230 LEISURE-TIME STUDIES. 



the investigation of the features of the human face has long 

 been known. But Lavater's system is on the whole much 

 too loose and elementary to be regarded as satisfactory by 

 modern scientists, whose repudiation of phrenology as a 

 system capable of explaining the exact disposition of the 

 brain functions, has unquestionably affected Lavater's method 

 also. Mr. Galton refers at the outset of his address to the 

 fact we have already alluded to, namely that physiologists- 

 have determined the rate at which nerve-force, representing 

 a sensation or impulse of thought and action, travels along 

 the nerves. The common phrase " as quick as thought " is 

 found to be by no means so applicable as is generally 

 supposed, especially when it is discovered that thought or 

 nervous-impulse, as compared with light or electricity, ap- 

 pears a veritable laggard. For whilst light travels at the 

 rate of many thousands of miles about 186,000 miles, 

 according to the latest researches in a second of time, 

 nerve-force in man passes along his nerves at a rate varying 

 from no or 120 to 200 feet per second. Or, to use Mr. 

 Galton's words, nerve-force is " far from instantaneous " in 

 its action, and has " indeed no higher velocity than that of 

 # railway express train." 



As we could naturally suppose from a consideration of 

 this fact, small animals presenting us with a limited distance 

 for nerve-force to travel, will avoid rapid blows and shift 

 for themselves in the struggle for existence at a much 

 quicker rate than large animals. Take two extreme cases 

 in illustration of this fact. A mouse hears a suspicious or 

 threatening sound, and at once, so to speak, accommodates 

 its actions and movements to its protection. The ear of 

 the mouse, as one of its "gateways of knowledge," is situated 

 so close to the brain that the interval which elapses between 

 the reception of the sound by the ear, or between its trans- 

 mission as an impulse to the brain and the issue of a com- 

 mand or second impulse from the brain to the muscles of 

 the body for the purpose of movement, is too short to be 

 perfectly appreciated by the observer. In a whale, on the 



