The Press. — London, England, 1856-09-20 00:00:00

Stn. 20, 1856. state of equilibrium. In a healthy state of body. their normal action produces pleasur able effects. Instead of endeavouring to establish more organs of sense than those generally received, it should be the object of philosophical teach ing to show that all sensations, through what ever organs received, are primarily referable to touch The eye is touched by light, the ear by air, the nose by odours, and so on. No sense acts without external influence—without, in fact, being positively touched by some sub stance foreign to itself. This truth ought never to be lost sight of, as it is a refutation of all those silly superstitions,—as second Eight a id mesmerism,—which have at different times imposed on the credulity of mankind. In treating of the ordinary five senses Mr. Bain seems to have no idea of a distinction necessary to philosophical accuracy. He con stantly speaks of odours, flavours, sounds, and colours as resident in objects, and not in the organs of sense which perceive them The distinction is not immaterial. It is, on the contrary, of fundamental importance, if only as showing the immeasurable superiority of the organs of the living body to the dead matter of which it_takes cognisance Philosophers do not think of saying of a needle that a pricking pain resides in it, yet it would be as reasonable for them so to speak as to say that grass is green or that sugar is sweet. The objects of which the senses take cognisance have something in their properties. which we imagine always to be properties of form or substance, that excites peculiar sensa tions in the organs of sense they touch, and hence our experience of colours, sounds, odours, and the rest._ _ It is to the exquisite constitution of the organs of sense that we must look as the main cause of 1411 the various sensations we expe rience. This will be readily acknowledged as regards the skin. Different sensations aro experienced as it touches different objects. The sensibility h in the exquisitely consti shoed skin, orrather in the nervous tissues pet - wading it and not in the objects with which it comes in contact. So with the taste. Sweetness doen not reside in sugar, nor saltness in salt. more than pain resides in a knife. But all the objects of which taste takes cognisance are so consti stuted as to affect the papilla) of the tongue in a peculiar manner, and so to produce various impressions of taste. Salt produces an im pression of saltness and sugar of sweetness, because a difference in the form of their crystals produces a different effect on the palate. And this organ is so wonderfully constituted as to receive pleasure from the forms of substances which are good for the body, and pain from the forms of those substances which are bad for it. To show the exquisite delicacy of these organs might woi thily employ the pen of a philosopher, and we had hoped that this was the task Mr. Hill had proposed to himself in the lengthened enumeration of objects which occupies his volume. We wero disappointed He is one of those persons whose minds do not penetrate beyond the surface. He mainly confines himself to such assertions as that sugar is sweet, vinegar is sour; that bees hum, cannon roar; that the sky is blue, and grass green I To judge by this volume he has merely reached the " great A little a" of the philosophical alphabet. - - - - The taste is not the most susceptible of the organs of sense, yet how fine is its perception It can detect the bitter of strychnine, though but one grain of the drug be mixed in a pail of water. And what is it that it detects? Why, the peculiar form or substance of the strychnine thus diffused, which, acting on the fine papilla, of the tongue, produces that sensation which we call bitterness. The nose is m or e s usceptible still. A small piece of musk has been exposed to the air for a great number of years without any percepti ble diminution of its weight. Yet, during all those years the musk has been throwing off the fine particles which constitute its odour, and the nose can at any time, without the slightest doubt, detect the presence of those particles in the air. Those particles arc sub stances; they act on and irritate the :nem- THE PRESS. brane of the nose, and produce the impression of a musky smell. Endeavour to detect the presence of musk in the air by any other test-- try to collect those particles—to ascertain their presence by any finely constructed instrument — and the immeasurable inferiority of the most delicate works of man to the organ of smell is at once apparent. Of all the organs of sense the ear has ever been our favorite object of study. There are mysteries in the light which acts on the eye that baffle all our researches. But air which acts on the ear can be better understood. We can show by actual experiment that all which we call sound is merely pulsation of air act ing on the ear. We see in the ear itself, the external shell exactly adapted to collect air, the tympanum or drum to reflect the faintest pulsations of the atmosphere ; and within, such marvellous mechanism of parts, with such contrivance to economise space, and to give in a narrow compass amazing development to the nervous tissue, as continually excite new marvel and admiration. And how wonderful the result. Each pulsation of the air, effected, whether by the softest musical instrument, by the human voice, or by -' Heaven's artillery," is faithfully caught by the ear, carried to the brain, and there produces the impression of sound we experience. In the Arctic regions, where air is condensed by the cold, it is not rare for the ear to catch words spoken at a distance of three or four miles or more. What is the mode of operation here? The apparatus of the larynx effects a movement in the air ; that movement is spread through the whole atmosphere for miles around; aril is caught at last by the ear with unfailing accuracy. A cannon fired at a moderate distance produces so violent a concussion of the air as to make the tremulousness of the win dow-glass visible to the eye. Instruments might be constructed to make such aerial con cussion more perceptible ; but what instru ment, save the ear, can be imagined which could detect that movement in the air caused by a musical instrument