JuxE 23, 1005.] 



SCIENCE. 



953 



most closely and here experimental mor- 

 phology must have its basis. 



3. AYith the incorporation and excretion 

 of matter, metabolism and growth, the 

 sources and uses of energy, irritability, 

 and the minute constitution of living 

 matter. In this last are included many of 

 the most fundamental problems, not neces- 

 sarily problems involving the question 

 'What is life?' but problems concerned 

 with the resolution of those factors and an 

 intimate knowledge of those materials 

 which make life possible. 



Benjamin M. Duggar. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS. 



THE BAHAMA ISLANDS.* 



This handsome volume on the Bahama 

 Islands is of merit in two regards. It is an 

 appropriate expression of the energetic initia- 

 tive of its editor in developing an interest in 

 geography in Baltimore, and it is a serious 

 scientific study of a peculiar group of islands. 



Professor Shattuck offered a course of lec- 

 tures on physical geography to the teachers 

 of Baltimore several years ago. The course 

 proved attractive and was well attended; it 

 was followed by an association of the teachers 

 for more lectures and for field excursions 

 under Shattuck's guidance. This association 

 was soon succeeded by the organization of the 

 Geographical Society of Baltimore under the 

 presidency of D. C. Gilman and the direction 

 of a distinguished board of trustees. The 

 membership in the society rose to something 

 like 1,500 in its first year of existence. Its 

 objects were to place before the public of Bal- 

 timore an annual course of lectures dealing 

 with geographical subjects, to foster geograph- 

 ical research, and from time to time to pub- 

 lish monographs of geographical investiga- 

 tions. AH these objects have now been real- 

 ized; hence although the activity of the so- 



* The Geographical Society of Baltimore. The 

 Bahama Islands. Edited by George Burbank 

 Shattuck. Ph.D., associate professor of pliysio- 

 graphic geology in the Johns Hopkins University. 

 New York, Maemillan. 1905. C30 pages, 93 

 plates, 7 figures. 



ciety has been sadly interfered with during 

 the past year by the disastrous conflagration 

 of 1904, the secretary, as director and editor 

 of the Bahama expedition, has had so notable 

 a success in bringing out a monographic vol- 

 ume on the first investigation undertaken by 

 the society that we confidently expect a re- 

 vival to full activity in due time, and a vigor- 

 ous continuation of the work thus begun. 



Shattuck having made a preliminary visit to 

 the Bahamas in 1902, the expedition of over 

 twenty members left Baltimore June 1, 1903, 

 in the Van Name, a hundred-ton schooner, 

 provisioned for a two-months' cruise, and 

 with an equipment to which the governmental 

 bureaus at Washington and the Johns Hop- 

 kins University had contributed. The results 

 of the expedition are now set forth in sixteen 

 chapters by nearly as many authors. Shat- 

 tuck and Miller describe the, geology and 

 physiography of the islands; Dall discusses 

 the fossils and the non-marine mollusks; 

 Fassig reports on magnetic and climatic ob- 

 servations, and Shidy on tides. The soils are 

 elaborately classified by Mooney; Coker de- 

 scribes the vegetation, and Coffin tells of the 

 mosquitoes. The fishes, birds, reptiles and 

 mammals are reported on by Bean, Stejneger, 

 Riley and Mdler; the sanitary conditions by 

 Penrose. The longest chapter is a history 

 of the islands by Wright, and the volume 

 closes with some general geographical consid- 

 erations by Shattuck. The illustrations are 

 numerous and good. 



Earlier observers have shown that the Ba- 

 hamas consist of 29 islands, some of which 

 are mere skeletons or strips of land, with 

 numerous small keys and rocks, in all some 

 three thousand in number, rising from a 

 shallow submarine platform or plateau, which 

 in turn stands up rather abruptly from the 

 deep ocean floor. The material of the plat- 

 form as far as known and of all the islands 

 is altogether calcareous, of shell and coral 

 origin, worked over by waves and winds. On 

 the islands the rock is weathered into a ragged 

 and pitted surface; its texture is so weak that 

 it is sawed or chopped into blocks for house 

 building. The area of the islands is but a 

 fraction of that of the platform, partly be- 



