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Title: Sir William Flower
Author: Richard Lydekker
Editor: Joseph Reynolds Green
Release date: July 11, 2025 [eBook #76480]
Language: English
Original publication: London: J. M. Dent and Co, 1906
Credits: Sonya Schermann and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIR WILLIAM FLOWER ***
ENGLISH
MEN OF SCIENCE
EDITED BY
J. REYNOLDS GREEN, Sc.D.
SIR WILLIAM FLOWER
_All Rights Reserved_
[Illustration]
SIR WILLIAM FLOWER
BY
R. LYDEKKER
[Illustration]
PUBLISHED IN LONDON BY
J. M. DENT & CO., AND IN NEW
YORK BY E. P. DUTTON & CO.
1906
PREFACE
Although the complete manuscript of this volume was placed in the hands
of the editor before the publication of the late Mr. C. J. Cornish’s
_Life of Sir William Flower_ (in 1904), yet the present writer was aware
that such a work was in progress, and that it would deal with the social
and personal rather than with the scientific side of Sir William’s
career. Consequently it was decided at an early period of the work to
concentrate attention in the present volume on the latter aspect of the
subject; as indeed is only fitting in the case of a biography belonging
to a series specially devoted to men of science. An incidental advantage
of this arrangement is that the writer has been able in the main to
confine himself to the discussion of topics with which he is more or less
familiar, rather than to attempt to chronicle events and episodes to
which he must of necessity be a stranger, and to attempt an appreciation
of a fine character for which he is in no wise qualified.
It will be obvious from the above, that any references in the text to
earlier biographies do not relate to Mr. Cornish’s volume.
In the course of the text, it has been necessary to make certain
allusions to the condition and the mode of exhibition of the specimens in
the public galleries of the Zoological Department of the Natural History
Museum previous to the new _régime_ inaugurated by Sir William Flower.
The writer may take this opportunity of stating that these are in no wise
intended to convey the slightest reflection on those who had charge of
the galleries previous to the new era. Technical museum-installation and
display is a comparatively new thing; and the old plan of arrangement had
become obsolete, not for want of attention, but because a more advanced
scheme had been developed by gradual evolution, and the adoption of this
involved a clean sweep.
In conclusion, the writer has to express his best thanks to Mr. C. E.
Fagan, of the Secretariat of the Natural History Museum, for kindly
reading and revising the proof sheets.
HARPENDEN LODGE, HERTS,
_July 1906_.
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I
GENERAL SKETCH OF FLOWER’S LIFE 1
CHAPTER II
AS CONSERVATOR OF THE MUSEUM OF THE COLLEGE
OF SURGEONS, AND HUNTERIAN PROFESSOR 31
CHAPTER III
AS DIRECTOR OF THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM 57
CHAPTER IV
AS PRESIDENT OF THE ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY 89
CHAPTER V
GENERAL ZOOLOGICAL WORK 95
CHAPTER VI
WORK ON THE CETACEA 139
CHAPTER VII
ANTHROPOLOGICAL WORK 153
CHAPTER VIII
MUSEUM AND MISCELLANEOUS WORK 169
APPENDIX (LIST OF BOOKS AND MEMOIRS) 179
Life of Flower
CHAPTER I
GENERAL SKETCH OF FLOWER’S LIFE
Born on 30th November 1831 at his father’s house, “The Hill,”
Stratford-on-Avon, William Henry Flower was a man who had the rare
good fortune not only to make a profession of the pursuit he loved
best, but likewise to attain the highest possible success in, and to
be appointed to the most important and influential post connected with
that profession. As he tells us in that delightful book, _Essays on
Museums_, he was pleased to designate as a “museum” when a boy at home
a miscellaneous collection of natural history objects, kept at first in
a cardboard box, but subsequently housed in a cupboard. And as a man
he became the respected head of the greatest Natural History Museum in
the British Empire, if not indeed in the whole world. Very significant
of his future attention to details and of the importance he attached to
recording the history of every specimen received in a museum, is the
fact that he compiled a carefully drawn-up catalogue of his first boyish
collection.
This early and persistent taste for natural history was not, as we
learn from the same collection of essays, inherited from any member of
either his father’s or his mother’s family, but appears to have been
an “idiopathic” development. His isolated position in this respect may,
perhaps, have caused Flower in later life to notice more specially
than might otherwise have been the case, how comparatively rare is the
development of an ingrained taste for natural history among the adult
members of the British nation. This idea was exemplified by his remarking
on one occasion to the present writer that he often wondered how many
persons out of every thousand he passed casually in the street, or met
in social intercourse, had the slightest sympathy with, or took any real
interest in the subjects which formed his own favourite pursuits and
lines of thought.
As regards his parentage, his father was the late Edward Fordham Flower,
who was a Justice of the Peace for his county, and from whom the son
inherited his tall and stately figure and dignified bearing. Edward
Flower, who was a partner in the well-known brewery at Stratford-on-Avon,
was the eldest son of Richard Flower, of Marden Hill, Hertfordshire,
who married Elizabeth, daughter of John Fordham, of Sandon Bury, in the
same county. In 1827 Edward married Celina, daughter of John Greaves, of
Radford Semele, Warwickshire, by whom he had, with other issue, Charles
Edward, late of Glencassly, Sutherlandshire, and William Henry, the
subject of the present memoir.
Edward Fordham Flower was noted not only for his philanthropy, but for
his efforts to abolish the bearing-rein, which in his time was neither
more nor less than an instrument of downright torture to all carriage
horses. As the result of his efforts in this direction, was founded in
1890, by Mr. C. H. Allen, of Hampstead, a small local society for that
district and Highgate, having for its object the abolition, or at all
events the mitigated use, of the bearing-rein for draught-horses of all
descriptions. That body did good work in this direction for many years in
the north of London; and by its means the Hampstead Vestry was induced
to prohibit the use of the bearing-rein on the horses in its employ—an
example subsequently followed by many large coal-owners and others
connected with horses.
From this small beginning arose in 1897 the now flourishing society known
as the Anti-Bearing Rein Association, of which, as was appropriate, Mr.
Archibald Flower, a grandson of Edward Fordham Flower, became Co.-Hon.
Secretary with Mr. Allen, while the late Duke of Westminster, and the
late Sir W. H. Flower (the subject of this biography) respectively
accepted the positions of Patron and President.
In all the obituary notices it is stated that William Henry was the
second son of Edward Fordham and Celina Flower. This, however, as I am
informed by Mr. Arthur S. Flower (the eldest son of Sir William), is not
strictly the case. As an actual fact, the eldest son of the aforesaid
Edward and Celina was really Richard, who died in infancy, so that
Charles, who was born second, grew up as the eldest son, and William
Henry as the second, whereas he was really the third.
The fair-haired and blue-eyed William not being intended to succeed his
father in the business, was permitted from his early years—fortunately
for zoological science—to pursue that innate love of natural history
which, as we have seen, developed itself in very early years and
continued unabated till the close of his career. That career naturally
divides into three epochs. Firstly, the period of boyhood and early
manhood; secondly, the long period of official life at the museum of
the Royal College of Surgeons; and thirdly, the time during which the
subject of this memoir occupied the post of Director of the Natural
History Branch of the British Museum, together with the short interval
which elapsed between his resignation of that position and his untimely
death. To each of the latter periods a separate chapter is devoted. It
has, however, been found convenient, instead of restricting the present
chapter to the first epoch, to include within its limits a general sketch
of Flower’s whole life. A fourth chapter is assigned to the period during
which he was President of the Zoological Society of London, although this
was synchronous with part of the period covered by the second, and with
the whole of that treated of in the third chapter. Finally, the full
description of his scientific work is reserved for subsequent chapters.
According to information kindly furnished by his widow, Lady Flower,
delicate health prevented William Flower from being much at school during
his boyhood, and he was thus largely dependent upon his mother—a sensible
and well-read woman—for his early education. He was also in the habit of
accompanying his father in his rides, whereby he became much interested
in all that concerns horses and their well-being. Best of all, as regards
opportunity for developing a love of animal life, he was in the habit
of taking long, solitary rambles in the country, thereby acquiring a
knowledge of Nature which could be obtained in no other manner, and
developing his powers of observation.
This innate taste for natural history appears to have been further
fostered in early life by frequent intercourse with the late Rev. P. B.
Brodie, an enthusiastic zoologist and geologist; but whether this took
place during school or college life the writer has no means of knowing.
Be this as it may, it appears that after a preliminary education, partly
at home and partly at private schools, Flower matriculated at London
University in 1849, (the year of his present biographer’s birth),
attaining honours in Zoology; and that during the same year having made
up his mind to adopt the study and practice of Medicine, or of Surgery
as a profession, he entered the Medical Classes at University College
and became a pupil at the Middlesex Hospital. It was apparently largely,
if not entirely, owing to his fondness for zoology that young Flower
selected Medicine as a profession, since at the time, as indeed for
many years subsequently, this was practically the only career open to
young naturalists devoid of sufficient private means whereby they might
hope to be able to devote a certain amount of time and attention to the
pursuits—and more especially Comparative Anatomy—towards which their
inclinations tended.
At University College Flower had a distinguished career, gaining the gold
medal in Dr. Sharpey’s class of Physiology and Anatomy, and the silver
medal in Zoology and Comparative Anatomy; the gold medal in the latter
subjects having been carried off the same year by his fellow-student,
Joseph Lister, who in after years became the distinguished surgeon, and,
as Lord Lister, was for some time President of the Royal Society of
London. In 1851—the year of the Great Exhibition—Flower passed his first
M.B. examination at London University, coming out in the first division.
In the same year he made a tour in Holland and Germany, while in 1853
visited France and the north of Spain; bringing home in both instances
numerous sketches in pencil and sepia of the scenery and people of the
countries traversed.
In all the obituary notices of Flower that have come under the present
writer’s notice, it is stated that he obtained the post of Curator of
the museum of the Middlesex Hospital after his return from the Crimea.
This is, however, proved to be incorrect by his first zoological paper,
“On the Dissection of a Species of Galago,” which was contributed to the
Zoological Society of London in 1852, and appeared in the _Proceedings_
of that body for the same year, where the author describes himself as
the holder of the post in question. As a matter of fact, he was elected
Curator in 1854, and resigned the post in 1854.[1]
Flower never took the degree of M.D., but three years after passing his
M.B. he became (on 27th March 1854) a member of the Royal College of
Surgeons of England.
A few weeks after this event a call was made for additional surgeons for
the army then serving in the Crimea, and young Flower, partly, perhaps,
from patriotic motives, and partly with a view of extending his practical
experience in surgery, promptly volunteered his services, which were
accepted. After spending a few idle months with the Depôt Battalion then
stationed at Templemore, in Ireland, he was gazetted as Assistant-Surgeon
to the 63rd (now the First Battalion of the Manchester) Regiment; and in
July 1854 embarked with his regiment at Cork for Constantinople. On its
arrival in the east the regiment was at once hurried up to join the main
army at Varna, whence it proceeded to take part in the expedition to the
Crimea, where both officers and men suffered severely from exposure to
the inclemencies of the climate and an insufficient commissariat during
the early months of the campaign. For ten weeks together, it is reported,
neither officers or men took off their clothes, either by night or by
day, and for the first three weeks all ranks were compelled to get such
sleep as they could obtain on the bare ground. Flower, who was present
at the battles of the Alma, of Inkerman, and of Balaclava, as well as at
the fall of Sebastopol, underwent many and thrilling experiences during
the campaign, alike in the field and in the hospital. The hardships and
privations which caused the strength of his regiment to be reduced by
nearly one-half within the short period of four months, could not but
tell severely on the constitution of the young surgeon, which was never
very robust; and from some of the effects of these he suffered throughout
his life. Nevertheless, in spite of all this, in the intervals of duty,
Flower, with but scant materials at his disposal, managed to find time
and energy sufficient to make a considerable number of vivid pen-and-ink,
or dashes of ink-and-water, sketches of his surroundings, including one
of his own tent overturned by the terrible snow-storm of 14th November
1854, and a second of the wrecked condition of the camp in general
at the end of the tempest. A panoramic view of Constantinople and a
sketch of the military hospital at Scutari were also among his artistic
productions at this period. In recognition of his services, Flower,
after being invalided home, received from the hands of Her Majesty,
Queen Victoria, the Crimean medal, with clasps for the Alma, Inkerman,
Balaclava, and Sebastopol; while he was also permitted to accept from
H.M., the Sultan, the Turkish war-medal.
Apparently Flower had never entertained the idea of taking up the
profession of an army surgeon as a permanency, and after his return to
London he definitely resigned military service, with the intention of
settling down to private medical practice in the Metropolis. In the
spring of 1857 he passed the examination qualifying for the Fellowship
of the Royal College of Surgeons; and about this time, or perhaps
immediately on his return to London, he joined the staff of the Middlesex
Hospital as Demonstrator in Anatomy. During the next year (1858) he was
elected to the post of Assistant-Surgeon to the same Institution, where
he resumed the Curatorship of the museum and was also appointed Lecturer
on Comparative Anatomy. Although a large portion of his time while at
the hospital was devoted to surgical and other duties connected with the
medical profession, his Lectureship and Curatorship required that he
should devote a considerable amount of attention to the more congenial
study of Comparative Anatomy.
It was during his connection with the Middlesex Hospital that his first
scientific work was published, this being the well-known and useful
little volume entitled _Diagrams of the Nerves of the Human Body_,
which appeared in 1861, and has passed through three editions. During
this period of his career he also contributed to Holmes’ _System of
Surgery_ an article on “Injuries to the Upper Extremities,” which
contained certain original observations with regard to dislocations of
the shoulder-joint; and he likewise wrote an essay on the same subject
to the Pathological Society, as well as several articles on various
surgical subjects to the medical journals of the day. But even at this
comparatively early period of his career Flower’s published scientific
work was by no means strictly confined to his ostensible profession, for
his two first papers on Comparative Anatomy—the one “On the Dissection of
a Galago”(Lemur); and the other “On the Posterior Lobes of the Cerebrum
of the Quadrumana”—appeared during the period in question. During this
period, as the writer of his obituary notice in the “Record” of the Royal
Society well remarks, there is little doubt that Flower had breathing
time, after his Crimean experiences, to collect his energies and gather
up a store of valuable information which stood him in good stead in later
years, when he had frequently less leisure to devote to pure study.
It was, moreover, during his official connection with the Middlesex
Hospital that Mr. Flower married Georgina Rosetta, the youngest daughter
of the late Admiral W. H. Smyth, C.S.I., etc., a well-known astronomer,
who was for some time Hydrographer to the Admiralty and likewise Foreign
Secretary to the Royal Society, the wedding taking place in 1858 at
the church of Stone, in Buckinghamshire, near the bride’s home. This
happy union had in many ways an important influence upon the future
career of the young surgeon, for, in addition to her father, several
of the relatives of Mrs. (now Lady) Flower were more or less intimately
connected with scientific work and scientific people; among them being
Sir Warrington Smyth (sometime Inspector-General of Mines), Professor
Piazzi Smyth, General Sir Henry Smyth, and Sir George Baden-Powell. It
was to Lady Flower that Sir William dedicated his last work, the volume
entitled _Essays on Museums_. A tour through Belgium and up the Rhine
followed the marriage.
Although it scarcely comes within the purview of this biography to allude
to the issue of this marriage, it may be mentioned that of the three sons
born to Sir William Flower, the second alone, Stanley Smyth, inherited
his father’s zoological tastes. Captain S. S. Flower (who takes his
first name from Dean Stanley, of Westminster, an intimate friend of the
family), after serving for some time in the 5th Fusileers, obtained the
appointment of Director of the Royal Museum at Bangkok, Siam, after which
he was made Director of the Khedival Zoological Gardens at Giza, near
Cairo, to which post (which he still holds) was subsequently added that
of Superintendent of Game Protection in the Sudan. Captain Flower has not
only raised the menagerie at Giza to a high state of perfection, but has
contributed several papers to the _Proceedings_ of the Zoological Society
of London on the zoology of Siam and the Malay countries.
To revert to the proper subject of this memoir, during his tenure of the
aforesaid official posts at the Middlesex Hospital it was apparent to his
intimate scientific friends—among whom were included the late Professor
T. H. Huxley and the late Mr. George Busk—that the inclinations of
Flower were all on the side of comparative anatomy rather than towards
practical surgery or medicine. Accordingly, when the appointment of
Conservator to the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons became vacant
in 1861 by the death of Mr. Quekett, Flower was strongly recommended by
Huxley (then Hunterian Professor), Busk, and other friends as a suitable
successor, and was in due course elected by the Council. When, nine
years later (1870), Huxley himself felt compelled by the pressure of
other engagements and work to resign the Hunterian Professorship, the
Conservator of the Museum was appointed to the vacant chair, thus once
more bringing together two posts which had been sundered since Owen’s
resignation.
On his appointment to the Conservatorship of the Museum of the College
of Surgeons, Flower once for all definitely abandoned medicine as a
profession, and determined to devote the whole of his energies for the
future to the study of his beloved comparative anatomy and zoology.
Nevertheless, he always remained in touch with his old profession, as
he was always in sympathy with those who were actively practising the
same. Indeed, since the collections under his charge included a large
pathological series, while during his tenure of office a large display of
surgical instruments was added to the exhibits, he could not, even had
he so desired, cut himself entirely adrift from old associations and old
studies.
Since a considerable amount of space in a later chapter is devoted to
Flower’s work as Museum Curator and as Hunterian Lecturer, it will be
unnecessary to allude further to it in this place, although it will
be appropriate to quote the elogium on his efforts in this sphere,
pronounced by the President of the Royal Society, when bestowing the
Royal Gold Medal in recognition of his services to zoology.
“It is very largely due,” runs the address, “to his incessant and
well-directed labour that the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons
at present contains the most complete, the best ordered, and the most
accessible collection of materials for the study of vertebrate structures
extant.”
As regards his Hunterian lectures, it has been well remarked that few
could have any idea of the amount of labour they involved, nor would any
one be likely to guess this from the ever-ready and earnest efforts of
the lecturer to give to others that knowledge he had so laboriously, and
yet so pleasantly, acquired within the walls of the museum.
In addition to the official Hunterian lectures, Flower during this
portion of his career commenced the delivery, as opportunity occurred,
of lectures of a much more popular description, at the Royal Institution
and elsewhere, by means of which he appealed to a wider audience than
any that could be attracted to technical discourses, and at the same
time was enabled to give a wide circulation to the discussion of
subjects connected with his own special studies which had more or less
of a general interest. In one of his earlier discourses of this type he
discussed at considerable detail the deformities produced in the human
foot by badly-designed boots or other covering among both civilised and
barbarous nations. Indeed, “fashion in deformity” was at all times a
favourite theme with the Hunterian Professor; and in a lecture on this
subject he uttered, for him, a strong protest against the evils caused
by the corset among European females, illustrating his remarks with a
ghastly figure of a female skeleton distorted by the undue pressure of
that fashionable article of costume.
In 1871, and again in later years, Professor Flower acted as Examiner
in Zoology for the Natural Science Tripos at Cambridge, where his suave
and dignified manner, and innate courtliness rendered him as great a
favourite as in the Metropolis. He was during some portion of his career
Examiner in Anatomy at the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons.
Flower’s official connection with the museum of the Royal College of
Surgeons was brought to a close by Owen’s resignation of the Post of
Superintendent of the Natural History Department of the British Museum,
when it was felt by all that the efficient and successful administrator
of the smaller museum in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, was the one man specially
fitted in every way to have supreme charge of the larger establishment in
the Cromwell Road. Professor Flower was accordingly selected by the three
principal trustees—the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lord Chancellor, and
the Speaker of the House of Commons—to fill this important post, into the
duties of which he entered during the same year. His administration of
the museum—which lasted until he was compelled by failing health to send
in his resignation a few months before his death—is fully discussed in
the fourth chapter, and was in every way a complete success.
During his long and successful official career Sir William was the
recipient of a number of honours (in addition to the medals he received
for his Crimean service), and he was likewise on the roll of the more
important societies connected with the branches of biological study in
which he was specially interested.
Of the Royal Society Sir William was elected a Fellow in 1864—at the
relatively early age of thirty-three—and he served on the Council of that
body for three separate periods, namely from 1868 to 1870, from 1876 to
1878, and again from 1884 to 1886, while in 1884 and 1885 he was one
of the Vice-Presidents. In 1882 his conspicuous services to zoological
science was recognised by the bestowal upon him of a Royal Gold Medal—one
of the most honourable distinctions in the gift of the Society; the other
recipient in the same year of a similar honour being Lord Rayleigh. In
handing to Professor Flower this medal, the President dwelt upon the
value of his contributions to both zoology and anthropology, referring,
in connection with the former science, to his paper on the classification
of the Carnivora, and, in respect to the latter, to the then recently
published first part of the “Catalogue of Osteological Specimens in the
Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons,” in which descriptions and
measurements of between 1300 and 1400 human skulls are recorded. The
present writer has been informed that Flower refused to be nominated
for the Presidentship of the Royal Society, owing to the fear that the
calls made upon his time by that office would interfere with his official
duties. Of the Zoological Society Professor Flower became a Fellow so
long ago as the year 1851, that is to say, three years previous to the
commencement of his Crimean service. After serving for several periods
on the Council he was elected to the honourable (and honorary) office
of President on the death of the Marquis of Tweeddale in 1879, and
in this important position he remained till his death. It should be
added that Flower never received one of the medals of the Zoological
Society, and this for the very good reason that such rewards are
bestowed in recognition of gifts to the Society’s Menagerie, and not for
contributions to zoological knowledge. Flower’s contributions to both
the _Transactions_ and the _Proceedings_ of the Society were numerous,
and, needless to say, valuable; the earliest in the former having been
published in 1866, and in the latter in 1852. With very few exceptions,
these communications relate to mammals. Fuller details with regard to Sir
William’s Presidency of the Zoological Society will be found in a later
chapter.
Of the Linnean Society, Flower was elected a Fellow in 1862, but he does
not appear to have ever taken any active part in the administration of
that body, or to have contributed to its publications, although for a
time he was a Vice-President.
To the Geological Society, on the other hand, of which he became a Fellow
in the year 1886, Sir William contributed three papers on paleontological
subjects, by far the most important of which was one on the affinities
and probable habits of the extinct Australian marsupial _Thylacoleo_.
Further allusion to this is made in the sequel. Of the other two, one
recorded the occurrence of teeth of the bear-like _Hyænarctus_ in the
Red Crag of Suffolk, and the other that of a skull of the manatee-like
_Halitherium_ in the same formation.
Of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland Flower
was elected a Vice-President in 1879, while in 1883 he succeeded to
the Presidential chair, and occupied that position till 1885. Of his
numerous contributions to anthropological science, many appeared in the
journal of the Institute.
In the annual meetings of the British Association for the advancement
of science, Flower, from an early date, took a lively interest. At the
Norwich meeting, in 1868, he acted as Vice-President of the section of
Biology, while he was President of the same section at the Dublin meeting
of 1878. At York he presided over the section of Anthropology in 1881;
he was a Vice-President at the Aberdeen meeting of 1885, while for the
second time he occupied the Presidential chair of the Anthropological
section in 1894 at Oxford, when his opening address on Anthropological
progress displayed great breadth of thought and generalisation.
Finally, he was President of the Association at the meeting held in
Newcastle-on-Tyne in 1889, his address at the latter meeting forming the
first article in _Essays on Museums_.
Among other offices of a kindred nature to the above, it may be mentioned
that Sir William was President of the section of Anatomy at the
International Medical Congress held in London in August 1881. His address
on that occasion (reprinted as article 7 of the volume just cited) being
on the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons. In July 1893 he acted
as President of the Museum’s Association at their London meeting, when,
after referring to the general scope of that body, and a brief survey
of some of the chief museums of Europe, he sketched out a plan for an
ideal building of this nature. This address also appears in _Essays on
Museums_. Sir William, the year before his death, had also undertaken to
preside over the meeting of the International Zoological Congress held at
Cambridge in the summer of 1898, but was prevented by failing health; his
place being filled by Lord Avebury (Sir John Lubbock). On 29th November
1895, Sir William Flower delivered an address at the opening of the Perth
Museum, in which he pointed out the special function of local museums.
Five years earlier (3rd November 1890) he had delivered another address
on a very similar occasion, namely, the opening of the Booth Museum, in
the Dyke Road, Brighton, famed for its unrivalled collection of British
birds, the great majority of which had been shot and subsequently mounted
in a most artistic manner by its founder. This splendid collection, it
may be mentioned, was bequeathed at Mr. Booth’s death to the British
Museum, but it was reluctantly declined by the Trustees, who waived their
right in favour of the Corporation of Brighton. At the end of October
1896, Sir William, then in failing health, somewhat rashly undertook a
journey to Scotland to assist Lord Reay in the inauguration of the Gatty
Marine Laboratory at St. Andrews.
Another important address delivered by Flower was one read before the
Church Congress at their meeting, held in October 1883, at Reading, on
“Recent Advances in Natural Science in Relation to the Christian Faith.”
It is reprinted in _Essays on Museums_. In this address Flower, while
proclaiming his full adherence to the doctrine of the transmutation of
species and the evolution of every organic form from a pre-existing
type, urged that this did not in the least shake his confidence in all
the essential teaching of the Christian religion. At the same time he
pointed out that the new doctrine in no wise detracted from the position
of the Divine Ruler of the world as the controller, and indeed the
originator, of animal development.
Shortly after his retirement from the post of Conservator, Professor
Flower was elected a Trustee of the Hunterian Collection of the Royal
College of Surgeons. Many years later, in 1881, he became a Trustee of
Sir John Soane’s Museum, in Lincoln’s Inn Fields.
Mention has already been made of the fact that in an early stage of his
career Sir William became an M.B. of London, and that later on he was
elected to the Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons. In addition
to these professional qualifications, he was also the recipient of
honorary degrees from the two elder Universities. Thus in 1891 he was
made a D.C.L. of Oxford, the public orator of the University, when the
degree was conferred, acclaiming him as a living proof of the truth of
the old saying, ἀρχή ἄνδρα δειξει, attributed to one of the seven wise
men of Greece, and as a man who had passed with increasing distinction
from one important official post to another; and he was likewise a D.Sc.
of Cambridge. But this by no means exhausts the list of his academic
honours, Edinburgh, St. Andrews, and Trinity College, Dublin, claiming
him on their roll of honorary LL.D.’s, while in 1889 he received from
Durham the degree of D.C.L. The Edinburgh degree, it may be mentioned,
was conferred on the occasion of the celebration of the tercentenary of
the University. Sir William was also a Ph.D.
Nor were Flower’s conspicuous services to zoological science suffered to
remain unrecognised by the Government of his country, for he was created
a C.B. in 1887, three years after his first appointment to the British
Museum, and five years later (1892) followed the higher distinction of
the K.C.B. But this does not exhaust the list of official honours, for in
1887 Sir William received from Her Majesty, the late Queen Victoria, the
Jubilee Medal. Had he lived to the date of its foundation, it is possible
that Flower might have been admitted by his Sovereign as one of the
original members of the Order of Merit.
From His Majesty the German Emperor Sir William Flower received the
distinction of the Royal Prussian order, “Pour la Mérite,” an honour of
which he was justly very proud. As a distinguished friend pointed out in
his letter of congratulation on learning of the new distinction, “it is
the one European decoration which an Englishman may be proud to wear,
and bestowed, as I believe it to be, with the sanction of the very few
who have already got it. It is the one order which real work, apart from
rank and wealth and courtiers’ trick, alone can win.” As another eminent
friend described it on the same occasion, it is truly “the blue riband of
literary and scientific decorations.”
Numerous foreign scientific societies, it is almost unnecessary to
observe, were proud to claim the name of Sir William Flower on the list
of their honorary members or associates. It is however by no means easy
to give a complete list of these honourable distinctions, for Flower was
not one who followed the fashion of adding every possible combination of
letters to his name in every book or paper he wrote. Perhaps the most
important of these distinctions was that of Foreign Correspondent of
the Institute of France. Among other societies and academies to which he
belonged, were those of the Netherlands, Sweden, and Belgium.
Although Flower’s scientific writings are discussed at length in the
later chapters of this memoir, it may be mentioned in this place that
during the “eighties” he contributed an important series of articles to
the ninth edition of the “Encyclopædia Britannica.” At the commencement
of that great undertaking, although the article “Ape” was confided to
the competent hands of the late Professor St. George Mivart, some of the
other articles, such as the one on “Antelope,” were entrusted to writers
who, whatever their other merits may have been, had certainly no claim
to be regarded as specialists on the subject of mammals. It was not long
before this was recognised by the publishers, who forthwith engaged for
this section of the work the services of Flower, supplemented by those of
the late Dr. Dobson and Mr. O. Thomas. Among the more important articles
by Flower were those on the Horse, Kangaroo, Lemur, Lion, Mammalia (in
co-operation with Dr. Dobson), Megatherium, Otter, Platypus, Rhinoceros,
Seal, Tapir, and Whale. These and other articles, together with the one
on Ape by Professor Mivart and several on the smaller mammals by Mr.
Thomas, were subsequently combined and revised to form the basis of the
_Study of Mammals Living and Extinct_, by Sir William Flower and the
present writer, and was published by Messrs. A. & C. Black in 1891, which
long formed the standard English work on the subject, although now, owing
to the rapid progress in zoology and the great change which has taken
place in nomenclature, is somewhat out of date.
The excellent little volume on _The Horse_ in Sir John Lubbock’s (Lord
Avebury) _Modern Science Series_, published in 1891, and the _Essays on
Museums_ (1898), also appeared during this portion of Flower’s career.
Although so largely occupied in the study of mammals and other creatures
from distant parts of the world, Sir William never travelled much, and
never visited little-known regions or did any important collecting
abroad. In addition to his Crimean experiences, and the journeys in
Holland, France, and the Rhine country, to which allusion has been
already made, his foreign tours appear to have been but few. In the
winter of 1873-74 he was, however, enabled to enjoy a trip up the Nile
in company with Mrs. Flower, and he visited Biarritz in 1892. During the
former excursion he made a number of sketches which bear ample testimony
to his powers as an artist. With his great knowledge of anatomy, it may
be here mentioned, coupled with his skill with the pencil, he enjoyed
a great advantage over many contemporary zoologists in being able to
draw accurate and life-like portraits of the animals he loved so well.
