EIGHTH ANDEDNESS. 225' 



lettered Mexican of the New World, are all found following a uniform 

 practice. So far as it can be discerned in the action of savage races,. 

 the same preference appears ; so that, unless we assume the transmis- 

 sion of a primeval usage through all the ramifications of descent from a. 

 common ancestry, we must look for some congenital source for such 

 predominating uniformity of law. 



Yet this apparent uniformity of practice is not without very notable 

 exceptions, the extent of which still remains to be determined. While 

 right-handedness everywhere predominates, left-handedness is nowhere 

 unknown. The ambidextrous skill of the combatant is indeed a 

 favourite topic of poetic laudation ; as in the combat between Entellus 

 and Dares (Mn. v. 457). Where the passionate Entellus strikes, now 

 with his right hand, and again with his left : 



" Prsecipitemque Daren ardens agit ajquore toto, 

 Nunc dextra ingeminans ictus nunc ille sinistra." 



But the more general duty of the left hand is as the shield-bearer, as 

 where ..SSneas gives the signal to his comrades, in sight of the Trojan& 

 (^n. X. 260) : 



" Stans celsa in puppi, clipeum cum deinde sinistra 



Extulit ardentem." 



The right hand may be said to express all active volition and all 

 beneficent action, as in j33n. vi. 370, " Da dextram misero," " Grive thy 

 right hand to the wretched," i. e., give him aid; and so in many other 

 examples, all indicative of right-handedness as the rule. The only 

 exception I have been able to discover occurs in a curious passage in 

 the Eclogues of Stobseus, rcsp} (^u/i-jr:, in a dialogue between Horus and 

 Isis, where, after describing a variety of races of men, it thus proceeds: 

 roh<; dk iv rw Xi/j} a.a(paXzi<z elvat xal w? irz} to TrXelffzov apLarepoiid^ooqj 

 xai ocroy aXXot. rai dz~iui rj.ipsc hepyooatv, abrohq zoj eucvvupM -poffrtOe- 

 fiivou<;, i. e., " While those on the south-west are sure-footed, and for 

 the most part fight with the left hand ; and as much force as others 

 exert with their right side, they exert by the application of their left." 

 Stobseus, the Macedonian, belongs, at earliest, to the end of the fifth 

 century of our era, but he collected diligently from numerous ancient 

 authors, some of whom would otherwise be unknown ; and here he 

 gives us the only indication of a belief, howeverVague, in the existence 

 of a left-handed people. 



As to the existence of individual examples of left-handedness, the 

 proofs are abundant, alike in ancient times and in our own day. 

 3 