at a considerable distance, and not only so, but could dis tinguish that particular form of pulsation from thousands of others effected by different means? It is not philosophical to speak of colours as resident in objects, or even to speak of light as composed of differentooloured rays. When light is decomposed into its component parts, each separate part in touching the eye— for here also there is positive contact—affects it in a different manner, so as to give the impression of a different colour. We forbear even to touch on a subject so full of rich matter for speculation. The undulating theory of light appears to us by far the most philosophical. Different impressions of colour are, according to that theory, produced by the different rapidity with which different rays of light strike the eye. Hence brilliant scarlet may by the rapidity with which the substance throws light on the eye produce an impres sion as painful in degree as that caused by an endeavour to look upon the summer's sun at noon. Mr. Bain does not always appear to appre ciate the significance of the facts he relates. He gives some curious experiments which have been made on the nervous system. If the optic nerve be touched, a sense of brilliant colour is produced ; if the olfac tory nerve, a vivid sense of smells; if the auditory nerve, a sense of varied sounds This alone would be sufficient to show what no philosopher need doubt or hesi tate to express, and what every philosopher should accept as the basis of his speculation on the senses, that their peculiar impressions reside in them, and are only exoited by phy sical contact with the forms of those various substances which act upon them. In our view, Mr. Bain's volume is valuable for the information, systematically arranged, which it contains. The original speculation seems to us wanting in depth and penetration. The volume of Mr. Hill is the first part of what we presume is intended to be a length ened work. We do not know what philoso phical purpose can be answered by the facts he has collected. 005 Eveleen. By E. L. A. Berwick, Author of "The Dwarf," Iso. &o. Three Vole. Loudon: Smith, Elder, and Co. AMOUOR there are etceteras after the name of this clever writer, we must plead our ignorance of the literary antecedents of the author of " Eveleen." There is proof in the three volumes of previous literary practise. The pen of the authoress moves with fluent ease, and we should think more highly of " Eveleen" if it came before us as the work of a mere novice. It is spiritedly written, though it fails to interest the feelings. Our readers, like ourselves, may have often listened to some platform speaker who rises with unabashed front toaddress his audience. His presence is comely, his gesture is correct, his sentences are smooth and sonorous, and the speech is without any other faults than those of not rivetting the hearers or exciting them powerfully. " Eveleen" reminds us of such performances. Its writer in Menai talent is considerably above the average of candidates for the laurels of the circulating library ; but in novel-writing, as in singing, it often happens that a certain indefinable charm will give more popular effect than is achieved by the best trained talents wanting the sponta neity of genius. The Piccolomini, or a Vestris, will delight in spite of defects, or want of labo rious study of their parts, where better tutored artists fail. " Eveleen" tells her own tale In three volinnes, and in doing so of course runs the risk of being tedious. Autobiographic novels are rarely successful, as they are too egotistical. " Rob Roy " is professedly told in the first person singular; but Francis Osbaldistnne, in point of fact, is only a showman, exhibiting a charming and connected series of dioramio sketches of Scottish character. in which the chief figures are the brilliant Die Vernon, the bold Rob Roy, aid the unctuous Bailie Nicol J'rvie, with magnificent Highland landscapes in the background. Now and again we are re minded by the phrase, " my dear Tresham," that the story is related ; but from the first we care little for the fortunes of the decorous walking gentleman who acts as usher to the rest of the characters in that admirable novel. " Jane Eyre," a work of great genius, is also a case in point to show that autebiographie novels from female pens must be executed at great risk of monotony. The latter portion of that remarkable work is impel-added, and mars the unity of the performance, while the first portion of the story would be gladly omitted by any reader. Women can rarely describe with effect Wealth dio, and Miss Austen would not have succeeded well if she had in troduced a character with a standing "1" through three volumes. Some of Miss Edgeworth's tales were told in the first person, but they were brief; and the same may be said of the novelettes in the Misses Lee's " Canterbury Tales." Another cause detracts from the effect of " Eveleen." The scene is laid in Ireland, and yet there is an absence of the peculiarities of Irish life. " Eveleen " herself has none of the qualities of an Irishwoman as we find them traced by Miss Edgeworth, Lady Morgan, or Mrs Hall. Mr. Cabhell °llea is introduced as " the bad character" of the book ; but we have long had a distant ac quaintance with him at the Adelphi Theatre, where the unworthy gentleman has appeared under every variety o► eyebrows and accents. There is also an unpleasant stepmother, who stalks here and there through the volumes, with some minor characters. The sustained smoothness of the cotikposition, and the evidence of care in "Eveleen," are commend• able, and the writer may at another time be more successful in realising her own wishes. In justice to her talents we shall select some passages. Eveleen resides with her uncle, who marries a second time, and Eveleen Redgreave has consequently to deliver up the keys to the new mistress of her uncle's house. The second wife is thus described In about a month after this first intimation, my uncle was married, and Brabszon-hall gained a new mistress. The children were not at the wedding,: our absence was at Ilia. Patrickson's particular request, as I afterwards heard; for she had been a belle and a beauty, and although now, "at the turn of her life" (a delicate phrase), she had