4o8 



NATURE 



[January 26, 191 1 



its habits in winter, however, we are told "little is 

 known." But further research into literature and 

 inquiry among observers should surely have corrected 

 this. 



A smear on the general attractiveness and beauty 

 of the second volume is unfortunately to be noticed 

 in the shape of a footnote wherein one of the con- 

 tributors indulges in a petulant attack on reviewers. 

 As the editor expressly repudiates responsibility for 

 the statements made in the note he is doubtless alive 

 to their exceedingly bad taste ; but why deface the 

 pleasing pages of the book with an acrid expression of 

 pique which can only be of interest to one person in 

 the world? 



At the end of the work there are to be chapters on 

 rare British birds, classification of British birds, dis- 

 tribution and migration of British birds, bird watch- 

 ing and photography, and bibliography. With regard 



Photo by E. L. Turner. 



Fig. 2, — Tree-creeper's Nesl tn a crevice in a Tree. From " The British 

 Bird-Book." 



to the illustrations, the artists include Winifred Aus- 

 tin, G. E. Lodge, H. Gronvold, G. E. Collins, and 

 A. W. Seaby. The coloured plates in the present 

 volumes are exceedingly pleasing and charming in 

 every way, and they certainly do answer the purpose 

 for which they have been designed. Their object is 

 to supply something more than a portrait of each 

 species for purposes of identification. Each picture 

 is, with few exceptions, to offer a study of some habit 

 of the bird or of one of its most characteristic and 

 striking attitudes ; it is to show the bird in its natural 

 surroundings, and the thirty-four plates in these 

 volumes are, on the whole, quite a success. In addi- 

 tion, we have a coloured plate of eggs, numerous 

 photographs of nests and eggs and young, an outline 

 map of the world, showing the six zoo-geographical 



NO. 2152, VOL. 85] 



regions, and a diagram explaining the names, of the 

 various external parts and portions of the plumage of 

 a bird. An inde.x is promised at the end of the book,, 

 which is to be completed in twelve of these sections or 

 volumes. 



The twenty plates of eggs which, with very short 

 letterpress, are meant to supplement the " Sketch 

 Book of British Birds," can hardly be said to be worth 

 publication.* 



The book is, in fact, too cheap. We cannot expect 

 twenty coloured plates for five shillings, and the cheap 

 reproduction has been a failure. Yet it was hoped 

 that by having a faithful representation of one normal 

 specimen of each species a key would be furnished by 

 which identification might be made comparatively 

 easy. This hope would have been better sustained, 

 poor as the figures are, had they been correctly 

 named. But, turning to plate iii., we find the egg of 

 the black-throated thrush referred to the rock thrush 

 and vice versa, that of the "American thrush " {Turdus 

 migratorius) to the redwing, that of the redwing to 

 the missel thrush, and that of the missel thrush to 

 the American thrush ; while on plate xv. the eggs of 

 the purple sandpiper and little stint do duty for one 

 another. We have not had patience to go through 

 all of them. This deplorable confusion has been 

 caused by the careless insertion of the reference 

 numbers. But it is fatal to the key, and will prove 

 fatal to the beginner's attempt to identifv eggs. A 

 few lines of letterpress are devoted to each species. 

 Turning to that relating to this plate xv., we find the 

 wood sandpiper called the wood " tattler," an American 

 name not in use in England, and the information that 

 the pectoral sandpiper is an American species the nest 

 of which is built on high grassy slopes in Lapland f 

 Tt is no longer correct to say that the eggs of the 

 knot are still unauthenticated. 



THE SEA-OTTER.'' 



SOME twenty years ago, in the days of the Bering 

 Sea question. Captain Snow was well known as 

 an authority on certain of the fur-seal fisheries of 

 the North Pacific, and he was, and still is, known 

 as one of the few authorities on the geography of 

 the Kurile Islands. He has now written a pleasant 

 book telling some of his manifold adventures in 

 this region of the world, and, above all, relating his 

 experiences in pursuit of sea-otter. There is an in- 

 terest,, which amounts to fascination in this singular 

 animal. Fifty years ago it was comparatively plenti- 

 ful all round the coast of the North Pacific, from 

 California and Oregon to Kamtschatka and the 

 Kuriles, though doubtless already much less abundant 

 than in Steller's time, more than a hundred 3-ears 

 before. But nowadays it has dwindled to very small 

 numbers, here and there among the Aleutian and 

 Kurile Islands, and these small numbers dwindle more 

 and more every year. I know of no living naturalist 

 who has seen the creature in its haunts, nor has any 

 zoological garden ever possessed it. Once upon a 

 time, Ijy the way, I spent a fortnight on Copper Island, 

 at the north end of which, five or six miles from my 

 hut, was a large rookery of sea-otters ; but while I was 

 provided with passports giving me perfect freedom of 

 access to the seal-rookeries, there was no word said 

 about sea-otters ; and day after day a polite functionary- 

 made excuses and apologies, a Cossack guard made 



1 "British Birds' Eggs." By A. F. Lydon. Pp. 62-f 20 plates. (London: 

 S.P.C K., 1910.) Price 5^. 



2 "In Forbidden Seas." Pecollections of Sea-Otter Hunting in the 

 Kurils. By H. T; Snow, F.R.G.S. Pp. xiv-f303. (London: Edward 

 Arnold, 1910.) Price i2,y. 6if. net. 