Nevertheless, if only from lack of time, he never attempted to illustrate
with his own hand any of his numerous scientific contributions—at all
events in later years. Owing to need for complete rest, after a short
sojourn in the early part of 1897 at Marazion, on the south coast of
Cornwall, he spent much of the following winter abroad; and after his
resignation of the Directorship of the Museum in 1898, he spent the
following winter at San Remo, from which he returned less than two months
before his death.
As regards the closing scenes of his life, a very few words must suffice.
For the last two years of his existence he had evidently been in failing
health, largely due to his incessant exertions and from his refusal to
spare himself, even when warned of the absolute necessity of so doing by
his medical adviser. In August 1898, after a long period during which
he had been compelled to devote little or no attention to his official
duties, he placed his resignation of the Directorship of the Museum in
the hands of the Trustees. The aforesaid sojourn at San Remo during
the following winter effected some slight temporary improvement in his
health, but on his return to London, in May 1899, it was painfully
apparent that his constitution—never too robust—was shattered beyond
hope of permanent recovery. And, after a slight temporary rally, from
his malady of heart-failure, a sharp relapse occurred on Thursday, 29th
June, followed by pneumonia, and on Saturday, 1st July, Sir William
Flower passed peacefully away, at the age of sixty-seven years, at his
residence, 26 Stanhope Gardens, London.
A memorial service was held on the following Wednesday at St. Luke’s
Church, Sidney Street, Chelsea, which was attended by a large and
sympathetic congregation of friends and scientific men, including Sir
Edward Maunde Thompson, the Chief Librarian and Director of the British
Museum, and Professor E. Ray Lankester, Sir William’s successor in the
Directorship of the Natural History Branch of the same.
Sir William was undoubtedly a man of high and noble character, endeared
to all with whom he was brought into intimate relations by his unfailing
courtesy and charm of manner. To the present writer, it may be said
perhaps without undue egotism, he was a friend and counsellor such as
cannot be expected more than once in a life-time.
No better summary of Sir William’s general character and high attributes
can perhaps be given (certainly the present writer cannot attempt to
rival it) than the one drawn up by his biographer in the “Year-book” of
the Royal Society for 1901, which may accordingly be quoted _in extenso_:—
“In private life no one was more beloved and esteemed. He was in every
sense a domestic man, finding the highest joys that life brought him with
his family and children. The same courtly bearing and high tone, the same
preference for all that was good, was in private circles mingled with
the same genial smile, the fascinating account of something interesting
or novel, and the respect and deference to others, which was part of
his upright, unselfish nature. Many a young naturalist will gratefully
remember the kind encouragement and valued advice he was ever ready to
offer, and the stimulus which the sympathetic interest of a leader in the
department gave him.
“In the busy life of Sir William and in the constant calls on brain and
nervous system—strong though these were—there came times when a feeling
of lassitude with headache and spinal uneasiness, if not prostration,
showed that the indoor life and the strain of many duties had told with
severity both on the central nervous system and on the heart. His annual
holiday sufficed in many cases to recruit his energies, especially when
he visited Scotland and the charming home of his friends, Mr. and Mrs.
Drummond, of Megginch. There he met other friends, such as Dean and
Lady Augusta Stanley [after whom a son and a daughter were respectively
named] and Colonel Drummond-Hay, of Seggieden, brother of Mr. Drummond.
Moreover, he was always interested in the splendid collection of birds
made by Colonel Drummond-Hay during his wanderings with the Black Watch.”
Another passage from the same memoir of his life runs as follows:—
“One side of Sir William’s life deserves special notice, viz., his social
influence, and the endeavour to popularise the great institution with
which he was officially connected. These influences, developed at the
Museum of the College of Surgeons with great success, were brought to
bear on a much wider circle in connection with the National Museum and
as President of the Zoological Society; and no one was more fitted than
he—either for the courtly circle or the large gatherings of working men
who flocked on Saturday afternoons to the galleries of the museum. In all
his many and varied social functions in his prominent positions he was
ably seconded by one who identified herself with his every engagement,
and to whom his last volume of collected addresses was dedicated. A man
of wide sympathies, he is found at one time addressing a Civil Service
dinner, at another a Volunteer gathering, now descanting on evolution
to a Church Congress, and again speaking at a Mayoral banquet, a girls’
school, or an industrial exhibition. The strain on his physique demanded
by these efforts would have been great to an ordinary man, but it must
have been serious to one whose main energies were heavily taxed by
exhausting scientific work. His powerful constitution was thus slowly but
surely sapped, yet to an eager mind and a generous heart, such as his,
little heed was paid to himself....
“Taken all in all, we shall not soon see so talented and so accurate a
comparative anatomist, so impressive a speaker, so facile an artist, or a
public man with a higher type of character.”
The zoological and anthropological side of Sir William’s work (with which
the present writer is more competent to deal than he is with his social
relations and character) is discussed at length in later chapters of this
memoir; but a few observations may be here introduced on subjects which
scarcely come within the category of purely scientific work.
At intervals during his life-time Flower communicated a considerable
number of letters to the _Times_ and other journals on topics more or
less intimately connected with animals and animal life. His sympathy
with the crusade against the tight bearing-rein, initiated by his
father, has already received mention. Equally marked was his sympathy
with the movement against the wearing by ladies of the plumage of birds
(other than game-birds, etc.), and more especially the so-called “osprey
plumes”—really the breeding-plumes of the egrets and white herons—in
the so-called decoration of their bonnets and hats. The extreme cruelty
involved—at least in the case of the “ospreys”—in this practice, which
entails the destruction of the birds during the nesting-season, when
these nuptial plumes are alone donned, and consequently in many instances
the destruction of the helpless young by slow starvation, was painted in
forcible language by more than one letter from Flower’s pen. Happily, as
the result of these and other letters from sympathetic naturalists, and
the foundation of the Society for the Protection of Birds (whose general
aims were likewise strongly advocated by Sir William), this detestable
practice has been much diminished of late years, although very much
remains to be done in this way before there can be any pretence of saying
that birds, even in this country, are treated by man as they deserve.
On another occasion he wrote, deprecating the wholesale destruction of
bottle-nosed whales, which had been advocated on account of the enormous
quantities of fishes devoured by these cetaceans. The question of pelagic
sealing in Bering Sea, and the best way of preventing unnecessary
slaughter, and thus eventual extermination, of the sea-bears and
sea-lions which visit the Pribiloff Islands, also occupied his attention.
And to him was confided the duty of selecting the naturalists (Professor
d’Arcy Thompson and Captain Barrett-Hamilton) who represented British
interests in the International Commission despatched to those islands in
1896 and 1897, to report on the sealing generally and the habits of the
sea-bears, or fur-seals.
The best mode of disposing of the bodies of the dead was also a subject
to which Sir William devoted a share of his attention, and he was a
strong advocate for cremation, or, failing this, for burial in wicker
caskets in light sandy soil.
The effects of the weather on “Cleopatra’s Needle” a comparatively short
time after it had been set up on the Thames Embankment; the best means of
utilising and beautifying the gardens in Lincoln’s Inn Fields; and the
anomaly that while a heavy book could be sent by post for a few pence,
the charge on a heavy letter, at the time in question, was considerable,
were among many other miscellaneous topics upon which he wrote.
In conversation it was Sir William’s great delight, whenever possible,
to turn the subject to his own particular studies and pursuits; but,
as mentioned by an exalted personage on an occasion referred to in the
sequel, he never wearied his hearers. In a new or rare animal, his
delight was almost childish; and the present writer has often reflected
how intense would have been his pleasure had he been spared to see the
first specimen brought to this country of that wonderful animal, the
okapi of the Semliki Forest.
To his official subordinates Sir William was also readily
accessible—possibly almost too much so; and he had always a word of
praise for work faithfully carried out under his direction, even if, from
a slight misunderstanding of his instructions, it had not been executed
precisely on the lines he himself would have desired. He was never above
lending a hand himself at manual work; and the writer well recollects an
occasion at the museum where a large animal was, with some difficulty,
being moved, and Sir William, although at the time manifestly unfit for
severe physical effort, would insist upon aiding in the task.
As a host, Sir William Flower, ably seconded by Lady Flower, had few
rivals and no superiors; and although he absolutely detested tobacco,
such was his good-nature, that he would not deny his male friends the
luxury of an after-dinner cigarette—the idea of ladies smoking would
probably have been too much even for his good-nature and tolerance of
other people’s little weaknesses.
This chapter may be fitly brought to a close by referring to the fact
that it was largely owing to the advocacy of Sir William that a statue
of his intimate friend Huxley was placed in the Central Hall of the
Natural History Museum, in company with those of Darwin and Owen, so
that “Huxley and Owen, often divided in their lives, would come together
after death in the most appropriate place and amidst the most appropriate
surroundings.” In this Valhalla of men pre-eminent in British biological
science of the nineteenth century, Flower’s own bust has found its home;
but of this more anon.
In this connection it may be added that Sir William Flower wrote for the
_Proceedings_ of the Royal Society the obituary notice of Sir Richard
Owen, who had been his predecessor in his own two most important offices.
Despite the fact that Flower had been instrumental in overthrowing at
least one of Owen’s “pet theories,” this biographical notice is written
in the kindest and most sympathetic spirit, giving full credit to the
“immense labours and brilliant talents” of this truly remarkable man.
An earlier obituary notice from Flower’s pen which appeared in the
same journal was devoted to a sketch of the life of George Rolleston,
the brilliant Professor of Anatomy and Physiology of Oxford, whose
comparatively early death in 1881 was one of the real losses to
biological science.
Of a more varied and popular nature were Flower’s reminiscences of
his friend Huxley, which appeared in the _North American Review_ for
September 1895. A fourth biographical notice was the “eulogium” on
Charles Darwin, delivered by Sir William at the centenary meeting of the
Linnean Society, held on 24th May 1888, in which the speaker acknowledged
the incomparable importance of Darwin’s work, and incidentally avowed
his own acceptance of the doctrine of evolution. Compared to Darwin’s
achievements, he observed, “most of the work which we others do is but
irregular, guerilla warfare, attacks on isolated points, mere outpost
skirmishing, while his was the indefatigable, patient, unintermittent
toil, conducted in such a manner and on such a scale that it could
scarcely fail to secure victory in the end.”
CHAPTER II
AS CONSERVATOR OF THE MUSEUM OF THE COLLEGE OF SURGEONS, AND HUNTERIAN
PROFESSOR.
[1861-1884.]
The death, in 1861, of the eminent histological anatomist, Professor
Quekett, rendered vacant the important post of Conservator of the Museum
of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. This
museum, it is almost superfluous to mention, was founded by the great
anatomist, John Hunter, and is hence often known popularly, although not
officially, as the Hunterian Museum.
“Originally a private collection,” observed Flower in his Presidential
address to the Anatomical section of the International Medical Congress,
held in London in the summer of 1881, “embracing a large variety of
objects, it has been carried out and increased upon much the same
plan as that designed by the founder, with modifications only to suit
some of the requirements of advancing knowledge. The only portion of
Hunter’s biological collection which have been actually parted with are
the stuffed birds and beasts, which, with the sanction of the Trustees
appointed by the Government to see that the college performs its part of
the contract as custodians of the collection, were transferred to the
British Museum, and a considerable number of dried vascular preparations,
which having become useless in consequence of the deterioration in their
condition, resulting from age and decay, have been replaced by others
preserved by better methods.”
In regard to the special purposes served by this museum, it is mentioned
in the same address that it is maintained by the College of Surgeons “for
the benefit not only of its own members, but for that of the profession
at large, and indeed of all who take any interest in biological science,
whether the young student preparing for his examination, or the advanced
worker who has here found materials for many an important contribution
by which the boundaries of knowledge have been materially enlarged. To
all such it is freely open without fee or charge. Even the written or
personal introduction of members, still nominally required, is never
asked for on the four open days from any intelligent or interested
visitor; and on the one day of the week on which it is closed for
cleaning, facilities are always given to those who are desirous of
making special studies, and to the increasing number of lady students,
whether artistic, scholastic, or medical. Artists continually resort to
the museum to find opportunities of studying anatomy of man and animals,
which no other place in London affords; and of late years it has been
the means of a still wider diffusion of knowledge, by the visits which
have been organised on summer Saturday afternoons by various associations
of artizans, to whom a popular demonstration of its contents is usually
given by the Conservator.”
Elsewhere in the same address we find the following passage in connection
with the teaching functions of this body:—
“The various professorships and lectureships that are attached
to the College have grown up chiefly in consequence of one of the
conditions under which the Hunterian Collection was entrusted to it by
Government—that a course of no less than twenty-four lectures shall be
delivered annually by some member of the College upon Comparative Anatomy
and other subjects, illustrated by the preparations.”
For some years previously to Professor Quekett’s death the offices of
Conservator of the Museum of the College and of Hunterian Professor of
Anatomy had been disassociated; the occupant of the professorial chair
at the date in question being the late Professor T. H. Huxley, while, as
already mentioned, Quekett held the Conservatorship. At an earlier date
the two offices had, however, been held conjointly; Owen having fulfilled
the duties of both for a period of no less than twenty-five years.
It may be added that, from the varied nature of the collections under
his charge, the Conservator is expected to have a knowledge not only
of comparative anatomy and zoology, but likewise of palæontology,
physiology, surgery, and pathology.
Such a wide range of knowledge is possible to few men at the present day,
but it was possessed to a very considerable extent by Mr. Flower, even
at this comparatively early stage of his career; and as the appointment
was congenial to his tastes, he applied for, and in due course was
elected to, the Conservatorship. The acceptance of this involved the
complete abandonment of practice as a surgeon—a course of action which,
I believe, was never regretted. For eight years Mr. Flower discharged
the duties of the Conservatorship to the satisfaction of the Council of
the College; and when, in 1869, Professor Huxley found himself compelled
by the pressure of other duties to relinquish the Hunterian chair,
Flower was elected in 1870 to fill the vacancy. He thus, for the first
time in his career, became entitled to the designation of “Professor,”
and he continued to hold the two offices till his transference to the
British Museum. Here it may perhaps be well to mention, in order to avoid
confusion, that in the early part of Flower’s official career at the
College of Surgeons the post of Articulator to the museum was held by a
name-sake—Mr. James Flower.
For the first eight years of his connection with the museum in Lincoln’s
Inn Fields the time and attention of Flower were almost entirely devoted
to the improvement, augmentation, and rearrangement of the collections
under his charge; and even when his duties as Hunterian Professor claimed
a large share of his time, no efforts were spared to maintain the former
rate of progress in the museum.
To record in detail the improvements and alterations made in the museum
under Flower’s able administration would obviously not only occupy a
large amount of space but would, likewise, be wearisome to the reader.
Attention will therefore be concentrated on a few salient features in
connection with his work.
Although the anatomy of man naturally took a prominent place in what
used to be called the “physiological” series, yet the preparations
illustrating this subject were in the main restricted to the viscera; the
details of regional anatomy and of the arrangement and distribution of
muscles, vessels, and nerves not finding a place in the original scheme
of the museum. This appeared to Flower to be a serious omission, and
he soon set to work to exhibit human anatomy—largely on account of its
paramount importance to the members of the medical profession—on a much
more extensive scale than was previously the case, thereby affording by
means of permanent preparations a ready demonstration, accessible at all
times, of the structure of every part of the human frame. To those who
have already learnt their anatomy, it has been well remarked, and who
wish to refresh their memory, or verify a fact about which some passing
doubt may be felt, or to those who are precluded by circumstances from
visiting the dissecting room, the preparations of this series must prove
of great value.
In connection with this series may be mentioned the fact that Flower
published during the year he took office the work which heads the
list of his numerous scientific contributions, namely, _Diagrams of
the Nerves of the Human Body, exhibiting their Origin, Divisions and
Connections_, which was favourably received by the medical profession.
In the preparation of the anatomical series, Flower’s almost unrivalled
powers of dissection stood him in good stead, and it was probably during
this period of his career that he first acquired the rudiments of that
originality and care in museum arrangement and display that led to his
being called in after life by a German savant “the Prince of Museum
Directors.”
Perhaps, however, the portion of the museum under his charge in which
Flower was most deeply interested was that devoted to the dentition
and osteology of the different orders of the Mammalia. As regards the
osteological series, he expressed himself in the above-mentioned address
of 1881 in the following words:—
“On this head we claim to be somewhat in advance of other museums,
on account of the improvements which have been made of late years in
preparing and articulating dried skeletons, and in displaying portions
of the bony framework in an instructive manner. Formerly all the bones
were rigidly fixed together, so that their articular surfaces, if not
actually destroyed, were completely concealed, and no bone could possibly
be removed and separately examined. The aim of a series of changes in
the method of mounting skeletons introduced here, and now adopted, more
or less completely, in many other museums, has been to obviate all these
difficulties, and to make each bone, as far as possible, independent of
all the rest, whilst preserving the general aspect and form of the entire
skeleton.
“Another improvement in the osteological series introduced within
the last twenty years has been the formation of a special collection
designed to show the principal modifications of each individual skeleton
throughout the vertebrate classes, by the placing the homologous bones
of a number of different animals in juxtaposition. For convenience of
comparison, the specimens of this series are all placed in corresponding
positions, mounted on separate stands, and to each is attached a label
bearing the name of the bone and the animal to which it belongs. This
series is especially instructive to the students of elementary osteology,
and forms an introduction to the general series.”
It might have been added with perfect truth that this series of the
detached homologous bones of different animals is of equal value and
importance to both the palæontologist and the evolutionist; since with
its assistance the former has a ready means of ascertaining the nearest
relationships of any fossil bone that may be brought under his notice,
while the latter is able to observe the modifications that any particular
bone has undergone in different groups of animals. He may notice, for
instance, the elongation and slenderness distinctive of the humerus,
or arm-bone, of the bat, and contrast it with the short and broad
contour characterising the same bone in the mole, while he may observe
the elongation of some of the bones of the hind-limbs distinctive of
jumping mammals, and their almost total disappearance in the whales and
dolphins. If the preparation of this series of specimens (which appears
to have been closely connected with his lectures on the osteology of the
Mammalia, and their subsequent incorporation in the well-known volume
noticed in the sequel) had been the sole limit of the work accomplished
by Flower, it would still have been sufficient to entitle him to the
gratitude of posterity.
It was while engaged in the development of the collections of this museum
that Flower made his important observations on the homologies and mode of
succession of the teeth of various groups of mammals, and more especially
the marsupials. Here, too, it was that he undertook the investigations
which led to his publication of a new scheme of classification for
the Carnivora; and it was likewise during his Conservatorship that he
published his valuable series of observations upon the comparative
anatomy of the mammalian liver. These and other kindred subjects may,
however, better be considered at greater length in a later chapter. It
must suffice therefore, to add in this connection that during Flower’s
term of office the unrivalled series of human skeletons and skulls
underwent a very marked and important increase.
By no means the least important part of Flower’s work in connection with
the museum of the College of Surgeons was the compilation and publication
of the first two volumes of the _Catalogue of Osteological Specimens_ the
first, dealing with man alone, issued in 1879, and the second, written
with the aid of his assistant, Dr. J. G. Garson, and treating of the
other members of the mammalian class, in 1884. The importance of these
works consists in the fact of their being a very great deal more than
mere catalogues of the contents of one particular museum. They are,
on the contrary, systematic treatises, embodying the views of their
chief author on such important subjects as zoological nomenclature and
classification, and on the best method of arranging museums which include
specimens of the dentition and osteology of both living and extinct
animals. They accordingly deserve notice at some considerable length, not
only on this account, but as forming a record of the great changes Flower
introduced into the museum at this period under his charge.
It appears that the first printed list of the contents of the museum was
published in the year 1831. In a few years, however, it became evident
that a work of a more ambitious nature was required; and in January 1842,
the then Conservator, Professor Owen, presented a report to the Council,
on the supreme advantage to be gained by combining in the proposed new
Catalogue both the recent and the fossil osteological Catalogues. Acting
on this, the Committee of Council resolved that such a Catalogue should
be prepared and published, and the duty of doing this was thereupon
confided to Mr. Owen.
For some reason or other, this excellent and far-seeing resolution
was not acted upon in its entirety; and although catalogues were in
due course compiled by Owen and published, the specimens belonging to
animals still extant were entered in volumes quite distinct from these
devoted to fossil bones and teeth; while the two series of specimens were
likewise kept apart in the museum itself. “Hence,” as Flower subsequently
observed, “each series was incomplete, and required reference to the
other for its perfect illustration and comprehension.” These defects
were remedied during the administration of Flower, who not only arranged
the extinct specimens in their proper position among those belonging
to recent animals, but likewise followed the same admirable plan in
drawing up the Catalogues. Later on, as we shall see in the sequel, he
endeavoured to introduce the same scheme into the Natural History Museum,
but was prevented by the force of circumstances from carrying his views
into full effect, although a small step in the right direction was
accomplished.
The first part of the Catalogue of the osteological specimens in the
museum of the College which, as already said, is devoted to man alone,
is a most laborious, accurate, and valuable work, dealing first with the
general osteology of man, then with his dentition, and, thirdly, with
the special characters of the osteology and dentition of the different
races of the human species—a line of study which had formed the subject
of several of his lectures as Hunterian Professor. Nor is this by
any means all, for the introduction to this volume forms a valuable
compendium of the principles and rules of the science of craniology; the
remarks on the mode of measuring skulls, and the method of calculating
from such measurements “indices,” whereby skulls of different types can
be compared with one another with exactness, being models of accuracy and
clearness, and rendered the more valuable from the tables by which they
are accompanied. For measuring the cubic contents of skulls, Flower was
convinced that mustard-seed formed the best and most accurate medium.
In addition to its value as a summary of the contents of that portion of
the museum of which it treats, and as a _précis_ of its chief author’s
views at that time as to the classification of mammals, the second part
of the Catalogue is of special importance on account of containing an
expression of opinion on the subject of zoological nomenclature—a subject
on which Flower had previously spoken in no uncertain tones in his
Presidential Address to the Zoological section of the British Association
at the meeting held in Dublin in 1878, which is republished in _Essays on
Museums_.
The keynote of Flower’s introduction to his Catalogue was the urgent need
of uniformity of nomenclature among zoologists; and on this, and the
subject generally, he expressed himself as follows:—
“As there is no matter of such great importance in a catalogue as the
correct naming of the objects described in it, this part of the subject
has engaged a very large share of attention in preparing the work. I
am not sanguine enough to suppose that the names I have adopted—always
after careful research and consideration—will in every case be deemed
satisfactory by other zoologists, yet I hope that some advance will
have been made towards that most desirable end—a fixed and generally
recognised nomenclature of all the best-known species of mammals.
Having selected the generic and specific name which I considered most
appropriate, I have given the place and date of their first occurrence,
but have only admitted such synonyms as have found their way into
standard works, judging it better that the remainder should be buried in
oblivion, or at all events only retained in professedly bibliographical
treatises. In selecting the name chosen, I have been mainly guided by
the views which have been gradually gaining general currency among
conscientious naturalists of all nations, and which were formulated in
what is commonly called the Stricklandian Code, adopted by a Committee
of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1842, and
revised and reprinted by the Association in 1865, and again in 1878....
The regulations laid down in these codes for the formation of new names
are unimpeachable; and although some of the rules for the selection
of names already in existence have given rise to criticism, and are
occasionally difficult of practical application when an endeavour is made
to enforce them too rapidly, they do in the main, when interpreted with
discretion and common-sense, lead to satisfactory results. As what we are
aiming at is simply convenience and general accord, and not abstract
justice or truth, there are cases in which the rigid law of priority,
even if it can be ascertained, requires qualification, as it is certainly
not advisable to revive an obsolete or almost unknown name at the
expense of one, which if not strictly legitimate, has been universally
accepted and become thoroughly incorporated in zoological and anatomical
literature; and it is often better to put up with a small error or
inconvenience in an existing name than to incur the much larger confusion
caused by the introduction of a new one.”
These are weighty words of wisdom, and it must be a matter for profound
regret to all persons of thoroughly philosophical and well-balanced minds
that, by the newer school of naturalists—led by an American section—they
have not only been received without the attention they merit as coming
from a man of Flower’s wide experience and mature judgment, but have
been absolutely ignored and the principle they inculcate treated with
disdain and contempt. Obscure names, frequently of the most barbarous
construction and sound, have been raked up from all conceivable sources
and substituted for the well-known terms adopted by Flower and many of
his contemporaries; while, to make matters worse, the good old rule
that no names antedating the twelfth edition of the _Systema Naturæ_ of
Linnæus should be recognised in zoological literature has, so far as
mammals are concerned, been treated absolutely as a dead letter.
If it be asked what has been the result of thus ignoring the deliberately
expressed and matured views of a judicial mind like Flower’s, and
whether we are perceptibly nearer the attainment of uniformity in the
matter of biological nomenclature, the reply must be that the subject
is in a more unsatisfactory state than ever, and the desired end as far
off. It is perfectly true, indeed, that a section of the students of
the systematic side of zoology have agreed among themselves to employ
only such names as they believe to be the earliest, quite irrespective
of the obscurity of their origin or the rule that such names should be
compounded according to classic usage. When, however, we take a broader
survey of the field of biology, we find that, almost to a man, the
anatomists, the palæontologists, the geologists, the evolutionists, the
students of geographical distribution, and other writers who discuss the
subject from aspects other than the purely systematic, adhere to the
more conservative side in respect of nomenclature. Moreover, even if
this were not the case, we should be but little forwarder, seeing that
in works like Darwin’s _Origin of Species_ and Wallace’s _Geographical
Distribution of Mammals_—which must remain classical so long as zoology
lasts as a science—the older style of nomenclature is used. Consequently,
even if the proposed emendations and changes were universally adopted,
the names employed by these and other contemporary writers would still
have to be learnt and committed to memory by all zoological students; so
that, instead of one series of names, as would have been practically the
case had Flower’s proposal been loyally adopted by his contemporaries and
followers, we are compelled to know and remember a double series.
Whether in the end there will not be a reversion to the judicial and
temperate conservative compromise proposed by Flower—and almost
everything in this world is based more or less upon compromise—from the
headstrong and radical mode of procedure followed by some of the younger
zoologists, remains to be seen.
Another subject on which Flower insisted very strongly in the work under
consideration was the inadvisability of multiplying generic and family
divisions in zoology. Here again we may quote his own words.
“I do not mean,” he writes, “that with the advancement of knowledge
improvements cannot be continually made in the current arrangement of
genera. The older groups become so unwieldy by the discovery of new
species belonging to them that they must be broken up, if only for the
sake of convenience; newly discovered forms which cannot be placed in
any of the established genera must have new genera constituted for them,
and fuller knowledge of the structure of an animal may necessitate its
removal from one genus into another; all these are incidents in the
legitimate progress of science. Such alterations should, however, never
be made lightly and without a full sense of responsibility for the
difficulties which may be occasioned by them, and which often can never
be removed. Complete agreement upon this subject can never be expected,
as the idea of a _genus_, of an assemblage of animals to which a common
generic name may be attached, cannot be defined in words, and only exists
in the imagination of the different persons making use of the expression;
but there might be no difficulty in coming to some general agreement, if
individual zoologists would look at the idea as held by the majority,
and would not give way to the impulse to bestow a name wherever there is
the slightest opening for doing so.”
Here, again, we have golden words, which are unfortunately ignored by a
large number of the zoologists and palæontologists of the present day.
Most noteworthy, perhaps, in the whole passage, is the emphasis given to
the fact that generic groups are but arbitrary creations of the human,
and that, far from being natural realities, they are solely and simply
formed as matters of convenience, so that their limits are absolutely
dependent upon individual or collective opinion.
Consequently, when we hear it said—as we may—that such and such an animal
_must_ constitute a genus by itself, we may be assured that in nine cases
out of ten the speaker is talking nonsense. It _may_ do so, but this is
purely as a matter of convenience for purposes of classification. As
examples of Flower’s broad and far-seeing way of looking at the limits
of generic groups, we may take his inclusion of the foxes in the same
group as the wolves, of the polecats and weasels with the martens, of
the two-horned with the one-horned rhinoceroses, and of the blackbirds
with the thrushes; and yet in all these instances, as in many others, a
large number of his successors—many of whom cannot lay claim to anything
approaching his intellectual capacity and his power of separating
essentials from trivialities—cannot be content with the grand simplicity
of his scheme of classification. What they gain by their involved systems
and minute subdivisions is best known to themselves—to the public such
complexity tends to render zoology, which ought to be one of the most
attractive and delightful of all sciences (and it was one of Flower’s
endeavours to make it as much so as possible), repulsive and distasteful.
The present writer’s opportunities of intercourse with Professor Flower
during his tenure of the Conservatorship of the Museum of the College
of Surgeons were but few and intermittent, and restricted to the latter
part of that time, he may therefore be pardoned for quoting from a
biographer who appears to have enjoyed more favourable opportunities in
this respect. Before doing so, however, the writer cannot refrain from
putting it on record that his own appointment to the Geological Survey
of India in the early seventies was largely due to the influence of
Professor Flower, who had been his examiner in the Natural Science Tripos
at Cambridge, in December 1871.
To revert to the subject of Flower’s personality in connection with his
appointment in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, his biographer in the “Year-Book” of
the Royal Society for 1901 writes as follows:—
“His tenure of office, viz., twenty-two years, as Conservator of the
museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, was a splendid record of
original and laborious work, of great administrative capacity, and of
unvarying courtesy to visitors. The museum was most popular under his
management. There, amidst the almost unrivalled collections, the tall,
fair-haired, and earnest worker was daily to be found, minutely studying,
comparing and measuring, or giving directions for the extension,
arrangement, and classification of the varied and valuable contents. From
a scientific point of view no post could have been better adapted to the
man or the man to the post. With many and varied lines of study lying
conveniently around him, in the quietude of an office less conspicuous
and exacting than the British Museum, in the full vigour of manhood, and
in the midst of sympathetic seniors, friends, and assistants, it can well
be imagined that Sir William’s powers attained great development, and
that perhaps he never felt so full of happiness and satisfaction with his
original work. It could not well be otherwise. His conscientious devotion
to duty, his remarkable skill in devising methods of mounting, his
artistic eye, his tact with subordinates, and the esteem in which he was
held by zoologists and comparative anatomists at home and abroad, give a
clue to his subsequent career, and show the training of one of the most
accomplished and courtly comparative anatomists our country has produced.”
