step by step. The work is now simpler, in the sense that we leave all
the invertebrate animals out of account; but there are so many organs
to be fashioned out of the four simple layers that the reader must
proceed carefully. In the second volume each of these organs will be
dealt with separately, and the parallel will be worked out between its
embryonic and its phylogenetic (evolutionary) development. The general
reader may wait for this for a full understanding. But in the meantime
the wonderful story of the construction of all our organs in the
course of a few weeks (the human frame is perfectly formed, though
less than two inches in length, by the twelfth week) from so simple a
material is full of interest. It would be useless to attempt to
summarise the process. The four chapters are themselves but a summary
of it, and the eighty fine illustrations of the process will make it
sufficiently clear. The last chapter carries the story on to the point
where man at last parts company with the anthropoid ape, and gives a
full account of the membranes or wrappers that enfold him in the womb,
and the connection with the mother.

In conclusion, I would urge the reader to consult, at his free library
perhaps, the complete edition of this work, when he has read the
present abbreviated edition. Much of the text has had to be condensed
in order to bring out the work at our popular price, and the beautiful
plates of the complete edition have had to be omitted. The reader will
find it an immense assistance if he can consult the library edition.

JOSEPH MCCABE.

Cricklewood, March, 1906.

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