Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 16.djvu/275

Rh Orleans in the spring of 1878, and Dr. Sanford E. Chaillé, of that city, first called the attention of the writer to it, and likewise sent a photograph from which the cut was made. This same horse was subsequently brought to the North, and a few days since was on exhibition at New Haven, Connecticut, where the writer examined him with some care. The animal is of small size, about ten years old, and is said to have been foaled in Cuba. He is known among showmen as the 'eight-footed Cuban horse.' With the exception of the extra digits he is well formed. The four main hoofs are of the ordinary form and size. The extra digits are all on the inside, and correspond to the index-finger of the human hand. They are less than half the size of the principal toes, and none of them reach the ground.

"Among the instances of recent polydactyle horses described to the writer by those who have seen them are two of special interest. One of these was a colt with three toes on one fore-foot, and two on the other. The animal recently died in Ohio. Another is a mare, raised in Indiana, and is still living, which is said to have three toes on each fore-foot, and a small extra digit on each hind-foot. In regard to the latter animal, the writer hopes soon to have more definite information.

"Besides the instances mentioned above of extra digits in place in the existing horse, there are many cases on record of true monstrosities, as, for example, additional feet or limbs attached to various portions of the body. Such deformities now admit of classification and explanation, but need not be considered in the present discussion."



HE veteran savants who inaugurated the great advances in modern physical research are passing away, one after another, leaving their achievements for completion to the succeeding generation, and their imperishable fame to the records of human history. Foremost among the centers of exact and productive inquiry and learning ranked the University of Berlin, founded in the years of Prussia's deepest humiliation at the hands of the great Corsican adventurer, out of the royal motive "to raise the down-trodden nation to strength and greatness by intellectual and mental vigor and virtue." Among the brilliant array of famous scholars of the first period of that university were Wilhelm and Alexander von Humboldt, Leopold von Buch, Carl Ritter, Fichte, Hegel, Enke, Boekh, Kunth, Link, Ehrenberg, Johannes Muller, E. Mitcherlich, Heinrich and Gustav Rose, Poggendorf, Dove, 