430 
NATURE 
[JunrE 27, 1912 
and grow together by crushing with a clamp and 
tying the crushed portions together with a catgut 
ligature. The general conclusions are that regenera- 
tion and restoration of conductivity take place in both 
nerves below the scar, as well as conduction of 
impulses through the scar, both along the original 
paths and from one nerve to the other. The research 
opens up further possibilities in the restoration of 
function in divided nerves by operative treatment. 
A sERIES of interesting observations has been made 
by Mr. L. L. Woodruff on the origin and sequence of 
the protozoan fauna of hay infusion (Journ. Exper. 
Zoology, vol. xii., No. 2). An infusion of hay allowed 
to stand shows an extraordinary succession of pro- 
tozoa, the sequence being Monad, Colpoda, Hypo- 
trichida, Paramecium, Vorticella, and Amceba, the 
determining factors of this sequence probably being 
those involving food supply and specific excretory 
products. It is concluded that these protozoa are 
derived from the grass, on which, after dew or rain, 
the various forms may be found—an observation pre- 
viously recorded by Kent. 
‘SPECULATIONS with regard to the Simplest Forms 
of Life and their Origin on the Earth” is the title 
of Prof. Minchin’s presidential address to the Quekett 
Microscopical Club, which appears in the April 
number of the club’s journal. Prof. Minchin suggests 
that it is the chromatin-substance which represents 
the primary living matter, the true material basis of 
life, and that the cytoplasm is of secondary import- 
ance in this respect. Organisms with abundant cyto- 
plasm, such as amcebze, are probably far from sepre- 
senting the most primitive type of living beings, 
which may have originated as extremely minute 
bodies, tiny specks of chromatin. 
Dr. DuckwortuH describes an Ashanti skull with 
defective dentition (Journ. Anatomy and _ Physiol., 
xlvi., part iii.). It is that of a young adult in which 
the upper incisor teeth have been removed, evidently 
in early childhood. This kind of mutilation is char- 
acteristically East African, and is met with in crania 
from rock-hewn tombs in Abyssinia of the fifth 
century A.D. 
We have received a copy. of the fifth edition, 
published by Mr. Upcott'Gill, and revised by Mr. C. J. 
Davies, of a popular little book, entitled ‘‘ Fancy 
Mice,’’ which, we believe, is regarded as the standard 
authority by breeders of these rodents. The present 
edition is stated to include the latest scientific in- 
formation on the subject of breeding for colour, and 
we notice that the recent theory of the derivation of 
the Japanese waltzing mice from the wild Mus wag- 
nevi of China is duly recorded. 
Ir is not a little remarkable that a distinct differ- 
ence between. the colouring of the British representa- 
tive of the lesser black-backed gull and the typical 
Scandinavian bird should have until recently escaped 
notice. These differences are brought out, with the 
aid of a photograph, by Mr. P. B. Lowe, in the June 
number of Witherby’s British Birds. From this it 
appears that the species includes the. typical Scan- 
NO. 2226, VoL. 89] 
dinavian or eastern race, with the pale areas of the 
neck and back dusky, and the British or western race 
(Larus fuscus britannicus), in which the same areas 
are lighter, the latter extending to the Spanish penin- 
sula, North Africa, and the Azores. 
ORNAMENTAL and other trees and shrubs in Illinois 
are, it appears from the twenty-sixth report of the 
entomologist of that State, particularly liable to the 
attacks of insects of various kinds. ‘‘Trees which 
have grown for years... begin to weaken and 
decay, the owner knows not why. This is oflen due 
to borers or scale-insects, the presence of which has 
not been detected or suspected, but whose injuries 
might have been prevented if the facts had been 
known in time.’ To remedy this unsatisfactory state 
of affairs by making owners familiar with the life- 
histories of the more destructive species of insects is 
the object of much of this report, which, although 
dated 1911, bears no clue as to its place of publi- 
cation. 
THE second volume of the 94th Jahresversammlung 
of the Verhandlungen der Schweiz Naturfor. Gesell- 
schaft contains a summary of the results of recent 
investigations with regard to the former presence of an 
*“Allemannienne”’ race in Switerland. Examination 
of a series of prehistoric skulls and skeletons indicates 
that the ancient Allemanniennes and modern inhabi- 
tants of northern Switzerland belong to two widely 
sundered types, the former being related to the popu- 
lation of Franconia, Moravia, and north-west Ger- 
many from the ninth to the fourteenth century. 
These people were a blonde-haired race resembling in 
physical characters the modern Swedes. This indi- 
cates that while great modifications have taken place 
since prehistoric times in the population of northern 
Switzerland and southern Germany, that of Sweden 
has remained practically in its original primitive 
condition, so far as the physical type is concerned. 
\ For many years past the exact nature of the peculiar 
tooth-like Palzozoic fossils described as Edestus, 
Helicoprion, &c., has formed an unsolved puzzle, some 
ichthyologists regarding these curious structures as 
forming part of the mouth-organs, while others have 
regarded them as appendages to the dorsal fins of 
Palaeozoic sharks. A specimen, referable to Edestus, 
discovered some eighteen years ago in the Coal 
Measures of Iowa, supplies, according to Dr. O. P. 
Hay (Proc. U.S. Nat. Mus., No. 1884, vol. xlii., 
p- 31), the solution of the problem. This specimen 
is double, comprising an upper and a lower element, 
and seems to indicate that these structures pertain 
to the region of the mouth. Both the upper and the 
lower elements are bilaterally symmetrical, and appear 
to have been produced in front of the mouth of the 
shark in such a manner that one worked against the 
other. Their shafts were produced by the consolida- 
tion of a median row of teeth, which gradually be- 
came worn out in the fore part of the series in the 
usual shark-fashion, but the bases of which persisted 
to form the shaft. 
SEISMOLOGISTS will be interested in the article on 
the Taal. voleano in the Philippine Islands and the 
