Feb. 13, 1879] 



NATURE 



345 



while steaming out of the bay, en rotite for Tunis, I 

 noticed that the smoke at the apex of the mountain was 

 ruddy from the reflection of the lava within the small 

 crater of 1878, and then for many days after, the summit 

 of the mountain was obscured by clouds, and snow lay 

 upon it when I next saw it towards the middle of last 

 January. G. F. Rodwell 



POPULAR NATURAL HISTORY^ 



VOLUME II. of this handsomely illustrated work on 

 natural history is equally weU got up as the first, 

 which we noticed some months ago; it contains brief 

 histories of the Camivora, Cetacea, Sirenia, Proboscidia, 

 Hyracoidea, and Ungulata. 



The terrestrial, or on-the-land-living Carnivores, are 

 described by Mr. Kitchen Parker, assisted by his son 

 Jeffery. The father's pleasant style and his power of 

 apt illustration will be recognised in the too few pages 

 introductory to this group, and some of the woodcuts 

 are from drawings made by the author. The marine 

 Camivora, the Whales, and the Sirenia, are described by 

 Dr. Murie, while the editor, with the assistance of Prof. 

 Garrod and Mr. Oakley, describes the Proboscidia, the 

 Hyracoidea, and the Ungulata. 



The land carnivora are, undoubtedly, as Mr. Parker 

 tells us, one of the most compact as well as one of the 

 most interesting groups among the mammalia. So many 

 of the animals contained in it have become " familiar in 

 our mouths as household words," bearing as they do an 



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Fig. I. — The B.ntur^ng [Arciiciis liniuro/i^). 



important part in fable, in travel, and even in history. 

 Many of them are of wonderful beauty, and many of 

 them are of terrible ferocity. Two she-bears out of the 

 vood tore up the forty and two naughty mocking little 

 children near Bethel, and the narrative thereof frightens 

 our own little children to this day. Packs of enraged 

 lions, "fierce with dark keeping," were by the noble 

 Romans let loose to mangle and devour helpless men 

 and women in the arena, and as for the wolf, what 

 terrible stories are not told about him ? He was the very 

 dread of the shepherd in the far distant times. As Mr. 

 Parker reminds us, his bad character for ferocity was so 

 well known in the early days, that "a very old sheep-master, 

 addressing his sons on his death-bed, these sons being 



' "Cassell's Natural History." Edited by P. Martin Duncan, M.B. 

 ^.K-b., Professor of Geologv, K:ng's CoUege, London. Vol. li. Illus- 

 trated. (London, Paris, and New York : Cassell. Petter, and Galpin.) 4to. 



eleven out of twelve of them shepherds, said, knowing^ 

 they would understand him, of the youngest, ' Benjamin 

 shall raven as a wolf : in the morning he shall devour the 

 prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.' " 



And with all this ferociousness of character, it is from 

 among the number of the land camivora that man has 

 selected his faithful and devoted follower the dog. For 

 a wonderfully interesting account of this friend of our 

 race, a friend in whom, as Mr. Darwin observes, it is 

 scarcely possible to doubt but that the love of man has 

 become an instinct, an instinct, as Mr. Parker naively 

 observes, not as yet certainly developed in man — there is 

 a pleasant chapter, one that tells of what is known of 

 prehistoric dogs, of the origin of the dog, and of the 

 many varieties of the dog. 



As an illustration of the general character of the wood- 

 cuts which so profusely adorn the volume, we have 



