Page:Collier's New Encyclopedia v. 09.djvu/31

SPEARS, RAYMOND SMILEY 13 SPECIFIC GRAVITY SPEARS, RAYMOND SMILEY, an / American author, born at Bellevne, Ohio, in 1876. He was educated in public schools and became a reporter on the New York "Sun." He contributed many- short stories and articles on travel to magazines, securing his material by ex- tensive tours on foot, in boats, automo- biles, etc. He was a member of the edi- torial staff of the "Adventure Magazine" and published "Camping on the Great River" (1912); "Camping on the Great Lakes" (1913) ; "The Cabin Boat Primer" (1913), etc. SPECIE PAYMENTS, SUSPENSION OF, AND RESUMPTION OF, terms sig- nifying the regulation of currency dur- ing times of stress, as during a war. Suspension of specie payments means that the Government and the banks sus- pend payments in metal coin, silver or gold, and issue instead "credit money," in paper. This was done in the United States in 1862, when the Government found itself compelled to borrow more money than could be raised by the banks of the country. In other words, the need of money by the Government, sud- denly expended, found the money in cir- culation inadequate to meet that need. So paper money must be issued to fill the gap. When this is done recklessly and without restriction, as it was in 1862, this paper currency depreciates in value. The resumption of specie pajinents after such a period of financial dislocation must necessarily be very gradual. In the above instance resumption was not begun till 1879, and then it was several years more before normal conditions were restored. During the Civil War the Government was again compelled to suspend specie payments because of the vast quantity of metal currency which was being hoarded by the people. A large volume of Treasury notes were, therefore, issued and made to take the place of metal money. It was 1879 be- fore the resumption of specie payments in this case could be begun. During the World War the United States was prac- tically the only belligerent country which was not compelled to suspend spe- cie payments, the result being that its currency is now at a premium in all other countries. SPECIES, in biology, a somewhat am- biguous term used to denote a limited group of organisms, resembling each other, and capable of reproducing similar organisms, animal or vegetable, as the case may be. A species is defined by Haeckel as "the sum of all cycles of re- production which, under similar condi- tions of existence, exhibit similar forms." Linnaeus held that all species were the direct descendants from and had the characters of primevally created forms, and in this he was followed by those who accepted the first chapter of Genesis- in a strictly literal sense. Buffon and Cuvier, leaving the question of origin on one side, held the distinguishing marks of a species to be similarity and capabil- ity of reproduction. But besides varie- ties and races in various species of animals and plants, dimorphism, and in others trimorphism, exists, so that close similarity cannot be taken as a criterion, and the value attached to external re- semblances varies in the case of differ- ent observers. At a later date was added the physiological definition that all the individuals of every species were capable of producing fertile offspring by inter- crossing, whereas sexual intercourse be- tween different species produced only sterile offspring or was actually infer- tile; and, though subject to exceptions, this definition is generally true. The de- scent of any given series of individuals from a single pair, or from pairs exactly similar to each other, is in no case capa- ble of proof. Darwin in his "Origin of Species" says: "I look at the term species as one arbitrarily given for the sake of con- venience to a set of individuals closely resembling each other, and that it does not essentially differ from the term va- riety, which is given to less distinct and more fluctuating forms" (see Darv/in- lAN Theory). That book popularized the idea of the mutability of species, the chief factor in which Darwin believed to be Natural Selection, though he after- ward modified his views to some extent as to its importance. A later theory of the origin of species is that of Physi- ological Selection, propounded by W. G. J. Romanes, F. R. S., who holds that many species have arisen on account of variations in the reproductive system, leading to some infertility with parent forms — mutual sterility being thus re- garded as one of the conditions, and not as one of the consequences of specific differentiation. In logic, a predicable that expresses the whole essence of its subject in so far as any common term can express it. The names species and genus are merely relative, and the same common term may in one case be the species which is predicated of an individual, and in an- other case the individual of which a species is predicated. Thus the individ- ual, George, belongs to the logical spe- cies man, while man is an individual of the logical species animal. SPECIFIC GRAVITY. See GRAVITY, Specific. Cyc— Vol IK