ON THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. XV 



primitive, or lowest in the scale of civilization, of the human race. 

 Of low stature (probably less than five feet on an average), they are 

 described by most observers as dwarf negroes ; but have none of the 

 distinctive characteristics of the African race. They have no tradi- 

 tion, and apparently no notion of their origin ; are reported to have 

 no notions of a Deity, of spiritual beings, or of a future state. Both 

 sexes go naked, without any sense of shame, and indulge their sensual 

 appetites in the simplest animal fashion. Entirely destitute of cloth- 

 ing, utterly ignorant of agriculture, living in the most primitive and 

 rudest form of habitations, their only care seems to be the supply of 

 their daily food. They are not, however, cannibals. Their imple- 

 ments are bows and arrows, rude spears, and nets ; and finding that 

 these suffice for the acquirement of food, they have carried their 

 inventive faculties no further. 



In reviewing the scientific history of the past year, the most notice- 

 able events (described at length elsewhere in the present volume) 

 maybe enumerated substantially as follows: 1. The extraordinary 

 attention given in both Europe and the United States to the invention 

 and improvement of warlike enginery and material ; the results of 

 which bid fair to almost rewlutionize the heretofore accepted science 

 of warfare. In the United States, owing the paralyzation of many 

 forms of industry by the civil war, the inventive skill of the country 

 has been largely directed to this subject, and more inventions relative 

 to war-implements and constructions have been brought out during the 

 twelve months of 1861, than in any equal former period of history. 

 Many of these are undoubtedly of little value, while others are of great 

 and acknowledged importance. The " Rodman," " Parrot," and " Saw- 

 yer " guns ; the novel " Ericsson's floating battery ; " Juan Patterson's 

 system of iron-plating ; and the new compressed powder, are examples 

 of late American inventions belonging to the latter class. 2. The 

 completion and effective maintenance of a line of telegraph across the 

 American Continent, from the Mississippi to the Pacific. 3. The gen- 

 eral announcement of Bunsen and Kirchhoff 's new system of spectrum 

 analysis, and the consequent discovery of three new elementary sub- 

 stances.* 4. Fremy's investigations into the nature and manufacture 



* More recent experiments would seem to show, that more has possibly been 

 claimed for the researches of Bunsen and Kirchhoff than can be established, and 

 that some of their conclusions have been too hasty, especially those respecting 

 the composition of the sun. Thus it has been recently ascertained that the bright 

 lines in the spectrum of a burning body vary with the temperature of the flame in 

 which the body is burned. Professor Fraukland, in a letter to Dr. Tyndall, pub- 

 lished in a late number of the London Philosophical Magazine, says : "I have 

 just made some further experiments on the lithium spectrum, and they conclu- 



