system of teaching botany proposed by the author. Each of the two books
is to represent the work of half a year, but each is to be independent
of the other, and they may be used in either order. The two books
relate respectively, as a whole, to ecology, or the life relations of
surroundings of plants, and to their morphology. The present volume
concerns the ecology. While it may be to the disadvantage of presenting
ecology first, that it conveys no knowledge of plant structures and
plant groups, this disadvantage is compensated for, in the author's
view, by the facts that the study of the most evident life relations
gives a proper conception of the place of plants in Nature; that it
offers a view of the plant kingdom of the most permanent value to those
who can give but a half year to botany; and that it demands little or
no use of the compound microscope, an instrument ill adapted to first
contacts with Nature. The book is intended to present a connected,
readable account of some of the fundamental facts of botany, and also
to serve as a supplement to the three far more important factors
of the teacher, who must amplify and suggest at every point; the
laboratory, which must bring the pupil face to face with plants and
their structure; and field work, which must relate the facts observed
in the laboratory to their actual place in Nature, and must bring new
facts to notice which can be observed nowhere else. Taking the results
obtained from these three factors, the book seeks to organize them, and
to suggest explanations, through a clear, untechnical, compact text and
appropriate and excellent illustrations.
[20] Plant Relations. A First Book of Botany. By John M. Coulter. New
York: D. Appleton and Company. (Twentieth Century Text Books.) Pp. 264.
Price, $1.10.
The title of _The Wilderness of Worlds_[21] was suggested to the author
by the contemplation of a wilderness of trees, in which those near him
are very large, while in the distance they seem successively smaller,
and gradually fade away till the limit of vision is reached. So of the
wilderness of worlds in space, with its innumerable stars of gradually
diminishing degrees of visibility--worlds "of all ages like the trees,
and the great deep of space is covered with their dust, and pulsating
with the potency of new births." The body of the book is a review of
the history of the universe and all that is of it, in the light of
the theory of evolution, beginning with the entities of space, time,
matter, force, and motion, and the processes of development from the
nebulæ as they are indicated by the most recent and best verified
researches, and terminating with the ultimate extinction of life and
the end of the planet. In the chapter entitled A Vision of Peace the
author confronts religion and science. He regards the whole subject
from the freethinker's point of view, with a denial of all agency of
the supernatural.
[21] The Wilderness of Worlds. A Popular Sketch of the Evolution of
Matter from Nebula to Man and Return. The Life-Orbit of a Star. By
George W. Morehouse. New York: Peter Eckler. Pp. 246. Price, $1.
In a volume entitled _The Living Organism_[22] Mr. _Alfred Earl_ has
endeavored to make a philosophical introduction to the study of
biology. The closing paragraph of his preface is of interest as showing
his views regarding vitalism: "The object of the book will be attained
if it succeeds, although it may be chiefly by negative criticism, in
directing attention to the important truth that, though chemical and
physical changes enter largely into the composition of vital activity,
there is much in the living organism that is outside the range of these
operations." The first three chapters discuss general conceptions,
and are chiefly psychology. A discussion of the structures accessory
to alimentation in man and the higher animals occupies Chapters IV
and V. The Object of Classification, Certain General Statements
concerning Organisms, A Description of the Organism as related to
its Surroundings, The Material Basis of Life, The Organism as a
Chemical Aggregate and as a Center for the Transformation of Energy,
Certain Aspects of Form and Development, The Meaning of Sensation,
and, finally, Some of the Problems presented by the Organism, are
the remaining chapter headings. The volume contains many interesting
suggestions, and might perhaps most appropriately be described as a
Theoretical Biology.
[22] The Living Organism. By Alfred Earl, M. A. New York: The Macmillan
Company. Pp. 271. Price, $1.75.
"_Stars and Telescopes_,"[23] Professor _Todd_ says, "is intended
to meet an American demand for a plain, unrhetorical statement of
the astronomy of to-day." We might state the purpose to be to bring
astronomy and all that pertains to it up to date. It is hard to do
this, for the author has been obliged to put what was then the latest
discovery, made while the book was going through the press, in a
footnote at the end of the preface. The information embodied in the
volume is comprehensive, and is conveyed in a very intelligible style.
