DECEMBER 18, 1913] 
NATURE 
457 
in the Naturwissenschaftliche Wochenschrift (No. 44, 
pp. 689-93) by Mr. Ernst H. L. Krause. It has been 
“prompted by the attempt of Sernander ‘and others to 
prove that the last marked post-glacial change in the 
climate of Europe, when the mean annual tempera- 
ture was about 5° C. lower than now, set in about 
500 B.c. This era witnessed the Persian invasion of 
Greece, the return of the Jews from captivity, and 
some other national movements, which often are 
consequences of changes in the productiveness of a 
region. But contemporary writers, in their geo- 
graphical descriptions, ought to afford some evidence 
of so considerable a variation of temperature, and on 
this point Herr Krause states the result of his inves- 
tigations. Beginning with Homer, whose age prob- 
ably corresponds with that of the best bronze work 
in the north (in which Sernander holds that the 
climate of Stockholm was dry and. warm), he’ finds 
nothing to imply any difference in the eastern 
Mediterranean from its present mean temperature. 
Hesiod’s writings (perhaps a century later) afford no 
hint of any alteration in the seasons, yet they deal 
with these and their relation to agriculture. Between 
his days and those of Aristotle, the temperature of 
Sweden must have fallen five degrees, yet the writ- 
ings of the latter, though dealing with natural history, 
afford no sign of such a change. Theophrastus, Aris- 
totle’s pupil, writes on botany without giving any hint 
of such an occurrence. Herr Krause therefore con- 
cludes that this hypothesis has no historical basis, and 
that any slight alteration, if such there be, can be 
otherwise explained. 
WE have received a copy of an article by Mr. E. 
Heller, published in the Smithsonian Miscellaneous 
Collections, vol. Ixi.; No. 1, on the northern, or Lado, 
race of the white thinoceros (Rhinoceros simus cottoni), 
based on the large series: of specimens obtained in 
the Lado Enclave during the Roosevelt expedition. 
The author believes that there really is good reason 
for the name “ white’”’ bestowed on the southern race 
of the species by the Boers. Full details of the dis- 
tinctive characters of the skull and teeth are given in 
the article, of which a full summary will be found in 
The Field of November 15. 
To The American Museum Journal for November 
Dr. W. D. Matthew contributes an interesting notice 
of the vertebrate remains found in the well-known 
asphalt-springs of Rancho-la-Brea, California, which 
formed during the later part of the Tertiary period a 
veritable death-trap for the fauna of the adjacent 
country. Even now, when the springs are compara- 
tively inactive, the animal that sets its foot on the 
apparently sound but really treacherous ground is as 
good as lost, but in the Pleistocene matters were ten 
times worse. Remains of more than fifty species of 
birds have been identified, and there were probably at 
least as many mammals. “ Wolves, lions [?=pumas], 
and sabre-toothed tigers, eagles, and vultures are the 
most common of the remains found; next to them 
stand the larger Herbivora, bisons, horses, ground- 
sloths, and larger ruminants and wading-birds; while 
remains of smaller quadrupeds and perching or 
ground-birds are comparatively rare. This is a fact 
NO. 2303, VOL. 92] 
of grim significance, for it indicates that the. larger 
quadrupeds, venturing out upon the seemingly: solid 
surface, and caught in the asphalt, served as a bait 
for animals and birds of prey, luring them from. all 
the country round about, and enticing them within 
the treacherous clutch of the trap; these in their 
turn falling victims, served to attract others of their 
kind.” 
THE latest issue (part 3 of vol. viii.) of Records of 
the Indian Museum is entirely occupied by reports on 
the zoological collections made by Mr. S. W. Kemp, 
assistant-superintendent of the museum, in the course 
of the punitive expedition against the Abors in 1911- 
12. One of the most interesting of Mr. Kemp’s dis- 
coveries in the Abor country—of a species of Reripatus 
—is not, however, here described. Most of the reports 
are merely lists of species with exact records of times 
and places of capture; but several of them are of 
wider interest. Mr. Ekendranath Ghosh contributes 
an excellent and well-illustrated paper on the anatomy 
of slugs of the genera Atopos and Prisma. Mr. 
B. L. Chandhuri, who describes the fishes, brings an 
old controversy regarding McClelland’s Barbus spilo- 
pholus to a satisfactory conclusion. And Mr. Kemp, 
in an interesting account of the river crabs and 
prawns, reiterates the extraordinary difficulty of deal- 
ing with the Potamonide in approved systematic 
fashion. The beautiful plates by A. C. Chowdhary 
and S. C. Mondul are a prominent feature of the 
volume. 
Tuar much-investigated animal, Amphioxus, still 
continues to provide material for elaborate anatomical 
memoirs, and will probably continue to do so for a 
considerable time. It is certainly very desirable that 
our knowledge of this most important type, which 
stands so near to what must have been the origin of 
the vertebrate series, should be as complete as pos- 
sible, and two recently published memoirs set an 
admirable example of thoroughness in dealing with 
special systems of organs. In the first part of a 
memoir entitled ‘‘ Untersuchungen iiber das Gefiiss- 
system der Fische."’ (Mitteilungen aus der Zoologischen 
Station zu Neapel, Bd. 21, No. 4, 1913), B. Mozejko 
demonstrates the existence in Amphioxus of an 
elaborate subcutaneous blood-vascular system. The 
other paper referred to is Miss. H. L. Kutchin’s 
“Studies on the Peripheral Nervous System of 
Amphioxus (Proc. American Academy of Arts and 
Sciences, vol. xlix., No. 10, 1913), in which the author 
describes, with great elaboration, the beautiful results 
obtained by intra vitam staining of the peripheral 
nerves with methylene blue. Both memoirs are ad- 
mirably illustrated, and in both the amount of detail 
observed as the result of very skilful technical mani- 
pulation is highly remarkable. 
AN important further contribution to the series of 
‘Studies in Indian Tobaccos” has been published by 
Gabrielle L. C. Howard, in the Memoirs of the 
Department of Agriculture in India (vol. vi., No. 3). 
The author points out that though most of the 
varieties of tobacco at present grown in India give 
large yields and are therefore very profitable, the 
cured leaf produced from them is usually of very poor 
