482 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. III. No. 65, 



circles was in chunks and hard as if sun-dried 

 or slightly baked. 



Waeren K. Moorehead. 



questions regarding habits and instinct. 



For purpose of extended comparison we wish 

 data as to habits, instincts or intelligence in ani- 

 mals, above all, minor and trifling ones not in 

 the books, useless or detrimental ones, and the 

 particular breed, species or genus showing each. 

 Examples ; Purrings licking ; washing face ; 

 kneading objects with forepaws, humping back, 

 and worrying captured prey (like the cat); 

 baying at moon (or otherwise); urination and 

 defecation habits (eating, covering up, etc.); 

 disposition of fseces and shells in nest ; rolling 

 on carrion ; cackling (or other disturbance) af- 

 ter laying ; eating ' afterbirth ' or young ; sex- 

 ual habits ; transporting eggs or young ; nest- 

 sharing ; hunting — partnerships, or similar intel- 

 ligent associations ; hereditaiy transmission of 

 peculiar traits ; rearing young of other species 

 with resulting modification of instinct ; feigning 

 death ; suicide ; ' fascination' and any others. 

 Circular of information will be sent and full 

 credit given for data used, or sender's name 

 will be confidential, as preferred. Answer as 

 fully as possible, always stating age, sex, place, 

 date (or season), species, breed, and whether 

 personally observed. 



G. Stanley Hall, 

 r. r. gurley. 



Clark University, 



Worcester, Mass. 



newly hatched chickens instinctively 



DRINK. 



Editor of Science: In your issue of March 

 6, 1896, appears an excellent and accurate 

 note by Wesley Mills, calling attention to an 

 error of statement made by Prof. Morgan in 

 Science (issue of February 14, 1896). 



With due deference to 'The Writer of the 

 Note, ' who follows Mr. Mills, and who says that 

 Morgan's argument is satisfactory — that "a 

 chick might die of thirst in the presence of 

 water," I desire to say that this is not my 

 understanding of the case. I have been, dur- 

 ing the last thirty-five years, a breeder of fowls 

 as an amateur, and I have given the hatching 

 and rearing of chickens close and continued at- 

 tention. 



I have repeatedly placed a shallow water 

 dish before the bars of a coop in which a newly 

 hatched brood had been placed the day previ- 

 ous, taken there directly from the hatching 

 nest, and in which they never had food or 

 water offered. Repeatedly, before these small 

 chickens, not twenty-four hours from the shell, 

 and before they had been offered food, I have 

 filled their shallow water tray, and observed 

 them toddle out to it, peck at it, or at once 

 thrust their bills into it, to drink at once by up- 

 lifting their heads, as all adult fowls do, the hen 

 never putting her head out from the bars, or 

 showing these young chicks how to do what 

 they instinctively did. I have made the same 

 experiments repeatedly with food, with the 

 same result, i. e., that chicks instinctively drink 

 and eat without any example being set by 

 the mother hen. Henry W. Elliott. 



Lakewood, Ohio, March 11, 1896. 



SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE. 



Moderne Volkerkunde, deren Entwicklung und 

 Aufgaben. By Thomas Achelis. 1 vol., 8°, 

 pp. 487. Stuttgart, Ferdinand Encke. 1896. 

 The author of this work is a ' doctor juris ' 

 in Bremen, and the writer of several treatises 

 on the development of the modern science of 

 ethnology, properly so called. In the present 

 volume he proposes to define the true aims of 

 that branch of research by an investigation in 

 the first place of its historical development; 

 secondly, of its contents ; and thirdly, of its 

 relations to other departments of knowledge. 

 He expressly states that the words ' Volker- 

 kunde ' and ' Ethnologic ' mean one and the 

 same science (p. 300), the aim of which is 'to 

 set forth the development of mankind in its 

 different branches and their various stages of 

 culture, and thus obtain, as nearly as possible, 

 a correct picture of a complete and organic 

 whole.' These stages of culture must be re- 

 garded as the constituent elements of a contin- 

 uous mental process or growth, and thus reveal 

 the unfolding of the universal human conscious- 

 ness. 



In this manner, ethnology leads up to philos- 

 ophy, which thus enters into the category of the 

 inductive sciences, and wins for itself a sub- 