The treatise begins with a running commentary or historical outline
of astronomical discovery, with a rigid exclusion of all detail. The
account of the earth and moon is followed by chapters on the Calendar
and the Astronomical Relations of Light. The other members of the
solar system are described and their relations reviewed, and then the
comets and the stars. Closely associated with these subjects are the
men who have contributed to knowledge respecting them, and consequently
the names of the great discoverers and others who have helped in the
advancement of astronomy are introduced in immediate connection with
their work, in brief sketches and often with their portraits. Much
importance is attributed by Professor Todd to the instruments with
which astronomical discovery is carried on, and the book may be said to
culminate in an account of the famous instruments, their construction,
mounting, and use. The devisers of these instruments are entitled to
more credit than the unthinking are always inclined to give them, for
the value of an observation depends on the accuracy of the instrument
as well as on the skill of the observer, and the skill which makes
the instrument accurate is not to be underrated. So the makers of
the instruments are given their place. Then the recent and improved
processes have to be considered, and, altogether, Professor Todd has
found material for a full and somewhat novel book, and has used it to
good advantage.
[23] Stars and Telescopes A Handbook of Popular Astronomy. Boston:
Little, Brown & Co. Pp. 419. Price, $2.
_Some Observations on the Fundamental Principles of Nature_ is the
title of an essay by _Henry Witt_, which, though very brief, takes
the world of matter, mind, and society within its scope. One of the
features of the treatment is that instead of the present theory of
an order of things resulting from the condensation of more rarefied
matter, one of the organization of converging waves of infinitesimal
atoms filling all space is substituted. With this point prominently
in view, the various factors and properties of the material
universe--biology, psychology, sociology, ethics, and the future--are
treated of.
Among the later monographs published by the Field Columbian Museum,
Chicago, is a paper in the Geological Series (No. 3) on _The Ores of
Colombia, from Mines in Operation in 1892_, by _H. W. Nichols_. It
describes the collection prepared for the Columbian Exposition by F.
Pereira Gamba and afterward given to the museum--a collection which
merits attention for the light it throws upon the nature and mode of
occurrence of the ores of one of the most important gold-producing
countries of the world, and also because it approaches more nearly
than is usual the ideal of what a collection in economic geology
should be. Other publications in the museum's Geological Series are
_The Mylagauldæ, an Extinct Family of Sciuromorph Rodents_ (No. 4),
by _E. S. Riggs_, describing some squirrel-like animals from the
Deep River beds, near White Sulphur Springs, Montana; _A Fossil Egg
from South Dakota_ (No. 5), by _O. C. Farrington_, relative to the
egg of an anatine bird from the early Miocene; and _Contributions to
the Paleontology of the Upper Cretaceous Series_ (No. 6), by _W. N.
Logan_, in which seven species of _Scaphites_, _Ostrea_, _Gasteropoda_,
and corals are described. In the Zoölogical Series, _Preliminary
Descriptions of New Rodents from the Olympic Mountains_ (of Washington)
(No. 11), by _D. G. Elliot_, relates to six species; _Notes on a
Collection of Cold-blooded Vertebrates from the Olympic Mountains_ (No.
12), by _S. E. Meek_, to six trout and three other fish, four amphibia,
and three reptiles; and a _Catalogue of Mammals from the Olympic
Mountains, Washington_, with descriptions of new species (No. 13), by
_D. G. Elliot_, includes a number of species of rodents, lynx, bear,
and deer.
_Some Notes on Chemical Jurisprudence_ is the title given by _Harwood
Huntington_ (260 West Broadway, New York; 25 cents) to a brief digest
of patent-law cases involving chemistry. The notes are designed to be
of use to chemists intending to take out patents by presenting some
of the difficulties attendant upon drawing up a patent strong enough
to stand a lawsuit, and by explaining some points of law bearing on
the subject. In most, if not all, cases where the chemist has devised
a new method or application it is best, the author holds, to take out
a patent for self-protection, else the inventor may find his device
stolen from him and patented against him.
