200 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



the sex-limited lacticolor form of the Magpie Moth (Abraxas 

 grossulariata) , and the very rare gynandromorph variation in 

 birds. The illustration here, a coloured one, forms the frontis- 

 piece, and represents a Bullfinch, male on one side and female 

 on the other. The normal specimens contrasted with this, by 

 the way, must be the large Northern Bullfinch, unless the 

 specimen was a dwarf as well as sexually abnormal. With regard 

 to the case of sex-linked characters most known to the world at 

 large, the almost proverbially rare tortoiseshell tom-cat, it is of 

 interest to note that such Cats appear to be generally sterile. 



Reptiles and Batrachians. By E. G. Boulenger, F.Z.S. London 

 and Toronto : J. M. Dent & Sons. 16s. net. 



Mr. Boulenger's position as the Curator of Lower Verte- 

 brates in the Zoological Gardens has given him ample oppor- 

 tunities for observing the classes with which this handsome and 

 fully-illustrated book has to deal, and what he has to say is put 

 plainly and scientifically, without any of the striving after effect 

 which is rather repellent in so many popular books. There are 

 also a good many original observations, but on the whole there 

 is not so much evidence of the author's professional oppor- 

 tunities as we could have wished, and the book cannot be 

 compared, from a bionomical point of view, with some other 

 standard volumes which have been published on the same 

 groups. Some of the omissions in the work are really serious ; 

 thus, in the general account of the Batrachia, nothing is said 

 about the absence of claws in all of them except the Newt Onycho- 

 dactylus and the Anuran genera Xenopus and Gampsosteonyx, 

 in the latter of which the claws are unique among vertebrates in 

 being the bony ends of the phalanges themselves, not horny 

 epidermal sheaths. The account of Xenopus does scant justice 

 to this most interesting amphibian ; the fact that the adult 

 will eat dead food such as chopped meat is not mentioned, 

 nor is anything said of a far more remarkable peculiarities 

 of the Tadpole, the remarkable transparency which enables 

 the brain and body-viscera to be plainly seen in the living 

 animal. Yet this remarkable creature bred about twenty 

 years ago in the Zoo collection. 



