406 Reviews and Book Notices. 
Twenty Country Rambles round Leeds, by John Hornby. 
W. Brierley, Leeds, 64 pp., 6d. In this readable pamphlet Mr. Hornby 
reprints a series of twenty articles which appeared in the Leeds Mercury 
Supplement two years ago. They are written in a chatty style, and each 
contains full details of the paths to be followed. We don’t know whether 
fhe author was short of ink, or whether he writes plays, but ‘ Enter lane.’ 
“Enter field.’ ‘ Hedge on left.’ ‘ Path ascends.’ ‘On.’ ‘On then.’ ‘ Distance 
lends, etc.’ ‘ Alight.’ ‘Come then,’ etc., seem unnecessarily brief. But the 
author evidently believes in ‘covering the ground.’ He takes us to Seven 
Arches, Eccup, Otley, Seacroft, Kirkstall, Crossgates, Arthington, Saltaire, 
Ilkley, Apperley Bridge, Methley, Armley, and a dozen other places ; and 
informs us that these walks ‘may all be compassed in a summer's afternoon.’ 
We don’t believe it. 
Science Progress for October (John Murray, 5/- net), contains several 
items of interest to readers of the ‘ Naturalist.’ Two of our contributors 
have papers, viz., Mr. T. Petch on ‘ Insects and Fungi,’ in which he describes 
the curious fungus-gardens of ants which he has discovered in Ceylon ; and 
‘Igneous Rock-Magmas as Solutions,’ by Mr. Alfred Harker. Mr. R. 
Lydekker writes on ‘ American Economic Entomology’; Dr. N. H. Alcock 
describes ‘A Simple Apparatus for Photo-microscopy,’ Mr. F. V. Theobald 
has a paper on ‘Economic Ornithology in relation to Agriculture, Horti- 
culture, and Forestry’; and Mr. F. J. Lewis describes ‘The Sequence of 
Plant Remains in the British Peat Mosses.’ In an interesting paper on 
‘The Origin of the ‘‘ Flower,”” Mr. W. C. Worsdell concludes that ‘a 
“flower” is the result of the extreme modification of a leafy branch or of a 
portion of the main axis, the axial part of which has been excessively 
shortened and contracted, and the perianth, leaves, stamens, and carpels 
reduced and altered from the condition of large fern-like foliage leaves. 
Thus, in the long run, it is the Ferns that we have to thank for our ‘ Flowers. 
Manual of British Grasses, by W. J. Gordon. London: Simpkin 
Marshall, Ltd., pp. vi. and 174. 8vo., 6/- 
This is a companion volume to ‘Our Country's Flowers,’ and _ is 
illustrated by 33 coloured plates containing figures of ror species of grasses. 
Some of these are not very characteristic, e.g., fig. 37 of Azra flexuosa shows 
a plant with flat leaves, but in the text they are described as ‘bristle shaped.’ 
The arrangement followed is that of Bentham, the reason for adopting it 
being that there is an accessible collection in the Natural History Museum 
at South Kensington, and this is arranged in ‘Bentham’s way.’ He follows 
the zoologists in the matter of omitting capitals in specific names, and 
erroniously states that the use of capitals in certain specific names is ‘ merely 
a printers custom,’ yet we notice he prints all the specific names with a 
capital in his index of species ; doubtless this is a printers custom. There 
is an interesting chapter on British cereals, also chapters on the characters 
of tribes, genera, and species, the two latter are freely illustrated by draw- 
ings of the florets and spikelets respectively; finally there is a useful 
tabular view of the species. The habitats given for the species are often 
inadequate and sometimes misleading, and the extra British distribution is 
very incomplete. Of the 174 pages of text we find 9 pages are devoted toa 
list of species (really a list of the plates), notwithstanding the fact that two 
pages are previously given to such a list. Six pages are filled with what 
are called ‘customary names’; they repeat the ‘customary’ names in the 
previous list, together with many which look anything but customary. 
These are again repeated in a seperate index of seven pages. An index of 
species occupies eleven pages, an index of genera two pages, and an 
extra three pages are taken up with a list of illustrations in the text; that is 
forty pages of this small book are devoted to these lists. Curiously 
enough, in spite of so much space being occupied in indexing, there are no 
references to the pages where the species are described, all the numbers 
refer to plates and figures; while in the index of genera we find many 
numbers that refer neither to text, figures, nor plates, and after a long 
search for their meaning we gave it up in dispair. 
Naturalist, 
