The Popular Science Monthly 1886-05: Vol 29

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= THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. MAY, 1886. THE DIFFICULTIES OF RAILROAD REGULATION. By ARTHUR T. HADLEY. NY practical scheme of railroad control is likely to be based upon a compromise. The different interests involved are so conflict- ing that it will not do to attempt a solution from any one standpoint exclusively. The direction which legislation is to take can not be de- cided by a mere consideration of complaints against the existing sys- tem, whether well-grounded or otherwise. We must also consider what other systems have been tried, and what evils they have involved ; what lines of treatment have been undertaken, and how far it has been found possible to carry them out. It is not a question what we would like to do, so much as what we actually can do. The community requires four things of its railroad system : 1, That it shall afford sufficient facilities to meet the wants of busi- ness. In other words, there must be enterprise in building new lines, and in keeping the old ones up to a high standard of efficiency. 2. That the charges, as a whole, shall be as reasonable as possible. If they are higher than those of other countries, or higher than is necessary for the support of the railroads, the business development of the community will be retarded. 3. That there shall not be arbitrary differences in charge which force business into unnatural and wasteful channels, or cripple one man for the enrichment of another. 4, That there shall be as little waste of. capital as possible, either by corruption, extravagance, or want of business skill. This is not quite so vital a matter as the other three, but it is one which we can not afford to leave out of account. No system of regulation is ever likely to be devised which shall secure all these results. Free competition, as we have tried it in vou, Xx1x.—l

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2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. America, produces rapid construction and low rates, but fosters dis- crimination and extravagance ; thus securing the first and second requirements, at the sacrifice of the third and fourth. The French system of regulated monopoly has just the opposite effect ; it pre- vents waste and discrimination, but development is slow and rates are high. The third and fourth requirements are secured at the expense of the first and second. England enjoys the first and fourth advan- tages, at the sacrifice of the second and third ; Italy has secured the second and third, but failed of the first and fourth. The Granger sys- tem of regulation sacrificed the first in the effort to secure the second. Partial state ownership, as we shall see, secures nothing at all; exclu- sive state ownership secures the third, at great risk of sacrificing all the others. The different requirements are to a certain extent in conflict with one another. This conflict can only be understood by studying the history of railroads, and the principles which underlie railroad business management. These are quite imperfectly known at present. There is probably no subject of equal importance on which public enlighten- ment is so much needed. The capital invested in the railroads of our country is eight times that of its banking institutions ; the tonnage carried by rail is four times that carried by water ; the abuses in inter- nal commerce come home to most of us far more directly than those in foreign commerce. Yet, for every man who has studied the political economy of railroads, there are a dozen who have studied that of ship- ping and foreign trade, and a hundred who have studied that of bank- ing. The complications of the subject are hardly recognized. Railroad reformers are far too ready to blindly pursue one specific object or com- bat one specific abuse, regardless what other objects may be sacrificed, or what other abuses fostered by their policy. From 1830 to 1873 the main object of nearly every community was to secure rapid development of railroad facilities—the first of the four requirements we have named. The railroad proved so much superior to other modes of transportation, that the country which had railroads prospered ; that which had not railroads fell behind. Legislation was everywhere devised to favor this end. Where capital was ready to invest, every encouragement was offered it. If the removal of obsta- cles was not enough, a subsidy was generally to be had for the asking. If the community could not afford to pay a subsidy outright, it guar- anteed a certain income to the road. If all these inducements were insufficient, the state stepped in and built the road itself. In England, where there was plenty of capital seeking investment, railroads were chartered literally by hundreds. In America they were not only ex- empted from the necessity of securing special charters, but received municipal aid, as well as grants of public land on a scale which was often outrageous. In France the state paid half the cost of building the road, and offered the companies monopoly privileges as an induce- eT

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THE DIFFICULTIES OF RAILROAD REGULATION. 3 ment for supplying the other half. Belgium built the main lines of road at state expense for state management; but at the same time the building of private lines was also encouraged in every possible way. It was not until too late that men saw what chaarces for waste and corruption were involved in this indiscriminate encouragement of railroad construction. England learned the lesson in 1847; Conti- nental Europe in 1873. In spite of the severe experiences of 1857, 1873, and 1884, it is by no means certain that America has learned it even yet. For a long time the only fear was that railroad charges would be too high ; and this fear was happily disappointed. The maximum rates which were fixed in the earliest charters were useless, simply be- cause the railroads generally adopted a lower scale of their own accord. It was found that the profits depended quite as much upon the volume of business as upon the absolute rates charged, and that it was often better to do a large business at low rates than a smaller business at higher rates. This is of course true to some extent in every depart- ment of industry, but there are reasons which make it apply specially to railroads. About half* the expenses of a railroad are to a consider- able extent independent of the amount of work done. Thus an increase in the volume of traffic does not produce a corresponding increase in cost. Railroad expenses may be roughly divided into two classes, accord- ing as they do or do not vary with the amount of business done. Those which do not vary rapidly are called fixed charges. This in- cludes interest on cost of construction, the general expenses of the organization as a whole, and a considerable part of the expense of maintenance, which is due to weather rather than to wear. Those expenses which vary nearly in proportion to the amount of- business done are called operating expenses. Under this head are included the different items of train and station service, with some others. The fixed charges of the railroads of the United States average somewhat over $2,500 per mile annually ; the operating expenses average from forty to sixty cents per train-mile. In order that a railroad asa whole may be profitable, it is neces- sary that it should earn money enough to pay fixed charges as well as operating expenses. But, in order to secure any individual piece of business, it can afford to make rates which shall little more than cover operating expenses, provided such business can be had on no other terms. To secure traffic which it could not otherwise have, a railroad can afford to make rates which would bankrupt it if applied to its whole business. *In Mr. Lansing’s valuable article on this subject (“‘ Popular Science Monthly,” Feb- ruary, 1886), the proportion is estimated considerably higher. Any argument on the rea- sons for the difference would be of too technical a character to come within the scope of this discussion.

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4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. Such was the origin of discriminations. Sure of a certain amount of traffic at high rates, which would contribute its full share to the pay- ment of fixed charges, each railroad strove to secure additional traffic at lower rates which would little more than pay operating expenses. This reduction was first made in favor of articles of low value, like coal, stone, or lumber, which could not be moved at all at high rates, but which could furnish a large business at low rates. Here it was an unmixed benefit to the public. The reduction was next applied in favor of long-distance traffic ; and here also it was a good thing in principle, though sometimes overdone in practice. Under the old sys- tem of equal mileage rates, where the charge was made proportional to the distance, it would have cost something like a dollar a bushel to get wheat from the Mississippi Valley to the seaboard ; a price which would have been simply prohibitory to the growth of the Western States. There were special circumstances which led the railroads to give the long-distance traffic more than its due share of favor. <A great deal of this traffic had the benefit of competition, either between sev- eral lines of railroad, or between rail and water routes. The reduc- tions in rates were made most rapidly where such competition was most active—that is, at the large cities. The result was a system which favored cities at the expense of the country—by no means a good thing. But this was not the worst. In any period of active rail- road competition large shippers were almost always given lower rates than small shippers. Amid the constant variation of rates, unscrupu- lous men gained advantages at the expense of more honorable men. Secret favors were generally given to those who least needed or least deserved them. The railroad agents forgot their obligations to the public as common carriers, Too often they were ready to sacrifice even the permanent interests of the stockholders themselves in the lawless struggle for competitive business. It must not be forgotten that railroad competition did some things for the country which nothing else could possibly have done. It’ taught our railroad men to handle a large business cheaply. It taught them to make money at rates which would have seemed suicidal to the easy-going managers who were not under any such stimulus. The rapid reductions of charge, in other countries as well as America, have been made in the stress of railroad wars. But, while railroad compe- tition has been in some respects a beneficent force, it can not be trusted to act unchecked. To the business community regularity and pub- licity of rates are more important than mere average cheapness. Busi- ness can adjust itself to high rates easier than to fluctuating ones. And railroad competition of necessity makes rates fluctuate. It tends to bring them down to the level of operating expenses, regardless of fixed charges. If it acts everywhere, as in the case of the New York Central and West Shore, it leaves little or nothing to pay fixed charges,

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THE DIFFICULTIES OF RAILROAD REGULATION. 5 and means ruin to the investor, followed by consolidation. If it acts at some points and not at others, those points which have the benefit of competition have rates based on operating expenses, while the less fortunate points pay the fixed charges. Then we have discrimination in a dangerous form. As long as competition exists, there is no escape from this alterna- tive. If it exists at all points, it means ruin; if it exists at some points, it means discrimination. The efforts to prevent these results by law while retaining the principle of competition, only show how powerless we really are in this matter. Let us look at them in order. The first legislators tried to treat the railroad as a public highway, over which any man should be at liberty to run cars, as he can run boats over a canal or wagons over a turnpike. This idea was incor- porated in the railroad charters of England and Prussia. It has never been quite abandoned by theorists ; bui practically it has proved a failure wherever tried. Physically it is impossible, on account of the danger of collision ; industrially it is impossible, on account of the added expense. Nobody would build a railroad on such terms unless the mere tolls for ‘the use of the track were to be made higher than the whole transportation charge now is. A second plan for making competition a public benefit has been that of state ownership of part of the competing lines. It has been tried on a large scale in Belgium and Prussia, and on a smaller scale in most other countries, the United States not excepted. It was thought by the advocates of the system that the government would thus obtain a controlling influence over the railroads with which it came in contact, and be able to regulate their policy by its example. These hopes have been disappointed. The private railroads under such circumstances regulate those of the government far more than the government regu- lates the private railroads. There is no chance to carry out any schemes of far-sighted policy. If the private roads are run to make money, the government roads must be managed with the same end in view. The tax-payers will not let the government lines show a deficit while com- peting private lines pay dividends. No administration would dare to allow such a thing, however important the end to be attained. Asa matter of fact the government roads of Belgium and Germany were as ready to give rebates as the private lines with which they came into competition. In Belgium they went so far as to grant special rates to those persons who would agree not to ship by canal under any circumstances. The same thing has been done in New York State ; but in Belgium the peculiar thing was that the canals and railroads both belonged to the government, and yet were fighting one another in this way. The system of partial state ownership was hardly distin- guishable in its effects from simple private ownership. This fact has been clearly recognized within the last twelve years. Within this period, Belgium, Prussia, and Italy have abandoned the “mixed sys- »

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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 6 tem.” Belgium and Prussia have made state management all but uni- versal ; Italy has practically given it up. Of much more importance in the United States has been the effort to regulate charges by legislation, without touching the question of ownership. There was no lack of authority for so doing. Common carriers had been made the subject of special regulation from time immemorial, and it was a well-accepted principle that their charges must be reasonable, But what constitutes a reasonable charge? On what basis are we to compute it ? It is by no means a sufficient answer to say that rates should be based upon cost of service. What items of cost shall we include? Shall we count the fixed charges, or simply consider operating ex- penses? In the earliest legislation the former course was adopted. The English tolls and maxima were calculated upon this basis. But they were soon found to be so high as to be almost inoperative. At any rate, they did not prevent discrimination. They allowed the rail- road to earn its fixed charges where it chose, and to lower rates else- where. A prescribed rate of this kind is too high to be of any use. On the other hand, to prescribe a rate which does not provide for fixed charges is even worse. This was tried in the Mississippi Valley in the Granger movement. It was argued by the farmers that, if the railroads could afford to carry their competitive traffic at very low rates, they could afford to do the same for the local traffic. All rates were therefore reduced by law to the basis of the competitive ones. What was the result? In Wisconsin, where the system was carried out most completely, a law of this kind was in operation for two years. At the end of that time, not a single railroad was paying dividends ; only four were paying interest on their bonds. Railroad construction was at a stand-still. The existing roads could not afford to extend their facilities for traffic. The development of the State was checked —checked so abruptly that the very men who were most clamorous for the railroad law in 1874 were most clamorous for its repeal in 1876. In their anxiety to secure low rates, they had overlooked the necessity for railroad development. This oversight reacted forcibly against them ; and the same reaction is likely to be felt wherever reckless rail- road legislation is attempted. Our railroad profits are not so high as is often supposed. They are less than four per cent on the nominal capital ; and, making all due allowance for water, probably less than six per cent on the actual investment. Admit, if you please, that the corruption of inside rings absorbs an additional amount which ought to go to the investor ; this does not affect the fact that, if your legis- lation prevents the investor from receiving his dividends, he will not invest his capital in your State. It is not now a question of ethics as to what you or he ought to do; it is a matter of fact, proved by actual experience as to what he will do.

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THE DIFFICULTIES OF RAILROAD REGULATION. 7 Fortunately, no other State had quite so severe an experience as ‘Wisconsin. There were somewhat similar laws in other States, for instance, in Illinois ; but the enforcement of the Illinois law was in- trusted to a commission. The commissioners were not men of expe- rience in these matters, but they had the sense to see that the attempt to reduce rates too sharply would defeat the purposes in view. They therefore used their powers with some discretion ; not attempting to re- duce rates everywhere at once, but simply to correct the worst abuses. They were not altogether successful, but they made no such disastrous failure as occurred in Wisconsin. ; There is an undeniable advantage in entrusting the execution of such a law to the somewhat discretionary power of a commission. A court is not well qualified to enforce a hard and fast law concerning railroad rates. The courts are compelled to rely somewhat blindly upon precedent ; while railroad management is so new a thing that the precedents derived from other lines of business are often mislead- ing. The best proof of the usefulness of railroad commissions is the extent to which they have prevailed. Nearly two thirds of our States have them ; there is scarcely a serious attempt at railroad regulation in the United States except through some such agency. But, even in the best hands, the power to fix rates is of somewhat doubtful utility. More effective statutes have been aimed at discrimi- nation itself—not to fix the rate, but to limit the chance for arbitrary differences. In one sense it ought hardly to need a statute todo this. Secret rebates and personal discriminations are so clearly against the spirit of the law of common carriers, that to call public attention au- thoritatively to these things is to condemn them. The work of the Hepburn Committee in New York, in 1879, had a value of this kind, quite apart from any positive legislation which it secured. The value of similar work done by certain railroad commissions can hardly be overestimated. The worst abuses may be thus checked ; but, as long as competition is at all active, there will be a good deal of local discrimination in favor of competitive points, which the common law is powerless to prevent. Against this system the so-called “short-haul” laws have been aimed. Probably no other point with regard to railroad regulation has been made the subject of so much’ discussion. The short-haul principle provides that a railroad shall not charge a larger gross sum for a part of any route than it does for the whole— not more, for instance, from Chicago to Springfield, Massachusetts, than from Chicago to Boston. It is thus intended to prevent the more outrageous forms of local discrimination. There can be no doubt that as a general principle it is correct. But it is not one which it is always possible to enforce by law. If the law can reach all the rival routes, and can be enforced against all of them, it does much good and little or no harm. But, if it reaches one route and not another, it sim-

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a 8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. ply makes the other route a present of the through traffic. What, for instance, would be the effect of a national short-haul law on the move- ment of wheat from Chicago to the seaboard? At present, it is a traf- fic which the railroads can afford to make special efforts to secure, and they bring the rates down nearly to the level of operating expenses, If they reduced local rates to this basis, they would have nothing left to pay fixed charges. The only way by which they could comply with the law would be by raising through rates. This would simply have the effect of sending the wheat to Europe via Montreal instead of via American ports. The Grand Trunk Railroad, which would be outside of our control, would have the chance to make low through rates, and get the heavy through traffic. The English stockholders of the Grand Trunk would be the persons most benefited by such a law. It is only a few years since the Prussian Government got into trouble in exactly this way. It was thought by the authorities that the low through rates favored the foreigners at the expense of the Germans ; and an attempt was made to carry out the short-haul prin- ciple rigidly. The result simply was that the foreigners sent their goods by other routes which Bismarck was unable to control, and that the Prussian railroads lost a part of their traffic, which, low as were the rates charged upon it, was yet a matter of importance to their business prosperity. Similar instances could be cited from almost any other country. Whenever we find a competitor which our law can not reach—be it water-route, foreign railroad, or domestic railroad which violates the Jaw in an underhand fashion—the short-haul principle simply cripples the roads which obey it, without producing any corresponding good effect. Experience has shown pretty clearly that local discrimination can be avoided only by bringing competition under control. The States where legal regulation of this matter has been most successful have been those like Georgia and Iowa, where the pooling system has been strongest and most stable, or those like Massachusetts, where competi- tion has become, in local business, largely a thing of the past. Every- where, in America and in Europe, periods of active competition have been periods of active discrimination. To check the second you must control the first. And the only practicable way of doing this, short of actual consolidation, is by a system of pooling. The mere agree- ment to maintain rates is not enough,; it is too easily violated by se- cret rebates. An agreement to divide the traffic or the earnings, as long as it holds at all, is much harder to violate secretly. This is what constitutes a “ pool.” We are thus reduced to the simple alternative, pooling or discrimi- nation. Each effort to prohibit both at the same time only makes the necessity more clear. The governments of Continental Europe have ceased to struggle against it. Rightly judging that discrimination is

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THE DIFFICULTIES OF RAILROAD REGULATION. 9 the main evil, they recognize pools as the most effective method of combating it. State roads enter into pooling contracts with private roads, railroads divide traffic with competing water-routes. The law, recognizing such contracts, is able to regulate them, and to deal with organizations of railroads better than it could deal with railroads indi- vidually. In this respect they have the advantage over us in America. In our vain effort to prohibit pools altogether, we have simply intensified their worst features. By refusing to recognize them at all, we have rejected the chance to regulate them. We have done worse than this. By taking all permanent guarantees away from them, we have forced them to pursue a short-sighted policy. The prejudice against pools, as we have often seen them, is not an unreasonable one ; but the fault is in the law quite as much as in the system. Admit, if you please (though it is by no means clear), that the disastrous multiplication of roads in 1882 was mainly due to the short-sighted manipulation of rates under the pooling systems: what then? Such short-sighted policy was an almost necessary result of a legal theory which refused to enforce pooling contracts, and made their continuance depend upon the voluntary adhesion of all parties. The pool was compelled to adopt a policy which should keep every one in good-humor for the day. The moment the directors of a single road were dissatisfied with pres- ent results, they could break the system down, regardless either of the rights of others or of their own permanent welfare. No policy can be more suicidal than this. The temporary inter- ests of the railroads often diverge widely from those of the commu- nity which they serve. Their permanent interests are almost identical. The sound and strong roads, with a permanent character to sustain, are much more likely to be managed in the public interest than roads on the verge of bankruptcy, whose only thought is for the present. Yet all our legislation is directed against roads of the former class. We place them at the mercy of reckless competition in the matter of rates. We allow the building of insolvent competitors by construc- tion companies whose operations are no better than blackmail. We strive to limit their dividends, when the only practical results of such a measure will be diminution of enterprise and increase of extrava- gance. In our fear that the influence of railroad managers may be- come too great, we have devised laws which seriously interfere with their power for good, and leave their power for evil almost unchecked. To this sweeping statement one important exception must be made. More by accident than by design, the railroad commissioners in a num- ber of our States have become the representatives of the permanent interests of the railroads and community alike, against the short-sight- ed policy of extremists on either side. The history of the Massachu- setts Commission has presented the most marked instance of what can be done in this way, by a body of men having no power except the

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10 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. power to secure publicity ; it is perhaps the most encouraging exam- ple in recent history of the power of government by public opinion, Whether a national commission could work successfully in this way is very doubtful. The public opinion of the nation as a whole is not so easily brought to bear in any one direction as is that of a single State. The national railroad system is too vast, the interests of ‘ different sections too conflicting. It is desirable that a national com- mission should be charged with the enforcement of certain specific provisions against discrimination. It would be a herculean task ; but it is one which needs to be done, and one which we may feel reason- ably sure that the courts could not even attempt to. do. On the other hand, it is desirable that the commission should not be a mere prosecuting body, but should depend for its force upon the in- fluence of public opinion behind it. In this respect, the bill now be- fore the United States Senate is a good one. It avoids alike the error of those who would give the commission no definite authority, and those who would charge it with doing what is actually impossible. The bill, as reported, rigidly prohibits personal discrimination, and generally prohibits local discrimination ; but under this latter head it empowers the commission to make exceptions. It says nothing about pools ; and, if this discreet silence is maintained, such a commission might readily use pools as a means of protecting tbe shipper against discrimination, instead of allowing them to be used solely for the pur- poses of the railroad investors and managers. The great danger is, that the bill is too moderate to pass. In spite of all that has been said and written on railroad questions, the great majority of men are extremists on this subject. Some want an abso- lute let-alone policy ; some want an energetic attempt at control which would really defeat its own ends. Both of these classes are op- posed to a bill of this kind. The advocates of the let-alone policy are afraid that it would be enforced. The advocates of vigorous control are afraid that it would stand in the way of more decisive action. They feel—and not altogether without reason—that the prolonged ab- sence of national control may ultimately bring the question of govern- ment ownership in the foreground. It must be remembered that a very considerable portion of the community believes in government railroad ownership, at least as an ideal. They perhaps exaggerate the evils of the present system, and certainly have the most unreasonable expectations of the good to be obtained from a change. It has been seriously argued with much show of figures, in a reputable working-men’s paper, that it is possible to carry passengers from New York to San Francisco at a dollar apiece and make money on it, and that everything above this represents sheer extortion, which would be avoided by government ownership! Now, as long as these things are believed, their absurdity makes them none the less dangerous. In forecasting the future, we must reckon with

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AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 11 the number of votes, and not simply with the value of the argument by which those votes have been influenced. Each year’s failure to adopt any measure of national control probably increases the number of votes which would be cast in favor of government ownership. It can not be denied that government ownership furnishes the best theoretical solution of the railroad problem, if we could only assume that the Government were possessed of infinite wisdom and virtue, But practically this condition is far from being realized in the United States. The question is a practical rather than a theoretical one. In countries like Germany, where the civil service represents the best ele- ments of the nation, state railroads have been a success, simply because of that fact. Whatever system will give you the best administrative talent is likely to prove most successful. But it would be a bold thing to say that the best administrative talent of the United States found its way into the civil service, or was likely to do so for the present. A state railroad system may be relied upon to do one thing—to check local discrimination. But this is not due so much to any con- siderations of public policy as to the complete monopoly which takes away all inducements to discriminate. Where a state road comes into conflict with private roads, it makes discriminations of the worst form. Where it has a monopoly, there is danger that it will avoid them by leveling up. The Italian investigating commission of 1878, after a careful comparison of the actual experience of different countries, came to the conclusion that state railroads did not, as a rule, do so much for industry as private railroads; that in general their rates were higher, their facilities worse, their responsibility less ; that the state railroad management was more apt to tax business than to foster it; while political considerations were brought into matters of rail- road construction and management in a way which was disastrous alike to railroads and to politics. It may be that these conclusions were in some respects overdrawn ; but they are sufficient to show the wide difference between the popular ideal of state railroad manage- ment and the reality as seen in actual practice. +64 seo AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXIOO. By Hox. DAVID A. WELLS. I. ‘ Sao Spanish rule over Mexico lasted for just three hundred years, or from 1521 to 1821 ; and, during the whole of this long period, the open and avowed policy of Spain was, to regard the country as an instrumentality for the promotion of her own interests and aggrandize- ment exclusively, and to utterly and contemptuously disregard the de-

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a 12 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. sires and interests of the Mexican people. The government or vice. royalty established by Spain, in Mexico, for the practical application of this policy, accordingly seems to have always regarded the attain- ment of three things or results as the object for which it was mainly constituted, and to have allowed nothing of sentiment or of humanita- rian consideration to starid for one moment in the way of their rigorous prosecution and realization. These were, first, to collect and pay into the royal treasury the largest possible amount of annual revenue ; sec- ond, to extend and magnify the authority and work of the established Church ; third, to protect home (i. e., Spanish) industries. Starting with the assumption that the country, with all its people and resources, was the absolute property of the crown in virtue of conquest, the accomplishment of the first result was sought through the practical enslavement of the whole native population, and the appropriation of the largest amount of all production that was compatible with the con- tinued existence of productive industries. With the civil power at the command of the Church, the attainment of the second result was from the outset most successful ; for, with a profession of belief and the acceptance of baptism, on the one hand, and the vigilance of the Inquisition and a menace of the fires of the auto-da-fe on the other, the number of those who wanted to exemplify in themselves the su- premacy of conscience or the freedom of the will, was very soon reduced to a minimum. And, finally, the correctness or expediency of the principle of protection to home (Spanish) industry having been once accepted, it was practically carried out, with such a logical exact- ness and absence of all subterfuge, as to be worthy of admiration, and without parallel in all economic history. For, in the first instance, with a view of laying the axe directly at the root of the tree of com- mercial freedom, all foreign trade or commercial intercourse with any country other than Spain was prohibited under pain of death; and that ordinance is believed to have been kept in force until within the present century. No schools or educational institutions save those of an ecclesiastical nature were allowed, and in these instruc- tion in almost every branch of useful learning was prohibited. Cer- tain portions of Mexico were admirably adapted, as they yet are, to the cultivation of the vine, the olive, the mulberry, and of fiber- yielding plants, and also for the keeping and breeding of sheep; but, as a colonial supply of wine, oil, silk, hemp, and wool might interfere with the interests of home producers, the production of any or all of these articles was strictly prohibited ; neither was any manu- facture whatever allowed which could by any possibility interfere with any similar industry of Old Spain. When Hidalgo, a patriotic Catholic priest, about the year 1810, with a desire to diversify the in- dustries of his country and benefit his countrymen, introduced the _ silk-worm and promoted the planting of vineyards, the authorities de- stroyed the one and uprooted the other; and through these acts first

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AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 13 instigated the rebellion that ultimately overthrew the government and expelled the Spaniards from Mexico. All official posts in the coun- try, furthermore, were filled by Spaniards, and the colonial offices were regularly sold in Madrid to the highest bidder. In the National Museum in the city of Mexico is a nearly or quite complete collection of the portraits of the fifty-six Spanish viceroys who successively governed the country. The series commences with a portrait of Cortes, which is said to be an original ; and, according to Mr. Prescott (who prefixed an engraved copy of it to the third volume of his “Conquest of Mexico”), has been indorsed by one of the best Spanish authorities, Don Antonio Uguina, as the “ best portrait ” of the conqueror that was ever executed. It is an exceedingly striking face, full of character, and more quiet, contemplative, and intellectual than might have been expected from his stirring and eventful career ; and as the picture is neglected and apparently in a state of decay, a copy of it ought at once to be acquired by our national Government and placed in the Capitol at Washington ; or, in neglect thereof, by some one of our historical societies. For, whatever may be the opinion entertained concerning the man and his acts, there can be no question that he was one of the most conspicuous characters in American history, and has left his mark indelibly upon what is now no small part of the terri- tory of the United States. Of the long series of portraits of his suc- cessors, as they hang upon the walls of the museum, the majority depicted in gorgeous vice-regal robes, and with stars and orders of nobility, there is this to be said—that, with few exceptions, they rep- reseat the most mediocre, unintellectual, and uninteresting group of faces that could well be imagined. They convey the idea that nearly all of the originals were men past the prime of life, whose business had been that of courtiers, and who had won their appointments either by court favoritism or from the supposed possession of qualities which would enable them to extort from the country and its people a larger revenue for the Spanish treasury than their predecessors. Among the few exceptions noted are the portraits of Don Juan de Acuiia (1722- 1734), the only Spanish viceroy born in America (Peru), and the Count de Revilla-Gigedo (1789-1794), both of whom were unques- tionably rulers of great ability, and who might also well be repre- sented in the national galleries of the United States; and the por- traits of occasional ecclesiastical viceroys—bishops or archbishops— conspicuous among their neighbors by reason of their more somber vestments. The faces of these latter are not devoid of intellectuality, or indications of mental ability ; but they are—one and all—stern, unimpassioned, and with an expression of grim malevolence and big- otry, which as much as says, “ Woe betide any heretic, or contemner of Church supremacy, who dares to question my authority!” To which may be properly added that, during nearly all the long period of Span- ish rule in Mexico, the Inquisition, or “ Holy Office,” wielded a power |

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14 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. as baleful and as despotic as it ever did in Old Spain, and held its last auto-da-fe and burned its last conspicuous victim—General José Mo- relos—in the Plaza of the city of Mexico, as late as November, 1815! In 1810, Mexico, under the lead of Hidalgo—whom the modern Mexicans regard as a second Washington—revolted against its Span- ish rulers, and, after many and varying vicissitudes, finally attained its complete independence, and proclaimed itself, in 1822, first an empire, and two years later, or in 1824, a republic. From this time until the defeat of Maximilian and his party in 1867, the history of Mexico is little other than a chronicle of successive revolutions, internecine strife, and foreign wars. In the National Palace, in the city of Mexico, is a very long, narrow room, termed the “ Hall of Embassadors,” from the circumstance that the President of the Republic here formally re- ceives the representatives of foreign nationalities. Upon the walls of this room, and constituting, apart from several elaborate glass chan- deliers, almost its only decoration, is a series of fairly painted, full- length portraits of individual Mexicans who, since the achievement of independence of Spain, had been so conspicuously connected with the state, or had rendered it such service, as to entitle them, in the opinion of posterity, to commemoration in this sort of national “ Val- halla.” To the visitor, entering upon an inspection of these interest- ing pictures, the accompanying guide, politely desirous of imparting all desirable information concerning them, talks somewhat after this manner : “This is a portrait of the Emperor Iturbide, commander-in-chief of the army that defeated and expelled the last Spanish viceroy ; elected emperor in 1822 ; resigned the crown in 1823 ; was proscribed, arrested, and shot in 1824. The next is a portrait of one of the most distin- guished of the soldiers of Mexico, General Mariano Arista” (the gen- eral who commanded the Mexican troops at the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma), “elected President of the Republic in 1851, was deposed and banished in 1853, and died in exile in 1855. His remains were brought home at the public expense, and a special de- cree commemorative of his services was declared by Congress. The next is General So-and-so, who also, after rendering most distinguished services, was shot”; and so on, until it seems as if there was not one of their conspicuous men whom the Mexicans of to-day unite in honoring for his patriotism and good service, but who experienced a full measure of the ingratitude of his country in the form of exile or public execution. In the same gallery is also a good full-length portrait of Washington, but, very appropriately, it is far removed from all the other pictures, and occupies a place by itself at the ex- treme end of the apartment.* * Since the establishment of her independence in 1821, Mexico, down to the year 1884 ‘—a period of sixty-three years—has had fifty-five presidents, two emperors, and one re- gency, and, with some three or four exceptions, there was a violent change of the gov-

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AN ECONCMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 15 In 1846 came the American war and invasion, when the United States, with “one fell swoop,” as it were, took from Mexico consider- ably more than one half of all its territory —923,835 square miles out of a former total cf 1,690,317. It is true that payment was tendered .and accepted for about one thirty-fourth part (the Gadsden purchase) of what was taken, but appropriation and acceptance of payment were alike compulsory. For this war the judgment of all impartial history will undoubtedly be that there was no justification or good reason on the part of the United States. It may be that what happened was an inevitable outcome of the law of the survival of the fittest, as exempli- fied among nations ; and that the contrasts as seen to-day between the life, energy, and fierce development of much of that part of Old Mexi- co that became American—California, Texas, and Colorado—and the stagnant, poverty-stricken condition of the contiguous territory— Chihuahua, Sonora, Coahuila—that remained Mexican, are a proof of the truth of the proverb that “the tools rightfully belong to those who can use them.” But, nevertheless, when one stands beside the monument erected at the foot of Chapultepec, to the memory of the young cadets of the Mexican Military School—mere boys—who, in opposing the assault of the American columns, were faithful unto death to their flag and their country, and notes the sternly simple inscription, “Who fell in the North American invasion” ; and when we also recall the comparative advantages of the contending forces—the Americans audacious, inspirited with continuous successes, equipped with an abundance of the most improved material of war, commanded by most skilled officers, and backed with an overflowing treasury ; the Mexi- cans poorly clothed, poorly fed, poorly armed, unpaid, and generally led by uneducated and often incompetent commanders ; and remem- ber the real valor with which, under such circumstances, the latter, who had received so little from their country, resisted the invasion and conquest of that country ; and that in no battles of modern times have the losses been as great comparatively as were sustained by the Mexican forces—there is certainly not much of pleasure or satisfaction that a sober-minded, justice-loving citizen of the United States can or ought to find in this part of his country’s history. And, if we are the great, magnanimous, and Christian nation that we claim to be, no time ought to be lost in proving to history and the world our right to the claim, by providing, by act of Congress, that all those cannon which ernment with every new administration. The year 1848 is noted in Mexican annals as the first time when the presidency was transferred without violence and under the law— General Arista peaceably succeeding General Herrera.‘ But Arista was deposed and ban- ished in the next two years, and in the next three months there were four presidents of the republic. Of the original and great leaders in the war of independence—namely, Hi- dalgo, Morelos, and Matamoros—all were shot. The same fate befell both of the emper- ors, and also two of the more noted presidents—Guerrero and Miramon. Of the other presidents, nearly all at one time or other were formally banished or compelled to flee from the state in order to escape death or imprisonment.

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16— THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. lie scattered over the plains at West Point, bearing the inscriptions “Vera Cruz,” “Contreras,” “Chapultepec,” “Molino del Rey,” and “City of Mexico,” and some of which have older insignia, showing that they were originally captured by Mexican patriots from Spain in their struggles for liberty; together with every captured banner or other trophy preserved in our national museums and collections, be gathered up and respectfully returned to the Mexican people. For, to longer retain them and pride ourselves on their possession, is as unworthy and contemptible as it would be for a strong man to go into the street and whip the first small but plucky and pugnacious boy he en-. counters, and then, hanging up the valued treasures he has deprived him of in the hall of his residence, say complaisantly, as he views them, “See what a great and valiant man I am, and how I desire that my children should imitate my example!” If it is peace and amity and political influence, and extended trade and markets, and a maintenance of the Monroe doctrine on the American Continent that we are after, such an act would do more to win the hearts and dispel the fears and suspicions of the people of Mexico, and of all the states of Central and South America, than reams of diplomatic correspond- ence, and endless traveling trade commissioners and formal interna- tional resolutions, Society is said to be bound by laws that always bring vengeance upon it for wrong-doing—“the vengeance of the gods, whose mills grind slow, but grind exceeding small.” What penalty is to be exacted of the great North American Republic for its harsh treatment and spoliation of poor, down-trodden, ignorant, super- stitious, debt-ridden Mexico, time alone can reveal. Perhaps, as this great wrong was committed at the promptings or demand of the then dominant slave-power, the penalty has -been already exacted and in- cluded in the general and bloody atonement which the country has made on account of slavery. Perhaps, under the impelling force of the so-called “manifest destiny,” a further penalty is to come, in the form of an equal and integral incorporation of Mexico and her for- eign people into the Federal Union. But, if this is to be so, the intel- ligent and patriotic citizens of both countries may and should ear- nestly pray that God, in his great mercy, may yet spare them. In 1861, Louis Napoleon, taking advantage of the war of the re- bellion in the United States, and regarding (in common with most of the statesmen of Europe) the disruption of the Great Republic as pro- spectively certain, made the suspension by Mexico of payment upon all her public obligations, a great part of which were held in Europe, a pretext for the formation of a tripartite alliance of France, England, and Spain, for interfering in the government of the country ; and in December, 1861, under the auspices of such alliance, an Anglo-French- Spanish military force landed and took possession of Vera Cruz. From this alliance the English and Spanish forces early withdrew ; but the French remained, and soon made no secret of their intent

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AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO, 17 to conquer the country. The national forces, under the leadership of undoubtedly the greatest and noblest character that Mexico has pro- duced, Benito Juarez, reported to be of pure Indian parentage, offered a not inglorious resistance ; and in at least one instance undoubtedly inflicted a severe defeat upon the French army. But with the almost universal defection of the clergy and the wealthier classes, and with the country weakened by more than forty years of civil strife and an impoverished exchequer, they were finally obliged to succumb ; and after a period of military operations extending over about sixteen months, or in June, 1863, the French entered the city of Mexico in triumph and nominally took possession of the whole country. <A’ month later, a so-called “assemblage of notables,” appointed by the French general-in-chief, met at the capital, and with great unanimity declared the will of the Mexican people to be the establishment of an empire in the person of the Archduke Maximilian of Austria, “or such other prince as the Emperor Napoleon should designate ” ; and in pursuance of this act the crown was formally offered to Maximilian at his palace in Austria in October, 1863, and definitely accepted by him in April, 1864. Viewed in the light of subsequent events, the point of greatest interest and importance in this scheme on the part of Louis Napoleon for the conquest of Mexico and its conversion into a French dependency, to the humiliation of whatever political organiza- tions might be left after the war to represent the former Federal Union, and to the utter discomfiture of the “Monroe doctrine ”—a scheme which Napoleon designed should constitute the most brilliant feature of his reign—was the connection of the Church of Mexico and its adherents with the movement. If not, indeed, as is often sus- pected, the instigators of it in the first instance, they were undoubt- edly in full sympathy with it from its inception—and with good reason. For as far back as 1857, Juarez, when a member of the Cabinet of General Comonfort, had been instrumental in the adoption of a po- litical Constitution which was based on the broadest republican prin- ciples, and which provided for free schools, a free press, a complete subjugation of the ecclesiastical to the civil authority, and universal religious toleration—a Constitution which, with some later amend- ments, is still the organic law of Mexico. Such a reform could not, and at the time did not, triumph over the privileged classes, the Church, the aristocracy, and the military leaders, and, although em- bodied in the form of law, remained in abeyance. But the Church and the aristocracy at the same time did not fail to recognize that, if Juarez and his party. ever attained political ascendency, their property and privileges would be alike imperiled. The subversion of the so-called Republic of Mexico, with its un- stable government and frequent revolutions, and its replacement with an empire, backed by the then apparently invincible arms of France, and with one of the Catholic princes of Europe on the throne, were, VOL, XX1X.—2

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18 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. therefore, most acceptable to the Mexican Church and its adherents ; and in Maximilian of Austria they thought they had found a man after their own heart. He was a man of elegant presence, winning manners, and of much refinement and culture ; and these qualities, with undoubted personal courage, contributed to give him a certain amount of personal popu- larity and sympathy. But he was, nevertheless, in all matters of goy- ernment, always a representative of the highest type of absolutism or imperialism, and in devotion to the Catholic Church an extremist, even almost to the point of fanaticism. The first of these assertions finds illustration in his establishment of a court, with orders of nobil- ity, decorations, and minute ceremonials ; the construction and use of an absurd state carriage—modeled after the style of Louis XIV— and still shown in the National Museum ; and worse, by the proclama- tion and execution of an order (which subsequently cost Maximilian his own life), that all republican officers taken prisoner in battle by the imperialists should be summarily executed as bandits ; and, sec- ond, by his walking barefoot, on a day of pilgrimage, all the way over some two or three miles of dusty, disagreeable road, from the city of Mexico to the shrine of the Virgin at Guadalupe. When the attitude and demand of the United States, on the termi- nation of the rebellion, induced the withdrawal of the French forces from Mexico, Maximilian, at the suggestion of Louis Napoleon, pre- pared to abdicate ; and, in October, 1866, even commenced his journey to Vera Cruz, with the intent of embarking from the country. Unfor- tunately for himself, however, he was persuaded by the Church party, under assurances of their ability to support him, to return to the city of Mexico and resume his government. But the attempt was hopeless, and culminated some six months later in his capture and execution by the republican forces, and with the downfall of the “ Maximilian” or the “imperial” government, Juarez became the undisputed, and also, to all intents and purposes, the absolute, ruler of the country. This portion of the more recent history of Mexico has been de- tailed somewhat minutely, because the series of events embraced in it led up to and culminated in an act of greater importance, than anything which has happened in the country since the achievement of its independence from Spanish domination. For no sooner had Juarez obtained an indorsement of his authority as President, by a general election, than he practically carried out with the co-operation of Congress, and with an apparent spirit of vindictiveness (engen- dered, it has been surmised, by the memory of the oppressions to which his race had been subjected), the provisions of the Constita- tion which he had been instrumental in having adopted in 1857. The entire property of the Mexican Church was at once “nationalized” (a synonym for confiscation) for the use of the state. Every convent, monastic institution, or religious house was closed up and devoted to

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T- Ys ty AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 19 secular purposes ; and the members of every religious society, from the Jesuits to the Sisters of Charity, who served in the hospitals or taught in the schools, were banished and summarily sent out of the country. And so vigorously and severely is the policy of subjugating the eccle- siastical to the civil authority, which Juarez inaugurated in 1857, still carried out, that no convent or monastery now openly exists in Mex- ico; and no priest or sister, or any ecclesiastic, can walk the streets in any distinctive costume, or take part in any religious parade or pro- cession ; and this in towns and cities where, twenty years ago or less, the life of a foreigner or skeptic who did not promptly kneel in the streets at the “procession of the host,” was imperiled. Again, while Catholic worship is still permitted in the cathedrals and in a sufficient number of other churches, it is clearly understood that all of these structures, and the land upon which they stand, are absolutely the property of the Government, liable to be sold and converted to other uses at any time, and that the officiating clergy are only “tenants at will.” Even the ringing of the church-bells is regulated by law. All those rites, furthermore, which the Catholic Church has always “classed as among her holy sacraments and exclusive privileges, and the possession of which has constituted the chief source of her power over society, are also now regulated by civil law. The civil author- ity registers births, performs the marriage ceremony, and provides for the burial of the dead; and while the Church marriage ceremonies are not prohibited to those who desire them, they are legally super- fluous, and alone have no validity whatever.” (See “ Report on Church and State in Mexico to the State Department,” by Consul-General Strother, December, 1883.) Such an achievement as has been here briefly chronicled, was in every respect analogous to, and was as momentous to Mexico as the abolition of slavery was to the United States. Like slavery in the latter country, the Catholic Church had become, as it were, incorpo- rated into the fundamental institutions of Mexico since its first inva- sion and conquest by the Spaniards. It had the sole management of all the educational institutions and influences of the country ; it held, in the opinion of a great majority of the people, the absolute control of the keys of heaven and hell ; it had immense wealth, mainly in the form of money ready to loan, buildings in the cities, and haciendas or estates in the country, and all the influences which wealth brings. And, even when Mexico achieved her independence, the influence of the Church was so little impaired by the accompanying political and social convulsions, that the national motto or inscription which the new state placed upon its seal, its arms, and its banners, was “ Re- ligion, Union, and Liberty.” Except, therefore, for the occurrence of a great civil war, which convulsed the whole nation ; and in which the Church, after favoring a foreign invasion, and placing itself in opposition to all the patriotic,

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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 20 liberty-loving sentiment of the country, had been signally beaten, its overthrow, as was the case with slavery in the United States, would not seem to have been possible. And even under the circumstances, it is not a little surprising and difficult of explanation, that a govern- ment could have arisen in Mexico strong enough and bold enough to at once radically overthrow and humiliate a great religious system, which had become so powerful, and had so largely entered into the hearts and become so much a part of the customs and life of its peo- ple; and that every subsequent national administration and party has now for a period of nearly twenty years unflinchingly maintained and executed this same policy. Mr. David H. Strother (“ Porte Crayon”), our late consul-general at Mexico, who has studied the matter very carefully, suggests that an ex- planation may be found in the character of the Indian races of Mexico, who constitute the bulk of the population, and “ whose native spirit of independence predominates over all other sentiments.” He also throws out the opinion that “the aborigines of the country never were com- pletely Christianized ; but, awed by force, or dazzled by showy ceremo- nials, accepted the external forms of the new faith as a sort of compro- mise with the conquerors.” And he states that he has himself recently attended “religious festivals where the Indians assisted, clothed and armed as in the days of Montezuma, with a curious intermingling of Christian and pagan emblems, and ceremonies closely resembling some of the sacred dances of the North American tribes.” It is also asserted that, on the anniversaries of the ancient Aztec festivals, garlands are hung upon the great stone idol that stands in the court-yard of the National Museum, and that the natives of the mountain villages some- times steal away on such days to the lonely forests or hidden caves, to worship in secret the gods of their ancestors. But, be the explanation what it may, it is greatly to the credit of Mexico, and one of the brightest auguries for her future, that after years of war, and social and political revolutions, in which the adherents both of liberty and absolutism have seemed to vie with each other in outraging humanity, the idea of a constitutional government, based on the broadest repub- lican principles, has lived, and, to as large an extent as has perhaps been possible under the circumstances, practically asserted itself in a national administrative system. When the traveler visits the cities of Mexico, and sees the num- ber and extent of the convents, religious houses, and churches, which, having been confiscated, are either in the process of decay or occu- pied for secular purposes ; and, in the country, has pointed out to him the estates which were formerly the property of the Church, he gets some realization of the nature of the work which Juarez had the ability and courage to accomplish. And when he further reflects on the numbers of idle, shiftless, and certainly to some extent profligate people, who tenanted or were supported by these great properties, and

