11. When cyanide of potassium is boiled with solution of hydrate of potash, formate of potash (CHKO,) is produced. From this, formic acid (CH, O,), the acid of ants is obtained by distillation with sulphuric acid. 12. When formate of potash is heated with hydrate of potash, it is converted into oxalate of potash (C, K, O.), whence oxalic acid (C, H, O.), same as from oxalis acetosella. 10 13. Oxalic acid heated with alcohol gives oxalic ether (C, H1. O.) used in No. 9. 14. By the action of anhydrous phosphoric acid upon the acids No. 9, the latter are converted into acids of the Acrylic series, thus: Dimethoxalic Acid gives Methacrylic Acid 6 C, H, O2 15. Distilled with alcohol, acetic acid gives acetic ether (C, H, O.), and with amylic alcohol, amylic acetate (C, H, O2). The first constitutes the bouquet of several wines, the second is the essence of pears. 16. Acetic ether, treated first with sodium and then with iodide of ethyl, gives butyric ether (C, H12 O), the essence of pineapples. For other synthetized products similarly obtained and in prospect, see Lecture, June 9, 1865, p. 2, viz.: 18 Propionic Ether C, HO | Enanthylic Ether C, HIB O2 Diethacetic Ether. C. H. O, Margaric Ether. 17. From propylic alcohol, glycerine (C, H, O.) the sweet principle of animal fats can be obtained. 18. By the combination of glycerine with the fatty acids, synthetized according to No. 6, oils and fats similar to animal and vegetable oils and fats are produced. 19. By careful oxydation, amylic alcohol is converted into valerianic aldehyde; and this, treated with prussic acid (got from cyanide of potassium, see No. 10), is transformed into leucine (C, H, NO,), found in the spleen, pancreas, liver, bile, and kidneys, and in the salivary glands. 13 V. ANTHROPOLOGY. 1. Lectures on Man: his Place in Creation and in the History of the Earth. By Dr. Carl Vogt. Edited by James Hunt, Ph.D. London, 1864. 2. The Plurality of the Human Race. By Georges Pouchet, M.D. Translated and edited by H. J. C. Beavan. London, 1864. 3. Memoirs Read before the Anthropological Society of London. Vol. I. 1863-4. London, 1865. 4. The Anthropological Treatises of Johann Friedrich Blumenbach. Translated and edited by Thomas Bendyshe, M.A. London, 1865. THE works, the titles of which we have placed at the head of this article, have been issued by the Council of the Anthropological Society of London, to their fellow members during the past twelve months, and may be accepted as affording a tolerably faithful representation, not only of what the Society has accomplished during that period, but what are the tendencies and objects of its principal members. We have heard or read somewhere, that if a number of young men, with some small share of ability, were to unite together and form a society, one of the leading rules of which should be to lose no opportunity of sounding each other's praises, the world might in process of time be almost brought to believe that a new and dazzling coruscation of talent had blazed forth, and that a fresh and startling revelation would shortly be announced. This seems to be the principle on which the leading members of the Anthropological Society of London have acted, such the process by the agency of which they seek to reach the Temple of Fame. Accordingly, we find the President, Dr. James Hunt, quoting, and of course with much approbation, the sayings and doings of the Assistant-secretary, Mr. C. Carter Blake. Member of Council, Mr. Beavan, is equally complimentary; and so the pleasant and highlyseasoned ball of flattery is tossed to and fro between President and Vice-president, Secretary, Treasurer, and Member of Council, though, we must confess, we are unable to see what these gentlemen have either said or done to merit so much laudation as they lavish on each other. Vogt's work on Man consists of a series of lectures delivered at the request of the Useful Knowledge Society, of the Canton of Neufchâtel. It is written in a popular form, and discusses the interesting problems of man's antiquity on earth and his relations to the lower animals, which have been rendered so familiar to the English public by the recent writings of Darwin, Lyell, and Huxley, and by the many controversies and discussions to which they have given origin. Hence those who have kept themselves at all on a level with these subjects will not find much that is new in the work before us, and we are somewhat at a loss to understand why these lectures, however well they may be adapted to place a German-speaking audience au courant with these problems, should have been selected by the Council of the Anthropological Society for translation and publication to their members; for we should have supposed that the members of a society which professes "to investigate the laws of man's origin and progress," would not have required to go to a foreign source for information on these topics, but would have made themselves acquainted with the writings of the most important at least of those men of science in this country who have communicated their speculations to the world, and with whom indeed it may be said that most of the recent theories and surmises on these subjects have originated. We should not, however, have pressed this objection to the translation of Vogt's Lectures if, after perusal of the book, we had felt that the argument had been fairly stated, and that a spirit of candour and a desire to seek for the truth, even though it might at first sight seem to be opposed to the predilections of the author, had pervaded its pages When the man of science enters on the physical investigation of a subject, which goes so far back in the history of the world as the first appearance of man upon earth, every step should be taken with the utmost caution, every seeming link in the chain of evidence should be weighed and tested with the greatest care; for though man's advent may not date from the dawn of time, and though he may not be able to claim an antiquity comparable to that of the Eozoon canadense, yet the tendency of all recent inquiry is to throw him much farther back than was at one time supposed, and to make him a contemporary of animals long since extinct, so that man, as he first appears in written history, is, compared with man primeval, but as a creature of yesterday. Vogt is a most strenuous advocate for this extended antiquity of the human race, and he has given a very readable account of the various localities in which human bones, or objects apparently the work of human hands, have been met with under