March 4, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



387 



be no difficulty in maintaining in these .pro- 

 grams a scientific standard of papers read as 

 liigli as that now presented by the professional 

 societies. Indeed, there would be no impro- 

 priety, particularly in the case of any section 

 which holds summer meetings, in relegating 

 the reading of technical papers at the convo- 

 cation meeting to the affiliated professional 

 societies, the section, if possible, offering, in 

 addition to the vice-presidential address, one 

 or more set papers or discussions of more gen- 

 eral interest. 



The solution when finally wrought out will 

 no doubt come by a process of evolution 

 rather than by revolution, and the present 

 trend is clearly in the direction of reserving 

 the time of convocation week very largely for 

 the reading of papers by the technical socie- 

 ties. Any attempt to force these societies 

 into the summer months is foredoomed to 

 failure. C. Judson Herrick. 



THE CASE OF WILLIAM J. LONG. 



To THE Editor of Science: The criticism 

 of William J. Long's published observations 

 on the habits of animals inaugurated so 

 vigorously by John Burroughs in The At- 

 lantic Monthly for March, 1903, and continued 

 no less forcibly by William Morton Wheeler 

 in your issue of February 26 arouses no little 

 interest in the personality and methods of a 

 writer whose work has met with so unfavor- 

 able a reception by naturalists. 



Are we to believe the accusation that the 

 author in question, to put the matter squarely, 

 is a ' liar,' or have we in Mr. Long a naturalist 

 whose powers of observation, discrimination 

 and interpretation are so far beyond those of 

 any other student of nature, living or dead, 

 that he is in effect a Galileo among animal 

 psychologists ? 



It can not be deiiied that Mr. Long, in spite 

 of his youth, has placed upon record more 

 remarkable statements regarding the behavior 

 of the birds and mainmals of New England 

 and New Brunswick than can be found in all 

 the authoritative literafure pertaining to the 

 animals of this region. 



The story of the crows and their game with 

 a china "-'ing; of the kingfisher that stocked an 



isolated pool with fish in order that it might 

 easily teach its young the art of fishing; of 

 the partridge that repeatedly drummed a roll- 

 call for the two missing members of a brood 

 of eleven; of the red squirrel with cheek- 

 pouches; of the porcupine that coiled in a ball 

 before rolling down hill; of the loon that 

 hatched its eggs, not by sitting on them, but 

 by gathering them close to her side with her 

 wing; of the woodcock that placed its broken 

 leg in a plaster cast; of the ducks that have 

 learned to drown salt-water mussels in fresh- 

 water pools; of the great blue heron that 

 scattered a pollywog in fragments on the water 

 as bait to draw fish within spearing distance : 

 these and many other equally remarkable ob- 

 servations and experiences are recounted with 

 a circumstantial detail that carries conviction 

 to all but the informed. 



Indeed, one has not to read far in any of 

 the half a dozen or more volumes which Mr. 

 Long has produced to discover some more or 

 less remarkable description of the actions of 

 animals. 



The nature of their contents and their un- 

 deniable literary merit furnish abundant rea- 

 son, therefore, why Mr. Long's works should 

 claim not only the attention of naturalists, but 

 of the public generally, and again it may be 

 asked, is the unsparing criticism to which 

 they have been subjected warranted? 



An apparently satisfactory reply to this 

 query is furnished by a defense of Mr. Long 

 published in the Boston Evening Transcript, 

 March 7, 1903, and by Mr. Long himself. The 

 writer of the Tratiscript communication seems 

 to have been acquainted with Mr. Long at An- 

 dover Theological Seminary. After saying 

 that Mr. Long prepared himself for college 

 by ' solitary ' study and that in entering the 

 sophomore class he had not experienced that 

 year in an undergraduate's life ' when a 

 young man learns to take himself for very 

 little,' he continues : 



From both these circumstances it comes about 

 that we have here a man easily tempted to over- 

 rate his personal knowledge, a man tempted to 

 superficiality, a man likely to draw rash and ill- 

 considered conclusions. It is also to be remem- 

 bered that Mr. Long is of Irish extraction — in- 

 flammable, poetic and volatile in temperament. 