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~_oreeoewvwwt* * AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 21 who, producing nothing and consuming everything, virtually lived on the superstitions and fears of their countrymen—which they at the same time did their best to create and perpetuate—he no longer won- ders that Mexico and her people are poor and degraded, but rather that they are not poorer and more degraded than they are. What amount of property was owned by the Mexican Church and clergy previous to its secularization is not certainly known (at least by the public). It is agreed that they at one time held the titles to all the best property of the republic, both in city and country ; and there is said to have been an admission by the clerical authorities to the ownership of eight hundred and sixty-one estates in the country, val- ued at $71,000,000 ; and of twenty-two thousand lots of city property, valued at $113,000,000 ; making a total of $184,000,000. Other esti- mates, more general in their character, are to the effect that the former aggregate wealth of the Mexican Church can not have been less than $300,000,000 ; and, according to Mr. Strother, it is not improbable that even this large estimate falls short of the truth ; “inasmuch as it is admitted that the Mexican ecclesiastical body well understood the value of money as an element of power, and, as bankers and money- lenders for the nation, possessed vast assets which could not be pub- lily known or estimated.” Notwithstanding also the great losses which the Church had undoubtedly experienced prior to the accession of Juarez in 1857, and his control of the state, the annual revenue of the Mexican clergy at that time, from tithes, gifts, charities, and pa- rochial dues, is believed to have been not less than $22,000,000, or more than the entire aggregate revenues of the state derived from all its customs and internal taxes. Some of the property that thus came into the possession of the Government was quickly sold by it, and at very low prices ; and, very curiously, was bought, in some nota- ble instances, by other religious (Protestant) denominations, which, previous to 1857, had not been allowed to obtain even so much as tol- erance or a foothold in the country. Thus, the former spacious head- quarters of the order of the Franciscans, with one of the most elegant and beautifully proportioned chapels in the world, within its walls, and fronting in part on the Calle de San Francisco, the most fashionable street in the city of Mexico, was sold to Bishop Riley and a well-known philan- thropist of New York, acting for the American Episcopal missions, at an understood price of thirty-five thousand dollars, and is now valued at over two hundred thousand dollars. In like manner the American Baptist missionaries have gained an ownership or control, in the city of Puebla, of the old Palace of the Inquisition ; and in the city of Mexico, the former enormous Palace of the Inquisition, is now a medical college; while the Plaza de San Domingo, which adjoins and fronts the Church of San Domingo, and where the auto-da-.fe was once held, is now used as a market-place. A formcr magnificent old convent, to some extent reconstructed and repaired, also affords quar-

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22 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. ters to the National Library, which in turn is largely made up of spoils gathered from the libraries of the religious “orders” and houses. The national Government, however, does not appear to have derived any great fiscal advantage from the confiscation of the Church property, or to have availed itself of the resources which thus came to it for effecting any marked reduction of the national debt. Good Catholics would not buy “God’s property ” and take titles from the state ; and so large tracts of land, and blocks of city buildings, passed, at a very low figure, into the possession of those who were indifferent to the Church, and had command of ready money ; and in this way individ- uals, rather than the state and the great body of the people, have been benefited. Having thus briefly glanced at the physical condition and political and social experiences of Mexico, we are now prepared to discuss the economic condition of the country, its prospect for industrial develop- ment, and its possible commercial importance and future trade rela- tions with the United States. Popvutation.—The element of first importance, and therefore the one entitled to first consideration in endeavoring to forecast the future of Mexico, is undoubtedly its population; the object alike for improve- ment, and the primary instrumentality by which any great improve- ment in the condition of the country can be effected. Whatever may be its aggregate—ten or twelve millions—it is generally agreed that about one third of the whole number are pure Indians, the descend- ants of the proprietors of the soil at the time of its conquest by the Spaniards ; a people yet living in a great degree by themselves, though freely mingling in the streets and public places with the other races, and speaking, it is said, about one hundred and twenty different lan- guages or dialects. Next, one half of the whole population are of mixed blood—the mestizos—of whose origin nothing, in general, can be positively affirmed, further than that their maternal ancestors were Indian women, and their fathers descendants of the Caucasian stock. They constitute the dominant race of the Mexico of to-day—the ranche- ros, farmers, muleteers, servants, and soldiers—the only native founda- tion on which it would seem that any improved structure of humanity can be reared. Where the infusion of white blood has been large, the mestizos are often represented by men of fine ability, who take natu- rally to the profession of arms and the law, and distinguish themselves. But, on the other hand, no small proportion of this race—the so-called ‘*leperos”— are acknowledged by the Mexicans themselves to be among the lowest and vilest speeimens of humanity in existence; a class exhibiting every vice, with hardly the possession of a single vir- tue. The remaining sixth of the population of Mexico are Europeans by birth or their immediate descendants, the Spanish element predomi- nating. The national language also is Spanish—a language not well

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AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 23 fitted for the uses and progress of a commercial nation ; and which will inevitably constitute a very serious obstacle in the way of indoctri- nating the Mexican people with the ideas and methods of overcoming obstacles and doing things which characterize their great Anglo-Saxon neighbors. It should also be borne in mind that a language is one of the most difficult things to supplant in the life of a nation through a foreign influence. The Norman conquest of England, although it modified the Saxon language, could not substitute French ; neither could the Moors make Arabic the language of Spain, although they held possession of a great part of the country for a period of more than seven centuries. It seems certain, therefore, that Spanish will continue to be the dominant language of Mexico until the present population is outnumbered by the Americans—a result which may occur before a very long time in the northern States of Mexico, where the population at present is very thin, but which is certainly a very far-off contingency in the case of Central Mexico. Of the present population of Mexico, probably three quarters, and possibly a larger proportion—for in respect to this matter there is no certain information—can not read or write, possess little or no prop- erty, and have no intelligent ideas about civil as contradistinguished from military authority, of political liberty, or of constitutional gov- ernment. It is difficult, in fact, to express in words, to those who have not had an opportunity of judging for themselves, the degraded condition of the mass of the laboring classes of Mexico. The veil of the pictur- esque, which often suffices to soften the hard lines of human existence, can not here hide the ugliness and even hideousness of the picture which humanity exhibits in its material coarseness and intellectual or spiritual poverty. The late consul-general Strother, who, as a citizen of one of our former slaveholding States, is well qualified to judge, ex- presses the opinion, in a late official report (1885), that the scale of liv- ing of the laboring classes of Mexico “ is decidedly inferior in comfort and neatness to that of the negroes of the Southern (United) States when in a state of slavery. Their dwellings in the cities are generally wanting in all the requirements of health and comfort—mostly rooms on the ground-floor, without proper light or ventilation ; often with but a single opening (that for entrance), dirt floors, and no drainage. In the suburbs and in the country, the dwellings in the cold regions are adobe; and in the temperate or warm regions mere huts of cane, or of stakes wattled with twigs, and roofed with corn-stalks, plantain-leaves, or brush.” In such houses of the common people there is rarely anything answering to the civilized idea of a bed, the occupants sleeping on a mat, skin, or blanket on the dirt floor. There are no chairs, tables, fireplace, or chimney ; few or no changes of raiment ; no washing apparatus or soap, and in fact no furniture whatever, except a flat stone with a stone roller to grind their corn, and a variety of earthen vessels to hold their

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24 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. food and drink, and for cooking (which last is generally performed over a small fire, within a circle of stones outside, and in front, of the main entrance to the dwelling). The principal food of all these people is In- dian corn, in the form of the so-called tortilla, which is prepared by placing a quantity of corn in a jar of hot water and lime (when it can be got) to soak overnight ; the use of the lime being to soften the corn, When it is desired to use it, the grain is taken out and ground by hand on the stone and the roller before mentioned, into a kind of paste, and then slightly dried or baked on an earthen tray or pan over a small fire. Everybody in Mexico is said to eat tortillas, and their prepara- tion, which is always assigned to the women, seems to employ their whole time, “to the exclusion of any care of the dwelling, their chil- dren, or themselves.” Foreigners, especially Americans, find them detestable. Another standard article of Mexican diet is boiled beans (frijoles). Meat is rarely used by the laborers, but, when it is ob- tainable, every part of the animal is eaten. Peppers, both green and red, mixed with the corn-meal or beans, are regarded as almost indis- pensable for every meal, and, when condensed by cooking, are de- scribed by one, who obviously speaks from experience, as forming “a red-hot mixture whose savage intensity is almost inconceivable to an American. ...A child of six or seven years old will eat more of this at a meal than most adult Americans could in a week—eating it, too, without meat or grease of any kind ; merely folding up the éortilla of wheat or corn-meal, dipping up a spoonful of the terrible compound with it, and hastily biting off the end, for fear some of the precious stuff should escape. Should one be fortunate enough to have anything else to eat, these tortillas serve as plates, after which service the plates eaten.” With all this, the agricultural laborers of Mexico, both Indians and mixed bloods, are almost universally spoken of as an industrious, easily managed, and contented people. By reason of the general mildness of the climate, the necessary requirements for living are fewer than among people inhabiting the temperate and more north- ern latitudes, and consequently poverty with them does not imply ex- treme suffering from either cold or starvation. When their simple wants are satisfied, money with them has little value, and quickly finds its way into the pockets of the almost omnipresent pulque or “lot- tery-ticket” sellers, or the priest. “If they are too ready to take a hand against the Government at the call of some discontented leader, it is not because they are Indian or Mexican, but because they are poor and ignorant.” One noticeable peculiarity of the Mexican laborer is the strength of his local attachments, and it is in rare instances only that he volun- tarily emigrates from the place of his nativity. This circumstance found a curious illustration in the experience of the recent railroad constructions in Mexico, where the builders found that they could rely

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AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 25 only upon the labor in the immediate neighborhood of their line of con- struction ; and that, generally, neither money nor persuasion would induce any great numbers of these people to follow their work any dis- tance from their native fields and villages. In those instances where temporary emigration was effected, the laborers insisted on carrying their families with them. The Government also recognizes to a cer- tain extent this peculiarity in their army movements ; and, whenever a company or regiment moves, the number of women—wives of the soldiers—accompanying seems almost absurdly numerous. They, how- ever, represent, and to some extent supply, the place of the army commissariat. In short, what Mexico is to-day, socially and politically, is the nat- ural and legitimate sequence, and exactly what might have been ex- ted from the artificial conditions which for more than three cent- uries have been forced upon her ; and history has never afforded such a striking, instructive, and pitiful illustration of the effect upon a country and a people, of long-continued absolutism and tyranny in re- spect to both government and religion. It is true that Spain, if called to plead at the bar of public opinion, might point to her éwn situation and Jecadence as in the nature of judgment confessed and punishment awarded. But what has the Church, in whose hands for so many years was exclusively vested the matter of education, and which lacked noth- ing in the way of power and opportunity, to say to the appalling depths of ignorance in which she has left the Mexican people ; an ignorance not confined to an almost entire lack of acquaintance with the simplest elements of scholastic learning—reading, writing, and the rules of common arithmetic—but even of the commonest tools and mechanical appliances of production and civilization? But, wherever may be the responsibility for such a condition of things, the conclusion seems irre- sistible that, against the moral inertia of such an appalling mass of ignorance, the advancing waves of any higher civilization are likely to dash for a long time without making any serious impression. EpucaTionaL Errorts aND AWAKENING IN Mexico.—It is, how- ever, gratifying to be able to state that at last the leading men of Mexico have come to recognize the importance of popular education ; and it is safe to say that more good, practical work has been done in this direction within the last ten years than in all of the preceding three hundred and fifty. At all of the important centers of population free © schools, under the auspices of the national Government, and free from all Church supervision, are reported as established ; while the Catholic Church itself, stimulated, as it were, by its misfortunes, and appar- ently unwilling to longer rest under the imputation of having neg- lected education, is also giving much attention to the subject ; and is said to be acting upon the principle of immediately establishing two schools wherever, in a given locality, the Government, or any of the Protestant denominations, establish one. In several of the national

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26 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. free schools visited by the writer, the scholars, mainly girls, appeared bright and intelligent, the teachers (females) competent, and the text- books modern. The language of instruction was, of course, Spanish, but a greater desire than ever before to learn English is reported, and it is now (contrary to former custom) generally taught in preference to French. Industrial schools, to which boys are appointed from dif- ferent sections of the country, analogous to the system of appointments in the United States for West Point and Annapolis, have also been established by the Government. One of the most interesting of these, and for the promotion of which the Mexican Central Railroad corpora. tion have co-operated, exists at Guadalupe, about five miles from the city of Zacatecas. Here, in a large and well-preserved convent struct- ure, confiscated by the Government and appropriated for school pur- poses, some two or three hundred Mexican boys are gathered, and practically taught the arts of spinning and weaving, printing, carpen- tering, instrumental music, leather-work, and various other handi- crafts ; while, in close contiguity, and in striking contrast with the poverty of the surrounding country, the ecclesiastical authorities are expending a large amount of money—the proceeds of a legacy of a rich Mexican mine-proprietor—in reconstructing and decorating ina most elaborate manner the church, which was formerly a part of the convent, and which has been left in their possession. The Federal Government also maintains national schools at the capital, of agriculture, medicine, law, and engineering ; a Conservatory of Music, an Academy of Fine Arts, a National Museum and a National Library ; together with institutions for the blind, deaf and dumb, the insane, for the reformation of young criminals, and such other system- atic charities as are common in enlightened communities. Most of these institutions are located in old and spacious ecclesiastical edifices which have been “nationalized”; and the means for their support seem to be always provided, although the Mexican treasury is rarely or never in a flourishing condition. At the same time it is almost cer- tain that all these laudable efforts on the part of the Government to promote education and culture have thus far worked down and affect- ed to a very slight extent the great mass of the people. But it is, nev- ertheless, a beginning. After all, however, as the stability of any form of government and the maintenance of domestic tranquillity with such a population as ex- ists in Mexico, is obviously contingent on the maintenance of a strong, well-organized, and disciplined army, the first care of the central Government is naturally to promote military rather than secular edu- cation ; and, accordingly, the National Military School, located at Cha- pultepec, and modeled after the best military schools of Europe, is in the highest state of efficiency. The system of instruction and the text-books used are French ; and the personnel of the school, both officers and cadets, will compare favorably with anything that can be

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AN ECONOMIC STUDY OF MEXICO. 27 seen at West Point. The army maintained by Mexico is larger than that of the United States, and the rank and file seem to be possessed of all the physical qualities essential for the making of good soldiers, But it is upon the patriotism and intelligence of the officers in com- mand of the army that the immediate future and prosperity of Mexico is dependent. The single fact, however, that the present Government and the most intelligent and influential people of Mexico have recog- nized the necessity of educating the masses of the people, and that probably the best that can be done under existing circumstances is being done, certainly constitutes the most hopeful and encouraging augury for the future of the republic. Tur GovERNMENT AND Socrat Forces or Mexico.—As might be expected from the existing conditions, the Government of Mexico— both Federal and State—although nominally constitutional and demo- cratic, is not, and from the very nature of things can not be, other than personal, and is often in the highest degree arbitrary and despotic ; in short, a military despotism under the form of a republic. For ex- ample, under date of February 15, 1886, the telegraph reports that the people of Coahuila are rejoicing over the fact that, after a term of a ear and a half of military rule, the civil authorities are to resume control of the local government ; but to this is added the following significant statement : “The policy of the civil government, however, will probably be identical with that pursued by the military, as the Governor-elect is a strong supporter of the Administration, and will accede to all the demands of the Federal Government.” No such thing as a popular assemblage, to discuss public questions of any kind, ever takes place in Mexico ; and when, in the fall of 1884, a young member of the national Congress from Vera Cruz—Diaz Miron—ventured to oppose a scandalous proposition of the then Presi- dent, Gonzales, for the readjustment of the claims of the English hold- ers of the national bonds, he felt it necessary to preface his speech on the floor of the House of Representatives with words to the effect that he fully recognized that, in opposing the Administration, he probably forfeited all chance for future political preferment, even if he did not at once endanger his personal freedom. And such, proba- bly, would have been to him the result, had not the students of the city of Mexico made the cause of Miron their own, and by organizing and assuming the aggressive, forced the Government to abandon their position. Although there are plenty of newspapers in Mexico—some sixteen “dailies” in the city of Mexico alone—they have, as might be ex- pected, but comparatively few readers, and apparently exist for some other purpose than that of reporting the “news.” Only one journal in the country—“ El] Monitor Republicano ”—a daily published in the city of Mexico, and representing the Liberal Opposition, claims a cir- culation as great as thirty-five hundred ; and probably next to this in

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28 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. circulation (twenty-five hundred reported) is the Church paper, “E] Tiempo,” which is bitter alike against the Americans and all their im. provements, not excepting even their railroads. Of all the other pa. pers, it is doubtful whether their average circulation ever reaches ag large a figure as eight hundred. . The press of Mexico, furthermore, can hardly be said to be free; inasmuch as, when it says anything which the Government assumes to be calculated to excite sedition, the authorities summarily arrest the editor and send him to prison ; taking care, however, in all such pro- ceedings, to scrupulously observe what has been enacted to be law, Thus, during the past year (1885), the editor-in-chief of “ El Monitor Republicano ” has served out a sentence of seven months in the com- mon penitentiary, for his criticisms upon the Government. Public opinion in Mexico means simply the opinions of the large landed proprietors, the professions, the teachers, the students, and the army officers ; comprising in all not more than from twenty-five to thirty thousand of the whole population. And it is understood that less than this number of votes were cast at the last presidential elec- tion, although the Constitution of Mexico gives to every adult male citizen of the republic the right to vote at elections and to hold office, Popular election in Mexico is, therefore, little more than a farce ; and the situation affords another striking illustration of a fact which is recognized everywhere by the student of politics, that an uneducated people will not avail themselves of the right to vote as a matter of course, or recognize any sense of duty or responsibility as incumbent upon them as citizens. Such a condition of affairs obviously constitutes in itself a perpetual menace of domestic tranquillity : for, with no cen- sus or registration of voters, no scrutiny of the ballot-box except by the party in power ; no public meetings or public political discussions ; and no circulation of newspapers among the masses, no peacefully organized political opposition has a chance to exist. Such opposition as does manifest itself is, therefore, personal and never a matter of principles, The central Government for the time being nominates and counts in what candidates it pleases; and, if any one feels dissatisfied or op- pressed, there is absolutely no redress to be obtained except through rebellion. Such has been the political experience of the Republic of Mexico heretofore ; and although the recent construction of railways, by facilitating the transportation of troops, has strengthened the central Government, there is no reason to suppose that what has happened in the past will not continue to happen until the first essential of a free government—namely, free and intelligent suffrage on the part of the masses—is established in the country ; and the day for the consumma- tion of such a result is very far distant. The present President of Mexico, Porfirio Diaz, is undoubtedly one of the ablest men who has ever filled the office of its chief execu- tive. He is believed to have the interest of his country supremely at

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DEVELOPMENT OF THE MORAL FACULTY. 29 heart ; is free from the suspicion that has attached, and probably with justice, to so many of the Mexican Presidents, of using his power, through contracts and expenditures, to enrich himself illegitimately ; and has appreciated the necessity and favored all efforts for establish- ing and extending popular education. It is not, furthermore, to be denied that many of the men associated with the present or recent administrations of Mexico are of very high character and fine abili- ties ; the recent representative of Mexico in the United States, Seiior Zamacona, and the present minister, Sefior Romero, for example, being the peers of the representatives of any of the governments of the Old World. +o soe DEVELOPMENT OF THE MORAL FACULTY.* Br JAMES SULLY, M. A. i has been long disputed whether the moral faculty is innate and instinctive, or whether it is the result of experience and education. The probability is that it is partly the one and partly the other. The child shows from an early period a disposition to submit to others’ au- thority, and this moral instinct may not improbably be the transmitted result of the social experience and moral training of many generations of ancestors. Yet, whatever the strength of the innate disposition, it is indisputable that external influences and education have much to do in determining the intensity and the special form of the moral senti- ment. We have now to trace the successive phases of its development. A consciousness of moral obligation arises in the first instance by help of the common childish experience of living under parental au- thority at the outset. The child’s repugnance to doing what is wrong is mainly the egoistic feeling of dislike to or fear of punishment. By the effect of the principle of association or “transference,” dislike to the consequences of certain actions might lead on to a certain measure of dislike to the actions themselves. And such an effort would greatly strengthen the innate disposition to submit to authority. When the forces of affection and sympathy come into play, this crude germ of moral feeling would advance a stage. An affectionate child, finding that disobedience and wrong-doing offend and distress his mother or father, would shrink from these actions on this ground. Not only so, the promptings of sympathy would lead the child to set a value on what those whom he loves and esteems hold in reverence, In this way love and reverence for the father lead on naturally to love and reverence for the moral law which he represents, enforces, and in a measure embodies. Even now, however, the love of right has not become a feeling for * From “Elements of Psychology, with Special Applications to the Art of Teaching.” In press of D. Appleton & Co.

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30 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. the inherent quality of moral rightness ; it is still a blind respect for what is enjoined by certain persons who are respected and beloved. In order that the blind, sympathetic regard may pass into an intelligent appreciation, another kind of experience is necessary. Thrown with others from the first, a child soon finds that he is af. fected in various ways by their actions. Thus another child takes a toy from him or strikes him, and he suffers, and experiences a feeling of anger, and an impulse to retaliate. Or, on the contrary, another child is generous and shares his toys, etc., with him, and so his happiness ig augmented, and he is disposed to be grateful. In such ways the child gradually gains experience of the effect of others’ good and bad actions on his own welfare. By so doing his apprehension of the meaning of moral distinctions is rendered clearer. “ Right” and “wrong” acquire a certain significance in relation to his individual well-being. He ig now no longer merely in the position of an unintelligent subject to a command ; he becomes to some extent an intelligent approver of that command, helping to enforce it, by pronouncing the doer of the selfish act “naughty,” and of the kind action “ good.” Further experience and reflection on this would teach the child the reciprocity and interdependence of right conduct ; that the honesty, fairness, and kindness of others toward himéelf are conditional on his acting similarly toward them. In this way he would be led to attach @ new importance to his own performance of certain right actions. He feels impelled to do what is right, e. g., speak the truth, not simply because he wants to avoid his parents’ condemnation, but because he begins to recognize that network of reciprocal dependence which binds each individual member of a community to his fellows. Even now, however, our young moral learner has not attained to a genuine and pure repugnance to wrong as such. In order that he may feel this, the higher sympathetic feelings must be further developed. To illustrate the influence of such a higher sympathy, let us sup- pose that A suffers from B’s angry outbursts or his greedy propensi- ties. He finds that C and D also suffer in much the same way. If his sympathetic impulses are sufficiently keen he will be able, by help of his own similar sufferings, to put himself in the place of the injured one, and to resent his injury just as though it were done to himself. At the beginning he will feel only for those near him, and the objects of special affection, as his mother or his sister. Hence the moral im- portance of family relations and their warm personal affections, as serv- ing first to develop habitual sympathy with others and consideration for their interests and claims. As his sympathies expand, however, this indignation against wrong-doing will take a wider sweep, and embrace a larger and larger circle of his fellows. In this way he comes to exercise a higher moral function as a disinterested spectator of others’ conduct, and an impartial representative and supporter of the moral law.

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DEVELOPMENT OF THE MORAL FACULTY. 31 The highest outcome of this habit of sympathetic indignation against wrong is a disinterested repugnance to wrong when done by the individual himself. A child injures another in some way, either in momentary anger or through thoughtlessness. As soon as he is able to reflect, his habit of sympathy asserts itself, and causes him to suffer with the injured one. He puts himself at the point of view of the child he has wronged, and from that point of view looks back on him- self, the doer of the wrong, with a new feeling of self-condemnation. On the other hand, when he fulfills his duty to another or renders him a kindness, he gains a genuine satisfaction by imaginatively realizing the feelings of the recipient of the service, and so looking back on his action with complacency and approval. When this stage of moral progress is reached, the child will iden- tify himself with the moral law in a new and closer way. He will no longer do right merely because an external authority commands, or because he sees it to some extent to be his interest to do so. The de- velopment of the unselfish feelings has now connected an internal pain, the pang of self-condemnation, and of remorse, with the consciousness of acting wrongly ; and this pain, being immediate and certain, acts as a constant and never-failing sanction. The higher developments of the moral sentiment involve not only a deepening and quickening of the feelings, but a considerable enlight- enment of the intelligence. In order to detect the subtler distinctions between right and wrong, delicate intellectual processes have to be car- ried out. Rapidity and certainty of moral insight are the late result of wide experience, and a long and systematic exercise of the moral faculty on its emotional and intellectual side alike. Since the moral feeling stands in a peculiarly close relation to the will, the practical problem of exercising and developing it is intimately connected with the education of the will and the formation of the moral character. This larger problem we have not yet reached, but we may even at this stage inquire into the best means of developing the moral sentiment regarded apart from its influence as a motive to action, and merely as an emotional and intellectual product. Inasmuch as the government of the parent and the teacher is the external agency that first acts upon the germ of the moral sentiment, it is evident that the work of training the moral feelings and judg- ment forms a conspicuous feature in the plan of early education. The nature of the home discipline more particularly is a prime factor in de- termining the first movements of growth of the childish sense of duty. In order that any system of discipline may have a beneficial moral in- fluence and tend in the direction of moral growth, it must satisfy the requirements of a good and efficient system. What these are is a point which will be considered later on. Here it must suffice to say that rules must be laid down absolutely, and enforced uniformly and con- sistently, yet with a careful consideration of circumstances and indi-

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32 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. vidual differences. Only in this way will the child come to view the commands and prohibitions of his parent or his teacher as representing and expressing a permanent and unalterable moral law, which is per. fectly impartial in its approvals and disapprovals. The effect of any system of discipline in educating and strengthen. ing the moral feelings and judgment will depend on the spirit and temper in which it is enforced. ‘On the one hand, a measure of calm ‘becomes the judicial function, and a parent or teacher carried away by violent feeling is unfit for moral control. Hence everything like petty personal feeling, as vindictiveness, triumph, and so forth, should be rigorously excluded. On the other hand, the moral educator must not, in administering discipline, appear as a cold, impersonal abstraction. He must represent the august and rigorously impartial moral law, but in representing it he must prove himself a living personality capable of being deeply pained at the sight of wrong-doing. By so doing he may foster the love of right by enlisting on his side the child’s warmer feelings of love and respect for a concrete personality. The child should first be led to feel how base it is to lie, and how cowardly to injure a weak and helpless creature, by witnessing the distress it causes his beloved parent or teacher. In like manner he should be led on to feel the no- bility of generosity and self-sacrifice by witnessing the delight which it brings his moral teacher. It is hardly necessary to add, perhaps, that this infusion of morality with a warm sympathetic reflection of the educator’s feelings presup- poses the action of that moral atmosphere which surrounds a good per- sonality. The child only fully realizes the repugnance of a lie to his parent or teacher when he comes to regard him as himself a perfect embodiment of truth. The moral educator must appear as the con- sistent respecter of the moral law in all his actions. The training of the moral faculty in a self-reliant mode of feeling and judging includes the habitual exercise of the sympathetic feelings, together with the powers of judgment. And here much may be done by the educator in directing the child’s attention to the effects of his conduct. The injurious consequences of wrong-doing and the benefi- cent results of right-doing ought to be made clear to the child, and his feelings enlisted against the one and on the side of the other. Not only so, his mind should be exercised in comparing actions so as to dis- ' cover the common grounds and principles of right and wrong, and also in distinguishing between like actions under different circumstances, 80 that he may become rational and discriminative in pronouncing moral judgment. ; What is called moral instruction should in the first stages of educa- tion consist largely of presenting to the child’s mind examples of duty and virtue, with a view to call forth bis moral feelings as well as to exercise his moral judgment. His own little sphere of observation

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\ oe _s_ S'S - wo _ —_ S—- WS i e L ’ wTeFTewaer Ve YO J ora ,- - — s DEVELOPMENT OF THE MORAL FACULTY. 33 should be supplemented by the page of history and of fiction. In this way a wider variety of moral action is exhibited, and the level of every- day experience is transcended. Such a widening of the moral horizon is necessary both for enlarging and refining the feeling of duty, and for rendering the meaning of moral terms deeper and more exact. And it stimulates the mind to frame an ideal conception of what is good and raiseworthy. The problem of determining the exact relation of intellectual to moral culture is one which has perplexed men’s minds from the days of Socrates. On the one hand, as has been remarked, the enlighten- ment of the intelligence is essential to the growth of a clear and finely discriminative moral sense. On the other hand, it is possible to exer- cise the intellect in dealing with the formal distinctions of morality without calling the moral faculty into full vital activity. This practical difficulty presses with peculiar force when we come on to the later exercises of moral instruction. The full carrying out of the process of informing the moral intelligence naturally conducts to the more or less systematic exposition of the ideas and truths of ethics. An enlightened conscience is one to which the deepest grounds of duty have begun to disclose themselves, and which has approximated to a complete and harmonious ideal of goodness by a systematic survey and co-ordination of the several divisions of human duty and the cor- responding directions of moral virtue and excellence. Something in the shape of ethical exposition is thus called for when the child reaches acertain point in moral progress. But the educator must be careful to make this dogmatic instruction supplementary to, and not a substi- tute for, the drawing forth of the whole moral faculty on its sensitive and on its reflective side alike by the presentation of living concrete illustrations of moral truth. Divorced from this, it can only degener- ate into a dead formal exercise of the logical faculty and the memory. The education of the moral sentiment is, as we have seen, carried out in part by the influence of the child’s companions. To surround him with companions is not only necessary for his comfort, but is a condition of developing and strengthening the moral feelings, as the sentiment of justice, the feeling of honor, and so on. The larger com- munity of the school has an important moral function in familiarizing the child’s mind with the idea that the moral law is not the imposition of an individual will, but of the community. The standard of good conduct set up and enforced by this community is all authoritative in fixing the early directions of the moral judgment. This being so, it is evident that the moral educator must take pains to control and guide the public opinion of the school. And in connec- tion with this he should seek to counteract the excessive influence of numbers, and to stimulate the individual to independent moral re- flection. VOL, xXx1x.—3

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34 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. DE CANDOLLE ON THE PRODUCTION OF MEN OF SCIENCE. Bry W. H. LARRABEE. HE first edition of Alphonse de Candolle’s “ History of the Sei- ences and of Scientific Men during two Centuries,” * which wag published in 1873, was speedily exhausted, and the book became, as the author says, a rarity in the library catalogues. A search for it two years ago revealed the fact that there was but one copy to be found in the European markets, and that was held at three times the ordinary price. Frequent references to the work as an authority, and many inquiries for it, made a second edition necessary, and it has appeared, with careful revisions and valuable additions, within the year. The primary object of the work was to study the influence of heredity in developing men of science; but it was obvious from the outset that this was only one of many factors that concurred in producing the result, and by no means always a predominant one. Hence the task became at once that of learning what influence was contributed by birth, and what by exterior circumstances, such as education, examples, institutions, etc. The mixture of the two categories is often inextrica- ble, as Mr. Galton has remarked, but in many cases we may succeed in determining which one of them 1s predominant. M. de Candolle precedes his principal study with general discussions of the subjects of heredity and selection, and of the operation of selec- tion in the human species, to which he has added in the later edition of his book an account of bis processes and the results of his newer inves- tigations on heredity. The latter were made upon thirty-one persons belonging to sixteen different families in comfortable circumstances, and bore reference to 1,032 distinct traits of character, for each of which he also inquired into its presence or absence in either or both parents. These traits were arranged in four categories : external, 287 ; internal, 140; instinctive and sentimental, 410; and intellectual, 195. The general result of the examination was to show in a striking man- ner that heredity is the usual, general, and predominant law, in both sexes and various degrees for all the categories of characteristics not acquired. Other facts of more limited application were brought out. Interruption of heredity during one or more generations, or atavism, was rarely presented, and seemed to say, when it occurred, not that the particular trait was wanting, but that it was feebly accentuated, in the intermediate generations. The more prominent or influential the per- * “ Histoire des Sciences et des Savants depuis Deux Siécles.” Preceded and followed by other studies on scientific subjects, particularly on “ Heredity and Selection.” By Al- phonse de Candolle. Second edition, with Additions. Geneva, Basle, and Lyon: H. Georg. Pp. 594. 1885.

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DE CANDOLLE ON MEN OF SCIENCE. 35 gon, for good or bad, the more he appeared to exhibit pronounced and numerous characteristics in the category of instinctive feelings and in- telligence. Some of these feelings in such cases appeared in the family for the first time. Women present fewer distinctive traits than men. All the distinctive characteristics, regarded in groups, are more freely transmitted by fathers than mothers. This is particularly the case with traits of intelligence ; probably because the characteristics in question are more strongly developed in the fathers. It is hard to learn whether characteristics acquired by education, reading, and ex- ample, and from social influences, such as patriotism, religious opinions, the point of honor, devotion to a dynasty, etc., are transmitted. Prob- ably they rest on weak but native and transmissibie bases, such ‘as sociability for patriotism, timorousness and curiosity for religion, a submissive spirit for loyalty, etc. The external influences of educa- tion, example, and other factors, develop upon these bases sentiments which become very strong, and are perhaps easily transmissible. The characteristics most marked in an individual are ordinarily those which he derives from both parents, and they exhibit special force if they are derived from these and also from other ancestors. A curious element of hereditary influence in developing men addicted to high mental ef- fort may be found in considering the condition of the clergy of a coun- try. It is not indifferent, M. de Candolle observes, “ whether some cate- gories of the instructed, intelligent, and respectable public, be restricted to celibacy or not. Laying aside all dogmatism and views respecting the discipline of the clergy, the result, relative to instruction, is not the same for a country where there are, for example, forty or fifty thousand celibate ecclesiastics, or the same number of clergymen- fathers of families. Even if we reduce heredity in intellectual affairs to a minimum, the mere existence, in Protestant countries, of married pastors, assures the development, from year to year, of a certain num- ber of educated persons who will exert a wholesome influence upon society.” Thus, Agassiz, Berzelius, Boerhaave, Robert Brown, Camper, Clausius, Encke, Euler, Fabricius, Grew, Hansteen, Hartsoeker, Oswald Heer, Jenner, Linnzus, Mitscherlich, Olbers, Claus Rudbeck, W. P. Schimper, Studer, Schweizer, Arthur Young, Wargentin, Wollaston, and Wiirtz, among men of science ; a list that includes Hallam, Hobbes, Puffendorf, and De Sismondi, among publicists and historians ; Addi- son, Gessner, Ben Jonson, Lessing, Jean Paul Richter, Swift, Thomson, Wieland, Young, and Emerson, among poets and men of letters ; and Christopher Wren and David Wilkie, among artists, would not have existed if their fathers, Protestant pastors, had been Roman Catholic priests, or would not have been what they were had their education been defective. These are examples of an external influence, operating in a coun- try at large, to modify heredity of intellectual tendencies, or to work along with it. The special object of M. de Candolle’s research is

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36 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. to determine how far such external influences, peculiar to different countries, have had effect, during the past two centuries, on the de- velopment of the sciences by producing the men most eminent in them. M. de Candolle takes as the criterion, in the selection of men to be subjects of his review, the judgment of the principal learned societies of Europe as expressed toward scientific men severally not of their own nations. He thus avoids possible errors of his own judgment, and those which might originate in the prejudices of any other persong by whose judgment he could be guided. The opinions expressed by those societies in the manner indicated are impartial, if any opinions can be. They may not be wholly just as to individuals, for not all the most deserving have received the notice of foreign societies, but, as averages, they are probably as fair as possible. The Royal Society of London is accustomed to name fifty foreign members from among the distinguished in all branches of science. The Frevch Academy of Sciences confers the title of Foreign Associate on eight scientific men not of France, and has usually, also, on its general list of correspond- ents from forty to seventy foreigners. The societies of Germany and Italy likewise confer suffrages among those men whom they consider to have done the most for science in other countries than their own. Taking the lists of the foreign members of these societies as they stand at stated periods from 1666, when Huygens was elected a foreign asso- ciate of the French Academy of Sciences, down to the present, we have a large catalogue of names which the scientific world has united, as it were, to pronounce its greatest. The first conclusion drawn from the analysis of the lists is that of the greater importance that has been attained during the last hundred years by the natural as distinguished from the mathematical and physical sciences. Another fact to be learned from them is the grow- ing tendency to devotion to special branches. The Greek philosophers and those of the middle ages were interested in all branches. In the days of Leibnitz and Newton, two or three designations were needed to describe a philosopher’s pursuits, as “astronomer and physicist,” or “mathematician, astronomer, and physicist,” and it might some- times be necessary to add “ linguist ” or “ poet.” But science has now become too large for this. Single branches must absorb the whole attention of those who would be proficient in them. And the impossi- bility of rising in science while following a lucrative profession or pursuing a hobby is becoming daily more evident. In this may lie one of the reasons why Roman Catholic ecclesiastics appear to have given up scientific pursuits. The lists, till the end of the eighteenth century, included many names of Jesuits, monks, and abbés. In the present cent- ury we have only the Abbé Haitly and Father Secchi. The difference is also in part due to the changed condition of the clergy. The clerical names on the lists of the last centuries were chiefly taken from the

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it QB as = @2 ® — 7 @ “4 sao @ ? e- iw le or ne en y it- DE CANDOLLE ON MEN OF SCIENCE. 37 sedentary clergy, whose ecclesiastical duties were light. The number of clergy of this class has been greatly reduced since the French Revo- Jution ; and the bishops and parish priests of to-day have no time for science. The increasing specialization of scientific work is also seen in the separation, in natural history, between collectors and describers, and between those who make applications of science and those who work at original research ; and a separation is growing up between teaching and purely scientific work. Dividing society into three elasses—the aristocratic, the middle class, and the workers—the for- mer appears to be most fruitful in proportion to its numbers in the development of scientific excellence ; but the list of Frenchmen in the present century appears to show an inclination in favor of the middle and working classes. By the force of circumstances a life of research is one of abnegation, which can hardly be recommended to those who have no worldly goods ; and the conferring of scholarships and fellow- ships upon poor students can hardly change the conditions to any great extent. It may result in making well-informed men and teachers, but many other circumstances and influences than a university education must concur to induce a young man to devote himself to investigation, to the discovery of truths, and the publication of his results. These come next under review. The appearance on the Academy lists in several instances of the names of father and son or of members of the same family, and in nu- merous instances of persons whose fathers had made a good record in professional or scholastic life, suggests heredity ; but it is not safe-to build too much on the suggestion—at least not in its application to the specific talent. There are other factors than heredity in the fam- ily life of professional and scientific men to direct the attention of ihe children toward kindred pursuits to those of the father. Heredity has a considerable effect, but it consists chiefly in the transmission of tastes and faculties that are useful in such pursuits, rather than of su- perior aptitudes for particular branches. Further than this, it does not operate directly, except perhaps in the case of the mathematical sci- ences. The power of family influences under the direction of scholarly fathers to cultivate such tastes in youth is shown in the large propor- tion of the names of sons of Protestant pastors on the scientific rolls. The occupations of physicians and pharmacists are more directly scien- tific than that of the pastor, but the number of sons of members of those professions on the lists is much inferior to that of sons of pastors. The difference is ascribed to the more quiet and intimate life of the pastoral home, and to the direct and constant supervision which is ex- ercised hy the pastor over the training of his sons. Switzerland fur- nishes more instances than any other country of members of the same family on the academical lists. This is because Swiss youth, particu- larly the sons of pastors, pursue their studies at home, living in their own families, while in France and Italy they are taken away from

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38 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. / home at the age of attending college. This was particularly true in Switzerland in the last century and the first half of the present one, especially at Geneva and Basle, the towns which have furnished the largest proportion of savants connected by family ties. Inquiring what personal traits contribute most to the making of a scientific man, a comparison is made of the characteristics possessed in common by four eminent men—Darwin, Linnzus, Cuvier, and the author’s father, Augustin-Pyramus de Candolle. They all had heads larger than the ordinary size ; strong and persistent will ; curiosity for the examination of accessible things and of truths ; great activity, exhib- ited in the walking excursions of Linnzus and De Candolle, the untir. ing industry of Darwin, and the constant occupation of Cuvier with his work, although he seemed to be phlegmatic ; order, shown in their aptitude in classification ; observing faculties, in which none could be superior to Darwin and Cuvier ; freedom from any taste for meta- physics ; sound judgment ; excellent memory ; great power of atten- tion, and remarkable faculty for generalization. As points of differ- ence, Darwin, Cuvier, and De Candolle were distinguished by amplitude of ideas, while Linnzus was narrow; Darwin and De Candolle were independent in opinion, Linnzus and Cuvier less so. None of the four had a natural taste for languages, but De Candolle and Darwin regretted that they knew so little of other languages than their own. Looking for the origin of the qualities they had in common, we find that Linnzus was the son of a country pastor, and grandson, through his mother, of another pastor. Cuvier, whose brother Frédéric was also a zodlogist, but less celebrated than he, was the son of a military officer, whose life does not throw any particular light on the origin of his distinctive characteristics. The De Candolle family were distin- guished by an independence of judgment that compelled them to change the country of their residence, for opinion’s sake, four times in three hundred years. These four naturalists were singularly favored by external circumstances. They were born in long-civilized coun- tries ; they received a Protestant education which did not repress their curiosity or the independence of their opinions ; they found, at home and around them, good examples, counsels, and encouragement ; and they studied in good schools. Special or innate tastes are not as important as they appear to be, unless they prove persistent. In that case they are cultivated in after- life, and are remembered and spoken of. But those who have the same tastes in infancy and fail to cultivate them, forget them and never speak of them. Multitudes of children chase butterflies and make collections of shells or insects without becoming naturalists, or construct toy houses and machines without becoming architects or en- gineers. Some scientific men have also been poetasters or amateur dramatists in their youth. Other special tastes and antipathies have some influence, but they result as often from the circumstances of

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DE CANDOLLE ON MEN OF SCIENCE. 39 sights, conversations, examples, or other incidents occurring in youth, as from descent. In instruction much depends on exciting curiosity or keeping it active. If, within the family or the school, we put questions to a child, or place it in such conditions that it will ask questions, its curi- osity is excited. If, on the other hand, we discourage and repress the inquisitive disposition, the impulses of curiosity are arrested, and the mind gradually bends toward indifference or timidity. “From the primary school to the university, the teaching may favor, contradict, or direct in one manner or another the inquisitive spirit of young people. Appropriate questioning, the repulsion of frivolous or inappropriate questions, approval of those which are serious, and the solution of which is possible to the pupil, speaking about things which are not yet discovered or comprehended, but the discovery of which by means of research and reflection is hopeful, a rare use of the principle of author- ity, which is opposed to scientific methods, are means which may be indicated to teachers as adapted to direct the minds of their pupils toward the higher region of the sciences. Those are not the most elo- quent or the most lucid professors who excite inquisitive minds, but those rather whose teachings leave doubts and suggest questions. If they can tell the whole and still excite curiosity, it is well ; but to pro- voke the efforts of the pupils by badly directed teaching is not as re- grettable as it is thought to be. Especially in the mathematical sci- ences, in which it is so important for the student to fix his attention, a merely ordinary teacher often succeeds better than a very skillful one.* The worst teacher, in the author’s opinion, is the one who represents science as finished. A point on which many of Mr. Galton’s corre- spondents, in the course of his inquiries respecting the education of English scientific men have insisted, “is that of giving freedom and leisure to pupils who show strong tastes in their studies. As they are original, curious, and independent in disposition, they are not very fond of having tasks imposed upon them. They are often poor scholars, but they are scholars who have a future, and provision ought to be made for giving them special treatment. Unfortunately, the system of education in common is opposed to that ; and this is one of the rea- sons why so many schools form mediocrities, without favoring indi- viduals who are superior to the average.” In reading the biographies of the several foreign associates of the French Academy, it is often a matter of surprise to observe how medi- ocre were some of the instructors of illustrious men, and how many * “They say,” said the author to Regnault, professor in the Ecole polytechnique of Paris, “that when you were young the school produced many more celebrated mathema- ticians and physicists than it does now. Is it true?” “Perhaps so,” he answered. “Why?” “ Because, you see, our principal professor of mathematics was so obscure, that the pupils had to meet after each lesson to go over it again. For some time I had to ‘ revise the exercise-books of my comrades. You can not imagine how it made me work.”

