Spencer and F. J. Gillen. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp.
671, with maps and plates. Price, $6.50.]
GENERAL NOTICES.
Miss _Mary H. Kingsley_ has given in her _West African Studies_[15] a
book marked by pungent wit and striking originality in its sketches of
adventure and observation, and containing in the chapters devoted to
ethnology results of her personal studies. She was already known by a
record of her adventures of a young Englishwoman traveling alone
through some of the worst regions of West Africa, embodied in her book
Travels in West Africa, which was published in the latter part of
1898. The present book may be regarded, as its name implies, as the
result and the embodiment of the afterthoughts of that hazardous
journey. It includes, after descriptions in which the unconventional
directness of expression is much to be remarked, an account of African
characteristics and a description of fishing in West Africa, chapters
of a soberer sort on fetich, schools of fetich, witchcraft, African
medicine and the witch doctor, and historical and economical chapters
on Early Trade, French Discovery, Commerce, the Crown Colony System
and some of its incidents, The Clash of Cultures, and African
Property. Miss Kingsley's criticisms of the present system of
administration being regarded as rather destructive, she endeavors to
set forth, in a chapter entitled An Alternative Plan, "some other way
wherein the African colonies could be managed." Special attention is
invited by the author to two articles in the appendix to the volume by
M. le Comte C. N. de Cardi and Mr. John Harford. We are pleased to
note the high appreciation which Miss Kingsley expresses of the
anthropological work concerning west-coast tribes of our former
contributor, Colonel A. B. Ellis--Sir A. B. Ellis when he died.
[Footnote 15: West African Studies. By Mary H. Kingsley. New York:
The Macmillan Company. Pp. 633, with Map. Price, $5.]
Mr. _Frederick Palmer's In the Klondyke_[16] is an unpretentious book
and free from the appearance of sensationalism, but gives a clear and
graphic account of the region and its ways and of the getting there at
the breaking up of winter. The author was at Dyea late in February,
having intended to go with a Government relief expedition which had
found no occasion to proceed farther. Being thus left out, he
undertook, with dogs and sledges and two companions who proved
congenial, the "untried journey" of six hundred miles over the ice
fields of the Lewes Lakes and the ice packs of the Yukon River, which
had been the contemplated route of the expedition. The start was made
about the 18th of March, with little time to spare, because the Yukon
was expected to become impassable by the 20th of April. The Chilkoot
Pass was achieved in a day, and the rest of the journey was made
"downhill with the current of the river at the rate of eight inches to
the mile," in weather that became very variable, with now hard
freezing and now slush in the middle of the day. The difficulties of
the journey must have been formidable, with considerable suffering,
besides a week in a hut with the measles, but no complaint further
than the mention of the incidents appears in the author's story. On
some of the days the thermometer ranged from 10° to 20° below zero at
two o'clock in the morning, to 80° above at night, and the author "had
one ear blistered by the frost and the other by the sun in the same
day." The party arrived at Dawson just four days before the final
break-up of the ice in the river. Accounts corresponding in temper and
vividness with that of the journey are given of Dawson, the miners and
mining, the history of the Klondyke mining enterprise, Klondyke types
of character and adventure, the toils and trials and profit and losses
of the "Pilgrims," the workings of the Government, and the return home
to civilization--which does not appear, after all, to have offered
transcendentally superior attractions to those who had experienced the
pleasure of adventure.
[Footnote 16: In the Klondyke, including an Account of a Winter's
Journey to Dawson. By Frederick Palmer. New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons. Pp. 218, with plates. Price, $1.50.]
