Literary Notices. Ixix 



pigs, by first scarifying those parts and then rubbing them with the 

 diseased surfaces of the ears of mutilated guinea-pigs ; but have not 

 been able in this way to communicate the disease." 



7th. Absence of two toes out of the three of the hind leg, and sometimes 

 of the three, in animals whose parents had eaten up their hind-leg toes which 

 had become anEesthetic from a section of the sciatic nerve. 



The author's experiments in this connection were carried on 

 through a series of six successive generations, so as to produce, if pos- 

 sible, a cumulative effect. Yet no effect of any kind was produced. 



Not less interesting is the vast series of experiments undertaken by 

 the author which yielded only negative results. These included thou- 

 sands of experiments on graft-hybridization both of plants and of ani- 

 mals, — bulbs, buds, tubers, the combs of Spanish cocks on the heads 

 of Hamburgs, in mice and rats the grafting together of different va- 

 rieties, and in rabbits and bitches the transplantation of ovaries of newly 

 born individuals belonging to different breeds. The author was, how- 

 ever, never able to obtain a graft in the latter case. The experiments 

 carried out in the transfusion of blood and the transplantation of fertil- 

 ized ova between different varieties of rabbits prove to have been 

 utterly irrelevant, for it appears that rabbits, even when crossed in the 

 ordinary way, never throw intermediate characters. Mr. Romanes 

 therefore promptly on this discovery .made arrangements for again re- 

 peating the experiments — only, instead of rabbits, using well-marked 

 varieties of dogs. But the completion of this research was denied him 

 by failing health. 



Much of the matter contained in part I. would be in the hands of 

 another a mere fruitless threshing over of old straw, but by reason of 

 his extensive experimental work every opinion expressed by Mr. 

 Romanes is weighty. His death just at this time is therefore the 

 greater loss. 



Section II, on Utility, is devoted to an elaborate, and as it seems 

 to me, a final proof of the inadequacy of natural selection as a uni- 

 versal cause of evolution. Into the details of this discussion we can 

 not here enter. c. j. H. 



Influence of Sensory Nerres upon Movement and Nutrition.^ 



Upon section of the whole series of sensory roots belonging to a 

 limb, the movements of the hand and foot are practically abolished, 



1 MoTT, F. W. and Sherrington, C. S. Experiments upon the Influence 

 of Sensory Nerves upon Movement and Nutrition of the Limbs. Prelim. Com- 

 munication. Proc. Roy. Soc, LVII, 345, 24 May, 1895. 



