head against one of the most difficult branches of physiological science! We have little doubt that his profession is the Law; because he appears to think, that "evidence" in science means only what a man will say or swear; and that scientific evidence -facts of nature-can be destroyed by mere assertion.

In the first paragraph of that larger portion of the article devoted to Phrenology, this science is pronounced to be "a system grounded on insufficient evidence; and for which there is no foundation in nature." The former part of the passage is equivalent to the deliberate assertion that the system has some foundation; the second part then being a deliberate assertion that it has none at all. How a system can be grounded on evidence (whether that be sufficient or insufficient in amount) and yet have no foundation, we must leave our excellent logician to explain it passeth our understanding. We are further informed that Spurzheim "abandoned the system of his master," for he "gave to the majority of the faculties new names, which he changed from time to time." Admirable reasoner! To change a dozen or two of names, is to abandon the system! Hear this, chemists, geologists, zoologists, botanists, you who are changing the names of things almost daily, hear this, and say where your systems can now be! Abandoned, no doubt. How stolid must be those who still publish botanical works "after the system of Linnæus," in which hundreds of new names are substituted for the names imposed on plants by Linnæus! We are also sagely instructed, that it is impossible for mental manifestation to be compared with brain, the latter being material, the former immaterial. Listen to this, O shade of Newton! How could you compare the force of gravity with the mass of bodies gravitating? The thing is altogether impossible: you must first prove that gravity is a material body, and then we may attend to your comparison. And Mr. Combe, what rank folly you, too, have been guilty of! Brain is material, mind is not material, how could you be so silly as to compare them? Thus, who could possibly say

Little development of Brain - - - Little manifestation of Mind. More development of Brain More manifestation of Mind. Great development of Brain - - - Great manifestation of Mind.

Even about simple matters of fact we find Anti-quack committing blunders equally glaring as are those of his unique logic. For instance, so little is he acquainted with phrenological literature, that he knows not who is the author of the standard English work on the subject. He speaks of the System of Phrenology as having been written by Dr. Combe. "Dr." might pass for a misprint, instead of "Mr.," but our learned Anti-quack

unfortunately also writes, "the doctor's words." It would thus seem that he must intend Dr. Andrew Combe, for he had spoken of Mr. Combe, in a former part of the paper. A mistake of this kind would be excusable enough in an indifferent person; but it shows Anti-quack to have a very slender acquaintance with the authors and works treating of the science he is condemning. And we are still further confirmed in this opinion, on finding him quoting the words of Dr. Gordon's attack, and attributing them to "Jeffries," intending Lord Jeffrey, we must suppose. Verily, ignorance is a great promoter of irrational hostility.

After about twenty pages of such excellent logic and accurate statements, as are exhibited in these instances, Anti-quack exclaims in wonderment, "Yet this is the system, the science!!! which a British physician, surgeon, anatomist, physiologist is still obtruding upon the attention of the British public!" Not only is a British physician, but hundreds of British physicians and surgeons are now obtruding "this system, this science," upon the attention of the British public. And we can further inform our logical pleader, Anti-quack, that the best British Medical Journals are also obtruding it upon the British public. The Medico-Chirurgical Review, The British and Foreign Medical Review, and The Lancet, are each recommending "this system, this science," to the British public. Fortunately for the phrenologists, and for the public, these periodicals are read far more extensively by members of the medical profession, than is the Dublin Journal. And we can tell Anti-quack why they are more read. First, their contents are greatly superior in quality; and secondly, by close printing, their contents are also much greater in quantity, in proportion to the price; indeed, the Reviews contain thrice the quantity of matter found in a number of the Dublin Journal, whilst their cost is not double that of the Journal.

VIII. Mr. Knight's Cases illustrative of the "Hereditary Instinctive Propensities of Animals."—(Recorded in the Philosophical Transactions for 1837, Part 2.)

THE want of space in our two last numbers prevented an earlier call on the attention of phrenologists, to some highly interesting cases of hereditary peculiarities in animals, recorded by the late

Mr. Knight, the horticulturalist; a close observer of nature, though we are not disposed to place quite so much reliance upon his explanations of things observed. He thinks that animals evince "an irresistible propensity to do that which their predecessors of the same family have been taught or constrained to do, through many successive generations." Admitting this to be a fact, there are two theoretic explanations to be offered; the first and least doubtful is, that when any mental faculty is much exercised in the parent, it is attended by an increase of development in its corresponding organ, and this organic enlargement is hereditarily transmitted; the other explanation is, that the special direction of a faculty is transmitted from parent to offspring. Mr. Knight evidently adopts the latter view; but some at least of his cases are explained by the phrenological doctrine of special organs for special feelings, which may increase in size individually, and thus increased may descend from parent to offspring. We shall quote a few of his cases, beginning with those most readily explained by reference to the familiar doctrines of Phrenology.

