September 7, 1917] 



SCIENCE 



231 



fort. The " Hortus," or " Ortus," was first 

 issued at Metz about 1475, and other editions 

 appeared at Strasburg about 1590 and later. 

 The part entitled " Tractatus de piscibus " is 

 divided into many short chapters, and has 

 numerous woodcuts of fish and fishing, all of 

 very singular character. 



Those who are familiar with ancient ang- 

 ling literature will recall in this connection 

 the earliest known book on fowling and fish- 

 ing, written in Flemish and printed at Ant- 

 werp in 1492. It is usually referred to as the 

 " Boecxken," or in German as " Buechlin " or 

 " Fischbuchlin " (editions of 1552 and 1578), 

 and contains woodcuts of angling scenes. As 

 a treatise on fishing, this tract has priority in 

 date over " The Book of St. Albans," ascribed 

 to Dame Juliana Barnes, Bernes or Bemers. 

 The first edition of this work was printed by 

 the school-master printer of St. Albans in 

 1486, but did not contain the " Treatyse of 

 fysshynge wyth an angle" with its accom- 

 panying woodcut. The second edition, from 

 the press of Wynkyn de Worde at Westmin- 

 ster in 1496, does contain it, however, and 

 it appears also to have been published as a 

 " lytyll plaunflet " in London about 1500. 

 There are excellent modern facsimile editions 

 of both the "Book of St. Albans" (M. G. 

 Watkins, 1880) and the early Flemish tract 

 known as " Boecxken " (Alfred Denison, 

 1872). A still earlier facsimile edition of 

 Dame Barnes' book is that by Mr. Joseph 

 Haslewood, in 1810; and in 1816 the same 

 bibliographer brought out the second English 

 edition of " The Dialogues of Creatures 

 Moralysed." The edition was limited to 100 

 copies, and of these 56 were destroyed by fire. 

 A Dutch version was printed in 1480, and a 

 French in 1482, both of them containing illus- 

 trations of fish and fishing scenes. 



Modern reproductions have also been pub- 

 lished of the remarkably fine animal drawings 

 in the "Albiun de Villard de Honnecourt" 

 (Lassus, 1858), dating from the thirteenth 

 century in France, and in " Das Tierbuch des 

 Petrus Candidus, geschrieben 1460" (Killer- 

 mann, 1914). It is to be hoped that before 

 very long we may have at our disposal fac- 



simile reprints of the wonderful animal fig- 

 ures, including fishes, which embellish four 

 valuable codices preserved in the Landesbib- 

 liothek at Stuttgart. Two of these manu- 

 scripts happen to be translations of the " Liber 

 de Natura Eerum," by Thomas of Cantimpre, 

 who spent iifteen years in its preparation prior 

 to 1240. Strangely enough, although trans- 

 lations of this work have been published (one 

 of them by Konrad von Megenberg, noticed 

 above), the original text has never been 

 printed. Large portions of it were, however, 

 incorporated by Vincent de Beauvais in his 

 various works, especially his the " Speculum 

 Naturale." Besides the Stuttgart codex of 

 Thomas Cantipratensis, others are preserved 

 in the libraries of Paris and Cracow. In 

 Book VII., the author treats of freshwater and 

 marine fishes. 



For the benefit of those interested in the 

 history of early prints and book illustrations 

 we may refer finally to the recently published 

 "List of works in the ISTew York Public Li- 

 brary relating to prints and their production," 

 compiled by F. Weitenkampf (1915), and also 

 to Dr. Ludwig Choulant's articles on illus- 

 trated incunabula relating to natural history 

 and medicine. C. R. Eastman 



American Museum op Natural History, 

 New York 



SCIENTIFIC EVENTS 



CALIFORNIA PETROLEUM 



Within a few days there will be issued the 

 Report of the Committee on Petroleum of the 

 California State Council of Defense. The 

 members of the Committee on Petroleum are: 



Max Thelen, president California Railroad Com- 

 mission, chairman, 



Eliot Blackwelder, professor of geology, Univer- 

 sity of Illinois, 



David M. Folsom, professor of mining, Stanford 

 University. ' 



The committee was appointed by Governor 

 Wm. D. Stephens on May 9, 1917, for the pur- 

 pose of ascertaining and reporting to him the 

 facts with reference to the production, distri- 

 bution and utilization of California petroleum 

 and its products. The report has been ap- 



