Oak Street UNCLASSIFIED nN a ARAMA cas re Age AKARANE: PAAR An aa\n i AAA Acti ain SANNA ae 222 AAR Mec B BEE TR | tal, AAO AAAS Kaban Ap sf Pe | Oa ethan aire Fahne AMAa Anal MAAK AARAANAR mannansnnn AW ee ee * aA i r m~ AA AAAS ANNA Ana a AR AAR ANI AAA AAA AAC KANRAD, ANAah a NESE AAA ahh AAT AN ANA AAARARI Na AA A AAA A a AUPNGES AN AAR % antes an NAN AAAI RA ANAIAIA A A An AA, Af nnn NAAN TNAOA A A en. a swt oa ‘AAP A AA SAARANAR AAA Na AA! (AA ala ont SANNA AARNI 0: \ A if A} a iA Pps Ale Z A : SWAN 31 9 me a At +f ‘ : UNIVERSITY OF ™ ILLINOIS LIBRARY AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN OAK STREET \Y : SS AS e she % <’ se cs A oS & ‘ & c ae @ Date Due ARRAS sc! Hy Sa: . Paik hai se AN ws! ff Kg ihe PW Ray ahr ih! ie ae t core Oe aa fr at ON edge BN, PP ARR ig icy. Aho isabem bt a ay: Me rf Mm ES en ' an ia) ye ah : pal y Px i re “4 Rivet Me aney Ma E eee cMurray College Library N\ THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY SCIENCE SERIES VOLUME I. CONTAINING, By HERBERT SPENCER: . By W. MATTIEU WILLIAMS: The Philosophy of Style. World-Smashing, By GEORGE RAWLINSON: Meteoric ¢Astronomys Lunar Volcanoes. By ANDREW WILSON: The Sea-Serpents of Science. The Civilizations of Asia. By T. H. HUXLEY: Demonstrative Evidences of Evolution. ence NEW YORK JOHN B. ALDEN, PUBLISHER 1883 ye © 4 Ws ees es ALL eh Seas Waren Te 7 Ast COPY @exs 4 3-9 — THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. PARTE ‘Causes of Force in Language which Depend upon Econ- omy of the Mental Energies. I.—THE PRINCIPLE OF ECONOMY APPLIED TO WORDS. COMMENTING on the seeming incongruity between his father’s argumentative powers and his ignorance of formal logic, Tristram Shandy says: ‘‘It was a matter of just wonder with my worthy tutor, and two or three fellows of that learned society, that a man who knew not so much as the names of his tools, should be able to work after that fashion withthem.” Sterne’s intended implication that a knowledge of the principles of rea- soning neither makes, nor is essential to, a good reasoner, is doubtless true. Thus, too, is it with grammar. As Dr. Latham, condemning the usual school-drill in Lind- ley Murray, rightly remarks: ‘‘ Gross vulgarity is a fault to be prevented; but the proper prevention is to be got from habit—not rules.” Similarly, there can be little question that good composition is far less depend- ent upon acquaintance with its laws, than upon practice and natural aptitude. A clear head, a quick imagina- tion, and a sensitive ear, will go far towards making all rhetorical precepts needless. He who daily hears and reads well-framed seutences, will naturally more or 4 _ THE HELZEVIR LIBRARY. less tend to use similar ones. And where there exists any mental idiosyncrasy—where there is a deficient ver- bal memory, or an inadequate sense of logical depend- ence, or but little perception of order, or a lack of con- structive ingenuity—no amount of instruction will rem- edy the defect. Nevertheless, some practical result may be expected from a familiarity with the principles of style. The endeavor to conform to laws may tell, though slowly. And if in no other way, yet, as facili- tating revision, a knowledge of the thing to be achieved —a clear idea of what constitutes a beauty, and what a blemish—cannot fail to be of service. No general theory of expression seems yet to have been enunciated. The maxims contained in works on composition and rhetoric are presented in an unorgan- ized form. Standing as isolated dogmas—as empirical generalizations, they are neither so clearly apprehended, nor so much respected, as they would be were they de- duced from some simple first principle. We are told that ‘‘ brevity is the soul of wit.” We hear styles con- demned as verbose or involved. Blair says that every needless part of a sentence ‘‘ interrupts the description and clogs the image;” and again, that ‘‘ long sentences fatigue the reader’s attention.” It is remarked by Lord Kaims that ‘‘to give the utmost force to a period, it ought, if possible, to be closed with the word that makes the greatest figure.” That parentheses should be avoided and that Saxon words should be used in preference to those of Latin origin, are established precepts. But, however influential the truths thus dogmatically em- bodied, they would be much more influential if reduced to something like scientific ordination. In this, as in other cases, conviction will be greatly strengthened when we understand the why. And we may be sure THH PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 5 that a comprehension of the general principle from which the rules of composition result, will not only bring them home to us with greater force, but will dis- cover to us other rules of like origin. On seeking for some clue to the law underlying these current maxims, we may see shadowed forth in many of them the importance of economizing the reader’s or hearer’s attention. To so present ideas that they may be apprehended with the least possible mental effort, is the desideratum towards which most of the rules above quoted point. When we condemn writing that: is wordy, or confused, or intricate—when we praise this style as easy, and blame that as fatiguing, we conscious- ly or unconsciously assume this desideratum as our standard of judgment. Regarding language as an ap- paratus of symbols for the conveyance of thought, we may say that, as in a mechanical apparatus, the more simple and the better arranged in its parts, the greater will be the effect produced. In either case, whatever force is absorbed by the machine is deducted from the result. A reader or listener has at each moment but a limited amount of mental power available. To recog- nize and interpret the symbols presented to him requires part of this power; to arrange and combine the images suggested requires a further part; and only that part which remains can be used for realizing the thought conveyed. Hence, the more time and attention it takes to receive and understand each sentence, the less time and attention can be given to the contained idea, and the less vividly will that idea be conceived. How truly language must be regarded as a hindrance to thought, though the necessary instrument of it, we shall clearly perceive on remembering the comparative force with which simple ideas are communicated by 6 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY, signs. To say ‘‘ Leave the room” is less expressive than to point to the door. Placing a finger on the lips is more forcible than whispering ‘* Do not speak.” A beck of the hand is better than ‘‘Come here.” No phrase cin convey the idea of surprise so vividly as opening the eyes and raising the eyebrows. A shrug of the shoulders would lose much by translation into words, Again, it may be remarked that when oral language is employed, the strongest effects are produced by inter- jections, which condense entire sentences into syllables, And in other cases, where custom allows us to express thoughts by single words, as in Beware, Heigho, Fudge, much force would be lost by expanding. them into spe- cific propositions. Hence, carrying out the metaphor that language is the vehicle of thought, there seems reason to think that in all cases the friction and inertia of the vehicle deduct from its efficiency; and that in composition, the chief if not the sole thing to be done, isto reduce this friction and inertia to the smallest pos- sible amount. Let us then inquire whether economy of the recipient’s attention is not the secret of effect, alike in the right choice and collocation of words, in the best arrangement of clauses in a sentence, in the proper order of its principal and subordinate propositions, in the judicious use of simile, metaphor, and other figures of speech, and even in the rythmical sequence of sylla- bles. The greater forcibleness of Saxon English, or rather non-Latin English, first claims our attention. The sev eral special reasons assignable for this may all be re- duced to the general reason—ecconomy. The most im- portant of them ts early association. A child’s vocabu- lary is almost wholly Saxon. He says J have, not I pos- sess—I wish, not J desire; he does not reflect, he thinks; THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 7 he does not beg for amusement, but for play; he calls things nice or nasty, not pleasant or disagrecable. The synonyms which he learns in after years never become so closely, so organically connected with the ideas sig- nified as do these original words used in childhood; and hence the association remains less strong. But in what does a strong association between a word and ar idea differ from a weak one? Simply in the greater case and rapidity of the suggestive action, It can be in nothing else. Both of two words, if they be strictly synonymous, eventually call up the same image. The expression, It is act?d, must in the end give rise to the same thought as It is sour; but because the term acid was learnt Jater in life, and has not been so often fol- lowed by the thought symbolized, it does not so readily arouse that thought as the term sour, If we remember how slowly and with what labor the appropriate ideas follow unfamiliar words in another language, and how increasing familiarity with such words brings greater rapidity and ease of comprehension; and if we consider that the same process must have gone on with the words _of our mother tongue from childhood upwards, we shall clearly sce that the earliest learnt and oftenest used words will, other things equal, call up images with less loss of time and energy than their later learnt syuo- nyms. The further superiority possessed by Saxon English in its comparative brevity, obviously comes under the same generalization. If it be an advantage to express an idea in the smallest number of words, then will it be an advantage to express it in the smallest number of syllables. If circuitous phrases and needless expletives distract theattention and diminish the strength of the impression produced, then do surplus articulations do 8 THH ELZEVIR LIBRARY, so. A certain effort, though commonly an inappreci- able one, must be required to recognize every vowel and consonant. If, as all know, it is tiresome to listen to an indistinct speaker or read a badly written manu- script, and if, as we cannot doubt, the fatigue is a cu- mulative result of the attention needed to catch succes- sive syllables, it follows that attention is in such cases absorbed by each syllable. And if this be true when the syllables are difficult of recognition, it will also be true, though in a less degree, when the recognition of them is easy. Hence, the shortness of Saxon words be- comes a reason for their greater force. One qualifica- tion, however, must not be overlooked. A word which in itself embodies the most important part of the idea. to be conveyed, especially when that idea is an emo- tional one, may often with advantage be a polysyllabic word. Thus it seems more forcible to say, ‘‘It is mag- nificent,”’ than ‘‘It is grand.” The word vast is not so powerful a one as stupendous. Calling a thing nasty is not so effective as calling it disgusting. There seem to be several causes for this exceptional superiority of certain long words. We may ascribe it partly to the fact that a voluminous, mouth-filling epithet is, by its very size, suggestive of largeness or strength; witness the immense pomposity of sesquipe- dalian verbiage: and when great power or intensity has to be suggested, this association of ideas aids the effect. A further cause may be that a word of several sylla- bles admits of more emphatic articulation; and as em- phatic articulation is a sign of emotion, the unusual im- pressiveness of the thing named is implied by it. Yet another cause is that a long word [of which the latter syllables are generally inferred as soon as the first are spoken] allows the hearer’s consciousness a longer time THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 9 to dwell upon the quality predicted; and where, as in the above cases, it is to this predicted quality that the entire attention is called, an advantage results from keeping it before the mind for an appreciable time. The reasons which we have given for preferring short words evident#7 do not hold here. So that to make our generalization quite correct we must say, that while in certain sentences expressing strong feeling the word which more especially implies that feeling may often with advantage be a many syllabled or Latin one, in the immense majority of cases, each word serving but as a step to the idea embodied by the whole sentence, should, if possible, be a one-syllabled or Saxon one. Once more, that frequent cause of strength in Saxon and other primitive words, their imitative character, may be similarly resolved into the more general cause. Both those directly imitative, as splash, bang, whiz, roar, etc., and those analogically imitative, as rough, smooth, keen, blunt, thin, hard, crag, etc., have a greater or less likeness to the things symbolized; and by mak- ing on the senses impressions allied to the ideas to be called up, they save part of the effort needed to call up such ideas, and leave more attention for the ideas them- selves. The economy of the recipient’s mental energy, into which are thus resolvable the several causes of the strength of Saxon English, may equally be traced in the superiority of specific over generic words. That concrete terms produce more vivid impressions than abstract ones, and should, when possible, be used in- stead, is a thorough maxim of composition. As Dr. Campbell says, ‘‘The more general the terms are, the picture is the fainter; the more special they are, the brighter.” We should avoid such a sentence as: 10 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. —In proportion as the manners, customs, ma amusements of a nation are crue] and barbarous, the regulations of their penal code will be severe And in place of it we should wrile: In proportion as men delight in battles, bull- fights, and combats of gladiators, will they punish by hanging, burning, and the rack. This superiority of specific expressions is clearly due to a saving of the effort required to translate words into thoughts. As we do not think in generals but in particulars—as, whenever any class of things is re- ferred to, we represent it to ourselves by calling to mind individual members of it—it follows that when an abstract word is used, the hearer or reader has to choose from his stock of images one or more by which he may figure to himself the genus mentioned, In doing this, some delay must arise—some force be ex- pended; and if, by employing a specific term, an ap- propriate image can be at once suggested, an economy is achieved, anda more vivid impression produced. Turning now from the choice of werds to their sequence, we shall find the same general principle hold good. We have a prior? reasons for believing that in every sentence there is some one order of words more effective than any other; and that this order is the one which presents the elements of the proposition in the succession in which they may be most readily put to- gether. Asina narrative the events should be stated in such sequence that the mind may not have to go backwards and forwards in order to rightly connect them; as in a group of sentences the arrangement should be such that each of them may be understood as it comes, without waiting for subsequent ones—so in every sentence the sequeuce of words should be that THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 11 which suggests the constituents of the thought in the order most convenient for the building up that thought. Duly to enforce this truth, and to prepare the way for applications of it, we must briefly inauire into the men- tal act by which the meaning of a scries of Wronds is apprehended. We cannot more simply do this than by considering the proper collocation of the substantive and adjective. Is it better to place the adjective before the substantive, or the substantive before the adjective? Ought we to say with the French—uwun cheval noir; or to say as we do--a black horse? Probably most persons of culture would decide that one orderis as good as the other. Alive to the bias produced by habit, they would ascribe to that the preference they feel for our own form of ex pression. They would expect those educatcd in the use of the opposite form to have an equal preference for that. And thus they would conclude that neither of these instinctive judgments is of any worth, There is, however, a philosophical ground for deciding in favor of the English custom. If ‘‘a horse black’ be the arrangement, immediately on the utterance of the word ‘‘horse,” there arises, or tends to arise, in the mind, a picture answering to that word; and as there has been nothing to indicate what kind of horse, any image of a horse sugzests itself. Very likely, however, the image will be that of a brown horse, brown horses being the most familiar, The result is that when the word ‘‘ black” is added, a check is given to the process of thought. Either the picture of a brown horse al- ready present to the imagination has to be suppressed, and the picture of a black one summoned in its place, or else, if the picture of a brown horse be yet unformed, the tendency to form it has to be stopped. Whichever 12 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. is the case, a certain amount of hindrance results. But if, on the other hand, ‘‘a black horse” be the expres- sion used, no such mistake can be made. The word “‘black,” indicating an abstract quality, arouses no definite idea. It simply prepares the mind for conceiv- ing some object of that color, and the attention is kept suspended until that object is known. If, then, by the precedence of the adjective, the idea is conveyed without liability to error, whereas the precedence of the substantive is apt to produce a misconception, it follows that the one gives the mind less trouble than the other, and is therefore more forcible. Possibly it will be objected that the adjective and substantive come so close together, that practically they may be considered as uttered at the same moment; and that on hearing the phrase, ‘‘a horse black,” there is not time to imagine a wrongly-colored horse before the word ‘‘ black” follows to prevent it. It must be owned that it is not easy to decide by introspection whether this is so or not. But there are facts collaterally im- plying that it is not. Our ability to anticipate the words yet unspoken is one of them. If the ideas of the hearer kept considerably behind the expressions of the speaker, as the objection assumes, he could hardly foresee the end of a sentence by the time it was half de- livered: yet this constantly happens. Were the suppo- sition true, the mind, instead of anticipating, would be continually falling more and more in arrear. If the meanings of words are not realized as fast as the words are uttered, then the loss of time over each word must entail such an accumulation of delays as to leave a hearer entirely behind. But whether the force of these replies be or be not admitted, it will scarcely be denied that the right formation of a picture will be facilitated THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE, 18 by presenting its elements in the order in which they are wanted; even though the mind should do nothing until it has received them all. What is here said respecting the succession of the adjective and substantive is obviously applicable, by change of terms, to the adverb and verb. And without further explanation, it will be manifest that in the use of prepositions and other particles, most languages spontaneously conform with more or less completeness to this law. _ On applying a like analysis to the larger divisions of a sentence, we find not only that the same principle holds good, but that the advantage of respecting it be- comes marked. In the arrangement of predicate and subject, for example, we are at once shown that as the predicate determines the aspect under which the sub- ject is to be conceived, it should be placed first; and the striking effect produced by so placing it becomes comprehensible. Take the often-quoted contrast be- tween ‘‘Great is Diana of the Ephesians” and ‘‘ Diana of the Ephesians is great.” When the first arrange- ment is used, the utterance of the .word “great” arouses those vague associations of an impressive nature with which it has been habitually connected; the im- agination is prepared to clothe with high attributes whatever follows; and when the words ‘ Diana of the “Ephesians” are heard, all the appropriate imagery which can on the instant be summoned is used in the forma- tion of the picture, the mind being thus led directly, and without error, to the intended impression. When, on the contrary; the reverse order is followed, the idea, ‘Diana of the Ephesians,” is conceived with no special reference to greatness; and when the words ‘‘is great” are added, the conception has to be remodelled, whence 14 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. arises a loss of mental energy and a corresponding diminution of effect. The following verse from Cole- ridge’s ‘‘ Ancient Mariner,” though somewhat irregular in structure, well illustrates the same truth: ** Alone, alone, all, all alone, Alone on a wide, wide sea! And never a saint took pity on My soul in agony.” Of course the principle equally applies when the pred- icate is a verb or a participle. And as effect is gained by placing first all words indicating the quality, con- duct or condition of the subject, it follows that the copula also should have precedence. It is true that the general habit of our language resists this arrange- ment of predicate, copula and subject; but we may readily find instances of the additional force gained by conforming to it. Thus, in the line from ‘ Julius Ceesar”— ‘“‘Then burst this mighty heart,” priority is given to a word embodying both predicate and copula. Ina passage contained in ‘‘ The Battle of Flodden Field,” the like order is systematically em- ployed with great effect: ‘“‘The Border slogan rent the sky! A Home! a Gordon! was the cry: Loud were the clanging blows: Advanced —forced back—now low, now high, The pennon sunk and rose; As bends the bark’s mast in the gale When rent are rigging, shrouds and sail, It wavered ’mid the foes.” Pursuing the principle yet further, it is obvious that for producing the greatest effect, not only should the THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 15 main divisions of a sentence observe this sequence, but the subdivisions of these should be similarly arranged. In nearly all cases, the predicate is accompanied by some limit or qualification, called its complement. Commonly, also, the circumstances of the subject, which form its complement, have to be specified. And as these qualifications and circumstances must deter- mine the mode in which the acts and things they be- long to are conceived, precedence should be given to them, Lord Kaimes notices the fact that this order is _preferable, though without giving the reason. He says: ‘‘ Whena circumstance is placed at the beginning of the period, or near the beginning, the transition from it to the principal subject is agreeable—is like ascend- ing or going upward.” A sentence arranged in illus- tration of this will be desirable. Here is one: Whatever it may be in theory, it is clear that in practice the French idea of liberty is—the right of every man to be master of the rest. In this case, were the first two clauses, up to the word ‘‘practice,” inclusive, which qualify the subject, to be placed at the end instead of the beginning, much of the force would be lost; as thus: The French idea of liberty is—the right of every man to be master of the rest; in practice at least, if not in theory. Similarly with respect to the conditions under which any fact is predicated. Observe in the following ex- ample the effect of putting them last: — How immense would be the stimulus to progress, were the honor now given to wealth and title given ex- clusively to high achievements and intrinsic worth! And then observe the superior effect of putting them first: 16 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. — —wWerethe honor now given to wealth and title given exclusively to high achievements and intrinsic worth, how inimense would be the stimulus to prog- ress! The effect of giving priority to the complement of the predicate, as well as the predicate itself, is finely dis- played in the opening of ‘‘ Hyperion”: ‘** Deep in the shady sadness of a vale Far sunken from the healthy breath of morn, Far from the fiery noon and eve’s one star Sat gray-haired Saturn, quiet as a stone.”’ Here it will be observed, not only that the predicate *‘sat” precedes the subject ‘‘ Saturn,” and that the three lines in italics, constituting the complement of the pred- icate, come before it; but that in the structure of that complement also, the same order is followed: each line being so arranged that.the qualifying words are placed before the words suggesting concrete images. The right succession of the principal and subordinate _propositions in a sentence manifestly depends on the same Jaw. Regard for economy of the recipient’s at- tention, which, as we find, determines the best order for. the subject, copula, predicate, and their comple- ments, dictates that the subordinate proposition shall precede the principal one, when the sentence includes two. Containing, as the subordinate proposition does, some qualifying or explanatory idea, its priority pre- vents misconception of the principal one; and therefore saves the mental effort needed to correct such miscon- ception. ‘This will be seen in the annexed example. ——The secrecy once maintained in respect to the Parliamentary debates, is still thought needful diplo- macy; and in virtue of this secret diplomacy, England THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 17 may any day be unawares betvayed by its ministers into a war costing a hundred thousand lives, and hundreds of millions of treasure: yet the English pique them- selves on being a self-governed people. The two subordinate propositions, ending with the semicolon and colon respectively, almost wholly de- termine the meaning of the principal proposition with which it concludes; and the effect would be lost if they were placed last instead of first. The general principle of right arrangement in sen- -tences, which we have traced in its application to the leading divisions of them, equally determines the prop- er order of their minor divisions. In every sentence of any complexity the complement to the subject contains several clauses, and that to the predicate several others; and these may be arranged in greater or less conformity to the law of easy apprehension. Of course with these, as with the larger members, the succession should be from the less specific to the more specific—from the ab- stract to the concrete. Now, however, we must notice a further condition to be fulfilled in the proper construction of a sentence; but still a condition dictated by the same general prin- ciple with the other: the condition, namely, that the words and expressions most nearly related in thought shall be brought the closest together. Evidently the single words, the minor clauses, and the leading divis- ions of every proposition, severally qualify each other. The longer the time that elapses between the mention of any qualifying member and the member qualified, the longer must the mind be exerted in carrying forward the qualifying member ready for use. And the more numerous the qualifications to be simultaneously re- membered and rightly applied, the greater will be the 18 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. mental power expended, and the smaller the effect pro- duced. Hence, other things equal, force will be gained by so arranging the members of a sentence that these suspensions shall at any moment be the fewest in num- ber; and shall also be of the shortest duration. The following is an instance of defective combination: ——A modern newspaper statement, though probably true, would be laughed at, if quoted in a book as testi- mony; but the letter of a court gossip, is thought good historical evidence, if written some centuries ago. A rearrangement of this, in accordance with the prin- ciple indicated above, will be found to increase the effect. Thus: ——Though probably true, a modern newspaper state- ment quoted in a book as testimony, would be laughed at; but the letter of a court gossip, if written some cen- turies ago, is thought good historical evidence. By making this change, some of the suspensions are avoided and others shortened: while there is less liabil- ity to produce premature conceptions. The passage quoted below from ‘‘ Paradise Lost” affords a fine in- stance of a sentence well arranged; alike in the priority of the subordinate members, in the avoidance of long and numerous suspensions, and in the correspondence between the order of the clauses and the sequence of the phenomena described, which by the way, is a further prerequisite to easy comprehension, and therefore to effect. ‘“‘As when a prowling wolf, Whom hunger drives to seek new haunt for prey, Watching where shepherds pen their flocks at eve In hurdled cotes amid the field secure, Leaps o’er the fence with ease into the fold: Or as a thief bent to unhoard the cash Of some rich burgher, whose substantial doors, THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLEZ. 19 Cross-barr’d, and bolted fast, fear no assault, In at the window climbs, or o’er the tiles: So clomb the first grand thief into God’s fold; So since into his church lewd hirelings climb.” The habitual use of sentences in which all or most of the descriptive and limiting elements precede those de- scribed and limited, gives rise to what is called the in- verted style: a title which is, however, by no means confined to this structure, but is often used where the order of the words is simply unusual. A more appro- priate title would be the direct style, as contrasted with the other, or ¢ndirect style: the peculiarity of the one being, that it conveys each thought into the mind step by step with little liability to error; and of the other, that it gets the right thought conceived by a series of approximations. The superiority of the direct over the indirect form of sentence, implied by the several conclusions that have been drawn, must not, however, be affirmed without reservation. Though, up to a certain point, it is well for the qualifying clauses of a period to precede those qualified, yet as carrying forward each qualifying clause costs some mental effort, it follows that when the number of them and the time they are carried be- come great, we reach a limit beyond which more is lost than is gained. Other things equal, the arrangement should be such that no concrete image shall be suggest- ed until the materials out of which it isto be made have been presented. And yet, as lately pointed out, other things equal, the fewer the materials to be held at once, and the shorter the distance they have to be borne, the better. Hence in some cases it becomes a question whether most mental effort will be entailed by the many and long suspensions, or by the correction of successive misconceptions. 20 THE HLZEVIR LIBRARY. This question may sometimes be decided by consider- ing the capacity of the persons addressed. A greater grasp of mind is required for the ready comprehension of thoughts expressed in the direct manner, where the sentences are anywise intricate. To recollect a number of preliminaries stated in elucidation of a coming idea, and to apply them all to the formation of it when sug- gested, demands a good memory and considerable power of concentration. To one possessing these, the direct method will mostly seem the best; while to one de- ficient in them it will seem the worst. Just as it may cost a strong man less effort to carry a hundred-weight from place to place at once, than by a stone at a time, so to an active mind it may be easier to bear along all the qualifications of an idea and at once rightly form it when named, than to first imperfectly conceive such idea and then carry back to it, one by one, the details and limitations afterwards mentioned. While converse- ly, as for a boy the only possible mode of transferring a hundred-weight is that of taking it in portions, so for a weak mind the only possible mode of forming a compound conception may be that of building it up by carrying separately its several parts. That the indirect method—the method of conveying the meaning by a series of approximations—is best fitted for the uncultivated, may indeed be inferred from their habitual use of it. The form of expression adopted by the savage, as in—‘‘ Water, give me,” is the simplest type of the approximate arrangement. In pleonasms, which are comparatively prevalent among the unedu- cated, the same essential structure is seen; as, for instance, in—‘‘ The men, they were there.” Again, the old possessive case— ‘‘ The king, his crown,” conforms to the like order of thought. Moreover, the fact that the THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 21 indirect mode is called the natural one, implies that it is the one spontaneously employed by the common people: that is—the one easiest for undisciplined minds. There are many cases, however, in which neither the direct nor the indirect structure is the best; but where an intermediate structure is preferable to both. When the number of circumstances and qualifications to be in- cluded in the sentence is great, the most judicious course is neither to enumerate them all before introducing the idea to which they belong, nor to put this idea first and let it be remodelled to agree with the particulars after- ’ wards mentioned; but to do a little of each. Take a case. It is desirable to avoid so extremely indirect an arrangement as the following: ‘‘We came to our journey’s end, at last, with no small difficulty, after much fatigue, through deep roads, and bad weather.” Yet to transform this into an entirely indirect sen- tence. would not produce a satisfactory effect; as wit- ness: ——At last, with no small difficulty, after much fatigue, through deep roads, and bad weather, we came to our journey’s end. Dr. Whately, from whom we quote the first of these two arrangements, proposes this construction: “At last, after much fatigue, through deep roads and bad weather, we came, with no small difficulty, to our journey’s end.” Here it will be observed that by introducing the words ‘‘we came’’ a little earlier in the sentence, the labor of carrying forward so many particulars is diminished, and the subsequent qualification ‘‘ with no small difficulty” entails an addition to the thought that is very easily made. But a further improvement may be produced. 