Feb. 19, 1885] 



NA TURE 



359 



summate — a complete and perfect example of a subter- 

 ranean tyrant ; all around him are hosts of juicy grubs 

 and worms, and thereout sucks he no small advantage. 

 Concerning tastes there is no disputing : one naturalist is 

 fond of whales, another of moles, shrews, and mice. All 

 these amusing types must have their supply of food : the 

 great mother, Nature, loves all, and shakes out of her lap 

 plenty for every kind. When we reflect that our country 

 possesses about 1200 species of insects, and that some of 

 the species are prolific beyond all calculation, then we 

 come to understand how the higher insectivorous tribes — 

 birds or small mammals — find so plentiful a table in the 

 wilderness. The hungry, impatient cat, who mistakes a 

 shrew for a mouse, and then leaves her musky prey un- 

 tasted, would starve upon that which fattens the mole, 

 the shrew, or the bat. The last of these kinds hawks for his 

 small prey, but the shrew, with his delicate proboscis, his 

 sharp eyes, and his quick ears, knows where small beetles 

 most do congregate. These he crunches and munches 

 with exquisite teeth, the cusps or points of which are of a 

 deep ferruginous red colour, more beautiful, strange to 

 say, because they are thus stained. The Power that made 

 the beetle strong in his polished and enamelled armour 

 made also the teeth of the shrew most fit instruments for 

 crushing that armour in which the beetle trusts. It is 

 pleasanter to look upon this vacillation, so to speak, of 

 beneficent purpose from the stand-point of a Darwin than 

 from the stand-point of a Paley : there is much that is 

 painfully mysterious in the whole matter, and we only see 

 it in a partial view." 



The lectures concludes thus : — 



" When the eyes of the prophet's servant were opened 

 he saw no longer barren rocks with mist resting upon 

 them, but the whole mountain was full of chariots of fire 

 and horses of fire. The vestments and ritual of nature 

 may take up all the attention and use up all the energies 

 of her votaries ; these superficial observers fail, however, 

 to find the real religion of nature — the beautiful but 

 awful omnipresence which every flower and every insect 

 reveals. The phenomena of nature are all mere fading 

 pageants, and the really cultivated mind finds lasting 

 satisfaction in meditating upon the recognisable forces 

 that underlie all sensible phenomena. 



" This, however, is what the older philosophers called 

 ' dry light,' and is not comfortable to most minds. The 

 deeper things of nature are a sort of manna, but the 

 souls of some people become dried up if you give them 

 merely this celestial kind of diet : so that they murmur 

 and say, ' We remember the fish which we did eat in 

 Egypt, freely ; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the 

 leeks, and the onions, and the garlic' 



" And yet this ignorance of nature is set up as a dead 

 wall against all progress of thought ; for these people are 

 ' most ignorant of what they're most assured,' certain 

 that they know all about their 'glassy essence'; and, 

 although as blind as moles, they are the enemies of all 

 who have had their eyes opened, to whom the mountain 

 is no longer misty and dark, but flaming with light. 



" ' Ne sutor supra crepidam' — do not trust the cobbler 

 in things outside his calling — is a proverb that cuts both 

 ways. The biologist may surely be allowed to know 

 things that relate to his own calling : the man who never 

 dreams of life, and the science of life, should be careful 

 how he contradicts its experts. On the other hand, 

 bigotry is not confined to one class of controversialists ; 

 some very bitter things have been said by men against 

 faith whose culture and science ought to have taught 

 them better. We have a right to look for nothing but 

 ' sweetness and light ' from the apostles and prophets of 

 this new dispensation. 



' ; When the dust of controversy shall have subsided, 

 when those who have to receive new ideas as if by a 

 surgical operation begin to feel the stirrings of these new 



conceptions thus let into them — the new heaven of 

 nobler thoughts about nature, and of the great First 

 Cause of nature — then all who can think will find that 

 they are colonising a new Atlantis. 



" The old song of the creation puts it thus — Evening 

 was morning was — day one. 



" Thus the shadows of the evening came first, and the 

 rosy light of dawn afterwards. Now, in science, even in 

 biological science, the morning is spread upon the moun- 

 tains, and soaring birds are singing at heaven's gate ; so 

 that the drowsiest folk are beginning to stir themselves 

 ere well awake." 



We have selected these examples for quotation in order 

 to recommend the book to the class of readers for 

 whom it is primarily intended ; but we must not conclude 

 without again observing that the lectures contain so much 

 solid information of the strictly scientific kind, that* even 

 the most bigoted of biological experts cannot afford to 

 disregard the material mountain, however little heed they 

 may care to give to the vision of the fiery chariots. 



George J. Romanes 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 



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Civilisation and Eyesight 



In reading lord Rayleigh's interesting remarks in Nature 

 (p. 340) upon Mr. Carter's paper, it has occurred to me that we 

 should not, in considering the question of " aperture," entirely 

 omit the fact that this, though probably following a general 

 rule applicable alike to savages and civilised beings, varies in 

 individual cases. An assistant, who has recently left my obser- 

 vatory, had a singularly " sharp " eye, and could pick up with 

 ease companions to double stars, small satellites, &c. , which 

 others saw with difficulty. Such were his powers in this respect 

 that I always appealed to him in the case of a doubtful observa- 

 tion. I noticed one day how large the pupils of his eyes were, 

 so large that I asked hirn if he had taken anything to artificially 

 dilate them. Subsequent examination proved that they were, 

 though of course varying with the stimulus of light, always 

 much larger than those of most other persons, so much so that 

 I laughingly used to call them " cat's eyes." They had also, in 

 fact, a peculiarity, attributed to feline sight, that he could read 

 fine print and distinguish lines by alight much less bright than 

 I could, and habitually used the gas half turned on, &c. Prob- 

 ably such instances would not be rare if they were looked for. 

 Another qtiestion arises on this head : Could it be possible that 

 such a condition of the eye, natural in some persons, could, by 

 certain uses .if the member, be fostered in others? 



I should n.t have ventured the suggestion but for having read 

 of the "chamois'' eye, by which the habitual, or even casual, 

 Alpine hunter can be recognised. I have no references at hand, 

 and it may he it was the look, and not the eye itself, that gave 

 rise to the cognomen ; but if there was any change in the eye- 

 conditions, and especially in that of aperture, «e might find a 

 reason why the far-gazing savage improves the power of the eye 

 by use. We know that by certain trades — watch-making, for ' 

 instance — these conditions are varied adversely to long sight, 

 and in the case of sailors and preventive service men a contrary 

 effect seems induced. Lord Rayleigh thinks that the superiority 

 of the savage is only a question of attention and interpretation oi 

 minute details, but when one reads that two distant dots are 

 resolved into distinctly-appreciable personages as regards sex, 

 garments, &c, one begins to suspect that "aperture " must also 

 come into play. At all events an inquiry whether these far-seeing 

 savages have large eye-apertures might help the solution of the 

 matter. 



The peculiarity affecting my assistant's eyes may he more 



