the vividness of the Sensorial impression (it may be
worth mentioning that Mr. Hansard has a decidedly artistic temperament), and
for the reproduction of details which were not likely to have been brought up
in conversation, even if the subject of them had happened to hear the visit men-
tioned as an event of his childhood ; and of such mention he has no remem-
brance whatever."

Now, there is very strong reason to believe that what is described
as a storing-up of Ideas in the Memory is the Psychological expres-
sion of Physical changes in the Cerebrum, by which Ideational states
are permanently registered or recorded ; so that the " traces " left by
them, although remaining so long outside the " sphere of conscious-
ness " as to have seemed non-existent, may be revived again in full
vividness under certain special conditions just as the invisible im-
pression left upon the sensitive paper of the Photographer is " devel-
oped " into a picture by the application of particular chemical sub-
stances. It must be freely admitted that we have at present no
certain knowledge of the precise mode in which this record is effected ;
but, looking at the manner in which the Sensori-motor apparatus, which

ON ACQUIRED PSYCHICAL HABITS. 307

is the instrument of our bodily activity, shapes itself to the mode in
which it is habitually exercised, we seem justined in assuming that
the same thing is true of the Cerebrum, which is the instrument of
our mental activity. For in no other way does it seem possible to
account for the fact of very frequent occurrence, and noticed in a pre-
vious paper, that the presence of a Fever-poison in the blood pervert-
ing the normal activity of the Cerebrum so as to produce Delirium
brings within the " sphere of consciousness " the " traces " of expe-
riences long since past, of which, in the ordinary condition, there was
no remembrance whatever.

The same occurrence has been noticed as a consequence of acciden-
tal blows on the head ; though these more commonly occasion the
loss than the recovery of a language. The following case of this kind
is mentioned by Dr. Abercrombie, as having occurred in St. Thomas's
Hospital :

" A man who had been in a state of stupor consequent upon an injury of
the head, on his partial recovery spoke a language which nobody in the hospital
understood, but which was soon ascertained to be Welsh. It was then discov-
ered that he had been thirty years absent from Wales, and that, before the
accident, he had entirely forgotten his native language. On his perfect recov-
ery, he completely forgot his Welsh again, and recovered the English language."
(Op. cit., p. 148.)

It seems perfectly clear, then, that, under what we cannot but term
purely Material conditions, strictly Mental phenomena present them-
selves. It is common to the whole series of cases, that the Automatic
play of the " Mechanism of Thought " does that which Volition is un-
able to effect. Whether it be the toxic condition of the Blood, or the
simple excitement of the Cerebral Circulation generally, or the special
direction of Blood to a particular part of the Brain, it is beyond our
present power to tell ; but, as all Brain-change is (like the action of
any other mechanism) the manifestation of Force, the production of
these unusual Mental phenomena, by the instrumentality of an unusual
reaction between the Blood and the Brain-substance, is no more diffi-
cult of comprehension than that of ordinary forms of Psychical ac-
tivity, which we have seen reason to regard as the results of the
translation (so to speak) of one form of Force into another.

The intimacy of the relation between the Psychical phenomena
of Memory and Physical conditions of the Brain is further shown, by
the effect of Fatigue and the impaired Nutrition of Old Age in weak-
ening the Memory, and of disease and Injury of the Brain in impair-
ing or destroying it. Every one is conscious of the difference in the
activity of the reproductive faculty in which Memory consists, accord-
ing as his mind is " fresh," or his head feels " tired." The latter state,
in which the Automatic activity and the directing power of the Will
are alike reduced, is clearly dependent, like the feeling of muscular
fatigue, on the deterioration of the Organ, or of the Blood, or of both

3 o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

combined, which results from the prolonged exercise of it : and it is
especially in our inability to recollect something which we wish to call
to mind, that this failure of power shows itself. An interval of repose
completely restores the power, obviously (to the mind of the Physiolo-
gist) by the renovation of the worn-out Brain-tissue, and by the puri-
fication of the Blood that has become charged with the products of
its " waste." The impairment of the Memory in Old Age 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 Ego is not distracted
from attending to them by the continual influx of impressions jaro-
duced by passing events. The extraordinary persistence of early im-
pressions, when the Mind seems almost to have ceased to register new
ones, is in remarkable accordance with the Law of Nutrition referred
to in a previous paper. It is when the Brain is growing, that the
direction of its structure can be most strongly and persistently given
to it. Thus the Habits of Thought come to be formed, and those
Nerve-tracks laid down which (as the Physiologist 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 mechanism, in accordance with the demands upon its activity,
so long as it is being called into use. Further, during the entire pe-
riod 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 accord-
ance 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 " when-
ever the right suggesting-strings are touched. But, as the Nutritive
activity diminishes, the " waste " becomes more rapid than the reno-
vation ; 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 Nutri-
tive activity, which yet suffices to maintain the original structure, not
being capable of keeping the subsequent additions to it in working
order. This earlier degeneration of fe^er-formed structures is a gen-
eral fact perfectly familiar to the Physiologist.

The effects of Disease and Injury on the Memory are so marvellous
and diverse, that only a very general indication of them can be here
given. Cases are very common, in which the form of impairment just
spoken of as characteristic of Old Age shows itself to a yet greater
extent ; the Brain being so disordered by attacks of Apoplexy or Epi-
lepsy (for example), that it seems altogether incapable of retaining
any new impressions, so that the patient does not remember any thing
that passes from day to day ; while the impressions of events which
happened long before the commencement of his malady recur with

ON ACQUIRED PSYCHICAL HABITS. 309

greater vividness than ever. The Memory of particular classes of
Ideas is frequently destroyed ; that, for example, of a certain Lan-
guage, or of some other branch of Knowledge, or of the patient's do-
mestic or social relations. Thus a case was recorded by Dr. Beattie,
of a gentleman, who, after a blow on the head, found that he had lost
his knowledge of Greek, but did not appear to have suffered in any
other way. A similar case has been recently communicated to me,
in which a lad, who lay for three days insensible, in consequence of a
severe blow on the head, found himself, on recovering, to have lost all
the Music he had learned, though nothing else had been thus " knocked
out " of him. Again, Dr. Abercrombie relates a curious case, on the
authority of an eminent medical friend, in which a surgeon who suf-
fered an injury of his head by a fall from his horse, on recovering from
his insensibility gave minute directions in regard to his own treat-
ment, but was found to have lost all remembrance of having a wife
and children ; and this did not return until the third day. Similar
losses of particular Languages, and other kinds of acquired knowl-
edge, have been noted as the results of Fevers.

One of the most remarkable results of recent Pathological research
has been, the discovery of the dependence of the condition termed
Aphasia, or " loss of memory of words," upon malnutrition of a cer-
tain part of the Cerebrum ; and the tracing of this malnutrition back
to an interruption in the supply of Blood. In this curious Mental in-
firmity (which often begins to show itself before there is any other
evidence of Cerebral disorder, but which is now recognized as a most
serious indication of impending mischief), the subject either forgets
the words he wants for expressing his ideas, or he uses inappropriate
words in their place. It is obvious that he knows what he wants to
express, but cannot recall the words in which to convey that knowl-
edge to others. There is no paralysis of speech, for his articulation is
quite unaffected ; so that he can repeat the words he wants, if they
are suggested to him by others. In a case formerly under my obser-
vation, the Aphasia went on gradually but very slowly increasing for
three or four years ; showing itself at first as to only a few out-of-the-
way words, but gradually increasing until no intelligible language
seemed to be left, except that of swearing, which came forth in a tor-
rent when any restraint was put on the patient's bodily activity, which
continued very energetic until near the close of life. In another case
recently mentioned to me by a medical friend, who was a near con-
nection of the patient, the disease ran its course in a few months.
Cases of this kind almost invariably terminate in Apoplexy. Now, it
may be said that we have here only the evidence of synchronous dis-
ease of the Brain and disorder of the Mind ; so that the dependence
of the latter upon the former is not made out. But the very curious
discovery was made a few years ago, by Dr. J. Hughlings Jackson,
that the locally-impaired nutrition of the Brain in these cases is usu-

3 io THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

ally attributable to " embolism " of the middle meningeal artery,
whereby the passage of blood through it is greatly impeded ; this
"embolism" consisting in the plugging of the artery by a fibrinous
clot brought from the heart, where it has been produced by valvular
disease. In the second of the cases just referred to, the usual brain-
lesion having been found, and the middle meningeal artery having
been examined, the fons et origo of the mischief was found to be, not
" embolism," but a morbid deposit on the inner wall of the artery,
producing a corresponding .obstruction to the circulation. Looking,
then, to the fact that immediate cessation of Mental activity is dis-
tinctly and unmistakably produced by the entire suspension of Blood-
circulation through the Brain, how can the Physiologist refuse to
recognize, in this local reduction of the Circulation, the Physical cause
of that limited reduction of Psychical activity which so distinctly fol-
lows it ?

But further, this singular fact, taken in connection with the recent
great extension of our knowledge as to the local alterations in the
calibre of the Arteries, which are produced through the " Vaso-motor "
system of Nerves, obviously points to the probability that the limit-
ed but transient lapses of Memory just alluded to are due to a local
reduction of the blood-supply in the part of the Cerebrum which min-
isters to the lost function ; and that the sudden recovery which some-
times occurs is the result of the renewal of the normal circulation,
through the giving way of the impacted clot, or the yielding of the
spasmodically-constricted arterial wall.

