10 



lower phalange, it becomes the index of a high destiny remarkable 

 for good or evil. When it is broken it indicates uncertainty in 

 attaining success. The line of Apollo, or the sun, if distinctly 

 defined, signifies a desire for celebrity and love of the arts. The 

 hepatic or liver line ought to interest us if there were any truth in 

 chiromancy, for we are told if it is well defined and of a good colour, 

 it indicates sound health, harmony of the fluids (whatever that 

 may be), rich blood, excellent memory, a good conscience, and 

 success in business. If undulating and tortuous, it is indicative of 

 liver derangements and doubtful honesty, which two I can quite 

 conceive might well go together. Cross lines generally indicate 

 defects. Thus on the mound of Jupiter, they signify superstition, 

 pride, egotism ; on Mercury, a tendency to pugnacity and violence ; 

 on the moon, to sadness, discontent, and morbid imagination ; all 

 which qualities are plainly traceable to the supposed attributes of 

 the heathen deities after whom they are named. Transverse lines 

 always indicate obstruction ; the most perfect line is spoilt by 

 another running across it. I might go on all night if I enumerated 

 the different significations of all the lines, crosses, mounds, &c., of 

 the hands, and the qualities to be deduced from their smoothness, 

 colour, prominence, and various other appearances— enough, if I 

 have pointed out to you the few grains of wheat in all this bushel of 

 chaff, and showed there is something to be learnt, some truth to be 

 gleaned, even from the mysticisms and absurdities of chiromancy. 



November 13th, 1888. 



The second ordinary meeting was held on November 13th, at 

 the Town Hall. The following paper was read by Dr. Tyson, on 



PAIN. 



Pain, perhaps many of you have thought, is hardly a fit subject 

 to bring before the members of the Natural History Society, and to 

 you who have considered it from only a moral point of view, I 

 admit that it is not, and I think would be better treated in a ser- 

 mon ; but pain has a very important physical bearing — known to 

 most of you unhappily — and it is to this pa.rt of my subject I shall 

 mainly speak this evening. What is pain ? In the first place, 

 pain of whatever kind has its seat in the brain, and without the 

 latter there is no such thing as pain. For instance, if certain 