22 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. by introducing the words ‘‘we came” still earlier; especially if at the same time the qualifications be re- arranged in conformity with the principle already ex- plained, that the more abstract elements of the thought should come before the more concrete. Observe the better effect obtained by making these two changes: © — At last, with no small difficulty, and after much fatigue, we came, through deep roads and bad weather, to our journey’s end. This reads with comparative smoothness; that is, with less hindrance from suspensions and reconstructions of thought—with less mental effort. Before dismissing this branch of our subject, it should ’ be further remarked, that even when addressing the most vigorous intellects, the direct style is unfit for communicating ideas of a complex or abstract character. So long as the mind has not much to do, it may be well able to grasp all the preparatory clauses of a sentence, and to use them effcctively; but if some subtlety in the argument absorb the attention—if every faculty be strained in endeavoring to catch the speaker’s or writer's drift, it may happen that the mind, unable to carry on both processes at once, will break down, and allow the elements of the thought to lapse into confusion. IIl.—THE EFFECT OF FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE EX- PLAINED. Turning now to consider figures of speech, we may equally discern the same general law of effect. Under- lying all the rules given for the choice and right-use of them, we shall find the same fundamental requirement —economy of attention. It is, indeed, chiefly because they so well subserve this requirement, that figures of Speech are employed. To bring the mind more easily THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 23 to the desired conception, is in many cases solely, and in all cases mainly, their object. Let us begin with the figure called Synechdoche, The advantage sometimes gained by putting a part for the whole is due to the more convenient, or more accurate, presentation of the idea. If, instead of saying ‘‘a fleet of ten ships,” we say ‘‘a fleet of ten saz/,” the picture of a group of vessels at sea is more readily suggested; and is so because the sails constitute the most conspicu- ous parts of vessels so circumstanced, whereas the word ships would very likely remind us of vessels in dock, Again, to say ‘‘All hands to the pumps” is better than to say ‘‘ All men to the pumps,” as it suggests the men in the special attitude intended, and so saves effort. Bringing ‘‘gray hairs with sorrow to the grave” is an- other expression, the effect of which has the same cause. The occasional increase of force produced by Met- onymy may be similarly accounted for. ‘‘The low morality of the bar” is a phrase both more brief and significant than the literal one it stands for. A belief in the ultimate supremacy of intelligence over brute force, is conveyed ina more conerete and therefore more realizable form, if we substitute the pen and the sword for the two abstract terms. To say ‘‘ Beware of drink- ing!” is less effective than to say ‘‘ Beware of the bottle!” and is so, clearly, because it calls up a less specific image. The Simile is in many cases used chiefly with a view to ornament, but whenever it increases the force of a passage, it does so by being an economy. Here is an instance: The illusion that great men and great events came oftener in early times than now, is partly due to historical perspective. As in a range of equidistant 24 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. columns, the furthest off look the closest, so the con- spicuous objects of the past seem more thickly clustered — the more remote they are. To construct by a process of literal explanation, the thought thus conveyed would take many sentences, and the first elements of the picture would become faint _ while the imagination was busy in adding the others. ‘But by the help of a comparison all effort is saved—the picture is instantly realized and its full effect produced. Of the position of the Simile,* it needs only to remark that what has been said respecting the order of the ad- jective and substantive, predicate and subject, principal and subordinate propositions, etc., is applicable here. As whatever qualifies should precede whatever is quali- fied, force will generally be gained by placing the simile before the object to which it is applied. That this arrangement is the best, may be seen in the following passage from the ‘‘ Lady of the Lake”: ““ As wreath of snow, on mountain breast, Slides from the rock that gave it rest, Poor Ellen glided from her stay, And at the monarch’s feet she lay.”’ Inverting these couplets will be found to diminish the effect considerably. There are cases, however, even where the simile is a simple one, in which it may with advantage be placed last, asin these lines from Alex- ander Smith’s ‘‘ Life Drama”: **T see the future stretch All dark and barren as a rainy sea.” * Properly, the term “ simile’’ is applicable only to the entire figure, inclusive of the two things compared and the comparison drawn between them. But as there exists no name for the illus- trative member of the figure, there seems no alternative but to employ ‘‘ simile’ to express this also. This context will, in each case, show in which sense the word is used, ~~ THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 28 The reason for this seems to be that so abstract an idea as that attaching to the word ‘‘future” does not present itself to the mind in any definite form, and hence the subsequent arrival at the simile entails no reconstruc- tion of the thought. Such, however, are not the only cases in which this order is the most forcible. As the advantage of putting the simile before the object depends on its being carried forward in the mind to assist in forming an image of the object, it must happen that if, from length or com- plexity, it cannot be so carried forward, the advantage is not gained. The annexed sonnet, by Coleridge, is defective from this cause: ““As when a child, on some long Winter’s night, Affrighted, clinging to its grandam’s knees, With eager wond’ring and perturb’d delight Listens strange tales of fearful dark decrees, Mutter’d to wretch by necromantic spell; Or of those hags who at the witching time Of murky midnight, ride the air sublime, And mingle foul embrace with fiends of hell; Cold horror drinks its blood! Anon the tear More gentle starts, to hear the beldame tell Of pretty babes, that lov’d each other dear, Murder’d by cruel uncle’s mandate fell: Ev’n such the shiv’ring joys thy tones impart, Ev’n so, thou, Siddons, meltest my sad heart.”’ Here, from the lapse of time and accumulation of circumstances, the first part of the comparison is forgot- ten before its application is reached, and requires re- reading. Had the main idea been first mentioned, less effort would have been required to retain it and to modify the conception of it into harmony with the comparison than to remember the comparison and refer back to its successive features for help in forming the final image. 26 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. The superiority of the Metaphor to the Simile is as- cribed by Dr. Whately to the fact that ‘‘all men are more gratified at catching the resemblance for them- selves than in having it pointed out tothem.” Butafter what has been said, the great economy it achieves will seem the more probable cause. Lear’s exclamation— “Ingratitule! thou marble-hearted fiend,” would lose part of its effect were it changed into— “Ingratitude! thou fiend with heart like marble;” and the loss would result partly from the position of the simile and partly from the extra number of words re- quired. When the comparison is an involved one, the greater force of the metaphor, consequent on its greater brevity, becomes much more conspicuous, If, drawing an analogy between mental and physical phenomena, " we say, As, in passing through the crystal, beams of white light are decomposed into the colors of the rainbow; so, in traversing the soul of the poet, the colorless rays of truth are transformed into brightly tinted poetry ;—— it is clear that in receiving the double set of words ex- pressing the two halves of the comparison, and in car- rying the one half to the other, considerable attention is absorbed. Most of this is saved, however, by putting the comparsion in a metaphorical form, thus: ——-The white light of truth, in traversing the many sided transparent soul of the poet, is refracted into iris- hued poetry. How much is conveyed in a few words by the help of the Metaphor, and how vivid the effect consequently produced, may be abundantly exemplified. From **A Life Drama” may be quoted the phrase, "I spear’d him with a jest,” THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 27 as a fine instance among the many which that poem con- tains. A passage in the ‘‘ Prometheus Unbound,” of Shelley, displays the power of the Metaphor to great ad- vantage: **Methought among the lawns together We wandered underneath the young gray dawn, And multitudes of dense white fleecy clouds Were wandering in thick flocks along the mountains Shepherded by the slow unwilling wind.” This last expression is remarkable for the distinctness with which it realizes the features of the scene: bring- ing the mind, as it were, by a bound to the desired con- ception. But a limit is put to the advantageous use of the Meta- phor, by the condition that it must be sufficiently simple to be understood from a hint. Evidently, if there be any obscurity in the meaning or application of it, no economy of attention will be gained; but rather the re- verse. Hence, when the comparison is complex, it is usual to have recourse to the Simile. There is, however, a species of figure, sometimes classed under Allegory, but which might, perhaps, be better called Compound Metaphor, that enables us to retain the brevity of the metaphorical form even when the analogy is intricate. This is done by indicating the application of the figure at the outset, and then leaving the mind to continue the parallel. Emerson has employed it with great effect in the first of his ‘‘ Lectures on the Times”: “The main interest which any aspects of the times can have for us, is the great spirit which gazes through them, the light which they can shed on the wondcrful questions, What are we, and Whither do we tend? We do not wish tu be deceived. Here we drift, like white sail across the wild ocean, now bright on the wave, now darkling in the trough Of the sea; but from what port did we sail? Whoknows? Or to what port are we bound? Who 28 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. knows? There is no one to tell us but such poor weather-tossed mariners as ourselves, whom we speak as we pass, or who have hoisted some signal, or floated to us some letters in a bottle from afar. But what know they more than we? They also found themselves on this wondrous sea. No; from the older sailors no- thing. Over all their speaking trumpets the gray sea and the loud winds answer—Not in us; not in Time.” The division of the Simile from the Metaphor is by no means a definite one. Between the one extreme in which the two elenients of the comparison are detailed at full length and the analogy pointed out, and the other extreme in which the comparison is implied instead of stated, come intermediate forms, in which the compari- son is partly stated and partly implied. Tor instance: Astonished at the performances of the English plough, the Hindoos paint it, set it up, and worship it; thus turning a tool into an idol: linguists do the same with language. There is an evident advantage in leaving the reader or hearer to complete the figure. And generally these intermediate forms are good in proportion as they do this; provided the mode of completing it be obvious. Passing over much that may be said of like purport upon Hyperbole, Personification, Apostrophe, etc., let us close our remarks upon a construction by a typical example. The general principle which has been enun- ciated is, that other things equal, the force of all verbal forms and arrangements is great, in proportion as the time and mental effort they demand for the recipient is small. The corollaries from this general principle have been severally illustrated; and it has been shown that the relative goodness of any two modes of expressing an idea, may be determined by observing which requires the shortest process of thought for its comprehension. But though conformity in particular points has been THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 29 exemplified, no cases of complete conformity have yet been quoted. It is indeed difficult to find them; for the English idiom does not commonly permit the order which theory dictates. A few, however, occur in Os- sian. Here is one: “As Autumn’s dark storm pours from two echoing hills, sO. towards each other approached the heroes. As twodark streams from high rocks meet and mix, and roar on the plain: loud, rough, and dark in battle meet Lochlin and Inisfail. . . . As the troubled noise of the ocean when roll the waves on high; as the last peal of the thunder of heaven; such is noise of the battle.” Except in the position of the verb in the first two similes, the theoretically best arrangement is fully carried out in each of these sentences. ‘The simile comes before the qualified image, the adjectives before the substan- tives, the predicate and copula before the subject, and their respective complements before them. That the passage is open to the charge of being bombastic proves nothing; or rather, proves our case. For what is bom- bast but a force of expression too great for the magni- tude of the ideas embodied? All that may rightly be in- ferred is, that only in very rare cases, and then only to produce a climax, should al the conditions of effective expression be fulfilled. Ill. ARRANGEMENT OF MINOR IMAGES IN BUILDING UP A THOUGHT. Passing on to a more complex application of the doc- trine with which we set out, it must now be remarked, that not only in the structure of sentences, and the use of figures of speech, may economy of the recipient’s mental energy be assigned as the cause of force; but that in the choice and arrangement of the minor images, out of which some large thought is to be built up, we 80 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. may trace the same condition to effect. To select from the sentiment, scene, or event described, those typical elements which carry many others along with them, and so, by saying a few things but suggesting many, to abridge the description, is the secret of producing a vivid impression. An extract from Tennyson’s ‘‘ Mari- ana” will well illustrate this: ** All day within the dreamy house, The door upon the hinges creaked, The blue fly sung i’ the pane ; the mouse Behind the mouldering wainscot shrieked, Or from the crevice peered about.” The several circumstances here specified bring with them many appropriate associations. Our attention is rarely drawn by the buzzing of a fly in the window, save when everything is still. While the inmates are moving about the house, mice usually keep silence; and it is only when extreme quietness reigns that they peep from their retreats. Hence each of the facts men- tioned presupposes numerous others, calls up these with more or less distinctness, and revives the feeling of dull solitude with which they are connected in our experience. Were all these facts detailed instead of suggested, our attention would be so frittered away that little impression of dreariness would be produced. Similarly in other cases. Whatever the nature of the thought to be conveyed, this skilful selection of a few particulars which imply the rest, is the key to success. In the choice of competent ideas, as in the choice of ex- pressions, the aim must be to convey the greatest quan- tity of thoughts with the smallest quantity of words. The same principle may in some cases be advanta- geously carried yet further, by indirectly suggesting THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 81 some entirely distinct thought in addition to the one ex- pressed. Thus, if we say, ——tThe head of a good classic is as full of ancient myths, as that of a servant-girl of ghost stories; it is manifest that besides the fact asserted, there is an implied opinion respecting the small value of classical knowledge: and as this implied opinion is recognized much sooner than it can be put into words, there is gain in omitting it. In other cases, again, great effect is produced by an overt omission; provided the nature of the idea left out is obvious. A good instance of this occurs in ‘‘ Heroes and Hero-worship.” After describ- ing the way in which Burns was sacrificed to the idle curiosity of Lion-hunters—people who came not out of sympathy but merely to see him—people who sought a little amusement, and who got their amusement while ‘the Hero’s life went for it!” Carlyle suggests a par- allel thus: ‘‘Richter says, in the Island of Sumatra there is a kind of ‘ Light-chafers,’ large Fire-flies, which people stick upon spits, and illuminate the ways with at night. Persons of condition can thus travel with a pleasant ra- diance, which they much admire. Great honor to the Fire-flies! But—!—” IV.—THE SUPERIORITY OF POETRY TO PROSE EXPLAINED. Before inquiring whether the law of effect, thus far traced, explains the superiority of poetry to prose, it will be needful to notice some supplementary causes of force in expression, that have not yet been mentioned. These are not, properly speaking, additional causes; but rather secondary ones, originating from those al- ready specified—reflex results of them. In the first place, then, we may remark that mental excitement 82 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. spontaneously prompts the use of those forms of speech which have been pointed out as the most effective. ‘‘Qut with him!” ‘‘ Away with him!” are the natural utterances of angry citizens at a disturbed meeting. A voyager, describing a terrible storm he had witnessed, would rise to some such climax as—‘‘ Crack went the ropes and down came the mast.” Astonishment may be heard expressed in the phrase—‘‘ Never was there such a sight!” All of which sentences are, it will be observed, constructed after the direct type. Again, every one knows that excited persons are given to fig- ures of speech. The vituperation of the vulgar abounds with them: often, indeed, consists of little else. “ Beast,” ‘‘ brute,” gallows rogue,” ‘‘ cut-throat villain,” these, and other like metaphors and metaphorical epi- thets, at once call to mind a street quarrel. Further, it may be noticed that extreme brevity is another charac- teristic of passionate language. The sentences are gen- erally incomplete; the particles are omitted; and fre- quently important words are left to be gathered from the context. Great admiration does not vent itself in a precise proposition, as—‘‘It is beautiful;” but in the simple exclamation—‘‘ Beautiful!’ He who, when reading a lawyer’s letter, should say, ‘‘ Vile rascal!” would be thought angry; while, ‘‘ He is a vile ras- cal!” would imply comparative coolness. Thus we see that alike in the order of the words, in the frequent use of figures, and in extreme conciseness, the natural ut- terances of excitement conform to the theoretical condi- tions of forcible expression. Hence, then, the higher forms of speech acquire a secondary strength from association. Having, in act- ual life, habitually heard them in connection with vivid mental impressions, and having been accustomed to THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 33 meet with them in the most powerful writing, they come to have in themselves a species of force. The emotions that have from time to time been produced by the strong thoughts wrapped up in these forms, are par- linlly aroused by the forms themselves. They create a certain degree of animation; they induce a prepara. tory sympathy, and when the striking ideas looked for are reached, they are the more vividly realized. The continuous use of these modes of expression, that are alike forcible in themselves and forcible from their associations, produces the peculiarly impressive species of composition which we call poetry. Poetry, we shall find, habitually adopts those symbols of thought and those methods of using them which instinct and analysis agree in choosing as most effective, and becomes poetry by virtue of doing this. On turning back to the various specimens that have been quoted, it will be seen that the direct or inverted form of sentence predominates in them, and that to a degree quite inad- missible in prose. And not only in the frequency, but in what is termed the violence of the inversions, will this distinction be remarked. In the abundant use of figures, again, we may recognize the same truth. Met- aphors, similes, hyperboles and personifications are the poet’s colors, which he has liberty to employ almost without limit. We characterize as ‘‘ poetical ” the prose which uses these appliances of language with any fre- quency, and condemn it as ‘‘over-florid” or ‘‘ affected” long before they occur with the profusion allowed in verse. Further, let it be remarked that in brevity—the other requisite of forcible expression which theory points out and emotion spontaneously fulfils—poetical phrase- ology similarly differs from ordinary phraseology. Im- perfect periods are freqtient, elisions are perpetual, and 84 THH ELZEVIR LIBRARY. many of the minor words, which would be deemed es- sential in prose, are dispensed with. Thus, poetry, regarded as a vehicle of thought, is es- pecially impressive, partly because it obeys all the laws of effective speech, and partly because in so doing it imitates the natural utterances of excitement. While the matter embodied is idealized emotion, the vehicle is the idealized language of emotion. As the musical composer catches the cadences in which our feelings of joy and sympathy, grief and despair vent themselves, and out of these germs evolves melodies suggesting higher phases of these feelings, so the poet develops from the typical expressions in which men utter passion and sentiment those choice forms of verbal combination in which concentrated passion and sentiment may be filly presented. There is one peculiarity of poetry conducing much to its effect—the peculiarity which is, indeed, usually thought its characteristic one—still remaining to be considered; we mean its rhythmical structure. This, improbable though it seems, will be found to come under the same generalization with the others. Like each of them, it is an idealization of the natural lan- guage of strong emotion, which is known to be more or less metrical if the emotion be not too violent, and like each of them, it is an economy of the reader’s or hear- er’s attention. In the peculiar tone and manner we adopt in uttering versified language, may be discerned its relationship to the feelings, and the pleasure which its measured movement gives us is ascribable to the comparative ease with which words metrically arranged can be recognized. This ast position will scarcely be at once admitted; but a little explanation will show its reasonableness, THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 85 For if, as we have seen, there is an expenditure of men- tal energy in the mere act of listening to verbal articu- lations, or in that silent repetition of them which goes on in reading—if the perceptive faculties must be in ac- tive exercise to identify every syllable—then any mode of so combining words as to present a regular recurrence of certain traits which the mind can anticipate, will di- minish that strain upon the attention required by the total irregularity of prose. Just as the body, in receiv- ing a series of varying concussions, must keep the mus- cles ready to meet the most violent of them, as not knowing when such may come, so the mind, in receiv- ing unarranged articulations, must keep its perceptives active enough to recognize the least easily caught sounds. And as, if the concussions recur in a definite order, the body may husband its forces by adjusting the resistance needful for each concussion, so, if the syllables be rhythmically arranged, the mind may econ- omize its energies by anticipating the attention required for each syllable. Far-fetched though this idea will perhaps be thought, a little introspection will countenance it. That we do take advantage of metrical language to adjust our per- ceptive faculties to the force of the expected articula- tions, is clear from the fact that we are balked by halt- ing versification. Much as at the bottom of a flight of stairs, a step more or less than we counted upon gives us a shock, so, too, does a misplaced accent or a super- numerary syllable. In the one case, we know that there is an erroneous preadjustment; and we can scarcely doubt that there is one in the other. Butif we habitually preadjust our perceptions to the measured movement of verse, the physical analogy above given renders it prob- able that by so doing’ we economize attention; and 36 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. hence that metrical language is more effective than prose, because it enables us to do this. Were there space, it might be worth while to inquire whether the pleasure we take in rhyme, and also that which we take in euphony, are not partly ascribable to the same general cause. PART IT. Causes of Force in Language which Depend upon Hcon- omy of the Mental Sensibilities, A FEw paragraphs only can be devoted to a second division of our subject that here presents itself. To pursue in detail the laws of effect, as applying to the larger features of composition, would carry us beyond our limits. But we may briefly indicate a further as- pect of the general principle hitherto traced out, and hint a few of its wider applications. Thus far, then, we have considered only those causes of force in language which depend upon economy of the mental energies: we have now to glance at those which flepend upon economy of the mental sensibilities. Ques- tionable though this division may be as a psychological pne, it will yet serve roughly to indicate the remaining field of investigation. It will suggest that besides con- sidering the extent to which any faculty or group of faculties is tasked in receiving a form of words and re- alizing its contained idea, we have to consider the state in which this faculty or group of faculties is left; and how the reception of subsequent sentences and images will be influenced by that state. Without going at length into so wide a topic as the exercise of faculties THH PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 37 and its reactive effects, it will be sufficient here to call to mind that every faculty (when in a state of normal activity) is most capable at the outset; and that the change in its condition, which ends in what we term exhaustion, begins simultaneously with its exercise. This generalization, with which we are all familiar in our bodily experiences, and which our daily language recognizes as true of the mind as a whole, is equally true of each mental power, from the simplest of the senses to the most complex of the sentiments. If we hold a flower to the nose for long, we become insensible to its scent. We say of a very brilliant flash of light- ning that it blinds us; which means that our eyes have for a time lost their ability to appreciate light. After eating a quantity of honey, we are apt to think our tea is without sugar. The phrase ‘‘a deafening roar,” im- plies that men find a very loud sound temporarily inca- pacitates them for hearing faint ones. Toahand which has for some time carried a heavy body, small bodies afterwards lifted seem to have lost their weight. Now, the truth at once recognized in these, its extreme mani- festations, may be traced throughout. It may beshown that alike in the reflective faculties, in the imagination, in the perceptions of the beautiful, the ludicrous, the sublime, in the sentiments, the instincts, in all the men tal powers, however we may classify them—action ex- hausts; and that in proportion as the action is violent, the subsequent prostration is great. Equally, throughout the whole nature, may be traced the law that exercised faculties are ever tending to re- sume their original state. Not only after continued rest do they regain their full power—not only do brief cessations partially reinvigorate them; but even while they are in action, the resulting exhaustion isever being 38 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. neutralized. The two processes of waste and repair go on together. Hence with faculties habitually exercised —as the senses of all persons, or the muscles of any one who is strong—it happens that, during moderate activ- ity, the repair is so nearly equal to the waste, that the diminution of power is scarcely appreciable; and it is only when the activity has been long continued, or has been very violent, that the repair becomes so far in ar- rear of the waste as to produce a perceptible prostra- tion. In all cases, however, when, by the action of a faculty, waste has been incurred, some lapse of time must take place before full efficiency can be reacquired; and this time must be long in proportion as the waste has been great. Keeping in mind these general truths, we shall be in a condition to understand certain causes of effect in composition now to be considered. Every perception received, and every conception realized, entailing some amount of waste—or, as Liebig would say, some change of matter in the brain—and the efficiency of the facul- ties subject to this waste being thereby temporarily, though often but momentarily, diminished, the re- sulting partial inability must affect the acts of perception and conception that immediately suc- ceed. And hence we may expect that the vividness with which images are realized will, in many cases, de- pend on the order of their presentation: even when one order is as convenient to the understanding as the other. There are sundry facts which alike illustrate this, and are explained by it. Climax is one of them. The marked effect obtained by placing last the most striking of any series of images, and the weakness—often the lu- dicrous weakness—produced by reversing this arrange- THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 39 ment, depends on the general Jaw indicated. As imme- diately after looking at the sun we cannot perceive the light of a fire, while by looking at the fire first and the sun afterwards we can perceive both, so, after receiv- a brilliant, or weighty, or terrible thought, we cannot ap- preciate a less brilliant, less weighty, or less terrible one, while, by reversing the order, we can appreciate each. In Antithesis, again, we may recognize the same gener- al truth. The opposition of two thoughts that are the reverse of each other in some prominent trait, insures an impressive effect; and does this by giving a momen- tary relaxation to the faculties addressed. lf, after a series of images of an ordinary character, appealing in a moderate degree to the sentiment of reverence, or ap- probation, or beauty, the mind has presented to it a very insignificant, a very unworthy, or a very ugly im- age, the faculty of reverence, or approbation, or beauty, as the case may be, having for the time nothing to do, tends to resume its full power, and will immediately afterwards appreciate a vast, admirable, or beautiful image better than it would otherwise do. Conversely, where the idea of absurdity due to extreme insignifi- cance is to be produced, it may be greatiy intensified by placing it after something highly impressive: espe- cially if the form of phrase implies that something still more impressive is coming. A good illustration of the effect gained by thus presenting a petty idea to a con- sciousness that has not yet recovered from the shock of an exciting one, occurs in a sketch by Balzac. Hi. hero writes to a mistress who has cooled towards him the following letter: **Madame—Votre conduite m’étonne autant qu'elle m’‘afflige. Non contente de me déchirer le coeur par vos dédains, vous avez l'indélicatesse de me retenir une brosse 4 dents, que Mes moyens 40 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. ne me permettent pas de remplacer, mes propri¢tés étant grevées d’hypothéques. ** Adieu, trop belle et trop ingrate amie! Puissionsnous nous revoir dans un monde meilleur! ‘* CHARLES-EDOUARD.”* Thus we see that the phenomena of Climax, Antithe- sis, and Anticlimax, alike result from this general prin- ciple. Improbable as these momentary variations in susceptibility may seem, we cannot doubt their occur- rence when we contemplate the analogous variations in the susceptibility of the senses. Referring once more to phenomena of vision, every one knows that a patch of black on a white ground looks blacker, and a patch of white on a black ground looks whiter, than else- where. As the blackness and the whiteness must really be the same, the only assignable cause for this is a dif- ference in their actions upon us, dependent upon the different states of our faculties. It is simply a visual antithesis. But this extension of the general principle of economy —this further condition to effective composition, that the sensitiveness of the faculties must be continuously husbanded—includes much more than has been yet hinted. It implies not only that certain arrangements and certain juxtapositions of connected ideas are best; but that some modes of dividing and presenting a sub- ject will be more striking than others; and that, too, ir- respective of its logical cohesion. It shows why we must progress from the less interesting to the more in- teresting; and why not only the composition as a whole, but each of its successive portions, should tend towards a climax. At the same time, it forbids long continuity of the same kind of thought, or repeated production of like effects. It warns us against the error committed THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 44 both by Pope in his poems and by Bacon in his essays —the error, namely, of constantly employing forcible forms of expression: and it points out that as the easiest posture by-and-by becomes fatiguing, and is with pleas- ure exchanged for one less easy, so the most perfectly constructed sentences will soon weary, and relief will be given by using those of an inferior kind. Further, we may infer from it not only that should we avoid generally combining our words in one man- ner, however good, or working out our figures and illus- trations in one way, however telling; but that we should avoid anything like uniform adherence, even to the wider conditions of effect. We should not make every section of our subject progress in interest; we should not always rise to a climax. As we saw that, in single sentences, it is but rarely allowable to fulfil all the con- ditions to strength, so in the larger sections of a com- position we must not often conform entirely to the law indicated. We must subordinate the component effect to the total effect. In deciding how practically to carry out the principles of artistic composition, we may derive help by bearing in mind a fact already pointed out—the fitness of cer- tain verbal arrangements for certain kinds of thought. That constant variety in the mode of presenting ideas which the theory demands, will in a great degree result from a skilful adaptation of the form to the matter. We saw how the direct or inverted sentence is spon- taneously used by excited people; and how their lan- guage is also characterized by figures of speech and by extreme brevity. Hence these may with advantage pre- dominate in emotional passages, and may increase as the emotion rises. On the other hand, for complex ideas, the indirect sentence seems the best vehicle. In 42 THE HLZEVIR LIBRARY. conversation, the excitement produced by the near ap- proach to a desired conclusion, will often show itself in a series of short, sharp sentences; while, in impressing a view already enunciated, we generally make our periods voluminous: by piling thought upon thought. These natural modes of procedure may serve as guides in writing. Keen observation and skilful analysis would, in like manner, detect further peculiarities of expression produced by other attitudes of mind; and by paying due attention to all such traits, a writer pos- sessed of sufficient versatility might make some approach to a completely organized work. - This species of composition which the law of effect points out as the perfect one, is the one which high genius tends naturally to produce, As we found that the kinds of sentences which are theoretically best, are those generally employed by superior minds, and by inferior minds when excitement has raised them, so we shall find that the ideal form for a poem, essay, or fic- tion, is that which the ideal writer would evolve spon- taneously. One in whom the powers of expression fully responded to the state of feeling, wou'd unconsciously use that variety in the mode of presenting his thoughts which Art demands. This constant employment of one species of phraseology, which all have now to strive against, implies an undeveloped faculty of language. To have a specific style is to be poor in speech. If we remember that, in the far past, men had only nouns and verbs to convey their ideas with, and that from then to now the growth has been towards a greater number of implements of thought, and consequently towards a greater complexity and variety in their combinations, we may infer that we are now, in our use of sentences, much what the primitive man was in his use of words, THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. 