May i6, 1890.J 



SCIENCE. 



303 



seen floating about half wray between the seer and the orchestra. 

 While the explanation of these peculiar associations is as yet very 

 defective, the possibility of their anticipating the sounds and their 

 comparatively recent growth, are interesting features of his case, 

 from which a possible explanation might proceed. 



Physical and Mental Powers. 



A number of physical measurements have been made upon 

 ^,134 Cambridge students within the past few years, and Dr. Venn 

 has tabulated tliese for the purpose of comparing mental with 

 jjhysical faculty. The measurements taken were the distance at 

 which •' diamond" type could be read ; the maximum pull exerted, 

 as in the act of stretching a bow; the maximum squeeze of each 

 hand ; the heid volume, which is the product of the extreme 

 length, by the extreme breadth, by the height above a given plane; 

 the lung capacity; and the height and weight. The men were 

 further classihed according to scholarship in three grades. A, B, 

 and C, and the averages of all the measurements were separately 

 tabulated for the three grades. As comparatively large and 

 homogeneous groups are dealt with, any correlation of superior 

 physical with superior mental capacity should be evident. The 

 tables, however, show that there is no practical difference in any 

 of the physical averages between the three grades, except in one 

 respect, the strength of pull. Here the lowest grade has the 

 largest average, while the highest grade has the lowest. Dr. Venn 

 interprets this to mean that each grade of students has about the 

 same general physical development, but that strength of pull is 

 something that results from special devotion to athletic sports, 

 and that it is the men who do not devote themselves so assiduously 

 to scholarship who have most time and inclination to develop this 

 side of their physical culture. One other distinction is also note- 

 worthy : it is that the head volume of the first grade in scholar- 

 ship is greater than in the lowest gi^de. The difference amounts 

 to about one seventh of the size of the head. How important this 

 fact may be must be deiermined by future statistics. When tabu- 

 lated according to age (nine-tenths of the men are between nine- 

 teen and twenty-four years of age), it seems clear that the heads 

 ■of university students keep on growing at least until the age of 

 twenty-four, while in the population generally the growth stops at 

 nineteen years. The height of the physical powers seems to be at- 

 tained at the twenty -second or the twenty-third year. While these 

 results are in agreement with the modern theory of the relation 

 of mind and body, they show the necessity of distinctive measure- 

 ments and careful interpretation, if sure results are to be obtained. 



HEALTH MATTERS. 

 Nose-Bleed. 



Obstinate nose-bleeding is frequently one of the most difficult 

 things to check. Several aggravated cases have lately occurred 

 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. As a last re- 

 sort. Dr. D. Hayes Agnevv tried ham-fat with great success. Two 

 large cylinders of bacon were forced well into the nostrils, and 

 the hemorrhage ceased at once. This is a very simple remedy, 

 and one which should be remembered for cases of emergency in 

 the country. 



Ground-Water and Typhus. 

 It is well known that a connection has been observed (in Munich 

 and other towns) between ground-water and typhus; the disease 

 gaining force as the water goes down, and declining as the water 

 rises. It is thought that certain decompositions are favored by 

 air taking the place of water in the ground. While in former 

 years Hamburg has exemplified this effect, says Nature, the last 

 typhus epidemic there, according to Professor Briickner, was 

 quite in discordance with the variations of ground-water. From 

 1838, it is stated, the typhus mortality in Hamburg steadily fell 

 from 19 to 3 or 3 per 1000; but from 1885 it rose again to 9 ; 

 and whereas before 1885 the epidemic was a summer one, with 

 its maximum in August, it now became a winter one, with max- 

 imum in December. The curve of ground- water continued to have 

 the same course as before. Professor Bruckner points out that 

 this epidemic of 1884^87 corresponded in tiaie with certain harbor 



works being carried out at Hamburg ; and he attributes it to the 

 upturning of enormous masses of earth, the abode of numberless 

 bacteria, whose diffusion among the inhabitants was thug facili- 

 tated. 



