Genre:

Regular Feature, Editorial, News-Commentary

Subjects:

Race, Population, Darwinism, Materialism, Unbelief, Sex

    Reports that in North America the barring of immigration has been put forward as not only 'the most effective method of keeping out the cholera', but also as being 'imperatively necessary for the maintenance of a high order of American civilisation'. The 'principle of the anti-Chinese law', it is argued, must now be applied to 'the Mongolians of the Old World', the numerous 'degraded, illiterate immigrants' who arrive daily from Southern and Eastern Europe. In their home countries 'Scepticism and materialism have dimmed their vision of the heavens', and 'the prospect of an escape to America [...] seemed the nearest equivalent for their wavering faith in a celestial paradise'. If even this 'terrestrial paradise' is denied them, the 'sweltering mass of human misery in Europe' will be left to 'Cut each other's throats in the mad struggle for sustenance'. Announces that there is 'another way out' which the French are 'resolutely practising', and that is 'to limit the family'. Without giving any further details, notes that in France last year there 'were more marriages than any year since 1884, but not more children'. (3)

Genre:

Regular Feature, Abstract

Publications abstracted:

Milner 1892 Milner, Alfred 1892. England in Egypt, London: E. Arnold
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Subjects:

Engineering, Engineers, Status, Imperialism

    Notes that 'the work of Scott-Moncrieff Moncrieff, Sir Colin Campbell Scott- (1836–1916) WBI
Close   View the register entry >> deserves a high place in the services which England has rendered to civilization'. In Egypt he has saved the government a huge amount of money by restoring 'a great dam, which had been allowed to go out of repair, about fourteen miles down stream from Cairo', and which has now helped to alleviate, at least partially, the continual 'Struggle for Water'. (83)

Genre:

Essay

Relevant illustrations:

eng.

Subjects:

Vaccination, Controversy, Medical Treatment, Institutions, Endeavour, Bacteriology, Disease, Humanism, Experiment, Gender, Laboratories, Heroism

    In a brief introduction, the editor insists that he has no intention of 'in any way committing myself to either side of the fierce controversy that rages round the great vivisectionist', but is nevertheless glad to print an article 'by an American lady who has shown her faith in Pasteurism'. After describing the 'strength of character' and 'tenacity of purpose' which have characterised Louis Pasteur's Pasteur, Louis (1822–95) DSB
Close   View the register entry >> long scientific career and declaring that 'the facts he wrenched from Nature are now admitted by all', the author of the article details the current programme of research undertaken at the Institut Pasteur Institut Pasteur, Paris
Close   View the register entry >> in Paris, which was 'built by public subscription five years ago'. Although Pasteur has become 'heart-sick with human stupidity' and 'stubbornness', and for 'a long time after the discussions upon inoculation against rabies nothing would have induced the great scientist to introduce any new discovery to the public', he now, at the moment of his seventieth birthday, takes enormous 'satisfaction in the triumph of his brilliant disciple, Monsieur W. M. Haffkine Haffkine, Waldemar Mordecai Wolfe (1860–1930) DSB
Close   View the register entry >>, in having succeeded in transforming and inoculating the cholera microbe'. Indeed, 'the humanitarian problem now at stake' with regard to cholera is so great, that 'the veteran savant has buckled on his armour and descended once more into the arena of controversy'. (89) The author recounts how she put herself forward to be treated with the experimental inoculation because although 'a number of men had been inoculated successfully with cholera, there was necessarily a doubt about the effect it would have upon women'. She then describes her visit to the Institut Pasteur, where she is particularly struck by the youthful good looks of Haffkine (he is 'blond, tall, erect, remarkably well-built') as well as 'the curiosities of his laboratories—a veritable treasure-house of every ill that "flesh is heir to"', which include several test-tubes of cholera microbes. (90) A diary records her sensations after having been injected with these microbes, and relates how, after two or three hours of feeling 'nothing abnormal', 'discreet little pains begin at the point of inoculation, and increase, until getting up and sitting down become matters of serious reflection, especially when your family and friends have no idea that you have been trying to do the heroic'. In order to 'test its efficacy to the utmost', Haffkine proposes applying his method to an area particularly prone to cholera epidemics, and Pasteur has already received permission to do this from King Rama V Rama V (Chulalongkorn Phra Paramindr Maha), King of Siam (1853–1910) CBE
Close   View the register entry >> of Siam. Concludes with the hope that 'cholera may be stamped out within the next few years' if 'the public' offer their assistance to Haffkine's experimental research. (91)

