THE BOOK SHELF 



Louis Agassis as a Teacher. Lane Cooper, Professor of English Language 

 and Literature in Cornell University. 74 pages with portrait frontis- 

 piece. Comstock Publishing Company. $1.00. 

 Professor Cooper has given to the thoughtful teacher a volume of the utmost 

 importance. Agassiz was our first great nature teacher and established for 

 us true nature study methods by taking his classes out of doors to study living 

 creatures in their environment. Professor Cooper has gathered from the 

 writings of Agassiz's four famous pupils, Shaler, Verrill, Wilder, and Scudder, 

 their testimony as to his methods and personality as a teacher and the result 

 is truly enlightening to the teacher of any subject whatever. "The study 

 of nature is an intercourse with the highest mind" — declared Agassiz and his 

 teaching showed that he never forgot to give reverence to this mind. 



Pets, Their History and Care. Lee S. Crandall, Assistant Curator of Birds, 



New York Zoological Park. 372 pp. with many illustrations from 



photographs. Henry Holt & Co. $2.00. 



This book is almost a zoology, so extensive is the number of species discussed. 



Mr. Crandall from his point of vantage in t?ie Bronx Zoo has been able to form 



a wide acquaintance in the animal and bird world. His accounts of each are 



clear, interesting and succinct. The rules for their care are based on general 



principles and are not obscured by many details which so characterize so 



many of the English books on pets. The illustrations are truly illustrative 



and very attractive and interesting, all being photographs of the creatures. 



It is a very valuable book of reference for nature study teachers. 



Muck Crops. By A. F. Wilkinson. Pp. xiii + 257, illustrated. Orange 

 Judd Co., 1916. 

 This little hand-book for the grower of vegetable crops on reclaimed muck 

 land, contains an introductory account of muck formation in swamps and bogs, 

 chapters on the value of muck as a soil maker and fertilizer, chapters on drain- 

 age and tillage, and separate chapters on each of fourteen of the most important 

 crops that are grown on muck — celery, lettuce, onions, mint, etc. It is a 

 very readable little book, and very convincing of progress in the application 

 of science to the utilization of the waste wet lands. J. G. N. 



A Year of Costa Rican Natural History. By A. N. and P. P. Calvert. 

 Pp. xix + 577 with colored frontispiece, map, and many illustrations. 

 This is such a manual as any naturalist or traveller might wish to have at 

 hand when sojourning in the tropics. It treats of Costa Rica, a beautiful 



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