wr 
OcTOBER 2, 1913] 
NATURE 
145 
the occurrence of burnt earth as an evidence of man’s 
existence in the Miocene (?) ‘Monte Hermosean.’” 
“The conclusions of the writers with regard to the 
evidence thus far furnished are that it fails to estab- 
lish the claim that in South America there have been 
brought forth thus far tangible traces of either geo- 
logically ancient man himself or of any precursors 
of the human race.” A. C. Happon. 
PAPERS ON INVERTEBRATES. 
2) Susie interest attaches to the description by 
Dr. A. Brinkmann, in the Bergens Museum 
Aarbok for 1912, part 3, of a new genus and species 
of deep-sea nemertine worm—Bathynectes murrayii— 
which differs from all previously known forms in the 
external position of the male genitalia. A single 
example was obtained so long ago as 1895, while 
sixteen others were collected by the Michael Sars in 
igo. The length of females ranges from 43 to 
61 mm., with a breadth of from 7:5 to 10 mm., but 
males are considerably smaller. Although the new 
organism, of which figures are given, represents an 
entirely new type, it forms in some degree a connect- 
ing link between Planktonemertes and Nectonemertes, 
In connection with the above may be noticed a paper 
by Dr. M. v. Gedroyé, in Bull. Ac, Sci. Cracovie for 
February, 1913, on certain new European leeches, 
referred to the genera Trocheta and Hzmentaria, 
special interest from a distributional point of view 
attaching to the second determination, owing to the 
fact that while the genus was originally described 
from South America, it is now known to occur in the 
United States, Canada, Lapland, and Poland. 
The death-feigning instinct (Katalepsie) among 
stick-insects (Phasmidz), as exemplified by-the species 
Cerausius morosus, forms the subject of a very interest- 
ing article by Mr. Peter Schmidt in Biol. Centralblatt 
of April 20. These insects, it appears, are extremely 
prone to assume the cataleptic phase, and may do so 
in almost any pose—sometimes lying flat on one side, 
with the limbs and antennz stretched out parallel with 
the body, sometimes with the legs straddled outwards 
and the head and thorax raised, and at other times 
standing on the head. As these insects are specially 
modified to imitate vegetation, it seems that the cata- 
leptic condition is another adaptation—of the muscular 
and nervous structures—to the same end. 
The beetles, spiders and scorpions, earwigs, and 
flies collected during the Abor Expedition of 1911-12 
form the subject of four articles by specialists in 
part 2 of vol viii. of Records of the Indian Museum, 
a number of new forms being described. In vol. iii., 
part 4, of Annals of the Transvaal Museum, Mr. L. B. 
Prout and Mr. E. A. Meyrick respectively describe 
new local Geometridz and Micro-Lepidoptera. 
We have received a copy of a concise “‘ Synopsis of 
the Classification of Insects,’ drawn up by Prof. Max- 
well Lefroy, and published by Messrs. Lumley, of 
Exhibition Road, at the price of one shilling. The 
arrangement of the orders is the one adopted by 
Messrs. Sharp and Shipley, and a brief, but apparently 
sufficient, definition is given of each order and family. 
The lack of an index is a decided drawback to the 
value of the work. 
To the May number of The Entomologist’s Monthly 
Magazine the Hon. Charles Rothschild contributes a 
note on the extremely rare bugs of the genus Caco- 
demus, which are parasitic on Old World bats. Three 
species are mentioned, one from South Africa, a 
second from India, and a third of which the home 
is at present unknown. Mr. Rothschild, it may be 
added, employs the name Clinocoride for the bugs, 
whereas Prof. Lefroy, in the synopsis just mentioned, 
uses Cimicid@. R 
NO. 2292, VOL. 92] 
that 
THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION AT 
BIRMINGHAM. 
SECTION D. 
ZOOLOGY. 
OpENING AppreEss BY H. F. Gapow, F.R.S., Presi- 
DENT OF THE SECTION. 
‘“ADDRESS your audience about what you yourself 
‘| happen to be most interested in, speak from the 
; fullness of your heart, and make a clean breast of 
your troubles."” That seemed good advice, and I shall 
endeavour to follow it, taking for my text old and 
new aims and methods of morphology, with special 
reference to resemblances in function and structure on 
the part of organs and their owners in the animal 
kingdom. First, however, allow me to tell you what 
has brought me to such a well-worn theme. Amongst 
the many impressions which it has been my good 
luck to gather during my travels in that enchanting 
country Mexico are the two following :— 
First, the poisonous coral snakes, Elaps, in their 
beautiful black, red, and yellow garb; it varies in 
detail in the various species of Elaps, and this garb, 
with most of the variations too, occurs also in an 
astonishing number of genera and families of semi- 
poisonous and quite harmless Mexican snakes, some 
of which inhabit the same districts. _A somewhat 
exhaustive study of these beauties has shown incon- 
testably that these often astoundingly close resemblances 
are not cases of mimicry, but due to some other 
cooperations. 
Secondly, in the wilds of the State of Michoacan, at 
two places, about twenty and seventy miles from the 
Pacific coast, I myself collected specimens of Typhlops 
which Dr. Boulenger without hesitation has deter- 
mined as Typhlops braminus. Now, whilst this genus 
of wormlike, blind little snakes has a wide circum- 
tropical distribution, T. braminus had hitherto been 
known only from the islands and countries of the 
Indian Ocean basin, never from America, nor from 
any of the Pacific Islands which possess other kinds 
of Typhlops. Accidental introduction is out of the 
question. Although the genus is, to judge from its 
characters, an especially old one, we cannot possibly 
assume that the species braminus, if the little thing 
had made its way from Asia to Mexico by a natural 
mode of spreading, has remained unaltered even to 
the slightest detail since that geological epoch during 
which such a journey could have taken place. There 
remains the assumption that amongst the of course 
countless generations of Typhlops in Mexico some 
have hit off exactly the same kind of permutation and 
combination of those characters which we have hitherto 
considered as specific of braminus, just as a pack of 
cards may in a long series of deals be dealt out more 
than once in the same sequence. 
The two cases are impressive. They reminded me 
vividly that many examples of very discontinuous dis- 
tribution—which anyone who has worked at zoo- 
geography will call to mind—are exhibited by genera, 
families, and even orders, without our knowing 
whether the groups in which we class them are natural 
or artificial. The ultimate appeal lies with anatomy. 
Introduced to zoology when Haeckel and Gegen- 
baur were both at their zenith, I have been long 
enough a worker and teacher to feel elated by its 
progress and depressed by its shortcomings and 
failures. Perhaps we have gone too fast, carried 
along by methods which have yielded so much and 
therefore have made us expect too much from them. 
Gegenbaur founded the modern comparative 
anatomy by basing it upon the theory of descent. 
The leading idea in all his great works is to show 
transformation, ‘‘continuous adjustment” 
