334 



KNOWLEDGE & SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[January, igo6. 



run through the bridges before our conception of what consti- 

 tutes a species, or even a race, can be regarded as finally 

 settled. 



The Senses of Animals. 



Several intcrestini; connnnnic.itions ha\e appc.ired during 

 the last few weeks concerning the senses and psxchology of 

 animals. A German authority has. for example, expressed the 

 opinion in somewhat confident terms that fishes are stone-deaf; 

 this view being based on the structure of their internal ear. 

 A discussion on the subject has appeared in the columns of 

 the Fii-ld newspaper, in which several anglers point out that 

 fishes can perceive vibrations, from which it is inferred that 

 they can hear. This is, of course, begging the question, as if 

 the German aurist is right in his contention that fishes laclc 

 the essential parts of the organ of hearing, it is quite evident 

 that vibrations must be perceived in some other manner. A 

 second Continental authority has adduced evidence to show 

 that ants recognize one another by means of the sense of 

 smell, which is apparently located at the base of their antenna-. 

 Finally, a third foreign naturalist, who writes from Costa Rica, 

 is of opinion that there is no difference in kind between 

 the essentially automatic actions of even the lowest organisms 

 and the manifestations of the human will, but that there is a 

 gradu.al transition from one to the other. 



Ne\v Bats. 



The study of bats has occupied a large amount of attention 

 during the last few months, and a number of new species and 

 races of the horseshoe and leaf-nosed groups have been named. 

 By far the most interesting addition to the list is, however, a 

 new mastiff-bat from West Africa, since it is a near relative of 

 a group hitherto known only from tropical America. It 

 comes, indeed, very close to the .American Molossiis. although 

 it has been made the type of a new genus — Eoiiiops. 



Papers R.ea.d. 



At the first meeting for the k)05-5 session of the Zoological 

 Society, held on November 14. Dr. Kidd discussed the arrange- 

 ment of the fine ridges on the hands and feet of various species 

 of mannnals, chiefly monkeys and lemurs. Mr. Honhote named 

 two new species, and one raceof Tibetan mammals, viz., a fox, 

 a hamster, and a vole. Major Evans communicated notes on 

 the gorals, or lesser goat-antelopes, of Burma ; while Miss 

 Bate gave an account of the mannnals of Crete. At the meeting 

 on November 28 Mr. Lydekker discussed the colouring of the 

 guereza monkeys, and also called attention to a mounted 

 specimen of the little known white-maned serow, or goat- 

 antelope of China; Mr. Thomas exhibited and discu-ssed a 

 collection of mammals from Japan ; and Mr. Kegan proposed 

 a rearrangement of the fishes of the southern family Galuaxiidir. 

 Ai the meetmg of the Geological Society held on November 22 

 Dr. Smith Woodward described new remains of a species of an 

 extinct genus of Chim;Era-like fishes from the Lias of Lyme- 

 Regis. 



REVIEWS OF BOOKS. 



My Life: A Record of Hvcnts and Opinions, by Alfred Rnssel 

 Wallace; in two vols. (Chapman and Hall; price, 25s. net.). — 

 Among the many claims to attention possessed by Dr. A. K. 

 Wallace's autobiography is that of furnishing a sunmiary of 

 most of the controversies which shook the mid-\'ictorian era. 

 It was the day of controversies and of controversialists, perhaps 

 because it was also the day of great generalisations ; perhaps 

 because scientific interests were less decentralised, and what 

 interested one body of scientific workers interested them all. 

 The controversies of to-day between Sir Oliver Lodge and 

 Professor Ray Lankester and Mr. Mallock on Psychics, or 

 between Mr. Hateson and Professor Karl Pearson on Heredity, 

 rouse no such passions as those between the Darwinians and 

 the theologians, or between Dr. Wallace (for example) and 

 St. George Mivart and the other sceptics of Spiritualism. To 

 read Dr. Wallace's record of these great controversies is to 

 experience a sense of intimacy with another generation, as 

 well as with other times. Dr. Wallace is the last of the great 

 controversialists. He was one of the three who "kept the 

 bridge " for Darwinism ; but a controversy even oi that 



embracing kind was not enough to absorb all his energies. 

