Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 6 (1902).djvu/418

358 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.

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.