galton.org 117
Visionaries
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and silver-filigree ornaments; gold and silver flower-stands etc.; elaborate coloured
patterns of carpets in brilliant tints are not uncommon.
“Another peculiarity resides in the extreme restlessness of my visual objects. It is
often very difficult to keep them still, as well as from changing in character. They will
rapidly oscillate or else rotate to a most perplexing degree, and when the characters change
at the same time a critical examination is almost impossible. When the process is in full
activity, I feel as if I were a mere spectator at a diorama of a very eccentric kind, and was
in no way concerned with the getting up of the performance.
“When a succession of images has been passing, I sometimes determine to introduce
an object, say a watch. Very often it is next to impossible to succeed. There is an evident
struggle. The watch, pure and simple, will not come; but some hybrid structure appears—
something round, perhaps—but it lapses into a warming-pan or other unexpected object.
“This practice has brought to my mind very clearly the distinction between at least one
form of automatism of the brain and volition; but the strength of the former is enormous,
for the visual objects, when in full career of the change; are imperative in their refusal to
be interfered with.
“I will now describe the cases illustrated. Fig. 71. I thought of a gun. The stock came
into view, the metal plate on the end very distinct towards the left (1). The wood was
elaborately carved. I cannot recall the pattern. As I scrutinised it, the stock oscillated up
and down, and crumpled up. The metallic plate sank inwards: and the stock contracted so
that it looked not unlike a tuning-fork (2). I gave up the stock and proceeded cautiously to
examine the lock. I got it well into view, but no more of the gun. It turned out to be an old-
fashioned flint-lock. It immediately began to nod backwards and forwards in a manner
suggestive of the beak of a bird pecking. Consequently it forthwith became converted into
the head of a bird with a long curved beak, the knob on the lock (3) becoming the head of
the bird. I then looked to the right expecting to find the barrel, but the snout of a saw-fish
with the tip distinctly broken off appeared instead. I had not thought either of a flint-lock
or of a saw-fish: both came spontaneously.
“Fig. 72. I have several times thought of a rosebud, as Goethe is said to have been able
to see one at will, and to observe it expand. The following are some of the results. The bud
appeared unexpectedly a moss rosebud. Its only abnormal appearance was the inordinately
elongated sepals (I). I tried to force it to expand. It enlarged but only partially