circumstances which manifestly point to a high antiquity. But in his desire to prove his argument, he has not exercised sufficient discrimination in the selection of his cases, and has accepted as evidence certain supposed proofs which have not stood the test of a rigid investigation. We may refer more especially, in support of our statement, to his account of the much talked of Moulin-Quignon jawbone, the authenticity of which he accepts without hesitation, although some of our most distinguished English palæontologists are unable to accept it as genuine. Again, he pronounces the Engis Cave skull, respecting the antiquity of which there seems to be no question, to be "one of the most ill-favoured, beast-like, and simious skulls we know of," though we must confess we see nothing in its form to justify such an opinion; and we fully coincide with the statement made by Professor Huxley, that there are no marks of degradation about it. But Vogt is a firm believer in the descent of man from the simious group standing next him, and therefore it suits his purpose to make out that the crania of the primeval races possessed an ape-like form. In his desire to believe anything which may seem to lend support to his argument, Vogt displays a readiness which stands out in marked contrast to the scepticism he displays upon other subjects which most men, at least in this country, are accustomed to hold in reverence, and to treat with consideration and respect. There are so many sins against good taste, so much that is offensive in the lectures, that some slight qualms of conscience as to their applicability to the tastes of the British public seem even to have affected the not very fastidious editor, Dr. James Hunt, for he confesses in his preface, "that at first I omitted a few passages which I did not think in good taste, but on proceeding with my labour I found that to cancel all the passages which might offend would be entirely to alter the character of the work." On re-consideration, therefore, he has effected a compromise, and, like the ingenious editor of a copy of the epigrams of Martial we once met with in our schooldays, he has struck out of the text some of the more ribald passages and has printed them as an appendix, where, in a concentrated, and, let us hope, nauseating form the reader may have the opportunity of perusing as choice a collection of scientific Billingsgate as is to be found in the English language. M. Pouchet's work, "On the Plurality of Races," is on a subject which has of late years, more especially in France and America, attracted considerable attention. In the former country it has been discussed with much ability by various distinguished men of science, and all that can be stated on the subject in the present condition of our knowledge seems to have been said by the advocates of one or the other side of the question. M. Pouchet, as the title of his essay would indicate, is a strenuous supporter of the descent of man from more than one primitive stock. Moreover he scouts the idea of a distinct human kingdom, and considers that the physical and psychological differences between man and the apes are not of kind, but merely of degree. He considers man to be comparable in all points with animals, and that a common origin ought to be sought for him and them. He laughs at the notion of a creation, and finds this common origin "in a mass of amorphous matter, which at a later period will form itself, or in the midst of which will be spontaneously developed, an anatomical element, that is to say, an organized body." Though how the "mass of amorphous matter" was itself formed, or what were the forces or agencies which induced the development of the "anatomical element" in it he does not condescend to tell us. Of such and similar loose assertions the essay is in a great measure composed, and the number of facts which the author advances in support of his statements, is so small that one is tempted to exclaim with Prince Hal, "O monstrous! but one half-pennyworth of bread to this intolerable deal of sack!" The volume of memoirs issued by the Anthropological Society consists of the most important papers read before it during the Session 1863-64. The first on the list is by the President, "On the Negro's Place in Nature;" but as it has already been noticed in the pages of this Journal, in connection with the meeting of the British Association in Newcastle, we need not allude to it further. Then follows a short but interesting paper by Dr. Peacock, in which are recorded the results of some observations on the weight of the recent brain in four negroes. His observations "tend generally to support the conclusions of Sir William Hamilton and Professor Tiedemann, that there is no very marked difference between the ordinary size of the brain in the African and the European; but they certainly indicate that the brain is usually somewhat smaller in the former race than in the latter." Mr. Bollaert contributes three elaborate papers "On the Astronomy of the Red Man," "On the Palæography of America," and "On the Past and Present Populations of the New World." As showing the great destruction of the aboriginal population, he states that the number of natives at present inhabiting the great western continent is probably not more than between ten and eleven millions, whilst at the time of the discovery of America in 1492, the population was over 100 millions. Messrs. Thurnam, Davis, and C. C. Blake furnish each a memoir on craniological subjects. Dr. Thurnam's is on ancient British and Gaulish skulls, a subject on which no man is more fitted to speak with authority. To attempt anything like an analysis of this very exhaustive paper in the space at our disposal is impossible. We may, however, cite the general conclusion he has arrived at, that there is proof of a succession of two primitive races-a long-headed and a short-in Britain in pre-Roman times, the dolicho-cephalous being the earlier of the two; but, as to France, he agrees with Carl Vogt in saying, "the farther we go back, the greater is the contrast between individual types, the more opposed are the characters, the most decided long-heads immediately by the side of the most decided short-heads." In a short memoir, entitled "Notes on certain Matters connected with the Dahoman," Captain Richard F. Burton congratulates his fellow-members that a society has at length arisen, in which a liberty of speech and a freedom of thought hitherto unknown in Great Britain is enjoyed, and then proceeds, evidently con amore, |