A cave or fissure in the Cambrian limestone of Port Kennedy, Montgomery
County, Pa., exposed by quarrymen the year before, was brought to the
knowledge of geologists by Mr. Charles M. Wheatley in 1871, when the
fossils obtained from it were determined by Prof. E. D. Cope as of
thirty-four species. Attention was again called to the paleontological
interest of the locality by President Dixon, of the Academy of Natural
Sciences of Philadelphia, in 1894. The fissure was examined again by
Dr. Dixon and others, and was more thoroughly explored by Mr. Henry C.
Mercer. Mr. Mercer published a preliminary account of the work, which
was followed by the successive studies of the material by Professor
Cope preliminary to a complete and illustrated report to be made after
a full investigation of all accessible material. Professor Cope did not
live to publish this full report, which was his last work, prepared
during the suffering of his final illness. It is now published, just
as the author left it, as _Vertebrate Remains from the Port Kennedy
Deposit_, from the Journal of the Academy of Natural Sciences of
Philadelphia. Four plates of illustrations, photographed from the
remains, accompany the text.
The machinery of Mr. _Fred A. Lucas's_ story of _The Hermit
Naturalist_ reminds us of that of the old classical French romances,
like Télémaque, and the somewhat artificial, formal diction is not
dissimilar. An accident brings the author into acquaintance and
eventual intimacy with an old Sicilian naturalist, who, migrating to
this country, has established a home, away from the world's life, on
an island in the Delaware River. The two find a congenial subject of
conversation in themes of natural history, and the bulk of the book is
in effect a running discourse by the old Sicilian on snakes and their
habits--a valuable and interesting lesson. The hermit has a romance,
involving the loss of his motherless daughter, stolen by brigands and
brought to America, his long search for her and resignation of hope,
and her ultimate discovery and restoration to him. The book is of easy
reading, both as to its natural history and the romance.
We have two papers before us on the question of expansion. One is an
address delivered by John Barrett, late United States Minister to
Siam, before the Shanghai General Chamber of Commerce, and previous
to the beginning of the attempt to subjugate the islands, on _The
Philippine Islands and American Interests in the Far East_. This
address has, we believe, been since followed by others, and in all
Mr. Barrett favors the acquisition of the Philippine Islands on the
grounds, among others, of commercial interests and the capacity of the
Filipinos for development in further civilization and self-government;
but his arguments, in the present aspect of the Philippine question,
seem to us to bear quite as decidedly in the opposite direction. He
gives the following picture of Aguinaldo and the Filipino government:
"He (Aguinaldo) captured all Spanish garrisons on the island of
Luzon outside of Manila, so that when the Americans were ready to
proceed against the city they were not delayed and troubled with a
country campaign. Moreover, he has organized a government which has
practically been administering the affairs of the great island since
the American occupation of Manila, and which is certainly better
than the former administration; he has a properly formed Cabinet and
Congress, the members of which, in appearance and manners, would
compare favorably with Japanese statesmen. He has among his advisers
men of ability as international lawyers, while his supporters include
most of the prominent educated and wealthy natives, all of which prove
possibilities of self-government that we must consider." This pamphlet
is published at Hong Kong. The other paper is an address delivered
before the New York State Bar Association, by _Charles A. Gardiner_, on
_Our Right to acquire and hold Foreign Territory_, and is published by
G. P. Putnam's Sons in the Questions of the Day Series. Mr. Gardiner
holds and expresses the broadest views of the constitutional power
of our Government to commit the acts named, and to exercise all the
attributes incidental to the possession of acquired territory, but he
thinks that we need a great deal of legal advice in the matter.
A pamphlet, _Anti-Imperialism_, by _Morrison L. Swift_, published by
the Public Ownership Review, Los Angeles, Cal., covers the subject of
English and American aggression in three chapters--Imperialism to bless
the Conquered, Imperialism for the Sake of Mankind, and Our Crime in
the Philippines. Mr. Swift is very earnest in respect to some of the
subjects touched upon in his essays, and some persons may object that
he is more forcible--even to excess--than polite in his denunciations.
To such he may perhaps reply that there are things which language does
not afford words too strong to characterize fitly.