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40 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. who were pupils of the most celebrated professors held a secondary rank in science ; and we have to admit that, while illustrious savantg may give good instruction, good teaching does not make illustrious savants, <A deplorable effect of instruction is to diminish originality, without some proportion of which quality a scientific man can not rise above the mean. When we inquire what is the influence of religion upon the de- velopment of scientific men, we find that the non-Christian countries are completely foreign to the scientific movement. We have no right to conclude from this that one has to be a Christian to be distinguished in science, for there are many examples to contradict such an assertion. We can only say that the Christian religion has been favorable to sci- ence by its general influence upon civilization. We can at least affirm that it has been, in the modern epoch, the only religion which has coincided with a real scientific development. Between the divisions of Christendom, the advantage is vastly in favor of Protestantism, While the proportion of Protestant to Roman Catholic populations is one to one and a half, Europe, outside of France, has furnished four times as many Protestant as Roman Catholic foreign associates to the French Academy of Sciences. France, where most of the Roman Catholic scientific men reside, has furnished about an equal number of Protestant and Roman Catholic foreign members of the Royal Society of London. No English or Irish Roman Catholic name appears on the list of the French Academy, although that Church includes a fifth of the population of the United Kingdom. - Austria is not represented there, and Roman Catholic Germany makes but a poor showing by the side of Protestant Germany. In Switzerland, where the Catholics are to the Protestants as one to one and a half, not one of the foreign as- sociates is a Roman Catholic. A similar difference appears to exist as among Swiss, English, and Irish, of the two cults in the lists of the London and Berlin societies. The difference is not attributable to any- thing in the doctrines of the churches, but rather to the different atti- tude—direct or indirect—of their clergy toward education, according as it is their habit to prescribe by authority or to leave every one free to form his own opinion. The more we proceed in an authori- tative way, the more we repress curiosity, the mother of science, and increase mental timidity. A population educated for many generations under the principle of authority naturally becomes timid in intellectual affairs. But a population habituated from infancy to scrutinize con- cerns which it is told are of the greatest importance, like those of religion, will not be afraid to examine purely scientific questions, and will know better how to proceed to the solution of them. The fact, already referred to, should not be forgotten, that a large number of distinguished men of science have been the sons of Protestant pastors. Remove from the list of savants of Protestant countries the names ap- . pertaining to this class, and we shall find the scientific standing of the

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DE CANDOLLE ON MEN OF SCIENCE. 41 two cults as to the other names nearly equal. Thus, a rule of pure dis- cipline, foreign to the doctrines and which has not always existed in the Church, has had bad consequences for science in Roman Catholic countries. Classes of ideas, feelings, sympathies, and antipathies may be trans- mitted in families by imitation or tradition, and have great influence on the course of their members. They often result from some great event which has made a marked impression on the family ; and we may have among the number traditions favorable to the pursuit of science. Pointed examples are afforded of them in the history of some of the Protestant families who were expelled from Roman Catholic countries in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. Among these are the nine Bernouillis, who were famous in mathematics or physics. Of the men of this class there have been eleven of the one hundred and one foreign associates of the French Academy—an enormous pro- rtion for a total population of less than a million souls. If the same proportion had ruled among, say, the Germans at large, we should have had three hundred and thirty German foreign associates instead of twenty-three ; or in the United Kingdom, one hundred and thirty British associates instead of twenty-seven ; and ten of these eleven lived in Switzerland. We might increase this number if we could trace all the cases of descent from refugee mothers. The English Puritans, who emigrated to this country, had essentially the same dispositions and character with the French Protestant refugees of the sixteenth century. Their descendants, direct and indirect, in New England have also shown favorable tendencies toward sciences of every kind. They have given Franklin and Rumford to the Euro- pean academies and have furnished other distinguished men of science and historians and men of letters in the United States. The current immigration to the United States, being composed chiefly of working-men, does not bear the promise of exercising influence on the progress of science. But if every emigrant-vessel carried only one such man as Nuttall, Agassiz, Engelmann, Marcou, or Pourtalés, we might expect different results. These men and others like them are already laying the foundations of good scientific traditions, and are adding their influence to that of the Pilgrims of New England. Public opinion is beneficial or not, according as it encourages or gives the stamp of fashion to those tastes and aims which are con- genial with scientific pursuits, or to the opposite ones. Form of gov- ernment seems to exercise but little positive influence. Provided civ- ilization is not destroyed by long seasons of revolutionary violence or wars, there is no reason for supposing that scientific work will be arrested in any country solely on account of its political régime. Cus- toms are much more important, and also education and family tradi- tions, The most favorable geographical situations are in the midst of civilized nations, in the temperate zone. Science does not prosper in

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42 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. the equatorial and tropical regions, nor in the south of Europe ag much as in the north and center. Nationality is not intrinsically a factor in science. Nevertheless, some nations have in their geographical situation, their extent, lap- guage, customs, or other incidental circumstances, features which are more or less favorable to science than corresponding features in other nations. The rank in representation in the academies has fluctuated variously between England, France, and Germany during the two cent- uries, while the smaller nations, like Holland, Switzerland, and the Scandinavian states, have, in proportion to their population, more than held their own in the competition with them. Switzerland seems to hold an extraordinary and constant superiority. Some of the reasons for this have been already explained. Another reason is to be found in the fact, which is brought out in the investigation, that a small country is on the whole more favorable to science than a large one, If public institutions could really furnish incitements to scientific researches and promote their success, large countries would have 3 manifest advantage. In other words, there should regularly be more illustrious savants to the million souls in a great nation than in a small one. The facts as revealed by statistics are of contrary import, and it is not impossible to divine why this is so. There are in a small coun- try, so far as concerns science, two advantages which may afford am- ple offsets to the lucrative places and honorary distinctions of large countries. One of the advantages is the relatively smaller importance of all public functions. In a small country, the careers of the army, the magistracy, and the administration can offer only moderate tempta- tions to youth who feel themselves capable. If they aspire to a Euro- pean reputation, science is the best means within their reach by which to obtain it. The public comprehends this, and, as it desires the value of the country to be measured by some other standard than that of the extent of its territory, it gives a moral support to men who seek to distinguish themselves in affairs purely intellectual. And this support of opinion, which is quite sensible in very small states, like Denmark and the Swiss cantons, comprehends also the advantage that men of merit prefer to remain in their country ; and they preserve there their good influence and their wholesome traditions, instead of removing to the capitals of great states. Furthermore, small countries touch upon other states at all points, or are, we might say, all frontiers. One can not live in one of them without making frequent comparisons with the institutions, laws, and usages of adjacent countries. This alone is a cause of intellectual ac- tivity, and profits to the cultivation of science. The vicinity of nation- al boundaries has also the excellent effect of rendering a complete tyranny impossible. It is very easy for persecuted persons to escape from a country of small extent and live at peace in an adjoining state. This has often been seen in Switzerland, and was observed in Germany

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ler ed nt- he ns nd fic re od y> ne of rt of BP oF 2 eeot F & <4

DE CANDOLLE ON MEN OF SCIENCE. 43 and Italy, when they were divided up into many small states. Then, when the fugitives have escaped into the other states, they can gener- ally get along with the language and customs, which will not be far removed from their own. But, in a very large country, not only is it hard to escape, but if one expatriates himself he will be exposed to the annoyance of finding himself among populations speaking a differ- ent language, and having other habits than his own. Of twenty conditions which M. de Candolle lays down as favorable and the opposite of them as decidedly unfavorable to the progress of science, Switzerland has all, and no unfavorable opposites ; Turkey all the unfavorable ones, and no favorable ones ; the United States all but four favorable, and the exceptions—want of a wealthy class, want of a leisurely class devoting themselves to scientific enjoyments, lack of mu- seums, etc., and non-proximity of civilized countries—are neither grave nor characteristic, but only temporary. Above all the conditions enumerated, and controlling them, is the superior condition, primarily requisite, that every individual shall be secured in the ability to do what he judges fit, provided he does no harm to another. The idea is commonly expressed by the two terms, security and liberty; but, in fact, there can be no security without liberty, nor liberty without security. The terms complement one another. The favorable conditions appear as a whole to have accumu- lated in their most obvious form in a triangular space comprehended between Central Italy, Scotland, and Sweden, with a projection extend- ing across the ocean to New England. This peculiar shaping is the result of historical causes, the chief of which are the three decisive movements for European civilization of the Renaissance, which origi- nated in Tuscany ; the Reformation, which started in Germany ; and political liberty, which has been laboriously and slowly developed in England. Other very important factors or superior conditions are, that the race shall be European, or of European origin ; that a long selection shall have prepared a considerable number of families for in- tellectual labors ; that the climate shall not be one of depressing heat, and that the geographical situation shall not be too far removed from centers of intellectual culture. If we inquire what have been the most important scientific discov- eries—that is, those which have not been mere applications, but which have opened new fields of research—made during the last forty years, we shall find among them those of spectral analysis, the transformation of forces, the ancient extension of the glaciers, the antiquity of man and prehistoric studies, evolution and natural selection, alternating generations, and deep-sea explorations. These have all originated in Scandinavia, Central Germany, Switzerland, Northern France, or Eng- land, or in the countries which have been found to occupy the first places in the academical lists. If we extend the inquiry to fifty or sixty years back, we shall find the case substantially the same. The

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44 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. countries all lie within the region which has been marked as governed by the most favorable conditions for science. Very distinguished or illustrious men compose in a manner the framework of our history ; but by their side we may see a considerable number who have perhaps contributed quite as much, by their collect- ive efforts, to the continuous progress of science. There may be found in this category some very ingenious men, very industrious, and worthy to figure in the first ranks, but whom a premature death has removed from activity, who have been prevented from publishing, or who have been obliged to give most of their time to work which made no show- ing. The celebrities who shine in the full light are, in reality, the manifestation of the existence of a public well informed and friendly to research. Scientific work is, in fact, much more than it appears to be, collective. This is one of the reasons why particular countries and groups of population obtain a superiority over others, and keep it for centuries. One or two celebrated men may disappear, without the choice and progressive population of which they were the highest expression being annulled. A group which has once produced such illustrations of its vigor may at any time furnish others. Under the present multiplication of scientific schools and societies, laboratories, museums, and establishments in which science is applied, thousands of persons are competing in scientific labors. The more this army of workers grows, the more should it have within itself in- ventive minds who will perfect processes and occasionally make dis- coveries. The average class of scientific men is now of higher quality, because it represents better teaching and more skill in practice ; but there will always be above this medium rank better endowed and more active savants, or those who are more masters of their time and their persons. The popularization of science by means of books, periodi- cals, lectures, and societies, and the interest taken by all intelligent people in scientific matters, are of great advantage to the progress of knowledge, for specialists make recruits and easily find assistance in mediums thus disposed. The slow and costly movements of gov- ernments are not equal in value to the zealous and disinterested impul- sion of the public. M. de Candolle’s opinions respecting the influence of politics and government patronage on scientific pursuits are, in fact, very decidedly expressed. After showing how religious preposses- sions, which are usually more positive, more firmly held, and more ex- clusive than any other kind of prejudices, may interfere with the free exercise of scientific thought, he observes that the incompatibility of political relations is still greater ; for politicians defend, not what they believe to be true, but what appears practicable or possible to realize, and are subservient to the authority of chiefs and majorities. Politics agree well with the aims of those whose chief pursuit is that of mate- rial gain, for such men frequently have to use the same methods as poli- ticians to succeed ; but the person who is seeking for pure truth in his- .

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le d y - 6 mo “<4 r se oe-wv lS — = fe we

DE CANDOLLE ON MEN OF SCIENCE. 45 tory, in law, or in moral, natural, or other science, is out of his place in a political assembly. He would hardly go there except from motives of triotism, or under a transitory, enthusiastic impulse, and would very soon find out that he did not belong there. How could he lend him- self to the mancuvres of politicians? How, for example, could he trade off a principle against a railroad, a charitable foundation for an election? How could he consent to transactions between truth and falsehood, to the barter of opinions which is the rule in political affairs? Men of science are sometimes found in considerable numbers in politi- cal assemblies, but the others always do their best to make them ridicu- lous, and kill them off by giving them bad names. “As a rule,” M. de Candolle adds, “ governments too much confound teaching with progress jn science. Many of them believe they have done everything when they have created schools and universities. They do not comprehend that they often do more harm than good by restricting these institutions in their methods, or in the choice of teachers, They do not know to what degree science lives on liberty and on the individual work of masters and pupils outside of the lessons. Sometimes they over- charge the professors with courses, examinations, or administrative details which deprive those who wish to work of the time to do so.* They pay but little attention to the encouragement of original publica- tions, the sale of which at the book-stores is far from being remunera- tive, and even when they do anything in that way, it is awkwardly, and to poor purpose. “The idea of constructing expensive buildings for universities, lab- oratories, etc., is now very much in vogue. Such munificence furthers some works and gives means of obtaining greater precision in experi- ments, but it discourages isolated investigators who have not the same resources, while researches at home are usually the best thought out and the most original.” ¢ Absolute sovereigns have sometimes invited distinguished men to their capitals and bestowed their favors upon them. But this, after all, was only a way of changing the place of scientific culture, not of creating it. Generaliy, emigrations of savants have been useful to * “ At the moment of writing this phrase, I have before me letters of French, German, and Italian professors, lamenting that they can not work for science, because they are charged with hundreds of examinations which could be attended to just as well by per- sons whose time is less valuable.” + Haeckel has gone so far as to say that the scientific work of institutions aud the intrinsic value of their publications stand in an inverse ratio to the magnitude of the buildings and the splendid appearance of their volumes. “I need only refer,” he adds, “to the small and miserable institutes and the meager resources with which Baer in Kénigsberg, Schleiden in Jena, Johannes Miiller in Berlin, Liebig in Giessen, Virchow in Wiirzburg, Gegenbaur in Jena, have not only each advanced their special science most extensively, but have actually created new spheres for them. Compare with these the colossal expenditures and the luxurious apparatus in the grand institutes of Cambridge, Leipsic, and other so-called great universities—what have they produced in proportion to their means ? ”

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46 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. themselves, to science, and to the countries which have welcomed them, in proportion as rulers have had the good sense to leave them time to work. Democracies encourage savants most by leaving them the widest liberty of opinion. They have furthermore the advantage of causing the separation from political life and public functions of those men who have taste for research, cabinet-work, independence of thought, and for the truth as set above popularity and material considerations, or for precisely those things which most further the advance of science, In general, whatever may be the form or the tendency of the govern- ment, men who cultivate science for itself should rather consider them- selves fortunate if they are out of favor with the administration. _- ae THE PROBLEM OF CRYSTALLIZATION. By ALFRED EINHORN, Px. D., M.E. Speen are symmetrical forms bounded by plane surfaces, A surface is said to be plane or level when its nature is such as is exemplified in a sheet of water extending over dimensions very small when compared to the radius of the earth. Crystals occur abundantly ; they are generally diminutive and frequently microscopic in size, and therefore readily escape ordinary observation. Quite different in this respect are many forms caused by the rougher forces active in Nature, and analogous to crystals in the regularity of the shapes they assume, They are not unfrequently noted for their unique and startling appear- ance, as is instanced in the five-sided columns of basalt, known in some volcanic regions, and distinguished for their weird forms and the awe and superstition they give rise to among the inhabitants. Also many erosion figures resulting from the disintegrating action of water and air upon rocks. Many examples of this category may be seen in the scenic displays of unexcelled grandeur afforded by our far West. Not to these, but to a more commonplace phenomenon, I will now direct the attention of the reader, inasmuch as it is, mechanically speak- ing, related to and will serve to elucidate the subject under consid- eration. I have reference to a heap of particles of more or less uniform size, arranging themselves under the influence of the pull or gravity of the earth, with the provision that their magnitude should be very small relative to that of the whole heap. Thus, a grain or gravel heap is an excellent example of the phenomenon I refer to, and it is a very remarkable circumstance that different heaps have the same slope, pro- vided the character of the material and the support upon which they rest remain the same. The slope (the inclination of the sides of the heap with the horizon) is dependent upon the magnitude and shape of the particles, and also upon the nature of the support ; the whole sys-

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THE PROBLEM OF CRYSTALLIZATION. 47 tem being subject to the gravity of the earth, they assume certain definite relative positions which determine the magnitude of the slope. In order to insure the same slope, the particles need not necessarily be perfectly alike, but the average size and shape of a limited number of them, chosen at random, should be uniform throughout. It is clear that the nature of the support must influence the slope of the heap, for, resting on a polished surface like a plate of glass, the slope is less than when supported on a rough surface, as a wooden floor. Generally, in a heap of gravel the slope is different from that of a heap of grain, inasmuch as the dimensions and shape of the grain-particles differ ma- terially from those of the gravel-particles. Bearing in mind that the magnitude of each of the particles is very small, when compared with that of the heap, and therefore their number very large, we have then considered a state of aggregation of particles, assuming certain definite outward forms, these being dependent upon known causes, which we can readily modify at will, so as to produce forms with stated slopes. Mechanically, this may be said to be entirely analogous to the problem of crystallization. There also we have states of aggregation of parti- cles occurring in definite regular shapes of infinite variety, depending upon the nature of the substance and the nature of the force active between the ultimate particles, and the problem of crystallization is solved when the nature of the ultimate particles and of the force which holds them in their relative positions in the crystal has become known to us. These are the actual questions under consideration, and before pro- ceeding with their further discussion we cite some instances of crystal- lization of substances, rendered familiar to us, either through their utility in the arts and industries, or the recognized value they have by reason of their rarity and beauty. In Fig. 1 a crystal of diamond is ry EVS VY Fra. 1. Fia. 2. Fie. 3. represented ; the beauty and value of this gem are greatly enhanced by the cutting process ; the remarkable property of cleavage, which all crystals possess to a greater or less extent, is well developed in the diamond, and skillfully utilized in its cutting. The form shown in the figure occurs at the Cape, and has a yellow titige ; the bluish-white

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48 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. Brazilian diamond is preferred. A crystal of hematite (iron-ore) is shown in Fig. 2 ; it occurs in the Island of Elba, has an iron-black color and metallic luster, while its powder is reddish-brown like ordinary iron-rust. Fig. 3 is 2 crystal of calcite remarkable for its optical property of double refraction and its ready cleavability in certain directions ; in substance it is the same as ordinary marble ; in fact, the latter consists of micro- scopic crystals of calcite. In Fig. 4 we have a crystal of garnet, not unfrequently seen in the mica-slates of New York. A crystal of sul- phur from Girgenti, Sicily, is shown in Fig. 5; that locality abounds in fine transparent crystals of this substance. Fig. 6 represents a cube SS o (7 Fra. 4. Fig. 5. Fra. 6. of native silver as found in Konigsberg, Norway ; and, finally (Fig. 7), a crystal of cassiterite (tin-ore) from Cornwall, in England, which has also been discovered in this country in the Black Hills, Dakota Ter- ritory. There are seven systems of crystallization, differing in the rela- tive magnitudes and directions of certain lines of symmetry, termed the axes of the crystal. In the first, second, and third systems, these lines bear the same inclination to one another, but their magnitudes are respectively equal in the first system (see Fig. 8) (here AA’, BB’, Fra. 7. Fra. 9. CC,’ are the three axes equal in magnitude and inclined at right angles to one another), equal in two of them in the second or dimetric system (Fig. 9) (here A A’ equals B B’, but CC’ is different from these), and unequal in all three axes in the third or trimetric system (Fig. 10) (here the axes A A’, BB’, and CC’, are all of unequal magnitudes, but their . mutual inclinations in this as well as in the second system are equal).

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THE PROBLEM OF CRYSTALLIZATION. 49 In the three oblique systems the axes are partly or altogether obliquely inclined to one another, while their magnitudes are unequal. Fig. 11 is a crystal of the monoclinic system, and Fig. 12 of the triclinic sys- tem. The names of the different oblique systems indicate the mutual inclinations of the axes. Fig. 13 represents a crystal of the hexa- gonal system, which is allied in symmetry to the dimetric sys- tem ; but there are four lines of symmetry, of which the three AA’, BB’, and CC’, lying in the Fie. 10. Fie. 11, Fia. 12. same horizon, are equal in their mutual inclination and magnitude, while the fourth axis, D D’, is at right angles to these but different in magnitude. The reader will now have formed a tolerably correct idea of a crys- tal, and when it is borne in mind that crystallization is a widely dif- fused and essential property of matter, and also that the solution of this question has engaged some of the ablest minds of the century, the high purpose and importance of this investigation will perhaps be- come evident to him. Now, the invariability of certain relations existing between the axes and the planes bounding crystal forms are geometrically similar, and are effects produced by causes similar to D those which occasion the constancy of the slopes in heaps of the same material. In the heap of gravel considered above, the horizon was chosen as the reference plane—in the crystal the planes containing the lines of symmetry are selected Fie we as reference planes, whereby to gauge the in-o£:---\-/77]""", clination of the bounding surfaces. From our considerations of the heap of gravel, the reader will perceive the intimate connection between outward form and internal structure, and is in a measure prepared to follow deductions made from the one upon the other. Already in the remote in- fancy of mineralogy assumptions as to the internal structure of crystals were made to explain the axial relations alluded to. The assumption that the internal structure of a crystal is similar to, and in a measure identical with, the internal structure of a cannon-ball pile, is sufficient to VOL, XXIx.—4 Fie. 138,

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5° THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. explain the axial relations observed in the first, second, and third sys. tems of crystallization. In the first system the ultimate particles of the crystal are symbolized by the sphere, while in the second and third sys- tems they are figures of oval form. The cannon-ball pile arrangement, or, as it is termed, the tetrad configuration, is represented in Fig. 14 (perspective of vertical circles of contact of the spheres) ; it derives this name from the fact that its type consists of four equal mutually touching spheres (Fig. 15). If in such an arrangement of particles sections are made in certain directions, we obtain the faces of the several crystal forms. In this manner the octahedral face (Fig. 16), the cubical face (Fig. 17), and the dodecahedral face (Fig. 18), have been obtained. In an octahedron, or in a cube, or in a dodecahe- dron, represented respectively in Figs. 8, 6, 4, and respectively com- posed of layers as indicated in Figs. 16, 17, 18, the ultimate particles have the same common arrangement, that is, the tetrad grouping. These forms, as has been shown above, all occur in nature ; but as yet the most powerful microscope has been unable to dissolve a crystal face into its ultimate particles. Still, they are not insensibly small ; their dimensions are shown to lie between certain limits, ascertained by combined computation and observation, and it is highly satisfactory that physicists have approximately obtained the same results in this direction, although the methods chosen were different. And it is the fact that we are dealing with invisibly small particles which renders the problem under consideration one of peculiar difficulty and interest. Instead of the tetrad configuration, there is a second grouping of par- ticles, which would also serve to explain the observed axial relations of crystals. It is deduced from Fig. 19, by placing the layer of spheres marked a centrally over the layer marked 5. But this grouping can not exist permanently in Nature ; it is, as I have elsewhere shown, ina mechanical state similar to that of an exceedingly thin coin placed on its edge—the slightest effort, tending to upset the coin, would do so— it is what is termed a position of unstable equilibrium, and therefore can not exist permanently ; the tetrad configuration, on the contrary, is in stable equilibrium. We have thus already almost involuntarily introduced force as a factor in our considerations, and the deductions already made from outward form upon internal structure must necessarily also embrace considerations of the forces that the ultimate particles are subject to ;| and again, in order to bring the subject within the natural sphere of conception of the human mind, we will analyze the force transitions and the force law in a cannon-ball pyramid, subject to the gravity of the earth, preparatory to proceeding with the more remote and recondite subject of crystallization. In Fig. 14 it is clear that the weight of the top ball is distributed among the lower three, in the three direction- lines joining the centers of the top and three lower balls respectively. ' On examination of a pyramid composed of a larger number of balls,

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THE PROBLEM OF CRYSTALLIZATION. 51 we observe that every ball of the pyramid bears the weight only of those balls that are arranged in three lines parallel to upper edges of the pyramid respectively, and meeting in the center of the ball. Thus, in Figs. 15@ and 156 are represented in plan the four layers of a pyramid of twenty balls. The ball a, of the lowest layer, can only receive the weights of the balls 5, 5, 6, of the second layer, trans- mitted in direction-lines parallel respectively to the three upper edges of the pyramid (Fig. 14), namely, DA, DA,, and DA,. The ball a can not receive the weight of any other ball of the pyramid ; it can not receive the weight of the topmost ball, d, inasmuch as the weight of this ball is transmitted only in the lines D A, DA,, and DA,, the three upper edges of the mid ; nor can it receive the weight of the ball C of the third layer, for that is only trans- mitted in three lines, of which two, CA, and CA,, can be seen in the figure. By a simple application of the physical principle known as the parallelogram of forces, we arrive at the deduction that all balls equidistant from the vertex of the pyramid are solicited by the same force ; or, in other words, that every ball of the pyramid is repulsed from the vertex with a force proportional to its distance from the vertex, as a direct con- sequence of this stress distribution. At the vertex itself the repul- sion is zero, The weight of the pyramid is uniformly distributed over its base ; a result which can readily be verified by experiment, and is also a verification of the stated force law. Now, an exactly analogous action occurs among the invisibly small particles of a crystal. In the pyramid of balls, it is the pull of the earth upon each ball which is active ; in the crystal it is the mutual attraction of the parti- as b 0 c d : S b b \ c Fis. 15. Fie. 14. cles. In the pyramid of balls, there are only three stress direction- lines respectively parallel to the upper edges of the pyramid, inasmuch as the pull of the earth acts only vertically downward, hence there is no weight transmission in the three horizontal direction-lines paral- lel to the basal edges respectively ; in the crystal, however, there are

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52 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. six stress direction-lines, inasmuch as the mutual forces between the ultimate particles of the crystal act in all the directions joining the centers of the particles respectively. That the stress can only be transmitted in six direction-lines is evident from the following consid- eration : In a pyramid of four balls (Fig. 154) we have evidently the six stress direction-lines joining the centers of the balls respectively. In case of a larger number of particles in contact, it is clear that in an octa- hedral face (Fig. 16) the stress can only be trans- mitted in three direction- lines, A A,, BB,, and CC,, for there is no con- tact between the parti- cles which would allow the stress to be transmit- ted in any other direc- tion ; in the cubical face (Fig. 17) there are but two stress direction-lines, D D, and EE, , and in the dodecahedral face (Fig. 18) there is but one stress direction-line, F F,; and generally on any particle in the tetrad configuration the stress can only be trans- mitted in six direction-lines, respectively parallel to the six edges of the pyramid. All this applies not only to the first or monometric sys- tem of crystallization, in which the ultimate particles are sym- bolized by the spherical form, but also to the dimetric and tri- metric systems in“which the ulti- mate particles are symbolized by an oval form. But this analogy between the pyramid of balls and crystals holds not only for the stress distribution, but extends also to the law of the forces active between the ultimate par- ticles. In order to satisfy the equilibrium condition, the physi- cal doctrine demands a unique law of force for a stated stress distribution, and elsewhere I have shown this law to be—Ever = particle is attracted to the center of the crystal with a force proportional to its distance from the center ; Fig. 16. Fie. 17. ‘while the law for the ball pyramid is—Every particle is repulsed from

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THE PROBLEM OF CRYSTALLIZATION. 53 the vertex of the pyramid with a force proportional to its distance from the vertex. The proper mathematical interpretation of the stated force law in crystals shows its perfect identity with the Newtonian law of gravita- tion, according to which every particle of the uni- verse attracts every other particle, with a force pro- x portional to the product of , the masses, and inversely as the square of the dis- tance. Thus, the symme- try, beauty, and definite- ness displayed in the in- finite variety of crystal S & forms have necessarily im- pressed themselves upon the observing mind, ever since the remote period of the dawn of the natural Fie. 18 sciences, as the silent car- riers of a law of profound influence upon the nature of substances. That this law, in obedience to which the planets are swept through space, should also regulate the position of the tiny crystal mole- cule, is a striking instance of the truism, in accordance with which the essences of things are not affected by their magnitude, and without which the human mind could not conceive the interaction of the forces of Nature. The stated law also governs the interaction of electrical masses, ' Now, the only reason why it applies to the ultimate particles of a crys- tal is their tetrad arrangement. Hence b b b ‘.b Fre. 19. the tetrad grouping of the ultimate par- _® ticles, and therefore crystallization, is caused by an agent which acts like elec- tricity. Very probably it is electricity itself, as is evidenced by the electrical a properties of certain crystal forms, which appear to establish an intimate causal connection between the structure of crystals and this agent. This is illustrated in many so-called hemi- morphic forms: these are forms in which opposite ends of a crystal, instead of being bounded by faces of the same form, are bounded by faces belonging to different forms. This phenomenon occurs in a

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54 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. crystals of tourmaline, topaz, and calamine. The ends which show this peculiarity alternately exhibit positive and negative electricity— the one kind when the mineral is heating, and the other while it is cooling. The experiments of Faraday and Tyndall also indicate this causal connection. Thus the problem of crystallization may be said to have arrived at the stage of a partial solution, and the manner in which the result has been obtained clearly shows why an agent like electricity is the cause of crystallization ; it also shows a perfect defi- nite relation existing between the intensity of this agent and the crys- tal form. When it is considered that difference in crystal form is, as a rule, associated with difference in chemical composition, it is easy to conceive how profoundly important this relation is in the chemism of substances. The intimate causal connection between electricity and chemical affinity is well accepted. The law of the periodicity of the elements, discovered by the Rus- sian chemist, Mendeljief ; the investigations of Kekule on the aromatic compounds, which throw a strong light upon their structure ; the law of Dulong and Petit, as to the constancy of the relation between the heat and atomic weight of the elements—all these give just grounds for the remark that, when brought into proper connection with the stated law of crystallization, an epoch may result in our knowledge of atoms. THE FACTORS OF ORGANIC EVOLUTION. By HERBERT SPENCER. IL. + = growth of a thing is effected by the joint operation of certain forces on certain materials ; and when it dwindles, there is either a lack of some materials, or the forces co-operate in a way different from that which produces growth. If a structure has varied, the im- plication is that the processes which built it up were made unlike the parallel processes in other cases, by the greater or less amount of some one or more of the matters or actions concerned. Where there is un- usual fertility, the play of vital activities is thereby shown to have deviated from the ordinary play of vital activities ; and conversely, if there is infertility. If the germs, or ova, or seed, or offspring partially developed, survive more or survive less, it is either because their molar or molecular structures are unlike the average ones, or because they are affected in unlike ways by surrounding agencies. When life is prolonged, the fact implies that the combination of actions, visible and invisible, constituting life, retains its equilibrium longer than usual in presence of environing forces which tend to destroy its equilibrium. That is to say, growth, variation, survival, death, if they are to be ‘reduced to the forms in which physical science can recognize them,

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THE FACTORS OF ORGANIC EVOLUTION. 55 must be expressed as effects of agencies definitely conceived—mechani- eal forces, light, heat, chemical affinity, &c. This general conclusion brings with it the thought that the phrases employed in discussing organic evolution, though convenient and in- deed needful, are liable to mislead us by veiling the actual agencies. That which really goes on in every organism is the working together of component parts in ways conducing to the continuance of their com- bined actions, in presence of things and actions outside ; some of which tend to subserve, and others to destroy, the combination. The matters and forces in these two groups, are the sole causes properly so called. The words “natural selection,” do not express a cause in the physical sense. They express a mode of co-operation among causes—or rather, to speak strictly, they express an effect of this mode of co-operation. The idea they convey seems perfectly intelligible. Natural selection having been compared with artificial selection, and the analogy pointed out, there apparently remains no indefiniteness ; the inconvenience being, however, that the definiteness is of a wrong kind. The tacitly implied Nature which selects, is not an embodied agency analogous to the man who selects artificially ; and the selection is not the picking out of an individual fixed on, but the continuance in an active state of such individual when others have been overthrown. Mr. Darwin was conscious of these misleading implications. In the introduction to his Animals and Plants under Domestication (p. '7) he says :— “ For brevity sake I sometimes speak of natural selection as an intelligent power ; . . « L have, also, often personified the word Nature; for I have found it diffi- cult to avoid this ambiguity; but I mean by nature only the aggregate action and product of inany natural laws,—and by laws only the ascertained sequence of events.” But while he thus clearly saw, and distinctly asserted, that the factors of organic evolution are the concrete actions, inner and outer, to which every organism is subject, Mr. Darwin, by habitually using the con- venient figure of speech, was, I think, prevented from recognizing so fully as he would otherwise have done, certain fundamental conse- quences of these actions. Though it does not personalize the cause, and does not assimilate its mode of working to a human mode of working, kindred objections may be urged against the expression to which I was led when seeking to present the phenomena in literal terms rather than metaphorical terms—the survival of the fittest * ; for in a vague way the first word, and in a clear way the second word, calls up an gnthropocentric idea. The thought of survival inevitably suggests the human view of certain sets of phenomena, rather than that character which they have simply as groups of changes. If, asking what we really know of a plant, we ex- * Though Mr. Darwin approved of this expression and occasionally employed it, he did not adopt it for general use ; contending, very truly, that the expression Natural Se- lection is in some cases more convenient. See Animals and Plants under Domestication (first edition) Vol. I, p. 6; and Origin of Species (sixth edition) p. 49.

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56 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. clude all the ideas associated with the words life and death, we find that the sole facts known to us are that there go on in the plant certain inter- dependent processes, in presence of certain aiding and hindering influ- ences outside of it ; and that in some cases a difference of structure or a favourable set of circumstances, allows these inter-dependent pro- cesses to go on for longer periods than in other cases. Again, in the working together of those many actions, internal and external, which determine the lives or deaths of organisms, we see nothing to which the words fitness and unfitness are applicable in the physical sense. If a key fits a lock, or a glove a hand, the relation of the things to one another is presentable to the perceptions. No approach to fitness of this kind is made by an organism which continues to live under certain conditions. Neither the organic structures themselves, nor their indi- vidual movements, nor those combined movements of certain among them which constitute conduct, are related in any analogous way to the things and actions in the environment. Evidently the word fittest, as thus used, is a figure of speech ; suggesting the fact that amid sur- rounding actions, an organism characterized by the word has either a greater ability than others of its kind to maintain the equilibrium of its vital activities, or else has so much greater a power of multiplica- tion that though not longer lived than they, it continues to live in pos- terity more persistently. And indeed, as we here see, the word fittest has to cover cases in which there may be less ability than usual to sur- vive individually, but in which the defect is more than made good by higher degrees of fertility. I have elaborated this criticism with the intention of emphasizing the need for studying the changes which have gone on, and are ever going on, in organic bodies, from an exclusively physical point of view. On contemplating the facts from this point of view, we become aware that, besides those special effects of the co-operating forces which eventuate in the longer survival of one individual than of others, and in the consequent increase through generations, of some trait which furthered its survival ; many other effects are being wrought on each and all of the individuals. Bodies of every class and quality, inorganic as well as organic, are from instant to instant subject to the influences in their environments ; are from instant to instant being changed by these in ways that are mostly inconspicuous ; and are in course of time changed by them in conspicuous ways. Living things in common with dead things, are, I say, being thus perpetually acted upon and modi- fied ; and the changes hence resulting, constitute an all-important part of those undergone in the course of organic evolution. Ido not mean to imply that changes of this class pass entirely unrecognized ; for, as we shall see, Mr. Darwin takes cognizance of certain secondary and special ones. But the effects which are not taken into account, are those primary and universal effects which give certain fundamental characters to all organisms. “Contemplation of an analogy will best

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THE FACTORS OF ORGANIC EVOLUTION. 57 prepare the way for appreciation of them, and of the relation they bear to those which at present monopolize attention. An observant rambler along shores, will, here and there, note places where the sea has deposited things more or less similar, and separated them from dissimilar things—will see shingle parted from sand ; larger stones sorted from smaller stones ; and will occasionally discover deposits of shells more or less worn by being rolled about. Sometimes the pebbles or boulders composing the shingle at one end of a bay, he will find much larger than those at the other: inter- mediate sizes, having small average differences, occupying the space between the extremes. An example occurs, if I remember rightly, some mile or two to the west of Tenby ; but the most remarkable and well-known example is that afforded by the Chesil bank. Here, along a shore some sixteen miles long, there is a gradual increase in the sizes of the stones ; which, being at one end but mere pebbles, are at the other end great boulders. In this case, then, the break- ers and the undertow have effected a selection—have at each place left behind those stones which were too large to be readily moved, while taking away others small enough to be moved easily. But now, if we contemplate exclusively this selective action of the sea, we overlook certain important effects which the sea simultaneously works. While the stones have been differently acted upon in so far that some have been left here and some carried there; they have been similarly acted upon in two allied, but distinguishable, ways. By perpetually rolling them about and knocking them one against another, the waves have so broken off their most prominent parts as to produce in all of them more or less rounded forms ; and then, fur- ther, the mutual friction of the stones simultaneously caused, has smoothed their surfaces. That is to say in general terms, the actions of environing agencies, so far as they have operated indiscriminately, have produced in the stones a certain unity of character ; at the same time that they have, by their differential effects, separated them : the larger ones having withstood certain violent actions which the smaller ones could not withstand. Similarly with other assemblages of objects which are alike in their primary traits but unlike in their secondary traits. When simultane- ously exposed to the same set of actions, some of these actions, rising to a certain intensity, may be expected to work on particular members of the assemblage changes which they cannot work in those which are markedly unlike ; while others of the actions will work in all of them similar changes, because of the uniform relations between these actions and certain attributes common to all members of the assemblage. Hence it is inferable that on living organisms, which form an assem- blage of this kind, and are unceasingly exposed in common to the agencies composing their inorganic environments, there must be wrought two such sets of effects. There will result a universal likeness

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58 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. among them consequent on the likeness of their respective relations to the matters and forces around ; and there will result, in some cases, the differences due to the differential effects of these matters and forces, and in other cases, the changes which, being life-sustaining or life-destroying, eventuate in certain natural selections. I have, above, made a passing reference to the fact that Mr. Dar. win did not fail to take account of some among these effects directly produced on organisms by surrounding inorganic agencies. Here are extracts from the sixth edition of the Origin of Species showing this, “Tt is very difficult to decide how far changed conditions, such as of climate, food, &c., have acted in a definite manner. There is reason to believe that in the course of time the effects have been greater than can be proved by clear evidence. . . . Mr. Gould believes that birds of the same species are more brightly coloured under a clear atmosphere, than when living near the coast or on islands; and Wollaston is convinced that residence near the sea affects the colours of insects. Moquin-Tandon gives a list of plants which, when growing near the sea-shore, have their leaves in some degree fleshy, though not elsewhere fleshy ” (pp. 106-7), ‘Some observers are convinced,that a damp climate af- fects the growth of the hair, and that with the hair the horns are correlated” (p. 159). In his subsequent work, Animals and Plants under Domestication, Mr. Darwin still more clearly recognizes these causes of change in or- ganization. A chapter is devoted to the subject. After premising that “the direct action of the conditions of life, whether leading to definite or indefinite results, is a totally distinct consideration from the effects of natural selection ;” he goes on to say that changed condi- tions of life “ have acted so definitely and powerfully on the organiza- tion of our domesticated productions, that they have sufficed to form new sub-varieties or races, without the aid of selection by man or of natural selection.” Of his examples here are two. “T have given in detail in the ninth chapter the most remarkable case known to me, namely, that in Germany several varieties of maize brought from the hotter parts of America were transformed in the course of only two or three genera- tions.” (Vol. ii, p. 277.) [And in this ninth chapter concerning these and other such instances he says “‘ some of the foregoing differences would certainly be considered of specific value with plants in a state of nature.” (Vol. i, p. 821.)] “Mr. Meehan, in a remarkable paper, compares twenty-nine kinds of American trees, belonging to various orders, with their nearest European allies, all grown in close proximity in the same garden and under as nearly as possible the same conditions.” And then enumerating six traits in which the American forms all of them differ in like ways from their allied European forms, Mr. Dar- win thinks there is no choice but to conclude that these “‘ have been definitely caused by the long-continued action of the different elimate of the two conti- nents on the trees.” (Vol. ii, pp. 281-2.) But the fact we have to note is that while Mr. Darwin thus took account of special effects due to special amounts and combinations of agencies in the environment, he did not take account of the far more ‘ important effects due to the general and constant operation of these

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THE FACTORS OF ORGANIC EVOLUTION. 59 agencies.* If a difference between the quantities of a force which acts on two organisms, otherwise alike and otherwise similarly condi- tioned, produces some difference between them ; then, by implication, this force produces in both of them effects which they show in common. The inequality between two things cannot have a value unless the things themselves have values. Similarly if, in two cases, some unlike- ness of proportion among the surrounding inorganic agencies to which two plants or two animals are exposed, is followed by some unlikeness in the changes wrought on them ; then it follows that these several agencies taken separately, work changes in both of them. Hence we must infer that organisms have certain structural characters in com- mon, which are consequent on the action of the medium in which they exist : using the word medium in a comprehensive sense, as including all physical forces falling upon them as well as matters bathing them. And we may conclude that from the primary characters thus produced there must result secondary characters. Before going on to observe those general traits of organisms due to the general action of the inorganic environment upon them, I feel tempted to enlarge on the effects produced by each of the several mat- ters and forces constituting the environment. I should like to do this not only to give a clear preliminary conception of the ways in which all organisms are affected by these universally-present agents, but also to sho, that, in the first place, these agents modify inorganic bodies as well as organic bodies, and that, in the second place, the organic are far more modifiable by them than the inorganic. But to avoid undue suspension of the argument, I content myself with saying that when the respective effects of gravitation, heat, light, &c., are studied, as well as the respective effects, physical and chemical, of the matters forming the media, water and air, it will be found that while more or less operative on all bodies, each modifies organic bodies to an extent im- mensely greater than the extent to which it modifies inorganic bodies. Here, not discriminating among the special effects which these vari- ous forces and matters in the environment produce on both classes of bodies, let us consider their combined effects, and ask—What is the most general trait of such effects ? * It is true that while not deliberately admitted by Mr. Darwin, these effects are not denied by him. In his Animals and Plants under Domestication (vol. ii, 281), he refers to certain chapters in the Principles of Biology, in which I have discussed this general inter-action of the medium and the organism, and ascribed certain most general traits to it. But though, by his expressions, he implies a sympathetic attention to the argument, he does not in such way adopt the conclusion as to assign to this factor any share in the genesis of organic structures—much less that large share which I believe it has had. I did not myself at that time, nor indeed until quite recently, see how extensive and pro- found have been the influences on organization which, as we shall presently see, are traceable to the early results of this fundamental relation between organism and medium. I may add that it is in an essay on “ Transcendental Physiology,” first published in 1857, that the line of thought here folleved out in it wider bearings, was first entered upon.

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60 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. Obviously the most general trait is the greater amount of change wrought on the outer surface than in the inner mass. In so far as the matters of which the medium is composed come into play, the unavoid- able implication is that they act more on the parts directly exposed to them than on the parts sheltered from them. And in so far as the forces pervading the medium come into play, it is manifest that, ex- cluding gravity, which affects outer and inner parts indiscriminately, the outer parts have to bear far larger shares of their actions. If it is a question of heat, then the exterior must lose it or gain it faster than the interior ; and in a medium which is now warmer and now colder, the two must habitually differ in temperature to some extent—at least where the size is considerable. If it is a question of light, then in all but absolutely transparent masses, the outer parts must undergo more of any change producible by it than the inner parts—supposing other things equal ; by which I mean, supposing the case is not complicated by any such convexities of the outer surface as produce internal con- centrations of rays. Hence then, speaking generally, the necessity is that the primary and almost universal effect of the converse between the body and its medium, is to differentiate its outside from its inside. I say almost universal, because where the body is both mechanically and chemically stable, like, for instance, a quartz crystal, the medium may fail to work either inner or outer change. Of illustrations among inorganic bodies, a convenient one is sup- plied by an old cannon-ball that has been long lying exposed. A coat- ing of rust, formed of flakes within flakes, incloses it ; and this thick- ens year by year, until, perhaps, it reaches a stage at which its exterior loses as much by rain and wind as its interior gains by further oxida- tion of the iron. Most mineral masses—pebbles, boulders, rocks—if they show any effect of the environment at all, show it only by that disintegration of surface which follows the freezing of absorbed water : an effect which, though mechanical rather than chemical, equally illus- trates the general truth. Occasionally a “rocking-stone” is thus pro- duced. There are formed successive layers relatively friable in text- ure, each of which, thickest at the most exposed parts, and being presently lost by weathering, leaves the contained mass in a shape more rounded than before ; until, resting on its convex under-surface, it is easily moved. But of all instances perhaps the most remarkable is one to be seen on the west bank of the Nile at Phile, where a ridge of granite 100 feet high, has had its outer parts reduced in course of time to a collection of boulder-shaped masses, varying from say a yard in diameter to eight or ten feet, each one of which shows in progress an exfoliation of successively-formed shells of decomposed granite: most of the masses having portions of such shells partially detached. If, now, inorganic masses, relatively so stable in composition, thus ‘ have their outer parts differentiated from their inner parts, what must

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THE FACTORS OF ORGANIC EVOLUTION. 61 we say of organic masses, characterized by such extreme chemical in- stability ?—instability so great that their essential material is named protein, to indicate the readiness with which it passes from one isom- eric form to another. Clearly the necessary inference is that this effect of the medium must be wrought inevitably and promptly, wherever the relation of outer and inner has become settled : a qualification for which the need will be seen hereafter. Beginning with the earliest and most minute kinds of living things, we necessarily encounter difficulties in getting direct evidence ; since, of the countless species now existing, all have been subject during millions upon millions of years to the evolutionary process, and have bad their primary traits complicated and obscured by these endless secondary traits which the natural selection of favourable variations has produced. Among protophytes it needs but to think of the multi- tudinous varieties of diatoms and desmids, with their elaborately-con- structed coverings ; or of the definite methods of growth and multi- plication among such simple Alg@ as the Conjugate ; to see that most of their distinctive characters are due to inherited constitutions, which have been slowly moulded by survival of the fittest to this or that mode of life. To disentangle such parts of their developmental changes as are due to the action of the medium, is therefore hardly possible. We can hope only to get a general conception of it by con- templating the totality of the facts. The first cardinal fact is that all protophytes are cellular—all show us this contrast between outside and inside. Supposing the multitudi- nous specialities of the envelope in different orders and genera of protophytes to be set against one another, and mutually cancelled, there remains as a trait common to them—an envelope unlike that which it envelopes. The second cardinal fact is that this simple trait is the earliest trait displayed in germs, or spores, or other parts from which new individuals are to arise ; and that, consequently, this trait must be regarded as having been primordial. For it is an established truth of organic evolution that embryos show us, in general ways, the forms of remote ancestors ; and that the first changes undergone, indi- cate, more or less clearly, the first changes which took place in the series of forms through which the existing form has been reached. Describing, in successive groups of plants, the early transformations of these primitive units, Sachs * says of the lowest Alge that “the con- jugated protoplasmic body clothes itself with a cell-wall” (p. 10) ; that in “the spores of Mosses and Vascular Cryptogams” and in “the pollen of Phanerogams” . . . “the protoplasmic body of the mother- cell breaks up into four lumps, which quickly round themselves off and contract and become enveloped by a cell-membrane only after com- plete separation ” (p. 13) ; that in the Hguisetacee “the young spores, * Text-Book of Botany, dee. by Julius Sachs, Translated by A. W. Bennett and W. T. T. Dyer.

