Notes and Comments. 
Oo 
cles 
to 
MESOZOIC PLANTS.* 
In this volume Dr. Stopes continues her extraordinarily 
detailed work among the remains of the Cretaceous plants 
preserved in the British Museum, and incidentally the collec- 
tions in the York, Maidstone and other museums are illustrated 
and described. The first plate figures an unusual fine specimen 
of Bennettites allchini, named after the curator of the museum at 
Maidstone, who gave facilities for examining it.. As illustrating 
the extraordinary strides recently made in palzo-botany, it may 
be stated that most of the enormous numbers of specimens 
referred to in this substantial work are merely fragments of 
wood, such as are usually found in museums labelled ‘ fossil 
wood from Greensand,’ etc. A microscopical examination of 
these specimens has resulted in most important contributions 
to science on the subject, some indication of the nature of which 
was given by Dr. Stopes at the British Association meeting at 
Manchester a little while ago. 
PALAZONTOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY. 
Volume 68 of this valuable journal, issued for 1914, is 
probably remarkable from the fact that it is the thinnest and 
most overdue volume issued by this society. Both facts are 
doubtless accounted for by the war. The present volume is 
entirely occupied by an account of ‘ The Pliocene Mollusca of 
Great Britain, by F. W. Harmer, being Supplementary to 
S. V. Wood’s Monograph of the Crag Mollusca.’ It occupies 
pages 201 to 302, and plates XXV-XXXIT. Manx and Brid- 
lington specimens are illustrated and described. The mono- 
graph is useful on account of the revision it makes of some of 
the so-called “ Crag ’ fossils found at Bridlington, in possession 
of Mr. W. B. Headley, and others, and the illustrations are 
admirable. 
SURVIVAL AND EXTINCTION OF INSECTS. 
In concluding his notes on “ Observations on some of the 
Causes determining the Survival and Extinction of Insects’ in 
The Entomologist’s Monthly Magazine, Mr. G. B. Walsh states 
“it seems probable that the most potent Auman causes in the 
destruction of animal life are building operations, close. grazing, 
clean agriculture and forestry, destruction of woodlands, heaths, 
commons, etc., and destruction of plant life by smoke, dust, and 
fumes ; the most potent human factor in its preservation is the 
establishment of preserves where conditions are like those of 
primeval nature ; and then, besides this, there is apparently 
* “Catalogue of the Mesozoic Plants in the British Museum (Natural 
History), Cretaceous Flora, Part 2, Lower Greensand (Aptian), Plants of 
Britain.’ By Marie C. Stopes, D.Sc., London: British Museum, 360 
pages, 32 plates. 
Naturalist, 
