Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 4.djvu/220

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208
THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

jected to the general law of sexual union. Among several thousand artemiæ studied by me, I have not found a single well-defined male individual. The distinguished Genevan naturalist, Carl Vogt, said, the other day, that he had had the like experience. Hence we may conclude that the artemia of our salt-marshes perpetuates its kind by means of virgin females, whose eggs, although deprived of seminal impregnation, are developed in an incubatory sac situated at the base of the maternal abdomen. These produce young artemiæ, which have to undergo amazing metamorphoses before they arrive at a complete resemblance to their parent. The name of parthenogenesis has been bestowed on this singular mode of reproduction by virgin females, independently of commerce with males; oftentimes, the latter do not exist at all, or at least are as yet unknown. In conclusion, we would remark that the eggs of our virgin artemia produce only females, while the unfecundated eggs of the queen-bee produce males, and males only.—La Nature.

THE REQUIREMENTS OF SCIENTIFIC EDUCATION.[1]

By Prof. R. W. RAYMOND.

THERE is danger that, in our new-born zeal for scientific education, we may sacrifice the interests of a truly liberal culture, producing, as I have said, a generation of specialists, incapable of appreciating the departments of human thought which lie outside their own, or even of rising within their own departments to broad and comprehensive views. We must not use the microscope till we spoil the eyes. We must not overtrain the investigator until he becomes less than a full man. The chemists, geologists, and engineers, must not cease to be intelligent and active citizens. It may be demonstrated that such a mistaken neglect of studies outside the range of a chosen profession cripples activity and impairs success even in that profession. It is one result of the brotherhood of knowledge that no man, whether employed in the original investigation of Nature, or in the application of natural laws to practical ends, can advance successfully without perpetual communication of his thoughts to others, and the reception of their suggestions and experiences in return. Hence the mastery of language, which was the first condition of civilization, remains the essential condition of progress. The power to comprehend statements, logical arguments, and demonstrations, and to make such statements as may be comprehended by others, and will carry weight and influence in the very perfection of their form, is a vitally important part

  1. Extract from the Inaugural Address at the dedication of Pardee Hall, of Lafayette College, Easton, Pa., by Rossiter W. Raymond, President of the American Institute of Mining Engineers.