38 The American Naturalist. [January, 
EDITORIALS. 
—T ne edict of the Czar wh ereby the town of Dorpat is hereafter to 
be known as Juriew, and its university, where heretofore the lectures 
have been in either German or Russian, is to be thoroughly Russian now, 
suggests a question which is rapidly becoming a serious one to thescien- 
tific world outside of Russia. This is, what shall be done with the 
“numerous papers published in the Slavic tongues? It is a serious task 
for the student to acquire a reading familiarity with the various Teutonic 
and Latin languages. Russian, Czech, and Polish, are almost impossi- 
ble. And yet the tendency on the part of the Russian Government is to 
compel the exclusive use of that tongue. Itis hereafter to be the language 
of all publications coming from the University of Juriew. Must 
the student of science hereafter add a knowledge of Russian to his 
other linguistic attainments? or is he justified in neglecting all 
Sclavic productions, just as he would those in Japanese, until they 
are translated into one of the languages previously in scientific use? 
Cannot our various International congresses discuss the question as to 
what languages shall be recognized as the proper vehicles for the pub- 
lication of the results of research, and come to some agreement where- 
by all papers printed exclusively in languages outside those of the 
Teutonic and Roman stocks are to be regarded as not published. 
Protests by the Western World are of no avail with the Czar, but 
the fact that the difficulty is such as to produce a practical boycott 
may produce good results. 
Since writing the above a case to the point has arisen. In the last 
number of the “ Morphologisches Jarbuch” the brilliant embryologist, 
Goronowitsch, takes Miss Julia B. Platt to task for ignoring previous 
literature. The facts are these. Miss Platt announced that the car- 
tilages of the vertebrate head are ectodermal in origin, and in support 
of her views she quoted from the available literature, including one 
paper by Goronowitsch. Mr. Goronowitsch complains that she ne- 
glected two other papers by himself, one of which was in Russian. 
tho nir- 
—THsE city council of Philadelphi 1 iation for the pu 
pose of securing certain collections of objects of Natural History which 
were exhibited at the Exposition at Chicago. The matter was placed — 
in the hands of Professor W. P. Wilson of the University of Pennsy!- 
vania, who carried out the object of his mission successfully, as he has | 
