88 A. STRADLING ANNIVEESAEY ADDRESS : 



springing without hesitation and alighting with unfailing accuracy 

 on the desired point, the impetus employed being no fraction 

 more or less than that demanded by the exact requirements of 

 the interval. Very beautiful is this to contemplate, but to my 

 mind not half so marvellous as the spot stroke at billiards, as 

 played by an expert — the precision, the almost microscopic 

 delicacy, the judgment, the correct apportioning of force ; above 

 all, the command of nerve involved to make stroke after stroke 

 with so unerring an aim. Still further, we have to reflect that 

 this aptitude, which has become well-nigh an instinct with the 

 player, has been acquired by him during a portion only of one 

 life-time — heredity is no factor in the case ; while with the 

 squirrel the faculty has been gained by the accumulated experience 

 of thousands and tens of thousands of generations. So, too, when 

 we catch a ball thrown up in the air, we calculate the trajectory 

 and place oiu' hand almost intuitively in the line of its descent. 

 "Witness also the dexterity attained by jugglers after a few 

 years' practice, enabling them to toss about and manipulate 

 half-a-dozen different objects while reading aloud from a book 

 or paper, or to throw a ball high above them whilst blindfolded, 

 and to so adjust the impulse and the distance which it shall 

 traverse that it shall fall into their outstretched hand. I doubt, 

 moreover, whether the whole creation of animals, living or extinct, 

 has ever produced such a marvel of semi-instinctive performance 

 as that offered by the musician who executes a rapid movement 

 on an instrument like the piano, where thousands of muscular 

 actions, each distinct, independent, co-ordinate, and purposeful, 

 take place within a minute ; and the marvel is multiplied ten -fold 

 when to this is superadded the process of reading and translating 

 each note coincidently. So again with the subtlety, neatness, 

 and delicacy of manipulation acquired in many trades and 

 industries, instances of which might be adduced by the hundred ; 

 but what I would rather lay stress on is the fact that equal 

 theme for astonishment may be found in countless acts of our 

 every-day life, complex movements which we perform almost 

 unconsciously (certainly without conscious thought), very little 

 to be distinguished in their results from what we call instinct, 

 yet all learnt and accumulated by obvious methods of attainment ; 

 such acts as running up stairs, balancing the body, the umbrella, 

 or the hat against a high wind, putting on a pair of gloves, 

 shortening our steps mechanically in crossing a road so that the 

 foot is exactly timed to reach the edge of the pavement, and 

 the numberless examples of instinctive memory and localization. 



