Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 5 (1901).djvu/302

276 The pages are always interesting, and very many are beautifully illustrated; but the figure of the Kallima butterfly given in support of "mimicry" is of an "hereditary" character, still showing the insect with the head uppermost on the twig, despite the many recent corrections that have appeared to the effect that the butterfly when at rest has head downwards.

is a most valuable synopsis of the Mammals of North America, but the knowledge and industry displayed seem to be in an inverse ratio to the strength of purpose in the author. Mr. Elliot recognizes the plethora of proposed species in his fauna: "A considerable number of the so-called species and subspecies contained in this volume will eventually swell the list of synonyms already sufficiently formidable." He further makes the remark that in late years there is an inclination to unduly separate in a specific sense "at the risk of reducing the science to one founded on labels and localities, instead of distinctive and prominent characters." He clearly states that "there is hardly a genus of North American mammals that does not contain too many named forms," but decides that the present time cannot be supposed "as opportune for a final and satisfactory revision." We regret this decision: either the criticism need not have been made, or it should have been pressed home by the author's revision. In the purely artificial canons of nomenclature, where the greatest liberty—if not licence—is observed, it requires no more courage to dethrone than to elect in a process that Mr. Elliot recognizes as largely one of names. One statement deserves special attention, as presumably applied to species not described on outside colouration, or non-essential measurements, but absolutely founded on cranial characters, and that is that these are subject to a large element of error, for "the lack of resemblances often observed among crania is frequently but the individual variations of a type." In this work crania are mostly, if not entirely, figured so that the caution becomes authoritative.

There can be little doubt that this synopsis of the Mammals of North America will for some time hold the field; it is, like all