which the actual rotation took place. This suggests a precaution-during the spin, hold the head down so that it is rotated about its long axis; on coming out of the spin, raise the head. Any disturbance experienced then will be in directional (i. e., horizontal) stability, and the more dangerous falling reaction will be avoided. The superior reliability of visual criteria of attitude should be recognized. "Follow the horizon, if it ties itself up in a knot," is a good rule to remember. A very illuminating incident that occurred at Mineola when the writer was stationed there, first suggested this analysis of the rôle the rotary vertigo may play in the tail-spin. On June 29, 1918, a pilot, while flying in a formation, lost his balance and fell off into a tail-spin. He got out of the spin, but fell off into another spin in the opposite direction. And he got out of the second spin also, but only to fall into a third, again reversing. He crashed and was seriously injured. The pilot in question was acquainted with the tail-spin, but had never done one "solo" before. It immediately occurred to the writer that the accident was a case of overcontrol due to a falling reaction and the precaution under (2) suggested itself. At the same time it was recalled that Lieutenant Simon,2 instructor in acrobatics at the school at Pau, France, cautioned his pupils to hold the head down under the cowl during a spin. Evidently the French aviator had arrived empirically at the same rule that the writer had deduced from his acquaintance with a physiological phenomenon. No knowledge of the precaution has been met with among American trainers. The observations were at the time (July, 1918) informally brought to the attention of several members of the staff of the Medical Research Laboratory at the field. Subsequent observations and experiences as a pilot in acrobatic flying have confirmed the conclusions. M. A. RAINES DEPARTMENT OF PHYSIOLOGY, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2 Quoted from Nordhoff in the Atlantic Monthly for April, 1918. THE GALTON SOCIETY FOR THE STUDY OF THE ORIGIN AND EVOLUTION OF MAN THE objects of the society are the promotion of study of racial anthropology, and of the origin, migration, physical and mental characters, crossing and evolution of human races, living and extinct. The charter members of the society are as follows: Madison Grant, Henry Fairfield Osborn, John C. Merriam, Edward L. Thorndike, William K. Gregory, Charles B. Davenport, George S. Huntington, J. Howard McGregor, Edwin G. Conklin. The organization of. the society was suggested and initiated by Messrs. Davenport and Grant on March 6, 1918. On April 2, after several previous conferences, Messrs. Davenport, Grant, Osborn and Huntington adopted the charter and the name of the society. The first meeting of the charter fellows was held in New York on April 7 at the residence of Professor Osborn, who outlined the object of the society and emphasized the importance of a union of effort on the part of specialists, working in close cooperation and harmony with one another but from widely diverse lines of approach. Professor C. B. Davenport was elected chairman and Dr. W. K. Gregory secretary. The following men were elected as fellows: Drs. Ernest A. Hooton, Peabody Museum; Gerrit Smith Miller, United States National Museum; Raymond Pearl, United States Food Administration; L. R. Sullivan, American Museum of National History; Frederick Tilney, New York; Professor Harris H. Wilder, Smith College; Dr. Clark Wissler, American Museum of Natural History. Two patrons were elected: Mrs. E. H. Harriman and Mr. M. Taylor Pyne, New York. A meeting of the society was held in the Osborn Library at the American Museum of Natural History on May 14. At this meeting Professor McGregor demonstrated his reconstruction of the skull of a typical adult Cro-Magnon man, based on all known remains of the race. Dr. Wissler sketched the rise of anthropology in Europe and America, and contrasted the two concepts of this study: the first as including all lines of investigation on the origin and evolution of human races and of their cultures, and the second as limiting anthropology to the study of physical characteristics. He said that the museum had tried to develop all branches of anthropology in the broader sense, and referred to the methods of exhibiting these lines which were to be illustrated by Mr. Sullivan's paper. Mr. Sullivan, in giving an account of a museum exhibit of the races of the Philippine Islands, based on a critical examination of the literature, showed that at least three physical types are present there, characterized by differences in skin-color, hair, stature, head-form and form of nose; first, the negritos, long recognized as a distinct race, who are short in stature, with a very dark brown skin, wide open dark brown eyes, black kinky hair, short head and short wide nose; second, the Malayan tribes, tallest of the island groups, with skins of varying shades of brown, dark brown Mongoloid eyes, straight black hair, and relatively narrow nose; and third, a group which is often confused with the second but belongs to the Indonesian racial type. This type stands between the negritos and Malays in point of size, is less Mongoloid in appearance, has the longest head on the islands, and straight or wavy dark brown hair. Mr. Sullivan's paper was discussed by Professor Kroeber who outlined the successive cultural strata in the Philippines. Professor Davenport, the chairman of the society, commented on the wide field for the labors of such an organization which was afforded by the presence in New York of representatives of many of the living races of Europe, Asia and Africa, and by the existence of various organizations which would gladly cooperate in the study of the races of Europe. He spoke of the vast material at hand for the study of human inheritance and hybridization. The second regular meeting of the society was held at the American Museum of Natural History on December 6, 1918. The meeting was preceded by a luncheon at which the members present were the guests of Professor Osborn and Mr. Grant. Mr. Grant presented