MARCH 7, I9I2 
AMERICAN 
referred 
THE LOBSTER.? 
| er work to below is “in a measure 
both a revision and an extension” of Prof. 
Herrick’s well-known memoir on ‘‘ The American 
Lobster,” published in 1896 in the Bulletin of the 
United States . Fish from 
several figures, including three fine coloured plates 
of larval stages, are reproduced. By far the larger 
part of the memoir, however, with 
the new knowledge of the natural history of the 
that during the 
fifteen years from the investigations of the author 
himself and of many other naturalists on both 
sides of the Atlantic. .As Prof. Herrick remarks, 
‘in all probability theretis no marine invertebrate 
in the world which is now better known,” and he 
has rendered a great service 
to zoology by bringing to- 
gether a vast amount o 
information on the _ habits 
and mode of life, the repro- 
duction, development, and 
growth of the lobster, anc 
on the economic and legisla- 
tive problems relating to its 
Commission, which 
is concerned 
lobster has been gained past 
+ en) s 
ay 3 
preservation and _artificia 
propagation. Out of the 
many points of interest dis- 
cussed only a few can be 
selected for comment here. 
[The European and Ameri- 
‘can lobsters are commonly 
regarded as distinct species 
of the genus Homarus, but 
they are very closely related, 
und, as Prof. Herrick re- 
marks, they “might at first 
sight be considered as geo- 
graphical varieties’’ of a 
single species. The only 
structural character which is 
given as distinguishing the 
the form of the 
rostrum, which in European 
Et 
two is 
NATURE 9 
interest to the systematist, the 
temptation to hll in gaps in our knowledge of 
the bionomics of either form by data drawn from 
the other, it may be of more than merely academic 
determine 
but in view of 
interest t¢ as exactly as possible the 
degree of affinity between them. 
Prof. Herri kx 
lat its range in the Mediterranean is limited on 
1e east by the Adriatic Sea, and this agrees with 
statements in other works of authority. If it be 
-orrect, however, is curious that the 
should have well known to Aristotle 
whose natural history studies were mainly 
states of the European lobster 
it is species 
been sc ) 
j arried 
on, as Prof. D’Arcy Thompson has recently told 
us, on the island of Mitylene. : 
A detailed account is given of the structure and 
a. Se a a ee) | C 
>RAH®A AAR 
Ce ee ee ee ee ee 
rtrarrte 
Li) 
lobsters is smooth on the 
underside, while in OM Chi-? Geen eer ne 
can specimens it usually free fro ult ; 
x larva; 4, fourth stage. 
bears a pair of small spines. 
Ver ording to Prof. Herrick, 
inconstant 
that they 
altogether in 
“either one, two, or 
size may be : 
may occasionally be 
lobsters. Slight 
the larve of th 
forms, although the author scarcely seems t 
stating that the European lobster 
is hatched “in a stage nearly comparable to the 
larva of the American 
1OWeVEr, it would be by no means 
three spines oO present,’ 
and he implies 
ibsent \merican 
differences are said to exist in 
two 
be justified in 
second lobster.” Even if 
this 
conclusive as to their specific distinctness, since 
were SO, 
other cases are known among Crustacea of species 
ther -e | nong Crust f sj 
(e.g. the prawn Palaemonetes varians) which differ 
in their mode of development in different parts of 
f 
their geographical range. As a mere matter « 
nomenclature the question is, of course, only of 
Nat History of the American Lobster.” By F. H. Herrick 
Bullet Bureau of Fisheries, vol. xxix., pp. 149-4 i—xlvii 
(Wa ngton, 19 ) 
NO. 2210, VOL. 89] 
lob: ters : e, 
euhryo at hatching (July) 
n nd third f 
1 (first line), first larva, not 
ne rva , third 
ine»), fir ree larval 
development of the great claws and of the pro- 
cess of autotomy and regeneration as affecting 
them. An interesting little piece of mechanism is 
described in the interlocking processes which 
strengthen the articulations between the basal 
segments of the limb. In the young lobster, in 
which the articulation between the second and 
third segments is movable, processes of this kind 
are developed on the adjacent margins of thes 
segments. In later stages, however, the s«¢ ond 
and third segments become soldered together, the 
junction forming the “breaking plane” at which 
autotomy takes place, and a new process grows 
out from the third segment to interlock with one 
on the first. A full description is given of the 
torsion of the great claws by which the movable 
finger comes to lie on the inner side instead of 
( n the upper al d outer side as it does in the 
