1894.] Recent Literature. 259 
grounds which I have considered in Appendix II. It seemsto me that 
‘in the present state of our knowledge, it is more prudent to follow Gal- 
ton in suspending our judgment with regard to this question, until 
time shall have been allowed for answering it by the inductive meth- 
ods of observation and experiment. 
“7. Hence, in conclusion, we have for the present, only to repeat 
what Weismann himself has said in one of the wisest of his utter- 
ances: ‘The question as to the inheritance of acquired characters re- 
mains, whether the theory of germ-plasm be accepted or rejected.’ ” 
“Tt is now close upon twenty years that I have accepted the sub- 
stance of this theory under the name of stirp; and since that time the 
question as to the inheritance of acquired characters remains exactly 
where it was. No new facts, and no new considerations of much im- 
portance, have been forthcoming to assist us in answering it. 
fore, as already stated in the preface, I intend to deal with this question 
hereafter as a question of per se, or one which is not specially associa- 
ted with the labors of Professor Weismann.” 
The theory entitled by Romanes by the name of “ stirp,” was tenta- 
tively suggested by Galton in 1875, and was more distinctly enunciated 
in the AMERICAN Naturaist for 1889, under the head of Diplo- 
genesis. An acceptance of it is to be found in the article by vom Rath 
which is republished in the January Naturatist. It is evident that 
the diversity in the views of biologists as to the inheritance of acquired 
characters is becoming more verbal than real. 
Extinct Monsters.‘—In this book of some 250 pages Mr. Hutch- 
inson has endeavored to give a popular account of some of the larger 
forms of extinct animals, and has illustrated the several chapters with 
drawings of restorations of them. These drawings are commended to 
the public by Dr. Henry Woodward, who pronounces them, in a pre- 
face, “ the happiest set of restorations that has yet appeared.” 
The author devotes seven of the sixteen chapters to the Saurians, 
drawing upon the discoveries in the United States for much of his 
material. Under the head of Sea-Scorpions many points of interest 
concerning Pterygotus and its allies are given. American Mammals 
are represented by one species from the Eocene, one from the Neocene, 
and one from the Plistocene. From the varied Sivalik fauna of India, 
the author chooses Sivatherium and Testudo atlas, and from South 
America the characteristic Sloths and Glyptodons. The remaining 
t Extinct Monsters. A Popular Account of Some of the Larger Forms of Ancient 
Animal Life. By Rev. H. N. Hutchinson, with illustrations by J. Smit. London, 
1893, Chapman and Hall, Publishers. 
