262 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
paring a manual which should deal with characteristic types of animals 
inhabiting New Zealand, more or less after the same fashion. 
It will be seen that in one important respect Prof. Hutton departs from 
the method advocated by Prof. Huxley, namely, that of regarding Zoology 
and Botany as forming one single science ; further, while noticing a much 
larger number of animal types, his investigation of them is by no means so 
elaborate as that sketched in the English book ; but on the other hand, his 
little work includes certain elements wanting in the latter, and which will, 
we think, peculiarly adapt it to be useful to those who are seeking to instruct 
themselves in isolated and out-of-the-way places. These are a description of 
the microscope, and a guide to its use, preceding the section on Morphology ; 
and a general synopsis of the classification of animals, and a tabular analysis 
of the families of insects which follow it. The last-mentioned portion of the 
contents is intended to enable students to make their first steps in taxono- 
mical zoology. The author wishes his readers to collect numerous insects, 
and then, by means of this table, to refer them to the families to which they 
belong. 
PONDS AND DITCHES.* 
TT T E welcome this little volume on account of its intrinsic qualities, and 
* ’ also as it may serve "to call the attention of a considerable number of 
readers to the interesting and instructive series of natural history objects that 
may be obtained from sources that most people pass, either without consi- 
deration or with a feeling of contempt. The author has given a good sketch 
of the botany and zoology of ponds and ditches, indicating, generally, the 
more striking and interesting members of the various groups of plants and 
animals that may be found in such localities. So far as it goes his work is 
a very satisfactory one throughout, and but for two or three objections it 
might justly have been recommended as a most satisfactory guide to that 
-wealth of organisms that people even the most insignificant pieces of stand- 
ing water. The author commences by describing the principal flowering 
plants which grow either in the water of ponds and ditches, or on their mar- 
gins, then notices, in their order, the lower forms of vegetable existence, the 
freshwater Algae, Desmids, and Diatoms, and finally the animals which abound 
in such places, commencing the latter part of his work with the Protozoa, 
and working upwards to the insects and their larvae. But, unfortunately, by 
what seems to us a great error of judgment, he has omitted all notice of the 
pond-haunting fishes and Batrachia, which would furnish materials for two 
interesting chapters, and this because they have already been treated in another 
volume belonging to the same series. We presume it is for the same reason 
that the pond Mollusca are also passed over sub silentio, and these two omis- 
sions seem to us to detract immensely from the value of Dr. Cooke’s little 
volume, which might so easily have been made a very excellent guide to the 
* Natural History Rambles. — Ponds and Ditches. By M. C. Cooke, M.A., 
LL.D. Sm. 8vo. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 
1880. 
