1856.] Importance of keeping up a High Tone in the Service. 285 great suits to be decided, the growing thirst for education to be slaked in one quarter, or the desire for it to be aroused and guided in another. There will be the obstacles created by pride, or superstition, or intolerance to be skilfully removed; the social problems to be carefully studied; innumerable reforms to be worked out, in spite of secret or declared opposition, of dull impassiveness; a huge amount of daily labour to be encountered; the same races to be governed by Englishmen until they be fit to govern themselves; an empire not to be abandoned to a despotic foreign power, nor left to return to the last century's chaos; whole tribes to be conciliated; cruel customs to be abolished; the honour, the high character, the impartiality of the British nation to be cheerfully staked and generously expended in the social regeneration of India and her people. These are great and onerous functions which we cannot abdicate, and which the new civilians must undertake to discharge. But it is due to the expectations held out to them that their prospects of independence should not be curtailed. This is due also to the character and tone of the whole of the present members, as well as to the nature of the work which all have to perform. Hard work, in a hot climate, under expense, isolation, and discomfort, must be well paid. High principle must be secured by making men independent, and by placing them above temptation. Too much credit must not be easily given to the virtue of incorruptibility. Civilians, who are rightly debarred from trade and speculation of all kinds, and who constantly see lawyers and merchants rapidly making far larger fortunes than they can ever hope to acquire, must not be rendered restless and discontented. It will not do to peril the good government of India, which depends so much on the ability and integrity of the Civil Service, by hasty reductions, or to lower in the eyes of natives and Europeans the social position of public servants, whose important and onerous duties cannot be made less. DWARFS AND GIANTS. AN ESSAY, IN TWO PARTS. PART II. EXPLANATORY. THE reader who followed us, as and in the first part we traced the historical notices of dwarfs and giants, will now be asked for indulgence as we proceed to the delicate and difficult task of explaining in the best way we are able,-Firstly, What are the peculiar anomalies which constitute dwarfs giants; Secondly, Upon what laws these anomalies depend. He will be the more indulgent when he learns that this is a task which has rarely been attempted, and that we have nowhere met with anything like a satisfactory enumeration of the anomalies or their causes; the nearest approach being made by M. Isidore Geoffroy St.-Hilaire, to whom we have already been so largely indebted. Addressing the general reader, in these pages, we hope to make no further demand upon him than that of a little attention, and shall endeavour to execute our task without recourse to technical expressions, which might confuse if they did not scare him. Looking at giants and dwarfs, and comparing them as they present themselves to ordinary observation, we find Firstly, giants are of rarer occurrence than dwarfs. Secondly, they are almost always of a lymphatic temperament, with scanty beard, flabby muscles, shrill voices, and feeble senses; they are often deformed or disproportioned. Thirdly, they are never longlived; and are, like dwarfs, almost universally the children of fruitful mothers of ordinary stature. Fourthly, they differ from dwarfs in one very noticeable respectnamely, they are always of unexcitable, indolent, cowardly tempers, and stupid; whereas dwarfs are always vivacious, restless, quarrelsome, and often intellectually remarkable. Some dwarfs are of feeble intellect, but all are vivacious and excitable. Giants never are. Thus, although the dwarf anomaly may be so profound as to include the intellectual organs, it never prevents great nervous activity ; whereas the giant anomaly always affects the intellectual organs, and always affects the nervous energy. To explain these, or any of these points, we must call in the aid of physiology, and see what light can be gained from the ascertained facts of growth and development. In popular language, and even in most scientific treatises, the terms Growth and Development are employed as if they were mutually convertible terms; but no sooner is any delicate investigation begun than absolute precision of language becomes indispensable; and the present occasion is one on which these terms require to be isolated and defined. Growth and Development signify two really different, though intimately allied, processes. We must isolate Growth, and consider it as indicating increase of bulk, only; this increase applies to a crystal as well as to a muscle, and is not peculiarly organic. Deve lopment, on the other hand, is modification of structure, and is peculiarly organic. The crystal, or other inorganic substance, cannot undergo a modification of structure and composition, without at that moment ceasing to be the crystal or substance it specifically was before; whereas all organisms (except per haps the very lowest) undergo modifications of structure and composition, yet retain their individuality. Growth, then, we see to be only a change of volume; the structure remains the same, the composition remains the same, size and quantity only are different. In Development, the volume remains the same, but the structure and composition change: a differentiation has taken place, both of form and material. Assimilation and differentiation are therefore the two processes desig nated as Growth and Development. Perhaps the simplest illustration is the egg, which, when first dropped into the nest, contains precisely the same organic elements as the full 1856.] Difference between Growth and Development. formed chick, which breaks the shell, and quits it. In becoming a chick the bulk has not increased; the weight has not increased; and, nevertheless, the liquid mass has developed into a solid animal having bones, muscles, nerves, and feathers, where a few days before nothing but liquid was to be found. Every Development, properly so-called, is to be compared on a minor scale to the transformations which the insect undergoes; and this Development having once taken place i.e. a tissue having been differentiated from a mass of cells -the part developed goes on growing, just as if no change had taken place, because the new tissue assimilates. If, then, under the general term Growth we include two organic processes-one of Growth and one of Development, we shall find many intricacies of our subject easily unfolded. And, first, we must fix in our minds this important law: once Growth and Development are two distinct processes, which, correlated in respect of Nutrition, are antagonistic one to the other.