366 



Rri'icics (i)i(f Book No/ ices. 



the chalk downs, fairies, etc., etc. There is a bibliography whieii is ol the 

 greatest service to students, and a wry good index, li the book has a 

 drawback at all, it is that once started, it iiinsi \)c read from cover to cover, 

 and for this other work must be neglected ! Hut it's worth it. 



Report on the Scientific Results of the Voyage of the S.Y. ' Scotia ' 

 durmg the vears 1002-4, under the leadership ol Dr. W. S. Bruci', X'ol. 

 IV., Zoology, Part I. ' Zoological Log,' by D. W. Wilton, J. H. H. I'inc an-l 

 R. N. R. Brown. Edinburgh : The Scottish Occanographical Laboratory. 

 105 pp., plates and maps. 10/6. 



This is an elaborately prepared report of a carefully made zoological 

 log kept during the voyage of the ' Scotia.' In the evenings when Vac ]iarty 

 met together, the appointed recorder extracted from the various nu inbi i s 

 the \anous observations they had made during the day. These wx re 

 written down on the spot, and too much praise cannot be given to the 

 assiduous w'ay in which the records have been made. In this way 

 mammal, bird, fish, reptile, mollusc and other forms of life arc noted and 

 described, and as by far the greater part of the voyage was made in a 

 land little known, amongst animals even more unfamiliar, the scientific 

 value of this log is enormous. This, however, is much increased by the 

 reproduction of over a hundred photographs of antarctic life. The photo- 

 graphs of the birds are perhaps the most striking, the extraordinary atti- 

 tudes of the penguins being particularly ludicrous. Many of our readers 

 who saw the photographs of tlie Emperor l\-nguins, etc., on the occasion 

 of ^Ir. W. Eagle Clarke's presidential address to the Yorkshire Naturalists' 

 Union, will be interested to know that many of them are reproduced in 

 this report. These alone are worth more than the price asked for the vol- 

 ume. As a frontispiece is an excellent coloured plate of Wcddell Seals and 

 Emperor Penguins, and there are also maps shewing the course taken by 

 the ship. We mttst congratulate Dr. Bruce and his colleagues on the 

 valuable nature of their zoological work, and upon the magnificent manner 

 in which the results of their observations have been given to the world. 



The Vegetation of some Disused Quarries, by S. Margerlson. Gaskarth, 

 Bradford, 52 pp., with 33 illustrations, 1909. 3/-. 



The title of this paper, which is reprinted from the Bradford Scientific 

 Journal, 1908 and 1909, suggests to the West Riding botanist a most 

 familiar subject, but one which holds out little of interest ; the sub-title, 

 however, is more promising — ' The Conquest of New Ground by Plants.' 

 This aspect of plant life has excited considerable interest in recent years, 

 both here and abroad, and has just received a fresh filip by the translation 

 of Ernst's ' New Flora of Krakatau.' An opportunity like the latter 

 rarely occurs, but we have in our limestone screes, cuttings, pit-hills and 

 quarry tips, ample opportunities for studying the problems of invasion 

 and succession, and though the areas mentioned are usually small, it is 

 surprising how similar the processes are in the main. 



Commonplace as the subject of the paper at first seems, it is obvious 

 that the author has found for himself a most interesting piece of work, 

 one which has grown in importance as the study has progressed. 



The quarries investigated are in Calverley Wood, between Bradford 

 and Leeds, and are along an escarpment in the Millstone Grit series, about 

 a third of a mile long, and consist of rough rock, flagstones and ragstones, 

 with bands of muddy and sandy shales resting on a bed of dark grey shale. 

 The steep slope is planted with trees, probably on the site of primitive 

 forest. It is of the dry oak type, with Quercus sessiliflora as the charac- 

 teristic tree, one of the type very common in this part of the West Riding. 

 The quarries range in age from one hundred years or more, down to some 

 closed so recently as 1905. The method of enquiry was to examine the 

 quarries in detail, and compare the vegetation on the tips and exposed 

 surfaces, according to age. Starting with the youngest, he notes the 

 ' making of the soil ' and the organisms — bacteria, moulds, algse, lichens, 

 mosses and ferns, together with a few phanerogams, chiefly with good wind 



Naturalist, 