48 and that a continuance of the process that has hitherto gone on must produce increasing heterogencity in our modes of expression. As now, in a fine nature, the play of the features, the tones of the voice and its cadences, vary in harmony with every thought uttered, so in one possessed of a fully developed power of specch, the mould in which each combination of words is cast will similarly vary with and be appropriate to the senti- ment, That a perfectly endowed man must unconsciously write in all styles, we may infer from considering how styles originate. Why is Johnson pompous, Goldsmith simple? Why is one author abrupt, another rhythmi- cal, another concise? Evidently in each case the habit- ual mode of utterance must depend upon the habitual balance of the nature. The predominant feelings lave by use trained the intellect to represent them. But while long, though unconscious, discipline has made it do this efficiently, it remains, from lack of practice, in- capable of doing the same for the less active feclings; and when these are excited, the usual verbal forms un- dergo but slight modifications, Let the powers of speech be fully developed, however—let the ability of the in- tellect to utter the emotions be complete, and this fixity of style will disappear. The perfect writer will express himself as Junius, when in the Junius frame of mind; when he feels as Lamb felt, wilk use a like familiar speech; and will fall into the ruggedness of Carlyle when in a Carlylean mood, Now he will be rhythmical and now irregular; here his language will be plain and there ornate; sometimes his sentences will be balaneed and at other times unsymmetrical; for a while there will be considerable sameness, and then again great varicty. His mode of expression naturally responding to his Ae THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. state of feeling, there will flow from his pen a compo- sition changing to the same degree that the aspects of his subject change. He will thus without effort con- form to what we have seen to be the laws of effect. And while his work presents to the reader that variety needful to prevent continuous exertion of the same faculties, it will also answer to the description of all highly organized products, both of man and of nature: it will be not a series of like parts simply placed in jux- taposition, but one whole made up of unlike parts that are mutually dependent, THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA. ON THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA MINOR— PHRYGIA, LYDIA, LYCIA, THE TROAS. AmoneG the nations which claimed to have existed from the remotest times, and which even ventured to dispute the palm of antiquity with Egypt, it is some- what surprising to find the small and not very distin- guished state of Phrygia. Phrygia was an inland tract, occupying the central portion of Asia Minor, which is an elevated plateau, bounded north and south by mountain-chains, and intersected here and there by rocky ridges. From what date the Phrygian people had really been settled in this region is exceedingly uncertain, They had congeners in Thrace, and were believed by some to have immigrated from Europe into Asia within historical memory. But it is doubt- ful, on the whole, whether this migration has any solid grounds to rest upon; and quite certain that, if a fact, it must be one belonging to very remote times, long anterior to the dawn of history. The interior of Asia Minor is known as Phrygia to Homer, and no hint is given by him of its inhabitants being newly come into the region. Priam had in his youth helped them when they were attacked by the Amazons, and speaks of them as if they were then (about B.c. 1300) the most powerful people of the Peninsula. Their own 4 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. traditions appear to have made them aztochthones, or aboriginals; and it would seem that they believed the repeopling of the earth after the flood to have begun in their country. Of course no great stress can be laid on such a tradition; but it is incompatible with any knowledge on their part of being recent immigrants into their territory. The civilization of the Phrygians was not of a high order. They were better known in the remoter times for their warlike qualities than for any progress which they had made in the useful or ornamental arts. Ho- mer celebrates their martial ardor, and the skill with which they managed their chariots, but says nothing of their occupations in peace, Other writers note their proficiency in boxing. As time went on, however, they developed a civilization, the impulse toward which may have been given from without, but which had features that were peculiar. They sculptured rock- tombs unlike any found elsewhere, and adorned them with an elegant patterning, accompanied by inscrip- tions. They invented a musical style of a stirring and martial character, which was adopted as one of their main styles by the’Greeks. They applied themselves, if we may believe Diodorus, to nautical matters, and for the space of twenty-five years held the command of the Mediterranean Sea. One of their tribes distin- guished itself in metallurgy, and from their wonderful skill acquired the reputation of being magicians. In connection with their music they composed odes and hymns, which they used in their religious services, and which must have had considerable merit, if they really ‘stimulated the development of lyric and elegiac com- position” among the Greeks of Asia. It will scarcely be argued at the present day that THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA. 5 Phrygian civilization began at a very early date. We cannot really trace the nation further back than about B.c. 1300, for their name is absent from the Bible, and from the early cuneiform and hieroglyphical inscrip- tions. Homer is the most ancient authority of their existence; and Homer, as above remarked, represents them as a warlike but scarcely as a civilized people. Their written characters are evidently derived from the Phenician, and were probably communicated to them at the time of their naval supremacy, or about B.c. 900-875. Their rock-sculptures are most likely later than this. The kind Midas, whose tomb and inscrip- tion still remain at Doganlu, near the ancient Coty- geum, is probably the monarch of the name whom Eusebius made a contemporary of Hezekiah (B.c. 726- 697). He is, perhaps, the same with the Midas whom Herodotus mentions as the first foreigner to send offerings to Delphi; and he possibly may be the Mita whom Sargon speaks of as one of his West-Asian antagonists. It is not clear that a Phrygian monarchy had existed very long before this. In the Homeric times no king is mentioned; and the traditional Gor- dias, the founder of the kingdom, if he be a real personage, may have been the father of this Midas, and have ascended the throne about B.c. 750.. The most flourishing period of Phrygia must be placed between B.C. 750 and zB.c. 565. For centuries anterior to B.c, 750 it had been an important military power—probably the chief power of Asia Minor; but we have no evi- dence of its condition at this period, and cannot say whether it was civilized or barbarous. The history of Lydia is carried back by ancient writers very consideraply beyond that of Phrygia. According to Herodotus, the country had been ruled : 6 THH ELZHVIR LIBRARY. by three dynasties in succession before its conquest by Cyrus (B.C. 554)—the first of them sprung from a certain Lydus, son of Atys; the next descended from the Grecian Hercules, and known_as Heracleids; the third descended from Gyges, son of Dascylus, and known as Mermnads. To the Mermnad dynasty he assigned 170 years; to the Heracleids 505 years; to the dynasty which preceded the Heracleids he could assign no definite duration—their origin was lost in the mists of antiquity, falling into the remote period when history melts into fable and legend. A settled monarchy had thus, according to the belief of Herodotus, existed in Lydia from a date at least as early as B.c. 1400; for we can scarcely allow to his first dynasty a less period than two centuries. The views of Herodotus are borne out to a certain extent by notices in other writers. Dio- dorus said that the Lydians had held the command of the Mediterranean for ninety-two years—from B.c. 1182 to s.c. 1090. Xanthus, the Lydian, who wrote the history of his native country in Greek during the life- time of Herodotus, appears by his fragments to have recognized the three dynasties of that writer, and to have claimed for the Lydian kingdom at least as high an antiquity. Homer does not throw much light on the subject. He does not use the name of ‘‘ Lydians” nt all; but it is generally agreed that the Méones, vhom he brings from Mount Tmolus to the assistance of Priam, represent the Lydian people. It has commonly been allowed that Herodotus’s third, or Mermnad, dynasty is historical. Gyges, its first monarch, was contemporary with the Greek poet Archilochus, who mentioned him in his writings. He sent magnificent offerings to Delphi, which were seen by Herodotus, and which the priests called ‘‘ Gygian.” “~) THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA. " Recently his name has been found in the inscriptions of the contemporary Assyrian monarch, Sardanapalus, who says that Gyges sent him presents, and accepted for a time the position of an Assyrian tributary. There is thus no shadow of doubt that a powerful and civilized monarchy was established on the west coast of Asia Minor at least as early as the beginning of the seventh century. With regard to the second, or Heracleid, dynasty, there is more doubt. That a family distinct from that of the Mermnads ruled in Lydia before the accession of Gyges may be pronounced certain; and the continuous list of six kings, preserved by Nicolas of Damascus and taken by him most probably from Xanthus, seems to deserve acceptance as historical. But beyond this all is uncertain. We do not know what authority the Lydian informants of Herodotus had for their state- ment that the second dynasty contained twenty-two kings in a direct line, whose reigns conjointly made up the number of 505 years. The statement itself is exceedingly improbable; and it seems on the whole unlikely that the Lydians of the fifth century B.c. were in possession of authentic records and of an exact chronology reaching back between 700 and 800 years. Their estimate can scarcely have been anything better than a rough guess at the time that the (so-called) Heracleid dynasty had lasted. It may easily have been something worse. It may have been an attempt to support by an apparant synchronism the idea of a con- nection between the royal houses of Assyria and Lydia, dating from the thirteenth century B.c., which some of the Lydians seem clearly to have asserted. But this supposed connection is probably a pure fiction, the offspring of national vanity, without any foundation in g THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. fact. Ifthe chronology was really invented to bolster up this figment, it does not deserve a moment’s con- sideration, but may be consigned at once to oblivion. As for the first Herodotean dynasty, its non-histori- eal character has been almost universally admitted. The kings assigned to it are clearly mythical person- ages, belonging, not to the nation’s history, but to its Pantheon. Manes is the heros eponymus of the Méo- nes, or Meones, Atys and Cotys are gods; Lydus and Asies are again eponymous heroes; Meles is an ideal founder of the capital. History begins at the earliest with the Heracleids; but scarcely with Agron, who is not more real than Brute the Trojan, or than Hengist and Horsa, sons of Witgils, and great-grandsons of Odin. We cannot trace the Heracleids further back than about B.c. 850; the dynasty may have commenced some centuries earlier, but we really know nothing of Lydia before the ninth century. From this time, however, if not even earlier, the Lydians appear to have been civilized. The wealth which Gyges boasted descended to him from the Herac- leid kings, who doubtless washed the sands of Pacto- lus, and worked the mines of Tmolus for many genera- tions. Commercial activity must have commenced and have made much progress under their sway, if, as seems tolerably certain, the invention of coined money was made by the Lydians during the time of their sovereignty. This invention implies a high degree of mercantile intelligence, and can scarcely have been made until commercial transactions with foreign na- tions had become both numerous and intricate. He- rodotus tells us that the Lydians, as far as he knew, were the first to engage in retail trade as a profession; and among the nations of Western Asia they were THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA, 9 noted for industry, for mental activity, and for a readiness to hold intercourse with foreign countries. They were skilled in music, and originated a style of their own, which the Greeks regarded as soft and effeminate. They claimed to have invented a variety of games at a very remote period. They were ship- builders, and did not shrink from the perils of long voyages. In glyptic art their early coins show them to have made some progress, for the animal forms upon these coins have considerable merit. They were well acquainted with the art of squaring and polishing hard stone and marble. If the rock-sculptures existing in their country are to be ascribed to them, we must give them credit for some grandeur of conception, as well as for a power of executing such works under difficultics. A grandeur of conception is also evidenced by the most remarkable of all the Lydian works which are still extant. The barrow or tumulus is a somewhat rude and common construction, requiring no great mechanical skill, and possessing little impressiveness, unless it is of vast size. The Lydians having adopted this simple form, which appears also in the neighboring Troad, for the tombs of their kings, gave dignity and majesty to their works by the scale on which they con- structed them. The Jargest of them all, the famous “tomb of Alyattes,” Herodotus compares with the monuments of Egypt and Babylon. It was a conical mound, above a thousand feet in diameter, emplaced upon a basement of hewn stone, and crowned with five stele, or pillars, bearing inscriptions. It.covered more space than the great Pyramid, but can scarcely have had so great an elevation. In its centre it contained a sepulchral chamber, eleven feet Jong, eight broad, and 10 THH ELZEVIR LIBRARY. seven high, formed of large blocks of white marble highly polished. It stood on the snmmit of a range of limestone hills which skirts the valley of the Hermus on the north, and is still ‘‘a conspicuous object on all sides,” Herodotus speaks as if this tumulus had in his day stood alone. It is scarcely possible, however, that this was really so. The monument stands now in the midst of a necropolis of similar tombs, all of which are seemingly of at least equal antiquity. Modern travel- lers have counted more than sixty of these tumuli; and among them are three or four but little inferior in size to the ‘‘tomb of Alyattes.” These are, in all proba- bility, the tombs of other (previous) Lydian kings, whose works Alyattes determined to outdo when he raised his great sepulchre. The size and number of the tumuli render this Lydian necropolis a most impres- sive sight. ‘‘It is impossible,” says Mr. Hamilton, a traveller rarely moved to admiration, ‘‘to look upon this collection of gigantic mounds, three of which are distinguished by their superior size, without being struck with the power and enterprise of the people by. whom they were erected, and without admiring the energies of the nation who endeavored to preserve the memories of their kings and ancestors by means of such rude and lasting monuments.” Lydian civilization belongs, then (so far as appears), to the three centuries commencing B.c. 850, and termi- nating B.c. 550. Like Phrygian civilization, it was (apparently) of home growth, only very slightly affected by the influence of Egypt, or of Assyria, or even of Phenicia. The chief mark which is left behind was the invention of coined money, whereby it gave an impetus to trade and commerce that can scarcely be too THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA. 11 highly appreciated. In other respects it was not a civilization of a high order. It did not affect literature, or science, or even art, otherwise than slightly. It probably, however, had some refining and softening influence on social intercourse and manners. Though the character of the Lydians for luxury and effeminacy belongs especially to later times, to the period when they had become subjects of the Persian or Macedonian monarchy, yet we may trace, under the independent kingdom, the germs of this soft temper. Anacreon, who lived at the time of the Persian conquest, and can scarcely have lived Jong enough to note a change of character produced by subjection, pointedly remarked upon it. It was alluded to by Sappho, his earlier contemporary. Herodotus, in his story of Gyges, in his account of Lydian manners during the reign of Alyattes, and in his description of the court of Croesus, implies it. Lydia must have played an important part in polishing and humanizing the Greeks, to whom they were for a century and a half the main representatives of Asiatic civilization. In the south-western corner of Asia Minor we have traces of a third civilization, which, though somewhat later than the two that we have been considering, is so united to them by locality, and so near to them in respect of time, as to render its conjunction with them in this review of early civilizations natural, if not necessary. Lycia extended along the southern coast of the peninsula from long. 28° 40’ to 30° 40’, comprising the fertile valleys of the Calbis and Xanthus, together with a large quantity of picturesque mountain country. It was inhabited by various warlike tribes, who main- tained their independence down to the time when Cyrus, having conquered Croesus (B.c. 554), com- 12 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. manded his general, Harpagus, to complete the subju- gation of Asia Minor. Harpagus reduced the Lycians after encountering a desperate resistance, and ap- parently received as his reward the satrapy, or rather sub-satrapy, of Lycia, which continued to be held by his descendants for eighty or a hundred years as a hereditary fief. During this period we find a style of architecture and of glyptic art existing in the country, which is very surprising. The Lycians either carve themselves sepulchral chambers out of the solid rock, or build themselves tombs of large masses of squared stone, in each case fashioning their sepulchres after the form of either a temple or a house, and adorning them with bas-reliefs, which approach nearly to the excel- lence of the best Greek art. These early Lycian sculp- tures furnish*a most curious problem. They are so Greek in character as to suggest strongly the idea of Greek influence. But they are accompanied by Lycian inscriptions, and they belong apparently to a time when Persia, and not Greece, was mistress of the territory. The question arises, Did art make the leap from the sculptures of Assyria to those of Lycia in Asta, without the help of the Greeks? and was Greece indebted to Lycia for the great bulk of those high qualities which are usually regarded as exclusively characterizing the artistic productions of Hella? If so, the Lycians deserve to stand on a pedestal among the Asiatic nations, and to be regarded as constituting a most im- portant link in the long series whereby the torch of knowledge has been handed on from age to age, and the gains made in early times by primitive Asiatic races have become the heritage of Europe and the common possession of modern civilized nations. Nor are the Lycian sculptures important only as e THH CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA. 18 indicating the high artistic excellence to which the nation had attained. They showed in the details of dress and furniture an advanced state of upholstery and of textile industry, which we should certainly not have expected to find among a people so little known and so seldom mentioned by ancient writers. We must conclude from the reliefs assigned to the middle of the sixth century B.c. that the Lycians were already, at the time of the Persian conquest, on a par with any other Asiatic nation, in the comforts and luxuries of life, while they excelled all other Asiatics in artistic merit and genius. It is in accordance with the general idea which we thus obtain of Lycian civilization, to find that the position of women in Lycia was much higher than that usually assigned to the weaker sex by the Orientals. Citizenship and nobility were transmitted in Lycia by the female line; and men, in tracing their genealogies, gave the list of their female and not of their male ancestors. Moreover, the Lycian sculptors freely ex- hibited the forms of women in their bas-reliefs, repre- senting them as unveiled before men, and as present with them at banquets. Herodotus, in close agreement With the monuments, notes this fact of the Caunians, who are proved by the inscriptions of their country to have been a mere branch of the Lycian people. The three civilizations of which we have hitherto treated in this chapter belong most probably to the ‘space between B.c. 850 and B.c. 450. If they ascend any higher, it is impossible, for want of records, to trace them. We may, however, gather from Homer, and from certain modern researches, that in the north- western corner of the Peninsula a civilization of a some- what low type was established on the banks of the 14 THE ELZEHEVIR LIBRARY. Scamander some four or five centuries earlier. Whether Dr. Schliemann’s discoveries are to be re. garded as having brought to light the veritable city whereof Homer sang or no, at any rate they prove the existence of metallurgic and ceramic skill, and of a certain amount of ingenuity and taste in ornament ata very remote date, prior to the introduction of letters, and while flint and stone instruments were still em- ployed, to a large extent, in the district where Troy must have stood—the broad plain bounded by hills, which is watered by the two streams of the Scamander and the Simois. If not the actual relics of the city of Priam, they indicate probably what the relics of that city would be if we were to find them, and what the character of its civilization was. We cannot agree with Dr. Schliemann that his discoveries reveal ‘‘a great civilization and a great taste for art.” What we find is a knowledge of metallurgy sufficient to produce cups, vases, ornaments, and implements, some of which are cast, some wrought by the hammer, some brought into their actual shape by a fusing together of their pieces; an acquaintance with the method of hardening copper by uniting it with an alloy of tin; a power of producing terra-cotta jars of a good quality, and as much as two feet in height; a tolerable taste in personal ornament, especially shown in female head-dresges, in bracelets, and in ear-rings; a fair skill in masonry; and a very moderate power of imitating animal forms. On the other hand, we note in the entire series of remains a general clumsiness of shape, and a style of ornamen- tation which is rude, coarse, and childish. In no re- mains of antiquity have we seen less elegance than in the thirty-two pages of ‘‘ whorls” with which Dr. Schliemann’s work closes. The patterning, where it is ~—s THE OIVILIZATIONS OF ASTA. 15 imitative at all, imitates animals as children do—with dots for heads, and lines for ears, body, tail, aud legs; where it is merely conventional, it is clumsy, irregular, and without beauty. The vases, cups, etc., are some- what better. Occasionaily the shapes are moderately good, but the great mass are either grotesque or clumsy. In the ornaments alone is there any approach to artistic excellence, and even these fail to justify the raptures into which they throw the discoverer. It is not unlikely that a civilization of the character revealed to us by Dr. Schliemann’s researches at Hissar- lik was spread widely over Asia Minor in times anterior to the Lydian, Phrygian, and Lycian developments, There are various remains of very primitive art in the country, which are still unclassified, and which may be- long to this early period. It isa marked characteristic of the art that it is of native growth, not the result of Baby- lonian, or Assyrian, or Egyptian, or Pheenician influ- ence. It is, in fact, Aryan art, and the civilization which it accompanies and indicates is Aryan civiliza- tion. That civilization is characterized by imagination and progressiveness in religion, by a tendency toward freedom in politics, by an elevated estimate of woman, by a general activity and industry, and by a high ap- preciation of art, a constant inventiveness, and a straining after ideal perfection. It was only in Euro- pean communities that these tendencies fully worked themselves out; but their germs may be seen in these early Asiatic efforts, when the Aryan race, in its in- fancy, was trying its powers, 16 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. ON THE CIVILIZATIONS OF CENTRAL ASIA—ASSYRIA, MEDIA AND PERSIA, INDIA. While the Aryan civilizations, described in the last chapter, were developing themselves peacefully side by side, in the extreme west of the Asiatic continent, the region which juts out toward Europe, and is known by the name of Asia Minor, the more central portion of the Continent—the Mesopotamian Plain, the great Tranic Plateau, and the Peninsula of Hindostan—was the scene of a struggle, not always peaceful, between three other types of human progress and advancement, which in those parts contended for the mastery. Two of these were, like the West-Asian civilizations, Aryan, while one, the Assyrian, was of an entirely different character. It is this last to which we propose to give the foremost place in the present chapter, not that we should assign it a priority of beginning over the other two, but inasmuch as it reached earliest its full de- velopment, and so belongs, on the whole, to a more remote period in the world’s history. The Assyrian empire is regarded by some writers as having commenced above 2000 years B.c. Ctesias de- clared that a thousand years before the Trojan War a great chief, Ninus, had founded Nineveh, had estab- lished his dominion from the shores of the Mgean to the sources of the Upper Oxus, and had left his throne to his descendants, who held it through thirty genera- tions for above thirteen centuries. The date of Ctcsias for the Trojan War was probably about B.c. 1200-1190; so that he must have meant to place the commencement of the Assyrian power about B.c. 2200. This view was long followed by writers on ancient history, by whom THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASTA. 17 the authovity of Ctesias, who passed seventeen years at the Court of Susa and had access to the Persian ar- chives, was regarded as paramount. ‘There have been, however, at all times historians to whom the Assyrian chronology of Ctesias has seemed extravagant and un- real, who have thought little of his authority, and have lowered his date for the establishment of the Assyrian empire by nine hundred or a thousand years. State- ments in Herodotus and in Berosus could be adduced in favor of the more moderate computation; and it ac- corded better than that of Ctesias with the scattered notices contained in the Hebrew Scriptures. Thus, the shorter chronology has at all times held its ground against the longer one; and having approved itself to such writers as Volney, Heeren, B. G. Niebuhr, and Brandis, has in the present century been the view most generally accepted by historical critics. The question, however, might have remained an open one for all time, either side of it being arguable, and the balance of probability appearing to different minds to incline differently, had not the discovery and de- cipherment of the cuneiform records come in to deter- mine it. By their aid the connected histories of As- syria and Babylonia can now be traced back continu- ously, and with a chronology that, if not exact, is at least approximate, to the middle of the fifteenth cen- tury B.c. It is now made clear that, so far from there having been at this date a vast Assyrian empire, which for seven hundred and fifty years had ruled over all Asia, from the Mediterranean and Agean to the banks of the Oxus and the Indus, Assyria was really, in B.c. 1500 - 1400, a weak state, confined within narrow boundaries, and only just emerging from Babylonian tutelage, its earlier rulers having been called pates?, or 18 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. ‘viceroys,” and its monarchs at this period having only just begun to assume the grander and more dignified title of ‘‘kings of countries.” The Assyrian empire does not commence til] a century and a half later, B.c. 1800, when Tiglathi-Nin (perhaps the Ninus of the Greeks) took Babylon, and established the predomi- nance of Assyria over Lower as well as Upper Mesopo- tamia. We cannot date much earlier than this the commencement of that peculiar form of Semitic civili- zation which is associated with the idea of Assyria, partly from the accounts of ancient writers, but mainly from the recovered treasures of art and literature which line the walls and load the shelves of our museums. The civilization of the Assyrians was material rather than spiritual. Its main triumphs were in architec- ture, in glyptic and plastic art, in metallurgy, gem- cutting, and manufactures, not in philosophy, or lit- erature, or science, properly so called. According to some, its architecture went to the extent of producing edifices of a magnificence scarcely exceeded by the grandest buildings of any age or country—edifices four or five stories in height, of varied outline, richly adorned from base to summit, and commandingly placed on lofty platforms of a solid and massive char- acter. The restorations of Mr. Fergusson, adopted by Mr. Layard, present to the eye Assyrian facades whose grandeur is undeniable, while, if the style and luxu- riance of their ornamentation are somewhat barbaric, yet the entire effect is beyond question splendid, strik- ing, admirable. If these representations are truthful, if they really reproduce the ancient edifices, or even convey a correct impression of their general character, we must pronounce the Assyrian architecture to have attained results which the best architects of the present THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASTA, 19 day could not easily outdo. Even if we hesitate to accept as ascertained fact conclusions which are in reality the ingenious conjectures of a fertile imagina- tion, we must still allow that the actual remains suffi- ciently indicate a grandeur of conception and plan, an appreciation of the fine effect of massiveness, and a variety and richness in ornament, which go far to show that the Assyrians were really great as builders, though it may be impossible, with such data as we possess, to Testore or reconstruct their edifices, If the remains of Assyrian architecture are such as to preclude an evact estimate of the merit to which the Assyrians are entitled as builders, with respect to their glyptic art it is quite otherwise. Here the remains are ample, and, indeed, superabundant. The museums of London, Paris, and Berlin contain the spoils of the great Mesopotamian cities in such profusion that no one acquainted with them can lack the means of form- ing a decided opinion upon the artistic power of the people. Even such as are without the leisure or the opportunity of visiting these rich depositories and seeing the sculptures for themselves may form a very tolerable judgment of them from the excellent works which have been published on the subject, as especially those of Mr. Layard and M. Botta. The author of the present work has also done his best to assist the public in form- ing correct views by placing before them the main features of Assyrian art in a condensed form in his ‘‘Monarchy of Assyria.” Mr. Vaux, in his ‘‘ Nineveh and Persepolis,” and various writers in the ‘‘ Dictionary of the Bible” and the ‘‘ Bible Educator,” have worked in the same direction; and the result is a very wide ac- quaintance with the products of Assyrian artists, if not a very exact critical appreciation of their merits, 20 THE HLZEVIR LIBRARY. It may perhaps be allowed to the present writer tu insert here, instead of a new criticism, the estimate which he formed of Assyrian glyptic art fifteen years ago, when fresh from a five years’ study of the subject. ‘In the Assyrian sculpture it is the actual,” he said, “the historically true, which the artist strives to repre- sent. Unless in the case of a few mythic figures con- nected with the religion of the country, there is noth- ing in the Assyrian bas-reliefs which is not imitated from nature. The imitation is always laborious, and often most accurate and exact. The laws of represen- tation, as we understand them, are sometimes departed from; but it is always to impress the spectator with ideas in accordance with truth. Thus the colossal buils and lions have five legs, but in order that they may be seen from every point of view with four; the ladders are placed edgeways against the walls of besieged towns, but it is to show that they are ladders, and not mere poles; walls of cities are made disproportionately small, but it is done, like Raphael’s boat, to bring them within the picture, which would otherwise be a less complete representation of the actual fact. The careful finish, the