36 
NATURE NOTES. 
to, and better than nothing for, a beginner. They are of course drawn to all sorts 
of scales, and although in the page of description which immediately precedes 
each plate, we are told about upon what scale each species is figured, it is a little 
tiresome to have perpetually to turn back to it. And it is a little startling at first 
to find, for instance (plate vi.), a meadow lark (two-fifths natural size) represented 
as a much more bulky bird than the mourning dove (one-seventh natural size). 
There are plenty more cases of this kind. 
This nicely got up book can be recommended not only to those American 
readers for whom it was jjrimarily intended, but also as a guide-book to any 
British field ornithologist who pays a visit to the Eastern States, and is anxious to 
learn something about the birds of the country. From all accounts there are 
plenty to be seen even in Central Park, New York City. 
O. V. Aplin. 
SHORT NOTICES OF BOOKS. 
The Plants of the Bible, by the Rev. George Henslow, M.A., F. L.S., &c., 
(Religious Tract Society, pp. 128. Price is.) Mr. Henslow’s little book is one 
of a series of educational books under the title “ Present Day Primers,” which 
promise to be valuable aids to all interested in the study of the Bible. There is 
necessarily a good deal of uncertainty about the plants that are mentioned in the 
Bible ; the popular names of plants used by the Hebrews were no more precise 
than those in use by us. The same name may often be applied to many different 
plants, while a single plant may have a large number of names. Then we have to 
deal with the English designations adopted by the translators of the authorized 
version at the beginning of the seventeenth century, a time when geographical 
botany was unknown and precision in botanical names had not been acquired. 
The revisers have tried to remedy the faults of their predecessors, but not always 
with success. Mr. Ilenslow has prepared his little volume with obvious care; he 
has investigated the etymology of the Hebrew names to see what light they throw 
on the plants designated, and has then examined the words used in the LXX. 
version. Greek and Latin botanical writers give him valuable hints, and more 
than all, the botanists of our own day, who, being acquainted with the plants of 
Palestine have written on those mentioned in the Bible, have been helpful. 
Having digested these sources of information, and utilized his personal knowledge 
of the Mediterranean flora, Mr. Henslow has given us a useful and valuable 
volume. Each plant is dealt with in a separate article, and the whole are grouped 
under various headings such as herbs, fruit trees, timber trees, &c. For easy 
reference this is an inconvenience, as a particular plant can be found only through 
the index. Much of the comfort of use is lost by not having the articles arranged 
alphabetically in a single series. The process blocks from herbarium specimens 
are not equal to the letterpress. Their replacement by good woodcuts, and the 
re-arrangement of the articles might well be adopted in a second edition. 
The happy alliance which has been formed between Messrs. Bell & Sons and 
the Humanitarian League, to which we referred in our December number^ is being 
continued with satisfactory results. Here are four more of the “ Animal Life 
Readers,” all well printed, suitably illustrated, neatly bound, and moderate in price 
(is. each). Itmaybeold association which induces us to give the preference for the 
volume which contains Mrs. Trimmer’s Histoiy of the Robins and Keeper's Travels 
in Search of his Master, and perhaps it is the same feeling which makes us rather 
resent the rewriting of “ the greater part of the book, to adapt it to the taste of 
the present freer and less precise age.” The Animals on Strike conies to us 
from America, and is likely to be new to English readers ; with it are some of 
Mrs. Beecher Stowe’s stones from the volume called Queer Little People, an ex- 
cellent collection which is still to be had. Miss Edith Carrington is responsible 
{or f'rom Many Lands and Man’s Helpers: the former is a capital selection of 
accounts of animals, birds, &c., from various regions, illustrated by useful maps. 
