Page Fourteen 



EVOLUTION 



June, 1937 



BOOKS 



IN QUEST OF GORILLAS— \Vm. 

 K.~Gregory and H. C. Raven, Dar- 

 win Press, 1937. 241 pages, $3.50, 



Four of the world's great anthro- 

 pologists are sent by Columbia Uni- 

 \ersit}- and the .American Museum of 

 Natural History into the Africa of Du 

 Chaillu, Livingstone and Stanley to 

 observe and photograph, hunt and col- 

 lect that important, but rare and little 

 known relative of man, the gorilla. 

 Thev succeeded in bringing back five 

 adult specimens, carefully embalmed 

 for detailed anatomic study, and a 

 live baby, who later grew up in the 

 bosom of Dr. Raven's family of 

 children. Besides the learned Dr. 

 Gregory and his co-author, the experi- 

 enced explorer. Dr. H. C. Raven, the 

 partv included the witty Dr. J. H. 

 McGregor and the athletic Dr. E. T. 

 Engle. Gregory and Engle had ad- 

 ditional, secondary errands on this 

 trip, the former to' study those "living 

 fossils", the African survivors of the 

 ancient lung-fishes, the latter to take 

 photographs and foot impressions of 

 African natives for study at Columbia. 



Ever since Huxley summarized 

 "Man's Place in Nature" three 

 quarters of a century ago, anthropolo- 

 gists have bewailed our lack of detail- 

 ed knowledge of gorilla anatomy. Such 

 knowledge should throw much light on 

 several problems of man's ancestry. 

 But the two known varieties of this 

 giant ape live in the depths of the 

 Congo jungle and the mountains of 

 Central Africa. Hunting out our poor 

 relation has always been a real man's 

 job. An expensive, well-equipped ex- 

 pedition, months of skillful, patient 

 hunting, a trip across the entire 

 African continent were required. Even 

 with recent facilities for travel the 

 task was formidable. Then there were 

 the problems of careful shooting, so as 

 to make embalming effective, and of 

 transporting these giants, weighing 

 around four hundred pounds, through 

 dense, pathless jungles, down to the 

 coast and across the sea. 



But all that is hut the technical part 

 of the stor\', which never mars the 

 racing pages of this absorbing book. 

 For this is travel in a world of wild 

 and magnificent scenery, across the 

 Great Rift Valley and tlie wonderful 

 Lake Region, up into the mountains, 

 down into the Congo Basin. This 

 world teems with life, plant, animal, 

 human. Every page has its verbal 

 picture of episode, strangeness, interest 

 and fun — protectively colored lizards 

 tl.at disappear when they stop, house- 

 geckos that walk on the ceiling, queer 

 mole-like creatures, kittens with fur 



patterns between spots and stripes, ant 

 armies with plodding workers and 

 belligerent soldiers, ostriches that 

 "stalk grandly", giant vipers hunted 

 with a split stick. 



Gregory, the dignified Columbia 

 Professor, turns out to be wholly 

 human. He is quite at home with the 

 dancing, laughing, begging natives. He 

 makes friends with the jungle pygmies. 

 S>mpatheticall\- he exposes native 

 foibles. There is the native chief, 

 dressed in white duck and sun helmet, 

 who rides a nickel plated bic>-cle be- 

 fore the crowd, bowing grandl.v at the 

 admiring applause. And that other 

 native "gentleman" who laid a board 

 floor so he could hear the tramping 

 sound of his white man's shoes. We 

 read of the death-dealing "Leopard 

 Society" executing native justice, of a 

 sable Juno of queenls' poise, of a 

 daintv 'Venus of quiet voice, of plain- 

 tive melodies which fade into mem- 

 ory's "Lost Chords". Even the calm- 

 1\- efficient Dr. Raven succumbs to the 

 friendly spell of these simple people 

 and confesses to negotiating the sale 

 of a wife (not his own. of course) for 

 two dollars. Most of the tale is told 

 by Gregory, who is finel\' gifted with 

 vivid description. He goes on gorilla 

 hunts, of course, but largely as ob- 

 server. Dr. Raven being the ofTicial 

 hunter. Both contribute to the stories 

 of the hunt. 



