ea 
CN 
és \¥° 
FEB 18 2105 
NOTES AND COMMEN 
A HISTORY OF BRITISH MAMMALS. 
Part XVI. of this fine work has recently been published.* 
It deals with the Orkney Grass Mouse; Locally Extinct 
Voles ; The British Water Rats; The Scuth British Water 
Rats ; ‘and Black Water Rats. The different named forms and 
varieties into which these small mammals are now being 
divided, renders their study and identification a matter of 
some difficulty, and unless care is exercised, the tendency seems 
to be to define varieties on rather slender evidence. However, 
“ British Mammals” cannot be said to be guilty of hurried 
or careless handling of the subject. There are several illustra- 
tions, including an excellently coloured plate of of skins Microtus 
hirtus, M. agrestis neglectus, M. orcadensis and M. agrestis exul. 
STianal Mu sey > 
SA 
LANCASHIRE AND CHESHIRE ENTOMOLOGISTS. 
The thirty-seventh Annual Report and Proceedings of the 
Lancashire and Cheshire Entomological Society are to hand. f 
Besides the rules, list of members, etc., there are summaries 
of papers read, a note on Tortrix costana vars. lwerana and 
intermedia, by W. Mansbridge; the President’s address on 
 Hairs-and,- Scales at; Lepidoptera,’ by 1 F...N. Pierce ;- and 
eighteen pages of ‘The Lepidopterous Fauna of Lancashire 
and Cheshire,’ compiled by W. Mansbridge, ‘ being a new 
edition of Dr. Ellis’s list.’ There is a portait of Mr. J. Cotton ; 
and a plate of the new varieties of 7. costana, and of lepi- 
dopterous hairs, etc. We would like to suggest to the editor 
the necessity of adhering to the rule that specific names should 
commence with small letters; especially in the case of new 
varieties ; the large capitals in the heading on page 18 look 
particularly aggressive, besides being inaccurate. By the way, 
in Mr. Mansbridge’s ‘ New Edition of Dr. Ellis’s list ’ no reference 
whatever is made to the fact that the list was originally pub- 
lished in The Naturalist, and that even in ‘ publications quoted ’ 
no mention is made of this journal. We trust that the omission 
is merely accidental. In an ordinary course we should have 
thought that before anyone printed a ‘ new edition’ of a list 
appearing in a scientific publication, the necessary permission 
would have been obtained, if only as an act of courtesy. 
THE BRADFORD ANTIQUARY. 
Part XVII. of the new series of this journal has been 
published, and gives evidence of the continued work and 
interest of the Bradford Historical and Antiquarian Society. 
Besides short notes, it contains a paper on ‘ Broughton Hall 
* Gurney and Jackson, 2/6. 
{ xxv. + 18 pp., 3/0. 
1915 Feb. 1. 