Thus Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, was acquainted with a person of
considerable attainments, who, on recovering from a fever, was found
to have lost all his acquired knowledge. When his health was re-
stored, he began to apply himself to the Latin Grammar; and, while,
one day, making a strong effort to recollect a part of his lesson, the
whole of his lost impressions suddenly returned to his remembrance^
so that he found himself at once in possession of all his former acquire-
ments. The like sudden restoration, after an equally sudden loss,
occurred in another case in which all acquired knowledge was lost for
a whole year / and in both the loss and the recovery there was clear
evidence of strong Emotional excitement, which is well known to the
Physiologist to have a most powerful control over the calibre of the
Blood-vessels.

There is another class of familiar phenomena, which affords strong
evidence of the dependence of the recording process upon Nutritive
changes in the Brain. Every one is aware that what is rapidly learned
that is, merely committed to Memory is very commonly forgotten
as quickly, " one set of ideas driving out another." That thorough
apprehension of what is learned, on the other hand, by which it is
made (as it were) part of the Mental fabric, is a much slower process.
The difference between the two is expressed by the colloquial term

ON ACQUIRED PSYCHICAL HABITS. 311

"cramming," as distinguished from "learning;" the analogy being
obvious to the overloading the stomach with a mass of food too great
to be digested and assimilated within a given time, so that a large
part of it passes out of the body without having been applied to any
good purpose in it. A part of this difference obviously consists in
the formation of Mental Associations between the newly-acquired
knowledge and that previously possessed ; so that the new ideas be-
come linked on with the old by " suggesting " chains. Such is espe-
cially the case, when we are applying ourselves to the study of any
branch of knowledge, with the view of permanently mastering it ;
and here the element of Time is found practically to be very impor-
tant. Thus, it is recorded of the late Lord St. Leonard's that, hav-
ing (as Sir Edward Sugden) been asked by Sir T. F. Buxton what
was the secret of his success, his answer was: "I resolved, when
beginning to read Law, to make every thing I acquired perfectly my
own, and never to go to a second thing till I had entirely accomplished
the first. Many of my competitors read as much in a day as I read
in a week ; but, at the end of twelve months, my knowledge was as
fresh as on the day it was acquired, while theirs had glided away
from their recollection." (Memoirs of Sir T. F. Buxton, chap, xxiv.)
In this Assimilating process, it is obvious that the new knowledge
is (as it were) turned over and over in the Mind, and viewed in all its
aspects ; so that, by its coming to be not merely an addition to the
old, but to interpenetrate it, the old can scrarcely be brought into the
" sphere of consciousness," without bringing the new with it. But,
from the considerations already adduced, it seems almost beyond
doubt that the formation of this Associative nexus expresses itself in
the Physical structure of the Brain, so as to create a mechanism
whereby it is perpetuated so long as the Nutrition of the organ is
normally maintained.

Another class of phenomena, now to be considered, seems to afford
even more direct and cogent evidence of the dependence of Memory,
in its simplest exercise, upon a registering process, that consists in
some Nutritive modification of the Brain-tissue. In what we call
"learning by heart" which should be rather called learning by
Sense, instead of by Mind we try to imprint on our Memory a cer-
tain sequence of words, numbers, musical notes, or the like ; the re-
production of these being mainly dependent upon the association of
each item with that which follows it, so that the utterance of the
former, or the picture of it in " the mind's eye," suggests the next.
We see this plainly enough when children are set to learn a piece of
poetry of which their minds do not take in the meaning ; for the rhythm
here affords a great help to the suggestive action; and nothing is
more common than to hear words or clauses (transferred, perhaps, from
some other part of the poem) substituted for the right ones, which are
not only inappropriate but absolutely absurd in the lines as uttered.

3 i2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

So, again, if the child is at fault, he does not think of the meaning
of the sentence, and of what is wanted to complete it ; but " tries
back" over the preceding words, that their sound may suggest that
of the word he desiderates. So there are older persons, with whom
the pictured remembrance of the words and phrases is more sugges-
tive ; as in a case to be presently cited. Now, in these instances, it is
a familiar fact that what is thus learned but once, however perfectly,
soon " goes out of the head," being only fixed there by continual rep-
etition ; and, as the Memory we are now considering is rather Sensorial
than Ideational, this fact is confirmatory of the doctrine that seems
probable on other grounds, of the superior (if not the exclusive) per-
sistence of the latter. We seem distinctly able to trace the action
of the recording process in this elementary form of Memory, in the
help given in the " learning by heart " of a task, by repeating it the
last thing at night ; for every school-boy, who has to commit to mem-
ory fifty lines of Virgil, knows very well that, if he can " say them to
himself," even slowly and bunglingly, just before going to sleep, he
will be able to recite them much more fluently in the morning. The
Physiologist sees here an obvious indication that the recording process
has gone on without interruption by new impressions on the Sensori-
um, so that there has been time for the fixation of the last by Nutritive
chano-e. We have, indeed, a remarkable converse phenomenon, in the
rapid fading away of a Dream, which, at the moment of waking, we
can reproduce with extraordinary vividness ; for the " trace " left by
its details is soon obliterated by the new and stronger impressions
made on our waking Consciousness, so that, a few hours afterward,
we are often unable to revive more than the general outline of the
Dream and perhaps not even that, unless we have told it to another
when it was fresh in our minds, of which act a "trace " would be left.

There are two classes of persons who are professionally called upon
for great temporary exercises of Memory, viz., Dramatic Performers
and Barristers. An actor, when about to perform a new " part," not
only, commits it to memory, but " studies" it, so as to make it part of
himself; and all really great actors identify themselves for the time
with the characters they are performing. When a " part " has once
been thoroughly mastered, the performer is usually able to go through
it, even after a long interval, with very little previous preparation. But
an actor is sometimes called upon to take a new " part " at very short
notice ; he then simply " learns it by heart," and speedily forgets it.
A case of this kind is cited by Dr. Abercrombie, as having been the
experience of a distinguished actor, on being called on to prepare
himself in a long and difficult part, at a few hours' notice, in conse-
quence of the illness of another performer. He acquired it in a very
short time, and went through it with perfect accuracy ; but immediately
after the performance forgot it to such a degree that, although he
performed the character for several days in succession, he was obliged

OiV ACQUIRE J) PSYCHICAL HABITS. 313

every day to prepare it anew not having time to go through the pro- *
cess of " studying " it, to which Mrs. Siddons used to give weeks or
even months. When questioned respecting the mental process which he
employed the first time he performed the part, he said that he entirely
lost sight of the audience, and seemed to have nothing before him hut
the pages of the hook from which he had learned it ; and that, if any
thing had occurred to interrupt this illusion, he should have instantly
stopped. {Inquiry into the Intellectual Powers, fifth edition, p. 103.)

In the case of Barristers, who are called upon to " get up " the
" briefs " which are supplied to them, to master the facts, to apply to
them the principles of Law, and to present them in the Court in the
form which they deem most advantageous to the "cause" they have
undertaken to plead, the very highest faculties of mind are called into
active exercise ; but, in consequence, it would seem, of the want of
previous connection with the " case " (of which they know nothing but
what is set down in their "brief"), and of the complete cessation of
that connection as soon as the decision has been given, they very com-
monly " forget all about it " so soon as they have transferred their
Attention to their next brief. A curious instance of this kind was
mentioned to the writer a few years ago by an eminent Barrister (since
elevated to the Judicial Bench), whose great scientific attainments led
to his being frequently employed in Patent-cases. A " heavy " case
of this kind was placed in his hands, and he was reminded of having
been engaged by the same parties in the same " case " when it had
been first brought to trial about a year previously. He had not the
slightest remembrance of its having ever been before him ; none of
the particulars of it seemed familiar to him; and he was only con-
vinced that he really had taken part in the previous trial by finding
the record of his engagement in his Fee-book. Even when he came
to " get up " the case again, no remembrance of his former attention
to it came within his " sphere of consciousness."

It seems, then, to admit of question whether every thine/ that passes
through our Minds thus leaves its impress on their Material instru-
ment ; and whether a somewhat too extensive generalization has not
been erected on a rather limited basis. For the doctrine of the indeli-
bility of Memory rests on the spontaneous revival, under circumstances
indicative of some change in the Physical condition of the Brain, of
the long-dormant " traces " left by such former impressions as are re-
ferable to one or other of the three following categories : 1. States of
Consciousness as to places, persons, language, etc., which were habitual
with us in early life, and which were, therefore, likely to have directed
the groicth of the Brain ; 2. Modes of Thought in which the formation
of Associations largely participates, and which are likely to have modi-
fied the course of its maintenance by Nutrition after the attainment
of maturity ; or 3. Single Experiences of peculiar force and vividness,
such as are likely to have left very decided " traces," although the

3 H THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

circumstances of their formation were so unusual as to keep them out
of ordinary associational remembrance. Thus a remarkable case is
mentioned by Dr. Abercombie (" Intellectual Powers," fifth edition, p.
149) of a boy, who, at the age of four years, underwent the operation
of trepanning, apparently in a state of perfect stupor, and who, after
his recovery, retained no recollection either of the accident by which
his skull was fractured, or of the operation, yet who, at the age of fif-
teen, during the delirium of fever, gave his mother an account of the
operation and of the persons who were present at it, with a correct de-
scription of their dress, and other minute particulars of which it was
scarcely possible that he could have acquired the knowledge from
verbal information. Here it would seem that all the Mental power the
patient then had must have been concentrated upon the impressions
made upon his Sensorium, which were thus indelibly branded (as it
were) upon his Organism ; but that these " traces," being soon covered
up by those resulting from the new experiences of restored activity,
remained outside the " sphere of consciousness " until revived by a
Physical change which reproduced the images of the objects that had
left them.

