June 16, 1899.] 



SCIENCE. 



829 



including Historical. Biographical." Can 

 one imagine anything less distinct, less con- 

 nected, less natural ? (Museums and honey, 

 the San Jose scale insect and the biography 

 of Huxley in one group ! ) . But how is this 

 applied ? The previously mentioned article 

 by de Winton on the forms of giraffe re- 

 ceives the index LOOOO, which, according 

 to analogy with all the other sciences, 

 would be ' Philosophy,' not, indeed, in re- 

 lation to Mammals or any form of Rumi- 

 nant, but to Zoology in general ! 



The chief ground of this want of unifor- 

 mity and naturalness, of these inconsisten- 

 cies, lies in the system of classification and 

 indexing adopted by the Committee of the 

 Royal Society. This is essentially an imi- 

 tation of the decimal system of Melville 

 Dewey. But, instead of simply adopting 

 this system, developed and tested by twenty 

 years' of work and extensive experience in 

 numerous libraries, the Committee has 

 thought best to employ in the separate divi- 

 sions other numbers for the same rubrics, 

 and also another sequence for the sub-divi- 

 sions, as well as other and changeable signi- 

 fications for these. One must unqualifiedly 

 agree with M. Ch. Richet in his derogatory 

 and harsh judgment upon this procedure 

 (i'. Revue seieiitif., ser. 4, T. 9, ISo. 24, p. 

 751). While M. Richet is decidedly right 

 in pointing out with severe criticism that 

 the Committee simply ignores previous 

 classifications and methods of indexing, and 

 has only aimed to produce something difier- 

 ent from what already existed, one maj^ go 

 further and affirm that, from the form in 

 which the Committee has drawn up a kind 

 of decimal system, it is evident that the 

 Committee either did not perceive the main 

 advantages of the Dewey system or that it 

 did not wish to recognize them. It adheres 

 to the externals, but misunderstands their 

 significance. Thus, according to Dewey, the 

 formal index 07 in all cases refers to the 

 method of study and its aids, such as the 



establishment of collections, etc. Under 

 ' Sociology ' Dewey calls this ' Education ' 

 (307). In order not to adopt one of 

 Dewey's expressions, the Committee intro- 

 duces the term ' Pedagogic,' which in such 

 a connection is misleading. But the way 

 in which this is interpreted is shown by the 

 example of the division ' 31 ' of Zoology, 

 cited above, and by the placing of compu- 

 ting machines, models, etc., under separate 

 indices coordinate with ' Pedagogy.' 



The English boast of being an eminently 

 practical people. In this case they have 

 not shown it to be true. There is scarcely 

 anything less practical than the ' Schedules 

 of Classification ' and the numerical indices 

 employed in them. Equally unpractical is 

 the method of citation of sources. In 'Chem- 

 istry ' what is the meaning of 'B.,' ' Bl.,' 

 'Soc.;' what (under 'Crystallography') is 

 ' ZsK.? ' The catalogue ought not to be 

 produced for chemists alone ; but the power 

 to interpret si;ch hieroglyphics is not to be 

 expected of other educated people. Alpha- 

 betic catalogues of the abbreviations should 

 be furnished ; and there should be two of 

 them — one, for the use of cataloguers, ar- 

 ranged according to the titles of the period- 

 icals; another, for those using the catalogue, 

 according to the initial letters of the abbre- 

 viation. The space that is perhaps saved 

 is not worth the cost — the constant trouble 

 of looking up references. One may abbre- 

 viate, but only so far as is compatible with 

 certain recognition of the source intended. 

 But this must be given accurately. ' Mem- 

 oires des Sav. Etrang ' is ambiguous. Is 

 Paris or is Brussels meant '? The cards re- 

 lating to the contents of works (' secondary 

 slips') must contain abbreviated state- 

 ments ; thus ' Teeth, histology of those of 

 Notoryctes, Tomes, etc.,' is correct. But 

 to convert the title into another form is 

 not permissible. Thus Beddard's paper, 

 ' Notes on the Anatomy of a Manatee 

 (Manatus inunguis) , lately living in the 