to the society a portrait of Sir Francis Galton. Professor Merriam spoke of the place anthropology should hold in the universities. In order to make the discussion concrete, he gave a brief outline of the history of anthropology in the University of California. When the department was started everyone thought best to begin with the local anthropological problem, in other words, with the study of the California Indians. Under Professor Kroeber this work has been carried to a very satisfactory conclusion and while a great deal more work should be done it seems that a point had been reached where new problems should be undertaken. The speaker thought this was typical of anthropology in America. Everywhere the feeling had been and rightly, that attention should be given to the problems at hand. The result is that we have a very systematic body of knowledge concerning the North American Indians, but have no contributing workers in larger anthropological problems. The effect of the world war and its broadening influences makes it highly desirable that anthropology should be put upon a broader and more fundamental plane, particularly should it deal with problems concerning our racial and national antecedents. The broadening of anthropology would also require the drawing in and coordination of much that has been done in psychology, biology, neurology and history. It was the hope of the speaker that the Galton Society would be able to bring about such coordination by bringing together some of the representative workers in respective lines. One of the first movements in this direction should be the encouragement of strong departments in our universities. Unless the universities can be induced to finance strong departments of anthropology we can not expect very great development in the future. On the other hand, it was the belief of the speaker that the universities would finance such departments of anthropology if they could see that the problems of anthropology were of universal BOTANICAL PARTICIPATION IN WAR WORK1 FROM the subject assigned me in this symposium, which, by the way, was before the armistice was signed, one naturally would suppose that what was expected was a catalogue of the achievements of botany during the war. From the amount of time allotted for this effort it becomes equally obvious that no such thing is possible. I therefore find myself in the delightful position of being free to disregard the subject (for no one can disregard the time limit) and shall discuss some aspects f the way in which botany may be regarded as having accomplished its full share in the world struggle, as well as attempt to point out the overwhelming importance of a recognition of the place the subject should occupy in any peace plan. This I shall hope to do without encroaching unduly upon the subjects assigned to those in this or other symposiums which have been announced, although I am inclined to think that at this time there cannot be too great a reiteration of the fundamental facts calculated to impress the public at large with some of the reasons which justify the existence of the science of botany. Of course, one might attempt to point out the achievements of botanists, who, because of their special interests or training, have been of invaluable assistance in suggesting various botanical raw materials for which the commercial man was seeking, or in obtaining the right kind of sphagnum for surgical dressings, or their part in the work of the Bureau of Air Craft Production or the Sanitary Corps or in the perfection of the gas mask and similar strictly war work. Then if one were permitted to dwell upon the far-reaching effect of the agricultural application of botanical investi 1 Read at the Symposium of Section G, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Baltimore, December 26, 1918. gations, not forgetting the activities of the plant pathologist, there would be no difficulty whatsoever in making a case for botany of which none of us need be ashamed. The botanists of the world apparently left it to the Germans to devise the ultimate way in which a knowledge of plants could be adapted for purposes of war. At least the following incident given by a war correspondent, which appeared in print but not vouched for by me, may be accepted as an illustration of a method of applying taxonomy, which, to say the least, is capable of wide use. A man in a German uniform was brought into a German camp, suspected of being a spy. He claimed to have come from a certain part of the front and to be the bearer of an important verbal message concerning the movements of troops, the ordinary methods of communication having been shot away. Immediately the camp algologist was summoned and samples of mud from the boots of the prisoner as well as dirt from his finger nails were examined microscopically. The botanist reported finding Conferva utriculosa Kurtzing or Tribonema utriculosum Hazen, according to the nomenclatorial code approved by the General Staff, together with certain blue-greens and diatoms which constituted a characteristic flora of a region quite different from that from which the prisoner claimed to have come. In fact, by consulting the charts prepared by botanists for this purpose it was possible to indicate that the man had been in Russia. Confronted with this overwhelming evidence the victim of applied botany confessed that he was a Russian spy and was shot at sunrise. has been subservient to war needs. The importance of any investigation has been distorted and magnified. A trivial piece of work conceived and finished in a week might be more useful in waging war than a lifetime spent in producing fundamental results which have no military value. Thank God, however, we are not always at war. It is likewise well to bear in mind that one should be cautious in citing too freely, as has been common in the past, the supposedly favorable attitude which Germany has held for all things scientific. May it not be that this tendency held up as a model for all the world and manifesting itself in most substantial subsidations, was merely another form of propaganda, or at least primarily for the purpose