Feb. 28, 1889] 



NA TURE 



429 



of cases by Darwinism where Lamarckism fails. Mimicry and 

 protective colouring, adaptation of flowers to insect visitors, in- 

 stincts of neuter insects, and Lamarck's chosen case, the giraffe, 

 were among these. 



It was then pointed out that breeders have never produced 

 new varieties by transmission of acquired characters (La- 

 marckian), but always by transmission of congenital characters 

 (Darwinian). 



Whilst all this tends to the complete rejection of Lamarck's 

 ' heory, it is true that Darwin himself admitted Lamarckism as 

 an explanation of some rudimentary organs (disuse), and of 

 some instincts (transmission of acquired habit). 



On the other hand, neo-Darwinians reject Lamarckism alto- 

 gether, because (i) the fundamental fact of transmission of a 

 change of structure or habit acquired during the life of an indi- 

 vidual by the action of external agencies is not only not proved 

 but is contrary to experience ; (2) such transmission is highly 

 improbable in view of the structure and origin of the repro- 

 ductive germs ; (3) even if admitted as possible, Lamarckism is 

 not needed in order to explain the facts of the structure and 

 habits of existing plants and animals, in addition to Darwinism. 



Pure Darwinism is sufficient. 



Finally, the lecturer dealt with some cases advanced by 

 Lamarckians as favourable to their views, and gave their 

 Darwinian explanation. 



Among these were rudimentary organs, where the fully- 

 developed organ would not be injurious, e.^. the intrinsic muscles 

 of the human ear. These were explained by panmixia and 

 parsimony of growth. 



Blind animals in caves and in the deep sea, e.g. blind cray- 

 fish, Thaumastocheles, and blind fishes, were shown to be best 

 explained by the natural selection of congenital blindness. 

 Amongst a whole brood of animals swept by a flood into a 

 cavern, or by a current into deep water, those with perfect eyes 

 would escape by following the light, whilst those with con- 

 orenitally defective eyes would remain and reproduce their defect 

 in iheir offspring, and in each succeeding generation the same 

 process of natural selection would be continued. 



Wingless insects and birds were similarly explainsd. 



Instincts, e.g. "shamming dead," nest-building, choice of 

 food, were briefly considered, and shown to be explicable by 

 Darwinism and not by Lamarckism. 



In fact, it was declared that, in proportion as our knowledge 

 of any class of such facts is extensive and thorough, the Dar- 

 winian explanation is found to be correct and the Lamarckian 

 inadequate and inapplicable. 



A consideration of the mental evolution of man, according to 

 neo-Darwinisni was promised as the subject of a future lecture. 

 It was briefly stated that the results of education and circum- 

 stances, good or bad, cannot be transmitted, whilst hereditary 

 qualities, good or bad, cannot be eliminated, except by selection 

 in breeding. 



The transmission of acquired experience does not take place 

 by heredity, but (among civilized societies) by the agency of 

 tradition and books. 



In civilized societies the injurious effects of unlimited neglect 

 of selective breeding is largely neutralized by panmixia, giving 

 an average race, neither wholly good nor wholly bad. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 

 Cambridge. — The Botanic Garden Syndicate, unlike some 

 others at Cambridge, have been able to erect their new plant- 

 houses within one pound of the estimate, ;^3000. The work has 

 been satisfactorily done by Messrs. Boyd, of Paisley. Solid 

 foundations have been laid, .'o that when required new wood- 

 work may be built on the same walls. The new houses include 

 a warm orchid-house, warm fern-house, stove, palm- house, 

 aquarium, and stove-pit. A laboratory, for investigations re- 

 quired to be conducted near the plant-houses, has been built ; it 

 contains two large working-rooms and a dark chamber. The col- 

 lections removed to the new houses are now in capital condition. 

 The hardy cactuses, probably unsurpassed, have been removed 

 to the border in front of the new stove. A new bed has been 

 made for the choicer hardy Ericaceae. Great progress has been 

 made in naming and labelling. Among plants of scientific 

 interest that have flowered in the gardens is Pilocarpus pennati. 

 folius, which yields pilocarpine, Erythroxylon Coca, Narcissus 



Broussoneti (the corona a mere rim), and many others. Among 

 the most interesting plants received have been Gerbera Jamesoni, 

 a fine Composite from the Cape, Isortandra Gutta (yielding gutta- 

 percha), VVashingtonia robust a, a choice new palm, Stcuhys 

 tuberifera, a new vegetable (the crosnes of the Paris markets), 

 and numerous hardy bamboos. 



