Volume 9 - Electric Scotland

REVIEWS 133
REVIEWS.
THE GEOGRAPHY OF MAMMALS. By William Lutley Sclater,
M.A., F.Z.S., and Philip Lutley Sclater, M.A., Ph.D., F.R.S.
:
(London Kegan Paul, Trench, Triibner and Co., Ltd., 1899.)
This volume affords, in a collected, convenient, and revised form,
the valuable series of papers contributed by Mr. W.->L. Sclater to
the "Geographical Magazine" between the years 1894 and 1897.
To these have been added chapters dealing with the subject from
the Zoological standpoint, and a chapter devoted to marine mammals
and their distribution. The book is embellished by 50 illustrations
giving excellent portraits of some typical mammals from each of the
zoo-geographical regions, and 8 maps showing the regions and
their division into sub-regions. The work is a valuable contribution
to the important subject upon which it treats ;
and the fact that
Dr. Sclater, the founder of the modern system upon which the
geographical distribution of animals is
based, has revised and edited
it, places the book in the forefront of works of its kind. The index,
however, is very unsatisfactory, having many shortcomings, which is
much to be regretted in a work treating of so many families and
species.
OUR RARER BRITISH BREEDING BIRDS : THEIR NESTS, EGGS,
AND SUMMER HAUNTS. By Richard Kearton, F.Z.S. Illustrated
by Photographs by C. Kearton. (Cassell and Co., Ltd., 1899.)
The title of this book is a decided misnomer, for the Blackcap,
the Corn Bunting, the Jay, and other species treated of are certainly
not among the "rarer British breeding birds." The fact is, the
book is a supplement to the author's volume on British Birds'
Eggs (1895). It is practically the fourth book on the subject
Mr. Kearton has issued in as many years. Like the others, its value
lies in the beauty of its illustrations.
We notice in the preface certain observations on the " Wild
Bird Protection Laws," claiming that the only real good done in the
United Kingdom in the way of bird preservation has been accomplished
by private effort. This is not the case in Scotland. But
what could private effort accomplish without the laws ? It is a very
easy thing to criticise the Bird, or any other, Acts ;
but Mr. Kearton
fails to tell us what he would have us do unless, indeed,
his extraordinary
opinion that prosecutions are undesirable, because they
advertise the locality from which the specimens were obtained, can
be regarded as such. If so, he takes anything but a lofty view of
our duty towards our feathered friends in adversity.