SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE. 



215 



and adapted for the use of American 

 schools and colleges. It aims to give 

 an outline of the structure and mor- 

 phology of certain typical members 

 of the various classes of animals and 

 also briefly discusses such zoological 

 questions as evolution, descent and dis- 

 tribution. An 'Elementary Course of 

 Practical Zoology,' by T. J. Parker and 

 W. N. Parker, has been issued somewhat 

 on the lines of Huxley and Martin's 

 'Biology,' aiming to give a rather de- 

 tailed account of the structure of a few 

 types instead of glancing at the animal 

 kingdom as a whole. 



Books on birds, and especially those 

 devoted to the popularizing of ornith- 

 ology, continue to be numerous, and 

 among them may be mentioned Keeler's 

 'Bird Notes Afield,' which introduces us 

 in a pleasant way to the better-known 

 birds of California, a subject of which 

 Mr. Keeler is well qualified to treat. 

 Less attractive from a literary stand- 

 point, but more important from a practi- 

 cal point of view, is Lange's 'Our Native 

 Birds: How to Protect Them and At- 

 tract Them to Our Homes,' which dis- 

 cusses the various causes for the decrease 

 of birds, and suggests methods by which 

 this may be prevented. Of a totally dif- 

 ferent character is Shelley's 'Birds of 

 Africa,' now in process of publication, 

 the first part of Vol. II having recently 

 appeared. While many undescribed 

 forms may be expected from Africa in 

 the future, this work brings the subject 

 down to date. 'The Birds of South Af- 

 rica' are described in one compact volume 

 by Arthur C. Stark, and the Australian 

 Museum is now issuing a new edition 

 of 'A Catalogue of Nests and Eggs of the 

 Birds of Australia,' by Alfred J. North, 

 the original having long been out of 

 print. It is to be hoped that the first 

 volume of the new hand-list of birds, 

 'Nomenclator Avium turn fossilium turn 

 viventium,' by R. Bowdler Sharpe, which 

 was published last fall, may soon be fol- 

 lowed by others, as the completed list 

 will be a boon to all working ornitholo- 

 gists. Finally, it may not be known to 



all our readers that last year Newton's 

 'Dictionary of Birds' was issued in one 

 volume at a reduced price. 



The second and final part of 'Insects,' 

 of the Cambridge Natural History, by 

 David Sharp, gives us one of the most 

 important, if not the most important 

 work on entomology that has appeared 

 for a long time, the two volumes form- 

 ing a condensed encyclopaedia of ento- 

 mology that will be needed by all work- 

 ing entomologists. Another useful work 

 on entomology is Carpenter's 'Insects, 

 Their Structure and Life,' that portion 

 devoted to the 'life' of insects being the 

 best, particularly the chapter on 'In- 

 sects and Their Surroundings.' Of a 

 strictly popular nature is Scudder's 

 'Every-day Butterflies,' which deals in a 

 charming way with some sixty species 

 of eastern North America. 



BOTANY. 



The beginning of the year has been 

 marked by the appearance of the usual 

 number of elementary and popular 

 books dealing with some phase of bot- 

 any. Among these Professor Barnes's 

 'Outline of Plant Life' (H. Holt & Co.) 

 is a simplified edition of a high school 

 text of a year earlier. Only the gross 

 anatomy of the plant is considered and 

 the ordinary routine of beginning with 

 the simpler forms and advancing to 

 ones of successively more complex struc- 

 ture is followed, and the principles of re- 

 production and physiology are pre- 

 sented. The student is given an in- 

 sight into the adaptive processes of the 

 plant by a study of the special forms 

 which live in the water, dry soil, deserts, 

 and other special conditions. 



'Lessons in Botany,' by Professor At- 

 kinson (H. Holt & Co.) is a similar edi- 

 tion of a high school text designed to 

 meet the needs of students in half-year 

 courses. The student is led to an in- 

 terest in the plant by a consideration of 

 seedlings and buds, then launched in 

 a course dealing with types of varying 

 morphological constitution with atten- 



