NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 285 



a people. If this is true of humanity, how equally certain is the 

 application of the principle to other animals than man. The 

 great conclusions that have been drawn from zoological studies — 

 especially during the last fifty years — have been based on a 

 nomenclature which has frequently misled and generally hampered 

 the student who sought to philosophise on the teachings of 

 specialists. According to one authority, a genus may be peculiar 

 to an island ; to another such a genus is considered as a synonym 

 of one which ranges over more than a single continent. Some 

 have actually been unable to treat a species as cosmopolitan, and 

 have seized minute local characters for specific division ; others 

 have failed to see differences where such exist. It is thus 

 evident that the right conclusions on zoo-geography depend upon 

 some finality in nomenclature. Such a monograph as the pre- 

 sent — for it is more than a catalogue — is the type of publication 

 which, while assisting the lepidopterist, will prove a boon to the 

 much distracted naturalist. 



Descriptive Guide to the Collection of Corals on view at the South 

 London Art Gallery, Camberwell, S.E. 



We have received this Descriptive Guide to the Collection of 

 Corals on view at the South London Art Gallery, a collection 

 lent for the purpose by Mr. John Morgan, of St. Leonards. We 

 were quite surprised to find, instead of the usual type catalogue 

 — as much at home with an exhibition of wax figures as a collec- 

 tion of zoological objects — a most readable pamphlet on life- 

 histories of the polyps themselves. This small publication con- 

 tains two good plates, some twenty-eight pages of printed matter, 

 a reference to some " popular works on Corals," and is sold for 

 one penny. With such a guide any person of average intelligence, 

 though without a previous knowledge of the subject, can follow 

 each specimen in the collection, and at the same time learn some 

 of the mysteries of Coral existence. This is a very good move 

 in a right direction. 



