ANY work on the Polydesmoidea from the pen of Count von Attems must command repsect. His contributions to our knowledge of a taxonomically difficult group have been very numerous and he is of course well fitted for the task of drawing together the threads of description and weaving them into a serviceable whole. The volume under notice begins with a list of works of reference occupying ten pages, and similar space is devoted to a clear and very useful systematic index. The author then plunges into the real business in hand to give nomenclatural particulars and full descriptions of the families mentioned in the title and to deal with all their subdivisions down to subspecies and varieties. It is a formidable task, for more than eight hundred species, certain and uncertain, need consideration. Myriapoda 3, Polydesmoidea II, Fam. Leptodesmidae, Platyrhachidae, Oxydesmidae, Gomphodesmidae Bearbeitet von Dr. Graf Attems. (Das Tierreich: eine Zusammenstellung und Kennzeichnung der rezenten Tierformen. Im Auftrage der Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin. Herausgegeben von F. E. Schulze, W. Kukenthal, K. Heider, fortgesetzt von R. Hesse. Lieferung 69.) Pp. xxviii + 487. (Berlin und Leipzig: Walter de Gruyter und Co., 1938.) 81·25 gold marks.