minute detail, the elaboration of every hair in a beard, and every stitch in the embroidery of a dress, reminds us of the Dutch school of painting, and illus- trates strongly the spirit of faithfulness and honesty which pervades the sculptures and gives them so great a portion of their value. In conception, in grace, in freedom and correctness of outline, they fall undoubt- edly far behind the inimitable productions of the Greeks; but they have a grandeur, a dignity, a boldness, a strength and an appearance of life which render them even intrinsically valuable as works of art; and considering the time at which they were produced, THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA. 21 must excite our surprise and admiration. Art, so far as we know, had existed previously only in the stiff and lifeless conventionalism of the Egyptians. It be- longed to Assyria to confine the conventional to relig- ion, and to apply art to the vivid representations of the highest scenes of human life. War in all its forms— the march, the battle, the pursuit, the siege of towns, the passage of rivers and marshes, the submission and treatment of captives—and the ‘‘mimic war” of hunt- ing, the chase of the lion, the stag, the antelope, the wild bull, and the wild ass—are the chief subjects treated by the Assyrian sculptors; and in these the con- ventional is discarded; freshscenes, new groupings, bold and strange attitudes perpetually appear; and in the animal representations especially there is a continual advance, the latest being the most spirited, the most varied, and the most true to nature, though perhaps lacking somewhat of the majesty and grandeur of the earlier. With no attempt to idealize or go beyond na- ture, there is a growing power of depicting things as they are—an increased grace and delicacy of execution, showing that Assyrian art was progressive, not sta- tionary, and giving a promise of still higher excellence, had circumstances permitted its development.” To their merit as sculptors and architects, the Assyr- ians added an excellent taste in the modelling of vases, jars, and drinking-cups, a clever and refined metallurgy, involving methods which, till revealed by their remains, were unknown to the moderns, a delicacy in the carv- ing of ivory and mother-of-pearl, a skill in gem-engrav- ing, glass-blowivg and coloring, brick-enamelling, fur- niture-making, and robe-embroidering, which place them beyond question among the most advanced and elegant of Oriental peoples, and show that, from a 22 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. material point of view, their civilization did not fall very greatly behind that of the Greeks. Combined with this progress in luxury and refinement, and this high perfection of the principal arts that embellish and beautify life, their sculptures and their records reveal much which revolts and disgusts—savage punishments, brutalizing war customs, a debasing religion, a crucl treatment of prisoners, a contempt for women, a puerile and degrading superstitiousness—teaching the lesson, which the present age would do well to lay seriously to heart, that material progress, skill in manufactures and in arts, even refined taste and real artistic excellence, are no sure indications of that civilization which is alone of real value, the civilization of the heart, a con- dition involving not merely polished manners, but gen- tleness, tenderness, self-restraint, purity, elevation of mind and soul, devotion of the thoughts and life to better things than comfort or luxury, or the cultivation of the esthetic faculties. Tranic civilization, or that of the Medes, the Persians, and (perhaps we should add) the Bactrians, is supposed by some moderns to have originated as early as B.c. 3784. Others assigned to it the comparatively moderate date of B.c. 2600-2500. The writer, however, who is most conversant with the early Iranic writings, and most com- petent to judge of their real age, Dr. Martin Haug, does not think it necessary to postulate for his favorites, the Tranians, nearly so great an antiquity. Haug suggests the fifteenth century B.c. as that of the most primi- tiver Ianic compositions, which form the chief if not the sole evidence of an Iranic cultivation prior to B.C. 700. The question is one rather of linguistic criticism than of historic testimony. The historic statements that have THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASTA, 28 come down to us on the subject of the age of Zoroaster, with whose name the origin of Iranic cultivation is by general consent regarded as intimately connected, are so absolutely conflicting that they must be pronounced valueless. Eudoxus and Aristotle said that Zoroaster lived 6000 years before the death of Plato, or B.c. 6348. Hermippus placed him 5000 years before the Trojan War, or B.c. 6184. Berosus declared of him that he reigned at Babylon toward the beginning of the twenty- third century before our era, having ascended the throne, according to his chronological views, about B.c. 2286. Xanthus Lydus, the contemporary of Herodotus, and the first Greek writer who treats of the subject, made him live six hundred years only before the invasion of Greece by Xerxes, or B.c. 1080. The later Greeks and Romans declared that he was contemporary with Darius Hystaspis, thus making his date about B.c. 520-485. Between the earliest and the latest of the dates assigned by these authorities, the difference (it will be seen) is one of nearly siz thousand years ! Modern criticism doubts whether Zoroaster ever lived at all, and regards his name as designating a period rather than a person. The period intended is that of the composition of the earliest portions of the Zend- avesta. To these portions, which are poems, and in the original bear the name of Gathas, Haug (as we have al- ready stated) assigns as the most probable date about B.c, 1500. We see no reason for doubting the sound- ness of this expert’s judgment, and we incline, there- fore, to regard Iranic civilization as having commenced somewhat earlier than Assyrian. Of this primitive civilization, whereof the seat seems to have been Bactria, rather than Media or Persia, we possess no actual remains, no tangible or material evi- 24. THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. dences. The only existing proofs of it are the Zendic writings; and the only notion of it which we can gain is that derivable from a careful study of these writings, or rather of their most ancient portions. From these we gather that the primitive Iranians were a settled peo- ple, possessing cities of some size, that they were de- voted to agriculture, and fairly advanced in the arts most necessary for human life. They had domesticated certain animals, as the horse, the cow, and the dog. They knew how to extract an exhilarating liquor from the Soma or Homa plant, the acid Asclepias or Sarcos- tema viminalis. They lived peaceably together, and rec- ognized the supremacy of law. They had formed the conception of poetry, and while some could frame, the generality could appreciate the beauty of metrical com- positions. Above all, they had a religion, which was surprisingly pure and elevated, consisting mainly in the worship of a single supreme God, an all-wise, all-boun- teous Spirit, Ahuramazda, The cultivation thus begun about B.c. 1500 in the far-off and little-known Bactria, received a fresh im- pulse toward the middle of the ninth century B.c., when the Iranians first came into contact with the Assyrians. Migratory movements had by this time brought the Medes into the district which thenceforth bore their name, and having thus become neighbors of the As- syrians, whose civilization was already advanced, they could not but gain something from their novel expe- rience. Among the chief gains made was probably that of writing. The wedge was adopted as the element out of which letters should be composed, and an alphabet was formed far less cumbrous than the Assyrian syl- labarium, whereby it became easy to express articulate _ sounds by written symbols, and so to give permanency THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASTA. 25 to the transient and fleeting phenomena of ordinary spoken language. Further advances were made between the end of the seventh and the middle of the fifth century B.c., about which time Iranian cultivation reached its greatest de- velopment. The Medes first (B.c. 680) and the Persians afterward (B.c. 560) attained to the leading position among the Oriental nations, and, inheriting the power, entered also into possession of the accumulated knowl- edge and civilization of the earlier masters of Asia. They did not, however, simply continue the past, or reproduce what they found existing. In the remains of Median and Persian times found at Hamadan (Ecba- tana), Behistun, Istakr (Persepolis), Nakhsh-i-Rustam, and Murghab (Pasargade), we have evidences of Iranian art and architecture, which are most remarkable, and which give the Medo-Persic people a very important position in the history of esthetic culture. While adopt- ing one or two leading features of building and orna- mentation from their Semitic predecessors, the Iranic races in the main gave a vent to their own native genius and fancy, and the consequence was that they intro- duced into the world a wholly new architecture, a style of high relief not previously attempted, and a method of decoration altogether their own, excellently well adapted to the character of their climate and country. The Iranic architecture was characterized, in the first place, by simplicity and regularity of design, and in the second by the profuse employment of the column. The buildings have for the most part a symmetry and exact- ness resembling that of Greek temples, They were em- placed on terraces formed of vast blocks of hewn stone, and were approached by staircases of striking and un- usual design. Double porticos of eight, twelve, or six- 26 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. teen columns gave entrance into pillared halls, where the columns were sixteen, thirty-six, or (in one instance) fs many as one hundred in number. Originally the pil- lars may have been mere wooden posts, such as are com- monly used in the domestic architecture of most nations where wood is plentiful. ‘These, when wealth flowed in, it became the practice to overspread with thin sheets of the precious metals. But after a while the Iranic architects, having to erect palaces in districts where wood was scarce, conceived the idea of substituting shafts of stone for the original wooden posts, and car- ried out their notion so successfully that at last they were able to poise in air pillars sixty-four feet high, having beautifully slender shafts, rich bases, and capi- tals of an elegant but perhaps somewhat too elaborate composition. The halls constructed on these supports extended over so vast an area that moderns have found no existing constructions with which they could com- pare them but the most ambitious of European cathe- drals. Speaking of the Chehl Minar, or Great Hall of Xerxes, at Persepolis, Mr. Fergusson says: ‘‘ We have no cathedral in England that at all comes near it in dimensions; nor, indeed, in France or Germany is there one that covers so much ground. Cologne comes nearest to it; . . . but in linear horizontal dimensions the only edifice of the middle ages that comes up to it is Milan Cathedral, which covers 107,800 feet, and (taken all in ali) is perhaps the building that resembles it most, both in style and the general character of the effect it must have produced on the spectator.” For the ornamentation of their buildings, externally, and to some extent internally, the Iranians, imitating their Semitic predecessors, employed sculpture. They did not, however, follow slavishly the pattern set them, THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASTA. 27 but in important respects improved upon their models. They adopted generally a style of much higher relief than that which had prevailed in Assyrian times, some- times almost disengaging their figures from the back- ground, sometimes carving them both in front and at the side, so that they did not fall far short of being statues. They gave to their human heads great dignity, and imparted to some animal forms a life and vigor never greatly surpassed. In variety and grace, however, they cannot be said to have equalled the Assyrians; and it is in their architecture rather than in their glyptic art, that they give evidence of real originality and genius. Their internal decoration of palaces was especially admirable. ‘‘ Such edifices as the Chehl Minar at Per- sepolis, and its duplicate at Susa—where long vistas of columns met the eye on every side, and the great central cluster was supported by lighter detached groups, com- bining similarity of form with some variety of orna- ment; where richly colored drapings contrasted with the cool gray stone of the building, and a golden roof overhung a pavement of many hues;” where a throne of gold under a canopy of purple stood on an elevated platform at one end, backed by ‘‘ hangings of white and green and blue, fastened with cords of white and purple to silver rings,” attached to the ‘‘pillars of marble;” where carpets of dazzling brightness lay here and there upon the patterned floor, and through the interstices of the hangings were seen the bright blue sky and the verdant prairies and distant mountains of Khuzistan or Farsistan—must have been among the fairest crea- tions with which human art ever embellished the earth, and beyond a doubt compared favorably with any edi- fices which, up to the time of their construction, had 28 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. been erected in any country or by any people. It was in these glorious buildings that Iranian architecture culminated; and there is reason to believe that from them the Grecian architects gained those ideas, which, fructifying in their artistic minds, led on to the best triumphs of Hellenic constructive art, the magnificent temples of Diana (Artemis) at Ephesus, and of Minerva (Athené) on the Acropolis of Athens. Of Iranian literary cultivation not much is known. There are no portions of the Zendavesta which can be positively assigned to the space between B.c. 900 and B.C. 880. The inscriptions of this period are dry docu- ments, and as compositions have little merit; but lapi- dary literature is rarely of an attractive kind. We are told that the Persians of the Achemenian times (B.C. 5603-30) had among them historians and poets; but the productions of these early authors have perished, and we have no account of them that is to be depended on. Perhaps it is, on the whole, most probable that in the great work of Firdausi we have, in the main, a repro- duction of the legends with which the antique poets oc- cupied themselves, and so may gather from his pages a general idea of the style and spirit of the early Persian poetry. In manners and general habits of life the Iranians did not differ greatly from the Assyrians. Their orig- inal religion was indeed of a high type, but it became corrupted as time went on, and ultimately sank into a mere debasing and sensualistic nature-worship. Their war customs were less brutal than those of their prede- cessors, but their system of punishment was almost equally savage; they had the same low estimate of women; they were cruel and treacherous, voluptuous, luxurious, given to drunkenness. Western Asia was THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA. 29 perhaps better governed under their sway than it had ever been previously; but there was still much in their governmental system that was imperfect, and that fell short even of what is possible under a despotism. Their civilization may be pronounced to have been, on the whole, more advanced than that of the Assyrians; it had a moral aspect; it was less merely material; but the highest qualities of real civilization were absent from it, and it cannot be said to have laid the world at large under many obligations. Indic civilization is supposed to have commenced about the same time with Iranic. There are so many points of resemblance between the ancient hymns of the Rig-Veda and the Githas, allowed to form the most ancient portions of the Avesta, that it is almost impossi- ble for persons familiar with both to assign them to periods very far apart. The ancestors of the Medes and Persians on the one hand, and of the Hindoos upon the other, appear to have left their primitive abode about the same time, and to have embodied their earliest religious thoughts soon after they separated in poems of the same character. Thus, there is a general agreement among literary critics as to the near connection in date of the two literatures. With regard, however_to the actual period, great diversity of opinion prevails, the same variety of views obtaining in respect of the earliest Vedas as we have already shown to exist with respect to the Giithas of the Zendavesta. But here again the chief ‘‘ expert”—the writer who has the largest acquaintance with the whole range of the Indian com- positions, and with the general history of language—has expressed himself, in moderate terms, as favorable to a date which is, comparatively speaking, late. Professor Max Miller, in his ‘‘ Ancient Sanskrit Literature,” lays 7 30 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. it down that there are four periods of Vedic composi- tion—the Chandas period, Mantra period, Brahmana period, and Sutra period; and after an elaborate and ex- haustive discussion, of which it is impossible not to admire the candor and the learning, comes to the con- clusion that the approximate date of each may be laid down as follows: Ghandas period acme S20 beales caetle see keeecee sede 1200 to 1000 B.c. Mantra period jis) .avhsisk ne bs lejuiae uahela alates Mae oe 1000 to 800 B.c. Brahman Period hic Sak nats sees Shambles me 800 to 600 B.c. ESET IOTION 4 cus en cies cae ses saat pene ae 600 to 200 B.c- Thus according to the highest living authority, the com. mencement of Vedic literature, and so of Indian civiliza- tion, need not be placed farther back than the beginning of the twelfth century B.c. The civilization which the writings of the Chandas period reveal is one of great simplicity. Cities seem not to be mentioned; there is no organized political life; no war worthy of the name; nothing but plundering expe- ditions. - Tribes exist under their heads, who are at once kings, priests, judges, and poets, and to whom the rest render obedience. Religion is a worship by hymns, and with simple offerings, as of honey, but scarcely yet with regular sacrifice. There is a power of metaphysi- cal speculation which may perhaps surprise us, but which seems congenital to the Oriental mind; and there is evidence of progress in some of the mechanical arts beyond what might have been expected. Ships are familiar objects to the writers of the poems; chariots are in common use; the horse and cow are domesticated, and are sheltered in stables; armor is worn, and is sometimes of gold; shields are carried in battle; an in- toxicating drink is brewed; dice have been invented, and gambling is not uncommon. THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASTA. 31 As time goes on, this extreme simplicity disappears. There are advances of various kinds. Cities are built and magnificent palaces constructed; trades become numerous; luxury creepsin. The priests, having come to be a separate class, introduce an elaborate ceremonial. Music is cultivated; writing is invented or learned. But, after all, the material progress made is not very great. Indian civilization is, in the main, intellectual, not material. Careless of life and action, of history, politics, artistic excellence, trade, commerce, manufacture, the Indians concentrate their attention on the highest branches of metaphysics, ponder on themselves and their future, on the nature of the Divine essence, on their own relation to it, and the prospects involved in that relationship. They discuss and they solve the most difficult questions of metaphysical science; they elaborate grammar, the science of language, which is the reflected image of thought; they altogether occupy themselves with the inward, not with the outward—with the eternal world of mind and rest, not with the transi- tory and illusory world of outward seeming and inces- sant changefulness. Hence the triumphs of their civil- ization are abstract and difficult to appreciate. They lie outside the ordinary interests of mankind, and are, moreover, shrouded in a language known to few, and from which there are but few translations. It is said, however, by those whose acquaintance with the early Iadian literature is the widest, that there is scarcely a problem in the science of ontology, psychology, meta- physics, logic, or grammar, which the Indian sages have not sounded as deeply, and discussed as elaborately, as the Greeks. eyes OAL Fat? Sh) | tig’ (SFU) ie adl Wie lek a bb gist Dy wilsel. Rie wes ee aie ee Na Fe iolvetdat ° etpaeiicy Cant pect aa Rita %e bie Thee Pry 7 n we ‘ aly Bae epee Y fevicy sooner: 4 rc seed Peover Ee A Dotly 9 |= ae e aR Sp) oe i fd ve ee 7a a ; By wh (oad Sores PROF E ‘ 4 i tide oto, mS Wat a aint , P ’ ; ~—“- ‘ area oy? os ahiel nba hag -, ; > PERL ial r ‘Bites THE DEMONSTRATIVE EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. Tue occurrence of historical facts is said to be dem- onstrated, when the evidence that they happened is of such a character as to render the assumption that they did not happen in the highest degree improbable; and the question I now have to deal with is, whether evi- dence in favor of the evolution of animals of this degree of cogency is, or is not, obtainable from the record of the succession of living forms which is presented to us by fossil remains. | Those who have attended to the progress of paleeon- tology are aware that evidence of the character which I have defined has heen produced in considerable and continually increasing quantity during the last few years. Indeed, the amount and the satisfactory nature of that evidence are somewhat surprising, when we con- sider the conditions under which alone we can hope to obtain it. It is obviously useless to seek for such evidence, ex- cept in localities in which the physical conditions have been such as to permit of the deposit of an unbroken, or but rarely interrupted, series of strata through a long period of time; in which the group of animals to be in- vestigated has existed in such abundance as to furnish the requisite supply of remains; and in which, finally, \ a 4 THH ELZEVIR LIBRARY. the materials composing the strata are such as to ensure the preservation of these remains in a tolerably perfect and undisturbed state. It so happens that the case which, at present, most nearly fulfils all these conditions is that of the series of extinct animals which culminates in the Horses; by which term I mean to denote not merely the domestic animals with which we are all so well acquainted, but their allies, the ass, zebra, quagga, and the like. In short, I use ‘‘ horses” as the equivalent of the technical name Hguide, which is applied to the whole group of existing equine animals. The horse is in many ways a remarkable animal; not least so in the fact that it presents us with an example of one of the most perfect pieces of machinery in the living world. In truth, among the works of human in- genuity it cannot be said that there is any locomotive so perfectly adapted to its purposes, doing so much work with so small a quantity of fuel, as this machine of nature’s manufacture—the horse. And, as a necessary consequence of any sort of perfection, of mechanical perfection as of others, you find that the horse is a beautiful creature, one of the most beautiful of all land- animals. Look at the perfect balance of his form, and the rhythm and force of its action. The locomotive machinery is,.as you are aware, resident in its slender fore and hind limbs; they are flexible and elastic levers, capable of being moved by very powerful muscles; and, in order to supply the’ engines which work these levers with the force which they expend, the horse is provided with a very perfect apparatus for grinding its food and extracting therefrom the requisite fuel. Without attempting to take you very far into the region of osteological detail, I must nevertheless trouble EVIDENCE OF HVOLUTION. 5 you with some statements respecting the anatomical structure of the horse; and, more especially, will it be needful to obtain a general conception of the structure of its fore and hind limbs, and of its teeth. But I shall only touch upon those points which are absolutely es. sential to our inquiry. Let us turn in the first place to the fore-limb. In most quadrupeds, as in ourselves, the fore-arm contains distinct bones called the radius and the ulna, The cor- responding region in the horse seems at first to possess but one bone. Careful observation, however, enables us to distinguish in this bone a part which clearly answers to the upper end of the ulna, This is closely united with the ehief mass of the bone which represents the radius, and runs out into a slender shaft which may be traced for some distance downwards upon the back of the radius, and then in most cases thins out and vanishes. It takes still more trouble to make sure of what is never- theless the fact, that a small part of the lower end of the bone of a horse’s fore-arm, which is only distinct in a very young foal, is really the lower extremity of the ulna. What is commonly called the knee of a horse is its wrist. ‘The ‘‘ cannon bone” answers to the middle bone of the five metacarpal bones, which support the palm of the hand in ourselves. The ‘‘ pastern,” ‘‘ coronary,” and coffin” bones of veterinarians answer to the joints of our middle fingers, while the hoof is simply a greatly enlarged and thickened nail. But if what lies below the horse’s ‘‘ knee” thus corresponds to the middle finger in ourselves, what has become of the four other fingers or digits? We find in the places of the second and fourth digits only two slender splint-like bones, about two thirds as long as the cannon bone, which gradually 6 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY, taper to the lower ends and bear no finger joints, or, as they are termed, phalanges. Sometimes, small bony or gristly nodules are to be found at the bases of these two metacarpal splints, and it is probable that these represent rudiments of the first and fifth toes. Thus, the part of the horse’s skeleton which corresponds with that of the human hand, contains one overgrown middle digit, and at least two imperfect lateral: digits; and these answer, respectively, to the third, otk second, and the fourth fingers in man. Corresponding modifications are found in the hind limb. In ourselves, and in most quadrupeds, the leg contains two distinct bones—a large bone, the tibia, and a smaller and more slender bone, the fibular. But, in the horse, the fibular seems, at first, to be reduced to its upper end; a short slender bone united with the tibia, and ending in a point below, occupying its place. Ex- amination of the lower end of a young foal’s shin-bone, however, shows a distinct portion of osseous matter which is the lower end of the fibula; so that the appar- ently single lower end of the shin-bone is really made up of the coalesced ends of the tibia and fibula, just as the apparently single lower end of the fore-arm bone is composed of the coalesced radius and ulna. The heel of the horse is the part commonly known ag the hock. The hinder cannon bone answers to the mid- dle metatarsal bone of the human foot; the pastern, cor- onary, and coftin bones, to the middle toe bones; the hind hoof to the nail; as in the fore-foot. And, as in the fore-foot, there are merely two splints to represent the second and the fourth toes. Sometimes arudiment of a fifth toe appears to be traceable. The teeth of a horse are not less peculiar than its limbs. The living engine, like all others, must be well EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. 7 stoked if it is to do its work; and the horse, if it is to make good its wear and tear, and to exert the enormous amount of force required for its propulsion, must be well and rapidly fed. To this end, good cutting instru- ments and powerful and lasting crushers are needful. Accordingly, the twelve cutting teeth of a horse are close-set and concentrated in the fore part of its mouth, like so many adzes or chisels. The grinders or molars are large, and have an extremely complicated structure, being composed of a number of different substances of unequal hardness. The consequence of thisis that they wear away at different rates; and, hence, the surface of each grinder is always as uneven as that of a good mill- stone. I have said that the structure of the grinding teeth is very complicated, the harder and the softer parts being, as it Were, interlaced with one another. The result of this is that, as the tooth wears, the crown presents a peculiar pattern, the nature of which is not very easily deciphered at first, but which it is important that we should understand clearly. Each grinding tooth of the upper jaw has an outer wall so shaped that, on the worn crown, it exhibits the form of two crescents, one in front and one behind, with their concave sides turned outwards. From the inner sides of the front crescent, a cresentic front ridge passes inwards and backwards, and its inner face enlarges into a strong longitudinal fold or pillar. From the front part of the hinder cres- cent, a back ridge takes a like direction, and also has its pillar, The deep interspaces or valleys between these ridges and the outer wall are filled by bony substance, which .is called cement, and coats the whole tooth. The pattern of the worn face of each grinding tooth 8 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. of the lower jaw is quite different. It appears to be formed of two crescent-shaped ridges, the convexities of which are turned outwards. The free extremity of each crescent has a pillar, and there is a large double pillar where the two crescents meet. The whole structure is, as it were, imbedded in cement, which fills up the val- leys, as in the upper grinders, If the grinding faces of an upper and of a lower mo- lar of the same side are applied together, it will be seen that the opposed ridges are nowhere parallel, but that they frequently cross; and that thus, in the act of mas- tication, a hard surface in the one is constantly applied to a soft surface in the other, and vice versa. They thus constitute a grinding apparatus of great efficiency, and one which is repaired as fast as it wears, owing to the long continued growth of the teeth. Some other peculiarities of the dentition of the horse must be noticed, as they bear upon what I shall have to say by and by. Thus the crowns of the cutting teeth have a peculiar deep pit, which gives rise to the well- known ‘‘mark” of the horse. There is a large space between the outer incisors and the front grinder. In this space the adult male horse presents, near the in- cisors, one on each side, above and below, a canine or ‘‘tush,” which is commonly absent in mares. In a young horse, moreover, there is not unfrequently to be seen, in front of the first grinder, a very small tooth, which soon falls out. If this small tooth be counted as one, it will be found that there are seven teeth behind the canine on each side; namely, the small tooth in question, and the six great grinders, among which, by an unusual peculiarity, the foremost tooth is rather larger than those which follow it. I have now enumerated those characteristic structures EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. 9 of the horse which are of most importance for the pur- pose we have in view. To any one who is acquainted with the morphology of vertebrated animals, they show that the horse deviates widely from the general structure of mammals; and that the horse type is, in many respects, an extreme modification of the general mammalian plan. The least modified mammals, in fact, have the radius and ulna, the tibia and fibula, distinct and separate. They have five distinct and complete digits on each foot, and no one of these digits is very much larger than the rest. Moreover, in the least modified mammals, the total number of the teeth is very generally forty-four, while in horses the usual number is forty, and in the absence of the canines it may be reduced to thirty-six; the in- cisor teeth are devoid of the fold seen in those of the horse; the grinders regularly diminish in size from the middle of the series to its front end; while their crowns are short, early attain their full length, and exhibit sim- ple ridges or tubercles, in place of the complex foldings of the horse’s grinders. Hence the general principles of the hypothesis of ev- olution lead to the conclusion that the horse must have been derived from some quadruped which possessed five complete digits on each foot; which had the bones of the fore-arm and of the leg complete and separate; and which possessed forty-four teeth, among which the crowns of the incisors and grinders had a simple struc- ture; while the latter gradually increased in size from before backwards, at any rate in the anterior part of the series, and had short crowns. And if the horse has been thus evolved, and the re- mains of the different stages of its evolution have been preserved, they ought to present us with a series of 10 THH ELZEVIR LIBRARY. forms in which the number of the digits becomes re- duced; the bones of the fore-arm and leg gradually take on the equine condition; and the form and arrangement of the teeth successively approximate to those which obtain in existing horses. Let us turn to the facts and see how far they fulfil these requirements of the doctrine of evolution. In Europe abundant remains of horses are found in the Quaternary and later Tertiary strata as far as the Pliocene formation. But these horses, which are so common in the cave deposits and in the gravels of Eu- rope, are in all essential respects like existing horses. And that is true of all the horses of the latter part of the Pliocene epoch. But, in deposits which belong to the earlier Pliocene and later Miocene epochs, and which occur in Britain, in France, in Germany, in Greece, in India, we find animals which are extremely like horses —which, in fact, are so similar to horses, that you may follow descriptions given in works upon the anatomy of the horse upon the skeletons of these animals—but which differ in some important particulars. For exam. ple, the structure of their fore and hind limbs is some- what different. The bones which, in the horse, are represented by two splints, imperfect below, are as long as the metacarpal and metatarsal bones; and, attached to the extremity of each, isa digit with three joints of the same general character as those of the middle digit, only very much smaller. These small digits are so dis- posed that they could have had but very little functional importance, and they must have been rather of the na- ture of the dew-claws, such as are to be found in many ruminant animals. The Hipparion, as the extinct Eu ropean three-toed horse is called, in fact, presents a foot similar to that of the American Protohippus (Fig. 9), ex- EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. 