The direct causal relation of Physical conditions to Mental states
may be made still more clear by following out into some detail the
phenomena of that peculiar form of Intoxication which is produced
by Hashish a preparation of Indian hemp used in the Levant for the
purpose of inducing what is termed the fantasia. The action of this
drug was very carefully studied some years ago by M. Moreau, Physi-
cian to the Bicetre, who had given great attention to the Psychology
of Insanity, and whose special object was to throw light upon that
subject by experimenting upon what he termed its artificial produc-
tion. His treatise, " Du Hachisch, et de 1' Alienation Mentale " (Paris,
1845), is one which deserves the attentive study of such as desire to
base their Psychology upon a comprehensive survey of facts.

One of the first appreciable effects of the Hashish, as of other Intoxi-
cating agents, is the gradual weakening of that power of Volitionally
controlling and directing the current of thought, the possession of
which characterizes the vigorous mind. The individual feels himself
incapable of fixing his attention upon any subject ; the continuity of
his thoughts being continually drawn off by a succession of discon-
nected ideas, which force themselves (as it were) into his mind, without
his being able in the least to trace their origin. These speedily engross
his attention, and present themselves in strange combinations, so as to
produce the most impossible and fantastic creations. By a strong
effort of the Will, however, the original thread of the ideas may still
be recovered, and the interlopers may be driven away ; their remem-
brance, however, being preserved, like that of a dream recalling events
long since past. These lucid intervals progressively become shorter in

ON ACQUIRED PSYCHICAL HABITS. 315

duration, and can be less frequently procured by a voluntary effort ;
for the internal tempest becomes more violent, the torrents of discon-
nected ideas are so powerful as completely to arrest the attention, and
the mind is gradually withdrawn altogether from the contemplation of
external realities, being conscious only of its own internal workings.
There is always preserved, however, a much greater amount of " self-
consciousness " than exists in ordinary Dreaming ; the condition rather
corresponding with that in which the sleeper knows that he dreams,
and, if his dream be agreeable, makes an effort to prolong it, being
conscious of a fear lest he should by awaking cause the dissipation of
the pleasant illusion.

It is another characteristic of the action of hashish that the suc-
cession of ideas has at first less of incoherence than in ordinary Dream-
ing, and the ideal events do not so far depart from possible realities ;
the disorder of the mind being at first manifested in errors of sense,
in false convictions, or in the predominance of one or more extravagant
ideas. These ideas and convictions are generally not altogether of an
imaginary character, but are rather suggested by external impressions,
these impressions being erroneously interpreted by the perceptive fac-
ulties, and giving origin, therefore, to fallacious notions of the objects
which excited them. It is in that more advanced stage of the " fantasia '
which immediately precedes the complete withdrawal of the mind from
external things, and in which the self-consciousness and power of the
Will are weakened, that this perverted impressibility becomes most re-
markable, more especially as the general excitement of the Feelings
causes the erroneous notions to have a powerful effect in arousing them.

"We become," says H. Moreau, "the sport of impressions of the most op-
posite kind ; the continuity of our ideas may be broken by the slightest cause.
We are turned, to use a common expression, by every wind. By a word or a
gesture our thoughts may be successively directed to a multitude of different
subjects with a rapidity and a lucidity which are truly marvellous. The mind
becomes possessed with a feeling of pride corresponding with the exaltation of
its faculties, of whose increase in energy and power it becomes conscious. It
will be entirely dependent on the circumstances in which we are placed, the
objects which strike our eyes, the words which fall on our ears, whether the
most lively sentiments of gayety or of sadness shall be produced, or passions of
the most opposite character shall be excited, sometimes with extraordinary vio-
lence ; for irritation shall rapidly pass into rage, dislike to hatred and desire of
vengeance, and the calmest affection to the most transporting passion. Fear
becomes terror, courage is developed into rashness, which nothing checks, and
which seems not to be conscious of danger, and the most unfounded doubt or
suspicion becomes a certainty. The Mind has a tendency to exaggerate every
thing ; and the slightest impulse carries it along. Those who make use of the
Hashish in the East, when they wish to give themselves up to the intoxication
of the fantasia, take care to withdraw themselves from every ..thing which
could give to their delirium a tendency to melancholy, or excite in them any
thing else than feelings of pleasurable enjoyment ; but they profit by all the
means which the dissolute manners of the East place at their disposal."

3 i6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

The disturbance of the Perceptive Faculties is remarkably shown
in regard to Time and Space. Minutes seem hours, and hours are pro-
longed into years ; and at last all idea of Time seems obliterated, and
the past and present are confounded together. M. Moreau mentions
as an illustration, that on one evening he was traversing the passage
of the Opera when under the influence of a moderate dose of Hashish.
He had made but a few steps, when it seemed to him as if he had been
there two or three hours ; and, as he advanced, the passage appeared
to him interminable, its extremity receding as he pressed forward. But
he gives another more remarkable instance. In walking along the
Boulevards, he has frequently seen persons and things at a certain dis-
tance presenting the same aspect as if he had viewed them through
the large end of an opera-glass that is, diminished in apparent size,
and therefore suggesting the idea of increased distance. This erro-
neous perception of Space is one of the effects of the Amanita muscaria,
an intoxicating Fungus used by the Tartars ; a person under its in-
fluence being said to take a jump or a stride sufficient to clear the
trunk of a ti*ee when he wishes only to step over a straw or a small
stick. Such erroneous perceptions are common enough among Lu-
natics, and become the foundations of fixed illusions ; while in the
person intoxicated by Hashish there is still a certain consciousness of
their deceptive character.

Though all the Senses appear to be peculiarly impressible in this
condition, yet that of Hearing seems the one through which the great-
est influence may be exerted upon the Mind, especially through the
medium of musical sounds. The celebrated artist, M. Theodore Gaul-
tier, describes himself as hearing sounds from colors, which produced
undulations that were perfectly distinct to him. But he goes on to
say that the slightest deep sound produced the effect of rolling thun-
der; his own voice seemed so tremendous to him that he did not dare
to speak out for fear of throwing down the walls, or of himself burst-
ing like a bomb ; more than five hundred clocks seemed to be striking
the hour with a variety of tones, etc., etc. Of course, those individuals
who have a natural or an acquh-ed " musical ear " are the most likely
to be influenced by the concord or succession of sweet sounds ; and in
such the simplest music of the commonest instrument, or even an air
sung by a voice in a mediocre style, shall excite the strongest emotions
of joy or melancholy, according as the air is cheerful or plaintive ;
the mental excitement being communicated to the body, and being
accompanied with muscular movements of a semi-convulsive nature.
This influence of music is not merely sensual, but depends, like that
of other external impressions, upon the associations which it excites,
and upon the habitual disposition to connect it with the play of the
Imaginative faculties.

It is seldom that the excitement produced by the Hashish fixes
itself upon any particular train of Ideas, and gives rise to a settled

ON ACQUIRED PSYCHICAL HABITS. 317

delusion ; for in general one set of ideas chases another so rapidly,
that there is not time for either of them to engross the attention of
the intellect; more especially since (as already remarked) there is
usually such a degree of self-consciousness preserved throughout, as
prevents the individual from entirely yielding himself up to the
suggestions of his ideal faculties. M. Moreau mentions, however,
that on one occasion, having taken an overdose, and being sensible of
unusual effects, he thought himself poisoned by the friend who had
administered it, and persisted in this idea in spite of every proof to
the contrary until it gave way to another, namely, that he was dead,
and was about to be buried; his self-consciousness, however, being
yet so far preserved that he believed his body only to be defunct, his
soul having quitted it. But when this is altogether suspended, as it
seems to be by a larger dose, the erroneous ideas become transformed
into convictions, taking full possession of the mind ; although sudden
gleams of common-sense burst through the mists of the imagination,
and show the illusive nature of the pictures which the " Internal
Senses " have impressed on the Sensorium. All this as every one
knows, who has made the phenomena of Insanity his study has its
exact representation in the different stages of Mental Derangement ;
the illusive ideas and erroneous convictions being in the first instance
capable of being dissipated by a strong effort of the Will, gradually
exerting a stronger and stronger influence on the general current of
Thought, and at last acquiring such complete mastery over it that
the Reason cannot be called into effective operation for the correction
of the perverted Ideas.

Here, then, we have an extraordinary exaltation of the Automatic
action of the Brain, manifesting itself in the rapidity and intensity of
the current of Thought ; while the controlling power of the Will is
not only relatively, but absolutely reduced. And this modification
of the normal form of mental activity is clearly referable to the per-
version of the normal action of the Blood upon the Brain, which is due
to the introduction of a new Physical agent into the former. The
production of errors of Perception, arising from the tendency to mag-
nification of the impressions actually made on the senses, is a pecul-
iarly interesting feature of this perversion ; which is clearly a mental
misinterpretation, not at all corresponding to the mere double vision
of the drunken man, which is an error of sense arising from the tem-
porary want of adjustment of the axes of the eyes. And with this
magnification there is connected a sentiment of happiness which at-
tends all the operations of the mind.

