46 Recent Literature, [January, 
still as useful and certainly as readable an introduction as he could 
desire. Balbiani has contributed additions to our knowledge 
of reproduction in the Arthropods and in the Vertebrates, and 
considerable new matter, illustrated with six chromo-lithograph 
plates, is given in the present volume, 
ZITTEL’S HAND-BOOK OF PALH@oNTOLOGY.—We have previously 
noticed this valuable hand-book, which is being issued in parts, 
the present one being the fourth of Vol.1. This completes the 
first division of the present volume, which treats of fossil Pro- 
tozoa, Ceelenterata, Echinodermata and Molluscoidea. The pres- 
ent part finishes the subject of fossil worms, but is mainly devoted 
to the Molluscoidea, namely the Bryozoa and Brachiopoda, which 
are placed under the Mollusca. It will thus be seen, that the 
classification so far from being modern, borders upon the paleozoic. 
Still the matter under each class heading is detailed, accurate ; 
the fossils are interpreted by reference to the living forms, of 
which a concise description is given, and, as we have before said, 
this work of Zittel’s, is on the whole, superior to any that the stu- 
dent can obtain. . 
McAtpine’s Biotocicat Atras.—The title sufficiently de- 
scribes this atlas, the plan of which is pretty good, though often 
the figures are clumsy, and more or less misleading. For ex- 
ample, the figures of the anatomy of the lobster are coarse, rough, 
and convey little idea of the parts as they exist in nature; they 
look as though they were copied from rough colored-chalk dia- 
grams sketched off-hand on the blackboard. The “ zoéa of the 
obster” is a rough figure of some decapod zoéa, but not the 
young freshly hatched lobster, which, as the authors should have 
known, has a much more advanced form than here represented. 
The drawings of the nervous system and eye of the same animal 
are abominable. Indeed, we could scarcely recommend the book 
for use in our schools and colleges. Something much better 
could have been prepared for the same money, 
EaTon’s SysTEMATIC Fern List.—Prof. Eaton, of Yale College, | 
has recently issued a “Systematic Fern List,” which will prove 
useful to our botanists, who wish to know what proportion of our 
native ferns they have in their collections. The list includes all the 
known ferns of the United States, and gives the geographical 
range of every species, and is intended “to serve as a check-list, 
and at the same time to show the classification of the genera.” 
Of the one hundred and fifty-one species enumerated, one hundred 
and forty are true ferns (order Filices), the remaining eleven be- 
1 Biological Atlas. A guide to the practical study of plants and animals, adapted 
to the requirements of the London Vasco Sciences and Arts Department, and ne 
use in schools and colleges, with accompanying text, containing arrangement a 
ar OD and terms, glossary and classification. 423 colored figures a 
.and A. N. ‘McALPINE. Edinburgh and London, W. | and A. K. 
Fanece. 1880. ‘gto, pp- 49. 
