246 



NATURE 



[April 28, 1910 



i)irds than the flamingo, and birds with more bril- 

 liant plumage, but no other large bird is so brightly 

 coloured, and no other brightly-coloured bird is so 

 large. When to these more superficial attractions is 

 added the fact that little or nothing has hitherto been 

 known of the nesting habits of this singular bird, one 

 may, in a measure at least, realise the intense longing 

 of the naturalist, not only to behold a flamingo city, 

 but at the same time to lift the veil through which 

 the flamingo's home life has been but dimly seen. 

 Nearly forty pages are devoted to the lifting of this 

 veil for the reader, and the account is illustrated by 

 more than a score of pictures of the birds at and on 

 their nests, and of the nests, eggs and the j'oung 

 in various stages ; included among these are two 

 beautiful coloured photographs of the adult birds, in 

 one of which they are seen feeding their young in the 

 nest. 



It is quite impossible to find space even to 

 enumerate all the contents of this charming book, 

 but Florida, Bahama, the western prairies, Cali- 

 fornia, and many other localities were visited by the 

 author, and are here described. Lastly, we have a 

 chapter on his impressions of English bird-life ; and 

 the impressions of such an experienced bird-man are 

 distinctly valuable and informing, and will be read 

 with the greatest interest by our field ornithologists. 

 We cannot enter into them widely here. As he 

 approached the coast of Wales the " boreal " birds 

 he saw about the stacks and islands of Wales afforded 

 convincing evidence of high latitude, and, at the 

 same time, an admirable illustration of the faunally 

 composite character of English bird-life, types 

 Americans are accustomed to consider representative 

 of northern and southern life-zones finding in Eng- 

 land congenial surroundings. Unlike some visitors, 

 the author was not too late to hear the nightingale ; 

 he was disappointed at first with the song of the sky- 

 lark, but before leaving England found himself 

 listening to it with increasing pleasure. None of the 

 birds seen from the train impressed him more than 

 the peewit. We read : 



"The bird's size, form, and colours, its grace of 

 carriage on the ground, and dashing, erratic, aerial 

 evolutions, give it high rank as an attractive part of 

 any avifauna ; while its abundance, in spite of the 

 demand which places thousands of its eggs on the 

 market annually, is inexplicable." 



This is all true, though most of the eggs come 

 from the Continent; but a bird which can furnish 

 Mr. Chapman with "a brand new sensation in bird- 

 life " must be something we ought to be proud of. 



The author visited various parts of England, and 

 many of our famous sea-bird haunts. His 

 pictures of these places (including one of Selborne) 

 are delightful, and everything he has written about 

 our avifauna is well worth reading. It is satisfactory 

 to read that birds are more abundant here than they 

 are in North America. The book is very full of 

 illustrations, and they are excellent — far better than 

 most of the photographs of this kind. But the 

 heavily leaded paper on which it is printed makes it 

 simply too heavy to hold without actual weariness ! 



O. V. A. 

 NO. 2113, VOL. 83] 



EXOTERIC PHILOSOPHY. 

 (i) In the Abstract. By N. Alliston. Pp 



i?6. 



(London : Swan Sonnenschein and Co. Ltd., 1909.) -. 

 Price 2S. 6d. 



(2) Progressive Creation : a Reconciliation of Reli- 

 gion with Science. By Rev. H. E. Sampson. In 

 two vols. Vol. i., pp. xii + 484; vol. ii., pp. vi + 517. 

 (London : Rebman, Ltd., 1909.) Price 21s. net. 



(3) Progressive Redemption. By Rev. H. E. Samp- 

 son. Pp. xxiv+616. (London : Rebman, Ltd., 

 1909.) Price 125. 6d. net. 



(4) Scientific Idealism, or Matter and Force and Their 

 Relation to Life and Consciousness. By W. Kings- 

 land. Pp. xxiii + 427. (London: Rebman, Ltd.,. 

 1909.) Price 7s. 6d. net. 



THESE books have this much in common, that 

 none of them bears the ^mdem'ic hall-mark. Of 

 the three writers, Mr. Alliston is the most ambitious; 

 of a precise logic. His book consists of a group of 

 essays on such various topics as "The Planetary 

 Distances," "Materialism," "The Value of Things. 

 His criticism of the first law of motion is perhaps the 

 most original effort in the book. He "is dissatisfied 

 with a formulation which assumes that rest and 

 frictionless motion are alike constant; he holds that 

 frictionless motion would cease as soon as the original 

 force should be exhausted. Mr. Alliston admits that 

 the law as stated must be considered practically 

 adequate; he does not attempt to make any infer- 

 ence, dynamical or metaphysical, from his criticism ; 

 and the essential proof for this inconclusive result, 

 the explanation of how an ideal unhindered velocity 

 would be diminished, he has not provided. Mr. 

 Alliston 's essay on materialism is a clear and simple 

 re-statement of now commonplace criticism ; he does 

 not, however, sufficiently realise the difficulty of find- 

 ing a moral differentiation between materialism and 

 a spiritualism which does not promise the conserva- 

 tion of individuality. The book is pleasantly written, 

 and might be turned over with interest and profit b\ 

 beginners in philosophy. 



The authors of the other works placed at the head 

 of this notice have each made a bold attempt to reach; 

 the final synthesis which is supposed to be the goal 

 of philosophy. Mr. Sampson's interest is, in the 

 main, theological; Mr. Kingsland's effort is more 

 purely philosophical. The system of the former, 

 though presented with much ability, will, it is to be 

 feared, strike most people as fantastic He start; 

 from the failure of science to account for evolutionary 

 breaks and "missing links." This failure suggest; 

 to him that the facts covered by the current theory 

 of evolution represent an interruption rather thar 

 an integral part of the great order of true evolu- 

 tion. That true order is, it appears, a progressive 

 creation of beings who pass by successive reincarna- 

 tions from lower to higher types, culminating at lasi 

 in perfect Godhood. A condition of its continuity ii 

 the preservation of purity of type, a condition violatec 

 by our "Adamic" ancestors, who inter-married witl 

 an inferior kind. Sin then entered the world 

 catastrophic physical changes occurred, and oui 

 history since has been a struggle towards the ancien 