" It is really happiness,'''' says M. Moreau, " which is produced by the
Hashish ; and by this I imply an enjoyment entirely Moral, and hy no means
sensual, as we might he induced to suppose. This is surely a very curious cir-
cumstance, and some remarkable inferences might be drawn from it ; this, for
instance, among others that every feeling of joy and gladness, even when the

3 i8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

cause of it is exclusively moral that those enjoyments which are least con-
nected with material objects, the most spiritual, the most ideal may be nothing
else than sensations purely physical, developed in the interior of the system, as
are those procured by the Hashish. At least, so far as relates to that of which
we are internally conscious, there is no distinction between these two orders of
sensations, in spite of the diversity in the causes to which they are due ; for the
Hashish-eater is happy, not like the gourmand or the famished man when
satisfying his appetite, or the voluptuary in gratifying his amative desires ; but
like him who hears tidings which fill him with joy, like the miser counting his
treasures, the gambler who is successful at play, or the ambitious man who is
intoxicated with success."

Most persons will be able to recall analogous states of exhilaration,
and the reverse condition of depression, in themselves; the former
being characterized by a feeling of general well-being, a sentiment of
pleasure in the use of all the bodily and mental powers, and a dis-
position to look with enjoyment upon the present, and with hope to
the future ; while in the latter state there is a feeling of general but
indefinable discomfort. Every exertion, whether Mental or Bodily, is
felt as a burden ; the present is wearisome, and the future is gloomy.
These, like all other phases of Human Nature, are faithfully portrayed
by Shakespeare. Thus Borneo gives expression to the feelings inspired
by the first state :

" My bosom's lord sits lightly in his throne ;
And, all this day, an unaccustomed spirit
Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts."

{Romeo and Juliet, V., 1.)

While the reverse state is delineated by Hamlet in his familiar
soliloquy :

" I have of late but wherefore I know not lost all my mirth, foregone all
custom of exercises ; and, indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition, that
this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory ; this most ex-
cellent canopy, the air, look you this brave o'erhanging firmament, this ma-
jestic roof fretted with golden fire, why it appears no other thing to me than a
foul and pestilent congregation of vapors." {Hamlet, II., 2.)

In the conditions here referred to, the same feelings of pleasure
and discomfort attend all the operations of the mind the merely
Sensational and the Intellectual. In the state of exhilaration, we feel
a gratification from sensations which at other times pass unnoticed,
while those which are usually pleasurable are remarkably enhanced ;
and in like manner, the trains of Ideas which are started being gener-
erally attended with similar agreeable feelings, we are said to be under
the influence of the pleasurable or elevating Emotions. On the other
hand, in the state of depression we feel an indescribable discomfort
from the very sensations which before produced the liveliest gratifi-
cation ; and the thoughts of the past, the present, and the future,

ON ACQUIRED PSYCHICAL HABITS. 319

which we before dwelt on with delight, now excite no feelings hut
those of pain, or at best of insouciance.

Now, there are many persons in whom these opposite Emotional
states are induced by Meteorological conditions; the one by a dry,
clear, bright atmosphere; the other by that close, damp, "muggy"
state of the air, which seems to lay a " wet blanket " upon all their
enjoyment, both bodily and mental. And precisely the same depressing
influence is often experienced from deficient action of the liver, causing
an accumulation of the materials of bile in the blood ; and it is just as
apparent to the Physician that the elimination of these by appropriate
remedies, so as to restore the Blood to its normal purity, thereby re-
moves the Moral depression, as it is that the introduction of a minute
quantity of Hashish into the Blood produces a Moral exaltation.

In these days of eager competition, again, it is extremely common
for a psychical state to be induced by the overtasking of the Brain,
which every intelligent medical practitioner recognizes as essentially
physical in its origin, but which yet manifests itself chiefly in moral,
and not unfrequently, also, in intellectual perversion. The excess of
activity is followed, as its natural result, by a state of depression ; in
which the subject of it looks at every thing, past, present, and future,
in a gloomy light, as through a darkened glass. His whole life has
been evil ; he has brought ruin on his affairs ; his dearest friends are
in league to injure him. At first this moral perversion extends itself
only to a misinterpretation of actual occurrences, which only differs in
degree from that which we observe in persons of a morose temper.
But, with the advance of the disorder, the mind dwells on its own
morbid imaginings, till they come to take the place of actual facts ;
and in this way hallucinations are generated i. e., creations of the
imagination, which are accepted as real occurrences. Now, here there
is no primary intellectual perversion ; the reasoning powers are not
disturbed; the patient can discuss with perfect sanity any question
that does not touch his morbid feelings; but the representations shaped
by his own mind, under the influence of these feelings, being received
as truths to the exclusion of his common-sense, all his actions are based
on those erroneous data. This condition is merely an intensification
of that just described ; and the Physician can no more doubt that it
depends upon an unhealthy condition of the bodily frame, than that
the delirium of fever and the fantasia of Hashish are dependent upon
the presence of a poison in the blood.

The Psychologist who neglects such phenomena as these, merely
because the inferences drawn from them by the Physiologist have a
dangerous flavor of " materialism," seems to me just as blameworthy
as the Physiologist who ignores the facts of consciousness, when they
do not happen to fit in with his own conclusions. The true Psycholo-
gist is he who lays the foundations of his science broad and deep in

3 2o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

the whole constitution of the individual man, and his relations to the
"World external to him ; and aims to build it up with the materials
furnished by Experience of every kind, mental and bodily, normal
and abnormal ; ignoring no fact, however strange, that is attested by
valid evidence, and accepting none, however authoritatively sanc-
tioned, that will not stand the test of thorough scrutiny.

It is very easy, and doubtless very pleasant, to dispose of " Cere-
bration " by a sneer ; but those who do so may be fairly called upon
in the first place to acquaint themselves with a class of facts which
they have never studied ; and, when they have examined them, may
be challenged to give some better and more scientific rationale of them
than that here offered. I should myself rejoice to welcome any new
light that metaphysics can throw upon such questions as the following :

1. What other than "Physical Antecedents" excite those states of
Consciousness which we call Sensations, and the Pleasure and Pain
associated with them ?

2. Does not all Psychological as well as Physiological probability
point to the identity of the Sensorial instrumentality through which
we become conscious (1) of a present Impression, and (2) of a remem-
bered Sensation ?

3. If, then, a Visual perception be immediately dependent on a
Physical change in the Sensorium, excited (through the optic nerve)
by a Physical change in the Retina, is it not probable that a Visual
conception depends on a corresponding Physical change in the Sen-
sorium, called forth (through the "nerves of the internal senses") by
a Physical change in the cortical substance of the Cerebrum ?

4. As Sensational Consciousness can be excited by " Physical An-
tecedents," why should not Ideational and Emotional f

5. Is there not Psychological as well as Physiological evidence
that the excitement of the Ideational consciousness is the residt of a
series of Physical changes taking place in the Cerebrum, as the action
of a Mechanism created by its preformed Habits ? In what other way
are the facts (admitted by Psychologists of all schools) to be accounted
for, which indicate the suggestion of one Idea by another through a
chain of Associations, some links of which lie outside the " sphere of
consciousness ? "

6. Is it conceivable that such an oft-recurring phenomenon as the
loss of some branch of acquired Knowledge, after a blow on the head
or a fever, is a mere coincidence f If not, on what other hypothesis
than that of " Physical antecedence" can the blow be the cause of this
Mental effect?

7. Is there not as much evidence that " Physical Antecedents " may
produce Moral Pleasure and Pain, as that they produce Sensorial
Pleasure and Pain ?

3. If in any case we admit Physical antecedence as the Cause (in
the ordinary language of Science) of Mental Phenomena, why not in

THE LONGEVITY OF TREES. 321

every case of automatic Mental activity ? whether this be left alto-
gether uncontrolled, or be in subjection to the will.

9. "When a series of Physical sequences comes to be established by
the Habitual action of the Cerebrum in particular modes directed or
permitted by the Will, is it not consonant to all Physiological proba-
bility that the tendency to similar sequences should be hereditarily
transmitted, like the tendency to bodily habits ? Contemporary Re-
view.

--

THE LONGEVITY OF TKEES.

By ELIAS LEWIS.

IN the vegetable world, limits of growth and life are strangely
diversified. Multitudes of forms mature and perish in a few days
or hours ; while others, whose beginning was in a remote antiquity,
have survived the habitual period of their kind, and still enjoy the
luxuriance of their prime. Some species of unicellular plants are so
minute that millions occur in the bulk of a cubic inch, and a flowering
plant is described by Humboldt, which, when fully developed, is not
more than three-tenths of an inch in height. On the other hand, we
have the great Sequoia, whose mass is expressed by hundreds of tons,
and specimens of the Eucalyptus, growing in the gulches of Australia,
surpass in height the dome of St. Peter's.

Some of the Fungi mature between the setting and rising of the
sun, while the oak at our door, which awakens the memories of our
childhood, has not perceptibly changed in bulk in half a century.
Trees grow more slowly as they increase in age. Nevertheless, it is
certain that growth continues while they continue to live. The devel-
opment of foliage implies interstitial activity and organization of new
material. In its vital processes there is little expenditure of force or
waste of substance. Its functions are essentially constructive, and its
growth and age are apparently without limits, excepting such as arise
from surrounding conditions. Thus many trees represent centuries,
and have a permanence that is astonishing and sublime. Travellers
stand awe-struck before the monuments which for forty centuries have
kept watch by the Nile, but the oldest of these may not antedate the
famous dragon-tree of Teneriffe. It is not surprising that the ancients
considered trees " immortal," or, as " old as Time."

