352 THE GROWTH OF THE BRAIN. 



matter to which sex it belongs, has the same cha- 

 racters, but so complicated are the reactions of it 

 with nutritive conditions that any inference from mere 

 size has little value. If the influence from size were 

 applied thoroughly, mental superiority would reside with 

 the tall as contrasted with the short men, since as a 

 rule tall men have the heavier brains. Size, therefore, 

 has a meaning, but is by no means entitled to dominate 

 the whole interpretation of the central system. There 

 is little or nothing in the weight relations of the female 

 encephalon to show it different from that of the male. 

 In reactions, however, the female has a more local 

 responsiveness than the male, and back of all this is the 

 matter of general physiology, which has .its distinct 

 modifications according to sex. Moreover, it is im- 

 possible to escape the conclusion that in women natural 

 education is completed only with maternity, which we 

 know to effect some slight changes in the sympathetic 

 system and possibly the spinal cord, and which may be 

 fairly laid under suspicion of causing more structural 

 modifications than are at present recognised. Basing 

 the inference on the size of the structural elements, 

 we should infer that the typical central system in the 

 female would be somewhat more easily fatigued, and 

 also be slightly less complete in organisation. 



For the rest we have no anatomy, and only modes 

 of response, on which to base a judgment. The charac- 

 teristic reactions seem in part to depend on fundamental 

 physiological differences, in part on the organisation of 

 the central system, and in part on nurture. Just how 

 far any variations in this last condition will modify the 

 reactions of women is at present a matter of experi- 

 ment, an experiment in which the brain-weight question 

 cuts a much smaller figure than was at one time imagined. 



In all cases the process of education must be much 



