BROWN UNIVERSITY.

Materials for the Study of Variation.-WILLIAM BATESON.-London and New York, Macmillan & Co., 1894. xv+597 $6.50.

Over thirty years ago Mr. Darwin outlined the great problems for investigation in natural history, and, one after another, these lines of investigation have been studied by naturalists. Embryology, paleontology and systematic classification early attracted the attention of many naturalists, and these branches of investigation have been very thoroughly studied in the last quarter of a century. Geographical distribution was made a special subject of research by Mr. Wallace and others. These various lines of study, while, of course, they have not been exhausted, have certainly been studied to such an extent that most of the valuable lessons which they teach have been learned. In recent years also another factor of the evolution problem, namely, that of heredity, has been the subject of eager research by various naturalists. It is somewhat strange that the problem of variation has been so universally neglected except by Darwin's Animals and Plants. It is upon variations in animals that the whole of the theories of Darwin and all evolutionary doctrines are based, but while the last thirty years has seen much speculation as to variations, both concerning their causes and distribution, while many illustrative instances have been accumulated, while nearly all the modern theories of evolution are based directly upon certain conceptions of variation, there has been no systematic attempt to study

Speculative

zoology has always a greater attractiveness to most minds than the more laborious and less entertaining work of collecting facts. The last twenty-five years has seen an abundance of publications upon evolution from theoretical grounds, and while variations themselves have been discussed on both sides of the Atlantic, these discussions have been almost universally based upon a few stock illustrations, and must be recognized as without any proper foundation in facts. Natural science is certainly indebted to Mr. Bateson for having taken up at last this branch of research which lies at the very foundation of the origin of species. Mr. Bateson's book has a very modest title, and the author simply claims to have brought together materials out of which a theory of the origin of species may in the future be built. But this is the only systematic attempt yet made to study variations themselves. The present volume is only the first instalment, and we are promised more in the future. A book of nearly 600 pages, filled with numerous illustrations, describing in more or less detail variations of all kinds, in all types of animals, will certainly find its way into the library of every naturalist who has any interest in speculative thought.

A review of this character is hardly a fitting place to discuss the subjects presented in this work. In reading over its pages there are, however, three or four striking conclusions of so much general theoretical importance that they may be selected as the teachings of this first volume. Most prominent among them stands the deduction of the author that variations are discontinuous. It is the theory of Darwin, and, in general, of his followers, that species were produced by natural selection acting upon slight continuous variations. The difficulties of this thought were plain to Mr. Darwin, and have become more plain

and more forcible as the years have passed. While the followers of Darwin's views have tried to shut their eyes to them and have tried to explain away the objections that have arisen, it has been plain to every thinking naturalist that the natural selection of minute accidental variations is entirely inadequate to accomplish the great end of producing species. The most important result of Mr. Bateson's study of variations is that the variations that occur in animals are not minute and continuous, or, rather, that they are frequently discontinuous. By this term the author means that variations may be sudden and extreme in character, such as the sudden development of a new tooth in a single generation, or the appearance of a new leg, or some other very prominent characteristic which appears at once without the numerous intermediate stages which Mr. Darwin's theory assumes. While Mr. Bateson does not claim that this view is demonstrated by the facts now collected, he does insist that all of his data point in that direction. The extreme significance of this conclusion upon the question of the origin of species is plain at once. A second conclusion which one reaches in the perusal of these instances is that variations are not haphazard, but, while, of course, they cannot be predicted with certainty, they do fall under certain definite laws. Mr. Bateson has found it possible to group the variations that occur in animals under very definite classes, so definite that, in many cases, at least, it is impossible to question that they are regulated by some organic law. Of course, Mr. Darwin recognized that variations had their causes, but, nevertheless, he was inclined to believe that they were 'par hazard.' According to the conclusions of Mr. Bateson, however, they are of a more or less definite nature. Incidentally also Mr. Bateson points out that the study of variation gives us a new conception of homology, and almost deprives

us of the belief in the long recognized law of reversion. It is somewhat surprising to be called upon to abandon the law of reversion, and perhaps the author does not deny that it may be a factor in development, but he does claim most of the instances so explained have nothing to do with this principle. It is not possible here to dwell further upon the many suggestive facts which are brought out by this study.

