BOOK REVIEWS. 



79 



recommended, and none who reads it can fail to have his interest awakened 

 by the lucid account of the mosses, " the first mercy of the earth," which 

 it contains. The book is abundantly illustrated and the figures in this 

 second edition are a great improvement upon those of its predecessor. 



" An Introduction to Geology." By Prof. W. B. Scott. 2nd. ed. 8vo., 

 816 pp. (Macmillan, New York, 1907.) lis. net. 



The second edition of this well-known text-book has been thoroughly 

 revised and brought up to date, several of the illustrations, for instance, 

 showing phenomena due to the great San Francisco earthquake of 1906. . The 

 plan of the book is to describe first the principal rock-forming minerals ; 

 secondly to consider the various forces that have been at work in moulding 

 the crust of the earth, dealing with volcanic agencies and the work of 

 earthquakes, and with those surface changes which will more closely appeal 

 to the garden designer, due to the action of water in its different forms ; 

 thirdly, the structure of the rocks themselves is dealt with ; then the 

 form of the earth, its mountains and river basins, and so on ; finally, an 

 account of the sequence of events in geological time with descriptions of 

 the fossils found in the different strata. The book is written in an 

 interesting style, and profusely and admirably illustrated. The illustra- 

 tions of geological phenomena are taken from many parts of the earth, 

 though as a book written in America for American students, the majority 

 illustrate parts of the United States. A full index is appended. 



"Life Histories of Familiar Plants." By J. J. Ward. 8vo., 204 pp. 

 (Cassell, London, 1908.) 6s. 



This is one of the now numerous books upon our native flowering 

 plants, written with the object of interesting the unscientific observer in 

 the common plants of field and forest. It deals in a popular way with 

 the structure of the plants treated upon, and especially with their relation 

 to their environment both animate and inanimate. In endeavouring to 

 find an explanation of the form, arrangement and markings of different 

 parts of plants, the author makes many ingenious suggestions, not all of 

 them very convincing. It is a pity, too, to write as though the plants 

 were sentient beings and are even able to convey messages to others of 

 the species ; as when, for instance, the first Oxalis found by folding its 

 leaves at night it lost less heat (the suggestion the author makes as the 

 result of the habit), "it forthwith conveyed the hint to the race." This is 

 only one instance of many that occur. 



The author ascribes sensitiveness to the root-cap — a structure com- 

 posed of dead cells ! (page 68). He says, too, that the cowslip is a plant 

 of the low meadows, but surely it is also a plant of the hills ; the slopes 

 of the Pegsden Hills, for instance, are covered with cowslips, and so is 

 many a railway embankment. His explanation of the difference in habit 

 of flowering between the cowslip and the primrose seems of very doubtful 

 value. 



So long as the reader of books of this kind will exercise his critical 

 faculties and will make observations as to the truth of statements for him- 

 self no great harm is done, but where children are concerned there is often 

 a danger of imbibing theories as facts and finding it difficult later to correct 



