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H H^ tt^rnfitr^ JLrUUUUUl. ~
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Critics are not the legislators, bat tri...
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Ova. readers have all heard of the Caled...
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This is the season when all who can quit...
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The Books on the War are becoming less n...
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BAIN OX THE SENSES AND THE INTELLECT. Th...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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H H^ Tt^Rnfitr^ Jlruuuuul. ~
h ICttoratott .
Critics Are Not The Legislators, Bat Tri...
Critics are not the legislators , bat trie judges aad police of literature . They do not ma ' -re law . 3—thev interpret and try to enforce them . — Edtnburgh Review .
Ova. Readers Have All Heard Of The Caled...
Ova . readers have all heard of the Caledonian Cremona , an instrument upon which no one plays , except in the way of witticism , for by a " transmutation of species" not clearly made out this Fiddle is developed from a parasitic animal , known to naturalists as the Acarus , and only so developed when a favourable nidus presents itself- In the last number of the Annales deS Sciences Naturelles there is a paper of great interest by M . Boubguignon detailing his experiments and observations on the contagion of this cuticular disturbance , which is named to ears polite only under a musical periphrasis . He took some of these Acari from a diseased horse , and tried in vain to innoeulate himself therewith . He then tried the effect of these Acari taken
from a man , and placed upon dogs , cats , rabbits and birds , without success . These experiments were multiplied , till he came to the conclusion that contagion was not possible between animals of different species , each animal having a parasite peculiarly his own . But this conclusion , which seemed so well founded , was suddenly overthrown by the discovery that the Acarus of the sheep might be placed on the skins of healthy sheep without effect . What did this meau ? Was contagion impossible ? Was spontaneous generation possible ? The question became important . M . Bourgdignon
suspected that the reason why healthy sheep were not susceptible was simply because they were healthy , and afforded no fitting nidus for the growth and propagation of the parasite . To test this suspicion he fed the sheep on a poor diet , and after three months of this regimen they were so susceptible that a few Acari were sufficient to give them a mortal disease . This result is important , although it is only another confirmation of the biological law of the necessary relation between an organism and a surrounding medium . The spores of fungi float in millions past healthy trees ; it is only when they arrive at one decaying that they find a home .
In the same number of the Annales there is a third memoir of M . Camiixe Dareste on the " Convolutions of the Brain in Mammalia , " in which extensive investigations in comparative anatomy are brought forward to show that the convolutions do not by any means follow the order of intellectual development ; on the contrary , in each species the convolutions are in each family in relation to the size of the animal , and where the size is variable , the same family will be found to contain convoluted brains and smooth brains , although no one thinks of attributing less intelligence to the small species than to the large species . INI . Dareste observes , moreover , that in the same brain these convolutions are often different in different
hemispheres . Valuable as his memoirs are , they ai-e , as he feels , by no means conclusive ; but they serve to swell the mass of evidence which the physiology of the nervous system has of late years assembled to show how much is still to be done before a definite and certain basis can be secured .
This Is The Season When All Who Can Quit...
This is the season when all who can quit London are departing , or preparing to depart , for the Continent or the sea-side . Let not our migratory readers settling on the coast forget to indulge themselves , and slaughter time , by minute inspection of the " Wonders of the Shore ; " Crustacea or jelly-fishes may not , indeed , bo so amusing , and are not so wonderful as the bipeds toddling on the sands , followed by demurer bipeds armed with new novels and " uglies ; " nevertheless , you can study the toddlers elsewhere , and ogle the demure bipeds in " lialls of dazzling light , ' but you cannot elsewhere examine the acalenh , or watch the voracious polype .
Nor need those condemned to stay at home be without their recreations in natural history . Objects abound . The nearest pond will furnish material for a life-time . Listen , reader , to a recital of one among the many facile pleasures within your roach . We will not touch on the fresh-water polypes , so many amusing accounts have been published of them and their ways ; we leave you to seek in books the wonders of insect-life ; we will for the present only introduce you to a few tadpoles , such as next June and July you may easily make personal acquaintance with . This summer wo devoted to a close study of frog tadpoles and toad tadpoles , trying various
experiments on them ; and growing so attached to thorn , that when , after an incautious exposure of thorn to a noonday sun , we returned homo and found one brood dead , our grief was .... Hut this tadpole tragedy must not be dwelt on longer . Koinember it , and profit by our experience , tadpoles cannot , bear the siinimor sun , ut lrast not when in glass cases . Keep them warm by all moans , but , keop them from the fur-darting Apollo . Lot us suppose next June arrived . You go into the fields , poor curiously in the ponds , nnd among tho groon which mantles on t . ho fnco of the water you ohsorvo little fialios which soom all head and tail , ditch a dozen of these ,
and bring with you in tho jug a little of tho wood which grows on the water . Place them in n , glass juv , such m \ s used for gold fish , and then you can watch thorn for hours with perfect oasu \ Tho weed disposes itself gracefully . A few water insects vary the scene . But the tadpoles aiv sufficient to absorb you . After a while two little lmd-Hko processes nro observed under tho tail ; these- prow and prow until you perceive that your supposed fish have got lege , imd very human-looking legs too , for the calf is evident . If
you know how to dissect , and are dexterous , you may now take one . of these tadpoles , and removing the skin which covers its chest , you will perceive two arms folded up beside the gills ; which said arms you will without dissection , in process of time , observe making their appearance externally , like the legs ; and then you must take care to place stones , or some other restingplace , in your jar , in order that the tadpole may exercise hia incipient lungs by coming out of the water to breathe the fresh air .. The tail now gradually becomes absorbed ; and the frog , which has been daily assuming more and more of the familiar aspect , is ready to hop into space . What can be simpler ? Who cannot get a glass jar and a dozen tadpoles ? With such simple means we promise you a great treat , which you will know how to multiply according to your philosophic interest in natural
processes , or your invention in devisirg experiments . If you cannot afford to keep a small vivarium , you can at least amuse yourself in the way just described .
