OCTOBKE 28, 1898.] 



SCIENCE. 



589* 



minerals of New Spain. His ' Natural His- 

 tory ' was printed in 1651 and is a store- 

 house of the knowledge of the Aztecs on 

 that subject. In describing a plant he al- 

 waj'S gave its native name and how em- 

 ployed by the Indians. 



In the Anales del Instituto Medico Nacional, 

 Tom. II., No. VI., 1898, is an article by 

 Dr. F. Altamirano, in which he endeav- 

 ors to identify the plants mentioned by 

 Hernandez and give their modern botanical 

 names. He quotes fifty-one, assigning most 

 of them to genera and species, and adds 

 the modern uses to which they are applied. 

 The article forms a useful appendix to 

 Hernandez. 



SEXUAL DIMORPHISM IN MAN. 



In a pamphlet of about forty pages Prof. 

 Dr. Giuseppe Marina sums up the results 

 of his measurements of 22,755 adults, 

 Italians, Slavs and Germans. His studies 

 tend to diminish the value of the skull- 

 form as a criterion and to cast doubt on 

 the ' criminal type.' But the most novel of 

 his results relate to the relation of the 

 sexual characteristics in general to the 

 pelvic diameters. He formulates the law 

 that in proportion as the pelvic index in 

 the one sex approaches that of the other, 

 this similarity will be correlated to a cranial 

 form and capacity, and to a number of 

 traits, physical and mental, which belong 

 to the other sex. Feminilism in the male, 

 for example, is displayed by the length of 

 the iliac crests, the shortness of the inferior 

 extremities, a wider pubic angle, ampler 

 cotyloid cavities, greater distance of the 

 umbilicus from the pubis, development of 

 the mammse, etc. Dr. Marina points out 

 that these traits are racial, sexual di- 

 morphism being much more marked in 

 some than in other stocks. The point is 

 of wide-reaching significance. (Studii An- 

 tropologici sugli Adulti. Torino, 1897. Fra- 

 telli Bocca.) 



HEREDITY ; A CONTRAST. 



In the Revue Scientifique for April last Dr. 

 Cesare Lombroso, in an able discussion of 

 the relative influence of heredity and en- 

 vironment, announced the conclusion that 

 " the influence of environment is potent 

 enough to annihilate all ethnic traits."' 



At the meeting of the German Anthro- 

 pological Society in August of this year 

 Professor Kollmann, of Basel, in an address 

 on the same subject, stated the dictum of 

 science to be that " the influence of heredity 

 is far stronger than that of environment. 

 The ethnic traits are immortal and persist, 

 though the peoples who bear them may dis- 

 appear from history." (Globus, Aug. 27, 

 1898.) 



These are two of the most eminent au- 

 thorities among European anthropologists. 

 As the traditional circus man said ^ 

 " You paj'S your money and you takes 



your choice." 



D. G. Brinton. 



University of Pennsylvania. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS. 

 THE conference on AN INTERNATIONAL CAT- 

 ALOGUE OF SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE. 



The Second Conference on an luternational 

 Catalogue of Scientific Literature began its ses- 

 sions in the rooms of the Royal Society on 

 October 12th. On the preceding evening the 

 President and Council of the Society gave an 

 ' At Home ' to meet the delegates, and a dinner 

 followed on the evening of the 12th. The for- 

 eign delegates in attendance at the opening of 

 the Conference were : France, Professor Dar- 

 boux and M. Deniker ; Austria, Professor Weiss 

 and Professor Boltzmann ; Hungary, Dr. A. 

 Heller and Dr. Theodore Duka ; Holland, Pro- 

 fessor Korteweg; Belgium, M. Descamps, M. 

 Otlet and M. Lafontaine ; Switzerland, Dr. J. 

 Henri Graf and Dr. Jean Bernoulli ; Japan, 

 Professor Einosuke Yamaguchi ; Norway, Dr. 

 J. Brunchorst ; Sweden, Dr. E. W. Dahlgren ■, 

 United States, Dr. Cyrus Adler. Men of science 

 throughout the world are greatly interested in 



