NATURE 



[February 4, 1909 



again to pour ridicule on the reasonably substantiated 

 claims of other workers to have made some slow 

 progress by the application of the experimental 

 method, but who, more modest than himself, still 

 remain non magistri scd discipuli naturae in regard 

 to cancer. 



(2) Dr. Powell White's volume is in many respects 

 an antithesis to that of Mr. Roger Williams. A 

 pathologist by profession, his aims and methods are 

 entirely different. The volume does not profess to 

 contain the whole pathology of cancer, and it is a 

 model of scientific self-restraint. Unlike Mr. Williams, 

 Dr. White extends a whole-hearted welcome to recent 

 experimental work. In four chapters the author 

 covers in simple language much that is of main 

 interest in the present phase of investigation of 

 cancer, the study of which he rightly insists may not 

 be separated from that of tumours generally. To 

 this end he classifies tumours according to their his- 

 tological structure and relation to normal tissues, and 

 dismisses a classification based upon embryological 

 conceptions as unscientific and useless. He then pro- 

 ceeds to discuss the rudiment of origin, the mode of 

 growth and extension, the clinical features, and the 

 relations of cancer to organisms attacked. In the 

 latter connection it is pointed out that in studying 

 questions of metabolism in individuals naturallv at- 

 tacked, it is difficult to separate the effects of the 

 cancer per se from those due to the disturbance of the 

 organ affected. The author is no doubt aware that 

 when cancer is implanted into normal animals this 

 complication is got rid of, and the effects of cancer 

 per se obtained pure. Mr. Roger Williams and Dr. 

 Powell White agree that there docs not appear to be 

 any specific cancer toxin, and in conformity with 

 modern conceptions " cachexia," or wasting, is re- 

 garded as a secondary accidental consequence, and not 

 as a necessary antecedent or concomitant constitu- 

 tional condition. Original and suggestive work is 

 recorded on the occurrence of cholesterin, fatty, and 

 other cr^-stals in cancer and in the adrenal cortex, and 

 it is hinted that cholesterin plavs some part in the 

 regulation of cell proliferation. 



The longest chapter in the book is devoted to causa- 

 tion. The evidence for and against extrinsic and 

 intrinsic causation is discussed. A congenital origin 

 is discarded, and a parasitic causation rejected as 

 being entertained mostly by surgeons and bacteriolo- 

 gists who do not appreciate the pathological and bio- 

 logical dilTiculties which £he hypothesis involves, and 

 because, while its upholders never think it necessary 

 to answer the criticisms against it, they continue to 

 bring forward the same old arguments in its favour. 

 This may be too sweeping a criticism of all the vi-ork 

 done on the hypothesis that cancer might be a para- 

 sitic disease, for, although negative, this work cer- 

 tainly cleared the air, and those who have participated 

 in it have done perhaps more to prove one another 

 wrong than many pathologists who have persistently 

 played the part of scoffing spectators. Still, we en- 

 tirely agree with Dr. Powell White that the term 

 parasitism can be applied only to the biological 

 behaviour of the cancer cell itself; any further analogy 

 NO. 2049, \'OL. 79] 



with the processes of known forms of infective disease 

 is certainly erroneous. 



The author considers that extrinsic factors long 

 known to plav a part in the causation of cancer are 

 adjuvant, and not essential, factors, and in defining 

 the intrinsic causative factors he comes to the conclu- 

 sion that a tumour arises from a disturbance of a 

 position of unstable equilibrium between the prolifera- 

 tive forces within the cell and the antagonistic 

 influences of the neighbouring cells. In short, the 

 author seeks his explanation vaguely in the continued 

 removal or diminution of the influences which restrain 

 proliferation, in a disturbance of what is defined as 

 "physiological equilibrium." The phrase physiolog- 

 ical equilibrium, when applied to the phenomena of cell 

 life, is, however, just one of those phrases which, while 

 appearing to define something, really defines nothing. 

 It is merely a vague re-sta"tem.ent of the problem, and 

 disregards the fact that the cell is really a very com- 

 plex mechanism of the component parts of which and 

 their inter-relations we are continually learning more. 

 Dr. White alludes to the progress that is being made 

 by the experimental study of cancer in mice, and in- 

 corporates many of the results as bearing upon cancer 

 in man. Now that it is possible to study the life- 

 history of the cancer-cell experimentally, we may hope 

 that ere long Dr. Powell White's vague explanation 

 ma)' be replaced by some more precise definition of 

 the mechanism responsible for the ceaseless prolifera- 

 tion of cancerous cells, in regard to which, and its 

 relations to constitutional conditions of the body, 

 alreadv much that is new is being learned. The 

 volume, which is the outcome of work generously 

 endowed by Mrs. Pilkington and encouraged by Prof. 

 Lorrain Smith, is well illustrated with statistical charts 

 and photomicrographs, and its perusal must prove 

 profitable to all who wish to be brought up to date in 

 the biology of cancer. E. I". B. 



MAN'S ANCESTRY. 

 Unsere Ahrenreihe (Progonotaxis Hominis) — kritischc 

 Sttidien i'tbcr phyietische AtUliropologie {Festschrift 

 ziir ^^o-jiihrigen Jubelfeier der Thiiringer Universi- 

 tdt Jena mid der damit verbundenen Ubergabe des 

 phyletischcn Museums aryi 30 JuU, 1908). By Ernst 

 Haeckel. Pp. iv-l-58; 6 plates. (Jena: Gustav 

 Fischer, 190S.) Price 7 marks. 



DURING the last four decades Prof. Haeckel has 

 so often sketched a hypothetical genealogical 

 tree representing the series of man's supposed an- 

 cestors, stretching right back to the remote Protozoa, 

 that his name as the author of a treatise bearing the 

 title at the head of this column will convey to most 

 readers a very precise idea of the general nature and 

 scope of the work. 



The book, in fact, is a new edition of the fatniliar 

 story of man's " phylogeny," brought up to date by 

 the incorporation of many of the results of recent 

 morphological and anthropological research, such, for 

 example, as Semon's, Schwalbe's and Klaatsch's 

 work. That it is embellished with a rich profusion 

 of characteristic new terms is not surprising, when 



