786 THE AMERICAN NATURALIST. [VoL. XXXII. 
slips in English, and loose statements. Misstatements and misuses 
of technical terms are altogether too numerous, even for a first 
edition. Of these a few examples must suffice. On page 233 we 
read that the Kentucky coffee tree “has the most compound leaves 
of all American trees ”; on page 2 a tulip flower is said to consist of 
six leaves ; on page 187 occurs the statement that “corn is the only 
grass which bears the sterile and fertile flowers on separate heads ” 
and on page 4 sepals are called leaflets. In spite of these defects, 
however, we should say that teachers may gain from this book not a 
little of profitable fact and hint if they are disposed to have due 
patience in overlooking much that seems crude and practically 
valueless. FREDERICK LEROY SARGENT. 
Needham’s Outdoor Studies.!— With the rapid development of 
“ nature study ” in the American schools has come a marked increase 
in the putting forth of nature study books. A good nature study 
book should be, above all, truthful ; its telling of nature should be 
accurate. Then it should be readily comprehensible, and written so 
as to attract and to hold the interest of its intended readers, be they 
teachers or children or both. Professor Needham’s little book 
possesses the qualifications just enumerated. The author is a careful 
and intelligent naturalist, and writes from personal observation and 
experience. He writes simply, and he writes interestingly. Outdoor 
Studies is certainly one of the good nature study books. 
The book is written, suggests the author, especially for the 
children. It is insistent in its demands for personal work by the 
student in “seeing and doing and thinking,” and explicit in its 
explanations of how to do this work. There are chapters on flowers 
and insects and chipmunks and birds under such titles as “ Busse 
and Eggs and Bumblebees,” “ Goldenrod, its Visitors and Tenants,” 
and “Houses that Grow” (galls and gall insects). The book is 
charmingly and helpfully illustrated, and the big scientific names, 
whose value is not overlooked but whose fear-inspiring capacity is 
fully recognized, are disposed of in a unique and effective way. 
Altogether the book is one to recommend to teachers, to parents, and 
to the children, for whom it is primarily written. v LK 
STANFORD UNIVERSITY, CALIFORNIA. 
1 Outdoor Studies, A Reading Book of Nature Study. By James G. Needham. 
Eclectic School Readings, American Book Company. New York, 1898. 
