626 



NATURE 



[October 26, 1905 



tific and practical, of well directed bonrds and com- 

 missions of agriculture and fisheries. 



A long chapter on the history of ichthyology, 

 enlivened by the photographic reproductions of several 

 dozen of the more prominent workers in this field, 

 and a chapter on the evolution of fishes since 

 Ordovician times, bring us to the systematic part, 

 which comprises the last quarter of the first and the 

 whole of the second volume. 



Here we have to find fault. There is no thorough 

 classification or system. The table of contents of the 

 chapters makes matters only worse. A single page 

 with an outline of the arrangement would be a boon. 

 The author is well aware of the uncertainty of the 

 position of many of the groups, or of their claim to 

 being natural assemblies at all. He never fails to 

 point out how they may be supposed to be connected 

 with each other, or that they are side branches of 

 the ideal tree, but he too often assigns to his groups 

 values or rank without reference to the next higher 

 category of which they are meant to form part. The 

 result of this treatment is bewildering to the reader 

 unless he studies the whole work and abstracts from 

 the man}' hints given a system of his own ; and in 

 this respect the book is truly a " Guide to the Study 

 of Fishes," and not a categorical text-book. 



The terms subclass, series, order, subdivision, are 

 often used promiscuously, sometimes as a heading I 

 which differs in its meaning from that assigned to 

 it further on. 



This being a case of fault-finding, a matter of 

 regret with a work which is otherwise so well done, 

 so full of information, and opening out so many new 

 vistas, let the reader try whether he can abstract from 

 it a CO- and sub-ordinated systematic arrangement. 



However, perhaps the author did not intend to 

 give a rounded-off classification. In many respects 

 his views differ from Boulenger's system, and it 

 may well be asked whether there is a single class 

 of animals about the grouping of which there is 

 general consensus. Leaving, therefore, this point, we 

 cannot but admire the masterly manner in which the 

 enormous class of fishes, recent and extinct, has 

 been marshalled. Group after group is diagnosed, 

 reviewed, discussed, figured, and endowed with never 

 flagging interest. 



" And with these dainty freaks of the sea, the 

 result of centuries of centuries of specialisation, de- 

 generation and adaptation, we close the long roll- 

 call of the fishes." H. G. 



THE FAR EAST. 

 The Far East. By Archibald Little. Pp. viii + 334. 

 (London : Frowde, 1905.) Price 7s. 6d. 



OF late years the Far East is only far in actual 

 distance ; it is very near to our thoughts, while 

 the ignorance regarding these lands is being very 

 rapidly dispelled. At the present moment it is Japan 

 that is attracting our attention ; five years ago it was 

 China, and probably in a few more years, now that 

 the Russo-Japanese contest is concluded, China will 

 again be the centre of interest. In his most interest- 

 ing book, "The Far East," Mr. Archibald Little 

 NO- 1878, VOL. 72] 



devotes more space to China than to Japan, having 

 been himself for very many years a resident of the 

 former country, and possessing a knowledge of the 

 Chinese surpassed by no one. China stands now at 

 the parting of the ways ; for many years resolute in 

 keeping out foreign inventions so distasteful to the 

 old-fashioned mandarin, circumstances have proved 

 too strong, and railways, the precursors of western 

 life, are now being built or projected throughout the 

 land. No one can foresee what changes twenty years 

 will bring about in this vast country, a vastness which 

 Mr. Little brings home to us by his diagrams and 

 comparative tables. 



To a lover of things historical, nothing can be more 

 fascinating than to wander back through the long 

 centuries to some thousands of years before the 

 Christian era ; and this it is necessary to do if one 

 would study Chinese history. To compress this into 

 a volume of reasonable size and yet to give a com- 

 prehensive account of each province is a difficult 

 task, but Mr. Little's apology in his preface is 

 unnecessary. 



China naturally lends itself to the division, which 

 is carried out in this book, into the northern, middle, 

 and southern basins, with the four dependencies of 

 Manchuria, Mongolia, Turkestan, and Tibet. Of 

 these four dependencies, it is in Mongolia and 

 Turkestan only that Chinese rule may be considered 

 as firmly established; in Tibet the amount of power 

 in the hands of the Chinese depends on the personal 

 characteristics of the Tibetan Dalai Lama and 

 Regent and the Chinese Amban ; undoubtedly one 

 result of Younghusband's mission to Lhasa has been 

 to emphasise Chinese authority in the eyes of the 

 Tibetans. Of Manchuria at the present moment it is 

 unsafe to hazard an opinion, but everything points 

 to its becoming once more a Chinese possession under 

 possibly Japanese moral tutelage. A consideration of 

 the two chapters on " Whilom Dependencies " leads 

 naturally to a thought of how of late years the more 

 outlying dependencies have been gradually lopped off, 

 how the once mighty Chinese Empire has de- 

 generated. Cochin China, Annam, Corea, as well as 

 Burma (which does not enter into the scope of this 

 book), all once paid tribute to China. 



Siam, for many years in danger of being squeezed 

 out of existence between two European Powers, has 

 taken a new lease of life, and is now in a more 

 prosperous condition than it has been for many 

 years. 



Japan might have many chapters written about it, 

 but we have been lately so inundated with things 

 Japanese that it is almost with a feeling of relief 

 that we turn once more to the chapters on China 

 itself. We would, in truth, most warmly recommend 

 this book to anyone about to travel in the F"ar East, 

 as well as to the stay-at-home reader, more par- 

 ticularly as regards China. 



Take the northern basin. What more interesting 

 to read about than Peking itself; Shansi, the province 

 of coal and iron ; Shantung, where the Germans at 

 great cost are slowly developing their trade through 

 Kiao Chau ? What great river in the world has 



