390 



NATURE 



{Feb. 27, 1890 



Birds" in volumes of simultaneous issue with his 

 volumes of birds. This egg-book of Mr. Hume's is one 

 of the best oological works ever published, and has long 

 been out of print. A good deal of the additional matter 

 which Mr. Hume had accumulated for a second edition, 

 was stolen by a dishonest servant, and sold for waste 

 paper in the Simla Bazaar, but enough has remained to 

 enable Mr. Oates to put before us a very interesting 

 record of the breeding habits of Indian birds ; and if any 

 tribute be wanted to Mr. Hume's energy and ability, 

 the reader has but to refer to the present work, to study 

 the oological records of the best circle of field-ornitho- 

 logists which ever rallied round the central figure of any 

 zoologist. The portraits of naturalists who have contri- 

 buted to the development of our knowledge of Indian 

 birds lend an additional interest to Mr. Oates's volume 

 on the " Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds." 



R. BOWDLER SHARPE. 



EPHEDRA. 



Die Arten der Gattimg Ephedra. Von Dr. Otto Stapf. 

 Pp. 112, I Map and 5 Plates. (Vienna : R. Tempsky, 

 1889.) 



EPHEDRA is one of the three genera of the small 

 Gymnospermous order Gnetaceae, the two others 

 being Gnetum and Welwitschia, that most curious of all 

 gymnospermous plants. Ephedra is a type of remark- 

 able habit, specially modified, though in a different way 

 from Welwitschia, to inhabit the dry and sandy regions 

 of the world. It has shrubby stems, with copious slender, 

 whip-like, straight or turning branches, foliar organs and 

 flower-wrapper reduced to a minimum, unisexual mostly 

 dioicous flowers in small catkins with dry imbricated 

 scales, the female catkins containing one or two flowers 

 only, and the males several, with from two to eight 

 stamens with the filaments usually joined in a column. 

 The species are numerous and difficult of determination, 

 partly because the leaves are nearly suppressed, partly 

 because the stems of all the species are very similar, and 

 that it is needful to have both staminate and pistillate 

 flowers to study before any given plant can be determined 

 confidently. 



The map shows clearly at a glance the geographical 

 range of the genus. It surrounds the basin of the Medi- 

 terranean, climbs the lower levels of the Central Euro- 

 pean Alps, attains its highest development in Central 

 Asia, reaching southward to the north of India and all 

 through Arabia, northward to Lake Baikal and the Ural 

 Mountains, and eastward to the western provinces of 

 China ; and reappears in the New World — in North Ame- 

 rica in California and Mexico, and in South America 

 in the Andes and over a wide area south of the tropic 

 from Chili across to Buenos Ayres. Though spread so 

 widely over extra-tropical South America, it does not 

 reach either the Cape or Australia, where the climate 

 and soil seem so suitable for it. None of the single 

 species have a very wide range, but it is one of the in- 

 stances where a well-marked, sharply isolated generic 

 type is represented in many different geographical areas 

 by distinct specific types. 



The present monograph is one of the best and most 

 complete works of the kind that have lately appeared. 



It is extracted from the second part of the sixteenth- 

 volume of the DenkscJu'iften der Mathematisch-Natur- 

 wisse7tschaftHchen class of the Kaiserlichen Akademie 

 der Wissenschaften in Vienna. Dr. Stapf is one of the 

 officials of the Botanic Garden of the University of 

 Vienna, and has had the advantage of full command of 

 material, both in the way of specimens and books. Two 

 of the plates and a large proportion of the letterpress 

 are devoted to the anatomy and morphology of the 

 vegetative and reproductive organs of Ephedra. In the 

 structure of the woody bundles Gnetacese establish some 

 links of transition between Coniferse and the typical 

 Dicotyledons. Ephedra approximates in some points 

 towards Casuarina. In the veining of its well-developed 

 leaves Gnetum recedesfrom the ordinary Gymnospermous 

 type. In Ephedra there is an unmistakable perianth to 

 the male flower, but the homology of the outer wrapper 

 of the seed is not so clear. Then follows the systematic 

 portion of the monograph. Dr. Stapf admits twenty- 

 eight certain and three imperfectly-known species, and 

 for each of these he gives a diagnosis, a figure showing 

 its essential characters, an extended description, and a 

 full account of its synonymy and geographical distribu- 

 tion. He makes three sections, Alatae, Asarea, and 

 Pseudo-baccatas, dependent mainly upon whether the seed 

 is fleshy in a mature state, or dry and furnished with a 

 wing. Then follows a list of local names, and a very full 

 list of the books in which the genus is noticed, extending 

 from Gerarde and Ray down to the present time. The 

 monograph is one that deserves to be studied carefully,, 

 both by structural and systematic botanists. 



J. G. B. 



OUR BOOK SHELF. 



Geological Mechanism ; or, An Epitome of the History 

 of the Earth. By J. Spottiswoode Wilson, C.E. 

 (London and Manchester : John Heywood, 1890.) 



The nature of this little work of 135 pages will be best 

 indicated by a brief statement of its contents. The book 

 is divided into three portions of not very unequal length. 



The first of these is " autobiographical," and relates, 

 with much circumstance, the author's adventures at the 

 Geological Society and Club, where, on the invitation of 

 the late Sir Roderick Murchison, he read a paper in the 

 year 1854. This is followed by an account (his own) of 

 the causes which led to a disagreement between himself 

 and the leaders of an exploring expedition of which he 

 had been appointed a member. This part of the book is 

 relieved from the charge of being prosaic, however, by 

 the introduction of some very remarkable, and undoubt- 

 edly original verses. 



Having devoted more than forty pages to himself, the 

 author has left for the earth little more than fifty page^ 

 more ; and in this space he contrives to dispose of a 

 great number of highly important problems, beginning 

 with " intelligence supreme ; the nebular theory of La- 

 place ; hypothesis of incandescence ; theory of the crys- 

 taUine rocks ; hypothesis of metamorphism," &c. ; and 

 finishing up with " the lunar, magnetic, and solar tides ^ 

 the progressive desiccation of the atmosphere and earth ;. 

 the change of time ; and the theory of creation." 



Comprehensive as is this portion of the book, however, 

 the author still finds much to put into his third part, or 

 appendix — such as, " tails or atmospheres of planets and 

 comets ; the magnetic pole and change of climate ; 

 the magnetic tide of the atmosphere, &c." As in the 

 first .part he rose into poetry, here, in the appendix, he 