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62 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. when first separated, are still naked, but they soon become surrounded by a cell-membrane ” (p. 14) ; and that in higher plants, as in the ~ol. len of many Dicotyledons, “the contracting daughter-cells secrete cel- lulose even during their separation” (p. 14). Here, then, in whatever way we interpret it, the fact is that there quickly arises an outer layer different from the contained matter. But the most significant evidence is furnished by “the masses of protoplasm that escape into weer from the injured sacs of Vaucheria, which often instantly become rounded into globular bodies,” and of which the “ hyaline protoplasm envelopes the whole as a skin” (p. 41) which “ is denser than the inner and more watery substance” (p. 42). As in this case the protoplasm is but a fragment, and as it is removed from the infit 2nce of the parent-cell, this differentiating process can scarcely be regarded us anything more than the effect of physico-chemical actions : a conclusion which is sup- ported by the statement of Sachs that “not only every vacuole in a solid protoplasmic body, but also every thread of protoplasm which penetrates the sap-cavity, and finally the inner side of the protoplasm- sac which encloses the sap-cavity, is also bounded by a skin” (p. 42). If then “every portion of a protoplasmic body immediately surround, itself, when it becomes isolated, with such a skin,” which is shown in all cases to arise at the surface of contact with sap or water, this pri- mary differentiaticn of outer fromm inner must be ascribed to the direcé action of the medium. Whether the coating thus initiated is secreted by the protoplasm, or whether, as seems more likely, it results from transformation of it, matters not to the argument. Either way the ac- tion of the medium causes its formation ; and either way the many varied and complex differentiations which developed cell-walls display, must be considered as originating from those variations of this phys- ically-generated covering which natural selection has taken advan- tage of. The contained protoplasin of a vegeta: cell, which has some self- mobility and when liberated sometimes performs ameba-like motions for a time, may be regarded as an imprisoned ameba ; and when we pass from it to a free ameba, which is one of the simplest types of first animals, or Protozoa, we naturally meet with kindred phenomena. The general trait which here concerns us, is that while its plastic or semi-fluid sarcode goes on protruding, in irregular ways, now this and now that part of its periphery, and again withdrawing into its interior first one and then another of these temporary processes, perhaps with some small portion of food attached, there is but an indistinct differ- entiation of outer from inner (a fact shown by the frequent coalescence of pseuopodia in Rhizopods) ; but taat when it eventually becomes quiescent, the surface becomes differentiated from the contents: the “passing into an encysted state, doubtless in large measure due to in- herited proclivity, being furthered, and having probably been once ‘ initiated, by the action of the medium. The connexion between con-

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FOOD ACCESSORIES AND DIGESTION. 63 stancy of relative position Zmong the parts of the sarcode, and the rise of a contrist between superficial and central parts, is perhaps best shown in the minutest and simplest Jnfusoria, the Monadine. The genus Monas is described by Kent as “ plastic and unstable in form, possessing no distinct cuticular investment; ... the food-substances incepted at all parte of the periphery”*; and the genus Scytomonas he says “differs from Monus only in its persistent shape and accom- panying greaier rigidity of the peripheral or ectoplasmic layer.” + De- scribing generally such low and minute forms, some of which have neither nucleus nor vacuole, he remarks that in types somewhat higher “the outer or peripheral border of the protoplasmic mass, while not assuming the character of a distinct cell-wall or so-called cuticle, presents, as compared with the inner substance of that mass, a slightly more solid type of composition.” { And it is added that these forms having so slightly differentiated an exterior “ while usualiy ex- hibiting a more or less characteristic normal outliue, can revert at will to a nseud-ameeboid and repent state.” * Here, then, we have several indications of the truth that the perraanent externality of a certain part of the substance, is followed by transformation of it into a coat- ing "alike the substance it contains. ‘ndefinite and structureless in the simplest of these forms, as instance again the Gregarina, || the limiting membrane becomes, in higher Jnfusoria, definite and often complex ; showing that the selection of favourable variations has had largely to do with its formation. In such types as the Foraminifera, which, almost structureless internally though they are, secrete calca- reous shells, it is clear that the nature of this outer layer is determined by inherited constitution. But recognition of this consists with the belief that the action of the medium initiated the outer layer, special- ized though it now is; and that even still, contact with the medium excites secretion of it. FOOD ACCESSORIES AND DIGESTION. By Dr. J. BURNEY YEO. M** like any other animal, is so much the creature of his food—- his physical perfection, his intellectual activity, and his moral tone are so dependent on the food he receives and the uses he is able to make of it in the processes of digestion and assimilation—that any accurate knowledge, founded on precise and reliable methods of inves- tigation, of the influence on digestion and nutrition of dietetic habits must of necessity be of the most general interest. * A Manual of the Infusoria, by W. Saville Kent. Vol. i, p. 232. + Ib. Vol. i, p. 241. ¢ Kent. Vol. i, p. 56. * Jb, 1.¢. Vol. 4, p. 57. | The Elements of Comparative Anatomy, by T. H. Huxley, pp. 7-9. b fog

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64 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, To Professor Sir William Roberts, of Manchester, we were already greatly indebted for a series of able and comprehensive researches on the action of “digestive ferments” and the “preparation and use of artificially digested food” ;* to those valuable researches Sir W. Roberts has recently added others equally important, chiefly on the subject of “ food accessories” and their influence on the chemical acts of digestion. ¢ The results of these experimental iuquiries are, in some respects, so novel and unexpected, and they contradict so many apparently un- founded assumptions, that they can not be too soon or too widely known. Man, as Sir W. Roberts begins by pointing out, is a very complex feeder ; he has departed, in the course of his civilization, very widely from the monotonous uniformity of diet observed in animals in the wild state. Not only does he differ from other animals in cooking his food, but he adds to his food a greater or less number of condi- ments for the purpose of increasing its flavor and attractiveness ; but, above and beyond this, the complexity of his food-habits is greatly increased by the custom of partaking in considerable quantity of cer- tain stimulants and restoratives, which have become essential to his social comfort if not to his physical well-being. The chief of these are tea, coffee, cocoa, and the various kinds of alcoholic beverages. It is to these “ food accessories ” and the elucidation of their influ- ences on the processes of digestion that Sir W. Roberts’s recent ex- periments and observations have been directed. These “ generalized food-customs of mankind,” he remarks, are not to be viewed as random practices adopted to please the palate or gratify our idle or vicious appetite. These customs must be regarded as the outcome of profound instincts, which correspond to important wants of the human econ- omy. They are the fruit of colossal experience, accumulated by countless mill- ions of men through successive generations. They have the same weight and significance as other kindred facts of natural history, and are fitted to yield to observation and study lessons of the highest scientific and practical value. It is unnecessary to describe here Sir W. Roberts’s methods of investigation ; they are fully set forth in the volume before us, and they are alike admirable for the ingenuity of their conception and the laborious accuracy of their prosecution. His object was to ascertain the precise influence of these food ac- cessories on the three chief parts of the digestive process : 1. Salivary digestion, i. e., the action of the saliva as a digestive agent ; 2. Peptic digestion, i. e., the action of the fluids secreted by the stomach as di- * “On the Digestive Ferments and the Preparation and Use of Artificially Digested Food.” Lumleian Lectures, delivered before the Royal College of Physicians in 1880 by Sir William Roberts, M. D., F. R. 8. London: Smith, Elder, & Co. ‘+ “Lectures on Dietetics and Dyspepsia.” Smith, Elder, & Co.

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FOOD ACCESSORIES AND DIGESTION. “95 gestive agents ; and, 3. Pancreatic digestion, i. e., the actién, of the ~ secretion of the pancreas as a digestive agent. We shall deviate a little from Sir W. Roberts’s methed of mar- shaling his conclusions, and shall summarize his results as to the ac- tion of the various food accessories on these three acts of digestion continuously. First, with respect to the action of ardent spirits on digestion. The experiments were made with “ proof-spirit” and with brandy, Scotch whisky, and gin ; and the conclusion is that, so far as salivary diges- tion is concerned, these spirits, when used in moderation and well di- luted, as they usually are when employed dietetically, rather promote than retard this part of the digestive process, and this they do by causing an increased flow of saliva. “A teaspoonful of brandy or whisky introduced into the mouth can be perceived at once to cause a gush of saliva. The common practice of adding a tablespoonful of brandy to a basin of arrowroot or sago gruel, thereforé, promotes its digestion.” The proportion must not, however, much exceed five per cent, and gin seems to be a preferable addition to either brandy or whisky. It was noticed in these experiments that brandy and Scotch whisky inter- fered with the digestive process, “precipitated the starch more read- ily,” altogether out of proportion to the amount of alcohol they con- tained, and brandy was worse than whisky ; and this circumstance appears to be due to certain ethers and volatile oils in them; and brandy contains a trace of tannin, which has an intensely retarding influence on salivary digestion. With regard to “peptic” digestion the results are still more sur- prising. It was found that with ten per cent and under of proof- spirit there was no appreciable retardation, and only a slight retarda- tion with twenty per cent; but with large percentages it was very different, and with fifty per cent the digestive ferment was almost paralyzed. In the proportions in which these spirits are usually employed dietetically not only do they not appreciably retard digestion, but these experiments show that they “act as pure stimulants to gastric digestion, causing an increased flow of gastric juice and stimulating the muscular contractions of the stomach, and so accelerating the speed of the digestive process in the stomach.” For obvious reasons (stated in these lectures) alcoholic drinks as used dietetically can never interfere with pancreatic digestion. Passing from the consideration of the influence of these ardent spirits on digestion to the more complex problem of the influence of such alcoholic beverages as the various wines and malt liquors, Sir W. Roberts arrives at the following conclusions : Even very small quantities of the stronger and lighter wines— sherry, hock, claret, and port—exercise a powerful retarding influence VOL, XXIx.—5

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66 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. on salivary digestion. This is wholly due to the acid—not the alcohol—they contain, and if this acid be neutralized, as it often is in practice, by mixing with the wine some effervescent alkaline water, this disturbing effect on salivary digestion is completely re- moved. The influence of acids in retarding or arresting salivary digestion is further of importance in the dietetic use of pickles, vinegar, salads, and acid fruits. In the case of vinegar it was found that 1 part in 5,000 sensibly retarded this process, a proportion of 1 in 1,000 rendered it very slow, and 1 in 500 arrested it completely ; so that when acid salads are taken together with bread the effect of the acid is to prevent any salivary digestion of the bread, a matter of little moment to a person with a vigorous digestion, but to a feeble dyspeptic one of some im- portance. There is a very wide-spread belief that drinking vinegar is an effi- cacious means of avoiding getting fat, and this popular belief would appear from these experimental observations to be well-founded. If the vinegar be taken at the same time as farinaceous food, it will greatly interfere with its digestion and assimilation. As to malt liquors, provided they are sound and free from acidity, they interfere but litttle with salivary digestion ; if they are acid, it is otherwise. Effervescent table-waters, if they consist simply of pure water charged with carbonic acid, exercise a considerable retarding influence on salivary digestion ; but if they also contain alkaline carbonates, as most of the table-waters of commerce do, the presence of the alkali quite removes this retarding effect. “The use of these waters as an addition to wines is,” Sir William Roberts observes, “highly commendable,” as they “ greatly mitigate or wholly obviate the retarding influence of these wines on the diges- tion of starch.” It was also observed that these weaker forms of alcoholic drinks (wines and beer) differed greatly in their influence on peptic digestion to that of the distilled spirits. They retarded it altogether out of proportion to the quantity of alcohol they contained. Port and sherry exercised a great retarding effect. “Even in the proportion of twenty per cent sherry trebled the time in which digestion was completed.” It should further be borne in mind that this wine also greatly retards salivary digestion. Sherry, then, is not a suitable wine for persons of feeble digestive powers. With hock, claret, and champagne it was also ascertained that their retarding effect on digestion was out of proportion to the alco- hol contained in them ; but champagne was found to have “a markedly _ less retarding effect than hock and claret” ; indeed, in the proportion of ten per cent champagne had a distinct, though slight, accelerating

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FOOD ACCESSORIES AND DIGESTION. 67 effect, and this superiority of champagne appears to be due to the «mechanical effects of its effervescent qualities.” The quantity of claret and hock often consumed by many persons at meals must exercise a considerable retarding effect on peptic diges- tion ; but small quantities of these wines (and even of sherry) do not produce any appreciable retarding effect, but act as pure stimulants, These wines, then, may be taken with advantage, even by persons of feeble digestion, in small quantities, but not in large. With regard to malt liquors, it was observed, as with wines, that they retarded peptic digestion in a degree altogether out of propor- tion to the amount of alcohol contained in them, and when taken in large quantities they must greatly retard the digestion, especially of farinaceous food ; but a moderate quantity of light beer, when “ well up,” is favorable to stomach digestion. It was proved by these experiments that the sparkling wines impede digestion less than the still ones, and when taken in moderate quantity “act not only as stimulants to the secretion of gastric juice and to the muscular activity of the viscus, but may, at the same time, slightly accelerate the speed of the chemical process in the stomach.” Next as to the influence of tea, coffee, and cocoa on the digestive processes : Tea exerts a powerful retarding influence on salivary digestion, coffee and cocoa a comparatively feeble one. Sir W. Roberts estimates the medium strength of the tea usually drunk at four to five per cent ; strong tea may contain as much as seven per cent, weak tea as little as two per cent. Medium coffee has a strength of about seven per cent, and strong coffee twelve to fifteen per cent ; cocoa, on the other hand, is generally weaker, not more than about two per cent, and this, he thinks, may be one reason why it is more suitable to persons with feeble digestions than tea or coffee. Tea exercises a powerful inhibitory effect on salivary digestion, and this appears to be entirely due to the large quantity of tannin it contains. It appears that tannin exists in two conditions in the tea-leaf. One, the larger portion, is in the free state, and is easily extracted by hot water; but about one fourth is fixed and remains undissolved in the fully exhausted tea- leaves. Some persons have supposed that by infusing tea for a very short time— only two or three minutes—the passing of tannin into the infusion would be avoided. This isa delusion; you can no more have tea without tannin than you can have wine without alcohol. Tannin, in the free state, is one of the most soluble substances known. If you pour hot water on a little heap of tannin it dissolves like so much pounded sugar. Tea infused for two minutes was not found sensibly inferior in its retarding power on salivary digestion to tea infused for thirty minutes. One gentleman of my acquaintance (says Sir W. Roberts) in his horror of tannin was in the habit of preparing his tea by placing the dry leaves on a paper

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68 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. filter and simply pouring on the boiling water. In this way he thought to evade the presence of tannin in his tea. But if you try the experiment, and allow the product, as it runs through the filter, to fall into a solution of perchloride of iron, you will find that an intense inky-black coloration is produced, showing that tannin has come through in abundance. In order to diminish as far as possible the retarding influence of tea on salivary digestion, it should be made weak and used sparingly, and it should not be taken with but after the meal. There is another means, mentioned by Sir W. Roberts, of obviating the retarding effect of tea on salivary digestion, and commended by him to the dyspeptic : it is to add a pinch of bicarbonate of soda to the tea when it is being infused in the tea-pot. He found that ten grains of soda added to an ounce of dry tea almost entirely removed this retarding influence. The infusion thus made is darker than usual, but the flavor is not sensibly altered, nor is the infusion rendered alka- line, for tea infusion is naturally slightly acid, and the soda, in the proportion mentioned, only just neutralizes this acidity. Coffee, unless taken in very large quantity, has very little retarding effect on salivary digestion ; this is explained by the fact that the tannin of tea is replaced in coffee by a substance called caffeo-tannic acid. Cocoa resembles coffee, and has little or no effect on salivary digestion ; the use of coffee or cocoa is therefore preferable to that of tea for persons of feeble digestion. With respect to the influence of tea and coffee on stomach diges- tion, it was found that they both exercised a remarkable retarding effect. There was no appreciable difference in the two beverages if they were of equal strength ; but, as coffee is usually made of greater percentage strength than tea, its effect must ordinarily be greater. Cocoa also had much the same effect if used of the same strength as tea or coffee, but, when of the strength ordinarily employed, its effect was inconsiderable. Strong coffee—café noir—had a very powerful retarding effect, and persons of weak digestion should avoid the cus- tomary cup of “ black coffee” after dinner. “T could not detect,” says Sir W. Roberts, “any appreciable difference be- tween the effect of tea infused for two or three minutes and tea infused for fif- teen or thirty minutes. If you wish to minimize the retarding effects of tea in persons of weak digestion, you should give instructions that the beverage be made weak, or that it be used in sparing quantities.” And he adds in a foot- note: ‘A good deal has been said of the injurious effects on gastric digestion of tannin contained in tea. I question whether the statements made with reference to this matter are worthy of attention. It has been alleged that meat-fiber is hardened by tea, and that the coats of the stomach are liable to be injured by this beverage. These views are entirely theoretical” (p. 48). Perhaps one of the most unexpected results of these experiments _of Sir W. Roberts was the discovery that deef-tea had a powerful retarding effect on peptic digestion, as much so as that of a five per

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FOOD ACCESSORIES AND DIGESTION. 69 cent infusion of tea, Further researches appeared to show that this retarding effect of beef-tea was due to the salts of the organic acids contained in it. While on the subject of beef-tea, it will be novel and instructive to many to hear that there is a wide-spread misapprehension among the public in regard to the nutri- tive value of beef-tea. The notion prevails that the nourishing qualities of the meat pass into the decoction, and that the dry, hard remnant of meat-fiber which remains undissolved is exhausted of its nutritive properties; and this latter is often thrown away as useless. A deplorable amount of waste arises from the prevalence of this erroneous notion. The proteid matter of meat is quite insolu- ble in boiling water, or in water heated above 160° Fahr. The ingredients that pass into solution are the sapid extractives and salines of the meat, and nothing more except some trifling amount of gelatine. The meat remnant, on the other hand, contains the real nutriment of the meat, and if this be beaten to a paste with a spoon or pounded in a mortar and duly flavored with salt and other con- diments, it constitutes not only a highly nourishing and agreeable but also an exceedingly digestible form of food.* Beef-tea must therefore be looked upon rather as a stimulant and restorative than as a nutrient beverage, but it is nevertheless very valu- able on account of those properties. Sir W. Roberts puts forward an ingenious argument, which can not be fully repeated here, in favor of the view that, in healthy and strong persons, this retarding effect on digestion observed to be produced by many of the most commonly consumed food accessories answers a dis- tinctly useful end. They serve, he maintains, the purpose of whole- somely slowing the otherwise too rapid digestion and absorption of copious meals. A too rapid digestion and absorption of food may be compared to feeding a fire with straw instead of with slower-burning coal. In the former case it would be necessary to feed often and often, and the process would be wasteful of the fuel; for the short-lived blaze would carry most of the beat up the chimney. To burn fuel economically, and to utilize the heat to the utmost, the fire must be damped down, so as to insure slow as well as complete combustion. So with human digestion: our highly prepared and highly cooked food requires, in the healthy and vigorous, that the digestive fires should be damped down, in order to insure the economical use of food. . . . We render food by preparation as capable as possible of being completely exhausted of its nutrient properties; and, on the other hand, to prevent this nutrient matter from being wastefully hurried through the body, we make use of agents which abate the speed of digestion. It must be borne in mind that these remarks apply only to those who possess a healthy and active digestion. To the feeble and dys- peptic any food accessory which adds to the labor and prolongs the time of digestion must be prejudicial ; and it is a matter of com- * “These remarks on beef-tea apply equally to Liebig’s extract of meat, Brand’s es- sence of beef, and Valentine’s meat-juice, all of which are devoid of albuminous constitu- ents ” (“ British Medical Journal,” August, 1885).

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' 7° THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. mon experience’ that beverages which in quantity retard digestion have to be avoided altogether by such persons or partaken of very sparingly. In the dietetic use of wines the writer of this article has constantly had occasion to make the observation that those wines agree best and are most useful which are absorbed and eliminated from the system with the greatest rapidity, as tested by the increase of the renal secre- tions, and he has been led to the practical conclusion that this is the best criterion of the suitability of any particular wine to any particu- lar constitution. If the effect of different wines on notoriously gouty persons be carefully observed, it will be found that some can drink champagne (in moderation, of course) with impunity, especially if a small quantity of an effervescing alkaline water be added to it, while claret will at once provoke some manifestations of gout ; others, who are unable to drink champagne without provoking a gouty paroxysm, will often be able to drink a mature, fine, soft claret even with advan- tage ; others will support hock well, and a few can drink fine sherries and ports in small quantities ; but in all it will be found that the test of the suitability of the particular wine to the particular constitution is its susceptibility to rapid elimination and vice versa. It has occurred also to the writer to make many observations as to the circumstances under which tea and coffee are found to agree or disagree with different persons ; in the first place, as Sir W. Roberts has pointed out, tea, if taken at the same time as farinaceous food, is much more likely to retard its digestion and cause dyspepsia than if taken a little time after eating ; and the custom adopted by many persons at breakfast, for instance, of eating first and drinking their tea or coffee afterward is a sensible one; so also it is better to take one’s five-o’clock tea without the customary bread-and-butter or cake than with it. Indeed, while there is little that can be said against a cup of hot tea as a stimulant and restorative, when taken about midway between lunch and dinner, and without solid food, it may, on the other hand, be a fruitful cause of dyspepsia when accompanied at that time with solid food. It is also a curious fact that many persons with whom tea, under ordinary circumstances, will agree exceedingly well, will become the subjects of a tea dyspepsia if they drink this beverage at a time when they may be suffering from mental worry or emotional disturbance. Moreover, it is a well-recognized fact that persons who are prone to nervous excitement of the circulation and palpitations of the heart have these symptoms greatly aggravated if they persist in the use of tea or coffee as a beverage. The excessive consumption of tea among the women of the poorer classes is the cause of much of the so-called *heart-complaints” among them: the food of those poor women consists largely of starchy substances (bread-and-butter chiefly), to-

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PHOTOGRAPHING THE HEAVENS. 71 ther with tea, i. e., a food accessory which is one of the greatest of all retarders of the digestion of starchy food. The effect of coffee as a retarder of stomach digestion would prob- ably be more felt than it is were it not so constantly the practice to take it only in small quantity after a very large meal; it is then mixed with an immense bulk of food, and its relative percentage pro- rtion rendered insignificant ; and to the strong and vigorous the slightly retarding effect on digestion it would then have may be, as Sir W. Roberts suggests, not altogether a disadvantage ; but after a spare meal and in persons of feeble digestive power the cup of black coffee would probably exercise a retarding effect on digestion which might prove harmful. It is also worthy of remark that in the great coffee-drinking countries this beverage is made not nearly so strong as with us. In this country good coffee always means strong, often very strong coffee ; but on the Continent they possess the faculty of mak- ing good coffee which is not necessarily very strong coffee, and which is, therefore, as a beverage, less likely to do harm. The general conclusion to be drawn from these highly interesting and instructive researches is that most of the “ food accessories ” which in the course of civilization man has added to his diet are, when taken in moderation, beneficial to him, and conduce to his physical welfare and material happiness ; but if taken in excess they may interfere to a serious and harmful degree with the processes of digestion and assimi- lation. It is also made clear that dietetic habits which may prove agreeable and useful to those who enjoy vigorous health and a strong digestion need to be greatly modified in the case of those who are feeble and dyspeptic.—Wineteenth Century. aoe ooo PHOTOGRAPHING THE HEAVENS. By Dr. HERMANN Y. KLEIN. NDOUBTEDLY one of the greatest achievements of modern days is the introduction of the exceedingly sensitive dry-plate in photography. By it one is enabled to picture the lightning’s flash, the trotting horse, the surging wave, and the foliage swayed by the breeze. It is not to be foreseen what manifold applications this new method will eventually find in the natural sciences. Here we will consider only one of its numerous applications, namely, its use in photograph- ing the starlit heavens. Whoever has tried to form an idea of the ‘number of stars, visible to the naked eye on a clear winter’s night, almost invariably overesti- mates them. The layman declares he sees a hundred thousand, ay, a million stars. Such estimates, however, far exceed the truth, and, if anything is certain, it is the fact that the number of stars to be seen

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72 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. with the naked eye is very small. All stars discernible by the keenest of human sight, without the aid of a telescope, have long been noted down on charts, and their position in the vaulted dome exactly determined. Should one count up all the stars in those parts of the heavens that become visible to us in the course of a year, even this sum would not by far approach seven thousand. However, if one resorts toa telescope, matters grow to be quite different ; more and more stars then become visible, the number depend- ing or the strength of the instrument in use. Fig. 1 rep- resents a certain portion of the heavens as seen by the Fic. 1. unaided eye. One discerns two brighter stars and several smaller ones. Fig. 2 shows this same spot, but as seen through a pow- erful telescope. This picture has not merely been drawn from fancy, Each point, even the smallest, was, after close observation, entered with the utmost care on a large chart, of which this illustration Fie. 2. is a copy, but reduced in size. And each single one of these stars is a mighty body, in its sphere a shining sun, equaling ours in grandeur and splendor. From the beginning, each of these suns has traveled its prescribed round, and has filled its place in the vast ‘universe. Such charts of the stars are leaves from the great volume of

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PHOTOGRAPHING THE HEAVENS. 73 the history of the universe, a work which astronomy teaches us to read. On one of these pages, that has already been in part deciphered, is re- corded the destiny of our planet. It is, then, not surprising that astronomers seek to gain possession of as many reliable copies of such leaves from this history as possible ; in other words, seek to own as exact and extensive star-maps as will include the very smallest luminous points in the heavens. What un- told work the compiling of such charts entails may well be imagined ; indeed, this is a task which is almost beyond human power. The chart from which the above picture is a copy was compiled at the observa- tory at Paris, and work at the same has already been continued for many decades. For years past, the two brothers, Paul and Prosper Henry, have been engaged in this exacting undertaking ; but, notwith- standing the great experience which they in the course of time had gathered, their task almost came to a sudden end in the year 1884, At that time, while pursuing their observations, they came to that region of the heavens traversed by the milky-way. As is well known, the mild, lambent light of the milky-way is caused by a conglomera- tion of countless miliions of stars placed behind one another to endless depths. To reproduce these millions of stars on charts proved to be utterly impossible. The two observers then summoned the art of photography, re- cently so much improved, to their aid. Naturally they could not make use of the ordinary apparatus of the photographer ; indeed, they were obliged to build a special telescope for their purpose. By means of clock-work, they succeeded in imparting to this a movement so prescribed and so regulated that the stars, though continuing in their unbroken course in the heavens, yet retain a stationary position with reference to the photographic plate. After many painstaking experi- ments, the enterprise was successful beyond expectation. Even the faintest of stars were plainly discernible on the plate, and in this man- ner more was accomplished in one hour than could be done by the old method of inscribing each star in many months. These results incited to further progress. A new and very large telescope was constructed and directed toward the starry heavens. The plate now showed stars of the fifteenth magnitude, i. e., those whose light is so faint that only very few telescopes in all Europe can render them perceptible. In order to obtain this result, the plate, notwith- standing its extreme sensitiveness, had to be exposed to the light of these stars for fully an hour. If one were to carefully examine such a plate, or rather a cliché made therefrom, doubts might perhaps arise as to whether some of the little points thereon might not have been occa- sioned by particles accidentally present on the original plate. Such doubts might well be entertained, but Messrs. Henry have succeeded in meeting them in a most ingenious manner. After having exposed the plate for an hour, they shifted its position a trace to the right, and

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74 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. again exposed it for the same length of time. After this they lowered the plate with the telescope to the same extent as they had before shifted its position, and then, for a third time, exposed for an hour. If, after this, the original were to be examined with a microscope, it would be seen that each little star is really composed of three points, which form a small triangle. Thus any doubt is dispelled that might have been entertained as to whether an accidental blur had been pictured. The advantage in preparing representations of the heavens by means of photography rests not only on the fact that by this means charts of the stars can be obtained much more readily than was the case when each star had to be separately noted, but the pictures thus obtained also seem to be absolutely correct ; they contain no faulty entries, no mistakes. Even the most attentive observer is liable to error; he may overlook one or more stars, he may make a wrong entry, etc. All of these risks are not to be feared in employing a pho- tographic plate ; it is like a retina that sees everything as it is/ This advantage can not be sufficiently appreciated, for it enables us to leave to coming generations an absolutely true and entirely correct picture of the starry heavens of to-day. The director of the observatory at Paris has for this reason suggested the obtaining of a complete pho- tographic picture of the entire heavens by the systematic co-operation of different observatories in the northern and southern hemispheres, This is, indeed, a grand project ; and to see it realized would, at all events, require a period of from eight to ten years—but what exceed- ingly important results would ensue from this ! With such charts from different times at his disposal, and equipped with a microscope and a micrometric apparatus to carry out his meas- urements, the investigator of the future will be enabled to make in his study astronomical discoveries that have hitherto escaped direct obser- vation by the telescopes of the observatory. In his study he will be able to prove whether any, and, if so, which stars have changed their position in the heavens, whether among the countless number of the faintest little stars in the milky-way new ones have arisen, or old ones disappeared—in short, with the aid of such charts there opens to the mind a vista of research and discovery that seems well-nigh endless. How much may be escaping astronomical science of to-day, simply because the eye of mortal explorer chances not to alight on that very point in the depths of the heavens where just then a most important event is taking place ! In future this will be different. Photographed charts of the heav- ens give an exact likeness of the appearance of the celestial dome at the time of their taking, and these may be examined and studied at any place and at any time, by day and by night. The most remote planet that revolves around the sun, known of to-day, is Neptune ; ' yet it seems most probable that beyond this, one or even more plan-

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HOW ALCOHOLIC LIQUORS ARE MADE, 75 ets are existing. As, however, they move but very slowly, and at the same time emit but little light, it has not yet been possible to dis- cern them among the millions of little fixed stars. But, when once the entire heavens, even to the very smallest of visible stars, shall have been photographed, and if this work be repeated after a period of about ten years, the charts thus obtained will solve the problem as to the most remote planets, and the latter must be found. Ay—even more. The photographic plate is superior to the observant eye, in perceiving and reproducing the smallest stars, inasmuch as it shows objects in those places in the heavens where, with the most powerful telescopes, nothing more is to be seen. In this connection the brothers Henry have recently made a most singular discovery. On the 16th of November they directed their large photographic telescope to that spot in the heavens where the star Maja is in the Pleiades, and afterward found on their plate, besides numerous stars, a spiral, nebulous spot, which, to a certain extent, seemed to come from the star Maja. As, even with the greatest tele- scopes of the observatory at Paris, no signs of such vapor could be perceived in that particular part of the heavens, a new photograph was taken on the 8th of December ; this also showed the vapor, and a third picture, obtained the following day, once more bespoke its pres- ence. There can, then, be no doubt as to the existence of a spiral-like nebulous spot in the vicinity of that star, but of which the eye, even with the aid of a most powerful telescope, can perceive naught. What wonderful prospects for the future here open to view! A veritable astronomy of the invisible begins. Celestial orbs, ever veiled from our direct gaze, are rendered perceptible—ay, trace their own picture. Therein lies the highest triumph of the human mind, that it is able, in the true sense of the word, to force Nature to reveal her secrets ; that aray of light, called into being in the most remote depths of space, created at a time ere perhaps the foot of man had ever trodden the earth, should to-day itself trace on a plate the outline and the form of that orb from which it emanated myriads of years ago.— Zranslated for the Popular Science Monthly from Die Gartenlaube. wee >-? HOW ALCOHOLIC LIQUORS ARE MADE. By JOSEPH DAWSON. —igpremirang may be our individual views or prejudices in rela- tion to the use and abuse of alcoholic liquors, the process of their manufacture is a very interesting chemical operation. Proof- spirit is defined by the United States internal revenue laws to be that mixture of alcohol and water which contains one half of its volume of

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76 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

absolute alcohol and 53°71 parts of water. When the alcohol and water are mixed together—while combining—contraction in volume takes place to the extent of 3°71 parts, resulting in 100 parts of proof- spirit. The law declares that the duties on all spirits shall be levied ac- cording to their equivalent in proof-spirits. The hydrometers adopted hy the Government for the purpose of testing the degree of strength are graded and marked (0°) for water, (100°) for proof-spirit, and (200°) for absolute alcohol, at a standard temperature of 60° Fahr. Alcoholic liquors can be made from any substance that contains saccharine matter already formed by Nature, or from any substance that contains the constituent elements that can be converted by some artificial process into the saccharine principle. In the United States they are generally produced from corn, rye, wheat, barley, rice, mo- lasses, apples, grapes, and peaches ; sometimes from potatoes and beets, Vinous fermentation converts sugar, glucose, or saccharine matter into alcohol and carbonic-acid gas ; the latter passing off into the atmos- phere. In order to bring about vinous or alcoholic fermentation five agents are indispensable, viz., saccharine matter, water, heat, a ferment, and atmospheric air. Sugar or saccharine matter in its various forms is the only element from which alcohol can be produced ; the others are mere auxiliaries to the decomposition. By establishing the quantity in volumes of the elements of sugar and alcohol, as indicated by the following tabulated statements, and by comparing the constituent elements of the two articles, so dissimi- lar in appearance, the fact of their slight difference would be incredible were it not established by science : COMPOSITION OF SUGAR IN VOLUMES. COMPOSITION OF ALCOHOL IN VOLUMES. RE OE GRUBER. 2. cv cc ccvcccccce -c0 ee eer re 2 DN dw h6S ccnee chess seeeen DB Rha asics <nincceewncesessicas 8 PE iitnnwtassesebesesedacess BY OUI. 06 40005600 ss00ee e0eceeees 0+ Gay-Lvssac. Take one volume of vapor of carbon and one of oxygen from sugar, which is accomplished by vinous fermentation and distillation, and you have alcohol. In order to obtain the best results, the process of scalding the va- rious kinds of grain used and making the yeast requires very skillful management ; so much so that the largest distillers employ a profes- sional and practical chemist to look after the scientific part of the busi- ness. The quantity and power of the yeast, in proportion to the quan- tity of saccharine matter in the mash, must be properly balanced, or in one case the fermentation will be too rapid, developing excessive beat, and consequently a loss of alcoholic vapor passing off with the car- bonic-acid gas, also inducing acetic fermentation, which, under certain conditions, is a destroyer of alcohol ; or, in the other case, if the yeast is too weak, so that it will not convert all the saccharine matter into

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HOW ALCOHOLIC LIQUORS ARE MADE. 77 alcohol, there will be a waste of material, and consequently a pecun- iary loss to the manufacturer. Can pure unadulterated alcoholic liquors be now obtained? This is a question frequently asked with a doubtful accent. I answer yes, as pure as were ever made, which assertion I will substantiate by giving a description of their manufacture. And as whisky is one of the most common liquors, it may be taken as an example. Malt is an almost indispensable article in connection with whisky-distilling, and is usually made of rye or barley. The grain is soaked in water until it begins to swell; it is then placed in a pile on the malting-floor, where it remains until heat is generated and saccharine fermentation takes place, causing the grain to germinate or sprout, and developing the saccharine matter and a peculiar ferment called diastase, which is the main object in the process of malting. When the process of germination has arrived at the point desired, the grain is spread over the floor to dry, for the purpose of suspending further fermentation ; when dry, the grain is very sweet and brittle, easily ground, and is known to commerce as rye and barley malt. The best distillers are very particular about the quality of grain they use, buying only the best in market. The proportions of each kind of grain used vary according to the particular brand of whisky desired. The usual proportions of grain are, two thirds corn and one third rye and malt. The corn is ground into a fine granulated meal, the rye to a medium fineness, and the malt is coarsely ground. The meal is all weighed, scalded, and mashed under the supervision of the United States internal revenue storekeeper. The corn-meal, being more difficult to scald than rye and malt, is first put into a mash-tub containing a proper quantity of hot water, and while the mash is being vigorously stirred with a revolving rake driven by steam or water- power, the temperature is raised to about 170° Fahr. This operation scalds the corn-meal and develops the starch ; after remaining at this temperature for the proper length of time, cold water is added to re- duce the temperature to about 150° Fahr., the rye and malt are then added. and the whole mass is continually stirred until the scalding is complete, and the starch is developed and converted into dextrine, and then into saccharine matter by the potency of the diastase contained in the malt. It is then cooled down as quickly as possible, in order to avoid viscous fermentation, by the addition of cold water and ice, to about 80° Fahr., and drawn off into a fermenting vat, and the yeast which has been previously prepared is added. The fermenting period varies from forty-eight to seventy-two hours, according to the kind of yeast used. By testing the density and temperature of the mash at the time of setting, and on the com- pletion of fermentation, with the aid of a saccharometer and thermom- eter, a close approximation can be obtained of the quantity of proof- spirit contained in the beer—by which name the mash is called after

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78 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. fermentation ; the greater the attenuation of the beer, as shown by the saccharometer, the greater the quantity of spirit. Fermentation being completed, where the ordinary copper stills are used, the beer is run into one still and is boiled ; the alcohol in the beer, being more volatile than water, rises, combined with more or less water, and passes through a copper coil or worm submerged in a cis- tern of water into which a continuous stream of cold water is running ; at the top of this cistern is an overflow-pipe conveying the heated water off as it rises. This operation condenses the vapor in the worm, and the spirit flows out colorless ; as all spirits, whether made from grain, fruit, or vegetables, flowing from the still-worm, have the ap- pearance of water. The product of this first distillation is called low-wine, from the fact that it is not of sufficient strength and purity to put upon the market. The boiling is continued until all the alcohol in the beer is evaporated and condensed ; then the refuse is drawn off from the still and fed to cattle and hogs, The low-wine is then run into still No, 2, called the doubler, and boiled again. The product from the doubler will be whisky varying from 100° to 150° in strength. When the three-chambered wooden still or column is used, and the beer is boiled by steam, spirits are produced of marketable strength at each run of the still. Under the internal revenue laws the distillers of grain and molasses can have no access to the spirits during the process of their manufact- ure, as the spirits are conveyed from the still in continuously closed pipes to large cisterns in a room with only one entrance, upon which is a Government lock, of the key of which the United States gauger is the custodian, until the spirits have been drawn off into barrels, and he has gauged the quantity and tested their degree of strength by the aid of a hydrometer and thermometer, placed a warehouse stamp on each package, and marked on each the capacity, quantity, and degree of strength of the contents. The gauger is, fortunately, not required to taste of the spirits to test their quality, as quality is not taken into consideration in levying the tax. After the gauger has completed his duties, the United States storekeeper takes charge of the spirits and sees that all of the pack- ages are safely deposited in the distillery bonded warehouse, where they remain under a Government lock—the key of which is in the care of the storekeeper—until the tax is paid. The limit of time that spirits can remain in bond, by the present revenue law, is three years. Congress was petitioned at the last two sessions, by parties interested in distilling, for an extension of the bonded period, but the petition was, I think, unwisely denied. It would be a blessing to the whole country if Congress would pass a law embodying the substance of the three following items : 1, Grant- ‘ ing unlimited time for spirits to remain in bond, in order to give all

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HOW ALCOHOLIC LIQUORS ARE MADE. 79 the time for improving the spirits desired before payment of the tax. 9, Prohibiting the withdrawal of alcoholic liquors from bond until they have been in the warehouse at least twelve months ; for the rea- son that new spirits, although they may be pure, are not fit for internal use, and should not be placed upon the market for sale until their con- stituent elements are thoroughly combined by age. 3. Prohibiting (if it can be done constitutionally) the mixing or compounding different kinds of alcoholic liquors, particularly those made from grain with those made from fruit, or the adulteration of the same by the addition of any deleterious or injurious substances. Heavy penalties to follow every violation and conviction. Various contrivances have been adopted, both in this and foreign countries, for the purpose of producing a kind of artificial age, and various compounds have been used to accomplish the desired result, and to a certain extent have been successful in deceiving the novice or uninitiated ; but, on the whole, you might as well try to put a mature brain, developed in all its manly proportions, upon the shoulders of a youth, as to try to make new spirits old, minus the element of time, and the necessary accompanying environments. A company in Boston, Massachusetts, claim to purchase the oldest liquors they can find in distillery bonded warehouses (three years old), and to purify and increase their mellowness by forcing warm air through them, thereby oxidizing the fusel-oil (or heavier alcohols), and expelling into the open air the light, poisonous ethers, leaving the liquors free from the aldehydes which stupefy and destroy the brain- tissues. The air is first passed through a chemical solution (Professor Tyndall’s well-known method), which deodorizes as well as destroys all germs of animal or vegetable origin ; and after being thus treated, analysis shows it to be pure atmospheric air, 79 parts nitrogen, and 21 parts oxygen. This purified air is then heated to a certain temper- ature, and, with the aid of a pump, forced through pipes with almost infinitesimal perforations, so as to bring the greatest amount of sur- face of air in contact with the greatest amount of surface of liquor in the shortest space of time, warming the liquors and producing a vio- lent agitation, which process, undoubtedly, accelerates the union and assimilation of the constituent elements, and, they also claim, elimi- nates the poisonous gases. The liquors are then filtered by the best- known methods to free them from any remaining débris. But to return to the distillery: you will see that the processes which the grain has gone through of mashing, fermenting, and the ex- traction of the spirits from the beer by distillation, and the placing of the completed product in the distillery bonded warehouse, are all done under the supervision of a Government officer, and thus far the distiller has had no opportunity, even if he had any desire, to adulterate the liquor. Any distiller who wishes to establish a reputation for manu- facturing a fine article, is as much interested in keeping his liquor

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80 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. pure as any person is who wishes to purchase and properly use a pure article. After the internal revenue tax has been paid, and the tax-paid stamps properly placed upon the packages, the spirits are withdrawn from bond ; each package having two stamps upon it—a warehouse and a tax-paid stamp—and when put upon the market in this condition they are known as two-stamp goods ; but the best distillers, instead of selling their goods directly from the bonded warehouse—if they have not been filtered and refined during the process of their manufact- ure—transfer them to the rectifying-house for rectification ; the object of which is to remove any pernicious substances or impurities, such as the grosser properties of the essential oils, or fusel, and acetic acid, and to improve the quality and flavor of the spirits. It is the essential oils extracted from the various materials used that impart the peculiar distinguishing characteristics to each kind of liquor. The alcoholic property is virtually the same in all spirituous liquors. The process of rectification is generally done by redistilling, and filtering through alternate layers of woolen blankets, sand, and granu- lated bone or maple charcoal—other complicated mechanical arrange- ments are sometimes used, called rectifiers, but they are not common— after which process, a little burned sugar is added to give them a kind of straw-color, simply, I presume, to distinguish them from water, and which gives the appearance of age without improving or injuring their quality. After rectification, the spirits are gauged by the United States gauger, and a rectifier’s stamp is placed upon each package, and the whisky is then ready for the market, pure and unadulterated, and known as one-stamp goods. Remember that I am now stating how good whisky is made ; all whisky is not made with the same degree of care. Some people are under the impression that if they buy two- stamp goods they are certainly getting a pure article, but that is not always the case, unless the whisky has been properly rectified during the process of manufacture. There is a vast difference between rectification proper and mixing or compounding. Rectification, in its proper sense, is purifying and refining. Compounding is diabolizing. Moral: Purchase from first hands, if possible. By this, Ido not mean to insinuate that all dealers in liquor are unscrupulous ; for, paradoxical as it may appear to some minds, there are many very generous, noble-hearted, upright men engaged in the liquor-traffic ; but the demand for cheap liquor is so great that some men can not resist the temptation to mix or compound, in order to supply this demand, and some of them feel that they are compelled to do it against their will in order to hold their customers ; and this practice will continue until the strong arm of a righteous law is placed _ upon it—a law thac every honest distiller and liquor-dealer will cor- dially approve.

