OCTOBEK 23, 1896.] 



SCIENCE. 



611 



government endowments for technical edu- 

 cation (at present about $3,500,000 a year), 

 especially for research, are desirable, the 

 author of the paper, as well as those who 

 discussed it, agreed that the greatest need ds 

 the improvement of the system of secondary 

 education. J. L. H. 



BELATIONS OF THE LEMURS, PRIMATES AND 

 UNGULATES. 



Prof. A. A. W. Hubrecht has contri- 

 buted to the second volume of the Gegen- 

 baur Festschrift an important memoir upon 

 the placentation of Tarsius, in which he 

 reaches the conclusion that this animal 

 should be entirely removed from the Lemu- 

 roidea, where it has always stood hither- 

 to, and placed with the true Primates or 

 Anthropoidea. The following is a recapitu- 

 lation of his conclusions: 



1. Numerous peculiarities in the forma- 

 tion of the blastocyst of Tarsius spectrum 

 show it to be more closely related to mon- 

 keys and man than to any other mamma- 

 lian genus. 



2. The ventral stalk in the blastocyst of 

 man and monkeys, with the ontogenesis of 

 which we were up to now most imperfectly 

 acquainted, is explained both onto- and 

 phylogenetically by the facts which we ob- 

 serve in Tarsius. 



3. By its dentition Tarsius takes an in^ 

 termediate place between the monkeys and 

 mesozoic Insectivora ; the upper molars are 

 purely tritubercular, the lower ones tuber- 

 culo-sectorial with well-developed pr'', me**, 

 pa'', hy** and en''. 



4. Among fossil Mammals the genus An- 

 aptomorphus Cope takes up an intermedi- 

 ate position between Tarsius and man. 

 Cope was thereby actuated to choose the 

 specific name homunculus. 



5. The Mammalian order of the Primates 

 should henceforth be looked upon as fully 

 distinct from that of the Lemures; the 

 former reaches back into the Mesozoic Per- 



iod and has been independent of all the 

 other Mammalian orders through the whole 

 Tertiaries. 



6. To the order of Primates belong (1) 

 man, (2) the monkeys, (3) the two genera 

 Tarsius (recent) and Anaptomorphus (fos- 

 sil, lower Eocene), which have been 

 hitherto classified with the Lemures. 



7. Undoubtedly agreater number of fossil 

 genera will have to be classed with the 

 Primates ; great prudence should, however, 

 prevail before we assign that place to any 

 of them. It is better to wait for more 

 complete skeletons before we attempt to es- 

 tablish any sharp distinction between fossil 

 Primates and Lemures. 



8. The Lemures (inclusive of Cope's ex- 

 tinct Mesodonta) have in their turn close re- 

 lationships to numerous Primitive Tertiary 

 mammalian types, such as the unspec- 

 ialized Ungulata, Cond3^1arthra, Creodonts, 

 etc. The placentation and the blastocyst 

 are in the Lemures fundamentally difier- 

 ent from those of Tarsius, but are at the 

 same time undoubtedly phylogenetically 

 comparable to those of the latter mammals. 



9. The placentation and the formation 

 of the blastocyst in the Primates cannot be 

 derived from what we find in the Lemures. 

 They can, however, without difficulty be 

 brought into genetic relationship with pro- 

 cesses such as we notice in central Insec- 

 tivorous genera, such as Erinaceus. 



CURRENT NOTES ON PHYSIOGRAPHY. 

 GRAPE BELT OP WESTERN NEW YORK. 



Grape raising is an important industry 

 along the Erie shore of western New York, 

 and it appears that, in addition to the favor- 

 ing climatic influences of the lake, the 

 gravelly bars of the ancient expanded lake 

 ofier the best soils for vineyards, as de- 

 scribed by Tarr (Bull. 109, Cornell Univ. 

 Agr. Exp. Station). These ancient lake 

 shores lie on the Erie plain, an inner low- 

 land denuded on the weak lower Devonian 



