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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



may revolutionize the topographical conditions and produce climatic and 

 physical changes. All these characteristics of rivers are systematically and 

 comprehensively set forth in Mr, Russell's book, where the life-history of 

 the stream is presented, from its beginning in a little mountain torrent 

 or hillside rill, through its course as it descends to the plain, wearing and 

 tearing and deepening its channel. In the plain its character and action 

 are modified under the new conditions in which it finds itself, and gradually, 

 as it approaches its mouth, it deposits, whereas it had torn away at its be- 

 ginning, and shows contrasts quite as marked as those between youth and 

 old age. Rivers have their growth in time, too, and a stream that has been 

 carrying on its work for long ages presents different characteristics 

 throughout its course from one that comes fresh to its task, and these dif- 

 ferences are pointed out. We are told, too, how rivers grow, drawing new 

 affluents to themselves and extending their sources backward, and how 

 when the sources of streams on different sides of a watershed approach 

 on the summit, there is a struggle for the mastery. These are only a few 

 of the new suggestions which the book offers us. Coming to the more 

 matter-of-fact details, the laws governing streams and their course; the 

 influence of inequalities and the hardness of rocks, especially on river- 

 side scenery; and the office of rivers as carriers of material in suspension 

 and in solution, are considered; then their deposits, under various heads 

 and aspects, and the effects of changes in the elevation of the land, of 

 variations in the load of material and of changes of climate upon them ; the 

 origin and characteristics of stream terraces and stream development, the 

 topics concerning which are too many and varied to bear more than a 

 passing reference. The more salient characteristics of American rivers 

 are discussed as to the nine drainage slopes — the Atlantic, St. Lawrence, 

 Hudson Bay, Arctic, Bering, Pacific, Great Basin, Gulf, and Caribbean — 

 each slope presenting its owm general characteristics, with varieties in 

 detail almost as numerous as the rivers. The whole is briefly summarized 

 in the last chapter. The Life History of a River. We have given merely 

 the tamest inventory of only a part of the topics of Mr. Russell's book. As 

 the subject is treated by the author with careful attention to specific fea- 

 tures, as the magnitude of our river systems is indicated, and as rivers with 

 different or contrasting characteristics — the St. Lawrence and the Colorado, 

 for example — are compared with one another, the subject takes on an 

 aspect that is really grand. 



GENERAL NOTICES. 



An unfulfilled intention entertained 

 by two successive prosectors of the Lon- 

 don Zoological Society — the late Pro- 

 fessor Garrod and the late W. A. Forbes 

 • — of writing a treatise on bird anato- 

 my, is carried out in the present work * 

 by their successor, Frank E. Beddard. 

 Professor Garrod had nearly completed 

 an account of the Anatomy of the Fowl, 

 which was to be followed by a presen- 

 tation of the anatomical characters of 

 the different groups. Professor Forbes 



• The Stmctiire and Claesiflcation of BIrdp. 

 By Frank E. Beddard. London and New York: 

 LougmunB, Green & Co. Pp. 548. 



died before he was able to add anything 

 to the manuscripts left by Professor 

 Garrod. In the instance of the present 

 work the detailed account of Gallus, 

 with which Professor Garrod intended 

 to preface his book, has been rendered 

 unnecessary by Dr. Shufeldt's mono- 

 graph on the Raven, dealing with one 

 particular bird type. Accepting this as 

 a sufficient presentation of that feature 

 of the subject, Mr. Beddard begins with 

 a general sketch of bird structure, pur- 

 posely avoiding histological detail and 

 the elaborate description of anatomical 

 facts, which in the present state of our 



