RECENT LITERATURE. 107 



EECENT LITERATURE. 



Zoology : A Text-book for Colleges and Universities. By Prof. 

 T. D. A. Cockerels. Pp. xiii + 558. New York: World 

 Book Company. 



This handy and very well-illustrated volume forms a welcome 

 departure from the average " text-book of zoology " with which one 

 is familiar. It contains upwards of two hundred excellent text- 

 figures, most of which are original. The title is perhaps a little 

 misleading ; it might perhaps have been described better as " An 

 Introduction to the Study of Zoology." Approximately half the 

 volume is devoted to a systematic survey of the classes and orders 

 of living animals, accurate, but not too elaborately detailed even for 

 a beginner. The author has succeeded very well in these chapters 

 in presenting the necessary facts and conclusions in a fresh and 

 readable manner, quite escaping from the deadening system of 

 enumeration of multitudinous details, than which little can prave 

 more, disheartening to most students. It is pleasing to find in this 

 section of the book a larger part than usual devoted to insects. 

 Entomologists are too frequently regarded with a kind of tolerant 

 scorn by the " zoologist " who does not study insects, yet ento- 

 mology af!'ords a readier ground for the study of many of the most 

 fascinating problems of modern zoology than does the study of 

 almost any other large class of animals. In addition it is hardly 

 necessary to mention the immense importance to man of the work 

 now being done by entomologists in all parts of the world, and to 

 hope that the treatment of this subject in the present volume is 

 an indication that entomology is at last about to come into its own. 



The remainder of the book is devoted to chapters on heredity, 

 variation, sex, natural selection, evolution, disease, eugenics, sociology, 

 distribution, etc., and also includes several sketches of the lives of 

 the fathers of zoology. Necessarily the author has been able only 

 very briefly to outline these subjects in the space allotted, yet the 

 information is as full as possible and accurate, and is quite sufficient 

 to stinmlate interest and to show the importance of these problems 

 and their intimate connection with everyday life. The inclusion of 

 the more important references to more important works on specio.l 

 subjects is a sound point and of much value to tlie student. The 

 book provides a very useful summary of the present state of zoology, 

 and should prove a very useful and handy work for botli tlie student 

 and the " man in the street " who wants to know what zoology is. 



N. D. R. 



Catalogue of the Lepidoptera Phalanm in the British Museum. 

 Supplement. By Sir George F. Hampson, Bart. Vol. ii, 

 pp. i-xxiii and 1-619. London: Printed by order of the 

 Trustees, 1920. 



As the genus Lithosia, Fabr., is older by some fourteen years than 

 Arctia, Schrank, the Family ArctiadjB of vol. iii (1901) becomes Litho- 

 siadae in this supplementary volume. 