of receiving every possible aid from every science which could contribute in the slightest way to building up a perfect war machine! In view of all that has transpired one is justified in questioning whether the underlying idea of the Teutonic mind was not science for science's sake but science for war's sake. When the Botanical Committee of the National Research Council was first formed it was apparently expected by some that this aggregation of botanical lights would assemble and after solemnly mentalizing on the whole situation would announce some discovery which would illuminate the world and win the war. Nothing could have been more absurd. So far as I know the only two suggestions which were made along the line of using botanical weapons for the direct destruction of life were rejected because they savored too much of Teutonic barbarity. Naturally the chief function of this or any other botanical committee could only be to have referred to it military problems requiring a knowledge of plants and their possibilities, in order that the most rapid and satisfactory solution be reached. That this was not always done until much valuable time was lost was not the fault of the botanists concerned, although it may have been the result of the general attitude of botanists, who, since they were freed from the demands made by materia medica, have reFor the past four years and more, science garded the birth of any botanical idea of prac The role that the ecologist might play in connection with camouflage and the aeroplane service was suggested at the meeting a year ago and need not be amplified here, although the temptation to do so is great. But with the close of the war, which obviously was not expected at the time this symposium was arranged for, such things considered from the standpoint of military effectiveness seem more or less out of date and we need to turn to more vital matters. tical importance as illegitimate, to be turned out into the cold to perish. These foundlings, however, were not infrequently rescued by some more enterprising member of a sister science and occasionally grew into most flourishing children of their foster parent. Again we are all familiar with the fact that many of the most practical aspects of botany have grown to be of so much importance that they now assume the place of independent sciences, and are no longer recognized as having any connection with their mother science. In fact botany unadorned now stands in the minds of most people-including many scientists as a synonym for the impracticable and the useless. The minute it becomes of value to man, either in peace or war, it must be called bacteriology or forestry or phytopathology. As a result of this wide-spread opinion we have a much-advertised achieve ment of another research council committee depending not only upon plants for the source of the product but also upon the application of botanical methods for the actual process of manufacture, yet with no reference whatsoever to botany. Another similar case is the recent establishment of a concern at present turning out more than seven tons a day of a product used in munitions, derived from corn. Although called chemical distillation, the process is one of fermentation, produced from pure cultures of an organism which is manipulated according to the practises devised in botanical laboratories. Examples might be multiplied indefinitely of those who, working in other sciences, ask: "Can you tell me of a plant containing a certain kind of substance, where it grows, what is its name, whether it can be obtained in large quantities, and how to distinguish it from related plants? If so I can use the information in the solution of a problem upon which I am engaged." And after the questions are answered there appears an article based almost entirely upon the results of botanical investigations, for which the science chiefly concerned receives no credit whatsoever. This is no imaginary case. All botanists have had at least a few such experiences and were there time I might quote from letters received during the past year which would emphasize even more strongly this aspect of giving no credit where it is due. It is probably true that botanists themselves are largely to blame for such a condition of affairs. Whether it be modesty or lack of interest or a failure to realize the importance of asserting themselves and emphasizing various aspects of science, the fact is self evident that altogether too much time in the past has been spent in criticism of others rather than attempting to correct their own faults. Perhaps we need a criterion by which botanical work may be definitely distinguished. We are obviously at a disadvantage in being confined to but one kingdom, while the chemist and physicist know no such limitations. But the plant kingdom certainly affords a reasonably wide field of endeavor, and presumably botanists are those concerned with plants-even plant physiologists. We calmly sit by and see aspects of our subject, which, according to present-day standards, make a thing worth while, appropriated for the benefit of other sciences because it is too much trouble or it is nobody's particular business to attend to such things. Even the very name botany is avoided under the slightest pretext. New titles for branches of this science, usually with the prefix "chemical," are coined so fast that one can hardly keep up with them, and if to-morrow the cause of influenza or any human disease were proven to be due to a species of Laboulbenia or Thelephora, Dr. Thaxter or Dr. Burt, although at once taking first rank as applied botanists, possibly, much against their will, would over night lose all association with botanical science and become at the very least a Laboulbeniaceaeologist or a Thelephoraceaeologist. It may be too late to correct much of this sort of thing which already exists or to hope for a bureau in the Department of Agriculture that bears the name of botany, but why allow it to continue without a protest and taking steps to prevent similar efforts to smother our science in a multitude of misleading and detrimental names? If a man spends nine tenths |