Nov. 6, 1879] 



NATURE 



would be cumbrous, for the obvious reason that in a given paper, 

 much valuable work is recorded which served only as a means to 

 the end treated of ; this work, therefore, lies hidden under a title 

 which does not even remotely refer to it. 



On the other hand, the compilation of lists of papers on 

 particular subjects is fraught with no great difficulty, and would 

 be of very great value. While the preparation of such minor 

 indexes founded on the Royal Society Catalogue may be left to 

 private enterprise, great advantage would, I think, be derived 

 from some united action in the matter. I have myself made 

 considerable headway with a classified list of papers on the 

 subject which chiefly interests me, and which perhaps is best 

 named Molecular Physics. This work necessitates my going 

 through the whole catalogue for the sake of comparatively few 

 papers, and I am further obliged to copy out the titles of, and 

 references to, the papers I require. Now, if a movable copy of 

 the Royal Society's Index were made as suggested by Mr. 

 Garnett (Nature, vol. xx. p. 554), and the different entries 

 classified in sciences, these difficulties would be removed ; Mr. 

 Garnett, however, underrates the ost of preparing such a 

 movable index, which would be large enough to deter many 

 "gentlemen with leisure" from undertaking it. This work, 

 therefore, must be carried out either by the Royal Society, or by 

 a committee of those who take an interest in the subject ; when 

 completed the index could be distributed among those willing to 

 undertake the subsequent arrangement in subjects. 



There is another suggestion which I should like to make 

 before closing this letter. Every month as it slips by adds 

 rapidly to the enormous accumulation of scientific papers ; unless 

 these are catalogued and classified immediately they are pub- 

 lished, the subject catalogue will never be satisfactory. What is 

 wanted, then, is the publication (say every quarter) of a complete 

 list of the scientific papers published during that period. I am 

 aware that, as mentioned by Mr. Garnet', many such lists now 

 appear, but none of them can be trusted as complete records. 



If, however, a list were published "by authority" (for 

 example, by the British Museum or the Royal Society), scientific 

 men all over the world would send the titles of their papers to 

 be entered in it, and it would soon be recognised that those who 

 did not do so would stand a chance of rendering their work 

 useless to those who travel after them along the same paths. 



Science Schools, November 3 F. D. Brown 



Easter Island 



In the very interesting review of Mr. Wallace's "Australasia," 

 in Nature, vol. xx. p. 598, there is a passing reference to some 

 views of my own concerning the stone images of Easter Island. 

 The nature of the inferences that may be drawn in this case is 

 not, I think, generally understood ; and without wishing to give 

 the subject more importance than it deserves, I should be glad if 

 you could allow me space for a few words upon it. 



Any positive ideas about the people who made them can 

 hardly be got from the images themselves. They are rudely 

 carved and ugly, and no existing race attempts to make anything 

 really like them. But they are very numerous and very' large ; 

 many of them weigh twenty tons, some probably two or three 

 times as much. They have been quarried from a volcanic hill, 

 conveyed several miles, and set upright upon pedestals, on 

 massive stone terraces of great length. Work of this kind re- 

 quires a definite amount of labour and strength. The amount 

 available depends on the population. The population of a 

 solitary inland inhabited by savages is strictly limited by its area ; 

 the area of Easter Island is not more than forty square miles. 

 There is, I believe, no known example in which an island of 

 fhis kind supports, in an uncivilised state, more than fifty persons 

 to the square mile. This is double the usual limit among 

 savages. 



Two thousand, therefore, would be the extreme limit of the 

 population of Easter Island, unassisted from without ; it has not 

 more than half this number at present. In a population of 2,000 

 there are about 500 adult males, and we are to consider whether 

 the work could have been done or even thought of with this 

 amount of physical strength. It is, doubtless, quite impossible. 

 A much larger number of people, or the help of civilised appli- 

 ances, must necessarily have been at hand ; but neither of these 

 could be at hand without external help, and this could only reach 

 the island across two thousand miles of ocean. 



This is the really important point in this chain of inferences. 

