227 
REVIEWS AND EXCHANGES. 
How to Teach the Nature Study Course, with Suggestions for Teaching it, based 
on A T otes of Lectures to 7'eachers in Training. By John Dearness. 5 inches 
x 7^ inches, 206 pages with frontispiece, lull page illustrations and figures 
in the text. Copp, Clark and Co., Toronto. Price 60 cents. 
The courses in Nature Study, drawn up by Ontario and Manitoba, are here 
considered in detail side by side. The grades or years which correspond are 
dealt with, up to the eighth, by the Vice-Principal of the London Normal School 
in Ontario, and many most valuable suggestions are offered in each case. There 
is hardly a topic that can be used in connection with the method of teaching- 
which is the essence of Nature Study — that does not come in for attention, and 
teachers will get a host of ideas which will be helpful to them when planning out 
a course suited to their own country, conditions and requirements. Even more 
important are the discussions on “ What Nature Study is,” “ Nature Study versus 
Elementary Science,” and the “ Preparation of the Teacher,” which form an 
introduction to the book. We may, in fact, say that in no other book which we 
have read during the progress of the movement has a better attitude been taken 
up, or a firmer grasp of the necessities and possibilities of Nature Study been 
shown. We are urged (on the last page) to judge the work by quality and not 
by quantity, and told that “ the highest criterion of success in teaching is increase 
of power rather than of knowledge — of power to observe, judge, act, sympathise, 
and enjoy.” 
A Text Book of Fungi, including Morphology, Physiology, Pathology and Classifi- 
cation. By George Massee. 5 inches x 7J inches, 427 pp., 141 figures. 
Duckworth and Co. Price 6s. net. 
Mr. Massee’s latest book will meet with a cordial welcome from all quarters. 
It summarises, in a masterly way, the vast amount of knowledge with regard to 
the Fungi, which during the last few years has accumulated, not gradually, but 
“ by leaps and bounds.” It also indicates where fuller information may be 
obtained, and it should prove especially uselul to those who, in studying 
agriculture and forestry, are bound to make themselves familiar with the plants 
that are not green. 
In the introduction, though giving all credit to cytologists, who have worked 
out the structure and behaviour of the component cells of fungi, Mr. Massee 
stoutly maintains that the time has not yet come for a classification based on 
cytology, and that under present conditions the value of systematic classification 
of plants depends entirely upon its practicability. lie points out that i 1 s 
primary object is to enable us to identify species correctly, and that while 
systematic botany, thus understood, is entirely outside cytology and physiology, 
these departments of research are dependent on systematic work for a clear 
indication of what particular species has been the subject of research. No small 
number of controversies and failures in attempting to corroborate the investiga- 
tions of others have arisen through mistaking one species for another. Mr. 
Massee even becomes mildly sarcastic with regard to some schemes that have been 
propounded, and to the sneers of cytologists, who in ignorance “expect from 
practical systematic botany, information that systematists do not pretend to 
furnish.” 
The first part of the volume deals with some thirty odd topics, such as 
anatomy, food, colours, parasites on fungi, proteciion against snails, and fossil 
fungi. Under the heading of “ Ecology of Fungi,” the results of some very 
interesting observations are given. Fungi, as they need organic food, have to 
follow green plants, but there are unexplained conditions which determine the 
presence or absence of certain fungi in any particular spot. While a white or 
pink-spored toadstool may oust the purple-spored mushroom from the beds 
prepared for it, never will the purple-spored species allow a black-spored fungu 