11 cept that, in the Hipparion, the smaller digits are situ- ated farther back, and are of smaller proportional size, than in the Protohippus. The ulna is slightly more distinct than in the horse; and the whole length of it, as a very slender shaft, inti- mately united with the radius, is completely traceable. The fibula appears to be in the same condition as in the horse. The teeth of the Hipparion are essentially simi- lar to those of the horse, but the pattern of the grinders is in some respects a little more complex, and there is a depression on the face of the skull in front of the orbit, which is not seen in existing horses, In the earlier Miocene and perhaps the later Eocene deposits of some parts of Europe, another extinct ani- mal has been discovered, which Cuvier, who first de- scribed some fragments of it, considered to be a Palao- thertum. But as further discoveries threw no light upon its structure, it was recognized asa distinct genus, under the name of Anchitheriwm. | In its general characters, the skeleton of Anchitherium is very similar to that of the horse. In fact, Lartet and De Blainville called it Pleotheriwm equinum or hippoides; and De Christol, in 1847, said that it differed from Hip- parion in little more than the characters of its teeth, and gave it the name of Mipparitherium. TEach foot pos- sesses three complete toes; while the lateral toes are much larger in proportion to the middle toe than in Hipparion, and doubtless rested on the ground in ordi- nary locomotion. The ulna is complete and quite distinct from the radius, though firmly united with the latter. The fibula seems also to have been complete. Its lower end, though intimately united with that of the tibia, is clearly marked off from the latter bone. 12 THE HLZEVIR LIBRARY. There are forty-four teeth. The incisors have no strong pit. The canines seem to have been well devel- oped in both sexes. The first of the seven grinders, which, as I have said, is frequently absent, and, when it does exist, is small in the horse, is a good-sized and permanent tooth, while the grinder which follows it is but little larger than the hinder ones. The crowns of the grinders are short, and though the fundamental pattern of the horse-tooth is discernible, the front and back ridges are less curved, the accessory pillars are wanting, and the valleys, much shallower, are not filled up with cement. Seven years ago, when I happened to be looking crit- ically into the bearing of paleontological facts upon the doctrine of evolution, it appeared to me that the Anchi- therium, the Hipparion, and the modern horses, consti- tute a series in which the modifications of structure co- incide with the order of chronological occurrence, in the manner in which they must coincide, if the modern horses really are the result of the gradual metamorphosis, in the course of the Tertiary epoch, of a less specialized ancestral form. And I found by correspondence with the late eminent French anatomist and paleontologist, M. Lartet, that he had arrived at the same conclusion from the same data. That the Anchithertum type had become metamor- phosed into the Hipparion type, and the latter into the Equine type, in the course of that period of time which is represented by the latter half of the Tertiary deposits, seemed to me to be the only explanation of the facts for which there was even a shadow of probability.* *I use the word ‘‘ type’’ because it is highly probable that many forms of Anchitherium-like and Hipparion-like animals existed in the Miocene and Pliocene epochs, just as many spe- EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. 13 And, hence, I have ever since held that these facts afford evidence of the occurrence of evolution, which, in the sense already defined, may be termed demon, strative. All who have occupied themselves with the structuia of Anchitherium, from Cuvier onwards, have acknowl. edged its many points of likeness to a well-known geuus of extinct Eocene mammals, Palwotherium. Indeed, as we have seen, Cuvier regarded his remains of Anchi- theriwm as those of a species of Palwotherium. Hence, in attempting to trace the pedigree of the horse beyond the Miocene epoch and the Anchitheroid form, I natu- rally sought among the various species of Paleotheroid animals for its nearest ally, and I was led to conclude that the Paleothertum minus (Plagtolophus) represented the next step more nearly than any form then known. I think that this opinion was fully justifiable; but the progress of investigation has thrown an unexpected light on the question, and has brought us much nearer than could have been anticipated to a knowledge of the true series of the progenitors of the horse. You are all aware that when your country was first discovered by Europeans, there were no traces of the existence of the horse in any part of the American con- tinent. The accounts of the conquest of Mexico dwell upon the astonishment of the natives of that country when they first became acquainted with that astounding phenomenon—a man seated upon a horse. Neverthe- less, the investigations of American geologists have cies of the horse tribe exist now; and it is highly improbable that the particular species of Anchitherium or Hipparion, which happen to have been discovered, should be precisely those which have formed part of the direct line of the horse’s pedigree. 14 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. proved that the remains of horses occur in the most su- perficial deposits of both North and South America, just as they do in Europe. Therefore, for some reason or other, no feasible suggestion on that subject, so far as I know, has been made—the horse must have died out in this continent at some period preceding the discovery of America. Of late years there has been discovered in your Western Territories that marvellous accumulation of deposits, admirably adapted for the preservation of organic remains, to which I referred the other evening, and which furnishes us with a consecutive series of records of the fauna of the older half of the Tertiary epoch, for which we have no parallel in Europe. They have yielded fossils in an excellent state of conservation and in unexampled number and variety. The researches of Leidy and others have shown that forms allied to the Hipparion and the Anchitherium are to be found among these remains. But it is only recently that the admi- rably conceived and most thoroughly and patiently worked-out investigations of Professor Marsh have given us a just idea of the vast fossil wealth and of the scientific importance of these deposits. I have had the advantage of glancing over the collections in Yale Museum, and I can truly say that, so far as my knowl- edge extends, there is no collection from any one region and series of strata comparable for extent, or for the care with which the remains have been got together, or for their scientific importance, to the series of fossils which he has deposited there. This vast collection has yielded evidence bearing upon the question of the pedi- gree of the horse of the most striking character. It tends to show that we must look to America, rather than to Europe, for the original seat of the equine series; and that the archaic forms and successive modi- - Fore Hind Fore Foot. Foot. Arm. Leg. Upper Molar. RECENT. EQUUS, PLIOHIPPUS. PROTOHIPPUS (Hipparion). MIOCENE. MIOHIPPUS (Anchitherium). ' MESOHIPPUS, EOCENE. pip ee —s 7 EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. 15 fications of the horse’s ancestry are far better preserved here than in Europe. Professor Marsh’s kindness has enabled me to put before you a diagram, every figure in which is an actual representation of some specimen which is to be seen at Yale at this present time (Fig. 9). The succession of forms which he has brought to- gether carries us from the top to the bottom of the Ter- tiaries. Firstly, there is the true horse. Next we have the American Pliocene form of the horse (Pliohippus); in the conformation of its limbs it presents some very slight deviations from the ordinary horse, and the crowns of the grinding teeth are shorter. Then comes the Protohippus, which represents the European Hippa- rion, having one large digit and two small ones on each foot, and the general characters of the fore-arm and leg to which I have referred. But it is more valuable than the European Hipparion for the reason that it is devoid of some of the peculiarities of that form—peculiarities which tend to show that the European Hipparion is - rather a member of a collateral branch than a form in the direct line of succession. Next, in the backward order in time, is the Miohippus, which corresponds pretty nearly with the Anchithertum of Europe. It presents three complete toes—one large median and two smaller Jateral ones; and there is a rudiment of that digit which answers to the little finger of the human hand. The European record of the pedigree of the horse stops here; in the American Tertiaries, on the contrary, the series of ancestral equine forms is continued into the Eocene formations. An older Miocene form, termed Mesohippus, has three toes in front, with a large splint-like rudiment representing the little finger, and 4 16 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. three toes behind. The radius and ulna, the tibia and the fibula, are dislinct, and the short-crowned molar teeth are anchitheroid in pattern. : But the most important discovery of all is the Oro- hippus, which comes from the Eocene formation, and is the oldest member of the equine series, as yet known. Here we find four complete toes on the front limb, three toes on the hind limb, a well-developed ulna, a well-developed fibula, and short-crowned grinders of simple pattern. Thus, thanks to these important researches, it has be- come evident that, so far as our present knowledge ex- tends, the history of the horse-type is exactly and pre- cisely that which could have been predicted from a knowledge of the principles of evolution. And the knowledge we now p®ssess justifies us completely in the anticipation that when the still lower Eocene deposits, and those which belong to the Cretaceous epoch, have yielded up their remains of ancestral equine animals, we shall find, first, a form with four complete toes and a rudiment of the innermost or first digit in front, with, probably, a rudiment of the fifth digit in the hind foot;* while, in still older forms, the series of the digits will be more and more complete, until we come to the five- toed animals, in which, if the doctrine of evolution is well founded, the whole series must have taken its origin. | That is what I mean by demonstrative evidence of ev- olution. An inductive hypothesis is said to be demon- * Since this lecture was delivered, Professor Marsh has discov- ered a new genus of equine mammals (Hohippus) from the low- est Eocene deposits of the West, which corresponds very nearly to this description.—American Journal of Science, November, 1876. a EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. 17 strated when the facts are shown to be in entire accord- ance with it. If that is not scientific proof, there are no merely inductive conclusions which can be said to be proved. And the doctrine of evolution, at the pres- ent time, rests upon exactly as secure a foundation as the Copernican theory of the motions of the heavenly bodies did at the time of its promulgation. Its logical basis is precisely of the same character—the coinci- dence of the observed facts with theoretical require- ments. The only way of escape, if it be a way of escape, from the conclusions which I have just indicated, is the supposition that all these different equine forms have been created separately at separate epochs of time; and, I repeat, that of such an hypothesis as this there nei- ther is, nor can be, any scientific evidence; and assur- edly, so far as I know, there is none which is support- ed, or pretends to be supported, by evidence or author- ity of any other kind. I can but think that the time will come when such suggestions as these, such obvious attempts to escape the force of demonstration, will be put upon the same footing as the supposition made by some writers, who are, I believe, not completely ex- tinct at present, that fossils are mere simulacra, are no indications of the former existence of the animals to which they seem to belong; but that they are either sports of Nature, or special creations, intended—as J heard suggested the other day—to test our faith. In fact, the whole evidence is in favor of evolution, and there is none against it. And I say this, although perfectly well aware of the seeming difficulties which have been built up upon what appears to the uninformed to be a solid foundation. I meet constantly with the argument that the doctrine of evolution cannot be well 18 THE EHLZEVIR LIBRARY. founded, because it requires the lapse of a very vast pe- riod of time; while the duration of life upon the earth, thus implied, is inconsistent with the conclusions ar- rived at by the astronomer and the physicist. I may venture to say that I am familiar with those conclusions, inasmuch as some years ago, when President of the Ge- ological Society of London, I took the liberty of criti- cising them, and of showing in what respects, as it ap- peared to me, they lacked complete and thorough dem- onstration. But, putting that point aside, suppose that, as the astronomers, or some of them, and some physical philosophers, tell us, it is impossible that life could have endured upon the earth for as long a period as is re- quired by the doctrine of evolution—supposing that to be proved—I desire to be informed what is the foun- dation for the statement that evolution does require so great a time. The biologist knows nothing whatever of the amount of time which may be required for the process of evolution. It is a matter of fact that the equine forms, which I have described to you, occur in the order stated in the tertiary formations. But I have not the slightest means of ‘guessing whether it took a million of years, or ten millions, or a hundred millions, or a thousand millions of years, to give rise to that se- ries of changes. A biologist has no means of arriving at any conclusion as to the amount of time which may be needed for a certain quantity of organic change. He takes his time from the geologist. The geologist, con- sidering the rate at which deposits are.formed and the rate at which denudation goes on upon the surface of the earth, arrives at more or less justifiable conclusions as to the time which is required for the deposit of a cer- tain thickness of rocks; and if he tells me that the ter- tiary formations required 500,000,000 years for their de- EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. 19 ‘posit, I suppose he has good ground for what he says, and I take that as a measure of the duration of the evo- Jution of the horse from the Orohippus up to its present condition. And, if he is right, undoubtedly evolution is a very slow process, and requires a great deal of time. But suppose, now, that an astronomer or a phys- icist—for instance, my friend Sir William Thomson— tells me that my geological authority is quite wrong; and that he has weighty evidence to show that life could not possibly have existed upon the surface of the earth 500,000,000 years ago, because the earth would have then been too hot to allow of life, my reply is: ‘‘ That is not my affair; settle that with the geologist, and when you have come to an agreement among yourselves, I will adopt your conclusion.” We take our time from the geologists and physicists; and it is monstrous that, having taken our time from the physical philosopher’s clock, the physical philosopher should turn round upon us, and say we are too fast or too slow. What we de- sire to know is, is it a fact that evolution took place? As to the amount of time which evolution may have occupied, we are in the hands of the physicists and as- tronomers, whose business it is to deal with those ques- tions. I have now, ladies and gentlemen, arrived at the con- clusion of the task which I set before myself when I un. dertook to deliver these lectures. My purpose has been, not to enable those among you who have paid no atten- tion to these subjects before, to leave this room in a condition to decide upon the validity or the invalidity of the hypothesis of evolution; but I have desired to put before you the principles upon which all hypothe. ses respecting the history of Nature must be judged; and furthermore, to make apparent the nature of the 20 THE EKLZEVIR LIBRARY. evidence and the amount of cogency which is to be ex- pected and may be obtained from it. To this end, I have not hesitated to regard you as genuine students and persons desirous of knowing the truth. I have not shrunk from taking you through long discussions, that I fear may have sometimes tried your patience; and I have inflicted upon you details which were indispensa- ble, but which may well have been wearisome. But I shall rejoice—I shall consider that I have done you the greatest service which it was in my power to do—if I have thus convinced you that the great question which we have been discussing is not one to be dealt with by rhetorical flourishes, or by loose and superficial talk; but that it requires the keen attention of the trained in- tellect and the patience of the accurate observer. When I commenced this series of Jectures, 1 did not think it necessary to preface them with a prologue, such as might be expected from a stranger and a foreigner; for during my brief stay in your country, I have found it very hard to believe that a stranger could be possessed of so many friends, and almost harder that a foreigner could express himself in your language in such a way as to be, to all appearances, so readily intelligible. So far as I can judge, that most intelligent, and, perhaps, I may add, most singularly active and enterprising body, your press reporters, do not seem to have been deterred by my accent from giving the fullest account of every- thing that I happen to have said. But the vessel in which I take my departure is even now ready to slip her moorings; I awake from my de- lusion that I am other than a stranger and a foreigner. I am ready to go back to my place and country; but, before doing so, let me, by way of epilogue, tender to you my most hearty thanks for the kind and cordial re- EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION. 21 ception which you have accorded to me; and let me thank you still more for that which is the greatest com- pliment which can be afforded to any person in my po- sition—the continuous and undisturbed attention which you. have bestowed upon the long argument which I have had the honor to lay before you. ee fe; ute a rrbat ay elise ’ 4 BE ilytite 3: Cy f of Hie sas WORLD-SMASHING. Str W. THomson’s moss-grown fragment of a shattered world is not yet forgotten. In the current number of the Cornhill Magazine (January, 1872) it is very severely handled; the more severely, because the writer, though treating the subject quite popu- larly, shows the fallacy of the hypothesis, even when regarded from the point of view of Sir W. Thom- son’s own special department of stuiy. That an eminent mathematician should make a great slip when he ventures upon geological or physiological ground is not at all surprising; it is, in fact, quite to be expected, as there can be no doubt that the close study of pure mathematics, by directing the mind to processes of calculation rather than to phenomena, induces that sublime indifference to facts which has characterized the purely mathematical intellect of all ages, It is not surprising that a philosopher who has been engaged in measuring the imaginary diameter, describing the imaginary oscillations and gyrations of imaginary atoms, and the still more complex im- aginary behavior of the imaginary constituents of the imaginary atmospheres by which the mathemat- ical imagination has surrounded these imaginary atoms, should overlook the vulgar fact that neither mosses nor other vegetables, nor even their seeds, can possibly retain their vitality when ultimately exposed to the temperature of a blast furnace, ani rae 34 EHLZEVIR LIBRARY. that of two or three hunared degrees below the freez- ing point; but it is rather surprising that the purely mathematical basis of this very original hypothesis of so great a mathematician should be mathematic- ally fallacious—in plain language, a mathematical blunder. In order to supply the seed-bearing meteoric frag- . ment by which each planet is to be stocked with life, it is necessary, according to Sir W. Thomson, that two worlds—one at least flourishing with life—shall be smashed; and, in order to get them smashed with a sufficient amount of frequency to supply the materials for his hypothesis, the learned President of the British Association has, in accordance with the customary ingenuity of mathematical theorists, worked out the necessary mathematical conditions, and states with unhesitating mathematical assurance that—‘‘It is as sure that collisions must occur be- tween great masses moving through space, as itis that ships, steered without intelligence directed to prevent collision, could not cross and recross the Atlantic for thousands of years with immunity from collision.” The author of the paper in the Cornhill denies this very positively, and without going into the mathe- matical details, points out the basis upon which it may be mathematically refuted—viz., that all such worlds are travelling in fixed or regular orbits around their primaries or suns, while each of these primaries travelsin its own necessary path, carrying with it all its attendants, which still move about him, just as though he had no motion of his own. These are the conclusions of Newtonian dynamics, the sublime simplicity of which contrasts so curiously with the complex dreams of the modern atom-split- ters, and which make a further and still more strik- ing contrast by their exact and perfect accordance with actual and visible phenomena. Newton has taught us that there can be no planets 2 WORLD-SMASHING. 35 travelling-at random like the Sir W. Thomson’s im- aginary ships with blind:pilots, and by following up his reasoning, we reach the conclusion, that among all the countless millions of worlds that people the infinity of space, there is no more risk of collision than there is between any two of the bodies that constitute our own solar system. All the observations of astronomers, both before and since the discovery of the telescope, confirm - this conclusion. The long nightly watching of the Chaldean shepherds, the star-counting, star-gauging, star-mupping, and other laborious gazing of medieval and modern astronomers, have failed to discover any collision, or any motion tending to collision, among the myriads of heavenly bodies whose positions and movements have been so faithfully and diligently studied. Thus, the hypothesis of creation which demands the destruction of two worlds in order to effect the sowing of a seed, is as inconsistent with sound dynamics as it is repugnant to common sense. . This subject suggests a similar one, which was discussed a few months since at the Academy of Sciences of Paris. On January 30th last M. St. Meunier read a paper on ‘‘ The mode of rupture of a star, from which meteors are derived.” The author starts with the assumption that meteors have been produced by the rupture of a world, basing this as- sumption upon the arguments he has stated in pre- vious papers. He discards altogether Sir W. Thom- son’s idea of a collision between two worlds, but works out a conclusion quite as melancholy. He begins, like most other builders of cosmical the- ories, with the hypothesis that this and all the other worlds of space began their existence in a condition of nebulous infancy; that they gradually condensed into molten liquids, and then cooled down till they obtained a thin outside crust of solid matter, resting upon a molten globe within; that this crust then 3 36 ELZEVIR LIBRARY. gradually thickened as the world grew older and cooled down by radiation. I will not stop to dis- cuss this nebular and cooling-down hypothesis at present, though it is but fair to state that ‘‘I don’t believe a bit of it.” Taking all this for granted—a considerable assump- tion—M. St. Meunier reasons very ably upon what must follow if we further assume that each world is somehow supplied with air and water, and that the atmosphere and the ocean of each world are limited and unconnected with those of any other world, or with any general interstellar medium. What, then, will happen as worlds grow old? As they cool down, they must contract; the liquid inside can manage this without any inconvenience to itself, but not so with the outer spherical shell of solid mat- ter. As the. inner or hotter part of this contracts, the cool outside must crumble up in order to follow it, and thus mountain chains and great valleys, lesser hills and dales, besides faults and slips, dykes, earth- quakes, volcanoes, etc., are explained. According to M. St. Meunier, the moon has reached a more advanced period of cosmical existence than the earth. She is our senior; and like the old man who shows his gray hairs and tottering limbs to in- considerate youth, she shines a warning upon our gay young world, telling her that— Let her paint an inch thick, to this favor she must come —that the air and ocean must pass away, that all the living creatures of the earth must perish, and the desolation shall come about in this wise. At present the interior of our planet is described as a molten fluid, with a solid crust outside. Asthe world cools down with age, this crust will thicken and crack, and crack again, as the lower part con- tracts. This will form rainwres, ¢.e., long narrow chasms, of vast depths, which, like those on the 4 WORLD-SMASHING. 37 moon, will traverse, without deviation, the moun- tains, valleys, plains, and ocean-beds; the waters will fall into these, and, after violent catastrophes, aris- ing from their boiling by contact with the hot inter- ior, they will finally disappear from the surface, and become absorbed in the pores of the vastly thickened earth-crust, and in the caverns, cracks, and chasms which the rending contraction will open in the inter- ior. These cavities will continue to increase, will become of huge magnitude when the outside crust grows thick enough to form its own supporting arch, for then the fused interior will recede, and form mighty vaults that will engulf not the waters merely, but all the atmosphere likewise. At this stage the earth, according to M. St. Meu- nier, will be a middle- aged world like the moon; but as old age advances the contraction of the fluid, or viscous interior beneath the outside solid crust will continue, and the raénures will extend in length and depth and width, as he maintains they are now grow- ing inthe moon. This, he says, must continue till the centre solidifies, and then these cracks will reach that centre, and the world will be split through in fragments corresponding to the different rainures. Thus we shall have a planet composed of several solid fragments held together only by their mutual attractions, but the rotary movement of these will, according to the French philosopher, become un- equal, as ‘‘ the fragments present different densities, and are situated at unequal distances from the centre; some will be accelerated, others retarded; they will rub against each other, and grind away those por- tions which have the weakest cohesion.” The frag- ments thus worn off will, ‘‘at the end of sufficient time, girdle with a complete ring the central star.” At this stage the fragments become real meteors, and then perform all the meteoric functions excepting the seed-carrying of Sir W. Thomson. It would be an easy task to demolish these specu- 5 38 HLIZHEVIR LIBRARY. lations, though not within the space of one of my letters. A glance at the date of this paper, and the state of Paris and the French mind at the time, may, to some extent, explain the melancholy relish with which the Parisian philosopher works out his dole- ful speculations. Had the French army marched vigorously to Berlin, I doubt whether this paper would ever have found its way into the ‘‘ Comptes Rendus.” After the fall of Paris, and the wholesale capitulation of the French armies, it was but natural that a patriotic Frenchman, howsoever strong his philosophy, should speculate on the collapse of all the stars, and the general winding-up of the universe. 6 METEORIC ASTRONOMY. THE number of the Quarterly Journal of Science for May, 1872, contains some articles of considerable interest. The first is by the indefatigable Mr. Proc- tor, on ‘‘Meteoric Astronomy,” in which he em- bodies a clear and popular summary of the researches which have earned for Signor Schiaparelli this year’s gold medal of the Astronomical Society. Like all who venture upon a broad, bold effort of scientific thought, extending at all into the regions of philosophical theory, Schiaparelli has had to wait for recognition. A simple and merely mechanical observation of a bare fact, barely and mechanically recorded without the exercise of any other of the intellectual faculties than the external senses and observing powers, is at once received and duly honored by the scientific world; but any higher effort is received at first in- differently, or sceptically, and is only accepted after a period of probation, directly proportionate to its philosophical magnitude and importance, and_in- versely proportionate to the scientific status of the daring theorist, At first sight this appears unjust: it looks like honoring the laborers who merely make the bricks, and despising the architect who constructs the edi- fice of philosophy from the materials they provide. Many a disappointed dreamer, finding that his theory of the universe has not been accepted, and that the expected honors have not been showered rf 40 HLZEVIR LIBRARY. upon him, has violently attacked the whole scientific community as a contemptible gang of low-minded mechanical plodders, void of imagination, blind to all poetic aspirations, and incapable of any grand and comprehensive flight of intellect. Had these impulsive gentlemen been previously subjected to the strict discipline of inductive scientific training, their position and opinions would have been very different. Their great theories would either have had no existence, or have been much smaller, and they would understand that philosophic caution is one of the characteristic results of scientific training. Simple facts, which can be immediately proved by simple experiments and simple observations, are at once accepted, and their discoverers duly honored, without any hesitation or delay, but the grander efforts of generalization require careful thought and laborious scrutiny for their verification, and there- fore the acknowledgment of their merits is neces- sarily delayed; but when it does arrive full justice is usually done. Thus Grove’s ‘‘ Correlation of the Physical Forces,” the greatest philosophical work on purely physical science of this generation, was commenced in 1842, when its author occupied but a humble position at the London Institution. The book was but little noticed for many years, and, had Mr. Grove (now Sir William Grove) not been duly educated by the discipline above referred to, he might have become a noisy cantankerous martyr, one of those ‘‘IIl- used men” who have been made familiar to so many audiences by Mr. George Dawson. Instead of this, he patiently waited, and, as we have lately seen, the well-deserved honors have been liberally awarded. In a very few years hence we shall be able to say the same of the once diabolical Darwin, and eight or nine other theorists, who must all be content to 8 METHORIC ASTRONOMY. 4l take their trial and patiently await the verdict; the time of waiting being of necessity proportionate to the magnitude of the issue, The theories of Schiaparelli, which, as Mr. Proc- tor says, ‘‘after the usual term of doubt have so recently received the sanction of the highest astrono- mical tribunal of Great Britain,” are not of so purely speculative a character as to demand a very long ‘term of doubt.” They are directly based on obser- vations and mathematical calculations which bring them under the domain of the recognized logic of mathematical probability. Those who are specially interested in the modern progress of astronomy should read this article in the Quarterly Journal of Science, which is illustrated with the diagrams neces- sary for the comprehension of the researches and reasoning of Schiaparelli and others who have worked on the same ground. I can only state the general results, which are that the meteors which we see every year, more or less abundantly on the nights of the 10th and 11th of August, and which always appear to come from the same point in the heavens, are then and thus visible because they form part of an eccentric elliptical zone of meteoric bodies which girdle the domain of the sun; and that our earth, in the course of its an- nual journey round the sun, crosses and plunges more or less deeply into the ellipse of small attendant bodies, which are supposed to be moving in regular orbits around the sun, Schiaparelli has compared the position, the di- rection, and the velocity of motion of the August meteors with the orbit of the great comet of 1862, and infers that there is a close connection between them, so close that the meteors may be regarded as a sort of trail which the comet has left behind. He does not exactly say that they are detached vertebre of the comet’s tail, but suggests the possibility of their original connection with its head. 9 42 ELZEVIR LIBRARY. Similar observations have been made upon the November meteoric showers, which, by similar reasoning, are associated with another comet; and further yet, it is assumed upon analogy that other recognized meteor systems, amounting to nearly two hundred in number, are in like manner associated with other comets. If these theories are sound, our diagrams and mental pictures of the solar system must be materi- ally modified. Besides the central sun, the eight planets, and the asteroids moving in their nearly circular orbits and some eccentric comets travelling in long ellipses, we must add a countless multitude of small bodies clustered in elliptical rings, all travel- ling together in the path marked by their containing girdle, and following the lead of a streaming vapor- ous monster, their parent comet. We must count such comets, and such rings filled with attendant fragments, not merely by tens or hundreds, but by thousands and tens of thousands, even by millions; the path of the earth being but a thread in space, and yet a hundred or two are strung upon it. In this article Mr. Proctor seems strongly disposed to return to the theory which attributes solar heat and light to a bombardment of meteors from with- out, and the solar corona and zodiacal light as visi- ble presentments of these meteors. Still, however, he clings to the more recent explanation which re- gards the corona, the zodiacal light, and the meteors as matter ejected from the sun by the same forces as those producing the solar prominences. For my own part I shall not be at all surprised if we find that, ere long, these two apparently. conflicting hy- potheses are fully reconciled. The progress of solar discovery has been so great since January, 1870, when my ejection theory was published, that I may now carry it out much further than I then dared, or was justified in daring, to ven- 10 METEORIC ASTRONOMY. 