Genre:

Editorial

Subjects:

Monographs, Reading

    Complains that the argument of St George J Mivart's Mivart, St George Jackson (1827–1900) DSB
Close   View the register entry >> book The Origin of Human Reason Mivart, St George Jackson 1889. The Origin of Human Reason: Being an Examination of Recent Hypotheses Concerning It, London: K. Paul, Trench
Close   View the register entry >> is impaired by the author's failure to show 'proper concern about the index' (92).

Genre:

Regular Feature, Biography

Subjects:

Periodicals, Medical Practitioners

    In recounting the 'antithetic qualities' of the Pall Mall Gazette Pall Mall Gazette (1865–1900+) Waterloo Directory
Close   View the register entry >>, reflects that 'At one time the sworn defender of the medical priesthood, with all its shibboleths—vaccination, vivisection, and the C. D. Acts—it became the enthusiastic champion of all the crusaders against all the infamies of the doctors and of the police' (139).

Genre:

Regular Feature, Abstract

Publications abstracted:

Blake 1893 Blake, William 1893. The Works of William Blake, Poetic, Symbolic, and Critical, ed. by Edwin J. Ellis and William B. Yeats, 3 vols, London: B. Quaritch
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Subjects:

Spiritualism

    Asserts that the mystical poet William Blake Blake, William (1757–1827) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> was 'what would now be called an inspirational medium', and suggests that the 'Psychical Research Society Society for Psychical Research
Close   View the register entry >> will do well to direct its attention to' aspects of his poetry, for 'Here is telepathy, indeed, if it be not vision. Mr. Myers Myers, Frederic William Henry (1843–1901) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> must see to it' (200–01).

Genre:

Editorial

Subjects:

Medical Treatment, Heterodoxy, Homeopathy, Quackery, Controversy, Boundary Formation

    Prints letters from the five patients still taking Cesare Mattei's Mattei, Cesare (1809–96) WBI
Close   View the register entry >> medicines for the cure of cancer, even though the experimental committee appointed to test their efficacy has long since 'terminated its duties'. Although the letters are 'of course, only of value from a subjective point of view, as expressions of the opinions of the patients themselves', they nevertheless establish that the patients are 'all still alive', and that 'all of them continue to have an unshaken faith in the efficacy of the Mattei remedies as a means of alleviating their pain'.

Genre:

Regular Feature, Editorial, News-Commentary

Subjects:

Engineers, Heroism

    Reports that in France, amidst 'the miasma of recent scandals' and 'the malaria of Panama' where many labourers working on the canal have perished, 'Severe sentences of fine and imprisonment have been passed upon the De Lessepses, M. Eiffel Eiffel, (Alexandre) Gustave (1832–1923) CBD
Close   View the register entry >>, and others for their share in the colossal swindling, but the net effect, so far, has not been to weaken the feeling of sympathy for the old Lesseps Lesseps, Ferdinand, vicomte de (1805–94) CBD
Close   View the register entry >>, the hero engineer of this epoch' (244).

Genre:

Regular Feature, Biography

Relevant illustrations:

eng. [7]

Subjects:

Exploration, Imperialism, Natural Imperialism, Heroism, Naturalists, Natural History, Zoology, Collecting, Medical Treatment, Pharmaceuticals, Extinction, Spiritualism, Materialism