But there was another side to Flower’s work during the greater part of
his official connection with the Royal College of Surgeons, and one which
brought him into wider and closer contact with the public than was the
case with his Conservatorship. This was the delivery of the lectures
which form the chief, if not the sole, duty of the Hunterian Professor.
According to the statutes of the College, the annual course of lectures,
which is short, must be on a different subject each year, but must in all
cases be illustrated by preparations in the museum.
The present writer was privileged to attend only one of these courses—on
the general structure of the Mammalia—and is therefore not competent
to speak from experience of these lectures as a whole. Nevertheless
the one course was amply sufficient to convince him of the lecturer’s
special qualifications for his task. Flower was indeed an ideal lecturer,
endowed with a fine presence, a suave and yet penetrating voice, great
power of expression, a slow and impressive delivery, and, above all,
an absolute mastery of his subject (whatever it might be) down to the
minutest and apparently most insignificant details. For him, every detail
of structure, whether functional or rudimentary, had a significance
and a meaning, and he would never rest satisfied till he had found out
what that meaning was, and had laid the whole of the evidence on which
he based his conclusions before his audience. That audience, which
generally included a considerable number of the elder members of the
medical profession, as well as many well-known zoologists and anatomists,
invariably listened with rapt attention to the story told so admirably by
the accomplished lecturer.
Of these lectures, the first course, delivered in 1870 on the Osteology
of the Mammalia, is perhaps the one which has rendered Flower most widely
known among zoological students, since, as noticed below, it became the
basis of a valuable little volume.
His introductory lecture in February 1870 was largely devoted to the
subject of plan, or “type,” in Nature, and to the evidence in favour of
the transmutation of species and evolution of organised beings—a doctrine
which was at that time by no means so widely accepted, even among
scientific men, as it is at the present day. In this address the lecturer
prefaced his remarks by explaining that since the main part of his
anatomical knowledge was derived from the splendid series of specimens
and preparations in the museum under his charge, so he intended to act
as the mouth-piece of the specimens themselves. After this introductory
lecture followed the regular course for the year, which was devoted to
the Osteology of the Mammalia, and it is perhaps this series which has
rendered the name of Flower most familiar to the ordinary students of
scientific zoology and comparative anatomy, since it was published during
the same year as a volume in Macmillan’s _Manuals for Students_, under
the title of _An Introduction to the Osteology of the Mammalia: being
the Substance of a Course of Lectures delivered at the Royal College
of Surgeons of England_. Such was the success of this admirable little
volume—which has ever since formed the recognised text-book on the
subject of which it treats, that a second edition was called for in 1876,
and a third in 1885. In expanding and revising the latter—in which, by
the way, the second half of the original title was dropped—the author,
owing to the pressure of official duties, called in the assistance of Dr.
J. G. Garson, of Cambridge, a well-known zoologist and anatomist.
This book, to be properly appreciated, should be studied in connection
with the series of homologous bones of different species of mammals
arranged by Flower himself in the museum of the College of Surgeons,
to which reference has been made in an earlier part of this chapter,
and from which most of the illustrations were drawn. The figures of the
dog’s skull have been reproduced in a large number of zoological and
anatomical works. The plan followed in this volume forms an admirable
model for all works of a kindred nature. In the first chapter the author
discusses the classification of the mammalia; in the second he describes
the skeleton of that group as a whole; while in the remainder the
modifications presented by the various bones in the different groups are
described in considerable detail. A special feature is the sparing use
of technical terms, and the careful explanation of the meaning of those
of which the use was unavoidable. Besides being carefully revised and
brought up to date, the third edition differed from its predecessors by
including a table of the number of vertebræ found in a large series of
species.
In the following year (1871) the Hunterian course, which comprised
no less than eighteen lectures, was devoted to the functions and
modifications of the teeth of mammals, from man to the monotremes,
although it was not known at that time that either of the two generic
representatives of the latter group really possessed true teeth, the
discovery of these organs in the Australian duckbill not having been made
till many years later.
Among other subjects included in his Hunterian lectures was the anatomy
and affinities of the Cetacea, or whales and dolphins, a group of mammals
in which Flower almost from the first displayed a marked and special
interest, and on which he became one of the first authorities. Since,
however, this is a subject to which fuller reference is made in a later
chapter, it need not be further discussed in this place.
In 1872 Flower’s Hunterian lectures were devoted to the subject of
the digestive organs of mammals; these lectures being reported, with
illustrations, in the _Medical Times and Gazette_ of the same year.
Perhaps the most important and certainly the most voluminous of these
lectures was the series on the “Comparative Anatomy of Man,” which
extended over several years, the course for 1880 dealing especially
with the skulls of the Fiji, Tongan, and Samoan islanders. The subject
of anthropology, or the study of the different races of mankind from a
zoological standpoint, shared indeed with that of the Cetacea a large
part of the Professor’s attention, and the two together formed, perhaps,
his favourite lines of investigation. In regard to the problems presented
by the human race when viewed from this standpoint, Flower has expressed
himself as follows:—
“Comparative anatomy is specially occupied in studying the differences
between one man and another, estimating and classifying their
differences, and especially discriminating between such differences as
are only individual variations (variations which, when extreme, are
relegated to the department of the teratologist) and those that are
inherited, and so become characters of different groups and races of
the human species. Physical anthropology, moreover, extends its range
beyond merely comparing and registering these differences of structure.
It also occupies itself with endeavouring to trace their cause, and the
circumstances which may occasion their modifications. It endeavours also
to form a classification of the different groups of mankind, and so to
throw light upon the history and development of the human species.”
The races towards which special attention was directed in these lectures
were mainly those inhabiting the islands of the Indian Ocean and the
Pacific, namely, the diminutive and degraded Andamanese, the Australians,
and their near but very distinct neighbours, the Tasmanians, long since
extinct, the Melanesians or Oceanic Negroes, and the Polynesians. With
the exception of the latter, which the Professor regarded as an aberrant
and somewhat mixed modification of the Malay stock, all these different
island races were considered to belong to the black or negroid branch
of the human species; and it was suggested that the Andamanese were
the purest living representatives of a great “Negrito” stock, which
had been formerly widely distributed, and had given rise to the true
African negroes on the one hand, and to the Oceanic negroes on the
other. As regards his view that the aboriginal Australians are members
of the negroid branch, it will be pointed out in a later chapter that an
alternative opinion has of late years gained considerable favour among
anthropologists.
The Hunterian lectures of Flower were, however, by no means restricted
to the negro-like races of the islands of the southern oceans. On the
contrary, the Professor devoted much attention in the course of the
series to the various races to be met with in our Indian dependencies,
dwelling especially on the so-called Dravidian (_i.e._ non-Aryan) tribes
of the Nilgiris and other districts of southern India, and likewise on
the still more remarkable and primitive Veddas of Ceylon. The Mongols,
as typified by the Tatars and Chinese, and their relationship on the one
hand to the Eskimo, and thus with the “Indians” of America, and on the
other with the Malays, were also discussed at considerable length in
these lectures.
The origin of the Egyptians was also a subject to which much attention
was devoted by the Hunterian Professor. “The much vexed questions,” he
said, “who were the Egyptians? and where did they come from? receive no
answer from anatomical investigations, beyond the very simple one that
they are one of several races which inhabit all the lands surrounding the
Mediterranean Sea; that they there lived in their own land far beyond
all periods of time measured by historical events, and that in all
probability it was there that they gradually developed that marvellous
civilisation which has exercised such a powerful influence over the arts,
the sciences, and the religion of the whole western world.” The truth of
these suggestions has been fully confirmed by the subsequent researches
of Professor Flinders Petrie.
As a whole, these Hunterian lectures on anthropological subjects were
a great success, and won for the Professor increased respect and
admiration from scientific men of all classes. They paved the way for the
preparation of that invaluable Catalogue of the anthropological specimens
in the museum of the College to which allusion has already been made.
When in 1884 Professor Flower, on the resignation of Sir Richard Owen,
accepted the Directorship of the Natural History Departments of the
British Museum, and was thus compelled to sever his official connection
with the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, after a service of
two-and-twenty years, the following resolution, on the motion of Sir
James Paget, seconded by Mr. Erichsen, was unanimously passed by the
Council of the College:—
“That the Council hereby desire to express to Mr. William Henry Flower
their deep regret at his resignation of the office of Conservator. That
they thank him for the admirable care, judgment and zeal, with which for
twenty-two years he has fulfilled the various and responsible duties
of those offices. That they are glad to acknowledge that the great
increase of the museum during those years has been very largely due to
his exertions, and to the influence which he has exercised, not only on
all who have worked with him, but amongst all who have been desirous to
promote the progress of Anatomical Science. That they know that while
he has increased the value and utility of the museum by enlarging it,
by preserving it in perfect order, and by facilitating the study of
its contents, he has also maintained the scientific reputation of the
College, by the numerous works which have gained for him a distinguished
position amongst the naturalists and biologists of the present time. And
that, in their placing on record their high appreciation of Mr. Flower,
the Council feel sure that they are expressing the opinion of all the
Fellows and Members of the College, and that they all will unite with
them in wishing him complete success and happiness in the important
office to which he has been elected.”
This is indeed a splendid, although by no means exaggerated, testimonial
to the success of Flower’s administration of the Museum of the College
of Surgeons, and to the good and lasting work he there effected—work
which paved the way to the improvements he was subsequently able to
effect in the Natural History Museum.
_Note._—On Owen’s retirement the post of Superintendent of the
Natural History Departments of the British Museum, which he had
filled, was merged into the new office of Director; a wider
scope being given to the duties of the post.
CHAPTER III
AS DIRECTOR OF THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM
[1884-1898]
On the resignation in 1884 by Sir Richard Owen of the post of
Superintendent of the Natural History Departments of the British Museum,
which four years previously had been transferred to the magnificent new
building in the Cromwell Road, officially known as the British Museum
(Natural History), but more commonly designated the Natural History
Museum, it was felt by all competent to form an adequate opinion on the
subject that Professor Flower was the one man specially and peculiarly
fitted for the post. And accordingly, in the course of the year in
question, he was duly appointed to that most important and influential
position, which may be regarded as conferring upon its occupant the
status of the leading official zoologist in the British Empire. It was in
this position that Flower became most widely known to the general public;
and here that he received the honours, firstly of C.B., and later on
K.C.B., conferred upon him by his Sovereign.
At the date when Sir William (then Professor) assumed the reins of
office, the position of Director of the Natural History Museum was
of a somewhat anomalous and peculiar nature. At that time (as now)
the administration of the museum was divided into four sections, or
departments, namely Zoology, Geology (or rather Palæontology), Botany
and Mineralogy, each of which was presided over by a “Keeper,” who had
practically unlimited control, both as regards finance and general
arrangement, of his own section. Consequently, as regards these four
departments, the Director had very little control over the museum he was
nominally supposed to govern; and his functions were to a great extent
limited to regulating the “foreign policy” of the institution under his
charge, that is to say, its relations to the parent establishment at
Bloomsbury, to the Treasury, and to the world at large. In fact, as Sir
William once remarked to the present writer, the Director at that time
had to find a sphere of work for himself.
Fortunately, such a sphere of work lay ready to hand, and Flower
immediately entered upon it with characteristic energy and enthusiasm.
So long ago as the year 1859, Sir Richard Owen, in one of his reports
to the Trustees of the Museum, recommended that the new building, in
addition to affording ample space for the general series of natural
specimens exhibited to the public, should likewise include a hall, or
other suitable apartment, for the display of a series of specimens
calculated to convey an elementary idea of the general principles of
systematic natural history and biological classification to the large
proportion of the ordinary public visitor not conversant with that
subject. In other words, the feature of the proposed section would be the
exhibition of a series of specimens selected to show the more typical
characters of the principal groups of organised (and, it was at the
time added, crystallised) forms. This, it was urged, would constitute
an epitome of natural history, and would convey to the eye, in the
easiest and most ready manner, an elementary knowledge of the sciences in
question.
In every modification which the plans of the new building underwent,
a hall for the purpose indicated in the above passages formed, as Sir
William has himself remarked, a prominent feature; being in the later
stages of the development of the building called, for want of a better
name, the “Index Museum.”
The increasing infirmities of age, coupled with the short time during
which he presided over the Natural History collections in their new home,
combined, however, to prevent Owen from making any real progress with
the so-called Index Museum; and although he furnished the idea of the
scheme and planned the general installation of the hall, the selection
and installation of its contents were left to his successor. And, with
the vast experience gained by Sir William during his tenure of office in
the Royal College of Surgeons, they could not possibly have been left to
abler hands.
Here it is necessary to explain that, whether by design or by accident,
history sayeth not, the Index Museum and the Central Hall generally were
not included in any one of the four great administrative departments
of the Museum, so that they consequently came under the immediate and
exclusive control of the Director himself.
Nor was Flower long in setting to work at the task which thus lay
awaiting his master-hand; and the Index Museum, as fast as the exigencies
of finance and the difficulties of procuring suitable specimens
permitted, gradually assumed the shape and character familiar to all
visitors of the building, not that in these respects it exactly followed
the lines suggested by Owen. In place of being, as was originally
proposed, a sort of epitome or index of the main collections in the
galleries, it developed rather into something “more like the general
introduction preceding the systematic portion of treatises on any branch
of natural history.”
Whether, in view of this departure from the original conception, Sir
William, if starting _de novo_, would have grouped all these separate
collections in a single apartment, or whether he would have split them
up and placed them at the commencement of the various series in the
exhibition galleries to which they respectively pertain, may be a moot
point. But, at anyrate, no detriment to his work would ensue if such a
splitting-up should be thought desirable in the future. And considerable
advantages would undoubtedly result if the series displaying the general
morphology and anatomy of the mammals were placed at the entrance of the
mammalian gallery, and so on with the other series at present exhibited
in the Index Museum.
Be this as it may, the series of specimens and preparations arranged
in the Index Museum under the immediate superintendence of Flower is
probably unrivalled in its way, and displays in a marked manner that
attention to detail and that eye to artistic effect which were among his
special attributes. In the “bay” devoted to mammals, special attention
was given to the display of specimens illustrating the various forms
assumed by the teeth in the different orders and families, and their
mode of succession and replacement;—subjects in which Flower always
displayed special interest, and in regard to which he made some important
discoveries. Here, too, were exhibited during the latter half of his
tenure of office the skeletons and half-models of a man and a horse,
placed in juxtaposition, in order to display the special adaptations
and modifications for, on the one hand, the upright posture and great
brain-capacity, and, on the other, for the high degree of speed and
endurance essential to an otherwise defenceless quadruped living, in a
wild state, on open plains. In this exhibit, which forms the frontispiece
to his well-known and deservedly popular little work on _The Horse_,
Sir William always took an especial pride; and it was one of the first
objects to which he directed the attention of the many illustrious and
distinguished visitors who sought his guidance in viewing the collections
under his charge. Another specimen in the same “bay” of which he was
especially proud is the skeleton of a young chimpanzee, dissected by Dr.
Tyson, and described by that anatomist in a work published in 1699, under
the title of the _Anatomie of a Pigmie_, being the earliest scientific
description of any man-like ape.
As regards the vertebrate “bays,” Sir William himself (always of course
with the aid of trained assistants) took an active part in the selection
and arrangement of the specimens. In the case of the invertebrate groups,
on the other hand, the task was left more to his subordinates; while
as regards the botanical section such relegation was, of necessity,
practically complete. Although it has been previously referred to
elsewhere, it may be mentioned that it was during the work on the Index
Museum the discovery of the absence in certain groups of birds of the
fifth cubital quill-feather was made; a fact now familiar to naturalists
under the title of diastaxy, or aquintocubitalism.
A special feature of the vertebrate section of the Index Museum was the
attention devoted to the mounting of the skins of the mammals exhibited.
In an address delivered to the British Association in 1889, Flower
referred to “the sadly neglected art of taxidermy, which continues
to fill the cases of most of our museums with wretched and repulsive
caricatures of mammals and birds, out of all natural proportions,
shrunken here and bloated there, and in attitudes absolutely impossible
for the creature to have assumed while alive.” And he was determined that
the specimens of this nature in the section of the museum under his own
immediate superintendence should be the best of their kind, and should
serve as models for the renovation of these in the zoological galleries
which he had determined to undertake so soon as the opportunity was
afforded.
Neither was he less particular in regard to labels describing the
exhibits. In the address already referred to, he had written that
“above all, the purpose for which each specimen is exhibited, and the
main lesson to be derived from it, must be distinctly indicated by the
labels affixed, both as headings of the various divisions of the series
and to the individual specimens. A well-arranged educational museum
has been defined as a collection of instructive labels, illustrated by
well-selected specimens.” Most, if not all, of the descriptive labels
in the vertebrate series of the Index Museum were written by the hand
of the Director himself, while all came under his personal supervision
before being placed in the museum. Labels of a descriptive nature had
hitherto been mainly, if not entirely, conspicuous by their absence on
the zoological side of the museum; and for some time the Index series
alone afforded an example of the nature of the Director’s views on
this all-important subject. Nor was this all; for in addition to these
descriptive labels, other and larger labels were affixed in the cases,
bearing the names of the various “classes,” “orders,” and “families,”
to which the specimens respectively pertained; the limits of the space
occupied by each group being indicated by black laths, varying in width
according to the grade of the group they demarcated. By this means
systematic divisions were clearly indicated; and on no consideration
would Flower permit of any single specimen being placed elsewhere than in
its proper systematic position.
Another innovation—so far at anyrate as the zoological side of the museum
was concerned—was the placing of small maps alongside each specimen
or each group, to illustrate, by means of colour, the geographical
distribution of the species or group.
As regards the function of the Index Museum, it may be admitted that
instead of, as originally intended, serving as an elementary guide
in natural history to the uninstructed public, this exhibit is more
generally used by serious zoological students, of whom numbers may from
time to time be seen, book in hand, and sometimes under the guidance
of a teacher, intently poring over the contents of the cases. Such a
use—although not perhaps the prime object of a national museum—is,
however, at least as important as catering to the requirements of the
ordinary visitor.
The display in systematic and serial order of the external characters
and internal anatomy of the leading types of living and extinct animals
and plants formed, however, only a part of Flower’s scheme of exhibits
for the central hall of the museum. Such specimens occupied only the
“bays” or alcoves on the west and east sides, and there remained the
large central floor space for exhibits of other descriptions. Advantage
was taken of this to display examples of the phenomenon of seasonal
colour-change in birds, accompanied in some instances, as in the ruff,
by the development of special plumes round the neck, or elsewhere; the
two species selected for illustration being the aforesaid ruff and the
wild duck or mallard; the latter bird, together with many other members
of its tribe, being remarkable on account of the assumption by the
males at certain seasons of the year of an “eclipse” plumage, almost
indistinguishable from that distinctive at all times of the year of the
female. Other cases were devoted to showing some of the more remarkable
kinds of variation produced from a single wild stock by domestication
and artificial selection; the species exhibited for this purpose being
several types of the common fowl, the various kinds of pigeons, and the
more remarkable strains of the canary. The introduction of domesticated
breeds, whose peculiarities are entirely, in the outset at anyrate, the
result of man’s interference with the ordinary course of Nature, is a
notable feature of this portion of the work of Flower, and indicates
his sense of the important bearing of such artificial variations on
the doctrine of the evolution of organic nature. “Mimicry” by animals
of one group of those of another also formed an important part of this
introductory series of exhibit; as did likewise the colour-adaptation
of animals to their inorganic surroundings. This latter phenomenon
is specially illustrated by a series of animals (mammals, birds and
reptiles) from the Libyan desert, which are set up amid rocks and sand
from the same locality so as to imitate as nearly as possible the natural
conditions. And this case, together with one of these to be noticed
immediately, affords an excellent example of Sir William’s painstaking
efforts to make the exhibits in the museum as realistic as possible,
and also his influence and persuasive power in inducing friends or
correspondents to aid his endeavours. For in both these instances the
animals and their inanimate surroundings were collected on the spot by
generous and enthusiastic donors.
The second instance of the adaptation of animals to their surroundings is
afforded by the two cases displaying respectively a summer and a winter
scene in Norway, with the birds and mammals in the one in their brown
dress, and in the other in their snow-white livery. Since Sir William’s
death an Arctic fox, in the appropriate dress, had been added to each
case, with a decided improvement to the general effect.
Another exhibit of the above nature is devoted to the phenomenon of
albinism and melanism among animals; the two cases in which the specimens
are shown containing an extraordinary number of species, varying in
size from leopards to mice, in which these remarkable colour-phases
are respectively displayed. The admission of such departures from
the ordinary type into the museum justifies, it may be mentioned, the
introduction of abnormalities of a more startling nature. Finally, as
illustration of a transition from one species towards another, Sir
William caused to be set up a series of typical specimens of the common
and the hooded crow, together with offspring produced by the union of
the two, which are to a great extent intermediate between the parent
forms. In the same cases is a series of goldfinches, showing a complete
gradation between birds of different coloration, and commonly regarded as
belonging to distinct species.
All the above instances serve to demonstrate, however inadequately,
Flower’s broad conception of the field to be covered by a national and
educational museum, altogether apart from the exhibition of specimens
illustrative of systematic natural history. It is no secret that Sir
William wished to add a series illustrative of the present geographical
distribution of animals on the surface of the globe; but, for lack of
space, all that could be attempted in this direction was the exhibition
of the British fauna, together with a map displaying the division of the
world into zoological regions, according to the scheme of Messrs. Sclater
and Wallace.
For several years, apart from administrative duties, Flower devoted
practically the whole of his available time to the elaboration of the
Index Museum and the other exhibits in the Central Hall, although he
found opportunity to draw up a list of the specimens of Cetacea (whales
and dolphins) in the collection of the Museum, which was published by
order of the Trustees in 1885. Probably, indeed, this list was compiled
before active work on the Index Museum had commenced. It is a very
useful work to the student of the group, although limited to species
represented in the Museum collection.
In the autumn of the year 1895 there occurred, however, an event, which
may be said to have revolutionised Flower’s position in the Museum, and
gave him that immediate personal control over the zoological collections
which was essential to the full development and perfection of his scheme
of museum reform and expansion. At that date Dr. Albert Günther retired
from the position of Keeper of the Zoological Department; and it was then
resolved by the Trustees of the Museum that this post should be held by
Sir William (who, by the way, had been made C.B. in 1887 and K.C.B. in
1892), in conjunction with the office of Director.
This arrangement was continued throughout the remainder of Sir William’s
term of office, and was likewise renewed when he was succeeded by
Professor E. Ray Lankester, the present holder of the combined posts.
This, then, gave Flower, as already stated, the opportunity for which
he had so long been waiting; and in January 1896 he undertook the
supervision of the reorganisation and rearrangement of the mammal gallery.
Here a digression of some length must be made, in order to make the
reader acquainted in a certain degree with the conditions then prevalent
in the museum in connection with the galleries open to the public. In the
first place, as already indicated, while the skins and bones of recent
animals were contained and exhibited in the Zoological Department, the
remains of their extinct relatives, and even the fossilised bones and
teeth of the living species, were relegated to the Geological Department,
which occupies the ground floor of the opposite side of the building. To
make matters worse, the skeletons of living mammals were exhibited on
the second floor of the zoological side of the building (instead of, as
they should have been, on the ground floor), and thus as far away as they
could possibly be from those of their extinct predecessors.
Such an unnatural and illogical sundering of kindred objects was
altogether repugnant to the mind of Flower, who in his address to the
British Association in 1889, to which allusion has been already made,
expressed himself as follows:—
“For the perpetuation of the unfortunate separation of palæontology
from biology, which is so clearly a survival of an ancient condition
of scientific culture, and for the maintenance in its integrity of the
heterogeneous compound of sciences which we now call ‘geology,’ the
faulty organisation of our museums is in a great measure responsible.
The more their rearrangement can be made to overstep and break down
the abrupt line of demarcation which is still almost universally drawn
between beings which live now and those which have lived in past times,
so deeply rooted in the popular mind, and so hard to eradicate even from
that of the scientific student, the better it will be for the progress of
sound biological knowledge.”
The force of circumstances, coupled with the expense which would have
been involved, was, however, too much for even a man with Flower’s
force of character and determination, and the attempt to merge the
palæontological with the zoological collections was consequently
perforce abandoned.[2] As a compromise a certain number of fossil
specimens, or casts of the same, were to be introduced among the recent
mammals; while, conversely, a few skeletons of the latter were to take
their place among the remains of their extinct forerunners.
In another mooted change, Sir William (as it lay entirely in the
Department under his own special control) was, however, more successful.
Previously it had been the practice in the museum to separate the
skeletons and skulls and horns of mammals from the mounted skins, placing
the former in a gallery by themselves, known as the Osteological Gallery.
As a result of this, if a visitor wanted to ascertain the peculiarities
of the skeleton of any mammal of which the skin was exhibited, he had
to mount to the gallery above, and on his arrival there, very probably
forgot the essential features of the skin. One of the first resolves in
connection with the rearrangement was to do away with the Osteological
Gallery altogether, and to place a certain proportion of the skeletons
and skulls in juxtaposition with, or near by, the stuffed skins.
Another feature of the old method of exhibition in vogue in the museum
was the crowding together of a vast number of specimens, good, bad, and
indifferent (mostly either the second or third), many of which were
duplicates, in such a manner that the great majority could scarcely be
seen at all, while the effect of those that were more or less visible
was marred and obscured by the adjacent specimens. To add to this
unsatisfactory state of affairs was the bad condition—due either to
age, to bad taxidermy, or both combined—of the bulk of the specimens.
Moreover, by some inconceivable Vandalism, dating apparently from a
very remote epoch in the museum’s history, every specimen was mounted
on a stand of polished sycamore, the effect of which was to mar even a
first-class specimen of taxidermy. When to the above is added the fact
that, beyond the scientific and in most cases also the popular name of
the species, nothing in the way of indicating the serial position of
the various groups was attempted, while all that was done in the way of
descriptive labels was the suspension here and there of frames containing
extracts from the “Guide” to the gallery, it may be imagined that the
state of the collection was very far indeed behind the Director’s idea of
what it should be. Moreover, although in the case of the smaller animals
a systematic arrangement was followed, the cases containing the larger
species were disposed without any reference to the systematic position of
the latter.
In regard to such matters the Director had, in the address quoted,
already expressed his own views in no uncertain tone, as is evident from
the following passage relating to the arrangement of specimens in the
public galleries:—
“In the first place,” he writes, “their numbers must be strictly limited,
according to the nature of the subject illustrated and the space
available. None must be placed too high or too low for ready examination.
There must be no crowding of specimens one behind another, every one
being perfectly and distinctly seen, and with a clear space around it....
Every specimen exhibited should be good of its kind, and all available
skill and care should be spent upon its preservation and rendering
it capable of teaching the lesson it is intended to convey.... Every
specimen exhibited should have its definite purpose, and no absolute
duplicate should on any account be permitted.”
The purport of these golden words, which at the time they were written
indicated an entirely new departure in museum arrangement and display,
was, so far as possible, followed in the rearrangement of the mammal
galleries. In the first place, the upper portions of the cases, which
were far too high above the ground to permit of the proper exhibition
of small specimens, were, except in those containing large mammals,
closed up and employed for displaying the labels relating to the larger
groups and the maps illustrating their geographical distribution. Then,
again, the shelves, in place of being arranged one above another like
those in a wardrobe, were reduced in number, and in most instances in
width, so as to be suited to the best possible display of the specimens
they were intended to carry. Duplicate specimens of all kinds, as well
as representatives of species having but little general interest, were
relentlessly weeded out and consigned to the store series; while efforts
were made to procure new examples, mounted in the best possible manner,
of all species—and these were by far the great majority—represented by
badly-mounted, or old and faded specimens. This part of the business was
found, however, to be a matter which must necessarily occupy much time,
as it is impossible to procure examples of rare or large species, in a
condition fit for stuffing, at the precise moment when they are required;
and there is also the question of expense, which becomes very heavy
indeed when renovating and replacing a collection of the proportions
of that of the National Museum. This portion of the work has therefore
been going on uninterruptedly ever since the first start was made, and
is indeed being continued at the present time; for it has been found
by experience that a collection of this nature, owing to the terribly
bleaching effects of sunlight, requires constant renovation, and that
exhibited museum specimens have only a definite and limited period,
varying to a considerable extent according to the colour and nature
of the hair in individual species, during which they are fitted to be
publicly shown. Instead of a museum, when once arranged, being “a joy
for ever,” it requires constant attention and renovation, so that even,
to keep them in proper order, the mammal galleries alone in the Natural
History Museum demand a large proportion of the time of one of the
officials.
Not the least important of the changes made in the mammalian galleries
under the supervision of Sir William Flower was the alteration of the
colour of the stands on which the specimens were mounted. These, as
already said, were of polished sycamore, the bright reflection from
which was exceedingly unbecoming to the specimens, to say nothing of
the obvious lack of æsthetic fitness in mounting stuffed mammals upon a
polished surface of this nature. Before anything in the way of a change
was attempted, Sir William sought the advice of his friend, the late
Lord Leighton, after consultation with whom, it was finally decided
that in future the stands should be of a good “cigar-colour.” This was
effected, in the first instance, by scraping and staining the original
sycamore stands—a work of great labour and expense; but all new ones were
subsequently made of wood more easy to work, walnut being employed in the
case of the smaller sizes. Even this improvement, great as it undoubtedly
was, did not, however, by any means represent the full extent of the
changes in this direction. After a short experience of the aforesaid
“cigar-coloured” stands, it was found that the general effect was much
improved by gouging out the upper surface of these, with the exception of
a narrow rim round the margin, to a depth of a quarter or half an inch,
and covering it with a thin layer of sand or earth, upon which leaves,
pebbles, etc., might be disposed if required. Instead of “skating on
sycamore tables,” the animals were by this means shown standing on a very
good imitation of a natural land surface.
