BOOKS AND CURRENT LITERATURE 69 



In the last paragraph on page 102 the teacher is directed, for a demon- 

 stration, to place plants in darkness for one day ir order to empty the 

 leaves of starch. One of the plants suggested is the nasturtium {Tro- 

 paeolum). Miss Eckerson showed in 1899 that it requires two nights and 

 one day, or about 48 hours, for nasturtium leaves to become emptied of 

 starch. See also paragraph 101 on page 104. On page 103 is the state- 

 ment that "Starch formation is most rapid in direct sunlight," whereas, 

 as Blackman showed in 1905, the optimum of light varies with the per- 

 centage of C0 2 available, and for the percentage of CO2 normally present 

 in the atmosphere, leaves, especially in summer, cannot use all the light 

 of direct sunlight for photosynthesis. 



It seems unfortunate to have repeated again, especially in a first-course 

 text, the erroneous notion that plant and animal metabolism are, in any 

 fundamental way, unlike, and especially that photosynthesis and the 

 synthesis of fats and proteins constitute the constructive metabolism 

 (anabolism) of plants. It only obscures the essential identity of metabo- 

 lism (i.e., the construction and continuous destruction of living substance, 

 not of carbohydrates, etc.) to class the synthesis of foods as a part of 

 plant metabolism. Photosynthesis is no more a part of plant metab- 

 olism than is the ascent of sap, though both processes involve, and are 

 accompanied by metabolic change. The authors' paragraph at the top 

 of page 126 really implies that animals have no constructive metabolism. 



No biological error is dying harder than the idea that Linnaeus intro- 

 duced the method of binomial nomenclature (p. 133). A more excusable 

 perpetuation of a misconception of minor importance is the classifica- 

 tion (p. 194) of the clover leaf as palmately compound. 



From the first full paragraph on page 143, stating that scientific 

 names are in reality not difficult and that there are many advantages in 

 their use, we are led to expect them later on, but for 154 pages dealing 

 with plants (pp. 143-297) we find hardly one scientific (Latin) name 

 of the plants referred to except in the legends of the illustrations. Not 

 even is the now rather common Agaricus, or agaric, used for the " meadow 

 mushroom," nor Amanita for the deadly "toadstool." "Sphagnum" 

 and " Polytrichum," however, come as a surprise on page 242. The 

 reviewer believes that pupils are easily repelled or "scared out" by Latin 

 binomials, and that they should be avoided, but there is also much truth 

 in the author's statement on page 143, and it seems as though it would 

 have been a distinct advantage to have given the binomials, at least in 

 parentheses. However, the authors have taken the safe course 