43 ture. Actual measurement of the projectile forces displayed in some of the larger prominences renders it not merely possible, but even very probable, that some of the exceptionally great eruptive efforts of the sun may be sufficiently powerful to eject solar material beyond the reclaiming reach of his own gravitating power. In such a case the banished matter must go on wandering through the boundless profundity of space until it reaches the domain of some other sun, which will clutch the fragment with less gravitating ener- gies, and turn its straight and ever-onward course into a curved orbit. Thus the truant morsel from our sun will become the subject of another sun—a portion of another solar system. What one sun may do, another and every other may do likewise, and, if so, there must be a mutual bombardment, a ceaseless interchange of matter be- - tween the countless suns of the universe. This is a startling view of our cosmical relations, but we are driving rapidly toward a general recognition of it. The November star showers have perpetrated some irregularities this year. They have been very un- punctual, and have not come from their right place. We have heard something from Italy, but not the tidings of the Leonides that were expected. Instead of the great display of the month occurring on the 13th and 14th, it was seen on the 27th. We have accounts from different parts of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, also from Italy, Greece, Egypt, etc. Mr. Slinto, in a letter to the Times, estimates the number seen at Suez as reaching at least 30,000, while in Italy and Athens about 200 per minute were ob- served. They were not, however, the Leonides— that is, they did not radiate from a point in the con stellation Leo, but from the region of Andromeda. Therefore they were distinct from that system of small wanderers usually designated the ‘‘ November 11 44 ELZEVIR LIBRARY. meteors,” were not connected with Tempel’s comet (comet 1, 1866), but belonged to quite another set. The question now discussed by astronomers is whether they are connected with any other comet, and, if so, with which comet? In the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, published October 24th last, is a very inter- esting paper by Professor Herschel, on ‘‘ Observa- tions of Meteor Showers,” supposed to be connected with ‘‘ Biela’s comet,” in which he recommends that ‘¢a watch should be kept during the last week in No- vember aud the first week in December,” in order to verify ‘‘ the ingenious suggestions of Dr. Weiss,” which, popularly stated, amount to this—viz., that a meteoric cloud is revolving in the same orbit as Biela’s comet, and that in 1772 the earth dashed through this meteoric orbit on December 10th. In 1826 it did the same on December 4th; in 1852 the earth passed through the node on November 28th, and there are reasons for expecting a repetition at about the same date in 1872. The magnificent display of the 27th has afforded an important verification of these anticipations which become especially interesting in connection with the curious history of Biela’s comet, which receives its name from M. Biela, of Josephstadt, who observed it in 1826, calculated its orbit, and considered it iden- tical with the comets of 1772, 1805, etc. It travels in a long eccentric ellipse, and completes its orbits in 2410 days—about 62 years. It appeared again, as predicted, in 1832 and 1846. Its orbit very nearly intersects that of the earth, and thus affords a remote possibility of that sort of collision which has excited so much terror in the minds of many people, but which an enthusiastic astronomer of the present generation would antici- pate with something like the sensational interest which stirs the soul of a London street-boy when he is madly struggling to keep pace with a fire-engine, d 12 METEORIC ASTRONOMY. 45 The calculations for 1832 showed that this comet should cross the earth’s orbit a little before the time of the earth’s arrival at the same place; but as such a comet, travelling in such an orbit, is liable to possi- ble retardations, the calculations could only be ap- proximately accurate, and thus the sensational as- tronomer was not altogether without hope. This time, however, he was disappointed; the comet was punctual, and crossed the critical node about a month before the earth reached it. As though to compensate for this disappointment, the comet at its next appearance exhibited some en- tirely new phenomena. It split itself into two com- ets, in such a manner that the performance was visi- ble to the telescopic observer. Both of these comets had nuclei and short tails, and they alternately varied in brightness, sometimes one, then the other, having the advantage. They traveled on at a distance of about 156,000 miles from each other, with parallel tails, and with a sort of friendly communication in the form of a faint are of light, which extended, as a kind of bridge, from one to the other. Besides this, the one which was first the brighter, then the fainter, and finally the brighter again, threw out two addi- tional tails, one of which extended lovingly towards its companion. The time of return in 1852 was, of course, anx- iously expected by astronomers, and careful watch was kept for the wanderers. They came again at the calculated time, still separated as before. They were again due in 1859, in 1866, and, finally, at about the end of last November, or the beginning of the present month. Though eagerly looked for by astronomers in all parts of the civilized world, they have been seen no more since 1852. What, then, has become of them? Have they further subdivided? Have they crumbled into me- teoric dust? Have they blazed or boiled into thin air? or have they been dragged by some interfering 13 46 ELZEVIR LIBRARY. gravitation into another orbit? The last supposition is the most improbable, as none of the visible inhab- itants of space have come near enough to disturb them. The possibility of a dissolution into smaller frag- ments is suggested by the fact that, instead of the original single comet, or the two fragments, meteoric showers have fallen toward the earth at the time when it has crossed the orbit of the original comet, and these showers have radiated from that part of the heavens in which the comet should have ap- peared. Such was the case with the magnificent display of November 27th, and astronomers are in- clining more and more to the idea that comets and meteors have a common origin—that meteors are little comets, or comets are big meteors. In the latest of the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, published last week, is a pa- per by Mr. Proctor, in which he expands the theory expounded three years ago by an author whom your correspondent’s modesty prevents him from naming —viz., that the larger planets—Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune—are minor suns, ejecting me- teoric matter from them by the operation of forces similar to those producing the solar prominences. Mr. Proctor subjects this bold hypothesis to mathe- matical examination, and finds that the orbit of Tem- pel’s comet and its companion meteors correspond to that which would result from such an eruption oc- curring on the planet Uranus. An eruptive force effecting a velocity of about thirteen miles per sec- ond, which is vastly smaller than the actually meas- ured velocity of the matter of the solar eruptions, would be sufficient to thrust such meteoric or come- tary matter beyond the reclaiming reach of the gravi- tation of Uranus, and hand it over to the sun, to make just such an orbit as that of Tempel’s comet and the Leonides meteors. He shows that other comets and meteoric zones 14 METEORIC ASTRONOMY. 47 are similarly allied to other planets, and thus it may be that the falling stars and comets are fragments of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, or Neptune. Verily, if an astronomer of the last generation were to start up among us now, he would be astounded at modern presumption. The star shower of November 27th, and its con- nection with Biela’s broken and lost comet, referred to in my last letter, are still subjects of research and speculation. On November 30th Professor Klink- erfues sent to Mr. Pogson, of the Madras Observa- tory, the following startling telegram: ‘‘ Biela touched earth on 27th. Search near Theta Centauri.” Mr. Pogson searched accordingly from comet-rise to sunrise on the two following mornings, but in vain; for even in India they have had cloudy weather of late. On the third day, however, he had ‘better luck,” saw something like a comet through an open- ing between clouds, and on the following days was enabled to deliberately verify this observation and determine the position and some elements of the motion of the comet, which displayed a bright nu- cleus, and faint. but distinct tail. This discovery is rather remarkable in connection with the theoretical anticipation of Professor Klink- erfues; but the conclusion directly suggested is by no means admitted by astronomers. Some have sup- posed that it is not the primary Biela, but the secon- dary comet, or offshoot, which grazed the earth, and was seen by Mr. Pogson; others that it was neither the body, the envelope, nor the tail of either of the comets which formed the star shower, but that the meteors of November 27th were merely a trail which the comet left behind. A multitude of letters were read at the Jast and previous meeting of the Astronomical Society, in which the writers described the details of their own observations. As these letters came from nearly all parts of the world, the data have an unusual degree 15 48 ELZEVIR LIBRARY. of completeness, and show very strikingly the value of the work of amateur astronomical observers. By the collation and comparison of these, impor- tant inductions are obtainable. Thus, Professor A. §. Herschel concludes that the earth passed through seven strata of meteoric bodies, having each a thickness of about 50,000 miles—in all about 350,000 miles. As the diameter of the visible nebu- losity of Biela’s comet was but 40,000 miles when nearest the earth in 1832, the great thickness of ee strata indicates something beyond the comet itself. Besides this, Mr. Hind’s calculation for the return of the primary comet shows that on November 27th it was 250 millions of miles from the earth. Those, however, who are determined to enjoy the sensation of supposing that they really have been brushed by the tail of a comet? still have the secondary comet to fallback upon. This, as already described, was broken off the original, from which it was seen gradually to diverge, but was still linked to it by an arch of nebulous matter. If this divergence has continued, it must now be far distant—sufiiciently far to afford me an oppor- tunity of safely adding another to the numerous speculations—viz., that we may, on November 27th, have plunged obliquely through this connecting arm of nebulous matter, which was seen stretching be- tween the parent comet and its offshoot. The actual position of the meteoric strata above referred to is quite consistent with this hypothesis. 16 —_ — > THE ORIGIN OF LUNAR VOL- CANOES. Many theoretical efforts, some of considerable violence, have been made to reconcile the supposed physical contradiction presented by the great magni- tude and area of former volcanic activity of the Moon, and the present absence of water on its sur- face. So long as we accept the generally received belief that water isa necessary agent in the evolution of volcanic forces, the difficulties presented by the lunar surface are rather increased than diminished by further examination and speculation. We know that the lava, scorie, dust, and other products of volcanic action on this earth are mainly composed of mixed silicates—those of alumina and lime preponderating. When we consider that the solid crust of the Earth is chiefly composed of silicic acid, and of basic oxides and carbonates which com- bine with silicic acid when heated, a natural neces- sity for such a composition of volcanic products be- comes evident. If the Moon is composed of similar materials to those of the Earth, the fusion of its crust must produce similar compounds, as they are formed in- dependently of any atmospheric or aqueous agency. This being the case, the phenomena presented by the cooling of fused masses of mixed silicates in the absence of water become very interesting. Oppor- tunities of studying such phenomena are offered at aa 50 ELZEVIR LIBRARY. our great iron-works, where fused masses of iron cinder, composed mainly of mixed silicates, are con- tinually to be seen in the process of cooling under a variety of circumstances. I have watched the cooling of such masses very frequently, and have seen abundant displays of miniature volcanic phenomena, especially marked where the cooling has occurred under conditions most nearly resembling those of a gradually cooling planet or satellite; that is, when the fused cinder has been inclosed by a solid resisting and contracting crust. The most remarkable that I have seen are those presented by the cooling of the ‘‘ tap cinder” from puddling furnaces. This, as it flows from the fur- nace, is received in stout iron boxes (‘‘ cinder- bogies”) of circular or rectangular horizontal section. The following phenomena are usually observable on the cooling of the fused cinder in a circular bogie. First, a thin solid crust forms on the red-hot sur- face. This speedily cools sufficiently to blacken. If pierced by a slight thrust from an iron rod, the red-hot matter within is seen to be in a state of seething activity, and a considerable quantity exudes from the opening. Ifa bogie filled with fused cin- der is left undisturbed, a veritable spontaneous vol- canic eruption takes place through some portion, generally near the centre, of the solid crust. In some cases this eruption is sufficiently violent to eject small spurts of molten cinder to a height equal to four or five diameters of the whole mass. The crust once broken, a regular crater is rapidly formed, and miniature streams of lava continue to pour from it; sometimes slowly and regularly, occa- sionally with jerks and spurts due to the bursting of bubbles of gas. The accumulation of these lava- streams forms a regular cone, the height of which goes on increasing. I have seen a bogie about 10 or 12 inches in diameter, and 9 or 10 inches deep, thus 18 LUNAR VOLCANOES. 51 surmounted by a cone above 5 inches high, with a base equal to the whole diameter of the bogie. These cones and craters could be but little improved by a modeller desiring to represent a typical volcano in miniature. Similar craters and cones are formed on the surface of cinder which is not confined by the sides of the bogie. I have seen them well displayed on the ‘‘running-out beds,” of refinery furnaces. These, when filled, form a small lake of molten iron covered with a layer cinder. This cinder first skins over, as in the bogies, then small crevasses form in this crust, and through these the fused cinder oozes from be- low. The outflow from this chasm soon becomes localized, so as to form a single crater, or a small chain of craters; these gradually develop into cones by the accumulation of outflowing lava, so that when the whole mass has solidified, it is covered more or less thickly with a number of such _ hil- locks. These, however, are much smaller than in the former case, reaching to only one or two inches in height, with a proportionate base, It is evident that the dimensions of these miniature volcanoes are determined mainly by the depth of the molten mat- ter from which they are formed. In the case of the bogies, they are exaggerated by the over powering resistance of the solid iron bottom and sides, which force all the exudation in the one direction of least resistance—viz., toward the centre of the thin upper crust, and thus a single crater and a single cone of the large relative dimensions above described are commonly formed. The magnitude and perfection of these miniature volcanoes vary considerably with the quality of the pig-iron and the treatment it has received, and the difference appears to depend upon the evolution of gases, such as carbonic oxide, volatile chlorides, fluorides, etc. I mention the fluorides particularly, having been recently engaged in making some ex- 19 52 ELZEVIR LIBRARY. periments on Mr. Henderson’s process for refining pig-iron, by exposing it when fused to the action of a mixture of fluoride of calcium and oxides of iron, alumina, manganese, etc. ~The cinder separated from this iron displayed the phenomena above de- scribed very remarkably, and jets of yellowish flame were thrown up from the craters while the lava was flowing. The flame was succeeded by dense white vapors as the temperature of the cinder lowered, and a deposit of snow-like, flocculent crystals was left upon and around the mouth or crater of each cone. The miniature representation of cosmical eruptions was thus rendered still more striking, even to the white deposit of the haloid salts which Palmieri has described as remaining after the recent eruption of Vesuvius. The gases thus evolved have not yet been analyti- cally examined, and the details of the powerful reactions displayed in this process still demand further study; but there can be no doubt that the combination of silicic acid with the base of the flour- spar is the fundamental reaction to which the evolu- tion of the volatile fluorides, etc., is mainly due. A corresponding evolution of gases takes place in cosmical volcanic action, whenever silicic acid is fused in contact with limestone or other carbonate, and a still closer analogy is presented by the fusion of silicates in contact with chlorides and oxides, in the absence of water. If the composition of the Moon is similar to that of the Earth, chlorides of sodium, etc., must form an important part of its solid crust; they should correspond in quantity to the great deposit of such salts that would be left be- hind if the ocean of the Earth were evaporated to dryness. The only assumptions demanded in apply- ing these facts to the explanation of the surface con- figuration of the Moon are, 1st, that, our satellite resembles its primary in chemical composition; 2d, that it has cooled down from a state of fusion; 20 LUNAR VOLCANOES. 53 and 8d, that the magnitude of the eruptions, due to such fusion and cooling, must bear some relation to the quantity of matter in action. The first and second are so commonly made and understood, that I need not here repeat the well- known arguments upon which they are supported, but may remark that the facts above described af- ford new and weighty evidence in their favor. If the correspondence between the form of a freely suspended and rotating drop of liquid and that ofa planet or satellite is accepted as evidence of the ex- ertion of the same forces of cohesion, etc., on both, the correspondence between the configuration of the Junar surface, and that of small quantities of fused and freely cooled earth-crust matter, should at least afford material support to the otherwise-indicated inference, that the materials of the Moon’s crust are similar to those of the Earth’s, and that they have been cooled from a state of fusion. I think I may safely generalize to the extent of saying, that no considerable mass of fused earthy silicates can cool down under circumstances of free radiation without first forming a heated solid crust, which, by further radiation, cooling, and contrac- tion, will assume a surface configuration resembling more or less closely that of the Moon. Evidence of this is afforded by a survey of the spoil-banks of blast furnaces, where thousands of blocks of cinder are heaped together, all of which will be found to have their upper surfaces (that were freely exposed when cooling) corrugated with radiating miniature lava streams, that have flowed from one or more craters or openings that have been formed in the manner above described. The third assumption will, I think, be at once admitted, inasmuch as it is but the expression of a physical necessity. According to this, the Earth, if it has cooled as the Moon is supposed to have done, should have dis- played corresponding irregularities and generally, 21 54 FLZEVIR LIBRARY. the magnitude of mountains of solidified planets and satellites should be on a scale proportionate to their whole mass. In comparing the mountains of the Moon and Mercury with those of the Earth, a large error is commonly made by taking the customary measurements of terrestrial mountain-heights from the sea-level. As those portions of the Earth which rise above the waters are but its upper mountain slopes, and the ocean bottom forms its lower plains and valleys, we must add the greatest ocean depths to our customary measurements in order to state the full height of what remains of the original moun- tains of the Earth. As all the stratified rocks have been formed by the wearing down of the original upper slopes and summits, we cannot expect to be able to recognize the original skeleton form of our water-washed globe. If my calculation of the atmosphere of Mercury is correct—viz., that its pressure is equal to about one seventh of the Earth’s, or 4} inches of mercury, there can be no liquid water on that planet, except- ing perhaps over a small amount of circumpolar area, and during the extremes of its aphelion winter. Thus the irregularities of the terminator, indicating m.9untain elevations calculated to reach to st, of the diameter of the planet, are quite in accordance with the above-stated theoretical considerations. Their is one peculiar feature presented by the cones of the cooling cinder which is especially interesting. The flow of fused cinder from the little crater is at first copious and continuous; then it diminishes and becomes alternating, by a rising and falling of the fused mass within the cone. Ultimately the flow ceases, and then the inner liquid sinks, more or less, below the level of the orifice. In some cases, where much gas is evolved, this sinking is so considerable as to leave the cone as a mere hollow shell; the inner liquid having settled down and solidified with a flat or slightly rounded surface, at about the level 22 LUNAR VOLCANOES. 55 of the base of the cone, or even lower. These hol- low cones were remarkably displayed in some of the cinder of the Henderson iron, and their formation was obviously promoted by the abundant evolution gas. If such hollow cones were formed by the cooling of amass like that of the Moon, they would ulti- mately and gradually subside by their own weight. But how would they yield? Obviously, by a grad- ual hinge-like bending at the base toward the axis of the cone. This would occur with or without fracture, according to the degree of viscosity of the crust and the amount of inclination. But the sides of the hollow-cone shell, in falling toward the axis, would be crushing into smaller circumferences, What would result from this? I think it must be the formation of fissures, extending, for the most part, radially from the crater toward the base, and a crumpling up of the shell of the cone by foldings in the same direction. Am I venturing too far in suggesting that in this manner may have been formed the mysterious rays and rills that extend so abun- dantly from several of the lunar craters? The upturned edges or walls of the broken crust, and the chasms necessarily gaping between them, appear to satisfy the peculiar phenomena of reflec- tion which these rays present. These edges of the fractured crust would lean toward each other, and form angular chasms; while the foldings of the crust itself would form long concave troughs, extend- ing radially from the crater. These, when illuminated by rays falling upon them in the direction of the line of vision, must reflect more light toward the spectator than does the general convex lunar surface, and thus they become especially visible at the full moon. Such foldings and fractures would occur after the subsidence and solidification of the lava-forming liquid—that is, when the formation of new craters 23 56 ELZEVIR LIBRARY. had ceased in any given region; hence they would extend across the minor lateral craters formed by outbursts from the sides of the main cone, in the manner actually observed. The fact that the bottoms of the great walled craters of the Moon are generally lower than the surrounding plains must not’be forgotten in connec- tion with this explanation. I will not venture further with the speculations suggested by the above described resemblances, as my knowledge of the details of the telescopic ap- pearances of the Moon is but second-hand. I have little doubt, however, that observers who have the privilege of direct familiarity with such details will find that the phenomona presented by the cooling of iron cinder, or other fused silicates, are worthy of further and more careful study. 24 THE SEASERPENTS OF SCIENCE, ‘“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your DRED Ev Be amlet. In the dull season of the year, when there is a de- cided lack of interesting or startling events, and when newspaper editors are at their wits’ end for material, three objects derived from the domain of the biologist have been credited with the task of re- viving the tide of public interest, and of restoring peace and composure to the editorial mind. It need hardly be said that the three objects alluded to are: ‘‘the frog from the solid rock,” ‘‘ the gigantic goose- berry’—occasionally supplemented by the discovery of ‘‘an egg of marvelous proportions,” and last, though by no means least, comes the announcement —made as if the being were some eminent tragedian returning to the scene of former triumphs—of the ‘‘reappearance of the great sea-serpent!’ People have come in fact to regard the annual advent of the ‘Great Unknown” as a sure and settled event; and doubtless there are many who would confess to a feeling of disappointment did the season slip past without an announcement of the mysterious stran- ger’s Visit. Notwithstanding the interest which the discussion of the sea-serpent question inevitably evokes, there are comparatively few persons to be found who regard the question from other than a purely sceptical point of view. ‘The intelligence that the sea-serpent ‘‘ has 2) THE EHLZEVIR LIBRARY. been seen again” is usually reckoned as equivalent to the statement that some grog-laden mariner has been exhibiting that phenomenon known to physi- ologists as ‘‘ unconscious cerebration,” or that some observer has been interpreting an unusual appearance in the sea by the light of the serpentine myth. Oc- casionally the subject affords an opportunity for the display of the anything but scientific use of the imagination of some feeble jokers, who succeed in imposing upon the credulity of editors, and in seeing their absurd descriptions of fictitious animals in all the prominence of large type. I have before me at the present time a most circumstantial account of the ‘‘capture of the sea-serpent at Oban,” in which the animal is described as having been attacked by a file of volunteers armed with rifles, and by a perfect flo- tilla of yachts and boats. The animal was, according to this account, happily delivered over to the tender mercies of the native talent. After causing stones to fly in showers by the sweep of its tail as it lay on the beach, it was secured, and a list of zoological characters, such as belong to no one known animal, is duly given. It can hardly be deemed astonishing that a non-scientific London entrepreneur, on reading the account of the monster’s capture, at once telegraphed to secure it forexhibition. History, it need scarcely be said, does not record the sayings of this gentleman on learning that, as one of the credulous public, he had been duly hoaxed. The literature of the subject is in one sense a huge record of mistakes and errors in observation, and the ordinary public, as wellas the scientific world, have long been accustomed to accept the erroneous side as representative of the entire subject, and as if no element or substratum of probability and fact was included in the whole matter. Thus, for example, because on one occasion an alleged sea-serpent on closer investigation was proved to consist of a long train or tail of sea-weed, with some heterogeneous material serving for the head—or since, on other oc. THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 8 casions, forms described as being of serpentine size have resolved themselves into shoals of porpoises swimming in line—readers of such detached state- ments are apt to rush to the settled conclusion that . all sea-serpent tales are explicable on some analogous footing. The relegation of the subject to the sphere of fable is therefore to be accounted a perfectly natural result of the almost invariable construction put upon a few ill-founded tales and medieval myths —to be presently alluded to—and also of the indiffer- ence with which zoologists themselves have treated the subject; while ignorance of the existence of a great body of perfectly reliable evidence supporting the view that large serpentine forms have been seen, together with a common incompetence to weigh evi- dence and to decide upon the merits of the case, may _ also be cited as two important factors in inducing a general disbelief in the personality of the modern Leviathan. Of the older chroniclers of sea-serpent lore, perhaps the most noteworthy is Olaus Magnus, the worthy archbishop of Upsala, who devotes a whole chapter in the course of his writings to the sea-serpent, and discourses most volubly upon the marine snake, and other monsters of the deep, such as krakens, whales, and the like. Speaking of some sea monsters, the exact nature of which it is zoologically impossible to define, Magnus writes that ‘‘ their forms are horrible, their heads square, all set with prickles, and they have sharp and long horns about, like a tree rooted up by the roots. They areten or twelve cubits long, very black, and with huge eyes, the compass whereof is about eight or ten cubits. The apple of the eye is of one cubit, and is red and fiery colored, which in the dark night appears to fishermen afar off under waters as a burning fire, having hairs like goose feathers, thick and long, like a beard hanging down. The rest of the body, for the greatness of the head, which is square, is very small, not being above 14 or 15 cubits long. One of these sea monsters will easily 4 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. drown many great ships, provided with many strong mariners.” The sea-serpent of this writer appears to have been a terrible animal, worthy of a place in the records of those knightly encounters with strange beasts which — mark our earlier literature. The marine snake of Magnus was 200 feet long, twenty feet thick, and appeared ‘‘ like a pillar’ when he elevated his head in mid-air. His hair was a cubit long, his scales were sharp and his skin black; and his eyes were like flaming fire. The appearances of such monsters were naturally regarded in the light of grave por- tents of coming disasters. One old writer, relating the capture of a marine monster, says that ‘‘in 1282, there was a fish taken in the sea, in all respects like unto a lyon.” The fishermen reported that ‘‘the fishe gave many frightfull scrikes and cries when it was taken, and at this time,” continues the narrative, ‘‘there fell a great discord between the Englishmen that were students in Paris and those of Pycardy that studyed there likewise. Their division was so terri- ble that it could hardly be appeased.” Starting thus with a basis of myth, it is little to be wondered at that modern ideas have continued to invest the ‘‘ sea- serpent” and its kind with an atmosphere of the ri- diculous. The simple and attentive consideration of the mat- ter, however, reveals certain aspects and features, in virtue of which it can hardly be dismissed from the sphere either of popular or of scientific thought, and which commend the subject to the intelligent mind, as a study of both a curious and highly interesting kind. Can we, for example, after perusing the mass of evidence accumulated during past years, dismiss the subject s¢mpliciter, as founded on no basis of fact? The answer to such a question must be an emphatic negative; since the evidence brought before our no- tice includes the testimony of several hundreds of sane and reasonable persons, who in frequent cases have testified on oath and by affidavit to the truth of THE SEA-SERPENTS OF SOIENCE. 