122 POWERS OF VISIOX. 



the value of my observations by comparinii- them with results 

 obtained by the use of the army test-dots in the ease of English 

 agricultural and out-door labourers, results which were extracted 

 from the Keport for 1881 of the Anthropometric Committee of the 

 British Association. After making this comparison Mr. Roberts 

 remarked that the figures gave no siipfiort to the belief that savages 

 jjossess better^ sight than civilised peoples ; and he pointed out that 

 my average of 60 feet, which, however, I had onh^ roughly 

 estimated, was somewhat excessive and should have been 57"5 feet, 

 which is only half a foot more than the distance at which Professor 

 Longmore has determined these test-dots ought to be seen by a 

 recruit with normal powers of vision. My observations were com- 

 paratively few, but, as above shown, they give no support to the 

 view that savages possess superior powers of vision as compared 

 with civilised races. 



In the correspondence in '•' Nature," above referred t'o, Mr. 

 Brudenell Carter supported the " commonly received view " that 

 the savage possesses greater acuteness of vision ; but Lord Rayleigh 

 held that it would be inconsistent w^ith optical laws to hold that 

 the eyes of savages, considered merely as optical instruments, are 

 gi-eatly superior to our own ; and he observed that it appeared to 

 him that the superiority of the savage is a question of attention 

 and practice in the interpretation of minute indications. The same 

 opinion was expressed by Mr. Roberts, when he referred to the 

 common mistake of travellers in confounding acuteness of vision 

 with the results of special training or education of the faculty of 

 seeing, results which, as he remarked, are quite as much dependent 

 on mental training as on the use of the eyes. 



There is a circumstance which may influence the powers of 

 vision possessed by these islanders; and it is this. With the object,. 

 I believe, of excluding flies and other insects from their dwelling.^,, 

 the natives keep the interiors dark, the door being usually the only 

 aperture admitting light. Coming in from the direct sunlight, I 

 have often had to wait a minute or two before my eyes became 

 accustomed to the change ; but the natives do not experience this 

 inconvenience. Some hours of the day they commonly spend in 

 their houses ; whilst at night they use no artificial light except the 

 fitful glare of a wood fire. It would seem probable that the influ- 

 ence of the opposite conditions presented by the darkness of their 

 dwellings and- the bright sunlight, would be found in the increased 



