National Republican. (Washington City (D.C.)) 1872-1888, 1874-03-23
TIE TRAINING oFxExoRH.

THE TRAINING OF NEK0RY
ILLUSTRATIONS OF HRrHoD AND
PRACTICE. -
From the New York Timss.1
Il d recorded of Persian King that he could
call by name every soldier of his vast army.
The same thing is told Of Mithridsfes. we
read also of men who, having scanned book
once, could repeat the whole from the preface
of "Dear reader to the word "Finis." All
these instances are cases of men with abnormal
and wonderful memories, which are to Be con
,eidered a. phenomenal ~ sixth toe on the FOOT,
or as the ligament which connected Chang and
Eng. There is, no doubt, considerable vaEia-
ton in the amount of memory possessed BY
average men, nor is there any law by which we
can az the proportion Of memory 70 what We
understand by the term intellect. A man might
have prodigious memory and yet be prodi
sious ass; conversely. man might think Justly
and forcibly, and yet have Q very poor men,
ory Our present race of psychologists have
not succeeded hitherto.in their attempts 1t an
alyzing qualities of the mind. They have, IN
deed, collected some facts about memory which
are interesting, but from these they have not
been able to construct . general law. They
have discovered, for example, that crows can
count as high as three, and that there are
tribes in the centre of Africa who have NOT
been able to create mineral words beyond four.
Even this is arrived at In bungling fashion,
in this manner: One, two, one-two, (shreeD
two-two, (four.) And yet this same degraded
race have q vocabulary Of over one hundred
words consequently, their memory must be
more powerful than their numeral system
would imply. A thousand anecdotes could be
given of proofs of memory in domestic animals,
and 1t is even of record that pointer dog was
taught to play dominocs. Unfortunately, the
record is somewha. dubious, because not only
do owners of clever quadrupeds love to e1ag-
gerate their powers, but waggish country journ-
alists are somewhat apt to invent anecdotes
when news is wanting. In our American sense
of humor there seems to be a strong leaven Of
the exploded form of joking once popular in
England, as the "bite," which consisted Of
telling unmitigated falsehoods. And nowhere
does this weakness crop up more prominently
than in anecdotes of animals. Therefore, one
must take with considerable caution the facts
presented with regard to memory in the lower
orders of the animal world. Enough, however,
is admitted TO prove that modified form of
memory Is to be found in brutes.
Perhaps the most interesting feature with
regard to the human memory that has been
ELECTED BY psychologists in their eudeavors to
find out what it is and in what 1t consists, Is
the capacity for special training which ordinary
memories possess Under this training average
men are able to perform positive feats quite as
q matter of course, without eliciting our special
wonder. Who, for example, has ever consid-
cred the case of conductor on Third avenue
car when the unpleasant vehicle is almost un-
pleasantly loaded down? He knows every per-
son who has paid the fare, and pounces down
upon the newcomers who have not with un-
swervfng accuracy. New hands and dishonest
men occasionally ask for the fare q second time,
but this is of rare occurrence. Gentlemen who
60 every day to Harlem by this most dismal
and uncivihzed conveyance will admit that
such demand hardly occurs once In three
years. And yet these conductors are not men
of even average intellectual power, or of
average memory, and their development simply
comes from training. The conductor, however,
of q New York Central train shows this power,
or rather this possibility of training, in q much
stronger light. Like his congener of the Third
avenue horse-line, his intellect and memory are
below the average, and yet from the time that
he becomes a conductor he accomplishes re-
markable feats of memory. There are from five to
eight, sometimes as many as thirteen, carriages
filled with passengers in train. He sees the
ticket of each once only, and though there are
several hundred of them, he knows exactly
where the new arrivals have seated themselves,
where to look for them, nor does he ever trou-
he any of the others to show their tickets.
This is a simple thing to write, but in the mind
must be q complex arrangement. He must
have every carriage, so to speak, distracted in
his mind with all its occupants, and the little
details by which he knows them and associates
them with their tickets. In No. 1, for ex-
ample, old man and boy with satchel, Yonkers;
fat woman with red face, Yonkers; pretty young
lady, Tarrytown; plain young lady with seal
skin jacket, Yonkers; man with red moustache,
Utica; two old gentlemen, both Rome, fat lady
with smart hat, and pretty daughter with ditto,
Tarrytown-and 80 on throughout the whole
carriage. Then, all the carriages are similarly
treated, and the mans mind becomes a series
of maps, in which every seat, with its occu-
pants, is succinctly drawn. Should man who
has shown his ticket lose It, there will be no
trouble when the circumstance is explained,
for the conductor is sure to remember having
seen 1t. And, what is stranger, the delinquent
will appeal confidently to the conductors men,
DRY. Some years ago there was q female who
used to travel on the New York Central,
and being of an avaricious and saving disposi-
ton, she hit upon the device of taking her
ticket for . station thirty miles short Of her
Al - =
given up her ticket that 1t had been for the
more distant place. The conductor, strong in
his trained memory, insisted upon 1t that the
females ticket had been for the shorter dis
tance, and she must pay the additional fare;
but she resisted, and the voice of the pas
scngers being on the woman's side she tn
umphed. But the word was passed among
all the conductors, and tie next time that the
Lady Travelled on the line, when the conductor
(not the same one) came to take the tickets,
and she offered hers, he recognized her, and
CURLY said, "Madame, in order that there shall
be no mistake this time, I'll take your ticket
when you are ready to leave the car" She saw
that she was found out, and paid up without
demur. All this came from training, and the wo-
mans scheme, though ingenious, was open to
this defect, that she had not taken into consid-
GRAFTON the muscular memory Of a conductor,
rendered abnormally powerful by exercise and
by certain power of viii which Il seems hu-
man beings can exert whenever they are com
PEELED by selfinterest.
This power of volition, of willing, 30 to
speak, that all the mental power shall be
thrown into one channel is capable of many
illustrations, besides that Of memory. But
these are the most interesting, because they
are unconscious. The conductor who tries to
remember, because his bread and butter are
concerned, does not know anything about the
laws Of volition, and would be very much sur
prised If he were TO learn that he remembered
not because he had q good memory, but because
he made his memory remember. We none of
Us know what tremendous powers we possess