Produced by Susan Skinner and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net [Transcriber’s Note: The following conventions are used in this text. _italic text_ =bold text= ^{superscript}] * * * * * SCIENCE FROM AN EASY CHAIR BY THE SAME AUTHOR EXTINCT ANIMALS THE KINGDOM OF MAN FROM AN EASY CHAIR [Illustration: A.—“YELLOW” OR IMMATURE EEL: NOT DESCENDING TO THE SEA (FEMALE) B.—“SILVER” OR MATURE EEL IN BRIDAL DRESS DESCENDING TO THE SEA (FEMALE), A SMALLER INDIVIDUAL THAN “A” HEAD OF IMMATURE AND MATURE SPECIMENS OF THE COMMON EEL OF THE NATURAL SIZE. ORIGINAL WATER-COLOUR DRAWINGS FROM LIVE SPECIMENS] SCIENCE FROM AN EASY CHAIR BY SIR RAY LANKESTER K.C.B., F.R.S. WITH EIGHTY-FOUR ILLUSTRATIONS SECOND EDITION METHUEN & CO. LTD. 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. LONDON _First Published April 14th 1910_ _Second Edition May 1910_ PREFACE This volume is a collection of some of the papers which I have contributed to the _Daily Telegraph_ during the years 1908-1909, under the title “Science from an Easy Chair.” I have revised and corrected the letterpress, and have added some illustrations. A smaller volume containing earlier papers was published by Messrs. Constable in 1908, with the title _From an Easy Chair_. It is my intention now to produce additional volumes (under the title “Easy Chair Series”) as their constituent articles accumulate, and I hope to be able to publish a second and a third instalment at no distant date. I should like to draw the special attention of the reader to the Frontispiece (Plate I.), which is very beautifully executed, and is, I believe, the first coloured drawing yet published showing the difference between the adult “silver” eel and the more abundant immature “yellow” eel—sometimes called the “frogmouthed eel.” The original drawings were prepared for me through the kindness of Dr. Petersen, of Copenhagen, who is the discoverer of many interesting facts about the common eel, and is director of the Danish Biological Laboratory.