November 4, 1922] 



NA TURE 



597 



noticed a few other slips and misprints. They do not 

 appreciably detract, however, from the value of this 

 volume, which will be welcomed by all physicists and 

 engineers. 



Spitsbergen and its Wild Life. 



Amid Snowy Wastes : Wild Life on the Spitsbergen 

 Archipelago. By Seton Gordon. Pp. xiv + 206, 

 2 maps and 114 illustrations. (London : Cassell and 

 Co., Ltd., 1922.) 155. net. 



ALTHOUGH the Spitsbergen Archipelago is only 

 six hundred miles from the north pole, yet, 

 owing to its accessibility, due to the influence of the 

 Gulf Stream drift which reaches its 

 western shores, it has been much 

 visited in the summer months by 

 naturalists and sportsmen, with the 

 result its bird-life is better known 

 than that of a number of continental 

 countries. Its ornithology is en- 

 crusted in a remarkable literature 

 dating from 1598, which comprises 

 no less than 150 contributions, and 

 includes Prof. Koenig's " Avifauna 

 Spitzbergensis," which from the 

 beauty of its meisenbach pictures of 

 scenery, and its excellent coloured 

 plates of birds arid their eggs, is 

 entitled to rank among the most 

 attractive of bird-books, while its 

 letterpress exhausts the historical 

 aspect of the subject down to the 

 year of its publication, 191 1. 



The latest expedition was organ- 

 ised by the University of Oxford, 

 and visited the archipelago in the 

 summer of 1921 under the leadership 

 of the Rev. F. C. R. Jourdain. Mr. 

 Gordon accompanied the party in 

 the capacity of photographer, and 

 hence the main attractions of his 

 book lie in the wealth and nature 

 of its illustrations, about one hundred 

 in number. These are supplemented 

 by a series of pleasantly written 

 chapters wherein he relates his 

 personal observations and experi- 

 ences. The scientific results of the 

 expedition, however, will appear in 

 due course ; those relating to orni- 

 thology are being prepared by Mr. 

 Jourdain, who is an eminent authority 

 on the subject. 



NO. 2766, VOL. I ioj 



The most interesting pictures and chapters of Mr. 

 Gordon's book are devoted to the pink-footed goose, 

 Brent goose, long-tailed duck, purple sandpiper, grey 

 phalarope, glaucous gull, and various nesting colonies. 

 The chief captures made by the expedition were a 

 number of eggs of the Bernicle goose, concerning the 

 nesting habits of which no trustworthy information was 

 forthcoming until 1907, when the first eggs were found 

 at Spitsbergen by Prof. Koenig. Five nests and twenty 

 eggs were obtained in 1921, but for some unexplained 

 reason the nest of this bird — not yet depicted — does 

 not appear in Mr. Gordon's series, though a chapter is 

 devoted to it. 



An interesting account is given of the coal-mining 



ting ground of the Pink-: 



