A Trait Common to us All.—The doctrine of the tendency of mankind to develop the like fancies and ideas at the like stage of intellectual infancy was mentioned by Mr. E. W. Brabrook in his presidential address before the Anthropological Section of the British Association, as a generalization for which we are fast accumulating material in folklore. It is akin to the generalization that individual savage races present in their intellectual development a marked analogy to the condition of the earlier races of mankind. The fancies and ideas of the child resemble closely the fancies and ideas of the savage and the fancies and ideas of primitive man. Mrs. Gomme has found that a great number of children's games consist of dramatic representations of marriage by capture and marriage by purchase, and that the idea of exogamy is distinctly embodied in them. There can be little doubt that they go back to a high antiquity, and there is much probability that they are founded upon customs actually existing, or just passing away, at the time they were first played. Upon the same principle, if we view children's stories in their wealth of details, we shall deem it impossible that they could have been disseminated over the world otherwise than by actual contact of the several peoples with each other. But if we view them in their simplicity of idea, we shall be more apt to think that the mind of man naturally produces the same result under like circumstances, and that it is not necessary to postulate any communication between the peoples to account for their identity. It does not surprise us that the same complicated physical operations should be performed by far-distant peoples without any communication with each other; why should it be surprising that mental operations, not nearly so complex, should be produced in the same order by different peoples without any such communication?
The Toes in Walking.—An instructive discussion of the walking value of the lesser toes by Dr. Heather Bigg is given in a recent copy of the London Lancet. Dr. Bigg believes that the lesser toes of the human foot are of little importance in walking—the great toe constituting the important tread of the foot—and in proof of this he gives an account of a patient, all of whose lesser toes it was found necessary to amputate because of persistent contraction of the tendons. On November 10, 1894, the toes were removed, especial care being taken to keep the resulting scars well up on the dorsal aspect of the foot, so as to be well away from the subsequent tread. In three weeks the patient could stand on her feet, and, after her return home, sent the following record of her progress toward complete recovery: December 30, 1894: "I am able to walk perfectly on my feet with little or no pain, but can not yet wear either slippers or boots, as they are still tender."—January 15, 1895: "I managed to get on my slippers yesterday and wore them with ease for more than six hours."—January 28th: "I put on my boots to-day for the first time. It still pains me slightly to walk; otherwise my feet are going on all right."—February 18th: "I ought to say that the steel plates only half way answer splendidly."—March 24th: "You will be glad to hear that I can walk splendidly now, just like a proper human being; it is just eighteen weeks next Tuesday since the operation."—May 5th: "I have decided to come to town next Monday week to let you see how well I can walk."—June 17th: "I played two sets of tennis on Saturday, and my feet were none the worse afterward."—July 24th: "You will be surprised to hear that the big toes have lengthened half an inch since the operation, and I have had all my boots lengthened and the toe line made straighter."—August 30th: "I know that you will be interested to hear that I have just accepted an invitation to a dance on September 13th. Whether I shall dance comfortably or not is another thing."—September 14th: "I went to the dance on Tuesday evening and thoroughly enjoyed myself after not dancing for so long. My feet were on their best behavior, and did not pain me once during the evening. I never realized before that I had no toes until I began to dance; then it seemed so odd only to have one toe, but I suffered no inconvenience whatever from the loss of them."—December 5th: "I get on so well with my bicycle." Only two disadvantages showed themselves as the result of the operation and these were temporary. One was that the great toes tended to pervert themselves toward the middle line of the feet, a thing which was readily remedied by the use of single-toed stockings, and by packing the space in the boot left vacant by the missing toes with cotton wool; the other was a loss of local sense on the outer sides of the feet, which went to show that the lesser toes were missed rather as tactile organs than anything else. This failure of feeling righted itself in time, presumably by a vicarious and intenser sense being acquired by the skin of the outer side of the foot. In all other respects the loss of the toes discovered no inconvenience.
Animals' Bites.—That there is something more serious than the mere wound in the bite even of a healthy animal is attested by Mr. Pagin Thornton, from a chapter in his own experience, and in the testimony of a number of his own friends who have suffered for weeks together from having been bitten. "And what is more surprising to me," he says, "is that some of us may have hands crippled for some time from bites of a man's teeth." Dog bites are always dangerous, but largely from the size of the wound which a dog biting in earnest will inflict. With men they usually fail to do their best. Animals recover from wounds more easily than men do; but Lord Ebrington says that deer bitten by the dogs in Exmoor hardly ever recover. Much of the poisoning caused by bites is supposed to be due to the state of the animal's teeth; and in this way the bite of a herbivorous animal, whose teeth are usually soiled, may cause worse after effects than that of a carnivore, whose wet mouth and wet tongue keep its teeth fairly clean. A similar difference is observable in the effects of being clawed and bitten by carnivora. Wounds made by the claws of leopards are poisonous, while those caused by the teeth are rarely septic. The force with which a bite in earnest is inflicted is an important element in its dangerous character. "It seems," says the London Spectator, "as if for the moment the animal threw all its force into the combination of muscular action which we call a 'bite.' In most cases the mere shock of impact, as the beast hurls itself on its enemy, is entirely demoralizing, or inflicts physical injury. A muzzled mastiff will hurl a man to the ground in the effort to fasten its teeth in his throat or shoulder. Then, the driving and crushing force of the jaw muscles is astonishing." Sir Samuel Baker noticed that the tiger usually seized an Indian native by the shoulder, and with one jaw on one side and the other on the other bit clean through chest and back. In nearly all cases the bite penetrates to the lungs. This kind of wound is characteristic of the bites of the felidæ. Hardly any bird recovers from a cat's bite, for the same reason. The canine teeth are almost instantly driven through the lung under the wing.