* This law is evident à priori. The very fact of a differentiation taking place of course implies a difference -implies that what before was homogeneous has now become heterogeneous-and this difference is necessarily an antagonism. The law is equally evident à posteriori. If a tadpole be kept excluded from light and heat, but duly supplied with food, its Growth continues, but its Development is arrested; it grows into a gigantic tadpole-it does not develope into a frog. The present writer has reversed the experiment with like confirmation of the principle. Keeping young tadpoles subject to as much light and heat as they could endure without perishing, he developed them into the tiniest frogs ever seen;t that is to say, he ac 287 celerated Development, which, being in its nature antagonistic to Growth, caused the Growth to be checked; precisely as in the old experiment Development was checked. Lyonnet tells us that the full-grown larva of the Great Moth is 70,000 times heavier than when it first quits the egg; yet its increase in development has been inappreciable. În insects we see the two organic pro cesses very strikingly separated: their larval state being devoted to Growth-their chrysalis state devoted to Development; and these two are never confounded. Very noticeable it is-and this indeed first led us to conceive the law,-that Growth is everywhere so much more rapid in the inferior organisms than it is in the more complex organisms. We can almost be said to see Confervæ grow, so rapidly are the cells produced; but the more complex plants grow slowly. The puff-ball Bovista giganteum) will grow in a single night from an almost invisible speck to the size of a pumpkin. The same fact meets us everywhere; Growth is at the expense of Development: thus, the tunny-which is said to be the most rapidly growing of all known fishes, and which at four months old is twenty times its original bulk-has a brain of only of its whole bulk. A point which it will be needful to bear in mind when we are speaking of giants. There are other laws of Growth which must be taken into consideration; for example, growth will necessarily depend for its rapidity on the rapidity with which the processes of composition and decomposition take place. The oyster, although by no means a complex organism, takes five years to acquire its full size, while some annelids are fullgrown in a few weeks; the turtles are as slow of growth as birds are rapid. Further, each phase of De In science, priority of publication is the only admissible test of discovery; although, therefore, we had arrived at the law enunciated in the text, by a quite independent method, long before finding it in M. Isidore Geoffroy St. Hilaire's work, it is due to that writer to acknowledge his priority, at least as to the fundamental conception. See Hist. des Anomalies, i. pp. 188 seq. + Varying the experiment this spring, we found that tadpoles kept in our study, warmed with a fire, and the direct rays of the sun, lost their external branchia three and four days before tadpoles hatched at the same time, and kept in a cool room, shaded from the light. Burdach: Traité de Physiologie, v. p. 488, French trans. velopment checks the rate of Growth. Thus, if, with M. St.-Hilaire, we consider the three great developmental epochs of dentition, second dentition, and puberty, we find the rate of Growth or increase serially diminished after every one of them. The infant grows with marvellous rapidity till its first teeth are developed; less rapidly between first and second dentition; still less rapidly between second dentition and puberty; and after that, it becomes slower and slower, until its rate is only sufficient to repair the waste. This antagonism is further exemplified in the fact familiar to botanists: in the growth of a tree, two processes go on, one cellular and horizontal, the other woody and vertical; and one of these constantly goes on at the expense of the other, so that the medullary rays, instead of being mere lines, become large, wedge-shaped masses. But we need not multiply examples further-the law has been sufficiently explained. With this law of normal growth, we may commence our explanation of those abnormal phenomena presented by dwarfs and giants, and justify the definition with which we set out. Dwarfs are beings in whom Development has been accelerated at the expense of Growth; giants, on the contrary, are beings whose Growth has been accelerated at the expense of their Development. The two organic processes, instead of pursuing their normal course, have been disturbed; and the result is an anomaly. The experiments which produced the tiny frog and the gigantic tadpole serve to illustrate this disturbance of the normal course; they were exaggerations of the Dwarf and Giant characteristics. In proportion to the gravity of the disturbance will be the gravity of the anomaly; but in all cases there will be found a defect of assimilation in the dwarf, and a defect of differentiation in the giant. Sometimes this defect may be so superficial, that a slight change in the conditions -such as the advent of puberty may entirely efface it, and the dwarf child will grow into a full-statured adult; sometimes the rate of Growth may be arrested by Development, and the gigantic child never surpass the normal standard of adults. Although the excessive complexity of the organism, and of the conditions which affect it, make most attempts at absolute definitions hopeless, we may safely say that, in all cases the dwarf exhibits a disproportion between Development and Growth; and the giant exhibits a disproportion between Growth and Development. M. Isidore St.