56 



The Canadian Field-Naturalist 



[Vol. XXXVI 



fact anticipates, much that is here presented. 

 Also Mr. Baldwin'st discoveries of the marital 

 relations of House Wrens in the same and succeed- 

 ing seasons contains much corroborative material. 

 It is rather surprising that so careful an investiga- 

 tor as Mr. Howard has overlooked these important 

 papers bearing, as they do, intimately on his 

 subject. 



A criticism that may not be out of the 

 way is that in spite of the exclusion of this im- 

 portant evidence, the book is padded. Probably 

 the author could have developed his thesis with 

 no loss of weight and with an increase of clarity 

 in half the number of pages. He goes to great 

 length to prove that which can be conceded. 

 The illustrations are photogravures beautifully 

 drawn and reproduced, a credit to both artist 

 and publisher, but they do not bear on the subject 

 in hand. They are portraits of birds in various 

 fighting attitudes that add nothing to the argu- 

 ment and do not illuminate a pertinent idea. As 

 proof that birds fight they are not needed, as 

 illustrations of methods of fighting they do not 

 come within the scope of the work. The plans, 

 however, showing how a field was divided up into 

 spheres of influence in succeeding years by its 

 Lapwin-g inhabitants, are complementary and 

 valuable additions to the text. 



The reviewer is here moved to make formal 

 protest against the all too common practice of 

 the publication of too expensive books on scientific 

 subjects. Knowledge should be made as nearly 

 free to all as possible and books, whose reason 

 for being is the diffusion of knowledge, should 

 be kept within the reach of as many students as 

 is compatible with the end in view. Editions 

 de luxe, unless accompanied by a popular edition, 

 are decidedly out of place in scientific fields and 

 should be frowned upon instead of praised and 

 imitated. Good paper, clear type and adequate 

 illustration should be used, of course, but elaborate 

 bindings, deckle-edges, wide margins, large pages 

 within each of which a small island of print floats 

 in a sea of white paper, unnecessarily expensive 

 illustrations and intentionally (I was about to say 

 maliciouslyj limited editions are to the detriment 

 rather than to the advancement of science and 

 should not be condoned even if they do tend to 

 the personal glory of authors by the high prices 

 attached to the works in second hand catalogues. 



Not all of these strictures apply to the work in 

 question, but enough of them do to make a peg 

 on which to hang the complaint. The very fact 

 that the book costs nearly four dollars and a 

 half, Canadian money, suflficiently shows that it 

 is unnecessarily expensive and debarred in 



tA6«<. Pror. Linn. Sor. of N.Y., No. i;t, 1918 1!)19. 



consequence from many private libraries that 

 need it. At a time like this when we have often 

 to forego necessary illustrations or make shift 

 with inadequate ones, we question the good taste 

 that uses them to give fictitious value to works 

 that are complete without them. 



P. A. T. 



Geological Survey of Canada, Museum Bul- 

 letin No. 33, 109 pp., 12 PLS., 

 October, 1921. 



Naturalists whose interests are not limited to 

 the natural history of present day geography will 

 doubtless welcome the group of five palaeontolo- 

 gical papers recently published by the Geological 

 Survey as Museum Bulletin No. 33. Biology 

 has its roots so deeply buried in the geologic past 

 that it appears safe to assume that many readers 

 of this magazine will be interested in one or more 

 of the group of five papers published in this Bulle- 

 tin. The authors include two members of the 

 palaeontological division of the Canadian Geolo- 

 gical Survey and three well-known palaeontologists 

 of the United States. The subjects dealt with 

 relate to parts of Canada as far apart as Anticosti 

 Island and the plains of Alberta. The fossils 

 discussed and illustrated represent the Pleistocene, 

 Cretaceous, Devonian, Silurian and Ordovician 

 rocks of Canada and the Cretaceous of Texas. 



The papers in the Bulletin are published under 

 the following titles: 



Faunal and Sediment Variation in the Anticosti 

 Sequence. By W. H. Twenhofel. 



New Species of Devonian Crinoidea from 

 Northern Canada. By Frank Springer. 



The Range of certain Lower Ordovician Faunas 

 of the Ottawa Valley, with Descriptions of some 

 new Species. By Alice E. Wilson. 



The Fossil MoUuscan Faunas of the Marl 

 Deposits of the Ottawa District. By E. J. 

 Whittaker. 



Two New North American Cycadeoids. By 

 G. R. Wieland. 



Professor Twenhofel sets forth in his paper some 

 very important conclusions from his detailed 

 study of the Anticosti Island Silurian and Ordo- 

 vician faunas, which should be of interest to all 

 geologists dealing with problems of Palaeozoic 

 correlation. Twenhofel states that "lateral gra- 

 dation of sediments and faunas may so develop 

 that one type of sediment with its fauna may 

 overlap another — the conditions responsible for 

 one type of deposition migrating laterally with 

 respect to the other. The common interpretation 

 would be "overlap" of the one by the other, a 

 withdrawal of the sea, a land interval, and the 

 development of an unconformity." Twenhofel 