B_\- means of booming signal guns 

 word was sent out to all the villages to 

 watch for gorillas, and b\' drums the 

 reports came in. The p\'gmies turned 

 out to be good trackers. Again and 

 again the hunters drew close to the 

 elusive giants, heard their stomachs 

 rumble, saw the bushes shaking, caught 

 a glimpse of a hair_\- arm. more rarely 

 of a peering face. Often some brave 

 male would rush them, but would stop 

 before becoming visible and retreat 

 noiselessl)' after covering the silent 

 earlier departure of his band. Now 

 and then gorillas have attacked men. 

 maiming or killing with their great 

 strength. However, none of our hunters 

 ran into danger, except Raven per- 

 haps, when he remained behind to 

 finish his hunting after the others had 

 started home, and came down with 

 sleeping sickness, two kinds of malaria, 

 hookworm and ascariasis, all at the 

 same time. But a missionary doctor 

 pulled him through, and every one ar- 

 rived home safely with a precious 

 cargo of specimens and a tale com- 

 pletely delightful to read. 



— Allan Brovis 



THE SOLAR SYSTEM .AND ITS 

 ORIGIN, — Henrv Norris Russell. 

 144 pp.— .MacMillan, N. Y. 193r 



Though the first formulation by 

 Swedenborg of the famous Nebular 

 H\pothesis on the origin of the solar 

 svstem is now fulK' two centuries old. 



the recognition of its fatal flaws dates 

 only from 1900 when Moulton exam- 

 ined mathematically its impossible 

 dynamics. The outstanding difllculty 

 was that the momentum of revolution 

 of the planets and satellites was sev- 

 eral times that warranted by their 

 masses relative to that of the Sun 



The immediate result was Chamber- 

 lin and Moulton 's Planetesimal Hypo- 

 thesis, the first of the tidal theories 

 (later to be modified by Jeans and 

 Jeffreys) which explain the solar sys- 

 tem as torn from the Sun by the 

 gravitational pull of a passing star. 



But even at the turn of the centur>- 

 only the most obvious of the facts to 

 be explained had been learned. The 

 planets (including the vast horde of 

 asteroids) all revolved in one direction 

 and nearly all m one plane, as did 

 most of their satellites. That rule ap- 

 plied also to their known rotations and 

 that of the Sun. .'Ml this definitely 

 pointed to a common origin. 



Now, howe\er, an array of facts has 

 been assembled of which our gener- 

 ation ma.v well be proud. Theory, too. 

 has made notable advances. But the 

 net result of this accumulation of facts, 

 physical, chemical, and mathematical, 

 has so far only added difllculties which 

 no theory of origins has consistently' 

 explained. The very presence of plan- 

 etary atmospheres, the existence of the 

 . satellites and particularly of comets, 

 off'er special difficulties. 



Recent theories have tried to include 

 all this detail of obstinate facts, but 

 with dubious successes. Jeffreys sub- 

 stituted a stellar collision for mere 

 tidal disruption. Nolke borrowed the 

 planets and comets from a nebula 

 through which the Sun may have pass- 

 ed. More recently. Lyttleton, follow- 

 ing a suggestion b\' Russell, assumed 

 the original Sun a binary star, dis- 

 rupted by a third passing star to form 

 our solar s\stem. Other theories, ap- 

 parentl\- of little promise, have yet to 

 be worked out in theoretical detail. 



Two thirds of this book is devoted 

 to the facts which must be explained 

 and, despite its technical thoroughness, 

 it is unusual for its clearness. The 

 last third co\ers the theories of origin 

 with the same lucidity. There is none 

 of the usual assumption of scientific 

 certainty, no effort to make evolution- 

 ary drama out of the puzzling array 

 of facts. Yet the fundamental fact, 

 that some two billion years ago the 

 Great Event of Planetary Birth took 

 place,— that fact is amply and con- 

 vincingly demonstrated by independ- ^ 

 ent, yet singularly consistent, evi- 

 dences. Altogether', as a summary of 

 our present knowledge of our solar 

 system and as a critical evaluation of 

 all theories of its origin, this small vol- 

 ume is quite unsurpassed. 



— Allan Bronis 



