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The popularity of online encyclopaedias as a source of information has increased tremendously in the past two decades. However, the issue of the quality and accuracy of the information available in online encyclopaedias remains one of debate. This is particularly the case in those encyclopaedias available on the internet which do not charge users to access information. There has, however, been much discussion about the accuracy of information available in 'free' online encyclopaedias, which do not pay contributors and editors a fee but instead rely on voluntary contributions from persons who regard themselves experts without formal clarification of their qualifications or a stringent process of peer-review or editing. While this characteristic facilitates rapid and free transfer of knowledge, critics argue that 'opening the editing process to all regardless of expertise means that reliability can never be ensured'.

According to the leading global provider of web metrics, Alexa.com, Wikipedia is the most popular online encyclopaedia and the sixth most popular website in the world. It has more than 19 million articles in 270 languages. All content is freely available and approximately 13-15% of global internet users visit Wikipedia each day. Wikipedia is a collaboratively compiled and edited encyclopaedia with contributions in the form of text, pictures, formatting, citations and lists from multiple, unpaid editors and professionals. The process is regulated by means of an explanation of changes made between editors, notability guidelines and a tutorial process for new editors. Disputes about content are usually resolved by discussions between 'Wikipedians', i.e. users, contributors and editors.

In December 2005 the scientific journal Nature reported on a study they had undertaken to compare the accuracy of science entries on Wikipedia with those on the online version of Encyclopaedia Britannica. Unlike Wikipedia, which relies on voluntary contributors, regardless of proven mastery or qualifications, Encyclopaedia Britannica uses selected paid expert advisors and editors. At the time of the Nature study, Wikipedia comprised 3.7 million articles in 200 languages and was ranked the 37th most visited website on the internet.

Nature invited independent academic scientists to peer review entries (in the English language) for their particular areas of science expertise, from both Wikipedia and Encyclopaedia Britannica. Each scientist was asked to identify any inaccuracies and comment on the articles' quality and readability, without being aware of the source of the article. Forty-two reviews were submitted to Nature revealing on average four inaccuracies per Wikipedia article, in contrast to three per Encyclopaedia Britannica article. The general response was one of surprise, with levels of accuracy in Wikipedia being better than expected. Wikipedia articles were rated more 'poorly structured and confusing' compared to articles from Encyclopaedia Britannica, with 'undue prominence being given to controversial scientific theories'. Nevertheless, for Encyclopaedia Britannica, the oldest continuously published reference work in the English language, the results were worse than 9

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 expected. While Jimmy Wales, the co-founder and promoter of Wikipedia, expressed delight, he also added: "Our goal is to get to Britannica quality or better".

In a rebuttal published in 2006, Encyclopaedia Britannica refuted Nature's findings, stating: 'Almost everything about the journal's investigation, from the criteria for identifying inaccuracies to the discrepancy between the article text and its headline, was wrong and misleading'. The rebuttal stated that the conclusion of Nature's report was false, because the journal's research was invalid and clearly stated that the purpose of its production was to 'reassure Britannica's readers about the quality of our (Britannica's) content, and to urge that Nature issue a full and public retraction of the article'. The document highlighted a number of concerns about Nature's research methodology including:

Nature responded by rejecting Encyclopaedia Britannica's criticisms, affirming its confidence in the study, and refusing to retract. Numerous other non-academic and academic publications have followed Nature's example, yielding interesting results. In 2007, a study by Stern magazine, compared 50 articles from the German Wikipedia to Brockhaus Enzyklopädie , the largest German language printed Encyclopaedia in the 21st century. Fifty articles from disciplines spanning politics, business, sports, entertainment, geography, science, medicine, history, culture and religion were rated by experts for accuracy, completeness, timeliness and clarity. Wikipedia achieved a mean overall score of 1.7 across disciplines on a scale from 1 (best) to 6 (worst), while entries for the same keywords from the paid online edition of the 15-volume Brockhaus achieved an average overall score of 2.7. Wikipedia articles scored higher on timeliness and accuracy than articles from Brockhaus Enzyklopädie, although the Wikipedia articles were judged too complicated for a lay audience.

The accuracy of Wikipedia entries in the sciences has been scrutinised. In a study published in the Annals of Pharmacotheraphy in 2008, Clauson and colleagues found the scope, completeness and accuracy of drug information in Wikipedia to be statistically lower than 10

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 that in a free, online, traditionally edited database (Medscape Drug Reference [MDR]). In a report establishing the internal validity of Wikipedia entries for 39 of the most commonly performed inpatient surgical procedures in the U.S., 100% presented accurate content while 85% of the entries contained appropriate information for patients. Interestingly, there was a correlation between an entry's quality and how often it was edited. In another case study, medical experts reviewed 35 Wikipedia articles on conjunctivitis, multiple sclerosis and otitis media with entries on similar topics from other popular online resources frequented by medical students. The results found Wikipedia entries to be the easiest resource in which to find information. In addition, although Wikipedia entries were reasonably concise and current, they failed to cover key aspects of two of the topics and contained some factual errors. The report concluded that Wikipedia entries were thus unsuitable for medical students. Nevertheless, in a recent report published in Psychological Medicine, ten researchers from the University of Melbourne concluded that 'the quality of information on depression and schizophrenia on Wikipedia is generally as good as, or better than, that provided by centrally controlled websites, Encyclopaedia Britannica and a psychiatry textbook'. For schizophrenia and depression, two commonly encountered psychiatric conditions, Wikipedia scored highest in the accuracy, timeliness and references categories – surpassing all other resources, including WebMD, NIMH, the Mayo Clinic and Britannica Online.

In one study, among the humanities and the social sciences, Wikipedia was not found to be a reliable source of historical articles, with an overall accuracy rate of 80% compared to 95–96% among the other sources, which included Encyclopaedia Britannica, The Dictionary of American History and American National Biography Online. Wikipedia's performance in articles on Philosophy was found to be mixed in one study, with high rates of coverage and accuracy but high rates of omissions as well. In an impressive review of thousands of Wikipedia articles in political science, about every major party gubernatorial candidate who ran between 1998 and 2008, the author found that Wikipedia was almost always accurate when relevant articles on the topic existed. The coverage of topics was often very good especially for recent or prominent topics, but not as good on older topics. Omissions were, however, found to be frequent.

Prior to Nature's seminal study in 2005, Wikipedia assessed the quality of its entries through its 'featured article' and 'good article' peer review process, and more recently through an ongoing pilot study to collect feedback , which involves readers and editors rating articles according to trustworthiness, neutrality, completeness and readability, as well as rating 11

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 their self-perceived qualification to comment. Wikipedia has continued to develop and refine its quality review processes in part as a result of the findings of the Nature study and of other similar studies. However, there has never been any attempt to replicate, better or extend Nature's study, across disciplines and languages. Such a study would not only allow a greater understanding of the accuracy and quality issues pertaining to Wikipedia entries but would also provide information on how such issues may be addressed and/ or resolved.

Recently, Wikipedia's founder Jimmy Wales highlighted the importance of such a task, i.e. a study inspired by the Nature study but employing greater rigour by carrying out the assessment of articles across languages and across a range of disciplines spanning the humanities and sciences, involving the following characteristics:

The importance of such a study would lie in the examination of articles in more than just the English language and in subjects other than solely science. This would allow differences in levels of accuracy and quality across languages and subject domains to be identified, which would inform decisions in the future, e.g. for editor recruitment efforts and the design of expert feedback mechanisms.

The size, scope and complexity of undertaking such a study would require considerable preliminary information on the methodology and design, compilation and functioning of rating scales, recruitment and location of the experts, and analysis and interpretation of results. As such it was decided that prior to the commencement of such a study, a small-scale preliminary project drawing on empirical evidence would be essential to determine a sound research methodology, which is the reason that the present study was undertaken.

This pilot study has therefore been carried out to collect and review preliminary evidence to inform the design of a larger, future study. The intention is that the results of this preliminary report will establish the best possible research approach, begin to hypothesise the best way for Wikipedia to measure and communicate the accuracy and quality of articles and provide a well-founded justification for seeking funding for a comprehensive study. This pilot study has been carried out for the Wikimedia Foundation by Epic, in partnership with the Department of Education at the University of Oxford, UK. The methodology, analysis and results of the study are presented in this report, followed by a discussion of the findings and the conclusion of the report. 12

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Aims:

The aims of this pilot study are as follows:

Objectives:

Research objective 1: To explore the opinions of expert reviewers pertaining to the accuracy, quality, references, style and overall judgment of Wikipedia entries.

Research objective 2: To compare the accuracy, quality, references, style and overall judgment of Wikipedia entries to those of alternative online encyclopaedias.

Research objective 3: To compare the accuracy, quality, references, style and overall judgment of Wikipedia entries with those of alternative online encyclopaedias in each language, i.e. English, Spanish and Arabic.

Research objective 4: To compare the accuracy, quality, references, style and overall judgment of Wikipedia entries with those of alternative online encyclopaedias in each academic discipline i.e. Humanities; Social Sciences; Mathematics, Physics and Life Sciences; and Medical Sciences.

