The geographical distribution of Labour

The small volcanic and limestone islands of the Lesser Antilles, in the eastern Caribbean, have a continuous history of commercial agricultural production which goes back 370 years. During this period, conditions of the environment, both natural (volcanoes, earthquakes, hurricanes, droughts) and human‐induced (deforestation, erosion, land degradation and reduction in the water‐table), have interfered with development in a variety of ways. The paper reviews past and present situations, and considers how growing sectoral imbalances may accentuate the resulting problems.     

The first Italian geographical congress

EUROPE.

A Geography of Ireland. By O. J. R. Howarth. The Oxford Geographies Edited by A. J. Herbertson. Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1911. Price 2s. 6d.

The Place‐Names of Berkshire. By the Rev. Walter R. Skeat. Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1911. Price 2s. net.

Nooks and Corners of Yorkshire. By J. S. Fletcher. With a Map. London: Eveleigh Nash, 1911. Price 2s. 6d. net.

ASIA.

The Story of Korea. By Joseph H. Longford, late His Majesty's Consul at Nagasaki; Professor of Japanese, King's College, London; Barrister‐at‐law, Middle Temple; Author of “The Story of Old Japan.” With Thirty‐three Illustrations and Three Maps. London and Leipsic: T. Fisher Unwin, 1911. Price 10s. 6d. net.

AFRICA.

The Opening‐up of Africa. By Sir H. H. Johnston, G.C.M.G., K.C.B. Home University Library of Modern Knowledge. London: Williams and Norgate. Price 1s. net.

“Yakusu” The Very Heart of Africa. Being some Account of the Protestant Mission at Stanley Falls, Upper Congo. By H. Sutton Smith, Baptist Missionary Society. London and Edinburgh: Marshall Brothers, Limited, 1911. Price 6s.

GENERAL.

British Plants: Their Biology and Geology. By J. F. Bevis, B.A., B.Sc., and H. J. Jeffrey, A.R.C.Sc. London: Alston Rivers, 1911. Price 4s. 6d. net.     

The effect of soil conditions on the long-term corrosion of buried tin-bronzes and copper

The object of this work was to relate the corrosion of tin-bronzes to the chemical condition of the soil in which they have been buried, most of them since the Bronze Age. Naturally, it was not easy to obtain recent hoards with their related soils, and considerable reliance had to be placed on recorded finds by taking recent soil samples from sites on which hoards were found over a hundred years earlier. Even so, with the exception of peat, a reasonable relationship appears to exist between the pH of the soil and the state of the metal. Acid soils are aggressive to metals and alkaline soils are benign. In no cases were sulphate reducing bacteria active in promoting corrosion. In the main, peat and peaty soils were benign in spite of their acidity, probably due to the protective action of polyphenols.     

The origins of agriculture and its consequences

Flannery, Kent, ed. Guila Naquitz: Archaic Foraging and Early Agriculture in Oaxaca, Mexico. Orlando, Florida: Academic Press, 1986. xix + 538 pp. including references, index, tables, figures, and Spanish synopsis. $98.50 cloth.

Merbs, Charles F., and Robert J. Miller, eds. Health and Disease in the Prehistoric Southwest. Arizona State University Anthropological Papers No. 34. Tempe,: Arizona State University, 1985. xix + 402 pp. including chapter references, tables, figures, and photographs. $17.50 paper.