Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 55.djvu/483

Rh nation. The final test of the season's work consisted of three parts: The passing in of lecture notebooks, the naming and classifying of a dozen fossils selected by the professor, and the answering of a set of difficult questions.

On account of the amount of time required for this course, and because the lessons were such as were not directly applicable to work in the public schools, the attendance decreased. The number who continued, however, were those who felt that a broad scientific education is necessary to the best teaching of even elementary science.

The fourth year was devoted to Mollusca, Cephalopoda in particular, and the class was fortunate in having for its teacher one whose investigations in this latter group have given him world-wide fame.

The evolution of the group from its straight radical form, now named and called Diphragnoceros, was traced through the bent, curved, and coiled forms of the Nautiloids, Ammonoids, and Belamites. The phylogeny of the Ammonoids presented a complete cycle, late forms entirely uncoiling and presenting the straight characters of their ancestors.

The study of Cephalopods amply illustrated the neo-Lamarckian theory of evolution, including the inheritance of acquired characters which is now believed by most paleontologists.

The fifth and last year of this course included the study of Arthropoda and Vertebrata. The insects presented many illustrations for the theory of natural selection, which the neo-Lamarckians consider an aid, but a subordinate factor, in the origin of species.

About this time Poulton gave a series of twelve lectures on animal coloration at the Lowell Institute, drawing his illustrations mainly from insects. Many of the students of The Teachers' School of Science in zoölogy and paleontology attended these lectures.

After working on fishes, batrachians, reptiles, birds, and mammals, in which the structural development of some animals—man, for example—was found to be retrogressive and the physiological development progressive, the lessons closed with the study of man's structure as compared with the anthropoid apes and the few remains of prehistoric man, and finally with a discussion of the works of paleolithic man.

The teachers who had attended this course throughout the five years and had passed satisfactory examinations have been presented with diplomas testifying to their proficiency.