The very comprehensiveness of this book forces it to deal in a general manner with its vast subject. There are thirteen chapters on such varying subjects as physiography, weather, biogeography, aboriginal and immigrant populations, economy, transport, and strategic aspects. In addition there are fourteen chapters on regional studies of the districts and countries of the Northlands—the North American, the northern Atlantic, the north Scandinavian, the various Siberian districts and north Russian islands.

These twenty-seven chapters have been contributed by fifteen authors, each an expert on his or her particular subject or subjects. Those of the regional studies devoted to Russian territory, all by Professor B. Zaborski of McGill University, should make particularly interesting reading for those to whom this part of the world is almost entirely unknown.

For the glaciologist the chapter on water masses, circulation and ice cover by Professor Maxwell J. Dunbar and that on weather and climate by Professor Kenneth Hare give a general summary of the subjects, but the emphasis must be on the word “general”. The diagrams in these two chapters suffer a little from their small size and the absence of easily detected coast-lines.

Great credit is due to the Editors who have accomplished what must have been a most difficult task in its complexity and the enormously wide field covered. The production, with the minor exception mentioned above, is admirable and the index is excellent.