The British Woodlice, being a Monograph of the Terrestrial Isopod Crustacea occurring in the British Islands

Abstract

AT present in England there are only two dozen species of these little land crustaceans on record. The number, combined with their love of obscurity, may remind us of the regal feast at which four-and-twenty blackbirds were served up concealed in a pasty. When the pie was opened, the birds began to sing. In correspondence with the daintiness of such a dish, the apostles of œcology are now earnestly trying to persuade society that all nature is tuneful. Those who are afflicted with toneless ears may assume a haughty indifference towards the resounding harmony, while they are themselves the objects of pity rather than of pride. The bright little volume under review is an excellent example of what can be done under the new impulse given to the old practice of “nature-study.” It shows how members of our fauna, that have long suffered from negligent and contemptuous treatment, may in friendly hands receive their proper meed of appreciation. Though, out of deference to tradition, the book goes by the unprepossessing name of “The British Woodlice,” its subtitle redeems the subject from prejudice by assigning it to its true place in classification. The many scurrilous colloquial terms that have been applied to these terrestrial isopods have, to the ordinary observer, obscured the fact that they are really made of one flesh and blood with the epicure's cherished treasures, the lobster and the prawn. Their use medicinally in old times would probably have been robbed of half its charm had this been understood, since in those days curative agencies seem to have been valued in proportion to the pain and disgust they inflicted on the patient. So lately as 1883, W. G. Black, in his “Folk Medicine,” writes:—

The British Woodlice, being a Monograph of the Terrestrial Isopod Crustacea occurring in the British Islands.

By Wilfred Mark Webb Charles Sillem. Pp. x + 54; with 25 plates and 59 figures in the text. (London: Duckworth and Co., 1906.) Price 6s. net.