    Observes that in 'Central Africa the human being is rather the parasite of the over-lord than the over-lord himself. The real masters of the interior are the animals, not the men. Hence in these regions the hunter is still the hero [....] the pioneer of civilization' (257). Although Frederick C Selous Selous, Frederick Courteney (1851–1917) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> 'can better drive a bullet from a rifle into the brain of a charging lion than he can impel his ideas into the mind of the British public', he 'would probably wish to be remembered more as a naturalist than as anything else. Though not a trained scientist he has made the scientific world his debtor by the care with which he makes his observations [...] and the intense interest which he displays in all forms of animated nature' (257–58). Indeed, the 'best specimens of wild animals that are to be found in the collection at South Kensington were shot by Mr. Selous in the wilds, and their skins sent home to become a permanent addition to the attractions of the capital', and he is 'just as eager in the pursuit of a moth as he is in the shooting of an elephant or the hunting of a lion'. By 'combining in his own person the prowess of the earliest hunters with the reflection, habits, and observation of the scientific naturalist', Selous is a 'typical man of his time' (258). Also notes that Selous is one of those 'natural miracles that occasionally occur, as if to prove the falsity of all the rules and regulations of the physicians' (259), exposing himself 'recklessly under African suns' without taking 'opium or alcohol, or any prophylactic except quinine and Warburg's fever mixture' (260). Expresses concern for the uncertain future of the few 'straggling specimens' of the African elephant which remain after the 'massacre of such numbers' of the species (263). Relates how during a visit to friends in the Transvaal who 'were deeply interested in the subject of spiritualism', Selous received a warning in a 'message by automatic writing' not to remain in that country (266). Concludes that although as both a 'Darwinian and a Cromwellian' Selous 'emerged from his South African wanderings a materialist in philosophy', there must come a 'doubt born of many strange phenomena' such as the automatic writing, and speculates that we may be 'on the eve of the Fourth Dimension' (269).

Genre:

Regular Feature, Abstract

Publications abstracted:

Burdett 1891–93, Burdett, Henry Charles 1891–93. Hospitals and Asylums of the World: Their Origin, History, Construction, Administration, Management, and Legislation; With Plans of the Chief Medical Institutions Accurately Drawn to a Uniform Scale, in Addition to Those of All the Hospitals of London in the Jubilee Year of Queen Victoria's Reign, 4 vols, London: J. & A. Churchill
Close   View the register entry >> Myers 1893, Myers, Frederick William Henry 1893. 'The Subliminal Consciousness', Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 9, 3–128
Close   View the register entry >> Willink 1893, Willink, Arthur 1893. The World of the Unseen: An Essay on the Relation of Higher Space to Things Eternal, London: Macmillan & Co.
Close   View the register entry >> Anon 1893a Anon. 1893a. Do the Dead Return?: A Record of Experiences in Spiritualism by a Clergyman of the Church of England, London: T. F. Unwin
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Relevant illustrations:

map

Subjects:

Hospitals, Statistics, Psychical Research, Spiritualism, Christianity

Genre:

Regular Feature, Biography

Relevant illustrations:

eng. [5], map [4]

Subjects:

Exploration, Imperialism, Heroism, Ethnography, Psychical Research, Spiritualism

Publications cited:

Skewes 1889 Skewes, Joseph Henry 1889. Sir John Franklin: The True Secret of the Discovery of His Fate. A Revelation, London: Bemrose and Son
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    Relates the experiences of the naval explorer W Parker Snow Snow, William Parker (1817–95) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >>, who, unlike other 'subjects selected for our Character Sketches', represents the 'much greater number of those who have failed—failed, that is to say, in winning recognition, competence, and what the world calls success' (371). After a varied career in the navy and as a literary amanuensis, Snow, then living in New York, discovered that he was 'naturally psychic, living near the edge of the fourth dimension'. In January 1850 he received 'a kind of clairvoyant vision' of the exact whereabouts of the survivors of John Franklin's Franklin, Sir John (1786–1847) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> ill-fated Arctic expedition to discover the north-west passage (376). This 'dream made so strong an impression upon him that he wrote to Lady Franklin Franklin, Jane, Lady (1792–1875) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> that very day', and she soon 'decided that her private search expedition should go to just those places where the vision had shown the survivors to be'. The 'survivors were not discovered in 1850', however, because the commander of the Prince Albert, on which Snow 'sailed [...] practically as second in command', decided abruptly to return home just when those they were supposed to be 'saving [...] were almost within hail'. (378) It was not until a further nine years had passed that the expedition led by Francis L McClintock McClintock, Sir Francis Leopold (1819–1907) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> brought news of the fate of Franklin's unfortunate expedition, but if in 1850 'the Admiralty Admiralty
Close   View the register entry >> had paid attention to the suggestions and strange notifications given they would have saved the country half a million of money, and probably have rescued at least one half of the Franklin expedition. It is a curious story and may well be borne in mind at a time when it is the cue of the unbeliever to assert that spiritualistic manifestations have never brought to light the existence of any fact which was not already known' (380). Although Snow's 'pamphlets have been suppressed, and all his efforts to bring the facts before the public have failed', he was never inclined to believe that 'McClintock had settled everything. In his opinion many of the crew were still alive, and, strange to say, he is by no means inclined to admit that they are all dead even now' (382), holding that some are 'still living among the Esquimaux' (381).

