January 1, 1897.] 



SCIENCE. 



35 



nected witli the flow of a glacier up stream was 

 explained by the action of a strong return 

 eddy. The temperature of the air, water and 

 ice in glacial crevices was also carefully re- 

 corded. Never to follow streams and never to 

 return except by the way of coming, were given 

 by Prof. Burton as two axioms for travelers in 

 Greenland. 



Mr. R. W. Porter gave an account of his 

 sketches of ice structure and of his water colors 

 of the natives. 



Stereopticon views illustrated the remarks of 

 all the speakers. Samuel Henshaw, 



Secretary. 



ANTHROPOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 



The 255th regular meeting of the Anthropo- 

 logical Society was held Tuesday evening, De- 

 cember 15, 1896. A paper read by Mr. George 

 R. Stetson under the title ' The Eye, the Ear, 

 and the Common Weal of Whites and Blacks, ' 

 was a resume of the literature of eye and ear 

 examinations, including the one made in the 

 Washington schools last winter by Drs. Belt, 

 ophthalmologist, and Eliot, otologist, of 500 

 white and 500 black children in the 4th and 5th 

 grades of the average ages of 11 and 12.56 years. 



The points emphasized in Mr. Stetson's paper 

 were : the prevailing ignorance of the normal 

 power of these organs and their consequent ne- 

 glect by the ' intelligent ' and ' ignorant ' 

 classes alike ; the gross carelessness of both 

 these classes, even when the defects are known; 

 the importance of systematic and accurate 

 school examinations in discovering defects im- 

 possible to remedy in later life, in correcting 

 erroneous and disastrous opinions as to the in- 

 tellectual capacity of children who have de- 

 fective eyes or ears, in detecting eye strain or 

 abnormal innervation of the eye muscles, etc. , 

 etc., and in the determination of the future oc- 

 cupations of those seriously affected ; the 

 great economic value of these tests in the pre- 

 vention of pauperism and in reducing the 

 number of expensive public institutions. 



Mr. Stetson asserted that not a single one of 

 our State Boards of Health or Education had 

 ordered systematic observations, which have 

 been thoroughly made in Germany and else- 

 where for several years, also that while the 



data obtained serve the admirable purpose of 

 pointing out the general neglect of these organs, 

 and of showing the importance and necessity of 

 greater attention to their defects, they failed to 

 be of any great value for general or compar- 

 ative purposes, because of the absence of uni- 

 formity in the methods employed in testing, of 

 periodical examinations and in the ages of those 

 examined, etc. Perhaps most important and 

 convincing evidence of the humanitarian and 

 economic value of such examinations, the writer 

 thought is found in the ignorance and indifier- 

 ence developed by the Washington inquiry, es- 

 pecially in the lower classes. Among the 

 Blacks, of all eyes classed as ' Extremely de- 

 fective,' ' Very defective ' and ' Defective,' 43^ 

 were unknown either to parent, teacher or 

 scholar. Of the 'Extremely defectives,' or 

 those with less than one-tenth normal vision, 

 22.50;^ were equally unknown. Of the ears of 

 the Blacks, 57^ were similarily unknown, and 

 of those having but one third normal hearing, 

 55 '/o . Among the whites the record is better. 

 Of all 'defective' eyes, 34.28^ were un- 

 known to all, and of all ' defective ' ears, 2 <fo 

 were unknown. The examination also disclosed 

 the fact that, with the knowledge of the existing 

 defects, the instances were very rare in either 

 race or social condition in which the persons 

 were under treatment. Otologists and ophthal- 

 mologists were shown to be in accord in the 

 opinion that even a partial defect in hearing or 

 in sight will find expression somehow in the 

 mental development, or, put in a different way, 

 that the diminution in mental de.velopment 

 will correspond closely to the degree of the 

 visual or aural defect. They are also in accord 

 in the belief that the eye and the ear can be 

 trained and educated to a much higher power 

 than they now possess, or allowed to become 

 atrophied by neglect or lost by abuse. The de- 

 tails of the Washington examination show very 

 slight racial differences. The visual defects 

 were 3.46^ greater in the Blacks, the aural de- 

 fects being equally divided. The difference in 

 the sight and hearing of the right and left eye 

 and ear was very slight in either race, while the 

 maximum percentage of defective eyes of both 

 races was found in the white female. In the 

 Whites the female eye and ear are both the 



