THE 



POPULAR SCIENCE 



MONTHLY. 



DEOEMBEE, 1901. 



A MECHANICAL SOLUTION OF A LITEKAEY PEOBLEM. 



By Dr. T. C. MENDENHALL. 



nnHE title given to this paper, chosen after much hesitation and with 

 -■- no little reluctance, is not to be looked upon as an assumption of 

 the definite and final solution of the principal problem to which atten- 

 tion has been directed. As a matter of fact I have hoped to conceal, for 

 at least a page or two, the identity of this principal problem, in order 

 that no well intentioned and good natured reader might be driven away 

 by what is a very general, not altogether reasonable, but quite natural, 

 prejudice. Whatever may be thought of the problem or of the im- 

 portance of its solution, it is believed that the method here suggested 

 and applied will be found to be of interest and, possibly, of consider- 

 able value in certain linguistic studies. 



Nearly twenty years ago I devised a method for exhibiting graph- 

 ically such peculiarities of style in composition as seemed to be almost 

 purely mechanical and of which an author would usually be absolutely 

 unconscious. The chief merit of the method consisted in the fact that 

 its application required no exercise of judgment, accurate enumeration 

 being all that was necessary, and by displaying one or more phases of 

 ihe mere mechanism of composition characteristics might be revealed 

 which the author could make no attempt to conceal, being himself 

 unaware of their existence. It was further assumed that, owing to the 

 well-known persistence of unconscious habit, personal peculiarities in 

 the construction of sentences, in the use of long or short words, in the 

 number of words in a sentence, etc., will in the long run manifest 

 themselves with such regularity that their graphic representation may 

 become a means of identification, at least by exclusion. In the present 



VOL. LX. — 7. 