 We are led by what I think are inevitable steps to the conclusion 

 that when these images were made there was a nation some- 



where whose ships navigated the Pacific Ocean in such a manner 

 that Easter Island could for a long period be supported as a 

 colony. 



I will not speak here of the anthropological bearings of this 

 inference. Let me, however, enter a gentle protest against the 

 sentence in which your reviewer speaks of " the accepted scien- 

 tific position that primitive man was savage." 



No doubt this is at present the belief of the majority of those 

 who express their views ; but there are names of great weight on 

 the other side, and, considering what our actual knowledge of 

 " primitive man " amounts to just now, it is rather hard upon 

 science to make her responsible for our speculations. 



November 3 Albert J. Mott 



Animals and the Musical Scale 



In a criticism in the Examiner of a book of mine on the 

 " Theory of Music," the writer says : — 



" We can hardly agree with Dr. Pole's view as to the essential 

 artificiality of the diatonic scale, especially in the light of many 

 facts collected by Mr. Darwin and other good observers. It is 

 now almost certain that several of the lower animals have a very 

 fair notion of the scale, and employ notes almost, if not quite, 

 identical as to interval with our own." 



If any of your readers can bring forward well authenticated 

 facts of the kind they will be very interesting. 



Athenamm Club, October 29 William Pole 



John Miers 



In your notice of the late venerable botanist, Mr. John Miers, 

 in Nature, vol. xx. p. 614, it is stated that " to the last he 

 disbelieved in the action of the pollen and of the pollen-tube in 

 the formation of the embryo-plant." 



It is possible that the writer may have had some further 

 warrant for this statement than the views published by Mr. 

 Miers in his memjir on Myostoma (Trans. Linn. Soc, xxv. 

 pp. 461-475 (1866), but it is scarcely borne out by them. 



Mr. Miers's position as there expressed is that "it is not the 

 pollen-tube, but simply the fluid-material contained in the 

 pollen-grain, and emitted from its tubes, which is the direct 

 agent in the process of fertilisation." 



Whatever maybe thought of this view, it is far from justifying 

 the strong statement that in supporting it Miers "disbelieved in 

 the action of the pollen." Henry Trimen 



October 28 



[It would certainly have been more explicit had we added the 

 word "tube" to pollen. At p. 468 of the paper cited by Dr. 

 Trimen, Mr. Miers remarked "that the very important fact 

 alluded to (the impact of the pollen-tube on the embryo-sac and 

 the consequent fertilisation of the ovule) has not yet been satis- 

 factorily proved." This was written in 1S66. In the same 

 paper "we have it demonstrated that in this case (Myostoma) 

 the theory of the application of pollen-tubes for the fertilisation 

 of its ovules is distinctly disproved." — Ed.] 



The Howgate Arctic Expedition 

 Capt. Howgate, U.S.A., having for some years past fruit- 

 lessly endeavoured to obtain the comparatively small grant of 

 50,000 dollars from the American Government, for the purpose 

 of carrying out his peculiar scheme of Arctic exploration, by 

 forming a colony of active and experienced men, with a few 

 families of Eskimos, at the coal-bed discovered some years ago 

 in Lady Franklin Bay, Smith Sound, lat. Si° N., has deter- 

 mined to equip a private expedition on a smaller scale with this 

 object. 



A screw-steamer of about 140 tons (cargo measurement) has 

 been bought for Capt. Howgate in the Clyde, has been refitted 

 there, but not strengthened for ice navigation, which is to be 

 done at Washington, and will, wind and weather permitting, sail 

 for America on Thursday, November 6. 



As most of your readers probably already know, Capt. How- 

 gate's intention is that the explorers, instead of living on board 

 ship, shall pass the winter in wooden houses taken out on pur- 

 pose in frames', to be set up near the coal-seam, the party to 

 remain in this locality for two or more years, watching a favour- 

 able opportunity of smooth ice or open water to push northward, 

 and occupying their time usefully in making scientific observa- 

 tions, which are still much wanted in that far north region. 

 Balloons, the telegraph, and probably the telephone, may be 

 brought into u-e. J- **- 



