Welsh Journals

BOOK REVIEWS The Pembrokeshire Landscape: Robert Evans and Brian John: Five Arches Press, Tenby: £ 1.20. This book explains, by photograph and erudite cap- tion, how the landscape and scenery of Pembrokeshire came to be what it is. The authors rightly "hope that the book will be of use to schools and colleges, where the visual impression, besides the written word, is of inestimable value in the understanding of both regional history and regional geography". Visitors to the county and, indeed, its residents, will find it equally useful. The photographs help to identify and understand such mysteries as Irish Sea till at Aber-mawr, the fluvio-glacial sands of Mullock Bridge, and the periglacial head on Carningli. The evolution of the man- made landscape is depicted from Neolithic time to post-war council housing, covering castles, churches, chapels, quarries, collieries, pubs and stately homes. The section illustrating recent changes in the landscape is less explicit and already a little out of date in places. Most of the eighty-six photographs are apposite, but many of them have lost much in reproduction. The cover has a superb vista of the coast in colour: one would hope for a future edition with clear colour photographs throughout, and a more durable binding. The text is of the high quality we have learned to expect from Dr. Brian John, although one wonders why he omitted reference to Bronze Age contribution to the man-made landscape; why he uses the antiquated term 'Celtic Cross' for a monument of the eleventh century, and where he found the third ogham stone in Nevern Church. The book is slightly marred by spelling mistakes, a wrong reference, and an index that is not in alphabetical sequence. Animals of Europe: Maurice Burton: Peter Lowe: £ 3. 75. The full title is 'Animals of Europe: the Ecology of the Wildlife' and the book surveys the continent as 'a product of the progression from primeval forest to intensive agricultural development and industrialisation'. It is not more than 30,000 years since ice sheets covered most of Europe: animals and plants appeared as they receded. From the twilight of the tundra and taiga to the sub- tropical Mediterranean maquis, through primeval forest and desert steppe, we follow the fauna and avifauna. We are reminded how the misuse of land led to the decline and fall of ancient Greece and Rome, how man has outstripped the animal in maltreating his environment. Man's folly is further revealed in his introduction of alien species, from the Black Rat to the Grey Squirrel. We are told that Giraldus Cambrensis was the first to record the presence in the west of the former, nibbling the books of St. Yvor who cursed it and expelled it from Ireland. The colour photographs are of a high order, many of them superb, but the picture of the Lesser Rorqual seemed strange to me until a sub-aqua friend pointed out that it is printed upside down. Animals and Their Colours: Michael and Patricia Fogden: Peter Lowe: £ 3.50. The book deals largely with camouflage, warning coloration, courtship, territorial display and mimicry in animals and birds. Colour, it is emphasized, plays an important and essential role in their everyday