Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 32.djvu/906

870 870 HARVARD LAW REVIEW lands are those which touch or border upon a stream, and the rear portions of such tracts, if sold, cease to be riparian, although becoming again riparian if repurchased; and the riparian right may be lost by prescription. Mr. Wiel regards his book as exploratory, and wishes for the general subject matter a stiU further investigation. It is to be hoped that the scholarly author himself will do the further work and then " consolidate the gains." Meanwhile, the present little book should be on the shelf of every real student of the law of waters. t t^t ^ L. Ward Bannister. Personal Identification: Methods for the Identification of Indivi- duals, Living or Dead. By Harris Hawthorne Wilder, Ph.D., Professor of Zoology in Smith College, and Bert Wentworth, former Pohce Com- missioner of Dover, New Hampshire. Boston: Richard C. Badger. 1919. PP- 374- This is a book of absorbing interest, though a purely scientific work, the re- sult of collaboration between scientific research and practical experience. It discusses all methods of personal identification, from Bertillon measurements to the reconstruction of a face upon a skull; identification by birthmarks and scars, by handwriting, voice, habits, by bones and teeth. The principal original work of the authors is their careful detailed study of identification by "friction skin," i. e., by finger prints and by prints of the palm of the hand or the sole ofjthe foot. The anatomical origin of this "friction skin" is found to be the cushions of flesh and folds of skin on the feet of climbing animals such as the rodents and the apes. The practical development and comparison of actual prints, such as might be left by a criminal, is described, and a method of classify- ing prints for reference is developed. The scientific value of the work is ap- parent. The lawyer, who may at any time find it necessary to establish personal identity, should find this book invaluable; and any student of law may profit- ably use it to become familiar betimes with methods of identification. J. H. B.