But, if the life of the tree is continuous, its leaves the organs of
its growth have their periods of decay, and are types of mortality.
The life of man is likened to the " leaf that perishes." In an animal,
the vital processes are carried on by a single set of organs, the im-
pairment of which limits the period of its life. With the tree, decay

VOL. III. 21

^22

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

of the organs is followed by constant renovation, and the foliage which
covers it the present summer is as new and as young as that which
adorned it a hundred or a thousand years ago. Trees which shed
their leaves annually, or at longer intervals as do the evergreens,

Fm. 1.

Section of Trunk of Fib-Tree, showing the Annual Kings of Growth.

grow by formation of new wood in layers upon their outer surface, and
just beneath the bark. These constitute the class Exogens, or outside
growers, as shown in Fig. 1. This plate, with others used to illustrate
this article, are from Figuier's " Vegetable World," and have been
placed at our disposal by the publishers of that interesting work.

Fig. 2.

Section of Palm, without Annual Rings.

A layer represents the growth of a year. Where these are acces-
sible, there is no difficulty in ascertaining the age of a tree, or the rate

THE LONGEVITY OF TREES.

3 2 3

of its growth ; and the rate thus ascertained may be applied to other
trees of its kind whose diameter is known, although its woody layers
he inaccessible. In this way the age of many trees has been esti-
mated. The relation between the age of a tree and its annual rings
was first noticed and applied by Montaigne, in 1581.

Fi<;. ?..

Pauu-Trees.

But this method of ascertaining a tree's age does not apply to the
class Endogens, in which the growth is internal, as shown in Fig. 2.

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326 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

In these a hard, inflexible shell forms around the inner portions, the
tree increases little in diameter, and no woody layers are found. To
this class belong the Palms, of which Fig. 3 is an illustration. The
age of this class of trees is estimated by comparing specimens with
others whose age is known, or from an ascertained rate of growth.
The oldest palms may not exceed five centuries, and their average
period is probably less than 200 years. The height of the tallest of
the species is said to be 192 feet. Trees growing in dense forests are
comparatively short-lived, and attain less bulk than those in open
places, where side-branches develop in the unobstructed rays of the
sun. In similar conditions the age and dimensions attained by trees
of each species are tolerably constant. Thus the average period of
oaks and pines may be 300 or 400 years ; but the exceptions are so
numerous and wonderful, that we shall present in this paper a few of
the most interesting and best-authenticated instances.

Of the white-pines, once the glory of the New England forests, we
are not aware that any have been found more than 430 years old. Nor
have we any oaks of extraordinary age. The Charter-oak at Hart-
ford may have been a small tree at the first settlement of New Eng-
land. The Wadsworth oak, at Geneseo, New York, is said to be five
centuries old, and 2 V feet in circumference at the base. The massive,
slow-growing live-oaks, of Florida, are worthy of notice, on account
of the enormous length of their branches. Bartram says : " I have
stepped 50 paces in a straight line from the trunk of one of these
trees to the extremity of the limbs."

The oaks of Europe are among the grandest of trees. The Cow-
thorpe oak is 78 feet in circuit at the ground, and is at least 1,800
years old. Another, in Dorsetshire, is of equal age. In Westphalia
is a hollow oak, which was used as a place of refuge in the troubled
times of mediaeval history.

The great oak at Saintes, in Southern France, is 90 feet in girth,
and has been ascertained to be 2,000 years old. This monument, still
or recently flourishing, commemorates a period which antedates the
first campaign of Julius Caesar !

The oriental plane-tree is noted in Eastern countries for its size
and longevity. Fig. 4 represents one near Constantinople, which is
100 feet high, and 150 feet in circuit. It has been suggested that
this is really a group of trees originally planted near together for
their shade. The figure, however, hardly confirms that opinion, and
many trees of this species are mentioned by travellers not greatly in-
ferior to this one in dimensions.

Most of the old plane-trees are hollow, their tops being sustained
by wood of recent growth. In this respect an exogenous tree resem-
bles a coral-reef, where the vitality and growth are at the surface
only.

Of chestnuts, we have the famous one at Tort worth, in Glou-

M

5

3!

B

328 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

cestershire, England, which was a large tree in the reign of King
Stephen, and is over 1,000 years old. Fig. 5 represents the " Great
Chestnut of Mount Etna," consisting, at present, of what appears to
be several trees, fragments of the original one. By a writer in the
North American Hevieio, for July, 1844, these are supposed to be
shoots from, rather than portions of, the old tree.

Jean Houel, who examined the trees, says " they are portions of
one tree." By removing the soil, the outer rim of the tree has been
found, and the circumference ascertained to be 175 feet. Other chest-
nuts near this are in girth 64, 70, and 72 feet respectively.

The lime or linden, in Europe, is an important tree. Those in the
town of Morat are celebrated in the history of Switzerland. One
was planted in 1476 to commemorate the defeat of the Burgundians,
under Charles the Bold ; the other was a noted tree at the time of the
battle, and is now near nine centuries old. But, equally famous is the
one at Wilrtemberg, called the " Great Linden," six centuries ago. It
is, probably, 1,000 years old, and measures 35|- half*feet in girth.
Four and a half centuries ago its branches were supported by 67 col-
umns of stone, now increased to 106, many of which are " covered
with inscriptions."

The well-known olive-tree is associated with our most cherished
recollections. There is an old one near Nice, 24 feet in girth, re-
garded by the inhabitants with great interest. Those on the Mount
of Olives may be contemporary with the Christian era. They are
known to have been in existence in 1217, when the Turks captured
Jerusalem.

The evergreen cypress, long celebrated for its longevity, is abun-
dant in the burial-grounds of Eastern nations, and, from it dark,
dense foliage, forms an impressive feature of Oriental landscapes. In
the Palace Gardens of Granada are cypresses said to be 800 years old ;
and there is one at Somma, in Lombardy, proved by authentic docu-
ments "to have been a considerable tree 40 years before the Chris-
tian era." Of this family of trees is our well-known white cedar,
specimens of which, exhumed from the meadows on the coast of New
Jersey, had from 700 to 1,000 rings of wood solid and fragrant as
if of recent growth.

The cedars of Lebanon are often referred to in the Sacred Writings.
The present trees are, 'we believe, seven large ones, with many of
smaller growth, situated in an elevated valley of the Lebanon Moun-
tains, 6,172 feet above the Mediterranean. The valley is surrounded
by peaks of the mountains, which rise 3,000 feet higher, and are cov-
ered with snow. Fig. 6 may give some idea of their massive gran-
deur. De Candolle supposes the oldest are 1,200 years old, but no
sections of their wood have been examined to determine their age.
The cedar is known to grow slowly, as does the North American or
bald cypress, which we will next notice. This tree is common in our

Sequoia Gigantea, of California .

33 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

Southern States, and its rate of growth lias been determined. On the
Mexican table-lands its growth and antiquity are immense.

The " Cypress of Montezuma," near the city of Mexico, is 44 feet
in girth, and its age is estimated at upward of twenty centuries. In
the church-yard of Santa Maria del Tule, in the Mexican State of
Oaxaca, is a cypress which "measures 112 feet in circuit, and is
without sign of decay." At Palenque are cypresses growing among
the ruins of the old city, whose streets they may have shaded in the
days of its pride. By the usual methods, the writer in the North
American Review calculates the age of the cypress at Santa Maria del
Tule at 5,124 years, or, if it grew as rapidly during its whole life as
similar trees grow when young, it would still be 4,024 years old.

The yew has long been used in Great Britain as an adornment of
places of sepulture, and is often referred to in English literature :

" Beneath these rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap."

This tree, of almost imperishable wood, is indigenous to Great
Britain. De Candolle ascertained its rate of growth, and concluded
that individual specimens are of great antiquity. There is a yew at
Ankerwyke House, older than Magna Charta. It was an old and cele-
brated tree when King John met the barons at Runnymede, in 1215,
and its age is upward of eleven centuries ; but the yews of Fountain's
Abbey and the Darley yew' are from three to five centuries older
than this. In Fortingal Church-yard, Perthshire, is a yew 18 feet in
diameter, through decayed portions of which funeral processions pass
on their way to the grave. The age of this tree is estimated at 1,800
years. But of greater antiquity is the one described by Evelyn, which
stood in Braborne Church-yard, in Kent. It measured 59 feet in
girth, and was believed to be 2,500 years old. This tree, which has
long disappeared, was probably contemporary with the founding of
Rome. The growth and decline of a great empire was spanned by the
duration of a single life.

More immense in bulk, but perhaps not older than these living-
monuments, are the pines of Oregon and the Sequoias of California.
Mr. Douglas counted 1,100 annual layers in a Lambert pine, and 300
feet is not an unusual height for the Douglas spruce. Hutchings
states that a Sequoia, which was blown down and measured by him,
was 435 feet in length. It was 18 feet in diameter 300 feet from the
around. Scientific observation has connected with these trees an in-
terest equal to that awakened by their size and age. Our most dis-
tinguished botanist, Prof. Gray, has shown that the Sequoias, now
growing on a limited area, had formerly a wide distribution, and
are lineal descendants from ancestral types which flourished at least
as far back in geologic time as the Cretaceous age. The descent
has been with modifications furnishing an important link in the

. ' I

00

6

332 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

chain of evidence which establishes the derivative origin of specific
forms.

