REVIEWS AND EXCHANGES 
77 
seen any scientific books published by Messrs. Dent ; but, if this very handy little 
octavo of about 400 pages, with nearly 200 illustrations, which are none the 
worse because most of them are borrowed (with full acknowledgment) from stan- 
dard authorities, issued at 4s. 6d., be a sample of works they purpose publishing, 
we can only hopj they will “ go on and prosjrer,” for we consider it a marvel of 
cheapness. The typography does credit to Messrs. Turnbull and Spears of Edin- 
burgh. Not the least merit of Mr. Carpenter’s work is the admirable sense of 
proportion which it evinces ; and we do not think we can better describe the scope 
of the book than by stating that it devotes 83 pages to anatomy, 44 to life-history. 
Common Earwig {Forjiatla auricu’aria L.) magnified. 
Tail-forceps of three male earwigs, showing variation. Magnified three times. 
33 to classification, 120 to the orders of insects, 64 to bionomics, 35 to the pedigree 
f insects, 14 to bibliography and ii to the index. Though there is none of that 
wealth of anecdotic lore on the marvels of “instinct” that made “Kirby and 
Spence” the delight of our boyhood — in fact, the word “ instinct ” does not occur 
in Mr. Carpenter’s index — the well-told stories of symbiosis, of mimicry, of family 
life and social communities in the insect world are as romantic as anything in the 
whole realm of Nature. We trust the author is exaggerating when he writes in 
his Preface of “ the thousand and more original works on insects now published 
yearly ; ” but so far as o.ur own limited knowledge goes, we are not acquainted with 
any work that quite occupies the ground of this valuable little book. We are 
able, by the kindness of Messrs. Dent, to give three exam.ples of the illustrations. 
Many others are taken from Professor L. C. Miall’s “ Cockroach ” and from the 
publications of the United States Department of Agriculture. 
A Glossary of popular local and old-fashioned Names of British Birds. By Charles 
Louis Plett. Jacksons’, Brigg. Price 6d. 
This is a reprint of the glossarial portion of Mr. Hett’s Bird Dictionary. 
Though it is perhaps inevitable in so cheap a booklet, there seems to us to be 
not a little inconvenience in the system by which every name in the glossary is 
followed merely by a number, entailing reference to another list, that of birds 
accepted as British by the British Ornithologists’ Union in 1883, in another 
part of the book. We should also have liked some indication of the districts in 
which the local names are used. 
