58 



The Canadian Field-Naturalist 



[Vol. XXXIV. 



His own published studies were confined chiefly 

 to the Crinoidea. He is known to students of the 

 Crinoidea for his valuable work on the Trenton 

 crinoidal fauna of Ontario. Walter R. Billings 

 during the period from 1881 to 1887 described in 

 the Transactions of the Ottawa Field-Naturalists' 

 Club, several new species and one new genus from 

 Ottawa and Belleville. 



During this period Billings took an active part in 

 the excursions of the Ottawa Field-Naturalists' Club 

 sharing the leadership of field parties with such 

 naturalists as James Fletcher, J. F. Whiteaves, W. 

 R. Ells and H. M. Ami. 



Many important additions to the knowledge of 

 the Crinoidea have been mdae by Dr. Bather from 

 siudies of material collected by W. R. Billings. 

 The very valuable collection of fossils left by Mr. 

 Billings has been presented to the Canadian Gcc- 

 logical Survey by his sister. Miss Myra, in accord- 

 ance with his wishes. Besides the crinoids des- 

 cribed by Billings, it includes much valuable material 

 from other groups of fossils and many specimens 

 from other countries. 



Billings was always ready to place at the dis- 

 posal of visiting geologists his intimate knowledge 

 of collecting localities in the Ottawa district. Many 

 geologists have been indebted to him for guidance 

 to the interesting localities for collecting near Otta- 

 wa. 



Palaeontology was as already stated an avoca- 

 tion with Walter R. Billings. He represented a 

 type of man far too rare in Canada but more com- 

 mon in England, who finds the time and shows the 

 ability to make worthy contributions to pure science 

 while following a profession in no way allied to the 

 science in which he delves. 



Walter Billings was a man of broad interests 

 and for many years took a keen interest in athletics. 

 In his younger days he took an active part in the 

 water sports for which Ottawa is noted. Many of 

 his vacations were spent on his luxuriously furnished 

 house boat. 



The palaenotological studies of Walter R. Bill- 

 ings had enabled him to "peer far back into the 

 night of time" but he claimed no such insight into 

 the future as the great majority of men believe they 

 have. His keen analytical mind had given him 

 little if any knowledge of the uncharted seas of the 

 Great Beyond. He was too frank and honest a 

 man to lay claim to knowledge or beliefs which he 

 had never acquired. It was therefore in deference 

 to his modest views regarding the limitations of the 

 human mind that the ceremonies usually observed, 

 were omitted at the passing of Walter R. Billings. 

 In his request that his remains be cremated we 

 glimpse the fact that his concern was more for the 

 welfare of these he left behind than for himself. 



E. M. Kindle. 



BOOK NOTICES AND REVIEWS. 



The library of McGill University has been en- 

 riched by a collection of text books, monographs, 

 and sets of periodicals (in English, French, Italian 

 and German) devoted to birds; constituting the 

 Emma Shearer Wood Library of Ornithology. This 

 library, the gift of Colonel Casey A. Wood of 

 Chicago, to his Alma Mater, will he endowed by 

 the donor, and is intended to serve not only as a 

 reference collection for the use of college students 

 and research workers but it will be available, so 

 far as its more popular books are concerned, to 

 readers, interested in birds, outside the University 

 precinc'.?. 



It may be added that Dr. Casey Wood is an 

 eld Ottawa boy, having graduated as prizeman from 

 the Collegiate Institute about 1875. He visited the 

 Capital in 1918 as representative of the Surveyor 

 General of the U. S. Army on a tour of inspection 

 of cur hospitals and other institutions engaged in 

 the rehabilitation of our disabled soldiers. Col. 

 Wood has retired from practice and is now engaged, 

 in California, on the Medical and Surgical (Ameri- 



can) History of the War and other literary tasks. 

 He was the Secretary of the Committee that pub- 

 lished the Anniversary Volumes dedicated to the 

 late Sir William Osier. 



In 1917, just before Dr. Wood took up his mili- 

 tary duties he published his Fundus Oculi of Birds. 

 This IS an important study of a neglected subject. 

 It is profusely illustrated with a wealth of coloured 

 plates and line drawings and is a most valuable ad- 

 dition to avian anatomy in general and bird optics 

 in particular. It also offers suggestions that may be 

 of great value in the classification of birds. 



Notes on some of the more common Animals 

 AND Birds of the Canadian Rockies. By 

 William Spreadborough. Canadian Alpine Jour- 

 nal, Vol. X., 1919, pp. 51-68. Mr. Spreadborough, 

 the veteran naturalist and field collector, who has 

 spent nearly every summer for the past thirty years 

 with field parties of the Geological Survey of Can- 

 ada, accompanying Mr. James McEvoy, Professor 

 John Macoun, and the late Mr. James M. Macoun, 



