H2 
THE ENTOMOLOGIST’S WEEKLY INTELLIGENCER. 
NOTICES OF BOOKS. 
A Populak History of Beitish Crus- 
tacea; comprising a Familiar Account 
of tlieir Classification and Habits. By 
Adam White, Assistant in the Zoolo- 
gical Department of the British Mu- 
seum. 12mo. pp. 358, with 20 coloured 
plates. 
Probably there is no branch of Zoolo- 
gical Science in which such vast progress 
has been made since the days of Linnaeus 
as the class Crustacea. In the last edi- 
tion of the ‘ Systema Naturae,’ one hun- 
dred and eleven Crustaceous animals 
were described, arranged under the three 
genera Cancer , Monoculus and Oniscus, 
which were united with spiders, scorpions, 
mites, lice, and even with the metamor- 
pliotic hexapod Termes and Pulex, to 
form an order of Insecta named Aptera, 
the sole bond of union between these 
discordant tribes being their want of 
wings. The anatomical researches, how- 
ever, which were made by various French 
naturalists about the close of the last 
century soon proved that this so-called 
order of insects combined within itself 
a most discordant mass of materials, 
some of which even, instead of being in- 
sects at all, possessed claims to the rank 
of several distinct classes, each as far 
removed from the true metamorphotic In- 
secta as they were from each other ; and 
then the class Crustacea was formed to in- 
clude the three Liunean genera first men- 
tioned above. 
The study of the species of these Crus- 
taceous animals has, howeyer, at various 
periods been followed with great ardour 
in the country, and whilst Pennant and 
Leach had investigated the larger ani- 
mals, Montagu, in his numerous papers 
published in the ‘ Transactions of the 
Linnean Society,’ made us acquainted 
with a great number of the smaller ones 
found on the Devonshire coast. The 
numerous papers of Dr. Leach published 
upon the Crustacea also did much to 
make the English student acquainted 
with the modern classification of these 
animals, and probably there does not 
exist a finer monograph than the ‘ Mala- 
costraca Podoplithalma Britannica,’ pub- 
lished by Leach, with engravings by 
Sowerby which have never been sur- 
passed. These led the way to Bell’s 
beautiful volume on the Stalk - eyed 
Crustacea, forming a portion of Van 
Voorst’s series of volumes on the British 
Fauna. Nor must the valuable papers 
published from time to time by Dr. Baird 
on the Entomostracous subclass be over- 
looked, and which have ultimately been 
concentrated into an excellent volume, 
published by the Ray Society, under the 
title of ‘Natural History of the British 
Entomostraca.’ 
But all these works were not only very 
expensive, but also more or less difficult, 
and even almost impossible to be pro- 
cured, so that the public will hail with 
pleasure the appearance of Mr. White’s 
little volume, of which the title is given 
at the head of the present article, the 
more especially also as the observations 
of Mr. Warington and other recent natu- 
ralists have shown that some at least of 
the Crustaceans are admirably adapted 
for the purposes of the aquarium ; their 
lively motions, singular forms and often 
elegant colours, giving them as great an 
interest as is afforded by any other tribe 
of animals. Moreover, the work before 
us, instead of being confined to the Stalk- 
eyed species, or the Malacostracans, or 
the Entomostracans alone, embraces the 
whole class, and Mr. White’s numerous 
contributions on the Crustacea, published 
in the Zoological Society’s ‘ Proceedings’ 
and elsewhere, have fully proved to the 
public his capability for undertaking 
such a work, as well as an excellent 
guarantee that the subject, not only in 
its technical but also in its popular de- 
tails, is brought down to the present day. 
