SCIENCE 



Friday, January 23, 1920 



C01^XJi,NTS 



Whitman's Work on the Evolution of the 

 Group of Pigeons: Professor T. H. Morgan. 73 



A Paleontological Revival at Yale University : 

 Professor Charles Schdchert 80 



William Gilson Farlow 82 



i?c Events: — 

 Besearch on Eubier Cultivation; Experi- 

 ment Stations of the Bureaat of Mines; 

 Grants for Besearch of the American Asso- 

 ciation for the Advancement of Science. ... 82 



Scientific Notes and News 84 



id Educational News 85 



Discussion and Correspondence: — 



Polydogmata of the Physicist: Professor 

 G. W. Stewart. Totem Poles for Museums : 

 Dr. Harlan I. Smith. To Mil Cats for 

 Laboratory Use: Horace Gdnthorp. Ants 

 and Scientists : Dr. Albert Mann 85 



Quotations : — 

 The British Natural History Museum 88 



Scientific BooTcs: — 

 Sosmer's Geodesy: Professor John P. 

 Hatpord 88 



Special Articles: — 



Concerning Application of the Probable 

 Error in Cases of Extremely Asymmetrical 

 Frequency Curves: Dr. Ellis L. Michael. 89 



The American Mathematical Society: Pro- 

 fessor P. N. Cole 91 



MSS. intended for publication and books, etc., intended for 

 review should be sent to Tbe Editor of Science, Garriaon-on- 

 Hudson, N. Y. 



WHITMAN'S WORK ON THE EVOLU- 

 TION OF THE GROUP OF PIGEONS 



The tliree volumes containing the work of 

 Professor Charles Otis Wliitman on pigeons 

 published by the Carnegie Institution of 

 Washington is a fine memorial to one of the 

 leaders of zoological research in Anaerica. 

 In the course of the sixteen years devoted to 

 this work Whitman brought together birds 

 from all parts of the world, bred them, studied 

 their juvenile and adult plumages, and their 

 habits, and made many crosses between differ- 

 ent species. When he died in 1910, his ex- 

 tensive and valuable collection of living birds 

 was saved through the devotion and sacrifices, 

 both personal and financial, of Dr. Oscar 

 Riddle, the editor of these posthumous 

 volumes. After that first year of precarious 

 existence, the Carnegie Institution met during 

 the five years following the expenses of main- 

 tenance, and during this time the birds, under 

 Dr. Riddle's care, were transferred to the lab- 

 oratory at Cold Spring Harbor where Whit- 

 man's work is being carried forward. With- 

 out this support only a fragment of Whit- 

 man's results cotild have been preserved or the 

 birds kept to complete many of the important 

 problems that were at the time of Whitman's 

 death still unfinished. The editing of the 

 work has been admirably done by Dr. Eiddle. 

 It is a fortunate circumstance that what was 

 left fell into the hands of one familiar with 

 Whitman's ways of thinking, and thoroughly 

 conversant with the many problems that had 

 grown out of Whitman's studies ; for " not 

 more than one fifth of the matter" was in 

 shape for publication when Whitman died. 



Volume I. gives Whitman's views and his 

 evidence for orthogenetic evolution. The 

 editor says in the preface. Whitman " has 

 accumulated the most weighty evidence for 



1 Postlmmoiis words of Charles Otis Whitman. 

 The Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1919. 



