A PICTURE BOOK OF EVOLUTION.

Otago Witness, Issue 2813, 12 February 1908, Page 77

A PICTURE BOOK OF EVOLUTION.

By Dennis Hird, M.A., Piincipal of Ruskin College, Oxford. Volume 11. containing Lessons from Comparative Anatomy and Embrj ology, and Giving the Pedigree of Man. One hundred and ninety-five Illustrations. London : Watte ar.d Co. Dunedin : Whitcombe and Tombs, Ltd., R. J. Stark and Co., and Braithwaite's Book Arcade. 3s.

(Reviewed by Dinornis.)

This is the second and final volume of a quite remarkable pictorial and literary production. The aim has been to illustrate the facts upon which evolution theories rest, on a "scale siich fis has never before been attempted. To get sight even of a like array of pictures and" diagrams as are here gathered together would involve years of close application and the overhaul of well-nigh the whole literature of modern science. Thereare veiy few who would dream of attempting any such task, but there are many who will eagerly con the results when the thing has been done for them, as it has now been done, in first-class style by a writer who is quite at ease with his subject. Not that only, but in the text there are many passages which indicate enjoyment and a keen sense of humour in the author, with no signs at all of heavy task-work. Well, some 14 months since I wrote in terms of warm praise of the initial volume, and for certain the present one is no less worthy of positive eulogy. Of both pictures and text it may truthfully be said that the author has got together for the purpose in hand the most striking and convincing things possible. There are nearly 200 illustrations, all of them thoroughly in place, whether intended to emphasise a bald fact, to point a moral, or to adorn a tale. There are 28 portraits of scientific celebrities, many of them being of those who have kid the foundations and reared the structure of evolutionary science. The frontispiece is a page picture of the noble statue of Darwin, in the University Museum, Oxford. By those really interested (and they are many) in the modern outlook upon Nature, those portraits will be reckoned a treasure in themselves. Here we have- Copernicus and Kepler ; Galilei and Newton; Oken, Goethe, and Lamarck ; Schleiden and Rchwann : -Yon Baer, Huxley, and Haeckel; Gegenbaur, O\yen. Hooker, and Romanes ; with others who have helped to correct and extend knowledge of the marvellous processes of Nature. Principal Hird has given along with each of his portraits brief biographical notes, useful as pointers to those who mar wish to increase their acquaintance with any of his notables.

These portraits adorn the last chapter, "The Discovers of Evolution." The four chapters preceding it form the bulk of the book, and contain a well-ordered and ungetoverable arrangement of illustrated arguments which should prove somewhat of n revelation to many minds.

First we are confronted with a persuasive and helpful dissertation on "Preliminary Points." Then a really admirable, if condensed, exposition of '"Comparative Anatomy," with numerous diagrams, everyone of them a downiight clincher as enforcing the idea of descent with modification, especially with lejrnrd to vhat are commonly called the higher animals. In Chapter 3we are presented with a luminous resume of all that is known about the significance of " Embryology and Rudiments." Here also both text and illustrations are of a kind to bring conviction to the most sceptical minds. The beautiful engraving of a In man embryo (aftei Professor Arthur Thomson), on pnge 116, should prove most inteiesting to thofe weakly, weary scoffers who are perennially concerned about the loss of their tails ! In Chapter 4, "The Pedigree of Man" is worked out of necessity somewhat sketcliiiy, but admirably diagrammed. The theme is too big for any chapter, but it can be readily followed up in Professor Hwckel's monumental work, " The Evolution of Man." now accessible to all.

Taken as a whole, Principal Hird's newest work is a marvellous performance within its limits. Carefully studied, it should go far to promote clarity of thought in many minds at present more or less befogged upon the subject of evolution generally, tooth cosmic and organic.