May 4, 1905] 



NA TURE 



■teaching before long became apparent in geological 

 literature. It was first translated into French in an 

 edition which, thanks to the singular erudition of its 

 editor, M. E. de Margerie, has been so enriched with 

 footnotes as to become an invaluable work of reference 

 for published papers in every department of the wide 

 range of subjects whereof it treats. Within the last 

 few months the first volume of an English translation 

 by Miss Hertha Sollas, under the direction of her 

 father. Prof. Sollas, of Oxford, has been issued by the 

 Clarendon Press. The labours of Prof. Suess are thus 

 placed within the reach of all English-speaking 

 geologists in a version which reads more like an 

 original treatise in our language than as the trans- 

 lation of a German work. 



That in covering so wide a field as that of the 

 " Antlitz " the author has necessarily had to rely on 

 recorded observations of unequal value, and that con- 

 sequently the deductions he has drawn may need to 

 be corrected from subsequently obtained fuller and 

 more accurate data, will doubtless be admitted by no 

 one more frankly than by himself. But even in regard 

 to questions which have long been discussed, and re- 

 garding which abundant facts have long been known, 

 there is room for different interpretations from those 

 which the professor has adopted. Thus the pheno- 

 mena of submergence and emergence of land in 

 .Sweden and the basin of the Baltic are treated by him 

 in great fulness and with much ingenuity, but he 

 arrives at conclusions strongly opposed to those to 

 which prolonged study has led the northern geologists. 

 This problem is one of fundamental importance in 

 regard to our conceptions of the nature of the move- 

 ments to which the surface of the globe is subject, and 

 it is much to be desired that some general agreement 

 in regard to it should be attained. 



Nevertheless, apart from differences of opinion, 

 which are inseparable from the growth of such a 

 science as geology, and even where one may be most 

 disposed to dissent from the views of Prof. Suess, the 

 transcendent value of his life-long labours is none the 

 less vividly realised now by all who have studied his 

 writings. Their importance in the history of science 

 will assuredly be no less fully acknowledged by the 

 future generations who will gain from them inspir- 

 ation and enlightenment. Meanwhile, he has the 

 satisfaction of abundant recognition from all civilised 

 countries. The learned societies of Europe have vied 

 with each other in doing him honour, and not the 

 least prominent among them has been our own Royal 

 Society, which ten years ago elected him as one of 

 its foreign members, and in the year 1903 awarded him 

 the Copley medal — the highest distinction which it 

 has to bestow. The " Antlitz " is not yet completed, 

 but the second part of the third volume is far advanced. 

 Let us trust that years of rest and quiet work are in 

 store for the illustrious geologist, and that he may 

 live to finish his work amidst the hearty congratu- 

 lations of the many fellow-workers who look up to 

 him as their master. .Vrch. Geikie. 



NO. 1853, VOL. 72] 



THE RUDIMENTS OF BEHAVIOUR. 

 Contributions to the Study of the Behaviour of Lower 

 Organisms. By Prof. Herbert S. Jennings. Pp. 

 256. (Washington : Carnegie Institution, 1904.) 

 T^HE author has been for about ten years a careful 

 ■^ observer of the rudiments of behaviour which 

 are exhibited by unicellular and other relatively simple 

 animals, and we have read with interest several of 

 his previous studies on the reactions of infusorians 

 and the like to various sets of stimuli. The general 

 impression conveyed was that infusorians and the 

 like gave evidence of an exceedingly simple and 

 stereotyped mode of behaviour — a mere reaction 

 method. When effectively stimulated by agents of 

 almost any kind, the animalcule moves backwards 

 and turns to a structurally defined side of its minute 

 body, while at the same time it may continue to 

 revolve on its long axis. In relation to all sorts of 

 stimuli, the behaviour seemed exceedingly simple and 

 machine-like. But Prof. Jennings has been gradually 

 discovering that the simple reaction-formula does not 

 cover all the facts, and he now gives us news which 

 seems almost too good to be true. 



He finds that even among unicellulars " the be- 

 haviour is not as a rule on the tropism plan — a set, 

 forced method of reacting to each particular agent — 

 but takes place in a much more flexible, less directly 

 machine-like way, by the method of trial and error." 

 This is a momentous conclusion, notably in relation 

 to comparative psychology. The data are foundation- 

 stones for the science of animal behaviour, and the 

 author is to be congratulated on his demonstration 

 that the wa3's of even very simple creatures are more 

 than series of " tropisms." 



In his " Introduction to Comparative Psychology " 

 (1894), Dr. Lloyd Morgan told the story of his dog's 

 attempts to bring a hooked walking stick through a 

 narrow gap in a fence. The dog " tried " all possible 

 methods of pulling the stick through the fence. Most 

 of the attempts showed themselves to be "error." 

 But the dog tried again and again, until he finally 

 succeeded. He worked by the method of trial and 

 error; and so, Prof. Jennings now assures us, do the 

 infusorians. 



" This method of trial and error involves many of 

 the fundamental qualities which we find in the be- 

 haviour of higher animals, yet with the simplest 

 possible basis in ways of action ; a great portion of 

 the behaviour consisting often of but one or two 

 definite movements, movements that are stereotyped 

 when considered by themselves, but not stereotyped 

 in their relation to the environment. This method 

 leads upward, offering at every point opportunity for 

 development, and showing even in the unicellular 

 organisms what must be considered the beginnings of 

 intelligence and of many other qualities found in 

 higher animals. Tropic action doubtless occurs, but 

 the main basis of behaviour is in these organisms 

 the method of trial and error." 



This is not the first time that the dawning of 

 intelligence has been discovered in the Protozoa, but 

 on previous occasions the discovery has been reported 

 by casual observers or by investigators unacquainted 

 with the tropisms. Prof. Jennings has made a special 



