MEMORY. a 



nuts. And so on through an almost endless cata- 

 logue. Tlie bare names of tlie fruits alone per- 

 fectly well known to every reader would probably 

 fill the entire length usually devoted to these 

 essays. For have we not entirely omitted the 

 whole great family of melons and gourds, veg- 

 etable marrows and cucumbers, the mulberry and 

 the tomato, the grape and the cherry, and so on 

 in infinite variety ? WliJitever group of things 

 we begin to think of, we shall find that just the 

 same wealth and variety of common every-day 

 knowledge occurs to us; each of us knows liun- 

 dreds of animals and birds and fish and insects ; 

 each of us is acquainted with the names of so vast 

 a number of diverse objects as would fill a whole 

 volume of close-packed type, or exhaust the re- 

 sources of a considerable dictionary. 



Then again consider the fact that, besides the 

 mere names Miemselves, we are all acquainteJ. 

 with innumerable points in the appearance or 

 habits of all the objects thus mentally enumerated. 

 Take a single example out of all the number thus 

 quoted — say the first, a strawberry, and reflect 

 for a moment how many facts about its structure 

 or growth the merest child or ignoramus can im- 

 mediately remember. Almost all of us know, of 

 course, that the strawberry grows upon a low plant 

 or vine, that all its leaves are arranged in sets of 

 three leaflets each, that its flower is white and of 