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HOW ALCOHOLIC LIQUORS ARE MADE, 81 Therefore, if you want a pure article, purchase from a distiller or first-class, reliable dealer ; and, by the term jirst class, I do not mean the man who has the largest and most attractive place of business, and the most capital invested, but the man who is known for his in- tegrity and truthfulness of character. Insist that the spirits must be at least twelve months old, and also be willing to pay a fair price for them. There is no more exception to the rule in the liquor business than in any other, that, if you want something of value, you must expect to pay value for it. At some distilleries, the spirits pass through a process of filtering between the worm and cistern-room, which extracts the impure foreign matter that is unavoidably forced up from the still with the vapor of spirits. When this purifying process is skillfully and carefully done, there is no absolute necessity for the further manipulation or rectifica- tion of the spirits, and the only element then required to make the spirits fit for medicinal purposes is time, and the longer the time the better. If kept in wooden packages the spirits will improve and ac- quire a slight color by age. Coloring-matter is not allowed by the Government to be put in the spirits when this filtering process is done at the distillery. Alcoholic liquors should not be offered for sale until they have been filtered or properly rectified, either during the process of manufact- ure, or after they have been withdrawn from the distillery bonded warehouse. The best distillers never let their goods go on the market until they have themselves put the whisky through a process of recti- fication, or refining ; and woe be to the man who dares to change its character in the original package bearing their brand, if they find sufficient evidence against him ! Rye-whisky is made from rye and malt, without corn, but experts say that it requires much longer time to mature, and become ripe and smooth, than does Bourbon whisky, which is made from corn, rye, and malt. Gin is made from the same materials and in the same manner as whisky, with one addition : juniper-berries are boiled in the last dis- tillation, imparting their peculiar flavor. There are two objections to straight (unmixed) American gin: First, it is usually sold when new, because the dealer can buy it cheaper and make a larger margin upon it than he can on the old arti- cle. Second, straight American gin is not filtered and relieved of for- eign and impure matters, but is sold with them in, obnoxious as they are, depending upon the juniper flavor to conceal their presence. Rum is made from molasses, diluted with, water, and a ferment added ; after fermentation it is distilled in the same manner as whis- ky and gin. Brandy is made from apples, grapes, peaches, and other fruits, generally from the expressed juice, but occasionally from the pomace or crushed fruit after fermentation. Fruits possess by nature an VOL, XX1x.—6

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82 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. azotized albuminous substance which produces spontaneous vinous fer- mentation, so that artificial yeasts or ferments are unnecessary. About fifty per cent more brandy can be made from ripe than from green fruit, and late fruit will produce much more brandy than early fruit, Brandy-distillers ought to devote more attention to filtration than they are in the habit of doing; it is a moral obligation which they owe to society. Some people are so credulous that they believe all imported liquors are pure and perfectly straight. By paying a very high price, pure imported liquors can be obtained, but the superiority of the best arti- cle consists mainly in great age. Some imported liquors are mixed, compounded, and artificially flavored before shipment to this country, and are again mixed with so-called pure spirit after their arrival here, ’ Trois-six French spirit, when originally produced, was the pure spirit of grape-wine ; now it is mainly manufactured from potatoes and the cereals, and forms the basis of many of the liquors imported into this country under the brand of French brandies and wines, and sold toa credulous public as the product of the pure juice of the grape. The duty on imported liquors is two dollars per proof-gallon, and on imported wines fifty cents per wine-gallon, while the United States internal revenue tax is only ninety cents per proof-gallon on domestic spirits, and none on domestic wines. People can judge for themselves whether the imported article is worth the difference in price. Chemists, in their analysis of anhydrous, absolute, or pure alcohol (200°), do not exactly agree in their results. However, there is only a slight variation from the following statement in the proportions of the three constituent elements : CT ada ns eee ee mea akan d Nees 52°32 ho achiGenes gus Ghetneided cedeeeee secbese cd cheseesses 84°38 Bas cc cc ccccccccccccccccsccccnsecesecocccnescccesees 13°30 100°00 Alcohol showing the foregoing analysis acts as a caustic on the living tissues of the body, and by injection into the veins it causes sudden death by coagulating the blood. By introduction into the stomach it generally causes death. Commercial alcohol is principally made from Indian corn, and gen- erally indicates twelve degrees less in strength, being 188°, than the preceding analysis. This commercial alcohol is reduced to any degree ’ desired by the addition of water, and known to the trade as French, pure, cologne, or neutral spirits, while in fact it is nothing but dilute alcohol. This spirit forms the bulk of nearly all the low-priced alcoholic liquors, whether called rum, gin, whisky, domestic or foreign brandies, that are placed upon the market, and this neutral corn-spirit enters largely into many of the better brands, Some wholesale liquor-deal-

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THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. 83 ers and compounders state that liquors made from pure cologne or neutral spirits are the purest liquors that can be found. That may be true; also, sulphuric acid and aqua-fortis may and presumably are pure, but they are, nevertheless, dangerous and deadly poisons. This neutral spirit has been robbed of all its native richness and reduced to a skeleton of extreme poverty by eliminating its natural oils and leaving it with a harsh, cutting, penetrating nature, and when taken internally it produces the worst effects upon the tissues. The natural oils in the materials from which alcoholic liquors are produced are the oils that have the greatest natural affinity for that particular kind of liquor, and if permitted to remain where they belong, when taken into the stomach in a refined condition, properly combined and assimilated, are bland and sedative in their effects, and any spirit that has been deprived of them is not fit to enter the human stomach. ——___ oe ——___ THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. By PHILIP GILBERT HAMERTON. MONG the most curious apparent inconsistencies of human na- ture is the possibly complete independence of the productive and the conservative states of mind. It seems as if the talent for pro- ducing things often led, of itself, to a carelessness about their preser- vation, perhaps from a feeling that it is easy to replace what may happen to be deteriorated. The most conspicuous instance of this temper is that of Turner, among artists. He was the most productive of painters and the most accumulative, liking to keep his own works about him much more than painters generally do ; and yet at the same time he does not appear to have given a thought to the preservation of the works he so greatly valued. His pictures were carelessly kept in a gallery that was never repaired ; his drawings were never arranged till Mr. Ruskin arranged them six years after Turner’s death, and it cost Mr. Ruskin a whole autumn and winter (1857), with the help of two assistants, working “every day, all day long, and often far into the night,” to convert the Turnerian mess of confusion into order. Had it been confusion or disorder simply, the evil would have been completely remediable by careful labor ; but unfortunately the same carelessness that led to disorder involved carelessness about preserva- tion. Many of the drawings were eaten away by damp and mildew, “and falling into dust at the edges, in capes and bays of fragile de- cay.” Others were worm-eaten, some were mouse-eaten, ‘‘ many torn half-way through.” Turner’s way of keeping his drawings was to roll them up in bundles and cram them into drawers. The rolled bundles do not even appear to have been protected by paper closed at the end against dust, and the squeezing seems to have flattened them ;

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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 84 for Mr. Ruskin tells us that “dust of thirty years’ accumulation, black, dense, and sooty, lay in the rents of the crushed and crumpled edges of these flattened bundles.” There were also numbers of pocket sketching-books “dropping to pieces at the back, tearing laterally whenever opened, and every drawing rubbing itself into the one oppo- site.” What strikes us most in this disorder is not so much the deteriora- tion of the sketches and drawings, which Turner possibly may not have foreseen, as the intolerable inconvenience of a system that must have made reference so difficult for the artist himself as to be always tedious and often impossible. A collection of studies should always be so arranged that any study whatever, even down to the most tri- fling memorandum, may be found at a moment’s notice. The care of an artist’s collection of studies is not, however, the subject of the present paper, which is addressed rather to the lay possessors of works of art than to professional artists. Turner’s way of keeping his drawings is a model of everything that the collector ought to avoid. Nobody but an artist would think of keeping drawings rolled up in bundles, for the simple reason that you can never see a drawing properly unless it lies flat. Then we learn that Turner exposed his collection to every one of the enemies that a prudent keeper provides against. These enemies are damp, dust, and vermin. In the case of water-color and oil pictures there are two other foes, light and darkness, a water-color being liable to fade in the light, and an oil-picture to turn yellow for the want of it. Damp and mildew are often spoken of as two enemies, but in fact they are only one, as mildew is a fungus or collection of fungi thriv- ing only in damp situations.* Damp, as everybody knows, is retained moisture, or, in other words, water diffused in minute particles that are held by some other substance so as to be prevented from joining each other and flowing away, while they do not get access to the air so as to be carried off by evaporation. Some substances are extremely favorable to the retention of damp, and it so happens that the mill- board commonly emplo;ed by framers to put behind prints, and by book-binders who make portfolios, is one of those substances which ab- sorb and retain damp with particular facility. It is employed by cop- per-plate printers to dry impressions, which are placed between sheets of mill-board under pressure, the boards soon drinking up the water contained in the wetted paper. The ingenuity of framers has led them to select this (of all substances in the world) to put behind engravings that are hung up on walls ; and, when the walls happen to be damp, it follows as a matter of course that the engravings are spoiled by mildew or rust-spot. If the reader has ever lived in a * So far as I know. My experience of mildew has been chiefly with prints and the sails of boats, which require almost as much care as prints, and in these cases mildew has always required damp as a condition of its existence. .

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THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. 85 house that is even moderately damp, he can hardly have failed to no- tice that the boards behind framed engravings swell and bulge out, which is the result of an increase in the bulk and area of the boards exactly proportionate to the quantity of water they have absorbed. When there is a sufficient supply of water certain fungoid growths will begin on the surface of the print under the glass, exactly like the growth of plants from the damp earth in a garden or conservatory. If there is iron in the paper here and there (which often happens), there will be spots of oxide of iron, or what we call rust, to give a pleasing variety of color, and if one of them happens to occur on a face, it must of course add greatly to its charm. Wooden backings are safer; and I have seen a room where the engravings with mill- ‘-ard behind them were all more or less spoiled by damp, while a .¢ engraving with a thick wooden backing was entirely uninjured. Nevertheless, I would rather not trust to deal boards, as it is well known that deal is very absorbent of moisture. I remember having a heavy block of deal dead-wood removed from the hull of a boat, and when it was sawed through the water oozed freely out of every fiber. Had it been submitted to a powerful pressure, such as that from a hy- draulic press, there can be no doubt that it would have been like squeezing a wetted sponge. The necessity for careful precaution about the backing of framed engravings is not simply due to the permeability of walls that let the damp come through them ; it may be also due to mere condensation on the inner surface of the wall even when it is well built and im- permeable. This is best seen on a painted wall, as papers can absorb a great deal of water without letting it be immediately visible. In a very cold winter the external walls of a house become chilled through- out their mass, and when they are painted on the inside a sudden rise in temperature will produce visible condensation from the damp air, because the wall has not yet had time to raise its own temperature to that of the atmosphere. If there are engravings against the wall, they will suffer as much as if the wall itself were damp throughout its sub- stance ; for if the backings are absorbent they will drink in a quantity of moisture from the streaming wall-surface, which they will after- ward slowly give off to the engraving for the encouragement of fungi and rust-spots. If oil-pictures are Lung against a wall of this kind, the canvas will absorb moisture (unless certain precautions are taken, of which we may give an account presently), and then the increase in its bulk and area will cause it to hang loosely on the stretching- frames. The only way to combat condensation is by heating the air sufficiently to warm the walls themselves, when, of course, it must cease. Nature herself puts an end to it ultimately in the same way if the mild weather continues, but more slowly, as it takes some time to raise the temperature of a mass of stone by a gentle increase of heat. A thin inner wall, or wainscot separated by a little space from the

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86 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. outer wall, may prevent condensation, because the thin partition, hay- ing little substance, rises easily in temperature. It would be quite worth while, in a house where valuable works of art are hung, to have thin inner walls with a circulation of warmed air between them and the thick external wall of the building. Tapestry is a very effective remedy against visible condensation, as it absorbs a great quantity of water, which it afterward gives off slowly into the atmosphere, and it may prevent or greatly diminish real condensation by being more easily warmed than a mass of stone can be. The evil of injury from damp ought, however, to be combated as much as possible in the framing of the pictures and prints themselves, I will begin with prints because they are more common, so that the preservation of them concerns a greater number of my readers. In the first place, I would never trust to a backing of mill-board or paste- board. A print may appear to be safe with such a backing for years, and then there may be a damper winter than usual, or you may go and live in a damper house, or you may be absent, and the house may not be heated with sufficient regularity, with the result of unexpected injury to your print. Why not make it safe from the beginning? It is easy to do this, so that the print may be hung on a damp wall with- out danger. Instead of mill-board put sheet-zinc for a backing. It need not be thick, and you can always get a piece of sheet-zinc as big as the largest print. By way of completing precautions I am careful to expel any moisture there may be in the print itself by heating it well over a spirit-lamp before inclosing it between the zinc and the glass, and instead of ordinary paste for the slips of paper that join the glass to the inside of the frame and the backing to the back of the frame I employ a strong solution of gum-lac in spirits of wine, which is impervious to moisture. The print is thus inclosed in a little space that is not only water-tight, but even air-tight as well, so that damp air can not get to it. I have tried the experiment of hanging prints so framed against the dampest walls that I could find, and they have passed more than one wet winter in perfect safety, while prints framed in the usual manner, with mill-board backings, were soon spoiled by mildew and rust-spots when hung upon the same walls. All that has just been said about the protection of framed prints applies with still greater force to water-color drawings, as a water-color is far more delicate in its constitution than a print, and therefore much less easily restored to its first appearance after it has been damaged by mildew. Engravings can not be injured at all by light, the only effect of which is to bleach slightly the paper on which they are printed, but it appears to be quite an ascertained fact that water-color drawings fade when they are painted in full colors, though water-color monochromes in sepia, bistre, or Indian-ink may resist light almost indefinitely. If, , then, the object is to preserve water-colors for future generations, they ought to be kept in cabinets ; but it is also intelligible that the owner

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THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. 87 of a collection may reasonably sacrifice a few drawings in his lifetime (and the sacrifice is only partial) to the satisfaction of seeing them more frequently and of ornamenting his walls with them. An intermediate plan with regard to water-color drawings is to have case-frames that allow one drawing to be easily substituted for another when the mounts are of the same size. The drawing is then exhibited fora short time only, and the owner has the refreshment of change on the walls of his room. The same plan may be followed with prints, simply for the sake of change. With regard to the keeping of drawings in portfolios, there are rea- sons for believing that portfolios are not entirely safe. I have known a case in which prints in portfolios suffered visibly from damp, when every possible precaution seemed to have been taken for their pres- ervation. The portfolios were kept in a closet six feet by eight, which was selected because it had no outer wall, and, though there was not a fireplace in the closet itself, the door of it opened on a room where a fire was constantly kept. The closet was believed to be the driest place in the house, and the house itself was not in a damp situation, being exposed to all the winds that blow, and built upon rather elevated ground. It happened, however, that the outer walls were built of a porous kind of sandstone, which retained moisture in the winter, and as the portfolios in which the prints were kept were made of mill-board, also a retainer of moisture, the prints were really damp in spite of the carefully chosen closet. They showed the signs of damp as much, al- most, as if they had been hung upon a damp wall with a mill-board backing to each frame. It is plain, then, that the portfolio does not afford absolute security, and, indeed, the mill-board of which portfolios are commonly made is in itself an element of danger. Shallow tin boxes, with removable lids made like those of pill-boxes, are much safer than the common portfolio. I have alluded in another paper (on the “Poor Collector) * to cabinets with shelves of thin wood separated from each other by small intervals. Prints or water-color drawings may be kept in such cabinets without other protection than a sheet of paper as a protection against the small quantity of dust that finds its way into the interior. The cabinets should be placed in rooms where there are regular fires, and when the room is thoroughly warmed the doors of the cabinets should be occasionally left open and their con- tents exposed to the air. As to the wood of which they are to be made, it should be one of the least absorbent woods. Well-closed cabinets or tin boxes are the best protection against dust. If portfolios are used, they ought always to have flaps, as with- out them dust is sure to get in and spoil the edges and sometimes part of the margins of the prints. The effect of dust in course of time is to discolor paper permanently. Suppose you lay a sheet of paper on another that is rather larger, so that the second shall not be entirely * “Longman’s Magazine,” September, 1885.

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88 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. covered by the first, and leave the two in a quiet place where dust wil] settle upon them, the unprotected margin of the second sheet will in course of time become discolored and show a contrast. Many draw- ings are so delicate that the dust can not be cleared from them without injuring the drawings themselves. Unfixed charcoals and pastels are the most delicate drawings of all, and require the most perfect protec- tion against dust. The tidy housekeeper who dusts the unfinished charcoal on the easel is alluded to with horror in the little treatises on that art as the most destructive of all its enemies. As the charcoal itself is nothing but unfixed dust, it obeys the housekeeper’s feather- brush only too readily, and disappears with the other dust that means nothing and is valueless. The housekeeper in such cases seems strik- ingly like the blind destructive forces of the natural world which respect genius and its productions no more than the commonest matter ; she is like the sea which drowns Shelley and rolls the fragment of a Greek statue among its pebbles. Protection against damp and dust may seem less necessary in the case of oil-pictures, but here also it has its importance. Unquestion- ably an oil-picture has a much stronger constitution than a water-color, yet it is admitted that some colors used in oil-paintings are affected unfavorably by moisture, and are insufficiently protected by pure oil. De Mayerne affirms that indigo fades in oil without varnish, but is durable under varnish, and the following quotation from Sir Charles Eastlake’s “ Materials for a History of Oil-Painting” will show the peculiar kind of danger that may arise from damp : “The effect of moisture on verdigris, even w'en the color is mixed with oil, as noticed by Leonardo da Vinci, shows that such a vehicle, ‘unless it be half resinified, affords no durable protection to some colors in humid climates ; and the efficacy of resinous solutions, as hydro- fuges, is at once exemplified by the fact that they answer the end which (unprepared) oil alone is insufficient to accomplish. Colors which are easily affected by humidity require to be protected accord- ing to the extent of the evil. Whatever precaution of this kind was requisite in Italy was doubly needed in Flanders. The superficial varnish which sufficed in the extreme case referred to by Leonardo was incorporated with the color by the oil-painters of the North. So in proportion as the Flemish painters adopted a thinner vehicle, the protecting varnish was applied on colors which the Italians could safely leave exposed, at all events till a general varnish was spread over the work. It will be remembered that this last method was unnecessary in the original Flemish process, according to which the colors, being more or less mixed with varnish, and being painted at once, remained glossy, and needed no additional defense.” It would not be safe, however, to conclude from this that a simple coat of varnish is a perfect insurance against damp, for varnish itself ‘ may be ultimately penetrated by damp, as Field showed in his chapter

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THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. 89 on the “ Fugacity of Colors.” Here is Field’s caution on the subject, which deserves attention : “Others, with some reason, have imagined that when pigments are locked up in varnishes and oils they are safe from all possibility of change ; and there would be much more truth in this position if we had an impenetrable varnish—and even then it would not hold with respect to the action of light, however well it might exclude the in- fluences of air and moisture ; but, in truth, varnishes and oils them- selves yield to changes of temperature, to the action of a humid atmosphere, and to other chemical influences : their protection of color from change is, therefore, far from perfect.” The best way, then, to keep oil-pictures in a state of safety is not to trust much to their power of resisting damp, but to treat them just as if they were notoriously delicate things like water-color drawings, although in reality we know that their constitution is more robust. An oil-picture, it is well to remember, may be attacked by damp from behind. If it is hung on a damp wall, the canvas will absorb damp from the wall, like the mill-board behind a water-color, and this damp will reach the colors through the priming. The proof that canvases absorb damp is that they hang flaccid on their stretching-frames when there is much moisture in the atmosphere. It is some protection to have the back of the canvas protected by a coat of paint applied with varnish, but a still better protection is to have two canvases on the same stretching-frame, the one that bears the work of the painter and another behind it with a coat of paint on both sides. The practice of having two canvases on the same stretcher has been adopted by more than one modern painter for various reasons. One reason is that an accidental blow to the canvas from behind,* or an indentation from some angular object, may produce a fracture of the paint in the pict- ure—a fracture not immediately visible, perhaps, but likely to show itself later. It is generally of no use to propose anything that has not been already adopted to some extent in practice, but I may call attention to a plan which is successfully adopted by house-painters to protect wall-papers from damp. Their way (or one of their ways) is first to apply tin-foil to the wall, making it adhere by means of a thick coat of white-lead. This is found to be a good protection for the wall- paper which is pasted on the tin-foil. It would probably, in the same way, be an excellent protection for pictures if the double-canvas sys- tem were adopted and the under canvas covered with tin-foil upon * Canvases are exposed to injuries of this nature in exhibitions chiefly, from the corners of other pictures that may be carelessly placed against them, before or after the exhibition. In private houses this danger is scarcely to be dreaded, but it is well to bear in mind that all people except painters believe that it does no harm to a canvas to lean it against the corner of a chair, a table, a box, or anything that may present itself conveniently. *

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go THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. white-lead. It has been remarked that a certain kind of decorative work used in the middle ages consisted of paint applied on tin-foil and protected by glass. Here was a double protection against damp, the glass before and the tin-foil behind, the glass answering to the varnish on a picture, but with more complete efficacy. Glass is now largely used in the National Gallery for the protection of oil-pictures, but, unfortunately, the common objection that it does not allow the spectator to see the picture easily is but too well founded. What we really see is too often the reflection of a group of visitors to the gallery, almost as in a looking-glass. This happens especially when the picture is a dark one, and many of the finest old pictures are dark, We are sometimes told that it is an affair of focusing the eye, and that if we look as we ought to do at the picture itself, and not at the reflections, we shall not see the reflections. What really happens is this : If we look at the reflections of the visitors we see them won- derfully well, down to the most minute inventions of the feminine cos- tume, and if we look at the picture we see it in a confused way inter- mingled with the reflections. This being so, it follows that private owners are not much encouraged to put their pictures under glass, It may be objected that water-colors are habitually protected in this way, and that no one complains. True, but in the first place, with regard to water-colors we have no choice, as any fly could spoil an unprotected water-color in a minute ; in the second place, a drawing in water- color is usually of small dimensions, so that it is more easily seen; and, lastly, water-colors are generally paler than oil-pictures, so that they do not make such perfect mirrors. A dark old oil-picture with a sheet of plate-glass before it is, in certain lights, almost as good a mirror as if the glass were lined with quicksilver. We can hardly, then, include glass among the means to be recommended for protect- ing oil-pictures from damp, and must trust rather to the dryness of the atmosphere in which the pictures are kept ; and yet it is necessary to avoid excessive heating, which in certain cases produces or favors cracking and destroys by detaching paint from the priming of the canvas. Canvas may not seem a very durable material, and yet, on the whole, it is preferable to wooden panels, for it may truly be said of wood, as it was said of the arch in architecture, that it is never at rest. It is always either swelling or contracting, and if a composite panel is not quite scientifically constructed, it is sure to tear itself and show fissures. Panels are therefore usually employed for small works only, and for these copper would be better still, though it has been used rarely. If a panel is well painted on the back, it will absorb damp less readily, and this precaution is very easily taken. The art of removing a painting from an old to a new canvas is now so well understood that the operation, which many years ago seemed ' formidable, is now performed every day without attracting attention.

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THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. 91 In this way an old picture gets a new lease of life; but the question remains whether the new lease might not be made longer, and indeed extended almost indefinitely, by impregnating the canvas with some- thing that would increase its durability without weakening its sub- stance. It is well known that the fiber of the threads in canvas is so weakened by the application of oil-paint, or oil alone, that it after- ward is easily torn, and it is weakened in the same way by some other applications. Oil-pictures unprotected by glass are always quietly accumulating a coat of dust and dirt, which, in course of time, unless it is occasion- ally removed, makes the hazardous process called “picture-cleaning ” present itself as an ineluctable necessity if the work be visible at all. The two preservative cleanings are first simply dusting with a light feather-brush and an occasional careful washing with a soft rag, some warm water, and a /ittile soap, but not a strong soap. I remember a house where a new Scotch house-maid, who was alarmingly industrious, was discovered one morning on the point of cleaning all the pictures in a certain room with soft-soap and a scrubbing-brush. She was about to apply the same treatment to the frames, on which there was a good deal of burnished gilding, which would all have immediately disappeared. As for the pictures themselves, if they were covered with old well-hardened varnish, they might possibly have survived, but unvarnished works would have been injured or destroyed. It is impossible to foresee what schemes a zealous servant may not carry into execution. Projecting ornaments on frames are always in danger from servants’ dusters. I once possessed a plaster statuette, which was valuable because there were only three copies in existence, and every successive house-maid broke its arm off with a blow from the wooden stick which is inside a feather-brush, The arm was regularly glued on again for the next house-maid. The feather-brush looks a most innocent instrument, but the stick in it makes the house-maid formidable. I once knew an old gentleman who possessed a picture of great value, the most important work of its master (one of the old masters) in existence. This picture was the pride and pleasure of his old age, and he could not help caressing it, as it were. From sheer love of it, he could not be satisfied with looking at it, but must needs touch it frequently also, and his way was to pass an oiled rag gently over its surface. I believe the oil he used was olive-oil (he was a Frenchman, and so there would always be olive-oil in the house for the salad), and as olive-oil never dries, or at least is the worst drier known,* perhaps it did not accumulate on the picture, but the dust must have stuck to it, and made a fresh application necessary from time to time merely to * Field says that olive-oil is reported to have been used for painting in Italy in place of the desiccative oils, but he thinks it likely that it was only employed as a diluent. No painter in our climate would think of using olive-oil in any way whatever.

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92 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. clean off the old one. Olive-oil does not dry properly, but it becomes sticky after long exposure to the air, and nothing could be better cal- culated to catch and retain dust. The wisdom of our ancestors made them rejoice in coats of varnish applied thickly over dirty pictures, to lock up the dirt between the paint and the varnish, and so preserve it for the delight of posterity. Our ancestors liked dingy pictures, and the dirtier they were the better they seem to have liked them. The Presi- dent of the Irish Academy, in a witty speech that I regret not to have kept, said that in Ireland at the present day the public taste required that a picture should be very black, and that it should not cost more than six pounds. Now, dirt is a great help to darkness of complexion, as we all know by the faces of dirty boys in the streets, and, if darkness were considered a merit in these boys, it would be a great mistake to wash them. The question of picture-cleaning is one of the most complicated that can be. Suppose you leave a very dirty picture as it is, do you see, can you possibly see, what the artist painted? Assuredly not; and why should decent people tolerate dirty pictures when they will not tolerate a dirty table-cloth? The answer is that, if the picture could be cleaned as safely as the table-cloth it would be done without hesitation, but that cleaning may possibly remove light glazes and scumblings along with the varnish, and that if these glazes, the finish- ing work of the artist, are once removed, no human being on earth, except the artist who painted the picture, can replace them. But, by the time a picture urgently wants cleaning, the painter has generally been for many years in his grave. Therefore, in having a picture cleaned you are risking that which can not be replaced. All this has been said before, but the arguments for and against picture-cleaning have usually been presented in a controversial manner by strong parti- sans of one side or the other, and, as I am not at all a partisan in the matter, I may be able to state the case more fairly. The choice of evils is this : To escape from the certain evil of leaving a picture con- cealed by the dirt upon it, you expose it to the possible evil of remov- ing the finishing glazes. Anybody who has painted a picture knows what a disaster that is. The degree of the disaster varies with differ- ent artists, according to the importance of the glazes in their system of work. To remove the glazes, even partially, from a Titian is to destroy the picture, because he glazed a great deal, and what we all know as the rich Titian color required that method for its production ; but, when a painter has used a more direct method, painting the in- tended color at once, or nearly so, then the removal of a glaze does not destroy the character of the picture, though it may diminish its beauty and charm. To remove a glaze, in any case, is to put the pict- ure back from a finished to an unfinished state ; this is exactly what is done, and the degree of destruction is in inverse ratio to the degree ' of advancement attained in that unfinished state. But, if the picture

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THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. 93 is extremely dirty, then it is as if some other person had glazed unin- telligently over the whole work, so that the original intentions of the artist are as much falsified in one direction by dirt as they are in an- other by taking the finish from his picture. The reasonable rule, then, would appear to be to clean pictures that really need it, but to avoid overcleaning with the most scrupulous care. The removal of varnish is in some cases rendered absolutely neces- sary by a foolish practice that was occasionally resorted to by our fathers—the practice of tinting the varnish itself to give what they wrongly imagined to be tone. It was believed that anybody could varnish a picture ; and, by one of those amazing delusions that take deep root in ignorant minds, it was thought that all the colors ina picture could be improved simultaneously by spreading one and the same transparent color over them. The question whether it is right to paint upon pictures when re- pairing them may be better understood by considering one or two par- ticular cases. I remember a house where the children were so much indulged that they were allowed to shoot with pop-guns and other engines at the family portraits, and they did this with such energy as actually to produce holes in the canvas—one large hole, for example, in the face of a lady who had been beautiful a hundred years ago. Now, if that picture came to you by inheritance in that state, the ques- tion about repainting would present itself to you in a practical form. You would have to determine whether the face was to remain in its damaged condition or to be repaired. To leave it damaged would be to destroy the effect of the picture on everybody’s mind, because everybody would think of the hole, and how the accident happened, instead of thinking about the beauty or history of the lady or the merit of the painting. It seems, then, that it would be reasonable to have the picture repaired, and yet it is indisputable that to do this must be to introduce the work of another man. Everything, then, de- pends on the skill of the restorer. In such a case as that the restorer would begin by carefully laying together the jagged threads of the canvas, so that none should project, and he would probably put a back- ing to support them ; then he would cover them with white-lead up to the level of the painted surface, and, when that was hard and dry, he would carefully color the white patch so as to replace what had been destroyed. Artists of considerable technical ability, but who have not the knack of producing salable pictures, sometimes attain such skill in the coloring of these patches that it becomes impossible to distin- guish them after restoration, and the picture has all the appearance of an uninjured work. I remember some portraits from an old French chateau that were all dirt and holes ; in fact, to call them dirty rags would scarcely have been an exaggeration, but the owner had a value for them, and wisely placed them in the hands of a very experienced painter. This artist knew a good cleaner, to whom he confided part of

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94 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. the work, and who began by cleaning the pictures carefully and put- ting them all on new canvases.* In this state the new canvas showed through all the holes like the skin of a pauper through his shirt, and every one of these little islands of new canvas had to be colored up to the tint of the surrounding paint, or rather to be colored like the paint which had disappeared, the nature of it having to be guessed from what remained round about it. When there is no detail, as often hap- pens in draperies and backgrounds, this is not extremely difficult, though it requires a well-trained eye to color ; but when detail has to be invented exactly in the style of the picture, that is a different mat- ter, which taxes the skill of the restorer to the utmost. However, there can be no question that when a picture is so injured as to present hiatuses, whether by holes in the canvas or by mere removal of the paint, it is an absolute necessity to have them filled as well as we can. Painting is not in the same position as literature in this respect. There are numerous unfinished lines in the “ Aneid,” and after the death of Virgil we are told that Augustus appointed a literary commission, em- powered by him to remove those parts which were glaringly unfinished and defective (as Virgil himself had died before his own intended re- visal of the poem) ; but we are also told that Augustus strictly for- bade the revisers to add anything whatever of their own. We all feel that no hand but that of the author should add anything to a poem; we all prefer certain fragments of Coleridge and Shelley to any finish- ing that would involve additions by a reviser. In a minor degree we object to restoration in sculpture, though here we tolerate it to some extent. When a nose is broken from a bust, it is generally restored, and so is a finger on a hand ; but prudent conservators of museums do not often attempt the restoration of an arm that has entirely disap- peared. These distinctions, as well as our greater desire for the restora- tion of paintings, are all perfectly logical. A hiatus does not make a poem intolerable. The numerous small gaps in the “ Aineid” have but avery slight effect in diminishing the reader’s satisfaction, the reason being that they occur one at a time, and each little gap is for- gotten in the interest of the next perfect opening of two pages ; but in a@ picture all the gaps are seen at the same time, and distract our atten- tion from the general beauty of the work. A Greek bust, however lovely, is a torment to us without its nose, and though the restored nose may not be so good as the lost original, it allows us to admire the beauties of the brow and chin in peace. If we shrink from the restora- tion of an arm, it is because we do not know enough about the arm that has been lost to replace it satisfactorily, but the lost arm is not spoiled ; it is simply absent, and though there are loss and mutilation, * When this is done the old canvases are entirely destroyed by friction without injur- ing the paint, which is then fixed on the new canvas. A painting is removed from a wooden panel by first planing the wood till it is very thin, after which what remains of ‘the wood is destroyed entirely by the use of sand-paper and scrapers.

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THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. 95 there is not a hiatus like an empty space which is inclosed within the four sides of a picture. The only exceptions to the necessity for res- toration in damaged pictures are those cases in which a fragment of ancient painting is preserved less as a work of art than as an object of antiquarian interest. Then, of course, however mutilated, it must re- main in its mutilated condition like all those things which are valuable as materials for antiquarian studies. Vermin have to be guarded against carefully in the preservation of works of art. Drawings and engravings are generally protected either by portfolios or by glass, which prevent the droppings of flies from spotting them ; but I have seen prints spoiled in this way by being carelessly left upon a table for a very short time, when the flies took their opportunity and left their black dots. Their excrement is sol- uble in water, and can be removed easily from any hard substance while it is fresh, though it hardens and becomes less soluble after- ward ; but on an engraving it is disastrous, as it sinks into the paper like a stain. It therefore becomes a pecessary precaution, especially in summer, to cover a print that is left‘on a table, or, better still, never to leave prints on tables at all.. The worms that bore into wood are dangerous only to pictures on panels, and, as very few pictures are painted upon wood in these days, this enemy is not so much to be feared. When he attacks an old panel his holes may be stopped with a little marine glue, applied hot ; but it is curious how often worms will attack a thin piece of wood without penetrating to the other side. In two specimens before me, small panels three eighths of an inch thick, and about four inches by five, I find that in one case the worms have made twenty-two holes, not one of which has got through to the other side ; and in the other case there are twenty-five holes, of which only seven have as yet penetrated. The only way to keep prints and drawings from the attacks of rats and mice is to have them always in closed cases if they are not framed, and, if the cases are of wood, it is a good precaution to have them cov- ered with thin sheet-iron behind and beneath, while the front panels may be glazed. Tin boxes are a perfect protection against rodents, and so, of course, is glass. Common portfolios are a poor protection, as a rat willingly attacks them, and soon eats his way through to the prints ; in fact, common portfolios are in all ways unsafe, being of use only to keep order. The danger from rats and mice is always present, for even in places where they are unknown they may at any time sud- denly make their appearance. A rat may find his way into your best protected room. I remember one summer’s day—in broad daylight, too—seeing a large rat quietly descending into my study by means of a window-curtain, the window having been left open. He had walked along a little stone ledge that the architect had carried round the house as an ornament, which is a great convenience to rats. When a house is perfectly quiet at night a rat will wander about in the coolest man-

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96 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. ner, and enter by any door that happens to be left ajar. In this way a fine black rat once got into my study and remained there for several days. I heard him distinctly behind certain heavy pieces of furniture, but could not get at him. He did a great deal of damage, though happily not to anything of much value, and he ended his career in a trap. Had I been away from home, the devastation caused by that one animal might have been serious. But his visit taught me a lesson, as he especially attacked portfolios, while the shallow tin boxes on shelves which I have adopted of late years entirely escaped his atten- tions. It is astonishing by what a narrow orifice a mouse will find her way into any place that she desires to visit. Drawers are sometimes so constructed that, although they fit well in front (for the sake of appearances), they are loose in the chest behind, and the consequence is that, if a mouse can get into the chest anywhere, she has all the drawers at her disposal. The first use she will make of any precious papers will probably be to tear them into little pieces and establish a comfortable nest in a corner. In my article on “The Poor Collector” I touched briefly upon the question of frames. We have already noticed the curious fact that people who are strict about cleanliness in common household matters will tolerate dirty pictures. Very dirty frames are also tolerated in some public and private collections ; in fact, I have seen collections where the notion that frames and pictures would be the better for be- ing clean does not appear to have dawned upon the owner’s mind, Surely, however, it is with these things as with all other things, clean- liness is pleasing in itself and an addition to the charm of beauty. One likes to see a pretty child with a clean face and an unspotted frock, though it might still be recognized as a pretty child if it lived in filth and squalor. In the case of pictures and their belongings, dirt is es- pecially incongruous, because there can not be any poverty to excuse it. Pictures and their frames are superfluities in any case, and why tolerate a dirty superfluity ?* A word, in conclusion, may be said about the art of exhibiting things to advantage in private rooms. It is astonishing how few peo- ple understand the simple principle that some works of art may be injurious to others when shown by the side of them. For example, engravings are always killed by paintings, and the white margins of * The one reason for dirty frames is the partial burnishing of the gilding. Oil-gild- ing can not be burnished; water-gilding, which takes burnish, can not be washed with water, and nothing but water will clean a fly-spotted, dirty frame effectually. Conse- quently a frame that has burnish upon it can only be dusted, and when it becomes really dirty it must be sent to the gilder; but, as regilding is expensive, it is postponed as long as possible—sometimes for a lifetime, and even for more than one generation. With oil- gilding only and one thin coat of varnish over the gilding (the varnish is nearly imper- ceptible if properly applied), a frame may be washed from time to time. This has been said already in the paper on “The Poor Collector,” but is repeated here in a note for * peaders who have not that paper to refer to.

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THE CARE OF PICTURES AND PRINTS. 97 engravings diminish the luminous quality of paintings ; yet there are le who hang paintings and engravings in the same room. Again, there are others who would not do that, but who will hang paintings together of which the style and sentiment are so absolutely incongruous that they can not avoid conflict, and require entirely different moods of mind for the right appreciation of them. Suppose you have a gravely furnished room, a library, and one or two portraits in it of thoughtful and serious men painted soberly and in quiet color, would it not evidently be a great mistake to admit into that room any picture whatever that should disturb the pensive tranquillity of the place? Fancy the effect if you admitted a gaudy modern portrait of an over- dressed lady with a smirk upon her face as she sat happy in her glare and glitter of millinery and trinkets! There ought to be in every room a certain prevailing note or mood of the human mind whatever it may be, and everything should be kept subordinate to that one dominant idea, with sufficient variety to avoid dullness, but without transgression of the limits prescribed by the idea. In a word, let us have ideal unity ; let us avoid the incongruous. A room may contain different works of art, but, in a comprehensive sense, it is a work of art in itself, and the first necessity for every work of art is unity. If it is decided that the note of the room is to be cheerfulness, it is easy to keep faithful to that. Light in itself is an element of cheerfulness, so the wall-paper will be light. Water-colors are more cheerful than oil-paintings, because water-color painting is apparently slighter and more rapid ; it conveys better the idea of felicitous dexterity. Water- colors, too, may have margins, and the white of the margins gives much light and gayety to a room. The frames must be gilded, because nothing is so cheerful as gilding ; but they must not be heavy, because massiveness is oppressive to the imagination. The pictures themselves should be generally light, and the coloring as bright and gay as it can be without crudity. In such a room we do not want melancholy land- scapes or solemn-looking personages, but we want blue skies and sun- shine, merrily rippling waters, human life in youth or healthy maturity, happy in activity and love, not burdened with care and sorrow—all in that sweet dream-land of the poetic imagination— “ Where the flowers ever blossom, the beams ever shine,” _ The opposite mood of thoughtful gravity is not by any means in- ferior as a motive, and it is more in consonance with the habitual feel- ings of mature age. The greatest of all artists have worked in the serious sense, and our noblest pictures, like our sweetest songs, “are those that tell of saddest thought,” or, if not quite of the saddest, still of that quietly grave, reflective thought which is “far from all resort of mirth.” Few paintings of the human face have such a permanent hold upon the memory, or are so often looked at, or for so many min- utes at once, as that picture by Francia in the Louvre which is simply VOL. XX1X.—7

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98 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. called the “ Portrait of a Gentleman.” Nobody knows anything what. ever about the original, but the “ gentleman” is so sad and thoughtful that we dream with him, and see the world through his melancholy eyes. In minor degrees many paintings have this kind of attraction ; it is to be found in landscape as well as in portrait and history, and, if a few thoughtful works are brought together in the same room, without being neutralized by anything discordant in furniture and decoration, their effect upon the mind may be both durable and pro- found.—Longman’s Magazine. THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE. By M. A. HOVELACQUE. VEN if the study of words, as it is carried on by the method of the natural sciences, did not furnish evidence that all language is traceable back to primordial monosyllabic elements, observation of the language-processes in children would lead to that conclusion. Gestures and physiognomical motions preceded language proper, or articulate language ; and on this point it is of interest to compare man with the monkeys, which are able to express a considerable variety of feelings by the play of the muscles of the forehead and the eyebrows, the lips, nose, and jaws. If asked on what vocalization depends, we should answer that it depends solely on a particular sensation being stronger than others. With the infant, voice is provoked at first by some uneasi- ness or suffering ; and it is not till a later period that it responds toa feeling of comfort and satisfaction. But in either case the first emis- sions have nothing intentional about them, and there is no link of volition between the feeling and the vocal manifestation of it. The time comes at last when the child, beginning to perceive what is going on around him, remarks that they always come to his help when he ‘has committed the act of utterance ; and he has from that time learned ‘by experiment the use of his vocal power. He employs it at first in a very general and vague way ; but, as he is taught by experience, he learns to exercise it more precisely, more in accordance with his voli- tion, and to adapt the vocal emission to the results he wishes to bring about. He also perceives the greater facility of expression it gives him, and so goes on developing his precious faculty as he continues to exercise it. Tylor has clearly brought out the fact that savages have in a high degree the power of expressing their ideas directly by emo- tional tones. These tones, or interjections, are the first elements of grammatical language. The same author has also remarked another fact, that children not more than three or four years old, for example, are ‘wont to observe the play of features, attitude, and gestures of the

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THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE. 99 rson who is speaking to them, in order to get the exact sense of the words which they hear. We mention here, without dwelling upon it, that the faculty of language stands in close relation with a certain one of the frontal con- yolutions of the brain, which the inferior monkeys do not possess and which is found in a rudimentary state in the anthropoids, but the full acquisition and most complete development of which have made man, what he is, the master of articulate speech. We thus perceive that the study of language belongs to the domain of the natural sciences. The objections that have been made to this view have little force with us. The first of them is that language is not transmitted with the blood. This confounds the transmission of the art of speech with that of the faculty of language. The faculty is hereditarily transmitted ; it is intimately related to the cerebral devel- opment, and goes down with the structure, nature, and qualities of the brain. As to the way in which the transmitted organ shall perform its functions, the parents of the child are there to stimulate and direct it, and to teach their offspring how to use the faculty it has inherited from them. We must not confound the faculty with the use that may be made of it. That use is an art, which the child acquires by tradi- tion. But, we repeat, in the period of formation of a language, sono- rous expression is only the more intense formulation of an emotion, usually associated with mimicry, the general attitude and face-play, a formulation which has the advantage of being more striking to strangers. In any case, it originally required to be complemented by gesture ; and peoples little advanced in civilization may still be cited, among whom conversation is difficult in the dark, where mimicry can not be brought in to aid it. Bonwick relates that the Tasmanians had to recur to gestures and signs to establish the exact sense of their words ; and Spix and Martins say the same of some of the savages of South America, and Cranz of the Greenlanders. These observations are far from being the only ones. that have been made to the same effect. A sound reason for including the study of language among the natural sciences lies in the fact that no man or group of men is com- petent arbitrarily to change the structure of its language. Fashion may sometimes admit particular words or banish others, but that has nothing to do with the structure. The morphological evolution of language defies all convention, all encroachment ; it goes on by virtue of its own force, more or less slowly or speedily, but without the fancy or the pleasure of men having any power to divert it from its course. In short, we must avoid confounding changes ‘in the vocabulary with linguistic, or, as we might call them, morphological changes. Among some Polynesian peoples, words are sometimes abolished ; they will cease, for example, to employ in conversation the syllables that occur in the name of a chief ; some people of the Bantu race will not pro-

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100 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. nounce any syllable that is found in the name of a near male relative, But these are special usages, temporary fashions, and have nothing whatever to do with the structure of the language. Then, again, we witness the creation of new words every day, but these words are always formed according to analogies with already existing words, They may be happy inventions or awkward attempts, but they are never pure creations or wholly fanciful. A second objection to the classification of linguistic among scien- tific studies rests upon the fact that whole peoples, and even races, are capable of abandoning their own language and adopting another. The fact is undeniable ; but it is also undeniable that language is inde- pendent of history ; and, to take one example among many, we have seen Latin go on in its evolution in Gaul, Spain, and Roumania, after having been adopted by the barbarians. It is proper to say something here about so-called mixed languages, which are, however, not at all hybrid in their structure, but have simply admitted foreign words into their vocabularies. With all the Persian and Arabic words it contains, the Turkish language is evi- dently and only Altaic. The Araucanian language, although it has received a host of Spanish words, is a purely American idiom. Eng- lish is Germanic, although its vocabulary is loaded with words of Latin origin. The French language was introduced into England by the Norman conquest in the eleventh century. From the two lan- guages which were then found in the presence of one another, the Anglo-Saxon and the French, it has been usually said that a mixed language was formed—the English. This assertion is very inexact, from the morphological point of view. French, after the conquest, became the language of the court and of justice, while it entered into the popular language, the Anglo-Saxon, only as to its vocabulary ; but there it made a deep impression. Of 43,000 words in the English lan- guage, as they occur in the dictionary, more than 29,000 are of Roman origin, while only 13,000 or 14,000 are of Germanic origin, or Anglo- Saxon ; yet the English language is wholly Germanic in its structure. The remains of the declensions of nouns and of the conjugations of verbs are Germanic, with no Latin about them. Another example of the kind is found in the Basque language, three quarters of the vo- cabulary of which is to-day Romanic; yet the fact does not prevent the language from having a peculiarly individual structure and form wholly free from Romanic elements in its grammar. In short, the processes of linguistic study—whickhave nothing in common with those of the study of philology—demonstrate that the linguist studies the anatomy of forms just as the botanist and zodlo- gist do. ; Another objection to the scientific view of linguistics is more specious, but not more solid. It is that, since articulate language can ‘ not be produced without vocal organs, it can not be regarded as an

