540 
The Transfer of Sensation. [September, 
VI. THE TRANSFER OF SENSATION. 
t HE recent discoveries based on the conversion of elec- 
tric currents into sound-vibrations have suggested the 
possibility of greater and wider results in the future. 
Is it not possible to convert light into eledtricity, and by this 
means to see objedts and witness events not merely at great 
distances, but in spite of intervening objedts. Is it not con- 
ceivable that the phenomena which depend on the absorption 
and refledtion of light may be so translated as to become 
manifest to the sense of touch, thus robbing blindness of 
more than half its terrors ? 
Certain phenomena observed and recorded by Dr. J. G. 
Davey, of Bristol, and recorded in the “Journal of Psy- 
chological Medicine and Mental Pathology ” (vii., Part i), 
throw a new light upon this question, as well as upon certain 
allied subjedts. It is now generally understood that the 
special senses, such as sight, are merely special develop- 
ments of feeling. We find creatures utterly eyeless ; others 
exist, again, which have very rudimentary and imperfedt 
eyes, so that, though they are demonstrably conscious of the 
difference between light and darkness, they are unable to 
perceive objedts. So far as we can judge, their outlook on 
the world is much the same as what we have if a piece of 
oiled paper or of ground glass were placed before our eyes. 
Such animals — e.g., the Doridse — have eyes placed beneath 
a skin which is not perfedtly transparent, and which has no 
aperture. From the mere vague consciousness of light not 
clearly distinguishable from feeling, as met with in the lowest 
animals and possibly in plants, up to the distindt recognition 
of variously illuminated objedts, as we meet with it in in- 
sedts, birds, and mammals, we find a gradual chain of deve- 
lopment. Sight is not a faculty sui generis , standing utterly 
apart, but has its root in that general sense of feeling which 
is distributed over the whole surface of the body. The same 
must be said of hearing, smell, and taste. The faculty 
which in its crudest state merely takes cognizance of solids 
becomes gradually refined, so as to be definitely affedted by 
the undulations of the inter-molecular ether. 
From this point of view we can better understand what 
has been called the law of “ organic compensation.” If one 
organ is weakened or destroyed, its fundtions are to some 
extent undertaken by some other organ. That, e.g., blind 
