52 
NATURE NOTES. 
remain undisturbed for twelve j-ears, the encloser pleads that by the Statute of 
Limitation he is entitled to consider this land as his very own.” We are "lad to 
.'-ee that other guides on the lines of this one are projected ; they cannot fail to 
be very useful to the Londoner during the coming summer. 
The Report of the National Footpath Preservation .Society for its eighth year 
(1891-92) gives a good account of work done. A list of 158 cases of interference 
with public footpaths and encroachments on roadside wastes, &c. , have come to 
the knowledge of the Society during the year, and the total number of cases now 
dealt with has reached 880 in a period of eight years. In many of these, action 
has been taken with satisfactory results. The .Society, which we have more than 
once commended to the notice of Selborn'ans, now numbers nearly 1,000 mem- 
bers. Those wishing to know more about it should write to the Secretary, Mr. 
1 1 . Allnutt, 42, Essex Street, Strand, W.C., for a Report, which we should like 
to see issued in a more convenient form than it at present possesses. 
FIELD PHILOSOPHY.* 
The present generation ought assuredly to be distinguished for the possession 
of a large number of observers who study nature in the fields, for it evidently 
delights in books on the subject, just as fishermen seem never to be weary of 
reading about fishing. Mr. Grant Allen and Dr. Wilson present us, in the work 
named below, with good specimens of the class. Bright and picturesque, dealing 
with very various scenes and subjects, each collection of papers should serve as a 
stimulus to the reader to go and do likewise, to turn his steps to some point in 
the country side, and see whether he cannot enjoy for himself the keener charm 
of doing what it is so pleasant to read about. 
One remark, however, constantly suggests itself as we study the descriptions of 
both authors. To our own taste, it would be still more interesting to be told 
what they actually have seen, inste.ad of what they deduce from the objects they 
observe concerning the life of the past and their hypothesis concerning it. It is 
with this that as a rule they deal, but when they depart from the rule and record 
mere facts the result appears more satisfactory. Mr. Grant Allen, for instance, 
has a p.iper entitled “ Eight-legged Friends,” in which he records his observations 
of two spiders which he had the opportunity of watching in circumstances so 
singularly opportune that they cannot fall to the lot of many. These creatures 
spun their webs outside a window that did not open, so close to the glass that 
they could be observed from within with a platyscopic lens, and into these webs 
insects of the most various kinds appear constantly to have str.iyed — flies and 
midges, wasps, bumble-bees and humming-bird hawk-moths. The history of the 
architectural achievements of the pair, of their individual characteristics and 
various methods of treating their various captives, and of their ghoulish habit of 
devouring their husbands, for both were females — is as good as a romance of the 
most tragic type ; and we would rather have more of the same sort, in place of 
the construction of hypothetical genealogies, which, truth to tell, become a little 
monotonous when once the principle becomes apparent on which they are framed. 
Dr. Wilson has some interesting chapters not exclusively based on his own 
observations, giving information about common objects. In “ Seal Skins and 
their Wearers,” for instance, he tells us of the habits of the animals from 
which these valu.rble articles are procured, and of the various labours and process 
which secure them for our use. He has also an article on spiders, whence we 
gather a number of curious det.ails concerning their susceptibility to music. It 
would appear that sounds of a certain kind suggest to them the buzzing of an 
* Science in Arcady, by Grant Allen. London : Lawrence and Bullen, 1892, 
pp. 304, price Ss. 
Science Stories, by Andrew Wilson, F.R.S.E. London : Osgood, Mcllvaine 
and Co., 1892, pp. 269, price 5s. 
