Editorial. 665 



in applying knowledge from our side to those of the physiologist 

 and pathologist." 



These points will be found elaborated and fully illustrated in 

 the extensive series of papers which has come from Professor 

 Burckhardt's pen, particularly in the introduction to the last of 

 his papers, on the central nervous system of the selachians as a 

 basis for a phylogeny of the vertebrate brain^ the first part of which 

 appeared last year. In the letter from which the above extract 

 was taken he wrote that he was at that time engaged upon the 

 final revision of the second and third parts of this paper, and it is 

 to be hoped that the work was sufficiently far advanced at the 

 time of his death as to permit the speedy publication of these two 

 parts. 



The most valuable of the concrete results of Burckhardt's 

 work so far as published is the demonstration of the conservative 

 character of the non-nervous parts of the brain and the consequent 

 worth of the membranous and ependymal tissues in the study of 

 phylogenetic relationships. This is brought out most graphically 

 in the paper pubhshed in 1895, entitled Der Bauplan des Wirbel- 

 tiergehirns^ which is accompanied by a large plate showing dia- 

 grarcimatic sagittal sections of all important types of vertebrate 

 brains with the corresponding regions colored the same way 

 throughout the series. The resemblance of these median and 

 largely membranous parts in the series from Petromyzon to man 

 is very striking. 



An important series of neurological researches which in some 

 ways resemble those of Burckhardt has been pubhshed by Dr. 

 G. Sterzi of Padua. The most recent of about a dozen papers 

 relating to the meninges and vascular supply of the central nervous 

 system is the first volume of a comprehensive treatise on the cen- 

 tral nervous system of vertebrates.* It is announced that the work 

 will be completed in six volumes, of which this first one is devoted 

 to the cyclostomes, and the others are to be upon the fishes, am- 

 phibians, reptiles, birds and mammals, respectively. The present 

 volume is divided into two books devoted to the petromyzonts 



- Das Zentral-Nen'ensystem der Selachier als Grundlage fiir eine Phylogenie des Vertebratenhirns. 

 I. Teil. Einleitung und Scymnus lichia. With 5 plates and 64 text-figures. Nova Acta, Ahh. kais. 

 Leop.-Carol. Akad. d. Nalurjorscher, Halle, Bd. 73, no. 2, pp. 238-449, 1907. 



^Morph. Arbeiten {Schwalbe), Bd. 4, no. 2. 1895. 



^ Sterzi, G. II sistema nervoso centrale dei Vertebrati. Ricerche anatomiche ed embriologiche. 

 Vol.1. Ciclostomi. 732 pp. and 194 figs. Padua, A. Draghi, Editore. 1907. Price, Lire 35. 



