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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLV. No. 1170 



moved towards the margin, paused an instant, 

 then deliberately plunged into the water. It 

 swam strongly across the current, keeping its 

 head, wrists, widely spread feet, and the tip 

 of its tail above the surface, and making 

 sculling strokes with its phalangeal mem- 

 branes, which hung straight downward. The 

 greater part of its back, and its interfemoral 

 skin, except near the tip of the tail, were sub- 

 merged. After reaching the ice a yard across 

 the open stream, it turned and swam back, and 

 attempted to clamber out at the point where 

 it had entered. Like King Eobert Bruce's 

 spider, it made six vain trials but on the 

 seventh it succeeded. It then shook itself in 

 quadrupedal fashion, crawled across the ice 

 to a nook beneath an overhanging rock, and lay 

 still. I continued to watch it for five minutes, 

 and was tempted to leave it until morning; 

 but, realizing that it would soon be frozen to 

 the spot, I picked it up. 



In my hand it seemed perfectly active, at 

 first struggling and biting characteristically, 

 and giving vent to infinitesimal squeaks and 

 to explosive puffs like the sound of a tiny 

 one-cylinder engine. At times it would shake 

 its head with a rapid vibration and snort 

 loudly. Within a few moments it began to 

 lick its membranes, comb its snout, ears and 

 body with its long-clawed feet, then to clean 

 the claws with its teeth, and, in short, to go 

 through all the elaborate preening movements 

 which make bats so extremely kitten-like. 

 From time to time I noticed an evanescent, 

 skunkish odor, which seemed as though it 

 might be due to some periodical, perhaps de- 

 fensive, glandular exudation. Its wet fur 

 dried surprisingly quickly under the influences 

 of the violent combing, and the high tem- 

 perature that the animal soon developed by 

 means of respirations at the rate of about 

 145 per minute. 



The bat was an old female, with teeth worn 

 down to a condition similar to that already 

 described by Murphy and Nichols (Z. c, p. 8). 

 Although it could have eaten no food for three 

 months or more, it passed feces which proved 

 to be composed principally of its own fur. 



Probably the most noteworthy point about 

 the whole incident is the record of an vm- 



woimded bat, certainly in full control of its 

 bodily coordination, swimming in the icy water 

 of a stream, apparently with intent. 



Egbert Oushman Murphy 

 Department op Natural Science, 

 Brooklyn Museum 



DR. HOBBS ON THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE 



To THE Editor of Science : Touching the ad- 

 dress of Professor William H. Hobbs to the 

 Michigan Academy of Science, printed in Sci- 

 ence (issue of May 11, 1917), I wish to point 

 out: 



1. That it is not customary among historians 

 and students of history to consider the thou- 

 sand years following the Hun invasions the 

 " dark ages," or, as Professor Hobbs calls them, 

 a " thousand years of stagnation " (p. 443) or 

 " cenlmries of intellectual stagnation" (p. 442). 

 jSTo period which includes the thirteenth cen- 

 tury can fairly be so described. 



2. That Galileo never was tortured by the 

 Inquisition (p. 443) and that the only " im- 

 prisonment " he suffered was in the homes of 

 his friends. 



3. That Giordano Bruno was burned for de- 

 nying the divinity of Christ — not for advocat- 

 ing the Copernican doctrine. 



4. That what Mr. Huxley termed " that chaff 

 about the ego and the non-ego, about noumena 

 and phenomena and all the rest of it, etc.," are 

 not mere " metaphysical abstractions " in the 

 sense that any thinking man can disi)ense with 

 them. A thorough grounding in metaphysics 

 (and logic) would be a very good start for a 

 career in " science " ; one does not know either 

 intuitively and both are necessary for clear 

 thinking and sound generalizing. 



Thomas F. Woodlock 

 Mount Vernon, N. Y. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 



Manual of Psychiatry. Fourth edition. Ee- 

 vised and enlarged. By J. Eouges De 

 Fursac, M.D., and A. J. Eosanoff, M.D. 

 New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Lon- 

 don: Chapman & Hall, Limited. 1916. 8vo. 

 Pp. 522. 

 Brevity, clearness of diction and simplicity 



of presentation with a sufficiently smaU. nujn- 