Prof. Gray thinks the age of the oldest living Sequoia may be
about 2,000 years, and remarks : " It is probable that close to the
heart of some of the living trees may be found the circle which records
the year of our Saviour's nativity." Fig. 7 is a representation of the
Sequoia.

The sacred banian, before noticed, is familiar to every reader. Its
main trunk attains a diameter of from 20 to 30 feet, and its enormous
roof of foliage may shelter the inhabitants of a considerable village.
The pendent branches are really roots, which, on reaching the ground,
penetrate it and form trunks. These correspond with the o\iter layers
of wood in an oak or a pine, and sustain the top, although the original
trunks decay and disappear.

The dragon-tree of Orotava, on the island of Teneriffe, is a well-
known and historic tree. Our representation of it (Fig. 8) is from a
drawing made in 1776. Twice during the present century it has been
dismantled by storms. It is but 69 feet high, but is 79 feet in circum-
ference. So slow is its growth that its diameter had scarcely changed
in 400 years. Recently it bore flowers and luxuriant foliage, as it may
have done before the " isles of the Western Ocean," on one of which it
was gi-owing, were a dream in the Grecian mythology.

The baobab, or monkey bread-fruit, is the last we can notice of the
ancient trees. It was first described by a Venetian traveller in 1454.
Fig. 9 is from a photograph of one on the west coast of Africa. These
trees are found, however, in nearly all portions of that country south
of the Desert, everywhere an imposing feature of the landscape, and
objects of regard if not of reverence by the natives. In the rainy season
they are in full luxuriance, and are covered with cup-shaped flowers six
inches in diameter. The trunks grow from 20 to 60 feet high, but are
sometimes 100 feet in circuit at the ground. The baobabs, like most
other trees, grow rapidly when young, but slowly when old. Recent
estimates attribute to some of the oldest a period of 3,000 years. This
is scarcely more than one-half the age assigned to them by early
writers.

In 1832 a baobab was transplanted into a garden at Caraccas,
which grew as much in 40 years as would have required 100 years by
early estimate. An account of this tree is published in Natur und
Leben, No. 1, 1873.

By the native town of Shupanga, near the Zambesi, in Eastern
Africa, is a venerable baobab, beneath which is the grave of Mrs. Liv-
ingstone.

Such, briefly, are some of the great living monuments of the vege-
table kingdom. In longevity they are in striking contrast with higher
types of life. Fixed to a single spot, the tree is what it is because of
the forces which act upon it. It is a monument of accumulated and

334 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

concentrated force. Transmuted sunlight is in all its fibres, and who
shall estimate the dynamic work which has been expended in its
structure ?

Dr. Draper observes that " the beat of a pendulum occupies a sec-
ond of time ; divide that period into a million of equal parts, then divide
each of these brief periods into a million of other equal parts, a wave
of yellow light daring one of the last small intervals has vibrated 535
times. Yet that yellow light has been the chief instrument in building
the tree." In the delicate texture of its leaves it has overcome molec-
ular force ; it has beaten asunder the elements of an invisible gas, and
inaugurated a new arrangement of atoms. The old dragon-tree rep-
resents forty centuries of this dynamic work a sublime monument
reared without toil by the silent forces of Nature !

In the outer air it has awakened every note of sound, from the
softest monotone to the rhythmic roar of the tempest ; but in its inner
chambers has been a murmur and music of life in the ceaseless move-
ment of fluids and marshalling of atoms, as one by one they take their
place in the molecular dance, which eludes the dull sense of hearing,
and becomes obvious only in results. The veil which hides these ulti-
mate processes of life has not yet been lifted, and Science pauses in
waiting before it, but only waits.

EAKLT HINDOO MATHEMATICS.

By Peof. EDWARD S. HOLDEN,

OF THE NATIONAL OBSERVATORY, WASHINGTON.

THERE is a certain fascination in our scanty knowledge of the
elder nations of the earth, which is due quite as much to their
chronological position as to the intrinsic interest of their doings and
sayings ; and it owes not a little of its keenness to the very scantiness
of that knowledge.

We are continually told that this is a practical century ; that we
are utilitarians in the strictest sense ; that there is no romantic faculty
left to us ; that we are apt to scorn all knowledge which has not a
direct practical bearing on the daily life and interests of us all. How
can we believe this when we would so eagerly hear of the autono-
my of the Aztecs, and while we care so little for modern Chili, for
example ?

We can speak with more interest of Karnac than of Bogota, and
a mummy is dearer to us than a Mongolian. We require our thoughts
to be suggested sometimes by an age of old and quaint habits, of
strange people with stranger gods. In our busy life, it is a relief to
turn to the Hindoo, who could spare the time " to sit beneath the tree

EARLY HINDOO MATHEMATICS. 335

and contemplate his own perfections," or to the Egyptian who evolved
pyramids, and obelisks, and avenues of spbinxes, out of bis infinite
leisure.

Tbere are always " the complaining ones," for whom the times are
stale, who would lament with Sir Thomas Browne that " mummy is
become merchandise, Mizraim cures wounds, and Pharaoh is sold for
balsams ; " but they forget that the great nineteenth century buys its
mummies in order to have a good look at them, and that it studies the
Rosetta Stone out of pure interest, and to make no money.

But the real interest of former ages is the study of their manner
of thought. We study what they thought to determine how they
thought it. We have an immense and vague curiosity to connect our
minds with the minds of long ages ago. Half the fascination of Dar-
win, Tylor, Lubbock, and Wilson, is from this cause.

It piques us to know that, sixteen hundred years before our era,
there was a poet who sang :

" Like as a plank of drift-wood
Tossed on the watery main,
Another plank encounters,
Meets touches parts again ;
So, tossed, and drifting, ever
On life's unresting sea,
Men meet, and greet, and sever,
Parting eternally." '

This surely is not the verse of a primitive people ; these are not
the feeble lispings of the infants of our race ; did it not require time
to accustom the Hindoo mind to similes as complex as these ? This
verse would not seem childish if Tennyson had written it ; it appeals
to as deep a consciousness as Coleridge's "Hymn in the Vale of
Chamounix," and would even bear comparison with the " Peter Bell "
of the great Lake poet.

If this people was so old thirty-four hundred years ago, when was
it young ? We begin to believe, with Bailly, 2 in the existence of " ce
peuple ancien qui nous a tout appris, except^ son nom et son exist-
ence."

It may, then, be interesting for us to glance at the state of science
among these predecessors of ours. But let us remember that we are
applying a severe test, when we compare their progress with the
science of to-day. Let us remember that it is only within a hundred
years that the return of comets has been predicted ; that our knowl-
edge of the constittition of the sun has been gained since 1859; that
Newton has been dead only 147 years, and that Lagrange and La-

1 "Book of Good Councils: written in Sanscrit, b. c. 1600;" translated by Edwin
Arnold, M. A., Oxford, 1861.

a " This ancient people who have taught us every thing but their own name and their
own existence."

336 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

place both lived and worked in our own century. When we consider
what astronomy would be without these three great men that is,
what it was only so few years ago we are better prepared to appre-
ciate the studies which laid the remote foundations of their triumphs.

It would be impossible, within moderate limits, to determine the
value of Hindoo astronomy, however interesting the effort might be,
since we should enter at once into debateable ground, and come among
great authorities in conflict.

Bailly, Delambre, Bentley, Davis, Hunter, Sir William Jones,
and others, have various, often contradictory, beliefs to maintain.
Some are partisans of the Greek, some of the Arab, others of the
Hindoo scientists of long ago. But, fortunately, some of the original
manuscript books of the Hindoos have come down to us : among others
various complete treatises on mathematics, and these are authentic and
of great age. Precisely of how great age it is difficult to ascertain.
Bailly, a Hindoo partisan, accepts the largest estimate ; Delambre, a
deti*actor of Hindoo science, and an advocate of the Greek, believes
the most important of them to have been written about a. d. 1114;
while the translator of this manuscript, Colebrooke, a distinguished
Sanscrit scholar, places the date of writing, in a. d. 1150.

This treatise, the "Lilivati" of Bhascara Acharya, is supposed to
have been a compilation, and there are reasons for believing a portion
of it to have been written about a. d. 628. However this may be, it is
of the greatest interest, and its date is sufficiently remote to give to
Hindoo mathematics a respectable antiquity.

The " Lilivati," according to Delambre, was written to console the
daughter of its author for her ill-success in obtaining a husband, and
it speaks well for the Hindoo gentlewoman that such a means could be
considered worth the attempting. It was called by her name, and
many of the questions are addressed to her, as we shall see.

It opens most auspiciously with an invocation to Ganesa, as follows :
" Having bowed to the Deity whose head is like an elephant's ; whose
feet are adored by gods ; who, when called to mind, relieves his vota-
ries from embarrassment, and bestows happiness upon his worship-
pers ; I propound this easy process of computation, delightful by its
elegance, perspicuous with words concise, soft, and correct, and pleasing
to the learned."

Thus fairly launched, the author gives various tables of Hindoo
moneys, weights, etc., and proceeds to business, not without another
invocation, however, shorter this time : " Salutation to Ganesa, re-
splendent as a blue and spotless lotus ; and delighting in the tremu-
lous motion of the dark serpent, which is perpetually twining within
his throat."