5 their descriptions of curious marine forms, seen and observed in various seas. The second supposition, that all of these persons have simply been deceived, is one which must also be dismissed. For, after making all due allowance for exaggeration, and for variations in accounts arising from different modes of expression and even from mental peculiarities in the witnesses, there remains asolid body of testimony, which, unless there is some special tendency to men- dacity on the part of persons who travel by sea, we are bound, by all the rules of fair criticism, and of evidence, to receive as testimony of honest kind. AsI have elsewhere observed, ‘‘ There are very many calmly and circumstantially related and duly verified accounts of serpentine, or, at any rate, of anomalous marine forms, having been closely inspected by the crews and passengers of vessels. Lither, therefore, we must argue that in every instance the sense of in- telligent men and women must have played them false, or we must simply assume that they are de- scribing what they have never seen. The accounts in many instances so minutely describe the appear- ance of such forms, inspected from a near standpoint, that the possibility of their being mistaken for inani- mate objects, as they might be if viewed from a dis- t-nee, is rendered entirely improbable. We may ius, then, affirm firstly that there are many verified ‘eces of evidence on record, of strange marine rms having been met with—which evidences, judged according to ordinary and common-sense rules, go to prove that certain hitherto undescribed marine organisms do certainly exist in the sea- depth.” The first issue I must therefore submit to the reader, as representing one of a large and impartial jury, is, that the mass of evidence accumulated on the sea-serpent question, when weighed and tested, even in a prima facie manner, plainly shuts us up to the belief that appearances, resembling those pro- duced by the presence in the sea of huge serpentine 6 THE HLZEVIR LIBRARY. forms, have been frequently noted by competent and trustworthy observers. Unless we are to believe that men and women have deliberately prevaricated, and that without the slightest excuse or show of reason, we must believe that they have witnessed marine appearances, certainly of unwonted and unusual kind. That ‘‘ something” has assuredly been seen, must be the verdict on this first issue. What that ‘‘ some- thing” is or was, and whether or not the evidence will support the opinion that the appearances de- scribed bear out the existence of a ‘‘sea-serpent” in the flesh, form points for discussion in the next in- stance. In the consideration of this second issue, two chief aspects are presented. We have thus, firstly, to as- sure ourselves that the evidence, the character of ° which has just been discussed, will support the as- sertion that the appearances noted were produced by living organisms. And provided this point be de- cided in the affirmative, we must assure ourselves, in the second place, of the probable kind and nature of these beings. Allusion has already been made to erroneous ob- servations, which have subjected the stories of sea- serpents to almost universal ridicule, and in which various /ifeless objects were at first credited with the representation of the marine monster. That along and connected string of seaweed, extending for some fifty or sixty feet along the surface of a sea, slightly disturbed by a rippling breeze, may be moved by the waves in amanner strongly suggestive of the move- ments of a snake in swimming, is a statement to the correctness of which I can bear personal testimony, and to the truth of which even observant sea-side visitors may testify. The movements of an unusu- ally long frond or group of fronds of tangle, attached to a rock, and set in motion at low water, by a light swell, has before now, and when seen indistinctly, suggested the idea of the existence at the spot of some large denizen of the sea, browsing on the sea- THE SHA-SHRPENTS OF SCIENCHK. %% weeds, with the fore part of its body, represented by the tangle fronds, occasionally appearing at the sur- face of the water. Floating trunks and roots of trees, serving as a nucleus around which sea-weed has collected, and to which barnacles and sea-acorns —producing a variegated effect by reason of their light color—have attached themselves in great num- bers, have also presented appearances closely resem- bling those of large marine animals swimming slowly along at the surface of the water. In one instance of this latter kind, related to me by a friend who was an actual spectator, the floating piece of timber assumed a shape imitating in the closest and most remarkable manner the head of some reptile—by the same rule, I suppose, that in the gnarled trunks and branches of trees one may frequently discern likenesses to the human face and to the forms of other living things. In this latter instance, the floating object was per- ceived at some miles’ distance from the deck of a yacht; and even when seen through a telescope, and carefully scrutinized by men accustomed to make out the contour and nature of objects at sea, the resem- blance to the head of some animal was so close that the course of the vessel was changed and the object in due time overhauled. This latter, therefore, presents an example of a case, the details of which, when re- lated, tempt people to maintain, without further par- ley, that sea-serpents always resolve themselves into inanimate objects of one kind or another. And so great in some minds is the fear of popular ridicule regarding this subject, that one ship-captain related that when a sea-serpent had been seen by his crew from the deck of the vessel, he remained below; since, to use his own words, ‘‘ had I said I had seen the sea-serpent, I should have been considered to be a warranted liar all my life after.” But the natural supposition and remark of the in- animate nature of objects seen at sea is at once noted to be anything but universal in its nature and appli- cation, when the records of sea-serpent history are ° THE ELZEVIR «LBRARY, examined in detail. Numerous cases exist in which the object, presumed to be a living being, has been scrutinized so closely that, save on the supposition that senses have played their owners false, or that minds have given way to an unaccountable impulse for lying, we must face and own the belief that liv- ing animals have been seen. Let us briefly examine one or two of the accounts of this kind which have been duly and faithfully recorded, with a view of ascertaining whether or not we may detect any in- herent or implied elements of improbability, and whether the evidence as to living things having been seen is of trustworthy kind. One of the most circumstantially recorded and best-known reports of the appearance of a sea-ser- pent is that of Captain M‘Quhe, who commanded H.M.S. Dedalus in 1848, and whose case, origin- ally published and commented upon in the Times of that year, may be almost unknown to the present and rising generation of readers. The first announce- ment in the Z?mes appeared in the form cf a para- graph on October 9th, 1848, stating that when the Dedalus was on her passage home from the East In- dies, and when between the Cape of Good Hope and St. Helena, the captain and most of the officers and crew saw an animal which from its form and shape they assumed to be a sea-serpent. Captain M‘Quhe’s own statement, contained in his reply to an official inquiry from the Admiralty, gives the date of the marine monster’s appearance as 6th August, 1848, and its exact habitat, at 5 p.m. of that day, as latitude 24° 44'S. and longitude 9° 22’ E. The captain sim- ply states it to be ‘‘an enormous serpent, with head and shoulders kept about four feet constantly above the surface of the sea, and, as nearly as we could approximate by comparing it with the length of what our maintop-sail yard would show in the water, there was at the very least sixty feet of the animal @ fleur d'eau, no portion of which was, to our perception, used in propelling it through the water, either by THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 9 vertical or horizontal undulation.” The animal, Captain M‘Quhe states,—and the observation is im- portant, as bearing on the question of the living na- ture of the object described,—passed the ship ‘rap- idly, but so close under our lee quarter, that had it been a man of my acquaintance I should easily have recognized his features with the naked eye.” The further dimensions of the animal are given as 15 or 16 inches in diameter ‘‘ behind the head, which was,” continues Captain M‘Quhe, ‘‘without any doubt, that of a snake,” while the color is described as being ‘‘a dark brown, with yellowish white about the throat.” No fins were visible, but it appeared to posess ‘‘ something like the mane of a horse, or rather (like ?) a bunch of sea-weed, washed aboutits back.” Lieutenant Drummond, of the Dedalus, who was officer of the watch on the memorable occasion, states in his report that the animal had a “‘ back fin,” which was ‘‘ perhaps twenty feet in the rear of the head.” This fin evidently corresponds to the struc- ture described in the captain’s report as ‘‘ something like the mane of a horse,” and which the introduction of the word ‘‘like” (as I have inserted it in paren- theses after the word ‘‘ rather” in his description) serves to correlate with the ‘‘ bunch of sea-weed”’ which ‘‘ washed about its back.” So far as an exact and circumstantial description, attested by the narrative of other witnesses, can tes- tify to the actual nature of an object, viewed, it must be remarked, by educated and observant men, the instance just given would appear to admit of not the slightest doubt that a truly living and actively mov- ing animal was observed, and also that its appearance was decidedly serpentine. It is noteworthy that in the whole course of the discussion which followed upon the publication of Captain M‘Quhe’s observa- tion, no one was found even to suggest that the ap- pearance was other than that of a living animal; al- though, as will afterwards be remarked, opinions varied greatly as to the nature of the being which 10 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. thus afforded so tantalizing and insufficient a glimpse of its structure and identity. Passing over many interesting reports of sea-ser- pents’ appearances now of some years’ date, I find in the daily newspapers, almost of the date at which these words are penned, statements, both made on oath and before legal authorities, regarding the ‘‘great unknown.” ‘The first of these statements I shall give in the words of the newspaper reports, which present a clear, unvarnished statement of the narrative, and of the circumstances in which it was offered for public investigation. ‘‘The story of the mate and crew of the barque Pauline, of London, said to have arrived in port from a twenty months’ voyage to Akyab—about having seen ‘a sea-serpent’ while on a voyage in the Indian seas, was declared to on oath before Mr. Raffles, the stipendiary magistrate, at the Liverpool Police Court. The affidavit was made in consequence of the doubt- fulness with which anything about the ‘ sea-serpent’ has hitherto been received; and to show the genuine character of the story it has been placed judicially on record. The following is a copy ofthe declara- tion, which will be regarded as unprecedented in its . way: BorovuGH oF LIVERPOOL, IN THE COUNTY PALATINE OF LANCAS- TER, TO WIT. We, the undersigned, captain, officers, and crew of the bark Pauline (of London), of Liverpool, in the county of Lancas- ter, in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, do solemnly and sincerely declare that on July 8, 1875, in lat. 5° 13’ S., long. 35° W., we observed three large sperm whales, and one of them was gripped round the body with two turns of what appeared to be a huge serpent. The head and tail appeared to have a length beyond the coils of about thirty feet, and its girth eight or nine feet. The serpent whirled its victim round and round for about fifteen minutes, and then suddenly dragged the whale to the bottom, head first. GrorGE Drevar, Master. Horatio THOMPSON. JOHN HENDERSON LANDELLS, OWEN BAKER. Wm. LEWARN. THE SEA-SHERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 11 Again, on July 13,a similar: serpent was seen about two hundred yards off, shooting itself along the surface, the head and nec: being out of the water several feet. This was seen only by the captain and one ordinary seaman, whose signa- tures are affixed. GrorGE Drevar, Master. OwEN BAKER. A few moments after it was seen elevated some sixty feet erpendicularly in the air, by the chief officer and the follow- ing able seamen, whose signatures are also afiixed. Horatio THOMPSON, WILLIAM LEWARN. OWEN BAKER. And we make this solemn declaration conscientiously, be- lieving the same to be true, and by virtue of the provisions of an act made and passed in the sixth year of the reign of his late Majesty, entitled ‘An Act to repeal an Act of the present Session of Parliament, entitled an Act for the more effectual abolition of oaths and affirmations, taken and made in various departments of the State, and to substitute decla- rations in lieu thereof, and for‘the more entire suppression of voluntary and extra-judicial oaths and affidavits, and to make other provisions for the abolition of unnecessary oaths.’ Severally declared and subscribed at Liverpool aforesaid the tenth day of January, one thousand eight hun- dred and seventy-seven. GEORGE DreEvar, Master. WILLIAM LEwarRn, Steward. Horatio THOMPSON, Chicf Officer. J. H. LANDELLS, Second Officer. OWEN BAKER. Severally declared and subscribed at Liverpool afore- said, the tenth day of January, one thousand eight hundred and seventy-seven, before T. 8. Rafiles, J. P. for Liverpool.” The second and final piece of evidence I shall cite is that obtained from an article entitled ‘‘ Strange Sea-Monsters,” by Mr. R. A. Proctor, which appeared in the Hecho of the 15th January, 1877. In this com- munication Mr. Proctor makes reference to some of the views which I have promulgated on this sub- ject, and by way of illustration gives the following interesting particulars of a recent sea-serpent narra- tive: 12 THH ELZHVIR LIBRARY. “Soon after the British steamship Nestor anchored at Shanghai, last October, John K. Webster, the captain, and James Anderson, the ship’s surgeon, appeared before Mr. Donald Spence, Acting Law Secretary in the British Supreme Court, and made affidavit to the following effect: On September 11, at 10.30 a.m., fifteen miles north-west of North Sand Lighthouse, in the Malacca Straits, the weather being fine and the sea smooth, the captain saw an object which had been pointed out by the third officer as ‘a shoal!’ Surprised at finding a shoal in such a well-known track, I watched the object, and found that it was in motion, keep- ing up the same speed with the ship, and retaining about the same distance as first seen. The shape of the creature I would compare to that of a gigantic frog. The head, ofa pale yellowish color, was about twenty feet in length, and six feet of the crown were above the water. I tried in vain to make out the eyes and mouth; the mouth may, however, have been below water. The head was immediately con- nected with the body, without any indication of aneck. The body was about forty-five or fifty feet long, and of an oval shape,perfectly smooth,but there may have been a light ridge along the spine. The back rose some five feet above the sur- face. An immense tail, fully one hundred and fifty feet in length, rose a fewinches above the water. This tail I saw distinctly from its junction with the body to its extremity; it seemed cylindrical, with a very slight taper, and I estimate its diameter at four feet. The body and tail were marked with alternate bands of stripes, black and pale yellew in color. The stripes were distinct to the very extremity of the tail. I cannot say whether the tail terminated in a fin or not. The creature possessed no fins or paddles so far as we could perceive. Icannot sayif it had legs. It appeared to pro- gress by means of an undulatory motion of the tail in a ver- tical plane (that is, up and down). Mr. Anderson, the surgeon, confirmed the captain’s account in all essential respects. He regarded the creature aS an enormous marine salamander. ‘It was apparently of a gelatinous (that is, flabby) sub- stance. Though keeping up with us, at the rate of nearly ten knots an hour, its movements seemed lethargic. I saw no eyes or fins, and am certain that the creature did not blow or spout in the man- ner of a whale. I should not compare it for a mo- THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 18 ment to a snake. The only creatures it could be compared with are the newt or frog tribe.’ ” * Placing these two latter narratives side by side with that of Captain M‘Quhe, we may firstly remark the singular coincidence that in all three narratives mention is made of the head of the animal being elevated above water—this feature in the animal’s mode of progression having evidently struck the ob- servers as a noticeable point; while the coincidence, viewed as a piece of internal evidenee, speaks strongly in favor of the implied truthfulness of the narratives. I think one may fairly assume that the supposition that the parties concerned were deceived into mistaking a lifeless for a living object, cannot for a moment be reasonably entertained. Laying aside for the present all questions as to the zoologi- cal position and rank of the animal, we may take it for granted, as based on evidence of reasonable kind, that the ‘‘ something” seen in each of these cases— which, be it remarked, are but types of many other - authenticated records of similar kind—was an active living animal. And we may also affirm that, from the circumstances in which the statements were made, as well as from the character of our witnesses, from their evident desire and from the trouble taken by them to place on record a faithful account of what they had seen, we have ample evidence to prove that part of our second issue which dealt with the question of the living or lifeless nature of the objects seen. If internal evidence is to be trusted at all, the present case strongly exemplifies its worth and value. We have, however, still to deal with a point in our * It is just possible that the ‘‘ flabby” or “ gelatinous” crea- ture mentioned in this narrative was a giant cuttle-fish, whose manner of swimming, color, absence of limbs, etc., would correspond with the details of the narrative. The ‘immense tail’? might be the enormous arms of such a crea- ture trailing behind the body as it swam backward, propelled by jets of water from the breathing ‘‘ funnel.” 14 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. second proposition, which brings us within the scope of truly scientific inquiry—namely, that devoted to the consideration of the kind or nature of the animals observed by narrators of sea-serpent tales. In the elucidation of this topic we may incidentally dis- cover implied proofs of the correctness and truth of the narratives on which the history of the sea-serpent is literally founded. ‘The discussion of the question from a zoological point of view may be fitly prefaced by an allusion to certain readily-explained cases of serpentine appearances caused by well-known and common forms of marine life assuming peculiar atti- tudes in the water, and of being indistinctly seen by observers. The instance already alluded to, of a shoal of porpoises swimming in line, with their backs and dorsal fins appearing now and then, with a kind of regular alternating motion, above the surface of the water, presents an example of a deceptive appear- ance brought about by a somewhat unusual habit of ‘familiar animals. I well remember being struck with surprise at an unwonted spectacle I beheld in the Frith of Forth some years ago, of an apparently long animal swimming rapidly through the water, and showing several widely-detached black fins. Being alone in a small skiff at the time, I confess to the feeling of caution prompting me to restrain my curiosity and to remain at a safe distance from the animal. My curiosity was, however, speedily dis- pelled by beholding the apparently long and single animal resolve itself into a few sun-fishes (Orthago- riscus), which happened to be rolling over and over in the water in line; their motions, viewed from a distance, together with the imperfect glimpse I had at first caught of the animals, rendering my former idea of the presence of an elongated moving body all the more realistic. Such cases are, however, not to be placed side by side with the plain accounts of unknown animals of large size having been distinctly seen in latitudes favoring the growth of animals with which we are less familiar, and to the explana- THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 15 tion of the affirmed and verified accounts of which we may next direct attention. As was naturally to be expected, zoologists began to overhaul their lists on the narration of these tales, with the view of attempting to discover some known form which would correspond with the details and appearances observed and described in the sea-serpent accounts. Could the zoologist point with reason to any single form or to a few animals which might, without any undue liberties being taken either with the animals themselves or with the sea-serpent tales, be regarded as the representatives of the marine mon- sters? Such was the question propounded for the solution of naturalists in former years, and such em- phatically is the chief question for consideration in the subject as it at present stands. The only group of animals to which our attention may be specially directed with the view of finding a zoological solution of the problem, is that of the Vertebrata—the highest group of animals, which pos- sesses the fishes as its lowest, and man and quadru- peds as its highest representatives. Laying aside the class of birds, as including no forms at all allied to our present inquiry, we are left with, speaking gen- erally, three groups of animals, from the ranks of which various forms may be selected to aid us in solving the sea-serpent mystery. These three groups are the fishes, reptiles, and mammalia, and it may be shown that from each of these classes, but more nota- bly from among the fishes and reptiles, various ani- mals, corresponding more or less closely with the descriptions given of strange marine monsters, may be obtained. An important consideration, however, must not be overlooked at this stage, namely, that too frequently the attempt to reconcile the sea-ser- pent with some known animal of serpentine form and nature, has limited the perceptions and foiled the labors of naturalists. Starting with the fixed idea that the unknown form must be a serpent, and not widening their thoughts to admit of the term 16 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. ‘‘serpentine” being extended to groups of animals other than the reptilia, naturalists soon exhausted the scientific aspect of the subject, and the zoologi cal solution of the problem was almost at once given up. Then, also, as far as I have been able to ascer- tain, zoologists and other writers on this subject have never made allowance for the abnormal and huge de- velopment of ordinary marine animals. My own con- victions on this matter find in these two considera- tions, but especially in the last idea, the most reason- able and likely explanation of the personality of the sea-serpent, and also the reconciliation of such dis- crepancies as the various narrations may be shown to evince. If we thus fail to find in the ranks of ordi- nary animal life, or among the reptiles themselves, the representatives of the ‘‘sea-serpents,” I think we may nevertheless build up a most reasonable case both for their existence and for the explanation of their true nature, by taking into account the facts, that the term ‘‘ sea-serpent,” as ordinarily employed, must be extended to include other forms of Verte- brate animals which possess elongated bodies; and that cases of the abnormally large development of ordinary serpents and of serpent-like animals will reasonably account for the occurrence of the animals collectively named sea-serpents. The case related by Captain M‘Quhe formed, as has been remarked, subject-matter for much discus- sion. As Mr. Gosse records in his charming work, ‘“‘The Romance of Natural History,” the various suggestions thrown out regarding the nature of the ‘“serpent” seen by the crew of the Deedalus, included and advocated its correspondence with a gigantic seal—this idea emanating from Professor Owen; with a Plesiosaurus—an extinct reptile, which possessed a very long swan-like neck, and which attained a usual length varying from eighteen to twenty or more feet; with other and allied forms of extinct reptilia; and with a large species of shark, the bask- ing shark (Selache maaima). The idea of Professor THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 17 Owen does not in the least correspond with Captain M‘Quhe’s circumstantial account of the appearance; and to Owen’s views the captain contributed a cour- teous but firm reply, refusing absolutely to admit that his description was susceptible of such modifi- cation as would bring Professor Owen’s idea of a gigantic seal and the serpent of the Dedalus into close correspondence. Mr. Gosse and others support the suggestion that the animal seen on this occasion was a kind of Plestosaurus. And this idea received apparent support from the fact recorded by Captain M‘Quhe that no motion was observed in the portion of the animal above water; it being thus concluded that the movements were produced by limbs existing in the form of swimming paddles, such as the Plesdo- saurt possessed, and which would in their natural position be concealed below the surface of the water. The suggestion of a huge shark is simply untenable from the utter want of correspondence between any feature of the shark’s conformation and the account of Captain M‘Quhe. The idea that the animal observed in this instance was a huge serpent seems to have been simply slurred over without that due attention which this hypothe- sis undoubtedly merits. While to my mind the only feasible explanation of the narrative of the crew of the Pauline must be founded on the idea that the animals observed by them were gigantic snakes. The habits of the animals in attacking the whales evidently point to a close correspondence with those of terrestrial serpents of large size, such as the boas and pythons; while the fact of the animal being de- scribed in the various narratives as swimming with the head out of water, would seem to indicate that, like all reptiles, they were air-breathers, and required to come more or less frequently to the surface for the purpose of respiration. The difficulties which ap- pear to stand in the way of reconciling the sea-ser- pent with a marine snake, in this or in other cases, are two in number. The great majority of intelli- 18 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. gent persons are unaware of the existence of serpents of truly and exclusively marine habits; and thus the mere existence of such snakes constitutes an appar- ent difficulty, which, however, a slight acquaintance with the history of the reptilia would serve at once to remove. Mr. Gosse speaks of these marine snakes —the Hydrophide of the naturalist—which inhabit the warmer seas, possess compressed fin-like tails adapted for swimming, and are frequentiy met with far out at sea.* While, as regards the claims of the ‘‘sea-serpent” to belong to the true serpent order, naturalists have dismissed this idea, simply because it has never occurred to them that a gigantic develop- ment of an ordinary species of sea-snake would fully correspond with most of the appearances described, and would in the most natural manner explain many of the sea-serpent tales. Suppose that a sea-snake of gigantic size is carried out of its ordinary latitude, and allow for slight variations or inaccuracies in the accounts given by Captain M‘Quhe, and I think we have in these ideas the nearest possible approach to a reasonable solution of this interesting problem. It will be asked how I account for the apparent absence of motion in the fore part of the body, and for the existence of a dorsal or back fin. inka suggest, in reply, that the simple movements of the laterally compressed tail, altogether concealed be- * It is interesting to note that frequent mention of the oc- currence of large ‘‘ sea-serpents’’ is made by the crews of vessels which have sailed through the Indian Ocean. An in- stance of a large sea-snake being seen in its native seas is afforded by the report of the master of thé bark Georgina from Rangoon, which (as reported in the newspapers of September 4th, 1877) put into Falmouth for orders on the 1st September. On May 2ist, 1877, in latitude 2° N. and longitude 90° 53’ E., a large serpent about forty or fifty feet long, gray and yellow in color, and ten or eleven inches thick, was seen by the crew. It was visible for twenty minutes, during which time it crossed the bow, and ulti- mately disappeared under the port-quarter. There can be little doubt that this sea-serpent was simply a largely de- veloped marine snake, THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 19 neath the surface, would serve to propel the animal forward without causing the front portion of the body to exhibit any great or apparent motion; while the appearance of a fin may possibly be explained on the presumption that seaweed may have become attached to the animal, or that the upper ridge of the vertically compressed tail extended far forward and appeared as a fin-like structure. The most important feature in my theory, how- ever, in which I may be desired to lead evidence, and that which really constitutes the strong point of this explanation, is the propability of the develop- ment to a huge or gigantic size of ordinary marine serpents. This point is one in support of which zoology and physiology will offer strong and favor- able testimony. There is no single fact, so far as I am aware, which militates in the slightest degree against the supposition that giant members of the sea-serpents may be occasionally developed. The laws which regulate human growth and structure, and in virtue of which veritable ‘‘sons of Anak,” like Chang the Chinese giant, and the Russian giant, differing widely in proportions from their fellow mortals, are developed, must be admitted to hold good for the entire animal kingdom. ‘There is, in fact, no valid reason against the supposition that a giant serpent is occasionally produced, just as we familiarly observe almost every kind of animal to produce now and then a member of the race which mightily exceeds the proportions of its neighbors. But clearer still does our case become when we con- sider that we have proof of the most absolute and direct kind of the giant development of such forms as cuttle-fishes, which have thus appeared as if in realization of Victor Hugo’s ‘‘devil-fish,” which plays so important a part in that strange, weird tale, the ‘‘Toilers of the Sea.” The huge polypus of Pliny ; the kraken of Bishop Pontoppidan, which that learned Churchman described as ‘‘ similior in- sule quam bestie;” the ‘‘poulpe” of De Montfort 90 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. which was large enough to swallow a three-decker; and lastly Victor Hugo’s cephalopodous creation, were deemed, not so very long ago, to belong en- tirely to the domain of myth and fancy. A few fragments of cuttle-fishes of large size had been now and then cast up on various coasts, it is true, but these instances were not regarded as at all sufficient to establish the existence of giant members of the group. At the present time, however, we are in full possession of the details of several undoubted cases of the occurrence of cuttle-fishes of literally gigantic proportions—developed, in fact, to an ex- tent justly comparable to that of the supposed ‘‘ sea-serpent,” when the latter is compared with its ordinary representatives of the tropical oceans. Other giants of the cuttle-fish race are known to science, and no residuum of doubt now remains in the minds of naturalists regarding the existence of prototypes of Victor Hugo’s ‘‘devil-fish.” Many zoologists might hesitate greatly before assigning these monsters to new genera or species, and would simply regard them as giant developments of ordi- nary and already known cuttle-fish forms. Is there anything more improbable, I ask, in the idea of a gigantic development of an ordinary marine snake into a veritable giant of its race—or, for that matter, in the existence of distinct species of monster sea- serpents—than in the production of huge cuttle- fishes, which, until within the past few years, re- mained unknown to the foremost pioneers of science! In the idea of gigantic developments of snakes or snake-like animals, be they fishes or reptiles, I hold we have at least a feasible and rational explanation of the primary fact of the actual existence of such organisms. The difference regarding details of appearance and structure described in the sea-serpent tales, leads us next, and lastly, to point out certain considerations which may serve to explain away some of the diffi- culties which beset the question. That many of the THE SHA-SHERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 921 nppearances described may have been produced b animals other than true serpents cannot be doubted. It therefore constitutes an important part of our task to indicate the probabilities of various other animal forms ‘‘ doing duty,” so to speak, for sea-serpents on some occasions. Amongst the fishes we may find not a few ex- amples of snake-like animals, which, admitting the fact of the occurrence of gigantic developments, may be supposed to mimic very closely the appearance of marine serpents. Any one who has watched the movements of a large conger-eel, for example, in any of our great aquaria, must have remarked not only its serpentine form, but also the peculiar gliding motion, which seems frequently to be produced in- dependently of the active movements of the tail or pectoral fin. Ido not doubt, however, that a giant ee] might by most persons be readily enough referred to its proper place in the animal sphere, although, when viewed from some distance, and seen in an imperfect and indistinct manner, the spectators—all unprepared to think of an eel being so largely de- veloped—might report the appearance as that of a marine snake. A visit paid to the Newcastle Museum of Natural History, on which occasion I had the pleasure of in- specting a dried and preserved ribbon or tape-fish of large size, forcibly confirmed an idea that such an animal, developed to a gigantic size, and beheld from a distance by persons unskilled in natural history— and who would, therefore, hardly dream of associ- ating the elongated being before them with their or- dinary ideas of fish-form and appearance—might ac- count for certain of the tales of sea-serpents which have been brought under our notice. I had been specially struck with the mention, in several accounts of sea-serpents, of a very long back fin, sometimes termed a ‘‘mane,” and of a banded body covered with tolerably smooth skin; whilst in several instances the description given of the heads of the sea-monsters 99 THE BLZEVIR LIBRARY. closely corresponded with the appearance of the head of the tape-fishes. These fishes have further been described by naturalists as occasionally having been seen swimming with an undulating or serpentine motion close to the surface of the water, the head being somewhat elevated above the surface—this lat- ter feature, as we have observed, forming a remark of frequent occurrence in sea-serpent tales. I found, on making inquiry into the history of these fishes, that their serpentine form had struck previous ob- servers, but, as far asI could ascertain, their merits as representatives of sea-serpents had never before been so persistently advocated. These views and the dimensions of the specimen at Newcastle I communicated to the Scotsman and Courant newspapers in June, 1876. The measure- ments of the ribbon-fish at Newcastle are given as 12 feet 3 inches in length, the greatest depth being 114 inches, and greatest thickness only 2% inches; the small dimensions in thickness, and the relatively long length and depth, giving to these fishes the popular names of ribbon and tape-fishes. The species was the well-known Gymnetrus or Regalecus Banksii of naturalists; and by the museum-attendant at New- castle I was informed that a still larger specimen of the same species was recently obtained off the Nor- thumberland coast, the length of this latter being 134 feet, the depth 15 inches, and the thickness 5 inches. These fishes possess a greatly compressed body. The breast fins are very small, and the ventral or belly fins are elongated and spine-like. The first rays of the dorsal or back fin are very long, whilst the fin itself extends the whole length of the back, and attains an average breadth of about three inches. Curiously enough, the publication of these views regarding the ribbon-fishes drew forth from the head of a well-known firm of fish merchants in Edinburgh a remarkable confirmation of the idea that gigantic specimens of these fishes might be occasionally de- veloped. The gentleman in question wrote to in- THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 93 form me that about thirty years ago he engaged the smack Sovereign, of Hull, Baillie commander, to trawl in the Frith of Forth for Lord Norbury, then residing at Elie Lodge, Fifeshire. Whilst engaged in their trawling operations the crew of the Sove- reign captured a giant tape-fish, which, when spread out at length on the deck, extended beyond the limits of the vessel at stem and stern. The smack was a vessel of forty tons burthen, and the length may therefore be safely estimated at sixty feet—this measurement being exceeded by the ribbon-fish. The breadth of the fish measured from five to nine inches, and the dorsal fin was from six to seven inches in depth. Unfortunately Lord Norbury seemed in- clined to view the giant he had captured with dis- trust, and ordered the fish to be cut in pieces and thrown overboard; but it is also worthy of remark that the trawlers seemed to express no gteat surprise at the size of Lord Norbury’s specimen, since they asserted that they had met with one much larger, this latter being colored of a dirty brown hue. It is interesting to note that the details furnished in the following account—taken from the Zimes of June 14, 1877—of a marine monster having been seen in the Mediterranean Sea, appear to be explicable on the ideas just mentioned regarding the tape-fishes. The account is furnished by observers whose vera- city it would simply be impertinent to question: **The Osborne, 2, paddled royal yacht, Commander Hugh L. Pearson, which arrived at Portsmouth from the Mediterranean on Monday, and at once pro- ceeded to her moorings in the harbor, has forwarded an official report to the Admiralty, through the com- mander-in-chief (Admiral Sir George Elliot, K.C.B.), respecting a sea-monster which she encountered during her homeward voyage. At about five o’clock in the afternoon of the 2d instant, the sea being ex- ceptionally calm, while the yacht was proceeding round the north coast of Sicily toward Cape Vito, the officer on the watch observed along ridge of fins, each 94 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. about six feet long, moving slowly along. He called for a telescope, and was at once joined by other offi- cers. The Osborne was steaming westward at ten and a half knots an hour, and, having a long passage before her, could not stay to make minute observa- tions. The fins were progressing in an eastwardly di- rection, and as the vessel more nearly approached them, they were replaced by the foremost part of a gigantic sea-monster. Its skin was, so far as could be seen, altogether devoid of scales, appearing rather to resemble in sleekness that of a seal. The head was bullet-shaped, with an elongated termination, being somewhat similar in form to that of a seal, and was about six feet in diameter. Its features were only seen by one officer, who described them as like those of an alligator. The neck was comparatively narrow, but so much of the body as could be seen developed in form like that of a gigantic turtle, and from each side extended two fins, about fifteen feet in length, by which the monster paddled itself along after the fashion of a turtle. The appearance of the monster is accounted for by a submarine volcano, which oc- curred north of Galita, in the Gulf of Tunis, about the middle of May, and was reported at the time by a steamer which was struck by a detached fragment of submarine rock. The disturbance below water, it is thought probable, may have driven up the mons- ter from its ‘native element,’ as the site of the erup- tion is only one hundred miles from where it was reported to have been seen.” I thought the opportunity a favorable one for offering a reasonable explanation of the circumstance, and I communicated my views to the 7?