(1) Zoologia (2) Einführung in die Biologie (3) The Freshwater Aquarium and its Inhabitants (4) Bilder aus dem Ameisenleben (5) Die Schwarotzer der Menschen und Tiere

Abstract

(1) IT seems almost axiomatic that if a text-book of zoology begins by dealing with the obscure details and overwhelming nomenclature of cytology, it is a bad book. Bad because organisms are not aggregates of cells, and because such a method is essentially an inverted one in relation to the grasp of the beginner. In this text-book, written for the School of Pharmacy at Buenos Aires, the inversion appears complete. The end of the book is an introduction showing how zoology has been pursued in the republic, whilst the beginning is occupied by Karyokinesis, modes of segmentation, and other difficult subjects. After general histology, we have evolution and transformation-theories treated in that diagrammatic and dogmatic way that is so destructive of their interest and advancement. The classification of animals adopted, Unicellularia, Radiata, Bilateralia, is almost as antique as that of the animal and vegetative functions maintained in the earlier part of this book. The “worms” are reduced to a type characterised by a trochosphere-larva and nephridia, whilst, for the o benefit of medical students, only parasitic forms are described. The book is, in fact, a compilation of the “cram” order, and is devoted mainly to the structure and life-history of parasites. In no single instance is the scale of a figure given.

(1) Zoologia.

By Angel Gallardo. Pp. 474. (Buenos Aires: Angel Estrada Cia., 1909.) Price 6 dollars.

(2) Einführung in die Biologie.

By Prof. Karl Kraepelin. Pp. viii+322. (Leipzig and Berlin: B. G. Teubner, 1909.) Price 4 marks.

(3) The Freshwater Aquarium and its Inhabitants.

By Otto Eggeling Frederick Ehrenberg. Pp. vii+352. (New York: Henry Holt and Co.; London: G. Bell and Sons.) Price 8s. net.

(4) Bilder aus dem Ameisenleben.

By H. Viehmeyer. Pp. viii+159. (Leipzig: Quelle und Meyer, n.d.) Price 1.80 marks.

(5) Die Schwarotzer der Menschen und Tiere.

By Dr. O. von Linstow. Pp. viii+144. (Leipzig: Quelle und Meyer, n.d.) Price 1.80 marks.