36 Recent Books and Pamphlets. 
Ametabola and Metabola is convenient, but it accords too high a rank 
to an adaptive feature. Complete metamorphosis is but a compara- 
tively recent introduction in the life of insects, and with it as a basis 
forms closely allied in structure are necessarily widely divorced. 
Again, in our opinion, the Orthoptera are clearly lower than the 
Pseudoneuroptera, a view whioh is not negatived by palgeontological 
evidence nor by embryology. 
We notice a few slips which can readily be corrected in the prom- 
ised introduction. On the first page the author writes " Vermes " 
where he clearly means " Annelida/' and the unnatural group of 
Tracheata is referred to on the same page. On the seventh page chitine 
is stated to be deposited ''in" the body-wall. On the eighth page 
it is stated that the eyes may possibly be modified legs, a view 
which is completely negatived by embryology. On the twenty-third 
page the sting of certain insects should have been stated to be a 
modified ovipositor. Perhaps the greatest omission of all is the ab- 
sence of any account of the embryology of Hexapoda. Still these, 
with the exception of the last, are minor points, and this exception 
we hope to see rectified before the volume is completed. As a whole, 
the work is of great value. The illustrations and descriptions will 
make it a true guide to the young student of insects, the accounts of 
noxious insects will aid the agriculturist and horticulturist, and we 
venture the prediction that it will be the most often referred to of 
Any book on the shelves of the working entomologist. 
EEOENT BOOKS AND PAMPHLETS. 
Abstracts of the Proceedings of the London Geological Society. No. 515. 
Reprint from the Breeder's Gazette, 
Bean, Tarleton il.— Report on Fishes Observed in Great Egg Harbor, 
tract from Bulletin of U. S. Fish Commission, 1887. From the aul 
Bodington, ^Zice.— Micro-Organisms as Parasites. Reprint from the Journal 
of Microscopy and Natural Science. From the author. 
Boulenger, G. ^.—Description of a New Snake (Sytorhynchus ridgewayi) 
from Afghanistan, Ext. from Annals and Magazine of Natural History 
Dec, 1887.— On the Affinity of tlie North- American Lizard Fauna. R< 
print from the Annals and Magazine of Natural History, Nov., 188' 
From the author. 
Brown, Henry fl".— Alatypes or Stenotypography. From the publisher. 
