The Canton mail. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 18??-1882, 1876-01-01

remarkable progress. In addition to
the recent admirable article in the
Contemporary Review, paper of
great interest on the subject, by DIR.
Emil Rosenberg, has been published in
a German review. He sets before
himself the problem, little touched
hitherto, of the. discovery of the steps
by which man may have developed
from the nearest mammalian stock.
Taking first the vertebral column, he
sets forth the differences existing there
in in the various Anthropomorphn
and seeks to reconcile them with that
of man. For instance, in two genera,
Troglodytes and Hylobates, there are
thirteen dorsal vertebr;e, while in the
orarg and in man there are only
twelve. But DIR. Rosenberg has dis
covered in more than one human en-
bryo an actual rib-rudiment on the
thirteenth dorsal vertebr;e so that the
homology of the thirteenth dorsali in
man and Troglodytes is established
Another result that DIR. Rosenberg
claims to have demonstrated from ex-
animation of human embryos is that a
process of transformation goes Oh in
the growth of the sacrllm, by which
vertebre at the proximal end, with
| their cOstal elements, are assumed into
the sacrum, while corresponding
number at the distal end undergo
reduction and are dismissed into the
caudle region And this process, gen
eralized, may be applied to each of the
hinder regions of the vertebral columns
| Thus in the history of development
each lumbar vertebra in man is the
result of a single transformation from
the condition of Il dorsal vertebra each
sacral vertebra has previously passed
through the lumbar stage while the
caudal vertebra have been successfully
dorsal, lumbar, and sacral, before be-
ing caudal.
VINO invented the piano-forte? The
Florentines, having caught the centen-
NAL infection, propose to commence
rate, next year, the One-hundredth
anniversary of the death of a certain
Cristofori, for whom they demand the
honor of having given to the world the
most elaborate and perfect of musical
instruments. But Cristofori's claim is
not of the clearest, and is very earnest
ly disputed. The fact probably is, that
to no single inventor do we owe the
piano. 1t gradually grew out of a
number of successive Improvements on
the ancient stringed instruments. The
old lutte, and spinnet, and harpischord,
were played upon with the fingers; the
piano is also stringed, and the main
difference between it and the harp in
mechanical principle is the substitution
of the "jack" or hammers, which
strike upon the strings instead of twang-
ing them. Who thought of this idea
of the jack and the keys by which the
hand communicates with it? He, per-
haps, has the best right to the credit of
the invention; but, whether 1t was the
Bohemian Schroeder, or the French
Mari,ls, or the Venetian Cristofori, it
seems impossible now to determine.
A disputed invention a century old is
hard to settle; even the discovery OF
ether as an anasthetic agent, made
within thirty years, is involved in a
maze of contradictory evidence. But.
even if Cristofori were the inventor of
the piano-forte, Florence can scarcely
claim the reflected honor; for he was
of scholastic Padua. 1t is interesting
to think that the piano is but little over
a century old, and that, while Mozart
only lived to see it coming into vogue,
Beethoven was almost the first great
composer who made use of it for pur-
poses of composition What an meal
culable benefit the piano has been to
the later maestri !-Ap2letons Journal.
A WRITER in Temple Bar ass;tils the
poetry of the present era in very
truculent if not discriminating fashion.
He says: If we rid ourselves of Il GER
tain glamour which its usually high
coloring sheds around its performances,
and of certain amount of unhealthy
sympathy with it which contemporary
can hardly resist, we shall find that,
substantially, the poetry ofthe Roman
tic school, the poetry which essentially
breathes the air and expresses the
feelings of the nineteenth century, is
thin, hazy, unsubstantial, deficient in
good sense us well as in definiteness,
wanting in sobriety and measured
judgment, too fine by half in its dress,
morbid, unsatisfactory, and inadequate.
1t does not satisfy. 1t excites; at
least it excites US. But whether it will
excite future generation is another
question. 1t is ornate, excessive in
adornment, outrageous in expression,
forced, odd, quaint, spasmodic, and
sometimes positively epiletic. 1t is
wanting in backbone, or rather in
dulges in those painful explosions and
contortions which accompany certain
forms of spinal disease. 1t is very
glowing, but it gives no light. 1t daz-
zles, but does not illuminate. 1t can
not be said of it, as Cicero says of the
true orator, 'Clarescit urendo.' 1t
does not brighten as it burns. 1t seeks
to run through the gamut of the
universe, but it has not yet discovered
Il concord. 1t is perfect Chinese
concert of sounds. Shelly is its most
pronounced type, and by far its great
est ornament; and nine-tenths of Shell
ley's poetry is diseased wall and a
shapeless cry that does not reach the
gods, and does not benefit man"