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THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE. 101 independent organism ; besides, the sounds or vocal emissions do not become a language till they acquire significance by means of an opera- tion that escapes us. It is easy to answer to this that, while language js in relation with a mental operation, it nevertheless constitutes a fact which is perceived by a sense—the sense of hearing. Of course, it is only in the abstract sense that we can regard language as an organ- ism, but there is no doubt that in reality it behaves like an organism, and that it is in a constant state of evolution. And it is to this con- dition of evolution that I invite attention. The phases of this evolution, as we understand it, are those of formation, growth, maturity, and decay. The variation is continual. Languages arise, are developed, pass on to decadence, and perish, like other organized beings. That their historical development is modi- fied in the course of ages, according to certain conditions, is incon- testable ; but the observer of these modifications never sees in them anything other than phenomena of natural evolution. The evident proof of this fact is that the evolution is, as a whole, the same in lin- guistic families essentially different from one another. Abel Rémusat has, in his “ Recherches sur les langues tartares,” indicated the general nature of the evolution of idioms: “In studying them attentively,” he says, “we are tempted to believe that they are as constant in their march as the physical constitution that gives origin tothem. . . . Possibly there prevails in languages less of the arbitrary than we have been accustomed to suppose ; and, if we bring to their study the necessary care, we may be able to find in them signs as sure, as pronounced, and as characteristic as those which we can deduce from physiognomy, the color of the skin, or any other physical and external peculiarity.” This “necessary care” bas been carried into the study of languages, and we shall see to what conclusions it has led us. We are not acquainted with any language in its embryonic condi- tion, if such a term is admissible. All of the languages submitted to our direct observation, even those of the most primitive stage, have passed the period of formation, which was prehistoric, and are now in the historical period, and generally in their decay. But by methodi- cally separating and comparing their formative elements we can put ourselves, as it were, into the period of their formation. The result of such comparative researches has confirmed the the- ory proposed in 1818 by William Schlegel, that languages first passed through a monosyllabic period ; that some of them rose to the stage of development called the agglutinative ; and that a small number of these last reach a later stage of flexion. The structure of the lan- guages of the first class is simple, that of the second class is complex, and that of the third class is still more complex. In the first phase of language, the root and the word are one, and each word-root or root-word is monosyllabic. The phrase is therefore

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102 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. a pure and simple succession of isolated roots. It is evident that the first process of elocution was of this character. Expression was found in uttering, one after another, monosyllables which were sometimes undoubtedly onomatopoetic—imitations of noises, sounds, and cries, Existing monosyllabic languages have singularly improved upon this primitive process, while they have still remained monosyllabic, They have not created grammar, there being no structure in their words, but they have created a syntax. This syntax consists in the position in the phrase given to the different root-words. The place which any monosyllable occupies in the phrase determines the mean- ing of that monosyllable. The same process of syntactical arrange- ment comes back into use in the existing analytical languages that are most advanced in decadence. When, for example, we say in English, “Peter likes John,” we are obliged to put the word Peter at the be- ginning of the phrase, and John at the end ; for both words have lost every morphological distinction that could show which of them is the subject and which the object. It is not so in the synthetical lan- guages in which the subject and the object are distinguished by the form of the word, and position in the phrase is of little importance. Thus, to say in Latin that the Helvetians sent legates, we say indif- ferently, Helvetii legatos miserunt, or Legatos miserunt Helvetii ; the form in which the two nouns are put defining their respective func- tions. In Chinese, the root which is to be the subject, or nominative ina phrase, takes its place before the root that has the significance of a verb. By thus assigning to the subject-word a fixed place in the phrase, the want of the grammatical elements which in Greek and Latin characterize the nominative case is obviated. In a monosyllabic language, in short, there is no grammar; there are no substantive forms, no verbal forms, or declensions, or conjugations, or gender, moods, or tenses, nothing but syntax, or “putting together.” This, moreover, is what we shall more easily grasp in studying the transi- tion from monosyllablism to agglutination, or the passage from the first to the second linguistic phase. This transition or evolution takes place in a very simple way. Some word-roots abdicate a part of their meaning and become simple elements of relation, while others retain their full and independent signification. In Chinese and in other existing monosyllabic lan- guages, we find this division of words into “full” words (which we may translate into English by a noun or a verb) and “vacant” words, the primary sense of which has gradually become obscured, and which have come to define more exactly or limit the broad sense of the “ full” words. It is an interesting fact that a similar process has been em- ployed at a much later stage in languages which have reached a high degree of development. Thus, in Latin, besides the word circus, ‘ a circle, we find circum, around, a kind of vacant word, denoting 4

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THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE. 103 only relation ; and examples of the kind might be multiplied in that language. So in Chinese,-a monosyllabic language, the word for with, the sign of the instrumental case (“with the arm,” “with a stick”) is simply the root which when a “full” word signifies to make use of. In the monosyllabic languages, the full words and the vacant words follow one another without ever amalgamating ; that is, the roots are always isolated from each other, and there is never a word of several syllables. It is true that we can form something like compounds by bringing two words together, but without uniting them. Thus, in Chinese, the words /%, father, and m2, mother, brought together un- der the form of /%-m2, signify parents ; and in the same way the words for “far” and “near” are made to signify distance. But there is nothing of derivation in this. Neither of the two words serves as an element of relation to the other, but each keeps all of its personality. A step further is taken at a certain moment of linguistic develop- ment. The word indicating relation, the vacant word, is joined to the full word, and a polysyllabic form arises. A new word is formed, consisting of something else than a simple root, by the agglomeration of different elements, and we are in a secondary or agglutinative stage. We have no longer two full words juxtaposed to form a composite word ; but an annexation to the principal word of a word playing the part of a secondary derivative and defining the relations of the root to which it is joined. When this derivative element is placed after the radical form, it is called a suffix; when it is placed at the beginning of the word, it is a prefix. Sometimes it is intercalated in the body of the word, and is then called an infix ; but that method of derivation is rare. It may be added that there are no limitations to derivation. The derived word may be the beginning of a second compound, and this of a third, and so on. Thus, in Magyar, the derivative zérat means he causes to shut, and zdérhat he can shut; then, by a secondary derivation, we form zdérathat, he can cause to shut. In like manner, zdratgat, he causes to shut often, is a secondary, and zdératgathat, he can cause to shut often, is a tertiary derivative. The languages of the third period of evolution, Latin for example, present a consider- able number of these secondary and tertiary derivatives. The Latin word pater, father, is a primary derivative, of which the full or radical element is ya and the limiting element is ter. Paternus, whence our paternal, is a secondary, and paternitas, corresponding with our pater- nity, is a tertiary derivative. But our languages have not the extraor- dinary facility in derivation possessed by some simply agglutinative idioms. Thus, in the Turkish language, a single word may be made to introduce an indefinite number of ideas: as, séumek, to love ; sév- memek, not to love ; sévilmék, to be loved ; sévilmémek, not to be loved ; stvdirmék, to make to love ; seévdirmém2k, not to make to

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104 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. love ; sevinmek, to love one’s self ; and so on, in which the derivatiye elements indicate, in the various forms, negation, causation, the reflex. ive quality, and other ideas, which in our language have to be ex- pressed by separate words. The larger number of languages are in the secondary or agglutina- tive stage. Among them are the negro, Malay, Polynesian, Dra- vidian, Altaic, Basque, and American languages or families of lan- guages. But community of structure is no sign of relationship ; it only indicates that two or more languages are in the same stage of evolution. Some languages have made but little progress in agglutination, while others have advanced a great way in it. Some of the Western African negro languages still use, with agglutinative forms, processes that appertain to the monosyllabic structure. These are not cases of return to ancient forms, but are survivals of ancient forms in the midst of more complex formations. Some idioms, also, perpetually betray the evidences of the passage from monosyllablism to aggluti- nation. Such languages have no literary value, and are not at all prominent ; but they are like those obscure vegetable or animal spe- cies which are frequently richer in facts for the botanist or zodlogist than other species that are usually esteemed much more useful or beautiful. It is not quite so easy to explain the phenomena of the evolution from agglutination to flexion. The principle by which the evolution takes place is that of a phonic modification of the root. In the Indo- European languages, among which are included the Sanskrit, Persian, Greek, Latin, etc., evolution took place, according to M. Victor Henry, not only in this way, but by an agglutination of infixes also. But this point is not yet cleared up. If we consider the ancient languages of the Indo-European family —Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin—we shall find that they are in different degrees synthetic ; while, if we examine the characters of the modern branches of the family, we shall discover that they are analytical. This effect is the work of linguistic decadence, which has been less rapid in the Slavic languages than in the Germanic, in the Germanic than in the Romanic languages. This decadence, which constitutes a new phase of evolution, is not brought about by chance. Regarding it phonetically, we see in it the results of the least effort. Diphthongs are condensed, as when in Latin veicos and deivos become vicus and deus. Assimilation takes place among the consonants, as when noctem, night, becomes notte, or sep- tem, seven, sette, or when the earlier s-sound is softened into a simple aspirate. A considerable number of phonetic variations, which baffle persons not familiar with linguistic studies, are justified by comparison with other words. Grammatical decadence also corresponds with a simplification. The

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THE EVOLUTION OF LANGUAGE. 105 ancient Indo-European language, of which the comparison of the San- skrit, Greek, Latin, Slavic, and Germanic languages has enabled us to restore the important forms, possessed a rich system of declensions. Latin lost a part of its cases, and had of others only vestiges. Old French went a step further, and only kept two cases, the subject and the object cases ; and even this greatly simplified declension disappeared in the fourteenth century, and the French language became wholly analytical, yet not without preserving traces of the two cases of the middle ages in the double forms of some of its words. The simplification of declension appears in all modern languages. In Persian there is, properly, no declension. The dative and accusa- tive are expressed by adding prepositions to the noun, the genitive by syntactical arrangement. Modern Greek has lost the forms of the dual number and of the dative case. Among the Semitic languages, current or spoken Arabic has dropped the terminations by which the cases are distinguished in literary Arabic. In vulgar Arabic the cases are distinguished by the position of the words or the use of preposi- tions. The same analytical phenomena may be observed in the con- jugations. In the original Indo-European system, the perfect was formed by the reduplication of the root. Latin formed its perfects by compositions of words in which the auxiliaries were partly disguised as terminations, and in modern languages the analytical process has been further carried out. The same process is going on in the future tenses, which in English have reached the ultimate stage of it. Deca- dence sometimes proceeds by the primary value of a form or a word being forgotten. French affords some curious examples of this. Take the words /wette, uvula, and lierre, ivy, which are from the Latin uveta, hedera. In old French they were written wette, hierre. When the article was prefixed they appeared as [uette, ?hierre. Then the mean- ing of the article was forgotten or misconceived, and it was written as apart of the words. It then had to be supplied again, and so the French say now Ja luette, la lierre. This deformation took place natu- rally and without intention. I come now to speak of the struggle for existence which is con- stantly going on between languages geographically near to one an- other and between different dialects of the same language. Unless one of the idioms is specially favored in the struggle by political cir- cumstances, it is evident that the one which is most advanced in evo- lution will gain upon those which are less advanced : this fact can be established by many examples. Thus, in the territory which is now France, Latin, introduced into Gaul by a relatively small number of persons, shortly surpassed the Celtic dialects. The French language is wholly Latin, having retained from the Celtic only a few recollections in its vocabulary ; but, when the Germans established themselves in a large part of Gaul, instead of giving their language to the conquered population, they abandoned it in the end and adopted the neo-Latin,

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106 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. which afterward became French ; and the French language is no more Germanic than it is Celtic. Natural selection has caused the disap- pearance of a considerable number of idioms. Languages which come into conflict are like groups of animals that have to struggle with one another for existence. They must gain upon their competitors, or re. sign themselves to disappear before them. Just as, in the contest for life and development, the best-armed races finally prevail over those .which are less favored, so languages which are best served by their own aptitudes and by external circumstances prevail over those whose evolutive force is less considerable, and over those which historical] conditions have less well prepared for the combat. In France, the French, the ancient langue d’oil gradually supplanted the langue d’oe, the Corsican, the Breton, the Flemish, and the Basque. In the British Islands, English eclipsed the Celtic languages, Irish, Scotch, Manx, and Gaelic, and will shortly have supplanted the Cornish. German has overcome a number of Slavic idioms. Another kind of selection is going on within the language itself with reference to the use of particular forms and words. In reference to this, the study of dialects is of great interest. Dialects should not be regarded as degenerate conditions of literary languages. These languages are simply fortunate dialects, whose rival dialects have been less favored. We are constantly meeting in dialects forms and words which their sister literary languages have not preserved ; and this fact gives dialects an important place in the study of the natural history of language. The fact that some idioms have been lost has been disadvantageous to linguistic studies because intermediate forms have thereby disap- peared, the existence of which would have explained many living forms. In this, again, we have presented in language something com- parable to what has taken place among animals and plants. More- over, a linguistic species, once extinct, can never be brought back to life. It has been only a little while since the Tasmanians disappeared, and their language with them. Those people who were the product of a long ethnic evolution can never be brought back; no more cana language like theirs, which was also the product of a long develop- ment, be revived. So in the world of animals and plants, the disap- pearance of a species is always definitive ; to bring it back to a new life would require the impossible return of the conditions of every kind which had brought it up to the stage which it had reached at the moment of its extinction. I should be satisfied if I could believe that this review, perhaps too rapid, has made evident the interesting fact of the life and evolution of languages. To say life of language does not seem sufficient, for that word only gives the idea of a simple state of activity. The word evolution is more rigorously exact. We find ourselves, in fact, in the presence of successive developments of an entirely natural order. The

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SCIENCE OF FLAT-FISH, OR SOLES AND TURBOT., 107 organic perfectionment of the brain gives to the highest of the primates the faculty of articulate speech ; that faculty, brought into play, gives rise to an extremely rudimentary system of expression, the source of which, as Lucretius has observed with much force and justice, lies in an imperious need. This need is, in fact, the creator of words. Gradu- ally the monosyllabic words become differentiated into principal words and words of secondary signification. A new phase begins with the closer association of words, and the different processes of derivation develop themselves more and more. The third phase is characterized at first by a remarkable synthetic process, which soon, however, under- goes simplification, and yields under the influence of_a more rapid civilization to a more and more accentuated analytical precision. The ultimate form has evidently not yet been reached by the English and French languages ; but since language was born with man, and is his single characteristic, though laboriously and slowly developed as all his powers have expanded, it is destined to be transformed into more and more perfect forms of expression as man himself continues to ascend in the scale of superiority. — Translated for the Popular Science Monthly from the Revue Scientifique. THE SCIENCE OF FLAT-FISH, OR SOLES AND TURBOT. «“ “\NCE upon a time,” says that delicious creation of Lewis Car- roll’s, the Mock Turtle, “I was a real turtle!” Once upon a time, the modern sole might with greater truth plaintively observe, I was a very respectable sort of a young codfish. In those happy days, my head was not unsymmetrically twisted and distracted all on one side; my mouth did not open laterally instead of vertically ; my two eyes were not incongruously congregated on the right half of my dis- torted visage ; and my whole body was not arrayed, like a Portland convict’s, in a party-colored suit, dark-brown on the right and fleshy- white on the left department of my unfortunate person. When I was young and innocent, I looked externally very much like any other swimming thing, except, to be sure, that I was perfectly transparent, like a speck of jelly-fish. I had one eye on each side of my head ; my face and mouth were a model of symmetry ; and I swam upright like the rest of my kind, instead of all on one side after the bad habit of my own immediate family. Such, in fact, is the true portrait of the baby sole, for the first few days after it has been duly hatched out of the eggs deposited on the shallow spawning-places by the mother- fishes. After some weeks, however, a change comes o’er the spirit of the young flat-fish’s dream of freedom. In his very early life he is a wan- —-

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108 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. derer and a vagabond on the face of the waters, leading what the gej- entific men prettily describe as a pelagic existence, and much more frequently met with in the open sea than among the shallows and sand-banks which are to form the refuge of his maturer years. But soon his Wanderjahre are fairly over: the transparency of early youth fades out with him exactly as it fades out in the human subject: he begins to seek the recesses of the sea, settles down quietly in a com- fortable hollow, and gives up his youthful Bohemian aspirations in favor of safety and respectability on a sandy bottom. This, of course, is all as it should be ; in thus sacrificing freedom to the necessities of existence he only follows the universal rule of animated nature. But, like all the rest of us when we settle down into our final groove, he shortly begins to develop a tendency toward distinct one-sidednegs, Lying flat on the sand upon his left cheek and side, he quickly under- goes a strange metamorphosis from the perfect and symmetrical to the lopsided condition. His left eye, having now nothing in particular to look at on the sands below, takes naturally to squinting as hard as it can round the corner, to observe the world above it ; and so effectually does it manage to squint that it at last pulls all the socket and sur- rounding parts clean round the head to the right or upper surface. In short, the young sole lies on his left side till that half of his face (except the mouth) is compelled to twist itself round to the opposite cheek; thus giving him through life the appearance constantly depre- cated by nurses who meet all unilateral grimaces on the part of their charges with the awful suggestion, “Suppose you were to be struck so!” The young sole is actually struck so, and remains in that dis- tressing condition ever afterward. This singular early history of the individual sole evidently recapit- ulates for us in brief the evolutionary history of the entire group to which he belongs. It is pretty clear (to believers, at least) that the prime ancestor of all the flat-fish was a sort of cod, and that his de- scendants only acquired their existing flatness by long persistence in the pernicious habit of lying always entirely on one side. Why the primeval flat-fish first took to this queer custom is equally easy to un- derstand. Solesf turbots, plaice, brill, and other members of the flat- fish family are all,as we well know, very excellent edible fishes. Their edibility is as highly appreciated by the sharks and dog-fish as by the enlightened public of a Christian land. Moreover, they are ill-provided with any external protection, having neither fierce jaws, like the pike and shark ; efficient weapons of attack, like the sword-fish and the elec- tric eel ; or stout defensive armor, like the globe-fish, the file-fish, and the bony pike, whose outer covering is as effectually repellent as that of a tortoise, an armadillo, or a hedgehog. The connection between these apparently dissimilar facts is by no means an artificial one. Fish which possess one form of protection seldom require the additional aid of another: for example, all the electric fish have scaleless bodies,

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SCIENCE OF FLAT-FISH, OR SOLES AND TURBOT. 109 for the very simple reason that no unwary larger species is at all likely to make an attempt to bite them across the middle ; if it did, it would soon retire with a profound respect through all its future life for the latent resources of electrical science. But the defenseless an. cestor of the poor flat-fishes was quite devoid of any such offensive or defensive armor, and, if he was to survive at all, he must look about (metaphorically speaking) for some other means of sharing in the sur- vival of the fittest. He found it in the now-ingrained habit of skulk- ing unperceived on the sandy bottom. By that plan he escaped the notice of his ever-present and watchful enemies. He followed (uncon- sciously) the good advice of the Roman poet: bene latuit. But, when the father of all soles (turbot, brill, and dabs included) first took to the family trick of lying motionless on the sea-bottom, two courses lay open before him. (That there were not three was proba- bly due to the enforced absence of Mr. Gladstone.) He might either have lain flat on his under-surface, like the rays and skates, in which case he would, of course, have flattened out symmetrically sidewise, with both his eyes in their normal position, or he might have lain on the right or left side exclusively, in which case one side would soon prac- tically come to be regarded as the top and the other side as the bot- tom surface. For some now almost incomprehensible reason, the father of all soles chose the latter and more apparently uncomfortable of these two possible alternatives. Imagine yourself to lie (as a baby) on your left cheek till your left eye gradually twists round to a new position close beside its right neighbor, while your mouth still con- tinues to open in the middle of your face as before, and you will have some faint comparative picture of the personal evolution of an infant sole. Only you must, of course, remember that this curious result of hereditary squinting, transmitted in unbroken order through so many generations, is greatly facilitated by the cartilaginous nature of the skull in young flat-fish. When once the young sole has taken permanently to lying on his left side, he is no longer able to swim vertically ; he can only wriggle along sidewise on the bottom, with a peculiarly slow, sinuous, and un- dulating motion. In fact, it would be a positive disadvantage to him to show himself in the upper waters, and for this very purpose Nature, with her usual foresight, has deprived him altogether of a swim-blad- der, by whose aid most other fishes constantly regulate their specific gravity, so as to rise or sink at will in the surrounding medium. Some people may indeed express surprise at learning that fish know anything at all about specific gravity ; but as they probably manage the altera- tion quite unconsciously, just as we ourselves move our limbs without ever for a moment reflecting that we are pulling on the flexor or ex- tensor muscles, this objection may fairly be left unanswered. The way in which Nature has worked in depriving the sole of a swim-bladder is no doubt the simple and popular one of natural selec-

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110 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. tion ; in other words, she has managed it by the soles with swim-blad- ders being always promptly devoured. Originally, we may well sup- pose, the ancestral sole, before he began to be a sole at all (if I may be permitted that frank Hibernicism), possessed this useful aérostatic organ just like all other kinds of fishes. But when once he took to lurking on the bottom and trying to pass himself off as merely a bit of the surrounding sand-bank, the article in question would obviously be disadvantageous to him under his altered circumstances. A bit of the sand-bank which elevates itself vertically in the water on a couple of side-fins is sure to attract the unfavorable attention of the neigh- boring dog-fish, who love soles like human epicures. Accordingly, every aspiring sole that ever sought to rise in the world with undue levity was sure to be snapped up by a passing foe, who thus effectually prevented it from passing on its own peculiar aspirations and swim- bladder to future generations. On the other hand, the unaspiring soles that hugged the bottom and were content to flounder along con- tentedly sidewise, instead of assuming the perpendicular, for the sake of appearances, at the peril of their lives, lived and flourished to a good old age, and left many successive relays of spawn to continue their kind in later ages. The swim-bladder would thus gradually atrophy from disuse, just as always happens in the long run with practically functionless and obsolete organs. The modern sole bears about per- petually in his own person the mark of his unenergetic and sluggish ancestry. At the same time that the young sole, setting up in life on his own account, begins to lie on his left side only, and acquires his adult ob- liquity of vision, another singular and closely correlated change begins to affect his personal appearance. He started in life, you will remem- ber, as a transparent body ; and this transparency is commonly found in a great many of the earliest and lowest vertebrate organisms. Pro- fessor Ray Lankester, indeed, who is certainly far enough from being a fanciful or imaginative person, has shown some grounds for believ- ing that our earliest recognizable ancestor, the primitive vertebrate, now best represented by that queer little mud-fish, the lancelet, as well as by the too famous and much-abused ascidian larva, was himself perfectly translucent. One result of this ancient transparency we still carry about with us in our own organization. The eye of man and of other higher animals, instead of being a modification of the skin (as is the case with the organ of vision in invertebrates generally), consists essentially of a sort of bag or projection from the brain, turned inside out like the finger of a glove, and made by a very irregular arrange- ment to reach at last the outside of the face. In the act of being formed, the human eye in fact buds out from the body of the brain, and gradually elongates itself upon a sort of stalk or handle, afterward known as the optic nerve. Professor Lankester suggests, as a proba- ‘ ble explanation of this quaint and apparently rather roundabout ar-

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SCIENCE OF FLAT-FISH, OR SOLES AND TURBOT. 111 rangement, that our primitive ancestor was as clear as glass, and had his eye inside his brain, as is still the case with the ascidian larva, As soon as his descendants began to grow opaque, the eye was forced to push itself outward, so as to reach the surface of the body ; and thus at last, we may imagine, it came to occupy its present prominent posi- tion on the full front of all vertebrate animals. To return to our sole, however, whom I have left too long waiting in the sand to undergo his next transformation: as soon as he has selected a side on which to lie, he begins to grow dark, and a pigment- ary matter forms itself on the upper surface exposed to the light. This is a very common effect of exposure, sufficiently familiar to ladies and others, and therefore hardly calling for deliberate explanation. But the particular form which the coloring takes in the true sole and in various other kinds of flat-fish is very characteristic, and its origin is one of the most interesting illustrations of natural selection to be found within the whole range of animated nature. In every case it exactly resembles the coloration of the ground on which the particular species habitually reposes. For example, the edible sole lies always on sandy banks, and the spots upon its surface are so precisely similar to the sand around it that in an aquarium, even when you actually know from the label that there is a sole to be found in a particular tank, you can hardly ever manage to spot him as long as he lies per- fectly quiet on the uniform bottom. Turbot, on the other hand, which prefers a more irregular pebbly bed, is darker brown in color, and has the body covered on its upper side with little bony tubercles, which closely simulate the uneven surface of the banks on which it basks, The plaice, again, a lover of open, stony spots, where small shingle of various sorts is collected together in variegated masses, has its top side beautifully dappled with orange-red spots, which assimilate it in hue to the party-colored ledges whereon it rests. In this last case the brighter dabs of color undoubtedly represent the bits of carnelian and other brilliant pebbles, whose tints of course are far more distinct when seen in water by refracted light than when looked at dry in the white and common daylight. We all know how much prettier peb- bles always seem when picked up wet on the sea-shore than under any other circumstances, Some few flat-fish even possess the chameleon power of altering their color, in accordance with the nature of the bottom on which they are lying. The change is managed by pressing outward or inward certain layers of pigment-cells, whose combination produces the de- sired hues. The origin of this protective coloration must once more be set down to that deus ex machind of modern biology, natural selection. In the beginning, those flat-fish which happened to be more or less spotted and speckled would be most likely to escape the notice of their ever- watchful and rapacious foes; while those which were uniformly

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112 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. colored brown or gray, and still more those which were actually black or light pink, would be at once spotted, snapped up, and devoured, Hence in every generation the ever-surviving sole or turbot was the one whose spots happened most closely to harmonize with the general coloration of the surrounding bottom. As these survivors would alone intermarry and bring up future families of like-minded habits, it would naturally result that the coloration would become fixed and settled ag a hereditary type in each particular species. Meanwhile, the eyes of the enemies of flat-fish, ever on the lookout for a nice juicy plaice or flounder, would become educated by experience, and would grow sharper and ever sharper in detecting the flimsy pretenses of insuffi- ciently imitative or irregularly colored individuals. Natural selection means in this case selection by the hungry jaws of starving dog-fish, When once the intelligent dog-fish has learned to appreciate the fact that all is not sand that looks sandy, you may be sure he exercises a most vigilant superintendence over every bank he happens to come upon. None but the most absolutely indistinguishable soles are at all likely to escape his interested scrutiny. The mere nature of the bottom upon which they lie has thus helped to become a differentiating agency for the various species and varieties of flat-fish. Soles, which easily enough avoid detection on the sandy flats, would soon be spotted and exterminated among the pebbly ridges beloved of plaice, or the shingly ledge especially affected by the rough-knobbed turbot. Flounders, whose coloring exactly adapts them to the soft ooze and shallow mud-banks at the mouths of rivers, would prove quite out of place on the deep pools of the channel, coy- ered with pale-yellow sand, where the pretty lemon sole is most at home. In the case of the true sole, too, the long, graceful, sinuous fringe of fins is so arranged that it can fit accurately to the surface on which the fish is lying, and so add in a great measure to the appear- ance of continuity with the neighboring sands. A sole, settling down on a ribbed patch of sand, can thus accommodate its shape to the underlying undulations, so that it is almost impossible to distinguish its outline, even when you know exactly where to look for it. Soles are very clever at choosing such deceptive hiding-places, and very seldom openly expose themselves on a flat horizontal surface. More- over, whenever they settle, they take care partially to bury themselves in the sand, with a curious sidelong flapping motion, and so still more effectually screen themselves from intending observers. I may note in passing that such correspondence in color with the general hue of the surrounding medium is especially common wherever a single tone predominates largely in the wider aspect of nature. Arctic animals, as everybody knows, are always white. Ptarmigan and northern hares put on a snowy coat among the snows of winter. The uncommercial stoat needlessly transforms himself on the approach ‘of cold weather into the expensive and much-persecuted ermine.

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SCIENCE OF FLAT-FISH, OR SOLES AND TURBOT. 113 Imagine for a moment the chances of life possessed by a bright scarlet animal among the snow-fields of Greenland, and one can see at once the absolute necessity for this unvarying protective coloration, Even a royal duke would scarcely venture to approve of flaring red uniforms under such conditions. All the conspicuous creatures get immediately weeded out by their carnivorous enemies, owing to their too great obtrusiveness and loudness of dress ; while those alone survive which exactly conform to the fashionable whiteness of external nature. So, too, in the desert every bird, lizard, grasshopper, butterfly, and cricket is uniformly dressed in light sand-color. The intrusive red or blue butterfly from neighboring flowery fields gets promptly eaten up by the local bird, whose plumage he can not distinguish from the sand around it. The intrusive scarlet or green bird from neighboring forests finds the bread taken out of his mouth by the too severe com- petition of his desert brethren, who can steal upon the native grass- hoppers unperceived, while he himself acts upon them like a red dan- ger-signal, and is as sedulously avoided by the invisible insects as if he meant intentionally to advertise in flaming posters his own hostile and destructive purpose. In short, sand-haunting creatures are and always must be neces- sarily sand-colored. A few tropical flat-fish, however, living as they do among the brill- iant corals, pink sea-anemones, gorgeous holothurians, and banded shells of the Southern seas, are beautifully and vividly spotted and colored with the liveliest patterns. In this case the necessity for pro- tection compels the fish to adopt the exactly opposite tactics. All those young beginners which happen to show any tendency to plain brown coloring are sure to be recognized as fish, and get promptly eaten up among their bright surroundings ; only those which look most like the neighboring inedible and stinging nondescripts stand any chance of escaping with their precious lives. A Quaker garb which would easily pass unobserved in the murky English Channel would become at once conspicuous by contrast among the brilliant organisms of Amboyna or Tahiti. This beautifully proves the rela- tivity of all things, as philosophers put it. Ordinary people express the same idea in simpler language by saying that circumstances alter cases. Most of our English flat-fish lie consistently on one side, and that the left ; they keep their right eye always uppermost. But the tur- bot and the brill reverse this arrangement, having the left side on top and colored, while the right side is below and white. Two other fish, known as the fluke and the megrim, but not received in polite society, follow the example of their fashionable friends in this respect. But in no case are these habits perfectly ingrained ; now and then one meets with a left-sided sole or a right-sided turbot, which looks as though a great deal were left to the mere taste and fancy of the individual flat- VOL. XXIx.—8

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114 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. fish. Some have taken to lying most frequently on one side and some on the other ; but it is interesting to note that when a normally right. sided individual has happened to lie with his left side uppermost that side becomes colored and distorted exactly the same as in his more gor. rect brethren. This shows how purely acquired the whole habit must be. It points back clearly to the days when flat-fish were still merely a sort of cod, and suggests that their transformation into the unsym- metrical condition is merely a matter of deliberate choice on their own part. Indeed, there seems good reason to believe that many young flat-fish never undergo this change at all, but swimming about freely in the open sea assume that peculiarly elongated and strange form known as the leptocephalic. I don’t mean to say that all leptocephali are originally the offspring of flat-fishes, but some probably are ; and so a word or two about these monstrous oceanic idiots and imbeciles may not be here out of place. Lolling about lazily in the open ocean a number of small, long, rib- bon-like fish are frequently found, quite transparent and glassy in ap- pearance, with no head at all to speak of, but furnished with a pair of big eyes close beside the tiny snout. They are languid, boneless, worm- like creatures, very gelatinous in substance, and looking much like pel- lucid eels without the skin on. For a long time these leptocephali (as they are called) were supposed to be a peculiar class of fishes, but they are now known to be young fry of various shore-haunting kinds, which have drifted out into the open ocean, and had their development per- manently arrested for want of the natural environment. They are in fact fish idiots, and though they grow in size they never attain real maturity. If, as some authorities believe, many of these queer idiotic forms really represent stray flat-fish, then their symmetrical develop- ment once more points back to the happy days when the ancestral sole still swam upright, with one eye on each side of his head, instead of being distorted into a sort of aggravated squinter. Besides the “ reversed ” specimens of soles and turbots—right-sided when they ought to be left-sided, and vice versa—occasional double or ambidextrous individuals occur, in which the dark color is equally de- veloped on both sides of the body. Whether these impartial flat-fish are in the habit of turning over in their beds—whether they represent the uneasy sleepers of pleuronectid circles or otherwise—I am not ina position to state ; but probably they are produced under circumstances where both sides have been frequently exposed to the action of light, which seems to have a sort of photographic effect upon the pigments of the fish’s body. Everybody knows in fact that the upper side or back of most ordinary fish, exposed as it is to the sunlight, is darker than the lower side or belly ; and this natural result of the solar rays has indirectly a protective effect, because when you look down into the water from above it appears dark, whereas when you look up from below the surface appears bright and shining; so that a fish is less

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SCIENCE OF FLAT-FISH, OR SOLES AND TURBOT. i115 likely to be observed (and eaten) if his back is dark and his under-sur- face white and silvery. Albino soles are far rarer than doubles, and seldom occur except in very young and foolish specimens. Naturally an albino forms an exceptionally sure mark for his enemies to hawk at, and he is there- fore usually devoured at an early stage of his unhappy existence, be- fore he has time to develop properly into a good specimen. For the same reason adult white rabbits are very rare in the wild state, because they form such excellent targets for owls in their early infancy. Rab- bits, when tamed, as we all know, tend to “sport” in color to a sur- prising extent ; but this tendency is repressed in the wild condition by the selective action of the common owl, which promptly picks off every rabbit that does not harmonize well in the dusk of evening with the bracken and furze among whose stalks it feeds. All the flat-fish are carnivorous. They live chiefly off cockles and other mollusks, off lugs, and lob-worms, or off small shrimp-like creat- ures and other crustaceans. In summer-time soles resort to banks and shallow spots near the mouths of rivers to deposit their spawn. They are obliged to do this in shaliow waters, because, like most other fish, they are very unnatural mothers, and leave the sun to do the whole work of hatching for them. To be sure, there are some few right- minded fish which take a proper view of their parental responsibilities, such as the pipe-fishes, which carry about their unhatched eggs in a bag, sometimes borne by the affectionate mother, but oftener still by the good father, a perfect model to his human confréres. Or again, the familiar little stickleback, who builds a regular nest for the recep- tion of the spawn, and positively sits upon it like a hen, at the same time waving his fins vigorously backward and forward so as to keep up a good supply of oxygen. But soles and most other fish consider that their parental duties are quite at an end as soon as they have de- posited their spawn in safety on a convenient sunny shallow. This fact produces a sort of annual migration among the soles and other flat-fish. In spring, when all nature is beginning to wake up from its winter sleep, the soles seek the shoal water, which forms their spawning-ground ; and, therefore, in April, May, June, and July, the British sole is chiefly trolled for off the Dogger Bank and the other great submerged flats of the North Sea. But when November comes on again the soles once more retire for the season into winter quarters in the deep water for the purpose of hibernating during the foodless period. The North Sea soles (in whose habits and manners the Lon- don public is most profoundly interested) generally resort for their long snooze to a deep depression known as the Silver Pits, lying close beside the Dogger Bank. These Silver Pits are so called because when they were first discovered (about the year 1843) they formed a sort of Big Bonanza for the lucky fishermen who originally resorted to them. There the soles lay, huddled together for the sake of warmth,

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116 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. like herrings in a barrel, thousands and thousands of them, one on top of the other, a solid mass of living and sleeping solehood, only waiting for the adventurous fisherman to pull them up and take them to mar. ket. Man, treacherous man, crept upon their peaceful slumber una- wares, and proceeded, like Macbeth, to murder sleep wholesale in the most unjustifiable and relentless manner. He dropped his lines into the Silver Pits—the water there is too deep for dredging—and hauled ' up the hapless drowsy creatures literally by the thousand till he had half exhausted the accumulated progeny of ages. The Silver Pits are still excellent winter fishing-grounds, but never again will they yield such immense fortunes as they did at the moment of their first ex. , ploration. In 1848, when the California gold-fever was at its very height, some other lucky smack-owners hit upon a second deposit of solid soles, lying in layers on a small tract of coarse bottom near Flambor- ough Head, where they retired to hibernate, perhaps, in consequence of the hard treatment they had received in the Silver Pits. This new El Dorado of the fishing industry was appropriately nicknamed Cali- fornia, because it proved for the time being a very mine of gold to its fortunate discoverers. But, like the prototypal California on the Pa- cific coast, its natural wealth was soon exhausted ; and, though it still yields a fair proportion of fish, its golden days are now fairly over. Driven from the banks and pits by their incessant enemy, the trawler, the poor soles have now taken to depositing their spawn on the rough, rocky ground where the fishermen dare not follow them for fear of breaking their nets against the jagged ledges. These rocky spots are known as sanctuaries, and if it were not for them it is highly probable that sole au gratin would soon become an extinct animal on our London dinner-tables. Even to the sanctuaries, however, they are rudely followed, as Professor Huxley has shown, by their hereditary fishy foes, who eat the spawn, and so deprive the world of myriads upon myriads of unborn soles, consigned before their time to dull ob- livion. Formerly, fishermen used to throw away these useless fish when caught ; in future, they have strict orders from the inspectors of fisheries to kill them all wherever found. However, even the remnant left by all enemies put together is quite sufficient to repeople the waters with a pleuronectid population with extraordinary rapidity. The fecundity of fish is indeed some- thing almost incredible. The eggs of soles are extremely small— not so big as a grain of mustard-seed—and the roe of a one-pound fish usually contains as many as one hundred and thirty-four thou- sand of them. Turbot are even more surprisingly prolific: Frank Buckland was acquainted with one whose roe weighed five pounds nine ounces, and contained no less than fourteen million and odd. eggs. It is a sad reflection that not more than one of these, on an average, ever lives to reach maturity. For if only two survived in

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SKETCH OF FRANCIS GALTON. 117 each case the number of turbot in the sea next year would be double what it is this; the year after that there would be four times as many ; the next year eight times again ; and so on in a regular arith- metical progression. In a very few decades the whole sea would be- come one living mass of solid turbot. As a matter of fact, since the number of individuals in any given species remains on the average exactly constant, we may lay it down as a general rule that only two young usually survive to maturity out of all those born or laid by a single pair of parents. All the rest are simply produced in order to provide for the necessary loss in infant mortality. The turbot lays fourteen million eggs, well knowing that thirteen million nine hun- dred and ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine will be eaten up in the state of spawn or devoured by enemies in helpless in- fancy, or drifted out to sea and hopelessly lost, or otherwise somehow unaccounted for. The fewer the casualties to which a race is exposed the smaller the number of eggs or young which it needs to produce in order to cover the necessary losses. In fish generally it takes at least a hundred thousand eggs each year to keep up the average of the species. In frogs and other am- phibians, a few hundred are amply sufficient. Reptiles often lay only a much smaller number. In birds, which hatch their own eggs and feed their young, from ten to two eggs per annum are quite sufficient to replenish the earth. Among mammals, three or four at a birth is a rare number, and many of the larger sorts produce one calf or foal at a time only. In the human race at large, a total of five or six children for each married couple during a whole lifetime makes up sufficiently for infant mortality and all other sources of loss, though among utter savages a far higher rate is usually necessary. In Eng- land, an average of four and a half children to each family suffices to keep the population stationary ; above that number it begins to in- crease, and has to find an outlet in emigration. If every family had four children, and every child grew up to maturity and married, the population would exactly double in every generation. Even making allowances for necessary deaths and celibacy, however, I believe that as sanitation improves and needless infant mortality is done away with, the human race will finally come to a state of equilibrium with an average of three children to each household. But this is getting very far away indeed from the habits of flat-fishes.— Cornhill Maga- zine. SKETCH OF FRANCIS GALTON. SKETCH of Francis Galton may appear with manifest fitness in the same number of the “ Monthly ” in which is published an abstract review of M. de Candolle’s researches into heredity and the other conditions favorable to the production of men of science. Mr.

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118 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. Galton is also a painstaking and intelligent investigator of the opera. tions of heredity ; he has made special studies of the family historieg of English men of science ; and presents in himself a bright example of the hereditary transmission of intellectual gifts. Francis Gatton is a grandson of Dr. Erasmus Darwin, the famous author of “ Zodnomia,” and a cousin of the illustrious author of the “Origin of Species.” He is the third and youngest son of 8. T. Galton, of Duddeston, near Birmingham, and was born in 1822. He received his preparatory education at King Edward’s School near Birmingham ; studied medicine at the Birmingham Hospital and King’s College, London ; and was graduated at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1844, He afterward made two journeys in Africa, the first of which, begun in 1846, was in the northern part of the continent and on the White Nile, through regions which were then rarely visited ; and the second in the western regions of South Africa, on which he started from Wal- fish Bay in 1850. Among the fruits of this journey was the book, “Narrative of an Explorer in Tropical South Africa.” He also re- ceived, on account of it, the gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society, of which he has since been an active member and efficient officer. He published in 1855 a book on the “Art of Travel, or Shifts and Contrivances in Wild Countries,” which has gone through numerous editions, and still holds its place in the markets. His “Meteorographica,” published in 1863, was the first attempt to repre- sent in charts on a large scale the progress of the elements of the weather. From his studies in connection with the preparation of this work was developed the theory of anti-cylones, which was first pro- pounded by him. A committee of the Board of Trade having been ap- pointed, after the death of Admiral Fitzroy in 1865, to examine into the past and future duties and administration of the Meteorological Office, Mr. Galton was placed upon it at the instance of the Royal Society. He is now a member of the Council, to whose hands the parliamentary grant for the maintenance of the Meteorological Office is intrusted. Mr. Galton is best known by his researches, which have been many, varied, and valuable. His journeys, and the books which he based upon them, stamp him a geographical explorer of no low or mediocre rank. His work in the Meteorological Office has been suffi- cient in itself to give him a high and extensive reputation. But all that he has done in these two branches has been surpassed, and we might say obscured, by his later researches in the laws of heredity and the growth of genius, and in anthropological measurements. Apper- taining to Mr. Galton’s studies on heredity are his paper on Pangenesis, read before the Royal Society in March, 1871, in which he drew, from his experiments on the transfusion of blood in rabbits and their after- breeding, conclusions adverse to Mr. Darwin’s theory on that subject, _ and which became the topic of a correspondence between Mr. Darwin, himself, and Dr. Beale in the columns of “ Nature” ; his researches into

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SKETCH OF FRANCIS GALTON. 119 the laws of blood-relationship, communicated in a paper to the Royal Society in June, 1872 ; and the inquiries which are represented in his books on “ Hereditary Genius, its Laws and Consequences ” (1869) ; “English Men of Science ; their Nature and Nurture” (1874) ; and “Inquiries into Human Faculty and its Development” (1883). In the lecture on “ Blood-Relationship ” he sought to analyze and describe the complicated relation that binds an individual, hereditarily, to his parents and to his brothers, and therefore, by an extension of similar links, to his more distant kinsfolk. By these means he hoped to set forth the doctrines of heredity in a more orderly and explicit manner than was otherwise practicable. “From the well-known cir- cumstance,” he said, “that an individual may transmit to his descend- ants ancestral qualities which he does not himself possess, we are assured that they could not have been altogether destroyed in him, but must have maintained their existence in a latent form. Therefore each individual may properly be conceived as consisting of two parts, one of which is latent and only known to us by its effects on his pos- terity, while the other is patent and constitutes the person manifest to our senses. The adjacent, and, in a broad sense, separate lines of growth in which the patent and latent elements are situated, diverge from a common group and converge to a common contribution, be- cause they were both evolved out of elements contained in a structure- less ovum, and they jointly contribute the elements which form the structureless ova of their offspring. . . . The observed facts of rever- sion enable us to prove that the latent elements must be greatly more varied than those that are personal or patent.” An elaboration of this view, and a more detailed examination of the phenomena caused the author “to be impressed with the fallacy of reckoning inheritance in the usual way, from parents to offspring, using those words in their popular sense of visible personalities. The span of the true hereditary link connects, not the parent with the offspring, but the primary ele- ments of the two, such as they existed in the newly impregnated ova whence they were respectively developed.” In conclusion, he recorded as one result of the investigation, a very clear showing that “large variation in individuals from their parents is not incompatible with the strict doctrine of heredity, but is a consequence of it wherever the breed is impure. I am desirous of applying these considerations to the intellectual and moral gifts of the human race, which is more mongrelized than that of any other domesticated animal. It has been thought by some that the fact of children showing marked individual variation in ability from that of their parents is a proof that intellectual and moral gifts are not strictly transmitted by inheritance. My argu- ments lead to exactly the opposite result. I show that their great indi- vidual variation is a necessity under present conditions, and I maintain that results derived from large averages are all that can be required, and all we could expect to obtain, to prove that intellectual and moral

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120 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. gifts are as strictly matters of inheritance as any purely physical quali- ties.” In 1874 Mr. Galton published his “English Men of Science ; their Nature and Nurture.” It was a summary of the results which he had obtained from inquiries addressed to the most eminent scientific men of England, respecting the hereditary and other circumstances which might have been influential in directing them toward the careers in which they shone, and promoting their success in them. His criterion, in selecting men as typical for his purpose, was somewhat like that which M. de Candolle adopted. He took persons who had been elected to the Royal Society, and of them those who had been other. wise distinguished by receiving medals, or by holding official positions in scientific bodies or professorships in some important college or uni- versity. One hundred and eighty men were questioned for facts con- cerning their parentage and descent, the religious opinions, occupa- tions, political party, health, stature, complexion, temperament, size of head, and a great many other particular facts concerning their parents and themselves ; regarding their brothers and sisters, and their salient characteristics ; the numbers and principal achievements of more dis- tant relatives, grandparents, uncles and aunts, cousins, nephews and nieces ; and the mode and duration of the education of the questioned scientific man himself, with an analysis of the causes of success of which he was conscious. From the replies to these inquiries it appeared that the chief quali- ties in the order of their prevalence among scientific men were, en- ergy, both of body and mind; good health; great independence of character ; tenacity of purpose ; practical business habits ; and strong innate tastes for science generally, or for some branch of it. The replies respecting the special experience in education of the men addressed exhibited a striking unanimity, notwithstanding the diversity of branches of science which they severally pursued. They commonly expressed a hatred of grammar and the classics, and an utter distaste for the old-fashioned system of education. “The fol- lowing seems the programme they themselves would have most liked : 1. Mathematics, rigorously taught up to their capacity, and copiously illustrated and applied, so as to throw as much interest into its pur- suit as possible ; 2. Logic ; 3. Some branch of science (observation, theory, and experiment), some boys taking one branch and some an- other, to insure variety of interests under the same roof ; 4. Accurate drawing of objects connected with that branch of science ; 5. Mechan- ical handiwork. All these to be rigorously taught. The following not to be taught rigorously : reading good books (not trashy ones) in literature, history, and art ; a moderate knowledge of the more useful languages, taught in the easiest way, probably by going abroad _in vacations. It is abundantly evident that the leading men of sci- ence have not been made by much or regular teaching. They craved

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ee aie SKETCH OF FRANCIS GALTON. 121 variety. Those who had it, praised it ; and those who had it not, concurred in regretting it. There were none who had the old-fash- joned high-and-dry education who were satisfied with it. Those who came from the greater schools usually did nothing there, and have abused the system heartily.” In 1877, as Vice-President of the Anthropological Department of the British Association, Mr. Galton described a method of accurately measuring mental processes, such as sensation, volition, the formation of elementary judgments, and the estimation of numbers ; suggested means, by the aid of photography, of studying the physiognomy of the criminal and other special classes of men ; and discussed the sub- ject of heredity in crime. In the address in which these thoughts were conveyed he suggested that there were no worthier professors of the branch of anthropology that relates to types of character “ than the writers of the higher works of fiction, who are ever on the watch to discriminate varieties of character, and who have the art of describing them. It would, I think, be a valuable service to anthropology if some person well versed in literature were to compile a volume of extracts from novels and plays that should illustrate the prevalent types of human character and temperament.” Carrying out the ideas of this address to a further extent, he discussed, in a paper read before the Anthropological Institute in 1878, the system of taking composite portraits, by combining the portraits of several individuals distin- guished by possessing some common quality into a single portrait which might be considered as typical of that quality personified. As among the possible practical applications of this system, he suggested that “it might be used to give typical pictures of different races of men ; to construct a really good likeness of a living person by the combination of several likenesses of the ordinary sort ; to produce, from many independent portraits of an historical personage, the most probable likeness of him ; and, lastly, an application of great interest in inquiries into the hereditary transmission of features.” Among the later investigations of Mr. Galton is an interesting one on “ Visualized Numerals,” regarding a faculty which very many persons have been proved to possess, of forming, when any number is mentioned or thought of, vivid conceptions of the figures constituting the number as projected before them or standing plainly out in the air. Since 1875 Mr. Galton has been engaged in active investigations, with the Anthropometric Committee of the British Association, of the heights, weights, etc., of human beings in the British Empire, and in obtaining photographic representations of the typical races. Mr. Galton was General Secretary of the British Association from 1863 to 1868 ; was President of its Geographical Section in 1862 and 1872, of the Anthropological Sub-section in 1877, and of the An- thropological Section in 1885 ; and he has been Vice-President of the Royal Geographical and Anthropological Societies, and a member of the councils of many other bodies.

