Mr. Rothschild's collection will not merely be for his own private use and that of his curators, but will be at the disposal of every competent specialist who desires to make use of it for reference. While arranging the collection, Mr. Rothschild and his curators will prepare a catalogue and describe the forms that appear to be new; and the systematic manner in which the collecting is being undertaken in little-explored regions abroad is certain eventually to yield most important results.

In conclusion, we would advise all our readers who are interested in mammals and birds, in the art of taxidermy, or in the arrangement of exhibition cases, to visit the Tring Museum. It is a remarkable and beautiful collection, of interest alike to the wandering amateur and the professed naturalist.

A. SMITH Woodward.

C. DAVIES Sherborn.

SOME NEW BOOKS.

The Visible UNIVERSE: Chapters on the Origin and Construction of the Heavens. By J. Ellard Gore, F.R.A.S. Demy 8vo. Pp. 346, with 6 stellar photographs and 12 lithographic plates. London: Crosby Lockwood & Son, 1892.

Price 16s.

MR. GORE is well known as an enthusiastic observer, an able computer, an authority on variable stars, and the author of successful works which appeal to the general reader and the amateur astronomer. The present volume, like its predecessors, is well written, well printed, and well illustrated. Its main object is to give an account of various hypotheses as to the origin and construction of the heavens, and of the arguments for and against them. In discussing various astronomical fictions, as these hypotheses may be termed, many facts are necessarily described and much interesting information is communicated. Thus, in reviewing the "Meteoritic Hypothesis," the author gives an account of the leading characteristics of stellar spectra and of the recent work by Professor Lockyer, Dr. Huggins, and others, on such subjects as the coincidence of the chief nebular line with the brightest termination of the magnesium fluting.

Mr. Gore has paid special attention to the distribution of stars in space, and this subject is accordingly treated at considerable length. The theories of Wright, Lambert, Herschel, Struve, Proctor, and others, as to the construction of the visible universe and the laws governing the distribution of stars, are described and critically examined. There is a very interesting chapter on stellar parallax and stellar motions in which the latest information on these important subjects is given. Speaking of the sun's motion in space, the author asks, What was the position of our system in past geologic time? If the motion has been rectilinear we must have come from that part of space in which Sirius is at present situated. Now, with a parallax of 0.39" the distance of Sirius from the earth would be about 49 billions of miles. With a velocity of 14 miles a second the sun's annual motion would be nearly 442 millions of miles. Therefore in 200,000 years the distance traversed would be about 88 billions of miles, which, carried back, would place it out in space far beyond the distance of Sirius." It is thus safe to say that the Ichthyosauri of the Lias must have looked upon a system of stellar distribution very different from that which we now see.

The book appeals to many classes of readers. Those who like to revel in metaphysical subtleties will find portions adapted to their peculiar taste; those who prefer to trace the work of individuals in the present state of our knowledge will turn to the historical parts; while those who feel that such subjects as the above are apt to become tedious, will find plenty to occupy their attention in the descriptive portions of the volume. Too many tastes are catered for to make the book uniformly palatable to any one individual.

Among the illustrations we may select for special commendation those which represent some of the recent results of the application of photography. The magnificent photograph of the nebula in Andromeda, by Mr. Isaac Roberts, forms an appropriate frontispiece.

SHORT STALKS; or, Hunting Camps North, South, East, and West. By E. N. Buxton. 8vo. Pp. vii., 405. Illustrated. London: Stanford, 1892. Price 21s. FROM the main title, which alone appears on the cover, it might be thought that the volume before us was a treatise on some branch of botany or horticulture, if not a novel, whereas, as a matter of fact, it is a very interesting book on "big game" shooting. It must not however, be thought that it comes merely under the designation of an ordinary book of sport, since the author gives us some very valuable information as to the habits and mode of life of the various animals treated. Moreover, Mr. Buxton has been fortunate in the localities he has selected for many of his hunting trips, whereby he has been brought into contact with animals as to whose habits there has hitherto been a dearth of information in the works of recent English writers. Sporting works on the larger mammals of Southern Africa, India, and North America are so numerous as to afford an almost superabundance of information; whereas, in regard to Eastern Asia, Europe, and North Africa there is a marked dearth of accessible and reliable observations by English sportsmen. We are, therefore, especially glad to welcome Mr. Buxton's accounts of the Sardinian Mouflon (Ovis musimon), of the Spanish or Pyrenean Wild Goat (Capra pyrenaica), of the Arui (Ovis tragelaphus) of North Africa, as well as of the Pasang or Persian Wild Goat (Capra ægagrus), and the Chamois (Rupicapra tragus). The majority of the twelve chapters into which the work is divided have already appeared as separate articles in various serials and newspapers, but they are now so much embellished by the addition of the excellent illustrations with which the book is adorned, that it is difficult to recognise them as the same. the courtesy of Mr. Stanford we are enabled to reproduce one of these illustrations as a sample. In addition to these excellent portraits of the animals he describes so graphically, Mr. Buxton also incidentally introduces some charming little sketches of bird-life and scenery.

