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BOOK NOTICES. 



Ornithology.— By Alfred Newton, M.A., F.R.S., F.Z.S., F.L.S., Professor 

 of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy in the University of Cambridge. 

 Reprinted from the 'Encyclopaedia Britannica ' [Ninth edition, vol. xviii., 

 pp. 1-50] by special permission. For private circulation. 

 In this most admirable and concise article Professor Newton deals with the 

 more scientific side of ornithology, in the vast literature of which there is ' much 

 that does not enter into the domain of science,' since it ranges from the 'recondite 

 and laborious investigations of the morphologist and anatomist to' the casual obser- 

 vations of the sportsman and the schoolboy.' 



In order to give some idea of the amount of information so marvellously 

 epitomised in the fifty pages before us, we may say that their contents fall under 

 three headings. 



I. A chronological notice of the chief ornithologists from Aristotle to the 

 present tim.e, with particulars of the more important of their works. This section 

 includes notices on the labours of more than a hundred naturalists. 



II. A survey of the works bearing on the faunal aspect of the science, with an 

 enumeration of the principal works on the avifauna of all countries, 



III. A review of the work of the more advanced school of ornithologists in 

 the important question of classification, which may be said to have been initiated 

 by Nitzsch in 1806. This section comprises a sketch of and remarks on all the 

 various systems which have been promulgated. 



The article bears all the evidence of being the production of a master in the 

 science, and, like all Professor Newton's writings, it is written with enviable con- 

 ciseness, combined with facility of expression and explanation, and doubtless, 

 too, with a care that ensures freedom from error — a characteristic which renders 

 him a most worthy example for all who would engage in scientific literary work. 



We regret one thing, however, and that is that the Professor has not given us 

 a sketch of his own ideas on the classification of this difficult class. This we con- 

 sider was a great desideratum, and would have been highly valued. In the con- 

 cluding portion of the article, nevertheless, we have his opinions on the relationship 

 and true position of various groups, which cannot fail not only to be of deep interest, 

 but also to have much weight with future systematists. — W. E. C. 



A Flora of the English Lake District. — By J. Gilbert Baker, 

 F.R.S., F.L.S. Demy 8vo, pp. 262. London : Geo. Bell and Sons, 1885. 6s. 



We have little but praise to accord to this the latest of British local floras. 

 A pai'agraph of general praise is, ordinarily, a poor compliment to pay to a book such 

 as this — which must have been in more than the usual degree a labour of love ; 

 but where the author is facile p-inceps at the work, and the result such as to be 

 well-nigh beyond cavil, what is a reviewer to say? The flora would be found 

 somewhat of a ' skeleton ' one by residents or others very well acquainted with the 

 region of which it treats — that is to say, it is more sketchy and less exhaustive- 

 than the author's ' North Yoi-kshire,' or even his Durham flora, and the masterly- 

 analysis and generalisation there found are here missed ; but the facts at command 

 have been marshalled in a telling and lucid manner ; and, it goes without sayings 

 M'ith the rare discrimination of wide experience. 



The region treated of is defined as ' a mountainous tract with a distinct physical- 

 individuality of its own, and with a distinct botanical individuality also, both in 

 respect of the plants that are present and those that are rare or absent,' this district 

 of Lakeland embracing parts of three counties : roughly, the south-western half of 

 Cumberland, the western half of Westmoreland, and that portion of Lancashire 

 detached from the main body of its county by the Morecambe estuary of the river 

 Kent ; the plants common to all, or confined to some of these comital areas, being, 

 indicated in the enumeration of the 893 species accepted ; that number being con- 

 trasted, as to distribution of the Watsonian Types, with 935 accepted for Northum- 

 berland with Durham, and 992 for 'North Yorkshire,' with the result that, 

 reckoning 532 species as general for Britain as a whole (out of 1425) 606 southern 

 and 238 northern, practically all of the 532 are present in Lakeland, 231 (little 

 more than a third) of the southern, and 125 (or more than half) of the northern : 

 very much indeed what one would have expected. It seems a pity that the area. 

 May 1885. 



