122 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXVIII. No. 708 



QUOTATIONS 



ACADEMIC CONTROL IN GERMANY 



The German university world has been 

 stirred to its depths by the sudden creation of 

 a fourth professorship of economics at the 

 University of Berlin, and the immediate ap- 

 pointment to it of a young teacher at the Uni- 

 versity of Kiel. For years past the three pro- 

 fessorships of economics at Berlin have been 

 held by Professors Wagner, Schmoller, and 

 Sering — men of world-vcide reputation, who 

 have been assisted by four or five " extra- 

 ordinary " professors and a swarm of docents. 

 There was, therefore, not the slightest neces- 

 sity, from the teaching point of view, of 

 creating a new professorship. But early in 

 this month the university authorities were 

 astounded to receive from the Ministry of 

 Education the notice that a new chair had 

 been founded, and that Professor Ludwig 

 Eernhard, thirty-two years of age, had been 

 appointed to it. The ministry explained that, 

 owing to certain circumstances requiring 

 haste, there had been no , time to sound the 

 university authorities, as was the invariable 

 custom ; nor had it either consulted or received 

 permission of the Prussian Diet, but had used 

 for this purpose certain emergency funds 

 given to it for an entirely difierent purpose. 

 The real reason, it appears, is that Professor 

 Bernhard has published a study of the Poles 

 in Prussia which supported the government in 

 its anti-Polish crusade. Having received a 

 call from a South German university, he was 

 about to accept it and give up his Polish 

 studies. Merely that he might continue them, 

 he was given a full professorship in the fore- 

 most German university. Naturally, the 

 world of scholars is up in arms at this use of 

 a great institution for purely political pur- 

 poses.* — New York Evening Post. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 

 Un prohleme de revolution. La theorie de 

 la recapitulation des formes ancestrales 

 au cours de developpement embryonnaire. 



^ The philosophical faculty at Berlin has voted 

 that, while it has no personal objection to Pro- 



(Loi biogenetique f ondamentale de Haeckel.) 



Par L. ViALLETON. Montpellier, Coulet et 



Fils. 8vo. 1908. 



This volume is a characteristic Erench pro- 

 duction in that it gives with rare skill a com- 

 prehensive and clear summary of a complex 

 scientific problem. To the American reader 

 it will seem strange that no mention is made 

 of Louis Agassiz, the most celebrated of all 

 the defenders of the theory of recapitulation; 

 and it is to be regretted that the article by 

 Adam Sedgwick, " On the Law of Develop- 

 ment, known as ' Von Baer's Law,' " which 

 was published in the Quarterly Journal of 

 Microscopical Science, 1894, should have re- 

 mained unknown to the author. None the 

 less, the work is very excellent of its kind. It 

 is based upon a series of lectures delivered a 

 year ago before the students of philosophy at 

 Montpellier. The author gives an introduc- 

 tion and historical review, which deals with 

 Meckel, his predecessors and followers, a 

 resume which biologists will surely welcome. 

 He then passes in a series of chapters, IV.- 

 VIII., to the presentation and discussion of 

 the evidence in the structure and development 

 of vertebrates, for and against the theory of 

 recapitulation. This is certainly very well 

 done; the selection of examples is apt, and 

 they are laid before the reader in such a way 

 that he is brought gradually to a clear under- 

 standing of the necessary limitations which 

 must be put upon the law of recapitulation. 

 These chapters deserve especially to be recom- 

 mended to the attention of teachers and stu- 

 dents of general biology. 



The last chapter is devoted to presenting 

 the ideas of Oskar Hertwig, and is essentially 

 a critical analysis of Hertwig's essay in the 

 concluding volume of his " Handbook of Com- 

 parative Embryology." Here, I think, the 

 author is somewhat at fault in attributing so 

 much originality to Hertwig. Eor many years 

 embryologists have been familiar not only 

 with the law of recapitulation, but with the 



fessor Bernhard, it does not approve his appoint- 

 ment, owing to the fact it was not consulted. 

 Thereupon Professor Bernhard declined the offer 

 of the ministry of education. — Ed. 



