242 The Irish Naturalist. September, 



INFUSORIANS AND THEIR ALLIES. 



A Treatise on Zoology. Edited b)' Prof. B Ray IvAnkfster, 

 LL.D., F.R.S. Part I. (second fascicle). Introduction and Protozoa, 

 by J. B. Farmer, D.Sc, F.R.S. ; J. J. Lister, M.A., F.R.S. ; 

 B. A. MiNCHiN, M.A., and S.J. Hickson, F.R.S. London : Black, 

 1903, pp. vi. + 451. Price 15^. net. 

 The present work, of which parts IL, III., and IV, have already been 

 reviewed in the Irish Naturalist, is addressed to the serious student of 

 zoology. It is intended to give him a thorough grasp of the systematic 

 classification of the animal kingdom. This being the aim of the great 

 treatise, it is most desirable to render it an easy and handy work of 

 reference. We note, therefore, with regret, that the original plan of 

 having all the Protozoa along with the Introduction confined to Part I. 

 lias not been adhered to, for we now receive onl}- the second fascicle of 

 Part I., containing some sections of the Protozoa and a discussion on 

 vegetable and animal cells ; while we are informed that the Introduction, 

 together with the remainder of the Protozoa, Mali follow in the first 

 fascicle. This peculiar method of publication will lead to the 

 separation, in the completed work, of the Foraminifera from their allies 

 the Radiolaria, Heliozoa, and Lobosa, by the general discussion on 

 animal and vegetable cells, which should surely have preceded the 

 description of all the various classes. As Part II. begins with chapter 2, 

 the first chapter has actually to run through the two fascicular volumes. 

 All the articles in this volume, except the one by Prof. Farmer, on the 

 structure of the animal and vegetable cells, have a useful bibliographical 

 appendix attached to them. The absence of such an appendix in this 

 one case will be particularly felt, as this section of the volume describes 

 a good many novel points in cell mitosis which students might wish to 

 follow up by consulting the literature bearing on the subject. 



Dr. Lister's carefully written article on the Foraminifera deserves due 

 recognition, though we should like to have seen some reference in such 

 an eminently British work to the writings of Mr. Joseph Wright, none of 

 which are alluded to in the Bibliography. 



Owing to the recent discoveries of the pathogenic properties of the 

 Sporozoa, the study of these minute parasites in man and beast is exciting 

 a good deal of interest at present. The section dealing with this hitherto 

 much neglected group has been allotted to Prof. Minchin, who seems to 

 possess a thorough grasp of this difficult and complex subject, which he 

 unfolds to us in an excellently written article, so that the perusal even 

 of the 210 pages of Sporozoa is a pleasure. One of the orders of this 

 class of Sporozoa, the Haemosporidia, are parasitic on the red blood 

 corpuscles of vertebrate animals. In many forms the entire sexual cycle 

 takes place in an intermediate host — an invertebrate animal of blood- 

 sucking habits — from which the vertebrate host is inoculated with germs 

 of the parasite. In man and the higher vertebrates generally, the 

 presence of Haemosporidia in the blood causes fevers and agues. The 

 fever known as tropical malaria is due to Sporozoan parasites, which are 



