302 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE, 
CORRESFON DENCE: 
SCIENCE LETTER FROM PARIS. 
July 30, 1880. 
Professor Vogt has drawn the attention of the National institute of Geneva, 
to the physiology of writing. It has been demonstrated that certain parts of the 
brain, situated in the region of the temples, have a predominating influence on 
the formation of articulated language. It is also well known that the nervous 
fibers inter-cross in the brain, and in such a manner, that the movements of the 
left arm are commanded by the right hemisphere, while the movements of the 
right arm are ordered by the left hemisphere of the brain. Apoplectic attacks 
and extravasations of blood, are more frequent in the left, than in the right side of 
the brain. Hence, when the left hemisphere is affected, paralysis and the impossi- 
bility to speak result for the members of the right side, while any lesion in the right 
hemisphere, resulting in paralyzing the left members, generally leaves language 
intact. Now since acenter existsf or language, does one also exist for writing? and 
since we are accustomed invariably to write with the right hand, the power to 
do so ought to be paralyzed when the left lobe of the brain becomes attacked. 
But we can learn not the less to write with the left hand; this raises a general 
question: Does the manner in which we write depend on physiological necessities 
created by the structure even of the brain itself? All peoples write with the right 
hand; how then comes it that the arrangement of the lines and letters be different ? 
The nations of Eastern Asia write from top downward, and in lines from 
right to left; Semitics and Europeans place the lines one below the other, but the 
former shape the letters from right to left centripetally, while the latter do so 
from left to right and centrifugally. The arrangement of the lines and letters 
and their formation, are independent of each other; it is the form and size of the 
letters that constitute individuality. The representation of an object by an im- 
age was the origin of writing; the knotted strings in use with the Aztecs was 
rather an aid-memory than a form of writing; besides, to make a knot on a 
handkerchief to sharpen the memory, is not uncommon among moderns. The 
Mexicans have a combination of image and phonetic writing, suggestive of a re- 
bus; the Red Indians when they paint images on skins, differ in little from the 
races that did the same on rocks. ‘The style of primitive writing depended on 
the material; on a cornice, the lines were horizontal; vertical on a pillar; circular 
round a column. Naturally on a pillar the writing would commence from the 
top downward. 
The Arabs and Mussulmans when writing, keep the hand fixed to the same 
spot, while the other—the left—gently pushes or spins the paper forward, from 
left to right. The Arabs also prefer to write while standing up, besides, the 
