104 REVIEWS. 



The author is a clergyman, and, of course, writes with tolerable fluency ; 

 but he tells us nothing that is not far better told in other books. Errors, 

 as we have seen, his work contains : but we will not stay to notice them, 

 as we are desirous to make some observations on " Ocean Gardens," by 

 Mr. Noel Humphreys. 



This book is divided into nine chapters. Chap. I. is a sort of preface, 

 written in a grandiloquent style, in which Mr. Humphreys tells us of the 

 sublime aspects of the ocean, the sound of its deep, ceaseless voice, the 

 eternal oncoming of its waves (we would remind Mr. Humphreys that the 

 tide occasionally goes out), those voices in the wind which ought to excite 

 strange sensations of admiration and curiosity and wonder. ** But, no ; to 

 most of the idle crowd those sights and sounds are invisible and unheard. 

 To appreciate nature as well as art, the mind requires a special education, 

 without which the eye and the ear perceive but little of the miracles pas- 

 sing before them." After a few brief allusions to Socrates, Apuleus, and 

 the Gymnosophists, Ray, Pulteney, Ellis, Linneus, Johnston, Harvey, John 

 Edward Gray, Gosse, Forbes, and Gilbert White, Mr. Humphreys adds, 

 '• Through the fascinating interpretation of the good Gilbert, many now 

 understand the attraction of those branches of natural history which he 

 so curiously investigated ; but few are willing to admit that it is as easy 

 to make the natural features of some obscure fishing village prove equally 

 interesting." Mr. Humphreys assures his readers that such is perfectly 

 possible, and then proceeds, in the following chapters, to give the special 

 education above alluded to, and to " lift the border of that dark green 

 curtain which conceals the wonders of the ocean floor from vulgar eyes." 

 His notion of a class is of a rather vicarious and uncertain character. The 

 " compound" zoophytes are made into a class by Mr. Humphrejs, but 

 the***, strange to say, include another class, the Pennatulidse. The Lucer- 

 nariadae also constitute a class ; and, at page 63, we are told that the 

 sponges form a curious class of zoophytes, which have, perhaps, a much 

 closer affinity to plants than any other class. 



The author is in no way fettered by the ordinary views of naturalists. 

 He tells us that " the functions of the flower-like set of organs with which 

 the Holothuriadae are provided are probably the same as those of the 

 Nudibranch class of Mollusks, which, though generally considered as being 

 a breathing apparatus, are, probably, at the same time, food-collecting 

 organs, as all the creatures thus furnished are liquid feeders." Often as 

 Mr. Humphreys quotes the works of Gosse, he seems to have failed to 

 notice the passages in which the voracity of the Nudibranchs in devouring 



