uent the zodiac, and scarcely ever attain to a heliocentric
latitude of 40 degrees. And that they move in orbits very nearly
parabolical, I infer from their velocity; for the velocity with which a
parabola is described is everywhere to the velocity with which a comet
or planet may be revolved about the sun in a circle at the same
distance in the subduplicate ratio of 2 to 1; and, by my computation,
the velocity of comets is found to be much about the same. I examined
the thing by inferring nearly the velocities from the distances, and the
distances both from the parallaxes and the phenomena of the tails, and
never found the errors of excess or defect in the velocities greater
than what might have arisen from the errors in the distances collected
after that manner.

SIR RICHARD OWEN

Anatomy of Vertebrates

Sir Richard Owen, the great naturalist, was born July 20, 1804, at
Lancaster, England, and received his early education at the grammar
school of that town. Thence he went to Edinburgh University. In
1826 he was admitted a member of the English College of Surgeons,
and in 1829 was lecturing at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, London,
where he had completed his studies. His "Memoir on the Pearly
Nautillus," published in 1832, placed him, says Huxley, "at a bound
in the front rank of anatomical monographers," and for sixty-two
years the flow of his contributions to scientific literature never
ceased. In 1856 he was appointed to take charge of the natural
history departments of the British Museum, and before long set
forth views as to the inadequacy of the existing accommodation,
which led ultimately to the foundation of the buildings now devoted
to this purpose in South Kensington. Owen died on December 18,
1892. His great book, "Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the
Vertebrates," was completed in 1868, and since Cuvier's
"Comparative Anatomy," is the most monumental treatise on the
subject by any one man. Although much of the classification adopted
by Owen has not been accepted by other zoologists, yet the work
contains an immense amount of information, most of which was gained
from Owen's own personal observations and dissections.

_I.--Biological Questions of 1830_

At the close of my studies at the Jardin des Plantes, Paris, in 1831, I
returned strongly moved to lines of research bearing upon the then