348 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION D. 



Kornicke found that moderate radio-activity caused excessive 

 growth of the chorophyll portion of a growing plant, and both he 

 and Mohsch found that seeds subjected to radio-activity of small 

 amount produced deformed seedlings through a diminution of their 

 heliotropic powers. 



Organisms constantly exposed to attenuated radio-activity are 

 affected by what is known as the cumulative re- action. Working 

 collateral with this must be the factor of decaying radium emana- 

 tions, and it is probable that the effects of these emanations would 

 be more pronounced in a sphere of attenuated activity, since in such 

 a sphere they would not be marked by the stronger and more obvious 

 effects of direct radio-activity. In vascular organisms the effects 

 of the decaying emanations are chiefly evidenced by hyperaemia in 

 the least resisting or most exposed tissues, for example, the skin 

 and the lungs ; this is abundantly proved by Curie, Bouchard, 

 Dorn and Wallstabe. In the higher animals it is also found that 

 constant exposure to attenuated activity produces a marked 

 influence on highly specialised cells, causing loss of function, espe- 

 cially in the organs of generation. 



The possibihty of the bearing of these facts on the origin of 

 life and species as an important factor seems reasonable. 



The primeval earth was probably a molten mass, surrounded 

 by an atmosphere of aqueous vapor. All the conditions then 

 extant prohibited hfe, as is now well recognised. How far the 

 natural production of radio-activity would be affected by this molten 

 mass it is unnecessary to discuss in this paper, but commencing with 

 the period immediately succeeding this in the earth's history, it 

 would be the period of greatest natural radio-activity from reasons 

 advanced previously. This period commenced as the earth cooled, 

 the aqueous vapor condensed, and vast oceans were formed sur- 

 rounding land consisting of primeval rock, gneiss or continental 

 granite. At the beginning on this barren land and in the shallower 

 oceans and at all the margins and depths the radio-activity would 

 still have been so excessive that no fauna or flora could be created. 

 But at the surface of the ocean, in the areas where there was con- 

 siderable depth, the inhibitory effects of the water on the natural 

 radio-activity would be apparent, and thus only in this locale of the 

 globe was it then possible for the primeval life to exist. It is here 

 that geologists have assigned the habitat of the earhest known 

 genera, minute radiolarians {Spumellaria and Nassellaria) of simple 

 spherical or ellipsoid characters. Any of the primitive organisms, 

 which attempted at first to go close to the bottom of the ocean or 

 drift into shallower waters, lost their protecting shield of water and 

 came within reach of the excessive radio-activity of the earth and 

 were killed, their bodies being rendered a and JS active, and were 

 strewn on the floor of the ocean. At the same time many of the 

 organisms must have died from natural causes at the surface, and 

 their dead bodies would sink to the bottom ; these would be non- 

 active. Thus, in course of time, the bottom of the ocean was 

 strewn with dead organisms, partly ^ active and partly non-active, 



