Upland and Meadow

Abstract

THIS is a very pleasantly written book by an author A. who may be justly regarded as a kind of American Gilbert White. We may as well inform our readers at once that the district of which the natural history is herein chronicled is situated by a little stream which empties itself into the River Delaware, and that the name, which will appear to English readers somewhat difficult of pronunciation, is of Indian origin. There are fourteen chapters in the work, and an index which is to be strongly commended for its completeness. It is really a most important feature in a book of this kind to have a good index, and in insisting upon this necessity we are intentionally paying a complimentary tribute to the author, because there is a large amount of valuable observation which readers should have occasion to refer to after the first perusal of the work, but which would be lost without such an index, owing to the necessarily disjointed mode of treatment entailed by an adherence to seasonal records. We need only refer to the early editions of Kirby and Spence's “Introduction to Entomology” as an example of a work containing a large collection of facts and observations rendered almost useless for want of an index.

Upland and Meadow, a Poaetquissings Chronicle.

By Charles C. Abbott (London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, and Rivington, 1886.)