The Zoologist/4th series, vol 6 (1902)/Issue 735/Notices of New Books
NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS.
This massive and beautiful volume is an addition to the series known as 'Atlanti Diversi per la Gioventù Studiosa,' editi da Ulrico Hoepli. It is written by an ornithologist who is not a stranger to these pages, and, published in a moderately cheap form, with a wealth of illustration, supplies a good handbook for the study of continental ornithology. The first section to p. 165 constitutes a general introduction to the subject, and refers to general structure, mimicry, dimorphism, hybridity, geographical distribution, migration, and classification, among other subjects; while an exhaustive bibliography is also appended. Five hundred and sixty-five species are descriptively enumerated, fifty coloured plates are given, and many blocks illustrate the text. The three concluding plates are devoted to eggs; the other plates each contains a number of birds, arranged in a somewhat ancient style, and not quite approaching the record form in either chromo-lithography or coloured photography of to-day, but still of a useful nature for recognition: iconographic more than absolutely artistic.
The author, however, has brought his letterpress thoroughly up to date. A knowledge of the Italian language, so far as descriptive phraseology is concerned, is not a difficult acquisition, even for those to whom Dante and Tasso in the original are sealed prophets. We English, as a rule, are perhaps the worst linguists in the world, and are meek before our own hairdressers and restaurant waiters, who are probably, in a colloquial sense, the best. We may find some solace in the reflection that the men who really know their own language are incomparably fewer than those who have a facile smattering of other tongues, and that to all inheritors of Babel the key to scientific diction is not a too difficult quest. There is sometimes a Sir R. Burton—but seldom. We write thus because the author of this book is really worth reading, and the difficulty of doing so to the most parochial Anglican is not insurmountable.
The lettering to the plates consists of Italian or local terminology. This really affords a useful lesson. Some authors are so inclined—even in these pages—to give British names only for British birds, that they may by perusal of these cognomens attain some conception of how local names appear to both English and Italian readers. We certainly should not have recognised our old friend the Bullfinch under the name of "Ciuffolotto," and the need is accentuated of birds when referred to in print being called by their universal or scientific cognomens, as the author has done in his text.
This is a book worthy of a shelf on the line in every naturalist's library, inciting frequent reference, but also demanding a much stronger binding than the one in which it is issued.
The publications of museums show by their subject-matters the varying specialities pursued by the official personnel. Formerly the South African Museum, when under the charge of Mr. Trimen, was the seat of lepidopteral publication; while the advent of Mr. W.L. Sclater produced volumes on mammalogy and ornithology. Now Mr. Péringuey has commenced a colossal work for one man to achieve, and is publishing nothing less than a descriptive catalogue of the South African Coleoptera, the last instalment of which occupies no fewer than eight hundred and ninety-six pages of vol. xii. of the Transactions of the South African Philosophical Society. This is not only an energetic but a courageous work for Mr. Péringuey to undertake away from European collections and libraries, and we trust he may be spared to complete his gigantic enterprise. A bare catalogue of South African Coleoptera alone is a desideratum, but a descriptive enumeration will place entomologists under an obligation, and they will welcome a work to whose virtues they will be wondrous kind, while to some unavoidable limitations they must critically be a little blind.
This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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