4 NATURAL SCIENCE. july, 



protozoa living at the bottom of the seas, naked amceboid creatures, 

 devoid of chlorophyll, living on crumbs and fragments of organic 

 matter, and at times cohering into plasmodia large or small; and such 

 creatures would correspond nearly enough to Huxley's idea of 

 Bathybius. 



H. N. MOSELEY. 



No reader of our article on the " Challenger " Expedition will 

 fail to observe how large and important a share of the work was done 

 by the late Professor Moseley. In that province of natural science 

 which is regarded as specially his own, namely, the Morphology of the 

 Invertebrata, his influence was prominent. Apart from his special 

 report on some of the Alcyonaria and Madreporaria, we find some of 

 the most important discoveries in many groups due to him : the true 

 nature of Pevipatus, and of the strange worm Pelagonemertes, the new 

 Tunicate Octacnemus, the phosphorescent organs of deep-sea fish ; 

 these and many others will always be associated with his name. 



But Moseley recognised that, while the deep-sea was not likely 

 to change its character for many a day, the customs of savages and 

 the flora of oceanic islands alike were disappearing or changing. He 

 chose wisely and deliberately to lose no opportunity of observing 

 these decaying aspects of life. The botanical work he did is fully 

 referred to by Mr. Baron Clarke ; to what Professor Haddon says of 

 his anthropological labours we may add a few words. 



Both in lectures and in private conversation, Moseley used to say 

 that the " Challenger " Expedition saw nearly the last of the unsophis- 

 ticated savage. The advent of missionaries and the spread of 

 commerce, however important they may be from other standards, 

 are wholly lamentable from the point of view of anthropology. 

 Moseley devoted a large part of his time ashore to the investigation 

 of the manners and customs of the natives. He brought back an 

 anthropological collection of the greatest interest and importance, 

 part of which is in the museum at Oxford, and part of which has been 

 distributed to various private and public institutions. But the 

 knowledge of primitive customs he had acquired is for the most part 

 lost. He was able to assist in the arrangement of the Pitt Rivers 

 collection, which was put under his control by the donor, and so far 

 a certain amount of his information was not lost. But it was a hope 

 of many of his intimates, a hope frustrated by his death, that one 

 day he would be able to write a volume on the habits and customs of 

 savages. 



Irish Scientific Worthies. 



We deeply regret to learn of the premature death of the Director 

 of the Science and Art Museum at Dublin, Professor Valentine BalL 



