July 27, 1893] 



NA TURE 



291 



association with dance-rhythm. Whether to such tone- 

 rhythm the term " music " can be satisfactorily applied, I 

 am myself inclined to question. But that is another 

 matter. We are bound to accept for the purposes of 

 his argument the definition which an author sets forth. 

 All that Mr. Spencer has written on the subject, however, 

 leads us to suppose that for him music includes melody, 

 or at least cadence. And I take it that in his speech- 

 theory it was the melody or cadence of music that he 

 specially had in view. Now " speech '' may either mean 

 intentional suggestion by means of vocal sounds, or such 

 suggestion by means of vocal sounds rendered articulate 

 and ordered in propositions. Taking the former and 

 broader meaning, it appears to me that the vocal sounds 

 associated with the dance must be regarded as having 

 suggestive value to those who are acting in concert, and 

 as possessed of rhythmic import ; and that, further, from 

 these vocal sounds arose the melodic and harmonic 

 elements of music. Personally, I should advocate the 

 more restricted use of the word " speech," and should 

 prefer to say that both music (including melody) and 

 articulate speech are of vocal origin. And this, I take 

 it, comes very near, not only to Mr. Wallaschek's own 

 view, but also to that of Mr. Spencer against whom he is 

 arguing. The association of these vocal sounds with the 

 concerted activity of the dance is quite in line with the 

 suggestion of Noird, adopted by Prof. Max MiiUer, that 

 the origin of speech is to be sought in the vocal sounds 

 uttered during the performance of common social 

 actions. 



There are many other points in Mr. Wallaschek's book 

 to which I should be glad to draw attention did space 

 permit. His discussion of the origin of the diatonic 

 scale is of interest and value. He is on firm ground in 

 his contention that primitive music is associated with 

 life-preserving and life-continuing activities, and was thus 

 in its early phases fostered and developed by natural 

 selection. This few evolutionists would care to ques- 

 tion. But concerning the development of music, as an 

 cesthetic activity, he does not suggest anything very 

 definite. He holds that there is nothing in the history 

 of musical development to justify a belief that the in- 

 heritance of acquired faculty has been a factor in the 

 process ; and here I think he is right so far as definite 

 evidence goes. He also holds that the great musician is 

 a man of power who has devoted his faculties to music, 

 and who would have been great as a painter or as a poet 

 had circumstances led him to devote his faculties to these 

 arts. And here again I believe that he is right. But 

 the question is, What has guided musical development 

 along the special lines that it has taken in Europe ? I 

 do not think that Mr. Wallaschek will contend that the 

 guidance has here been that of natural selection. But 

 guidance there has been. No doubt in this as in 

 other matters of art, man has been giving objective 

 expression to his ideals. But what has led the ideals 

 to take the form they have taken ? This is one of the 

 most difficult problems presented by the psychology of 

 iusthetics ; and it no doubt lies somewhat beyond the 

 field of primitive music on which Mr. Wallaschek has 

 given us a work of real merit and value. 



C. Llovd Morgan. 

 NO. 1239, VOL. 48J 



EARLIER RECOLLECTIONS OF MARIANNE 



NORTH. 

 Some Further Recollections of a Happy Life, selected 

 from the Jonrnals of Marianne North, chiefly between 

 the Years 1859 and 1869. Edited by her sister, Mrs. 

 John Addington Symonds. Post 8vo, pp. 316, with 

 two portraits and a sketch. (London and New York : 

 Macmillan and Co., 1893.) 

 '"r'HlS volume might very appropriately have borne the 

 -L title of " Earlier Recollections," inasmuch as it de- 

 scribes the life of Marianne North antecedent to the period 

 comprised in the two volumes previously before the 

 public. On this point Mrs. Symonds says in her 

 preface : " When publishing the former volumes of my 

 sister's autobiography, it was th&ught wiser to cut out 

 some of the earlier chapters describing well-known 

 ground, in order to make room for those more distant 

 journeys by which her name had become known to the 

 to the world. But the unexpected success which that 

 book met with induces me now to add those first 

 European journeys, with one through Egypt and Syria." 

 It is probable that these sketches of travel in Europe, 

 Egypt, and the Holy Land, from twenty-four to thirty- 

 four years ago, will appeal to an even wider range of 

 readers than the accounts of Miss North's later journeys 

 to the furthermost parts of the earth, after she had be- 

 come so widely known as a traveller and a painter. The 

 same freedom in style and criticism pervades this as well 

 as the former volumes. Briefly, it may be described as a 

 rapid and graphic narrative of the incidents of travel, 

 interspersed with lively observations on peoples and 

 places, on plants and animals, and on the physical 

 features of the countries traversed, with here and there 

 historical allusions and reflections. The earlier journeys, 

 that is from 1859 to 1869, were made in the company of 

 her father ; and her sister, who has edited these recol- 

 lections of long ago, was also of the party up to 1867, 

 and therefore well qualified for the task. The first trip 

 was to the Pyrenees and Spain, by way of Jersey, St. 

 Malo, Rennes, Tours, Bordeaux, and Pau. A stay of a 

 month was made at Luchon, where Miss North made her 

 first attempt at landscape painting. Thence they went 

 to Barcelona, Tarragona, Valencia, Madrid, Toledo, 

 Granada, Malaga, Seville, and Cadiz, and home by sea. 

 This trip occupied nearly six months, and is described in 

 less than thirty pages ! In fact, the pace is tremendous, 

 though the travelling in Spain was nearly all by diligence, 

 which was very exciting if not absolutely dangerous. 

 However, only the main incidents are touched upon, and 

 the reader finds himself in a fresh place on every page. 

 In 1S65 and 1866 Egypt and Palestine were visited. 

 Even at that period Miss Northpainted very assiduously, 

 but a painting of doum and date palms, on the Nile 

 above Philae, is the only one in the North Gallery at Kew 

 of that date. After the death of her father, in 1869, Miss 

 North continued to travel, in order to forget her loss ; 

 first visiting Mentone and then Sicily. Much of her 

 time was occupied in painting, though only one picture, 

 the Papyrus growing in the Ciane, near Syracuse, is in 

 the collection at Kew. All the rest, with one other ex- 

 ception alluded to above, are the work of her more distant 

 journeys of later date. But all persons who have read 



