sessed at the time, and that he will on all occasions be happy to print correct notices of Mr Smith's proceedings, if he will take the trouble, as he has now done, to furnish him with the means of doing so. The Editor and Conductors of the Journal feel no resentment on account of the inferior motives ascribed to them, and disrespectful expressions contained in Mr Smith's letter. They leave their conduct with confidence to the judgment of the phrenological public both now and hereafter. MR SIDNEY SMITH TO THE EDITOR. EDINBURGH, 13th June 1837, 20 CLYDE STREET. SIR, I received your letter of the 18th ult., and regret to find that my communication of the same date was not in time for your number of this month. I shall rejoice to find that neither the Editor nor Conductors of the Journal are actuated by inferior motives, and that there is no ground for suspecting any of those who have an influence in its management, of making it the mere vehicle of promoting their individual ulterior interests, and that none of them are influenced by any paltry spirit of jealousy against other phrenologists who differ from them in their views widely, either in science, morals, or religion. I thank you for the expression of your good wishes, but am extremely sorry to find that you have no other source of regular information on the subject of the progress and success of lecturers upon the science, than their own statement. This is a source which the public ought, and is entitled to look upon with suspicion. I would before this have informed you of my proceedings, had I not been conscious that, in ordinary circumstances, intelligence from so interested a quarter ought not to be trusted. The necessity of the case must, however, justify a departure from the general rule, and I must for once become my own historian, in order to bring up the day-book of phrenological statistics. I lectured during the winter in Falkirk, under the auspices of the School of Arts there. A course on Chemistry preceded that on Phrenology, yet such were the superior attractions of the latter subject, although the lecturer had to stand in competition with a long experienced, talented, and successful professor, that the audience increased from 30 or 35 to nearly 300. All the clergymen of the place attended regularly, with the exception of the established minister, and one of them moved a vote of thanks to the lecturer, which was carried unanimously, for the assistance which the course had given to the elucidation of truth and the principles of morality. A soirée was afterwards given, at which my excellent and liberal-minded friend Mr Welsh, the Relief clergyman, presided, attended by the numerous ladies who had honoured the lectures by their presence, the Sheriff-substitute, the principal medical gentlemen, and other respectable inhabitants. The principal topic of observation was the lectures on Phrenology, with some excellent allusions highly gratifying to a phrenologist, upon education, and its lively expounder Mr James Simpson. He will be gratified to know that his exhortations to found an infant school at Falkirk, were crowned with complete success. Besides the course, I gave a forenoon lecture and manipulation, and at their own request, on various occasions manipulated the heads and indicated the characters of many of the principal and most remarkable men in the town. So completely triumphant was the experiment, that it alone convinced them of the truth of Phrenology, and so striking has been the effect of the science on the minds of the people, that so late as 14th May last, a member of the committee of the School of Arts thus writes: "Phrenology still continues to be an exciting subject of conversation among us, and seems to have made a much deeper impression in all our circles than from the knowledge I have of the place I could have anticipated." It is with a deep feeling of gratitude that I now here acknowledge the extreme kindness and attention with which I was treated by the inhabitants of Falkirk, and for the liberal, enlightened, and unprejudiced spirit with which they received the statements which I had to offer. To the ladies of that place, Phrenology is deeply indebted for the patient and most attentive hearing which it obtained. I enclose a notice by the Stirling paper of the course, which was sent to me the week after I returned to Edinburgh. On the 5th of May, I received a requisition to lecture at Kelso, signed by about a hundred of the inhabitants, including landed proprietors in the neighbourhood, four clergymen, seven physicians, besides bankers, writers, teachers, merchants, and others. I gave nine introductory lectures in the Town Hall, which had been kindly granted by the Chief Magistrate, who attended them. The audience numbered a major proportion of ladies. I am happy to say that I have succeeded in organizing a philosophical association in Kelso. I am sorry that I have not the two first notices which appeared in the Chronicle, of my lectures, but I send the last two for your inspection. I am happy to find that the inquiring minds of the inhabitants of Hawick demand farther information on Phrenology, and it is probable that the good town of Berwick-upon-Tweed will follow the example. I remain, Sir, your obedient servant, SIDNEY SMITH. Note by the Editor.