=^2 



NATURE 



[April 20, 191 1 



i. ...... .., j".,,. .i, v|ualitie«." But where the motor theory 



tnost completely breaks down is when it attempts to ex- 

 plain functional problems. Meaning, thinking, recog- 

 nising, have all been tentatively explained in terms of 

 .motor theory. Now " movements in and of themselves 

 have no meaning, are not immediately recognised nor 

 understood. These functions require just as much ex- 

 planation when they attach to movements as to any 

 mental process." Function is evidently something more 

 than movement ; use is something more than structure. 

 As the author points out, " more important than either 

 sensation by itself or movement by itself is the fact that 

 consciousii in organis<'d system." 



In 'I'Ut I ^ V Monthly Magazine Im Ajuil Mr. 



G. H. Vcrrall adds one hundred species of Diptera to the 

 British list. Of these, .seven are entered as new species, 

 but since there is no diagnosis, these would appear to be 

 ttomina nuda, which may be appropriated by anyone else. 



The Bergens Museum Aarsberetning for 1910 contains 

 a brief account of the recent Atlantic cruise of the Michael 

 Sars, financed and directed by Sir John Murray. The 

 collections, it appears, are to be worked out at the Bergen 

 .Museum, where the types of new forms will be preserved. 



According to an article by Dr. Bather in the March 

 number of The Museums Journal, the Muses are to have 

 no roof over their heads in some of their habitations, for 

 the movement in favour of open-air museums is stated to 

 be making distinct progress. .Such establishments will be, 

 of course, for ilic display of antiquities not liable to 

 deterioration h\ < xjKJsure to the weather, and they will 

 certainly li;i\r tin .idvantage of cheapness. It is satis- 

 factory to iiotr ih.it Dr. Bather considers the exhibition <>f 

 local objects should be the main function of local 

 museums, their first duty being " to interest the people of 

 their city or county in their own history." 



The Bulletin Scientifique de la France et dc la Belgique 

 is making a praiseworthy effort to advance the assimila- 

 tion of current scientific literature by publishing an 

 annual " Bibliographia Evolutionis," which is to record 

 not only the titles of books and papers, but likewise to 

 give a precis of their contents. The present issue, of 

 which we have been favoured with a copy, deals with the 

 year 1910, and contains 345 items. The compilers are 

 to be congratulated on the celerity with which they have 

 accomplished this work, and are entitled to the gratitude 

 .,f ..11 ,,,,1,..,.. ,,f ^^ihjpcts connected with evolution, both 

 iini botany. 



Is < oniK ( lion with the arrival of the first livin^ , 1, phant- 

 seal at our own Zoological Gardens, to which i\l\.icnce 

 has been mad. in Nature already, it is interesting to note 

 that, accord: nj4 to Science, half-a-dozen young elephant- 

 seals from Guadalupe Island, on the Californian coast, 

 have been received at the New York Aquarium in excel- 

 lent condition. Although not more than nine months old, 

 these young monsters average about 250 lb. in weight, and 

 measure from 4i to 5 feet in length. Although described 

 as a distinct species (Macrorhinus angustirosiris), the 

 Guadalupe sea-elephant is identified by Mr. Rothschild with 

 the typical M. leoninus of Juan Fernandez, the Crozet 

 form, to which the London specimen belongs, being re- 

 gard. .1 li\ i>Mii ;is a race of the same species. 



J and life-history of pycnogonids (Pantopoda) 



form the .subject of an illustrated article by Mr. H. Prell 



in the third part of the Bergens Museum Aarbog for 



ino. If kept in cold water, the members of the genus 



NO. 2164, VOL. 86] 



Nymphon flourish in at, „. \.. ol thcju 



a few are also able to swim by the aid of 



hairs, which are more Mrongly developed in n 



in females. They feed entirely on Hydrozoa, more •-;>:- 

 ally Campanulariida.-, and the curious mode in which t;i< w 

 organisms arc seized and devoured is well shown in the 

 illustrations. The species of Pycnogonum which are 

 parasitic on sea-anemones, the juices of which they suck, 



are, on the othi-r hand, much r .i;n.. ..1. ,., i-. ;., 



confinement. 



The accepted classification of the brittle^tars (Ophi- 

 uroidea), according to Mr. H. L, Clark in a paper, oi 

 302 pages, published as Bulletin No. 75 of the U.S. 

 .National Museum, is little .short of an absurdity, nor has 

 any attempt been made for the last thirty years to put it 

 on a rational basis. Unfortunately, the author ha» not 

 found himself in a position to remedy this unsatisi 

 state of affairs, and he has therefore followed a cL. .;. 

 cation based on a compilation of the work of Lyman and 

 some of his successors. Mr. Clark's paper relates to the 

 North Pacific representatives of the group, of which an 

 enormous collection, comprising more than 40,000 speci- 

 mt»ns, referable to about 190 species, were at his disposal, 

 the bulk of these having been collected by the Albatross 

 during various cruises to and from Alaska, Bering Sea, 

 and Japan. Out of 189 species, no fewer than 112 are 

 from south Japanese waters, to which most of them are 

 restricted. This Honshu fauna, as it is called by the 

 author, is evidently related to the still richer Oriental 

 ophiurid fauna, although only about a dozen species are 

 at present common to the two. The Bering Sea fauna is 

 very distinct from that of Honshu, although the two are 

 connected by a group of sixteen common species. Other 

 points brought out in the monograph are the occurrence 

 of West Indian species in the North Pacific, and evidence 

 in favour of the existence of a distinct circumpolar fauna. 



A V.4LUABLE paper on the post-larval development and 

 minute anatomy in the genera Scalpellum and Ibla has 

 been lately published by Dr. F. H. Stewart in the 

 Memoirs of the Indian Museum (vol. iii.. No. 2, iqii). 

 The author has been able to supplement, in some important 

 particulars, the accounts of cirripede development as given 

 in Darwin's classical Ray Society Monograph and in 

 Hoek's well-known contribution to the Challenger Re|X>rts. 

 There are four plates of excellent drawings representing 

 stages between the cyprid-larva and the adult, mostly 

 taken from species of Scalpellum. It will be remem- 

 bered by students of the barnacles that while Darwin 

 and Hoek had stated the dwarf male forms of Scalpellum 

 and Ibla to be sexually pure, Gruvel at a later date 

 (1899) claimed to detect rudimentary ovaries in the 

 peduncle of the male Scalpellum peronii. Dr. Stewart 

 fails to find in S. squamuliferum, and also in a specimen 

 of S. peronii itself, any cells that can be regarded as o\*a, 

 and his descriptions suggest the probability of Gruvel 's 

 " cellules ovariennes non d^velopp^s " being, in truth, 

 large cement-gland cells. Dr. Stewart has also estab- 

 lished the absence of any trace of a testis in the female 

 Ibla cumingii. His work therefore confirms Darwin's 

 distinction of truly unisexual forms, hermaphrodite 

 forms, and pure dwarf-males among the barnacles. 



.•\ 1.ENGTIIV paper in Russian by Mr. S. Kostytschew, 

 dialing with respiration phenomena in plants, is published 

 in the botanical section (No. i) of " Travaux de la Soci^td 

 Imp^riale des naturalistes de St. P^tersbourg " (vol. xlii.). 

 From liis ocpt-riments and conclusions derived therefrom 



