MEASUREMENT OF CHARACTER. 737 



ment, whether of the chest as a whole, or of the portion over the 

 heart, it sucks in or blows out a little puff of air. A thin India-rubber 

 tube connects its nozzle with a flat elastic bag under the short arm of 

 a lever. The other end of the lever moves up and down in accordance 

 with the part of the chest to which the pneurao-cardiograph is applied, 

 and scratches light marks on a band of paper which is driven onward 

 by clock-work. This little instrument can be worn under the buttoned 

 coat without being noticed. I was anxious to practice myself in its 

 use, and wore one during the formidable ordeal of delivering the Rede 

 Lecture in the senate-house at Cambridge, a month ago (most of this 

 very memoir forming part of that lecture). I had no connection es- 

 tablished between my instrument and any recording apparatus, but 

 wore it merely to see whether or not it proved in any way irksome. If 

 I had had a table in front of me, with the recording apparatus stowed 

 out of sight below, and an expert assistant near at hand to turn a stop- 

 cock at appropriate moments, he could have obtained samples of my 

 heart's action without causing me any embarrassment whatever. I 

 should have forgotten all about the apparatus while I was speaking. 



Instrumental observers of the reflex signs of emotion have other 

 means available besides this, and the sphygmograph that measures the 

 pulse. Every twitch of each separate finger even of an infant's hand 

 is registered by Dr. Warner's ingenious little gauntlet. Every move- 

 ment of each limb of man or horse is recorded by Dr. Maret. The 

 apparatus of Mosso measures the degree in which the blood leaving 

 the extremities rushes to the heart and head and internal organs. 

 Every limb shrinks sensibly in volume from this withdrawal of the 

 blood, and the shrinkage of any one of them, say the right arm, is 

 measured by the fall of water in a gauge that communicates with a 

 long bottleful of water, through the neck of which the arm has been 

 thrust, and in which it is softly but effectually plugged. 



I should not be surprised if the remarkable success of many per- 

 sons in "muscle-reading" should open out a wide field for delicate 

 instrumental investigations. The poetical metaphors of ordinary lan- 

 guage suggest many possibilities of measurement. Thus, when two 

 persons have an " inclination " to one another, they visibly incline or 

 slope together when sitting side by side, as at a dinner-table, and they 

 then throw the stress of their weights on the near legs of their chairs. 

 It does not require much ingenuity to arrange a pressure-gauge with 

 an index and dial to indicate changes in stress, but it is difficult to de- 

 vise an arrangement that shall fulfill the threefold condition of being 

 effective, not attracting notice, and being applicable to ordinary fur- 

 niture. I made some rude experiments, but, being busy with other 

 matters, have not carried them on, as I had hoped. 



Another conspicuous way in which one person differs from another 

 is in temper. Some men are easily provoked, others remain cheerful 

 even when affairs go very contrary to their liking. We all know spe- 



TOL. XXV. — 47 