Research Objective 5: To comment on issues of importance pertaining to the design and methodology in carrying out the study. 13

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Figure 3.1 below depicts the research methodology employed in the study. In summary, this consisted of 31 experts (academics and doctoral students) reviewing two pairs of articles each in their area of expertise and in their native language. The languages selected for the purpose of this study were English, Spanish and Arabic. The rationale for selecting the same is mentioned in section 3.1 below. The academic areas of expertise selected for the purpose of this study were (a) Humanities (b) Social Sciences (c) Mathematics, Physics and Life Sciences and (d) Medical Sciences. The rationale for selecting these four academic areas to classify both articles and the reviewers' areas of expertise, was that they correspond with the four main academic divisions at the University of Oxford, which is where this study was carried out. Further details on each aspect of the methodology are described in the sections that follow.

3.1 Selection Criteria

3.1.1 Selection of Languages

As of July 2012, there were 285 different language versions of Wikipedia. Three of the most popular world languages were included for the purpose of this study, based firstly on their popularity in terms of numbers of native speakers and secondly in terms of numbers of Wikipedia articles, with the intention of choosing those with potential for a wide reach.

The top five world languages in order by numbers of native speakers were found to be Mandarin (Standard Chinese), Spanish, English, Hindi-Urdu and Arabic. These appear in the list of number of articles per language version of Wikipedia ordered as follows: English, Spanish, Chinese, Arabic and then Hindi-Urdu. The Chinese Wikipedia was found to be 14

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Preferable Criteria:

The selection process of the encyclopaedia was based on the availability, quality and length of its articles. The selection was carried out by the research team with reference in each case to a native speaker in each of the three study languages (postgraduate students at the University of Oxford). The selection of comparative encyclopaedias for the study was made independent of the opinions of the research team at the Wikimedia Foundation. This was done in order to increase the robustness of the study design by eliminating any potential biases in the selection of the alternative encyclopaedias for comparison.

The following encyclopaedias were selected:

Encyclopaedia Britannica:

For the English language, the alternative encyclopaedia selected was the online home version of Encyclopaedia Britannica. As well as being the oldest English-language encyclopaedia, it was also the encyclopaedia originally chosen by Nature to compare with Wikipedia. Britannica was founded in 1768, in Edinburgh, Scotland, and has grown continuously since then with offices in London, New Delhi, Paris, Seoul, Sydney, Taipei and 16

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 Tokyo. The ownership of Britannica passed to two Americans in the 1930s and, since then, the company's headquarters has been in Chicago. Britannica was an early leader in digital publishing. In 1981, the first digital version of the Encyclopædia Britannica was created for the Lexis-Nexis service. It has been stated to be possibly the first digital encyclopaedia in the world. As personal computers grew in number in the mid-1980s Britannica produced the first multimedia CD ROM encyclopaedia in 1989. In 1994, Britannica Online, the first encyclopaedia on the Internet, was introduced.

Enciclonet:

Enciclonet was selected to be the alternative encyclopaedia of choice in Spanish. Enciclonet is an online project based on the Universal Encyclopaedia and developed by Micronet equipment. It is described as the first online general encyclopaedia in Spanish (www.enciclonet.com). It was selected because of its high popularity, its high Alexa traffic rank of 322,628 and because of the comprehensive nature of its articles. The other online Spanish encyclopaedias considered were Enciclopedia Universal en Español (which was not chosen as it could not be accessed in January 2012), Ateneo de Cordoba (which was not chosen as it incorporated Wikipedia articles), Gran Enciclopedia Aragonesa (which was not chosen because it was not found to be as comprehensive as Enciclonet), a little-known encyclopaedia developed by the University of Sevilla and Gran Enciclopedia de Espana (which was not found to be as comprehensive as Enciclonet).

Mawsoah and Arab Encyclopaedia:

Mawsoah was selected to be the alternative encyclopaedia of choice in Arabic for the social sciences and medical sciences. Arab Encyclopaedia was selected as the alternative Arabic encyclopaedia for mathematics, physics and life sciences. Due to extreme difficulty encountered in finding an online Arabic encyclopaedia to meet all four essential criteria, it was decided to select the best encyclopaedia choices for each academic discipline as there appeared to be a substantial segregation of encyclopaedias by discipline.

Mawsoah was selected because it has 150,000 articles and its articles appear to be comprehensive and have good categorisation. Arab Encyclopaedia was chosen because it appeared to have the highest traffic amongst the other alternative online encyclopaedias and has hyperlinks embedded into articles. Unlike Mawsoah, however, Arab Encyclopaedia's articles are authored by a single person. In addition, it is extremely important to highlight that neither Mawsoah nor Arab Encyclopaedia covered all academic disciplines to the same extent, even for basic articles and articles on key concepts.

The other option considered for Arabic encyclopaedias was Dahsha, a Saudi Arabian encyclopaedia with high traffic. However, on exploring this option further, Dahsha did not appear to have the same coverage of topics as either Mawsoah or Arab Encyclopaedia. 17

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 3.2 Sampling

3.2.1 Sampling of Expert Reviewers

Step 1: Selection of student reviewers

Student reviewers were recruited from the University of Oxford. All were postgraduate students, either currently studying or recently having completed either a masters or doctoral degree. 116 students were initially identified as potential reviewers, in order to cover the full range of academic disciplines and native languages selected for the study, 12 of whom were finally invited to participate (a further 12 were identified as a back-up). Each selected student was asked to provide biographical information in terms of educational qualifications, area of expertise and current academic focus (see Appendix I (2)).

Step 2: Identification and recruitment of established academics

Student reviewers identified academic experts known to them in their own areas of academic expertise. Criteria for nomination were as follows:

Essential Criteria

Desirable Criteria:

Each student was asked to nominate three academic experts and to provide contact details and a brief biography for each of three nominees. The list of nominees was reviewed by the research team to ensure they were eligible for participation. In the rare cases where the academic did not have a PhD, students were asked to nominate another academic in their stead. The final list of nominated academic experts totalled 33, out of which number 22 accepted the invitation from the project team to participate.

Step 3: Completion of review using online feedback tool

Reviewers were asked to review articles in their native language and relating to their area of academic expertise using an online review tool specially designed for the purpose of the 18

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Rh flour moved in the direction of tide water. The total of tolls in the last year of its official life was over 20,000 dollars. The story of the coal moved is better told in the amount carried by the Cayuga and Seneca Lakes Canal, and partly distributed by the Genesee Valley, which was 400,000 tons, now reduced to a few boatloads to accommodate the railroads and not the public. There could not possibly have been serious loss to the state from the Genesee Valley Canal and yet it passed the" way of the other waterways. This canal offers the most picturesque ruins. A railway runs along the bottom for a part of the way. The remains of the works at Dansville have a kind of melancholy grandeur; a sad evidence of the greed and folly of man.

It is only a matter of time when the subsidary canals will be rebuilt. With the increased value of material and labor, it will cost hundreds of thousands while the original represented thousands. It will not be a question of money. It will be an overmastering impulse to equal the best in canal structure. France, Germany, Belgium, Holland will be the criteria. There appears every prospect that the roads will take their normal place as freight carriers.

It is planned to build a canal from the great lakes to Pittsburg, thence to the Gulf. Such a waterway, if constructed with a view of paying interest on the investment, will never be built. As a check to the greed of the railways, as x a plan to place them in normal accord with the transportation interests of the country, it will prove an unalloyed blessing. Of more value than all else will be the vast tide of traffic that will seek the cheap route of the canals. Seen from this point the canals will always pay. The lateral waterways of New York, in their darkest hour, paid the people manyfold. The sin of the abandoned canals rests to-day upon this charming region. The fleets of steamers, sloops and barges have disappeared and the lakes have drifted back to primeval solitude.


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hundred years which began with the births of Darwin, Tennyson and Gladstone, and closes with the deaths of Meredith and Swinburne, has been a notable period in English history. Its two chief movements—the growth of science and the growth of democracy—are adequately represented by Darwin and Gladstone. Tennyson was the most widely read and perhaps the greatest poet of the period. The scientific man may be permitted to moralize over the world-wide extension and permanence of Darwin's contribution as compared with Tennyson's. Fifty years ago Darwin's name was almost unknown, whereas Tennyson's was a household word in England. A little later a man was not thought to have made himself ridiculous by saying that he sided with God against Darwin and the devil. Now Tennyson's reputation is being defended; no one would think of defending Darwin. The University of Cambridge lavishes its academic ceremonial on the man of science rather than on the poet. Tennyson wrote:

 The man of science himself is fonder of glory, and vain, An eye well practised In nature, a spirit bounded and poor.

But Darwin's personality and character are comparable with his services to science.

We may place the science of the nineteenth century before its poetry and Darwin before Tennyson; but to do so it is not needful to depreciate the poetry or the poet laureate. Indeed a scientific journal may well call attention to the fact that Tennyson was largely influenced by the science of his period and permitted it to become part of his poetry. Poetry based on the classical tradition can not make a wide or deep appeal to a world in I which it is no longer living; the future of poetry depends on the possibility of its adjusting itself to science and modern life, and Tennyson should receive honor for his efforts to this end.

