94 report — 1877. 



most fishes ; and they not only act in elevation and depression, but in lateral rota- 

 tion, as any one can verify for himself by watching fishes in an aquarium. In 

 order to accommodate these united lateral appendages most conveniently to the 

 sinuous curves into which the body of a fish is thrown in swimming, and to di- 

 minish the surface of resistance to the water, the parapodia have divided them- 

 selves into two groups, leaving the centre of the body, where the cephalic and 

 caudal curves meet during progression, free from lateral appendages.. 



Time would fail to permit me to catalogue the many other recent additions to our 

 knowledge of Ontogeny derived from Embryology, so I must draw to a conclusion 

 by referiing very briefly to the department of morphological science with which my 

 own daily work brings me most closely into contact, viz. that of Human Anatomy. 



Considering the limited field, and the care with which the human body has been 

 scrutinized for so many years, it is easily understood that the amount of annual 

 progress is inconsiderable, except in matters of minute detail; still every year 

 gives to us a solid addition to our knowledge ; and of the fruits of the past year's 

 work^ I would refer, in passing, to the papers of Bernays on the development of 

 the Auriculo-ventricular Valves, of Klein on the Histology of the Omentum, and 

 of Herbert Watney on the Distribution of the Connective Reticulum throughout 

 the whole alimentary canal. 



In matters of detail it is still surprising how much yet remains to be done even 

 in this much wrought department. In a subject so personally interesting as that 

 of Human Anatomy, it is surely of practical utility, if not of scientific interest, that 

 we should have correct and broadly based statements regarding averages of con- 

 ditions in the case of the variable structures of the human body (and what part is 

 not variable F). In the dissecting-rooms of Great Britain and Ireland there are at 

 least six hundred hiunan bodies examined annually, and yet there are few variable 

 structures concerning which we have observations made on any thing like such a 

 numerical basis. 



It has been the fashion on the part of certain anatomists to disparage the work 

 of those who observe and collate such cases of variety ; but surely such a method 

 of regarding any group of constantly recurring morphological facts is unphiloso- 

 pbical, even though the bearing of the facts be not at first sight obvious ; and until 

 we know the laws of whose operations these so-called anomalies are special cases, 

 on general principles it becomes the business of the anatomist to collect, collate, 

 and record these cases. Thanks to the researches of the laborious and indefati- 

 gable Prof. Wenzel Gruber, of St. Petersburg, that prince of descriptive anatomists, 

 and to those of others too numerous to mention, the anatomical text-books of to-day 

 are much more definite than they were thirty years ago. Yet much still requires 

 to be done ; and in even our most recent hand-books we often seek in vain for 

 information on points of descriptive anatomy. Surely it is to be hoped, and not 

 too much to _ expect, that in a few years some of the many small lacunae in our 

 knowledge will be filled up, and the study of human anatomy will become, not a 

 mere matter of words and names, as it has in too many respects been hereto- 

 fore, but a really scientific study, a practical application of sound morphological 

 principle. 



Anthropology. 



Address to the Department of Anthropology. By Feancis Galton, F.R.S. 



Permit me to say a few words of personal explanation to account for the form 

 of the Address I am about to offer. It has been the custom of my predecessors to 

 give an account of recent proceedings in Anthropology, and to touch on many 

 branches of that wide subject. But I am at this moment unprepared to follow their 

 example with the completeness I should desire and you have a right to expect, 

 owing to the suddenness with which I have been called upon to occupy this chair. 

 I had, indeed, the honour of being nominated to the post last spring ; but circum- 



