Oct. 19, 1883.] 



* KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



243 



immersed in glycerine the tongue, with its appendages, 

 becomes a singularly beautiful object, with dark 

 ground illumination. A power of IJ in. is handy for a 

 preliminary view, after which a half-inch will exhibit 

 most of the important details. The hairs are exquisitely 

 arranged in a series of whorls, and become very brush-like 

 towards the tip. All through the tongue there runs a 

 tubular hollow, and at the tip an opening may be discovered 

 as shown in the arched part of Fig. 3 (Oct. 5). I made a 

 mistake in describing this as iinderside uppermost. It 

 is exactly the opposite. The opening into the tube 

 is on the upper side, which the reader will please 

 correct in p. 217. This sketch was made from 

 a preparation in Canada balsam, which permits 

 the use of much higher powers than can be employed wlien 

 an object is in a cell with Huid, but it has the important 

 disadvantage of pressing together parts that ought to be 

 seen in their natural positions. The tip of the tongue is 

 damaged by this squeezing. As seen in the glycerine it 

 is not at all flat, but somewhat pufled out, and with a 

 hollow like a spoon. Seen sideways the spoon shape is 

 very plain. It is provided with peculiar short, sharp, 

 curved spines. I imagine from an examination with high 

 powers that at the base these spines may be provided 

 with nerve filaments, and that they may be sense-organ 

 appendages, like cat's whiskers. After the tongue has 

 been kept a few days soaking in glycerine, its 

 transparency is increased, and the tube which runs down 

 it is seen to be connected at the base with a 

 bladder-like pharynx. The act of extending the tongue 

 causes the whorls of hairs to stand out a little, and this 

 makes them very effective for the sweeping use made of 

 them. 



The maxillffi, as seen with the half-inch objective, are 

 not only hairy — which the knife-like maxilhe of biting 

 insects are not — but liberally provided with respiratory 

 tracheal tuVjes running across them. External organs freely 

 supplied with these tubes are usually adapted to collect 

 some information ; that is, receive and transmit some im- 

 pressions. In the bee, the maxillre are tongue-helpers, and 

 we may be sure that a supply of nerve-power secures the 

 harmonious co-operation of the several parts of this com- 

 plicated feeding apparatus. As it is not convenient for 

 Knowledge to give much space in one number to a single 

 subject, further elucidation of the bee's mouth organ must 

 wait for the next paper. 



KRAO. 



AT the recent meeting of the British Association, Mr. 

 J. Park Harrison introduced the subject of Krao, 

 the so-called " missing link." He said that the idea that 

 the hairy child lately exhibited at the Westminster 

 Aquarium possessed ape-like peculiarities, which she liad 

 inherited from wild parents in some remote forest in Laos, 

 appeared to be so widely entertained that he thought it 

 well to bring the; subject before the department. Ho 

 quoted statements that had been made in advertisements, 

 and in a circular issued at the Aquarium, and called 

 attention to the guarded language of some of the daily 

 papers, and lie then said it was unfortunate that an account 

 by Dr. Garson, which had appeared in the Jlri/is// ifediral 

 Journal, had not obtained a wider circulation. That account 

 showed that there was nothing abnormal in Krao except 

 hairiness, and since then a letter had been published from 

 a resident in Siam which stated that her parents were 

 !~!iamese, and were then living. Neither possessed any 



special peculiarities, nor did their other children. Siamese 

 was Krao's native language, but she had picked up a little 

 Laos. The joints of her arms and fingers were flexible, but 

 not more so than those of other Siamese. Her power of 

 grasping things with the toes was also possessed more or 

 less by all the Siamese, who are a barefooted people. Her 

 parents were in the habit of showing her, and they sold her 

 for £60 — double the value of an ordinary child. The first 

 letter of her name expressed whiskers. She was an intelli- 

 gent Siamese child, with no peculiarity beyond hairiness, 

 and she possessed rather a pathological than an anthropo- 

 logical interest. 



Dr. Garson said that the child was a well-marked example 

 of the yellow-coloured races found inhabiting the eastern 

 parts of India. The cheeks were normal, there was no 

 enlargement of the space between the gums and the cheeks, 

 and the fulness of the cheeks was entirely due to their 

 thickness. There were no double teeth ; the hands and 

 feet exhibited mobility, the feet not having been deformed 

 by boots. The direction in which hair grew could be 

 studied from this child on account of the quantity. On 

 the fore-arms the hair was directed outwards and upwards ; 

 on the upper arms it was outwards and downwards. 

 Such cases occurred in various races and in difierent 

 parts of the world. In many the development had been 

 greater than in this child. There w-ere no ape-like 

 characters present, nor any that would indicate specific 

 difference of any kind. As to the so-called rudimentary 

 tail, there was no abnormality to be observed in that 

 region. Cases of reported development of tail were ex- 

 tremely doubtful. In some cases slight abnormalities did 

 occur, but could not be regarded as tail developments. 

 Every one had normally a homologue of a tail, but it had 

 only in one or two cases been found to be enlarged in size. 

 The explanation as to these abnormal developments of hair 

 which seemed most reasonable was the atavistic theory. If 

 we were able to trace back man to a primitive condition 

 we should probably find that he was covered with hair 

 The follicles in which the hair grew had not disappeared 

 in ourselves, and an abnormal growth was simply the re- 

 appearance of an old condition which was normal in the 

 primitive race of man. 



Dr. Struthers, of Aberdeen, described Krao's ease as a 

 special case of development of the hair which was normally 

 rudimeutary on the human body. He had once in Aber- 

 deen had to examine the case of a body reported to have a 

 tail, but he found that it was simply a case of misdirection 

 of the natural bones, and so the tail case broke down. The 

 anthropologists were often jokingly asked when they were 

 going to find a man with a tail. It should be remembered 

 that even the higher apes had no tail, and tlierefore the 

 question of tail or no tail was of no importance. To discuss 

 the missing link was to tread on dangerous ground. Hair 

 would never settle the question. The great point was 

 the brain. The missing link w\as not a link, but a chain. 

 The brain was one link, and the other was erect posture. 

 If we could conceive a monkey having somehow got one 

 day an abnormally superior brain, it would not remain up 

 a tree. Then his limbs would commence to adapt them- 

 selves to their new conditions. Given the larger brain and 

 the larger intelligence, the other development would follow 

 in the course of time. The missing link, in one of the 

 most painful senses, could be seen any day in the idiot 

 ward of an asylum. 



Mr. Hyde Clarke said he was one of the Council of 

 Science of the Westminster Aquarium, but they had not 

 been asked to see Krao. He classed the " missing link " 

 with the tattooed Greek sailor and the whale that turned 

 out to be a porpoise. 



