248 



NATURE 



[October 21, 1920 



calumnies. Its appetite for a dead rabbit or the 

 like has doubtless given some basis for misinter- 

 pretation. We doubt whether it is quite correct 

 to say that the rollingf-up musculature (orbicularis 

 pannicidi) of the hedfjehop is also used in raising 

 the spines, but perhaps Miss Pitt means merely 

 that the contraction of the cap-like sheet is a factor 



in making the spines stand out firmly. We like 

 what is said in regard to the individuality of hedge- 

 hogs and other beasts of the field. Miss Pitt is 

 to be congratulated on a book which takes its 

 place in the first rank of works on field natural 

 history. It is a personal record of clever, patient, 

 and sympathetic observation. J. A. T. 



Obituary. 



Prof. Yves Delage. 



BY a large number of zoologists, who have 

 known the charm of Roscoff Marine Station 

 during the last twenty years or more, the death 

 of Prof. Yves Delage on October 8 will be felt 

 as a personal loss. It was not merely that Prof. 

 Delage grudged no time or trouble if he could help 

 one with a piece of work ; it was the impressive 

 sincerity of the man and the simplicity with which 

 he wore his learning. He had an encyclopajdic 

 knowledge of the shore-fauna and of the literature 

 of biology, but he encouraged the learner with a 

 Darwin-like humility. His devotion to science was 

 singularly complete. All through his life, with an 

 extraordinary intensity, he was preoccupied with 

 biological and psycho-biological problems, and he 

 did not often unbend his bow except for the simple 

 pleasures of domesticity and the open air. 



Yves Delage was born at Avignon in 1854 and 

 educated at various provincial schools. He was 

 greatly influenced in his student days by de Lacaze- 

 Duthiers, whom he afterwards succeeded both at 

 the Sorbonne and at Roscoff. It was under this 

 master that he acquired a great liking for 

 "microtomy" of a rather different sort from that 

 which the word now suggests. We mean what 

 Delage himself called "patient dissections under 

 the microscope," the kind of investigation which 

 he illustrated in his thesis (1881) on the vascular 

 system of sessile-eyed Crustaceans. That he did 

 not, however, stand so aloof as Lacaze-Duthiers 

 did from the use of the microtome was shown in 

 subsequent researches, such as those dealing with 

 the development of sponges (1887). After a period 

 of assistantship to Lacaze-Duthiers, of whom he 

 always spoke with great reverence, Delage became 

 professor at Caen and director of the adjacent 

 Marine Station at Luc. He soon returned, how- 

 ever, to the Sorbonne, and was actively at work 

 there until quite recently. He was elected a member 

 of the Institute in 1901, about the time when he 

 assumed full charge at Roscoff; he received the 

 degree of LL.D. from Aberdeen University when 

 he attended the quatercenfenary celebrations in 

 1906; and he was awarded the Darwin medal by 

 the Royal Society in 1916. For some years past 

 his eyesight had given way badly, but his mental 

 vision was unimpaired. 



Delage 's scientific industry was at once a re- 

 proach and an inspiration to those who knew him ; 

 it was almost incredible. His great book on 

 "Heredity and the Great Problems of General 

 Biology " (1895, second edition 1903) is a monu- 

 NO. 2660, VOL. 106] 



ment. It is marked by erudition, clearness of 

 exposition, fair-mindedness, and keen criticism. 

 We have temperamentally a great admiration for 

 his judicial way of balancing evidence, sometimes 

 so judicially that the reader's mind is left in a 

 state of indecision. His own view was definitely 

 neo-Lamarckian, and he had many a thrust at 

 Weismannism. Then there are the twenty 

 volumes or so of "L'Annee Biologique," a very 

 valuable series of critical summaries of current 

 biological memoirs, even the last volume contain- 

 ing many contributions from Delage himself. Again, 

 there are the half-dozen volumes of the "Traite de 

 Zoologie Concrete," in which he was ably assisted 

 by M. H^rouard and others. Besides these there 

 were smaller undertakings, such as the very suc- 

 cessful volume, written along with M. Goldsmith, 

 on "Modern Theories of Evolution" (1909), and a 

 similar volume on "Parthenogenesis " (1913). 



Dfclage's most important contributions to zoo- 

 logy and biology have been (i) his fine study of 

 the life-history of the extraordinary Crustacean 

 parasite Sacculina, (2) his precise work on the 

 development of sponges, and (3) his remarkable 

 experiments on artificial parthenogenesis, with 

 which his name (along with that of Jacques Loeb) 

 will always be associated. We recall also the 

 strange experiments on "merogony" and re- 

 searches on the semicircular canals and otocysts. 

 The study of the ear had a great fascination for 

 him. Nor can we forget a long paper on a whale 

 stranded near Luc, for it was in this connection, 

 about 1885, that we had in our student days, work- 

 ing at the Luc laboratory, our first knowledge of 

 Delage. We suppose that he made mistakes 

 in his work like other distinguished men, but 

 surely his life was marked by what he said 

 Lacaze-Duthiers had by example taught to his 

 school — " la perseverance, la suite dans le travail, 

 la conscience dans I'observation, la sobriety dans 

 les inductions theoriques." 



Delage was at work at Roscoff this summer and 

 autumn, and it is surely not unfitting that the last 

 subject of his eager scientific analysis should have 

 been dreams, on which we believe he had recently 

 completed a treatise. A young student who re- 

 turned last month from a working holiday at 

 Roscoff has given us a pleasing glimpse, with 

 which we close our appreciation. Every day after 

 lunch it was Delage 's habit to sit for a while in 

 front of the laboratory so that any student might 

 know he was then and there at home. 



J. Arthur Thomson. 