The Books On The War Are Becoming Less N...
The Books on the War are becoming less numerous , but the war poets multiply . Nay , our contemporary , the Atlien & um , advances the proposition , that only in times of war have poetic voices been heard . We think the coincidences noted are coincidences , and not causally related ; but the question is too wide to be disposed of in a sentence , and instead of arguing it , we will turn to Shakspkaee for a passage , which is quite in accordance with the temper of the times ; it is from Coriolanus ^ in that inimitable scene where the servants of Tcu-us Auitdius discover who it is they have treated with contumely , and discover also that they knew all the while there was something in him— " He had , sir , a kind of face , methought—I cannot tell how to term it . " Well , these fellows talk of war : — '
2 nd Servant . This peace is nothing , but to rust iron , increase tailors , and . breed ballad-makers . 1 st Servant . Let me have war , say I : it exceeds peace as far as day does night ; it ' s spritely , waking , audible , and full of -rent . Peace is a very apoplexy , lethargy ; mulled , deaf , sleepy , insensible ; a getter of more bastard children than war ' destroyer of men . . . . Ay , and it makes men hate one another . 3 rd Servant . Reason : because they then less need one another .
Bain Ox The Senses And The Intellect. Th...
BAIN OX THE SENSES AND THE INTELLECT . The Senses and the Intellect . By Alexander Bain , A . M . J . W . Parker and Son This is a very considerable contribution to Psychology . It is a treatise in many respects novel , and always elaborate , on the Senses and the Intellect ; clear in its exposition , rich in facts , suggestive in views , and free from , any hinderances or pedantries of terminology . The Mind Mr . Bain considers as possessing three attributes or capacities : — First . It has Feeling , in which term I include what is commonly called Sensation and Emotion . Secondly . It can Act according to Feeling . Thirdly . It can Think . The three terms , Feeling , Emotion , and Consciousness , express one and the same fact or attribute of Mind ; but the second attribute , or Action ,
will at first surprise the reader until he learns that Mr . Bain means by it those mental actions which take place under the prompting and guidance of Feeling . The whole of these feeling-prompted actions are ranged under the term Volition . In the present volume only the Senses and the Intellect are considered ; a future volume is to complete the treatise by an exposition of the Emotions and the Will . The First Book , which is on the Senses , is the best and most exhaustive treatise on that subject our language possesses . Placing himself at the true physiological point of view , he describes the nervous system in general as a fit introduction to the special instances of nervous action in the senses . " The current character of the nerve force , " he says ,
" leads to a considerable departure from the common mode of viewing the 1 position of the brain as the organ of mind . We have seen that the cerebrum is n mixed mass of grey and white matter—the matter of centres and the matter of conduction . Both are required in any act of the brain known to us . The smallest cerebral operation includes the transmission of an miluence from one centre to another centre : from a centre to an extremity , or the reverse . The organ of mind is not the brain by itself ; it is the brain , nerves , muscles , and organs of sense . " This view of nervous action he justly considers a complete refutation of the common notion of a sensorium within the brnin—a sort of inner chamber where impressions are stored up for reproduction on some future day . It is the man "who thinks ; not the brain only ; not an entity having a shadowy residence somewhere in the
brain . •» «¦ x » ? The result of this mode of conceiving mind is seen in Mr . Bam s exposition of tho senses , especially in that admirable and novel attempt to write the Natural History of the Feelings upon a uniform descriptive method . Ihus he not only explains each sense , both in its organ and function , but he describes and classifies it in its psychinl characteristics . One sense is shown to have the property of pre-eminently exciting emotional and volitional operations , another of exciting tho intellectual . The sensations ot the anfor le l motors to actionbut tuej
iurmontarv canal , examp , are powerfuas , nisli the intellect with little food , since , however intense while they « £ P ™ - sent , they are not recoverable by the intellect . # The hungry or tliirst > man is ci critically prompted to action to relieve himself of ^ 'l Z wnSsution , ° but once relieved , he cannot rccal with any « l « Cinctiuaw t ^^ lion itself ; whereas tho sense of sight is an eminently " ^ ^ * " ' ions cause tho intellect can recover wit ? , wonderful dwtmotnej ^^ dTn g as made by right . Mr . Bain further dustingu . shenj the « j ; f ^^ ^ aiufs at thoy are voluminous , massive , or intense . J slio t , I j t , mt . the precision of Natural History ; , uu Itho -cry ^ "J ^ ,, oxoo utod . would claim great pnuao , even it » f . J ^ J ^ hive to debate with Miv There are many points upon winch we sUomu
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 11, 1855, page 771, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/ldr_11081855/page/15/
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