August 12, 1897] 1 



NATURE 



355 



natural history was swept away, as chessmen from the board at 

 the end of a game. So for as our science is concerned, there is 

 a complete break at this period. The modern school of zoology 

 dates from the appointment of Prof E. S. Morse, of Salem, 

 Mass., U.S.A., to the chair of Zoology at the University of 

 Tokyo, in 1877. His indefatigable zeal and genial manners 

 won many friends for the new science among all classes of 

 society, while his lectures, popular or otherwise, drew attention 

 for the first time to the immense strides which our science, 

 under the stimulus of Darwinism, was making in the West. He, 

 with a few students under him, also soon had in working order 

 a tolerably good museum — the nucleus of the present zoological 

 and anthropological collections of the Science College. It was 

 also during his stay and through his care that the Tokyo Bio- 

 logical Society, from which the Tokyo Zoological Society is 

 directly descended, was first organised. It is truly wonderful 

 how much he accomplished in the brief time he was in Japan. 

 On the return of Prof. Morse to America, he was succeeded by 

 Prof C. O. Whitman, now of the University of Chicago. It 

 was the latter who first introduced modern technical methods. 

 These two Americans, Morse and Whitman, thus stood sponsors 

 to the modern school of zoology in Japan. 



Since 1881, the development of zoology in Japan has been 

 entirely in the hands of Japanese.^ The spirit of earnest 

 study which signalised the natural history school of the pre- 

 Restoration days is happily revived, but with higher and wider 

 purposes, and with greater facilities for successful attainment. 

 Though only twenty years have passed since the " new de- 

 parture," a vigorous school of zoology has already sprung up. 



There can be no doubt that the establishment of the marine 

 station at Misaki, by the Imperial University, in 1887, gave 

 a great impetus to the study of zoology in Japan. Situated at 

 the point of the peninsula jutting out between the Bay of 

 Sagami and the Bay of Tokyo, it has access to localities long 

 since famous as the home of some remarkable forms of animal 

 life. Along the coast, all sorts of bottoms are found, yielding 

 a rich variety of animal forms, while the hundred-fathom line 

 is within two or three miles of the shore, and depths of five 

 hundred fathoms are not very difficult of approach. The ex- 

 istence of a remarkable deep-sea fauna in these profounder 

 parts has been ascertained within the last few years, and zoo- 

 logical treasures are now being constantly hauled up. The great 

 "Black Current" {Kuro Shhvo) sweeps by, not many miles 

 out, and a branch of it often comes right into the harbour of 

 Misaki, gladdening the heart of the Plankton collector. Face 

 to face with this inexhaustible treasury of animal forms, the 

 zoologist will have to possess unusual powers of self-restraint, 

 indeed, not to grow enthusiastic over his science. 



The prospects of zoological science in Japan have never been 

 brighter than they are at this time. All of its main branches, 

 including applications of it to practical purposes, such as 

 fisheries, sericulture, entomology, &c., are now fairly repre- 

 sented. Each year will see gradual additions to the specialists 

 of different groups, as the number of graduates from the Im- 

 perial University increases. The marine station at Misaki, 

 which has become too small for our growing body, will be re- 

 moved within the present year to a new site, about two miles 

 north of its present location, and its accommodations will Ije 

 considerably enlarged. While perhaps not essential to the 

 pursuit of science, the extreme beauty of the situation, which 

 commands a matchless view of Fujiyama and the Sagami Bay, 

 will certainly not lessen its attractions ; and an additional 

 charm to those who are interested in the heroic achievements 

 of the past may be found in the historical associations with 

 which the spot abounds. A proposed railway, passing near 

 the new site, will bring the station within two or three hours 

 of Tokyo. A number of teachers, scattered over different parts 

 of the country, are acting somewhat as sentinels at the outposts 

 of zoology, and doing good service in collecting animal^ from 

 diflferent localities. The field of activity has also lately been 

 suddenly widened by the addition of Formosa to the territory 

 of Japan, and the work of a collector now on that island will, 

 it is hoped, be but the forerunner of many similar undertakings. 



i Some who read this statement may consider that I have not given due 

 credit to those zoologists from other countries who have lived in, or visited, 

 Japan from time to time. It is certainly as far as possible from my inten- 

 tion to slight the labours of Hilgendorf, Doderlein, Pryer and others, but 

 the fact remaihs that the recent development of the zoological school in 

 Japan has been almost entirely independent of these men. It is a pleasure 

 to me to add that Mr. Owston, of Yokohama, b.is been very active in 

 unearthing the treasures of the deeper parts in ibe. Sagami Sea.— K. 



