SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



281 



Dormant Eye of 

 Beech-Bark. 



(From " Text - Book of 

 the Diseases of Trees.") 



Summer Studies of Birds and Books. By W. Warde 

 Fowler, 288 pp. 8vo. (London and New York : 

 Macmillan and Co.) Price 6s. 



Most of the essays in this 

 work have already appeared 

 elsewhere, but, as it is stated 

 in a prefatory note, they 

 have been to some extent 

 rewritten. Every line of the 

 chapters on birds shows the 

 author's intense love and 

 appreciation of his feathered 

 friends. He does not write 

 only as a critic, but as one 

 who has lived with them and 

 loved them. The chapter 

 " On Wagtails " for instance, 

 gives, even to the uniniti- 

 ated reader, a conception of 

 the habits of those graceful 

 frequenters of our marshes, 

 meadows and lawns. Writ- 

 ing of the pied wagtail, 

 he says : "In the breeding 

 season a freshly-mown lawn has a great attraction 

 for him ; the meadow grass is then either growing 

 to hay, or getting so thick and coarse that it is not 

 easy to find insects in it. I fancy too that all wag- 

 tails like to use their little legs freely, unhampered 

 by thick stalks of crowded herbage ; on a lawn they 

 can see insects at a distance, and run with sudden 

 spurts, half flying too, sometimes to seize them. 

 While eating and while running the tail is mostly 

 still ; but no sooner is the run over and a fresh 

 morsel pounced on, than it is moved up and down 

 rapidly, showing plainly the two outer white 

 feathers." This book 

 is not in any way a 

 scientific treatise, but 

 comes more within the 

 department of country 

 lore. In " Summer 

 Studies of Birds and 

 Books " there are many 

 brightly-written pages, 

 which will appeal di- 

 rectly to lovers of 

 country scenes, -p ,„ 



Practical Inorganic 

 Chemistry : Analysis and 

 Sketches. A Class-book 

 for the Elementary Stage 

 of the Science and 

 Art Department. By 

 Ebenezer J. Cox, 

 F.C.S. 57 pp. 8vo, 

 and illustrations. (Lon- 

 don : Rivington, Percival 

 and Co. 1894.) Price is. 



The author is head- 

 master of the Technical 

 Science School of Bir- A Young Pine killed 



mingham, and, as such, (From " Text-Book of 



conceived the idea of 

 thus helping students 



through their examinations of the Science and Art 

 Department, the book being adapted to the 

 syllabus for 1894. As a text book, which has 

 reached its third edition, it appears good, but we 

 greatly fear that it is just one of those instances of 

 encouraging students to pass examinations by 

 " cram " and with as little knowledge of their sub- 

 jects as enables them to get through without failure. 



Butterflies and Moths (British). By W. Furneaux, 

 F.R.G.S. 358 pages, 8vo, with twelve coloured 

 plates and numerous illustrations in the text. 

 (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1894.) Price,. 

 10s. 6d. net. 



When such an old-established firm of publishers 

 of the high standing of Messrs. Longmans and Co. 

 issue a book, the public have a right to believe that 

 firm takes the responsibility of the book being 

 trustworthy and correct from an educational point 

 of view. Consequently large numbers are sold 

 solely on the reputation of Longmans and Co., as 

 publishers of the best educational works. This 

 must surely have been the origin of the first 

 words of the preface to the work now under notice. 

 They say, " The favourable reception with which 

 the ' Out - door World ' has been greeted, has 

 encouraged the publishers to issue a series of 

 volumes dealing with the various branches of 

 Natural History treated in that work." Hence we 

 have this volume. In April Science-Gossip (ante, 

 page 39), we noticed the " Out-door World," and 

 plainly gave an indication of the incapacity of the 

 author to write such a book. In certain literary 

 circles there are books known as "fudged," this 

 inelegant word meaning that the "author" has 

 compiled a book, without any personal knowledge 

 of the subject, from the writings of others, generally 

 with less than more accuracy. It has never been 

 our misfortune to meet with worse cases of " fudg- 

 ing " than these two books advertised by Messrs. 

 Longmans as the first of their " Out-door World 

 Library." Why a firm such as theirs could not 

 find some writer with at least a rudimentary 

 knowledge of the subjects treated, is inexplicable. 

 We have never met, nor even previously heard of 

 this "author," but if 

 we are to have a series 

 of such works inflicted 

 upon us, it is quite time 

 to offer a vigorous pro- 

 test in the interests of 

 that ever-rising army of 

 beginners, who will have 

 more to unlearn from 

 one of these books, than 

 the time so occupied 

 would, under proper 

 guidance, if applied to 

 some subjects, make 

 them fairly proficient. 

 The aptitude the com- 

 piler has shown for 

 picking out of old-time 

 books, and perpetuating 

 long ago exploded and 

 corrected statements, is 

 truly remarkable. 



The first part of the 

 book is occupied by a 

 summary of " Kirbyand 

 Spence's Entomology," 

 and " Knaggs's Lepi- 

 dopterist's Guide," oc- 

 cupying 137 pages. The 

 butterflies are dealt with 

 in about sixty pages and the moths in another 

 hundred or so pages. That part of the book which 

 fulfils its title being chiefly a series of extracts from 

 "Newman's British Butterflies and Moths," and 

 the second volume of " Stainton's Manual." 

 Then follows a partial reprint of the " Entomo- 

 logists' Synonymic List of British Lepidoptera," 

 which is described as " South's List" (!) (being 



by Agaricus Mellens. 

 the Diseases of Trees.") 