The well-known verses of "In Memoriam" were printed nine years before the "Origin of Species." The geology may have have come from Lyell, but it was twenty years before Lyell would have been willing to accept the last verse of the stanza:

The solid earth whereon we tread

In tracts of fluent heat began. And grew to seeming random forms, The seeming prey of cyclic storms, Till at the last arose the man.

The doctrine of evolution is frequently used, as in "Maud," where the first verse is scarcely less significant than the second in the couplet:

 As nine months go to the shaping an infant ripe for his birth, So many a million of ages have gone to the making of man.

There will also be found in Tennyson an adequate conception of physical science and an attempt to put even its practical achievements into poetical form. Thus the age is told to

and we even hear of

Scientific knowledge is assumed or taught continually in the pages of Tennyson from the first lines of the "Lady of Shalott," which reawakened the spirit of English poetry—

 On either side the river He Long fields of barley and of rye. ..

Willows whiten, aspens quiver Little breezes dusk and shiver.

to his last poem with


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308 the kindly sphere

Medievalism and modern life, classical reference and scientific simile are curiously commingled in Tennyson's poems. As one turns back to them "the tender grace of a day that is dead" does not fully return. They are not like science universal; but for their own epoch they were not only great poems, but also rendered a not insignificant service in the diffusion of the scientific spirit.

greatness of the Victorian era is now represented among the living by men of science—Hooker, Wallace, Avebury, Lister, Huggins, Galton—all past eighty years of age. Sir Francis Galton—the "sir" is a tardy recognition on the king's recent birthday—now in his eighty-eighth year has done well to prepare the reminiscences which have been published under the title "Memories of my Life." He is typical of the great period in which he has lived and to the preeminence of which he has contributed his share. Like his cousin, Charles Darwin, he has had no profession, but with sufficient private means he has devoted his life to the advancement of science. There are certain marked resemblances in intellect and character between the two kinsmen—scientific curiosity reaching from obscure details to broad theories, patience combined with daring, royal simplicity and directness—which might be used to illustrate the theories of heredity in which both have been interested. Galton, like Darwin, studied medicine and like him was a student at Cambridge; but, unlike Darwin, he has lived in London and has taken an active part in the social and scientific activities of the time. He has been in intimate personal relations with the scientific and other leaders and a helpful friend to many at the beginning of their scientific work. The writer of the present note is one of a large company that owes him an unpayable debt for personal kindness and intellectual stimulation.

Galton—the Sir Francis does not come naturally—gives rather full details, as is becoming, of his parentage and early life. On both sides he was of quaker stock. He traces to inheritance his taste for science, for poetry and for statistics, and his endurance of physical fatigue. His formal schooling was not profitable. He says (it was before going to Cambridge): "In the spring of 1840 a passion for travel seized me as if I had been a migratory bird." He made a somewhat adventurous trip to the near east, and his travels were continued more seriously on completing his studies. He made two trips of exploration in Africa, in the second conducting an expedition of some 1,700 miles through unknown regions in the southwest. For this he was awarded one of the gold medals of the Royal Geographical Society in 1854, and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society two years later.

In 1853 Galton married a daughter of the dean of Peterborough, the father of a gifted family, and thenceforth residing in London carried out the investigations and published the long series of important memoirs and volumes, the contents of which are all too briefly reviewed in the reminiscences. First appeared works on travel, then serious attention was given to meteorology and the Kew Observatory. In 1865 were published two papers on "Heredity Talent and Character"; and these were followed by the studies on variation and individual differences which are largely summarized in "Human Faculty." The work on anthropometry, on association and on imagery opened up new fields for psychology; the composite portraits and the study of finger prints are known to all. Nearly every one of the 183 publications contains a new idea or an ingenious application. The work on


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Rh heredity and its application to eugenics, beginning before the publication of the volume on "Hereditary Genius" in 1869 and continuing to the present time, is of vast importance. Numerous articles on these subjects by Galton himself and by others who have received their inspiration from him have been published in this journal, and it is of course out of the question to give a summary in a brief note. There are no other problems so important as those to which Galton has given the name eugenics, and there is no one else who has done so much toward making straight the way for their solution.

Sir Francis Galton's unnumbered services to science has been the establishment of a laboratory for the study of national eugenics at the University of London. In cooperation with the biometric laboratory and the department of applied mathematics, also under the direction of Professor Karl Pearson, it is leading the way in a movement likely to become dominant in the course of the present century. National eugenics is officially described as "the study of agencies under social control that may improve or impair the racial qualities of future generations, either physically or mentally." It is further stated that it is intended that the laboratory shall serve as a storehouse of statistical material bearing on the mental and physical conditions in man, and the relation of these conditions to inheritance and environment, as a center for* the publication or other lorm of distribution of information concerning national eugenics, and as a school for training and assisting students in special problems in eugenics.

The general scope of the work which has been undertaken may be gathered from an enumeration of the publications for which the laboratories of the University of London are responsible. Biometrica is a journal for the statistical study of the biological sciences published about four times a year.and now in the seventh volume. It is a storehouse of materials and methods, dominated naturally by the interests of the editor. In some ways it is an advantage and in some ways a drawback that Professor Pearson is a mathematician. The need of applying mathematical methods to variation and heredity should be emphasized and stress on the method has permitted the treatment and unification of varied material. But it is also true that so long as there are but few biologists who are mathematicians, there is danger that certain methods may become prematurely crystallized and these special methods may be regarded as an end rather than as a tool. In addition to Biometrica there has been established this year a Treasury of Human Inheritance, devoted to family histories, including diseases, physical traits and mental qualities. Then there are two series of memoirs, one entitled Biometric Series, the other Studies in National Deterioration, published at the expense of the Drapers' Company. The first of these contains chiefly Professor Pearson's more recent mathematical contributions to the theory of evolution, while the second includes so far three studies, one on the relation of fertility in men to social status and two on inheritance and infection in tuberculosis. Lastly, there is a lecture series, of which but one has been issued, and a memoir series from the eugenics laboratory. The memoirs include a study of the inheritance of ability from the Oxford class lists and of the relation between success in examinations and in after life; inheritance of insanity, the resemblance of first cousins and the inheritance of vision.

recently issued monograph from the Eugenics Laboratory on the


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310 of vision, which is by Miss Amy Barrington and Professor Karl Pearson, is of special interest, as it is one of the first attempts to determine the relative influence of heredity and environment, and announces the unexpected conclusion that there is no definite evidence that schools have a deleterious effect on the eyesight of children. Other results are that keenness of vision is an inherited character, that there is some relation between intelligence and good eyesight, but none between this and poverty or shiftless parentage.

The authors have not obtained data of their own, but work over results that have already been published. For heredity they discuss the work of Steiger, which has the drawback that the material is not a random selection from the population, but starts with abnormal cases. Allowing for this, they conclude that heredity is as strong in the case of astigmatism as for other physical traits, such as height or eye color.

For environment the authors depend largely on a study of 1,400 school children made by the Edinburgh Charity Organization Society. These children show a high degree of fraternal resemblance. The conditions of eyesight are reproduced in the accompanying diagram. It appears that emmetropia—which the authors regard as synonymous with normal vision, though there are good grounds for regarding the hypermetropic eye as normal—actually increases, from the age of six to ten, while astigmatism decreases. There is no appreciable change in myopia. Myopia, or near-sightedness, does increase from the age of ten to fourteen, though only to 6.5 per cent, of the children.

These figures do not agree with those of Cohen, Erismann, Risley and other investigators. Cohen, for example, found the percentage of myopics to be: in village schools 1.4 per cent., in elementary schools 6.7 per cent, in intermediate schools 10.3 per cent., in the gymnasium 26.2 per cent, and in the university 59.5 per cent. The fact is that the Edinburgh children, being from the poorest classes, probably did not greatly strain their eyes with reading and school work. The authors say: "The persistent use by the Germans


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312 of non-hygienic characters for their type. . . renders all comparisons of English and German conditions unprofitable." One might suppose, on the contrary, that this comparison would indicate that progressive myopia is due to environment rather than to heredity. Cohen indeed found that of 1,000 nearsighted children only 2.7 per cent, had a near-sighted father or mother.

Professor Pearson may be correct in urging that "the first thing is good stock, and the second thing is good stock, and the third thing is good stock," but it does not appear that this conclusion can be deduced from what is known in regard to defective eyesight. There is danger that an attitude such as Professor Pearson's may lead to neglect of those factors of the environment which we can improve. When he says: "Pay attention to breeding, and the environmental element will not upset your projects," he rather neglects to emphasize the fact that paying attention to breeding does not under what Galton calls "the existing conditions of law and sentiment" give us much chance to improve the racial stock in man. We can not breed a race immune to myopia, but we can refrain from producing a generation of myopic school children.

regret to record the death of Dr. R. E. C. Stearns, of Los Angeles, known for his work on the Mollusca; of John Morse Ordway, until recently professor of metallurgy at Tulane University; of Mr. Lefferts Buck, a leading New York engineer; of Dr. T. W. Bridge, professor of zoology at Birmingham, and of Dr. V. R. Matteucci, director of the Observatory on Mt. Vesuvius.

of the University of Michigan, has been appointed state geologist of Michigan, to succeed Dr. A. C. Lane, who has become professor of geology in Tufts College.—Dr. C. Gordon Hewitt, lecturer in economic zoology in the University of Manchester, has been appointed entomologist to the Dominion of Canada in succession to the late Dr. James Fletcher.

celebrated his ninety-second birthday on June 30. His scientific career began seventy years ago, when he went out as surgeon and naturalist with Sir James Ross's Antarctic expedition.—Dr. C. Lloyd Morgan, Fit.S., known for his contributions to comparative psychology, has resigned the office of vice-chancellor of the University of Bristol.

