58 



NA TURE 



[May 21, 1896 



I trust, therefore, that the experiments described in 

 the Bakerian Lecture will show that the diftusion can 

 readily be measured in solid metals, and that they will 

 carry one step further the work of Graham. 



W. C. ROKERTS-AUSTEN. 



BOOKS ON BIRDS} 

 'T'HE issue of works on ornithology continues in an 

 ■'• unbroken stream. There can be little doubt that 

 since the arrangement of the birds in the National 

 Museum in South Kensington, in their natural attitudes 

 and surroundings, was adopted — a system largely followed 

 in inany of our provincial museums — there has been a 

 distinct increase in the interest taken in natural history, 

 and, as might be expected from the amount of knowledge 

 as to their life and habits which these groups convey, 

 the study of birds has largely increased. The constant 

 demand for work after work on the limited subject of 

 British birds is very remarkable, and is to some e.xtent a 

 measure of the growing- interest in this branch of science. 

 With the second \olume, which has lately appeared. 

 Dr. R. Bowdler Sharpe has completed his " Handbook to 

 the Birds of Great Britain" in Allen's Naturalist's Library, 

 of which he is the editor. His knowledge of the subject 

 of which he treats is admittedly unrivalled, while the 

 thorough manner in which he performs all his work — 

 though vast in amount — is so well known, that his name, 

 as editor and author, is sufficient guarantee for the value 

 and excellence of these two volumes. All that is essential 

 to be known in the life-history of British birds is related 

 shortly yet fully, in clear, popular language. This work 

 forms a concise monograph of our native birds ; indeed, 

 no better or more authoritatixe work on the subject has 

 yet been published. It is illustrated by numerous 

 coloured full-page plates, the bulk of them the resus- 

 citated drawings of Lizars from Jardine's Library. As 

 has been often already pointed out, and pressed upon 

 the attention of the publishers in regard to other volumes 

 of this series, those plates are quite unworthy of the text. 

 In the preface to the second volume the author replies 

 to the critics who have attacked his method of nomen- 

 clature adopted in this and other \olumes of the Library, 

 the result of which is that certain species come to be 



5 " A Handbook to the Birds of Gre.it Britain." By R. Bowdler Sharpe, 

 LL.D. Vol. i. 1894. Pp. xxii + 342. Vol. ii. 1895. Pp. xi -f- 308. (London : 

 W. H. Allen and Co., Ltd.). 



" British Birds." By W. H. Hudson, C.M.Z.S. With a Chapter on 

 Structure and Classification, by Frank E. Beddard, F.R.S. Pp. xviii -f 363. 

 (London and New York ; Longmans, Green, and Co., 1895.) 



"The Wild-Fowl and Sea-Fowl of Great Britain." By a " Son of the 

 Marshes." Edited by J. A. Owen. With Illustrations by Brj-an Hook. 

 Pp. 326. (London : Chapm.in and Hall, Ltd., 1895.) 



" Birds from Moidart .ind Elsewhere ; dr.-»wn from Nature." By Mrs. 

 Hugh Blackburn. Pp. viii + 191. (Edinburgh : Uavid Douglas, 1895.) 



■' The Birds of Berwickshire, with Remarks on their Local Distribution, 

 Migration, and Habits, and also on the Folk-lore Proverbs, Popular 

 Rhymes and Sayings connected with them. By George Muirhead, 

 F.R.S.E. In two volumes. Vol. i. 1889. Pp. xxvi -f 334. Vol. ii. 1895. 

 Pp. xii -(- 390. (Edinburgh : David Douglas.) 



" North American Shore Birds : a History of the Snipes, Sandpipers, 

 Plovers, and their Allies." By Daniel Giraud Elliot, F.R.S.E. With 

 -seventy-four plates. Pp. viii -f 268. (London : Suckling and Galloway. 

 New York : Francis P. Harper, 1895.) 



" The Birds of Ontario, being a Concise .\ccount of every Species of 

 Bird known to have been found in Ontario, with a description of their Nests 

 and Eggs, and Instructions for Collecting Birds and Preparing and Preserv- 

 ing Skins, .-ind Directions how to form a Collection of Eggs." By Thomas 

 Mcllwraith. 2nd edition. Pp. ix -h 426. (London : T. Fisher Unwin : 

 Toronto : William Briggs, ,894.) 



" Birdcraft ; a Field-book of Two Hundred Song, Game, and Water 

 Birds." By Mabel Osgood Wright. With full-page plates. Pp. xvi -|- 3t7. 

 (New York and London : Macmillan and Co,, 1895.) 



