370 



NATURE 



[December 3, 1914 



taken by Mr. R. C. Murphy during 1912 and 1913. 

 The main objects of the trip were to obtain a collec- 

 tion of South Georgian birds, and skins, and skeletons 

 of the sea-elephant. Unfortunately the latter part of 

 the programme was not accomplished, although a 

 considerable series of sea-elephant skulls was obtained. 

 Despite the lack of definite arrangements for collecting 

 invertebrates, a number of interesting specimens were 

 secured, which, together with certain plants, form the 

 subjects of notes by specialists embodied in the report. 

 One of the new types is an eight-rayed starfish, described 

 by Prof. Koehler, of Lyons, as Anasierias octoradiata. 

 During the voyage to the south specimens of the 

 male of the minute parasitic crustacean Pandarus 

 satyrtis — previously known only by females — were ob- 

 tained on the fins of a shark. 



The October number of the Emu contains a trans- 

 lation of an article by Mr. L. Brasil (originally pub- 

 lished in the Bull. Soc. Linn. Normandie), on the 

 emeu of King Island. In the early part of last 

 century, when Baudin's expedition landed there, that 

 island abounded with emeus, which were, however, 

 soon after killed off. Peron found emeus both on 

 King Island and Kangaroo Island, and in the account 

 of his voyage, published a plate showing one black- 

 breasted and a second and larger whitish-breasted bird. 

 The former, as represented by a female specimen in 

 the Paris Museum, certainly came from Kangaroo 

 Island, but it has been suggested by Mr. G. M. 

 Mathews that the white-breasted bird came from King 

 Island, and is either the extinct Dromaeus minor, or 

 a second and distinct species, D. spenceri. This view 

 is disputed by Mr. Brasil, who considers that both 

 Peron 's birds came from Kangaroo Island, and sug- 

 gests that the whitish-breasted specimen represents the 

 male, and the black-breasted (as attested by the Paris 

 specimen) the female. Whether the Kangaroo Island 

 D. parvulus is really distinct from the King Island 

 D. minor is left an open question. 



In addition to a paper on the nomenclature of local 

 birds and another on the probable mode of extermina- 

 tion of the moas, to which reference was made in 

 the issue of Nature of November 5, p. 265, 

 under the title of "Ornithological Notes," the Trans- 

 actions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute 

 for 1913 contain communications in which several 

 additions are made to the fauna of the Dominion and 

 the surrounding sea. Among these is one by Mr. S. 

 Berry, of California, on a collection of cephalopods 

 from the Kermadoc Islands, in which two new species 

 of Polypus (Octopus), and a new squid of the genus 

 Abralia are named and described; tvi^o of the new 

 forms are figured. Certain New Zealand fishes — two 

 of which are described as new — form the subject of an 

 illustrated note by Mr. E. R. Waite, the most gener- 

 ally interesting specimen being a ribband-fish 

 {Lophofes cepedianus) taken in the Wellington dis- 

 trict. Two plates illustrating a long paper by Mr. 

 M. N. Watt on the eggs of New Zealand Lepidoptera 

 are notable on account of the exceeding beauty of 

 form and sculpture of some of the specimens figured. 

 Botanists will be interested in a communication from 

 Mr. T. F. Cheeseman on the rate of growth of the 



NO. 2353, VOL. 94] 



kauri pine {Agathis australis), and the age to 

 which it attains. It has been asserted that one of 

 these giant trees, with a diameter of 24 ft., is more 

 than 4000 years old, and a second, of 22 ft. in dia- 

 meter, not less than 3600. In the opinion of the 

 author, based on the number of rings of growth and 

 an estimate of the rate of growth at different ages, 

 these figures should be reduced, respectively, to 1396 

 and 1280. 



Attention has been directed on several occasions in 

 these columns to the excellent work accomplished by 

 the Essex Field Club. Among its many activities is 

 the assistance the members of the club render to the 

 Essex Museum of Natural History at Stratford. The 

 museum is under the control and management of the 

 Higher Education Sub-committee of the Education 

 Committee of the County Borough of West Ham, 

 while the care and arrangement of the collections are 

 undertaken by the council of the Field Club in pursu- 

 ance of agreements- with the West Ham Corporation. 

 The club also interests itself in a second museum 

 situated in Epping Forest, the whole of the arrange- 

 ment and organisation of which has been carried out 

 by the honorary curators, Messrs. W., B. G., and 

 H. A. Cole, assisted by other members of the club. 

 At the Stratford Museum is a library of some 3000 

 volumes on natural history and kindred sciences, and 

 local teachers are encouraged to make free use of 

 them. Facilities for class teaching at the museum 

 have been arranged, and teachers may also borrovk^ 

 duplicate specimens for demonstration. The excellent 

 work in these directions which is being done by the 

 Essex Field Club shows how much enthusiastic local 

 societies can assist in scientific education. 



In two recent papers Dr. W. E. Agar continues his 

 studies on heredity and the life-cycle in the Daph- 

 niidae. The larger paper, on " Experiments on In- 

 heritance in Parthenogenesis " (Phil. Trans. Roy. 

 Soc., No. B 323), consists of a very interesting study 

 of inheritance in parthenogenesis. As is well known, 

 Johannsen and others maintain that within a " pure 

 line " there is no inheritance of size-variation ; all 

 such variability is regarded as due to environment, 

 and not inherited. These conclusions have been criti- 

 cised by Prof. Karl Pearson, who adduced the work 

 of Warren on Daphnia and an Aphid as being 

 opposed to them. Agar has made very full experi- 

 ments with the Daphnid, Simocephalus exspinosus, 

 supported by less extensive work on other Daphnids 

 and on the Aphid Macroslphum. He bred many 

 generations from single females hatched from 

 ephippia, and although when the ancestral correla- 

 tions are worked out in a population derived from a 

 number of ex-ephippio females, these correlations are 

 considerable (o-3-o-6), 3-et the parental correlation is 

 in general no greater than the grandparental, or even 

 great-great-grandparental. ^^^hen, however, a popu- 

 lation is produced from a single ex-ephippio female, 

 there is no correlation at all between parents or earlier 

 ancestors and offspring. The ancestral correlation in 

 the first case is due to the presence of many geno- 

 types among the population ; within the single geno- 

 type the correlation vanishes. The paper contains 



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