1898] NOTES AND COMMENTS 363 



what is wanted is to bring those specialists and the facilities they 

 possess into touch with the Survey collections. This, of course, 

 would involve the increase of the staff' of the British Museum, at 

 least by the addition of the palaeontologists of the Survey, and, if 

 good work be really desired, by two or three more. 



We do not advocate, and we do not know anyone that 

 advocates, the severance of the Survey collections from the 

 surveyors, whose publications must always be based on the 

 evidence of these particular rocks and fossils ; and no one can 

 be desirous of distributing the geological collections among those 

 already in the British ]\luseura, which latter are arranged primarily 

 in accordance with zoological classification. Such a distribution 

 would be a severe blow to the study of geology, and would quite 

 do aw^ay with any advantage that might be gained by the change of 

 site. No 1 the great need already at the Natural History Museum 

 is for a geological and stratigraphical series. This gap might be 

 filled by the Jermyn Street collections. We should like to see the 

 erection of the eastern wing of the Natural History Museum, and 

 the installation therein of a museum of stratigraphic and dynamical 

 geology, chiefly illustrating the history of our own islands. We 

 would have a stratigraphical series more complete and detailed than 

 at present is possible at Jermyn Street. What an object-lesson it 

 would be to see the faunas of every zone displayed in an ascending 

 series ! What an impulse it would give to more exact geological 

 investigation, and how enormously this in its turn would benefit 

 the students of the different taxouomic groups, both of animals 

 and of plants ! 



There is, as we said at the beginning, little doubt that the 

 recommendations of the Committee will be carried out in one 

 way or another before very long. In what precise way and with 

 what spirit remains to be seen. We believe that the greatest im- 

 provement will be effected by a change on the lines here sketched 

 out, if only that change can be made without harmful friction. 



Mr Herbert Spencer on Polar Bodies : a Postscript 



To the article on Cell-Physiology published in our May number, 

 Mr Herbert Spencer wishes to add a paragraph, containing (so he 

 writes to iis) " a clinching argument." It runs thus : — " A test fact 

 remains. Sometimes the first polar body extruded undergoes 

 fission while the second is being formed. This can have nothing 

 to do with reducing the number of chromosomes in the ovum. 

 Unquestionably, however, this change is included with the preceding 

 changes in one transaction, effected by one influence. If, then, it is 

 irrelevant to the decrease of chromosomes, so must the preceding 