In criticism one may say that the English is extremely poor. The subject, of course, is a difficult one, and the author is obliged to use a new terminology and to explain his principles as he progresses. This in itself renders the book somewhat obscure, but we must add to this the fact that in many cases his sentences are very involved and cumbersome, and altogether the work is difficult reading. We may also somewhat regret that the author does not weave into the work a few more suggestions as to the significance of some of the facts that he has treated. The great part of this work reads like a museum catalogue, and museum catalogues are much more intelligible if one understands the basis of classification. Mr. Bateson, however, distinctly states that he does not consider the evidence as yet sufficient to warrant conclusions except in regard to some few general subjects. One may also question if most of his material does not savor too strongly of abnormal, and, indeed, almost pathological variations, to fairly serve as a basis for a theory of the origin of species. But, in spite of one or two such minor criticisms, the book of Mr. Bateson is an extremely valuable addition to zoological literature, and when it is completed by subsequent volumes upon variations of different nature it is hardly possible to doubt that it will be one of the few valuable and lasting additions to the literature on the general subject of the evolution of organic nature. H. W. CONN.

WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY.

Grundriss der Ethnologischen Jurisprudenz.ALBERT HERMANN POST.-Two Vols.— Oldenburg and Leipzig, 1895. Ethnologische Studien zur Ersten Entwicklung der Strafe.-S. R. STEINMETZ.-Two Vols. -Leiden and Leipzig, 1894.

In these two carefully prepared and thoroughly reasoned works we have for the first time an unbiased application of the facts furnished by ethnology to an analysis of the evolution of jurisprudence. The study of them will prove of the greatest profit to the advocate, the anthropologist and the philosophic student of the growth of society.

Dr. Steinmetz, in his over 900 large octavo pages devoted to the subject, pursues the idea of punishment through all the forms under which it appears in early conditions, such as personal revenge, blood feuds, compounding of offences, family, totemic and social punishment, the vengeance of the gods, and religious chastisement. The foundation for this historic analysis is laid in the earlier pages of the first volume by an able excursus on the psychological motives which underlie the thirst for vengeance and the passion for cruelty. This furnishes a philosophic basis on which the author constructs his conclusions by an inductive study of all the forms of punishment and penalty found in primitive and early peoples. With this he is contented, and with a temperance worthy of high commendation, he refrains from committing his work to one or another 'school' by applying it to the defence of some pet doctrine of popular sociology, which would at once limit its usefulness. He rather says: "Here are the psychic motives; and here are the results to which under various conditions they have given rise. Let the facts present their own inferences."

This impartial spirit also thoroughly pervades the more comprehensive study of Dr.

Post. It is considerably over a thousand pages in length and is an exhaustive analysis of the whole notion of rights, of the person, the family, the clan and the state, as they apply to both persons and things. In the second volume he traverses in his investigation of penalties much of the ground occupied by Dr. Steinmetz, and a comparison of their methods and results is quite interesting. The author's reading is immense, and the care with which he cites his authorities is most praiseworthy. While fully aware of the distinctly philosophic nature of his subject,-for a people's abstract conceptions of ethics are embodied in their concrete forms of laws,-he withstands the temptation to theorize on these points and keeps himself strictly within the limits of objective and inductive inquiry.

Of both these works it may be said that they represent the purest scientific method, and that they stand in the front rank of the contributions to Ethnology in its true sense which have appeared of late years.

D. G. B.

Flora of Nebraska.-Edited by members of the Botanical Seminar of the University of Nebraska.-Introduction and Part 1., Protophyta-Phycophyta; Part 2, Coleochatacea, Characea.-Lincoln, Nebraska, Published by the Seminar, 1894. 4to, pp. 123, pl. 36.

The beautiful work here noticed must long hold first place in the published results of the exploration and study of a local flora. It is hard to find words in which to express our gratification at its appearance, and we have tried in vain to find any point which is fairly open to adverse criticism. Beginning with a synopsis of the larger groups, including families, and an introduction contributed by Professor Bessey, in the details of which there is room for much difference of opinion, there follow concise descriptions of the classes, orders, families, genera,

species and varieties of Protophyta and Phycophyta found within the State, contributed by Mr. DeAlton Saunders, and of the Coleochataceæ and Characea by Mr. Albert F. Woods. The descriptions are well drawn, the typography excellent and the plates accurate and well executed. We tender our cordial congratulations to all concerned in the production of the book and to all who may have opportunity to use it. N. L. B.

NOTES.

THE SCIENTIFIC SOCIETIES.

THE programs of the mid-winter meetings of the several scientific societies promise of the several scientific societies promise large attendance and many important papers. The American Society of Naturalists meets at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, and in conjunction with it the American Morphological Society and the American Physiological Society. At the same place and time the American Society of Geologists meets. During the same week the Anatomists meet at Columbia College, New York; the American Psychological Association meets at Princeton; the American Folklore Society meets at Washington, and the annual meeting of the American Mathematical Society is held at Columbia College. These meetings will be These meetings will be fully reported in SCIENCE.

PHYSICS.