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The first chapter of the book is devoted to the Mouflon, which the author describes as one of the most difficult animals to stalk which he has ever come across. The second deals with the Chamois of the Alps, while the variety inhabiting the Pyrenees is described in the ninth chapter under its Iberian name, Izzard; and here we may point out to the author that he is quite behind modern zoology in referring to this animal under the title of Antilope rupicapra. The third chapter is devoted to American game, where some interesting observations are recorded as to the habits of the Bighorn Sheep (Ovis montana); while in the fifth Mr. Buxton treats of the Arui and Mountain Gazelle of Algeria. The author appears to have been the first Englishman who has hunted these animals, and the results of his observations have already appeared in the Zoological Society's Proceedings. We are told that the name "Aoudad," so commonly applied to the Arui, is quite unknown in its native land, and the author also speaks as to the remarkable powers of concealment possessed by these animals. The Elk of Norway claims the whole of the fifth chapter; while the sixth (which originally appeared in the Nineteenth Century) treats of the Pasang, under the legend of The Father of all the Goats," in allusion

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to the probability of its being the ancestor of the domestic breeds. The most interesting of all is, however, the seventh chapter, which treats of the Pyrenean wild goat. Mr. Buxton says that, in contradiction to the true Ibex, this animal largely frequents scrub-jungle, and he points out-we believe for the first time-that the inward inclination of the tips of its horns is evidently adapted to passing with ease among bushes, the true Ibex, which inhabit open country, having the tips of their horns divergent.

Other chapters, relating to Reindeer and Bear, do not call for special notice, and we accordingly conclude by congratulating both author and publisher on the production of a work which, while written professedly for the sportsman, contains much that is deserving of the best attention of the naturalist. R. L.

OUR COUNTRY'S BIRDS, AND HOW TO KNOW THEM. By W. J. Gordon. Crown 8vo. Pp. viii., 152. Illustrated. London: Day & Son, 1892. Price 6s. MR. W. J. GORDON is already well known as the author of "Our Country's Flowers," which has attained a well-merited reputation as a handy and convenient guide to the British flora. In the work before us he has treated the birds of Britain in a somewhat similar fashion, the result being a volume which contains, perhaps, more information in a small compass than any other of equal size which has come under our notice. The great feature of Mr. Gordon's work is that every species is illustrated, and that, too, by a coloured figure, and since these figures have been executed by Messrs. Willis and Holding, any comment as to the excellence of their execution would be superfluous. Mr. Gordon, we are glad to see, rather ridicules the idea of including such birds as the Flamingo under the title of British, but as the species has occurred in the British islands, he is perforce compelled to include it in his list.

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The great object of the volume is to enable any person to identify any bird he may happen to come across in the British Islands, and for this purpose Mr. Gordon provides us with an elaborately workedout system of "keys." He is, however, careful to add that this is merely an empirical method, and has nothing to do with classification. Other chapters deal, however, fully with the classificatory portion of the subject, in the course of which the peculiarities of the bones of the skull in the different groups, as well as the subject of pterylosis, are briefly but carefully treated. An unique feature in the book is the series of tables of dimensions of all the British species.

We may point out that in including Pandion among the Falconida the author is not up to date, we ourselves being persuaded of the correctness of the view that this genus represents an order connecting the Accipitres with the Striges. We cannot, moreover, accept the inclusion of all the Passerines in a single family "Passeridæ."

These, however, are comparatively small defects, and the author is to be congratulated on having given such a large amount of information on British birds in such an exceedingly small compass.

R. L.

THE BUILDING of the BritISH ISLES: A Study in Geographical Evolution. By A. J. Jukes-Browne, B.A., F.G.S. Second edition. Pp. xiv., 465. 8vo. London: George Bell & Sons, 1892. Price 7s. 6d.

ONE object of geological enquiry is to picture the physical conditions that attended the deposition of the many geological formations. In its most interesting aspect, the subject is inseparably connected with