620 



SCIENCE, 



[Vol. IX., No. 229 



Sliufeldt and Dr, Matthews have both studied 

 this cradle carefully with reference to deforaia- 

 tion. 



The Sioux cradle represents those of all the 

 tribes on the plains of the great west. It is a 

 trellis or rack of four pieces, like a skid or a 

 flower-frame, or a frame on which fur skins are 

 stretched. Two upright pieces nearly contiguous 

 at the foot are spread apart at the top. They are 

 held in place by cross-slats above and below. A 

 strip of buffalo-skin, fur side up, covers this 

 frame. The child lies on this in a sort of ham- 

 mock between the vertical slats. There is an am- 

 ple pillow. The enclosing portion is shoe-shaped, 

 made of leather, and strengthened around the 

 face by stiff hide. The child is lashed in by the 

 closing of these leather flaps, which are now for 

 the most part gorgeously adorned with bead- work. 



The Algonquin cradle is, like that of the Navajo, 

 a board with stationary padded pillow, ample 

 bed, and cover ornamented with porcupine-quills. 



There are no cradles in the national museum 

 from the southern Indians. The squaws that fre- 

 quent southern cities at present carry their chil- 

 dren in shawls or sacks on their backs. 



No attempt is here made to touch the literature 

 of the subject, which generally introduces more 

 confusion than knowledge. • O. T. Mason. 



DR. BAIN ON ULTIMATE QUESTIONS OF 

 PHILOSOPHY. 



Prof. Alexajstder Bain of Aberdeen is univer- 

 sally regarded as the greatest exponent of the 

 association school of psychology, and for this 

 reason his scattered papers and addresses are care- 

 fully read by philosophical students. At the last 

 meeting of the Aristotelian society, he read a 

 paper on the ' Ultimate questions of philosophy,' 

 which is reported as dealing with the philosophi- 

 cal differences of opinion that grow out of the 

 attempts to give reasons for what has to be as- 

 sumed as being ultimate. At the outset the author 

 illustrated the position that a science may be very 

 debatable in its foundations, and yet the super- 

 structure raised upon these may be sound and un- 

 impeachable. This is most apparent in the mathe- 

 matical and physical sciences, in several of which 

 the ultimate axioms are given in questionable 

 forms, without impeding the development of 

 truthful doctrines, both inductive and deductive. 

 Less obvious is the application to logic and psy- 

 chology, which, in the opinion of some, are in a 

 state of total arrest until the fundamentals are 

 thoroughly adjusted. Yet this extreme position 

 may be overstated ; for in these sciences many 

 important results have been obtained, while con- 



troversy still rages in regard to the primary truths 

 of both. In following out the main design of the 

 paper to deal with ultimate questions, the two 

 foundation axioms of logic, namely, the axiom 

 of self-consistency and the axiom of nature's uni- 

 formity, were first considered, the chief stress of 

 the discussion being laid on the second. The 

 absolutely ultimate character of the belief that 

 the future will resemble the past was contrasted 

 with the three other views of the axiom : namely, 

 1°, that it is an identical proposition (as main- 

 tained by Taine and Lewes) ; 2°, that it is an in- 

 tuition ; 3", that it is a result of experience. As 

 to the last view, which is the empii-ical doctrine, 

 the author contended that experience could not 

 assure us of what has not yet happened without 

 making the assumption that the future will be as 

 the past has been, that is, without begging the 

 matter in dispute. The axiom is not properly de- 

 scribed either by experience or by faith, and should 

 be treated as unique, and should receive an un- 

 meaning name, that compares it to nothing else. 

 Considering that probably the earliest explicit 

 statement of the axiom is that given in Newton's 

 third rule of philosophizing, there would be no 

 improj)riety, but very much the reverse, in this 

 bicentenary year of the ' Pi-incipia,' in baptizing 

 it the ' Dictum of Newton.' The author then re- 

 viewed the several questions that might be re- 

 garded as ultimate in ethics, dwelling especially 

 upon the proper view of disinterested action, 

 which could not be obligatory without ceasing to 

 be disinterested. Finally a search was made in 

 psychology for the best examples of questions of 

 the ultimate class. 



ASYMMETEY. 

 Dr. T. G. Morton of Philadelphia has recently 

 called attention, in the Medical times of that city, 

 to the effects of unequal length of the lower limbs 

 in producing lateral spinal curvature. Asymmetry 

 of this kind has been known for some years, but 

 it does not appear that it has been regarded as a 

 cause of ailment in other parts of the body. Dr. 

 Morton finds that it leads to backache of distress- 

 ing severity, and also tiiat it can be cured by 

 adding to the shoe-heel of the short leg. The fol- 

 lowing is abstracted from his accounts of several 

 cases : a young man, aged twenty -five, had been 

 troubled for over a year with severe and con- 

 tinued backache, extending to the right side. 

 "When attempting to straighten up his back, he 

 experienced a cramp-like feeling. It was found 

 that his right leg was one and five-eighths inches 

 shorter than the left, and that the right arm and 

 leg were smaller than the left. The unsymmet- 

 rical form of the body was very apparent in a 



