EDITOR'S TABLE. 



12 3 



eral deposits will be somewhat more com- 

 plete. Yours very truly, 



C. A. Trowbridge. 

 New Yobs, September 6, 1881. 



NUMBER-FORMS AND COLORS. 



Jlessrs. Editors. 



In " The Visions of Sane Persons," in 

 the " Monthly " for August, the author, Fran- 

 cis Gallon, speaks of a certain proportion of 

 people (five per cent.) to whom the thought 

 of a series of consecutive numbers invaria- 

 bly brings the vision of them arranged in a 

 perfectly defined and constant position. 



From my earliest recollection, numbers 

 have always appeared to me arranged in a 

 straight line of regularly increasing height, 

 extending from north to south : 1 is flat on 

 the ground ; 2 close to it, but a little higher 

 and a little farther to the south, and so on. 

 The row of figures extends upward at an an- 

 gle of about forty degrees. I said that 1 

 was flat on the ground. I do not mean the 

 literal ground, for the whole vision appears 

 surrounded by and outlined against that 

 brownish-red light which falls through our 

 closed lids upon our eyes, when we shut them 

 in the full glare of sunlight. I meant that 

 1 is at the feet of the imaginary person who, 

 wishing to read these numbers, stauds with 

 his back to the north, looking southward 

 and upward at this regularly ascending row. 



Not only do they have position ; they 

 also have color that is, nearly all of them. 

 The conception of color or non-color is asso- 

 ciated with them all : 1 is transparent, like 

 glass or water ; 2 has a reddish tinge ; 3 is 

 a bluish-green (I have in mature years 

 seen the exact shade that my childish im- 

 agination invested this number with in 

 shallow bays, and waters of the tropical 

 Pacific) ; 4 is also red, but a different shade 



from 2 more of a crimson; 5 is a very 

 pretty, delicate gray, always spotless a 

 Quaker woman's dress reminds me of 5 ; 6 

 is a deeper shade of 3, a deeper blue-green ; 

 7 1 always disliked. It is a yellowish brown, 

 the hue of withered fields and bare earth 

 in winter, when there is no snow on the 

 ground ; 8 is black ; 9 is a decided green, a 

 darker shade of 3 and 0. Whether this is 

 because it combines them I can not say ; 10 

 is colorless, being composed of two numer- 

 als that are colorless, though, as previously 

 indicated, the conception of non-color is as- 

 sociated with it. 



The 'teens likewise have colors, but not 

 individual ones. The numeral in the units' 

 column gives color to the whole, though it 

 is somewhat diluted by the colorless qual- 

 ity of the 1 by which it stands. It is as if 

 an equal quantity of clear water had been 

 poured into a colored liquid. In the num- 

 bers above twenty, sometimes one numeral, 

 sometimes fenother, gives color to the num- 

 ber, but this is done in an arbitrary manner, 

 and I can perceive no rule. These higher 

 numbers, too, are somewhat confused, not 

 so clear as those of lower denomination. 

 The only ones that are distinct are 22, 33, 

 44, 55, etc. I will add, in conclusion, that 

 there is connected with them no conception 

 beyond form, position, and color. 



Will some chemist, or some one well 

 read in history, please explain the allusions 

 and references in this passage from Vic- 

 tor Hugo's " Les Miserables " ? It will be 

 found in Chapter CCXLIX, of Lascelles 

 Wraxall's translation : " It was from the 

 drain of Munster that John of Leyden pro- 

 duced his false moon ; and it was from the 

 cesspool-well of Kekhscheb that his Orien- 

 tal Menaeehmus, Mokannah, the veiled proph- 

 et of Khorassan, brought his false sun." 

 Louise Coffin Jones. 

 Oskaloosa, Iowa, August 5, 1881. 



EDITOR'S TABLE. 



BALANCE AND COMPENSA TION OF IN- 

 ORGANIC FORCES. 



IT was some forty years ago that the 

 organic chemists, represented by 

 such masters as Dumas and Liebig, 

 worked out the beautiful idea of the bal- 

 ance of organic nature. They showed 

 that the vegetable and animal king- 

 doms carry on antagonist processes 

 each for ever undoing the work of the 

 other. The atmosphere is the arena of 

 this subtile conflict, being poisoned by 



the animal world and purified by the 

 vegetable world ; while these opposing 

 processes so effectually counteract each 

 other, that the air is automatically 

 maintained in a condition fitted for the 

 preservation of the living races. 



A corresponding balance of forces 

 is displayed on a grand and still more 

 striking scale in the inorganic world, 

 by which the varied configuration of 

 the earth's surface and the continued 

 habitability of the globe are maintained. 