The Physiology of Taste. 



. The localization of the different forms of taste sensations is a 

 subject which is usually cursorily passed over in text-books, with 

 the statements that the posterior third, the tip, and sides of the 

 tongue only are sensitive; that sweet substances are best perceived 

 by the tip, bitter ones at the back; and so on. In a German 

 medical journal is an abstract of interesting observations by 

 Oehrwall, who, by the aid of a lens, stimulated the individual 

 papillffl by means of a fine brush dipped in solutions of sugar, 

 quinine, acetic acid, and salt. He found that, as had before been 

 observed, the circumvallate papillae were particularly sensitive, 

 but that on the sides and tip the fungiform papillae only were 

 sensitive. He estimated that in the whole tongue there were 350 

 to 400 of these papillae, of which he found 135 only to respond to 

 stimuli. Many of them appeared to be excited by all four of the 

 substances employed, but in other cases papillae were found to 

 respond to one form of stimulus but not to another. Thus nine- 

 teen per cent responded to acetic acid, but not to sugar; twenty- 

 four per cent which were sensitive to acid were unaffected by 

 quinine ; while fifteen per cent which recognized sugar did not 

 respond at all to the application of quinine. All of the papillae 

 were sensitive to touch, pain, heatj and cold. When stimulated 

 by a mild faradic current, an acid taste only was excited. He 

 confirmed the observations of older authors, that most of the 

 anterior two-thirds of the dorsum of the tongue was devoid of 

 gustatory papillae. 



The Pre-Frontal Region of the Brain. 



Modern physiologists, says a Berlin correspondent of the La7i- 

 cet, regard the pre-frontal part of the brain as the seat of charac- 

 ter and intellect. After the removal of this part in dogs and 

 monkeys, no paralysis of any muscles or loss of sensibility occurs, 

 but singular changes in the behavior, emotions, and character of 

 the animals have been observed. They become livelier, restless, 

 impatient, irritable, quarrelsome, and violent. Their movements 

 seem purposeless, and their attention to what is going on around 

 them, and their intelligence, are diminished. These observations 

 have been confirmed by similar phenomena in the case of human 

 beings. The well-known " Crowbar case," described by the 

 American physician Dr. Harlow, is one in point. A young man 

 was busy tamping a bursting-charge into a rock with a pointed 

 iron rod, when the charge suddenly exploded and the rod entered 

 his head under the angle of the lower jaw, came out in the fron- 

 tal region, and was found some distance off, covered with blood 

 and brain-substance. He became childish, wilful, fickle, and 

 restless, and suffered loss of intellectual power. Gradually, how- 

 ever, these symptoms disappeared: he recovered, and lived for 

 thirteen years. His skull is preserved in Harvard University. 



Gastric Juice and Pathogenic Germs. 



Drs. Kurlow and Wagner, in a paper on " The Influence of 

 Gastric Juice on Pathogenic Germs," which they publish in the 

 Frucft, defcribe some interesting experiments which they have made 

 on this subject, from which they are led to the conclusion that con- 

 stant or specific microbes do not exist in the stomach; and those 

 which enter it, together with sputum, food, or other ingesta, are 

 only accidental and temporary residents, and cannot live in the nor- 

 mally acid contents of the stomach. Gastric juice is, according 

 to the authors' experiments, an exceedingly strong germicidal 

 agent, and when living bacilli get into the intestinal canal it is 

 due to various conditions entirely independent of the gastric juice. 

 When the latter is normal and in full activity, only the most pro- 

 lific microbes, such as tubercle bacilli, the bacilli of anthrax, and 

 perhaps the staphylococci, escape its destructive action; all others 

 are destroyed in less than half an hour. Similar influences exist 

 in the intestines, as proved by inoculations with the cholera ba- 

 cilli. On the latter subject the authors intend making further 

 experiments. 



