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NA TURE 



\yune 4, 1 8 74 



how can men of ability and education be expected to pre- 

 sent themselves as candidates for the posts, when there 

 are so many much more remunerative ways in which they 

 may get a larger competency ? 



If we look round at our public institutions we find that 

 the machinery of those which prove themselves to be the 

 most successful is that in which a single officer has the 

 control, he being frequently re-elected, and responsible only 

 to a body which criticise all his actions, and to which he 

 refers all serious questions of finance and management. 

 Inefficiency on the part of the officer under this arrange- 

 ment allows of his replacement without difficulty, at the 

 same time that he is continually kept up to his work by 

 the superior governing body, who find it a much easier 

 task to detect faults than they would to remedy them 

 themselves. 



The case of the Australian Museum is somewhat pecu- j 

 liar. That institution seems to be in the hands of a few 

 collectors of the old school, who treat it as a plaything of 

 their own, rather than a public institution, supported by 

 public funds. They have a curator, Mr. Gerrard Krefft, 

 of whose very high scientific position in the mother country 

 they cannot be fully aware, or they would be more liberal to 

 him, and give him more opportunities for the employment 

 of his abilities. The naturalist who on seeing the curious 

 new mud-fish from Queensland was enabled to say from 

 a superficial examination, that it " is allied to Lepidosiren, 

 and is Ceratodus " — a statement which Dr. Gunther's 

 superb monograph on that fish so strongly substantiates — 

 and who has done such excellent work with regard 

 to the I\Iarsupiaha, both recent and extinct, de- 

 serves greater opportunities than he evidently possesses 

 under the tender mercies of amateur trustees, especially 

 when they include among their numbers men such as a 

 Mr. Macleay, who has thought it worth his while to refer 

 to this journal in terms which clearly indicate either that 

 he has never heard of it or of the Royal Commission 

 whose recommendations we reproduced, or that he has 

 not the least sympathy with the subjects of which it 

 treats ; the latter of which tendencies must make him 

 quite unsuitable for the position which we regret to see 

 he holds as one of the governing body. 



The complaint of Mr. Cooper, who applied for a select 

 committee to inquire into and report upon the condition 

 and system of management of the museum, was that — 



"As a rule a body of trustees was not the proper body 

 to manage such institutions. Persons who were unpaid 

 and irresponsible did not take that interest in the institu- 

 tion they ought to do, and would not devote their time to 

 it. The Government found the whole of the money to 

 pay the cost of the institution, and surely they ought to 

 have a voice in its management. In asking for the com- 

 mittee, he had not the slightest desire to censure the 

 trustees. He believed they did the best they could, but 

 many of them could not devote the time that was neces- 

 sary." 



In the discussion which followed it was shown that 

 on all occasions it is difficult to get a quorum, except 

 on an occasion like that in which it was proposed to 

 employ the museum-building as a ball-room during the 

 visit of the Duke of Edinburgh to Sydney, when of the 

 twenty members of the committee, the ten official were in 

 favour of its employment as such, in opposition to those 

 who sat by election. 



A committee was finally appointed to consider the 

 question of appointing a permanent officer, and if they 

 then conclude their deliberations by placing Mr. Krefft in 

 a position worthy of his scientific attainments, they will 

 confer as great a benefit on zoology generally, as they will 

 show a power of appreciating worth, independent of petty 

 party-spirit. 



RIBOT'S "ENGLISH PSYCHOLOGY" 



English Psychology. Translated from the French of Th. 

 Ribot. (Henry S. King and Co.) 



SEEING that the doctrines of the English school of 

 Experimental Psychology are '' unknown, or very 

 nearly unknown, in France," M. Ribot has certainly done 

 a very useful work in giving to the French people an 

 analysis of the conclusions in mental science arrived at 

 by Hartley, James Mill, Herbert Spencer, A. Bain, G. H. 

 Lewes, Samuel liailey, John Stuart Mill. The most sub- 

 stantial objection that could be urged against such an 

 undertaking is the difficulty of doing satisfactorily the 

 thing attempted. In no department of knowledge claim- 

 ing the name of Science is there so little settled doctrine ; 

 indeed, Mr. Lewes has just told us in his '' Problems ol 

 Life and Iilind" that there is still wanting the materials 

 for its construction as a science ; nor is there in any 

 science so little agreement among the authorities, or so 

 great probability that honest application may be rewarded 

 with an entire misapprehension of their meaning. The 

 book before us is of course M. Ribot's answer to this 

 objection ; and we are bound to say that, considering the 

 special difficulty of the task, and remembering the object 

 he had in view, it is a very worthy and valuable perform- 

 ance. While there is probably not one of the writers 

 whom he has undertaken to expound who would not 

 object to his rendering of one or other of their opinions, 

 all must, we think, agree in regarding iil. Ribot as a 

 highly appreciative student, and must feel grateful to him 

 for this attempt to spread their opinions. Indeed to us 

 M. Ribot seems rather to err in the direction of wishing 

 to present in the most favourable light, and to make the 

 most of, the views of each writer in turn. 



Partly, perhaps, to this same amiable disposition may 

 be referred the impression of greater agreement among 

 the authorities given by a perusal of M. Ribot's pages than 

 by a study of the authors themselves. Mr. Herbert 

 Spencer is, and with all justice, placed at the head of our 

 psychologists ; and Prof. Bain is made to differ from 

 him in no essential particular — an interpretation which 

 we are inclined to believe would be accepted much 

 more willingly by Prof. Bain himself, who now recognises 

 the doctrine of inheritance, and would fain have it under- 

 stood that his disagreements with Mr. Spencer on some 

 other points " are more apparent than real," than by his 

 less clear-sighted disciples. The account of Prof. Bain's 

 theory of the supposed acquisition of voluntary powei 

 opens with a statement that here we have " the idea of 

 progress, evolution, and development." But the instructed 

 student in these matters must know that the growth 

 of voluntary power that Prof. Bain would explain is 

 not the evolution of Mr. Spencer ; it is, on the con- 

 trary, a description of the manner in which, accord- 

 ing to his imagination, each individual acquires those 



