Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 6.djvu/684

664 system—paleontological lectures were unavoidably associated with the controversy initiated by that philosopher, every lecture directly or indirectly bearing on the theory of development commanded a numerous and fashionable audience. Attentive listeners sought, in the discourses of Prof. Owen, for facts and deductions more or less damaging to the bold theory advanced in the now famous "Origin of Species by Natural Selection." But the uproar occasioned by the "Essays and Reviews," and Mr. Frederick Harrison's review of the reviewers in the Westminster, has nearly subsided, and the polemical element has faded out of geological discussion. Denuded of its controversial spice, paleontology no longer possesses its whilom attractiveness, and the audience of to-day is apparently composed of those who care for the subject for its own sake alone. Prof. Duncan is discoursing on that friend of my youth, the ichthyosaurus, and in a few neat and graphic sentences describes the manners, customs, and peculiar structure of the great fish-lizard, with whale-like body, crocodile head, and monstrous saucer-eyes. The plesiosaur with the outline described by the late Prof. Buckland as that of a "turtle with a serpent pulled through it" next engages attention, and is described very graphically as a "longshore-man" of the diluvial period, a prowler on the edges of the great deep, and a snapper-up of unconsidered trifles. Plesiosaurus disposed of, the inevitable pterodactyle turns up, the flying lizard of predatory habits, the possible progenitor of birds, and the certain original of the heraldic dragon and griffin. The shape of the head and the gradual adoption by this grewsome creature of a breastbone, give still more coherence to the theory that pterodactyle is a lizard which is rapidly making up his mind to become a bird. These particulars, and a dissertation on coral islands, make up the body of an interesting lecture, which fails, however, to warm the audience into enthusiasm. Perhaps people don't care for coral islands, or mayhap, to parody a line of Mr. Bret Harte—"the pterodactyle's s played out."

On another raw afternoon, about 3, I betake myself to Albemarle Street, and become the spectator of a widely-different scene. The theatre is already full of eager visitors and thirsters after science, when elucidated by those brilliant experiments which excite the admiration and envy of Prof. Tyndall's imitators—I had almost written rivals, forgetting that in this country, and in his own particular line of physical demonstration, Dr. John Tyndall, F. R. S., philosopher and cragsman, has no rival. At a three-o'clock lecture many ladies are, of course, present, in all the variety of gorgeous array at present in fashion, for, however severe may be the mental attributes of these fair students of physical science, no sternness is ever visible in their outward appearance. Pending the arrival of the Professor of Natural Philosophy, these young ladies are chatting pleasantly among themselves. Are they talking science, I wonder, or discussing