August 11, 1893. 



SCIENCE. 



8i 



made to cause these nerves to "vibrate" (to use tlie orig- 

 inal Helmholtzian term) the sensation communicated to 

 consciousness would still be red. But this doctrine, which 

 has strong reasons in its favor, as regards the sense of 

 hearing, had never much support in the sense of smell 

 and taste, and has now been totally disproved for the 

 sense of sight. 



A few years ago Holmgren announced a remarkable 

 discovery, and at the same time a remarkable confirmation 

 of the original theory of Helmholtz. He cavised a very 

 minute image of a point of light to fall upon the retina, 

 so minute as to be smaller in diameter than the diameter 

 of the rods and cones. If this image was of white light, 

 it felt to the observer sometimes red, sometimes green and 

 sometimes blue, as it moved about the retina; if it was of 

 yellow light, it looked sometimes red and sometimes 

 green; and the primary colors were at times altogether 

 invisible. If this observation had been confirmed by 

 other investigators, it would have proved conclusively that 

 each minutest fibre of the optic nerve responds onlj' to a 

 limited range of vibration-j)eriods of light, and that, as 

 Helmholtz at first was inclined to suppose (he says explic- 

 itly in the first edition of his Physiological Optics that the 

 three effects viay all be ca]oable of being transmitted by a 

 single nerve), three adjacent fibres must participate in 

 conveying a sensation of grey to the brain. But this ob- 

 servation of Holmgren has not been confirmed. The ex- 

 periments have been repeated by Hering with quite 023j)o- 

 site results, and he has also detected the probable source 

 of Holmgren's error; and Hering's results have been con- 

 firmed in Helmholtz's laboratory. Hering's jJaper on the 

 subject was published in PJiuger's Archiv some four years 

 ago; I am unable to look up the exact date, as the admir- 

 able free public library of Duluth as yet lacks scientific 

 books of a non-jjojaular character. In view of these ex- 

 periments, no writer on j)hysiological optics (not even 

 Helmholtz) at j)resent expresses himself in anj other lan- 

 guage than that which implies that all the j)hysiological 

 . processes essential to the production of grey-sensations 

 and of color sensations may go on in a single cone (if not 

 in a single rod). C. L. Franklin. 



Duluth, Aug, 2, 1893. 



CURRENT NOTES ON ANTHROPOLOGY.— NO. XXXH. 



[Edited by D. G. Brinton, M. D., LL. D., D. Sc] 

 Recently Published American Codices. 



So rare are the documents which escaped the fanatic 

 iconoclasm of the early missionaries, that it is a most 

 agreeable duty to chronicle the discovery and jDublication 

 of hitherto unknown Codices, or native manuscripts, of 

 the Mexican and Central American 25eo2Dles. 



Last year, the American Philosophical Society pub- 

 lished in admirable style the Codex Poinsett, the frag- 

 ment of a pre-Columbian book relating to the collection 

 of taxes in the ancient empire of Anahuao (a term entire- 

 ly proper, in spite of Dr. Seler's onslaught uj)on it). Its 

 name was given to it after Mr. Poinsett, formerly minis- 

 ter of the United States to Mexico, who brought it from 

 that country and jn-esented it to the Society, which has at 

 considerable cost had it carefully chromo-lithograj)hed 

 and incorj)orated in its Transactions. 



With not less praiseworthy zeal the Royal Library of 

 Berlin has within the jDreseut year issued fac-similes of 

 sixteen fragments of native Mexican MSS., brought from 

 that country by Alexander von Humboldt, accompanying 

 them with a small volume {pp. 136) of exj)lanatory text 

 from the pen of Dr. Seler, whose knowledge of the sub- 

 ject places him in the very front rank of Mexicanists. A 

 few of these fragments, three or four of them, date ante- 

 rior to the conquest; but the majority are subsequent to 



it, though none probably later than 1571. They are aU 

 of value in the study of the hieroglyphic script. 



A third Codex of remarkable interest, and unquestion-' 

 ably ancient, has been published at Geneva by M. Henry 

 de Saussure under the title of "Le Manuscrit du Cacique.'" 

 It contains sixteen pages or plates, in colors, and toler- 

 ably well preserved. According to the statements about 

 it, it is not of Nahuatl, but of Mistecan origin, which 

 would increase its value, as this tribe is one of whom we 

 have few monuments, though we know its culture ranked 

 high, and dated from remote antiquity. It is said to con- 

 tain the biography of a certain powerful Cacique, by name 

 Sar Ho, whence the name given it. 



The great libraries of our country should not delay to 

 secure copies of these three ancient documents, as they 

 are all published in limited editions, and they should be 

 placed within reach of those in this country who devote 

 some of their time to the fascinating problem of American 

 hieroglyphic writing. 



Ethnologic Jurisprudence. 



The first volume of a work, which will certainly be an 

 epoch-making one, has appeared in Germany. It' is Dr. 

 Albert Hermann Post's "Grundriss der Ethnologischen 

 Jurisprudenz" (A. Schwartz, Leipzig). It will be followed 

 by a second volume, which will not be long delayed. 



The author is already well known as a leading student 

 in this department of ethnology, and also as a profound 

 thinker on the fundamental problems of the social rela- 

 tions of man. In his present work he sets out in the 

 first volume to exhibit all the primitive forms of law, cus- 

 tom and procedure, so that from them the fundamental 

 and universal principles of the jurisprudence of all nations 

 can be deduced. The second volume wiU indicate the 

 development of these general principles in special fields 

 of human law. 



In this first volume. Dr. Post defines the elementary 

 forms of the social organization as all reducible to four, 

 the consanguine, the territorial, the feudal, and the social; 

 or, the tribal, the communal, the regal and the demo- 

 cratic. Each of these has its own peculiar theory of what 

 relates to ethics, rights and laws; and though in minor 

 details there are constant and wide variations, each is 

 controlled in its development by obedience to certain un- 

 derlying principles, which place its moral and legal codes 

 on diverse paths of development. They are in a measure 

 historically sequent, the consanguine organization always 

 being that of men in the lowest stages of culture, while 

 the true social organization is as yet chiefly ideal, and 

 may never be fully reached in practice. 



The style of the author is terse and clear, and his read- 

 ing is most extensive and accurate. The field he has 

 chosen is a comparatively new one, and the results he 

 has reached are in the highest degTee of immediate and 

 practical importance. It has been well said by Dr. 

 Krauss, of Vienna, in a recent publication, that it would 

 be a fortunate chance to substitute some of Dr. Post's re- 

 flections on the rights of humanity for the wholesale mur- 

 der stories which stir the heart of youth in the school 

 readers, under the name of jjatriotic wars. 



The Study of Prehistoric Arch/eology. 

 Now that archaeology is recognized to be the only guide 

 where history is silent, and often the more trustworthy 

 guide where history talks a good deal, its systematic study 

 should interest aU who occupy themselves with questions 

 of the higher education. 



Dr. Hoernes, whose work on that branch has been al- 

 ready mentioned in these columns, contributes to the last 

 number of the Zeitschi-ift fiir Ethnologic a scheme for the 

 instructor, which is intended to present aU the science in 

 the most favorable manner for the student. It is as fol- 

 lows: 