Among the papers read at the Fourth International Catholic Scientific
Congress, held at Fribourg, Switzerland, in August, 1897, was one by
_William J. D. Croke_ on _Architecture, Painting, and Printing at
Subiaco_ as represented in the Abbey at Subiaco. The author regards the
features of the three arts represented in this place as evidence that
the record of the activity of the foundation constitutes a real chapter
in the history of progress in general and of culture in particular.
PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.
Benson, E. F. Mammon & Co. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 360.
$1.50.
Buckley, James A. Extemporaneous Oratory. For Professional and Amateur
Speakers. New York: Eaton & Mains. Pp. 480. $1.50.
Canada, Dominion of, Experimental Farms: Reports for 1897. Pp. 449;
Reports for 1898. Pp. 429.
Conn, H. W. The Story of Germ Life. (Library of Useful Stories.) New
York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 199. 40 cents.
Dana, Edward S. First Appendix to the Sixth Edition of Dana's
Mineralogy. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Pp. 75. $1.
Franklin Institute, The Drawing School, also School of Elementary
Mathematics: Announcements. Pp. 4 each.
Ganong, William F. The Teaching Botanist. New York: The Macmillan
Company. Pp. 270. $1.10.
Getman, F. H. The Elements of Blowpipe Analysis. New York: The
Macmillan Company. Pp. 77. 60 cents.
Halliday, H. M. An Essay on the Common Origin of Light, Heat, and
Electricity. Washington, D. C. Pp. 46.
Hardin, Willett L. The Rise and Development of the Liquefaction of
Gases. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 250. $1.10.
Hillegas, Howard C. Oom Paul's People. A Narrative of the British-Boer
Troubles in South Africa, with a History of the Boers, the Country, and
its Institutions. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 308. $1.50.
Ireland, Alleyne. Tropical Colonization. An Introduction to the Study
of the Subject. New York: The Macmillan Company. $2.
Kingsley, J. S. Text-Book of Elementary Zoölogy. New York: Henry Holt &
Co. Pp. 439.
Knerr, E. B. Relativity in Science. Silico-Barite Nodules from near
Salina. Concretions. (Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science.)
Pp. 24.
Krõmskõp, Color Photography. Philadelphia: Ives Krõmskõp. Pp. 24.
Liquid-Air Power and Automobile Company. Prospectus. Pp. 16.
MacBride, Thomas A. The North American Slime Molds. Being a List of
Species of Myxomycetes hitherto described from North America, Including
Central America. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 231, with 18
plates. $2.25.
Meyer, A. B. The Distribution of the Negritos in the Philippine Islands
and Elsewhere. Dresden (Saxony): Stengel & Co. Pp. 92.
Nicholson, H. H., and Avery, Samuel. Laboratory Exercises with Outlines
for the Study of Chemistry, to accompany any Elementary Text. New York:
Henry Holt & Co. Pp. 134. 60 cents.
Scharff, R. P. The History of the European Fauna. New York: Imported by
Charles Scribner's Sons. Pp. 354. $1.50.
Schleicher, Charles, and Schull, Duren. Rhenish Prussia. Samples of
Special Filtering Papers. New York: Eimer & Amend, agents.
Sharpe, Benjamin F. An Advance in Measuring and Photographing Sounds.
United States Weather Bureau. Pp. 18, with plates.
Shinn, Milicent W. Notes on the Development of a Child. Parts III and
IV. (University of California Studies.) Pp. 224.
Shoemaker, M. M. Quaint Corners of Ancient Empires, Southern India,
Burmah, and Manila. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 212.
Smith, Orlando J. A Short View of Great Questions. New York: The
Brandur Company, 220 Broadway. Pp. 75.
Smith, Walter. Methods of Knowledge. An Essay in Epistemology. New
York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 340. $1.25.
Southern, The, Magazine. Monthly. Vol. I, No. 1. August, 1899. Pp. 203.
10 cents. $1 a year.
Suter, William N. Handbook of Optics. New York: The Macmillan Company.
Pp. 209. $1.
Tarde, G. Social Laws. An Outline of Sociology. With a Preface by James
Mark Baldwin. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 213. $1.25.