Genre:

Miscellaneous

Subjects:

Steamships, Military Technology, Government

Genre:

Editorial, Essay

Subjects:

Heterodoxy, Imagination, Mathematics, Psychical Research, Spiritualism, Evolution, Technology, Telegraphy, Experiment, Psychology

People mentioned:

Henry Sidgwick Sidgwick, Henry (1838–1900) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >>

    Drawing on the speculations of both Arthur Willink's Willink, Arthur (b. 1850) WBI
Close   View the register entry >> book The World of the Unseen Willink, Arthur 1893. The World of the Unseen: An Essay on the Relation of Higher Space to Things Eternal, London: Macmillan & Co.
Close   View the register entry >> and the anonymous "I Awoke!" Anon. 1893b. "I Awoke!", "A Door was Opened in Heaven" by Three Friends, London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent
Close   View the register entry >>, asserts that the 'Fourth Dimension is something that can be expressed by mathematical formula, and can be imagined, if you have a vivid imagination, but which has never been seen by mortal man'. At present 'Life, as we know it, consists of three dimensions: the first is length; the second, breadth; and the third, height; and the fourth is throughth, if I may venture to give it a name. We, however, get glimpses of it in clairvoyance, in the phenomena of hypnotism, and in all the experiments which are known as telepathy, crystal-gazing, thought-reading, and all things, which, according to the known laws of third dimensional space, would render communication impossible'. (426) Traces the evolutionary process by which 'space of three-dimensions replaced space of two, as space of two dimensions had succeeded space of one' in human experience, and suggests that it is 'becoming more and more evident to those who observe and note the signs of the times that we are in very deed and truth on the eve of the fourth dimension'. Chief amongst these portents of a new dimension is 'telepathic automatic handwriting, by which the mind of a person whose body is in Germany can use the hand of a writer who is in England'. (427) The remainder of the article lists William T Stead's Stead, William Thomas (1849–1912) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> numerous experiments, often involving members of his family, with telepathic automatic handwriting, which form 'the substance of a paper which I have submitted to the Psychical Research Society Society for Psychical Research
Close   View the register entry >> for their investigation, and upon which they will no doubt report in due time'. Defending the large number of unsuccessful experiments involving telepathic automatic handwriting, notes 'how patiently and long the electricians have laboured, year after year, completing the telephone and phonograph, before they were able to perfect either for the use of mankind', before insisting that in the case of the 'mental-manual telephone' it would be 'unscientific to count up the number of experiments that have failed against the number that have succeeded'. Similarly, 'One well established, indubitable message transmitted by the human telephone proves that the thing can be done, just as one message flashed by the Atlantic cable from America to England proved the possibility of cable communication between the continents, though immediately afterwards the cable was severed and all communications ceased'. Also refers to '"Julia" Ames, Julia A (1861–91) WBI
Close   View the register entry >>—as I call the invisible intelligence that from time to time controls my hand' (see Oppenheim 1985 Oppenheim, Janet 1985. The Other World: Spiritualism and Psychical Research in England, 1850–1914, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Close   View the register entry >>, 33–34). (428) Concludes by suggesting that automatic telepathy affords a 'possibility of communicating with the real self', although the instances of this 'have been of so confidential a nature that it is impossible for me to submit them or to ask the persons concerned to verify the accuracy of the statements' (431).

