NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 267 
a more reliable estimate on many points than is likely to be the 
case with a casual observer. Moreover, the subjects upon which 
Captain Lucas has most to say are just those upon which a tem- 
porary visitor would be likely to know least. Called by the 
exigencies of his military duties many hundred miles from civili- 
zation, he has met with opportunities of enlarging his experience 
of camp life and the chase of wild animals, which fully justify the 
appearance of the present volume. 
Wisely omitting all description of the outward voyage, with 
which every one is so familiar, and saying as little as possible on 
the appearance of Cape Town, which has already been described 
by numerous writers, he takes the reader at once to his colonial 
quarters and initiates them into all that he thinks most likely to 
interest a new-comer, from a military and sporting point of view. 
It scarcely falls within our province to criticise the various 
Statistics, however interesting, which are given of the civil and 
military life, and the account which is furnished of the mode in 
which Kaffir warfare is conducted. We shall confine attention to 
such portions of Captain Lucas’s narrative as relate more particu- 
larly to Natural History. 
It is scarcely to be expected that the author could pass Ascen- 
sion Island without noticing the Turtles and the wonderful colony 
of Terns which is annually to be found there in the nesting season. 
So badly is the Island supplied, that the garrison, he tells us, 
is mainly dependent for its subsistence upon these two sources of 
provision. 
It was uot until the author found himself on outpost duty, that 
he was in a position to observe or make notes on the strange and 
interesting animal life by which he was surrounded. At Fort 
Brown, near the banks of the Great Fish River, he employed his 
leisure hours in learning to preserve and set up birds, of which he 
found many beautiful species. Conspicuous amongst them were 
the little Crested Kingfisher, a perfect gem of colour, several 
species of Sugar-bird (Neclarinea), which were constantly to be 
seen flying over the Aloe-blossoms, the Orange-throated Lark, the 
Blue Jay, and the Kaffir Finch, whose black and white plumage 
and red throat were set off by his long streaming tail, the feathers 
of which are so prolonged that they droop into a perfect arch, and 
when flying nearly overbalance him. 
The sandy plain on which the Fort was situated was covered 
