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proposed in view of the correlations which have been shown to 
exist between the transformations that occur in the stages of devel- 
opment and decline in the individual and those that characterize 
the evolution of the group to which it may belong, to designate the 
study of these correlations by the new term ‘‘ Auxology,’’ This 
term is open to the objection that it is derived from aviy, meaning 
simply progressive growth up to and including the adult stages, and, 
although in common with others I have felt that it has claims to be 
retained, there are good reasons why it should be restricted in 
application, if adopted, to researches upon growth. I have placed 
alternative terms at the head of this abstract, because one or the 
other is likely soon to be adopted and I hardly feel competent to 
arrive at a decision myself without further study of the facts. 
Cope in his ‘‘ Method of Creation of Organic Forms,’’ used the. 
term Bathmism from Baéyds, meaning a step or threshold, to 
designate growth force, and it is therefore questionable whether 
the term Bathmology should not be substituted for Auxology in 
order to give uniformity to the nomenclature. 
Dr. C. S. Minot, who has given the first demonstration of the 
fundamental law of growth, has shown that the common notions 
with regard to the action of this force in organisms are erroneous. 
His plotted curves of the actual additions in bulk to the body by 
growth during equal intervals of time in guinea pigs show that 
these increments are in steadily decreasing ratio to the increase of 
weight of the animal from a very early age. He was so much 
impressed by these facts that he characterized the whole life of the 
individual as a process of senescence or growing old. 
This law is applicable also to the growth of the body as measured 
by the ratio of the increase of the shell in all its diameters and by the 
distance apart of the septa with relation to the ratio of increase of the 
transverse diameters of the volution. The great rapidity of the 
growth starting from the apex of the conch is obvious and can be 
observed in all the figures of the young given in this paper which 
spread out suddenly in the building of this part of the skeleton. 
The septa mark successive arrests in this process of construction, 
and it can be readily seen that the first septa are wider apart in 
proportion to the diameters of the volution in the nepionic (larval) 
stagethan in the early part of the neanic (adolescent) stage and 
that more uniformity in the distance apart occurs in the ephebic 
(adult) stages until the last of the gerontic (senile) stage is reached. 
