44Q 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



[Oct. 26, 1888. 



worm-like ancestors ; that the principle of change of 

 function was the best guide in tracing morphological his- 

 tories ; and that degeneration might proceed to an un- 

 limited extent. In his first paper he holds that the mouth 

 of living vertebrates has originated from a union of two 

 gill-clefts. He regards the hypophysis in Teleosteans as 

 a pair of prasoral gill-clefts arrested in their development 

 in such a manner as not to reach the surface of the skin. 

 In Petromyzon he considers that the so-called nasal organ 

 probably still retains to some extent the function of a 

 gill. All previous observers, including Balfour and 

 Gegenbaur, had regarded the visceral arches of the Elas- 

 mobranchs as equivalent to the arches in Petromyzon. 

 Dohrn, however, proves that the external cartilages have 

 nothing to do with the arches of Petromyzon. The tuni- 

 cate eye is regarded by Dohrn as having degenerated 

 from the vertebrate eye to its present condition. 



Research. A Monthly Illustrated Journal of Science. 

 Vol. I. No. 4. October 1st, 1888. 



The first article in the issue before us, " On Science 

 Teaching in Schools and Colleges," appeals strongly to 

 our sympathies. We most cordially endorse the remark 

 that : — " The examination system of this country requires 

 a most thorough overhauling and remodelling, and in no 

 subjects more so than in science. At present it is to a 

 great extent a curse and hindrance to true scientific 

 progress." 



But we feel inclined to go a little further than our con- 

 temporary, and to ask if the'exceptional stress laid upon 

 examinations in this country is not a main cause of our 

 unsatisfactory position in science ? 



In the notice of the recent meeting of the British Asso- 

 ciation, it is very appropriately said that in the address 

 to Section F. the line between science and politics was 

 overstepped more than once. 



Mr. T. Mellard Reade, in a paper on " Mountain For- 

 mation," seems to accept the theory of Sir W. Thomson, 

 that the earth from the centre to the circumference is 

 " as solid as steel." 



There is a bright little article on " Llandudno and its 

 Flora," which will doubtless prove a boon to phytolo- 

 gists visiting that popular watering-place. 



The Sixty-fifth Report of the Sheffield Literary and 

 Philosophical Society, for the Year Ending December 

 1887. Delivered at the Annual Meeting, January 

 yd, 1888. Sheffield : Leader and Sons. 



The Sheffield Literary and Philosophical Society is a 

 favourable specimen of a number of societies instituted 

 in the first quarter of the present century, for the joint 

 cultivation of literature and science. Exception may, 

 perhaps, be taken alike to the name and to the scope of 

 these bodies. The term "philosophical," save in the 

 phrase " philosophical instruments," is no longer used as 

 a synonym for "scientific." As to the scope of the 

 Society, we often find that literature serves for a disguise 

 under which almost anything may be introduced. As, 

 further, the relations between science and literature are, 

 to say the least, somewhat strained, such bodies would 

 probably be the gainers in efficiency by submitting them- 

 selves to a process of dissociation. 



Among the papers, etc., printed in this report, litera- 

 ture seems to predominate, if we may judge from the 

 space allotted to " Samuel Bailey, the Bentham of 

 Hallamshire," to " Half-hours with Charles Dickens," and 

 to the "History of a Fascination." 



In the first of these memoirs politics crop up to an 

 extent very undesirable. 



Of the scientific papers the most important are " The 

 Discovery of the Planet Neptune," by Mr. B. D. Wrang- 

 ham ; " The Principal British Poisonous Plants, and How 

 to Distinguish Them," by the President, Mr. E. Birks ; 

 " The Perception of Odours, and the Mistakes of the 

 Colour Blind," by Mr. Simeon Snell ; and " Studies in 

 the Border Land of Geology and History," by Dr. H. C. 

 Sorby, F.R.S. We doubt, however, if any of these 

 papers, save the last, makes additions to our former 

 knowledge. In other words, the Society is not engaged 

 to any appreciable extent in the work of original obser- 

 vation and research. May we not here hope for a reform? 



Third Annual Report of the City of London College Science 

 Society, 1887-8. London : Howes. 



This report shows a very satisfactory activity. 



We notice, firstly, a very able paper by Professor G. S. 

 Boulger, F.L.S.,on the " Use of Experiment in Biology." 

 We are disposed to agree with him in rejecting as 

 vicious the commonly made distinction between the ex- 

 perimental and the observational sciences, and in re- 

 garding experiment as absolutely essential to the ad- 

 vancement of biology. 



Mr. G. E. Mainland gave a paper on " Spiders," con- 

 trasting the classes Arachnida and Insecta. 



" The New Darwinism ; or, the Segregation of the Fit," 

 was discussed by Mr. J. W. Gregory, who curiously still 

 admits the doctrine of the sterility of hybrids. He 

 grants the existence of a fertile hybrid between the hare 

 and the rabbit ; he will not be able to deny the similar 

 case of the American bison and the domestic cow, or of 

 the carrion crow and the hoodie, not to speak of the 

 multitudes of fertile hybrids in the vegetable kingdom. 

 Therefore, as a law of nature can admit of no excep- 

 tions, the dogma of the infertility of hybrids falls to the 

 ground, and to admit it is to give to the Old School an 

 advantage to which they are not entitled. 



THE FOUNDATION-STONES OF THE 

 EARTH'S CRUST. 



An Evening Discourse delivered by T. G. Bonney, 

 D.Sc, LL.D., F.R.S. , F.G.S., etc., before the 

 British Association, on September iotk, 1888. 



T^\0 we know anything about the earth in the beginning 

 of its history — anything of those rock masses on 

 which, as on foundation-stones, the great superstructure of 

 the fossiliferous strata must rest? Palaeontologists, by their 

 patient industry,have deciphered many of the inscriptions, 

 blurred and battered though they be, in which the story 

 of life is engraved on the great stone book of Nature. Of 

 its beginnings, indeed, we cannot yet speak. The first 

 lines of the record are at present wanting — perhaps 

 never will be recovered. But apart from this : before 

 the grass and herb and tree, before the " moving creature 

 in the water," before the " beast of the earth after his 

 kind," there was a land and there was a sea. Do we 

 know anything of that globe, as yet void of life ? Will 

 the rocks themselves give us any aid in interpreting the 

 cryptogram which shrouds its history, or must we reply 

 that there is neither voice nor language, and thus accept 

 with blind submission, or spurn with no less blind 

 incredulity, the conclusions of the physicist and the 

 chemist ? 