French Association for the Advancement of Science will meet this year at Lille on August 2-7, under the presidency of Professor Landouzy, dean of the faculty of medicine in the University of Paris. The gold medal of the association, which was instituted last year, is to be awarded to Professor H. Poincaré who will deliver a lecture during the course oi the meeting.

heirs of the late Herr Heinrich Lanz, head of the Mannheim engineering firm, have given a million Marks for the establishment of an academy of science at Heidelberg.—M. Henry Deutsch has given 500,000 francs, and promises in addition an annual grant of 15,000 francs, towards the creation of an aerotechnical institute in the University of Paris. M. Basil Zakaroff has given 700,000 francs for the foundation of a chair of aviation in the faculty of sciences of the university.


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INCE the London Exhibition of 1851, and the first Paris Exposition of 1855, there have been probably one hundred expositions in various parts of the world. Generally they have been held in commemoration of some historic event or anniversary, and each one, large or small, has usually had some special distinctive feature. The great exposition at Chicago had its White City and its illuminations; the Buffalo Exposition had its architecture, its illuminations and the added advantage of its striking environment, and the various French expositions have each possessed peculiar points to mark their individuality. All of them have been held for six months or more, but in a great many cases from one third to one half of that time elapsed before all the departments were completed and opened to the public. In this way public interest was checked at the beginning, and when the exposition was finally completed, a good part of the allotted time had passed, and the enthusiasm always excited by these affairs had begun to flag.

New York in itself is not only the greatest exposition, perhaps, in the world, because of its geographic features and its wonderful resources, but its various lines of transit—surface cars, elevated railways and subways—facilitate the handling of great crowds. In addition to this New York lies between two rivers, and is as easily reached by boat as by rail, to say nothing of the attractive physical advantages this location gives it.

The writer, in an article published in the North American Review for September, 1902, and entitled "The Management and Uses of Expositions," strongly urged the holding of an exposition to mark the tercentenary of Henry Hudson's arrival at the mouth of the river which bears his name. The forecast of the present advantages of our city


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given in this article has been almost literally fulfilled, and the writer realizes more than ever that he was correct in saying that the museums and institutions of our city would "furnish a greater display to the visitor than any exposition yet held on the continent."

New York, with its great variety of public buildings, its miles of waterways, its dozens of museums, its many civic buildings, its great system of parks, stands alone as a prominent and fitting exposition ground. Why erect a city of staff, wood and other inflammable material to hold costly objects? Whoever contributed his much-prized works of art to such shelter, awaited, with fear and trembling, their safe return, and few of the finest things were ever loaned except in Paris, where they were shown in permanent structures such as the artistic Nouveau Salon, and its dainty neighbor, the Petit Salon, to the right of which is the magnificent Pont Alexandre II.

Although not so named, this Hudson-Fulton Celebration really presents the features of a great exposition, for when all the resources


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of New York are presented as they will be on this occasion, and given a brilliant and attractive setting, it will be found, that no exposition ever organized on this continent has offered a greater variety of interest. To apply the standard of monetary value may seem a trifle vulgar when we are treating of the triumphs of art in all its forms, and yet this standard merely expresses the worth of antiquities and artistic creations in a more exact way than by using superlatives of speech. A reasonable estimate of the value of the attractions that our city offers to its visitors would be rather in excess of $2,000,000,000 than below that figure, and


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 by Sir John Collier. Original in Tate Gallery. London. On his last voyage (in the Adriatic) Hudson was set adrift in a small boat by his mutinous crew and nothing was later heard of him. Hudson-Fulton Celebration Commission.

yet, where the great expositions of the past have cost from $10,000,000 to $20,000,000 or more for their organization, all the treasures and beauties of New York can he displayed at an expense of only $1,000,000. A single building, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, with the objects it will hold, would not he over-valued at from $30,000,000 to $40,000,000. At an exposition the public is called upon to pay fifty cents admission each time to enter the gates and an additional fee for each special exhibition. The great New York celebration will be free for all, even for those who have no car fare to enable them to ride. The demonstrations are in the heart of the city itself. They do not take place in some suburb, or barren, out-of-the-way spot. They are not encompassed


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Rh within a temporary city built like that at Coney Island, or held away out in the Bronx, on the Palisades or at Staten Island; neither is the celebration instituted or furthered to boom any special piece of real estate, or to sustain the selling of a quantity of traction stock or railroad stock that might be affected by an unusual traffic for the time being.

The celebration is designed to cover a very wide field, and the aim of the commission has not been confined to honoring the explorer of the Hudson River and the man who made steam navigation a permanent success; in addition to this the occasion has been utilized to illustrate and emphasize the development and greatness of New York City, the metropolis of the western hemisphere. Those who can understand the true significance of this celebration, and who are able to forecast the future, will see the vision of a still greater and more magnificent city, worthy of being called a world metropolis.

Although the naval parade owes its greatness to the presence of the American and international war fleet, and to the immense aggregation of vessels of all kinds and denominations assembled for the occasion, the place of honor is fittingly assigned to the replicas of the two small vessels which helped to make the names of Hudson and Fulton famous. The reproduction of the Half Moon, generously offered by the government of the Netherlands, is a craft of but 80 tons burden and is only 74 feet long and 17 feet wide. The Half Moon will be under the command of Commander Lam, who will be costumed to impersonate Henry Hudson; the crew will also wear the dress of sailors of Hudson's time. A comparison with the Celtic shows in a striking manner the wonderful progress in naval construction, the giant liner being 700 feet long and 75 feet wide, while its tonnage is 20,904. The historic Clermont, which, in 1807, made its memorable trip up the Hudson, thus inaugurating steam navigation on the river, has been carefully reproduced. This craft, while larger than the Half Moon, is still small and insignificant in comparison with the magnificent steamers of to-day. It is only 150 feet long and 18 feet wide.

The reproductions of the Half Moon and the Clermont constitute the central point, the very focus, of the celebration, and this has been fully recognized by the commission. Hence the opening day, Saturday, September 25, will be devoted to a grand naval parade, perhaps the greatest naval pageant ever seen. The eighty warships, American and foreign, form the most imposing array of naval forces assembled at any time in the new world, and we may safely say that, with one or two possible exceptions, no fleet of equal might and numbers was ever brought together.

The United States will be represented by 16 battleships, 12 torpedo-boats, 4 submarines, 2 supply ships, 1 repair ship, 1 torpedo vessel, 1 tug and 7 colliers: 53 vessels in all, the battleships constituting the


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318 most powerful fleet ever assembled except on a few occasions in the English Channel. Rear-Admiral Sea ton Schroeder, U.S.N., is in command.

From the Netherlands comes the cruiser Utrecht, commanded by Captain G. P. van Hecking Colenbrander, R.N.N., and the replica of the Half Moon. Germany sends the cruisers Dresden, Hertha, Viktoria Luisa and Bremen, under the command of Grand Admiral H. L. R. von Köster, retired, of the Imperial Navy. The English squadron will consist

of the cruisers Inflexible, Drake, Argyll and Duke of Edinburgh, commanded by Admiral Sir Edward Seymour, of the Royal Navy. France will be represented by two battleships, the Liberté and the Justice, under the command of Vice Admiral Le Pord. From Italy come the cruiser Etruria and the schoolship Etna, on board of which will be the cadets of the Royal Naval Academy—the future officers of the Italian navy.

Latin America will also participate in the parade, Mexico being represented by the gun-boat Bravo, commanded by Captain Manuel E. Izaguirre; Cuba, by the revenue-cutter Hatuey; the Argentine Republic, by the warship Presidente Sarmiento, and Guatemala, by a coastpatrol boat.

