steel, and four steel plates of moths, caterpillars, beetles and their larvæ, with forty-six cuts in the text, we first open upon a memoir of Dr. Harris, by Col. T. W. Higginson. Then follows Harris' Correspondence with Hentz, Melsheimer, Doubleday, Herrick, Leconte, Miss Morris, and shorter communications from Say, Zimmerman, and others. An Appendix contains numerous descriptions of larvæ, republished papers, his contributions to entomology in the "New England Farmer," extracts from agricultural papers, etc., etc. The work is beautifully printed, edited with the greatest care and fidelity to the memory and fame of Dr. Harris, and is a work that every one who wishes to be an entomologist should read and reread, that he may imbibe the spirit of conscientious research and unwearying devotion to truth that were among the prime characteristics of Dr. Harris' nature.

PICTURES AND STORIES OF ANIMALS.*- These works will unquestionably prove of benefit to the young. They are not so praiseworthy in point of composition as in the amount of information which they contain. The illustrations are most of them characteristic, while others have that stiff, woodeny appearance but too often found in works upon Natural History. The Tenney series, unlike all other juvenile works of its class, treats principally of American animals, and for that reason, if for no other, we heartily recommend it to those who would instruct their children or younger pupils in the rudiments of Natural History.

FISHING IN AMERICAN WATERS.†- That Genial is the nature if not the exact name of the author of this most useful and entertaining volume must be apparent to every reader. Fun and fishing, tackle and tattle, pisciculture and porgies, are sandwiched together in a most delightful manner throughout the entire work. The author is evidently a Waltonian angler, an "honest man who fears God, loves his neighbor, and goes a fishing."

A fly-fisher, and, as is well known a master of that gentle art, he does not, as has been lately the fashion, "wash his hands of such dirty things" as worms, grubs and flies, and affect to despise those who use them as Goths and Vandals, but honestly acknowledges that skill may be displayed even in bait-fishing, and gives the results of his experience in that line for the benefit of those benighted heathens, who, as yet, may be totally innocent of any knowledge of the hackle, palmer, or coachman.

The Natural History department of the book is, however, to say the least, somewhat curious, as witness the following:

"I may also state my conviction that a whale is a fish, and that the porpoise is also a fish, though the members of this genus travel in pairs, suckle their young, of which they usually have but one at a birth, which the parent mammal guards with jealous care." (p. 25.)

*Pictures and Stories of Animals for the Little Ones at Home. By Mrs. Sanborn Tenney. Six Vols., 12mo. Sheldon & Co., New York.

+Fishing in American Waters. By Genio C. Scott. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1869. 8vo, pp. 484.

Again (p. 41) he gives us an entirely new scientific classification of the fishes as follows: First, Mammalia!!!! Second, the genus Salmo. Third, all other oviparous fishes.

Again (p. 353), "Spallanzani proved the possibility of impregnating the eggs of fishes artificially. He took the eggs of a frog and impregnated them with the semen of a male frog." Surely all is fish which comes to Mr. Scott's net, Mammals and Batrachians included.

The section on Fish Culture, occupying sixty-two pages, is valuable and interesting, though written apparently more for the purpose of satisfying curiosity than of giving information to the working pisciculturist, who is anxiously looking for some work in the English language (any other will be thankfully received, but English preferred) which will give full and accurate directions for the artificial propagation of fishes. Coste, Haxo, Shaw, Boccius, Francis, Præd, Garlick, Fry, and even Norris, leave much to be desired.

Of the pictorial embellishments a great deal may be said on both sides. The grotesque initial letters are capital, the figures of fishes, taken for the most part from a well-known school-book, are very poor and by no means new; with half a dozen exceptions those in the back part of the book are intended to represent European species, and the others are with one or two exceptions, so uncharacteristic and inaccurate in detail (e. g., a smelt without the adipose dorsal, p. 102, etc.), as to render the name under the cut a very important appendage. The fishing scenes are decidedly below par. On page 391 is a cut which has been going the rounds of the periodical press for the past year, and which we had hoped was, ere this, worn out. It has appeared successively in "Harper's Weekly" and "Monthly," "Scientific American," and " 'Phrenological Magazine." It represents a poor martyr trout in the hands of an unskilful manipulator, who holds her in such an outre manner, and squeezes her so tightly, that the eggs are forced out at the wrong way. A view of a much more humane and profitable method of handling trout may be seen on the frontispiece of "Francis' Fish Culture."