Nor was this all. At an early period during the rearrangement of the
mammal galleries, Sir William suggested that many of the larger species
might be mounted upon imitation ground-work covering the entire floor
of the cases in which they were exhibited. This idea was forthwith put
into execution in several cases, notably in these containing the lions,
the tigers, and the group of fur-seals from the Pribiloff Islands,
presented by Sir George Baden-Powell. Supposed difficulties with regard
to the cleaning of the glass of the cases prevented this plan from being
carried out to any greater extent during Sir William’s life-time. But
these presumed difficulties were subsequently overcome, and of late years
a considerable number of the cases containing the larger species of
mammals have been treated in this manner with excellent effect and a vast
increase to the general attractiveness of the museum. In some instances a
merely conventional ground-work has been introduced, but in others a more
realistic effect has been attempted. A notable example of this is the
reindeer-case, in which the artificial ground-work is covered with rocks,
lichen, moss, and birch-stems obtained from the reindeer pastures of
Norway. Similarly, the Arctic musk-oxen have been placed on an imitation
snow-slope. Although, as already said, much of this work has been
carried out since his death, the idea originated entirely with Flower. A
similar grouping of animals on artificial ground-work—when possible in
imitation of the natural surroundings—has been instituted in some of the
American museums, but whether following Flower’s lead, or as an original
inspiration, I am unable to say.
At the time when Sir William took over the office of Keeper of the
Zoological Department (in addition to the Directorship), the scheme then
in vogue at the museum scarcely assigned to man his real zoological
position—at the head of the order Primates in the mammalian class. It is
true that in the osteological gallery the genus Homo was represented by
a couple of skeletons and a series of skulls. But in the gallery devoted
to stuffed specimens man, as an integral portion of the exhibited series,
was conspicuous by his absence. This by no means suited the views of
the Director, who in an obituary notice of Owen quoted with approval
a statement of the great anatomist to the effect that no collection of
zoology could in any way be regarded as complete without a large amount
of space being devoted to the display of the physical characteristics
of the various races of the human species. “The series of zoology would
lack its most important feature were the illustrations of the physical
characters of the human race omitted.” Such a series, thought Owen in
1862, would require a gallery of something like 150 feet in length, by
50 feet in width, for its proper display. Stuffed specimens being, of
course, out of the question, the series was to include “casts of the
entire body, coloured after life, of characteristic parts, as the head
and face, skeletons of every variety arranged side by side for facility
of comparison, the hair preserved in spirit, showing its characteristic
sign and distinctive structures, etc.” Had photography been in anything
like its present advanced position in 1862, no doubt its aid would have
been claimed in illustrating the various racial types of the human
species.
A gallery of anything like the dimensions required by Owen was quite out
of the question when Flower planned the addition of an anthropological
section to the mammalian series, but one-half of the portion of the upper
mammal gallery now open to the public was reserved for this purpose,
so that man took his proper place in the zoological series immediately
after the gorilla, chimpanzee, and the other man-like apes, which, in
their turn, were preceded by the lower types of monkey. In the main, the
specimens exhibited in this series follow on the lines suggested by Owen,
including coloured casts of the upper part of the body, or the head and
neck alone, specimens of the hair, skulls, skeletons, etc.
In addition to these is a series of photographs of heads enlarged to
natural size, and including, whenever possible, a full face and a profile
view of each individual represented. Flower took great interest in these
photographs (as in the anthropological series generally), and made
several experiments before finally deciding as to the scale to which
they were to be enlarged. As facilities for photographing in the museum
itself were at the time very limited, Flower enlisted the assistance
of Dr. H. O. Forbes, Director of the Liverpool Museums, who entered
enthusiastically into the project, and under whose superintendence the
great majority of the reproductions from photographs now exhibited was
produced; the arrangement being that Liverpool should have a copy of
every photograph forwarded for reproduction.
The races of mankind were arranged in the gallery according to Flower’s
own scheme, fuller reference to which is made elsewhere in the present
volume. Flower himself did not survive long enough to see the arrangement
he had plotted out fully installed. Of late years, although some progress
has been made in this direction, the series of coloured casts of the
various human races has not increased so rapidly as Flower had hoped they
would; but, nevertheless, a fairly representative series had been brought
together, and there is, at present, ample space for additions when
opportunities of acquiring new specimens occur. It should be added that
Flower inaugurated the plan of making a collection of photographs of the
various human races to be kept in the study series.
It must not, however, be supposed that Flower, during his too brief
tenure of the office of Keeper of the Zoological Department, by any means
confined his attention to the mammalian galleries. On the contrary, he
had with his own hands rearranged two of the cases in the bird gallery,
namely, those containing the humming-birds and the woodpeckers; and
shortly before his resignation he was planning the rearrangement of all
the cases in this section; a work which since his death has been carried
out to completion on the same lines. In this connection it is, however,
only fair to state that in the obituary notice of Flower, published in
the “Year-Book” of the Royal Society for 1901, full justice has not been
done to his predecessors. The passage in question runs as follows:—
“Every effort was made to give the specimens natural postures and natural
surroundings. Thus, for example, the tree on which the woodpecker was at
work, was cut down, the foliage modelled in wax, and all the surroundings
carefully kept. Hovering birds were suspended by fine wire or thread.
Birds making nests in holes, such as the Manx shearwater, sand-martin and
kingfishers, either had the actual parts or a model of these beside them,
just as the nests of the gannets and guillemots on the Bass Rock were
shown with their natural environment.”
The obvious inference from this would be that the cases of birds mounted
in imitation of their natural environment, inclusive of the splendid
model of a portion of the Bass Rock, with its feathered inhabitants
placed in the “pavilion” at the end of the bird gallery, are due to the
initiation of Flower. This is far from being the case; and he himself
would have been the very last man to claim credit which was not his due.
As a matter of fact, the idea of mounting birds in this manner originated
with Dr. Bowdler Sharpe during the Keepership of Dr. Günther; the first
case installed on these lines being the one containing the common coot.
The series was continued during Dr. Günther’s term of office, and was
kept up by Flower after his succession to the Keepership. As regards
the Bass Rock model, this was also installed during Dr. Günther’s
Keepership, and, I believe, while Owen was Superintendent. What Flower
did initiate in the bird gallery was the rearrangement of the wall-cases
on much the same lines as the mammal galleries, including the rejection
of duplicates and uninteresting species, and the replacement of worn-out
and badly-mounted specimens, by new and artistically set-up examples,
and the addition of maps and descriptive labels. As a matter of fact,
the replacement and remounting of specimens have been carried out to a
much greater extent among the birds than has been found possible with the
mammals. A large number of the birds have been mounted by Cullingford
of Durham, whereas nearly all the mammals have been set up by three
London taxidermists, namely Rowland Ward, Ltd., Gerrard, and Pickhardt.
This plan of employing several firms of taxidermists, instead of giving
all the work to one, was much favoured by Flower, as it gave rise to a
healthy competition and rivalry, and thus produced better results; the
different firms being kept up to the mark by having their names affixed
to the more important examples of their respective work.
Before his last illness Flower had in contemplation a plan for treating
the reptile and fish galleries (in which the crowded exhibits displayed a
monotonous and dismal “khaki” hue) on the above lines, but this work was
left for his successor, by whom it is in course of being carried out with
characteristic energy and originality.
There is, however, another section of the zoological department of the
museum which owes its conception entirely to Sir William Flower, and
which he was fortunately spared to complete. This is the whale-room,
or whale-annexe, as it might be better called; for it is a temporary
structure of galvanised iron, lined with match-boarding built out from
the north-west angle of the building, and entered by a passage leading
out of the corridor alongside the bird gallery. At the time that Flower
took over the Keepership of the Zoological Department, with the exception
of a skeleton of the sperm-whale, placed in the middle of the Central
Hall, the specimens of Cetacea were housed in a portion of the basement,
never intended for a public gallery and very unsuited to that purpose.
The collection consisted mainly of skeletons and skulls, together with
samples of whalebone and teeth; for it had been found by experience that
it was a practical impossibility to mount the skins of the larger whales
for exhibition purposes. Indeed, there is great difficulty in doing this
even in the case of the dolphins, porpoises, and smaller whales, owing
to the fact that their skins are saturated with oil, which, even after
the most careful preparation, is almost sure, sooner or later, to exude
through the pores, and render the specimens unsightly, if not absolutely
unfit for exhibition.
Previously to Flower’s attempt to make an adequate and striking
exhibition of the bodily form of the larger whales, some of the smaller
members of the group, such as the killer-whale, had been modelled in
America in papier-maché; one such model of the species in question being
exhibited in the museum. Flower, however, conceived the idea of making
models in plaster of even the largest species of whales; but, in order to
save both material and space, resolved that these should be restricted
to one-half of the animal, and should be constructed upon the actual
skeleton, thereby ensuring, with the aid, when possible, of measurements
taken from carcases, practically absolute accuracy as regards size and
proportion. In due course, after great labour and care, such half-models
were built up on the skeletons of the sperm-whale, the southern
right-whale, and two species of fin-whale, or rorqual, while others
were made of some of the smaller kinds, such as the narwhal and the
beluga or white whale. Skeletons and skulls of other species, together
with complete models or stuffed skins, or models of the head alone, of
many of the porpoises and dolphins, and other specimens illustrating
the natural history of the Cetacea, were likewise placed in the new
annexe, which was opened to the public on Whit Monday 1897. Flower had
always been impressed with the great structural difference between the
toothed whales, as represented by the sperm-whale, grampuses, porpoises,
dolphins, etc., on the one hand, and the whalebone-whales, such as the
right-whales, humpbacks, and finners, on the other; and in order to
emphasise this essential distinction, he caused the skeletons and models
of the one group to be mounted with their heads in one direction, while
those of the second were turned the opposite way.
Although it was found impossible to obtain a skeleton of the Greenland
right-whale, Flower was able to persuade Captain Gray, a well-known
whaler, to carve a miniature model in wood, which gives an excellent
idea of the proportions, especially the huge size of the head and mouth,
of this interesting species. Sketches on the walls of the building
illustrate the habits and mode of capture of the sperm-whale, while
others serve to show the bodily form of species not yet represented by
models.
At the time it was opened this exhibit was absolutely unique; and, in the
belief of the writer, it remains so to the present day. Unfortunately,
the size and design of the building, which has a row of wooden posts down
the middle, are such as greatly to interfere with the proper effect of
the specimens exhibited; and it is much to be hoped that means will be
found to erect a larger gallery, of a more permanent nature, which will
not only allow the contents of the present structure to be adequately
seen, but will likewise leave space to permit of models of other species,
such as the humpback whale, to be added to the series.
Hitherto I have dwelt exclusively upon Sir William’s efforts to improve
the museum under his charge, from the point of view of the general
public, that is to say, as an institution for the exhibition of natural
history specimens. It must, however, be always remembered that this was
but one side of his task, and that he laboured hard during the whole
time of his official connection with the museum not only to increase
the study, or reserve, collections (which are those on which the real
scientific work of the museum is almost exclusively based), but to add to
the space available for their storage and for the workers by whom they
are studied.
Early in his career as Director he recognised the insufficiency of the
accommodation of this nature, although, as usual, he expressed his
opinion in extremely cautious and guarded language. For instance, in his
address as President of the Museum Associations in 1893, after referring
to the deficiencies of all, at that time, modern museums, which were
described as having been built during a period when opinion was still
divided as to the proper function of institutions of this nature, he
continued as follows:—
“In none, perhaps, is this more strikingly shown than in our own—built,
unfortunately, before any of the others, and so without the advantages of
the experience that might have been gained from their successes or their
shortcomings. Though a building of acknowledged architectural beauty, and
with some excellent features, it cannot be taken structurally as a model
museum when the test of adaptation to the purpose to which it is devoted
is rigidly applied.”
This unsuitableness, it may be added, is apparent not only in the lack
of accommodation for the study series, but in the exhibition galleries
themselves, where architectural ornament interferes with the proper
display of the specimens, if indeed it does not absolutely preclude
their being placed on the walls, while an excess of light (which has
been partially remedied by blocking up the lower portion of the windows
in some of the zoological galleries) causes the specimens to become
prematurely bleached and faded.
As regards the deficiency of accommodation for the study series in the
museum, Sir William endeavoured to remedy this, so far as possible, by
closing some portions of the galleries previously open to the public—a
step, which, however necessary, tended to mar the building, so far as
exhibition purposes are concerned.
“While thus maintaining,” writes his biographer in the “Year-book” of
the Royal Society for 1901, “the high scientific reputation of the
great National Museum, he continued to popularise the institution and
science by taking parties of working men round the museum on Sundays,
and occasionally a distinguished visitor, like Dr. Nansen, would also
join the group. Nor was he less attentive to members of the Royal Family,
or to distinguished statesmen, like Mr. Gladstone, who honoured the
museum with their presence. Foreign rulers, like the Queen of Holland,
the Prince of Naples, the Empress Frederick of Germany, and the King of
Siam, were also interested in the collection, so that the popularity
and welfare of the museum were greatly extended by the Director’s tact
and urbanity. Formerly, he had taken a leading part in interesting the
Prince of Wales (his present Majesty), who was present at Sir James
Paget’s Hunterian Oration in 1877, in the Museum of the Royal College
of Surgeons, and in arranging for an exhibition of the Prince’s hunting
trophies at the Zoological Society shortly afterwards, so in his
new sphere royal and other powerful influences were utilised for the
improvement and popularising of the collection.”
King Edward, as Prince of Wales, it may be added, was a constant
attendant at the meetings of the Board of Trustees at the Museum during
Sir William Flower’s administration; and would occasionally, at the close
of the meeting, accompanied by the Director, make an inspection of some
of the galleries. As indicative of the interest he took in the details of
the arrangement of the museum, it may be mentioned that on one of these
tours of inspection His Majesty took exception to the position assigned
to the head of a reindeer, and desired that it might be placed elsewhere.
One other point in connection with Sir William’s administration may be
noticed. Ever since its establishment the hall and public exhibition
galleries of the Natural History Museum had been guarded during
exhibition hours by members of the Metropolitan Police—an arrangement
which involved a very large expense to the country. Flower suggested
that, provided two or three police sergeants and constables were detailed
for special duty, the general work of guarding the collections could be
equally well done by members of the Corps of Commissionaires, thereby
not only effecting a considerable financial saving, but likewise a fresh
area of employment for a very deserving class of the community. This
arrangement, which was found to work smoothly and satisfactorily, has
remained in force ever since. It may be added that the opening of the
museum for a limited number of hours on Sunday afternoons commenced
during Flower’s tenure of office; this arrangement being common to other
institutions of a like nature.
At the special recommendation of the Trustees, the Treasury, when Sir
William reached the age for retirement, according to Civil Service rules,
extended his term of office for three years. A lengthened period of
physical weakness and prostration rendered it, however, impossible for
Flower to avail himself of the whole of this extension, and in July 1898
the state of his health was such that he felt himself compelled to send
in his resignation.
When this resignation was accepted by the Standing Committee of the
Trustees of the Museum, a special Minute, signed by Lord Dillon, gave
expression to the regret felt by that body and the Trustees generally
at the retirement of Sir William, to whom every compliment was paid as
a worthy successor of Sir Richard Owen, and as one who had done so much
towards the reorganisation of a museum pre-eminent amongst institutions
of its kind.
To enter upon the relations of Flower to his subordinates in the Museum
is treading upon somewhat delicate ground; it may be safely affirmed,
however, that to those who were in full sympathy and accord with his
way of looking at things and his schemes for the general advancement
and improvement of the institution under his charge, no truer friend or
kinder master could possibly have been found. Owing to the fact that the
time of the permanent officials of the museum is for the most part fully
occupied in working out the store collections, and registering and, when
necessary, describing new acquisitions, Sir William soon found that he
had not sufficient skilled labour at his disposal wherewith to carry out
the installation of the Index Museum and his meditated improvements in
the exhibition series. Accordingly he obtained the assent of the Treasury
to employ the services of a few scientific men not on the staff of the
museum for these purposes; an arrangement which has been continued under
his successor.
Sir William’s services to the museum, as well as to science in general,
are commemorated by a bust, executed by Mr. T. Brock, and placed on the
south side of the entrance to the first “bay” of the Index Museum. The
funds necessary for this were raised by the “Flower Memorial Committee,”
to which Mr. F. E. Beddard, Prosector of the Zoological Society, acted as
Secretary. The bust, which in a profile view, is an excellent likeness
of the late Director, was unveiled on 26th July 1903, by the Archbishop
of Canterbury, in the presence of a representative assemblage of men of
science and personal friends, as well as of statesmen.
The proceedings were opened by Professor E. Ray Lankester, the Director
of the Museum, who moved that Lord Avebury (better known in scientific
circles as Sir John Lubbock), the Chairman of the Memorial Committee,
should take the chair. The Chairman, having taken his seat, expressed his
pleasure in being called upon to preside at the ceremony, on account of
his admiration and respect for the late Sir William Flower, and for the
services he had rendered to zoological science.
Dr. Philip Lutley Sclater, the Secretary of the Zoological Society, also
spoke as an old and intimate friend of the late Director, with whom he
had been brought into specially close contact during the long period the
latter presided over the Zoological Society.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, in a brief speech previous to unveiling the
bust, referred to two traits in Flower’s character which had specially
struck his Grace, and which were seldom found associated in the same
individual, one of these being his great love of talking on his own
special subjects of study, and the other that, in spite of this, he never
bored even the least interested of his hearers. During his Directorship
Flower had done more to popularise the museum, and museums generally,
than had any other man of science.
The proceedings closed with the usual vote of thanks to the Chairman.
In addition to writing numerous scientific memoirs, Flower found time
during his tenure of the Directorship of the museum to prepare for
publication two volumes of considerable interest. The first was the one
on _The Horse_, issued in 1891, to which fuller reference is made in a
later chapter; and the second, the well-known _Essays on Museums_, which
appeared in 1898, and consists of a collected series of essays, articles,
addresses, etc., on natural history and kindred subjects. A melancholy
interest attached to this volume (which is dedicated to Lady Flower),
since, as we are told in the preface, it was compiled during a period of
enforced restraint from active occupation, which was evidently only the
prelude to the final breakdown.
It was also during his Directorship of the Museum that _The Study of
Mammals_ saw the light.
CHAPTER IV
AS PRESIDENT OF THE ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY
[1879-1899]
During a portion of his tenure of office as Conservator of the Museum
of the Royal College of Surgeons, and throughout the whole of his
Directorship of the Natural History Museum, Sir William Flower occupied
the Presidential Chair of the Zoological Society of London—the oldest
body of its kind in existence. The events narrated in the present
chapter occurred therefore during the period covered by its two
immediate predecessors; nevertheless, this method of treatment, although
breaking the chronological order, has been found, on the whole, the most
convenient.
The Zoological Society, it may be observed, has been in the habit of
selecting its presidents from three distinct classes. As in the case of
the late Prince Consort, the president may be a personage of exalted
rank without any claim to a special knowledge of zoology. On the other
hand, as exemplified by the Earl of Derby, who filled the office in the
“fifties,” the Marquis of Tweeddale in the “seventies,” and the Duke of
Bedford at the present time, he may combine high rank with a more or less
pronounced taste for and knowledge of natural history, or, finally, as in
the case of the founder, Sir Stamford Raffles, he may be selected solely
for his eminence as a zoologist or as a lover of animals.
On the death of the Marquis of Tweeddale, 29th December 1878, Professor
Flower was selected by the Council to fill the presidential chair; the
appointment being duly ratified at the Annual Meeting of the Society
held the following spring. From that date till the year of his death,
Flower was annually re-elected president by the unanimous vote of the
meeting. He made an admirable president, his deliberate mode of speaking
being specially well adapted to the comments expected from a scientific
man occupying the presidential chair at the scientific meetings. From
his wide knowledge of zoology, anatomy, and palæontology, he was able
to speak to the point on almost all the papers read at the Society’s
meetings; and those privileged to listen to his remarks on any specimen
in which he was specially interested will not readily forget the
impressive manner in which he brought its more salient and characteristic
features to the notice of his hearers. Many of his more important
scientific memoirs communicated to the Society had been published in its
_Proceedings_ or _Transactions_, before he accepted the presidential
chair, in days when the calls on his time were not so pressing or so
numerous as they afterwards became; but even after his elevation to the
presidency several valuable memoirs were received from him, the most
important being, perhaps, one on the classification and affinities of the
dolphins, to which fuller reference is made in another chapter.
During Flower’s presidency several important events and changes occurred
in the affairs of the Zoological Society; and although the management
was to a very great extent in the hands of the Secretary, Dr. P. L.
Sclater, yet in matters of extreme importance the influence and opinions
of the president always made themselves felt—the more so, perhaps, that
they were not in special evidence in the case of trivial matters. In the
early eighties the Society suffered severely from financial depression,
its income in the years 1883 and 1884 falling far below its expenditure.
Thanks, however, to the patient sagacity and great administrative powers
of the president and secretary, the affairs of the Society were soon
put on a much more satisfactory basis, and long before the death of the
former, a state of prosperity was reached which had seldom, if ever, been
equalled, and certainly never excelled.
In the first year of his presidency, Flower delivered one of the Davis
lectures in the Society’s Gardens, the subject being birds that do not
fly, and he also lectured in the two following years, selecting as his
subjects in 1881 firstly whales, and secondly dolphins. The following
year was notable on account of the sale to the great American showman,
Barnum, of the African elephant “Jumbo.” The reason for thus parting
with a valuable and interesting animal was that it was unsafe to keep it
in the gardens any longer. The sale, as stated in the “Record” of the
Society, caused a good deal of public excitement, but the Council would
not have parted with the animal unless satisfactory reasons for so doing
had been laid before it by the responsible Executive of the Gardens.
A still more important event occurred in 1883, namely the transference of
the Society’s Offices and Library from No 11 to No 3 Hanover Square; the
freehold of the latter house having been secured by the Council at a cost
of £16,250. Such an important transaction would not, we may be assured,
have been allowed to take place without the most careful deliberation and
consideration on the part of the President.
On the first meeting of the Society, held on 1st April 1884, in its
new premises, the President took the opportunity of congratulating the
Fellows present on the very great improvement in the Meeting-room, the
Library, and the Offices, resulting from the change. The Society had
occupied the old house, No 11 Hanover Square, for forty-one years, and
had long since quite outgrown the accommodation it afforded in all the
three departments mentioned above.
The income of the Society had increased from £9137 in 1843 to £28,966 in
1883, with a corresponding increase of clerical work. The Library had
been almost entirely formed since the earlier of these dates, and was
rapidly increasing, and the attendance of the Fellows at the evening
meetings for scientific business had been such that the old rooms were
quite inadequate for their accommodation. The President trusted that the
increased facilities afforded by the move would be taken advantage of by
the Fellows in promoting, with even greater zeal than previously, the
work for which the Society was founded, and in maintaining and extending
the high reputation it had acquired in the scientific world.
Few presidents or chairmen, whether of scientific societies or of
commercial companies, could have had a more satisfactory record of
progress to lay before their supporters. The following account of
certain events in the Society’s history which took place in 1887 is
extracted from the “Record” of its work:—
“In order to mark the Jubilee of her late Majesty Queen Victoria which
took place this year, in some special way, it was decided to hold
the General Meeting in June in the Gardens. After the usual formal
business had been transacted, the Silver Medal awarded to the Maharaja
of Kuch-Behar was presented to His Highness in person, and suitably
acknowledged. Professor Flower, C.B., President of the Society, then
delivered an address, which was printed as an Appendix to the Council’s
Report. It dealt in general terms with the principal points in the
history of the Society, from its foundation in 1826, tracing its progress
throughout. The connection of the Royal Family with the Society as
Patrons and Donors, the scientific meetings, the publications, the Davis
Lectures, the menagerie, and the recent improvements in the Gardens were
passed in review. The President concluded by appealing for the continued
support of the public, either by becoming Fellows or by visiting the
Gardens, and expressed the hope that the ‘brief record of the Society’s
history would show that such support was not undeserved by those who
have had the management of its affairs.’ A reception held after the
meeting was numerously attended by the Fellows and their friends, and
by many specially invited guests, among whom were the Queen of Hawaii
and Princess Liliokalani, the Thakor Sahib of Limdli, H.H. the Prince
Devawongse, and the Maharaja of Bhurtpore.”
The reception, which was held on 15th June in brilliant weather, was a
marked success; the number of foreign visitors in their native dresses
lending additional patches of colour to the scene. The President’s
address on the occasion is reprinted in his _Essays on Museums_.
Referring to Sir William’s death, the “Record” of the Society has the
following paragraph:—
“On 1st July [1899] the Presidentship of the Society became vacant by
the death of Sir William Flower who had filled the office for more
than twenty years. During this period Sir William Flower had regularly
occupied the Presidential chair, and had been constantly engaged on
committees and on other matters connected with the Society’s affairs. In
Sir William Flower the Society lost a zoologist of the highest ability
and a most able and energetic President. To succeed him the Council
selected His Grace the Duke of Bedford as President, and their choice was
confirmed at the Anniversary Meeting in 1900.”
CHAPTER V
GENERAL ZOOLOGICAL WORK
In the course of the preceding chapters numerous more or less incidental
references have been made to the contributions of Sir William Flower to
biological literature, as well as to his many improvements in museum
organisation and arrangement. The more detailed discussion of these
has, however, been reserved for the present and succeeding chapters, of
which the first two are devoted to the zoological and the third to the
anthropological side of his work, while in the fourth his views in regard
to museums and certain other subjects are taken into consideration.
Regarding the general scientific work of Flower, it must be confessed at
the outset that this is characterised in the main by its conscientious
carefulness and exactness, rather than by brilliancy of thought,
conception, or style. Great attention to detail, both as regards the work
itself and in reference to authorities (which were always most carefully
verified), is indeed one of the leading features of his labours; but
there is no epoch-making discovery or comprehensive generalisation which
can be associated with his name. In connection with his careful attention
to small and apparently trivial points of detail, the following passage
from Professor Ray Lankester’s obituary notice in _Nature_ may be
appropriately quoted:—
“He did his own work with his own hands, and I have the best reason to
know that he was so deeply shocked and distressed by the inaccuracy
which unfortunately crept into some of the work of his distinguished
predecessor, Owen, through the employment of dissectors and draughtsmen,
whose work he did not sufficiently supervise, that he himself determined
to be exceptionally careful and accurate in his own records and notes.”
In another passage of his notice the same writer observes that:—
“Caution and reticence in generalisation certainly distinguish all
Flower’s scientific writings. Whilst he was on this account necessarily
not known as the author of stirring hypotheses, his statements of fact
gained in weight by his reputation for judgment and accuracy.”
Flower’s zoological studies related entirely to the vertebrates and
almost exclusively to mammals, although he devoted a few papers, such as
the one on the gular pouch of the great bustard, and that on the skull
of a cassowary, to birds. Other groups, I believe, he never touched. In
the earlier years of his scientific career, at anyrate, his labours were
in the main devoted to the anatomical aspect of zoology, such subjects
as the dentition, osteology, and the structure and characters of the
brain and viscera claiming a much larger share of his attention than was
bestowed on the myology. In latter years the classification of the major
groups of the mammalia received much attention from Flower. Not that he
was in any way what is nowadays called a systematist in zoology, that is
to say, he took no active part in describing new species (not to mention
sub-species, which had scarcely begun to be recognised by naturalists in
his day), or the redefining of generic groups, and other work of this
nature. Indeed, as mentioned in the chapter devoted to his career at
the College of Surgeons, he was extremely conservative in this respect,
and strongly opposed to the modern fondness for small generic groups,
and also for changing generic names which, from long association, have
come almost to be regarded as household words and integral parts of the
English language. The substitution of the name _Procavia_, for _Hyrax_,
the familiar title of the Klipdass, was, for instance, very repugnant to
him, although loyally accepted when found to be coming into general use.
As a matter of fact, so far as my information goes, with the exception
of certain whales and dolphins, and one extinct sea-cow (_Halitherium_),
Flower never named a new species of animal, nor, I think, did he ever
propose a new generic term. Indeed, so opposed was he to any interference
with names of the latter description in general use, that when several
such were replaced by alternative ones in the _Study of Mammals_, it was
expressly stipulated by him that the responsibility for such substitution
should rest solely with the present writer.[3]
The modern system of forming trinomials to indicate the local races,
or sub-species, of mammals (as exemplified by _Giraffa camelopardalis
rothschildi_ and _Giraffa camelopardalis capensis_ for two of the local
phases of the species of giraffe typified by _G. camelopardalis_ of the
Egyptian Sudan and Abyssinia), was practically in its infancy during the
active life-time of Flower, and it is doubtful how he would have approved
of the extent to which it has been subsequently carried. Nevertheless,
that he appreciated the practice of recognising minute local differences
of colour, size, etc., in the same species of mammals is evident from
an incident within the writer’s own knowledge, which occurred at the
Natural History Museum, when a tray containing the local phases of one
of the species of the small squirrel-like rodents known as chipmunks
was submitted to his notice; his remark being that such variations from
a common type ought in nowise to be ignored, if we wished to make our
knowledge of animals anything like complete, and that the simplest way of
indicating such differences was to assign them distinct names.
In a general way, however, it may be said that Sir William’s sympathies
were with the wider and more philosophical aspects of zoology rather
than with the details of specific and sub-specific distinction (which,
by the way, have scarcely any more right to be regarded as real
philosophical science than has stamp-collecting)[4]; and that, from a
systematic standpoint, his interest was very largely concentrated on the
relationships existing between the mammals of to-day and their extinct
predecessors. Several of his lectures and papers, and one especially of
his separate works (that on _The Horse_) were indeed devoted to this
aspect of the subject; and on every possible occasion he emphasised his
conviction of the necessity of studying (and arranging in museums) living
and extinct mammals together, if we wish to make our science really
practical.
As a matter of fact he had the strongest possible objection to the
recognition of “palæontology” as a science apart from zoology, and he
even went so far as to mildly rebuke (in his own inimitably courteous and
gentle manner) the present writer, for venturing to offer to the public
a volume on that subject. To a great extent, no doubt, he was perfectly
right in this contention, although there are points of view from which
“palæontological” works are decidedly convenient, even if their existence
and production cannot be logically justified.
As regards the particular groups of mammals (other than man) in which
Flower was more especially interested, there can be no doubt that the
Cetacea (whales and dolphins) occupied the first position. And on this
subject he was undoubtedly one of the first authorities, his only
possible rivals in this country, at anyrate, being Sir William Turner and
Professor Struthers. Next to this group came, perhaps, the marsupials,
in which a most important discovery was made by Flower in regard to the
succession and replacement of the teeth.
