172 
NATURE NOTES 
its flight. Can you inform us as to the cause? The leaves we have observed the 
bees carrying are not withered, but freshly picked. Do the bees gather them 
themselves ? 
Oak Manor, Battledown, Cheltenham, Lena Shaw. 
July 24, 1906. 
93. Clover Growing in Circles. — We have recently made, and sown 
with grass seed, a new croquet-lawn. The grass does not seem to “ do ” very 
well, and quite a third of it has (to use an Irishism) come up white clover. This 
grows almost entirely in circles, which at a little distance have much the same 
appearance as “ fairy rings,” and the general effect is very curious. What can 
be the reason of this strange manner of growth? 
Ropley, August 7, 1906. Marie S. Hagen. 
91. Plants on the Chalk. — Referring to my note on “ Plants on the 
Chalk ” (No. 389 of your August issue), I enclose a photograph of the patch of 
Echium vtilgare referred to in it. The tallest spike we could find measured four 
feet. On a recent visit to the same place, I found a specimen of Salvia verticillata. 
Is this species becoming colonised? I found a plant of it a few years ago in some 
waste ground at Norwood, and it was identified for me at Ivew or Kensington. 
It is not, as far as I am aware, a garden plant, and is not mentioned amongst the 
numerous species of sage referred to in my copy of Robinson’s “ English Flower 
Garden ” (1883 edition). 
Walton-on- the- Hill. M. Teesdale. 
REVIEWS AND EXCHANGES. 
Familiar Trees. By Prof. G. S. Boulger. Parts I. to VI. Cassell and Co. 
Price 6d. net each part. 
It is nearly thirty years since the present editor of Nature Notes first 
described our British Trees in the Journal of Forestry. His seiies of papers, 
entitled “The Beauties of British Trees,” was intended to direct the attention of 
artists and of the non-bolanical public to the beauties which a detailed study of our 
trees will reveal. At the request of Messrs. Cassell these articles were rewritten 
and extended so as to include familiar but non-indigenous species, and were 
issued between 1886 and 1889 in forty parts, each describing one species, and 
illustrated by two chromo-lithographs, one of the whole tree and the other of 
details of flower, leaves and fruit, from water-colour studies, by W. H. J. Boot, 
R.B.A. It was the first book on British trees to be illustrated in colour. The 
whole book has now been revised, the trees described being nearly half as many 
again as in the original issue. The present edition is to be completed in twenty- 
nine parts, issued fortnightly, each containing two subjects. The additional 
coloured plates, bringing the number up to 1 1 4 , are from the very skilful brush 
of A. F. Muckley, and each tree is also illustrated by an uncoloured photo- 
graph from Nature, these pictures being the work of various eminent artists. 
A novel feature of scientific interest is the reproduction of a complete series of 
micro-photographs of the woods of the species, magnified ten, or in most cases, 
thirty diameters, by Messrs. J. A. Weale and F. W. Saxbv. The use of the 
three-colour process enables the publishers to issue the work thus enlarged at 
little more than half its former price. 
Animal Heroes. By Ernest Thompson Seton. With two hundred illustrations. 
Archibald Constable and Co. Price 6s. net. 
A new book by Mr. Thompson Seton is an event, a red-letter day for Nature- 
lovers. His pen and pencil have lost none of their cunning, though the stories in 
this volume are not as uniformly sad in their dinouement as in some of the author’s 
previous productions. On the whole, we like “ The Slum Cat,” the best of the 
eight biographies, though “ The Legend of the White Reindeer,” in which the 
author transfers the scene to Norway, is the most poetically told. Of the full- 
page drawings we prefer “The Pirates in Ambush.” It is needless to add that 
the whole book is, like everything Mr. Seton writes, thoroughly Selbornian in 
in spirit. 
