DISCOVERY 



71 



which, when the tank is running on the road, are 

 sufficiently raised to clear the surface." 



For cross-country work this remarkable vehicle is 

 equipped with caterpillar chains, and for crossing 

 water two propellers are " attached to the shafts 

 which project from the rear of the under-water body, 

 power being obtained from the motor." 



PSYCHO-ANALYSIS AND M. COUE 



" In the early stages of psychological medicine the 

 chief stress was laid on suggestion, of which hypno- 

 tism was the most striking form. Faith and sugges- 

 tion are still the prominent agencies in most lines of 

 psycho-therapeutical treatment. It is altogether to 

 them that are due any beneficial results which may 

 have come from the sensational methods of Coue, of 

 which so much has been recently heard, and those 

 processes form the basis of much of the treatment 

 methods practised to-day. It is now one feature of 

 these two processes and of methods founded upon tl^em 

 that they make no attempt to reach the root of the 

 disorder, in the treatment of which they are applied ; 

 but their advocates are content to treat the outward 

 and obvious manifestations usually called symptoms. 



" \\'hen M. Coue tells his devotees to say that their 

 pains are growing less and their appetite greater 

 every day, he makes no attempt to discover the 

 causal factors upon which the pains or the diminished 

 appetite depend. Using the language of ordinary 

 medicine, the treatment is purely palliative. The 

 main principle of modern medicine is that, if symptoms 

 only are treated while the cause of the symptoms is 

 left untouched, the trouble will probably recur sooner 

 or later, perhaps even in far more troublesome guise 

 than that for which the palliative remedies were 

 originally applied. The second main line of treatment 

 is that which recognises this principle and makes it 

 its chief business to discover the nature of disorder, 

 one often dating back for many years, through whose 

 activity the symptoms are produced. Its object is 

 that the sufferer shall come to imderstand the faulty 

 trends by which his disorder has been produced, and 

 by such self-knowledge shall see where his life has 

 left the normal path and how his steps can again be 

 set upon the path of health. It is this process which 

 is denoted when the physician speaks of the process 

 of re-education." — The late Dr. W. H. R. Rivers in 

 "An Address on Education and Mental Hygiene" 

 included in his recently published book. Psychology and 

 Politics. (Kegan Paul, 12s. 6d.) 



A REMARKABLE ATMOSPHERIC 

 PHENOMENON AT SEA 



The January number of The Geographical Journal 

 contains a problem-raising note on a letter written to 



the Editor by Dr. A. Birnham-Smith describing a 

 phenomenon witnessed by the latter and other persons 

 on board the s.s. Eden Hall in the Persian Gulf fifteen 

 years ago. 



" It was dark at the time, with a very glassy sea, 

 when it suddenly appeared as if someone was turn- 

 ing flashlights on the ship (which was not provided 

 with electric light). It turned out to be waves of 

 light wheeling round the ship in the air just over the 

 sea, and not actually on the surface. The phenomenon 

 was observ^ed for twenty minutes by all on board. 

 Although, as we have said, the appearance seems to 

 be an unusual one, a very similar phenomenon was 

 reported in 1909 by the master of the Danish East 

 Asiatic Company's steamer Bintang, Captain Gabe, as 

 seen in June of that year during the passage through 

 Malacca Strait, and a printed description was after- 

 wards issued by the Danish Meteorological Institute, 

 with an illustration. In this case the phenomenon is 

 said to have resembled a revolving light, with a 

 pretty fast rotation, the light-waves taking the form 

 of long arms issuing from a centre which seemed to 

 lie on the horizon. Inquiries instituted with a view 

 to learning whether other observations of such a 

 phenomenon existed at first met with negative replies^ 

 but eventually the report of a similar experience was 

 obtained through the Dutch Meteorological Institute 

 from Captain Breyer of the Dutch steamer Valentijn, 

 who in 1910 observed the phenomenon near the 

 Natuna Islands in the South China Sea." 



New Methods of Judging 

 Musical Ability 



By Robert H. Thouless, M.A. 



Fellow of Corpus Cbristi College, Cambridge ; LecUtr^T in Psychulogij in 

 the University 0/ Manchester 



C.VN psychological investigation throw any light on 

 the nature of the musical mind, on the problem of 

 what makes up the difference between the musical 

 person and the person who, in spite of all his efforts, 

 remains incapable of musical performance and appre- 

 ciation ? This is a problem which has been attacked 

 by Professor Seashore, of the University of Iowa. 

 His results have interest both for the teacher of music 

 and for the student of psychology. 



The method of dealing with such a problem as this 

 is, first, to analyse the complex function of musical 

 talent into simpler elements ; secondly, to devise 

 methods of testing separately the ability of different 

 individuals in each of these simpler functions. We 

 ask, for example, why one person learns to play and. 



