January 1, 1898.] 



KNOWLEDGE. 



Founded in 1881 by RICHARD A. PROCTOR. 



LONDOX : JANUARY 1, 1S9S. 



CONTENTS. 



The Karkinokosm, or World of Crustacea. By the 



Eer. Thomas K. R. SxEnicso, m.a., f.b.s., f.l.s. 



(lUmtrated) 



A Drowned Continent. By K. Ltdekkbb, b.a., f.e.s. ... 

 Is Weather affected by the Moon ? By Aiex. B. Mac- 



Do^yArL, M.A. (Illustrated) ... 



Serpents and how to recognize them. By Lioxei .Testis 

 The Prismatic Camera during Total Eclipses. By 



Wm. Shackieion, f.b.a.s. {Illustrated.) (Plate) 

 Notes on Comets and Meteors. By W. F. DENXiyo, 



F.B.A.S. ... 



Richard Proctors Theory of the Universe. By C. 



Eastox. (Illustrated) ... 



British Ornithological Notes. Conducted by Haert F. 



WiTHKEBT, F.Z.S., M.B.O.r. ... 



Science Notes 



Letters : — A. T. Mastebman ; A. Geaham, m.a. ; Thos 



J. HaBDT ; W. H. S. MOXCK ; ■ lONOBAMrS ' 



Notices of Books. (Illustrated) 



Books Eeceited 



Obituary 



Botanical Studies. — I. Vaucheria. By 

 jEyNIXGS, F.L s., F.G.S. {Illusf rated) 



The Face of the Sky for January. 

 Sadlke, f.r.a.s. 



Chess Column. By C. D. Locock, b.a. 



A. 



By 



THE KARKINOKOSM, OR WORLD OF 

 CRUSTACEA. 



By the Rev. Thomas E. R. Stebbing, .m.a., f.r.s., f.l.s., 



Autlwr of " A History of Cnistiicen," " The Xaturalist of 

 Cumbrae," " Report on the Aniphijiodti collected hy H.M..S. 



' Chttllenijer,' " etc. 



DAN CHAUCER'S well of EngUsh undefiled being 

 at the disposal of the naturalist, it is often 

 thought that only out of pedantry or sheer 

 perverseness he tills his story with names and 

 terms borrowed from alien tongues, framing 

 uncouth compounds out of dead Greek and Latin. Instead 

 of saying that the subject now before us is Carcinolotry 

 (pronounced Karkinology), or the science of Crustacea, it 

 may, therefore, be more acceptable to declare that the 

 discussion will turn on the nature of barnacles, water-fleas, 

 fish-lice, scuds, hoppers, slaters, hodmandods, shrimps. 



prawns, hermits, lobsters, crayfish, crawfish, and crab- 

 fish. The explanation is not quite so compendious as the 

 word "Crustacea." It is much longer, and yet does not mean 

 so much. It tries to be explicit, and yet remains vague. 

 For, on the one hand, many of the popular names above 

 given are misleading, since no crustaceans are fishes, and 

 some water-fleas and fish-Uce are not crustaceans ; and, 

 on the other hand, there are several important groups 

 which, because they are seldom seen unless expressly 

 sought for, and because they make no direct appeal to the 

 pleasure or convenience of mankind, have been passed 

 over without receiving any colloquial designation. The 

 truth is that no branch of natural history can be handled 

 with any degree of thoroughness to the exclusion of its 

 own appropriate terms of art ; and, as these are intended 

 for cosmopoUtan use, there is an advantage in deriving 

 them from the languages of ancient Greece and Rome, 

 which can provoke no international jealousies in the breasts 

 of modem students. 



The class Crustacea, omitting one controversial group, 

 may be conveniently divided into three sub-classes called 

 Malacostraca, Entomostraca, Thyrostraca. Of these 

 names the first is primeval, and the second of long 

 standing. Their meanings have ceased to be of impor- 

 tance ; it is only the application of them that is important. 

 No one thinks that General Wolfe was especially ferocious, 

 or Charles James Fox exceptionally cunning, or that 

 Bishop Butler had charge of his master's wine-cellar, 

 whatever the circumstances may have been which in the 

 past gave rise to their family names. On the same 

 principle the term Entomostraca {see Fig. 1), meaning 



,^^^ ■ 



X 



Fig. 1. — Sstheria gihoni (Baird). A Phyllopod of Palestine. 



insects with shells, may well be retained, although the 

 animals intended are no longer classed among insects, 

 and many of them are totally devoid of shells. There is 

 a natural craving for descriptive names in science — for 

 names that teach something. That this craving is so 

 seldom gratified is not due to ill nature on the part of 

 the naturalists. Attempts to indulge it are generally 

 failures. The most ingeniously constructed name can 

 scarcely be expected to enshrine more than one striking 

 characteristic of the group it denominates. Now, research 

 is provokingly progressive, and in its progress it is quite 

 fond of showing chat the character specified in the ingenious 

 name either does not belong to all the members of the 

 group, or that it belongs also to the members of several 



