Reviews and Book Notices. 363 
the fossils, and the accompanying flora does not suggest any 
special degree of cold. One of the speakers who had seen the 
excavations made laid great stress on the smell of the bones, and 
this reminds us of an incident told by a geologist whose veracity 
has never been questioned. He was at Ludlow, and wishing 
to locate the well-known bed containing fish remains, went to 
the Market Place. He sniffed the air all round, and at last 
detecting a fishy odour, he followed the scent, and was led 
straight to the exposure ! 
Prof. J. Joly found the rocks of the Simplon Tunnel to con- 
tain radium in unsuspected quantities. He is led to enquire 
whether this may not account for the high temperatures ex- 
perienced in making the tunnel, and the thermal convection 
caused by the removal and deposition of radium bearing 
sediments may be a factor in mountain building. 
Prof. J. Milne delighted the large audience which came to 
hear him with a racy account of his recent researches on 
Earthquakes. He finds that photographic plates exposed in 
dark caves and mines are affected by a mysterious light 
emanating from the rocks, and some of these coincide with the 
times of recorded earthquakes. His catalogue of important 
earthquakes shows that a maximum occurred between the 
years 1150 and 1250 A.p., and another increase commenced 
about the year 1650, and is still in progress. 
The 1907 meeting, although not a large one, was most 
enjoyable, and Section C will never forget the warm welcome 
and the kindness extended to its members by the _ local 
geologists. 
——_—- <> 
Familiar Indian Birds, by Gordon Dalgleish. West Newman, London, 
1907. 70 pp. Price 2/6 net. Apparently this book is for the benefit of 
those people in India who are likely to take an interest in the more common 
birds met with in that Empire. Several of the notes have previously 
appeared in English and Indian journals. In twenty-nine short articles the 
author describes the more common representatives of the Indian avi-fauna. 
The names of some of them sound odd to English ears :—the Amethyst- 
rumped Sunbird would doubtless have a different name in England, and 
several are ‘Crimson-breasted,’ ‘ Rose-ringed,’ ‘ Indian spotted,’ Bengal 
green,’ etc. The author describes how the ‘ Paddy-bird’ threw itself into a 
fighting attitude, though this may have nothing to do with its name. But 
the illustrations, by two artists, are very poor. If the ‘ Blue-faced Barbet’ 
is anything like the drawing on p. 15, we are sorry for it, although its 
bright colours may be ‘blended together with exquisite harmony ;’ and the 
‘Purple Sunbird’ on p. 13 is surely drawn from a model carved in wood. 
The frontispiece is called ‘ Bird-scaring in Bengal.’ Apparently in India 
deformed, long-necked, hump-backed and macrocephalous humans are 
selected for the purpose of frightening the birds, or are the four bipeds 
perched in a tree rather out of drawing? In view of its size, etc., the price 
of the book is too high. 
1907 October Te 
