Book Reviews Tarns of the Central Lake District E. Haworth, G. de Boer, I. Evans, H. Osmaston, W. Pennington, A. Smith, P. Storey and B. Ware (2003). Brathay Exploration Group Trust, Ambleside, Cumbria, U.K. Pp. x + 204. ISBN 0-906-01517-0. Price £12.00. I must admit that the thought of having to wade through a book of bathymetric maps of the smallish lakes of Cumbria filled me with dread. Although I have a personal and scientific interest in these lakes, having lived in Cumbria and worked with data from them, I thought this book would push even my peculiar interests to their limits. But I have been pleasantly surprised by this book, which is so much more than cartography, and I found myself reading the whole thing with ease. Tarns of the Central Lake District, published by the Brathay Exploration Group Trust, is the culmination of a study that started soon after the war as a scheme to introduce youngsters from the industrial northern cities to science and the environment. The origin of these high altitude lakes, at the time still subject to debate, was decided as a suitable project to combine these goals. As a result of these surveys we now know that many of these cirque lakes sit in basins cut from the rock by the erosive force of glaciers. But we also know far more about these lakes and their surroundings than we did when the first team of youngsters set off carrying a boat to Easedale Tarn in 1947, and this information is summarised in the book. Chapters are dedicated to the geological history of the Lake District, the history of glaciations in the Lake District, and the late and postglacial history of change in the lakes and their surroundings, including the changes in vegetation, human colonisation and the effects of acid rain. And all this is before the section detailing the bathymetric maps, the majority of which are reproduced here for the first time. The charts themselves, the product of much voluntary hard physical labour, have been digitised and reproduced in excellent detail and stand- ardised high quality, with each of the 50 ÔlakesÕ (in one the retaining moraine has been breached) accompanied by a detailed description, covering the geology, forma- tion, flora (and where known palaeoflora) and fauna, and much else besides. There are also over 50 other illustra- tions, including maps, plates of the tarns, copies the original hand drawn charts, palaeolimnological pollen and diatom figures, and even photos of bandy-legged youths hauling boats over mountains. All this adds up to a very readable book that is full of information and suitable for anyone interested in the Lake District, mountain lakes or lake history. Iwan Jones Tracking Environmental Change Using Lake Sediments Vol. I: Basin Analysis, Coring and Chronological Techniques W.M. Last and J.P. Smol (Eds) (2001). Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht. Pp. 548. ISBN 0-7923-6482-1. Price £76. Vol. II: Physical and Geochemical Methods W.M. Last and J.P. Smol (Eds) (2001). Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht. Pp. 504. IBSN 1-4020-0628-4. Price £76. Vol. III: Terrestrial, Algal and Siliceous Indicators J.P. Smol, H.J.B. Birks and W.M. Last (Eds) (2001). Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht. Pp. 371. ISBN 1-4020-0681- 0. £60. Vol. IV: Zoological Indicators J.P. Smol, H.J.B. Birks and W.M. Last (Eds) (2001). Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht. Pp. 217. ISBN 1-4020-0658- 6. £43. History, it has been said, is mostly bunk or the propa- ganda of the victors. On the other hand interpreting the present is impossible without knowing what has gone before. And no sensible prognosticator of the future will ignore the lessons of the past. Many are not sensible, however! Palaeolimnology is the history department of freshwater science. It now has a battery of techniques to throw light on how lakes, river floodplains and other wetlands have changed with time and with the trends of climate and human influence. In recent decades it has become more quantitative and the range of chemical and biological fossils that can be interpreted has widened. Its powers can be oversold. Jack Vallentyne once likened the interpretation of lake processes from sediment, as the study of the physiology of an animal solely from its faeces. But, of course the study is not an isolated one. There is a plethora of physiological information with which to plumb the poo, and it has been a mistake to coin the terms ÔneolimnologyÕ and ÔpalaeolimnologyÕ. There is but one study. These volumes are the protocols of the history department. They constitute a review of the techniques available for studying lake sediments, divided into basin analysis, coring and dating techniques; physical and geochemical methods; plant and algal methods; and animals, though protozoa and sponges have crept in among the plants. A fifth volume on statistical analysis is in preparation. The work is comprehensive; sufficient details are often, though not always, given for someone to carry out a procedure, though of course keys are generally not included and many of the physical meth- ods demand manuals that will be specific to particular sets of equipment. Biologists will be introduced to new Freshwater Biology (2004) 49, 678–679 678 Ó 2004 Blackwell Publishing Ltd