3fi2 



NA TURE 



[January 28, 1909 



look for some deeper meaning', such as that for which 

 Dr. Frazer arg'ued a year or two ago in the Inde- 

 pendent Review. 



In the visual section is included also a discussion of 

 the dance, commonlv unisexual in the lower stages of 

 culture, and of phallic emblems and amulets. Under 

 the heading of hearing we have a discussion of the 

 role of music in sexual life, while the next chapter, 

 mirabile dictu, is devoted to a classification of " gentle- 

 men's stories " and allied themes. 



In dealing with the sexual importance of the sense 

 of smell Dr. .Stoll gives an interesting discussion on 

 the classification of odours, and has also a p^ood deal 

 to say on the subject of racial fcetor. The last chapter 

 deals with the sense of touch ; it includes a discussion 

 of kissing, of specific sexual acts, and of inversion and 

 perversion. It is clear that a work of this sort, if it 

 is to be in any sense complete, demands encyclopsedic 

 knowledge, and can only be successfully carried 

 through with the aid of numerous monographs on the 

 various questions. In recent years a number of general 

 works on the sexual life of primitive peoples have 

 appeared, together with a certain number of mono- 

 graphs on special points such as inversion in Eastern 

 .\sia. Until the number of the latter has considerably 

 increased it will hardly be possible to produce anything 

 more than a sketch of the subject with which Dr. Stoll 

 has dealt; he would probably be the first to recognise 

 the fact. He is, however, as he informs us in the pre- 

 face, chiefly concerned to classify from the point of 

 view of psychology ; and as a classification of anthro- 

 pological facts Dr. StoH's work is as useful as it must 

 have been laborious. 



That these two works should both have been pro- 

 duced in Germany is no accident. The Teutonic spirit 

 aims at an all-embracing philosophy, whether the sub- 

 ject be metaphysical or something less abstruse. It is 

 perhaps fortunate that both in England and France 

 the feeling in anthropological circles is in favour of 

 knowing all about something rather than a little about 

 everything. Classification of knowledge may be the 

 ultimate goal ; at the present day we have still to lay 

 the foundations of such a classification. 



N. W. T. 



THE BONE MARROW. 

 The Bone Marrow, a Cytological Study. By VV. E. 

 Carnegie Dickson. With 49 photomicrographs and 

 12 coloured plates by Richard Muir. Pp. xii+i6o. 

 (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1908.) Price 

 2I. 2s. net. 



"T^HE first part of the book contains a brief descrip- 

 J- tion of the histological methods employed, 

 followed by a description of the various types of 

 marrow and of the changes it undergoes in disease. 



The second part deals with the cytology of the 

 marrow, which the author has studied with the object 

 of observing pathological changes in the cells. The 

 reviewer is inclined to think that in the present state 

 of our knowledge this attempt is premature. The 

 changes illustrated on plate iii., Figs. 1-5, may be 

 degenerative, but some of the nuclei in these cells 

 have a remarkable resemblance to those figured by 

 NO. 204S, VOL. 79] 



L. H. Huic in her papers on Drosera {O.J.M.S., vols. 

 xxxix. and xlii., n.s.), where the cells were subjected 

 to purely physiological stimuli. So also the type of 

 eosinophil cell on plate iii.. Fig. i, No. 14, and Fig. 3, 

 No. 23, is frequently met with in the tissues. lis 

 nucleus somewhat resembles that of an exhausted 

 nerve cell (Mann, J. of Anat. and Physiol., vol. xxix., 

 1894), and is quite possibly a physiological appearance. 

 Much more work on the lines of these three most 

 important papers must be done before we can safely 

 begin the study of intracellular pathology. 



On p. 36 the author explains shortly the opinions 

 of Dominici and Pappenheim on the parent cell of 

 the neutrophil myelocyte, a cell called by the former 

 non-granular basophil myelocyte, and by the latter 

 identified with Ehrlich's large lymphocyte. He illus- 

 trates his idea of this cell in plate i., Figs. 10, 11, 12. 

 The cells in each of these figures are quite different 

 from those pictured by Dominici, Pappenheim and 

 Ehrlich in the works cited in the bibliography. They 

 are typical l.irge mononuclears (Ehrlich's). It is a 

 curious fact, but neither in the coloured plates nor the 

 schemes on plate xii. is there a single example of an 

 undoubted large lymphocyte, one of the most charac- 

 teristic cells of the marrow, and common to it and the 

 other blood-forming organs. 



On the same page he says of this cell ; — 



" According to my own observations this staining 

 reaction " (of the cytoplasm) " varies within some- 

 what wide limits, all gradations from a definite blue 

 to a pale pink being obtainable with methylene blue 

 and eosin." 



This passage indicates that the technique used by 

 the author is quite unsatisfactory. Every histologist 

 knows that most things, especially the cytoplasm, can 

 be stained with eosin. On the other hand, the 

 cytoplasm of these cells (large lymphocytes, lympho- 

 cytes, large mononuclears) has a marked affinity for 

 basic dyes, as can be seen in preparations stained 

 with Pappenheim's pyronin methyl green mixture, or 

 with toluidin blue or polychrome methylene blue, and 

 differentiated with weak acetic acid. Ehrlich pointed 

 out many years ago that successive methods, such as 

 hematoxylin and eosin, or eosin and methylene blue, 

 which the author has worked with, are quite inade- 

 quate for the study of the blood. The reviewer finds 

 that in order to demonstrate neutrophil granules 

 regularly in sections and wet fixed films, the acid and 

 basic dyes must be used simultaneously, and their 

 proportions so adjusted that the granules are stained 

 with the acid dye while the cytoplasm of the adult 

 leucocyte and myelocytes is unstained, and that of the 

 promyelocytes and large and small lymphocytes is 

 stained with the basic dve. 



Judged by this standard, many of the figures in the 

 coloured plates, although very beautiful, are worthless 

 for the object in view. Thus, in plate i.. Fig. 13, 

 there are lymphocytes with eosin-stained cytoplasm. 

 In plate iii., Figs, i and 2, the nuclear chromatin is 

 blue to violet, all else pink. The majority of the cells 

 in plate iii.. Fig. 4, and the large cells with basophil 

 cytoplasm in plate vii., Fig. 10, are labelled myelo- 

 cytes, but their granules are not shown, and therefore 

 it is not proved that they are myelocytes. 



