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detail of the customs and beliefs associated with a life-giving elixir all over 

 the world, in the Ancient East, in China and India, and in the ancient 

 civilisation of Central America, an identity masked by local differences of 

 artistic expression. 



The Chinese Dragon, a great synthetic wonder-beast, built up from a 

 reptile and a bird, with deer's antlers and spots, holding a pearl, living in 

 a rain-cloud and controlling the weather, is shown to have been concocted 

 by syncretism, and by misunderstandings of a whole series of beliefs, all of 

 which separately can be traced back to Western Asia, where their origin 

 can in some part be explained. 



The same dragon with the same artistic form associated with the same 

 stories occurs in Central America. 



Thus the occurrence all over the world of a vast series of beliefs and 

 customs identical in detail, however much they may appear to differ in 

 general effect, implies a spread of culture from an evolutionary centre in the 

 Ancient East, undergoing changes and acquiring local characteristics in 

 other places and finally distributed practically throughout the world. 



This spread can only be brought about by migrations of men, similar 

 to the piratical raids which established Malay kingdoms over the East 

 Indies, and it remained only to discover an adequate motive for these voyages 

 of discovery. That outburst of exploration from Western Europe which 

 in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries led to the discovery of America 

 and the East Indies, was inspired by a search for spice, for precious stones 

 and for gold, as well as by a love for adventure. Mr. W. J. Perry has, «by 

 a most ingenious method, shown that the much earlier voyages which spread 

 civilisation round the world had the same end. He has shown that through- 

 out the continents the old centres of civilisation are on the sites of old gold 

 workings or of washings for precious stones. In those cases where evidence 

 of ancient mining are missing we find that the colony was on the site of a 

 pearl or jade fishery. Primarily these jewels were valued, not for their 

 own beauty, but because they were supposed to contain in abundance that 

 elixir vitse, without which neither man nor god can live. 



Thus the love of gold and precious stones which originated in Egypt or 

 in the Ancient East, and was there founded on their magical uses as carriers 

 of fertilit)^ and life, led to their acceptance as currency and provided the 

 material basis on which all civilisations have been built up. 



D. M. S. W. 



The Physical Basis of Heredity. By Prof. T. H. Morgan. [Pp. 305, with 

 117 figures. Monographs on Experimental Biology.] (Philadelphia 

 and London : J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1919. Price I2.50 net.) 



One of the most fascinating fields of modern biological work is undoubtedly 

 that dealing with the subjects of heredity, particularly from the cytological 

 aspect. Not merely does it possess intrinsic interest, but it is also a branch 

 of investigation that has made enormous strides during the last two decades. 

 The rediscovery of Mendelism in igoo led to a fresh outburst of experimental 

 breeding and genetics. After a few years it became inevitable that investi- 

 gators should turn to study the nuclear mechanism for an explanation of the 

 phenomena they were obtaining from their breeding experiments. This line 

 of inquiry yielded results probably far beyond the expectations of its founders, 

 and of the many workers on such problems Professor Morgan and his co- 

 investigators stand in a pre-eminent position. The work has gone on at such 

 a pace and in such diverse places and directions that it has been impossible 

 for the general biologist or student to keep up with it, unless he happens 

 to be working along similar lines, and naturally it will be years before the work 

 is assimilated into ordinary textbooks. Much of it is of fundamental im- 



