August 23, 1906] 



NA TURE 



411 



Cox, which led him not only to transliterate after 

 their manner, but even to extend the fad into English, 

 and to write such dreadful words as " Ilellenilc " and 

 " Dionysiak." As a critic said, " Why not Dionusiak 

 Mulh?" which was a palpable hit. However, to be 

 lust, much of this sort of thing also has disappeared 

 from Mr. Brown's present book, which we readily 

 allow to be a heap of antiquarian learning, Assyrio- 

 Hogical and other, on the subject of which it treats. 



Whether the Assyriology and the Sumerology are 

 .ill right the lay critic is unable to tell, but there is 

 probably a good deal in Mr. Brown's Assyrian learn- 

 ing that is not entirely orthodox, to judge from the 

 undoubtedly unorthodox nature of much of his Greek 

 philology, to which i\mm&.-€^-6(~ia testifies. That 

 •dreadful soloikism (as we suppose Mr. Brown would 

 •say) makes us perhaps unduly suspicious. If so, we 

 hasten to beg Mr. Brown's pardon, as we do not 

 wish to share the fale of the Assyriological reviewer 

 (not ourselves) of vol. i. of " Primitive Constellations " 

 in Nature (April 13, 1899, vol. lix., p. 553), who said 

 thai Mr. Brown made mistakes in his .Assyrian and was 

 '.mitten by a Browniak thunderbolt for his temerity. 

 The learned author refers to this circumstance in 

 a note in the volume under review. Perhaps Mr. 

 Brown may think he scored, but it is perfectly 

 plain that when he wrote " Barsipki " as the name 

 of the town of Barsip (Borsippa) he was under the 

 ■erroneous impression that the written suffix -fet was 

 pronounced, otherwise he would not have spelt it out. 

 "'Barsip'''" was written, "Barsip" was said; 

 ■' Barsipki " was never either written or said. If 

 Mr. Brown does not understand what is meant he 

 does not understand the cuneiform writing, and if 

 his Assyriology is bad the whole of his book must be 

 bad too. 



OVR BOOK SHELF. 



Biiilogisclic niid morplwlogische Uiitersuchttngen iibcr 



]\'asser- iiud Siimpfgewdchse. Erster Teil. Die 



Lebensgeschichte der europaischen Alismaceen. By 



Prof. Hugo Glijck, Heidelberg. Pp. xxiv-l-3i2 + 



xiv figures and plates. (Jena : G. Fischer, 1905.) 



Price 20 marks. 



I'liis elaborate and apparently e.xhauslive monograph 



3, one of the fruits of the morphological school 



founded in Munich by Goebel, but the author, struck, 



;is so many writers have been, with the enormous 



variability of these plants, has here attempted to bring 



together the facts, not only of the influence of the 



<Mivironment as expressed in the direct action of such 



agencies as light, situation, water, and other factors, 



but has also tried to weave these into a sort of system 



such as can be used by the systematist. 



He says : — " Meiner Ansicht nach ist das der 

 ■einzige Weg, der uns iiber das Zustandekommen der 

 cinzelnen Formen und ihre .'\bhangigkeit vom 

 Standort sicheren .\ufschluss erteilt, da ja in der 

 freien Natur die .Standortsverhiiltnisse dieser Pflanzen 

 einem steten Wechsel unterworfen sind und sich der 

 direkten Beobachtung mehr oder minder entziehen." 



But, in addition, extensive collections of herbarium 

 material were made and examined, and plants over 

 wide areas examined in situ. 



The book falls into two parts, of which the first 



NO. 192 [,. VOL. 74] 



or special part deals with the biology in the German 

 sense of the word, of the various species of Alysma, 

 Rchinodorus, Elisma, Caldesia, Damasonium, and 

 Sagittaria. Each of these species is then examined 

 in detail as regards the general action of the environ- 

 ment, its aquatic forms or varieties, its land forms, 

 its seedlings, and its so-called monstrosities whether 

 found wild in nature or produced in culture, and 

 lastly, the condition in which it passes the winter. 

 Here and there are notes on other matters of detail, 

 such as floating apparatus, the influence of light, 

 turios, submersed forms, &c. 



The second or general part of the work describes an 

 investigation of the adaptation of the various parts to 

 different functions in general. One of the most 

 interesting sections here will be the examination of 

 the formative factors (gestaltbildener factoren), and 

 another is the results considered in respect to system- 

 atic botany. There is a rather too meagre index, but 

 a very special word of praise should be given to the 

 plates, and we congratulate author and publisher alike 

 on the drawing and reproduction of the figures. Few 

 morphologists will be able to dispense with the book, 

 and certainly no systematist concerned with the 

 biology of this interesting group of water-plants. 



School Gardening for Little Children. By Lucy R. 



Latter. Introduction by Prof. P. Geddes. Pp. 



xxiv-t-166. (London: Swan Sonnenschein and Co., 



Ltd., 1906.) Price 2S. 6d. net. 

 The value of any particular scheme of education for 

 little children depends more on the interest the teacher 

 feels in the subject, and on the sympathy he or she 

 is able to manifest towards the pupils, than on the 

 scheme itself. We think this will be obvious to any- 

 one who peruses the pages of the volume before us. 

 Most children bred in the country have a " garden all 

 to themselves," but we doubt whether any permanent 

 benefit is derived by them unless their work in it is 

 directed with sympathetic intelligence such as is re- 

 vealed in Miss Latter's pages. " I have tried," says 

 the author, " to prove that it is possible to make 

 nature-teaching the central point of the life of a 

 school without detriment to the children ; that such 

 teaching gives a real meaning and incentive to all 

 the handwork and leads to a richer and truer appreci- 

 ation of poetry, pictures and music. 



" The experiment has been going on for nearly six 

 years, during which time it has successfully stood the 

 test of Government inspection. Each year has shown 

 an increasing gain to the children intellectually as 

 well as physically and morally. Instead of the chil- 

 dren being less prepared for the work of the senior 

 schools, it is found that they read, write, and do 

 arithmetic as well, if not much better, for having had 

 daily contact with plants and animals and opportuni- 

 ties for observing the various natural phenomena 

 which affect their lives in one way or another. It is 

 further found that such children pass on to the senior 

 schools with a quickened power of observation, a far 

 greater amount of intelligence, a keener desire to 

 learn, and a greater refinement of heart than if their 

 earlier years had been spent in acquiring mechanical 

 perfection in the arts of reading, writing, and arith- 

 metic before any real experience had been accumulated 

 as a basis for those more formal branches of instruc- 

 tion." 



Miss Latter speaks with authority, and a perusal of 

 her book leads us to accord willing assent to it. In 

 subsequent pages she tells us what have been the 

 procedures which have contributed to her success, how 

 part of the hard asphalt playground has been con- 

 verted into the school-garden, how the garden is 