The _History of Physics in its Elementary Branches_[17] has been
prepared by Professor _Cajori_ in the belief that some attention to
the history of a science helps to make it attractive, and that the
general view of the development of the human intellect gained in
reading a history on the subject is in itself stimulating and
liberalizing. The author has had in mind Professor Ostwald's
characterization of the absence of the historical sense and the want
of knowledge of the great researches upon which the edifice of science
rests as a defect in the present method of teaching. The subject is
treated by periods. In ancient times the Greeks, while displaying
wonderful creative genius in metaphysics, literature, and art, being
ignorant of the method of experimentation, achieved relatively little
in natural science. The Roman scientific writers were contented to
collect the researches of Greek professors. Except in a few instances
the Arabs did not distinguish themselves in original research. Writers
in the middle ages were only commentators, and knew nothing of
personal investigation. The physicist of the renascence abandoned
scholastic speculation and began to study Nature in the language of
experiment. The seventeenth century was a period of great experimental
as well as theoretical activity. In the eighteenth century speculation
was less effectively restrained and guided by experiments. The
nineteenth century "has overthrown the leading theories of the
previous one hundred years, and has largely built anew on the older
foundations laid during the seventeenth century." The evolution of
physical laboratories, first for teachers and then for students, is
the subject of the last chapter.
[Footnote 17: A History of Physics in its Elementary Branches,
including the Evolution of Physical Laboratories. By Florian
Cajori. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 322. Price, $1.60.]
"The Great Commanders Series" of D. Appleton and Company is enriched
by a biography of _General Sherman_,[18] whom the author, General
_Manning F. Force_, styles "the most picturesque figure in our civil
war." He was more than this; he was its scholar and statesman--a man
distinguished by the possession of high military combined with the
best civil qualities. Further, as General Force well says, "his
character was absolutely pure and spotless." In his dealings with the
Vigilance Committee in San Francisco he assumed a position which it
required courage of a much higher order than a soldier's to maintain.
While comfortably situated as an honored professor in the State
Military Academy of Louisiana when the Legislature passed the
Ordinance of Secession, he had no hesitation in deciding what to do.
He at once gave in his resignation in a letter that is a model of
manliness, declaring his preference "to maintain allegiance to the
Constitution of the United States as long as a fragment of it
survives." His career as a general in the civil war is described at
length. Through it all his foresight, seeking always to accomplish the
most with the least expenditure and ultimate suffering, to which his
strategy was adapted, is conspicuous. At this time and afterward his
supreme thought appears to have been as to what would best conduce to
the permanent good of the republic. To his military ability and
self-effacing patriotism he added a far-seeing wisdom in council that
could always be relied upon. "In his most unguarded words his
principle was always clear, noble, and intensely patriotic, and his
careless colloquial expressions often covered a practical wisdom and
insight of a most striking kind."
[Footnote 18: General Sherman. By General Manning F. Force. New
York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 353.]
In preparing their _Text-Book of Algebra_[19] the authors, assuming
that mental discipline is of the first importance to every student of
mathematics, have endeavored to present the elements of the science in
a clear and logical form, while yet keeping the needs of beginners
constantly in mind. Special attention is given to making clear the
reason for every step taken; each principle is first illustrated by
particular examples, and then rules and suggestions for performing the
operation are laid down. The authors have endeavored to avoid apparent
conciseness at the expense of clearness and accuracy, and have thereby
made their volume somewhat larger than ordinary text-books. Features
to which attention is called are the development of the fundamental
operations with algebraic numbers and the concrete illustrations of
these operations; the use of type forms in multiplication and division
and in factoring; the application of factoring to the solution of
equations; the solutions of equations based upon equivalent equations
and equivalent systems of equations; the treatment of irrational
equations; the discussions of general problems and the interpretation
of positive, negative, zero, intermediate, and infinite solutions of
problems; the treatment of inequalities and their applications; the
outline of a discussion of irrational numbers; a brief introduction to
imaginary and complex numbers; and the great number of graded examples
and problems.
[Footnote 19: Text-Book of Algebra, with Exercises for Secondary
Schools and Colleges. By George Egbert Fisher and Isaac J.
Schwatt. Part I. Philadelphia: Fisher & Schwatt. Pp. 683. Price,
$1.25.]
The material of the _Primary Arithmetic_, Number Studies for the
Second, Third, and Fourth Grades, of _A. R. Hornbrook_ (American Book
Company), has been chosen with careful reference to the development of
the number sense of little children, as noticed by the author and as
reported by many other observers. A distinctive feature of the work is
the use of diagrams called "number tables," as a concrete basis for
the child's thinking while he is getting his first ideas of the facts
of the addition and multiplication tables. In them the numbers up to
one hundred are presented in columns of tens, and so handled as to
exhibit to the child's conception the relations of the several digits.
