200 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



one who offended him; and so it was with some of my other sons. 

 On the other hand, I could never see a trace of such aptitude in my 

 infant daughters; and this makes me think that a tendency to throw 

 objects is inherited by boys. 



Fear. — This feeling probably is one of the earliest which is expe- 

 rienced by infants, as shown by their starting at any sudden sound 

 when only a few weeks old, followed by crying. Before the present 

 one was four and a half months old, I had been accustomed to make 

 close to him many strange and loud noises, which were all taken as 

 excellent jokes, but at this period I one day made a loud snoring noise, 

 which I had never done before; he instantly looked grave and then 

 burst out crying. Two or three days afterwards I made, through for- 

 getfulness, the same noise, with the same result. About the same time 

 (viz., on the 137th day), I approached with my back towards him 

 and then stood motionless; he looked very grave and much surprised, 

 and would soon have cried, had I not turned round; then his face 

 instantly relaxed into a smile. It is well known how intensely older 

 children suffer from vague and undefined fears, as from the dark, or in 

 passing an obscure corner in a large hall, etc. I may give as an in- 

 stance that I took the child in question, when two and one fourth years 

 old, to the Zoological Gardens, and he enjoyed looking at all the ani- 

 mals which were like those that he knew, such as deer, antelope, etc., 

 and all the birds, even the ostriches, but was much alarmed at the 

 various larger animals in cages. He often said afterwards that he 

 wished to go again, but not to see 'beasts in houses'; and we could in 

 no manner account for this fear. May we not suspect that the vague 

 but very real fears of children, which are quite independent of expe- 

 rience, are the inherited effects of real dangers and abject superstitions 

 during ancient savage times? It is quite conformable with what we 

 know of the transmission of formerly well-developed characters, that 

 they should appear at an early period of life, and afterwards disappear. 



Pleasurable Sensations. — It may be presumed that infants feel 

 pleasure whilst sucking, and the expression of their swimming eyes 

 seem to show that this is the case. This infant smiled when 45 

 days, a second infant when 46 days old; and these were true smiles 

 indicative of pleasure, for their eyes brightened and eyelids slightly 

 closed. The smiles arose chiefly when looking at their mother and 

 were therefore probably of mental origin; but this infant often smiled 

 then, and for some time afterwards, from some inward pleasurable 

 feeling, for nothing was happening which could have in any way excited 

 or amused him. When 110 days old he was exceedingly amused by a 

 pinafore being thrown over his face and then suddenly withdrawn; and 

 so he was when I suddenly uncovered my own face and approached 

 his. He then uttered a little noise which was an incipient laugh. 



