MYSTERIES OF MEMORY

Hokitika Guardian, 13 December 1920, Page 1

MYSTERIES OF MEMORY

(By Dr Haydn Brown, author of “Making a Memory.”)

Renders are puzzled by certain instances, such as the following, which is one of many I have psychologically investigated : A breeder possessed some 200 head of cattle. He had risen from the position of farm hand, had never been educated either privately or in school, yet he engaged in big buying and selling transactions..

There was not only planted in his memory the important points regarding practically every animal he had once “looked over,” but also he could at once give every detail as to pedigree, prices at which each had changed hands, names of buyers and sellers. He had a remarkable memory only concerning cattle.

He possessed it largely by reason of the fact that he could neither read anybody else’s figures nor write his own, being obliged therefore to exercise his concentrated powers all the more. Memory is a matter of mental interest, application, and concentration but chiefly interest. There are people possessing remarkable memories regarding certain subjects, however, wlio are also great readers and writers, and who are quite interested in a large number of subjects. The instance conies to mind of a lawyer who knows by heart nearly the whole of Bradshaw’s Railway Guide, partly for the reason that his father was an engineer and took great interest iu new ventures and in the management of railway systems which involved economic alterations as to times of arrival and departure. This lawyer declared that it was quite easy for him, when new editions came out, to note the alterations in speed that had" been made and to observe, arrangements which were designed to suit other companies. • « * V * * *

I am acquainted with a man who has parliamentary election statistics at his fingers’ ends, and is able to refer to elections which have taken place over the past twenty years or more. He cannot forget them. It is quite common for psychologists to find examples of people who display a defective mentatility as a whole but who exhibit surprising powers of memory for certain tilings. Thus a man. is known who is “incapable of managing bis own affairs” from a mental point of view but who has an extraordinary fine knowledge of and momory for horseracing and its statistics; yet ho has never seen a horse-race iu his life. He caught the enthusiasm from once being in company with betting men who were much excited, and he watched the daily papers for reports. In this instauce a portion of the brain was emotionally claimed, and this was greatly exercised while the rest simply drifted into am idleness and indifference that was equally natural and aceptable.