These
observations I recorded on the 9th of July, 1877, in Jena, while the
child was left free to do what she pleased.
The girl, eight years of age, born, according to the testimony of her
father, with the frontal fontanelle (fonticulus anterior) closed and
solid, had a smaller head than a child of one year. The notes follow the
same order as that of the observations.
_Time, 8.15 A. M._--The child yawns. She grasps with animation at some
human skulls that she sees on a table near her, and directs her look to
charts on the walls. She puts her fingers into her nostrils, brushes her
apron with both hands, polishes my watch, which I have offered her and
she has seized, holds it to one ear, then to one of her father's ears,
draws her mouth into a smile, seems to be pleased by the ticking, holds
the watch to her father's other ear, then to her own other ear, laughs,
and repeats the experiment several times. Her head is very mobile.
The child now folds a bit of paper that I have given her, rolls it up
awkwardly, wrinkling her forehead the while, chews up the paper and
laughs aloud. Saliva flows from her mouth almost incessantly. Then the
child begins to eat a biscuit, giving some of it, however, to her father
and the attendant, putting her biscuit to their lips, and this with
accuracy at once, whereas in the former case the watch was held at first
near the ear, to the temple, and not till afterward to the ear itself.
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