A statement like that of the capture of Turbot on the coast of New Brunswick (p. 432), must be taken with full allowance as to what is intended by the name of Turbot.

But with these exceptions, and as far as is promised, the book is the best that has yet been issued. To give instructions for fishing in American waters is what is promised in the title, and this is faithfully carried out, and to use a new and strikingly original phrase, no library of works on Angling can be complete without it. -TRUTTA.

THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY.*"It was with a view," the author states in his preface, "of illustrating the gradations between the forest, prairie, and desert; the varying conditions of temperature and moisture, and

The Mississippi Valley: its Physical Geography, including sketches of the Topography, Botany, Climate, Geology, and Mineral Resources; and of the Progress of Development in Population and Material Wealth. By J. W. Foster, LL. D. Illustrated by maps and sections. Chicago: S. C. Griggs & Co. 1869. 8vo, pp. 443. $3.50.

their effects in determining the range of those plants cultivated for food; and, at the same time to trace the character of the fundamental rocks over the whole of this region, pointing out the mode of occurrence of those ores and minerals useful in the arts; and, finally to trace the colonization of this region from its feeble beginnings to its present magnificent proportions, that this work was undertaken." The author does not confine the attention of the reader to the physical features of the Mississippi Valley alone, but carries him away over the Rocky Mountains down the Pacific slope, and up the Valley of the St. Lawrence, and devotes an entire chapter to the llanos and pampas of South America, and the steppes and deserts of Asia, Africa, and Australia. We have in this very readable volume the most recent and comprehensive account of the Great Valley of the West that has been published in a popular form. The chapters on the origin of prairies and the geological features of the region drained by the Mississippi are exceedingly interesting, and by their clear presentation of facts, with which the author has familiarized himself while engaged upon Government surveys and in private research, are well calculated to give the general reader a good idea of the formation of our continent, and the origin of the grand features which go very far in determining the physical and moral condition of the nations dwelling on its surface.

NATURAL HISTORY MISCELLANY.

BOTANY.

TABLE-MOUNTAIN PINE. -There seems to exist such a diversity of opinion among authors in regard to the geographical range of this tree (Pinus pungens Michaux), that we have thought a statement as to its distribution might not be amiss.

Michaux anticipated that it would be the first of our native trees to become extinct, because its limits were so narrow and its habitat so easy of access, and so frequently swept over by fire. Nuttall tells us "its range is so wide that we have no reason to fear its extirpation." Chapman finds it on the "mountains, rarely west of the Blue Ridge, Georgia to North Carolina, and northward." In 1859, Gray limited it to "Blue Ridge, Virginia, west of Charlottesville, and southward." In 1863, he adds, on the authority of Prof. Porter, "the mountains of Pennsylvania, etc." In 1867 the same author gives a new locality near Reading, Pa., which was discovered by Thomas Meehan.

Unless we take the above statement of Prof. Porter in a pretty wide light, we have in none of these limits assigned anything like an indication as to how common the tree is in Pennsylvania. Thus far I have found it ranging from the banks of the Juniata River, in Mission County,

Pa., to Penn's Valley, in Centre County, Pa. In the latter place it is extremely common, and often forms the largest portion of the woods. The trees, too, attain a height of fifty, and perhaps I may add, not seldom sixty feet.

Mr. Hoopes, in his "Book of Evergreens," has given an admirable representation of one of the characteristic cones. Here I would state that the strong spine which tips each scale is subject to a most remarkable variation in size; sometimes dwindling down until it is less than in Pinus rigida. I have even seen this variation, from the real typical spine to the dwarfed one, on well formed scales of the same cone. We may recognize the tree usually at a glance by the persistent whorls of large cones. -J. T. ROTHROCK.

