348 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XX. No. 506. 



handily to explain the non-extinction of 

 species. On this point the second century 

 writer, Aulus Gellius, in his highly prized 

 'Attic Nights' (xiii, 7), has left on record 

 the following interesting observations : 



" Herodotus has related in his third book 

 that the lioness produces but once in its life, 

 and at that birth never more than one whelp. 

 Biit Homer says that lions produce and bring 

 up- many whelps, these being the lines in 

 which he plainly asserts this : 



Thus in the center of some gloomy wood, 

 With many a step, the lioness surrounds 



Her tawny young, beset by men and hounds. 



******** 



'' When this diilerence and opposition of 

 sentiments between the most celebrated poet 

 and most eminent historian greatly perplexed 

 me, I thought proper to consult Aristotle's 

 exquisite ' Historia Animalium,' and whatever 

 he has there written upon this subject, I have 

 put down in these commentaries. His state- 

 ments are found in book VI. [as follows] : 



" That the lion copulates backwards and is 

 retromingent, has been mentioned before. But 

 it copulates and produces not at all seasons, 

 though in every year. It produces in the 

 spring, and generally has two offspring. 

 When its produce is most numerous it has 

 six, but sometimes it has only one. It is an 

 idle story which tells us of the lioness, that 

 when she brings forth her young, she loses the 

 future power of generating, and it arises from 

 the scarcity of the lion's race, for the kind is 

 rare, not known in many places and nowhere 

 in Europe except in that country which is be- 

 tween the river Achelous and the Nessus. * * * 

 The Syrian lions produce five times in their 

 life, at first five cubs, then one less every time, 

 after which they become barren." 



In that mystical early Christian bestiary, 

 whose unknown author is called the ' Phys- 

 iologus,' and whose authority was widely ac- 

 cepted throughout Europe during the middle 

 ages, three peculiarities are claimed for the 

 lion. First, to throw hunters off his tracks 

 he rubs out his footmarks with his tail. Sec- 

 ondly, when the lion sleeps, his eyes never 

 close. Thirdly, the lioness bears her cub dead, 

 but on the third day his sire comes, breathes 



into his face, and thus brings him to life. 

 These attributes were all supposed to have a 

 deep religious significance, the meaning of 

 which has been explained by the commentators 

 of ' Physiologus.' Dante's idea of the lion 

 forms the subject of a special chapter in R. 

 T. Ilolbrook's ' Dante and the Animal King- 

 dom '(1902). C. R. Eastman. 

 Harvard University. 



THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 



The Cambridge meeting of the British 

 Association adjourned on August 24 to meet 

 at Cape Town, South Africa on August 15, 

 1905. The attendance at the Cambridge 

 meeting was 2,789, the largest except on five 

 previous occasions — at Manchester in 1861, at 

 Newcastle in 1863, at Bath in 1864, at Man- 

 chester in 1887 (the largest meeting ever held), 

 and at Liverpool in 1896. 



Scientific grants to the value of £1,000 were 

 made, as follows : Mathernatical and Physical 

 Science. — Electrical standards, £40; Seismo- 

 logical observations, £40; investigations of the 

 upper atmosphere (kites), £40; magnetic ob- 

 servations, £50. Chemistry. — Aromatic nitra- 

 inines, £25; dynamic isomerism, £20; wave- 

 length tables of spectra, £5 ; study of 

 hydroaromatic substances, £25. Geology. — 

 Movements of underground waters, balance in 

 hand; life zones in British carboniferous 

 rocks, balance in hand; fossiliferous drift de- 

 posits, balance in hand; erratic blocks, £10 

 and unexpended balance; fauna and flora of 

 British trias, £10. Zoology. — Index animal- 

 ium, £75 ; table at zoological station at Naples, 

 £100; development of frog, £10 and unex- 

 pended balance ; higher Crustacea, £15 and un- 

 expended balance. Geography. — Investiga- 

 tions in the Indian Ocean, £150. Economic 

 science and statistics. — Trade statistics, £20. 

 Anthropology. — Age of Stone Circles, £40; 

 anthropometric investigations, £10; excava- 

 tions on Roman sites in Britain, £10; excava- 

 tions in Crete, £75 and unexpended balance; 

 anthropometry of native Egyptian troops, £10 ; 

 Glastonbury Lake Village, balance in hand; 

 anthropological teaching, balance in hand. 

 Physiology. — Metabolism of individual tissues, 

 £30 and unexpended balance ; state of solution 