Not even the most sympathetic of biographers would attempt for one
instant to assume that his hero—if a zoologist—could by any possibility
be infallible; and it has to be recorded that many changes and amendments
have had to be made in Flower’s conclusions. Perhaps, indeed, Sir William
has been to some extent especially unfortunate in this respect, owing to
the extreme imperfection of the state of our palæontological (I must use
the objectionable word) knowledge at the date when much of his best work
was accomplished. At that time, in spite of the enormous and valuable
results achieved by Cuvier, Owen, and others, mammalian palæontology
may be said to have been in its infancy compared to its present state;
the wonderful discoveries in North and South America being then either
unknown or only partially revealed, and the same being the case with
regard to those made known by the working of the phosphorite beds in
Central France.
These and other discoveries have, for instance, totally revolutionised
our ideas with regard to the affinities of the different families of the
modern Carnivora, and have thus led to considerable modifications of the
views entertained by Flower as to the relationships of the members of
this group.
Moreover, there is another important factor which has to be taken into
consideration. At the time when Sir William wrote his celebrated memoir
on the Carnivora, the effects of what is now universally known among
zoologists as “parallelism in development” were quite unrecognised.
By “parallelism” (to abbreviate the expression) is meant, it may be
explained, a remarkable tendency which undoubtedly exists among animals
of markedly diverse origin to become more or less like one another in
at least one important structural feature, when living under similar
physical conditions, or specially adapted for similar modes of existence.
Not unfrequently this structural resemblance, when closely examined, is
found to be less close than might at first sight have seemed to be the
case; the adaptation having been brought about by the modification of
structures originally more or less dissimilar towards a common type. In
other words, the same goal has been reached by two different routes.
An excellent example of this is offered by the development of
“cannon-bones” in the lower portion of the limbs of the members of the
horse tribe on the one hand and those of the deer and antelopes on the
other; the object of this lengthening and strengthening of this part
of the limb being in both instances the attainment of increased speed.
Whereas, however in the one instance the cannon-bone is formed from one
original element, in the other it is the result of the fusion of two
such elements. In this case, indeed, the difference in the structure of
this part of the skeleton in the two groups is so apparent as to leave
no reasonable doubt as to the remoteness of the affinity between their
respective ancestors. There is, however, a certain group of extinct South
American hoofed mammals in which the cannon-bone corresponds exactly
in origin and structure with that of the horse, from which it might be
assumed that the two animals were closely related, whereas, from other
evidence, we know that they are widely sundered. Approximately similar
structures are therefore in many instances far from being indications of
genetic affinity between the animals in which they respectively occur.
Before the occurrence of this parallelism was recognised by naturalists
as an important factor in their development, such resemblances were,
however, frequently regarded as indications of a common parentage, so
that animals which had comparatively little to do with one another were
brigaded as members of the same assemblage.
With these preliminary remarks, we may proceed to a general survey of
Sir William’s zoological work. It has, however, been found convenient to
relegate the consideration of his numerous memoirs on the Cetacea to the
next chapter, by which means their connection will be made more apparent
than if they were discussed among those on other sections of zoology.
The first zoological paper (and indeed the first scientific work of
any description) published by Flower seems to have been that on the
dissection of one of the African lemurs belonging to the genus _Galago_,
which appeared in the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_ for 1852, and
serves to prove, as mentioned in the first chapter, that the author was
at that time holding the post of Curator of the Museum of the Middlesex
Hospital. The paper itself is of little importance, dealing only with the
structure of the muscles and viscera of the species in question.
The next paper on the list, which appeared in the same journal for 1860,
was also written during this part of Flower’s career; it is one of the
few devoted to the anatomy of birds, and describes the gizzard of the
Nicobar pigeon and other graminivorous species.
About this time Flower began to devote his attention to the mammalian
brain; his first contribution on this subject being “Observations
on the Posterior Lobes of the Cerebrum of the Quadrumana, with the
Description of the Brain of a _Galago_,” of which an abstract appeared
in the _Proceedings_ of the Royal Society of London for 1860, although
the complete memoir was not published till 1862, in the _Philosophical
Transactions_. The date of publication of the abstract proves that these
studies were commenced, and the memoir in question completed, before (and
not, as stated by Professor M’Intosh,[5] after) the author’s appointment
to the Conservatorship of the Museum of the College of Surgeons, which
did not take place till the year 1861. The brain of another monkey was
also described in a paper on the anatomy of a South American species then
known as _Pithecia monachus_, which appeared in the Zoological Society’s
_Proceedings_ for 1862. In the following year (1863) he published, in
the _Natural History Review_, a still more important communication,
dealing with the brain of the Malay siamang (_Hylobates syndactylus_),
one of the man-like apes, in which it was shown that in this species
(and probably therefore in gibbons generally) the posterior part of the
cerebrum, or main division of the brain, overlapped the cerebellum, or
hind brain, to an even less degree than in the American howling-monkeys,
which had hitherto been regarded as the lowest members of the group, so
far as the feature in question was concerned. That such a feature should
occur in one of the highest groups of apes was certainly a remarkable
and unexpected discovery. Yet another contribution to the same subject
was made in 1864, when a paper appeared in the Zoological Society’s
_Proceedings_ on the brain of the red howling-monkey, then known as
_Mycetes seniculus_, but of which the generic title is changed by many
modern naturalists to _Alouata_.
The earlier memoirs of this series published (in the _Philosophical
Transactions_), writes Professor M’Intosh in the _Scottish Review_ for
1900, “formed important evidence in the discussions which took place
between Owen and Huxley in regard to the posterior lobe of the brain,
the posterior cornu, and the hippocampus minor.” Professor Owen, at the
Cambridge Meeting of the British Association in 1862, maintained, from
specimens of the human brain in spirit, and from a cast of the interior
of the gorilla’s skull, that in man the posterior lobes of the brain
overlapped the cerebellum, whereas in the gorilla they did not; that
these characters are constant, and therefore he had decided to place man,
with his overlapping posterior lobes, the existence of a posterior horn
in the lateral ventricle, and the presence of a hippocampus minor in
the posterior horn, under the special division Archencephala. Moreover,
he grouped with these features the distinctive characters of the foot
of man, and showed how it differed from that of all monkeys. Flower’s
accurate investigations enabled Huxley to substantiate his antagonistic
position to Owen’s doctrines, viz., that these structures, instead of
being the attributes of man, are precisely the most marked cerebral
characters common to man with the apes. Huxley also asserted that the
differences between the foot of man and that of the higher apes were of
the same order, and but slightly different in degree from those which
separated one ape from another.
The result of this controversy was the overthrow (except in the mind
and works of its author) of Owen’s separation of man on the one hand
as the representative of a primary group—the Archencephala; and of
apes, monkeys, Carnivora, Ungulates, Sirenians, and Cetaceans on the
other hand, as forming a second group—the Gyrencephala.[6] As will
be seen from the above quotation, this result was very largely due to
the work of Flower, although it was brought into prominent notice by
the superior fighting powers of Huxley, who was also an older, and at
the time at anyrate, a better-known man. It may be added that Flower
himself subsequently abandoned the use of the term “Quadrumana,” as
distinguishing apes and monkeys on the one hand from man, as “Bimana,”
on the other, and brigaded all altogether under their Linnæan title
“Primates.”
The contributions of Flower to our knowledge of (and, it may be added, to
the clearing up of misconceptions in regard to) the mammalian brain, was,
however, by no means confined to the Primates (man, apes, monkeys, and
lemurs). On the contrary, his researches were of equal—if not indeed of
more—importance with regard to the structure of that organ in the lower
groups of the class, namely the marsupials and the monotremes (duckbill
platypus and spiny ant-eater).
In the well-known Reade Lecture of 1859, Professor Owen expressed himself
as follows with regard to the brain of the two groups last mentioned:—
“Prior to the year 1836, it was held by comparative anatomists that the
brain in mammalia differed from that in all other vertebrate animals by
the presence of the large mass of transverse white fibres called ‘corpus
callosum’ by the anthropotomist; which fibres, overarching the ventricles
and diverging as they penetrate the substance of either hemisphere of
the cerebrum, bring every convolution of the one into communication with
those of the other hemisphere, whence the other name of this part—the
‘great commissure.’ In that year I discovered that the brain of the
kangaroo, the wombat, and some other marsupial quadrupeds, wanted the
‘great commissure’; and that the cerebral hemispheres were connected
together, as in birds, only by the ‘fornix’ and ‘anterior commissure.’
Soon afterward I had the opportunity of determining that the same
deficiency of structure prevailed in the _Ornithorhynchus_ (duckbill) and
_Echidna_ (spiny ant-eater).”
Owen’s conclusions with regard to the absence of the great connecting
band of fibres between the hemispheres of the marsupial brain were
first published in the _Philosophical Transactions_ for 1837; those,
with regard to the same lack in the monotremes, being added in Todd’s
_Cyclopædia of Anatomy and Physiology_, Article “Monotremata.” In the
latter article it was also stated that the brain of the echidna was
further distinguished from that of other mammals by the circumstance
that whereas in the latter the portion of the brain known as the optic
lobes consists of four lobes (_corpora quadrigemina_), in the echidna and
duckbill there are only a pair of such lobes (_corpora bigemina_.)
In consequence of this supposed lack of the corpus callosum in their
brains, Owen separated the marsupials and monotremes from other mammals
in a primary group by themselves, under the title of Lyencephala.
Flower’s attack on these conclusions was commenced by a paper which
appeared in the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_ for 26th January 1864,
entitled “On the Optic Lobes of the Brain of the Echidna,” in which it
was conclusively demonstrated that these structures resembled those of
the higher mammals in being four-lobed.
More important still was his memoir “On the Commissures of the Cerebral
Hemispheres of the Marsupialia and Monotremata, as compared with those
of the Placental Mammals,” which was published in the _Philosophical
Transactions_ of the Royal Society for 1865. In this was shown, it was
thought, the existence in both monotremes and marsupials of a distinct,
although very small, corpus callosum connecting the two hemispheres of
the brain; the anterior commissure, which in the higher mammals is the
smaller connecting band, being in this instance much the larger.
Recent researches have, however, tended to show that Owen was after all
right in denying the existence of a corpus callosum in the latter groups.
Even allowing for this correction, the result of this important paper was
to discredit among all zoologists capable of forming an adequate opinion
on the subject Owen’s proposed fourfold division of the Mammalia into
Lyencephala, Lissencephala, Gyrencephala, and Archencephala. And these
terms have now completely disappeared from zoological literature.
In those days it required no considerable amount of courage to attack
a man of Owen’s established social and scientific position on an
important subject like this; and Flower’s triumph was therefore the more
conspicuous. Of course such of these discoveries as are valid, if they
had not been made by him, would have been made later on by somebody else,
as they merely required accurate dissection and observation. But this
may be said of every discovery of a like nature; and Flower is entitled
to all credit for having worked out the subject in the way he did. It
may be added, that, with our present knowledge of mammalian morphology,
a classification based on the characters of the brain is manifestly
based on a misconception from first to last; the degree of development
and specialisation of that organ being purely adaptive features, and
therefore not dependent upon structural relationships. Had Owen’s
classification been maintained, it would have been necessary to assign
the primitive Carnivora and Ungulata to a group quite apart from the one
containing their existing representatives.
In the light of modern research, it cannot now be held that the result
of Flower’s investigations in this direction was to demonstrate the
existence of a corpus callosum to the brain in all the members of the
mammalian class.
In another paper, dealing with the brain of the Javan loris, published
in the _Transactions_ of the Zoological Society, Flower made a further
contribution to the study of this part of the organism. Previous to the
appearance of the memoir on the marsupial and monotreme brain, Flower had
published, in the _Natural History Review_ for 1864, one on the number of
cervical vertebræ in the Sirenia (manati and dugong). Apart from several
papers on whales and dolphins, which, as already mentioned, are reserved
for consideration in a later chapter, the next noteworthy zoological
contribution from Flower’s pen appears to be one on the gular pouch of
the great bustard, published in the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_
for 1865. This pouch, which, it may be observed is confined to the
cock-bird, and inflated during the breeding season, is a very remarkable
structure, which has recently been described in greater detail by Mr. W.
P. Pycraft.
Two years later (1867), Flower contributed to the same journal a paper
on the anatomy of the West African chevrotain, _Hyomoschus aquaticus_,
or, as it is now called, _Dorcatherium aquaticum_. The specimen on
which the paper was based was the first of its kind which had ever been
dissected—at least in this country; and the result of its examination
was to confirm the view that the mouse-deer, or chevrotains, cannot be
included among the true ruminants, or Pecora, but rather that they form
a group (Tragulina), in many respects intermediate between the latter
and the pigs and hippopotamuses, or Suina. To the essential difference
between the chevrotains and the musk-deer, which have often been
confounded, Flower was very fond of recurring in his later writings.
About the year 1866 Sir William began to turn his attention to the teeth
of mammals, more especially as regards the mode in which the milk or baby
series is succeeded by the permanent teeth, and the general homology of
the milk with the permanent, and of the individual teeth of both series
with one another. As the result of these investigations he published
during the next few years the following papers on this subject. First and
most important, one on the development and succession of the teeth of
marsupials, which appeared in the _Philosophical Transactions_ for 1867.
In the following year he delivered before the British Association at
Norwich a paper entitled “Remarks on the Homologies and Relation of the
Teeth of the Mammalia,” which was published in the _Journal of Anatomy
and Physiology_ for the same year. In that year he also published, in
the _Proceedings_ of the Zoological Society, an account of the homology
and succession of the teeth in the armadillos. A general sketch from his
pen of the dentition of mammals was published in the _British Medical
Journal_ for 1871, while in the _Transactions_ of the Odontological
Society for the same year, appeared a paper on the first, or milk,
dentition of the Mammalia.
By far the most important of this series of papers is undoubtedly the
one on the succession and homologies of the teeth in the marsupials or
pouched mammals; and it is the one which contains, perhaps, the most
noteworthy discovery made by Flower.
Owen had previously pointed out that marsupials differ from ordinary
placental mammals in having four (in place of three) pairs of cheek-teeth
at the hinder part of the series which have no milk, or deciduous,
predecessors, and are therefore, according to the usual rule, to be
regarded as true molars, in contradiction to premolars, in which such
deciduous predecessors are generally developed. He considered, however,
that all the premolars in the kangaroo (and therefore presumably in other
marsupials) as well as the incisors or cutting teeth, and the canines
or tusks, were preceded by milk-teeth. Flower, on the other hand (who
it is only just to add had a much fuller series of specimens of young
marsupials on which to work than was available to Owen), was enabled
to show that in the Marsupialia only one pair of teeth in each jaw, at
most, is preceded by a milk-tooth. The tooth, in question, is the fifth
from the posterior end of the series, and whereas in the adult animal
it differs in character from those behind it, its deciduous predecessor
resembles the latter. The replacing tooth was further considered to
correspond with the fourth or last premolar of placental mammals, while
the replaced tooth was regarded as the only one in the entire series
corresponding to the milk-teeth of placental mammals. This view rendered
it necessary, of course, to regard all the four pairs of cheek-teeth
behind this abnormal one as corresponding to the true molars of
placentals, as had been done by Owen, thus making, as already mentioned,
marsupials to differ from ordinary placentals by possessing four instead
of three pairs of these teeth.
Before proceeding to notice an amendment which has been proposed in
regard to the homology of the one successional tooth of the marsupials,
certain other features connected with it and its predecessor discussed by
Flower may be briefly mentioned. He noticed, to quote from an admirable
epitome of his observations on this point, drawn up by Professor M’Intosh
in the _Scottish Review_ for 1900, “that there were considerable
differences in the various genera as to the relative period of the
animal’s life at which the fall of the temporary molar and the evolution
of its successor takes place. In some, as in the rat-kangaroos, it is one
of the latest, the temporary tooth retaining its place and its functions
until the animal has nearly, if not quite, reached its full growth, and
is not shed until all the other teeth are in position and use. On the
other hand, in the Tasmanian wolf the temporary tooth is very rudimentary
in size and form, and is shed or absorbed before any other teeth enter
the gum. Anterior to the period of Sir William Flower’s communication,
mammals had been, in regard to the succession of their teeth, divided
into two groups—the Monophyodonts, or those that generate a single
series of teeth, and the Diphyodonts, or those that develop two sets
of teeth, but, as he pointed out, even in the most typical Diphyodonts
the successional process does not extend to the whole of the teeth,
always stopping short of those situated most posteriorly in each series.
The pouched animals (marsupials), he stated, occupied an intermediate
position, presenting, as it were, a rudimentary diphyodont condition, the
successional process being confined to a single tooth on each side of
each jaw.”
All this is unexceptionable. Flower, however, went further than this, and
claimed that the true molar teeth of mammals correspond serially with the
permanent premolars, canines, and incisors, and not with their deciduous
predecessors. And he therefore urged (as indeed must be the case on these
premisses) that the whole dentition of adult marsupials corresponds with
the permanent dentition of placentals. A further inference from this
is that the milk-teeth, instead of being an original development, may
rather be a set superadded to meet the temporary needs of mammals whose
permanent set is of a highly complex type.
To review the objections which have been raised against these views would
be entering on a very difficult question, and one in regard to which
uniformity of opinion by no means exists among naturalists even at the
present day. It may be mentioned, however, that from the circumstance of
the later milk-premolars resembling (as was noticed by Flower in the case
of the one tooth replaced in marsupials) the true molars rather than the
permanent premolars, it has been suggested that the milk-dentition is
serially homologous with the true molars. And on this view, the entire
dentition of marsupials (with the exception of the one replacing tooth)
corresponds to the milk-dentition of placentals. Possibly, however, the
larger number of incisors which distinguish many of the carnivorous
marsupials from the placentals may be due to the development of teeth
belonging to the permanent series with those of the milk-set, and both
persisting together throughout life. Be this as it may, it is evident,
on the above view of the serial homology of their dentition, that
marsupials, instead of as Flower supposed, showing the commencement of a
milk-dentition, really exhibit the decadence of the permanent series.
In this respect they display a precise similarity to the modern
elephants, as indeed was pointed out by Flower in his original paper,
although on a false premiss, for he at that time regarded the anterior
cheek-teeth of the elephant as the representatives of the permanent
premolars, whereas they really correspond with the milk-premolars.
One objection has indeed been raised with regard to the identification of
the adult marsupial dentition with the milk-set of placentals, namely,
the existence in certain marsupialia of rudimentary teeth belonging to
an earlier set than the one functionally developed. This has been got
over by regarding these rudimentary germs as the representatives of a
prelacteal series.
Passing on to another point, it has to be noticed that exception has also
been taken to Flower’s view that the replacing tooth of marsupials and
its deciduous predecessor correspond to the fourth, or last premolar of
placentals. The question has been discussed in considerable detail in
the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_ for 1899 by the present writer,
who had for material the dentition of certain extinct South American
mammals quite unknown to science at the time Flower’s paper was written.
The result of these comparisons was to render it evident, in the present
writer’s opinion, that the replacing tooth of the marsupials corresponds
to the third, instead of to the fourth, premolar of placentals. From
this it follows that marsupials agree with placentals in possessing only
three pairs of true molars; the first of the four teeth in the former
behind the replacing tooth being the last milk-premolar (which is never
replaced) instead of, as supposed by Flower, the first true molar. This
conclusion, as pointed out by the present writer in the paper referred
to above, had really been arrived at years previously by Owen, who also
believed the replacing tooth to correspond to the third premolar of
placentals.
In thus bringing marsupials into line with placentals as regards their
dentition, this later interpretation accords well with recent discoveries
in regard to other parts of the organisation of the former animals.
It should, however, be mentioned that the newer view is by no means
accepted by all zoologists, although it has received the support of
the well-known American paleontologist, Dr. J. L. Wortman,[7] who is
specially qualified to form a trustworthy opinion on a point of this
nature.
Finally, whatever be the eventual verdict as to the serial homology of
the marsupial dentition as a whole, and also as to that of the replacing
premolar, Flower must always be credited with the discovery that
marsupials replace only a single pair of teeth in each jaw by vertical
successors.
The other papers on dentition referred to above as having been written
by Flower about the same time are, although interesting in their way,
of far less importance than the one published in the _Philosophical
Transactions_. Indeed the one read before the British Association in 1868
and published in the _Journal of Anatomy and Physiology_ for the same
year, is little more than a recapitulation of the results arrived at in
the former.
The paper on the development and succession of the teeth in the
armadillos, published in the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_ in
1868, is, on the other hand, of considerable interest on account of its
confirming the fact first mentioned by the French zoologist, Professor
Paul Gervais, but generally overlooked by subsequent writers up to that
time, that the common nine-banded armadillo (_Tatusia peba_) differs from
its relatives in replacing some of its teeth by vertical successors. This
at the time was an unexpected feature in any member of the so-called
Edentate mammals; and tended further to break down the supposed hard and
fast distinction between monophyodonts and diphyodonts.
Closely connected with the subject of dentition is a paper on “The
Affinities and Probable Habits of the Extinct Marsupial, _Thylacoleo
carnifex_ (Owen),” communicated by Flower to the Geological Society of
London in 1868, and published in the _Quarterly Journal_ of that body
for the same year. After alluding to the paper on marsupial dentition,
Professor Ray Lankester, in his obituary notice of Sir William in
_Nature_, of 13th July 1899, observes of the communication under
consideration that—“The next most striking discovery which we owe to
Flower seems to me to be the complete and convincing demonstration that
the extinct marsupial, called _Thylacoleo carnifex_ by Owen, was not a
carnivore, but a gnawing herbivorous creature like the marsupial rats and
the wombat—a demonstration which has been brought home to the eye even of
the unlearned by the complete restoration of the skull of _Thylacoleo_ in
the Natural History Museum by Dr. Henry Woodward.”
If we are to believe later authorities, Flower’s demonstration of the
herbivorous nature of the creature in question was by no means so
“complete and convincing” as the learned Professor would have us believe;
but of this anon.
The first important paper on _Thylacoleo_, which was a creature of
the approximate size of a jaguar, whose remains are met with in the
superficial formations of Australia, was one by Owen, published in the
_Philosophical Transactions_ for 1859. From the general characters of the
skull (which was at that time only known by fragments), and especially
from the rudimentary condition of the hinder cheek-teeth and the enormous
size of the secant replacing premolar, which bears a certain superficial
resemblance to the carnassial tooth of the cats, its describer was led
to the conclusion that _Thylacoleo_ was a marsupial carnivore, and “one
of the fellest and most destructive of predatory beasts.” Probably
Owen’s views at this time were, that the creature had its nearest
living relatives in the members of the Australian family _Dasyuridæ_,
such as the Tasmanian devil (_Sarcophilus ursinus_), and that it bore a
relationship to the existing carnivorous marsupials somewhat similar to
that presented by a lion to a dog. At this time there was no evidence to
show whether the large teeth near the front of the jaw, the existence of
which was indicated in the original specimen merely by its empty socket,
was a canine or an incisor; and though Owen was inclined to regard it
as the former, he admitted that it might be an incisor, in which event
he recognised that the affinities of the animal would be more with
the herbivorous, or diprotodont section of the marsupials, and more
especially the phalangers, or so-called opossums of the colonists. This
is clearly indicated by the following sentence appended by Sir Richard
to his description:—“If, however, this be really the foremost tooth
of the jaw, it would be one of a pair of terminal incisors according
to the marsupial type exhibited by the _Macropodidæ_ (kangaroos) and
_Phalangistidæ_ (phalangers).”
In 1866, after receiving additional specimens from Australia, Owen
was enabled to describe the greater part of the skull and the entire
dentition of _Thylacoleo_. The large anterior teeth were clearly
recognised to be incisors, which, in Owen’s opinion, “proved the
_Thylacoleo_ to be the carnivorous modification of the more common and
characteristic type of Australian marsupials, having the incisors of
the lower jaw reduced to a pair of large, more or less procumbent and
approximately conical teeth, or ‘tusks.’” Not only did the additional
evidence serve to confirm Sir Richard in his view of the carnivorous
propensities of _Thylacoleo_, but he considered that in this extinct form
we have “the simplest and most effectual dental machinery for predatory
life and carnivorous diet known in the mammalian class. It is the extreme
modification, to this end, of the diprotodont type of marsupialia.”
Beyond, however, admitting its affinities with the diprotodonts, Sir
Richard Owen does not appear in this later paper to have regarded
_Thylacoleo_ as a near relative of any of the existing forms; but in the
article on “Paleontology” in the eighth edition of the _Encyclopædia
Britannica_, published in 1859, he seems to have considered it allied to
_Plagiaulax_ of the Purbeck strata of Dorsetshire, which had been shown
by Dr. Hugh Falconer to be probably of herbivorous habits.
Sir William Flower, in the aforesaid paper in the Geological Society’s
_Quarterly Journal_ for 1868, while agreeing with Owen that _Thylacoleo_
was related to the diprotodont rather than to the polyprotodont
carnivorous marsupials, differed from the conclusion that it was a
carnivore. While the large cutting premolar teeth were considered by
Owen to resemble the carnassial teeth of a lion, Flower was struck by
their similarity to the corresponding teeth of the rat-kangaroos and
the phalangers. After discussing the other teeth, he concluded that “in
the number and arrangement of these teeth ... _Thylacoleo_ corresponds
exactly with the modern families _Macropodidæ_ and _Phalangistidæ_, and
differs completely from the carnivorous marsupials.”
After alluding to the small size of the brain-cavity and the large
space for the attachment of the powerful muscles which worked the lower
jaw, and suggesting that these features may be only to be expected in
a large form as compared with the smaller members of the same group,
Flower concluded that the habits of all species with the same general
type of dentition must necessarily be similar. And, on these premisses,
it was urged that _Thylacoleo_ must in all probability have been a
vegetable-feeder. The large premolar may seemingly have been “as well
adapted for chopping up succulent roots and vegetables, as for dividing
the nutritive fibres of animal prey.” It is further suggested that the
nutriment of _Thylacoleo_ “may have been some kind of root or bulb; it
may have been fruit; it may have been flesh.” While in conclusion it is
argued that the organisation of the animal did not countenance the idea
of its preying on the large contemporary marsupials.
Omitting reference to Owen’s reply to this reversal of his conclusions,
and also to certain comments and additions to the arguments by other
writers, we may pass on to a paper by Dr. R. Broom, published in the
_Proceedings_ of the Linnean Society of New South Wales for April 1898,
and entitled “On the Affinities and Habits of _Thylacoleo_.”
In this the author admits that the animal in question, as suggested
by Owen in his second paper, and more fully determined by Flower, was
undoubtedly a diprotodont, and that it was nearly allied to the modern
phalangers. With the latter it is indeed closely connected by the
recently discovered extinct _Burramys_, which differs from the existing
members of that group by the large size of the secant premolar.
After discussing numerous points in connection with the problem,
Dr. Broom states that those who believe _Thylacoleo_ to have been
carnivorous, “evidently consider that the molars have been reduced
through their functions being taken up by the large premolars. But could
the large premolars take up the molar function—could they grind? Even
those who favour the idea of _Thylacoleo_ being a vegetable-feeder, admit
that the premolars were cutting teeth, and the difficulty of imagining
a herbivorous animal without grinders is got over by supposing that its
food was of a soft or succulent nature.”
But for the creature to have lived on succulent roots and bulbs, the
vegetation of that part of Australia where it lived must, urges Dr.
Broom, have been quite different from what it is at the present day;
and we have no justification for assuming any such change to have taken
place. Moreover, an animal that could only slice, and not grind up,
vegetable food, could apparently subsist only on ripe fruit, and such is
to be met with in Australia only at one season of the year, when, owing
to the abundance of frugivorous mammals, little, if any, is allowed to
fall to the ground.
“It is probably however,” adds Dr. Broom, “unnecessary to discuss further
what food _Thylacoleo_ could possibly have obtained, when we have, as I
hold with Owen, the most satisfactory proof from its anatomical structure
as to what food it did obtain. It must be admitted that _Thylacoleo_
had enormous temporal muscles, and it is perfectly certain that such
muscles would not have been developed unless the animal required them.
For what could such powerful muscles be required? Most certainly not for
slicing fruits or succulent roots and bulbs, nor would they be required
even for the slicing of fleshy fibres. Temporal muscles are chiefly used
apparently for closing the jaws more or less forcibly from the open
position, while for the more complicated movements of mastication it is
the masseter and pterygoid muscles that are chiefly used. Hence in all
carnivorous animals the temporals are largely developed and the masseters
more feebly, because the killing process requires a very forcible closing
of the jaws, and the work to be done by the premolars and molars is
comparatively little. In herbivorous animals the conditions are reversed.
The jaws are here rarely required to be opened widely or to be closed
with any great force, while a very large amount of grinding work has to
be done; hence the temporals are rarely much larger than the masseters,
and often very much smaller. When we look at _Thylacoleo_, we find not
only the enormous temporals and only moderate masseters, but everything
else about the skull seems to be built on carnivorous lines. Owen has
shown the wonderful similarity which exists between the molar machinery
in _Thylacoleo_ and the lion, and it is hard to conceive as possible any
other cause giving rise to such a specialisation in _Thylacoleo_ than
that which led to a similar specialisation in the cat tribe. Another
most striking feature is to be seen in the condition of the incisors.
Leaving out of consideration the mode of implantation and structure of
the teeth—both confirmatory of the carnivorous hypothesis—there is one
point which appears to me absolutely conclusive on the subject. Unless
Owen’s figures are altogether unreliable, the lower incisors are quite
unlike those of the herbivorous diprotodonts. In such typical forms as
the wombat, the koala, the kangaroo, and the phalanger, though there are
different modifications of the arrangement, we have the lower incisors
meeting the upper, and forming with them an instrument for biting
through a moderately tough, fibrous tissue, and even in the very small
diprotodonts, so far as I am aware, the lower incisors always meet and
work against the upper. But in _Thylacoleo_ we have powerful pointed
incisors which do not meet, but overlap. Though technically incisors,
they are not intended to incise, but to pierce and tear. Such powerful
pointed and overlapping teeth, though easily explained on the theory
that they were intended to kill and tear animal prey, were never surely
provided merely to pierce succulent vegetables or ripe fruit. It might of
course be argued that the incisors were used as weapons of defence, as
apparently are the canines in the baboon; but against this idea is the
objection that the incisors were put to some use which wore them down and
blunted them more rapidly than would be the case if they were chiefly
used on the rare occasions when the animal had to defend itself; and
furthermore, were such the case, the temporals would not require to be
greatly developed.
