298 REPORTS ON THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 



made upon living animals ; not under the direction of anatomical knowledge or 

 the guidance of just induction, but conducted with cruelty and indifference, in 

 hope to catch at some of the accidental facts of a system which, it is evident, 

 the experimenters did not fully comprehend.' 



On the last page (p. 66) of the introduction Bell says : — 



'I will now lay before my readers the papers which I presented to the Royal 

 Society on this subject, and in the order they are printed in the "Philosophical 

 Transactions." ' 



The remainder of the volume from p. 67 to p. 392 consists of the 

 four papers published from 1821 to 1823, to which we have already 

 alluded. At first sight these are simple republications : each of the 

 four papers is headed by the words, from the ' Philosophical Transac- 

 tions,' 1821, 1822, and 1823. Bead before the Boyal Society July 12, 

 1821, May 2, 1822, March 20, 1823, June 19, 1823. 



But when we come to compare these ' republished ' with the original 

 papers we find that they contain emendations, quite insignificant as to 

 bulk, but most significant as to meaning. For they occur at crucial 

 passages and have the effect of transforming erroneous statements in 

 the original version into correct statements in the revised version. And 

 we search the volume in vain from cover to cover for some indication 

 by Bell that the text of the republished papers contains alterations. 

 And when we look more closely into the differences of text we find 

 that their collective effect has been completely to transform the original 

 meaning of Bell's principal statements not only as regards points of 

 interpretation but also as regards descriptions of experiment. 3 



The slight emendations silently made in this first edition of 1824 

 are transferred to and amplified in subsequent editions. In the third 

 edition, which in one or other of its two issues of 1836 and 1844 is the 

 ordinary and regular source of information concerning Bell's work, 

 the transformation of statements is complete, and in this third edition 

 at the foot of p. 33, p. 48, and p. 89 we find an acknowledgment by 

 Bell that the republished are not identical with the original texts. But 

 in 1836 there can be no particular objection to the editing of the text. 

 The mischief had been done in 1824 by the unacknowledged alterations. 



I shall quote a single paragraph from the original paper of 1821 

 and from the republished paper of 1824 in illustration of the subtle 

 character of Bell's emendations of text in 1824 while at the height of 

 his campaign against Magendie : — 



Original versiox, 'Phil. Trans.,* 1821, pp. 409-410. 

 Of the Trigeminus or Fifth Pair. 



' In all animals that have a stomach, with palpi or tentacula to embrace their 

 food, the rudiments of this nerve may be perceived; and always in the vermes, 

 that part of their nervous system is most easily discerned which surrounds the 

 oesophagus near the mouth. If a feeler of any kind project from the head of an 

 animal, be it the antenna of the lobster or the trunk of an elephant, it is a 

 branch of this nerve which supplies sensibility and animates its mvsrles. But 



' See the account of the experiment of the ' thrown ass ' in the Philosophical 

 Transactions of 1821, and in Bell's three editions, viz., in 1821 at pp. 412-3; in 

 1824 at pp. 105-7 ; in 1830 at pp. 73-4 ; 1836 and 1844, at pp. 52-3. 



