id 
DECEMBER 1899] FRESH FACTS 441 
the evidence of a curved rostrum and an impression of the pro-ostracum ; a few 
of the septal lamellae are preserved. The author regards it as belonging to the 
Sepiadae and as a link between the belemnites and cuttlefish, and he compares 
it with Belosepia. The latter, however, is a Tertiary form, and no true Sepia is 
known from Mesozoic rocks. This fact, while increasing the interest of the 
discovery, leads us to ask for more evidence. 
AUTOGAMY IN PrimuLaceArk. A Field Naturalist, M.A. Camb. “The 
Primrose and Darwinism,” London Quarterly Review, clxxxiv. October 1899, 
pp. 209-235. This very interesting and circumstantial indictment of Darwin’s 
conclusions in regard to cross-fertilisation in primroses occurs in a place where 
it may be overlooked by many botanists. After relating his observations and 
stating his criticisms, the unknown author says: “It is not possible from the 
above considerations in reference to the method of Darwin’s experiments, and 
especially also from the above case of the primrose, to avoid the conclusion that 
Darwin has not established his theory that cross-fertilisation is necessary to the 
full fertility of flowers. On the contrary, we are of opinion that the primrose 
gives strong confirmatory evidence to Axell’s view, that under zatural and equal 
conditions self-fertilisation of flowers is both the legitimate fertilisation and the 
most productive.” 
ELIMINATION IN Sparrows. HERMON C. Bumpus. ‘The elimination 
of the unfit as illustrated by the introduced sparrow, Passer domesticus,” a 
fourth contribution to the study of variation. Eleventh Lecture in Biol. 
Lectures at Wood’s Holl in 1898. Boston, 1899, pp. 209-226. After a severe 
storm a number of English sparrows were brought to the anatomical laboratory 
of Brown University. Seventy-two revived; sixty-four perished; and the 
author has made a careful comparison of the eliminated and the surviving. He 
has reached three conclusions :—(1) That the birds which perished were elimin- 
ated because of deficiency in certain structural characters possessed by the 
survivors ; (2) the process of selective elimination is most severe with extremely 
variable individuals, no matter in what direction the variations may occur ; 
(3) disregard of structural qualifications finally produces a throng of degenerates, 
whose destruction will follow the arrival of adversity. 
ANOTHER EntcmMa. Ricnarp Heymons. “ Ueber bliischenformige Organe 
bei den Gespenstheuschrecken. Ein Beitrag zur Kenntniss der Eingeweide- 
nervensystems bei den Insecten,” Sitzber. Preuss. Akad. Berlin, 1899, pp. 563- 
575, 2 figs. In the head of a European stick-insect, Baczl/us rossi’, there lie 
near the gullet, and associated with the pharyngeal ganglion, two little vesicles 
of ectodermic origin which are very puzzling. They are neither ganglionic nor 
glandular, and contain a central chitinous spherule surrounded by several 
concentric chitinous lamellae. Perhaps they are comparable to the ‘“ corpora 
allata” which occur in a number of other insects, but they are not the same 
in detail, and besides we do not know what the “corpora allata” are. Heymons 
tried by experiment to find out something about their function, but the result 
was inconclusive. He leaves their nature an enigma, except that he suggests 
that they may have something to do with the visceral nervous system. 
New Peracic NemMerTEAN. W. McM. Woopworrs. “Preliminary 
account of Planktonemertes agassizli, a new pelagic Nemertean,” Bu//. Mus. 
Comp. Zool. Harvard, xxxv. 1899, pp. 1-4, 1 pl. This new form, like the 
only other known genus, the ‘‘ Challenger” Pelagonemertes, was taken in the 
Pacific Ocean from considerable depths. In its leaf-like body, hyaline structure, 
rhynchocoelom as long as the body, unarmed proboscis, dendrocoelous gut, 
and absence of cephalic grooves or organs of special sense, it resembles Pelago- 
nemertes ; but its distinctive features are: a common external opening for 
mouth and proboscis, supraoesophageal ganglia smaller than the suboesophageal, 
the presence of a median dorsal vessel, and the large number of lateral diverti- 
cula of the intestine. 