An immense fleet of seagoing and coastwise merchant vessels, steamboats, ferryboats, steam yachts, motor boats, tugs and steam lighters, sailing crafts, police boats, wrecking boats, fire boats, hospital boats, naval-militia vessels, steam cutters and launches, United States revenuecutters and other craft, including the Clermont and Half Moon, will assemble in ten squadrons in the Harbor, in the vicinity of the Brooklyn


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Staten Island and New Jersey shores. An object of interest for all will be the historic Roosevelt, used by Commander Peary in his successful trip to the North Pole. Staten Island has contributed a reproduction of Commodore Vanderbilt's periagua, the forerunner of the Vanderbilt ferryboats between Staten Island and Manhattan. The warships will also rendezvous in the harbor, and at 1:30 the parade will begin, the warships in the lead. The whole array of vessels, at least seven miles in length, will advance, slowly and majestically, up


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 An exact photograph of the replica of the Half Moon, in which Hudson sailed under the auspices of the Dutch East India Company, built by patriotic citizens of Holland and to be presented to the Commission. Hudson-Fulton Celebration Commission.

the Hudson River. When the head of the column reaches Forty-second Street, the two leading warships will swing out of line and cast anchor opposite each other; a little further on the second pair will then perform the same evolutions, to be succeeded in turn by all the other warships, the line finally extending from Forty-second Street to 175th Street. The civic fleet will continue on its way, passing to the left of the warships until the head of the line is reached, when the vessels will cross over and move down the river between the warships and the Manhattan shore, to 110th Street.

In the meanwhile the replicas of the Half Moon and the Clermont, accompanied by their more immediate escort, will pass up between the lines of warships to 110th Street and will be greeted by a salute in passing. Arriving at 110th Street, the formal presentation of the two vessels will be made, the exercises taking place on a landing stage constructed at that point.

The parade of the civic fleet will be repeated in the evening, starting at 7:30, and will make a very brilliant spectacle, for the moving vessels as well as the warships will be illuminated with electric lamps, which will outline their form with a tracery of fire.


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Rh On Wednesday, September 29, about 9:30, the Half Moon and the Clermont will leave their anchorages at 110th Street and will proceed up the river, stopping for a time at Yonkers, Tarrytown, Ossining, Peekskill and Cornwall. On Friday, October 1, these vessels will arrive at Newburgh, where they will meet the Upper and Lower Hudson fleets. The latter fleet will leave New York on the morning of October 1, and will consist of the submarine Costine (the first submarine), twelve torpedo boats and a large number of other ships, divided into six squadrons.

There can be no question that the naval parade with which the Hudson-Fulton Celebration begins, represents the central idea of the whole festival. The spectators, in gazing upon the immense fleet of modern vessels, may find it difficult to realize that the tiny ships, the Half Moon and the Clermont, so faithfully reproduced for this occasion, occupy a more important place in the world's history than will all the gigantic vessels that are assembled to honor the two remarkable men who accomplished so much with such scant resources.

This lesson is especially important in our time, for the tendency of our day is to lay undue stress upon mere magnitude, and to believe that larger ships, larger buildings and larger cities necessarily mark a real progress in civilization. No sane person will deny the fact that the conditions of life have changed and are changing for the better—slowly, it is true—but there can be as little question that the rate of progress would be greatly accelerated if the essentials of civilization


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322 were more regarded than the development of mere material greatness.

The first of the land parades, the great historical pageant, will take place on Tuesday, September 28, and will consist of 54 cars, or "floats," bearing groups of figures and accessories illustrating scenes from the history of the city or state of New York. These floats will be accompanied by marching bodies from various civic societies, American and foreign. The one which will head the procession has been named "The New York Title Car" and will bear a seated figure of the Goddess

of Liberty; two owls, the birds of Minerva, are perched upon the high back of the chair on which the goddess sits, signifying that wisdom has guided her in her progress. The contrast between the primitive conditions of Henry Hudson's time and those of the present day is strikingly presented by the model of an Indian canoe alongside of that of an ocean liner, and by representations, in due proportions, of a "skyscraper" and of an Indian wigwam.

The parade will be divided into four divisions, devoted, respectively, to the Indian, the Dutch, the Colonial and the Revolutionary periods, each division being preceded by a car bearing a group which epitomizes


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the leading characteristics of the period. The last car typifies the hospitality of our city, a gigantic figure of Old Father Knickerbocker standing upon it with hands outstretched and extending a hearty welcome to all the nations of the earth. In order to add to the verisimilitude of the different groups, Iroquois Indians have been secured to man the Indian floats; members of the various Holland societies to represent

 Celtic (1909)—length 700 feet, beam 75 feet, depth 49 feet, displacement 37,870 tons, tonnage 20,904 tons, horsepower 13,000. Half Moon (1609)—length 74.54 feet, beam 16.94 feet, depth 10.08 feet, tonnage 80 tons. The Celtic crosses the Atlantic in a little less than eight days. The Half Moon crossed the Atlantic in fifty-nine days.


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Rh the characters on the Dutch floats, and descendants of the old Colonial families, members of the Society of Colonial Wars, Sons of the Revolution, etc., to perform the same service on the Colonial floats. The float showing the capture of Major André will be manned by descendants of John Paulding, one of André's captors.

The parade will begin at 110th Street and Central Park West and will proceed down Central Park West to 59th Street, through that street to Fifth Avenue, and down Fifth Avenue to Washington Square.

This parade will be repeated in Brooklyn on Friday, October 1, proceeding from the Memorial Arch at the entrance to Prospect Park by way of the Eastern Parkway to Buffalo Avenue. Richmond Borough will also have its historical parade, on a smaller scale, it is true. This will take place on Monday, September 27, and will traverse the Amboy Road, between New Dorp and Oakwood. The ceremonies on the site of the first church on Staten Island, founded by the Waldensians, will commemorate the first permanent settlement on the island.

The military parade will take place on Thursday, passing over the route followed by the historical pageant. It will be composed of the Federal Troops of the Department of the East, the National Guard of the State of New York within the limits of New York city, the United States Navy and Marine Corps, the Naval Reserve, the veteran organizations, and marines and sailors from foreign warships. It is estimated that 25,000 men will be in line.

The carnival parade on Saturday evening, October 2, will traverse the route followed by the historical parade and the military parade. This will unquestionably be one of the most interesting and probably the most brilliant feature of the celebration. It will be under the care of the German societies of New York, and the Germans have always displayed a remarkable aptitude for organizing and designing pageants of this kind. The fifty cars composing the parade will be artistically illuminated, and many thousands of torch-bearers will precede and follow the emblematic groups. These will represent music, art and literature, and the wide field of German legend, song and history will furnish most of the themes. The streets along the route of the parade will be made as light as day by festoons of electric lamps. This pageant will be repeated in Brooklyn on the evening of Saturday, October 9, and will pass along the Eastern Parkway.

The general illumination of the city every night during the festival period will offer the most brilliant spectacle ever seen in this country. All the municipal buildings, as well as thousands of private buildings, will be lighted up by tens of thousands of electric lights. The four bridges spanning the East River will be radiant with rows of lights, 14,000 being placed on the Queensboro Bridge, 13,000 on the Brooklyn Bridge, 11,000 on the Williamsburg Bridge and the same number on


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the Manhattan Bridge. As seen from any point on the East River, these bridges will be outlined against the dark background of the night, so as as to appear like structures of flame, evoked by a magician's hand. On the other side of the island, both shores of the Hudson River from Forty-second Street to Spuyten Puyvil will be ablaze with light. At 110th Street there will be a battery of twelve searchlights, aggregating 1,700,000 candle power; these lights will be directed up, down and across the river, illuminating an immense radius. Another battery of searchlights, four in number and aggregating 400,000 candle power, will cast its rays upon Grant's Tomb, which will be thrown into striking relief by the dazzling light.

The historical parade and all the other pageants of the week will


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Rh tastes. On Sunday evening, September 26, the masterpieces of Irish music and song will be rendered in Carnegie Hall by Irish citizens of New York, many of the songs being given in both English and Gaelic. In the Hippodrome, on the same evening, there will be a concert by the United German Singers of the Northeast District of New York.

On Monday evening, September 27, the Hudson-Fulton official ceremonies will open with a reception to the distinguished visiting guests at the Metropolitan Opera House, when all the distinguished foreign guests will present their addresses, after an official welcome by the Hudson-Fulton Celebration Commission, Gen. Stewart L. Woodford, Charles E. Hughes, Governor of the state of New York, Mayor George B. McClellan, and Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, over ninety years old, author of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic," will recite a poem.

On Tuesday evening, September 28, there will be a musical festival by the German Liederkranz in the Metropolitan Opera House, and on Thursday evening, September 30, a concert will be given by the New York Festival Chorus in Carnegie Hall. Lastly, there will be a sacred concert at Carnegie Hall by the People's Choral Union, under the leadership of Walter Damrosch, on Sunday, the third of October.

Educational exercises, dealing with subjects appropriate to the celebration, and designed to be participated in by universities, colleges, schools, museums and learned and patriotic societies throughout the state, will be held on Wednesday, September 29. In New York City, the following lectures will be delivered in various rooms of the New York University: "Literature of the First Two Centuries of New York City," by Professor Francis H. Stoddard; "Conditions Determining the Greatness of New York City as a Commercial and Financial Center," by Professor Joseph F. Johnson; "The Political History of New Netherlands" by Professor Marshall S. Brown; "History of Education in New York," by Professor Herman H. Home; "Fulton and Other Promoters of Steam Navigation," by Professor Daniel W. Hering; "History of Steam Navigation," by Professor Charles E. Houghton; "A Comparison of the Steam Engine Before 1809 with Fulton's Steam Engine," by Professor Collins P. Bliss; "The Physiographic Development of the Hudson River Valley," by Professor Joseph E. Woodman. There will also be exercises in connection with the university's schools in Washington Square. In Brooklyn Borough there will be literary exercises on Tuesday evening, September 28, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.

