404 



NATURE 



[ShrlhMlihk 15, 1923 



Research Items. 



and IMC 

 •laborate 



KoDHK K, I Ml 



Dr. A. II. Ki.M- 

 of Kodi V 1; 

 l'-rimini,ii !■ i. 



mom );^r.ij)li 111 \s nn n m- n 1 1; ■ 1 .> ? - \\\<- \\\ 

 a IcKi'iid has become cinliriMrd m a tnhal - 

 a!ii\(s a1 Itir source ot tlic \.f>t legeiulur} <,.i.ii« nL 

 will, li I ..111 I ilmted to swell the Spanish, French, 

 Scaiulma\ iaii, a\\*.\ Cormaii epic. It is recorded by 

 Bvzantiiie hi^iiu i,iii>, li\ the Arabian compiler in 

 soutlicrn Spam. I- .1 1.. iman inonkisli rlironicler, by 

 a French jon",!' li\ an hdimdie sagaman. 



When the epu 1 : aks down, the material is 



woikiil up anew in the ballads of southern and 

 nortlu III Europe, and while in Spain the people sing 

 of the fatal passion of Don Kodrigo, in far otf Den- 

 mark they know of King Eric Clipping and Ins love 

 for the marshal Is wife. This scholarly monograph is 

 a valuabk' conirilniiion to the study of saga literature. 



Prehistoric American Indian Design. — The 

 figures of men and animals and geometric designs on 

 prehistoric Indian pottery from the Mimbres Valley, 

 New Mexico, are described by Dr. J. W. Fewkes in 

 a monograph recently issued by the Smithsonian 

 Institution. They are unic^ue among the pottery 

 from prehistoric North America, including human 

 figures hunting, gambling, and engaged in various 

 other occupations, animals of all kinds ; and the 

 geometric designs show many beautiful and striking 

 combinations of carved, rectangular, and zig-zag 

 elements, at times forming most intricate patterns. 

 It is difficult to imagine how these ancient inhabitants 

 of the south-west were able to achieve the accuracy 

 and perfection of these involved designs without the 

 aid of mechanical devices. The predominance of 

 animal designs indicates that these largely formed 

 the food of the ancient Mimbrenos. Most of the 

 bowls were of the mortuary type, buried with the 

 dead under the floors of the houses, and nearly all 

 the bowls are " killed " or punctured, in order to 

 serve the needs of the dead in the other world. 



The Life-history of the Horse Oxvuris. — 

 B. Schwartz records {Philippine Jonrn. Sci., vol. 23, 

 No. i) observations on the life-history of Oxyuris equi, 

 a nematode of common occurrence in the colon, 

 caecum, and rectum of horses. The egg develops 

 rapidly, exposure to air being however requisite, and 

 in four days contains a larva. When such eggs are 

 swallowed by guinea-pigs, emergence of the larva occurs 

 in the small intestine, the operculum present at one 

 end of the egg being lifted or detached. No evidence 

 of invasion by larvae of the liver, lungs, or other organ 

 could be found. The life-history of O. equi appears 

 to be simple and direct. The author concludes that 

 the eggs must be eliminated from the host before 

 development can take place, and that horses become 

 infected as the result of swallowing water or food 

 which has become contaminated with the eggs. The 

 larvae hatch in the intestine, settle down in the caecum 

 and colon, and by successive moults attain sexual 

 differentiation. 



Crustacea from Pacific Islands. — The little 

 group of atolls, of which Fanning Island is the chief, 

 lies about a thousand miles south of the Hawaiian 

 Islands and just north of the equator. A knowledge 

 of its marine fauna is therefore important in attempt- 

 ing to delimit the Indo-Pacific region of marine 

 zoogeography stretching east of Suez with a very 

 uniform faunal facies which only dies out as it meets 

 with the very different faunas of Western America, 

 of Northern Japan, and of South Austraha. As a 



contril>utK)n to this knoule l^t; .Mr. < . ii. 1 ' 

 offers a list of " Crust. i< < .< from Palmyra ai 

 Islands " (Bernice 1'. liishop Museum, 1 

 Honolulu, 1923). As the author was with 

 to much important literature on his subj. . i, .. 

 satisfactory to know that tl»e identification of ti 

 more critical species is vouched for by Dr. Mary i 

 Rathbun (who describes two new species in a 

 appendix) and Dr. Waldo L. Schmidt of Washint^l< 

 One interesting sp)ecies whic h reaches its no: 

 limit on these islands is the ircc-climbing cf. 

 crab. It has been stated to occur at th( 

 Islands, but according to the author is not f ■ 

 A sinister explanation of its absence is su^v 

 the remark: " ( )ii I aiming the species is i.e 

 depleted, a ■ le of fo< 



by the Cili 



Circulation of Water in Sponges. — In an int< ■ 

 esting paper on " ! •■" Relation of the Form of 

 Sponge to Its < published in the Quarter: 



Journal of Mu.- , j ...// Science (vol. 67, Part II 

 Dr. G. P. Bidder discusses the mechanics of t; 

 sponge-circulation. He emphasi.ses the fact that : 

 most sponges pressure-chambers are establi :.' 1 

 whereby the velocity of the oscular flow is contnui- ! 

 In dealing with the action of the flagella of tl 

 collared cells, l)\- wlmh the water is propelled throuL 

 the canal system, 1 that they appear as 



labouring in thick gi -suggests that " to unde 



stand microscopic physics it 1 cable short -c 



to think of the water as treac ; doubt whetl; 



this idea will appeal to those who are familiar wi- 

 the extraordinary rapidity of movement of cilia ai 

 flagella in general, or, to take quite a different exampi 

 the active dancing of the extremely minute partick 

 in the vacuoles of the Desmid Closterium. A di 

 cussion of this problem by experts in physical scien 

 would be of great value to biologists. 



*? Development OF the Corpus LuTi avs. — 



The Swiss Societv of Natural Sciences has recently pub- 

 lished as part ofits fifty-sixth volume a magnificently 

 illustrated memoir by Dr. Max Kupfer, entitled 

 " Der normale Turnus'in der Ans- und Riickbildung 

 gelter Korper." Dr. Kiipfer was formerly a pupil 

 of Prof. E. Zschokke, who was the first to adopt the 

 practice, now employed by the veterinarians of many 

 different countries, of squeezing out the persistent 

 corpus luteum or " yellow body " of the ovar>- as a 

 means of inducing oestrus and thereby overcoming a 

 frequent cause of sterility in cows and heifers. Dr. 

 Kiipfer's memoir deals with the gross changes in 

 the anatomv of the ovary and more particularly the 

 corpus luteum of cows at different stages, and the 

 coloured figures, which occupy no less than twenty- 

 eight plates, afford a ver>' valuable guide to the 

 variation in the appearances of the organ from the 

 time of ovulation onwards in both pregnant and 

 non-pregnant animals. The memoir is further illus- 

 trated bv some excellent graphs, one of which re- 

 presents the degrees of development and regression 

 and the amount of overlapping of the corpora Itttea 

 dating from successive ovulation periods. The 

 corpus luteum of pregnancy is stated to reach its 

 maximum development at about the second month. 

 There are also illustrations of c\-stic ovaries, which 

 are another cause of sterihty Wo notice an error 

 in the table on page 32, where it is incorrectly stated 

 that according to Dr. Marshall sows do not ovulate 

 spontaneously during oestrus. The memoir is pro- 

 vided with an excellent bibliography. It is issued 

 from the scientific laboratory' of the slaughter-house 



NO. 28 II, VOL. I 12] 