Genre:

Regular Feature, Abstract

Publications abstracted:

Richter 1893 Richter, Eugen 1893. Pictures of the Socialistic Future: (Freely Adapted from Bebel), London: Swan, Sonnenschein
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Subjects:

Medical Treatment, Homeopathy, Heterodoxy, Monographs, Nationalism

    In remarking on how sometimes 'a book or pamphlet achieves a great success in one country while remaining totally unknown across the frontier', observes that 'Of this a notable illustration was supplied the other day by Kneipp's Kneipp, Sebastian (1821–97) WBI
Close   View the register entry >> book on the Water Cure Kneipp, Sebastian 1892. My Water-Cure: Tested for More Than 35 years, and Published for the Cure of Diseases and the Preservation of Health, London: Grevel
Close   View the register entry >>, which although it had achieved a circulation of hundreds of thousands in Germany, was only published last year in an English dress' (433).

Genre:

Regular Feature, Editorial, News-Commentary

Subjects:

Institutions, Imperialism, Sex, Hygiene, Public Health, Morality, Lecturing, Materialism, Controversy, Religion

People mentioned:

Josephine E Butler Butler, Josephine Elizabeth (1828–1906) ODNB
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Institutions mentioned:

Army Army
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    Records the opening in South Kensington of the Imperial Institute Imperial Institute
Close   View the register entry >>, the purpose of which is to carry out research into the resources and raw materials of the British empire, but warns that it 'is not likely to be a popular resort, given over as it is almost entirely to what Lord Rosebery Primrose, Archibald Philip, 5th Earl of Rosebery and 1st Earl of Midlothian (1847–1929) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> described as Blue Book and Biscuit' (589). Relates a discussion with Frederick S Roberts (1st Baron Roberts) Roberts, Frederick Sleigh, 1st Earl Roberts of Kandehar, Pretoria, and Waterford (1832–1914) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >>, who has now returned to England, regarding the article on the military's toleration of prostitution in India in the previous number of the Review of Reviews [Anon, 'A Question for Lord Roberts. Who is Responsible for the Masked Mutiny in the Indian Army?', Review of Reviews, 7 (1893), 487], and applauds the exposure of this 'very infamous system flourishing in the heart of the Indian army in full defiance of the will of Parliament Houses of Parliament
Close   View the register entry >>' by the American physician and temperance campaigner Kate Bushnell Bushnell, Kate (b. 1856) WBI
Close   View the register entry >>. Also remarks that Thomas H Huxley's Huxley, Thomas Henry (1825–95) DSB
Close   View the register entry >> Romanes Lecture at Oxford in May was 'One of the most remarkable discourses of recent years [....] It is an admirable rendering into modern scientific dialect of the familiar passages in which the Apostle Paul sets forth the sombre doctrine of the necessary antagonism between the natural man and the spiritual'. Suggests that 'Professor Huxley will have much more useful work in hand for some time to come in defending his exposition of Calvinism up to date against its assailants than in thrashing out the ancient controversy about the Gadarene swine. There may be flaws in his argument, but there is no doubt that he tramples into slush the favourite commonplaces of the laissez faire materialist optimists. Professor Huxley, like Mr. Cecil Rhodes Rhodes, Cecil John (1853–1902) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> and other really earnest Englishmen, has got a great deal of the Puritan grit in him, even when he uses the strength that it gives to attack the system by which it was generated'. (598)

Genre:

Letter

Subjects:

Exploration, Heterodoxy, Patronage

    Prints a bitter letter from Snow which complains at the paltry sum of £15 6s. contributed to his retirement fund after the appeal in a previous number of the Review of Reviews [see Anon, 'Character Sketch: April. Mr. W. Parker Snow—Sailor, Explorer, and Author', Review of Reviews, 7 (1893), 371–86 and , Anon, 'William Parker Snow', Review of Reviews, 7 (1893), 530], and suggests that more would have been raised if the appeal had been made on behalf of '"poor savages" abroad; or one of the hordes of foreign locusts devastating our land, and driving native born to want and misery'. Also protests that William T Stead Stead, William Thomas (1849–1912) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> 'against my first wish, placed me on a sort of pedestal (pillory, it has rather turned to be), before the public, with certain inducements held out, proving now to be fallacious', but avows nevertheless 'I have fought a bold fight in a just and national cause, ever undisguisedly, and, be I ill or well, poor or not, shall stand firm to my last hours'. (659)