Commemorative services will take place throughout the city and state on Saturday, September 28. On this day the Reformed Protestant Dutch Church of the City of New York, organized in 1628 and representing the earliest religious organization in New York, will hold special commemorative services at 11 and 8  in its churches at Second


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336 on Fort Washington Avenue. This fort was gallantly defended on November 16, 1776, by the Maryland and Virginia Regiment, against the attack of the Hessian troops.

The following dedications have also been officially recognized by the commission: On Wednesday, September 29, the City Wall Bastion Tablet, at No. 48 Wall Street, New York, marking the site of a bastion in the old city wall to be dedicated by the Society of Colonial Wars in the State of New York; the Fort Amsterdam Tablet placed on the United States Custom House in New York City, marking the site of Fort Amsterdam, dedicated by the New York Society of the Founders and Patriots of America. On Monday, September 27, the Palisades Interstate Park, extending for thirty miles along the western shore of the Hudson River, from Fort Lee, N. Y., to Piermont, N. Y., will be dedicated by the commissioners of the Interstate Palisades Park. The date for the dedication of the bust of Verrazzano, the Italian navigator who visited New York Harbor in 1524, has not yet been selected by the Italian societies which have donated it to the city.

Aquatic sports will be the order of the day on Wednesday, September 29, when boat races will be held on the Hudson River, the boats being manned from the crews of the foreign and American warships. There will also he interstate contests between members of the Naval Reserves from different states, canoe races and motor-boat races. At Yonkers, on the same day, high-power motor-boats will compete, and there will be boat races between various amateur crews from clubs.

The astonishing progress in aeronautics during the past year has excited public interest to the highest pitch, and the celebration commission is making every effort to assure the presence of some of the leading aeronauts and aviators. While the arrangements for this branch of the celebration are not fully completed at the time of writing, the public will certainly be given an opportunity to see many types of dirigibles and aeroplanes, and some sensational flights will be made. If the weather conditions are favorable, the aeronautical exhibitions will begin on Monday, September 27.

In organizing the various parades and exercises, the celebration commission has not forgotten the children of our city, for whom special festivals will be held, on Saturday, October 2, at fifty different centers. There will be games, historical plays, folk-dances, etc., given by thousands of children from the public schools, and accommodations will be provided for a half million children to witness the spectacles.

The close of the celebration in all its phases will be marked by a chain of immense beacon-fires lighted on mountain tops and heights from Staten Island to the head of navigation on Saturday evening, October 9. All these beacons will be connected by electric wires and will be lighted simultaneously by President Taft. The beacons are made of peat with chemicals, so that they will burn even if it rains.


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N the preceding articles in this series the origin and development of the neuromuscular mechanism has been broadly sketched in a succession of representative stages. The first stage was that of the independent effector, the muscle which was brought into action by the direct influence of environmental changes as seen in the pore sphincters of sponges. The second stage was that of the combined receptor and effector in which the receptors, in the form of diffuse sensory epithelia or specialized sense-organs, served as delicate triggers to set the muscles in action and thereby render the effectors responsive to a wider range of stimuli than they would be under independent stimulation. Finally, the third stage is seen in the complete neuromuscular mechanism in which a central nervous organ or adjustor has developed between the receptors and the effectors. This adjustor serves as a switchboard for nervous transmission and a repository for the effects of nervous activities.

This line of progressive differentiation from the muscle to the complete nervous system is complicated by the fact that in the more complete examples of the third stage the nervous system is found connected not only with such effectors as muscles, but with electric organs, chromatophores, glands, luminous organs, etc. If the history of the growth of the neuromuscular mechanism as it has been sketched in these articles is a correct one, the effectors just named must be regarded in the light of relatively recent acquisitions and in my opinion they illustrate an invasion and appropriation on the part of the nervous system of territory that was not originally under its control. This principle of appropriation results not only in the acquisition of totally new forms of effectors such as glands, etc., but also in gaining control over independently and newly developed muscles. Examples of this kind will be taken up first in discussing this question of nervous appropriation.

The differentiation of the central nervous organs is in large part a process that goes on hand in hand with the differentiation of the muscles. This is well seen not only in the higher invertebrates, but also in the vertebrates. The differentiation of a single muscle into a group of muscles and the consequent and corresponding changes in the


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Rh relations, both central and peripheral, are too well known to require comment. To this process must be added, I believe, the appropriation of totally new muscles. There is good reason to assume that the heartbeat in tunicates is of myogenic origin and the fact that the embryonic vertebrate heart pulses before it contains any nervous elements is strong evidence in favor of the view that the cardiac muscle of the primitive vertebrate was a muscle developed independently of nervous control. That that muscle in modern adult vertebrates is under a certain amount of nervous control is unquestionable, but this control is not of the kind usually seen in other neuromuscular combinations. The nerves that enter the heart are probably not ordinarily directly concerned with its beat, for, as already pointed out, this continues after they are cut. The function of these nerves seems to be that of modifying this beat and in this respect two classes of fibers may be. distinguished: augmentors which increase the beat, and inhibitors which retard or even check it. This whole nervous mechanism has the appearance of having been superimposed upon a muscle that was originally non-nervously active, and I therefore regard the vertebrate heart as an example of an originally independent muscle secondarily brought under the influence of central nervous organs. Many other muscles, like the sphincter pupillæ, etc., have doubtless had a like history, but as they have not been investigated from this standpoint, the question of their exact relations to nervous control must remain for the present somewhat open.

In the vertebrates at least, nervous effectors include not only muscles, but also electric organs. These organs occur not infrequently among the fishes. They are best represented in the South American electric eel, the electric catfish of Africa and the torpedoes of the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. They also occur less fully developed in certain skates, mormyres and the star-gazer. These organs are usually imbedded in a mass of the fish's muscle or they occupy such positions that they clearly replace muscles. Their histogenesis, as worked out particularly in the skates by Ewart (1888), shows conclusively that each electric plate is a modified muscle-fiber and in fact there seems to be good reason to conclude that all known electric organs, excepting possibly those of the electric catfish, are modified muscles. This is entirely consistent with what is known of the physiology of these two kinds of effectors, for muscles not only move parts, but generate through their activity a certain amount of electricity, while the electric organs have lost the power of producing molar movements and have enormously increased that of producing electricity. Electric organs, though often described as a special class of effectors, are in reality merely modified muscles and therefore can not be regarded properly as a new appropriation of the nervous system.


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340 The chromatophores, on the other hand, are effectors which are in no sense derived from muscles. These organs enable many animals to make relatively sudden changes in their external coloration, and though they are present in many animals, they are most perfectly developed in the arthropods, mollusks and vertebrates. They are also present in the more complex types of eyes, where their movements serve to protect the receptive elements from exposure to excessive light or to open them to the full effects of dim light. The investigation of these organs dates from comparatively recent times and van Rynberk (1906), who has recently summarized our information about them, has shown that the accounts already given are in many respects contradictory. Hence what I shall have to say I shall draw mostly from those fields with which I am somewhat acquainted at first hand.

That some chromatophores are completely independent of nervous control even though they are most intimately associated with nervous mechanisms is well attested. The deeper part of the compound eye in the shrimp, Palæmonetes, contains a layer of cells, the retinular cells (Fig. 1), which though they carry rhabdomes and end proximally in nerve-fibers and are therefore unquestionably sensory cells, contain many dark pigment-granules which change positions in accordance with the illumination. From this standpoint these cells are true chromatophores. In an eye exposed to the light the pigment-granules occupy distal positions in these cells; in one in the dark they come to lie in proximal positions. The place occupied by the pigment in a given eye is entirely determined by the presence or absence of light in that eye, for the two eyes have no sympathetic relations. Moreover if a persistent shadow is cast on part of one eye, the condition characteristic for the dark is assumed by that part even though the pigment in the rest of the eye is in the position characteristic for light. These observations show the physiological independence of the chromatophores in different parts of the eye. These organs, though connected by nerve-fibers with the central nervous organs, are also in their action independent of such parts, for the movements of their pigment from the dark to the light position and the reverse go on in an essentially normal way even after these connections have been cut. Chromatophores then may carry out under direct stimulation somewhat complicated pigment-migrations in


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Rh intimate relations to the successful action of such an organ as an eye, and yet with complete independence of central-nervous control. Other chromatophores, like those in the skin of lizards, can be as clearly demonstrated to be under the control of nerves as those in the eyes of Palæmonetes have been shown to be free from this control. The integumentary color changes in lizards are often extremely complicated processes, especially in such forms as the chameleon, but they include as a fundamental principle the inward and outward migration of dark pigment-granules within certain large unicellular chromatophores (Fig. 2). When these pigment-granules pass out into the processes of the chromatophores, they give to the surface of the lizard a dark or even black aspect. When they migrate inward to the body of the chromatophore,

 showing the condition due to the dark (A) and to the light (B). c, chromatophore; d, derma; e, epidermis; g, irregular masses of ground color.

which is often hidden in pigment masses of some particular color, they thus allow the ground-color behind them to assert itself. By this simple inward and outward migration of the pigment, the chief change in the color differences of the lizard's skin is accomplished. The question that we have to consider is to what extent these changes are controlled by the central nervous organs.

