EDITOR'S TABLE. 



3 6 3 



one who reads the marvelous revelations 

 of the works of God which this learned 

 naturalist has published can for a moment 

 doubt the existence of the divine wisdom 

 which pervades the realms of Nature. 



R. M. K. Ormsby. 

 Chester Hill, N. T., November 27, 1876. 



To the Editor of the Popular Science Monthly. 



Dear Sir : In a letter addressed to you, 

 and published in your columns, from the 

 pen of Thomas Meehau, Esq., in which he 

 is " getting right on the record," I am dis- 

 turbed by the following expression in refer- 

 ence to my Buffalo a'ddress : " Prof. Morse 

 could only help me with the audience by 

 remarking, ' We all know that Mr. Meehan 

 is a Darwinian, and an evolutionist, but 

 must say he has an odd way of putting it.' 

 That my good friend does not regard me as 

 much of either is, however, clear, from his 

 making no reference to any of my labors in 

 his ' History of Evolution.' " 



The reader of this might think that I had 

 either overlooked the interesting contribu- 



tions of Mr. Meehan in the " Proceedings " 

 of the Philadelphia Academy, and his own 

 journal, or else had done him a manifest 

 injustice. That I am not guilty, either of 

 oversight or injustice in this matter, the 

 following lines from my Buffalo address will 

 prove : " A review of the work accomplished 

 by American students, bearing upon the 

 doctrine of descent, must of necessity be 

 brief. Even a review of a moiety of the 

 work is beyond the limits of an address of 

 this nature. And for obvious reasons I 

 must needs here restrict it to one branch of 

 biology, namely, zoology.'''' The obvious rea- 

 son is that I am not a botanist, therefore no 

 reference is made to the works of Dr. Gray, 

 Mr. Meehan, Prof. Beal, and others, who 

 have made valuable contributions to the 

 subject. In the solitary case where I al- 

 luded to the fertilization of yucca, it was 

 to show the curious moth Pronuba, so ad- 

 mirably described by Prof. Riley, as an in- 

 sect showing peculiar adaptations for the 

 work in hand. Edward S. Morse. 



Salem, Massachusetts, November 4, 1876. 



EDITOR'S TABLE. 



PHILANTHROPIC FAN A TICISM AGAINST ) 

 SCIENCE. 



EEFEEENCE has been repeatedly 

 made in our pages to an English 

 Parliamentary Commission, appointed 

 to inquire into the practice of vivisec- 

 tion, or experiments upon living ani- 

 mals, made for scientific purposes by 

 the physiologists of that country. The 

 inquiry was the consequence of a pro- 

 longed and intense public agitation, in 

 which the sympathies of the people 

 were excited, and their indignation 

 aroused, by frightful stories of cruelty 

 deliberately and wantonly perpetrated 

 upon innocent animals under the pre- 

 text of advancing scientific knowledge. 

 The movement was systematically and 

 skillfully engineered by those who make 

 philanthropy a business. Money was 

 plentifully contributed by the rich to 

 carry it on, and with plenty of money 

 there is never any difficulty in engaging 



the press in a good work. Appealing 

 to the sensibilities by exaggerated ac- 

 counts of the way poor animals were 

 tortured, the subject naturally took a 

 deep hold of the sympathies of women, 

 and its measures were promoted and 

 sustained by many ladies of wealth and 

 high social position, and were under- 

 stood to be warmly encouraged by the 

 queen herself. But the humane feelings 

 of both sexes were profoundly stirred 

 by the tales of atrocity that were cir- 

 culated, so that the scientific physiol- 

 ogists of the country began to be looked 

 upon as fiends, reveling in the infliction 

 of agony upon helpless animals. The 

 stories, of course, were unscrupulous 

 exaggerations, or arrant lies, but the 

 public is a great believer and fond of 

 pungent sensations, while fervid phi- 

 lanthropy is not apt to trouble itself 

 much about cool matters of evidence. 

 The Parliamentary Commission, con- 



