424 NATURAL SCIENCE [ December 
from various directions. Though in the main Polynesian, more par- 
ticularly Samoan, in general character, there is evidence in the arts 
and appliances of affinities with Micronesian culture, while even 
Melanesian traces are not wanting. The curious shell-bladed cocoa- 
nut scraper, mounted upon a wooden, elbow-shaped stock, belongs to: 
a type of tool which has been recognised in Matty Island, to the 
north of New Guinea, while Mr Hedley might have added that the 
same is also found in. the Solomon Islands, and that it crops up again 
in Ceylon, with a metal blade substituted for the shell. In North 
India, too, a nearly allied implement is found with a knife-blade 
replacing the scraper. “The details given regarding the various types: 
and the manufacture of fish-hooks are of importance, and point to- 
affinities with the fish-hooks, both of the eastern and the western 
Pacific groups. The canoes are described in detail. The various im- 
plements, toys, etc., are too numerous even to be mentioned here, but 
all are recorded with care. It is a pity that the term ‘drum’ is. 
applied to the hollow trough-shaped wooden instrument of Funafuti. 
This belongs to a very widely distributed type of instruments, which 
belongs essentially to the gong series, and should on no account be 
confused with the drums, which are characterised by a sounding 
medium of tense membrane. The vague descriptions of some travel- 
lers constantly confuse the two perfectly distinct instruments, and 
ethnologists should studiously avoid falling into the same error. Mr 
Hedley is wrong in supposing that the ‘ploughing’ method of pro- 
ducing fire by friction is the only one employed in the Pacific Islands. 
The simple twirling drill has been described from New Zealand, the 
New Hebrides, and Carolines, and other instances might be men- 
tioned. In this, as in many other instances, a specialist would, no 
doubt, have added greatly to the information given in the paper, but 
at the same time Mr Hedley’s contribution should prove a useful one, 
and welcome to ethnologists. Henry BALFour. 
A CATALOGUE OF MAMMALS 
CATALOGUS MAmMMALIUM, TAM VIVENTIUM QuAM FosstLium, a Dr E. L. Trouessart. 
Nova editio (prima completa). Fasciculus II., Carnivora, Pinnipedia, Rodentia 
I. (Protrogomorpha and Sciuromorpha), pp. 219-452 ; Fasciculus III., Rodentia IT. 
(Myomorpha, Hystricomorpha, Lagomorpha), pp. 453-664. Berlin: R. Fried- 
linder & Sohn, 1897. Price, 10 marks each fasciculus. 
THE second and third portions of this admirable and most useful 
list fully bear out the promise of the first part, noticed in Natural 
Science for May. They contain, besides the Carnivora and Pinnipedia, 
which the author separates ordinally, the whole of the rodents, the 
most difficult and most numerous order of mammals, and will there- 
fore be most welcome to every working mammalogist. The list 
seems throughout to be remarkably complete and up to date, and we 
have scarcely been able to find a single omission. The print and get- 
up are even better than in the first parts, and the misprints due to 
some of the specific names being printed with capitals are reduced to 
a minimum (though not to na). Acting on a suggestion in our pre- 
vious notice the original localities for the names considered to be 
synonyms have been printed opposite the latter, so that it can be seen 
