Abstract
IN my own experience (I can with confidence only give that) I differ almost wholly from that of Mr. Joseph Le Conte, as expressed in NATURE (p. 452). In my case strength and dexterity of arm do not in everything go together. For instance, although strongly left-handed, I learnt to write with the right hand and shoot from the right shoulder, and could do either very indifferently indeed if attempted with the left hand or arm. I perhaps may call myself with truth a rather handy man, improved upon by living for many years in places where tradesmen were not to be had. In all connected with pencil, pen, ink, and paper, such as printing, chart-making, my left hand, although strongest, was clumsy, whereas my right showed considerable skill, as was exhibited once in rather a ludicrous manner by the Hydrographer of the Admiralty mistaking my pen-and-ink chart of some seven hundred miles of Arctic discovery for an engraving of the same. My left leg is the stronger, yet I use it in kicking and in other ways requiring dexterity; e.g. when very many years younger I could perform the many curious movements or steps of some of our Scottish dances with much more accuracy and ease with the left foot than with the right. I fear the subject-matter of this note may be scarcely considered a valid excuse for so much self-notice.
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RAE, J. Right-sidedness. Nature 29, 477 (1884). https://doi.org/10.1038/029477d0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/029477d0
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