MlTSUKURI 



NO. 1450, VOL. 56] 



THE WORSHIP OF METEORITES.^ 



"LJERE is a small fragment of iron that has a curious history. 

 ■ _ It is a portion of a mass of meteoric iron found upon a 

 brick altar in one of the Ohio mounds. Along with it were 

 various objects — a serpent cut out of mica — sevexal terra-cotta 

 figurines — two remarkable dishes carved from stone into the 

 form of animals ; pearls, shells, copper ornaments, and nearly 

 three hundred ankle bones of deer and elk. There were but one 

 or two fragments of other bones, and one animal furnished but 

 two of these ankle bones ; hence they must have been selected 

 for some special, important reason. The figurines had been 

 apparently broken for some purpose, and the whole collection 

 had suffered in the fire not a little. In a like altar of another 

 mound of the same group were found nearly two bushels of like 

 objects. 



It must have been in some ceremony of a religious, possibly 

 one of a funereal, character that the mound builders collected 

 here on the altar their ornaments and other valuables, and after 

 burning them buried the charred debris in the huge earthen 

 mound that was built over them and the altar. 



What would we not give if this fragment could be endowed 

 with the power of repeating to us its experience — chapters in 

 the history of that people ? But nearly all that we can say is 

 that it was found among objects held by them in peculiar 

 esteem, and used by them in some serious, probably religious 

 ceremony. 



There was formerly, and so far as I know there is still, in 

 the collection of meteorites in Munich, a stone that weighs 

 about a pound. It fell in 1853 in the region north of Zanzibar, 

 on the East African coast, and was seen and picked up by some 

 shepherd boys. The German missionaries tried to buy it, but 

 the neighbouring Wanikas, because it fell from heaven, took it 

 to be a god. They secured possession of it, anointed it with 

 oil, clothed it with apparel, ornamented it with pearls, and 

 built for it a kind of temple to give it proper divine honours. 

 The agents of the missionaries were not allowed even to see the 

 stone, far less could they purchase the Wanika's tutelar deity. 

 Neither entreaties, nor arguments, nor offers of the missionaries, 

 nor of the officials were of any avail. But when three years 

 later the wild nomad tribes of the Masai came down upon the 

 Wanikas, burned their village, and killed large numl:)ers of 

 them, the Wanikas thought very differently of the stone's pro- 

 tecting power. . In fact they lost all respect for it. A famine 

 having meanwhile arisen, the elders of the tribe were quite 

 ready to exchange their palladium for the silver dollars of the 

 missionaries. 



Among the jBuddha legends is one of two merchants who 

 offered food to the Buddha, which was accepted, and in conse- 

 quence of their request for some memorial of him the Buddha 

 gave them a hair and fragments of his nails, and told them 

 that hereafter a stone should fall from heaven near the place 

 where they lived, and that they should erect a pagoda and 

 worship these relics as though they were Buddha himself. 



The nations of India have always been specially superstitious 

 about stones fallen from the skies. In 1620 an aerolite fell 

 near Jullunder, and the king sent for a man well known for 

 the excellent sword blades that he made, and ordered him to 

 work the lump into a sword, a dagger and a knife. The mass, 

 however, would not stand the hammer, but crumbled in pieces. 

 By mixture with iron of the earth the required weapons were 

 made. 



In 1867 a shower of stones fell, some forty in number, at 

 Saonlod. The terrified inhabitants of the village, seeing in 

 them the instruments of vengeance of an ofli'ended deity, set 

 about gathering all they could find, and having pounded them 

 into pieces they scattered them to the winds. 



In 1870 a meteorite fell at Nidigullam, and the Hindoos at 

 once carried it to their temple and worshipped it. The same 

 has been repeated in India on the occasion of several other 

 stonefalls in the present century. One native ruler refused to 

 allow a stone to be carried across his territory for fear of the 

 injury that might come to his people or his lands. 



Two Japanese meteorites, formerly the property of a daimio 

 family, were long kept and handed down as heirlooms, being 

 in the care of the priests in one of the family temples. They 

 were among the family offerings made to Skokujo on her fes- 

 tival days. They were connected with her worship by the 



1 A lecture delivered in New Haven, Conn., by the late Prof. Hubert A. 

 Newton. (Reprinted from the A uierican Joutnul of Science.) 



