12 



NATURE 



[November 2, 191 1 



for many years before reaching full conviction on the 

 question of evolution. Nor is this surprising ; no one 

 can read the suggestive series of letters to Sir Joseph 

 Hoolvcr without realising how great and numerous 

 were the "doubts and difficulties" through which the 

 veteran botanist battled his way towards final accept- 

 ance of his friend's views. The publication of the 

 Lvell correspondence showed that the author of the 

 "I'rinciples " at the time of the publication of the 

 first volume was perfectly satisfied as to the truth of 

 organic evolution ; this has been insisted upon both 

 by Huxley and Haeckel. Yet, while writing his 

 second volume, Lyell fell so strongly under the 

 influence of Cuvier (whose palaeontological work 

 naturally fascinated him) that he not only rejected 

 Lamarck's hypothesis, but at times seemed to hesitate 

 about the evolutionary theory altogether. Again, no 

 one reading Herschel's address to the British Asso- 

 ciation in 1845. i" which the "Vestiges" is so severely 

 handled, could realise the fact that in 1836 he was 

 writing to his friend Lyell that he was satisfied that 

 the principle of continuity was applicable to organic 

 as well as inorganic nature. It is no disparagement 

 to either of these great thinkers to admit that, while 

 weighing carefully the arguments for and against 

 evolution, they inclined sometimes towards one side 

 and at other times to the opposite view, and, in the 

 words of Darwin, underwent "endless oscillations of 

 doubt and difficulty." 



John W. Judd. 



ANTHROPOLOGICAL RESEARCH IN 

 NORTHERN AUSTRALIA. 



ALL friends of anthropology will rejoice to learn that 

 ^*- after an interval of some years Prof. W. Baldwin 

 Spencer, F.R.S., has resumed his researches among 

 the aborigines of Australia. The following particu- 

 lars as to his work and his plans are extracted from 

 a letter addressed to Mr. J. G. Frazer on September 

 13- 



The Commonwealth Government of Australia is 

 about to. undertake measures for the settlement of 

 the Northern Territory, and during the present year 

 it sent a small party to make preliminary investiga- 

 tions in that region. The leadership of the party 

 was entrusted to Prof. Baldwin Spencer. The mem- 

 bers of the party went to Port Darwin, and from 

 there across to Melville Island; then they returned 

 to Port Darwin and travelled south about two hundred 

 miles, after which they crossed the continent to the 

 Gulf of Carpentaria. Amongst all the tribes 

 examined by the expedition the belief in the re- 

 incarnation of the dead is universal, and the same 

 is true of the notion that sexual intercourse has 

 nothing, of necessity, to do with the procreation of 

 children. "The latter fact," says Prof. Spencer, "is 

 interesting because we now know that this belief 

 exists amongst all the tribes extending from south 

 to north across the centre of Australia." On the other 

 hand, Prof. Spencer found among these northern 

 tribes none of the intichiuma or magical ceremonies 

 for the multiplication of the totems which form so 

 important a feature in the totemism of the central 

 tribes; nor could he discover any restrictions observed 

 by the natives in regard to eating their totemic 

 animals and plants. "The absence of intichiuma 

 ceremonies," he adds, " is doubtless to be associated 

 with the fact that the tribes in the far north live 

 under conditions very different from those of the 

 central area. They never suffer from drought or lack 

 of food supply. This seems to show that the in- 

 tichiuma ceremonies are a special development of 

 tribes that live in parts such as Central Australia, 

 where the food supply is precarious." 

 NO. 2192, VOL. 88] 



In one or two tribes along the Roper River a very 

 curious totemic system was discovered. Among these 

 people a man must marry a woman of a particular 

 totem, but the children take a totem different from 

 both that of their father and that of their mother. 

 For example, a man of the Rain totem must marry 

 a woman of the Paddy-melon (a species of small 

 kangaroo) totem, and their children are of the Euro 

 (a species of kangaroo) totem. Again, a Porcupin>- 

 man marries a Lizard woman, and their children :<■ 

 Bats. In these tribes each exogamous class has c 

 tain totems associated with it. Again, in these trit 

 the natives are convinced that the spirit children kn' 

 into what woman they must enter, so that the 1 

 spring shall have the proper totem. Everywhere, \" 

 among the tribes traversed by the expedition, tht- 

 women and children believe that the sound of the bull- 

 roarer is the voice of a great spirit who comes to t.-ii 

 away the boys when they are initiated; but durii 

 the initiatory ceremony, when the boys are shown t! 

 churinga for the first time, they are informed tli 

 the noise in question is not made by a spirit, but ti\ 

 the churinga, or bull-roarer, which was used in tin 

 past by one of the mythical ancestors of the triK 

 Lastly, Prof. Spencer could detect among these trit. 

 no trace of anything like a belief in a supreme beir. 

 On the whole, he considers that, with minor vari 

 tions, the beliefs of these northern tribes are closi . 

 similar to those of the central tribes. 



Prof. Spencer hoped to start about November i fr.: 

 another expedition to Melville Island, the inhabitan 

 of which he is particularly anxious to studv, as th' 

 are hitherto practically uncontaminated by European 

 influence. His intention is to reside among ther 

 until February. All anthropologists will look forwni 

 with keen interest to the publication of Prof. Spencer 

 fresh inquiries in this promising region. It is mm 

 to be regretted that his former colleague in researr' 

 Mr. F. J. Gillen, has been prevented by the state 

 his health from taking any part in these new invest' 

 gations. 



THE TAAL VOLCANO. 



'X*HE latest publication received from the Weathr 

 -^ Bureau of the Philippines is entirely devot. 

 to a violent eruption of the Taal Volcano, whic 

 took place on January 30 of this year. Th: 

 volcano, which lies thirty miles south of Manila, ;~ 

 represented by a crater in a small island which rise- 

 from the centre of Lake Bombon. As this lake joins 

 Taal in its activities it also must be regarded as an 

 active crater. If its waters could be removed by the 

 deepening of the channel of the river which now 

 drains it, we should have a replica of Mount Aso, in 

 South Japan, viz., a large crater about twelve miles 

 in diameter with an active cone in its centre. The 

 craters of these two mountains rank among the 

 largest of which our world can boast, but thev are bv 

 no means comparable with the largest in the moon. 

 If, however, the crater plains of Taal and Aso could 

 be lowered to the level on which these mountains 

 grew, they would closely resemble many lunar vol- 

 canoes. 



The written history of Taal commences in 1572. 

 Since that time the volcano has been fifteen times in 

 eruption, the last being that now under consideration. 

 Often it has obliterated hamlets and villages round 

 the lake, but its last effort has practically cleared out 

 evervthing. The number of dead is given as 1335. 

 but because so manv were buried beneath the ash and 

 mud the exact number will never be determined. Of 

 all the inhabitants round the lake the only sur\'ivors 

 appear to have been those who were absent from their 