VARIATION IN THE SARRACENIA.—Mr. Wm. H. Silsbee, of this city, has brought in from the woods in Beverly, a variety of Serracenia purpurea Linn., which is worthy of notice. The modification is chiefly in color, though the size of the flower, judging from the specimen examined, is rather less than the average of the common kind. The deep purple usually seen is wholly wanting; the scape, sepals and stigma, being of a light apple green, while the petals have taken on a decided, though rather pale yellow. The leaves were not collected, and whether any change is found in them does not yet appear. This would seem a case of albinism, nearly parallel with that in Aquilegia Canadensis Linn., reported some years ago by Mr. G. D. Phippen, of Salem. It is an interesting question whether, in the case of deep-colored flowers like these, there is a tendency, when passing into the albino state, to stop the process at the yellow tints, as a sort of intermediate point, and not carry it forward to full whiteness. Farther observation is highly desirable; and we learn that Mr. Silsbee is acquainted with several spots where this variety of the Sarracenia is found.-C. M. TRACY.

DOUBLE EARLY SAXIFRAGE. This beautiful variety of the Saxifraga Virginiensis has been detected again by John H. Sears, in a new locality near Beverly Bridge. The panicle is smaller than in the normal form, but each flower is full-double to the very centre, the change obliterating every trace of stamen and pistil, and the blossoms remind one of those of the Queen of the Meadow (Spirea), such as we see it in the gardens. -J. L. RUSSELL, Salem.

COREMA CONRADI (Torrey).—This plant, which occurs in Newfoundland and on some of the islands off the coast of Maine, also on Cape Cod, near Plymouth, was found many years ago at Cedar Bridge, Ocean County, N. J., by Prof. S. W. Conrad, of Philadelphia. It was carefully described by Dr. Torrey in 1837 (in the Annals of the New York Lyceum of Natural History, Vol. iv, p. 83) under the name of Empetrum Conradi, and its New Jersey localities accurately indicated. A visit to Cedar Bridge, made in April of this year by the writer and C. F. Parker, of Camden, N. J., showed that the plant has entirely disappeared from that locality. It is said to have been also found at Pemberton Mills, N. J.,

but from that point it has been banished by agricultural encroachments. There is therefore no evidence that this species now exists south of Cape Cod, though it is possible it may again be found in New Jersey, and if anywhere in that State, probably on the wide stretch of barren, sandy dunes, a few miles west of Cedar Bridge, locally known as "The Plains," extending along the border between Burlington and Ocean Counties. Long Island should also offer some favorable points for its occurrence. -J. H. REDFIELD, Philadelphia.

FRAGARIA GILLMANI.In the NATURALIST (p. 221) Judge Clinton describes a new Fragaria, from Mexico. With specimens before me, it is clearly nothing but Fragaria vesca Linn. F. vesca is a very variable plant. It is found not only all over Europe but through the whole mountain range of the American continent to the south of Mexico, and probably beyond. The higher the range the greater is the tendency to a racemose, and an "everbearing" character. I have in my herbarium specimens collected even in the comparatively low elevation of the Alleghanies in Pennsylvania, that are not in the slightest degree different from this Mexican one.

It might not be amiss to describers of species to suggest that greater attention be given to natural variations. Great evil has resulted to Botany from attributing to Horticulture so many great changes that are really but the regular developments of natural law. I have given particular attention to the strawberry for over twenty years, and am sure that "hybridization and the gardener's skill" in the production of varieties are pure imagination. The gardener has preserved, but he has not originated variations. I have not had the opportunity of examining Schleactendals' S. Mexicana, and some other of these so called species but from what I have gathered of the law of variation in Fragaria, and the direction of that law in the numerous forms of Fragaria that I have examined, I have little doubt that they are forms of one thing. Indeed, with the exception of F. Indica, there is every probability that all the species of strawberry are closely related forms of one another.

One law in strawberry development which has been of great service to me is that the "runner," or stolon, is but a modified "flower stalk," or peduncle, bearing along its course viviparous buds, instead of flowers. The grades between the forms of this one thing-that is, the vigorous runner and the floriferous scape-are beautifully illustrated by selecting the most floriferous forms (F. semperflorens of Duchesne), and the more vigorously running kinds (F. Illinoensis Gray). In F. semperflorens (F. Gillmani Clinton), the plant sometimes produces no stolons, but when it does flowers will frequently come out at the nodes, and the singular appearance is presented of a few single-flowered peduncles with a couple of leafy bracts, sending out roots as a living plant. When it does not produce stolons, the number of flower spikes is increased, and as they cannot "run," as a stolon, make up for this by continual axial production, bearing a succession of flowers through the whole season. By