120 SCIENCE PROGRESS. 



Megalosaurus in fact ". Nor is confusion less when I am 

 told in one sentence that the organisation of the germ cut 

 directly from pre-existing parental organisation of the same 

 kind is not the definitive organisation which belongs to the 

 fully formed organism, but is that primary organisation 

 which belongs to protoplasm itself, and I read in the 

 sentence immediately preceding that " the essential thing is 

 not simply continuity of germ substance of the same 

 chemico-physical constitution, but actual identity of germ- 

 organisation with stirp-organisation ". The organisation of 

 the germ is identical with the organisation of the stirp, and 

 yet the organisation of the germ is not that of the fully 

 formed organism, but is a primary organisation which 

 belongs to protoplasm itself. What does it all mean ? It is 

 different and yet it is identical, and it is organisation, organisa- 

 tion, toujours organisation. I beg Dr. Whitman, for pity's 

 sake, to descend from his altitude, scarcely dreamed of in the 

 philosophy of Harvey and Wolff, and to condescend to 

 inform a poor bewildered mortal, who confesses to a pre- 

 judice in favour of things which he can understand, what 

 this wonderful primary organisation is. 



Seriously speaking I believe that organisation either 

 means a plan of structure of the same type as the structure 

 of higher animals and plants, and capable of being described 

 in intelligible terms as it has been by Weismann, Wiesner 

 and others, or it means nothing at all ; it is a mere phrase 

 which seeks to cover but does not conceal our ignorance. 



G. C. Bourne. 

 ( To be continued. ) 