The regulations altering the arrangement of papers in the 

 Natural Sciences Tripos have been confirmed, making tbe papers 

 special ones in subjects, instead of general ones covering all the 

 subj ects. 



The following have been appointed members of the Boards of 

 Electors to Professorships named : Moral Philosophy, Principal 

 Caird ; Chemistry, Prof. A. W. Williamson ; Botany, Sir Joseph 

 Hooker ; Geology, Prof. A. H. Green ; Jacksonian of Natural 

 Philosophy, Prof. A, W. Williamson ; Mineralogy, Prof. H. N, 

 Story-Maskelyne ; Political Economy, Right Hon. L. H. 

 Courtney ; Zoology, W. H. Flower, C.B. ; Experimental Physics, 

 Sir W. R. Grove ; Mechanism and Applied Mechanics, Sir F. J. 

 Bramwell, F.R.S. ; Physiology, Prof. Humphry; Logic, Prof, 

 Bain. 



Mr. A. E. Shipley has been approved as a teacher ol 

 Comparative Anatomy for the purpose of medical study. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



The American Journal of Science, February.— Points in the 

 geological history of the Islands Maui and Oahu, Hawaii, by 

 James D. Dana. The subjects illustrated by the present state 

 of these islands are : the conditions of extinct volcanoes in 

 different stages of degradation ; the origin of long lines of pre- 

 cipice cutting deeply through the mountains ; the extent and 

 condition of one of the largest of craters at the period of extinc- 

 tion, and the relation of cinder and tufa cones to the parent 

 volcano. The accompanying plates, reduced from the recent 

 large Government maps, show the present general features of 

 both islands. Incidental reference is made to the late controversy 

 on Darwin's theory of coral islands, the author declaring em- 

 phatically that no facts have hitherto been published by Mr. 

 Murray or Mr. Guppy that prove the theory false, or set aside 

 the arguments in its favour. Some of the facts are more in 

 favour than opposed to it, while none do more than offer a 

 possible alternative. — An experiment bearing upon the question 

 of the direction and velocity of the electric current, by Edward 

 L. Nichols and William S. Franklin. The authors, who had 

 already independently developed a method similar to that 

 lately described by Foeppl (Anna/en der Pliysik nnd Cheniie^, 

 here repeat his experiment with an apparatus capable of indi- 

 cating the direction and velocity of the current, supposing it to 

 have direction, even though that velocity Were very great indeed. 

 They show that they would have been able to detect a change 

 of deflection due to the motion of the coil, even though the 

 velocity of the current had been considerably in excess of one 

 thousand million metres per second. — On the occurrence of 

 monazite as an accessory element in rocks, by Orville A. Derby. 

 The researches of Mr. John Gordon and Prof. Gorceix have 

 placed beyond doubt the wide distribution of monazite in the 

 sea and river sands of Brazil, but under circumstances that give 

 no clue to its origin. The petrographic analyses here described 

 have resulted in the discovery that gneiss, granite, and syenite 

 yield, besides zircon, a certain quantity of microscopic crystals 

 of a heavy yellow mineral apparently identical with the Bahia 

 monasite. Recently, also, Mr. Gordon has obtained residues of 

 zircon and monazite from the river sands at Buenos Ayres, and 

 from gneiss and granite decomposed in situ at Cordoba in the 

 Ai^entine Republic— On the use of steam in spectrum analysis, 

 by John Trowbridge and W. C. Sabine. These experiments 

 show that a remarkable degree of economy in time and in waste 

 of apparatus results from the use of a jet of steam in spectrum 

 analysis, when the spark method of obtaining the spectra of 

 metals is employed. — A comparison of the electric theory of 

 light and Sir William Thomson's theory of a quasi-labile ether, 

 by J. Willard Gibbs. A comparison is here instituted between 

 the electric theory of light and the new theory of an elastic ether 

 expounded by Sir William Thomson in the Philosophical 

 Magazine for November 1888. The result of this inquiry seems 

 to be that both theories in their extreme cases give identical 

 results. The greater or less degree of elegance, or completeness, 

 or perspicuity, with which these laws may be developed by 

 different physicists should weigh nothing in favour of either 