"Photographs of the Life-History tiroups of Birds in the Grosvenor 

 Museum, Chester." Prepared by Mr. R. Newstead, Curator ; photographed 

 by G. W. Webster. 1895. 



"The Royal Natural History." Edited by Richard Lydekker, B A., 

 F.R.S. Vol. iv. Birds (chaps, viii.-xxi.). Pp. xv -|- 583. (London : 

 Frederick Warne and Co., 1895.) 



" The Fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma." Published 



der the authority of the Secretary of State for India in Council. Edited 

 by W. T. Blanford. Birds. Vol. ill. By W. T. Blanford, F.R.S. 



p. .\iv -f 450. (London: Taylor and Francis; Calcutta and Bombay: 



hacker and Co. ; lierlin : Friedlander, 1895.) 



NO. 1386, VOL. 54] 



designated by a duplication of their generic and specific 

 names. Dr. .Sharpe appears to us to have adopted the 

 only logical course open to him, and his reply would 

 seem to be unanswerable. "Thus if Linnaeus," he says, 

 " called the Partridge Tetrao perdi'x, the name pcrdix 

 ought to be retained at all costs for the species. When 

 Po-dix was taken in a generic sense and the species was 

 called Perdix cinerca, I contend that it ought ne\-er to 

 have been allowed, and if in restoring the LinniBan 

 specific name of perdix, it results that the oldest generic 

 name is also Pcrdix, and the species has to be called 

 Pcrdix perdix (L.), 1 can only say I am sorry, but it 

 cannot be helped." 



In Mr. Hudson's "British Birds" a brief account is 

 given of the appearance, language and life-habits of all 

 the birds that reside permanently or for a portion of 

 each year within the limits of the British islands. The 

 descriptive accounts of the various species are shorter, 

 less technical and precise, but not less accurate than 

 those in Dr. .Sharpe's "Handbook." On the other hand, 

 our author trusts that his work has the merit of simplicity, 

 as it is intended for the general reader and, more especi- 

 ally, for the young. The species alone are described, the 

 family and generic characters being omitted, as there 

 was not space to make the book, "at the same time, a 

 technical and a popular one." Like all that comes from 

 Mr. Hudson's pen on this subject, the present volume is 

 sympathetically and attractively written. It is illustrated 

 by eight chromolithograph plates from original drawings 

 by A. Thorburn, in addition to eight full-page plates and 

 one hundred figures in black-and-white, from drawings by 

 G. E. Lodge, prepared for this work, the whole of which 

 are exc]uisitely reproduced. Altogether the book is to be 

 very highly recommended. It is prefaced by a chapter on 

 structure and classification by so competent an anatomist 

 as Mr. F. E. lieddard, F.R.S. His contribution, however, 

 though very clear and condensed, is, we fear, somewhat 

 above the heads of the bulk of the young readers for 

 whom Mr. Hudson's pages have been written. On p. 17, 

 he remarks, with reference to the fore-limb in Diiiornis 

 that no trace of a wing has been so far discovered. In 

 1S92 a scapulo-coracoid, with a distinct glenoid cavity, 

 was figured in N.\TURE (vol. xlv. p. 257), indicating the 

 presence of a humerus, which is surely at least a " trace " 

 of a wing. 



In the "Wild Fowl and Sea-Fowl of Great Britain," 

 a " Son of the Marshes " depicts the haunts rather than the 

 habits of the birds of our estuaries and fen-lands. His 

 volume is more a collection of shooting sketches than a 

 serious contribution to ornithology, notwithstanding the 

 short technical descriptions, at the conclusion of each 

 chapter, of the several species of the group to which the 

 chapter is devoted. The author has given us during many 

 years numerous delightful sketches of marsh-land life at 

 every season, and under all conditions of sky and tem- 

 perature ; but we have had his message so often now, 

 that it has begun to lose much of its freshness and 

 flavour. In this latest delivery we cannot resist the 

 impression that we have heard all he tells us before, and 

 said even better than here. Many of his pages leave 

 with the reader the irritating suspicion of having been 

 elaborated with toil, and the matter beaten out to cover 

 an allotted space. The numerous quotations from all 

 sorts and conditions of marsh-folk, "coy" men, net-setters, 

 and wild-fowlers, in which we fail, through obtuseness 

 probably, to jjerceive anything humorous, quaint or 

 original, might have been largely curtailed with advan- 

 tage to the narrative. J. A. Owen, who edits the 

 volume, has allowed to escape detection such unorthodox 

 expressions as " to flight " and " flighting birds," as also 

 the use of that most objectionable term " scientist," to 

 indicate the professed man of science. The volume has 

 numerous excellent full-page black-and-white illustrations 

 by Bryan Hook. 



