268 NATURAL SCIENCE [October 



contains the account of a remarkable anemone, Acrozoanthus australiae, 

 that builds itself a home on the outside of the tubes of a nereid worm. 

 This the worm does not like, and stretches out its habitation in another 

 direction. The anemone, equal to the emergency, follows the new 

 branch, whereupon the worm strikes out again like a doubling hare. 

 The process continues till the anemone secures its inevitable victory, 

 and results in the formation of a singularly regular zig-zag polyp- 

 stock. Many of these polyparies grow side by side on submerged 

 rocks, sticking upwards when covered by water but hanging down 

 when exposed by the ebb of the tide like the corkscrew ringlets of an 

 old maid. We feel it our duty to note that in this chapter another 

 new species of coral is proposed, " provisionally associated with the 

 title of Turbinaria revoluta." Some day naturalists will recognise the 

 futility of excusing their new names on the ground of their " provi- 

 sional " nature. At present the phrase is generally diagnostic of the 

 amateur, and should be shunned by so accomplished a naturalist as 

 Mr Saville-Kent. 



Insect oddities and vegetable vagaries are the titles of the last two 

 chapters, to which space does not permit further allusion. It is, how- 

 ever, in these that some of the most beautiful illustrations of the 

 volume are contained, notably of the shy-flowering cacti. Of the 

 other illustrations, those of most interest to the naturalist are of the 

 animals taken under water ; and in this new branch of photography 

 the author has made good progress since we first had the pleasure of 

 calling attention to his efforts. The group of holothurians (Colochiriis 

 ancc/ps), is a notable and instructive example of this genre. A 

 word of praise is clue to Messrs Waterlow, whose reproductions and 

 printing do the fullest justice to the art of the author. The chromo- 

 plates are ambitious, but, with the exception of plate 4, representing 

 a madrepore-reef, and Mr Frohawk's drawing of Chlamydosaurns, they 

 do not appeal to us. The attempt to reproduce the vivid colours of 

 the animals results in glaring masses devoid of life and natural 

 chiaroscuro. It is with the camera pure and simple that the author 

 is most successful, and he has learned the art of applying the scissors 

 to his photographs with the happiest results. We wish, for his own 

 .sake, that he would apply those useful instruments to his prose. His 

 golden rule is : never use one syllable when a word of four syllables 

 is to hand, never use one word when six will do, and don't bother too 

 much about the meaning of your phrases. When he wants to tell us 

 that a certain lizard will eat any food, he says " the gastronomic pro- 

 clivities of Trachysaurus are essentially omnivorous," and it amuses 

 him to speak of a hansom cab as "that indispensable anticlimax of 

 British Citizenship." To photograph an animal is "to immortalise it 

 with the camera," an expression which shows that the author properly 

 appreciates his own work. Neither can we fail to be struck by the 

 number of slips in the names of people, and even in some of the long 

 words so dear to him. Thus we find H. F. Blandford for W. T. 

 Blanford, J. I>. for G. D. Haviland, \l C. for A. C. Haddon; Gunther 

 for Gunther, Rontgen fur Rontgen : If. M. Johnston of Hobart is called 

 Johnson, though he must be well known to Mr Saville-Kent: even 

 four of the officers at the very museum where the author was formerly 

 an assistant are incorrectly referred to; Ipswich is confused with 