By their use he first learns the properties of ten, then of two, and
so on of the others--not presented in regular order, but with a view
of exhibiting special properties--and their relations to one another.
The method is ingenious and appears useful.
The study on _Rhode Island and the Formation of the Union_, of the
Columbia University Series in History, Economics, and Public Law (The
Macmillan Company, New York), was undertaken by Mr. _Frank Greene
Bates_ in order to ascertain why Rhode Island so long delayed its
ratification of the Federal Constitution. The delay seems to have been
largely a matter of the assertion of State rights, in which Rhode
Island appears at that time to have been but little, if any, behind
South Carolina. Liberty "was the presiding genius of the spiritual
life of the colony, and the principle of freedom of conscience was
never lost sight of; and this could not otherwise than heighten the
other characteristics of the colony--individualism." The course
pursued was the natural outcome of the conditions of the times, the
"outcropping of the undying love of the people of the State for
democracy and liberty, and their jealousy of all authority outside
their own boundaries."
"No book up to recent date," says the author of _Pantheism, the Light
and Hope of Modern Reason_, who signs his name _C. Amryc_, and gives
no publisher's name, "has treated pantheism as consistently as it
deserves to be treated"; and he adds that "it is no creed; it is a
logic; it makes absolutely no demand upon 'belief'; what is not
logical is rejected, what is logical to-day is accepted, no matter
whether it was unlogical a thousand years ago or will be illogical a
thousand years hence; we are only responsible for our times." As
pantheism, if it is a true logic, must be applicable to all races, the
author has not chosen his examples from one nation or tribe; and he
believes that the views he expresses are also those of nine tenths of
what is called modern science. Many topics are treated of, some of
which would not at first thought be associated with an exposition of
pantheism. The matter and manner of the book are various. Parts of it
are fairly good reading; other parts strike us as different.
A book on _The Principles of Agriculture_, prepared by Prof. _L. H.
Bailey_ as a text-book for schools and rural societies, is published
as a number of the Rural Science Series of the Macmillan Company
($1.25). In it agriculture is treated as a business, not a science,
but as a business which is aided at every point by a knowledge of
science. "It is on the science side that the experimenter is able to
help the farmer. On the business side the farmer must rely upon
himself, for the person who is not a good business man can not be a
good farmer, however much he may know of science." The principle of
the intelligent application of knowledge is illustrated in a remark of
the author's about the treating of drainage. The learner is apt to
begin at the wrong end of his problem. In the usual method the pupil
or reader is first instructed in methods of laying drains. "But
drainage is not the unit. The real unit is texture and moisture of
soils--plowing, draining, green cropping, are methods of producing a
given or desired result. The real subject-matter for first
consideration, therefore, is amelioration of soil, rather than laying
of drains." Professor Bailey aims throughout this book to get at "the
real subject-matter for first consideration" in matters relating to
soils, the plant and crops, and the animals and stock.
_Ideals and Programmes_ (C. W. Bardeen, Syracuse, N. Y., 75 cents) is
a collection of thoughtful and suggestive essays, by _Jean L. Gourdy_,
on the practical side of school life and the teaching of children. The
author's ideal seems to be that the teacher should have a plan for her
work, preparing for it so as to have the whole course marked out on
general lines for the entire school year. Thus, her occupation should
be to qualify herself for doing the work right. These statements of
general principles are followed by essays on reading and plans for
teaching, correlation as "the headstone of the corner of successful
teaching, geography, sand modeling, field lessons, kindergarten
training, and discipline." The burden of the whole is by skillful
adaptation to get the best possible out of every lesson, in which a
liberal use of field work assists greatly, and above all to avoid the
stiff, formal, juiceless lessons of the old style of teaching.
There have been several biographies of Faraday, most of them now out
of print; but the life, work, methods, character, and aims of the
man--who was "beyond all question the greatest scientific expositor of
his time"--can not be kept too constantly or too long before the minds
of students. Welcome, therefore, is the easily accessible and
convenient volume _Michael Faraday: His Life and Work_, which has been
prepared by Prof. _Sylvanus P. Thompson_, and is published by the
Macmillan Company in their Century Science Series ($1.25). The work by
which Faraday contributed so much to the advancement of knowledge is
made prominent, and is illustrated largely, due regard being had to
the limitations of the size of the book, with citations from his own
journal and copies of his drawings.
