RECORDS OF MEETINGS 347 



weight, eyes, ears, nose, throat, teeth, heart, lungs, stomach, spleen, 

 liver, kidneys and nervous condition. A record of the death-rate in 

 the families was obtained as well as a record of the student's intellectual 

 standing. The students were divided into eight claasses, according to 

 the kinds and quality of stimulants used by the parents. 



The examination showed: first, that there was on an average a very 

 decided difference between the offspring of abstainers and those of users, 

 even where tea or coffee was used by only one parent, for the offspring 

 of the abstainers were superior in size, intellect and bodily condition to 

 those of the caffein parents ; secondly, as the use of caffein was increased 

 by the parents, from once to three and four times a day, a gradual de- 

 crease in height, weight, bodily condition, etc., of the offspring was 

 manifest; thirdly, in families where not only tea and coffee were used, 

 but also tobacco, the children were still more inferior mentally and 

 physically, increasingly so with the increase of caffein drinks in connec- 

 tion with tobacco; fourthly, where alcohol was used with the above 

 narcostimulants the lowering of the physical and mental status was very 

 marked. 



Comparing all the offspring of the narcostimulant parents with those 

 from abstaining parents, the latter were found to be better in all the 22 

 measurements than the former. Some of the differences were very 

 great, especially in weight, height, eyes, ears, physical health and rate of 

 mortality. There are over 100 per cent more eye, ear and physical de- 

 fects in the offspring of narco-parents ; 72 per cent more children died 

 in this than in the abstaining class; 79 per cent of the narcostimulant 

 families had lost one or more children, while only 49 per cent of the 

 abstaining class had lost any children. It was also shown that the 

 death-rate of the parents in this latter class was 41 per cent higher than 

 in the former. The research also brought out the fact that it took the 

 offspring of the narcostimulant parent eight tenths of a year longer to 

 graduate from the grades. In the Academy they were on an average a 

 year and seven months older than the students from the abstaining class. 



Mr. Chrislip said in abstract : Experiments have been carried on in 

 the psychological laboratory of Columbia University - and elsewhere for 

 the purpose of comparing visual and auditory memory. The points in- 

 vestigated in the first experiment were to determine : the number of 

 repetitions required by each sense to reproduce in a certain order cer- 

 tain total series of like construction; the average number of characters 

 of a series recalled in their proper order for each repetition of series of 

 like construction for each sense; and to determine, if possible, the best 

 material for testing the two senses. 