-Hilaire, in spite of his clear recognition of the law which has guided us, defines a dwarf to be an instance of arrested development,' and a giant of 'development in excess. This appears to us not only a disregard of the important distinction between the two processes included by him under the term 'Development,' and by us under the term Growth,' but it also disregards important facts-viz., that the diminution of the dwarf is not a diminution of all the parts of his body, nor is the increase of the giant an increase of all the parts of his body; but, on the contrary, the dwarf has a perfectly developed nervous system, as large, or nearly so, as that of the giant; whereas the giant has only a largely developed nutritive system, with small brain, flabby muscles, &c. Thus much, then, our inquiry may be said to have attained: we know what sort of anomaly a dwarf is, and in what it is distinguished from the other anomaly, named giant; and further, in what respects both are anomalous, compared with the human species. This may seem but a small result after so long an inquiry; but the basis of all successful speculation must be laid in first distinctly understanding in what the things about which we speculate specifically differ from all other things. We have ascertained a specific character, and may therefore begin our adventurous course of speculation. Why, for instance, is the dwarf always vivacious, and often intellectually active, the giant always indolent and dull? The question met us in the first part of this Essay, but the answer was adjourned. On the first blush one would be tempted to say, 'The reason is simple, the dwarf has com plete development, therefore he is vivacious; the giant, imperfect de 1856.] Life under Three Aspects. velopment, therefore he is dull.' But truth, in these intricate matters, is not usually betrayed by the first blush; and on a close scrutiny of that answer it will appear-Firstly, that the imperfection of development here attributed to giants, is only relative; they have a nervous system perhaps quite as perfectly formed as the dwarfs have; precisely as dwarfs have a perfectlyformed nutritive system, although this system is relatively inferior to their nervous system. Secondly, the smaller animals are more vivacious than the larger animals of their species, although in them development is equal. Since, then, this answer is utterly to be rejected, we must seek a better. Shall we fall back upon that much-credited answer, which attributes the difference to the greater rapidity of circulation in the smaller bodies? It looks plausible, but is not to be trusted. What if another answer could be given, not less plausible, and somewhat more illuminating? Life has been distinguished by all physiologists since Bichat, as organic and animal. All the functions which minister to the growth and preservation of the individual or the race, are classed as organic (also called vegetative); all the functions which place man in active relation with the external world, are classed as animal (also called relative). The division has been found convenient, and because convenient, will remain, in spite of criticism. For our immediate purpose, however, it will be more convenient to consider life under three cardinal aspects Nutrition; Motion; and Sensibility. Corresponding with these, there are three divisions of the nervous life directing-Firstly, the Nutritive system; Secondly, the Locomotive system; Thirdly, the Sensitive system. It is not necessary to admit Virey's conception, that an animal 'is a developed nerve,' in order to agree with physiologists of all classes, 289 that the nervous system does preside over and influence the three divisions of life. There may indeed be ground for discussion in the question how far the nervous influence participates in the production of the various nutritive processes; for it is certain that assimilation, secretion, respiration, &c., take place in animals which have no nerves, and in plants, also without nerves; but it is nevertheless demonstrable, that in animals possessing nerves, the nutritive processes are influenced by nervous action, and will not continue without it. To allude only to such familiar facts as the diminution of the milk secretion in a mother whose mind is made fretful and anxious, or the sudden flow of saliva caused by the sight of food, or the profuse perspiration caused by terror, is enough to show how nervous influence regulates the organic processes; and the anatomical fact that every artery is accompanied by a nerve, explains the influence. With respect to the second vital function, that of Locomotion, no one doubts that it is produced under nervous stimulus; although, as in the former case, we see the phenomena also manifested by animals destitute of nerves. Thirdly and finally, that Sensibility is the peculiar privilege of a nervous system, is a position unhesitatingly and universally main tained. Thus we are justified in asserting that the great fountain of influence which incessantly springs from the nervous centres, runs off into three distinct streams-the Nutritive, the Locomotive, and the Sensitive. But we shall commit a serious error if we imagine these streams to be independent of each other; we may consider them as separate, and as specialized into special systems, but we must not forget that they spring from a common fountain, and are intimately correlated. Thus Claude Bernard has proved that the reflex * De la Physiologie dans ses Rapports avec de Philosophie, 1834. Le système nerveux est susceptible d'une action relative à notre faculté sensitive, et d'une autre qui concerne que nos fonctions vitales et végétatives. À la première de ces actions se rapportent les sensations et les mouvements volontaires; à la seconde, tient l'influence des nerfs sur la digestion, la circulation, et les sécrétions. Les sympathies et les changemens physiques, qui sont à la suite de certaines idées ou de certaines passions, semblent participer de ces deux espèces d'actions.-Cuvier: Leçons de Anat. Comp. ii. p. 104, éd. de l'An viii. |