The inward and outward migration of the pigment of the chromatophores is well seen in the skin of the so-called Florida chameleon, Anolis. According to Carlton (1903), who has studied this animal with care, the passive state in its chromatophores is that in which their pigment is gathered together in the cell-bodies. This state is brought about when the lizard is removed from the stimulating effect of light, when the blood and nerve supply of a given region are cut off, when the animal is etherized, or when it dies. In fact any change that might be expected to interfere with nervous activity calls forth this condition. Since nicotine is a poison for the sympathetic nervous system, rendering it temporarily inactive, and since the inward migration of the chromatophoral pigment is immediately produced on injecting a very small amount of nicotine into the Anolis, it is probable that the reverse process, the outward migration, is dependent upon the normal action of


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342 these poisoned parts, the sympathetic nerves. For these reasons I believe that in Anolis the inward migration is a process which is ordinarily under the control of the chromatophore itself and that the outward migration, which takes place all over the animal when even only a small spot in the skin is illuminated (Parker and Starratt, 1905), is dependent upon the action of sympathetic nerves.

In the true Chameleon, as Brücke (1852) and many others have demonstrated, precisely the reverse is true; the outward migration is independent of nerves and the inward migration is produced by them. Moreover, judging from the results of experiments on the spinal cord, the nerves which in Chameleon are concerned with these changes are not sympathetic nerves, but spinal nerves.

These differences between Anolis and Chameleon I believe to be well founded. In my opinion both animals have descended from a stock in which the chromatophores were entirely independent of nervous control and in the process of descent the chromatophores of different lines became separately appropriated as effectors of the nervous system. In the ancestors of Anolis the sympathetic nervous system became related to the outward migration of pigment; and in those of the Chameleon the spinal system associated itself with the inward migration. The fact that Chameleon and Anolis belong not only to separate families, but to separate suborders of lizards, rather emphasizes this view than otherwise.

Such instances as the independent retinal chromatophores of Palæmonetes and the nervously dependent chromatophores of Chameleon and Anolis lead me to believe that chromatophores are effectors evolved independently of nervous control, but in some cases secondarily appropriated as nervous end-organs.

What has been said of chromatophores so far as their relation to nerves is concerned is probably also true of glands. The majority of glands are unquestionably independent of direct nervous control. In almost all instances a blood supply is essential to the action of a gland, and as this can be controlled by nerves there is thus an indirect influence of the nervous system on the action of the gland, but this nervous control over the blood supply is very different from a direct nervous control over secretion. I know of no good reason to assume that nerves have any direct influence on the secretions of the kidneys, the liver or even the pancreas. The pancreatic juice which appears with such precision on the arrival of food in the small intestine has been shown by Bayliss and Starling (1904) to be secreted not through the action of nerves on the gland, but through the action of a substance, secretin, produced by the food in the intestine and carried by the blood to the gland. If into the blood of a fasting animal whose nerves to the pancreas have been cut a small amount of secretin is injected, the pancreas will begin to produce its characteristic secretion.


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Rh Although most glands are not under direct nervous control, some are as completely under this control as the majority of muscles are. The best examples of this condition are the sweat glands and the salivary glands. The fact that when the nerves supplied to the salivary gland are stimulated, secretion may take place at a pressure higher than that of the blood supplied to the gland shows conclusively that the production of saliva is not a simple organic filtration process, but is dependent upon action called forth in the secretory cells by a nervous impulse. This view gains additional support from the fact that in the salivary glands nerve fibers have been found to end in connection with the secretory cells. There is therefore every reason to believe that the salivary glands, and the same may be said of the sweat glands, are organs whose secretions are directly controlled by nerves.

As these several examples show, some glands are completely under the control of nerves and others are not. In my opinion the latter represent the primitive state of this form of effector and the former the condition after such organs have been appropriated by the developing nervous system.

Luminous or phosphorescent organs afford another class of effectors which have probably originated independently and fallen secondarily under the influence of the nervous system. These organs, however, have been studied so imperfectly that it is at present difficult if not impossible to get satisfactory evidence as to their exact condition. Some animals have been supposed to possess phosphorescent organs when in reality their luminosity was due entirely to reflection; others like certain earthworms were found to be phosphorescent because their slime contained photogenic bacteria. But aside from these spurious cases there is an abundant range of truly phosphorescent animals, examples of which occur from protozoans to vertebrates. One peculiarity in their distribution is that true phosphorescent animals are not found in fresh water; they are either marine or air-inhabiting.

In all cases where animal phosphorescence has been examined with care, it seems to be dependent upon the production of a special substance by the light-producing cells. This substance is not in the nature of a living, structurally organized material like muscle, for it can be crushed into a paste and still show light. Moreover, Bongardt (1903) dried the phosphorescent organ of a common firefly over calcium chloride and then kept it in a sealed tube from July 16, 1901, till August 3, 1902, a period of over a year. After this the tube was opened and the organ wet with distilled water; in twelve minutes it glowed so that it could be seen at a distance of two meters. Evidence of this kind supports the view that the phosphorescent substance is not living but rather formed material, such as a secretion, and resembles in this respect pepsin or trysin.


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344 If phosphorescent organs produce a substance essentially a secretion to which their characteristic activity is due, they might without impropriety he classed as glands, but if they are thus classed, it must he remembered that the majority of them are so placed that they have no access to cavities or the exterior; hence they would be in the nature of ductless glands. In one respect, however, they differ even from ductless glands; the substance that they produce is not carried away from them even by the blood-stream hut is used locally for the production of light. Hence though phosphorescent organs may be in many important respects like glands, they differ in certain ways from all ordinary glands.

Whether phosphorescent organs are under the control of nerves or not is a question of some uncertainty. The fact that many highly specialized phosphorescent organs have a rich innervation indicates that they are under nervous influence, but even this may be of the indirect kind such as has already been indicated for glands and not a direct control. In ctenophores Peters (1905) has shown that a few paddle-plates will glow on mechanical stimulation precisely as the rows of plates in the normal animals do. He has also shown that the primitive nervous system of these animals plays no direct part in this phosphorescence. This instance seems to me to be a perfectly clear case of phosphorescence not under the control of nerves, though in an animal with a nervous mechanism.

In the common firefly the relations are not so well understood. Thus Bongardt (1903), though he describes an intimate nervous plexus in the luminous organ of this animal, believes that its rhythmic photogenic activity is not under even indirect nervous control. He maintains, on what, however, is not really strong experimental evidence, that the firefly can not extinguish its light through nervous action and he believes that the phosphorescent rhythm is due to totally different factors. This case merely shows the fragmentary nature of our knowledge of this phenomenon even in so well-known an example as the firefly.

As a good instance of nervous control over phosphorescence the brittlestar, Ophiopsila, recently studied by Mangold (1907), may be quoted. On mechanical stimulation the ventral surfaces of the arms of this animal glow for a short time. The phosphorescence begins in the stimulated part and, if this be an arm, it may spread over this arm to the disk and thence to the other arms. The course that it follows is that of the radial and circular nerve-strands. If any of these are interrupted by being cut, the phosphorescence does not pass beyond the cut, thus showing that it is probably controlled by the nerve.

These instances, few and confessedly fragmentary as they are, indicate that phosphorescent organs, though in many important respects like glands, are in reality a separate class of effectors and that in some


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Rh instances their action is independent of nervous control, while in others it is under this control. In my opinion the instances of independent action represent a primitive state; the others a condition brought about through the appropriation of these organs as end-organs by a developing nervous system.

If what has been stated in this article is correct, we must picture to ourselves as steps in the evolution of the nervous system not only the independent origin of muscle around which the nervous organs subsequently develop, but also the independent origin of other effectors such as chromatophores, glands and phosphorescent organs and the secondary appropriation of many of these by a developing nervous system. This principle of appropriation I believe to be as significant in elucidating the present condition of the nervous system and its appendages, as the principle of evolutionary sequence of parts, muscle, sense organ, and central nervous organ, as given in the first three articles.


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346

NDOUBTEDLY the progress of zoology has played an important part in the intellectual development of civilized mankind, but the way in which it has moulded thought is but vaguely appreciated by most people. On that account it is my purpose to discuss the question of the service of zoology to intellectual progress.

We speak of the intellectual development of civilized mankind, meaning thereby the general level of mental development that any people has attained; and we observe that the circumstance that chiefly sets one people on a pinnacle higher than another people is their degree of intellectual development.

There is nothing that afflicts us all more closely than that our young people should learn to think straight, and that they should ally themselves with the thought of their time, and take part in it, because this mental life of ours is remaking for us our ideas of the universe in which we live. It is not peopling it with phantasiesfantasies [sic] and dreams so much as with realities. There was never a time before when realities were so carefully sought after.