The principles of numeration and addition are then stated con-
cisely, and he affably propounds his first question : " Dear, intelligent
Lilivati, if thou be skilled in addition and subtraction, tell me the sum

EARLY HINDOO MATHEMATICS. 337

of 2, 5, 32, 193, 18, 10, and 100, added together; and the remainder
when their sum is subtracted from 10,000."

He then rapidly plunges into multiplication as follows : " Exam-
ple. Beautiful and dear Lilivati, whose eyes are like a fawn's ! tell
me what are the numbers resulting from 135 taken into 12 ? . . . . Tell
me, auspicious woman, what is the quotient of the product divided by
the same multiplier?"

The treatise continues rapidly through the usual rules, but pauses
at the reduction of fractions to hold up the avaricious man to scorn :
" The quarter of a sixteenth of the fifth of three-quarters of two-thirds
of a moiety of a dramma was given to a beggar by a person from
whom he asked alms ; tell me how many cowry-shells the miser gave
if thou be conversant in arithmetic with the reduction termed subdi-
vision of fractions."

The " venerable preceptor," as Bhascara calls himself, illustrates
what he terms the rule of supposition by the following example : " Out
of a swarm of bees, one-fifth part settled on a blossom of Cadamba y
and one-third on a flower of SilincThri / three times the difference of
those numbers flew to the bloom of a Gutaja. One bee which re-
mained, hovered and flew about in the air, allured at the same moment
by the pleasing fragrance of a jasmin and pan dan us. Tell me, charm-
ing woman, the number of bees."

This example is sufficiently poetical, but there is given a section on
interest, and one on purchase and sale for merchants. It is easily
seen that this arithmetic vai'ies but little from that taught in our com-
mon schools to-day. The processes are nearly the same, and the ad-
vance of the Hindoos in this science is due largely to their admirable
system of notation, viz., that called the Arabic, which, however, was
undoubtedly derived by the Arabs from Hindoo teachers, as is admitted
by the best authorities.

The next section of the book is occupied with a kind of arithmetical
geometry, which has for its basis the relation between the squares of
the sides of a right-angled triangle. The demonstration of this cele-
brated theorem is given both geometrically and algebraically by one
of the commentators. This algebraic demonstration is so short and
so direct that it will be given : If C and D are the greater and less
sides of a right-angled triangle, and B the hypothenuse whose greater
and less segments are c and d, then

B : C = C : c or c = W

B

Also, B:D = D:d or d = D_'

B~

Therefore B = c + d = CJ + I) 2 and B a = C 2 + D \

B

It is noteworthy that Wallis, in his " Treatise on Angular Sections,"
vol. in. 22

33 3 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

(Chapter VI.), gives this demonstration, and supposes it to be given for
the first time.

The Hindoos, however, were not skilled in geometry. One of their
authors even chides another for attempting to prove geometrically
what can be seen by experience. One of the aphorisms of the present
treatise is as follows : " That figure, though rectilinear, of which sides
are proposed by some presumptuous person, wherein one side equals
or exceeds the sum of the other sides, may be known to be no figure ; "
and the proof of this is thus given, " Let straight rods, of the length of
the proposed sides, be placed on the ground, and the incongruity will
be apparent."

The geometry of the circle in " Lilivati " is the best feature of the
book on plane figures. The " rule " of the text is that the ratio of
the diameter to the circumference is f-f-f-^, or 3.1416 exactly.

This is given in the text without demonstration, but one of the
commentators thus establishes it : the side of the inscribed hexagon is
first found to be equal to the radius ; the side of the dodecagon is de-
rived from this ; " from which, in like manner, may be found the side
of a polygon with twenty-four sides ; and so on, doubling the number
of sides in the polygon until the side be near to the arc. The sum of
such sides will be the circumference of the circle, nearly." The side
of the polygon of three hundred and eighty-four sides is found, and
the ratio given above is deduced.

The explanation of the method of finding the area of the circle is
somewhat indirect, and is likewise ingenious. The circle is divided
into two semicircles by a diameter: if this diameter is 14, the semi-
circumference is equal to 21^--~-. Suppose a number of radii drawn,
and the semi-circumference developed into a right line ; each half of
the circle will become a saw-shaped figure (Fig. 1) ; placing these to-

FlG. 1.
22

Fig. 2.

m

zz

gether, we should have a rectangle, Fig. 2, of equal area with the circle.
This, of course, leads to the formula, ixr 2, area circle = 2-rrr.r ix.r 3 .

2

To find the surface of the sphere, and its contents, similar methods are
employed.

The following sections are concerned with some practical questions,
as the determination of the number of boards which can be cut from a
prism of wood, the number of measures of grain in a mound, and for-
mulas for the length of the shadows of gnomons. Sections on the sub-

EARLY HINDOO MATHEMATICS. 339

jects of permutations follow which are sufficiently obscure, and the
treatise concludes with the neat sentiment that "joy and happiness is
indeed ever increasing in this world for those who have Lilivati clasped
to their throats. . . ."

Next follows the " Vija-Ganita," a treatise on algebra, of which
science the author observes : " Neither is algebra consisting in sym-
bols, nor are the several sorts of it, analysis. Sagacity alone is the
chief analysis : for vast is inference."

The methods of Hindoo algebra are rude. Positive quantities have
no sign, while negative ones are distinguished by a dot. For the un-
known quantities the different colors are used, and the initial letters
of their names are placed in an equation. Equality must be expressed
in words, for the sign was first used by Robert Recorde, who says,
11 No two things can be more equal than a pair of parallel lines."
(Hutton.)

Equations of the first and second degree are treated of, but with
obscurity.

It is noteworthy that at least two references are made in this
treatise to older authors, which deserve quotation as showing the
nature of problems previously proposed.

" Example, by ancient authors. Five doves are to be had for three
drammas ; seven cranes for five; nine geese for seven ; and three pea-
cocks for nine : being a hundred of these birds for a hundred drammas
for the prince's gratification."

" Example by an ancient author. What number multiplied by
three and having one added to the product becomes a cube : and the
cube root squared and multiplied by three and having one added, be-
comes a square ? "

Enough has been given to show that the Hindoo mind was apt at
mathematical logic, and to exhibit the characteristic grace of fancy
with which it regarded science.

Arithmetic, when the world was young, was not inconsistent with
fancy and with enjoyment. Algebra was regarded with a certain
awe. We cannot better illustrate this than by one more quotation
from the translation by Colebrooke of the " Vija-Ganita : "

" There is no end of instances, and therefore a few only are ex-
hibited. Since the wide ocean of science is difficultly traversed by
men of little understanding, and, on the other hand, the intelligent
have no occasion for copious instruction, a particle of tuition con-
veys science to a comprehensive mind, and, having reached it, ex-
pands of its own impulse. . . . The rule-of-three terms constitute
arithmetic ; and sagacity, algebra."

34o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY.

By HEEBEKT SPENCEE.
XII. The TJieological Bias.

' ' "TTTHAT a log for hell-fire ! " exclaimed a Wahabee, on see-
VV ing a corpulent Hindoo. This illustration, startling by its
strength of expression, which Mr. Gifford Palgrave gives ' of the be-
lief possessing these Mohammedan fanatics, prepares us for their gen-
eral mode of thinking about God and man. Here is a sample of it :

" "When 'Abd-el-Lateef, a "Wahabee, was preaching one day to the people
of Riad, he recounted the tradition according to which Mahomet declared that
his followers should divide into seventy-three sects, and that seventy-two were
destined to hell-fire, and one only to Paradise. ' And what, O messenger of
God, are the signs of that happy sect to which is insured the exclusive posses-
sion of Paradise ? ' Whereto Mahomet had replied, ' It is those who shall he in
all conformable to myself and to my companions.' ' And that," added 'Abd-el-
Lateef, lowering his voice to the deep tone of conviction, ' that, by the mercy
of God, are we, the people of Riad.' " a

For present purposes we are not so much concerned to observe the
parallelism between this conception and the conceptions that have
been, and are, current among sects of Christians, as to observe the
effects produced by such conceptions on men's views of those who
have alien beliefs, and on the views they are led to form of alien socie-
ties. "What extreme misinterpretations of social facts result from
the theological bias may be seen still better, in a case even more re-
markable.

By Turner, by Erskiue, and by the members of the United States
Exploring Expedition, the characters of the Samoans are, as compared
with the characters of the uncivilized generally, very favorably de-
scribed. Though, in common with savages at large, they are said to
be " indolent, covetous, fickle, and deceitful," yet they are also said to
be " kind, good-humored, . . . desirous of pleasing, and very hospita-
ble. Both sexes show great regard and love for their children;" and
age is much respected. " A man cannot bear to be called stingy or
disobliging." The women " are remarkably domestic and virtuous."
Infanticide after birth is unknown in Samoa. " The treatment of the
sick was . . . invariably humane and all that could be expected."
Observe, next, what is said of their cannibal neighbors, the Fijians.
They are indifferent to human life ; they live in perpetual dread of one
another ; and, according to Jackson, treachery is considered by them
an accomplishment. " Shedding of blood is to him" (the Fijian) "no

1 "Journey through Central and Eastern Arabia," vol. ii., p. 370.

2 Ibid., vol. ii., p. 22.

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY.