Uline, Edwin B. Higinbothamia. A New Genus, and other New Dioscoreaceæ,
New Amaranthaceæ. (Field Columbian Museum, Chicago Botanical Series.)
Pp. 12.
Underwood, Lucien M. Molds, Mildews, and Mushrooms. New York: Henry
Holt & Co. Pp. 227, with 9 plates. $1.50.
United States Civil-Service Commission. Fifteenth Report, July 1, 1897,
to June 30, 1898. Pp. 736. Washington.
Fragments of Science.
The Dover Meeting of the British Association.--While the attendance
on the meeting of the British Association at Dover was not large--the
whole number of members being 1,403, of whom 127 were ladies--the
occasion was in other respects eventful and one of marked interest. The
papers read were, as a rule, of excellent quality, and the interchange
of visits with the French Association was a novel feature that might
bear many repetitions. The president, Sir Michael Foster, presented, in
his inaugural address, a picture of the state of science one hundred
years ago, illustrating it by portraying the conditions to which a
body like the association meeting then at Dover would have found
itself subject, and suggesting the topics it would have discussed.
The period referred to was, however, that of the beginning of the
present progress, and, after remarking on what had been accomplished
in the interval, the speaker drew a very hopeful foreview for the
future. Besides the intellectual triumphs of science, its strengthening
discipline, its relation to politics, and the "international
brotherhood of science" were brought under notice in the address. In
his address as president of the Physical Section, Prof. J. H. Poynting
showed how physicists are tending toward a general agreement as to
the nature of the laws in which they embody their discoveries, of the
explanations they give, and of the hypotheses they make, and, having
considered what the form and terms of this agreement should be, passed
to a discussion of the limitations of physical science. The subject of
Dr. Horace T. Brown's Chemical Section address was The Assimilation
of Carbon by the Higher Plants. Sir William H. White, president of
the Section of Mechanical Science, spoke on Steam Navigation at High
Speeds. President Adam Sedgwick addressed the Zoölogical Section on
Variation and some Phenomena connected with Reproduction and Sex; Sir
John Murray, the Geographical Section on The Ocean Floor; and Mr. J.
N. Langley, the Physiological Section on the general relations of
the motor nerves to the several tissues of the body, especially of
those which run to tissues over which we have little or no control.
The president of the Anthropological Section, Mr. C. H. Read, of the
British Museum, spoke of the preservation and proper exploration of
the prehistoric antiquities of the country, and offered a plan for
increasing the amount of work done in anthropological investigation
by the use of Government aid. A peculiar distinction attaches to
this meeting through its reception and entertainment of the French
Association, and the subsequent return of the courtesy by the latter
body at Boulogne. About three hundred of the French Associationists,
among whom were many ladies, came over, on the Saturday of the meeting,
under the lead of their president, M. Brouardel, and accompanied by a
number of men of science from Belgium. They were met at the pier by the
officers of the British Association, and were escorted to the place
of meeting and to the sectional meetings toward which their several
tastes directed them. The geological address of Sir Archibald Geikie
on Geological Time had been appointed for this day out of courtesy to
the French geologists, and in order that they might have an opportunity
of hearing one of the great lights of British science. Among the
listeners who sat upon the platform were M. Gosselet, president of
the French Geological Society; M. Kemna, president of the Belgian
Geological Society; and M. Rénard, of Ghent. Public evening lectures
were delivered on the Centenary of the Electric Current, by Prof. J.
A. Fleming, and (in French) on Nervous Vibration, by Prof. Charles
Richet. Sir William Turner was appointed president for the Bradford
meeting of the association (1900). The visit of the French Association
was returned on September 22d, when the president, officers, and about
three hundred members went to Boulogne. They were welcomed by the mayor
of the city, the prefect of the department, and a representative of
the French Government; were feasted by the municipality of Boulogne;
were entertained by the members of the French Association; and special
commemorative medals were presented by the French Association to the
two presidents. The British visitors also witnessed the inauguration of
a tablet in memory of Dr. Duchesne, and of a plaque commemorative of
Thomas Campbell, the poet, who died in Boulogne.