ACTUAL trial trips with flying machines have recently been made by Mr. Maxim and Prof. Langley. Mr. Maxim's machine was fastened to rails to prevent its rising, and sailed 500 feet at the rate of 45 miles per hour. Prof. Langley's æroplane was allowed to fly over the water at Quantico, Md., on December 8th. Both Mr. Maxim and Prof. Langley use light steam engines in preference to storage batteries.

THE Société Internationale des Électriciens established a central laboratory at Paris about seven years ago. The principal

object of the laboratory was the preservation of electrical standards, and to afford practical electricians an opportunity for testing their various instruments. It is evident that such a laboratory offers special advantages for the investigation of questions belonging to the science and industry of electricity. These facilities have been to some extent utilized; but, in order to increase the usefulness of the institution, the Society has added to it a School of Applied Electricity. This school, which will be opened on December 3d, has been constructed on a plot of land granted by the

city of Paris, the funds for the building having been raised by private subscription. Purely practical instruction will be given

at the school. There will be two chief courses, one dealing with the industrial applications of electricity, and the other with electrometry. It is hoped that the school will be a training ground for higher work in the Central Laboratory, to which it is attached.-Nature.

ANTHROPOLOGY.

DR. CHARLES L. DANA's address on Degeneration and its Stigmata, delivered at the Anniversary Meeting of the New York Academy of Medicine, Nov. 28, 1894, has been printed in the Medical Record, of

Dec. 15th. Dr. Dana traces with much skill the historic development of the scientific method that discovers mental traits and especially mental degenerations from their physical manifestations.

THE charges made against the management of the Elmira Reformatory have been dismissed by Governor Flower. The majority of the commissioners who examined the charges report that the institution stands preeminent among the reformatories of the world and that its success in the reformation of criminals has been extraordinary. This confirms the views of the leading criminologists and reformers.

EDUCATIONAL.

DR. J. K. TALMAGE has been called to the professorship of geology recently established in the University of Utah.

AMERICA has accomplished much for the advancement of Anthropology, but the work has been largely done by the Government institutions and by individuals. Columbia College offers this year courses in Anthropology (Dr. Farrand and Dr. Ripley), and the University of California must now be added to the institutions proposing courses in this subject.

THE Universities of Oxford and of Cambridge have recently taken action of considerable interest to Americans proposing to study abroad. The comparatively few Americans who have been in residence at Oxford or Cambridge would undoubtedly agree in recommending this course to others as highly as studying at a German university. But hitherto degrees could only be obtained by undergoing very irksome examinations. Oxford will now confer the degrees Litt. B. and Sc. B. on evidence of 'a good general education,' and research work evincing a high standard of merit.' Three years' residence is required, but this condition may be modified. The grace adopted at Cambridge is as follows: "That a syndicate be appointed to consider: (1) the means of giving further help and encouragement to persons who desire to pursue courses of advanced study or research within the University; (2) what classes of students should be admitted to such courses; (3) what academic recognition, whether by degrees or otherwise, should be given to such students, and upon what conditions; that the syndicate be empowered to consult and confer with such persons and bodies as they may think fit; and that they report to the Senate before the end of the Lent Term, 1895."

THE fourth edition of Minerva (1894–1895)

presents as frontispiece an etched portrait of Lord Kelvin by Herkomer. The book now extends to 930 pages, an increase of 69 pages over the preceding edition, many new institutions having been included. The American universities and colleges added in this edition are Bryn Mawr, Cincinnati, Colgate, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Nebraska, Ohio Wesleyan, Vermont, Wellesley, Western Reserve, making the total number thirty-nine. In attendance of students the order of the great universities is Paris, Berlin, Madrid, Vienna, Naples, Moscow, Budapest, Munich, Athens, Oxford, Harvard. But in many of these institutions attendance on popular lectures seems to be included.

A WORK with the range of Minerva, giving the courses as well as the instructors in institutions of learning, would be of much use, but a difficult undertaking. The need has, however, been supplied for the different institutions of Paris by Le livret de l'étudiant de Paris (Delalain Frère 189495), prepared under the direction of the general council of the faculties.

FORTHCOMING BOOKS.

DR. DANIEL G. BRINTON, Professor of American Archæology in the University of Pennsylvania, has in press a Primer of Mayan Hieroglyphics, to be published by Ginn & Co., Boston, in which he aims to explain the elements of the mysterious writing on the monuments of Central America.

GINN & Co. also announce a series of handbooks on the History of Religions, edited by Prof. Morris Jastrow, Jr., of the University of Pennsylvania. The Religions of India, by Prof. E. W. Hopkins, of Bryn Mawr, will form the first volume.

MACMILLAN & Co. announce The Principles of Sociology, by Prof. Franklin H. Giddings, of Columbia College; Monism, The Confession