July 14, 1898] 



NATURE 



247 



«elves foaled before 1870 and who therefore were, or would have 

 been, at least 25 years old at the date of the last Year Book in 

 my possession, which is for 1896. This is practically a sufficient 

 allowance, giving say 5 years to the foals in which to make 

 their record, and 20 years as the limit of the breeding age of 

 •either parent. My selection from list (i) contained 716 sires, 

 and that from list (2) contained 494 dams. Reducing to per- 

 centages, the distinguished oftspring (standard performers) to 

 lOO sires and to lOO dams from these lists respectively, are 

 <abulated below, disregarding decimals. Thus out of each 

 Distribution of the Parents of Standard Performers. 



a 00 selected sires, we see that 46 produce only one standard 

 performer, 17 produce two, 10 produce three, 7 produce four, 

 and 5 produce three. Thus far the distribution of prepotency 

 lis not particularly abnormal, and we might have guessed that 

 there would be about 3 cases more, none of which would contain 

 more than from seven to eight standard performers, but the 

 fiicts are surprisingly otherwise. Although the frequency of the 

 successively larger families decreases with fair regularity, the 

 Tate of their diminution is far too slow to be compatible with 

 the normal law of frequency. Instead of the expected 3 cases, 

 •each containing six, seven or eight standard performers, we 

 find 17 cases of far higher contents. Thus in the list of 716 

 sires, the number of distinguished offspring are, — 60 to Blue 

 Bull, 71 to Strathmore, 83 to George Wilkes, 92 to Happy Medium 

 and 1 54 to Electioneer. Making full allowance for the tendency of 

 breeders to send the best mares to the best horses, the prepotency 

 of the sires just named is enormous, that of Electioneer super- 

 latively so. The same results are indicated by the produce of the 



iams, though the figures are less striking owing to the relative 

 ! wness of their offspring. A sire produces some 30 foals annually, 

 ;i dam only one, while the period of production is presumably 

 longer for the sire than for the dam. Consequently out of the 

 'list of 494 dams, the three mares Emetine {sic), Minnehaha and 

 Green Mountain Maid, who produced respectively 7, 8 and 9 

 standard performers, seem as phenomenal as the five horses 

 mentioned above. Again, prepotency is as we should have 

 expected, heritable in a marked degree ; thus all of the above 

 five sires except Blue Bull a.r& sons of '■'• Hambletonian 10," and 

 one of the three mares. Green Mountain Maid, was dam of 

 Electioneer. 



My conclusion is that high prepotency does not arise through 

 normal variation, but must rank as a highly heritable sport, or 

 aberrant variation ; in other words its causes must partly be of 

 a different order, or else of a highly different intensity, to those 

 concerned in producing the normal variations of the race. In 

 ' sport, the position of maximum stability seems to be slightly 



hanged. I have frequently insisted that these sports or " aber- 

 I uices" (if I may coin the word) are probably notable factors in 

 the evolution of races. Certainly the successive improvements 

 <if breeds of domestic animals generally, as in those of horses 

 in particular, usually make fresh starts from decided sports or 

 iberrances, and «re by no means always developed slowly 



hiough the accumulation of minute and favourable variations 

 hiring a long succession of generations. 



Francis Galton. 



Zoology as a Higher Study. 



The following, necessarily condensed, comments on Prof. 

 Ray Lankester's criticisms may be permitted. 



(i) Prof. Lankester's views on the citation of authorities in 

 text-books have been published before. To the best of my 

 belief "authoritative public opinion," if it had expression, 

 vsould favour the side of common sense in this matter. A text- 

 00k, adapted to the needs of the elementary student, in which 

 he "historical method of exposition " should be followed, and 

 ;ich discoverer awarded his due meed of recognition, is an im- 

 ;> issibility, within reasonable Hmits of size and cost. Our 



NO. 1498, VOL. 58] 



reasons for omitting all references to authorities really were 

 those given in the preface, which I invite Prof. Lankester to 

 re-peruse, not those which he ungenerously ascribes to us. 



