NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 77 



are now seven series, this volume being a translation of the 

 first. 



To entomologists the work is, or should be, quite familiar, 

 but it addresses a wider audience ; to all who study bionomics it 

 inculcates a method of painstaking observation which is almost 

 unique. M. Fabre is an entomological Sherlock Holmes, as 

 far as those insects are concerned which he has watched or 

 "shadowed." He knows their whole proceedings, to some of 

 which the terms murder and assassination are, we think, too 

 frequently applied. Could a hymenopteron be heard in reply, it 

 would probably retort that our slaughter of a sheep was in 

 nowise different from their action of obtaining living provender for 

 the sustenance of their young. When we read of the war waged 

 by insect upon insect, we marvel more at the conclusions of some 

 of the advanced school of mimickists, who would ascribe all 

 colour for protection against larger but lesser foes. 



M. Fabre claims to have exploded one error concerning the 

 balls of dung so frequently seen rolled along by the Dung- 

 beetles (Scai'abcsidce). These globular masses were always sup- 

 posed to contain an egg, but it appears they are the material for 

 banqueting in subterraneous palaces, and that the large ball 

 which does contain the egg is never rolled to the hole, but is 

 constructed in it. 



The book is very nicely illustrated ; but we are quite sure 

 that had its pages been submitted to Dr. Sharp, who wrote the 

 preface, several entomological gaucheries would have been absent. 

 We trust that the remaining series of the ' Souvenirs ' may also 

 soon appear in this translated and illustrated form. 



A Textbook of Zoology. By G. P. Mudge, A.B.C.Sc, Lond., 

 F.Z.S. Edward Arnold. 



Another text-book of zoology in these days of rapid publi- 

 cation should exhibit another method in treatment, even if new 

 facts are hardly procurable. This volume certainly exhibits a 

 considerable difference in the treatment of its subject to many 

 other handbooks, and Mr. Mudge has produced a book which 

 will probably be more useful to the zoological student than to 