“There is thus, in my opinion, no other conclusion tenable than that
_Thylacoleo_ was a purely carnivorous animal, and one which would be
quite able to, and probably did, kill animals as large as or larger than
itself.”
This opinion as to the carnivorous habits of _Thylacoleo_ is approved by
Mr. B. A. Bensley, who has specially studied the Australian marsupials
in a memoir recently published in the _Transactions_ of the Linnean
Society of London.
If it be correct, it reduces the net result of Flower’s investigations on
this subject to a fuller realisation of the diprotodont affinities of the
animal under consideration.
In the latter part of 1868, Mr. Flower, as he was then styled,
communicated to the Zoological Society a most important paper entitled,
“On the Value of the Characters of the Base of the Cranium in the
Classification of the Order Carnivora,” which was published in the first
part of the Society’s _Proceedings_ for the following year. Working
on the lines suggested twenty years previously by Mr. H. N. Turner,
who had pointed out the importance of certain peculiarities of the
base of the skull in the Mammalia, and especially demonstrated their
constancy in the different groups of the Carnivora, Flower felt himself
justified in dividing, on these characters, the existing terrestrial
representatives of that order into three groups. These were—1st, the
Æluroidea, comprising the cats (_Felidæ_), the fossa (_Cryptoproctidæ_),
civets and mongooses (_Viverridæ_), the aard-wolf (_Proteleidæ_), and
hyænas (_Hyænidæ_); 2nd, the Cynoidea, including only the dogs, wolves,
and foxes; and 3rd, the Arctoidea, embracing the bears (_Ursidæ_), the
raccoons and pandas (_Procyonidæ_ and _Æluridæ_), and the weasels,
badgers, otters, etc. (_Mustelidæ_).
One result of this classification from cranial characteristics was to
determine definitely the position of the American cacomistle (_Bassaris_
or _Bassariscus_), which had been previously uncertain. The genus, as
might have been expected from distributional considerations, turned out
to belong to the raccoon family (_Procyonidæ_).
As regards the relationship of the three main groups, subsequent
palæontological discoveries have fully confirmed Flower’s view that
the _Canidæ_ (Cynoidea) occupy a central, or perhaps rather a basal,
position. Palæontology has, however, also shown that the bears (_Ursidæ_)
are a direct offshoot from the _Canidæ_, and accordingly that, if
extinct forms be taken into consideration, there is no justification
for the separation of the two families into distinct primary groups
(Arctoidea and Cynoidea). On the other hand, fossil forms from the
Lower Tertiaries of France and of North America seem to demonstrate the
existence of a complete gradation between the primitive dogs (_Canidæ_)
and the ancestral civets (_Viverridæ_), thus breaking up the distinction
between the Cynoidea and the Æluroidea. Nor is this all, for according
to the French palæontologists, there exists a transition between the
primitive civets and the early weasels (_Mustelidæ_); which, with what
has been already stated in connection with the bears, indicates that
the Arctoidea is a more or less artificial group, the members of which
have come to resemble one another to a certain degree in regard to the
characters of the base of the skull, owing to “parallelism.” In this
connection it is somewhat curious to note that a certain resemblance,
which had been pointed out by Turner as existing between the mongooses
or ichneumons (_Viverridæ_) and the weasels, was regarded by Flower as
of no importance. Finally, it is by no means improbable that the cats
(_Felidæ_) have no near kinship with the civets, but may be directly
sprung from more primitive Carnivora.
It is thus evident that Flower’s proposed triple division of the
Carnivora is not altogether in accord with palæontological, or
phylogenetic, evidence. An amendment is to merge the Cynoidea in the
Arctoidea, and thus retain only two groups. The observations recorded in
the paper have a high permanent value, in respect to the structure of the
carnivorous skull.
Another paper by Flower appeared in the Zoological Society’s
_Proceedings_ for 1869, dealing with the anatomy of the soft parts of
that remarkable animal, the African aard-wolf (_Proteles cristatus_).
Although the skeleton had been previously described, no information
had hitherto been available with regard to the viscera. In the paper
discussed in the foregoing paragraphs Flower, from the external
characters, coupled with those of the dentition and skeleton, had
regarded the creature as the representative of a distinct family,
intermediate in some respects between the _Hyænidæ_ and the _Viverridæ_.
The result of the examination of the viscera was in the main to support
this conclusion, although it showed that the _Proteleidæ_ are more
closely allied to the _Hyænidæ_ than the author had previously believed
to be the case. The aard-wolf may, indeed, be regarded as a kind of
small and degraded hyæna, with an almost rudimentary type of dentition,
suitable to the soft substances on which it feeds.
Passing on to the year 1870, we have to note the appearance of two
separate works bearing Flower’s name. The first of these was the
_Introductory Lectures to the Course of Comparative Anatomy_, delivered
at the Royal College of Surgeons in that year. Far more important
was the issue of the first edition of that invaluable text-book, _An
Introduction to the Osteology of the Mammalia_. Since, however, mention
of this work had been already made in an earlier chapter, it need not be
further alluded to in this place.
During the same year, exclusive of those on the Cetacea, several papers
were published by Flower in various scientific serials. Among these, bare
mention must suffice for one, “On the Connexion of the Hyoid Arch with
the Cranium,” which appeared in the twentieth volume of the _Report_
of the British Association. More important is the article “On the
Correspondence between the parts composing the Shoulder and the Pelvic
Girdle of the Mammalia.” In this the author pointed out that although
the homology between the scapula in the shoulder-girdle and the ilium in
the pelvis had long been admitted by naturalists, yet much misconception
existed with regard to the exact correspondence between the respective
surfaces and borders of these bones; and he then proceeded to define
and describe these correspondences in considerable detail. The names
then assigned by Flower to the component surfaces and borders of the
bones in question have ever since been generally adapted by naturalists.
Observations were also recorded with regard to the homology between the
coracoid bone and the ischium. A second paper in the same journal for
1870 dealt with the carpus of the dog; while in 1873 he published in this
medium a note on the same part of the skeleton in the sloths.
Reverting once more to the _Proceedings_ of the Zoological Society,
in which the bulk of his contributions to the anatomy of mammals was
published, we find a paper by Flower in the volume for 1870 on the
anatomy of the Himalayan panda (_Ælurus fulgens_.)
The specimen on which the paper was based was the first example of
this remarkable animal which had ever been dissected; and the brain
and viscera were described at considerable length. The result of the
dissection was to confirm the author’s previous opinion—based on the
external characters and skeleton—as to the near affinity of _Ælurus_ to
the American _Procyonidæ_; and it was left somewhat an open question,
whether it should be included in that group, or regarded as the
representative of a family (_Æluridæ_) by itself. In after years Mr. W.
T. Blanford adopted the former view. In the following year (1871) Flower
contributed a note to the _Proceedings_, recording the occurrence of a
specimen of the ringed seal (_Phoca hispida_) on the Norfolk coast in
1846; and he also wrote a paper in the same volume on the skeleton of one
of the cassowaries. The somewhat remarkable fact that the two-spotted
palm-civet (_Nandinia binotata_) differs from the other genera of
the same group by the absence of a blind appendage, or cæcum, to the
intestine, was recorded by Flower in the same serial for 1872.
Of much more importance than either of the foregoing were two
contributions to mammalian anatomy made by Sir William during the year
last mentioned. The one, which appeared in the _Medical Times and
Gazette_, was the report of “Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy of the
Organs of Digestion in the Mammalia, delivered at the Royal College of
Surgeons in February and March, 1872.” In this article, which is well
illustrated, will be found descriptions of the various forms assumed by
the stomach in a large number of the ordinal and family groups; especial
attention being directed to the remarkable complexity of that organ in
the porpoise. The other, which was published in _Nature_, and in abstract
in the _Report_ of the British Association, dealt with the arrangement
and nomenclature of the lobes of the mammalian liver. It is, perhaps, one
of the most valuable of the author’s contributions to visceral anatomy;
and introduced order and precision where confusion had previously
reigned. The names then given to the different lobes of the liver have
been very generally adopted in zoological and anatomical literature.
In 1873 Flower delivered before the Royal Institution a lecture on
palæontological evidence of gradual modification of animal forms, which
is published in the _Proceedings_ of that body for the same year. In this
he touched on the important evidence afforded by the discoveries which
had then been recently made in North America in favour of the derivation
of one animal form from another, directing particular attention to the
case for the evolution of the horse. Another paper on the same subject
appears in the _British Medical Journal_ for 1874; while, as noticed
below, Sir William again lectured on palæontological evolution in 1876.
The year 1874 was noteworthy, so far as palæontology is concerned, by the
appearance in the _Philosophical Transactions_ of the Royal Society of a
paper by Flower on part of a remarkable mammalian skull from Patagonia,
described under the name of _Homalodontotherium cunninghami_. In justice
to the author, it should be said that he was not responsible for the
undue length of the generic name, which had been bestowed by his friend
Huxley four years previously in the Geological Society’s _Journal_, and
which Flower was therefore compelled to employ. It refers to the fact
that the jaws of the new animal are remarkable for the even and unbroken
wall formed by the teeth, which show no enlarged tusks. At the time the
geological age of this interesting fossil was quite unknown; but it
formed the forerunner of the marvellous discoveries of the remains of
fossil mammals of middle tertiary age in Patagonia, which have been made
of late years, and have done so much to increase our knowledge of the
past life and history of the South American Continent.
Of minor interest is a paper by the then Hunterian Professor in the
_Quarterly Journal_ of the Geological Society on a much rolled and
battered skull from the so-called Red Crag of Suffolk, which the author
referred to a species of that extinct genus of sea-cows (Sirenia) known
as _Halitherium_. Such interest as the specimen possessed was due to
its affording the first evidence of the occurrence of remains of that
genus in Britain. Another paper, it may be mentioned, was published by
Flower in the same journal for 1877, in which another well-known extinct
continental genus of mammals was added to the fauna of the Red Crag of
East Anglia. The paper described two molar teeth, in the York Museum,
from the deposit in question, evidently referable to the large bear-like
animal known as _Hyænarctus_, of which the first remains had been
described many years previously from the Siwalik Hills of North-Eastern
India. As the mention of this paper has broken the chronological order of
treatment, it may be added that in 1876 Flower published another paper,
this time in the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_, on a mammalian skull
from the Red Crag. The specimen referred to in this communication was
provisionally assigned to Cuvier’s genus _Xiphodon_, and was believed to
have been originally washed out from a formation much older than the Red
Crag, and reburied in the latter.
Next on our list comes a paper on the anatomy of the musk-deer (_Moschus
moschiferus_), contributed to the serial last cited for 1875, in which
the author points out how widely this animal differs from the more
typical deer, and shows that it cannot even claim a near relationship
with the Chinese water-deer, despite the fact that in both species the
males are devoid of antlers, and are armed with long sabre-like tusks in
the upper jaw. In several respects—notably the presence of a gall-bladder
to the liver—the musk-deer is indeed nearer to the hollow-horned
ruminants (Bovidæ), than to the other members of the deer tribe (Cervidæ).
In 1876 Professor Flower delivered before the Royal Institution an
extremely interesting lecture on the extinct mammals of North America,
which at that time were in course of being made known to the scientific
world by the writings of Professors Marsh and Cope. In the course of
this lecture Flower alluded at considerable length to the ancestry
of the horse—then a comparatively new subject—and also discussed the
structure and affinities of those gigantic many-horned mammals commonly
known as Dinocerata. In concluding, the lecturer observed that the work
accomplished in America taught us—“First, that the living world around
us at the present moment bears but an exceedingly small proportion to
the whole series of animal and vegetable forms which have existed in past
ages. Secondly, that, notwithstanding all that has been said, and most
justly said, of the necessary imperfection of the geological record, we
may hope that there is still so much preserved that the study of the
course of events which have led up to the present condition of life on
the globe, may have a great future before it.”
The subsequent discoveries of fossil mammalian remains in such enormous
quantities in Patagonia, and still later in the Libyan desert, have
rendered this utterance almost prophetic.
During the same year (1876) appeared, in the _Philosophical
Transactions_, a notice by Flower of the seals and cetaceans obtained
during the _Transit of Venus_ expeditions of 1874 and 1875. The year
1876 likewise witnessed the publication, in the _Proceedings_ of the
Zoological Society, of an article on the skulls of the various existing
species of rhinoceroses, in which it was shown that the number of such
species had been altogether unjustifiably exaggerated by the late
Dr. J. E. Gray and other writers, and that in all probability there
were really not more than five. Certain characters connected with the
postero-lateral region of the skull were also described, which served to
divide these species into groups. A further contribution to our knowledge
of the skulls of the rhinoceroses was made by Flower in 1878, when he
described, in the same journal, the skull of an Indian specimen, which
it was thought might be the _Rhinoceros lasiotis_ of Dr. Sclater—now
known to be (as then suggested) merely a local race of the two-horned _R.
sumatrensis_.
Between the years 1880 and 1883 several papers on mammalian zoology were
published by Flower in the _Proceedings_ of the Zoological Society and
elsewhere, none of which can be regarded as of first-rate importance. The
first of these (_P.Z.S._ 1880) dealt with the internal anatomy of that
rare mammal, the bush-dog (_Speothus_, or _Icticyon_, _venaticus_), of
Guiana, which had never previously been described. The author regarded
this animal as a specialised member of the Canidæ, showing some signs
of affinity with the wild dogs (_Cyon_) of Asia. In 1880 the museum
of the Royal College of Surgeons received a very large skull of the
elephant-seal or sea-elephant (_Macrorhinus leoninus_); and this induced
Flower to draw up some notes on that enormous creature, which appeared
in the above-named journal for 1881. The author described it as “an
animal which, notwithstanding its former abundance and wide distribution,
and its great zoological interest, is still very imperfectly known
anatomically, and very poorly represented in collections.” Fortunately,
since that date—mainly owing to the energy and liberality of Mr.
Rothschild—specimens of the skin and skeleton of this huge seal have
been secured for our museums before it was too late. In the same volume
Flower drew attention to the evidence showing that the sea-cow, or
manati, of which a pair were living at the time in the Brighton Aquarium,
occasionally, or periodically, comes ashore for the purpose of grazing.
In the same year appeared an article from his pen in the _British Medical
Journal_ on the anatomy of the Cetacea and Edentata; while in 1882 the
question of the mutual relationships of the mammals commonly included in
the latter order (such as sloths, ant-eaters, armadillos, pangolins, and
aard-varks) were discussed by him in the _Proceedings_ of the Zoological
Society.
The trend of the paper last mentioned, as well as that of some of his
other communications published shortly before, indicates that about this
time, instead of restricting his attention more or less entirely to their
anatomy, Flower was much occupied with the subject of the classification
of the Mammalia. And the reason is not far to seek, for he had undertaken
not only the volume of the “Catalogue of Osteological Specimens in the
Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons,” dealing with mammals other
than man, but he had likewise engaged (in co-operation with the late Dr.
Dobson) to write the article “Mammalia” for the ninth edition of the
_Encyclopædia Britannica_. With the view apparently of clearing the way
for these two important contributions to zoology, he published during the
early part of 1883 in the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_ a paper on
the “Arrangement of the Orders and Families of Mammalia.”
To discuss this important paper in detail on the present occasion is
quite unnecessary; and it will suffice to state that it has formed the
basis on which all modern classifications of the group are framed. Indeed
it has been accepted by most writers with little or no modification. In
this scheme it was proposed to divide mammals into three primary groups,
or sub-classes, namely, Prototheria, or Ornithodelphia, as represented
only by the egg-laying group; Metatheria or Didelphia, including the
pouched group, or marsupials; and Eutheria or Monodelphia, comprising the
whole of the remaining or placental groups. Of late years, owing to the
discovery of unexpected relationships between placentals and marsupials,
it has been proposed to recognise only two sub-classes of mammals: the
Eutheria, comprising the two groups last mentioned, and the Prototheria,
or monotremes. The scheme chiefly differed from the one proposed some
years earlier by Huxley in the inclusion of the Hyracoidea (klipdass) and
Proboscidea (elephants) as sub-orders of the Ungulata, instead of their
forming separate orders by themselves. In this instance Flower ranked the
Artiodactyla, Perissodactyla, Hyracoidea, and Proboscidea as equivalent
sub-orders of Ungulata, but later on he brigaded the two former together
as Ungulata Vera, and the two latter as Subungulata.
The above scheme was employed by Flower in the article “Mammalia,”
written by him for the ninth edition of the _Encyclopædia Britannica_,
the volume containing which appeared in 1883. This article, with others
by himself and other authors, formed, as will be noticed later on,
the basis of the _Study of Mammals_ published in 1891. Among other
articles contributed by Flower to the _Encyclopædia_ were those on the
Horse, Kangaroo, Lemur, Lion, Mastodon, Megatherium, Otter, Platypus,
Rhinoceros, Seal, Swine, Tapir, Whale, and Zebra.
The aforesaid scheme of classification was likewise used in the second
part of the “Catalogue of Osteological Specimens in the Museum of the
Royal College of Surgeons,” which was written with the assistance of Dr.
Garson, and appeared in 1884. Since this valuable work has been already
noticed at some length in the chapter devoted to Flower’s official
connection with the College of Surgeons, it need not be further referred
to in this place, except that the writer may again take the opportunity
of expressing his regret that the views on nomenclature there enunciated
have not met with acceptance among the modern school of naturalists.
At the “Jubilee” meeting of the Zoological Society, held in June 1887,
Flower, as President, read an address on the “Progress of Zoological
Science” during the reign of Queen Victoria, which appeared in the
_Report_ of the Council of that year, and to which reference has been
made in an earlier chapter.
About this time the Natural History Museum received a series of antlers
shed year by year by one particular red-deer stag, together with the
complete skull and antlers of the same animal; and this gift induced
Flower to deliver in December 1887 a lecture on “Horns and Antlers”
before the Middlesex Natural History Society, which is printed, with
a plate of the aforesaid series of red-deer antlers, in a somewhat
abbreviated form, in the _Transactions_ of that Society.
If we except a few on Cetacea, noticed in the next chapter, Sir William’s
contributions to the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_ after 1883 were
not numerous or of much importance. In 1884 he contributed, however,
remarks on the so-called white elephant from Burma, then exhibited in
the Society’s Menagerie; and in the same year he also wrote on the young
dentition of the capybara. In 1887 he discussed the generic position
and relationships of the pigmy hippopotamus of Liberia. The acquisition
in the following year by the Natural History Museum of specimens of
that breed of Japanese fowls remarkable for the excessive elongation
of the tail-feathers of the cocks, led to a note on that subject in
the _Proceedings_ for the same year. This paper, it may be incidentally
mentioned, is noteworthy, on account of the evidence it affords that Sir
William did not regard the variations displayed by domesticated animals
as in any way unworthy the notice of the naturalist; while the next shows
that monstrosities or abnormalities—at all events to a certain extent—are
also worthy of recognition. The note incidentally alluded to in the
last sentence appeared in 1889, and dealt with an African rhinoceros
head, showing three horns. Finally, in 1890, Sir William exhibited and
commented upon a photograph of the nesting-hole of a hornbill, showing
the female “walled up” with mud.
The next year (1891) saw the publication of _An Introduction to the
Study of Mammals, Living and Extinct_, written, as already said, in
collaboration with the present writer, and embodying the whole of
Flower’s contributions to the _Encyclopædia Britannica_, together with
certain articles by other authors from the same work, and such new
material as was necessary in order to weave these _disjecta membra_ into
one connected and harmonious whole.
In the same year was also published, in the _Modern Science Series_, Sir
William’s admirable little volume on _The Horse_, which was likewise
largely based on his _Encyclopædia_ articles. In this work Flower dwelt
particularly on the vestiges exhibited by the modern horse of its descent
from more generalised ancestors; and he was successful in demonstrating
that the structure known to veterinarians as the “ergot,” represents one
of the foot-pads of the earlier forms.
Undoubtedly the most important elements in the foregoing tale of work are
those relating to the mammalian (and especially the marsupial) brain, and
the marsupial dentition. And if Flower had accomplished nothing more than
this, he would have been entitled to gratitude of his successors. But,
as we shall immediately see, all the above formed but a portion of his
zoological labours.
CHAPTER VI
WORK ON THE CETACEA
Next at any rate to the study of the various races of the human species
(which he took up seriously later on in his career), the group of
mammals to which Flower devoted special attention, and which attracted
his greatest interest, was undoubtedly that of the Cetacea, or whales,
dolphins, porpoises, etc. At the time when he set himself seriously to
study these aquatic and fish-like mammals, the zoology of the group was
certainly in a most confused and unsatisfactory state; partly, no doubt,
owing to the comparative rarity of complete specimens in our museums, and
the consequent difficulty of instituting accurate comparisons, and partly
to the reckless prodigality with which names had been given to imperfect
or insufficiently characterised specimens by some of his predecessors and
early contemporaries, and the needless multiplication of generic terms.
It was consequently at this time almost impossible to be sure which was
the right name for even many of the commoner species; while in the case
of the rarer kinds, the confusion was almost hopeless. When Flower left
the subject—which he only did when his working days were over—it was in
great measure thoroughly in order, although of course much was left for
future workers to fill in. Unhappily, his views on the nomenclature of
the group have not been accepted by all his followers; so that a fresh
and totally unnecessary source of confusion has been introduced of late
years into a subject which had already sufficient difficulties of its own.
In regard to the discrimination of species, Flower took a view almost the
reverse of that held by some of his predecessors and colleagues; and, as
he says himself, he may have consequently erred in a direction the very
opposite of theirs. “As species have not generally been recognised as
such,” he wrote in the British Museum _List_ of 1885, “unless presenting
constant distinguishing characters capable of definition, it is probable
that, in the imperfect state of knowledge of many forms, some may have
been grouped together which a fuller acquaintance with all parts of their
structure, external and internal, will show to be distinct.”
Apart from his explaining to popular audiences that whales were mammals
and not fishes, Flower emphasised three points very strongly in regard
to the organisation and physiology of these animals. First of all,
he pointed out that, as a rule, they do not “spout” water from their
“blowholes.” “The ‘spouting,’ or more properly the ‘blowing’ of the
whale,” he wrote, “is nothing more than the ordinary act of expiration,
which, taking place at larger intervals than in land animals, is
performed with a greater amount of emphasis. The moment the animal rises
to the surface it forcibly expels from its lungs the air taken in at the
last inspiration, which is of course highly charged with watery vapour in
consequence of the natural respiratory changes. This, rapidly condensing
in the cold atmosphere in which the phenomena is generally observed,
forms a column of steam or spray, which has been erroneously taken for
water.”
Secondly, he drew attention to the importance of the rudiments of
hind-limbs which occur in many whales as affording decisive evidence
of the descent of the group from land mammals. And thirdly, he
emphasised the marked distinction between baleen, or whalebone, whales
(Mystacoceti), and toothed whales and dolphins (Odontoceti); although
he appears never to have gone so far in this direction as some modern
naturalists, who are of opinion that these two groups have originated
independently of one another from separate types of land mammals.
Another point to which Flower devoted a considerable share of attention
was the dimensions attained by the larger species of whales. Previously,
there is no doubt that very great exaggeration had been current in this
respect, and that such things as 150-feet whales are unknown. With his
excessive caution, and determination to be on the safe side, it is
however probable that in some instances—notably the Greenland right-whale
and the sperm-whale—Flower somewhat under-estimated the maximum
dimensions.
At what date Flower first began to study whales seriously, it is not
easy to ascertain. From the fact of his contributing three papers on
this subject to the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_ for 1864, it may,
however, be inferred that by that time he had devoted no inconsiderable
amount of attention to the group. In the first of those he described a
specimen of a lesser fin-whale, then recently stranded on the Norfolk
coast; while in a second, and much more important communication, he gave
notes on the skeletons of whales preserved in the museums of Holland
and Belgium which he had recently visited. Two of these he described as
indicating apparently new species; although their right to distinction
was not maintained. In the same year he described two skulls of grampuses
from Tasmania, which were regarded as representing a new species, under
the name of _Orca meridionalis_; a further note on these being added in
the Society’s _Proceedings_ for 1865, when the species was transferred
to the genus _Pseudorca_. Later still it was found that the supposed
species was inseparable from the typical _P. crassidens_; named by Owen
many years previously on the evidence of a skeleton from the Lincolnshire
Fens. In another note published the same year in the same journal he
showed that one of the whales named by him in 1864 was identical with the
one now known as _Balænoptera sibbaldi_; while a second paper described a
specimen of the fin-whale commonly known as _B. musculus_. A further note
on the synonymy of _B. sibbaldi_ appeared in the _Proceedings_ for 1868.
Reverting to earlier publications, in 1866 the Royal Society of
London issued a volume containing translations by Flower of certain
very important memoirs on Cetacea by Professors Eschricht, Reinhardt,
and Lilljeborg. As these were written in a language understood by
comparatively few Englishmen, the translation was a distinct benefit to
“cetology” in this country.
Between the years 1869 and 1878 inclusive, six very important memoirs on
whales (including in that term porpoises, dolphins, etc.) from Flower’s
pen appeared in the _Transactions_ of the Zoological Society of London.
The first of these, which was published in the year first mentioned, was
devoted to the description of the skeleton of the very interesting and
then little-known South American freshwater or estuarine dolphins, _Inia_
and _Pontoporia_. In the course of this memoir it was demonstrated that,
in spite of the wide distance between their habitats, these dolphins and
the freshwater dolphin of the Ganges and certain other Indian rivers,
_Platanista gangetica_, collectively form a distinct family group—the
Platanistidæ, which exhibits many very generalised features.
In the second memoir of this series, which appeared in 1869, Flower
treated in an exhaustive manner of the osteology of the sperm-whale, or
cachalot. “The fine skeleton of a young male which he procured for the
Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons,” writes Professor M’Intosh in
his obituary notice of Sir William, “formed the basis of this important
paper, and enabled him to add to and correct much which had been written
on this subject. The description of its huge cranium as a large, pointed
slipper, with a high heel-piece and the front trodden down, the hollow
limited behind by the occipital crest, continued laterally into the
elevated ridges of the broadly expanded maxillæ, which rose from the
median line to the edge of the skull, instead of falling away, as in most
Cetaceans, must be familiar to all students of the group. In this vast
cavity lies the ‘head-matter,’ composed of almost pure spermaceti.”
It was further demonstrated that the available evidence pointed to the
existence of only a single species of true cachalot; the small adult jaws
not unfrequently seen in collections being apparently those of females,
which are known to be far inferior in size to the old bulls.
It may be added, in connection with sperm-whales, that the abrupt
termination of the muzzle, shown (in a somewhat modified degree) in the
model of the old bull, set up under Sir William’s direction in the Whale
Room at the Natural History Museum, has been said by certain modern
naturalists to be incorrect. Inquiries instituted at the present writer’s
suggestion at the New Bedford Cachalot-whaling Station have, however,
proved that the abruptness is under-estimated rather than exaggerated in
the restoration.
This brief reference to the Whale Room at the museum, and Flower’s work
in superintending the construction of models of several of the larger
members of the group, must, it may be further added, suffice in this
place, seeing that fuller mention of the subject has been already made in
an earlier chapter.
The third memoir of the series in the Zoological Society’s _Transactions_
treats of the Chinese white dolphin (_Delphinus_, or _Prodelphinus_,
_sinensis_), and was published in 1872. In the following year appeared
one on Risso’s dolphin, _Grampus griseus_, in which the author directed
attention to certain variable markings always seen on the skin of this
species. These, it has been subsequently shown, are produced by the claws
in the suckers of the cuttlefish which forms the food of this species.
The two remaining memoirs in the _Transactions_, which appeared
respectively in 1873 and 1878, were devoted to that difficult, and at
the time imperfectly known group, termed ziphioid, or beaked whales. In
the first of the two attention was concentrated on the aberrant and
rare form known as _Berardius arnuxi_; while the second was exclusively
devoted to the much more abundant types included under the generic title
_Mesoplodon_, in allusion to the single pair of lower teeth near the
middle of the sides of the lower jaw, which forms the single dental
armature of the cetaceans of this genus. The beaked whales, it should be
added, had been previously discussed by Flower in a preliminary paper
published in the Zoological Society’s _Proceedings_ for 1871 and 1876,
and likewise in an article communicated in 1872 to _Nature_.
Special interest attaches to a paper by Flower published in the
_Transactions_ of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall for 1872,
and also in the _Annals and Magazine of Natural History_ for the same
year, on the bones of a whale dug up at Petuan, in Cornwall, sometime
previously to 1829, and now preserved in the museum of the above-named
Society. The whale represented by these remains was made the type of the
new genus and species _Eschrichtius robustus_, by the late Dr. J. E.
Gray. That it was a member of the group of whalebone-whales, and that
it could not be identified with either of the genera then known, namely
_Balæna_, _Balænoptera_, and _Megaptera_, was fully demonstrated by
Flower, who also showed that it agreed with the two latter in having the
neck-vertebræ free.
“The interesting question,” he added, “remains, whether this species
still exists in our seas; if extinct, it must have become so at a
comparatively recent period, certainly long after Cornwall was inhabited
by man. The negative evidence of no specimen having been met with by
naturalists in a living or recent state, is hardly conclusive as to its
non-existence, as our knowledge of this group of animals is lamentably
deficient. We are acquainted with many species, even of very large size,
only through isolated individuals, and the discovery of others new to
science is by no means an infrequent or unlooked-for occurrence at the
present time.”
In the opinion of the present writer, it is quite probable that this
whale may be identical with the grey whale of the Pacific, described many
years subsequently by the late Professor Cope as _Rhachianectes glaucus_,
in which event that name will have to give place to _Eschrichtius
robustus_.
In the year 1879, and for some time after, Flower directed his attention
more especially to the dolphins and porpoises, which collectively
constitute the family Delphinidæ of naturalists, and he published a
series of papers on this group in the _Proceedings_ of the Zoological
Society. In the volume for 1879 there appeared, for instance, one paper
on the common dolphin (_Delphinus delphis_); a second on the bottle-nosed
dolphin, now known as _Tursiops tursio_; and a third on the skull of
the white whale, or beluga (_Delphinapterus leucas_). Of far greater
importance was, however, the appearance in 1883 of a paper in the same
serial on the generic characters of the family Delphinidæ as a whole.