In _American Indians_, a book second in order but first in date of
publication of a series of "Ethno-Geographic Readers" (D. C. Heath &
Co., Boston), Prof. _Frederick Starr_ has succeeded in conveying a
large amount of information about our aborigines in a very small
space, and has done it in a clear style and a very satisfactory
manner. The book is intended as a reading book for boys and girls in
school, to whose tastes and capacity it seems well adapted; but the
author will be pleased if it also interests older readers, and hopes
it may enlarge their sympathy with our native Americans. Besides the
accounts of the tribal divisions, general customs, manner of life,
houses, and institutions--which when they are counted up are found to
be quite numerous--it has articles on the sign language, medicine men
and secret societies, the mounds and their builders, George Catlin and
his work, the cliff-dwellings and ruins of the Southwest, the tribes
of the Northwest coast, matters of religious and mythological
significance, the Aztecs, the Mayas, and the ruined cities of Yucatan
and Central America.
The revision, for the fifth edition, of _H. Newell Martin's The Human
Body_ (Henry Holt & Co., New York, $1.20) was undertaken by Prof.
_George Wills Fitz_ with the idea of bringing the book into accord
with the late developments of physiology, of simplifying the treatment
of some parts while expanding that of others, and of giving additional
illustrations. Every effort has been made to avoid injuring those
features of the author's work which have contributed to making the
book so favorably known. The changes in the first nine chapters are
largely verbal; but considerable alterations and additions have been
made in some of the succeeding chapters. The directions for
demonstrations and experiments have been greatly enlarged and
collected into an appendix. They include the new requirements in
anatomy, physiology, and hygiene for admission to Harvard College and
the Lawrence Scientific School.
We have already noticed some of _Lucy S. W. Wilson's_ excellent
Manuals on Nature Study, particularly the one intended for the
guidance of teachers. We now have in the same line the _First Reader_
of a series on _Nature Study in Elementary Schools_ (New York: The
Macmillan Company, 35 cents), a book composed of original matter and
selections which has been prepared "with the desire of putting into
the hands of little children literature which shall have for their
minds the same interest and value that really good books have for
grown-up people." But the author does not expect to accomplish this by
merely giving the book to the child and leaving the reading to work
out its own effect. Each of the lessons is intended to be preceded by
a Nature lesson. During or after the reading a lesson should be given
in the new words introduced, and afterward the lessons should be
grasped for the sake of thought. The lessons, which have appropriate
illustrations from Nature, present some novel features. Among them is
an apparent intention in the original compositions to follow the
child's method of thought.
_The American Elementary Arithmetic_ (American Book Company) is
intended by the author, Prof. _M. A. Bailey_, to cover the first five
years' work (beginning apparently very young) in the study, and is the
first of a two-book series. It is divided into two parts--for the
primary and for the three succeeding grades. It contemplates the use
of apparatus, consisting of paper, pasteboard, toy money, blocks, and
splints. The attempt is made to give every subject twice: first in
pictures, and second in the particular form of printed words.
Mathematical conceptions are presented in the first chapter in the
order in which they are supposed to arise in the child's
consciousness--first, once or more, indefinitely; next, how many, by
holding up fingers, laying down sticks, etc.; and then by words, and
so on--all introductory work designed to develop step by step a
mathematical vocabulary, and to form a habit of clear mathematical
thinking. The laboratory plan is followed in the succeeding chapters.
In the _Language Lessons_ of _J. G. Park_ (American Book Company) an
arrangement of the matter is aimed at which will draw upon the student
for such effort as may be expected at a given stage of advancement,
which will cause him to think first and then to express his thought
with clearness and precision. In the succeeding parts are given
exercises on language work, with special drills upon capitalization
and punctuation, inductive lessons in grammar, and, finally, lessons
so graded that a student may advance very readily from them into the
higher work of grammar. The study is facilitated by the use of
striking illustrations as the basis of lessons.
