SOME CURIOSITIES OF THINKING. 727 



tion. A color may cause a slirill sound to be heard. I was told 

 lately of a lady who was overcome by such a sound on entering a 

 room where decorations, hangings, and furniture were red in 

 color. On the other hand, certain sounds may awaken the idea of 

 colors. I have heard of a man who seemed to see the color green 

 when he heard a violin played ; another person always had a sen- 

 sation of red at the sound of a trumpet. Another person,* who 

 had become blind, had retained this persistent association, and 

 when the vowel sounds were pronounced slowly he had, accom- 

 panying each, a sensation of color like a transparent colored sheet 

 a short distance in front of his face. Each vowel sound had its 

 own corresponding tint, which was always the same for that 

 vowel : a was red ; e, gray ; i, black ; o, white ; u, green. When 

 the vowel sounds were uttered in rapid succession there appeared 

 to be a confused, rapidly changing faint screen of color, but it did 

 not obtrude itself on his consciousness unless he expressly directed 

 his attention to it. This association persisted after this man had 

 become blind. Many such instances have been recently collected 

 by Flournay in his interesting book, Des Ph(^nomfenes de Synop- 

 sie. It is said that twelve per cent of people have such a power 

 of color-hearing. It is certainly a fact that the most of us have an 

 unpleasant involuntary feeling on hearing certain sounds. We 

 all dislike the creaking noise of a slate pencil drawn across the 

 slate or the sound produced by a man filing a saw, I think this 

 is more than mere dislike of sound it is a real sensation of a non- 

 auditory and painful character a forced, unnatural association. 



Thirdly : The study of child life and of the mental develop- 

 ment of the infant is the third line of research which has been of 

 great service in the investigation of mental action. It is not pos- 

 sible for one accustomed to think without regarding his mental 

 processes to suddenly stop in the course of thought and analyze 

 accurately his methods of thinking. The rapidity of associations, 

 their determination in certain lines by habit and by use, and their 

 enormous number in the active mind, baffle all analysis. But if 

 we watch the growth of thought in the child, if we notice the ac- 

 cumulation of memory pictures, the gradual building up of con- 

 cepts and the formation of the links in the chain of reasoning, we 

 can get at the elements of many complicated mental processes 

 Thus the study of the mental growth of the child throws hght 

 upon the study of adult thinking. . , ^ .-u . ^ t 



And here, too, the value must be recognized of the study of 

 those imperfect minds which are arrested in their development at 

 certain points. Thus, there are children whose powers of percep- 

 tion appear to grow with their growth, whose powers of recogni- 



* Lancet, March 31, 1894. 