"I possessed," says Mr. Knight, "one young spaniel, of which the male parent, apparently a well-bred springing-spaniel, had been taught to do a great number of very extraordinary tricks (some of which I previously thought it impossible that a dog could be made to learn), and of which the female parent was a well-taught springing-spaniel; and the puppy had been taught, before it came into my possession, a part of the accomplishments of its male parent. This animal possessed a very singular degree of acuteness and cunning, and in some cases appeared to be guided by something more nearly allied to reason than I have ever witnessed in any of the inferior animals. In one instance I had walked out with my gun and a servant, without any dog, and having seen a woodcock, I sent for the dog above-mentioned, which the servant brought to me. month afterwards I sent my servant for it again, under similar circumstances, when it acted as if it had inferred that the track by which the servant had come from me would lead it to me. It left my servant within twenty yards of my house, and was with me in a very few minutes, though the distance which it had to run exceeded a mile. I repeated this experiment at different times, and after considerable intervals, and uniformly with the same results, the dog always coming to me without the servant. I could mention several other instances, nearly as singular, of the sagacity of this animal, which I imagined to have derived its extraordinary powers in some degree from the highly cultivated intellect of its male parent."

A

If we take for granted, that the clever male parent had more

intellect than usual with spaniels, in consequence of larger organs of intellect, which (phrenologically speaking) must have been the case; and if we also assume, that this larger development would descend to its offspring, we have an explanation of the superior intelligence of Mr. Knight's spaniel, without resorting to the less likely supposition of any special modifications by training being communicated from parent to offspring. We return to Mr. Knight.

"I stated that a young terrier, whose parents had been much employed in destroying polecats, and a young springingspaniel, whose ancestry through many generations had been employed in finding woodcocks, were reared together as companions, the terrier not having been permitted to see a polecat, or any other animal of a similar character, and the spaniel having been prevented seeing a woodcock, or other kind of game; and that the terrier evinced, as soon as it perceived the scent of the polecat, very violent anger; and as soon as it saw the polecat, attacked it with the same degree of fury as its parents would have done. The young spaniel, on the contrary, looked on with indifference; but it pursued the first woodcock which it ever saw with joy and exultation, of which its companion, the terrier, did not in any degree partake.”

Here again, it does not appear to us necessary to resort to the hypothesis, that the spaniel inherited a special tendency to hunt woodcocks, and the terrier a special tendency to hunt polecats. The two dogs were of widely different breeds, and each by its organisation was probably adapted to the ordinary purposes for which those breeds are usually kept. If we are to rely on Mr. Knight's judgment, in regard to the state of feelings in the dogs, when their senses were affected by the presence of their proper quarry, we are to infer that the Destructiveness of the terrier was much greater than that of the spaniel. We know not to what faculty the fondness for springing birds is to be referred: it can scarcely be that of Destructiveness; and if not, there seems no more difficulty in phrenologically explaining the different tastes of the two dogs, than there is difficulty in explaining why one man is more powerfully excited by musical sounds and another by colours; namely, by the presumption of a corresponding degree of development of the cerebral organs concerned. The next

case we quote is more like an example of a change in disposition transmitted by descent.

"I have witnessed, within the period above mentioned, of nearly sixty years, a very great change in the habits of the woodcock. In the first part of that time, when it had recently arrived in the autumn, it was very tame; it usually chuckled

when disturbed, and took only a very short flight. It is now, and has been during many years, comparatively a very wild bird, which generally rises in silence, and takes a comparatively long flight, excited, I conceive, by increased hereditary fear of man.'

We should explain this case, rather by supposing an increased development of the organs of Cautiousness and Secretiveness, than by supposing an "increased hereditary fear of man" in particular. Besides, by the time woodcocks reach the west of England, in the present day, they have probably been more alarmed and chased during their passage, than was the case in time past. The three following anecdotes can scarcely be accounted for without adopting Mr. Knight's hypothesis of acquired habits, or a special direction of the natural faculties, becoming hereditary.

"The hereditary propensities of the offspring of the Norwegian Ponies," [Mr. Knight had imported Norwegian mares] "whether full or half-bred, are very singular. Their ancestry have been in the habit of obeying the voice of their riders and not the bridle, and the horse-breakers complain, and certainly with very good reason, that it is impossible to give them what is called a mouth; they are nevertheless exceedingly docile, and more than ordinarily obedient where they understand the commands of their master. They appear also to be as incapable of understanding the use of hedges as they are of bridles, for they will walk deliberately, and much at their ease, through a strong hedge; and I therefore conclude that the Norwegian horses are not in the habit of being restrained by hedges similar to those of England."

"I procured a puppy of a breed of setters, which had, through many generations, been employed in setting partridges for the flight net only, and of whose exploits I had heard many very extraordinary accounts. I employed it as a pointer in shooting partridges; and for finding coveys of these birds in the open field, I never saw its equal, or in its manner of setting them; but it would never set its game amongst brakes or hedge-rows. Whenever it found a bird in such a situation, it invariably sat down, in the same attitude, and alternately looked into the bush, and at me, seeming to think that setting partridges in such situations was not a part of its duty."

"In one instance I saw a very young dog, a mixture of the springing-spaniel and setter, which dropped upon crossing the track of a partridge, as its male parent would have done, and sprang the bird in silence; but the same dog, having within a couple of hours afterwards found a woodcock, gave tongue very freely, and just as its female parent would have done."