SEPTEMBER 14, 1916] 
NATURE 31 
which are hard to accept and must surely have 
been founded on hearsay evidence, and perhaps 
too readily believed. We are told that when the 
blaeberries have ripened, the woodcocks betake 
themselves to the hillsides and consume great 
quantities of the fruit! With regard to the 
statement that “deer, calves, and lambs’”’ are 
taken by eagles, we wonder whether this may be 
.a slip for “deer-calves and lambs,” which sounds 
much more likely to be true. The book might 
have been smaller with advantage had it been 
confined to the relation of the author’s most valu- 
able observations. But a considerable amount of 
space is occupied with descriptions of the plumage 
of the birds treated of, and accounts of their dis- 
tribution within and outside the British islands. 
Both these subjects seem to us to be beyond the 
province of the book. The descriptions seem to 
be unnecessary, and in some cases inadequate, 
while of the accounts of distribution it must be 
said that they are open to criticism. For instance, 
we are told that “there is no bird which has so 
’ Fic. 2.—Dotterel going to the nest. 
wide a range as the golden eagle—in fact, it is 
met with almost throughout the world.” 
One of the pleasantest chapters in the book is 
that on the snow bunting. A curious incident is 
related showing the undoubted love of coolness 
which drives this arctic bird to the high Scotch 
mountains. One very hot day a bird which 
usually frequented a scree was found on a 
dwindling snowfield seeking relief from the heat. 
At times he would seek to cool himself by running 
-over the snow with his head half-buried beneath 
the surface, and throwing up a furrow as from a 
‘diminutive snow-plough. 
The oyster-catcher (a name which we read at 
first with surprise among hill-birds) appears to 
be only a winter visitor to the eastern seaboard 
of Scotland—or such parts of it as the author is 
familiar with—and to retire to the hills to breed. 
Early in March oyster-catchers leave the river 
estuaries and make their way in pairs up the rivers 
—the Don and Spey, forinstance. Near the source 
of the Spey the bird reaches, and is numerous 
on, a flat 1500 ft. above sea-level. We regret to 
read that the white-tailed eagle has decreased 
enormously during the last thirty years, and that 
NO. 2446, VOL. 98] 
well be altered in a second edition. 
From ‘‘ Hill Birds of Scotland.” 
there are now only two pairs of them breeding in 
Britain. The extermination seems to have been 
effected mainly by sheep farmers and shepherds, 
their hatred of the bird sometimes prompting 
them to acts of unnecessary and cold-blooded 
cruelty. 
There are some things in the book which might 
The author 
thinks that in our language there is no distinctive 
name for the peculiar evening flight of the wood- 
cock, and treats ‘‘ Réding ” as only a Scandinavian 
one. But “road” is surely English, and the well- 
known tracks through covers pursued by wood- 
cocks have long been called ’cock-roads. It is 
searcely correct to say that prior to the nineteenth 
century no case of the woodcock nesting in 
Britain was recorded. Willughby (1678) mentions 
that they bred sometimes in England. White 
(1789) records nests, and Pennant (1776), Walcot 
(1789), and Lewin (1797) all record woodcocks 
breeding with us. 
There is in the opinion of west-country orni- 
thologists no ground for believ- 
ing that the dotterel ever bred on 
the Mendip Hills. And the ob- 
servation that this bird “is the 
only representative of the widely 
distributed and extensive group 
[of waders] to restrict her clutch 
always to three hostages to for- 
tune’? shows a want of know- 
ledge of these birds. For, not to 
mention some others, the normal 
clutch laid by the Kentish plover 
consists of three eggs only. 
There are between thirty and 
forty illustrations, the most pleas- 
ing of which show the wild 
scenery affected by. the birds 
treated of. Others show the 
nests or young of birds, and we 
notice occasionally the want of consideration for 
the feelings and interests of both sitting and 
young birds, which is sometimes regrettable, on 
the part of enthusiastic bird-photographers. 
The publishers allow us to reproduce a beau- 
tiful. picture of the haunts of those oyster-catchers 
which go far inland and high up to breed—the 
hills in the background with a fresh coat of snow, 
and the bulky collectibn of dead heather stems 
brought together by this erratic bird when (as 
it does sometimes) it constructs a nest in the true 
sense of the term; also a photograph of a dotterel 
going to her nest. 
SCIENTIFIC METHOD IN BREWING 
PRACTICE. 
es his address to the Institute of Brewing, of 
which an abstract was published in NATURE 
of July 6, Dr. Horace Brown has given a very 
fascinating account of the gradual introduction of 
scientific method into the brewery, and his 
reminiscences, which extend over rather more than 
half a century, enable us to appreciate very 