-We cheerfully insert Mr Smith's two letters, and the account of his proceedings contained in them. Conscious as we are of having carried on this Journal for fifteen years, at an expense of time, trouble, and money, which would have exhausted the patience of most men, and of having been supported in our arduous undertaking purely and solely by the love of truth, we feel very much at ease under Mr Smith's reiterated insinuation of our being actuated by inferior and interested motives, in not having paid a reporter to communicate an account of his lectures in different parts of the country. We confess, indeed, that we are so callous to reproach on that score, as to doubt whether, but for the exertions and sacrifices we have made in diffusing the knowledge and hastening the progress of Phrenology, the public would now have been so well prepared to hail the appearance of Mr Smith as a lecturer, and to appreciate either his abilities, or the importance of the truths which he so zealously advocates. Confident in the omnipotence of truth, we laboured long and arduously in its diffusion with but little encouragement from any quarter; and now that the prospect is brightening, and that success begins to reward our exertions, we are ready to welcome not only Mr Smith but a thousand more fellow-labourers into the field. There is room and work enough for all, let their talents and activity be what they may. Mr Smith blames us,-concurring, as he says, with Mr Hewett Watson,-for promoting our own peculiar views in the conduct of our Journal. We wish Mr Smith had quoted Mr Watson's words. Without the italics, which are ours, Mr Watson's words are: The Journal" has been much complained of as representing the feelings and ideas of its conductors, rather than those of the phrenological public." This passage, which merely means that there is much in the Journal which is a transcript of the faculties, affective and intellectual, of the writers in it, neither warrants Mr Smith's words that the complaint is "general," nor that the Journal is" altogether" confined to the kind of writing objected to. But least of all do Mr Watson's words give to the charge, even by implication, the immoral colour with which Mr Smith's words aggravate it," promotion of the peculiar views of its conductors," "vehicle for promoting their individual ulterior interests,” “ paltry spirit of jealousy against other phrenologists," the whole of Mr Smith's censure in his first letter, which, by insinuation, he deepens in his second, imputing inferior or interested motives, of which Mr Watson never dreamed. We answered Mr Watson's objections in the merely philosophical character in which we understood them (for he attributes to our Journal “moral excellence") in this volume, p. 239; and we see, and have seen, no reply to that answer. We then regretted, and still regret, that the objections were not better considered by Mr Watson. Injury, which our perseverance and sacrifices little merited, could not fail to be done by them; but, although sorry, we were not angry, and assuredly never thought of imputing any other motives to Mr Watson than the same zeal for truth, with which we trust we ourselves have ever been actuated. In subjoining Mr Smith's account of Alexander Millar, who was executed at Stirling for murder, we must not be understood as adopting, while we faithfully convey his "peculiar views." From some of them,-that, for example, about the bilious temperament depending on the organ of Firmness, and that which assigns the love of change as the function of Destructiveness,we entirely dissent; but that Mr Smith may not again accuse us of preferring our own views and keeping his from our readers, we leave them unquestioned and unrefuted, to be judged of according to their inherent merits. ARTICLE IV. PHRENOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT OF ALEXANDER MILLAR. By Mr SIDNEY SMITH. IN a biographical sketch of this unfortunate individual, recently published at Stirling, there occurs the following passage: :"His body was conveyed to a cell in the court of the jail, where, by permission of the Magistrates, a cast of his head was taken; the operation being superintended by several respectable members of the Phrenological Societies both of Stirling and Glasgow. The assumed prevailing traits of the poor man's character we have not ascertained." Having procured a cast of the head, I proceeded to supply the desideratum hinted at in the last sentence of this quotation. The development is under-noted:-- Perceptive Faculties, Reflecting Faculties, From Occipital Spine to Individuality, over top of head, From Ear to Ear, over top of head, 15 16 141 141 16 I have had, as I anticipated, great difficulty in taking this development. My experience as a phrenologist, and my practice in the criminal courts, had led me to observe that, in the heads of most persons who had pursued a long career of defiance to the laws of their country, there was a great want of symmetry, and a number of inequalities of surface. Millar's head Is much twisted. One ear is placed further back and lower down than the other. The organ of Cautiousness is nearly two inches further forward on one side than on the other. veral of the organs are depressed on the right side-others on the left. Se The head is of considerable size, indicative of power of character in some direction. The average of size, it will be seen, is on the side of the propensities; and it was to be expected, therefore, that the character would take its complexion, to the greatest extent, from these. The sketch is somewhat meagre in details interesting to a phrenologist; but still there are some which are of great importance. I have long publicly expounded the doctrine that the Temperaments depend upon, or are indicated by, the peculiar development of certain organs. I found that the bilious, or, more properly the muscular temperament, depended on the organ of Firmness; and when it was casually mentioned to me that a person had been apprehended for murder, after a pursuit in which he had manifested the most extraordinary gymnastic powers, I immediately told the gentlemen who had informed me of the circumstance, that his organ of Firmness would be VOL. X.-NO. LIII. X X |