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122 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, CORRESPONDENCE. DOES THE FLYING-FISH FLY ? Messrs. Editors: ROFESSOR MOBIUS says, in “The Popular Science Monthly ” for Decem- ber, that “ flying-fish are incapable of flying, for the simple reason that the muscles of their pectoral fins are not large enough to bear the weight of their body aloft in the air.” If they are incapable of flying, then they do not fly; so there’s the end on’t. But, if they really do fly, they are capable of flying ; end the argument is as good in this case as in that. In both we must look to the facts. Passing out of the harbor of San Pedro one day, the steamer came into a schoo | of fish. Being the first I had ever seen, I watched them with great interest. Their flight was often several hundred feet—far- ther than a strong man can throw a stone— describing a gentle curve at its highest part only a few feet above the watcr. The ve- locity was nearly uniform, gently accelerated for a few seconds after leaving the water, and correspondingly retarded before enter- ing it again.. Now, every one of these facts is incon- sistent with the single-impulse hypothesis. It is simply impossible that a fish could ac- quire under watcr, or just at leaving it, a velocity that could carry it so far after pass- ing into the air. The resistance of water against a body moving rapidly is so great that a bullet soon spends its force when passing into it. To suppose that a fish could strike the water with its fins with such force as to carry it several hundred | feet in the air, is to suppose an unsup- posable case; and certainly to refute the | charge that “the muscles of their pectoral fins are not large enough” for flight. A stone thrown from the hand describes a rabolic curve. The fish moves nearly rizontally. The initial impulse must be immensely greater that could carry it, with- | out any apparent falling, several hundred feet—so great that no strength of muscle could be equal to it. Again, the resistance | of the air can not be inconsiderable, and the velocity of flight, if acquired from a single impulse, should be retarded from the mo- ment of leaving the water; but, as before stated, the contrary is true. It docs not always move in a straight line; but this could be true on either hypothesis, the fish using the tail-fin as a rudder. The distance of flight, the nearly horizonal line described, - and the nearly uniform velocity, would be simply impossible on the single-impulse hy- pothesis, but are entirely consistent with the supposition that the fish actually flies, The pectoral fins of the flying-fish are very large, and shaped like the wings of a bird. Their motion, while in the air, is that of flying, not of mere fluttering. Possibly the above facts may be of some use in settling the reputation of the flying. fish. Isaac Kintey, Los ANGELES, CALIFORNIA. THE INTERPRETATION OF GENESIS, Messrs. Editors: Pustic attention having been } drawn to Professor Huxley’s article on “ The Interpreters of Genesis and the Interpreters of Nature” (republished in “The Popular Science Monthly” for February), I ask the privilege of saying a few words, in reply to that portion of his paper which particularly interests believers in the Bible. No doubt but he is right as to the order of life set forth by Mr. Gladstone. I think, too, he is justi- fied, at least to some extent, in his protest against the readiness of “reconcilers” to change their explanations, and to force new meanings on the Hebrew to meet the exi- gencies of scicnce, After his protest, Professor Huxley turns from Mr. Gladstone to what he supposes to be the story in Genesis. Of course, we turn to our Bibles to see for ourselves, I think every opponent of revelation will agree that it is fair to try the story, not by what others have said, but by its own words. And I would propose as a suffi- ciently severe working hypothesis the fol- lowing rule of interpretation: Zhe story means what it says. We shall not add tot nor take from it, and its words shall be taken each in tts ordinary sense as determined lexicon and grammar. As a corollary, add, the account is not responsible for what its friends or foes have said it says—unless it be found there; and that omission is not denial. This rule seems rigid enough to re- move the reproach of Professor Iluxley in his New York lecture—“ One can but admire the flexibility of the Iebrew language.” The third proposition of Professor Huxley’s paper, “the central idea of this story, the maintenance of which is vital, and its refu- tation fatal,” that on which they —the theologians—“ are surely prepared to make a last stand,” is this: “ The animal species which compose the water-population, the air-population, and the land-po originated during three distinct and succes-

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CORRESPONDENCE. sive periods of time, and only during these ods of time.” Although Professor Huxley does not ak of vegetation, yet, undoubtedly, he would include it also in his statement, and therefore I venture to bring that, too, into the discussion, and add, in accordance with his central idea: The species which compose the present vegetable kingdom originated in one distinct period of time preceding the three animal populations, and only in that one period of time. As this “ central idea” certainly has no existence in science, the only question of interest is: Does it exist in Genesis; or is it an interpolation of Professor Huxley’s ; or, rather, is it an unfounded tradition which he has too yeadily adopted? I read in Genesis i that at a certain time the earth “ brought forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit-tree bearing fruit whose seed is in it.’* Professor Huxley’s central idea adds, “And there were no plants before these.” The first is true, the last is false. Again, I read that at a certain time the waters swartoed with water-creatures, among which were “whales,” and every kind of moving creature, which the waters brought forth abundantly, and fowls that were to fly in the air. That is all, and itis true. But Professor Huxley’s central idea adds, “ And before whales and fowl there was no form of animal life,” an addition which is false. Further on I read that, subsequent to the ts and animals named, the earth brought forth cattle, beasts, and creeping things. This also is true. Professor Iluxley’s “ cen- tral idea” adds, “And before them there were no land-animals of any kind.” Another falsehood. Where the account is simply silent, Pro- fessor Huxley fills the hiatus, and then says, in substance: How unworthy of scientific notice; how false—three statements in a few lines, important ones too, which every geologist knows are not true! It is clear that the story is a myth. It may be said—True, Moses does de- seribe modern species, but here is where his error lies. Ile intended to describe the beginning of organic life, and, instead, has described only the latest. If so, he built more wisely than he knew. Intending to state what geologists now know would have been false, he has, in fact, stated what they know to be true. It seems to me that his intention was to say that all things were made by God, and, looking around on the universe, he names what he saw—the heav- ens, the light, the firmament, the land and seas, the sun, moon, and stars, the vege- table and animal world then in existence. * Revised Version says, v.12: “And the earth brought forth grass, herb yielding seed afler its kind and tree rearing fruit, wherein is the seed thereof after its kind. 123 These, or rather their coming into being, he names in a certain order. All, save the last two, are not mentioned in Professor Hux- ley’s article, but they are the basis of his indictment ; it is therefore eminently proper to see what are the facts of our world’s his- tory pertaining to the advent of life, and how they accord with the three statements in Genesis, “ The following propositions "—I quote from Professor Huxlcy’s tenth “Lay Ser- mon ”—“ are regarded by the mass of pale- ontologists as expressing some of the best- established results of paleontology” : “ Animals and plants began their exist- ence together, and these succeeded each other in such a manner that totally dis- tinct faune and flore occupied the whole surface of the earth, one after the other, and during distinct epochs of time. “ A geological fauna or flora is the sum of all the species of animals or plants which occupied the surface of the globe during one of the epochs.” I add: a geological horizon * is the sum of all the species of plants and animals of one of those epochs. There were many horizons—as many as epochs. Professor Dana makes upward of fifty (“‘ Manual of Geology,” pp. 142, 143). I note a few which are of peculiar importance, either in them- selves or in relation to this account. In the earliest are found traces of ma- rine plants only, and of the lowest forms of animal life (an Archean horizon). . In another, perhaps a million years later, radiates, mollusks, and articulates are found, while sea-weeds are the highest type of plants. Another million or so of years brings us to the Upper Silurian, where are found a few land-plants, but among them no fruit- trees. Another vast stretch brings a Devonian horizon, with more land-plants, but no such flora as Moses describes. There were fishes, but neither “ whales” nor “ fowl.” Long after this came the Carboniferous period, with water-animals and land-animals, and an abundant flora. Still, there were no fruit-trees, nor were there whales in the seas or cattle on the land. Later, again, in the Tertiary, we find a flora exactly answering to that in Genesis, containing, as it does, , herbs, and fruit-trees with the seed in the fruit—i. e., angiosperms, including in that term palms. As to the animals of this horizon, there were then fishes, birds, and mammals, but not of livin Professor Dana, (“ Manual of Geology,” revised edition, page 518), says, “ All the fishes, birds, reptiles, and mammals of the Tertiary are extinct.” These, therefore, were not the fauna of *“On the same horizon "is said of the fossils and strata of one age.—*“ Imperial Dictionary.”

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124 which Moses wrote as “living creatures.” But still later, in the Quaternary, there were fishes, amphibians or reptiles, mammals and birds, whales and seals. Most of the birds are still represented. Some, however, have died out very recently, say within a century or less. Of the others, save the mammals, all kinds, so far as known, are still in existence. The mammals are nearly all extinct.* At this time, therefore, the marine life and the “fowl” of to-day came into exist- ence. I note here a circumstance that is in remarkable harmony with the well-known fact that many species of invertebrates, and perhaps some others, have come down from the Tertiary. There is the fiat that the waters were to swarm with living creatures, and then, in the next verse, an assertion of creatorship so broad as to include every living creature—as if it said God “‘ created,” through his way of doing such things, all that appeared for the first at that time, as well as all else then living. Coming still further down in the world’s history, we reach the horizon of to-day, with its living species of land-animals, including cattle, beasts, and creeping things. The remark about the previous horizon applies here also. I submit, therefore, as the result of an examination of the Mosaic record, that Pro- fessor Huxley’s “ central idea” has no ex- istence in Genesis if taken without “ flexi- bility ” or additions; and, it appears to me that, according to geology, the story as told in Genesis is true as to its order. A flora containing fruit-trees did come before the living air and water population; and these came before living cattle and beasts. As to all other matters pertaining to * life the account is silent, but silence is not falsehood. In the limited space of a Ictter I have been able to give but scant justice to my theme. Other important questions press upon me. What about man? What is the true “central idea”? What about the rest of the chapter ; will it bear this intensely liter- al treatment? And the “days,” are they days or periods ? I can but hint at answers, and that only to two of the questions. Paleontology tells very little about man. Genesis says only that God made a pair whom he called Adam.+ There may have been older races. Such seem to be referred to when Cain says he is afraid that whoever meets him will kill him; and so where the account speaks * Page 345, Nicholson's “ Ancient Life History” : “ No extinct forms of fishes, amphibians, or —- are known to occur.” Also “ Manual of Geol-

ogy.” third edition, p. 5683: “The mammals are SEE Eeaeeiien to Go punta <8 Go Be. man, vised Version.

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. of the sons of God and the daughters of men. The true “central idea” is God’s ere. atorship. This might have been given ip one sentence, or have been extended into particulars, and these particulars might have been given in any order, or, if the au. thor was wise enough to be able to do it, the particular acts of creatorship might have been named in the order of their oc. currence. As there are, on a close analysi some forty matters of order or fact in this story, it is impossible that by any chance or guess they should fall into the true order, But what if they are there? As to the “days,” I suppose that they were twenty. four hours long, and that creation was mill. ions of years in being accomplished. The paradox is, as it seems to me, easily explained, but to attempt it now, or to give my reasons for believing the order identical with that revealed by science, would extend this letter beyond its due limits. Yours truly, C. B. Warrina. Povcaxerpsigz, N. Y., March 21, 1886,

ANTIDOTES FOR SNAKE-POISON. Messrs. Editors: Ix “The Popular Science Monthly” for May, 1885, I read with great interest an address by Professor William W. Keen, M. D., in the course of which he mentioned Drs. Weir Mitchell and Reichert, of Phila- delphia, as being engaged in experiments on the venom of the cobra and rattlesnake, At that time I decided to send you the ac. count of an incident which might furnish a clew to a proper antidote for this venom; but a protracted illness in my family has hitherto prevented the carrying out of this intention. I am now in a position to do so, and shall therefore proceed at once to the narrative of the incident in ques- tion. In the summer of 1883, while engaged in some field-work in Polonio Pass, San Luis Obispo County, California, a young “setter” dog, belonging to a comrade, was bitten on the nose by a rattlesnake. The dog suffered for a few days, but did not die. However, from a sprightly and intelligent animal, he became transformed into a sickly and stupid one. He became emaciated and miserable, and his vision was greatly im- paired—in fact, all of his faculties seemed to be benumbed. Shortly afterward we went up into the Sacramento River Cafion, and took this dog, together with a host of others (the usual concomitants of an engineer’s camp), with us to our new field of labor. Now, in the late autumn the banks of the upper Sacramento River become annually lined with the decay- ing bodies of large numbers of “dog” sal-

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EDITOR’S TABLE. 125 mon—salmon that have died from exhaus- ; lines, and what I have here stated can be tion while endeavoring to force themselves | verified by at least a dozen witnesses. to the head-waters of the river for spawning To my mind this incident seems to point purposes ; and in the fall of 1883 our canine | to the conclusion that there is developed in camp-followers partook voraciously of this | salmon, and possibly in other decaying fish, free salmon-feast, with the result that all of | an organic principle, in itself poisonous, but them, with one single exception, died—with | which may prove to be a counter-agent for every indication of being poisoned. The | the poison of the rattlesnake and of other single exception was the young dog that | venomous serpents. I am therefore inclined had suffered from the rattlesnake-bite. He | to believe that an examination of this mat- apparently experienced no discomfort from | ter might result in the production of an an- his meal; and, strangest of all, from that | tidote to the terrible venom of the poisonous day he became a well dog! He regained | snakes; and, in the hope that such may be his youthful elasticity of spirit, became ro- | the case, I remain, respectfully yours, bust, and, when I last saw him, was as play- Bernarp BieNENFELD. ful and intelligent a dog as I have ever scen. 1018 Post Street, San FRanctsco, t There is no exaggeration in any of these November 29, 1835. EDITOR’S TABLE. CHARITY AND SENTIMENTALITY. ing—whether, for example, the exist- N apostle once wrote, “Let love | ence of a convenient asylum into which be without dissimulation.” Had | the orphan could be put had anything he lived in our day, he might have|te do with the child’s being placed thought it quite as important to say, | there rather than otherwise provided “Let love be without sentimentality.” | for. 4. What moral effects seem to In looking over the reports of charita- | flow from the absence of parental af-— ble institutions—especially purely vol- | fection and influence. 5. What the untary ones—we are frequently struck | special influences of the home or asylum by the utter absence of any attempt to | seem to be in different classes of cases. deal in what might be called a scientific | 6. What the subsequent course in life manner with the facts that come within | of children released from the home has their scope. Instead of this, we have | been. any amount of sentimentality and gush, It is too much the habit of the pious ascriptions of thanks to Provi- | present day to think that, if things are dence, considerable laudation of the done from a right motive, they must officers engaged in the work of the in- | be done well. One evil effect of this stitution, and long lists of donations, | is to discourage criticism of motives with the names of the donors, of | apparently good; yet the interests of course. Now, we would cheerfully | society as a whole call for nothing exchange all this for a little informa- | more strongly than for a stringent criti- tion likely to be servicable in a scien- | cism of motives as well as of actions. tific point of view. Say it is an “‘or- | Take the case of our orphan asylum phans’ home.” ‘What we should like | again. In some small town, a lot of to know in connection with the opera- | benevolent people, chiefly of the more tions of such an institution may be | emotional sex, will decide that an or- roughly indicated under the following | phan asylum is wanted. There may heads: 1. In regard to each inmate, | be only three or four cases within their whether he or she is really an orphan | knowledge at the time that in any way ornot. 2. If so, how the condition of | call for such an institution; and proba- orphanage and dependence arose. 8. | bly no very great amount of private How it happened that private aid from | effort would be required to dispose of friends or relatives was not forthcom- | these satisfactorily in a private way.

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126 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. Still, the idea of an orphan asylum, managed by a society of ladies, is a very taking one. It will make room for a lady president, two or three lady vice-presidents, a lady secre- tary, a managing committee of la- dies, and, of course, lady visitors. So the asylum is ushered into existence. Though modest in its beginnings, it is still beyond the real wants of the local- ity. The few known orphans are gath- ered in; and then the ladies, hungry for objects of benevolence, look round for more; rather than have empty rooms and a half-employed matron, they “rope in,” on one pretext or an- other, children who are not orphans at all. Then they challenge public atten- tion by annual reports and annual col- lectiens. Of course, every man in the community who wants to be credited with even a fragment of a soul must subscribe to the orphan asylum. It would be as much as one’s social ex- istence was worth to so much as hint a doubt as to whether an institution with a name so redolent of charity was really performing a useful office in the community. So the funds come in freely. The ladies, finding how prompt is the response to their benevo- lent appeals, conceive large and dar- ing schemes. They are going to have a building now that will be a credit to the town, and that will not only rob orphanage of half its terrors, but widely advertise the willingness of the com- munity to shoulder everybody’s private burdens in the matter of children need- ing protection through the Joss of par- ents. So a ridiculously large building goes up, to the infinite pride and satis- faction of the lady managers, and the silent wonderment of the meditative citizen with a gift for arithmetic and averages, but perhaps no experience as to how the orphan business like other businesses can be “ boomed.” Now, the hard, bottom fact is, that fuss and vanity enter very largely into - many of these schemes of so-called charity. They reek with sentimentg]. ity ; and therefore it is no wonder that those who work them content them- selves with reports at once jejune and nauseating —jejune in facts, nauseat- ing in phraseology. The best possible way to check these flabby imitations of real charity would be to summon them somewhat peremptorily to give such facts as might furnish material for a really scientific study of their opera- tions. They could not in decency re- fuse the demand, if made by a certain number of their respectable supporters; and yet we are convinced that, to com- ply with the demand in anything like an honest and thorough fashion, would be to show that their work was, in part at least, hollow and even hurtful. We believe that a vast amount of harm is being done, not only by thoughtless private charity, but by ill-organized, ill-directed, and over-ambitious corpo- rate charity. However, let scientific thinkers, men who have taken to heart all that is implied in the great truth that two and two make four, settlo right down to work on the reports of some of these pretentious concerns; and, where they find information lack- ing that ought to be given, quietly ask for it. The world would be none the worse for the puncturing of a few of the bubbles blown by vanity and floated by sentimentality ; and the way to puncture them is to bring the “sci- entific method” to bear on their very unscientific operations. We are glad to see that the views expressed in these columns a year ago, in regard to the inexpediency of giving Federal aid to education in the South or anywhere else, are gaining ground among the most intelligent representa- tives of public opinion. The “‘ Boston Herald,” one of the most progressive papers in the country, which at one time favored the scheme, now opposes it. There is altogether too strong & disposition in certain quarters to bring the Federal Government into play for =—C

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LITERARY NOTICES. the redress of all kinds of wrongs. The jdeal should rather be to reduce its func- tions to the narrowest limits in order that all the more life may reside in our local institutions, and all the more scope be left to private initiative. It js easier to stereotype a civilization than people imagine, and the way to do itis to look to the Government for every- thing. To show how easy it is to make a fallacious use of figures, we may men- tion that in the alarming statistics fre- quently published in support of the Blair Bill for Federal aid to education in the South—statistics intended to show what an overwhelming mass of igno- rance existed in the Southern States— no account was taken of the fact that a very large proportion of the illiterate blacks belonged to a class—the adult population—whom educational meas- ures could never reach, however lib- eral might be the appropriations made therefor. A recent writer has pointed out that when we come to compare the percentage of children attending school in the South with the percentage | so attending, say, in New England, the difference is by no means very striking. The South is evidently doing well, and will yet do better, if no intrusive and demoralizing aid is afforded to it out of the national treasury. LITERARY NOTICES. Taree Yraxs or Arctic Service. An Ac- count oF THE Lapy Frankuin Bay Ex- PEDITION OF 1881-’84, AND THE ATTAIN- MENT OF THK Fartnest Norta. By Avotpnts W. Greety. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. Two vols. Pp. xxv—428, and 444, with Maps. No story of tragic adventure has ever excited greater interest or invoked stronger sympathy than that of the life and suffer- ings of Lieutenant Greely and his party of twenty-four men at Cape Sabine during the winter of 1883-84. Other parties have suffered intense privations and pains, in the Arctic regions and other inhospitable parts of the globe; but, as a rule, there have been 127 features of some kind to set off and relieve the uniformity of their misery, or else, all having perished, the world has escaped the sorrow of viewing the picture of their suf- fering in photographic detail. But with this party of our countrymen there were nine months of monotonous uniformity of suffer- ing, and slow, steady progress toward death; and enough have survived its perils to de- scribe the pains in all their colors. It is right that we should have this full story of the expedition from its commander. He was responsible for its management, and he was the member of it, if any, who was best able to take a complete view of it as a whole, and in all its aspects. In preparing his account, he has, he says, spared neither health nor strength. For materials he has drawn upon his own diary, the official field reports, and the journals of Lieutenant Lock- wood and Sergeant Brainard, the only com- plete ones, with his own, that were kept. As is fitting, the story of the last terrible days of starvation, freezing, and death, is told almost wholly in the words of the dia- ries as it was recorded from day to day at the time, with hardly a word of comment. The expedition commanded by Lieuten- ant Greely was intended to establish one of the international stations for circumpolar observation that had been decided upon after the suggestion of Lieutenant Wey- precht, of the Austrian Navy, by the Polar Conferences which met in Hamburg and Berne in 1879 and 1880. Two of the four- teen stations established were assigned to the United States—one at Point Barrow, in lati- tude 71° 18’ north, longitude 156° 24’ west, under Lieutenant Ray, and one at Lady Franklin Bay, latitude 81° 44’ north, longi- tude 64° 45’ west, under Lieutenant Greely. The station at the latter point, when estab- lished, was named Fort Conger, after Sen- ator Conger, of Michigan, who had inter- ested himself specially in behalf of the ex- pedition. Hardly had the party landed, when a defect in its organization revealed itself, in the shape of inharmonious ele- ments and the want of strong enough au- thority. The circumstance, says Lieutenant Greely, emphasizes “ the necessity of select- ing for Arctic service only men and officers of thoroughly military qualities, among which subordination is by no means of sec-

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128 ondary importance.” Our wonder is that the thought of a plan of selection from which this was omitted should have been tolerated for an instant. The primary ob- ject of the expedition being to carry out the scientific programme of the Hamburg Polar Conference, the utmost care was given to physical observations. The series began July 1, 1831, at St. John’s, Newfoundland, and terminated June 21, 1884, forty hours before the rescue of the survivors. Sum- marics of them are given in the appen- dixes to the book, and a chapter is allotted to the description of the manner in which they were taken. Natural history observa- tions and collections were also made, but the collections, of course, in the straits to which the expedition was reduced, could not be brought home. As good provisions as were possible under the circumstances were, however, made for the preservation of the scientific results. They were cachéd, at places which were suitably marked and de- scribed, and may possibly be recovered by more fortunate adventurers. <A suggestive glimpse of the character of Arctic life dur- ing the winter darkness is afforded by the fact that some of the observations and the places for taking them were arranged so as to afford the men reasonable occasions, in going to mark them, for going out-of-doors and taking walks of considerable length. Exercise is as indispensable in the winter of the poles as in more favored regions, and one of the difficult problems for explor- ers is to manage matters or “ sugar-coat ” it, so that it shall be taken regularly and in sufficient amount without appearing to be administered as a medicine. Two important geographical schieve- ments stand to the credit of the expedi- tion: They are the journey of Lieutenant Lockwood, Sergeant Brainard, and the Es- kimo Christiansen to the farthest north, and the exploration of Grinnell Land. The itin- erary of the northerly journey, as given from the journals of the explorers, is very interesting, and, with the aid of the accom- panying maps, is very clear. It was on the 13th of May, 1882, when, having made six- teen miles in ten hours, and worn out by travel through deep snow, the party made their farthest camp at the north end of * Lockwood Island, which, by circum-meridian

THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. and subpolar observations reduced by Gausg’s method, was determined to be in 83° 23-8’ north, the highest latitude ever attained by man. The highest latitude reached previous to this was by Markham, on sea, in 1876, 88° 20’ 26". Of this event Sergeant Brain. ard’s field-notes say: “‘We have reached a higher latitude than ever before reached by mortal man, and on a land farther north than by many was supposed to exist. We unfurled the glorious Stars and Stripes to the exhilarating northern breezes with an exultation impossible to describe.” So, says Lieutenant Greely, “ with proper pride, they looked that day from their farthest vantage. ground of the farthest north (Lockwood Island) to the desolate cape which, until sur. passed in coming ages, may well bear the grand name of Washington.” Of this party Sergeant Brainard, “ without whose efficient aid and restless energy, as Lockwood said, the work could not have been accomplished,” is the only survivor. The exploration of Grinnell Land begun by Licutenant Greely in the spring, whose journey of two hundred and fifty miles of travel in twelve days was marked by the discovery of the large Lake Hazen and the interesting Ienrietta Nesmith Glacier, was continued in the summer with the results, as summed up by the author, of the satisfactory, if not complete, determina- tion of the extent of North Grinnell Land; the outlining of the extraordinary and pre- viously unsuspected physical conditions of the interior of that country; and the dis- covery of numerous valleys covered with comparatively luxuriant vegetation, which afford sufficient pasturage for large num- bers of musk-oxen. About five thousand square miles of newly discovered land fell under observation, of which over one half was determined with sufficient accuracy to enable its physical geography to be passed upon. Lieutenant Greely’s discoveries ac- cord closely with the opinions of Sir Joseph Hooker; and “the intimate relation be- tween the physical sciences is forcibly illus- trated by the ability of a highly trained and accomplished specialist to state from a hand- ful of plants the insularity or continental configuration of a land and its physical con- dition.” Another expedition was made, across Grinnell Land, by Lieutenant Lock- wood, who carried out his commander’s in-

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LITERARY NOTICES. structions to their full extent, although he started under the belief that they could not be accomplished. Lieutenant Greely has his views of the constitution of the polar regions, and they are entitled to all the respect which the opinions of a man of intelligence who has had unusual opportunities for observation have a right to command. He docs not doubt “that in the vicinity of the north and south poles are glacial lands entirely covered by icc-caps of enormous thickness, which throw off the huge floebergs of the north and the yet more remarkable flat- topped icebergs of the south. The north polar land is, I believe, of limited extent, and its shores, or the edges of its glaciers, are washed by a sea which, from its size and consequent high temperature, its ceaseless tides and strong currents, can never be en- tirely ice-clad. . . . Far be it from me to advocate a navigable polar sea. On the contrary, I am firmly possessed with the idea that an ice-belt from fifty to a hundred miles wide borders the lands to the south- ward, and that the water-space to the north- ward can only be entcred in extremely favor- able years by the Spitzbergen route.” We had marked many passages illustra- tive of the monotonous life of the Arctic winters and its depressing and irritating effect upon the minds of the men ; descrip- tive of the toilsome journey from Camp Conger to Cape Sabine, and of the attempt to cross Smith Sound ; and incidents of the unprecedented sufferings of the party in their spring of cold starvation at Cape Sabine ; but we have no space for them. The story, moreover, is not one that can be represented by incidents selected here and there, but should be taken in a whole. The head- ings of the closing chapters fittingly suggest its character. They are: “The Beginning of the End”; “‘The Last of Our Rations ”; “The End—by Death and Rescue.” Of the whole, Lieutenant Greely says: “No pen could convey to the world an adequate idea of the abject misery and extreme wretched- ness to which we were reduced at Cape Sa- bine. Insufficiently clothed, for months without drinking water, destitute of warmth, our sleeping-bags frozen to the ground, our walls, roof, and floor covered with frost and ice, subsisting on one fifth of an Arctic ra- VOL, XXIx.—9 129 tion, almost without clothing, light, heat, or food, yet we were never without courage, faigh, and hope. The extraordinary spirit of loyalty, patience, charity, and self-denial —daily and almost universally exhibited by our famished and nearly maddened party— must be read between the lines in the ac- count of our daily life penned under such desperate and untoward circumstances.” Easy Lessons 1x German. By Apo.pue Dreysprine. New York: D. Appleton & Co. Pp. 103. Price, 70 cents. Tue “Easy Lessons” is intended as an introduction to the author’s “ Cumulative Method,” and to be adapted both to schools and to home instruction. It is designed not only for those who shun “ full-grown” text- books, and to whom price is a material con- sideration, but more especially for the boys and girls of the primary classes, to whose intellectual status it is better adapted than are the larger works, The aid of illustra- tions is freely called in to enforce the mean- ing of the nouns and verbs, so that each of the conventional lessons into which the work is divided is in fact a series of object-lessons. We regard the author’s system, which con- sists of frequent repetition and the putting of the word or set of words, which is the par- ticular subject of the lesson, through its va- rieties of combinations and changes, as an excellent one. The exercises are conver- sational, are made interesting and amusing, and are so directly to the point they are de- signed to enforce, that by the time the pupil is through with one of them, it is well im- pressed upon his mind, and not likely to be forgotten. Tue DETERMINATION OF Rock-FoRMING Min- gras. By Dr. Evcen Hussak. Author- ized Translation from the German, by Erastus G,. Suits, Ph.D. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Pp. 233. Price, $3. Ts book is intended to supply a want long felt by students of mineralogy and li- thology. It presents, ina shape adapted for use in the class-room and the laboratory, a digest of numerous articles bearing upon the subject, that have appeared in technical journals and other publications of various countries, The first part of the work treats of the

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130 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. methods of investigation adopted in min- eralogical and petrographical research ; the optical methods and the micro-chemical methods are considered in turn. The second part is devoted to the study of mineral determination. A table for de- termining the system of crystallization of the rock-forming minerals is followed by a most elaborate set of tables which give the com- position and chemical reactions of the min- erals, their structure, association, etc. A great number of illustrations are scat- tered through the book, and a feature that will prove most welcome is the bibliography to Part II, which contains references to many works on mineralogy, and to numer- ous memoirs that have been published in scientific periodicals. History or THE Pactiric Srates or Nortu America. By Husert Howe Bancrorr. Vol. XXVIII. Alaska, 1730-1885. San Francisco: A. L. Bancroft & Co. Pp. 775. Price, $5. Avaska furnishes materials for a more varied and interesting history than any one would imagine before reading this volume. The story is really full of incident and ad- venture, and is graphically presented. The early history of Alaska, as the publishers well remark, is wholly different from the history of any other part of America. It dates from a different quarter of the globe ; the territory was seized and occupied by a people who never mingled in American af- fairs before or since. “ For reckless cour- age, for indifference to suffering and death, for cruelty and iniquity, the Russians were in no wise behind the Spaniards. And the character and customs of the Russians them- selves are no less objects of interest than those of the natives of Alaska, which, for the most part, are unlike those of other American aboriginal peoples. The Russian fur-trade, as it was in the beginning, the century march of the Cossacks across Si- beria, the voyages of discovery to the oppo- site coast of America, and the fur-hunting expeditions which followed, are all full of thrilling interest.” Of the importance of Alaska the author has a much better opin- ion than generally prevails, and observes that “Scandinavia, her Old-World counter- part, is possessed of far less natural wealth, and is far less grand in natural configuration, In Alaska we can count more than eleven hundred islands in a single group. We can trace the second largest water-course in the world. We have large sections of territory where the average yearly temperature js higher than that of Stockholm or Chris. tiania, where it is milder in winter, and where the fall of rain and snow is less than in the southern portion of Scandinavia.” And the area of this part of the terri. tory is greater than that of Scotland and Southern Scandinavia combined. The re. sources, also, of Alaska, “though some of them are not yet available, are abundant, and of such a nature that, if properly econ. omized, they will never be seriously im. paired.” To procure material for this his. tory, Mr. Bancroft dispatched an agent well acquainted with its affairs, on three distinct journeys to Alaska, who visited all places of historical importance and persons of his. torical note, and thus obtained much fresh information ; explored, by his assistants, documentary material in Sitka, San Fran. cisco, and Washington ; was aided by his friend M. Pinart, and men of letters and officers in St. Petersburg, in collecting in- formation from the Russian archives; and obtained all the accessible authorities in print in Russia, other European countries, and the United States. This volume has the distinction from the others of being the first of the series which is complete in itself, with preface, and index from the beginning of the history to the present day. PRACTICAL AND ANALYTICAL Cremtstry. By Henry Trimerte, Ph.G. Philadelphia: P. Blakiston, Son & Co. Pp. 94. Price, $1.50. Tus book is intended for the use of students of medicine, pharmacy, and others who may have but ‘a comparatively limited amount of time to devote to the study of chemistry. Part I, “ Practical Chemistry,” discusses briefly the preparation and proper- ties of gases and the preparation of salts; Part II treats of “ Qualitative Analysis”; Part III of “Quantitative Analysis.” The former contains some reference to the reac- tions of organic compounds, the latter em- braces examples for practice in both gravi- metric and volumetric estimation.

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LITERARY NOTICES. To-Day: A Summary of the — of Evolution as held - Scien- tists at the Present Time, and an Ac- count of the Progress made by the Dis- cussions and Investigations of a Quarter of a Century. By H. W. Cony, Ph. D., Instructor of Biology at Wesleyan Uni- versity. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons. Pp. 342. Price $1.75. Tue greater evolution of ideas precipi- tated with such unparalleled rapidity dur- ing the last generation by the promulgation of the general doctrine of evolution and the wide-spread interest in the subject which has followed have brought us, as was inevitable, to a stage of popular lit- erature upon the question which shows plenty of signs that it is no longer the scientific world that is chiefly addressed. The number of those who think themselves competent to explain evolution to ordinary people is largely increasing, but, while their efforts are undoubtedly commendable, it must be admitted that much of their work is inferior and unsatisfactory. The subject itself is extensive, complex, and unsettled, and it requires a good deal of sound infor- mation, careful habits of thinking, and ex- cellent scientific judgment, so to present it as not to convey to uninstructed minds about as much error as truth. The present volume, although not with- out merit, belongs nevertheless to this un- satisfactory class of books upon evolution. In the first place, the title is mischievously misleading. It would lead us to expect a discussion of the subject in its full breadth and latest developments and applications ; whereas it is confined, we might almost say, strictly to one branch of the subject—organic evolution ; and the book might much better be named a treatise on Darwinism than an exposition of the evolution of to-day. While dealing with the details of biological devel- opment, Dr. Conn writes with tolerable clearness; but when he tries to expound the fundamental conceptions of his volume, as presented in its title, he writes neither clearly nor correctly, and betrays consider- able confusion of mind over the larger re- lations of his subject. In his introduction, Dr. Conn says: “ Evolution is not Darwjn- ism. We have now reached the conclusion as to what is now ordinarily meant by evo- lution” (derivation of species by descent, 131 Ep.), “and such was Darwin’s understand- ing of the term. But it must not be con- founded with Darwinism. Evolution is sim- ply a theory as to the method by which species have been introduced into the world, entirely independent of any idea as to the causes which have brought about their in- troduction. Darwinism is evolution, but it is more than this; it is at the same time an attempt at an explanation of the causes of evolution.’’ Again, he says, “ Darwinism proper, then, is not evolution, but its ex- planation.” Now, these views are probably original with Dr, Conn; at any rate, we have never met them before, and they are certainly far from representing the “evolution of to- day.” Evolution, as now most generally held, is a law of Nature—a law of trans- formation by which phenomena undergo changes, passing from one form to another, by which the past has given rise to the pres- ent, and the present determines the future through the agencies of the natural world. Evolution is a phase of the order of Nature of great comprehensiveness, or it is noth- ing; it has its large divisions, of which or- — ganic evolution is one. Mr. Darwin devoted himself to the study of one of the elements or factors of organic evolution—the origin of species by means of natural selection. To define evolution as excluding the study of causes, and then to define Darwinism as a study of causes, or as explanation of evolution, is simply absurd. As a matter of science, evolution is essentially, and indeed solely, a problem of forces and causes, and Mr. Darwin did what he could to trace them out in the line of his special work; but he never made even an attempt to study the theory of evolution as a general law of Na- ture, to analyze, formulate, or reduce it to scientific expression. Tae Sux. By Aménte Goittemin. Trans- lated from the French, by A. L. Parrson. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. Pp. 297. Price, $1. Tus book forms one of a series termed “The Illustrated Library of Wonders,” of which Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons are now publishing a new and revised edition. Inviting his readers to join him in a lit- tle trip of the imagination—a trifle of some

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132 ninety million miles or thereabout—the au- thor discourses pleasantly on that luminous sphere that forms the destination of this astronomical journey. The sun is considered as the source of light, of heat, and of chemical action; its influence on living beings, on animals and plants, is commented upon. The position of the sun in the planetary world, its rotation, its physical and chemical constitution, are all studied in turn; and, finally, there are given the reasons why life is, must be, im- possible upon its surface. Numerous illus- trations are scattered throughout the text. History or Catrrornta. By Tueopore H. Hirrett. San Francisco: Occidental Publishing Company. Pp. 799. Price, $5. Tue author of this history is a well- known legal writer of California, who has spent many years of industrious labor in its preparation, His purpose has been to give an account, and, at the same time, a pict- uresque history of the State, a popular his- tory, adapted to the use of those who have not time to read a larger work, but who de- sire at the same time a comprehensive re- view of the subject, in which every branch is treated in due proportion to its relative importance as viewed with regard to the whole. No other State, the publishers claim, possesses so romantic a history as California, and in no work on the subject that we have observed has more effort been made with greater success to present it in a way which, while it does not lack in the es- sential point of accuracy, shall make the story interesting and pleasant in the reading. Beginning with the very first account of the country found in the older records, it traces the development, illustrates the progress, and shows how, step by step, the State be- came what it is. The old voyages, with their interesting incidents ; the heroic tale of the early settlements ; the labors of the missionaries, and their establishment of the missions ; the lives and acts of the Span- ish and American governors; the changes wrought in the condition of the country by the revolution against Spain and Spanish ideas; the growth of the civil as opposed to the ecclesiastical, and the popular as op- posed to the monarchical power ; the strug- THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. gles of individuals and factions; and the evolution of the new State, are related in a plain, engaging style. In the present yol. ume the first book is devoted to the stories of the early voyagers; the second book covers the period of the Jesuit mission get. tlements of Lower California, and closes with an account of the Indians of that re. gion ; the third book covers the period of the Franciscan missions and the beginnings of Alta California ; and the other books include the history of the Spanish govern. ors, the Northwest coast fur-trade, later Northwest coast-voyages and discoveries, overland expeditions and explorations, and the Indians of Alta California. The second volume, which will complete the work, is promised soon. A Text-Boox or Inorganic Cuemistry. By Professor V. von Ricuter. Authorized Translation, by Epgar F. Surru, Ph. D, Philadelphia; P. Blakiston, Son & Co, Pp. 423. Illustrated. Price, $2. Tue fact alone that this volume bears the imprint, “Second American from the fourth German edition,” would seem to be- speak for this work a degree of merit not common to many of the numerous produc. tions that have appeared in this field of sci- ence. A careful examination of its pages confirms this impression. Usually text- books on this subject present but a more or less complete enumeration of facts. The different elements are considered in turn: their occurrence, modes of preparation, properties, important compounds, etc., are discussed ; but little effort is made to point out the theories deduced from the observa- tions and experiments. In this work, however, the inductive method is followed throughout. ’ Experi- ments are given and carried out, with the intention of drawing conclusions from them, and of illustrating the close relation be- tween the results obtained and the theories founded upon them. The introduction briefly defines the prov- ince of chemistry, refers to the principle of the indestructibility of matter, the conser- vation of energy, chemical energy, condi- tions of chemical action, chemical symbols and formule. The elements are classified according to the law of periodicity, this meaning simply that the properties of the

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LITERARY NOTICES. 133 elements and their compounds present them- selves as a periodic function of their atomic weights. Attention must also be directed to an- other feature of this book, as important as it is novel in a text-book on inorganic chemistry. When bodies enter into chemi- cal combination, heat is almost invariably evolved; and, on the other hand, when a compound is decomposed into its constit- nents, heat is absorbed and transformed into chemical energy. The study of these phenomena, thermo-chemistry, is here in- troduced in connection with the different groups of the elements, thus familiarizing the student from the start with one of the fundamental principles of chemical science, yet one which has heretofore been almost entirely relegated to works on theoretical chemistry. In short, Von Richter offers a most clear, vivid, and interesting presenta- tion of his subject. Van Nostrann’s Scrence Serres. VeENTILa- Tion OF Buitpincs. By W. F. Butter. Re-edited and enlarged, by James L. GreenteaF, C.E. Pp. 147. Warer-Merers. By Ross E. Browne. Pp. 89. Tar Preservation or Timper py THe Use or Antiseptics. By S. B. Bourton. Pp. 223. Mecnanicat Inrecrators; including the Various Forms of Planimeters, By Pro- fessor Henry S. H. Saaw. Pp. 212. Price, 50 cents each, Ventilation of Buildings.—This essay was originally prepared for delivery before an audience, which will account for the fact that it contains remarks and comments on subjects which can hardly be considered as specially connected with the ventilation of buildings, though in themselves of interest and importance. It was written for English conditions, and the present copy has been re-edited and enlarged by Mr. Greenleaf to adapt it for use in this country. The needs for ventilation are first discussed, and then a method is given for ventilating private houses, showing how this method may be adapted to old and to new buildings. Ap- pended to the book is a reprint from “ Van Nostrand’s Magazine” on “ How much Ven- tilation ?” by the editor of this issue. Water-Meters.—-A brief treatise on some of the principal forms of water-meters in use, embracing descriptions of the promi- nent features of two forms of piston-meter, the Worthington and the Kennedy, and three forms of velocity-meters, the Siemens of English manufacture, the Siemens of Ger- man manufacture, and the Hesse meter. A series of tests conducted with the latter is given. An appendix contains a translation of an article on some forms of water-meters not considered in the text previous. This article is by Charles André and was pub- lished in the “ Génie Civil.” The book is intended mainly for hydraulic engineers. The Preservation of Timber by the Use of Antiseplics.—A paper prepared for the Institution of Civil Engineers and discussed before them ; the discussion is appended. It is a careful review of the history of pre- serving timber, and the chief methods adapted to that end. Mechanical Integrators.—Descriptions of various devices that may be designated as mechanical aids to mathematical computa- tion; chiefly such are considered as will prove of value to engineers. Cnemicat Anatysis ror ScHoors anp Sct- ENCE Ciasses. Qualitative - Inorganic. By A. H. Scorr-Wuirs, B.Sc. New York: Scribner & Welford. Pp. 130. A concise text-book intended in the first place for students fitting for examinations at English colleges. Valuable hints are given as to the preliminary analysis, then follow schemes of examination for bases and for acids, and appended are notes on apparatus, on the preparation of reagents, etc. A quite extensive list of the chemical symbols of substances made use of in the analytical work is given. These symbols are arranged in alphabetical order, and, as the corresponding names are also given, will prove very convenient for the student. First Lessons in Paitosorpny. By M. 8. Hanpiey. New York: Scribner & Wel- ford. Pp. 59. A brieF presentation, in the form of con- versations, of the elementary conceptions of philosophy. This book is intended to serve as an introduction to metaphysics and logic. It is essentially based on the writings of 8. H. Hodgson, principally on “Time and Space,” by this author.

