September i, 1923] 



NATURE 



Z^7 



In all these applications^ the guiding and selecting 

 initiative must come from the direct study of culture. 

 On these lines- and on these lines only the new anthro- 

 pology can hope to ripen in the future to an independent^ 

 self-contained^ and sovereigTi study with a firm basis 

 in biological science^ itself a solid bridge between 

 humanism and natural history. But this is only a 

 hope and a forecast ! Much work will have to be done 

 yet, and in this, the present volume, an excellent 

 summary of the actual state of our science will be of 

 great help and value. B. Malinowski. 



Sexual Physiology. 



The Physiology of Reproduction. By Dr. Francis H. A. 

 Marshall. Second and revised edition. Pp. xvi + 

 770. (London : Longmans, Green and Co., 1922.) 

 365. net. 



WITH the gradual rise of the experimental school 

 in biology, and with the increasing demand for 

 scientific method in veterinary and medical practice, 

 the existence of a definite gap in scientific literature 

 came to be recognised. Nowhere was the subject of 

 the physiology of reproduction dealt with at all 

 adequately ; in the ordinary text-book of physiology 

 it was dismissed after a very superficial treatment. 

 Moreover, there was not a physiologist competent to 

 write upon this subject at all authoritatively. Bio- 

 logists, pure and applied, owe a great debt of gratitude 

 to Dr. Marshall for having chosen this field in which to 

 work; for, thanks to his labours, the difficulties of a 

 great band of research workers have been made much 

 less complex. 



The second edition of this comprehensive text-book 

 on sexual physiology maintains the reputation so 

 readily secured by its predecessor, published thirteen 

 years ago and long since out of print. It is born into 

 a world somewhat different from that in which the first 

 edition played its part so well ; the specialities have 

 become so fragmented that to-day no one book on this 

 subject can hope to satisfy the demands of such varied 

 interests as those of the experimental biologist, the 

 cytologist, the embryologist, the psychologist, the 

 geneticist, the veterinarian, the obstetrician, and the 

 eugenist. Each no doubt will discover disappointing 

 omissions and conclude that his own particular interest 

 has been somewhat neglected ; yet it cannot be denied 

 that the book remains the only common meeting- 

 ground for all those who are working on the general 

 subject of the physiology of reproduction. It is a most 

 admirable book of reference for the specialist in one 

 branch who wishes to examine his conclusions in the 

 light of the work of others, while to the student of 

 biology at the beginning of his career it will prove a 

 NO. 2809, VOL. I 12] 



veritable mine of information and a great stimulus to 

 his scientific curiosity, for in its pages a hundred and 

 one problems, all urgently demanding further investiga- 

 tion, are suggested. When it is remembered that Dr. 

 Marshall reviews the work of some fourteen hundred 

 investigators, that for the exposition of the subject- 

 matter nearly eight hundred pages are required, and 

 that for the making of the book the collaboration of 

 four specialists was demanded, an idea of the immense 

 amount of research that has been and is being done in 

 this most important subject will be gained. 



Dr. Marshall himself is responsible for the chapters 

 dealing with the breeding season, the cestrous cycle, the 

 oestrous changes in the non-pregnant uterus and in the 

 ovary, gametogenesis, the accessory sexual apparatus, 

 the endocrine function of the gonads, parturition, lacta- 

 tion, fertility, sex-determination, and the phases in the 

 life of the individual. Dr. Cramer has revised and 

 partly rewritten his section on the biochemistry of the 

 sexual organs, and has also revised that originally 

 contributed by Dr. Lochhead on the changes in the 

 maternal organism during pregnancy. Dr. Lochhead's 

 other sections on foetal nutrition and on the physiology 

 of the placenta, owing to the author's absence from 

 Great Britain, unfortunately have not been revised. 



The least satisfactory part of the book, both as 

 regards arrangement and subject-matter, is, we think, 

 that contributed by Dr. Cresswell Shearer on fertiHsa- 

 tion. It begins with a section on the oxidation pro- 

 cesses in the ovum on fertilisation and during develop- 

 ment ; it concludes with one on parthenogenesis, natural 

 and artificial, in which the actual processes which 

 initiate cleavage are discussed ; while between the two 

 we find, inter alia, under " The hereditary- effects of 

 fertilisation " a quite unnecessary statement of Weiss- 

 mann's speculations grafted gratuitously on to an 

 elementary exposition of Mendelism. In this the 

 author, apparently through an inadequate compre- 

 hension of the chromosome hypothesis, devotes a 

 considerable amount of space to tilting at windmills of 

 his own creation without attempting to initiate the 

 reader into the actual facts which have been demon- 

 strated by Morgan and his school. Surely, if it was not 

 the author's purpose to deal with experimental genetics, 

 it would have been better to have omitted all reference 

 to the subject than to have detailed a nomenclature 

 which is of historical interest only and to have criticised 

 hypotheses of which the significant data are not men- 

 tioned. But, as we have said, no specialist will find 

 his own peculiar interest satisfactorily treated in this 

 book : the obstetrician will complain that the pheno- 

 mena connected with the function of reproduction in 

 the human subject do not meet with the treatment that 

 they deserve, the psychologist will perhaps disagree with 



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