July 12, 1912] 



SCIENCE 



59 



breadth throughout. It is coral red in color and 

 has a beautiful sheen resembling the earnelian. 

 Whether this is its natural color, or whether it is 

 due to cooking, I can not decide. The appendages 

 are relatively small. The base of the hand (carpus 

 or fifth segment) nearly surpasses the arm (meros 

 ■or fourth segment), and is strongly tuberculated ; 

 the hands are large, and are bordered, moreover, 

 -with a very delicately raised and toothed margin 

 (Eande), studded everywhere with yellowish, trans- 

 parent hairs. The feet are all chelate, while in the 

 common crayfish the first pair only have this 

 ■character. 



This faulty description seems to have been 

 •drawn from an imperfect specimen, or with 

 insufficient care, supplemented by incorrect 

 data in regard to habit, and not very happy 

 ■guesses in filling up the gaps of whatever sort. 



Herbst's work was in a large measure a 

 ■compilation, being at the same time a curious 

 and interesting epitome of the life and lore of 

 ■the Crustacea from the most ancient times. 

 The numerous drawings which were in copper- 

 plate and colored by hand, are rather poor 

 even for the period (particularly in this vol- 

 ume), when not copied from a master, like 

 Eoesel von Eosenhof. Any statements re- 

 garding the problematical Cape species need 

 not have been taken too seriously, when of the 

 ■common European lobster which had been 

 known and eaten from antiquity, he stated in 

 the same paragraph, that it carried its eggs 

 under its tail, and laid them in the sand.' 



As an illustration of another side of Herbst's 

 ■work I give the following in free translation : 



Crayfish, when kept in confinement are fed with 

 beer daily, or ■with sweet milk, which is better, 

 ■and of which they are very fond. 



""The pairing season (of the European lobster) 

 begins in spring, and continues during most of the 

 summer. Their fertility is uncommonly great; 

 1S,444 eggs have been counted under the tail of 

 ■a single lobster, not to speak of those which still 

 remained in the body. They lay their eggs in the 

 sand, where they are hatched by the sun." 

 Italics mark this contradiction, which is the more 

 singular from the fact that Boesel's figure of the 

 crayfish's eggs attached to the swimmeret is repro- 

 duced. The last statement was probably copied 

 tfrom Pennant. 



It is in this work also that we have a figure 

 of the Pope's head in the lobster's stomach 

 (Tab. 46, fig. 5), for as the writer says: 



The middle and lateral teeth (of the gastric 

 mill) give a striking impression, and may be 

 likened to the Pope, seated in the choir with his 

 cardinals (p. 205). 



If the legs of Herbst's "Krebs" were all 

 chelate, or if it lived in mountain streams, as 

 Professor Huxley remarked,' it could be 

 neither crayfish nor lobster, since in both there 

 are but three pairs of chelate or double claw- 

 bearing legs, and the lobsters were, so far as 

 known, exclusively marine. On the other 

 hand Milne Edwards at an early period rightly 

 showed that Herbst's Cancer was a true lob- 

 ster, and as such briefly described it in his 

 " Natural History,'" under the name Homarus 

 capensis. His description, now known to be 

 correct, so far as it goes, was as follows : 



Body slender; rostrum flattened, much shorter 

 than the peduncles of outer antennae, and finely 

 toothed along its borders. Carpus granular; hands 

 elongate, greatly compressed, garnished over their 

 upper surface 'with a finely denticulate crest, and 

 covered -with hairs above. Length about 5 inches. 



That this description was made from an 

 actual specimen we have the testimony of 

 Milne Edwards himself, who, as Stebbing re- 

 marks, placed after it in his "Natural His- 

 tory," the letters " 0. M.," which mean " those 

 species which exist in the Museum of Natural 

 History, where they will be found arranged in 

 the same order as in this work." The draw- 

 ing of the species, which as we have seen was 

 published fifteen years later, excepting the 

 crude figure of Herbst, remains the only one 

 in existence to this day. Unfortunately Milne 

 Edwards's figure appeared in a highly tech- 

 nical paper of a general character,' where it 



' Huxley, T. H., ' ' On the Classification and Dis- 

 tribution of the Crayfishes," Proceedings of tJie 

 Zoological Society of London, pp. 752-788, Lon- 

 don, 1878. 



' ' ' Histoire naturelle des Crustaces, " T. 2, p. 

 335, Paris, 1837. 



' ' ' Observations sur le Squelette Tegumentaire 

 des Crustaces Decapodes et sur la Morphologie de 

 ces Animaux." Plate 11, fig. 1, Ann. Sci. Nat. 

 Zoologie, Ser. 3, Vol. XV., Paris, 1851. 