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. 134 CuemicaL Equitisriom THE RESULT OF THE Dissipation oF Enercy. By G. D. Live- inc, M.A., F.R.S. New York: Scrib- ner & Welford. Tuts essay presents the substance of a course of lectures delivered by the author in the University of Cambridge. The doc- trine of the dissipation of energy is, that “there is a universal tendency in nature for energy to take such forms and to be so dis- tributed that it is not available to do me- chanical work.” This theory is here con- sidered in a form especially adapted to the problems of chemistry, and will prove of in- terest to students of chemical philosophy. MorstureE AND DRYNESS; OR, THE ANALYSIS or ArTmosPHERIC HUMIDITIES IN THE Unrrep States. By Cuarces Denison, A. M., M.D. Chicago: Rand, McNally & Co. Pp. 30, with Charts. Price, $1. An essay read before the American Climatological Association, and reprinted from “The New York Medical Journal” for September, 1884. The author takes the position that “an aetually small amount of atmospheric moisture is the most important element in the best climates for phthisis.” The causes affecting dryness, i. e., temper- ature, altitude, the seasons, etc., are con- sidered; tables of Signal-Service stations in the United States, rated in order of dryness, are given ; and, finally, the physical effects of dryness are discussed. PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED. A gg we Boroughs. By William P. Hol- combe. timore: N. Murray. Pp. 51. 50 cents. Bulletin of the Philoso; Society of Washing- ton. Vol. VIII, 1885. Washington: Smithsonian Institution. Pp. 110. 75 cents. Forests and Fruit-Growers. By Abbot Kinney, Los Angeles, California. Pp. 5. Eczema. By George H. Rohé, M.D. Balti- more: Thomas & Evans. Pp. 46. Bulletin of the Scientific Laboratories of Deni- son beng 4 Edited by C. L. Herrick, Gran- ville, Ohio. Pp. 136, with Tables and Plates. American Society of Microscopists. Eighth An- nnal Meeting, August, 1885; ings. D. 8. Kellieot, Secretary. Buffalo,N. Y. Pp. 258, with 8. Reflex Irritation from Byes of Labia Minora. By Charles L. Gwyn, M. D., Galveston, Texas, » F Gyrating Bodies. An Empirical Study. By C. B. Warring. Ph. D., Poughkeepsie, N. Y. Pp. 106, The Ph and potegipstes of Money. By Rodmond Gibbons. New York: G. P. Putnam's Bons. Pp. 34. 25 cents. On the Nutritive Value of some Beef Extracts. By Thomas J. Mays, M.D. Philadelphia. Pp. 12. THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. The Influence of Sewerage and Water-S the Death-Kate in Cities. By Erwin F. mie Arbor, Mich. Pp. 84, with Plates. International Electrical Exhibition, — on Educational Apparatus and A tus for igh Electro-Motive Force. Pp. 56. eteorologi- cal and other Registers. Pp. 13. Philadelphia, Ottawa Field Naturalists’ Club. Transactions No. 6. 1884, 1885. F. R. Latchiord, Ottawa, Van. ada. Pp. 140, with Plates. Montreal Botanic Garden. First Annual D. P. Penhallow, Director. Pp. 31. Repert The Processes of Electrotyping and Stereotyp- ing. Boston: H.C. Whitcomb & Co. Pp. 24, Report of the Agricultural Experiment Station at Amherst, Mass.,{for 1855. O. B. Hadwen, Secre- tary. Pp. 141. The Sphingide of New England. By C, Fernald, Goons, Me. Pp. 87, with Plates. r3.5 Food Consumption. etc. By Carroll D. W; With Chemical Analysis aut Gooutanees Any —~ W. O. Atwater, Middletown, Conn, Pp. “The Economic Fact-Book and Free-Traders’ Guide. Edited by R. R. Bowker. New York Free- Trade Club, 39 Nassau Street. Pp. 151. 25 cents, Passaic, New Jersey, and its Advantages as 9 Place of Residence and as a Manufacturing Center. By William H. Gillen. Pp. 48. List of the Aphidide of Minnesota. By 0. W. Oestlund, University of Minnesota. Pp. 56. Double Congenital Displacement of the Hip. By Buckminster Brown, M.D. Boston : Cupples, Up- ham & Co. Pp. 24, with Plates. Notes giving a Cause for the Present Dull Times, By Frederic Grimm, San rrancisco, Pp. 96. Quetety Report of the Bureau of Statistics, Treasury ent, to December 31, 1885, Washington : Government Printing-Office. Pp. 100, The Topographic Features of Lake Shores. By Grove K. Gilbert. Washington : Gevernment Print- ing-Office. Pp. 121, with Plates. The Monthly Index. Q. P. Index, Bangor, Me. Monthly, folio page. 25 cents a year. Taxation of Mutual Life Insurance, L. Greene. Pp. 10. The Half-Breed—Vita sine Literis. Reade. Montreal: Dawson Brothers. The Social Emancipation of the Gipsies. B James Simson. New York: Thomas R. Knox Pp. 30. 25 cents. Electric Lighting: Its Present Condition. By N. H. Schilling, Ph. D, Boston: Cupples, Upham & Co. Pp. 55. Scouring of Wool in Belgium, Great Britain, and Germany. Consular Reports. Washington : Gov- ernment Printing-Office. Pp. 8, with Plates. Dutch Village Communities on the Hudson Riv- er. By Irving Elting. Baltimore: N. Marray. Pp. 68. 50 cents. Town Government in Rhode Island. By Will- fam E. Foster. The Narragansett Planters. By Edward Channing. Baltimore: N. Murray. Pp. 86 and 23. 50 cents. Fish Remains and Tracks in the Triassic Rocks at Weehawken, New Jersey. By L. P. Gratacap. 4 Destruction of our Native Birds. Committee Report, American Ornithologists’ Union. Pp. 16. Les Cranes dits deformes. *(Skulls called de- Senet) By Juan Ignacio de Armas, Havana. p. 16. On the Inequalities of Wealth. By an Ameri- can. New York: Theo. Berendsohn, Pp. 15. 10 cents. + Medicine? By Albert L. Gihon, M.D. 1884; Re- By Jacob By John Pp. 38, Discussion of a . ~ on the South Pass Jetties. By James B. Eads, Pp. 48.

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POPULAR MISCELLANY. Chicago Manual Training-School. Third Annua, Catalogue. Pp. 16. Notes on the Literature of Explosives. No, IX: By Professor Charles E. Monroe, U.S. N. A. An- napolis, Md. Pp. 138. Studies of Rhythm. By Professor G. Stanley Hall and Joseph Jastrow, Johns Hopkins Univer- sity. Pp. 8. Labor Differences and their Settlement. B Joseph D. Weeks. New York: Society for Politi- cal Education, 81 Park Row. Pp. 79. 25 cents. Torpedoes for National Defense. By William H. Jaques, U. S. Navy. New York: G. P. Put- nam’s Sons. Pp. 49. 25 cents. New Theories concerning the Nervous Ele- ments. By Thomas Powell, M. D., Paoia, Kan. 1 sheet page. Municipal Administration. By Robert Mathews, Rochester, N. Y. Official Register of Physicians and Midwives in Illinois. Springfield, Ill.: State Board of Health. Pp. 814. New Fresh-Water Sponges from Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. Two papers. By A. H. Mce- Kay, Canada. Pp. 4 and pp. 8. How shall the Erie Canal be improved? By the Hon. Horatio Seymour. Jr. New York Board of Trade and Transportation, 55 Liberty Street. Pp. 8. Appalachia, March, 1836. . 188. 50 cents. Register of the Appalachian Mountain Club, for 1836. Pp. 40. Boston: W. B. Clarke and Carruth. The Fonetic Herald for 1885, Port Hope, Can. A, Hamilton. Pp. 40. Monthly. 25 cents a year. The Path. Edited by William Q. Judge. New York: Aryan Theosophical Society, A. H. Geb- hard, Publisher. Monthly. Pp. 32. $2. year. The Skeleton in Geocoecyx. By R. W. Shufeldt. Pp. 12, with Plates. The Distribution of Rainfall in New England, February 10 to 14, 1886. By Winslow Upton. Pp. 6, with Plates. His of the Appointing Power of the Presi- dent. W tow M. Malmon New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 129. Cassell’s National Library. No. 6, “The Rivals” and “School for Scandal.” Pp 189. No. 8, “Plutarch’s Lives of Alexander the Great and Julius Cesar.” Pp. 192. No. 9,“ The Castle of Otranto,” by Horace Walpole. . 191. “The Voyage and Travels of Sir John Mandeville, Kt.” Pp. 192. 10 cents each, The Flow of Water in Open Channels, etc. B P.J. Flynn, 0. E. New York: D. Van Nostran Pp. 113. 5v cents. re Brewers’ and Maltsters’ Directory, 1886, . 83. The Late Mrs. Null. By Frank R. Stockton. ere York: Charles Scribner's Sons. Pp. 437. 1.50. The Story of Chaldea, from the Earliest Times to the Rise of Assyria. By Zénaide A. Ragozin. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons. Pp. 381. $1.50. Bulletin of the U. 8. Fish Commission. Vol. V, — Government Printing-Office. Upland and Meadow. By Charles C. Abbott, M. De New York : Harper & Brothers. Pp 397. New York State Entomologist. Second Annual Beport, 1885. By J. A. Lintner, Albany. Pp. 265. The Epic Songs of Russia. By Isabel Florence bf . New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. Pp. $2.50. : Manual Training. By Charles H. Ham. New York: Harper & Brothers. Pp. 408. American Diplomacy and the Furtherance of . By Eugene Schuyler. New York: Charies Scribner's Sons. Pp. 469. $2.59. The Science of Business. By Roderick H. Smith. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 182. 135 Messianic E tions and Modern Judaism, By Solomon Schindler. Boston: 8. E. Cassino & Co. Pp. 290. $1.50. The Choice of Books and other Li Pieces. By Frederic Harrison. London: Macmillan & Co, Pp. 446. The Order of Creation eepens Bate, , Controversy). New York: The th - Seeker Company. Pp.178. 75 cents, Salammbé of Gustave Flaubert. Englished by M. French Sheldon. New York: Saxon & Co. Pp. 421. $1.50. Hunting Trips of a Ranchman. By Theodore Roosevelt. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 347. 50. United States Geological Survey. J. W. Pow- ell, Director. Fifth Annual Report. Washington : Government Printing-Office. Pp. 469, with Plates and Maps. Zwei Profile durch die Sierra Nevada. (Two Profiles through the Sierra Nevada.) By E. Reyer, Vienna. Pp. 34, with Plate. Aunalen k. k. Naturhistorischen Hofmuseum (Annals of the Royal-Imperial Nataral History Court Museum). By Dr. Franz Ritter von Hauer, Vienna. Pp. 46. Sur les Changements temporaires de Refrangi- bilité des Raies du Spectre de la Chromosphére et des Protubérances Solaires (on Temporary Changes of Refrangibility of the Rays of the 8 of the Solar Chromosphere and Protuberances), By E. L. Trouvelot, Paris. Pp. 14, with Plates. POPULAR MISCELLANY. Glacial Elevations of the New England Coast.—Professor N. S. Shaler, in the course of his studies to investigate the origin of kames or “ Indian ridges,” which are particu- larly abundant and characteristic along the New England sea-coast south of Portland, Maine, has been led to the conclusion that the glacial submergence along this coast was much greater than is commonly assumed. Very distinct cross-bedded sands in exten- sive sheets occur at points as much as one hundred and seventy feet above high tide, in positions where, owing to the contour of the ground, one can not believe that they were formed in any inclosed basin of fresh water. They are found at Randolph Station, on the Old Colony Railway, and about Attleboro, Massachusetts, at heights of from one hundred and ninety to two hundred feet. These deposits were clearly distributed by tidal action, and, as we must suppose that the water lay to the depth of fifty feet or so above the place of the de- posit, there must have been something like two hundred feet of depression along this shore where the glacier left it. Between this level and the present shore -line. the kames are plentifully scattered. In consid- | eration of their delicate structure and sharp

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136 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. outlines and other features, it is difficult to see how they escaped the cutting action of the sea-beach that must have been dragged over all of this surface as it was emerging from the sea. A single month of exposure to such waves as act even in the more shel- tered bays would entirely destroy their more delicate outlines. After a careful examina- tion of the evidence, Mr. Shaler has been driven to suppose that at the close of the glacial period the re-elevation of the land must have been accomplished with a very great suddenness. The Genesis of Inventions.—In a paper read before the Anthropological Society of Washington, on “The Genesis of Inven- tions,” Mr. Franklin A. Seely proposes the term Eunematics to designate the study of invention. He lays down, as fundamental postulates of this science, that, given any artificial implement or product, we must assume that there was a time when it did not exist; that before it existed there must have been a creature capable of producing it; and that such creature before producing it must have been conscious of needing it, or must have had use for it. Further, that every human invention has sprung from some prior invention or from some prior known expedient; that inventions always generate wants, and these wants generate other inventions ; that the invention of tools and implements proceeds by specialization ; and that no art makes progress alone. The last four of these propositions are verifiable from the history of any and of all modern inventions; the three former are deduced, and must be confirmed, if they need con- firming, by the study of prehistoric inven- tions. In illustration of their force, Mr. Seely produces a theoretical study of the invention of the stone hatchet, a tool which represents the earliest human workmanship of which any knowledge has come to us, and presents in its rudest form the evi- dences of being the fruit of long-antecedent growth. When men used wooden poles for pikes, they found that their weapons were better if they were pointed. One man found that he could point pikes by rubbing them back and forth on a certain gritty stone he had. Other men brought their pikes to him to be sharpened. Then they found that they could sharpen them themselves on other stones. The sharp edge of a cliff was found to be particularly good for this purpose, and, when it was rubbed dull, an- other cliff-edge was looked out. Then, by some accident, the dulled cliff-edge was broken off, and a new edge, possibly even sharper than the old natural edge, was pre. sented. The step was not long from this discovery to designedly breaking off cliff. edges. Then some one discovered that the broken piece, fixed so as to be steady, or held in the hands, would also cut. When the stick-sharpener found that he could hold the stick firmly and trim it by passing over it the sharp stone held in the hand, he had a flint knife. Another series of experi- ments led to inserting the sharp stone into a handle, and another series to the differ. entiation of stones of different shapes and sizes for various purposes. Parallel with these processes were those of the develop. ment of cords for tying, from the first acci- dental shred of bark to fabricated strings of twisted bark or cut strips of hide. Parental Peculiarities in Fishes and Frogs.—Fish and frogs are not usually re- garded as very careful parents, but a few species exercise something like a particular care for their young. Sticklebacks build nests for the reception of the eggs, and the males watch them and defend them against intruders. The males of sea-horses (Hippo- campi) and pipe-fishes are provided with pouches in the under side of the body, re- minding us of those of the opossum, in which the eggs are put after having been cast by the female, and are cared for till they are developed. These pouches seem also to be a kind of home for the young. The female of the genus Solenostoma also has a pouch, formed by the union of the ventral fins with the body, in which the eggs are laid and hatched, and this is fur- nished with a series of long, thread-like bodies bearing small projections, for the attachment of the eges, and possibly for the nutrition of the young. The skin and tissues of the under-body of the mother As- predo, when the egg-laying season comes round, assumes a soft, spongy texture, to which the eggs adhere till they are hatched, when the skin becomes smooth again. The

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er POPULAR MISCELLANY. male of the Arins of Ceylon and the Chio. nais of the Sea of Galilee carry the eggs in the back part of the mouth. The eggs of dog-fishes, sharks, skates, and rays are in- closed in capsules which in texture resem- ble a bit of sea-weed. The mother-frog of the Alytes obstetricans lays her eggs in long chains of sixty or more. The male takes this string, twines it around his thighs, and retires till the young are ready to leave the egg; then he goes into the water, and the young swim out. The eggs of the Ameri- can frogs are placed in pouches in the back of the mother, and in the Surinam toad the egg and the tadpole go through their full development thus inclosed, each in its own cell, till, when they emerge, they differ only in size from the parent. More than one hundred and twenty of these tadpole-cells have been counted in the back of a single female of this species. A Chilian frog has the organs, corresponding with the “vocal sacs” of our bull-frogs greatly distended, and the young are hatched in these. The exaggeration of these organs has produced more or less of distortion in other parts of the animal. Happy Tenant-Farmers.—A writer in “Chambers’s Journal” holds up Lord Tolle- mache, of Peckforton Castle, Cheshire, as a landlord who has found a plan of dealing with his tenants that satisfies his farmers, his laborers, and himself, and which is work- ing with encouraging results. This propri- etor set out to establish cottage-farms upon his estate, for the purpose of attaining three results: To satisfy the natural and praise- worthy desire of the laborers to have a cow, and land to maintain it; to train the rising generation of laborers’ children from infan- cy in dairying and agricultural pursuits; and to secure a supply of high-class labor- ers for his large tenant-farmers. All of these results are in process of accomplish- ment. The cottage-farms consist of house- inclosures—the houses being built in pairs and fitted with conveniences—of about half a rood of garden-land each, with a tract attached, including pasture, of about three acres, and are leased at a fixed rent of fifty dollars a year, for twenty-one years. The laborers thus housed are declared markedly superior to those of their class in most social atmosphere of the neighborhood is exhilarating. In every house visited the furniture was good and excellently cared for. Neatness and cleanliness were evi- dently habitual. . . . And it is the proud boast of the neighborhood that the laborers on the Tollemache estates are unexcelled in England.” As a consequence of this system, “while dread and perplexity per- vade the shires, the happy dwellers upon Lord Tollemache’s estate are at peace. Ev- ery large farm is occupied, and the obtain- ing of one is the great object of those liv- ing outside.” Automatie Fire - Extingaishers, — Pro- fessor Silvanus P. Thompson, in a recent address before the Society of Arts, dwelt upon the fact that great fires usually owe their magnitude and their consequent ter- rors to the circumstance that a certain in- terval of time necessarily elapses before any application is made to extinguish them —because no one is at hand and ready to act on the instant. It is to the fatal two minutes or five minutes that pass before help arrives, that the mischief is due. Noth- ing but a self-acting or automatic system, which will operate at the right moment and at the very spot, without the intervention of the human hand, will meet the case, Au- tomatic systems exist, and are of several kinds, and efficient. Automatic sprinklers are self-acting valves connected with a sys- tem of water-pipes placed in the ceiling of a room, which, on the outbreak of a fire, open and distribute water in a shower or spray exactly at the place where the fire breaks out. The apparatus may be arranged so that, whenever it is called into operation by the heat, it shall sound an alarm-bell and summon aid to the spot. These devices are relied upon in.many of the manufactur- ing establishments of New England, with an estimated reduction of the risk of con- flagration to one twentieth of what it for- merly was, Seveéral designs for sprinklers depend for their efficacy on the melting of some kind of easily fusible solder or cement by the heat of the incipient fire, and the consequent loosening of the valve which holds the water back. The obvious requi-

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138 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. sites of a good sprinkler are that the solder should fuse at a low and well-defined tem- perature, without any appreciable prior soft- ening; that the mechanism should not be liable to get out of order or stick; that the parts opened by heat should be capable of ready replacement without skilled labor; that there should be no leakage at the valve; and that the quantity of solder to be melted should be small, and so placed that it is not cooled by contact with too great a mass of metal, or exposed to the drip of the opening valve. Closely allied to the auto- matic sprinkler proper is the system of sprinkling by perforated pipes through an automatic valve. The automatic fire-door, which should not be of iron, because it curls up, but of wood protected by sheathings of tin-plate, is arranged to shut on an inclined track, and is kept open by a rod made with a scarf-joint in two parts twisted in the center, and secured by a fusible solder; or the door may be held by a cord holding a weight, the fall of which releases the door; the fall to be produced by the melting of a solder set in some convenient part of the cord. Another class of devices depends upon the introduction into the electric cir- cuit of a fusible link, the melting of which breaks the circuit; or into the broken cir- cuit of a strained catgut band, the contrac- tion of which by the heat brings the wires into contact. In one of the applications of this system a reservoir of carbonic acid is opened and the acid distributed. Mr. Jolin has invented an arrangement for making the hand-grenade extinguisher automatic. He proposes to hang the grenade at the top of aroom in a sort of a cage, which is pro- vided with a small button held together with fusible alloy. When that is affected by the ascending hot air, the button bursts, and the cage opens and allows the grenade to fall, while an iron weight follows it, and, break- ing it in mid-air, causes the liquid to be sprinkled about. Parasitic Fangi on Plants.—Professor T. J. Burrill, in a paper of the Illinois State Laboratory of Natural History on the para- sitic fungi of the State, remarks with ref- erence to the nature of these pests, that “during the last part of the first half of this century learned discussions arose upon the specific distinction between the parasite and the host, and esteemed botanists held the view that what was taken for the for. mer was but a diseased condition of the lat. ter—the rust of wheat, for example, wag only the degraded cell-tissues of the wheat itself. Such difference of opinion, however, no longer exists among those who have pos- session of the information now acquired, The tissues of higher plants do not change by any process of degradation or transfor. mation into the things called fungi, neither do the latter originate in any other manner than as descendants of pre-existing forms through as rigid specific lines as can be traced among any animals or plants. It ig known, too, that however much the fungus is found within the tissues of the host-plant, it began its growth outside of the latter, and gained introduction only by forcible en- trance. Spores are never taken up by ab- sorption and carried by the aqueous cur. rents from part to part of the plant. The fungus passes through the tissues very much as roots pass through soil, sometimes appar- ently without in any degree successful op- position, sometimes nearly or quite baffled in the struggle by the mechanical and physio. logical resistances of the host-plant.” The Punjab.—The Punjab derives its name—which means “five waters ”—from the five great rivers traversing it—the Jhe- lum, Chenab, Ravi, Béas, and Sutlej—which, united, flow into the Indus about five hun- dred miles above its mouth. In early times the country was called the land of the “seven rivers,” and the Indus itself, on the one side, and the Saraswati, on the other side, were counted in addition to the five streams already named. The Saraswati, according to General R. Maclagan, presents aninteresting problem. All the other rivers of the seven take their rise in the snows of lofty mountains, and, being fed from unfail- ing sources, are always great streams; but the Saraswati rises in the low outer hills, depends on periodical rains only, and, while subject to floods, is dry for a great part of the year. Even in the flood season, the water with which its upper valley is inun- dated runs off so quickly that it all disap- pears before it can reach the Sutlej or the Indus. Yet in the ancient Indian writings - em

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POPULAR MISCELLANY. 139 it is described as a mighty river like the others. The name, which means “having running water,” seems to mark it as a con- stant as well as powerful stream, and is ap- plied as an epithet to the Indus and other great rivers. The volume of the stream may have been partly affected by the changes which the country in general has undergone, but a considerable part of the discrepancy must be attributed to the poetic character of the Vedas and the imperfect knowledge which the Sanskrit people may have pos- sessed of the character of this river. In the later writing, dating from about the sixth century B. c., the Saraswati is said to sink into the earth and to pass underground to join the Ganges and the Jumna at their con- fluence. The people had then gone farther into the country, and had become better ac- quainted with the Saraswati. Influence of Direct Solar Heat on Vege- tation.—Mr. M. Buysman has published a paper on the “Influence of Direct Sunlight on Vegetation.” On account of the con- stant high temperature in the tropical re- gions, plants there are less dependent on direct solar heat than in the temperate and frigid zones, but there are some even there which require this condition for their luxu- riant growth. Among these are the date- palm and the sugar-cane. In the warm temperate zone, the orange grows best in the direct sunlight, and the vine requires the heat of after-summer to ripen its fruits. Everywhere, whether in the warm or tem- perate region, corn is grown with success wherever there is in summer direct sun- light enough to ripen its grains. On high- lands, the influence of insolation is very much increased. But the solar warmth of the after-summer is necessary to ripen the fruits of the most important plants; and it is for lack of this, and not from any de- ficiency in the mean temperature, that the vine can not be cultivated successfully in cloudy England. The limit of corn culti- vation ascends on the continent generally farther to the north than onthe shores. In Norway, it reaches 70°; at Fort Norman, Canada, 65°; at Yakutsk, Siberia, 62°; on the northeast shores of Asia and the north- eastern shores of America, nearly to 50°; on the western shores of America, 57°. No- | where else is the influence of insolation more distinctly observed than in the Arctic regions. Richardson remarks, of the vicin- ity of Slave River, near 60° north latitude, that he had never felt the heat of the trop- ics so oppressive as he experienced it on some occasions in those regions, though the sun’s rays are there always horizontal in- stead of vertical, as is the case in the trop- ical countries. This is because in summer the sun rests above the horizon. In Nova Zembla the vegetation is, in places exposed to the sun’s rays, “like an arctic flower- garden,” for the surface of the soil is not covered with grass as in the temperate re- gions ; and the flowers are of a much greater size than the leaves. In the Tundra of Si- beria, on tae declivities of hills sheltered from the winds and exposed vertically to the sun’s rays, the same herbaceous vegeta- tion, with its large, splendidly colored flow- ers, is observed, but this is not the case in plains where the sunlight in its horizontal direction can not have so much influence on the vegetation of the frozen ground. There- fore these plains are in general really des- erts, covered only with moss. Insolation is also the cause of the rich vegetation in some parts of the mountains in the tem- perate zone. Even in the most northern regions there can be a rich vegetation where the plants in sheltered localities are exposed to the sun. Several instances are mentioned by Mr. Buysman in which plants have been found blooming in these regions while their roots were frozen. A Bee Nuisanee.—M. Delpech, of the Hygienic Council of the Department of the Seine, has published a report on the damage done by bees and the dangers resulting from the existence of apiaries in the city of Paris. The bees, it appears, have be- come a real and formidable nuisance in some parts of Paris, especially in the neigh- borhood of the sugar-refineries and the rail- way-stations, where hundreds of stands are kept. The extent of their depredations upon the Say sugar-refinery is estimated at 25,000 francs, or $5,000, a year. A glass filled with sirup will be emptied by them in less than two hours; and, if a trap is set, more than a hectolitre, or nearly three bushels of them, may be caught in a day.

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140 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. The laborers in the refinery, who have to work half naked, and whose skin is soiled with molasses, suffer greatly from them, so much that operations have to be suspended at times. Children in the schools near the bee-stands are frequently stung, and horses passing in the neighborhood are in constant danger. M. Delpech maintains that bees are in reality much more dangerous than is generally believed. He makes a triple classi- fication of the accidents that may arise from the wounds they inflict: 1. Trifling acci- dents, with heat and swelling, followed by a feeling of oppression and itching; 2. More serious accidents, which are cured, beginning with the same symptoms as the former, followed by great weakness, pre- cordial anxiety, cold in the extremities, nau- sea, insupportable headache, often by net- tle-rash, and sometimes by convulsive and tetanic symptoms; 8. Accidents resulting in death, which often speedily follows stings in the face, head, neck, etc. The fatal ter- mination is preceded by two kinds of symp- toms—those resulting from local lesions, the exceptional gravity of which is due to the seat of the injury, as where a swelling in the throat is produced resulting in as- phyxia ; and those in which the toxic action of the poison introduced into the circula- tion seems to be the immediate cause of death. In this case we have a condition of syncope and asphyxia, with signs of con- vulsion and tetanus. A considerable num- ber of cases of death resulting from bee- stings are cited in the report. Ancient House Sanitation.—Dr. W. H. Corfield reviewed the “History of House Sanitation ” in an address which he recently delivered, as president, before the English Society of Medical Officers of Health. The necessity of removing surplus rain-water for preventing dampness in the soil of resi- dences has been recognized from the most ancient times, and found emphatic expres- sion in Rome twenty-five hundred years ago, when a grand drainage system for the city, a part of which is still in operation, was constructed by Tarquin the Elder; and the main drain of his work, “The Cloaca Maxima,” is styled by Dr. Corfield “the great pattern of all drains.” The device for deodorizing excrement by mixing it with dry earth is at least as old as the time of Moses. According to Livy, the Cloaca Maxima was used also to carry away the filth of the city ; and, according to Mr. Bald- win Latham, the water-closet is a very an. cient device, the use of which “has been traced to all nations that had arrived at a certain degree of refinement.” They were probably of Asiatic origin. They were in. troduced into Rome during the republic; and remains of them have been found in the Palace of the Cesars at Rome, and in the ruins of Pompeii. A New Prospective Source of Heat.—Mr, J. Starkie Gardner has published a paper on the utiiization of the underground heat of the earth. He holds that the crust of the earth is thin, and that its movements are more compatible with a thickness of ten than of fifty miles. The deepest artesian well in the world is being bored at Pesth, Hungary, with the object of securing an unlimited supply of warm water for the city baths, and has already reached a depth of more than three thousand feet. The present tem- perature of the water is 161° Fahr., and the borings will be prosecuted till water of 178° is obtained. “It needs no seer,” says Mr. Gardner, “to pierce the not distant future when we shall be driven to every expedient to discover modes of obtaining heat without the consumption of fuel, and the perhaps far more remote future when we shall bore shafts down to the liquid layer, and conduct our smelting operations at the pit’s mouth.” Bacteria under High Pressure.—M. A. Certes has reported on experiments which he has made on the decomposition of organic matter under high pressure, with the pur- pose of ascertaining whether the process takes place in the depths of the sea in the same manner as in the open air. He found that bacteria thrive and increase under pressures of from three hundred to six hun- dred atmospheres, almost as in a normal temperature, except that the microbes are different and the results of their action have only a feeble instead of a strong odor, and are acid instead of alkaline in their reaction. M. Certes will continue his experiments in the winter at the normal temperature of the sea depths, or 39°. ~s.

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POPULAR MISCELLANY. 141 Canadian Forest Preservation.—In his paper at the American Forestry Congress, on “Forest Preservation in Canada,” Mr. A. T. Drummond sketched a plan for the preservation and renewal of forests which might in some respects be equally applica- ble to the United States and Canada. Leases of public timber areas should be restricted to definite periods of five or at most seven years, with a rule that, after the expiration of the lease, the land should have rest for twenty years to allow the young timber to grow up. The timber limits should be re- stricted in size to about fifty square miles, as is now done in Manitoba. This would enable the Government more systematically to carry out the system of alternate leases and rests. The production of square tim- ber should be discouraged, on account of the great waste of material in forming the square log, and of the additional food for forest-fires which the waste material cre- ates. The cutting on public lands of trees under twelve inches at the stump should be punishable by a heavy fine. This would have the effect of preserving the younger trees till they attained a merchantable size. The starting of forest-fires should: be made criminal, Wherever the forests have been cut over by the lumbermen and wherever fires have swept through areas of public lands not specially suitable or available for settlement, reserving or replanting with proper kinds of timber should be attended to. Lastly, the forests should be put undez the charge of suitable officers, Sea Air and Mountain Air.—In a paper on “the Climatic Treatment of Phthisis,” Dr. Harold Williams, of Boston, considers the question of what conditions make a climate—say of the sea or the mountains, to either of which patients are generally sent— favorable for the treatment of consumption, They can not be conditions of moisture, or of atmospheric pressure, or of variability of temperature, for these are opposite on the sea and on mountains. The only conditions in which the two classes of location agree with any precision are those of purity of air and of the proportion of ozone constitu- ent. Sea air contains small quantities of saline particles, and of iodine and bromine, while mountain air is usually lower in tem- perature and more diathermanous ; but these are not regarded as essential qualities. One fact to be regarded in considering the ques- tion is that, with or without treatment, cer- tain cases of phthisis naturally tend to re- covery. Another fact is that any change of climate—which is often accompanied by a change of scene, of habits, of exercise, of food, of dress, of thought, and of surround- ings—is of importance in cases of disease. When all the meteorological differences be- tween the air of the mountains and the air oi the sea are summed up, the sea-air seems to possess certain possible advantage over that of the mountains, “in that it is warmer and purer, and that it presents slighter va- riations, both of temperature and humidity. But this, it must be remembered, is the air over the sea itself, air that can only be pre- scribed through the medium of ocean voy- ages, a prescription open to the grave ob- jections of idiosyncrasy against the sea; sea-sickness; anxiety at leaving friends, fears of dangers, lack of companionship, variety, and exercise ; and, above all, inferi- ority of food. Added to which is the diffi- culty of selecting a voyage which shall ex- tend over a sufficiently long period of time.” Hence sea air, though perhaps the best of all kinds, is really available for only a few. Island and seaboard stations resemble most nearly the sea, but differ from it with re- spect to variations of temperature and hu- midity, and purity of the air. “ Physiologi- cally speaking, therefore, it may be said that mountain air is no better than island or sea- board air, because it is colder and more lia- ble to sudden and excessive changes of tem- perature, while, on the other hand, it may be contended that island or seaboard air is no better than mountain air, because of its diminished purity.” An important factor always to be consulted is the idiosyncrasy of the particular patient, for or against the sea or the mountains. “We must admit that, in the present state of our knowledge, the meteorological differences of climate have been proved to be of little importance in the treatment of phthisis.” But there are probably beneficial effects of a change of climate which we may regard as due to factors common to all groups of health re- sorts, and which vary only in degree. These factors are: the change itself; the purity

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142 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. of the air; the increased number of hours of open-air exercise permitted; and the im- proved hygienic surroundings of the patient. An ideal health resort for consumption “should be sparsely and newly settled, It should possess a pure water-supply and ade- quate drainage. It should be of a dry and porous soil, and should be favorably situ- ated with respect to neighboring heights and marshes and prevailing winds. It should be equable in temperature and should possess the maximum of pleasant weather. It should not be so hot as to be enervating, nor so cold as to prevent ont- door exercise and proper ventilation of the houses, It should afford plenty of amuse- ment; it should not be crowded with con- sumptives, and it should be sufficiently unfashionable to admit of hygienic dress. Above all, it should afford suitable accom- modations for the invalid.” Intelligence of Swallows, — Professor Grant Allen, speaking of swallows, says that no other race has lived in such close connection with man and yet learned so little from his companionship. Still, they show some signs of intelligence. In mak- ing the mud walls of their nests, for in- stance, they allow each layer to dry thor- oughly before proceeding to top it by another course. In acquiring the habit of building in chimneys, which has been car- ried to swallows by the westward course of civilization, they exhibit some faculty of adaptation. As a rule they place their nest five or six feet below the top of the chim- ney, to keep it out of the way of owls, not directly over the kitchen-fire, but over an adjoining flue. And it requires some art to get down into the shaft. The emergence of the young swallows from this place is a re- markable instance of intelligent action still wavering on the brink of mere hardened in- stinct. As soon as they are strong enough to move, the chicks clamber rather than fly up the perpendicular shaft, by beating their wings “in some ineffectual compromise be- tween a flop and a flutter.” Often they fail and fall crushed to the hearth. Then, hav- ing reached the summit, it is some time be- fore they venture upon flight, and they ac- quire the art only by degrees as it were. ‘Mr. Romanes has collected a few yet more unequivocal cases of intelligence in swal. lows. In one case a bell-wire, on which a swallow’s nest partly rested, twice demol- ished it. Convinced that it wasa dangerous object, they constructed a tunnel for the wire to pass through, and were troubled by it no more. In another case a pair of swallows were molested by sparrows trying to dispos- sess them of their nest. They thereupon modified the entrance to their home, so that, instead of opening by a simple hole, it was carried on outward in the form of a tunnel, Instances are recorded where several swal- lows have combined to drive away sparrows which had robbed a pair of comrades of their nest. A Pony Champion.—*“ Land and Water” has a remarkable story of a pony which saved its master from destruction by a say- age dog. The master, a clergyman residing in a lonely neighborhood, was going, with the pony, a retriever, and a Dachshund, while obeying a call to visit a sick parishioner in the night, past a shepherd’s cottage where a very fierce dog was kept. This dog, hav- ing got loose, made an attack on the party, trying the retriever first and then the Dachs- hund. The pony became frightened, and the master dismounted, when the dog turned upon him. The affair became very serious for the clergyman; the Dachshund had been put out of the combat, the retriever had hid behind the hedge, and he had to keep up the fight alone, with no other weap- on than a riding-whip. Then he “heard a scampering, and the next moment the faith- ful pony rushed up and darted so suddenly between the combatants that the dog turned tail and fled, evidently thinking the pony to be a larger and dangerous edition of him- self. The gailant little fellow pursued the cur until he was fairly chased back to the cottage-door. Then he returned quite do- cile to his master, and the friendly quartet were able to continue their way in peace ond safety once more.” NOTES. A REPRODUCTION in phototype of seven- teen pages of a Syriac manuscript, contain- ing the epistles known as the “ Antilegome- na,” is to be published by the Johns Hopkins University, under the editorial supervision

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NOTES. 143 of Professor Isaac H. Hall. The manuscript consists of the Acts and Catholic Epistles, and the Pauline Epistles, with Hebrews, to- ther with tables to find Easter, etc., tables of ecclesiastical lessons, and a poem giving the history of the genesis of the manu- script. Proresson Germain Ség, of Paris, re- marks, concerning the alimentary impor- tance of water, that it is essential to dissolve the salts taken in with the food and elimi- nate them from the system. He denies that man can live on a purely vegetable diet, and points out that the vegetarians them- selves confess the fallacy of their theory by using eggs, milk, and butter, by which they make up for the want of solid meat. Proressor H. A. Rowrianp, of Johns Hopkins University, has completed a photo- graphic map of the solar spectrum, from wave-length 3,680 to 5,790, and has nearly ready the portion above 3,680, to the ex- tremity of the ultra-violet, wave-length about 3,100. A scale of wave-lengths has been added, and the whole is ciaimed to be more exact and give greater detail than any other map in existence. While the error in wave-length at no part exceeds xyhqq, the wave-lengths of more than 200 lines in the spectrum have been accurately determined to sdvo0 part. A comicaL feature of the almanacs pub- lished for use in Belgium has been brought to light. With the exception of two scien- tific works, whose editions are limited, they are all—495,000 out of a total of 500,000 copies a year—calculated for Paris. They give the times of the rising of the sun and moon, in which the local difference is often fifteen minutes, for Paris, making at cer- tain seasons the day half an hour longer or shorter than it actually is in Belgium! Eclipses are calculated in detail as for Paris, even if they will not be seen at all in Bel- gium ; and, if such an event should occur as an eclipse visible in Belgium which will not be seen in Paris, the almanac will know nothing about it. The “ Grand double Al- manach de Liége” does not recognize any of the discoveries that have been made in the solar system during the last three quarters of a century! In addition to three cases previously re- ported for the current season, the “ Lancet” records, in three weeks, three other deaths occasioned by accidents in playing foot-ball. In one case, the victim was kicked in the stomach by an opposing player ; the second case was also traced to a kick in the stom- ach, followed in time by fits; and, in the third case, the player’s head, in the rush, was doubled under his breast, and the spinal cord was ruptured. Evidently a reform is needed in the conduct of this game. An Association for the Protection of Plants was formed at Geneva in January, 1883. On the Ist of January, 1885, it num- bered 226 members, resident in eight can- tons of Switzerland, with correspondents in France, Belgium, England, and Italy. It has established a garden of acclimatization for Alpine plants, and has distributed the seeds of five hundred species for cultivation in other countries. It has also received, by gifts or exchange, seeds from other coun- tries for its own botanical garden. Its latest “ Bulletin ” contains a paper on a local flora near Geneva, and a paper by Henry Corre- von, director of the garden at Geneva, rec- ommending the cultivation of the edelweiss, M. Foret has made a communication on the behavior of rivers derived from glaciers, like the Rhine and the Rhéne, when they run across Jakes. They have been found to preserve their distinct existence, and to continue their course in deep ravines exca- vated through the lake-bottoms. The ra- vine of the Rhine in the Lake of Constance has been traced for five kilometres in length and to 1°65 metres below the level of the water. Where it is most largely developed, it is six hundred metres wide and seventy metres deep. The ravine of the Rhone is of similar dimensions, and has been traced for six kilometres. The course of these ravines is tortuous. They appear to be of recent origin, or in course of formation, and are a result of the superior density of the cold, sediment-charged glacial water of the rivers. TuE anti-vivisectionists predicted, some , years ago, that the investigators to whose objects they are “ anti” would come at last to experiment on the human subject. Mr. W. Mattieu Williams has become aware of three instances in which this horrible pre- diction has been fulfilled, in each case with the full consent of the subject and without injury to him. Pasteur has mutilated hu- man skin and moistened the blood with the poisonous secretions of mad rabbits. Dr. B. W. Richardson has invented a pain- less cutting-knife, and has tested it upon his own arm. And Mr. Harrison Branthwaite, in the interest of temperance, has adminis- tered brandy, for the purpose of testing its thermic effects, to three classes of persons— habitual drunkards, moderate drinkers, and abstainers. MM. Mittarpet and Gayon, having ma- nured the vine with sulphate of copper, mixed with lime, find that most of the cop- per is deposited in the leaf, while merely a doubtful trace can be found in the juice of the grape. Other experiments, with other salts and other plants, indicate that the chlorophyl of the leaves is the most active agent in picking up the foreign matter.

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144 Tue London “Sanitary World” pub- lishes regularly a “ Black-List,” including tne names of dealers who have been proved to be selling falsified or adulterated goods. It intends to secure for this list. the records of all proceedings under the Foods Act, and against the owners of rookeries, throughout England, so that the people of all the vil- lages can learn at once who is cheating them and selling them unwholesome goods. A yew artificial fire-proof stone or plas- ter has been invented, the principal con- stituent of which is the mineral asbestine, a silicate of magnesium. This is mixed with powdered flint and caustic potash, and with sufficient water-glass (silicate of soda) to make it into an adhesive plaster. It is fur- ther mixed with sand before use. It does not require lathing, but adheres to a smooth surface, and may be applied upon a wall or ceiling of sheet-iron. For fixing soils in embankments, or where there is wash, reliance is usually placed upon the roots of grass or other plants ; and long delays are often incurred, with frequent renewals and repairs of gul- leys, before a network of roots can be ob- tained capable of giving a firm foundation. M. Cambier, of the French railway service, has found in the double poppy a most valuable plant for this purpose. It grows quickly, and helps to support the soil in about two weeks, while, at the end of three or four months, it forms a stronger net- work of roots than any grass known. It is an annual, but sows itself after the first year, Accorpine to the Newcastle (England) “ Journal,” Mr. Walter McDonald, of Ilder- ton, near Wooler, while trying to clear a dam which had been clogged by a freshet, fell into a snow-drift, and might have been buried in it but for the extraordinary sa- gacity of his collie dog. He was struggling to reach the branch of a tree that overhung him, which the dog observing, it sprang at the branch, pulled it down, and held it with- in its master’s reach till he was able to get a hold upon it. Mr. Ciemens WINKLER, of Freiburg, Sax- ony, announces the discovery by himself, in the new mineral argyrodite, of a new non- metallic element, closely related to arsenic and antimony, to which he has given the name of Germanium, OBITUARY NOTES. Proresson Jonn L. Camppext, of the chair of Geology and Chemistry in Wash- ington and Lee University, died at Lexing- _ ton, Virginia, February 2d, in the sixty-fifth year of hisage. He had beena professor at THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. Lexington since 1851. He was the author of contributions on “ Virginian Geology in American Science,” his last paper hayj been a review of the geological reports Professor W. B. Rogers. _—" Tue death of M. Jules Jamin, Perpetual Secretary of the Section of Physical Science in the Paris Academy of Sciences, is an. nounced. He was born in 1813, was elected a member of the Academy in 1858, was an eloquent teacher and debater, and a fre. quent contributor to the “ Revue des Deux Mondes ”; he published many papers in the “ Transactions ” of the Academy, was author of a course in physics for the Polytechnic School, and had patented an electric light, Mr. Caartes Witt1amM Prac, who was distinguished as a field geologist of the southern coasts of England, died in Edin. burgh on the 28th of February, in his eighty-sixth year. He was the son of a country mechanic and inn-keeper, and served in the revenue coast-guards for twenty years, and afterward in the cus. toms, for pay hardly ever much exceeding five hundred dollars a year. He was an industrious collector, and an indefatigable hunter of new species ; he became very early acquainted with the marine fauna of his dis. tricts ; first detected the lower Silurian fos- sils in the supposed Azoic rocks of Corn- wall; furnished the Polytechnic Society in 1848 a valuable paper on land and fresh- water shells and marine animals; discov- ered the fossils in the altered rocks of the Highlands, which enabled Murchison to elu- cidate the structure of that region; and has been said by a living geologist to have done more in the field of old red sandstone fos- sils “than all other geologists put to- gether.” CuartEes James Epwarp Morren, Pro- fessor of Botany in the University of Liége, died February 28th, in his sixty-third year. He was a son of Professor Charles Morren, of the University of Ghent, who was after- ward Professor of Botany in the University of Liége. Being called upon to assist his father in teaching, he prepared, as his espe- cial examination thesis for the doctorate, a dissertation on green and colored leaves, by which he first became known to the botan- ists of Europe. He succeeded his father as full professor in 1858. He was founder of the Botanical Institute of Liége; editor of the “ Belgique Horticole,” and author of nu- merous memoirs and academic dissertations on questions of botany, chemistry, and vege- table physiology. Dr. Hetnricn Fiscuer, mineralogist and Professor at the Freiburg University, is dead. He was best known by his book on “Jadite and Nephrite.”

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