HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



81 



Virgil's time they ate them with milk and cheese. 

 The best tables in France and Italy make them a 

 service. It Italy also they boil them in wine, and 

 then smoke them a little ; these they call anseri, or 

 geese, I know not why. . . . The bread of the flour 

 is exceeding nutritive ; it is a robust food, and makes 

 women well complexioned, as I have read in a good 

 author ; and a decoction of the rind of the tree 

 tinctures hair of a golden colour, esteemed a beauty 

 in some countries. . . . How we here use chestnuts 

 in stewed meats and beatille pies our French cooks 

 teach us." 



There still exist some remarkable specimens of the 

 -chestnut tree, whose age and size are very notable, 

 but none of these, perhaps, save one can boast of 

 having saved the life of a man. There is a cele- 

 brated one in the Jardin des Tuileries, which bursts 

 into leaf earlier than any of its neighbours, usually 

 by March 1st. The story runs that a celebrated 

 painter, Joseph Vien, was accused of having assassi- 

 nated his rival at the Royal Academy on March 20th, 

 1746. Vien proved before the tribunal that at the 

 moment of the murder he was standing talking with 

 the Duchesss de Ronceraux under a chestnut tree. 

 He said he could identify the tree, for it was the 

 ■only one in leaf. This alibi, we are told, saved the 

 painter's head, and from that time the precocious 

 tree has been noted. It seldom fails in its early 

 leafage ; the extreme cold of some years occasionally 

 ■delays it a little. 



It has been stated that we no longer use the wood 

 ■of the chestnut for building ; but its timber is found 

 •very durable where exposed to the action of water, 

 and for this reason is still used in water mills. The 

 wood also makes one of the best kinds of charcoal. 

 A special use of the wood which may be mentioned 

 (is in the little musical instrument called " Castanets," 

 whose name indicates the material of which it is 

 made, or perhaps one should say was originally 

 made — bone or ivory being now often substituted. 

 The Moors, however, who were its first inventors, 

 made it of the wood of the chestnut tree. 



NOTES ON NEW BOOKS. 



A NA TURA LISTS VO \ 'A GE ROUND THE 

 jOi WORLD, by Chas. Darwin, F.R.S., &c. 

 (London : John Murray). This is an edition de luxe 

 of the first work written by our great naturalist. 

 Anybody who has read it is not likely to have for- 

 gotten it. It is a kind of natural history " Robinson 

 Crusoe." It was during that famous voyage that 

 Darwin made the observations and laid the founda- 

 tion for his famous theory of Natural Selection. The 

 present edition is by far the best and most attractive 

 hitherto published. The illustrations are artistic in 

 the highest degree, as everybody will understand 

 when he knows they are by the artist of Lady 

 Brassey's " Sunbeam." Most of them are from 



sketches made on the spot by Mr. Pritchett, with 

 Darwin's book by his side. 



Physiology of Bodily Exercise, by Fernand Lagrange, 

 M.P. (Lcndon : Kegan Paul & Co.). This is a new- 

 volume of what is fairly entitled to be called the 

 celebrated " International Scientific Series." As its 

 title imports, it is devoted to what may be termed a 

 new science — that of athletics or bodily exercise. 

 For this reason it commends itself to the attention of 

 all athletes ; or, for the matter of that, the larger 

 number of people who have come to see there can be 

 no long continued good health without exercise of 

 some kind. Dr. Lagrange is perhaps the best 

 medical authority on the subject, so that whatever he 

 says in this respect is entitled to attention. The 

 book is one that ought to be read by all school- 

 masters and schoolmistresses in particular, to whose 

 notice we would strongly commend Part vi., on the 

 " Office of the Brain in Exercise." 



Foods for the Fat, by Dr. N. E. Davis (London : 

 Chatto & Windus). This is a useful little treatise on 

 how to cure corpulency. The author is of opinion 

 that a sound constitution and a lithe and active 

 frame are necessary to good health, and that cor- 

 pulency tends to curtail not only perfect health, but 

 many of the pleasures of life. In other words, he 

 regards corpulency as an insidious disease. Dr. 

 Davis not only describes this disease, but, what is 

 more important to corpulent people, gives quite a 

 cookery list of dishes, all of them tempting, and the 

 consumption of which would reduce corpulency. 



The Reign of Law, by the Duke of Argyll 

 (London : John Murray). The noble author has 

 been a man of war from his youth. He is now 

 vigorously fighting in the columns of " Nature," 

 Professor Ray Lankester, Professor Dyer, Herbert 

 Spencer — any one who comes first, like Hal o' the 

 Wynd ! Twenty-five years ago, he combated 

 Darwinism in the chapters forming the present 

 volume, after his lively and entertaining fashion. 

 His efforts have not been in vain, as is proved by the 

 fact that this is the nineteenth edition. 



Handbook of England and Wales (London : John 

 Murray). This is the second edition of one of the 

 most useful works of its hind ever issued. It seems 

 a pity its clever original compiler could not see his 

 book so practically appreciated. There is no better 

 or handier book for foreigners ; and very few more 

 instructive or entertaining work for Englishmen who 

 take an interest in the topography and archaeology of 

 their own land. 



A Catalogue of British Fossil Vertebrata, by 

 A. Smith-Woodward and C. D. Sherborn (London : 

 Dulau & Co.). Both the authors of this valuable 

 work of reference are young and rising men of 

 science. Our readers have read many papers in our 

 own columns by Mr. Woodward, and will, therefore, 

 be fully prepared to admit his fitness to be the author 

 of a book like the present. It does for fossil 