Special attention was directed in this communication to the value of the
pterygoid bones, on the under surface of the skull, in the classification
of the family; and characters were formulated which enabled the various
genera to be identified, wholly or in part, by this part of the skull.
Flower’s classification of the Delphinidæ has, with some slight
modifications, been very generally accepted by later naturalists. Some
time after the publication of this paper the present writer pointed
out to the author that two of the generic names employed by him were
barred by previous use in a different sense; and in a note subsequently
published in the _Proceedings_, these were accordingly replaced.
Flower was, however, by no means forgetful of his earlier love for the
cachalot and beaked whales (Physeteridæ); and in 1883 and again in 1884
he published papers in the _Proceedings_ on their near relatives the
bottle-nosed whales (not to be confounded with the bottle-nosed dolphins)
of the genus _Hyperöodon_. In these investigations he was much indebted,
as on several previous occasions, to the observations of Captain Gray, a
well-known whaler. As regards the common bottle-nose (_H. rostratus_),
Sir William succeeded in demonstrating that the great differences which
had long been noticed in the skull were due to distinctions either
of sex or age; the old males developing huge maxillary crests—with a
broad and flattened front surface—of which there is scarcely any trace
in the younger members of the same sex, or in females of all ages. In
consequence of this difference in the skull, the head of the old bull
bottle-nose is easily recognisable by the abrupt and prominent elevation
of the forehead immediately behind the base of the beak. Flower was
also able to show that bottle-noses yield true spermaceti, especially
in the head; a fact which does not appear to have been previously known
to zoologists, although it may have been to whalers. At the present day
there is a considerable trade in bottle-nose sperm-oil and spermaceti;
these being often blended with the products of the cachalot, from which
they are distinguishable by their specific gravity. In his 1882 paper
Flower described a water-worn bottle-nose skull from Australia, which
he regarded as indicating a second species of the genus—_Hyperöodon
planifrons_. The correctness of this determination has been demonstrated
by complete skeletons of the same whale from the South American seas.
The last two papers on Cetacea by Sir William in the _Proceedings_ of
the Zoological Society refer to the occurrence of examples of Rudolphi’s
rorqual (_Balænoptera borealis_) on the English coasts. In the one paper
he described a specimen stranded on the Essex shore in 1883, and in the
other an example captured in the Thames four years later.
As regards other contributions to our knowledge of the Cetacea, Sir
William in 1883 delivered before the Royal Institution a lecture on
“Whales, Past and Present,” which is reproduced in the _Proceedings_ of
that body for the same year. A second lecture, “On Whales and Whaling,”
was delivered before the Royal Colonial Institute for 1885, and is
published in the _Journal_ of the Institute for that year. The article
“Whale,” for the ninth edition of the _Encyclopædia Britannica_, is also
the work of Flower; it is reproduced, almost as it stands, in the _Study
of Mammals_.
The year 1885 saw the publication of the “List of the Specimens of
Cetacea in the Zoological Department of the British Museum,” a small, but
nevertheless valuable work, from which an extract has already been made.
Even when this was written, the museum contained skulls or skeletons of
nearly all the more important and well-established representatives of the
order, the only notable deficiency being the large whalebone whale from
the North Pacific commonly known as the grey whale, and scientifically
termed _Rhachianectes glaucus_. It was not many years before this gap
was filled by the acquisition of a complete skeleton of the species in
question.
In concluding this brief notice of the work accomplished by Flower on the
Cetacea, an extract may be made to illustrate his views with regard to
the ancestry and origin of the group:—
“The origin of the Cetacea,” he wrote, “is at present involved in much
obscurity. They present no signs of closer affinity to any of the
lower classes of vertebrates than do many other members of their own
class. Indeed in all that essentially distinguishes a mammal from the
oviparous vertebrates, whether in the osseous, nervous, reproductive, or
any other system, they are as truly mammalian as any other group. Any
supposed marks of inferiority, as absence of limb-structure, of hairy
covering, of lachrymal apparatus, etc., are obviously modifications (or
degradations, as they may be termed) in adaptation to their special mode
of life. The characters of the teeth of _Zeuglodon_ and other extinct
forms, and also of the fœtal Mystacocetes, clearly indicate that they
have been derived from mammals in which the heterodont type of dentition
was fully established. The steps by which a land mammal may have been
modified into a purely aquatic one are indicated by the stages which
still survive among the Carnivora in the Otariidæ and in the true seals.
A further change in the same direction would produce an animal somewhat
resembling a dolphin; and it has been thought that this may have been the
route by which the Cetacean form has been developed. There are, however,
great difficulties in the way of this view. Thus if the hind-limbs had
ever been developed into the very efficient aquatic propelling organs
they present in the seals, it is not easy to imagine how they could
have become completely atrophied and their function transferred to the
tail. So that, from this point of view, it is more likely that whales
were derived from animals with long tails, which were used in swimming,
eventually with such effect that the hind-limbs became no longer
necessary. The powerful tail, with its lateral cutaneous flanges, of an
American species of otter (_Lutra brasiliensis_) may give an idea of
this member in the primitive Cetaceans. But the structure of the Cetacea
is, in so many essential characters, so unlike that of the Carnivora,
that the probabilities are against these orders being nearly related.
Even in the skull of the _Zeuglodon_, which has been cited as presenting
a great resemblance to that of a seal, quite as many likenesses may be
traced to one of the primitive Pig-like Ungulates (except in the purely
adaptive character of the form of the teeth) while the elongated larynx,
complex stomach, simple liver, reproductive organs, both male and female,
and fœtal membranes of the existing Cetacea, are far more like those of
that group than of the Carnivora. Indeed, it appears probable that the
old popular idea which affixed the name of ‘Sea-Hog’ to the porpoise,
contains a larger element of truth than the speculations of many
accomplished zoologists of modern times. The fact that _Platanista_,
which, as mentioned above, appears to retain more of the primitive
characteristics of the group than any other existing form, and also the
distantly related _Inia_ from South America, are both at the present day
exclusively fluviatile, may point to the freshwater origin of the whole
group, in which case their otherwise rather inexplicable absence from the
seas of the Cretaceous period would be accounted for.
“On the other hand, it should be observed that the teeth of the
Zeuglodonts approximate more to a carnivorous than to an ungulate type.”
This difficulty with regard to the teeth is indeed one which it is
impossible to disregard, since it is scarcely credible that grinding
teeth such as characterise herbivorous mammals of all descriptions
could ever have been modified into the teeth of whales, either living
or extinct. There is, moreover, the unmistakable resemblance presented
by the cheek-teeth of the aforesaid extinct zeuglodons to those of
Carnivora. Both these facts seem to point to the derivation of toothed
whales, at any rate, from flesh-eating rather than herbivorous mammals;
although they have certainly no relationship with the eared seals.
Since the foregoing passage was written it has been practically
demonstrated that the toothed whales, at any rate, are the descendants
of primitive Carnivora. Professor E. Fraas, of Stuttgart, and Dr. C.
W. Andrews, of the British Museum, have, for instance, shown that the
zeuglodons are derived from the Eocene group of Carnivora known as
Creodontia; while there is every reason for regarding the zeuglodons
themselves as the ancestors of modern toothed whales.
CHAPTER VII
ANTHROPOLOGICAL WORK
The study of the physical characters of the various native races of the
human species—that is to say, anthropology, in contradistinction to
ethnology—occupied a very prominent position in Sir William Flower’s
scientific career; and it is difficult to say whether this or the study
of whales was the branch of biology on which his greatest interest was
concentrated. Perhaps we might say that the two together formed his
especially favourite subjects. Whereas, however, as we have seen in the
last chapter, he was studying the Cetacea at least as early as the year
1864, when papers from his pen were published, anthropology does not
appear to have been seriously taken up by him till considerably later
in life; the first papers and lectures by him that have come under the
writer’s notice dating from 1878.
As regards the special departments of this science to which Sir William
devoted a large share of attention, we may mention, in the first place,
the discovery of the best methods of accurately determining the capacity
of the human cranium, and the drawing-up of formulæ for “indexes” to
serve as a basis for comparing the cranial measurements of different
races. Secondly, we may take the classification of these races as one of
his most important lines of investigation. While, in the third place,
may be noticed his partiality for the study of the inferior races of
mankind, more especially those belonging to the black, or Negro, branch
of the species; dwarf races, like the Central African Akkas, and the
Andaman Islanders, or exterminated types, like the Tasmanians, having
apparently a very strong claim on his interest. And here it may be
mentioned that not only is anthropology largely indebted to Flower for
his published works on this subject, but likewise for the energy he
displayed in collecting specimens of the osteology of dwindling races,
while there was yet time. It was at his initiation that Sir Joseph Fayrer
was induced to use his influence with the Indian authorities for the
purpose of securing skulls and skeletons of Andamanese for the Museum of
the Royal College of Surgeons. The result of this was the acquisition of
a fine series of specimens of the osteology of this fast-disappearing
race, at a time when it was still comparatively uncontaminated and
undeteriorated by contact with Europeans. That such contact must
inevitably lead, sooner or later, to the disappearance of the inferior,
or “non-adaptive” races of mankind, was a favourite dictum of Sir
William’s; and its truth has been confirmed by the events of the last few
years.
If not actually the earliest, the first really important contribution to
anthropology on Flower’s part was a Friday Evening lecture “On the Native
Races of the Pacific Ocean,” delivered at the Royal Institution on 31st
May 1878, and published in the _Proceedings_ of that body for the same
year. In this lecture Sir William described the native races of Oceania,
or those inhabiting the islands, inclusive of Australia, scattered
through the great ocean tract bounded on the east and west respectively
by the continents of America and Asia. The subject was treated very
largely upon the basis of the collection of skulls and skeletons in the
Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons; yet the lecturer was careful to
point out that even this extensive series was wholly insufficient for
the purpose of forming a classification of mankind founded on physical
structure.
“It can only afford certain indications, valuable as far as they go,
from which a provisional, or approximative system may be built up. Very
many, indeed the majority of the islands, are totally unrepresented in
it; others are illustrated by only one or two individuals.” “Were the
collection anything like representative,” it is added later, “it would
probably be found possible to distinguish the natives of each island, or,
at all events, of each group of islands, by cranial characters alone.”
Special attention was in this course directed to the Australians on the
one hand, and to the frizzly-haired Melanesians, or Oceanic Negroes
(as distinct from the straight-haired Polynesians) on the other.
That the Melanesians were the primitive denizens of the greater part
of Oceania, and that the original area they once inhabited has been
much circumscribed by Polynesian invasion, the lecturer was fully
convinced; and the great difficulty of distinguishing in some instances
to what extent this invasion has led, in certain cases, to a mixture
of the two stocks, was earnestly insisted upon. At the conclusion of
his discourse Flower commented very strongly on the urgent need of
making anthropological collections in these islands forthwith; and,
although perhaps his prophecy of impending extermination was a little
exaggerated, it is no less urgent at the present day.
“In another half century,” he said, “the Australians, the Melanesians,
the Maories, and most of the Polynesians will have followed the
Tasmanians to the grave. We shall well merit the reproach of future
generations if we neglect our present opportunities of gathering together
every fragment of knowledge that can still be saved, of their languages,
customs, social polity, manufactures, and arts. The preservation of
tangible evidence of their physical structure is, if possible, still
more important; and surely this may be expected of that nation, above
all others, which by its commercial enterprise and wide-spread maritime
dominion has done, and is doing, far more than any in effecting that
distinctive revolution.”
What are we doing at the present day, it may be asked, to avoid this
reproach? If we may judge by the slowness with which anthropological
specimens came into the national collections (and it is difficult to
select a better test), the answer must surely be, I am afraid, in the
negative.
Of a still more popular type than the preceding was a lecture on the
“Races of Men,” delivered by Flower in the City Hall, Glasgow, on 28th
November 1878, and published as a separate pamphlet.
The third, and perhaps the most interesting lecture given by Flower
during the year under consideration, was the one at Manchester on
November 30th, on the “Aborigines of Tasmania,” which is published in the
tenth series of _Manchester Science Lectures_. In this discourse Flower
traced the sad story of European intercourse with this interesting
people and their final extermination; pointing out that the last male
died in 1869, and the last female in 1876. At the time this lecture was
delivered four complete skeletons of Tasmanians of both sexes had been
obtained and sent to England by the late Mr. Merton Allport, of Hobart.
Of these, two were then in the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons,
while the third was in the collection of the late Dr. Barnard Davis,
and the fourth in that of the Anthropological Institute of London. Dr.
Davis’s specimen came to the Museum of the College of Surgeons after
the owner’s death; and it was a great source of satisfaction to Sir
William that, in after years, he obtained the Anthropological Institute’s
specimen (which is remarkable for retaining the inter-frontal suture of
the skull) for the Natural History Museum. Somewhat less than thirty
Tasmanian skulls were at this time known to exist in England, and a few
have been since acquired for public collections. Flower dwelt upon the
close affinity of the Tasmanians to the Melanesians (although the skulls
of the two are perfectly distinguishable), and their wide difference from
their Australian neighbours.
Perhaps, however, the most important contribution made by Flower to
anthropology in 1878 was his paper on the “Methods and Results of
Measurements of the Capacity of Human Crania,” which appeared in the
_Report_ of the British Association for that year and also in _Nature_.
This was paving the way for the first part of the valuable “Catalogue of
Osteological Specimens in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons
of England,” which appeared in the following year, and is entirely
devoted to man. This accurate and laborious work was very far from being
a mere catalogue of the contents of this section of the museum under the
author’s charge, for it is in fact to a great extent a manual of the
methods employed in human craniology; tables and figures being given of
the manner in which the measurement of skulls are made, and the method of
calculating “cranial indexes.” For taking the cubical capacity of skulls
Flower employed mustard-seed, and the “craniometer” invented by Mr. Busk.
In the introduction is given a general sketch of the osteology of man,
followed by a dissertation on his dentition, and this, in turn, by an
account of the special osteological and dental features of the various
native races of the human species.
Earlier in the same year Flower had entered in some degree on the domain
of ethnology by contributing to the _Journal_ of the Anthropological
Institute a paper illustrating the “Mode of Preserving the Dead in
Darnley Island and in South Australia,” figuring the mummified body of a
Melanesian from the above-named island. Another paper of somewhat similar
nature from Flower’s pen was published in the same journal for 1881,
dealing with a collection of monumental heads and artificially deformed
crania of Melanesians from the Island of Mallicollo, in the New Hebrides.
These preserved heads have attracted the attention of Europeans ever
since Cook’s visit to the island in 1774; and appear to be quite unique.
“Whatever the special motive among the Mallicollese,” wrote Flower,
“whether they are the objects of worship or merely of affectionate
regard, it must be very difficult for a passing traveller without
intimate knowledge of the language and of the condition of mind and
thought of the people to ascertain; but the custom is obviously analogous
to many others which have prevailed throughout all historical times and
in many nations, manifesting itself among other forms in the mummified
bodies of the ancient Egyptians, and which has received its most æsthetic
expression in the marble busts placed over the mouldering bones in a
Christian cathedral.”
Reverting to 1879, we find in the _Journal_ of the Anthropological
Institute for that year an important and interesting paper by Flower on
the “Osteology and Affinities of the Natives of the Andaman Islands,”
a subject to which the author made a further contribution in the same
journal for November 1884. In the first of these communications the
author gave the results of the examination of nineteen skeletons and a
large series of skulls, while in the second he was able to amplify these,
and thus to render his averages more trustworthy by the details of no
less than ten additional skeletons. As in all his other papers of this
nature, Sir William first traced in considerable detail the history of
European intercourse with the Andamanese, or “Mincopies,” as they were
often called at one time, and then proceeded to point out the external
and osteological features of these interesting and diminutive people.
Relying to a great extent on the “frizzly,” or “woolly” character of
their hair, Flower was fully convinced that these people belong to the
Negro branch of the human family.
“With the Oceanic Negroes, or Melanesians, as they are now commonly
called, we might naturally suppose they had the most in common. But this
is not the case. Although the Melanesians vary much in stature, none are
so small as the Andamanese, and some are fully equal to the average of
the species. Their crania, whenever they are met with in a pure state,
are remarkably long, narrow, and high.... The pure Fijians are perhaps
the most dolichocephalic [long-headed] race in the world, and the New
Caledonians and the New Hebrideans come near them. In this respect they
are therefore as distinct as possible from the Andamanese.... As is well
known, the African frizzly-haired races are mostly of moderate or tall
stature, but there are among them some, as the Bushmen of the South,
and others less known from the Central regions, as diminutive as the
Andamanese.”
The lecturer then went on to state that although African Negroes were,
as a rule, of the long-headed type, yet there were even then indications
of the existence of round-headed races in the heart of the continent.
In conclusion, it was added that although their very rounded skulls
probably formed a special feature of the Andamanese, yet that he regarded
the “Negritos,” or group of which that race formed a section, “as
representing an infantile, undeveloped or primitive form of the type
from which the African Negroes on the one hand, and the Melanesians on
the other, with all their various modifications, may have sprung. Even
their very geographical position, in the centre of the great area of
distribution of the frizzly-haired races, seems to favour this view.
We may, therefore, regard them as little-modified descendants of an
extremely ancient race, the ancestors of all the Negro tribes.”
On the other hand, it was suggested that long isolation and restriction
to a confined area might have led to physical degeneration, so that the
peculiarities of the Andamanese type might be of comparatively recent
origin.
Another interesting race to which Sir William devoted special attention
was the Fijians, who, as already incidentally mentioned, offer the most
extreme contrast to the round-headed Andamanese, by the extreme length
and narrowness of their skulls. His paper on the “Cranial Characters
of the Natives of the Fiji Islands,” appeared in the _Journal_ of the
Anthropological Institute for 1880; and was illustrated, like the one
on the Andamanese, with carefully drawn figures of typical skulls.
After mentioning that nothing definite was known with regard to the
anthropology of one of the islands of the Fiji, or Viti, group, the
author added that “with regard to Viti Levu, all the evidence we possess
shows that the people who inhabit the interior of the island present
in their cranial conformation a remarkable purity of type, and that
this type conforms in the main with that of the Melanesian islands
generally; indeed they may be regarded as the most characteristic, almost
exaggerated, expressions of this type, for in ‘hypersistenocephaly’
(extreme narrowness of skull), they exceed the natives of Fati, in the
New Hebrides, to which the term was first applied.
“The intermixture of Tongans or other Polynesian blood with the Fijian,
appears to be confined to the smaller islands, and even in these not to
have very greatly modified the prevailing cranial characteristics.”
At the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science,
held at York in the autumn of 1881, Professor Flower, as Chairman of the
Department, read an address to the Anthropological Department on the
study and progress of anthropology, more especially in this country; at
the conclusion of which he urged the strong claim of the Anthropological
Institute of Great Britain and Ireland to the support of all interested
in that subject. Three years later (1884) he gave, as President, an
address “On the Aims and Prospects of the Study of Anthropology,” before
the last-named body, at the Anniversary Meeting in January. Here again
the speaker directed attention to the comparatively small degree of
interest taken in this country in this most important science, and urged
that not only scientific students, but wealthy men, ought to do something
towards aiding its progress. “Our insular position, maritime supremacy,
numerous dependencies, and ramifying commerce, have given us,” he
remarked, “unusually favourable opportunities for the formation of such
collections—opportunities which, unfortunately, in past times have not
been used so fully as might be desired.” A change, indeed, it was added,
had of late years come over matters in this respect; but, while fully
admitting this, it can scarcely be maintained that even at the present
day we are doing all that we might in this direction.
Between the years 1879 and 1885 inclusive, Flower appears to have
devoted much of his attention to elaborating a satisfactory biological
classification of the various races of mankind. In the former he drew up
a preliminary scheme of this nature, which was published in the _British
Medical Journal_ for 1879 and 1880, under the title of “Anatomical
Characters of the Races of Man.” Impressed with the importance of
having some well-marked feature, other than those afforded by the
skull, by means of which the skeletons of such races could easily be
distinguished, he turned his attention to the scapula, or shoulder-blade,
and in 1880, with the assistance of Dr. J. G. Garson, published in the
_Journal of Anatomy and Physiology_ a paper “On the Scapular Index
as a Race-Character in Man.” On the whole, although the number of
skeletons examined was confessedly insufficient, the results obtained
were decidedly satisfactory, and agreed fairly well with those of other
observers. The Australians and Andamanese, for instance, accorded in this
respect with the Negro type. On the other hand, Bushman skeletons, as had
been observed in Paris, approached in this respect to the Caucasian type,
while the Tasmanians were unexpectedly found to differ markedly from the
other black races in their scapular index.
In 1884, in a paper published in the _Journal_ of the Anthropological
Society, Sir William recorded the results of a large series of
observations in regard to the value of the size of the teeth as a
race-character, and was enabled, by means of a “dental index,” to
divide the human species into a “Microdont,” or small-toothed group,
a “Mesodont” group and a “Macrodont,” or large-toothed group. In the
first group were included Europeans and other members of the Caucasian
stock, as well as Polynesians, and many of the non-Aryan tribes of
Central and Southern India. In the second group came Chinese, American
Indians, Malays, and African Negroes; while in the third were included
Melanesians, Andamanese, Australians, and Tasmanians. If it be borne
in mind, as explained in the original paper, that the teeth in African
Negroes are actually larger than in Europeans, although the “index” is
reduced by the great length of the base of the cranium (which forms a
factor in the index) in the former, the results accord remarkably well
with the under-mentioned classification of the human species, which is
indeed partly based on the character in question.
“The Classification of the Varieties of the Human Species” is the title
of Flower’s Presidential Address to the Anniversary Meeting of the
Anthropological Institute, held in January 1885. In this scheme the
species was divided into three main stocks, or branches, namely (1) the
Negroid, or black; (2) the Mongolian, or yellow; and (3) the Caucasian,
or white. In the first were included the African or typical Negroes,
the Hottentots and Bushmen, the Oceanic Negroes or Melanesians, and the
Negritos of the Andaman Islands and other parts of Asia; the Australians
being provisionally classed near the Melanesians. The second, or
Mongolian, branch was taken to include the Eskimo, the typical Mongols of
Central and Northern Asia, the brown Polynesians or “Kanakas,” and the
so-called American Indians, from the great lakes of Canada to Patagonia
and Tierra del Fuego. In the third, or Caucasian, group were classed, of
course, all the remaining representatives of the human race, including
Europeans, the ancient Egyptians, and the modern fellahin of the Nile
delta, the natives of India, the Ainu of Japan, and the Veddas of Ceylon.
In the main, this classification has been very generally accepted by
anthropologists, although exception has naturally been taken to some of
the items. The Australians, for instance, which differ markedly from
all the undoubted representatives of the Negroid branch, form a case in
point. Sir William was inclined to think that these people do not form
a distinct race at all, but that they may be derived from a Melanesian
stock, modified by a strong infusion of some other race, probably a low
Caucasian type, more or less nearly allied to the Veddas of Ceylon or
some of the Dravidian races of Southern or Central India. It is added,
however, that the Australians may possibly be mainly sprung from a
very primitive type, from which the frizzly-haired Negroes branched
off; frizzly hair being probably a specialised feature not the common
attribute of the ancestral man; confirmation of this last supposition
being afforded, it may be mentioned, by the straight hair of the man-like
apes.
Neither of the above theories is, however, altogether satisfactory;
and it has been suggested by some writers that the Australians, like
the Veddas of Ceylon, and the Indian Dravidians, are a very primitive
Caucasian type. Against this, is their scapular index, their large teeth,
and projecting jaws (which must not be confused with protrusion of the
lips alone). Until, however, we know which of the three great human
branches was the one which traces its origin back to ape-like creatures,
it is almost impossible to arrive at any satisfactory conclusion on this
puzzling question.
Another point in regard to which Flower’s classification has met with
adverse criticism is the position assigned to the brown Polynesians,
which some authorities believe to be mainly of Caucasian origin, and
accordingly term Indonesians.
Taken as a whole there can, however, be no question but that the
classification proposed by Sir William was an extremely valuable
contribution to systematic anthropology.
The last two really important contributions to anthropology made by
Sir William were both published in 1888: the one, under the title of
“The Pygmy Races of Man,” in the _Proceedings_ of the Royal Institution
(forming an address); and the other, entitled “Description of Two
Skeletons of Akkas, a Pygmy Race from Central Africa,” in the _Journal_
of the Anthropological Institute. The second of these two communications
dealt with two imperfect skeletons—male and female—of the pigmy African
race known as Akkas, obtained by the late Dr. Emin Pasha at Monbotto
during his last expedition. The female specimen, which is the least
imperfect of the two, and is said to be that of a very old individual,
is now mounted in the Natural History Museum. In general character,
the skulls were found to come very close to the Negro type; it is true
they are somewhat less elongated, but the relative breadth proved to
be much less than the describer was led to expect from what had been
previously written with regard to the craniology of this tribe. The whole
skeleton fully confirmed earlier statements that the Akkas are the
most diminutive living people. They are quite distinct from the African
Bushmen (characterised, among other features, by their tawny skins), and
also from the Asiatic Negritos, as represented by the Andamanese; and
they accordingly seem rightly referred to a distinct branch of the Negro
stock, for which the name Negrillo has been suggested.
In the first of the two papers cited above, Sir William gave a general
account of all the races of mankind which can be included under the title
of “pigmies,” such as the Bushmen, Negrillos, and Negritos. As regards
the second group he wrote as follows:—
“The fact now seems clearly demonstrated that at various spots across
the great African Continent, within a few degrees north and south of the
Equator, extending from the Atlantic coast to near the shores of the
Albert Nyanza (30° E. long.) and perhaps ... even further to the east,
south of the Galla land, are still surviving, in scattered districts,
communities of these small Negroes, all much resembling each other in
size, appearance, and habits, and dwelling mostly apart from their
taller neighbours, by whom they are everywhere surrounded.... In many
parts, especially at the west, they are obviously holding their own with
difficulty, if not actually disappearing, and there is much about their
condition of civilisation, and the situations in which they are found,
to induce us to look upon them, as in the case of the Bushmen in the
south and the Negritos in the east, as the remains of a population which
occupied the land before the incoming of the present dominant races. If
the account of the Nasamenians, related by Herodotus, be accepted as
historical, the river they came to, ‘flowing from west to east,’ must
have been the Niger, and the northward range of the dwarfish people far
more extensive twenty-three centuries ago than it is at the present time.”
Sir William’s only remaining anthropological paper of any importance
appears to be one on skulls of the aboriginal natives of Jamaica,
published in the _Journal_ of the Anthropological Institute for 1890.
It should not, however, be forgotten that, as more fully narrated in an
earlier chapter, one of the last acts of Sir William’s scientific career
was to organise the arrangement of the anthropological series in the
Natural History Branch of the British Museum—an undertaking of which he
was not spared to witness the completion (so far as anything of this
nature can be said to be anywhere near “complete”).
If he had left nothing but his anthropological labours to bear testimony
to his zeal for science and his capacity for organisation, Sir William
Flower would have deserved well of posterity. And it should be recorded
to his credit that the majority of naturalists, at all events in this
country, are employing, with some minor modifications, not only his
anthropological classification, but that of mammals in general. It is
true that both these schemes were based on the labours and ideas of his
predecessors, but it was reserved for him to so modify and improve them
as to lead to the almost universal acceptation with which they have been
received.
CHAPTER VIII
MUSEUM AND MISCELLANEOUS WORK
Much of the substance of this chapter has been already alluded to in the
earlier portions of the present volume; but it has been found convenient
to give Sir William’s views on the objects and arrangement of museums
somewhat more fully in this place, while reference is also made to
various items of miscellaneous work which do not fall within the scope of
either of the three previous chapters.
Of Flower’s hereditary interest in the crusade against tight
bearing-reins, and his official connection with the Anti-Bearing-Rein
Association, sufficient mention has been already made in the first
chapter. It will likewise be unnecessary in this place to do more than
mention his _Diagrams of the Nerves of the Human Body_ published in 1861,
to his “Supplement to the Catalogue of the Pathological Series in the
Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons,” issued in 1863, and to certain
articles on surgical subjects contributed by him at an early portion of
his career. All these, coupled with the practical experience he gained
during his Crimean service, indicate, however, that had Sir William
decided to devote his energies and talents to surgery as a permanent
occupation, there is little doubt he would have risen to high eminence in
that profession.
The little work entitled _Fashion in Deformity_, is based on a Friday
Evening lecture at the Royal Institution, delivered on 7th May 1880,
and first published in the _Proceedings_ of the Institution for the
same year. In its separate, and more fully illustrated form, it was
issued in 1881. This is certainly one of Flower’s most original efforts,
touching upon ground much of which has received but little notice from
either earlier or later writers. The subjects discussed include the
origin of fashion; mutilations of domesticated animals by man for the
sake of fashion; fashion in hair and in finger-nails; tattooing; fashion
in noses, ears, lips, teeth, and head, the latter being illustrated by
the curious custom prevalent among certain widely sundered races of
forcibly compressing the cranium in infancy by means of bandages, so as
to permanently modify and alter its contour to a greater or less degree.
Analogous to this compression of the head is the crippling by bandages of
the feet of Chinese female infants, which is described in some detail.
But the author is of opinion that European nations are scarcely less to
blame in the matter of distorting the feet for the sake of fashion; and
pointed-toed and high-heeled boots and shoes come in for his most severe
condemnation. Neither, as mentioned in the first chapter, was he less
scathing in his diatribes against the corset and tight-lacing. That the
last-mentioned article of female attire is likewise charged in certain
instances with being the inducing cause of cancer was however probably
unknown to him.
That these strictures against the prevalent fashions of our own days
had little or no practical result (certainly none in the case of the
female sex), may be taken for granted. The work has, however, a very
considerable amount of interest as illustrating a number of instances of
the manner in which uncivilised nations modify and mutilate various parts
of the body for the sake of what they are pleased to regard as ornament,
or fashion; and is therefore a valuable contribution to ethnology.
The address delivered by Flower at the meeting of the Church Congress,
held at Reading in 1883, on the bearing of recent scientific advances on
the Christian faith, has likewise been alluded to in the first chapter.
It will therefore suffice here to quote a portion of the concluding
paragraph, which demonstrates that nothing among modern discoveries had
served to shake in the very slightest degree the author’s profound belief
in all the essential truths of the faith of his forefathers.
