May 28, 1914| 
NATURE 
229 
III 
cephalus zone in Africa, which contains dicynodonts 
of very similar type. If this be so, the Cistecephalus 
zone will be topmost Permian, and the underlying 
Pariasaurus zone Middle Permian. 
In an article in the February number of the 
American Naturalist Prof. E. C. Case shows that the 
“ sail-backed ” reptile, Edaphosaurus crucifer, of which 
a restoration is given, is perfectly distinct from the 
genus Dimetrodon, with which it had been incorrectly 
identified. So far from the two being identical, 
Dimetrodon was carnivorous, whereas Edaphosaurus 
probably subsisted on molluscs or insects, with perhaps 
an occasional vegetable meal. Unlike most of its 
reptilian contemporaries, its head was small in pro- 
portion to the body; the dentition consisted of a mar- 
ginal series of sharp conical teeth, and of crushing 
teeth on the palate, the latter opposed by a corre- 
sponding series on the inner side of the lower jaw. 
We have received a corrected copy of a reprint from 
Dr. L. Reinhardt’s ‘‘ Vom Nebelfleck zum Menschen” 
(second edition), issued as an appendix to Dr. H. 
Hallier’s ‘‘Der Stambaum des Pflanzenreiches” 
(Munich), which is being completed by Dr. Reinhardt 
himself. This appendix, in addition to a table ex- 
hibiting the geological succession of the leading groups 
of plants and animals, as exemplified in central 
Europe, contains a number of phylogenetic “‘ trees ”’ illus- 
trating the evolution of animals and of plants, as well 
as of many of their classes and orders. Many criticisms 
of these ‘‘trees’’ might be made, but it must suffice to 
mention that the author regards the toothed whales as 
descended from early carnivorous, and the whalebone 
whales from primitive herbivorous mammals. Mam-, 
mals themselves he derives from Permian ‘ Urrep- 
tilien,’”’ which in turn gave rise to ‘‘ Sauromammalien,”’ 
a group from which the carnivorous theriodonts are 
expressly excluded. 
In an article published in the Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. 
Hist. for 1913 (vol. xxxii., pp. 261-274) Prof. H. F. 
Osborn shows that a skull from the Eocene of 
Wyoming described by Cope in 1884, and referred to 
the genus Triplopus, under the name T. amarorum, 
really belongs to the Chalicotheriida, or perisso- 
dactyles with edentate claws, of which it is the 
earliest known representative. It is consequently 
made the type of a new genus, Eomoropus, which is 
believed to be a specialised offshoot from the stock 
which gave rise to the titanotheres, on one hand, 
and to the forerunners of the horse group on the 
other. 
Three publications dealing with the horse family 
and its extinct forerunners have been issued recently 
in America. The first, entitled the ‘‘ Evolution of the 
Horse,”’ takes the form of a fully illustrated guide to 
the members of the group exhibited in the American 
Museum of Natural History. In the first part, Dr. 
W. D. Matthew discusses the evolution of the horse 
group in nature, while in the second Mr. S. H. Chubb 
deals with the origin of the domesticated breeds of the 
horse, and the structure, growth, and succession of 
the teeth, this latter section forming a really valuable 
contribution to science. In a memoir published by the 
irving Press, New York, under the title of ‘‘The 
Horse, Past and Present,’’ Prof. H. F. Osborn treats 
of the same collection, and also of the members of the 
norse family now living in the New York Zoological 
Park. In the third publication, which is in the form 
of a guide-book to the remains of extinct perisso- 
dactyles allied to the existing horse group preserved in 
Yale University, Dr. R. S. Lull records the various 
expeditions—starting from 1870—which have contri- 
buted to the collection, and concludes with a brief 
summary of the equine pedigree. 
NOguaea0; VOL, 193, 
THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF TASMANIA. 
oF Ress commemorate the seventieth anniversary of the 
foundation of the Royal Society of Tasmania 
the secretary, Mr. E. L. Piesse, has prepared a valu- 
able sketch of its history. The society dates from 
October 24, 1843, and therefore from a quarrelsome 
epoch of Tasmanian history. Its founder, Sir John 
Eardley Wilmot, had landed as Governor before 
arrival of the news of Sir John Franklin’s recall; 
and an uncomfortable situation was relieved by Wil- 
mot’s undertaking a tour in the northern part of the 
island until Sir John Franklin had time to vacate 
Government House. Sir John Franklin in 1838 had 
established a Society for the Promotion of Natural 
History in Tasmania, and after a nameless existence 
it adopted in 1842 the title of ‘‘The Tasmanian 
Society.”’ With characteristic generésity Lady Frank- 
lin established a Franklin Museum about three miles 
from Hobart, and endowed it with aro acres of land, 
A museum building in a classic style of architecture 
was erected, but in consequence of uncertainty as to 
the ownership, owing to vagueness in the deed of gift, 
Lady Franklin’s ideas have not been carried into 
effect. Shortly after his arrival, Eardley Wilmot 
determined to reconstitute the Tasmanian Society; but 
its members were mostly Franklinites, and all but 
five of them withdrew from the meeting, owing to 
disputes over unimportant details. . 
The Governor and those who remained then estab- 
lished a new society under the name of the Botanical 
and Horticultural Society of Van Diemen’s Land. 
Its main objects, according to the charter, were ‘to 
develop the physical character of the island and illus- 
trate its natural history and productions.”” Next year 
Queen Victoria became the patron of the society. It 
accordingly became the Royal Society of Van Diemen’s 
Land, a title which was necessarily changed in 1855, 
when the name of the colony was altered to Tas- 
mania. The older Tasmanian Society was merged 
in the Royal Society in 1848, and in the same year 
the society established the Tasmanian Museum, and 
in the next year commenced the publication of its 
Papers and Proceedings. In 1860 the site of the pre- 
sent museum in Hobart was given to the society by 
the Government, and the new museum was finished in 
1862, and extended in 1886 and 1go1. The society 
has done excellent work by the formation of valuable 
Tasmanian collections and by the publication of its 
papers and Proceedings, which are one of the main 
storehouses of information on the natural science of 
Tasmania. 
Mr. Piesse’s paper is published in the volume for 
1913, which also includes a series of valuable contri- 
butions to knowledge of Tasmania. Mr. Rodway, 
the Government botanist, contributes a monograph 
on the Tasmanian mosses, including short summaries 
of all the species known in the island. These belong 
to 114 genera 
Mr. Beattie reprints with explanatory notes a list of 
words used by the Oyster Bay tribe; the list was 
compiled in 1824, and has only recently been dis- 
covered. Dr. Noetling describes a section near 
Hobart, and insists that all the fossiliferous beds of 
southern Australia, which have long been generally 
assigned to the Eocene, are at the earliest Miocene. 
This conclusion is further supported by the description 
of a fossil whale from Wynyard on the northern coast 
of Tasmania, by H. H. Scott. Mr. Piesse contributes 
two papers on proportional representation, which 
is adopted in Tasmania. . Wi Ge 
1 Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania for the Year 
JQ13- 337 Pp., 1 text-fig. 22 plates, 1 map. (Hobart, 1914). Price iss. 
