556 



NATURE 



{April 14, 1887 



than castaways (Nos. 167, 169). In another case, " as the 

 greater part of one side is flat . . . it is evidently done 

 for the purpose of being held in the hand " (p. 86). Again, 

 "the object of making such an instrument is clear," 

 namely, " for insertion in a club " (pp. 94, 95). " There 

 can be no doubt that . . . they have been, or were 

 intended to be, inserted into sockets " (p. 109). No. 159, 

 in which '' we have a shaft-smoother, borer and knife 

 included in one object" (p. 116), must have been the 

 delight of some Palaeolithic schoolboy ! Where state- 

 rfients of opinion occur in such form as " / have no 

 doubt," they are of course justifiable ; but in this sceptical 

 age it is risky to say " there can be no doubt." It is quite 

 refreshing to hear that there are implements whose " use 

 is almost beyond conjecture " (p. 98). Most likely differ- 

 entiation in the use of tools did not go far in Palaeolithic 

 times. 



In the illustrations it would seem that in some cases 

 justice has hardly been done to the specimens, or we 

 should not be told by so experienced a person as the 

 author that No. 144 (Plate ii.) is " the finest example of 

 Palaeolithic work " that he has seen. There is, too, a 

 deficiency that should be supplied in another edition : a 

 map and a genera! section of the district would much 

 help most readers ; and these could well be given instead 

 of some of the foreign objects, such as the eternal carved 

 reindeer, &c., without which no anthropological work 

 seems to be thought complete, and which, by frequent 

 repetition, have grown to be nearly as irritating as the 

 faces and figures ever obtruding themselves from the 

 advertising columns of newspapers and magazines. 



The frontispiece, by Mr. Worthington Smith, should be 

 acceptable to the advocates of women's rights. The 

 woman is represented as the skilled artist, whilst the man 

 is the mere labourer ! 



OUR BOOK SHELF 



Hand-book of Practical Botany for the Botanical Labora- 

 tory and Private Student. By Prof. E. Strasburger. 

 Edited from the German by W. Hillhouse, M.A., 

 F.L.S. (Swan Sonnenschein, Lowrey, and Co., 1887.) 

 Prof. Strasburger's well-known work, "Das botan- 

 ische Practicum," has already been reviewed in the pages 

 of Nature (vol. x.x.x. p. 214), so that a short notice may 

 suffice for the present hand-book, which is essentially a 

 translation of the smaller German edition. Only the 

 account of the fall of the leaf (pp. 156-59) has been taken 

 from the larger work. 



The present edition has been fully revised by the 

 author, and also contains a considerable number of edi- 

 torial notes and additions. The latter are usually indi- 

 cated by being inclosed in brackets. It would, perhaps, 

 have been better if this had been done throughout, 

 especially in the introduction. A number of additional 

 figures have been inserted by the editor. These are almost 

 all reproductions of familiar text-book illustrations. Many 

 of them certainly come in well, but we cannot help feeling 

 that the constant reappearance of old figures has become 

 rather wearisome, and that in this instance it tends to 

 take off from the freshness which was so pleasant a 

 characteristic of Prof. Strasburger's " Practicum." 



We mil h regret that no account of any of the sea- 

 weeds finds a place in this edition. The admirable 

 descripti'iii of Flicus in the larger treatise of the author 

 might well have been introduced here, while we think 

 that tlie editor would have been well advised to add an 



example of the red seaweeds on his own account, or at 

 least to reproduce Prof. Strasburger's description of the 

 fresh-water Batrachospermum. It is easy to see why the 

 author, writing for German elementary students, omitted 

 all reference to seaweeds in his smaller edition. In Eng- 

 land we are in a very different position, and it is a pity 

 that students should not at once be made acquainted 

 with plants which are so instructive and so easily 

 accessible. 



As the editor explains in his preface that the translation 

 was executed at a time of serious pressure, it would be 

 unfair to enter into any detailed criticism. It must, how- 

 ever, be admitted that the signs of haste are very frequent, 

 and that there is much need for revision in a future 

 edition. There are one or two instances of this which 

 cannot be quite passed over. At p. II, " durchschnitt- 

 lich," which means on the average, is translated " section- 

 ally," while at p. 49 we have " carefully," where the author 

 says " with advantage" ("mit V'ortheil"). At p. 169, note 2, 

 " perfection " should be " development," while on p. 208 

 the statement that " we know the angular outline of the 

 crystals [in Spirogyra] even without reagents," has an odd 

 eftect. The word should of course be recognise. At 

 p. 67 the use of the word " pits " for the deep depressions 

 ("Griibchen") which lead down to the stomata in Aloe, 

 &c., seems to us likely to confuse the beginner. The 

 phrase " starch-builders " (p. 43, &c.) strikes us as awkward, 

 and is certainly not accurate as a translation. The use 

 of the term laticiferous cells, in speaking of Chelidoniuni, 

 is unfortunate. The organs in question of course come 

 under the head of laticiferous vessels. 



In conclusion we may express a doubt whether the 

 un-English form " fibro-vasal" has any advantages over 

 the familiar word " fibro- vascular." 



The appendices have been much expanded from the 

 original indices of the author, and should be of great use 

 to the student, to whom the book as a whole will be 

 extremely welcome. D. H. S. 



Elementary Practical Biology — Vegetable. By Thomas 



W. Shore, M.D., B.Sc. (London : Churchill, 1887.) 

 This book is welcome more as a sign of the ever-growing 

 attention paid to plant-structure than for any peculiar 

 merit it has as a guide to the subject. The author fairly e.x- 

 presses his indebtedness to such practical books as Bower 

 and Vines's, and claims originality only for his arrangement 

 and treatment of the subject. The arrangement is as fol- 

 lows : — First comes an introduction dealing with the neces- 

 sary apparatus and the preparation, &c., of objects. This 

 is very concisely and sensibly done. Part I. deals 

 with general vegetable morphology, treating in due 

 sequence of the cell, the tissues, the systems of tissues, 

 the apices of stems and roots, and cell-multiplication or 

 cell-reproduction. Part II. is devoted to the Crypto- 

 gamia, beginning with the Fungi and working up to the 

 vascular forms. Part 111. is confined to the Gymno- 

 sperms, and Part IV. to the Angiosperms. So much for 

 the arrangement. There may be no guide to practical 

 work covering precisely all these types in this way, but 

 text-books are by no means wanting which contain this 

 arrangement of matter. The originality here is therefore 

 not at all striking — perhaps fortunately so. As for the 

 treatment, the student is conducted through the course 

 with a baldness in the directions to note this and observe 

 that, which reminds one of the style of a personal con- 

 ductor through an historic building. The book has a 

 purely practical aim, with the excellent purpose of pre- 

 venting " cram" ; but a student who should undergo this 

 course of instruction, noting and observing no more than 

 he is here directed to do, would find himself, at the end of 

 it, the dispirited possessor of a mass of information which 

 would result in a sad fit of mental indigestion. A prac- 

 tical guide of this kind throws too much of the burden of 

 instruction upon the lecturer whose course accompanies 



