i893. NOTES AND COMMENTS. 169 



teresting series of papers on the Quaternary Geology of Russia. The 

 most valuable of these, especially to the foreign reader, will be 

 Professor S. Nikitin's outline of the present state of our knowledge of 

 the subject. In this summary it is pointed out that Palaeolithic man 

 existed in Russia contemporaneously with the mammoth during the 

 second half of the Glacial Epoch, but only towards the southern limit 

 of the glaciated area. In the more northern districts all the imple- 

 ments yet found belong to the more advanced Neolithic races. The 

 existence of a distinct Interglacial Period, like that recognised by 

 Scandinavian and German geologists, has not yet been satisfactorily 

 demonstrated in Russia. 



It is impossible to criticise this paper without an intimate know- 

 ledge of Russian geology, but it may be worth while to remark that in 

 Western Europe also, the relics of Palaeolithic man are only found in 

 regions beyond the southern limits of the last glaciation. Is it possible 

 that in Russia, as was perhaps the case in Britain, Palaeolithic man 

 was Interglacial ? His relics are not found in the areas covered by 

 ice during the last glaciation, and this has been explained as the direct 

 result of the advance of the ice, which ploughed up and destroyed 

 all the pre-existing Palaeolithic deposits as far as it could reach. 



Our Monthly Selection. 



Mr. James Pavn has somewhere expressed regret at the supposed 

 fact that men of science are unable to make their subject popularly 

 interesting. It is certainly true that " popular science " does not, as 

 a rule, result from the literary activity of persons qualified to write 

 upon such subjects. We have had occasion more than once to point 

 out that this, if a blessing, is one securely wrapped up ; for it is to be 

 presumed that an individual, if he cares to read scientific articles, 

 prefers them to be fairly reliable, else why read an article which is 

 clearly meant to be instructive ? 



The editor of a recently-started journal, entitled "The Sketch," 

 advertises his willingness to consider paragraphs which are " smartly "' 

 written. As an indication of what he wants, attention may be 

 directed to a paragraph in the first number — " Why not a Professor 

 of the Zoo ? " The writer talks a little about the parietal eye ; for 

 this overworked organ of vision appears to have just filtered down 

 through the " daiHes " to the "weeklies." In the course of time it 

 may perhaps reach the monthlies. We present Mr. Payn gratis with 

 the suggestion. The antiquity of the points with which it deals is, 

 however, not the only claim which this paragraph has to be considered 

 smart. Many of us will be astonished to hear that the "hole " in a 

 baby's head at birth is the vestige of a parietal eye ! The writer 

 concludes with a lament that there is no professor at the Zoo to make 

 men acquainted with these facts (!). Even though he presumably 

 possesses no parietal eye himself, the two usual organs of vision would 



