NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 197 



are unattacked ; this is interesting, as the fact that they can detect 

 coloration seems to indicate a higher sense of sight and less reliance 

 on smell than some authorities allow. It would be very interesting 

 to make similar experiments with other members of the Gastropoda; 

 for example, some of the aquatic Snails accustomed to feeding on 

 Algse, or even such salt-water species as the common Whelk. — 

 R. Cardew. 



NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS. 



A List of British Birds. Second and Revised Edition. British 

 Ornithologists' Union. London : W. Wesley & Son. 

 1915. 7s. U. 



This list is a revised edition of that compiled by a Com- 

 mittee of the British Ornithologists' Union in 1883, brought up 

 to date and embodying the numerous additions to the British 

 bird-list which have been made during the last generation; this, 

 of course, renders it indispensable for workers on our birds. A 

 certain number of changes have been made in the scientific 

 names, in conformity with the practice of American and German 

 zoologists, in going back to the tenth edition of Linnaeus. 

 Personally, we do not see why British naturalists should follow 

 the lead of either America or Germany (especially the latter !), 

 since neither of these countries has published any work com- 

 parable with the British Museum ' Catalogue of Birds,' which is 

 far more important to working naturalists than any edition of 

 Linnaeus; the interest of the great Swede's work nowadays is after 

 all historical, not zoological, just like that of Aristotle's. How- 

 ever, several well-known names, though technically inadmissible, 

 have been retained in the present work to avoid confusion, and 

 the references to Saunders's classical Manual and to the British 

 Museum volumes are given as synonyms, so old-fashioned 

 people are still well accommodated. 



The derivations of the (more or less) classical scientific 

 names are still given as in the first edition, and it seems to us 

 that the work has here been ill-revised ; Gorone, for instance, 



