Appletons' Popular Science Monthly, May 1899: Volume LV, No. 1, May 1899Various
History
Appletons' Popular Science Monthly, May 1899: Volume LV, No. 1, May 1899
Various
Science -- Periodicals; Technology -- Periodicals
Lawrence, Hudson Bay, Arctic, Bering, Pacific, Great Basin, Gulf, and
Caribbean--each slope presenting its own general characteristics, with
varieties in detail almost as numerous as the rivers. The whole is
briefly summarized in the last chapter, The Life History of a River.
We have given merely the tamest inventory of only a part of the topics
of Mr. Russell's book. As the subject is treated by the author with
careful attention to specific features, as the magnitude of our river
systems is indicated, and as rivers with different or contrasting
characteristics--the St. Lawrence and the Colorado, for example--are
compared with one another, the subject takes on an aspect that is
really grand.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] The Last Link. Our Present Knowledge of the Descent of Kan. By
Ernst Haeckel. Adam and Charles Black. 1898.
[B] Rivers of North America. A Reading Lesson for Students of
Geography and Geology. By Israel C. Russell. New York: G. P. Putnam's
Sons. Pp. 327. Price, $2.
GENERAL NOTICES.
An unfulfilled intention entertained by two successive prosectors of
the London Zoölogical Society--the late Professor Garrod and the late
W. A. Forbes--of writing a treatise on bird anatomy, is carried out in
the present work[A] by their successor, _Frank E. Beddard_. Professor
Garrod had nearly completed an account of the Anatomy of the Fowl,
which was to be followed by a presentation of the anatomical
characters of the different groups. Professor Forbes died before he
was able to add anything to the manuscripts left by Professor Garrod.
In the instance of the present work the detailed account of _Gallus_,
with which Professor Garrod intended to preface his book, has been
rendered unnecessary by Dr. Shufeldt's monograph on the Raven, dealing
with one particular bird type. Accepting this as a sufficient
presentation of that feature of the subject, Mr. Beddard begins with a
general sketch of bird structure, purposely avoiding histological
detail and the elaborate description of anatomical facts, which
in the present state of our knowledge are not of great use in
classification. The main part of the book is the account of the
structure of the different groups of birds, which is treated of to a
considerable extent; and a large number of facts, some of which are
recorded for the first time, are incorporated in the systematic part
of the book. While all the principal facts pertaining to the subject
are believed to have been given, and nothing of importance to have
been left out, references are made in each section to most of the
memoirs already published. The majority of the facts of bird structure
have been verified by the author, especially those relating to
osteology and anatomy, and he has drawn liberally on the notebooks of
his two predecessors. The book gives first an account of the general
structure of birds; next of the reproductive and renal organs, the
circulatory, respiratory, and muscular systems, osteology, brain and
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