Others, again, lose the power of speech or of writing without having their understanding of language interfered with or without any paralysis of the muscles—the effort-memory of speech is lost.
Such effects find their only possible explanation in the fact that each set of memory-pictures may be destroyed simply, and this is only possible provided they are situated in separate regions of the brain.
And there is a great practical application of all this theory of localization, which has only been reached within the past three years.
If it is possible to locate a set of memories, and in the progress of disease those memories are lost, it is evident that the location of the disease has been determined. Sometimes that disease is of a kind which can be removed—for example, a brain tumor. From a study of such facts as those presented here it has been possible to determine the location of tumors in the brain, and, although externally there was no sign of disease, it has been possible for surgeons to go through the skull to find the tumor and to remove it. Up to the present time about seventy such operations have been done in this country and in Europe, and of these fifty have been successful, and what was formerly considered a necessarily fatal disease has thus been cured.
The practical demonstration of the truth of the new phrenology is therefore complete.
The old phrenology, as we have seen, was wrong in its theory, wrong in its facts, wrong in its interpretation of mental processes, and never led to the slightest practical result. The new phrenology is scientific in its methods, in its observations, and in its analysis, and is convincing in its conclusions. And who can now set a limit to the benefit it has brought to mankind by its practical application to the saving of human lives?
| LIFE AT THE CAMEROONS. |
By ROBERT MÜLLER, M. D.
THE Cameroons youth has the inclination to independence from the day of his birth, and it is taken advantage of by his mother. Before he can walk, she sets him out near the house, where he looks about him all the day at will. As soon as he is large enough she gives him the day's catch of fish of his father or elder brother, to spread and turn for drying and putting away. As soon as he can use his legs, he is taken by his brothers or a friendly youth in the canoe, and is gradually taught the management of the vessel. When he has become stronger, he is allowed
