No. 548] NOTES AND LITERATURE 



503 



Every one has previously been inclined to belittle the splendid 

 energy and self-sacrificing zeal which have stood hark of Ann-- 

 ghino's sensational accounts of his discoveries. To any one who 

 has known Ameghino and who has heard him give his own 

 reasons for his conclusions and describe his own treasures, this 

 kindly appreciation by Scharff will seem well merited. This 

 does not, of course, mean that we must accept all of Ameghino's 

 theories, especially those regarding the origin of man. 



A review, in the true sense, of Scharff 's book is impossible! 

 Each page is replete with valuable data. Well digested, and is 

 pregnant with suggestion. All of the critics of Scharff 's previ- 

 ous works will agree that they are certainly suggestive in the 

 extreme, even if their postulates may not be accepted. . It seems 

 caviling indeed to conclude this notice with a list of little faults, 

 yet they are very evident, some of them, and may be corrected 

 easily in subsequent editions. Thus on page 20 we should have 

 Corah us ncmoralis, instead of m( nioralis. a species which is not 

 confined to Nova Scotia, but which for years has been the com- 

 monest large Carabid about Boston and Cambridge. On page 

 141, dealing with the pine-barren flora and its northward pro- 

 longation, we find no mention of the most important contributions 

 which have ever appeared regarding the relationship of the flora 

 of Newfoundland with the coast regions further south, those of 

 Merritt L. Fernald, while, besides, no mention is made of the 

 writings of Witmer Stone or Harshberger, both well known in 

 connection with their work on the pine barrens. Again on page 

 151 we are surprised to learn that raccoons breed well in con- 

 finement and also to find no mention of the species of I'roryon 

 described by Miller from the French West Indian Island of 

 Guadeloupe. The knowledge of this fact would have been of 

 great interest in connection with the occurrence of Procyon may- 

 nardi on New Providence, which Scharff admits is an enigma, 

 and the other remarks on the dispersal of raccoons. On page 1 73 

 we read north Carolina, elsewhere correctly North Carolina. 

 On page 180 we find Crorotlilus a»><rica»us spoken of as the only 

 West Indian species in the genus, the important CrocodUu* 

 rkombifer being passed by. On page 204 no mention is made 

 of Boulenger's discovery of Bombiun maxima from Yunnan, a 

 fact which is most important, fulfilling the prediction made by 

 Stejneger that a discoglossoid toad would be found in this area, 

 the center of dispersal of the group. On page 266 we find Por- 

 torico, one word: on the map it is given correctly as Puerto 



