344 
THE EAR AND HEARING. 
any subjects which may appear desirable It was considered 
that by this means more particularly matters of interest in 
regard to the next day’s excursions might be of service. 
The Committee also had under its consideration the 
arrangements for the award of the Darwin Medal, which were 
referred to it for amendment by the Council at the Meeting 
last June. The paragraph which defines the papers eligible 
for the prize will now stand :— 
“ The Darwin prize is to be awarded to the paper, or set of 
papers by the same author, of highest merit which has been 
sent in since the expiration of the last term for which a prize 
was awarded for that subject.” 
Thus any paper, or set of papers in zoology, sent in 
between March 31st, 1882, and March 31st, 1886, will be 
eligible for the Darwin prize for 1886. 
It will be seen that the alteration consists in inserting the 
words “ or set of papers by the same author,” doubts having 
arisen as to the powers of the adjudicators in this particular. 
Another paragraph was adopted, viz. :—“ The Council 
shall in any year withhold the Darwin Medal, in case the 
majority of the adjudicators report that the papers submitted 
to them are not of sufficient merit to deserve it.” 
THE EAR AND HEARING. 
BY W. J. ABEL, B.A., F.R.M.S. 
(Continued from page 285.) 
The estimation of distance and direction of sounding 
bodies is a purely intellectual operation—the result of 
inference from intensity of sensation, &c. 
The perception of distance and direction is only acquired 
by experience. Sensations of touch are localised only after 
multiform experience of the difference in the degree of the 
sensations excited in various spots. It is the same with 
hearing; we judge of the distance and direction of the 
sound by the kind of impression produced. If a sound 
is already known to us, as in the case of the human voice, we 
judge its distance by the feebleness of its impression upon 
the nerve of hearing. If the intensity at a given distance is 
unknown, as for example, thunder, we suppose it nearer 
according as it is louder. The rumbling of a waggon in the 
street is thus often mistaken for distant thunder, and vice 