%mes in the fol- lowing terms, the latter appearing in that journal for June 15th, 1877: ‘‘ About a year ago I ventilated in the columns of several journals the idea that the ‘sea- serpents’ so frequently seen were in reality giant tape-fishes or ribbon-fishes. While not meaning by this statement to exclude the idea that other ani- mals—such as giant sea-snakes themselves—may oc- THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 25 casionally personate the ‘sea-serpent,’ I am, as a zoologist, fully convinced that very many of the re- ported appearances of sea-serpents are explicable on the supposition that giant tape-fishes—of the exist- ence of which no reasonable doubt can be entertained —have been seen. The report of Captain Pearson, of the royal yacht Osborne, appears, as far as zoologi- cal characters are concerned, to be fully explained on the ‘ ribbon-fish’ theory. The long back fins, the scaleless skin, the rounded head, and, lastly, the two great side (or pectoral) fins, each measuring man feet in length, all form so many details correspond- ing exactly to the appearance of a great tape-fish. I offer these observations with the view of showing that, given a recital founded, as I believe the present narrative to be, on fact, we possess in the lists of liv- ing and of well-known animals adequate representa- tives of the ‘ great unknown.’” The imperfect view obtained of the body renders the expression contained in the report, that the body was ‘‘ like that of a gigantic turtle,” somewhat prob- lematical as to its correctness, and in the absence of more defined information does not necessarily in- validate the views expressed above as to the person- ality of this strange tenant of the Mediterranean Sea. In an article entitled ‘‘ Strange Sea Creatures,” which appeared in the Gentleman’s “Magazine for March, 1877, Mr. R. A. Proctor, speaking of my views regarding the sea-serpent, remarks that I offer ‘‘as an alternative, only the ribbon-fish.” This observation being hardly correct, I may point out that in the article in Good Words, from which Mr. Proctor quotes my views, I distinctly refer to the probability of giant sea-snakes being occasionally de- veloped and appearing as the modern sea-serpent. The use of the word ‘‘only” in Mr. Proctor’s re- mark is misleading; since I offer the ribbon-fishes simply as explanatory of certain sea-serpent narra- tives, and not asa sole and universal representative of the modern leviathan. 26 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. Thus, then, with the ribbon-fishes at hand, and with the clear proofs before us that these and other animals may be developed to a size which, when compared with their ordinary dimensions, we can only term enormous, I think the true and valid ex- planation of the sea-serpent question is neither far to seek nor difficult to find. ‘To objectors of a prac- tical turn of mind, who may remind me that we have not yet procured even a single bone of a giant ~ serpent, I would point out that I by no means main- tain the frequent development of such beings. 'The most I argue for and require is their occasional pro- duction; and I would also remind such objectors of the case of the giant cuttle-fishes, which, until with- in the past few years, remained in the same mysteri- ous seclusion affected at present by the great serpen- tine unknown. I need only add that I have as firm faith in the actual discovery of the giant serpent of the sea, as that in the giant tape-fish we find its rep- resentative, or that in the huge development of ordi- nary forms we discover the true and natural law of its production. To sum up my arguments by way of conclusion, I respectfully submit, as does a pleading counsel to his jury— Firstly: That many of the tales of sea-serpents are amply verified, when judged by the ordinary rules of evidence; this conclusion being especially sup- ported by the want of any primd facie reason for pre- varication. Secondly: That, laying aside appearances which can be proved to be deceptive and to be caused by inanimate objects or by unusual attitudes on the part of familiar animals, there remains a body of evidence only to be explained on the hypothesis that certain gigantic marine animals, at present unfamiliar or unknown to science, do certainly exist; and, Thirdly: That the existence of such animals is a fact perfectly consistent with scientific opinion and knowledge, and is most readily explained by ,recog- THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 97 nizing the fact of the occasional development of gi- gantic members of groups of marine animals already familiar to the naturalist. Since the foregoing remarks were penned, details have been published (Nature, February 21st, 1878) respecting ‘‘ A New Underground Monster,” which have a very decided bearing on the sea-serpent ques- tion, as tending to show that even in the land-fauna of remote districts there may be included animals of a size and nature utterly undreamt of by the scienti- fic world. ‘The details alluded to are forwarded by the well-known naturalist Fritz Miller, and are relat- ed of the appearance and doings of the ‘‘ Minhocao,” a creature supposed to be a ‘‘ gigantic earth-worm,” and which inhabits the highlands of the southern provinces of Brazil. The account as given in the pages of Nature is of similar nature to the stories told us of the existence and appearance of sea-ser- pents. There is the same simplicity of narrative, united to an absence of all reason or cause for exag- geration or invention. We are therefore bound, as already remarked, either to accept such stories as true—as relating to observed facts—and to examine them impartially with the view of detecting discrep- ancy and of possibly modifying details; or, on the other hand, to unhesitatingly and simply reject them. This latter procedure would of course be founded on an unwarrantable supposition—such as in the ordi- nary affairs of life would not for amoment be toler- ated—namely, that deliberate lying and meaningless deception are vices of commoner occurrence than humanity at large has been led to suppose. The marks or tracks of the animal, of whatever descrip- tion it may be, are a valuable source of evidence which, unfortunately, the ‘‘pathless deep” cannot offer to the inquirers into the personality of the ‘*sea-Serpent.” Pending further research, one may only remark, that the details given are inall respects of a very circumstantial and clearly related kind, 28 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY and are such as would lead us to be exceedingly hopeful, now that scientific attention has been di- rected to the matter, of new and extraordinary addi- tions being made to the lists of zoologists. The following is the account of the animal in ques- tion: ‘‘The stories told of this supposed animal,” says Fritz Miller, ‘‘ sound for the most part so incredible that one is tempted to consider them as fabulous. Who could repress a smile at hearing men speak of a worm some fifty yards in length and five in breadth, covered with bones as with a coat of armor, uprooting mighty pine trees as if they were blades of grass, diverting the courses of streams into fresh channels, and turning dry land into a bottomless mo- ’ rass? And yet, after carefully considering the dif- ferent accounts given of the minhocao one can hard- ly refuse to believe that some such animal does really exist, although not quite so large as the coun- try folk would have us to believe. ‘‘ About eight years ago a minhocao appeared in the neighborhood of Lages. Francisco de Amaral Varella, when about ten kilometers distant from _ that town, saw lying on the bank of the Rio das Ca- veiras a strange animal of gigantic size, nearly one meter in thickness, not very long, and with a snout like a pig, but whether it had legs or not he could not tell. He did not dare to seize it alone, and whilst calling his neighbors to his assistance, it vanished, not without leaving palpable marks behind it in the shape of a trench, as it disappeared under the earth. A week later, a similar trench, perhaps constructed by the same animal, was seen on the opposite side of La- ges, about six kilometers distant from the former, and the traces were followed, which led ultimately under the roots of a large pine tree, and were lost in the marshy land. Herr F. Kelling, from whom this in- formation was obtained, was at that time living as a merchant in Lages, and saw himself the trenches made by the minhocao. Herr E. Odebrecht, whilst THE SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 929 surveying a line of road from Itajahy into the high- lands of the province of Santa Caterina, several years ago, crossed a broad, marshy plain traversed by an arm of the river Marombas. His progress here was much impeded by devious winding trenches which followed the course of the stream, and occasionally lost themselves in it. At the time Herr Odebrecht could not understand the origin of these peculiar trenches, but he is now inclined to be- lieve that they were the work of the minhocao. ‘* About fourteen years ago, in the month of Janu- ary, Antonio José Branco, having been absent with his whole family eight days from his house, which was situated on one of the tributaries of the Rio dos Cachorros, ten kilometers from Curitibanos, on re- turning home found the road undermined, heaps of earth being thrown up, and large trenches made. These trenches commenced at the source of a brook, and followed its windings, terminating ultimately in a morass, after a course of from 700 to 1000 meters. The breadth of the trenches was said to be about | three meters. Since that period the brook has flowed in the trench made by the minhocao. The path of the animal lay generally beneath the surface of the earth under the bed of the stream; several pine trees had been rooted up by its passage. One of the trees from which the minhocao in passing had torn off the bark, and part of the wood, was said to be still standing and visible last year. Hundreds of people from Curitibanos and other places had come to see the devastation caused by the minhocao, and supposed the animal to be still living in the marshy pool, the waters of which appeared at certain times to be suddenly and strangely troubled. Indeed, on still nights, a rumbling sound like distant thunder and a slight movement of the earth was sensible in the neighboring dwellings. This story was told to Herr Miller by two eye-witnesses, José, son of old Branco, and a stepson, who formerly lived in the same house. Herr Miiller remarks that the appear- 30 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY, ance of the minhocao is always supposed to presage a period of rainy weather. ‘‘In the neighborhood of the Rio dos Papagaios, in the province of Parana, one evening in 1849, after a long course of rainy weather, a sound was heard in the house of a certain Joao_de Deos, as if rain were again falling in a wood hard by, but on looking out the heavens were seen to be bright with stars. On the following morning it was discovered that a large piece of land on the farther side of a small ‘hill had been entirely undermined, and was traversed by deep trenches which led toward a bare open plateau covered with stones, or what is called in this district a ‘legeado.’ At this spot large heaps of clay turned up out of the earth marked the onward course of the animal from the legeado into the bed of a stream running into the Papagaios. Three years after this place was visited by Senhor Lebino José dos Santos, a wealthy proprietor, now resident near Curitibanos. He saw the ground still upturned, the mounds of clay on the rocky plateau, and the remains of the moved earth in the rocky bed of the brook quite plainly, and came to the conclusion that it must have been the work of two animals, the size of which must have been from two to three meters ia breadth. ‘‘In the same neighborhood, according to Senhor Lebino, a minhocao had been seen several times be- fore. A black woman going to draw water from a pool near a house one morning, according to her usual practice, found the whole pool destroyed, and saw a short distance off an animal which she de- scribed as being as big as a house moving off along the ground. The people whom she summoned to see the monster were too late, and found only traces of the animal, which had apparently plunged over a neighboring cliff into deep water. In the same dis- trict a young man saw a huge pine suddenly over- turned, when there was no wind and no one to cut it. On hastening up to discover the cause, he found THH SHA-SERPENTS OF SCIENCE. 31 the surrounding earth in movement, and an enor- mous worm-like black animal in the middle of it, about twenty-five meters long, and with two horns "on its head. % ‘In the province of Sao Paulo, as Senhor Lebino also states, not far from Ypanema, is a spot that is still called Charquinho, that is Little Marsh, as it formerly was, but some years ago a minhocao made a trench through the marsh into the Ypanema river, and so converted it into the bed of a stream. ‘*In the year 1849, Senhor Lebino was on a journey near Arapehy, in the State of Uruguay. ‘There he was told that there was a dead minhocao to be seen a few miles off, which had got wedged into a narrow cleft of arock, and so perished. Its skin was said to be as thick as the bark of a pine tree, and formed of hard scales like those of an armadillo. ‘**From all these stories it would appear conclusive that in the high district where the Uruguay and the Parana have their sources, excavations and long trenches are met with, which are undoubtedly the work of some living animal. Generally, if not always, they appear after continued rainy weather, and seem to start from marshes or river-beds, and to enter them again. The accounts as to the size and appearance of the creature are very uncertain. It might be suspected to be a gigantic fish allied to Lepidosiren and Ceratodus ; the ‘swine’s snout’ would show some resemblance to Ceratodus, while the horns on the body rather point to the front limbs of Lepi- dosiren, if these particulars can be at all depended upon. In any case, concludes Herr Miller, it would be worth while to make further investigations about the minhocao, and, if possible, to capture it for a zoological garden! ‘*To conclude this remarkable story, we may ven- ture to suggest whether, if any such animal really exist, which, upon the testimony produced by Fritz Miller, appears very probable, it may not rather be a relic of the race of gigantic armadilloes which in 32 THE ELZEVIR LIBRARY. past geological epoehs were so abundant in Southern Brazil. The little Chiamydophorus truncatus is, we believe, mainly, if not entirely, subterranean in its habits. May there not still exist a large representa- tive of the same or nearly allied genus, or, if the suggestion be not too bold, even a last descendant of the Glyptodonts?” ANDREW WILSON. 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My present monthly magazine, CHOICE LITERATURE, Is virtually the successor of THE LIBRARY MAGAZINE, which I edited and pub- lished under The American Book Exchange, and the latter is therefore of particular interest to all my patrons. When the publication of THE LIBRARY MAGAZINE was under- taken I resolved to make as good a periodical as lay in my power, whether or not anybody subscribed for it. The remarkable favor with which it was received by thinking people and the steady demand which continues for the bound volumes indicate that there are many who agree with me as to what is a good magazine. In what other periodical can you find within approximately - the same compass such an array of able, interesting; valuable matter? Where else can you find an equal amount of choice current literature at less than from five to ten times its cost ? Prices Reduced. Volumes will be supplied separately, or in sets, and sent pre- paid at the following prices: Bound in cloth. Volumes 1,2 and 8, 40 cents each; Volume 8, 50 cents ; Volumes 4, 5, 6, 7 and 9, 35 cents each. Bound in half Russia, gilt top. Volumes 1, 2 and 8, 65 cents each; Volume 3, 70 cents; Volumes 4, 5, 6, 7 and 9, 50 cents each. The Nine Volumes bound in cloth, - - - - - $3,20. 56m se o fs “half Russia, gilt top, $4.80. ; Tables of Contents. Volume 1. January to June, 1879, 774 pages. Future of India, The, E. Perry Coup D’Etat, A Poem : Theatrical Makeshifts and Blunders. H. B. Baker Winter Mornin the Country. A. H. Japp Happy Valley, The, L. A. Phoenicians in Greece, The, A. H. Sayce Gossip about Leicester Square Woman’s Love, A, A Slavonian Study Imperial Pardon, An, F. A.S. Christmasin Morocco. C. A. P. Italian Poets, Guarini. T. A. Trollope Vaquero, The, A Poem. F. Desprez Two Modern Japanese Stories Supposed Changes in the Moon. R. A. Proctor Thackeray, Recollections of, Friends and Foes of Russia. W.E. Gladstone English Men of Letters—Shelley. T. Bayne Growth of London, The, Farmhouse Dirge, A. Austin * Dreamland. A Last Sketch. Julia Kavanagh ~ - France, Contemporary Life and Thought in, G. Monod Schoolship Shaftesbury, The, H.C. Ewart Knocked Down and Picked up Again Atheism and the Church. G. H. Curteis Ferney in Voltaire’s Time, and To-day. W. G. Blaikie Discoveries of Astronomers—Hipparchus, R. A. Proctor Fersen, Count Jean Axel de ‘ Socialism, Chapters on, J ohn Stuart Mill Contentment. A Poem. C.C. Fraser Tytler Association of Local Societies. (i) . CO. Ward The Library Magazine— Continued. Reform in Teaching the Classics. J. S. Blackie Worth of a Classical Education. B. Price Lamb, Charles, Anecdotes of, A. Black Contemporary Life and Thoughtin Russia. T.S. Cobbett, William, Thomas Hughes Transvaal, About the, American View of Annerican Competition. KE, Atkinson Artificial Somnambu!lism, R. A. Proctor Progress of Greece, The, R. C. Jebb Irving’s Hamlet Dedicatory Poem to the Princess Alice Defence of Lucknow, The, A Poem Socialism, The Difficulties of, J. Stuart Mill Biographies of the Season Choice of Books. Fred Harrison Homes and Haunts of Italian Poets—Tasso. F. E. Trollope Cupid’s Workshop. A Ballad. S. Gibney. Plain Words about the Afghan Question. A, Forbes Fresh Assyrian Finds. B. H. Cooper Entomology. Popular Science Review Art Education in Great Britain. C. Lindsay Toilers in Field and Factory. No.1, Exodus Wagner as a Dramatist. E. Rose Royal Wedding, The, A.Poem. H.C. Merivale Locusts. Chambers’s Journal Probability as the Guide of Conduct. Gladstone Dobell, Sidney. A Sketch. R. Buchanan Toilers in Field and Factory. No. II, Characteristics Through the Ages. A. Poem French Republic and the Catholic Church. John Morley Commercial Depression and Reciprocity. B. Price Alcohol, its Action and Uses. J. R. Gasquet Their Appointed Seasons. J. G@. Wood Study of Natural History. St. George Mivart Chances of English Opera. F. Hueffer Manzoni’s Hymn for Whitsunday. Dean A. P. Stanley Philological Society’s English Dictionary Historical Aspect of American Churches. Dean Stanley Greece and the Treaty of Berlin. W.E. Gladstone Froissart’s Love Story. Walter Besant Musi cal Cultus of the Day. H.H. Statham Critic on the Hearth, The, James Payn Calculating Boys. R. A. Proctor French Novels. Blackwood’s Magazine Schopenhauer on Men, Books, and Music. M. B.E. Visit to the New Zealand Geysers. C. Bunbury Volume 2. July to December, 1879, 804 pages. Franklin, Benjamin, Thomas Hughes Last Jewish Revolt, The, Ernest Renan Drunkenness in England. John B. Gough Etna. R.A. Proctor Our New Wheat Fields in the Northwest. T. T. V. Smith Generic Images. F. Galton Hidden Treasures. Torlonia Museum. Blackwood. Comédie Francaise, The, F. Sarcey “ Egils Saga,” The, E. W. Dragon Flies. J. G. Wood Milky Way, The, A Poem. C. Templar To Garibaldi. A Sonnet. J.S. Blackie Studiesin Biography. Fraser’s Magazine Music and Musicians. Quarterly Review French Play in London. Matthew Arnold Classical Controversy, The, A oo The Library Magazine—OCOoniinued. History and Politics. J. R. Seeley Meteor Dust. R. A. Proctor In Denmark, A. J.C. Hare Prince Napoleon. J. H. McCarthy McCarthy, Justin, A Sketch. University Magazine New Vocation for Women. _J. Chesney Future of China, The, W.H. Medhurst In Sweden. A.J. C. Hare Notes from Cyprus. Blackwood Clerical Education in France. E. About. Cagliostro of the Second Century. J. A. Froude Hungarian Episode—Zigeuner Music. Fraser’s Magazine Haunted. A Poem. G. B. Stuart Lark, The, A Poem. M. Collins History and Politics, II. J. R. Seeley Problem of the Great Pyramid. R. A. Proctor Black, William, A Sketch. University Magazine Dulce est Decipere. A. Poem. J. A. Symonds Prize French Novel, The, Blackwoo National Poetry of Servia. K. Freiligrath Kroeker Surgeon and the Mogul’s Daughter. Chambers Dialogue on Human Happiness. W.H, Mallock Artistic Dualism of the Renaissance. Vernon Lee God in the Indo-European Mythology. J. Darmesteter Baptism. Dean A. P. Stanley History and Politics, III. J. R. Seeley In Norway. A. J.C. Hare Down Among the Dutchmen. H. Van Laun Our Nameless Benefactors. J. G. Wood Horace. Odesiand 15. Gentleman’s Magazine Double Memorial of Newstead Abbey. W. G. Blaikie Parliamentary Government in America. H. White Model Men and Women. Dutton Cook Age of Dante in the Florentine Chronicles. E. M. Clerke First and Last. A Poem. A. K. Ion. Blackwood’s Magazine Whatis Religion? J. P. Thompson Joseph De Maistre on Russia. Quarterly Review Blackbird, The, A Poem. Sydney Grey Pascal and his Editors. Quarterly Review Hans Sachs and the Mastersong. M. W. M. C. Demise of the Kaiserbund On Freedom. F. Max Muller Unity of Nature. A Speculation. H. Carlisle Cinderella. W.R.S, Ralston History and Politics, IV. J. R. Seeley Ancient British Church. London Quarterly Review Mathematician’s View of Evolution. W.H. L. Russell Beasts, Birds and Insects in Irish Folk-lore. L. McClintock Blackwood, John, Obituary. Athencum Sermon in Stone. A Poem. A. Dobson. Volume 3. January to June, 1880, 115% pages Russian Gypsies, The, C. G. Leland Philosophy of Color. Hdinburgh Review Lord’s Prayer and the Church. J. Ruskin Literary Calling andits Future. J. Payn Whatis Rent? B. Price Functions of the Brain. J. Althaus Utility to Flowers of their Beauty. E. Fry Where are wein Art? Lady F. P. Verney Homes and Haunts of Italian Poets—Alfieri. ¥. B. Trollope Shakespeare’s Fools. J. N. Hetherington Conservatoire of Music for ere aw C. S. Maine The Library Magazine—Ooniinued. Buddha’s First Sermon Blackwood, John. A Sketch. Blackwood’s Magazine Land Laws and Landlords. J. S. Blackie Justinian, A Poem. R. Buchanan Data of Ethics—Spencer. H. Calderwood Character and WEttogs of Cyrus the Great. G. Rawlinson Health and Home,I. B. W. Richardson Colorado. J. W. Barclay Rejected Manuscripts. Belgravia Handel. H. H. Statham Russian Nihilism. F. Cunliffe-Owen Cervantes’ Voyage to Parnassus. James Mew Pheedra and Phédre. L. Tennyson Old Fashioned Gardening. M. A, Paul : Delane, John Thadeus. A Sketch. Macmillan’s Mag. Prayer among all Nations. C, Geikie raaceal aint Me Ghost Story. A. Jessopp Free Trade, Railways and Commerce. W.E. Gladstone Usury. John Ruskin ( Health at Home, continued. B. W. Richardson Paganism in Paris. Hyacinthe Loyson New Fiction. H. Holbeach Pyramids of Ghizeh. R, A. Proctor Beginnings of Greek Sculpture. W.H. Poter Irish Needs and Remedies. H. M, Hyndman Reign of Queen Anne. Blackwood Sensational Science. A Poem. G. R. Sims Middle Class Domestic Life in Spain. H. J. Rose Whatis Jupiter Doing? H. J. Slack Hagan’s Death Song. Freiligrath-Kroeker Cid, The, W.E. A. Axon Sleepless Night. ASonnet. A. Austin Manliness of Christ. Thomas Hughes Copyright. Matthew Arnold Beethoven. H. H. Statham Story of the “‘ Merchant of Venice.” J. aang Beginnings of Greek Sculpture, II. W.H. Pater. Sham Admiration in Literature. J. Payn Philosophy of Drawing-rooms. G. A. Burns and Béranger. C. Mackay Radiant Matter. D. Pigeon Perfect Death, The, A Poem. A.P.S. Seeking Rest. A Poem. J. A. Noble Light of Asia, The, A Poem. Edwin Arnold Goethe’s “‘ Farbenlehre.” J. Tyndall Outlook in Europe, The, Scrutator Deep Sea and its Contents. W.B. Carpenter Personal Property, Debt and Interest. T. W. Newman Health at Home, III. B. W. Richardson Franklin, Benjamin. Edinburgh Review Atheism and the Rights of Man. W.H. Mallock Recent Events in Arabia. W.S. Blunt Pinch of Poverty, The, J. Payn Animal Intelligence. Westminster Review Whatisa Bank? B. Price Variations of the Roman Church. Dean Stanley Marcus Aurelius. By Ernest Renan Renan, Ernest, ASketch. G. Saintsbury Daltonism. William Pole Old Part of Naples: . John Peter Volume 4, July-August, 1880, 390 pages. French Republic and the Catholic Church, E, Scherer Landscape Painting. R. P. Collier Xantippe—a fragment. Amy vey? The Library Magazine— Continued. Thorean, Henry David, his Character and Opinions Health at Home, IV. B. W. Richardson Pleafor Musicians L. T. Channing, Wm. E., the Abolitionist. T. Hughes Method of Zadig. . H. Huxley English Poets, The, Matthew Arnold Diamonds, N. atural and Artificial, A.M. Clerke Backwoods of Ceylon. A. Gray Suicide. Blackwood’s Magazine Sculptures on the Facade of St. Mark’s, Venice. J. P. Richter Sources of German Discontent. K. Hillebrand Migration of Popular Stories. G. W. Cox French Clergy and the Present Republic. Abbe Martin Stranger in America. G, J. Holyoake Too Much and Too Little to Do. London Society Railroads of the United States, E. Atkinson Austrian Power, The, E. A. Freeman Cimabue and Coal Secuttles. G. A. Book of Job, The, T. K, Cheyne Wodan, Wild Huntsman, Wandering Jew, Karl Bland Deciine of German Universities, A. T. S. Goodrick Postal Notes, Money Orders and Bank Checks. W.S. Jevons Fable, A, A Poem. A. Dobson Girlhood. A Poem, Aileen Volume 5. October, 1880, 400 pages. Why the Colonies Separated from Britain. John Fiske Recent and Future Arctic Voyages. Quarterly Review Englishman’s Protest. Cardinal Manning Andersen, Hans Christian, Letters to and from, Moon and its Folk-Lore, The, T. F. T. Dyer Founders of New England.—John Winthrop. W.F. Rae Creed of the Early Christians. Dean Stanley Afghans and their History. Prof. E. Sachau Growth of Sculpture. G. Allen Sonnet in England, The, J. A. Noble Life in the Homeric Age. Temple Bar Ireland. J. A. Froude Week in Athens, A, Blackwood’s Magazine Health at Home, V. B. W. Richardson California. R. H. Patterson MentalImagery. F. Galton Youth of Queen Bess. Temple Bar How the Planets Travel. 8S, B. J. Skertchly Bayard of the Kast. Blackwood’s Magazine Iceland. D, Wedderburn Foreign Titles. Cornhill Magazine Jelly Fishes, A. Wilson Milton and Wordsworth. Temple Bar New Renaissance, or the Gospel of Intensity. H. Quilter Seamy Side of Letters, The, Cornhill Magazine Romance of Literary Discovery. Temple Bar Volume 6. December, 1880, 400 pages, College Education. J. A. Garfield 2 Future Governmental Changesin the U.S. E. V. Smalley Future of the Canadian Dominion. W. Clark Lowell, James Russell, Poet and Essayist. H. R. Haweis Chemistry of the Stars. Edinburgh Review Cattle Ranches of the Far West. W.B, Grohman Are we Englishmen? G. Allen Greece and the Greeks. W. J. Stillman Boston in England. A. Rimmer Old Pacific Capitol (Monterey). R. L. Stevenson Philosophy of Conservatism, We H. Mallock The Library Magazine—Continued. Burns, Robert. A Sketch. G. W. Curtis * Odd” People. Mrs. Mulock-Craik Procedure of Deliberative Bodies. A. Bain Mythical and Medizeval Swords. F. P. Verne Oldest City in the World (Damascus). Prof. Robertson Chase, The, Its history and laws. A. E. Cockburn Literary Success a Hundred Years Ago. M. Hunt Visit to a Religious H>usein Greece. C. Russell Roof of the World, The, (Ban-i-duniah). Blackwood Philosophy of Crayfishes. H. Goodwin Art of Singing, Past and Present. Vernon Lee Germany, Pastand Present. Edinburgh Review Gibraltar of the East (Aden). Temple Bar Co-operation. Thomas Hughes Darwin, Erasmus, A Sketch. Temple Bar Volume 7. February, 1881, 400 pages. Reminiscences of Bowdoin. A.S. Packard Political Organization in General. H. Spencer Lowell, James Russell, Poet and Essayist, II, H. R. Haweis Subscription. Dean Stanley Chase, The, Its history and laws, II, A. E. Cockburn George Eliot’s Analysis of Motives. N. Sheppard Church of England Fifty Years yon J. A. Froude Taxation in the United States. Contemporary Review Prophetic Power of Poetry. J.C. Shair New Departure in Temperance. W. Gladden Glastonbury, British and English. E. A. Freeman Suicidal Mania. Wm. Knighton Horses and their Feet. G. W. Cox Newspaper, The, Robert Collier Recent Travelsin Japan. Quarterly Review Sheridan, Richard Brinsley, Temple Bar What Can be Done for Ireland. W.B. Jones Buddhists and Buddhism in Burmah. Shway Yoe - Health at Home, VI. B. W. Richardson Forgotten Empire in Asia Minor, (Hittite). A. H. Sayce Shakespeare as a Prose Writer. J.C. Collins In China Town, San Francisco. I. D. Hardy Early Celtic College, An, H. Macmillan Oldest State in Europe (San Marino). J.T. Bent Does Writing Pay? Belgravia Nihilism in Russia. M. Kaufmann Geist’s Grave. A Poem. M. Arnold Californian Society. Quarterly Review Oldest Religious Buildings in Christendom, The, H. Holmes Volume 8. October, 1881, 758 pages. Beyond. David Swing Vermont Ruskin. Spectator English re cata F. A. March Study of History. Edward A. Freeman Literary Profession in the South. Margaret J. Preston Reminiscences of the High Church Revival. J. A, Froude Aisthetics in Parliament. Justin McCarthy Day with Liszt in 1880. H. R. Haweis Study of Shakespeare. Joseph Crosby Genius and Method. Temple Bar Who wrote “Gil Blas?”” Henry Van Laun Morality of the Profession of Letters. R. L. Stevenson Thomas Carlyle. Mrs. Oliphant Political Differentiation. Herbert Spencer Modern Italian Poets. Francis Huefter Night on Mount Washington. Professor G. W. Blaikie Byron in Greece. Temple Bar 6) The Library Magazine—Continued. Carlyle’s Lectures on European Culture. Prof. Edw. Dowden What Became of Cromwell? Gentleman’s Magazine United States for Agricultural Settlers. Earl of Airlie’ Novels and Novel-makers. Good Words How to Read Books. John Dennis William Prescott at Bunker Hill. Robert C. Winthrop First Printed Book Known. M. D. Conway Revised Version of the New Testament. Alex. Roberts Sir David Brewster and Sir J. Herschel. Alex. Strahan Charles Dickens in the Editor’s Chair Justice to Beaconsfield. George M. Towle Sword, The, Blackwood’s Magazine Early Life of Thomas Carlyle. J. A. Froude Anecdotes of Bibles. Chambers’s Journal First English Poet, The, William Allingham Bonaparte. J.R.Seeley_ | ; Origin of London. Cornhill Magazine William Blake. Frederick Wedmore Francis Bret Harte. M.S. V.deV. Gossip of an Old Bookworm. W.4J. Thoms Cuneiform Writing. W.O. Sproull English and American English. Richard A. Proctor Dogs of Literature. Temple Bar British Census of 1881. Chambers’s Journal Great Discovery in Egypt. Saturday Review Another World Down Here. W. Mattieu Williams Volume 9, December, 1881, 288 pages. Women as Civil Servants. Margaret E. Harkness In Wyoming. Archibald Geikie Arthur Penrhyn Stanley. Augustus J. C. Hare The Canadian Tariff. oldwin Smith James A. Garfield. James Russell Lowell Worry. J. M. Granville The Home of John Bunyan at Elstow. Saturday Review Fiction: Fair and Foul. John Ruskin Earthquakes: Their Cause and Origin. arterly Review The Progress of Medicine. Westminster Review The Geysers of the Yellowstone. Archibald Geikie Young Mrs. Carlyle. Mary C. Taber Modern Spanish Literature. Wentworth Webster The Development of Electric Lighting. Quarterly Review. Notices of ‘‘ Choice Literature.” “A monthly of very decided merit.”—Central Methodist, Cat lettsburg, Ky. “Ts worthy a generous support.”—The Dartmouth, Hanover, Here is indeed “ Choice Literature” at a cheap price.—South- ern Churchman, Richmond, Va. “Brings to readers of limited means all that is best in the cur- rent literature of the day. Certainly its great merits deserve a high place in public favor.”—Presbyterian, Toronto, Canada. ‘Devoted to the reprint of the best of articles published in current periodicals. It is the cheapest magazine of choice liter- once of Pashia we have any knowledge.”—Religious Telescope, ayton, O. ** The enlarged Choice Literature has just come to hand and I congratulate you. The number is a worthy successor to the ex- cellent Library Magazine, which I took from the beginning, and which I considered even superior in character to the Eclectic, which I was also taking.”— W. - Kin@, Newark, Ohio. he ae Ue ‘ ae nat i f Ay ¥ Meee t 2 oe} ee ht : g ne Mikey pe mer ere mentees