TRAVELS OF A NATURALIST IN NORTHERN EUROPE,
Travels of a Naturalist in Northern Europe. By J. A. Harvie- Brown, F.R.S.E., F.Z.S., &e. With Coloured Plates and other Illustrations and 4 Maps. 2 vols. (T. Fisher Unwin. X23 3s, net.)—The ornithological work which Mr. Harvie-Brown has done is too well known for us to dwell upon it. The two volumes before us contain the journals which he kept from day to day during his expeditions in 1871 to Norway, in 1872 to Archangel, and in 1875 to the Fetchers. In his preface he apologises for publishing such "stale news." This is unnecessary, for the diaries are full of interest to ornithologists, though the results of the collecting work have, of course, long ago been published in the Ibis and elsewhere. The only thing we do not understand is why he did not publish these actual diaries, as they are now presented to us, some thirty years ago. Although ornithologists will be sent almost crazy with excitement by the accounts of bird's-nesting on the Tundras, and long to be off to those happy hunting-grounds, the general reader (however fond of travels he may be) is likely to find much that is tedious in the lists of birds observed daily and the accounts of the series of skins and eggs that were obtained. The first two journeys were undertaken in the company of Mr. Edward R. Alston, the last in that of Mr. Henry Seebohm. Ornithology has made vast strides since those days. Wolley and other English collectors had not penetrated as far east as the White Sea. When the journey to the Petchora was planned there were six birds which regularly visited the shores of the British Islands, of which the breeding places, the nests, or the eggs were almost or entirely unknown. In the case of three, the little stint, Bewick's swan, and the grey plover, Mr. Harvie-Brown and Mr. Seebohm were successful. The remaining three were the knot, the sanderling, and the curlew sandpiper. The last-named bird was shot at the extreme north-east point which the travellers reached, and next year was discovered by Drs. Finsch and Brehm a little further to the east breeding at the mouth of the river Ob. The two remaining birds were discovered nesting at the extreme limit of animal life in the Arctic regions by Captain Feilden, the naturalist on the Alert.' Thus does our knowledge slowly increase ; yet how little do we know of birds, and how much there is for ornithologists to do before the whole globe will have been properly " worked." The book contains, besides the journals, lists of birds collected, some excellent coloured plates of the eggs of the grey plover and little stint, three maps, and a few notes on the Samoyeds. A History of Preaching. By Edwin Charles Dargan, D.D. (Hodder and Stoughton. Is. 6d.)—A writer who undertakes to give a history of one important province of Christian life during fifteen centuries—A.D. 70 to A.D. 1572—sets himself a really impossible task. The book is a treasury of learning of a certain kind, but the learning is scarcely helpful. Dr. Dargan gives a succession of judgments on periods and individuals. The soundness of theso we do not propose to question. But they do not really instruct. The reader carries away an opinion about the qualities of Chrysostom, or Bernard of Clairvaux, or Tauler, but he does not carry away any fruitful idea of these great men. A more useful thing would have been to take a typical example of each period, and deal with that example with some fulness, giving, for instance, some characteristic sermon at full length. Dr. Dargan seldom even gives extracts. There is (Ale of half-a-page or so in the account of Chrysostom, but none when we come to Basil the Great, or Gregory of Nazianzus, or Ambrose, or Augustine. As a bibliography, indeed, the volume may be useful. Unfortunately, the books to which it might serve as a guide are not within easy reach.
AN AUSTRALIAN CRICKETER ON TOUR.
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