SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



2 43 



The Preface is well worth reading, and we 

 sympathize with the author in his story on page xii., 

 in which he describes how he suffered one night in 

 the cause of science. Reading that story rominds 

 one of a similar suffering for a bird's-nesting exploit, 

 while at school on the moors not far from Penistone. 

 There are other good stories in the same pages 



The Structure and Development oj the Mosses and 

 Ferns : Archegoniata. By Douglas Houghton 

 Campbell, Ph.D. 544 pp. demy 8vo, illustrated 

 with 266 figures. (London and New York : 

 Macmillan and Co., 1895.) Price 14s. net. 



This remarkable group of plants is so interesting 

 that it has had many champions, but none have 



Nest of Gadwall. From Kearton's " British Birds'-Nests." (Cassell and Co., Limited.) 



which form an excellent opening to the book 

 proper. With regard to this, we wish we had in 

 the accounts of the various birds, still more of the 

 author's original notes, which must be very volu- 

 minous after so much experience, and could not fail 

 to be instructive as well as entertaining, We trust 

 he may see his way at a later period to publish 

 them in some form or other. 



produced a more mportant work upon these little- 

 worked families. The author is Professor of Botany 

 at the Leland Stanford Junior University, in 

 California. He has, however, consulted many 

 leading botanists both of America and Europe ; 

 and has worked on the national collection at the 

 British Museum, South Kensington. The term 

 Archegoniatse includes a large number of plants 