(2) Where the names of the original' authors of figures have 

 not been quoted, and the proximate source from which the 

 block was borrowed or the figure copied has alone been given, 

 the name of the original author is, in most instances, a matter 

 of no consequence whatever. In a very few cases the omission 

 is regrettable. 



(3) The main responsibility for the "most astonishing" of 

 the errors which Prof. Ray Lankester has noticed in the text- 

 book, viz. the statement that ossification occurs in the skeleton 

 of Elasmobranchs, rests with me, and not with the two sons of 

 W. Kitchen Parker. The most astonishing thing to the 

 initiated onlooker will doubtless be Prof. Lankester's evident 

 confidence that this is an error. 



(4) The "error " with regard to the nephrostome of Lumbricus 

 is Prof. Lankester's. If he will read over that part of the 

 " Text-book " as it would be read by a student, taking the de- 

 scription of Nereis as the foundation, he will understand what 

 I mean. "Corresponding segment" is not " same segment." 



(5) The criticism of the statement regarding coelome and 

 hremocoele in Peripatus would have lost all its apparent cogency 

 had Prof. Lankester quoted only three lines more (see "Text- 

 book," vol. i. p. 561). William A. Haswell. 



The Nature and Habits of Pliny's Solpuga. 



I read with much interest Mr. Pocock's article on " Solpuga" 

 (Nature, vol. Ivii. p. 618). It may be worthy of note that a 

 species of Galeodes is met not infrequently in Southern Cali- 

 fornia, and is one of the few Arthropodous animals that is bold 

 enough to attack and devour the honey-bee. It enters the hive 

 and seizes the bee, worker as well as drone, and soon makes away 

 with it. Were these Arachnoids as abundant as the Robber- 

 flies (Asilidre), they would be nearly as serious enemies of the 

 bee-keepers of Southern California as are those insects. They 

 are not, however, sufficiently numerous to do any serious mis- 

 chief, and so are not feared or dreaded. A. J. Cook. 



Claremont, Cal., May 12. 



The Weather of this Summer. 



In your notice of Symons's I^Iet. Mag. this week, I seem to 

 be credited with (discredited by ?) the announcement that this 

 summer will probably be wet. May I point out that it is one 

 thing to announce this, and another to say that in the five years 

 ending with the next sunspot minimum year (say 1901, or there- 

 abouts), there will probably be more wet summers than dry ? 

 Further, the two rules cited in the notice are based on data 

 extending from 1816, not merely from 1841. 



July 8. Alex. B. MacDowall. 



THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM. 

 T^HE following memorial has been addressed to the 

 -*■ Trustees of the British Museum :— 



Sir, My Lords, and Gentlemen, — We, the undersigned, 

 being persons interested in the science of Natural History, 

 venture to address to you the following observations suggested 

 by the retirement of Sir W. H. Flower from the post of Director 

 of the Natural History Museum (British Museum). 



It is, in our opinion, of great importance to the welfare of 

 Natural History that the principal official in charge of the 

 national collections relating to this subject should not be sub- 

 ordinate in authority to any other officer of the Museum. The 

 Natural History Collections are in a part of London remote 

 from the National Library and the other departments of the 

 British Museum ; the supervision of these collections and the 

 direction of the large staff entrusted with the care of them are 

 sufficient to tax the whole energies of any one entrusted with 

 those duties. For the purpose of facilitating this task and 

 avoiding possible friction, it seems to us necessary that the 

 Directors should meet the Trustees and represent them before 

 Her Majesty's Treasury as the responsible head of a department, 

 and not as a subordinate. 



A position such as we have described was held, to the great 

 satisfaction of the scientific world, by Sir William Flower, 

 who succeeded Sir Richard Owen ; to abolish it now would 

 involve a great change of policy. We believe that the existing 

 system has given satisfaction to the staff of the Museum and to 