34i

crime, but a glory." They kill the decrepit, maimed, and sick. While,
on the one hand, infanticide covers nearer two-thirds than one-half
of the births, on the other hand, " one of the first lessons taught the
infant is, to strike its mother : " anger and revenge are fostered. In-
feriors are killed for neglecting proper salutes ; slaves are buried alive
with the posts on which a king's house stands ; and ten or more men
are slaughtered on the decks of a newly-launched canoe, to baptize it
with their blood. A chief's wives, courtiers, and aides-de-camp, are
strangled at his death being thereby honored. Cannibalism is so
rampant that a chief, praising his deceased son, wound up his eulogy
by saying that he would " kill his own wives if they offended him, and
eat them afterward." Victims were sometimes roasted alive before
being eaten ; and Tanoa, one of their chiefs, cut off a cousin's arm,
drank the blood, cooked the arm and ate it in presence of the owner,
who was then cut to pieces. Their gods, described as having like
characters, commit like acts. They eat the souls of those who are de-
voured by men, having first " roasted " them (the " souls " being sim-
ply material duplicates). The Fiji gods " are proud and revengeful,
and make war, and kill and eat each other;" and among their names
are " the adulterer," " the woman-stealer," " the brain-eater," " the
murderer." Such being the account of the Samoans, and such the
account of the Fijians, let us ask what the Fijians think of the Samo-
ans. " The Feegeeans looked upon the Samoans with horror, because
they had no l-eligion, no belief in any such deities" (as the Feegeean),
" nor any of the sanguinary rites which prevailed in other islands" ' a
fact quite in harmony with that narrated by Jackson, who, having be-
haved disrespectfully to one of their gods, was angrily called by them
" the white infidel."

Any one may read, while running, the lesson conveyed; and, with-
out stopping to consider much, may see its application to the beliefs
and sentiments of civilized races. The ferocious Fijian doubtless
thinks that, to devour a human victim in the name of one of his can-
nibal gods, is a meritorious act ; while he thinks that his Samoan
neighbor, who makes no sacrifices to these cannibal gods, but is just
and kind to his fellows, thereby shows that meanness goes along with
his shocking irreligion. Construing the facts in this way, the Fijian
can form no rational conception of Samoan society. With vices and
virtues interchanged in conformity with his creed, the benefits of cer-
tain social arrangements, if he thinks about them at all, must seem
evils and the evils benefits.

Speaking generally, then, each system of dogmatic theology, with
the sentiments that gather round it, becomes an impediment in the
way of Social Science. The sympathies drawn out toward one creed
and the correlative antipathies aroused by other creeds, distort the in-
terpretations of all the associated facts. On these institutions and

1 Lubbock's " Prehistoric Times," second edition, p. 442.

342 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

their results the eyes are turned with a readiness to observe every
thing that is good, and on those with a readiness to observe every
thing that is bad. Let us glance at some of the consequent perver-
sions of opinion.

Already we have seen by implication that the theological element
of a creed, subordinating the ethical element as it does completely in
early stages of civilization and very considerably in later stages, main-
tains a standard of right and wrong, relatively good perhaps, but per-
haps absolutely bad good, that is, as measured by the requirements
of the place and time, bad as measured by the requirements of an ideal
society. And, sanctifying, as an associated theology may thus do,
false conceptions of right and wrong, it falsifies the measures by which
the effects of institutions are to be estimated. Obviously the sociologi-
cal conclusions must be vitiated if beneficial and detrimental effects
are not respectively recognized as such. An illustration enforcing
this is worth giving. Here is Mr. Palgrave's account of Wahabee
morality, as disclosed in answers to his questions :

" ' The first of the great sins is the giving divine honors to a creature.'

" ' Of course,' I replied, ' the enormity of such a sin is beyond all doubt.
But if this be the first, there must be a second ; what is it ? '

" ' Drinking the shameful,' in English, ' smoking tobacco,' was the unhesi-
tating answer.

" ' And murder, and adultery, and false witness? ' I suggested.

"'God is merciful and forgiving,' rejoined my friend ; 'that is, these are
merely little sins.'

" ' Hence two sins alone are great, polytheism and smoking,' I continued,
though hardly able to keep countenance any longer. And 'Abd-el-Kareem,
with the most serious asseveration, replied that such was really the case." x

Clearly a creed which makes smoking one of the blackest crimes,
and has only mild reprobation for the worst acts committed by man
against man, negatives any thing like Social Science. Habits and insti-
tutions not being judged by the degrees in which they conduce to social
welfare, the ideas of better and worse, as applying to social arrange-
ments, cannot exist ; and such notions as progress and retrogression
are excluded. But that which holds so conspicuously in this case
holds more or less in all cases. At the present time, as in past times,
and in our own society as in other societies, public acts are judged by
two tests the test of supposed divine approbation, and the test of
conduciveness to human welfare. Though, as civilization advances,
there grows up the belief that the second test is equivalent to the
first, though, consequently, conduciveness to human welfare comes to
be more directly considered, yet the test of supposed divine approba-
tion, as inferred from the particular creed believed, continues to be
very generally used. The wrongness of conduct is conceived as con-

1 " Journey through Central and Eastern Arabia," vol. ii., p. 11.

THE STUDY OF SOCIOLOGY. 343

sisting in the implied disobedience to the supposed commands, and
not as consisting in its intrinsic character as causing suffering to
others or to self. Inevitably the effect on sociological thinking is,
that institutions and actions are judged more by their apparent con-
gruity or incongruity with the established cult than by their tenden-
cies to further or to hinder well-being.

This effect of the theological bias, manifest enough everywhere,
has been forced on my attention by one whose mental attitude often
supplies me with matter for speculation an old gentleman who unites
the religion of amity and the religion of enmity in startling contrast.
On the one hand, getting up early to his devotions, going to church
even at great risk to his feeble health, always staying for the sacra-
ment when there is one, he displays what is ordinarily regarded as an
exemplary piety. On the other hand, his thoughts ever tend in the
direction of warfare : fights on sea and land furnish topics of undying
interest to him ; he revels in narratives of destruction ; his talk is of
cannon. To say that he divides his reading between the Bible and
Alison, or some kindred book, is an exaggeration ; but still it serves
to convey an idea of his state of feeling. Now you may hear him
waxing wroth over the disestablishment of the Irish Church, which he
looks upon as an act of sacrilege ; and now, when the conversation
turns on works of art, he names, as engravings which above all others
he admires, Coeur-de-Lion fighting Saladin, and Wellington at Water-
loo. Or, after manifesting some kindly feeling, which, to give him his
due, he frequently does, he will shortly pass to some bloody encounter,
the narration of which makes his voice tremulous with delight. Mar-
velling though I did at first over these incongruities of sentiment and
belief, the explanation was reached on observing that the subordination-
element of his creed was far more dominant in his consciousness than
the moral element. Watching the movements of his mind made it
clear that, to his imagination, God was symbolized as a kind of tran-
scendently powerful sea-captain, and made it clear that he went to
church from a feeling akin to that with which, as a middy, he went to
muster. On perceiving that this, which is the sentiment common to
all religions, whatever be the name or ascribed nature of the deity
worshipped, was supreme in him, it ceased to be inexplicable that the
sentiment to which the Christian religion specially appeals should be
so readily overridden. It became easier to understand how, when the
Hyde-Park riots took place, he could wish that we had Louis Napoleon
over here to shoot down the mob, and how he could recall, with more
or less of chuckling, the deeds of press-gangs in his early days.

That the theological bias, thus producing conformity to moral prin-
ciples from motives of obedience only, and not habitually insisting on
such principles because of their intrinsic value, obscures sociological
truths, will now not be difficult to see. The tendency is to substitute
formal recognitions of such principles for real recognitions. So long

344 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

as they are not contravened directly enough to suggest disobedience,
they may be readily contravened indirectly ; for the reason that there
has not been cultivated the habit of contemplating consequences as
they work out in remote ways. Hence it happens that social arrange-
ments essentially at variance with the ethics of the creed give no of-
fence to those who are profoundly offended by whatever seems at vari-
ance with its theology. Maintenance of the dogmas and forms of the
religion becomes the primary, all-essential thing ; and the secondary
thing, often sacrificed, is the securing of those relations among men
which, the spirit of the religion requires. How conceptions of good
and bad in social affairs are thus warped, the pending controversy
about the Athanasian creed shows us. Here we have theologians who
believe that our national welfare will be endangered, if there is not in
all churches an enforced repetition of the dogmas that Father, Son,
and Holy Ghost, are each of them Almighty ; that yet there are not
three Almighties, but one Almighty ; that one of the Almighties suf-
fered on the cross and descended into hell to pacify another of them ;
and that, whoever does not believe this, " without doubt shall perish
everlastingly." They say that, if the State makes its priests threaten
with eternal torments all who doubt these doctrines, things will go
well ; but, if those priests, who, in this threat, perceive the devil-wor-
ship of the savage usurping the name of Christianity, are allowed to
pass it by in silence, woe to the nation ! Evidently the theological bias
leading to such a conviction entirely excludes Sociology, considered as
a science.

Under its special forms, as well as under its general form, the theo-
logical bias brings errors into the estimates men make of societies and
institutions. Sectarian antipathies, growing out of differences of doc-
trine, disable the members of each religious community from fairly
judging other religious communities. It is always difficult, and often
impossible, for the zealot to conceive that his own religious system and
his own zeal on its behalf may have but a relative truth and a r