“Science,” he observes, “has thrown some light, little enough at present,
but ever increasing, and for which we should all be thankful, upon the
processes or methods by which the world in which we dwell has been
brought into its present condition. The wonder and mystery of Creation
remain as wonderful and mysterious as before. Of the origin of the whole,
science tells us nothing. It is still as impossible as ever to conceive
that such a world, governed by laws, the operations of which have led to
such mighty results, and are attended by such future promise, could have
originated without the intervention of some power external to itself. If
the succession of small miracles, supposed to regulate the operations of
nature, no longer satisfies us, have we not substituted for them one of
immeasurable greatness and grandeur?”
Although he does not say so in so many words, there is little doubt
(reading between the lines) that Flower regarded the evolution of
animated Nature as part of a preordained divine plan, and that he had
little, if any, faith in such theories as “survival of the fittest,” as
the true explanation of Nature’s riddle.
This address, like most of the other addresses and papers discussed in
this chapter, is reprinted in _Essays on Museums_.
We pass now to the concluding portion of our subject, namely Flower’s
influence and example in modifying and advancing previous conceptions as
to the functions and objects of museums, and the mode and manner in which
their contents should be arranged and distributed: on the one hand for
the purpose of instructing and interesting the public, and on the other
for advancing the study of biological science. In many respects this was
perhaps the most important item in Flower’s life-work; and he may be said
to have created the art of museum development and display.
In regard to the value and importance of his labours in this respect, no
better testimony can be adduced than that given by such a distinguished
adept in this kind of work as Professor E. Ray Lankester, the present
Director of the Natural History Departments of the British Museum.
“The arrangement and exhibition of specimens designed and carried out by
Flower in both instances,” writes Professor Lankester, after alluding to
his predecessor’s labours first at the Royal College of Surgeons, and
afterwards at the British Museum, “was so definite an improvement on
previous methods, that he deserves to be considered as an originator
and inventor in museum work. His methods have not only met with general
approval, and their application with admiration, but they have been
largely adapted and copied by other Curators and Directors of public
museums both at home and abroad.”
Much has been said with regard to Flower’s views on museum arrangement in
the chapter devoted to his official connection with the British Museum.
It may, however, be permissible to repeat that in his epoch-making
address on museum organisation, delivered before the British Association
in 1889, he insisted, in the case of large central public museums, on the
absolute necessity of separating the study from the exhibition series;
and likewise on the limited number and careful selection of the specimens
which should be shown to the public in the latter, and the prime
importance of carefully-written and simply-worded descriptive labels for
each group of specimens, if not, indeed, for each individual specimen.
His idea was, in fact, that the specimens should illustrate the labels
rather than the labels the specimens. A limited number, rather than
an extensive series, of exhibited specimens, and ample room for each,
were also features in his progress of reform. Not less emphatic was Sir
William on the importance of combining the extinct with the living forms
in our museums; but this, as stated elsewhere, he was unable to carry out
in the national collection.
It was, however, by no means only in our great national museums that
Flower took so much interest, and advocated (and to a great extent
succeeded in carrying out) such sweeping and beneficial changes. He
was equally convinced of the supreme importance and value, as educating
media, of school and county museums, if organised and kept up on proper
and rational lines; and he did all that lay in his power to promote the
establishment, extension, or development of institutions of this nature.
At the request of the Head-Master, in 1889, Flower furnished some written
advice as to the best method of arranging a museum at Eton College, and
these were published as an article in _Nature_ for that year, under the
title of “School Museums.” The writer observed that the subjects best
adapted for such a museum are zoology, botany, mineralogy, and geology;
adding that “everything in the museum should have some distinct object,
coming under one or other of the above subjects, and under one or other
of the series defined below, and everything else should be rigorously
excluded. The Curator’s business will be quite as much to keep useless
specimens out of the museum as to acquire those that are useful.” It was
further urged that the “Index Museum,” in the Natural History Museum,
furnished the best guide to the lines on which a school museum should be
furnished and arranged, but that the exhibits should be restricted to a
simpler and less detailed series.
Under the title of “Natural History as a Vocation,” Sir William published
in _Chambers’ Journal_ for April 1897 an article dealing with biology
as a profession, and also discussing the best means of encouraging and
directing the “collecting instinct,” which is so marked a feature in
some boys. This article is reprinted in _Essays on Museums_, under the
title of “Boys’ Museums.” It serves to show that Flower considered the
aforesaid “collecting instinct” worthy, under certain restrictions, of
every encouragement.
Since the appearance of Flower’s article pointing out their value and
importance, natural history museums have been established at many, if not
most, of our public schools besides Eton. Those at Marlborough, Rugby,
and Haileybury may be specially noticed as being, to a great extent,
arranged on the lines advocated by Sir William.
As regards county and other local museums, Flower in the article under
the latter title, published in _Essays on Museums_, advocated that these,
in addition to natural history specimens, should likewise illustrate the
archæology, and indeed the general history of the district; obsolete
implements, such as flint-and-steel and candle-snuffers, if of local
origin, legitimately finding a place within its walls. The natural
history of the locality, needless to say, should be well illustrated, and
so arranged and named that any visitor can easily identify every creature
and plant he may have met with during his rambles in the district.
The subject of administration is next discussed, when after fully
admitting the value of volunteer assistance, the writer lays it down as
imperative that a competent paid Curator must be engaged if the museum is
to be really useful and to properly fulfil its purpose.
Now that so many institutions of this nature are under the control of
the County Councils, and their expenses defrayed out of the rates, the
following passage has a most important bearing on the management of
local museums:—
“The scope of the museum,” observes Sir William, “should be strictly
defined and limited; there must be nothing like the general miscellaneous
collection of ‘curiosities,’ thrown indiscriminately together, which
constituted the old-fashioned country museum. I think we are all agreed
as to the local character predominating. One section should contain
antiquities and illustrations of local manners and customs; another
section, local natural history, zoology, botany, and geology. The
boundaries of the county will afford a good limit for both. Everything
not occurring in a state of nature within that boundary should be
rigorously excluded. In addition to this, it may be desirable to have a
small general collection designed and arranged specially for elementary
instruction in science.”
These words of warning deserve, in the present writer’s opinion, more
attention than they have yet received at the hands of those responsible
for the administration of not a few local museums.
It may be added that Flower was of opinion that ordinary local museums
should not undertake original research work, which should be reserved
for the larger establishments in our chief cities and the metropolis.
With the means at their disposal—often insufficient even for the proper
functions—local museums should have quite enough to do in illustrating
local products.
Not that Sir William Flower was of opinion that, in our larger cities,
museums of a totally different nature from the local museum on the one
hand and from the general museum on the other, may not have a justifiable
_locus standi_. This is amply demonstrated by his remarks (republished
in _Essays on Museums_) on the occasion of the opening of the Booth
Museum at Brighton, in November 1890, which contains one of the finest
and best mounted collection of British birds in the kingdom.
FOOTNOTES
[1] The writer is indebted to the Secretary of the Middlesex Hospital for
these particulars.
[2] At the cost of a gap in the systematic series, a step has been
subsequently made in this direction by the transference of the elephants
and sea-cows to the Geological Department.
[3] An American writer has recently attributed, quite unjustifiably, the
names in question to Flower.
[4] The present writer has the less compunction in making this assertion,
seeing that he himself is responsible for naming no inconsiderable number
of these so-called sub-species of mammals.
[5] _Scottish Review_, April, 1900, p. 5.
[6] From the extract from Professor M’Intosh’s notice of Flower’s work
above cited, it might be inferred that Owen first proposed the terms
Archencephala, Gyrencephala, etc., at the Cambridge Meeting of the
British Association in 1862. This is not so, as these terms were used by
him in a paper read before the Linnæan Society in 1857, and also in his
Reade Lecture “On the Classification and Geographical Distribution of the
Mammalia,” delivered at Cambridge on 10th May, 1859, and published in
London (by J. W. Parker) as a separate volume the same year.
[7] _American Journal of Science_, vol. xi. p. 336 (1901).
APPENDIX A
SOME BIOGRAPHICAL AND OBITUARY NOTICES OF SIR WILLIAM FLOWER.
_The Biograph and Review_, vol. vi. No. 31 (1881).
_Medical News_, 16th December 1881.
_Contemporary Medical Men_, London, 1887.
_The Times_, 3rd July 1899.
_The Spectator_, July 1899.
_Nature_, 13th July 1889. Professor E. R. Lankester.
_Natural Science_, August 1899. R. Lydekker.
_Geological Magazine_, August 1899. Dr. H. Woodward.
_Scottish Review_, April 1900. Professor M’Intosh.
“Year-book” of the Royal Society, 1901. W. C. M.
“Sir William Henry Flower, K.C.B.; A Personal Memoir.” By C. J. Cornish.
London, 1904.
APPENDIX B
LIST OF THE MORE IMPORTANT SCIENTIFIC PUBLICATIONS OF SIR WILLIAM FLOWER.
A. BOOKS AND SEPARATE PAMPHLETS.
1. “Diagrams of the Nerves of the Human Body, Exhibiting their Origin,
Divisions, and Connections.” London, 1861.
2. “A Supplement to the Catalogue of the Pathological Series in the
Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons.” London, 1863.
3. “Introductory Lectures to the Course of Comparative Anatomy, delivered
at the Royal College of Surgeons of England, 1870.” London, 1870.
4. “An Introduction to the Osteology of the Mammalia,” being the
substance of the course of lectures delivered at the Royal College of
Surgeons of England in 1870. London, 1870. Second edition, 1876. Third
edition (revised with the assistance of Hans Gadow), 1885.
5. “Catalogue of the Specimens illustrating the Osteology and Dentition
of Vertebrated Animals, Recent and Extinct, contained in the Museum of
the Royal College of Surgeons of England.” London. Part I. Man (1879);
Part II. Mammalia (1884), written in conjunction with Dr. J. G. Garson.
6. “Fashion in Deformity, as Illustrated in the Customs of Barbarous and
Civilised Races.” (_Nature_ series). London, 1881. Also published in the
_Proceedings_ of the Royal Institution for 1880.
7. “Recent Advances in Natural Science, in their Relation to the
Christian Faith.” A paper read before the Church Congress, 1885. London,
1885.
8. “Recent Memoirs on the Cetacea,” by Eschricht, Reinhardt, and
Lilljeborg. A Translation. London (Ray Society), 1866.
9. “List of the Specimens of Cetacea in the Zoological Department of the
British Museum.” London, 1885.
10. “An Introduction to the Study of Mammals Living and Extinct” (written
in collaboration with R. Lydekker). London, 1891.
11. “The Horse: a Study in Natural History.” London, 1891.
12. “Essays on Museums and Other Subjects connected with Natural
History.” London, 1898.
B. ZOOLOGICAL AND ANATOMICAL MEMOIRS, ARTICLES, AND NOTES PUBLISHED IN
SCIENTIFIC SERIALS, ETC.
_a. In the “Philosophical Transactions” of the Royal Society of London._
13. “Observations on the Posterior Lobes of the Cerebrum of the
Quadrumana, with the Description of the Brain of a Galago,” vol. clii.
pp. 185-201 (1862). Abstract in _Proc. Roy. Soc._, vol. xi. pp. 376-381
(1860).
14. “On the Commissures of the Cerebral Hemispheres of the Marsupialia
and Monotremata, as compared with those of the Placental Mammals,” vol.
clv. pp. 633-651 (1865). Abstract in _Proc. Roy. Soc._, vol. xiv. pp.
71-74 (1865.)
15. “On the Development and Succession of the Teeth in the Marsupialia,”
vol. clvii. pp. 631-642 (1867). Abstract in _Proc. Roy. Soc._, vol. xv.
pp. 464-468 (1867), and in _Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist._, vol. xx. pp. 129-133
(1867.)
16. “On a Newly-discovered Extinct Mammal from Patagonia
(_Homalodontotherium cunninghami_),” vol. clxiv. pp. 173-182 (1874).
Abstract in _Proc. Roy. Soc._, vol. xxi. p. 383 (1873).
17. “Seals and Cetaceans from Kerguelen Island (_Transit of Venus
Expeditions_, 1874 and 1875),” vol. clxviii. pp. 95-100 (1876).
_b. In the “Proceedings” of the Royal Society of London._
18. Reply to Professor Owen’s paper: “On Zoological Names of
Characteristic Parts and Homological Interpretations and Beginnings,
especially in reference to Connecting Fibres of the Brain,” vol. xiv. pp.
134-139 (1865).
_c. In the “Transactions” of the Zoological Society of London._
19. “On the Brain of the Javan Loris (_Stenops javanicus_, Illig.),” vol.
v. pp. 103-111 (1866).
20. “Description of the Skeleton of _Inia geoffroyensis_, and of the
Skull of _Pontoporia blainvillei_,” vol. vi. pp. 87-116 (1869).
21. “On the Osteology of the Sperm-Whale or Cachalot (_Physeter
macrocephalus_),” vol. vi. pp. 309-372 (1869).
22. “Description of the Skeleton of the Chinese White Dolphin (_Delphinus
sinensis_),” vol. vii. pp. 151-160 (1872).
23. “On Risso’s Dolphin (_Grampus griseus_),” vol. viii. pp. 1-21 (1873).
24. “On the Recent Ziphioid Whales, with a Description of the Skeleton
of _Berardius arnuxi_,” vol. viii. pp. 203-234 (1873).
25. “A Further Contribution to the Knowledge of the Existing Ziphioid
Whales; Genus _Mesoplodon_,” vol. x. pp. 415-437 (1878).
_d. In the “Proceedings” of the Zoological Society of London._
26. “Notes on the Dissection of a Species of Galago,” 1852, pp. 73-75.
27. “On the Structure of the Gizzard of the Nicobar Pigeon and
Granivorous Birds,” 1860, pp. 330-334.
28. “Notes on the Anatomy of _Pithecia monachus_, Geoffr.,” 1862, pp.
326-333.
29. “On the Optic Lobes of the Brain of the _Echidna_,” 1864, pp. 18-20.
30. “On a Lesser Fin-Whale (_Balænoptera rostrata_, Fabr.) recently
stranded on the Norfolk Coast,” 1864, pp. 252-258.
31. “On the Brain of the Red Howling Monkey (_Mycetes seniculus_,
Linn.),” 1864, pp. 335-338.
32. “Notes on the Skeletons of Whales in the Principal Museums of Holland
and Belgium, with Descriptions of Two Species, apparently new to Science
(_Sibbaldius schlegeli_ and _Physalus latirostris_),” 1864, pp. 384-420.
33. “On a New Species of Grampus (_Orca meridionalis_), from Tasmania,”
1864, pp. 420-426.
34. “Note on _Pseudorca meridionalis_,” 1865, pp. 470-471.
35. “On _Physalus sibbaldii_, Gray,” 1865, pp. 472-474.
36. “Observations upon a Fin-Whale (_Physalus antiquorum_, Gray) recently
stranded in Pevensey Bay,” 1865, pp. 699-705.
37. “On the Gular Pouch of the Great Bustard (_Otis tarda_, Linn.),”
1865, pp. 747-748.
38. “Note on the Visceral Anatomy of _Hyomoschus aquaticus_,” 1867, pp.
954-960.
39. “On the Probable Identity of the Fin-Whales described as _Balænoptera
carolinæ_, Malm., and _Physalus sibbaldii_, Gray,” 1868, pp. 187-189.
40. “On the Development and Succession of the Teeth in the Armadillos,”
1868, pp. 378-380.
41. “On the Value of the Characters of the Base of the Cranium in the
Classification of the Order Carnivora, and on the Systematic Position of
_Bassaris_ and Other Disputed Forms,” 1869, pp. 4-37.
42. “Note on a Substance Ejected from the Stomach of a Hornbill,” 1869,
p. 150.
43. “On the Anatomy of the _Proteles cristatus_, Sparmann,” 1869, pp.
474-496.
44. “Additional Note on a Specimen of the Common Fin-Whale (_Physalus
antiquorum_, Gray, _Balænoptera musculus_, Auct.) Stranded in Langston
Harbour, November 1869,” 1870, pp. 330 and 331.
45. “On the Anatomy of _Ælurus fulgens_, Fr. Cuv.,” 1870, pp. 752-769.
46. “On the Skeleton of the Australian Cassowary,” 1871, pp. 32-35.
47. “On the Occurrence of the Ringed or Marbled Seal (_Phoca hispida_) on
the Coast of Norfolk, with Remarks on the Synonymy of the Species,” 1861,
pp. 506-512.
48. “Remarks on a Rare Australian Whale of the Genus _Ziphius_,” 1871, p.
631.
49. “Note on the Anatomy of the Two-Spotted Paradoxure (_Nandinia
binotata_),” 1872, pp. 683 and 684.
50. “On the Structure and Affinities of the Musk-deer, (_Moschus
moschiferus_, Linn.),” 1875, pp. 159-190.
51. “Description of the Skull of a Species of _Xiphodon_, Cuvier,” 1876,
pp. 3-7.
52. “On some Cranial and Dental Characters of the Existing Species of
Rhinoceros,” 1876, pp. 443-457.
53. “Remarks upon _Ziphius novæ-zealandiæ_ and _Mesoplodon floweri_,”
1876, pp. 477 and 478.
54. “On the Skull of a Rhinoceros (_R. lasiotis_, Scl.) from India,”
1878, pp. 634-636.
55. “On the Common Dolphin (_Delphinus delphis_, Linn.),” 1879, pp.
382-384.
56. “Remarks upon a Drawing of _Delphinus tursio_,” 1879, p. 386.
57. “Remarks upon the Skull of a Female Otaria (_Otaria gillespii_),”
1879, p. 551.
58. “Remarks upon the Skull of a Beluga, or White Whale (_Delphinapterus
leucas_),” 1879, pp. 667-669.
59. “On the Cæcum of the Red Wolf (_Canis jubatus_, Desm.),” 1879, pp.
766 and 767.
60. “On the Bush-Dog (_Icticyon venaticus_, Lund),” 1880, pp. 70-76.
61. “On the Elephant-Seal (_Macrorhinus leoninus_, Linn.),” 1881, pp.
145-162.
62. “Notes on the Habits of the Manatee,” 1881, pp. 453-456.
63. “On the Mutual Affinities of the Animals composing the Order
Edentata,” 1882, pp. 358-367.
64. “On the Cranium of a New Species of _Hyperöodon_, from the Australian
Seas,” 1882, pp. 392-396.
65. “On the Skull of a Young Chimpanzee,” 1882, pp. 634-636.
66. “On the Whales of the Genus _Hyperöodon_,” 1882, pp. 722-734.
67. “On the Arrangement of the Orders and Families of existing Mammalia,”
1883, pp. 178-186.
68. “On the Characters and Divisions of the Family _Delphinidæ_,” 1883,
pp. 466-513.
69. “On a Specimen of Rudolphi’s Rorqual (_Balænoptera borealis_, Lesson)
lately taken on the Essex Coast,” 1883, pp. 513-517.
70. “Remarks on the Burmese Elephant lately deposited in the Society’s
Gardens,” 1884, p. 44.
71. “Remarks upon Four Skulls of the Common Bottle-nose Whale
(_Hyperöodon rostratus_), showing the Development, with Age, of the
Maxillary Crests,” 1884, p. 206.
72. “Exhibition of a Mass of pure Spermaceti, obtained from the
‘head-matter’ of _Hyperöodon_,” 1884, p. 206.
73. “Note on the Dentition of a young Capybara (_Hydrochærus capybara_),”
1884, pp. 252 and 253.
74. “Note on the Names of Two Genera of _Delphinidæ_,” 1884, p. 417.
75. “Remarks upon a Specimen of Rudolphi’s Rorqual (_Balænoptera
borealis_) taken in the Thames, 1887,” p. 564.
76. “On the Pygmy Hippopotamus of Liberia (_Hippopotamus liberiensis_,
Morton), and its Claims to Distinct Generic Rank,” 1887, pp. 612-614.
77. “Remarks upon a Specimen of a Japanese Cock, with Elongated Upper
Tail-coverts,” 1888, p. 248.
78. “Remarks upon the Skin of the Face of a Male African Rhinoceros with
a Third Horn,” 1889, p. 448.
79. “Remarks upon a Photograph of the Nest of a Hornbill (_Tocus
melanoleucus_), in which the Female was shown ‘walled in,’” 1890, p. 401.
80. “Remarks on the Rules of Zoological Nomenclature,” 1896, pp. 319-320.
_e. In the “Natural History Review.”_
81. “On the Brain of the Siamang (_Hylobates syndactylus_, Raffles),”
1863, pp. 279-287.
82. “Note on the Number of Cervical Vertebræ in the Sirenia,” 1864, pp.
259-264.
_f. In the “Journal of Anatomy and Physiology.”_
83. “On the Homologies and Notation of the Teeth of the Mammalia,” vol.
iii. pp. 262-278 (1869); Abstract in _Rep. Brit. Assoc._, vol. xxxviii.
(Trans. of Sections), pp. 262-288 (1868).
84. “On the Composition of the Carpus of the Dog,” series 2, vol. vi. pp.
62-64 (1870).
85. “On the Correspondence between the Parts Composing the Shoulder and
the Pelvic Girdle of the Mammalia,” vol. vi. pp. 239-249 (1870).
86. “Note on the Carpus of the Sloths,” vol. vii. pp. 255 and 256 (1873).
_g. In the “Quarterly Journal” of the Geological Society of London._
87. “On the Affinities and Probable Habits of the Extinct Australian
Marsupial, _Thylacoleo carnifex_, Owen,” vol. xxiv. pp. 307-319 (1868).
88. “Description of the Skull of a Species of _Halitherium_ (_H.
canhami_) from the Red Crag of Suffolk,” vol. xxx. pp. 1-7 (1874).
89. “Note on the Occurrence of Remains of _Hyænarctus_ in the Red Crag of
Suffolk,” vol. xxxiii. pp. 534-536 (1877).
_h. In the “Proceedings” of the Royal Institution._
90. “On Palæontological Evidence of Gradual Modification of Animal
Forms,” vol. vii. pp. 94-104 (1873).
91. “The Extinct Animals of North America,” vol. viii. pp. 103-105
(1876), and _Popular Science Review_, vol. xv. pp. 267-298 (1876).
92. “On Whales, Past and Present, and their Probable Origin,” vol. x. pp.
360-376 (1883).
_i. In the “Report” of the British Association for the Advancement of
Science._
93. “On the Connexion of the Hyoid Arch with the Cranium,” vol. xl.
(Trans. of Sections), pp. 136 and 137 (1870).
94. “A Century’s Progress in Zoological Knowledge,” vol. xlviii., pp.
549-558 (1878), and _Nature_, vol. xviii. pp. 419-423 (1878).
_j. In the Annals and Magazine of Natural History._
95. “On a Sub-Fossil Whale (_Eschrichtius robustus_) Discovered in
Cornwall,” ser. 4, vol. ix. pp. 440-442 (1872).
96. “Extinct Lemurina,” ser. 4, vol. xvii. pp. 323-328 (1876).
_k. In the “Journal” of the Royal Colonial Institute._
97. “Whales and Whale Fisheries”: a Lecture delivered at the Royal
Colonial Institute on 8th January 1885 (1885).
_l. In Nature._
98. “On the Arrangement and Nomenclature of the Lobes of the Liver in
Mammalia,” vol. vi. pp. 346-365 (1872); and also _Rep. Brit. Assoc._,
vol. xlii. (Trans. of Sections), pp. 150 and 151 (1872).
99. “On the Ziphioid Whales,” vol. v. pp. 103-106 (1872).
100. “Museum Specimens for Teaching Purposes,” vol. xv. pp. 144-146,
184-186, and 204-206 (1876).
_m. In the “Transactions” of the Geological Society of Cornwall._
101. “On the Bones of a Whale found at Petuan,” 1872, 8 pp.
_n. In the “Bulletin” of the Brussels Academy._
102. “Sur le basin et le fémur d’une Balénoptère,” vol. xxi. pp. 131 and
132 (1866).
_o. In the “Medical Times” and “Gazette.”_
103. “Comparative Anatomy,” a Lecture, 1870.
104. “Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy of the Organs of Digestion of
the Mammalia,” delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons of England, in
February and March 1872.
_p. In the “Transactions” of the Odontological Society of London._
105. “On the First or Milk Dentition of the Mammalia,” vol. iii. pp.
211-232 (1871).
106. “Note on the Specimens of Abnormal Dentition in the Museum of the
Royal College of Surgeons,” vol. xii. pp. 32-47 (1880).
_q. In the “British Medical Journal.”_
107. “Dentition of the Mammalia,” 1871.
108. “History of Extinct Mammals, and their Relation to Existing Forms,”
1874.
109. “The Anatomy of the Cetacea and Edentata,” 1881 and 1882.
_r. In the “Encyclopædia Britannica,” 9th Ed._
110. “The Horse,” vol. xii. pp. 172-181 (1881).
111. “Mammalia” (_Insectivora_, _Chiroptera_ and _Rodentia_, by G. E.
Dobson), vol. xv. pp. 347-446 (1883).
112. “Whale,” vol. xxiv. pp. 523-529 (1888).
And other articles.
_s. In the “Report” of the Council of the Zoological Society._
113. “On the Progress of Zoology”: Address to the General Meeting held at
the Society’s Gardens, 16th June 1887. Appendix, 1887, pp. 37-67.
_t. In the “Transactions” of the Middlesex Natural History Society._
114. “Horns and Antlers,” 1887, pp. 1-10.
C. ANTHROPOLOGICAL PAPERS.
_a. In the “Journal” of the Anthropological Institute._
115. “Illustrations of the Modes of Preserving the Dead in Darnley Island
and in South Australia,” vol. viii. pp. 389-394 (1879).
116. “On the Osteology and Affinities of the Natives of the Andaman
Islands,” vol. ix. pp. 108-135 (1879).
117. “On the Cranial Characters of the Natives of the Fiji Islands,” vol.
x. pp. 153-173 (1880).
118. “On a Collection of Monumental Heads and Artificially deformed
Crania from the Island of Mallicollo, in the New Hebrides,” vol. xi. pp.
75-81 (1881).
119. “On the Aims and Prospects of the Study of Anthropology,” vol. xiii.
pp. 488-501 (1884).
120. “Additional Observations on the Osteology of the Natives of the
Andaman Islands,” vol. xiv. pp. 115-120 (1884).
121. “On the size of the Teeth as a Character of Race,” vol. xiv. pp.
183-186 (1884).
122. “On the Classification of the Varieties of the Human Species,” vol.
xiv. pp. 378-395 (1885).
122A. “On a Nicobarese Skull,” vol. xvi. pp. 147-149 (1886).
123. “Description of two Skeletons of Akkas, a Pygmy Race from Central
Africa,” vol. xviii. pp. 3-19 (1888).
124. “On two Skulls from a Cave in Jamaica,” vol. xx. pp. 110-112 (1890).
_b. In the “Report” of the British Association._
125. “Methods and Results of Measurements of the Capacity of Human
Crania,” 1878, pp. 581, 582; and _Nature_, vol. xviii. pp. 480, 481
(1878).
126. “The Study and Progress of Anthropology” (Address to Anthrop. Dept.
of Zoological Section), 1881, pp. 682-689; and _Nature_, vol. xxiv. pp.
436-439 (1881).
_c. In “Nature.”_
127. “The Comparative Anatomy of Man” (Abstract of Lectures), vol. xx.
pp. 222-225, 244-246 (1879), and 267-269; vol. xxii. pp. 59-61, 78-80,
97-100 (1880).
_d. In the “British Medical Journal.”_
128. “The Anatomical Characters of the Races of Man,” 1879 and 1880.
_e. In the “Journal of Anatomy and Physiology.”_
129. “On the Scapular Index as a Race-Character in Man,” vol. xiv., pp.
13-17 (1880), written in co-operation with Dr. J. G. Garson.
_f. In the Manchester Science Lectures for the People._
130. “The Aborigines of Tasmania, an Extinct Race.” A Lecture delivered
in Hulme Town Hall, Manchester, 30th November 1878, ser. x. pp. 41-53.
_g. In “Report” of Glasgow Science Lectures Association._
131. “The Races of Man,” 53 pp. Glasgow (1878).
_h. In the “Proceedings” of the Royal Institution._
132. “The Native Races of the Pacific Ocean,” vol. viii. pp. 602-652
(1878).
133. “The Pygmy Races of Men,” vol. xii. pp. 266-283 (1888).
D. ON MUSEUMS AND MUSEUM ARRANGEMENTS.
134. “The Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.”
Presidential Address to the Anatomical Section of the International
Medical Congress, held in London, 4th August 1881. [Reprinted in _Essays
on Museums_, as are the other papers and addresses quoted under this
heading.]
135. “Museum Organisation.” Presidential Address to the British
Association for the Advancement of Science, at the Newcastle-on-Tyne
Meeting, 11th September 1889. _Rep. Brit. Assoc._, 1889.
136. “School Museums: Suggestions for the Formation and Arrangement of
Natural History in connection with a Public School.” _Nature_, 26th
December 1889.
137. “The Booth Museum.” Address at the Opening of the Booth Museum,
Brighton, 3rd November 1890. _Zoologist_, December 1890.
138. “Local Museums.” From a letter in support of the establishment of a
County Museum for Buckinghamshire (24th November 1891), and an Address at
the Opening of the Perth Museum (29th November 1895).
139. “Modern Museums.” Presidential Address to the Museums’ Association,
at the Meeting held in London, 3rd July 1893. _Museums’ Association
Journal_, 1893.
140. “Natural History as a Vocation (Boys’ Museums).” _Chambers’s
Edinburgh Journal_, April 1897.
E. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES BY SIR WILLIAM FLOWER
_Mostly Republished in “Essays on Museums.”_
141. “Biographical Notice of Professor Rolleston.” _Proc. Roy. Soc._,
1882.
142. Obituary Notice of George Busk. _Journ. Anthrop. Inst._, vol. xvi.,
p. 403 (1886).
143. “Biographical Notice of Sir Richard Owen.” _Proc. Roy. Soc._, 1894.
144. “Reminiscences of Professor Huxley.” _The North American Review_,
September 1895.
145. “Eulogium on Charles Darwin.” Centenary Meeting of the Linnean
Society, 24th May 1888.
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