The _Semi-annual Report of Schimmel and Company_ (Leipsic and New
York), though primarily a business document, furnishes much
information about the industries in essential oils and fine chemicals,
and concerning progress in the departments of chemical science
relating to these. The report for October, 1898, speaks of much
research and many valuable studies as having been carried on during
the preceding six months in the domain of the essential oils and their
constitution, and of ample material for scientific reports as having
been gathered.
PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.
Agricultural Experiment Stations. Bulletins and Reports. Connecticut:
No. 128. Commercial Feeding Stuffs. Pp. 12; No. 129. Inspection and
Care of Nursery Stock. By W. E. Britton. Pp. 10. Twenty-second Annual
Report, Part II, Food Products. Pp. 120.--Cornell University: No. 165.
Ropiness in Milk and Cream. By A. R. Ward. Pp. 16; No. 166. Sugar-Beet
Investigations for 1898. Pp. 50; No. 167. The Construction of the
Stave Silo. By L. A. Clinton. Pp. 16.--Hatch Station, Massachusetts
Agricultural College: No. 61. Asparagus Rust. By G. E. Stone and R. E.
Smith. Pp. 20.--Iowa Agricultural College: No. 40. Relation of Acid
Fermentation to Butter Flavor and Aroma. Pp. 12; No. 41. New Orchard
Fruits and Shrubs. Pp. 64; No. 42. Weeds and Potato Scab. Pp. 12.--New
Hampshire Agricultural College: No. 63. Third Potato Report. By F.
William Ranes. Pp. 32; No. 64. The Forest Tent Caterpillar. By
Clarence M. Weed. Pp. 24.--New Jersey: No. 136. Field Experiments with
Nitrogenous Fertilizers. By E. B. Voorhees. Pp. 32.--New York: No. 149
(popular edition). Will Poultry thrive on Grain Alone? By F. H. Hall
and W. P. Wheeler. Pp. 7; No. 151 (popular edition). How Ringing
affects Grapes. By F. H. Hall and Wendell Paddock. Pp. 4; No. 152
(popular edition). Two Apple Pests and how to check them. By F. H.
Hall and V. H. Lane. Pp. 8; No. 153. Director's Report for 1898. By W.
H. Jordan. Pp. 36; No. 154 (popular edition). Profitable Potato
Fertilizing. By F. H. Hall and W. H. Jordan. Pp. 2; No. 155 (popular
edition). Sugar-Beet Success for the Season. By F. H. Hull and L. L.
Van Slyke. Pp. 8.--Ohio: No. 100. The Home Mixing of Fertilizers. By
C. R. Thorne. Pp. 40; No 101. Oats. By J. F. Hickman. Pp. 24; No. 102.
Treatment for Insect Pests and Plant Diseases, etc. By W. J. Green and
others. Sheet; No. 103. The San José Scale Problem. By F. M. Webster.
Pp. 24. Newspaper Bulletin No. 192. Bovine Tuberculosis. Pp.
2.--Purdue University: No. 75. The Sugar Beet. By H. A. Husten and A.
H. Bryan. Pp. 20; No. 76. Skim Milk for Young Chickens. By W. B.
Anderson. Pp. 8; No. 77. Field Experiments with Corn. By W. C. Latta
and W. B. Anderson. Pp. 160.--University of Illinois. Eleventh Annual
Report. Pp. 16; No. 84. Spraying Apple Trees. By J. C. Blair. Pp.
36.--United States Department of Agriculture. Natural History of the
Marias Islands, Mexico. By E. W. Nelson. Pp. 96.--West Virginia.
Nursery Hints. By L. C. Corbett. Pp. 24.
Barber, Edwin Atlee. Anglo-American Pottery, Old English China with
American Views. Indianapolis, Ind.: Press of the Clay Worker. Pp. 175.
Barrett, John. The Philippine Islands and America's Interests in the
Far East. Hong-Kong. Pp. 65.
Binet, Alfred. The Psychology of Reasoning. Based on Experimental
Researches In Hypnotism. Chicago: Open Court Publishing Company. Pp.
191. 75 cents.
Bridges and Framed Structures. Monthly. Vol. 1, No. 2. May, 1899.
Chicago: The D. H. Ranck Publishing Company. Pp. 92, with plates. 30
cents.