The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1886-07-23

tHe HdLHe Vi d person ne mas once seen
or read of With all this singular
power OF memory, however, he is not
man whose general grasp Of mind is
at all noteworthy.
The same may be said OF scores oi
men whose one rich gift of memory
has brought them into prominence.
No one has CLAIM, ID any high intellec-
tual rank for the renowned Memory
Corner Thompson" who drew from
actual memory, in twenty-five hours;
at two sittings, in the presence of two
well-known gentlemen, correct plan
of the parish of ST. James, Westminster,
with parts of the parishes Of st. Mary
lebone, St Ann and st. Martin; which
plan contained every square, street,
lane. court alley, market, church;
chapel and all public buildings, with
all stables and other yards, and also
every public-house in the parish, and
the corners of all streets, with all
minutia, as pumps, posts, trees, houses
that project and inject, bow-windows.
Carlton House, ST. James Palace and
the interior of the markets, without
scale or reference to any plan, book, or
paper whatever; who undertook to do
the same for the parishes of st. An
drew, Holburn, St. Giles-in-the Fields,
St. Paul's, Convent Garden, St.
Mary-le-Strand, St. Clements and
St Georges; who could tell the corner
of any great leading throughfare from
Hyde Park corner or Oxford street to
St Paul's; who could take an ihven-
tory of gentleman house from attic
to ground floor and write it out after
wards. He did this at Lord Nelson 8
at Merton, and at the Duke of Kent s,
in the presence of two noblemen."
Turning, now, from examples like
the foregoing, which have been given
to show that great memory does not
argue in all cases any unusual mental
power in other directions, let us look
at some of the ''great people, whose
great memories" illustrate the corr
rectness of Sir Arthur Helps dictum.
Running over long list of examples,
which the writer has prepared for his
own use in the study of this subject, he
has been struck with the fact, that the
last three or four centuries appear to
much greater advantage in this review
than any similar period which preceded
them. This. after all, is not surpris-
ing, when the circumstances of mod
ern life are carefully considered; but
it is not in accordance with common
opinion. There is notion abroad
that the power of memory has declined
since the invention of writing, and
especially since the invention of print
ing and the universal spread of cheap
books and newspapers. Nothing could
be more mistaken than such suppo-
sition. If we do not nowadays use the
memory as the only registry of facts
within our reach, we do use the mem
DRY even more than the ancients, for
the simple reason that our knowledge
travels over an UNNECESSARILY wider
area, we have more to remember, and,
as civilization and culture advance, a
good memory becomes more and more
needful for the work of life; the gener-
al level of intelligence is being raised,
and mental power is developed from
age to age. In this general advance
ment and growth, memory has its
share.
The verbal memory displayed by the
old Greek rhapsodists and bards, or
the Icelandic scalds, was undoubtedly
remarkable, and Is often held up to the
envy of these degenerate days. Yet
the modern Shah-nama-Khans, Koran
Khans and other singers and
reciters of Persia, who will re-
cite for hours together without
stammering," and the Calmuck ma
tional bards, whose songs and recita-
tons sometimes last whole day."
can not surely be whit behind, if in
deed they do not surpass the prodigies
of early ages. We are often reminded
of Greek gentlemen who knew their
Homer by heart, in the days when Ho-
mer occupied the field almost alone and
there was very little else to learn. But
what are their exploits by the side of
men like Joseph Justus Scaliger, who
committed Homer to memory in
twenty-one days, and the whole
Greek poets in three monthsp" Casau-
bon says of Scaiiger: "There was no
subject on which any one could desire
instruction which he was not capable
of giving He had read nothing which
he did not forthwith remember. So
extensive and accurate was his &C
quaintance with languages that if dur
ing his lifetime he had made but this
single acquisition it would have APP
peared miraculous. "
Since the revival of learning in Eu-
rope there have been scores, yea, hum
dreds of scholars who have known
''their Homer" by heart and thou
sand other things besides. Bishop
Saunderson, old Isaac Walton tells
us, could repeat all the odes of Hor-
ace, all Tully's Offices, and the best
part of Juvenal and Persius. Euler
the mathematician and Leibnitz the
philosopher could recite the Eneid
from beginning to end. In their day,
Person, Elmsley, Parr and Wakefield,
held the foremost place as scholars, and
all, of course, had rare memories, but
the palm must be given to Person,
of whom endless stories are told. Be-
fore he went to Elton, he was able 10
repeat almost the whole of Horace,
Virgil, Homer, Cicero and Livy. When,
as practical joke, school-fellow
slipped the wrong book into Persons
hand, just as he was about to read and
translate, the boy was not discon-
certed, but went on to read from his
memory, as if nothing had occurred.
In later life, his performances APP
preached the miraculous. 1t would re-
quire all our space to give any fair idea
of them; for he not only knew all the
great Greek poets and prose writers
pretty well by heart, but could recite
whole plays of Shakespeare, or com.
plete books from Paradise Lost, Pope's
Rape of the Lock, Barrow's sermons
scenes from Foote, Edgeworth's Essay
on Irish Bulls, scores of pages from
Gibbon or Rapin. He is also said to
have been able to repeat the whole OF
the Moral Tale of the Dean of Badajoz,
and Smollett's Rod erick Random from
the first page to the last
Gilbert Wakefield's memory was
also of the gigantic order, but it will
not bear comparison with Persons.
There were few passages in Homer OF
Pindar which he could not recite at a
moments notice; Virgil and Horace he
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