No. 1 07 1, Vol. 42] 



NA TURE 



33 



these he has incorporated the allied work and generaliza- 

 tions of Ryder and other collaborateurs, the whole being 

 woven into a connected argument. The author declares 

 at the outset that he is the more convinced "that it is the 

 habit that has given rise to the structures of animals, and 

 not the structures which have forced animals to adopt 

 their special habits," while he sets himself to discover, 

 "in the light of the descent traced by palaeontology, 

 the mechanical causes for the existence of the salient 

 characters of the skeleton and dentition of the Mammalia." 

 The paper abounds in suggestive and ingenious passages, 

 and the author sums up his conclusions in the words :— 



"The general law which we may derive from the preceding 

 evidence is, that in biological growth, as in ordinary mechanics, 

 identical causes produce identical results. " 



We have, in all, that which savours of rank Lamarckism ; 

 and the assiduous author of the remarks we have cited is 

 (as our readers have lately been made aware), clearly, no 

 believer in the non-transmission of acquired characters. 

 He asserts that 



"since the modifications acquired by use during life are neces- 

 sarily useful, it seems that, according to the post-Darwinians, 

 the only way of acquiring useful variations known to us, is ex- 

 cluded from the process of organic evolution ; " 



and further, that 



"were this hypothesis true, there would have been no evolu- 

 tion." 



Again, he writes, 

 "in spite of Weismann's theory to the contrary, so long as the 

 t;erm- plasma is subject to nutrition, it is subject to influences 

 (luring the adult life of an animal, and it would be an exception 

 to all other tissues were it not so." 



The second and last paper in the September issue is by 

 W. M. Wheeler, upon " The Embryology of Blatta ger- 

 manica and Doryphora decemlineata^' It is illustrated 

 by seven exquisite plates, which, we are glad to note, are 

 of native (American) origin. In testimony to the thorough- 

 ness of the author's work, it need only be said that he pro- 

 fesses to be able to tell "just what position any oothecal &gg 

 held in the ovary, or just what position any ^gg in the ovary 

 will hold in the capsule." Evidence of direct cell-division 

 is adduced, and the author's observations under this head 

 have a most important bearing upon the allied researches 

 of Carnoy. The author records the discovery of the 

 very early appearance and paired arrangement of the 

 Malpighian tubes, and he regards the facts to which he 

 alludes as indicating "that at one time they opened on 

 the surface of the body, and that their orifices were 

 subsequently carried in by a deepening of the proctodreal 

 invagination," and that " probably these tubes in insects 

 are homologous with the anal tubes of EcJiiurus larva, 

 which are modified segmental organs." Gegenbaur, as is 

 well known, long ago postulated such an origin for the 

 excretory apparatus of the Insecta, and Beddard has 

 lately substantiated his belief, on argument from analogy i 

 to the Chtttopod worms, in which he finds {Acanthodrilus) 

 evidences of such an inturning of undoubted nephridia. 

 The author has investigated, among other things, the 



\ orientation in ookinesis, and he draws the conclusion I 

 that " the force of gravitation has no perceptible effect ' 

 on the development of the eggs of Blatta, but that these 

 highly differentiated eggs, utterly unable to revolve in their 

 envelopes, like the eggs of birds and frogs, have their con- 



I stituents prearranged, and the paths of their nuclei pre- 

 determined, with reference to the parts of the embryo." 



In the DeceiTiber number of the journal, Dr. Shufeldt 

 communicates a detailed work " On the Position of 

 ChamcEa in the System" (28 pp.). In this welcome 

 addition to his previous papers on the smaller Passerines, 

 the author gives a short description of the pterylosis, 

 visceral anatomy, and myology of the bird, and deals at 

 greater length with its skeletal anatomy ; he concludes 



that the Wren Tit is allied to the Bush Tits {Psaltriparus) 

 rather than to the true Wrens. Dr. G. Baur rushes into 

 print with two short notes, " On the Morphology of the 

 Vertebrate Skull," and " On the Morphology of Ribs and 

 the Fate of the Actinosts of the Median Fins of Fishes," 

 respectively. In the twelve short pages devoted to 

 the two, the conclusions are arrived at that " the 

 doctrine of the 'otic' bones established by Prof. Huxley 

 twenty-five years ago, and held since that time by nearly 

 all morphologists, is incorrect," and that " the elements of 

 the anal and caudal fins of fishes . . . are represented by 

 the chevron bones of the tail vertebrae, which are the 

 partial homologues of the actinosts." The author's pro- 

 posal to revive the term " petrosal " for that element now 

 known as the " pro otic " is especially to be deplored. 

 ! These notes, although not wholly destitute of merit, are 

 premature. They deal with questions in morphology 

 which have taxed the powers of the greatest anatomists, 

 and which are not to be summarily disposed of in a suc- 

 \ cession of scrappy communications, any one of which may 

 more or less completely contradict its predecessors. If, 

 in respect to these leading topics, every intelligent inquirer 

 is thus to dogmatically foist upon the public his musings 

 upon facts observed in individual specimens, to say 

 nothing of others pitchforked in second-hand, and which 

 he has therefore not observed at all, what is to become 

 of our already too voluminous literature? We cannot 

 allow to pass unnoticed the contraction of Theromorpha 

 to "Theromora"; life is too short for actions of this 

 kind, even if etymologically justifiable. The remaining 

 contribution is by E. B. Wilson, upon " The Embryo- 

 logy of the Earthworm" (55 pp.). It is an extended ac- 

 count of investigations previously announced in an earlier 

 issue of the same journal ; and it is, moreover, very 

 welcome now that current research is revealing in 

 the earthworms an altogether unexpected and intensely 

 interesting range of modification. The author's results 

 raise momentous questions affecting the most important of 

 current morphological beliefs ; while largely confirmatory 

 of the recent work of Kleinenberg, they run counter to the 

 same in matters of vital importance, and interest in them is 

 thereby enhanced. The most important topics dealt witii 

 are the origin of the mesoblast and the development and 

 morphology of the head (prostomium). The author 

 asserts that Kleinenberg was in error in his account of the 

 origin of the first-named, and he criticizes those facts 

 and deductions which lead him to reject the ordinary 

 conception of the mesoblast as an embryonic layer : he 

 attempts to show that the cerebral ganglia do not arise in- 

 dependently of the rest of the nervous system, and that the 

 cavity of the prostomium is from the first unpaired. 

 These and other lines of investigation have led him to a 

 reconsideration of the annelid Trochosphere, and that 

 he regards as " a secondary larval form," which has 

 " arisen from an elongated segmented ancestral form, 

 . . . the head region or prostomium being enormously 

 developed, . . . and the trunk region more or less re- 

 duced." The author confirms Kleinenberg's discovery of 

 the remarkable " cleavage pore," and suggests a probable 

 significance for the same. He regards both muscular 

 and glandular segments of the nephridia as ectoblastic in 

 origin, and he adduces reason for suspecting that the 

 Hirudinea may formerly have possessed sita?. The last- 

 named is by no means the least suggestive point raised 

 in this excellent paper, which fully realizes the expectations 

 raised by its author in his preliminary note referred to. 



We observe that the late publication of this journal, so 

 conspicuous at the outset, is being persisted in. With 

 respect to this, as concerning more than one of their 

 scientific serials, our American brethren are establishing 

 a dangerous precedent for which there is absolutely no 

 excuse ; and it is with much dissatisfaction that we note 

 the adoption of a similar course nearer home. 



G. B. H. 