Genre:

Editorial, Announcement, Literary Notice

Subjects:

Supernaturalism, Christianity, Scientism, Periodicals, Psychical Research, Popularization, Colleges, Scientific Practitioners, Natural Law

People mentioned:

Annie Besant Besant (née Wood), Annie (1847–1933) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >>

    After noting that during 'the last eighteen months I have been engaged more or less intermittently in studying the various phenomena connected with what is vulgarly called the supernatural', William T Stead Stead, William Thomas (1849–1912) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> complains that hitherto these 'phenomena of the Borderland have not been subjected to the close systematic and sustained investigation which has been found necessary in the physical sciences'. Indeed, some investigators have sought to 'construct a theory of the invisible, without taking as much trouble as Darwin Darwin, Charles Robert (1809–82) DSB
Close   View the register entry >> found necessary to devote to the study of the habits of the earthworm'. (675) It is therefore necessary to 'introduce the scientific spirit into the study of occult subjects' (678). At the same time, 'students of the occult' have to contend with constant 'obloquy and ostracism', as well as a 'public opinion which is as ribald and intolerant of the students of the so-called supernatural as the philosophers of Greece and Rome were of the apparently incredible assertions of the apostles of Christianity'. Likewise, there is 'no money in occultism, and those who believe with Josh Billings Shaw, Henry Wheeler (pseud Josh Billings) (1818–85) WBI
Close   View the register entry >> that the chief end of man is ten per cent. naturally give the subject a wide berth' (Joseph O Baylen observes that Stead's 'preoccupation with spiritualism decreased the Review's circulation and revenue'; see Baylen 1979 Baylen, Joseph O. 1979. 'W. T. Stead as Publisher and Editor of the Review of Reviews', Victorian Periodicals Review, 12, 70–84
Close   View the register entry >>, 76). In the face of these 'sneers and persecutions of the less gifted majority', the 'first essential is to establish a mode of communication between investigators of all kinds, so that we may have the field scientifically mapped out, in order that the explorer may know what lies before him'. This consideration, Stead reports, 'has led me to decide on publishing a Quarterly Review and Index of the Periodical Literature bearing upon the Occult World. I cannot describe it better than by saying that Borderland Borderland (1893–97) Waterloo Directory
Close   View the register entry >> will be a quarterly REVIEW OF REVIEWS Review of Reviews (1890–1900+) Waterloo Directory
Close   View the register entry >> dealing with subjects which are supposed to lie beyond the pale of human knowledge [....] It will attempt to do in a popular and catholic form that which is done in a more or less doctrinaire and exclusive way by the Brahmins of Psychical Research'. (675) Rejecting the 'constant dogmatism and pharisaic intolerance of men of science when face to face with a new truth', the new periodical will 'take nothing for granted' and only when it has 'exhausted every possible explanation that is based upon what we ordinarily call natural laws' will it 'admit the possibility' of 'the presence of invisible intelligences' as 'at least a provisional working hypothesis' (677–78). Also notes that 'the burden and responsibility of the actual production of Borderland will fall exclusively upon the shoulders of Miss X. Spoer (née Freer), Ada M Goodrich (1857–1931) ODNB
Close   View the register entry >> and myself' (678).

Genre:

Regular Feature, Abstract

Publications abstracted:

Hudson [1893] Hudson, Thomson Jay [1893]. The Law of Psychic Phenomena: A Working Hypothesis for the Systematic Study of Hypnotism, Spiritism, Mental Therapeutics, etc., Chicago: A. C. McClurg; London: G. P. Putnam's Sons
Close   View the register entry >>

Subjects:

Psychical Research