Thomas George Bond Howes. xxxiii 



graph, they say, " And as to the skull, the now well-known fact that, whereas 

 in the Amniota the hypoglossal nerve-bearing region, truncal in origin, is 

 incorporated in the occiput, in the Batrachia these nerves are postoccipital," 

 once again opens the gap between the Batrachia and Amniota ; indeed, so 

 markedly that "our ideas may be systematised by applying to the former 

 condition the term Archicraniate, and to the latter that of the Syncraniate" 

 Finally, they lead up to, but leave open, the question, whether terrestrial 

 vertebrates are descended from batrachian reptiles or reptilian batrachians ; 

 that is, from a group which possessed a coraco-sternum and an archicranium, 

 or from one which possessed a costal-sternum and a syncranium, " structural 

 combinations which go hand in hand." Every page of this memoir carries 

 evidence of the extremely careful investigation conducted by the joint authors. 

 But also it is marked throughout by the distinguishing characters which 

 Howes impressed on his own work. Acute and fearless criticism is frequent . 

 equally or more frequent are expressions of admiring appreciation. At every 

 point astonishing familiarity is displayed with the literature of the subject in 

 all its bearings. The contributions of Germany and Japan, of Belgium and 

 France, and Bussia, of England and New Zealand and the United States of 

 America, are all weighed in the balance. A paper is not neglected because it 

 is of ancient date, nor yet because it has only been published " during the 

 passage of this memoir through the press," or even shortly after the revisal of 

 the proofs. 



As may be gathered from his writings in general, Howes found his favourite 

 study in the anatomy of vertebrates, Nevertheless, when delivering addresses 

 as President of the Malacological Society, in 1896 and 1897, he showed a 

 commanding familiarity with all that had been written on the subject of 

 Mollusca. His addresses as President of the South-eastern Union of Scientific 

 Societies in 1900, and of Section D of the British Association in 1902, were 

 equally impressive as the fruit of wonderfully capacious reading combined 

 with high intellectual capacity. He was, however, by no means a voluminous 

 author, although it might well have been expected that he should be by those 

 accustomed to his voluminous fluency in expounding any topics which 

 appealed to his easily kindled enthusiasm. 



Howes was born on September 7, 1853, and may be said to have spent a 

 quiet, unostentatious, and comparatively uneventful life in accumulating and 

 dispensing vast stores of biological knowledge. He was elected a Fellow of 

 the Boyal Society in 1897. He was long the treasurer of the Anatomical 

 Society, which he helped to found in 1887. From 1895 to 1903 he was the 

 highly efficient zoological secretary of the Linnean Society. He served on the 

 Council of the Zoological Society, and on its Beorganisation Committee, and 

 was more than once a vice-president. In everything he undertook it was with 

 him evidently only a question of doing the best work which the situation 

 demanded or permitted ; but it was seemingly without question that he under- 

 took everything which he was asked to undertake. It is a sort of axiom in 

 the intellectual world that a man may be killed by worry, but not by work. 



vol. lxxix. — b. d 