If we look into history we shall see that there has been a ruling power in the mental life of different peoples characteristic of every age, such as the mental devotion of the Romans to law and government, of the Greeks to art and philosophical disquisitions, of the people of the middle ages to mystical metaphysics and theological dogma, and so on.

Let us now ask: "What is the dominant note in intellectual life today?" Is it not a greater care to determine the truth? Is it not the investigating spirit? Is it not that spirit which we may designate generically as the scientific spirit? Perhaps great material prosperity is the most evident aspect of life to-day, but in the mental sphere there is certainly a disposition to analyze, to experiment and to arrive at conclusions by the method of observation and reasoning.

This situation is very different from the one from which the civilized world has recently emerged. A former state prevailed in which authority was declared to be the source of knowledge. In the sixteenth century, and earlier, men believed things not because they could be shown to be true, but because some one had said they were true. In order to crush out dissent the authority for a certain statement was quoted, and the authority cited was usually one of the ancient writers.


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Rh The Revival of Learning.—But the human mind, ever restive to discover the relation between causes and effects in the production of natural phenomena, would not permanently brook this restraint. The minds of the more energetic and independent thinkers revolted against the reign of authority, and, under the leadership of such minds, there began a reform that is known to us all under the title of the revival of learning, a reform of wide extent and of great importance to the human race. I wish to take a few minutes to point out that the essence of this reform consisted in a change in the method of the pursuit of knowledge.

This so-called revival of learning affords a striking illustration of how a change in mental interests may have great consequences for those who engage in it. Let us first picture to ourselves the fruits of the mental life of the middle ages, and then contrast this with the results of the changed method of ascertaining truth introduced at the time of the revival of learning.

It is an old, oft-repeated story, how with the overthrow of ancient civilization the torch of learning was nearly extinguished. Not only was there a complete political revolution; there was also a complete change in the mental interests of mankind. The situation was complex, and it is true that there were many influences at work, but the extinction of all scientific activity which occurred at this time was due to a complete arrest of inquiry into the phenomena of nature. The physicist no longer experimented, the naturalist no longer sought for relation and causes in living beings.

One circumstance that played a considerable part in the cessation of scientific investigation at this time was the rise of the christian church and the dominance of the priesthood in intellectual as well as in spiritual life. The world-shunning spirit, so scrupulously cultivated by the early christians, promoted a spirit that was hostile to observation. The behest to shun the world was acted upon too literally. The eyes were closed to nature and the mind was directed towards spiritual matters, which truly seemed of higher importance. Presently the observation of nature came to be looked upon as proceeding from a prying and impious curiosity—as an attempt to search out the concealments of the Almighty.

Books were scarce, schools of philosophy were reduced, and any general dissemination of learning ceased. The priests who had access to the books assumed the direction of intellectual life. But they were largely employed with the analysis of the supernatural, and without the wholesome checks of observation and experiment, mystical explanations were invented for natural phenomena, while metaphysical speculation became the dominant form of mental activity.

Authority declared the Source of Knowledge.—In this atmosphere free inquiry could not live, controversies over trivial points were en


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348 gendered and the ancient writings were quoted as sustaining one side or the other. All this led to referring questions as to their truth or error to authority as the source of knowledge, and resulted in a complete eclipse of the reason.

This was a barren period, not only for science, but also, curiously enough, for those studies which were especially engaged in. Notwithstanding the fact that for more than a thousand years all the new works were written by theologians, there was no substantial advance in their field of learning, and the reflection comes to us that the reciprocal action of free inquiry is an essential condition for the growth of any department of learning.

We should remember that the mental life of the Middle Ages was active. It is a mistake to suppose that men of those times differed much in their mental powers from those of to-day. The medieval philosophers were masters of the metaphysical method of argument, and their ingenuity and mental alertness were great. The principal thing that held progress in check was the method of setting about to ascertain truth.

Renewal of Observation.—It was an epoch of great importance, therefore, when men began again to observe, and to attempt, even in an unskilful way, hampered by intellectual inheritance and habit, to unravel the mysteries of nature and to trace the relation between causes and effects in the universe. The new movement was, as previously said, a Tevolt of the intellect against existing conditions. In this movement were embraced all the benefits that have resulted from the development of modern science. The invention of printing, the voyages of mariners, the growth of universities, all helped in a general way, but just as the pause in science a thousand years or more earlier had been owing to the turning away from nature and to new mental interests, so the revival was a return to nature and to the method of science.

The Widening Horizon.—The reign of authority in intellectual matters lasted for twelve centuries, and then gave way gradually to the reign of observation and reason. Under the influence of the new method we have been moving generation by generation into a state of clearer discernment and into an intellectual atmosphere of wider horizon.

There is an inspiration in this ever-widening horizon. We must recognize, I think, that there has been a reconstructive force accompanying scientific progress. Wherever traditional opinion has been uprooted something more helpful to humanity has been planted. When rightly understood, we see that this freer life of thought has been constructive and helpful, not merely iconoclastic. Man has once again taken his high place in the world as the interpreter of nature, and as investigation widens his comprehension of the laws of natural


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Rh, he is extending his control in the sphere of nature and turning natural forces to his advantage.

The Study of Nature.—I now turn to another phase of the subject, viz.: to a consideration of the effect upon mental life of advances in the knowledge of natural phenomena. Let us, if possible, catch a glimpse of the edifice that has been built upon the foundation since the early naturalists broke ground and began operations.

One of the most notable things of the last half century has been the mental evolution produced by the great extension of knowledge of organic nature. This more intimate acquaintance with natural phenomena, and of living nature in particular, has altered our way of looking at the world, and especially of our relation to it. The whole fabric of thinking has been so profoundly changed by the biological advances to which I refer that all educated people ought to make themselves acquainted with the generalizations of biology and with the foundations upon which they rest. This science is not a remote branch of learning; it touches every-day life at many points, and affects our well-being more closely than is generally realized.

The study of nature and the explanation of natural phenomena possess an inherent interest to which most minds respond. The physicist and chemist have for their territory the field of inorganic nature, but the biologist has the advantage of dealing with the living world. There is, in reality, nothing in the sphere of knowledge more fascinating than the study of life. Any reference to the part that bacteria play in the world awakens a responsive interest. References to the doctrine of evolution, and the light it throws on the origin of the human body as well as on the races of animals, arouse attention. The teachings of science in reference to the life of the globe have awakened wonder, sometimes dissent, but always interest.

Zoology the Central Subject.—Now the kind of knowledge to which I am referring belongs to the domain of biology, and in that domain zoology is the central subject. Many people think of zoology as it was in the time of Linnæus, or, at best, as it was in the early part of the nineteenth century, when the spiritless activity of species-making was its prominent feature. It is no longer merely a mass of knowledge that enables its devotees to name animals and to arrange systematically a cabinet. Zoology of to-day is vastly different; it has become one of the leading departments of science. While dealing with the structure, the development and the evolution of animal life, it at the same time brings one into contact with those changes in human opinion for which its own advances have been largely responsible.

From the group of the natural sciences there emerges into prominent place the princely science of zoology. As was said before, it is the central subject in all that advance in the knowledge of organic nature to which reference has been made. It is best fitted, it seems to me, to give


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350 to the students in our colleges and universities an idea of the results of the activity of the nature seekers. Its sister science, botany, which runs parallel to it, deals with similar phenomena in plants. Still, it is only among animals that we find nervous responses tolerably well developed. The presence of a nervous system in animals in connection with a highly developed state of other organs affords a more comprehensive picture of vital activity. If I seem, in this statement, to show bias, it should be set down to the circumstance that my activities for some years have been taken up mainly with the study of animal life.

The observations in zoology, as carried on to-day, are so illuminating and have such important bearings that we can see why it is that all over the civilized world it has been given such a prominent place in universities and colleges. We begin to understand why great buildings are constructed for its laboratories, and why a number of men in one faculty represent different phases of zoological investigation. This is why in the State University of Iowa, as in other similar institutions, zoology has come to occupy a prominent and an honored place in the curriculum of studies.

It is the ideas of this science woven into the fabric of human thought which I have in mind, rather than merely its details. Disjointed fragments of knowledge are of little worth; they must be combined into a unity before they have much meaning. Isolated facts should be treated as merely specific illustrations of broad truths. The study of one stone in an edifice as to its chemical analysis, its resistance to strain and crushing weight, and its microscopic structure, will not give us an idea of the edifice as a whole. Thus it is that after our students have observed and experimented in the laboratory they must, under the guidance of the lecturer, be brought to see the relation of their specific observations to zoology as a science.

It is owing largely to advances in zoology that we are enabled to formulate theories about the world, the history of living beings on it, and the part they play in the scheme of nature. It is owing to the intellectual progress that zoology has chiefly promoted that we have been able to comprehend the structure of the human body and thereby to discern the means of promoting its well being and assisting in its care. It is owing chiefly to the advances supplied by the study of zoology that one can adequately appreciate the soliloquy that Shakespeare puts in the mouth of Hamlet: "What a piece of work is man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals!"

His structure and his development excite in the mind of the anatomist the same measure of admiration and wonder. And we observe in passing that the most discerning anatomists are the comparative anatomists of zoology.