Doulton Potteries.—Sir Henry Doulton, head of the Lambeth potteries, whose death, November 17, 1897, has been recorded in the Monthly, preferred devoting himself to the factory to engaging in the study of a learned profession for which his parents intended him, and himself did much of the largest work produced there in the earlier days of his connection with it. As the factory was enlarged, it made drain pipes, vessels and appliances of stoneware for chemical and other similar uses, for which it gained prizes at the great exhibitions of 1851 and 1862; ale pots and mugs of traditional and original designs; terra-cotta vases; and first exhibited articles of higher artistic merit at Paris in 1867. It showed a magnificent collection at Vienna in 1873, and its exhibit at Philadelphia in 1876 was one of the marked features of our Centennial. The chief styles of its work are the ornamental salt-glazed stoneware known as Doulton ware, and the underglaze-painted earthenware called "Lambeth faïence." Sir George Birdwood ascribes as the great merit of Sir Henry's life work his adherence to the two principles of making, as far as possible, every piece intended for decoration on the wheel, and of giving the utmost scope to the designer into whose hands the piece fell for ornamentation. Four hundred designers, mostly women, and some of them real artists, are engaged at the potteries, and each has her way and signs her name to her work; so that "Sir Henry Doulton succeeded in creating a most prolific school, or rather several schools, of English pottery, the influence of which has been felt in the revival of the ceramic arts in all the countries of the Old World"—where they had been demoralized by the use of machinery; and through the influence of his example, working since 1871, the United Kingdom now produces "the most artistic commercial pottery of any country in the world."
MINOR PARAGRAPHS.
A little over a year ago Professor Fraser published the results of some researches which showed that the bile of several animals possessed antidotal properties against serpents' venom, and against the toxines of such diseases as diphtheria and tetanus, and that the bile of venomous serpents is an antidote to their venom. The results from an extension of these first experiments have been recently published in the British Medical Journal. The most important conclusions are as follows: The bile of venomous serpents is the most powerful antidote to venom, and is closely followed in efficiency by the bile of innocuous serpents. Regarding the antidotal power of bile on the toxines of disease, Professor Fraser found that the bile of venomous serpents had more antidotal power than that of the majority of the other animals examined. It is curious that among the non-venomous animals the rabbit's bile is the most powerful in antidotal properties.
Three ways are mentioned by Prof. W. A. Herdman in which disease may be communicated through oysters to the consumer; viz., by the presence in the animal of inorganic, usually metallic, poison; or of organic poison; or of a pathological organism or definite disease germ. From experiments in the inoculation and disinfection of oysters, it was found that all traces of these organisms could be removed by proper washing. Good currents passing the beds are an important factor in keeping the oyster healthy, and make it possible for the animal to absorb large quantities of sewage and dispose of it. The effect of this is to purify the water; but in the sifting process, while the sewage is passing through, the animal retains disease germs, and may pass them on to the consumer. Oysters should therefore be given an opportunity to purify themselves, as is done in France, where they are kept for a time in clean tanks before being sent to market. Oysters may be effectively washed in fresh water. Sea water is unfavorable to disease germs. Greenness in oysters is caused by food administered to improve their quality; by the presence of copper; and in some American oysters by an inflamed condition of the mantle. Green spots are also produced by wandering cells getting under the epithelium. These cells are loaded with granules which give a copper reaction.
The most interesting result of the massacre and sack of Benin, the Saturday Review says, was the capture of a large series of brass plaques, statuettes, box lids, pipes, etc., which have been brought to England. The various articles are all castings, and their elaborate ornamentation bespeaks for their makers great skill in metal working. Most African tribes have smiths who hammer pieces of brass rod and wire into simple ornaments; but these Benin brasses represent a stage of metal working far more advanced than anything recorded for the native races of Africa. Nothing like them is being made by any negro race at present, and nothing is known that can be regarded as a precursor of them. A statuette in the Liverpool Museum of a negro holding a flint gun fixes their date as not earlier than about 1630. In trying to account for them, many think they were due to the influence of some comparatively advanced tribe that reached Benin from the central Soudan and brought with them a knowledge of brass work derived from early, possibly Egyptian, sources; and others attribute the work to some prisoner or trader who lived at Benin in the seventeenth century.
NOTES.
The Committee of the British Association on Meteorological Photography reported that the result of their determinations of the heights of clouds showed the existence of greater altitudes in hot weather under thunderstorm conditions, when clouds may occur at five or six different levels, extending as high as ninety thousand feet. A rise of cloud takes place in hot weather, also during the morning and early afternoons, while the lowest altitudes are found during cyclones.