NATURE 



25 



ZOOLOGY AS A HIGHER STUDY. 



A Text-book of Zoology. By Prof. T. Jefifery Parker, 

 D.Sc, F.R.S., and Prof. William A. Haswell, M.A., 

 D.Sc, F.R.S. 2 vols. Pp. XXXV 4- 779 and xx + 683. 

 (London : Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1897.) 



Traits de Zoologie Concrete. By Prof. Yves Delages and 

 E. Herouard. Vols. i. and v. Pp. xxx + 584 and 

 xi + 372. (Paris : Reinwald, Schleicher fr^res, 1896 

 and 1897.) 



THOSE who write books to assist the University pro- 

 fessor and the advanced student of zoology are 

 entitled to great consideration on the part of those to 

 whom their work is addressed, for their self-appointed 

 task is a most difficult and in many ways an elusive one. 

 The mass of detailed concrete fact with which such 

 authors attempt to grapple is simply prodigious, and in- 

 creases yearly at an enormously rapid rate. The general- 

 isations and theories which hold these facts together are 

 in proportion delicate and flimsy structures which, though 

 they are absolutely essential, yet are easily strained^ 

 misrepresented, ignored or ludicrously accentuated by 

 any but the most careful and judicious writer. 



In judging an expository treatise dealing with a branch 

 of science, it is necessary that a reviewer should not 

 only recognise the claims upon his gratitude which the 

 long labour of an author may possess, but should also 

 distinctly appreciate the precise purpose of the treatise 

 under notice — the point of view adopted by the author, 

 and his reason for adopting it. The book by Profs. 

 Parker and Haswell is addressed to University students, 

 but yet is intended to be fitted for beginners. It consists 

 essentially in an extended application of the method of 

 teaching by detailed examination of a series of types or 

 examples, now used almost universally for a preliminary 

 or elementary course of zoological study. This method 

 was started in this country not by Huxley, as our authors 

 state, but by Rolleston. It is probably the best way of 

 commencing the study of zoology. It should, however, 

 be limited to a course involvmg some six or eight 

 well-selected examples. To carry it on as the staple 

 or main form of study after the preliminary course is, 

 in my judgment, a serious error. An acquaintance 

 with the large generalisations of zoology, a determined 

 grasp of some of its unsolved problems, a concrete 

 appreciation of the actual range and extent of genera 

 and species, recent and fossil, in at any rate some large 

 groups in a complete manner, and not by mere vague 

 sampling, are what the University student needs to have 

 offered him by way of education. He will, of course, 

 examine and dissect carefully as many animals as he 

 can ; but they will not necessarily be those selected as 

 examples by our authors. Nor should the student, I 

 venture to think (after his preliminary course;, mechan- 

 ically demonstrate and identify a host of details in 

 animal after animal, simply because those details are 

 there capable of being identified, and are mentioned in 

 the text-book. This would tend to make our delightful 

 and romantic comparative anatomy as dreary and soul- 

 NO. 1489, VOL. 58] 



destroying as is what Rolleston termed " Anthropotomy." 

 A kind of training, it is true, may be given in this way, 

 but it is a bad and injurious training, and does not lead 

 to the progress of zoology or comparative anatomy. 



It seems to me that, as a book to guide the student 

 to a second course rather than one dealing with a further 

 series of common-place examples treated with measured, 

 not to say exasperating, detail, we should welcome one 

 which treated only of exceptional, puzzling and debate- 

 able animals, such, for example, as Trichoplax, Limno- 

 codium, Ctenoplana, a Cystid, Sternaspis, Acanthob- 

 della, Lingula, Limulus, Peripatus, Neomenia, Balano- 

 glossus. Hippocampus, Siphonops, Hatteria, Rhea and 

 Ornithorhynchus. In such a book it would, at any rate, 

 be necessary to consider the significance of the structures 

 described, and to make them really the means of dis- 

 cussing the affinities of the several animals. 



The publication of Profs. Parker's and Haswell's text- 

 book was almost simultaneous with the sad and untimely 

 death of one of its authors, Jefifery Parker. Many of 

 the beautiful original drawings (more than one thousand 

 in number !) with which the book is illustrated are from 

 his pencil. There can be no doubt that his health 

 suffered for a year or more before he succumbed, and 

 hence we are justified in assigning responsibility for the 

 very numerous and curious errors which the book con- 

 tains to Prof. Haswell and to Prof. W. N. Parker, of 

 Cardiff, who undertook a final revise of the sheets in 

 this country, rather than to Jeffery Parker. 



I have already indicated that I do not think that the 

 unlimited extension of the method of teaching by detailed 

 examination of representative types is satisfactory as the 

 method to be pursued in a University course. Neverthe- 

 less the student will undoubtedly find Parker's and Has- 

 well's book useful in assisting him in dissection and in 

 examination of skeletons. The authors give a general 

 account of the structure of the larger and smaller groups, 

 illustrated by the selected examples, and a brief exposi- 

 tion of the classification and contents of each group of 

 the animal kingdom ; but there is no profession of making 

 this exposition complete. Chapters on geographical 

 distribution and the history of zoology are given at the 

 end of the book, which are so well done that one could 

 wish they were longer. 



The authors have deliberately adopted a course of 

 procedure with regard to the citation of authorities and 

 references to monographs and other literature, which 

 they defend in their preface at some length. Their pro- 

 cedure is simply this— that they give no references at all ; 

 they never cite the name of an authority, nor give the 

 vaguest intimation as to whether the statement they are 

 making is as old as Cuvier, or is a brand-new discovery, 

 or a special opinion of their own. Even when they 

 copy a woodcut from a previous work, they often 

 omit to state the name of the author to whom it is due, 

 and only quote the copyist who preceded them in taking 

 it from the original author. I can not sufficiently strongly 

 condemn this policy of omission. To me it appears 

 simply disastrous. The authors of the present book have 

 only imitated the example of some recent German writers 

 in thus effacing the discoverer's claim to recognition, and, 

 whilst reducing their own statements to a condition of 

 puzzling confusion, have rendered their book useless 



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