Reviews and Book Notices 351 
larger spiders, they belong to an entirely different group, 
with a different eye arrangement (Cribellate) characterised 
by the possession of an extra spinner differing in shape and posi- 
tion from the others, which is, always in the 2 and sometimes 
in the g, associated with a comb of hooked bristles on the 
fourth pair of legs, though in Zorvopsis neither structure is so 
highly developed as in the allied genera. The spinner pro- 
duces a special kind of silk, which is carded by the comb, 
and spread over a framework of ordinary silk, forming a most 
tenacious snare. Similar webs made by their British relatives 
may be seen in old walls and cellars, and may be recognised 
when fresh by their blue appearance. 
Mr. Musham has also sent me from Selby a female Hetero- 
poda venatoria (of almost world-wide distribution) with an extra- 
ordinary number of young, newly hatched from a single 
egg-sac ; found in a bunch of bananas; and I have seen dis- 
played in various museums, examples of Mygale caught 
locally, amongst foreign products. 
Doubtless, many other exotics reach this country, but on 
arrival finding no suitable habitat available, are speedily 
detected and destroyed, and all record of them lost.* 


7O: 
The Birds of Shakespeare, by Sir Archibald Geikie, O.M., K.C.B., etc. 
Glasgow: J. Mackhose & Sons, I916. x. + 121 pp., 3s. 6d. net. In 
this book Sir Archibald Geikie has extended his presidential address to 
the Haslemere Natural History Society, which was delivered in March 
last ; and states that ‘In all humility I desire to lay this little Tercentenary 
offering at the shrine of the ‘“‘ Sweet Swan of Avon.’’’ Over fifty species 
of birds are enumerated by Shakespeare in his plays, and the apt references 
to them prove that in many instances he was familiar with their habits. 
This is shown by many quotations selected, pearls strung together with 
Sir Archibald’s facile needle and inimitable thread. His notes are illus- 
trated from blocks taken from Saunder’s well-known ‘ Manual of British 
Birds,’ though for some unexplainable reason these seem to us to be out of 
place. There is an excellent head-piece as a tail-piece. It shows the 
author with ‘a friendly chough.’ 
An Introduction to the Study of Fossils (Plants and Animals), by 
H. W. Shimer. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. xiv. + 450. 
ros. 6d. net. This volume is by the “ Associate Professor of Paleontology 
in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,’ and it is essentially an 
American publication. We know of no book quite like it published in 
Britain. Strictly speaking, it is an introduction to the science of Palzon- 
tology, and deals with almost every phase of the various forms of life 
represented in the rocks by their dead remains. All the examples men- 
tioned are from America, but the remarks on the state of their preservation, 
the various ways in which remains of animals and plants are preserved, 
are so well described, that the volume will be welcome to British workers. 
There are nearly two hundred illustrations to the volume, which alone 
make it of value to the geologist. The price is very reasonable. 
a a a a 
* See also The Naturalist, 1913, Feb., p. 114. 
1916 Nov. 1. 
