196 RIGHTHANDEDNESS. 



rises in tile scale of intellectual superiority, he seems as it were to 

 widen still further this difference in proportionate manipulative appli- 

 ance, and to convert one hand into the special organ and servant of 

 his will ; while the other is relegated to a subordinate place, as its mere 

 aider and supplement. 



We have thus a progressive scale, from the imperfectly developed, on 

 to the perfectly educated hand : all steps in its adaptation to the higher 

 purposes of the manipulator. The hand of the rude savage, of the 

 sailor, the miner, or blacksmith, while well fitted for the work to which 

 it is applied, is a very different instrument from that of the chacer 

 engraver, or cameo-cutter; of the painter or sculptor. The latter, 

 indeed, is unquestionably a result of development, whatever the other 

 may be; for, as we have in the ascending scale the civilized and 

 educated man, so also we have the educated hand as one of the most 

 characteristic features of his civilization. 



But so soon as attention is directed to the educated hand, the distinc- 

 tion of right and left-handedness acquires prominent importance. 

 Whence does it arise ? If it be the result of any organic structure, 

 dependent, for example, on the relative disposition of the viscera, or of 

 the great arteries of the upper limbs, we should look for some indications 

 of it among the lower animals, and especially among the Quadrumana. 

 But it has scarcely yet been studied even in the intermediate stage of 

 savage man. 



Where the subject has attracted any notice, the universality of right- 

 handedness has been assumed, except in purely abnormal manifestations; 

 and too frequently any disposition to deviate from it in childhood is 

 treated as a bad habit, if not indeed as something nearly allied to per- 

 verse moral delinquency. But any evidence of the existence of right- 

 handedness generally among savage races is exceedingly vague. In the 

 rude manipulations of a purely savage life, the imperfection of the tools, 

 and the general absence of combined operations, the distinction in the 

 use of one hand rather than the other is of little importance. In 

 digging roots, climbing rocks or trees, in the rude operations of the 

 primitive boat-maker or hut-builder; in hunting, flaying, cooking, or 

 most other of the operations pertaining not only to the hunter, but also 

 to the pastoral stage : there is little manifest motive for the use of one 

 hand more than the other; and on the supposition of either becoming 

 more generally serviceable, it would attract no notice, nor interfere in 

 any degree with the arts of life, though some gave a preference to the 