 Land nationalisation. Socialism, Spiritualism, and a fierce dis- 

 pute with a fanatic about the configuration of the Earth were 

 some of the subjects du which he argued, wrote, and spoke ; 

 and it is significant of the energy which he put into all that he 

 did that the last named of these controversies — settled by the 

 famous 15etlford Level experiments— gave him more trouble 

 and took up more of his time than any of the rest. The 

 details, the correspondence, and the stages of these contro- 

 versies are all related with great fulness in the two volumes of 

 Wallace's " Life." and would be of the greatest interest and 

 value even had he himself played a less prominent part in 

 them. His position, however, with regard to them is of the 

 first importance. To many people in this degenerate day he is 

 chiefly remembered as the associate of Darwin in what people 

 are sometimes pleased to regard as the •' discovery " of the 

 Darwinian theory. A theory of this kind is never '• dis- 

 covered " ; it must be the outcome of the most patient and 

 long-continued examination, observation, and confirmation of 

 research. If it were otherwise, then L")emoeritus or some of 

 the early Greek philosophers who speculated on the origin of 

 the universe might be claimed as the " discoverers" of Dalton's 

 .'\tomic Theory, or of the Fourth State of Matter postulated by 

 Sir William Crookes, and elaborated as a theory of Professors 

 J. J. Thomson and Rutherford. In such a sense Dr. Wallace 

 might — with much more justice — claim to be the discoverer of 

 the Darwinian doctrine of the origin of species, for the idea 

 came to him as a brilliant flash of inspiration while he was in 

 the Malay Archipelago examining and classifying some of his 

 zoological captures. " At the time in question," writes Dr. 

 Wallace, " I was suffering from a sharp attack of intermittent 

 fever, and every day during the cold and hot fit had to lie 

 down for several hours, during which time I had nothing to do 

 but to think over any subject that particularly interested me. 

 I )ne day something brought to my mind Malthus's • Principles 

 of Population,' which I had read about twelve years before. I 

 thought of his clear exposition of the ' Positive checks to in- 

 crease ' — diseases, accidents, war, and famine — which keep 

 down the population of savage races to so much lower an 

 average than that of more civilised peoples. It then occurred 

 to me that these causes and their equivalents are continually 

 acting in the case of animals also. . . . Vaguely thinking 

 over the enormous and constant destruction thus involved, it 

 occurred to me to ask the question ' Why do some die and 

 some live ? ' And the answer was clearly, ' that on the whole 

 the best fitted live.' . . . Then it suddenly flashed on me 

 that this self-acting process would necessarily iuipvovc the nice, 

 f)ecause in each generation the inferior would be killed off and 

 the superior would remain, that is, the fittest tiouli! sitrvwe." 

 The idea, thus furnishing one of the curious coincidences of 

 science, occurred to Wallace while Darwin was working at it ; 

 but it is none the less to Darwin that the establishment of the 

 great principle on a firm basis is due ; and it is to him, as Dr. 

 Wallace modestly admits, that we must ascribe the name of 

 the real discoverer. In this extract we have touched upon 

 only one facet of interest among the many for which these 

 remarkable volumes are conspicuous. They were written by 

 a man who was intimate with the best scientific intellect of 

 two generations, and who has been generous in relating the 

 points of contact he had with them. 



An Elementary Text-Book of Inorganic Chemistry, by R. Lloyd 

 Whiteley, F.I.C.; pp. S and 243 (Methuen ; price, 2S. (id.i. — 

 Students taking the elementary stage of the Board of Educa- 

 tion examinations in inorganic chemistry will find all they 

 require in this little book, w hich is too short, howe\er, to include 

 much more than the details essential for this particular pur- 

 pose. It is well printed and illustrated, and gives descriptions 

 of numerous experiments in such a way that students can re- 

 peat them for themselves. 



Radioactivity. Professor Rutherford (Camb. Univ. Press, 

 los. 6d. net). — The appearance of a second edition of 

 this treatise so soon after the appearance of the first is 

 an event which gives rise to an apology from the author 

 to the purchasers of the first edition. However, so rapid 

 and extensive have been the advances made in our know- 

 ledge of the subject, that everyone will concede that no 

 apology is due. The present edition is \u all intents a new 

 book, although it is based upon the old one. Besides a re- 

 arrangement of the whole, three new chapters have been 



