l8 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS. 



than Oxford, to consult him. In sundry interesting fields of Ger- 

 man literature he had also wrought to good purpose. Alost of all, 

 he had, by close study and thought, realized the deep meanings of 

 important phases of French history. 



Here I may be pardoned for a personal reminiscence : 



At the height of Doctor Langley's activity in scientific research, I 

 was honored with an invitation to deliver a course of lectures in this 

 city, on ''The Causes of the French Revolution." Most unexpect- 

 edl}', I found Doctor Langley among my auditors at every lecture. 

 To my still greater surprise, I found in my walks and talks with him 

 that he was competent to discuss, as a master, the whole subject with 

 which I dealt. I particularly remember his minute and accurate 

 knowledge of the comparative value of sundry authorities, and it 

 is only justice to say that I had reason to be deeply indebted to him 

 for suggestions regarding them. It was not merely that he had read 

 works of importance in the history of the period concerned, from 

 the statesmanlike judgments of Thiers to the prose poem of Thomas 

 Carlyle, but that he had gone extensively into original sources, and 

 especially into the multitude of memoirs, which throw so remarkable 

 a light into the causes of the fact that the vast change which has been 

 taking place in France during more than a hundred years came not 

 by a steady, healthful evolution, but by a terrific revolution. 



He had indeed personally known Carlyle and was clearly influ- 

 enced by the great Scottish prophet's theory regarding great men as 

 the centers of historical development. A long range of historical 

 personages in various countries had especially interested him, and 

 among these Leonardo da Vinci, Cromwell, Frederick the Great, 

 Louis XIV, Napoleon, and Lincoln ; upon these he had read exten- 

 sively and thought deeply. 



And he went yet further afield. Curious is the fact that, visiting 

 Tahiti in 1901, he became especially interested in what, to most 

 travelers, would appear a mere piece of clumsy jugglery, but which 

 he recognized as a survival from the early history of our race, 

 namely, the power acquired by certain persons to withstand intense 

 heat, or to appear to withstand it. As a result, he published an ex- 

 ceedingly interesting contribution entitled "The Fire Walk Cere- 

 mony in Tahiti," thus throwing light into the history of the ordeal, 

 which plays so great a part in the early history of human law, both 

 as regards procedure and penalty. 



But he soared into wider and broader realms — into studies of the 

 metaphysicians and of the modern psychologists — associating him- 

 self with societies for psychical research. He seemed to attempt all 



