Decembee 25, 1896.] 



SCIENCE. 



947 



mation as defined by the United States Geologi- 

 cal Survey was referred as far back as 1888, as 

 Jurassic formation. 



Jules Marcou. 

 Cambridge, Mass., December, 1896. 



SOME NEURAL AND DESCRIPTIVE TERMS. 



To THE Editor op Scence : In a recent cir- 

 cular asking the opinions of experts as to the 

 prevailing and preferred usage of anatomic and 

 neurologic terms in behalf of the projected 

 Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology, Dr. 

 C. L. Herrick mentions certain terms and 

 principles which have been either proposed or 

 adopted by me. 



But for the request to ' respond as early as 

 possible,' I should suggest that replies be 

 either delayed or regarded as provisional un- 

 til after the appearance of my paper, ' Neural 

 Terms, International and National,' Journal of 

 Comparative Neurology, VI., pp. 216-340, De- 

 cember, 1896), wherein the general subject is 

 discussed at length, and in parallel columns are 

 given the neuronyms adopted by the Anatom- 

 ische Gesellschaft in 1895 and those now pre- 

 ferred by me. But for the remoteness of Dr. 

 Herrick' s present address the following com- 

 ments would be submitted to him first. 



3 (b). For the part now called by the Gesell- 

 schaft ' Subtantia perforata lateralis ' I form- 

 erly proposed prseperforata, but since 1889 have 

 employed prsscribrum. 



4 (e). Metencephalon, as employed in the last 

 three editions of ' Quain ' and adopted by me 

 in 1881, designates the last definitive encephalic 

 segment, i. e., between the cerebellar segment 

 (our epencephalon) and the myelon or spinal 

 cord. As given in the circular it has two other 

 usages, viz., either for the cerebellar segment 

 alone (His) or for both regions (some authors). 

 The encephalic segments will form the subject 

 of a paper at the coming meeting of the Asso- 

 ciation of American Anatomists. 



(g). Metencoele is doubtless a misprint for 

 metacoele. The Latin (international) forms are 

 metacoelia and mesocoelia ; the national English 

 forms metacele and mesocele. 



(j). As to Neuron (proposed by me in 1884 as 

 a mononym for axis eerebro-spinalis) see ' Refer- 

 ence Handbook, IX., 100, and Proceedings As- 



soc. Amer. Anat., 1895, 44-45. Indirect en- 

 dorsement of it is contained in such compounds 

 as neuromere, neurenteric, etc. It like manner 

 myelencephalon (for either the entire cerebro- 

 spinal axis or for the last encephalic segment) 

 embodies indirect endorsement of myelon for 

 medulla spinalis. 



As to cephalic and caudal, cephalad and caudad, 

 during an experience of sixteen years no ac- 

 tual instance of misapprehension has been ob- 

 served. But since they evidently are not accep- 

 table to some, might not the increasing employ- 

 ment of prse and post in composition with the 

 force of adjectives, justify taking these preposi- 

 tions as the bases of adjectives, viz. praealis, 

 postalis, England, prseal and postal ; adverbs, 

 prsead and postad. As mere vocables the last 

 two are no more objectionable than quoad. 

 Classic precedents for the derivation of adjec- 

 tives from prepositions or adverbs are contrariuSf 

 extraneus, proprius, crastinus, pristinus, interior^ 

 supernus, and arjurepog. BURT G. WILDER. 



Ithaca, N. Y., December 19, 1896. 



SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE. 

 CARL VOGT. 



La Vie dhm Homme, Carl Vogt. Par William 



Vogt. Avec deux portraits par Otto Vautier. 



Paris, Libraire C. Reinwald ; Stuttgart, E. 



Nagele. 1896. 4°. Pp. 265. 



The life of this well-known naturalist wa& 

 stormy and eventful, in a degree momentous to 

 science, and also to the political and philoso- 

 phical history of his time. His son has given 

 us a vivid portrait of an interesting character — 

 a very positive one — who, besides leaving his 

 imprint on the science of his day, was in some 

 respects a many-sided man, not only being an 

 eminent investigator, a teacher, a founder of 

 scientific societies, a popular lecturer, a bril- 

 liant caustic writer and controversialist, but 

 also a man of great public spirit, an active re- 

 publican, almost a revolutionist, protesting and 

 fighting during the middle of this century for 

 right and justice against the ultra-conservative, 

 reactionary forces in State and Church. 



Carl Vogt was born in 1817 at Giessen. He 

 was by extraction a Celt, rather than a Ger- 

 man, and this may account for his turbulent, 

 combative, revolutionary nature, while his pro- 



