372 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVII. No. 949 



the academic costume worth paying $35 to 

 $95 for?" I would quickly answer "No."' 

 Considering it desirable to provide myself 

 with a doctor's gown and hood, I purchased 

 the silk and velvet trimming by the yard, and 

 got a dressmaker to make the gown after the 

 pattern of one owned by a friend. As a result 

 I have a first-class gown of the best material, 

 and the cost was about half the regular price 

 of a similar gown ready made. 



J. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 

 Michigan Bird Life, a List of the Bird 

 Species known to Occur in the State To- 

 gether With an Outline of their Classifica- 

 tion and an Account of the Life History of 

 Each Species, luith Special Reference to its 

 Relation to Agriculture. With seventy-five 

 full page plates and one hundred and fifty- 

 two text figures. By Walter Bradford 

 Barrows, S.B., Professor of Zoology and 

 Physiology and Curator of the General Mu- 

 seum. Special Bulletin of the Department 

 of Zoology and Physiology of the Michigan 

 Agriculture College. Published by the 

 Michigan Agricultural College. 1912. 

 8vo. Pp. xiv + 822, 70 half-tone plates and 

 152 text figures. 



The purpose and general character of the 

 present work are stated by the author to be to 

 provide an authoritative list of the birds of 

 Michigan, with such additional information 

 respecting them as would be useful and of in- 

 terest not only to the nature lover and general 

 reader, but to students and teachers. In a 

 work originating with and published by a 

 State Agricultural College, it is eminently 

 proper that special attention should be given 

 to the economic status of the species in rela- 

 tion to man's interests, yet it is recognized 

 that each has " a scientific, an esthetic, a hu- 

 man value, which can not be estimated in dol- 

 lars and cents," and which should forever pro- 

 tect it " from extreme persecution, and above 

 all fi'om final extinction." 



An introduction of nearly thirty pages 

 deals with the physiographic and climatic fea- 

 tures of the state, the distribution of its 



plant and animal life, and especially its bird 

 life with reference to the different areas char- 

 acterized by special conditions of environ- 

 ment, as prairies, marshes and pine and hard- 

 wood forests. The subject " how to study 

 birds " is discussed at some length, and with 

 intelligence and fairness, the conclusion being 

 that field-glass records of rare species by ama- 

 teurs should not be relied upon as satisfactory 

 evidences of occurrence. Where there is any 

 improbability of a bird being at a given time 

 and place, the record should " rest upon an 

 actual specimen taken at that locality and 

 either preserved for the examination of any 

 one interested or at least examined and identi- 

 fied by a competent authority before being 

 destroyed." 



Nearly ten pages are given to the subject of 

 migration, which includes not only comment 

 on the migratory movements of birds in Mich- 

 igan, but a summary of recent progress in 

 knowledge of bird migration, remarks on the 

 rapidity of flight in birds, and on the disas- 

 ters known to overtake birds in migration, by 

 which thousands upon thousands lose their 

 lives through adverse weather conditions, so 

 that large areas become nearly depopulated of 

 certain species. Attention is also called to 

 recent changes iu the bird life of Michigan 

 through deforestation of large portions of the 

 state, the draining of marshes, etc., and the 

 consequent increase or decrease of certain 

 species. 



The main text of the work treats, in syste- 

 matic sequence, of the 326 species of birds 

 known to occur in the state, with keys to the 

 species and higher groups, a liberal amount of 

 biographical matter, followed by diagnoses in 

 small type. The life histories are especially 

 full, with often somewhat extended discussion 

 of the economic relations of the species to 

 agriculture, for which the author is especially 

 fitted by his twenty-five years of study of the 

 complex relations of birds to insects and crops 

 as a specialist in this field, first under the 

 United States Department of Agriculture aud 

 later at Michigan Agricultural College. A 

 " hypothetical list " of 62 species of birds that 

 have been attributed to Michigan by previous 



