November 28, 1912] 



NATURE 



359 



ought to have a ready sale on this side of the 

 Channel, because the marine and estuarine 

 animals it describes and illustrates are those with 

 which all shore collectors and amateur fishermen 

 are familiar. To these the book may be recom- 

 mended without reserve. 



(3) The gift of writing- science for children is 

 much rarer than is usually supposed. If it can 

 be acquired, Mr. Ellison Hawks has much to learn 

 in the use and disuse of words and in the handling 

 of subject matter before he can hope to qualify 

 for a place in the small band of authors endowed 

 with the gift. Apart from this defect and a few 

 of less moment, his book on bees is quite good 

 in its way, and holds all about the structure, 

 habits, and practical keeping of honey-bees that 

 the ordinary layman is likely to want. 



Not without misgivings on the score of the 

 probable suppression or transference of long- 

 cherished and familiar names did we look through 

 the new "Hand-list of British Birds," by Messrs. 

 Hartert, Jourdain, Ticehurst and Witherby (4). 

 That our fears were justified in a measure is shown 

 by the appearance of some strange, often uncouth, 

 terms, like horin for hortensis for the garden 

 warbler, by the transference of musicus from the 

 song thrush to the redwing, and by a most dis- 

 concerting shuffling of the names of our owls. 

 The barn owl, for example, so familiar as Strix 

 fiammea, is now Tyto alba, its generic name 

 Strix going to the tawny owl and its specific 

 name fiammea to the short-eared owl ! We are 

 forced to admit, however, that until systematic 

 zoologists agree on the question of exempting 

 certain names from the law of priority, con- 

 scientious compilers of catalogues are compelled 

 to put it in force. On the other hand, we welcome 

 the suppression of many generic names, and re- 

 joice that the blackbird is still a Turdus, that the 

 n-ook finds a place in Corvus, and that the kestrel, 

 gyrfalcon and merlin are associated with the 

 peregrine under Falco. The volume, which deals 

 with distribution and migration as well as with 

 names, is useful and carefully compiled, and will 

 have to be seriously reckoned with by all writers 

 on British birds, despite the protests to which 

 its nomenclature is sure to give rise. 



(5) In Mr. Dakin's memoir on the whelk 

 (Buccinum) zoological students will find an admir- 

 able and well-illustrated treatise on the anatomy 

 of this common gastropod, supplemented by brief 

 accounts of its embryology, distribution and 

 economics. 



(6) Like all the volumes of " Das Tierreich " 

 which deal with obscure groups, Dr. Miiller's 

 monograph of the Ostracoda is a colossal piece of 

 work. More than nine hundred species of these 



NO. 2248, VOL. 90] 



minute Entomostraca are tabulated and classified. 

 It will give a fresh impulse to the study of the 

 group, but cannot be regarded as final, since some- 

 thing like six hundred named species have to be set 

 aside, through no fault of the author, as dubiae. 

 What a benefit it would be to the study of such 

 orders as this if specialists would abandon for 

 a time the description of new species and seriously 

 address themselves to the task of classifying 

 properly those that have already been described ! 



R. I. P. 



OUR BOOKSHELF. 



Biologische und morphologische Untersuchuiigen 



iiber Wasser- und Sunipfgewdchse. By Prof. 



H. Glijck. Dritter Teil :— Die Uferflora. 



Pp. xxxiv + 644 + viii plates. (Jena: Gustav 



Fischer, 191 1.) Price 33 marks. 

 Prof. Gluck has produced a portentous volume 

 on the riparian flora, forming the third instalment 

 of his work on water and swamp plants. Frankly, 

 we do not find justification for the 600 or more 

 I pages of his book, and we fancy most readers 

 who have been in the habit of using their eyes 

 when observing or collecting plants will find but 

 little to reward them for the trouble of its perusal. 



There are many examples, often of very moder- 

 ate interest, adduced to illustrate the fact that 

 submerged forms are apt to differ from the terres- 

 trial representatives of a given species. Here and 

 there, however, interesting observations are re- 

 corded, e.g., the very different water and land 

 forms of Veronica Beccabunga. 



The author claims many new "forms," e.g., 

 Veronica Beccabunga forma submersa, Gliick. 

 Many of these are already known, though pos- 

 sibly not recorded, nor even dignified with a Latin 

 name. 



Species undergo fission, as they are apt to do 

 in the hands of those who concentrate attention 

 on variable forms. It is, however, fair to say 

 that many of these rest on the authority of other 

 writers before Gliick, but it would have been of 

 more general interest had the claims to specific 

 or even mutational rank been experimentally 

 settled. 



No doubt a work of this kind possesses some 

 value, but, as it appears to us, it excellently illus- 

 trates the truth of the saying that the secret of 

 dullness lies in the attempt to write all one knows. 

 Prof. Gliick gives the impression (perhaps un- 

 justly) that he has written all he knows about 

 his subject, and certainly he has jotted down a 

 good deal that is already very familiar to others. 



The Teratology of Fishes. By Dr. James F. 

 Gemmill. Pp. xvii 4- 73 + xxvi plates. (Glas- 

 gow: James MacLehose and Sons, 1912.) 

 Price 155. net. 

 Dr. Gemmill's memoir is mainly a very complete 

 and well-illustrated account of the structure of 

 the major abnormalities, or double, triple, and 



