104 
BAUER. 
drawn with utmost care, are nevertheless subject to a “per- 
sonal equation/’ is, as we at once readily see, a matter of the 
very highest importance. 
Many of you are doubtless familiar with the Hindoo fable 
set to rhyme by Saxe: 
“It was six men of Indoostan 
To learning much inclined, 
Who went to see the Elephant 
(Though all of them were blind), 
That each by observation 
Might satisfy his mind. 
“The First approached the Elephant, 
And happening to fall 
Against his broad and sturdy side, 
At once began to bawl : 
‘God bless me ! but the Elephant 
Is very like a wall !’ 
“The Second, feeling of the tusk, 
Cried, ‘Ho ! what have we here 
So very round and smooth and sharp? 
To me ’tis mighty clear 
This wonder of an Elephant 
Is very like a spear !’ ” 
The third, happening to grasp the “squirming trunk with- 
in his hands,” declared the elephant to be “very like a 
snake;” the fourth, feeling “about the knee,” thought the 
elephant seemed “very like a tree;” the fifth, “chancing to 
touch the elephant’s ear,” described him as being “very like 
a fan,” and when within the scope of the sixth came the 
swinging tail, the fact that the elephant “is very like a rope” 
was to him proved beyond dispute. 
“And so these men of Indoostan 
Disputed loud and long, 
Each in his own opinion 
Exceeding stiff and strong, 
Though each was partly in the right, 
And all were in the wrong !” 
