Introduction xix 



We have now passed in review all the methods open to the histologist and anatomist 

 as aids to the localisation of cerebral function, and if I seem to have painted the advantages 

 of these methods in too bright a colour, and if also I have conveyed the idea that 

 histological research is the most potent force in the solution of problems concerning 

 localisation, let me dispel that concej.it ion by stating that I yield to none in my admiration 

 of the succession of classical original researches coming from the pens of Ferrier, Schafer, 

 Beevor, Horsley, Sherrington, Mott and Ballance in this country ; of Hitzig, Goltz, Munk and 

 Bechterew on the continent, and of others whose names inspire an equal amount of respect, 

 and who might be worthily included in this list of pioneers in the field of experimental 

 neurology and physiology ; let me also state that I should be totally lacking in my sense 

 of esteem if I failed to take respectful cognisance of the ever-memorable labours of a second 

 honoured coterie of observers who, following in Broca's footsteps, have taken the human 

 subject as their study, and consummated the aim of the experimenter by bedside investi- 

 gation. And in continuation let me unreservedly grant, in reference to the process or chain 

 of events which ultimately leads to the final localisation of function, that not until the 

 ground is prospected and prepared by the physiologist and clinician can the histologist hope 

 to step in and work with any real measure of success ; but when given guiding lines by 

 preliminary exploration, I maintain that the microscopist will probably succeed in defining and 

 rubbing the corners off the boundaries of the productive field with an accuracy and certainty 

 which with one exception is denied to his predecessors. The exception is the motor area, 

 for it seems that by improved methods, the outlines of this centre can be determined to a 

 hair's breadth ; with other fields, notably those which we regard as sensory stations, the case 

 is different. Their position can be only roughly indicated by experimental ablation or a 

 natural lesion, and histology alone can give their precise extent and limits. 



Perhaps enough has been said to justify my opening remark to the effect that to the 

 satisfactory accomplishment of cortical localisation a free and harmonious collaboration between 

 workers in the several provinces is an essential postulate, and I hope in the following pages 

 to indicate the exact areas of cortex which we can now point to and set aside as being 

 of known function. It will be seen that these areas embrace all those functions which we 

 may regard as primary, common to all animals and necessary in some way to natural ex- 

 istence ; there only remain over those " silent " stretches of cortex the superior development 

 of which marks the human brain, and which may have for their role the maintenance of 

 those intellectual attributes which place man above all other animals. Although at the 

 present day we have no sure grounds for the subdivision and separate allotment of higher 

 functions in these comparatively unknown territories, and the significance of the few histological 

 lines which I have drawn across them is perfectly obscure, yet I hope that good will result 

 from the survey alone. Particularly do I hope that those who, like myself, have pledged 

 their energies to the apparently hopeless task of elucidating problems connected with mental 

 disease will derive benefit from this research, for it was only after several valuable years 

 had been spent in the cause of scientific research in a laboratory attached to an asylum 

 for the insane that I recognised that it was necessary for some worker to begin at the 

 beginning, and attempt to piece together our disjointed knowledge of the structure of the 

 cortex, and now that a large extent of the brain surface can be eliminated as being of 

 known function, and the ground we tread has grown firmer, we can return with accentuated 

 zeal to grapple with these practical problems. 



