172 The Museum Gazette 



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We have not, however, exhausted the combinations which are 

 possible. It may be that a monoecious plant having both male and 

 female flowers separately may also have some perfect ones. This 

 condition of triple variety is realised in the maple, and hence the 

 expressions in Babington which have puzzled our young correspon- 

 dent. Such a plant is described very awkwardly as " polygamous." 



Classification. — It has been well said that "classification is the 

 superstructure and outcome of morphology." The best classification 

 is simply the best exposition of the sum of our knowledge of the 

 things classified. 



Prehistoric Man.— Professor Ray Lankester, in his recently 

 published Lectures, gives the following estimates : " The most im- 

 portant of the prehistoric remains of man take us back, to judge 

 from the position in which they are found, some one hundred and 

 fifty thousand years (150,000). These are the remains found in 

 river gravels in England and France and other countries, proving 

 that man lived here in a savage state with the Mammoth, the 

 Rhinoceros, Hyena, Cave Lion and Cave Bear " (p. 85). After deal- 

 ing with the facts as to the thickness of stratified rocks, he proceeds : 

 " The estimate thus given probably does not fully represent the time 

 which has elapsed. If you take 1,000 years for each foot you only 

 get an approximate measure of the time represented, because a great 

 deal more time has passed than is actually shown by the permanent 

 deposits or strata. Strata have been broken up by the sea and water 

 and have been deposited again and again, and it is probable that a 

 much longer time has elapsed than one thousand years for each foot 

 of the deposits which form the stratified crust of the earth." 



