-So 



NA TURE 



[December 9, 1922 



Prof. Max Weber. 



Celebration of Seventieth Birthday. 



THERE are few living zoologists whose researches 

 have taken so wide a range as have those of 

 Prut. Max Weber of Amsterdam, whose seventieth 

 birthday has been celebrated in Holland during the 

 week. As naturalist-traveller by land and sea 

 in many parts of the world, he has brought together 

 vast collections for study by his pupils and colleagues ; 

 as anatomist and histologist, he has studied the struc- 

 ture and elucidated the affinities of verv diverse groups 

 of animals from flat-worms to mammals ; he has 

 written the best text-book of mammalian anatomy and 

 conducted one of the most important oceanographical 

 expeditions of recent times ; nor has he disdained to 

 labour as a " mere systematist " at the description and 

 ( ataloguing of species of Crustacea, fishes, and reptiles. 



To select for mention the most significant among 

 contributions to knowledge so numerous and so varied 

 is no easy task. Among the first that come to mind 

 are Weber's demonstration that the pattern formed bv 

 the hair-follicles in the skin of various mammals can be 

 interpreted as derived from the scaly covering of 

 reptilian ancestors, and the evidence he has adduced 

 for the dismemberment of the order Edentata. 



As a zoogeographer, .Max Weber's studies on the 

 fauna, and especially on the freshwater fishes, of the 

 East Indian Archipelago will have a permanent value, 

 whether or no " Weber's line " is to replace " Wallace's 

 line " as the accepted limit between the Oriental and 

 the Australian regions. 



An enterprise of a very different kind carried out 

 under Max Weber's personal leadership was the ex- 

 ploration of the Malayan seas in the years 1899 and 

 1900 by the Dutch steamship Siboga. The stately 

 series of reports on this expedition, which have been 

 appearing under his editorship since 1902, form a 

 contribution to the science of the sea scarcely surpassed 

 in importance save by those of the Challenger expedi- 

 tion. Dealing with only a restricted area of the ocean, 

 but paving far more attention to the fauna and flora 

 of the shallower waters than the naturalists of the 

 Challenger were able to do, it is not too much to say 

 that the Siboga expedition has given a new aspect to 

 many problems of the distribution of marine animals 

 in tropical seas. 



It remains to be added that Madame Weber (nie 

 van Bosse) is a botanist of distinction, who has contri- 

 buted monographs on many of the groups of seaweeds 

 collected by the Siboga ; she has also described the 

 minute aLse which find a curious habitat on the hairs 

 of sloths. * W. T. C. 



Prof. D'Arcy W. Thompson has sent us the following 

 letter signed by other British naturalists and himself : 



Dear Professor Max Weber, 



You celebrate your seventieth birthday 

 to-day, and we, who are your colleagues and are 

 but a few of your many friends in England, join 

 together to congratulate you and to wash you many 

 years to come of work and happiness. By your long 

 life of teaching and research, by your leadership of 

 the Siboga Expedition, by your great handbook of 

 the Mammalia, and by innumerable other important 

 publications, you have come to be the acknowledged 

 leader of zoology in the Netherlands and to be recog- 

 nised far and wide as one of the most distinguished 

 naturalists of our time. Your solid learning has 

 upheld the great scientific traditions of your country, 

 your investigations have influenced and stimulated 

 many of us, your broad interests, your singleness of 

 purpose, the simplicity of your life, and your genius 

 for friendship have set an example to us all. 



December 5. 



E. J. Allen. 

 Chas. W. Andrews. 

 J. H. Ashworth. 

 W. Bateson. 

 Gilbert C. Bourne. 

 W. T. Calman. 

 Geo. H. Carpenter. 

 Wm. J. Dakin. 

 Arthur Dendv. 

 J. C. Ewart. 

 P. W. Gamble. 

 J. Stanley Gardiner. 

 Walter Garstang. 

 James F. Gemmill. 

 Sidney F. Harmer. 

 J. R. Henderson. 

 W. A. Herdman. 



Alcock. 



Sidney J. Hickson. 

 Jas. P. Hill. 

 Wm. Evans Hoyle. 

 J. Graham Kerr. 

 E. W. MacBride. 

 W. C. McIntosh. 

 Doris L. Mackinnon. 

 P. Chalmers Mitchell. 

 C. Lloyd Morgan. 

 Edward B. Poulton. 

 R. C. Punnett. 



C. Tate Regan. 

 G. Elliot Smith. 

 Oldfield Thomas. 

 D'Arcy W. Thompson. 



D. M. S. Watson. 



A. Smith Woodward. 



Obituary. 



II. J. Elwes, F.R.S. 



MR. HENRY JOHN ELWES passed away on 

 November 26, after a life full of activities spread 

 over seventy-six years. Born heir to landed property 

 and great wealth, his life at first promised to be that of 

 the typical English gentleman. He was sent to school 

 at Eton, and served for five years in the Scots Guards; 

 afterwards he became one of the greatest travellers of 

 modern times, led on by his love of natural history, 

 entomology, horticulture, trees, and big game shooting, 

 lie visited Asia Minor, Tibet, Nepal, India, China, 

 Formosa, Siberia, Caucasia, North and South America, 

 and most if not all the countries of Europe. As a 



NO. 2771, VOL. I IO] 



landowner, he was interested in sheep, and studied all 

 tlie various breeds. He rendered important services to 

 entomology bv his enormous collections, which are now 

 housed at South Kensington. He was a keen gardener, 

 and introduced many beautiful and rare plants, a con- 

 siderable number of which are figured in the Botanical 

 Magazine. His " Monograph of the Genus Lilium " is 

 a standard work. He aided several of the great scientific 

 societies in many ways, and became president of the 

 Royal Entomological Society of London and of the 

 Royal English Arboricultural Society. 



Mr. Elwes wrote numerous papers on gardening, 

 agriculture, entomology, ornithology, and forestry. It is 

 perhaps in the latter subject that his public services were 



