THE BOOKSHELF. 
253 
of interest. The volume is very well illustrated, and will make an admirable 
Christmas-box for the younjjster who is already familiar with most home-made 
books on natural history. 
Hut if we are to speak of Christmas-boxes, we must not fail to note that that 
admirable picture-book, All Ahout Animals (Newnes), which we noticed at some 
length in our .September issue, is now complete, furnishing a collection of 
authentic animal portraits such as h.as never before been brought together. We 
must refer our readers to what we have already said for further particulars about 
the book ; its value and interest have been kept up to the end. The twelve 
numbers, including 240 pictures, each occupying a page, cost, without discount, 
6s., the cover for binding them half-a-crown ; so that, for less than half a sove- 
reign, every nursery can po.ssess a delightful and instructive collection of pictures 
of animals. We trust few will fail to be supplied with it. 
-Messrs. Newnes have also issued in twelve sevenpenny parts. The Thames 
Illustraled, an admirably and profusely illustrated guide to the upper portion of 
our river — that Iretween Richmond and Oxford. Mr. John Leyland, who is 
responsible for the work, has shown much skill in the selection of the many 
charming landscapes and buildings herein portrayed. 
Messrs. Cassell, having completed the cheap popular re-issue, in sixpenny 
weekly parts, of their Familiar Wild Flowers, are now proceeding to give us their 
companion work. Familiar Garden Flowers, at an equally cheap rate. The plan 
of the two books is, as is well known, similar; the plates in each are by Mr. F. 
E. Hulme, the letterpress to the Garden Flowers being by Mr. Shirley Hibberd. 
The volumes formed by these two series will be a delight to many a schoolroom, 
and a treasured possession of many a young naturalist. We are inclined to envy 
Messrs. Cassell the power of doing good which they exercise by the issue of cheap 
and excellent publications like these. 
somewhat more serious and systematic, yet popular and interesting, book 
about wild flowers is Mr. R. Lloyd IVaeger’s Open-Air Studies in Botany 
(GrifPn, 7s. 6d.). It is no easy task to write an original Ixtok on British plants, 
but -Mr. Fraeger has succeeded in accomplishing it. lie lakes us to localities ol 
various kinds — meadow, cornfield, river, sea, mountain and bay — and makes us 
sit down by him while he examines and tells us all about the wild flowers which 
he has gathered in each place. This may not seem an absolutely new scheme, 
but those who peruse Mr. Praeger’s book — and we hope many of our readers will 
be among them— will find that he has treated it in a new manner, by bringing 
in to his descriptions the results of recent re.^earches into the movements, ferti- 
lization, colour, and distribution of plants. None but one well acquainted with 
plants in the field could have written this book, and by no means every one pos- 
sessed of such knowledge could have set forward in simple yet accurate language 
the phenomena with which Mr. Fraeger deals. We must not omit to call atten- 
tion to the charming illustrations, especially those reproduced from photographs 
of groups of growing plants. We understand that this is Mr. Praeger’s first 
attempt at popular writing ; we hope we shall have other works from his pen, 
equally accurate and attractive in every way. The only fault we have to find with 
our copy of the book rests with the publishers, who have disfigured the title page 
with a hideous red stamp. 
One of the best and cheapest books we have seen for a long time is Prof. 
Bertram Windle’s Life in Early Britain (Nutt, 3s. 6d.), “being an account of 
the early inhabitants of this island and the memorials which they have left behind 
them.” Here once more we have a man of scientific eminence — for Prof. Windle 
is Dean of the Medical Faculty and Professor of Anatomy at Mason College, 
Birmingham — providing out of the stores of his knowledge a book at once popular 
and accurate, compiled from the best authorities, with many original observations 
— the whole expressed in a clear and interesting manner. While thoroughly “ up 
to dale,” to use a convenient if not elegant expression. Prof. Windle does not 
indulge in the speculations dear to romance writers of the Clodd and Grant Allen 
type, although he is careful to state clearly and fully the solid conclusions at which 
