1886. | Recent Literature. 145 
must not be blindly followed paragraph by paragraph and page by 
page. Its proper function is suggestive, and, if so used, it will 
prove of great value in the botanical laboratory. 
We cannot omit commending the form which the publishers 
have given the book. The type, printing, paper and binding are 
excellent, the flexible covers being especially commendable.— 
Charles E. Bessey. 
TorREY’S BIRDS IN THE BusH.’—This is a dangerous little book. 
Young naturalists who have chosen paths that are not those of 
song and color should avoid it, lest they also should, by its win- 
some sweetness, be charmed to become ornithologists. Birds 
appeal to other faculties beside those of the intellect. The musi- 
cian, the poet, the painter, all find inspiration in the oscines, Per- 
haps this is the reason there is so much twaddle written about 
birds. Since there is an audience writers devoid of the artistic, 
poetical, or musical faculties pen a series of quasi-scientific me- 
anderings, and send it forth as a bird-book. But Mr. Torrey 
loves bird-song and bird-beauty and tells his love in language 
remarkable for force and picturesqueness. The eleven chapters 
teem with the result of years of life among the birds, and the 
author has a quaint way of comparing bird-life and bird-ways 
with our own life and ways, without allowing the reader to forget 
that it is only a bird he is talking about. No heavier blow has 
been dealt the sparrow-hater than that given in the first chapter of 
this book. Though by no means a sparrow-lover, Mr. Torrey 
confesses that, in the space of the last seven oreight years, he has 
watched upon Boston Garden and Common some thousands of 
specimens, representing not far from seventy species. The author 
Owns to the true aboriginal temperament—he loves to be out of 
doors, but hates out-of-door employment; this is the stuff orni- 
thologists should be made of, plus eyes. 
Neuchatel, his correspondence with Humboldt, his nine summers 
Spent in Alpine exploration—this volume will seem like a ro- 
mance. To those who never saw this child of genius, the second 
volume, recounting his successful life in America, the Iand of his 
adoption, will be full of interest. 
` Birds in the Bush. By BRADFORD TORREY. Boston, Houghton, Miffin & Co. 
Fogg Agassiz—His Life and Correspondence. Edited by ELIZABETH CARY 
1z. Two volumes. Boston, Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1885. 12mo. $4- 
