408 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



he has had to take the penalty in very 

 serious losses. With Part 8, devoted to 

 French Sociology, he issues the follow- 

 ing notice of the cessation of the work : 



"With the issue of the eighth part, here- 

 with, the publication of the "Descriptive 

 Sociology " will be closed. 



The collecting, classifying, and abstract- 

 ing of the materials contained in the parts 

 now completed was commenced in 1867 ; and 

 the work, carried on at first by one compiler, 

 subsequently by two, and for some years by 

 three, has continued down to the present 

 time. 



On going through his accounts, Mr. Spen- 

 cer finds that during the fourteen years which 

 have elapsed since the undertaking was com- 

 menced, the payments to compilers, added to 

 the costs of printing, etc. , have amounted to 

 -4,425 15s. Id., while up to the present time 

 the returns (including those from America) 

 have been 1,054 12s. Id. returns which, 

 when they have been increased by the amount 

 derived from the first sales of the part now 

 issued, will leave a deficit of about 3,250. 



Even had there been shown considerable 

 appreciation of the work, it would still have 

 been out of the question to continue it in face 

 of the fact that, after the small sales which 

 immediately follow publication, the returns, 

 so far from promising to repay expenses in 

 course of time, do not even yield five per cent 

 interest on the capital sunk. 



Should the day ever come when the love 

 for the personalities of history is less and the 

 desire for its instructive facts greater, those 

 who occupy themselves in picking out the 

 gold from the dross will, perhaps, be able to 

 publish their results without inflicting on 

 themselves losses too grievous to be borne 

 nay, may possibly receive some thanks for 

 their pains. 



The personality of this announce- 

 ment makes some corrections here ap- 

 propriate. It has been often said that 

 the profits of Mr. Spencer's American 

 reprints have been greater than those 

 of the original English publications. 

 This is a mistake. Some of his books 

 sold better in this country at first, but 

 the English sales have had a steady in- 

 crease, so that the income from them 

 has been greater than from the Ameri- 

 can editions. In regard to the "De- 

 scriptive Sociology," although encour- 

 aged by his American friends to expect 



fair returns from it here, the sales have 

 been so small that the publishers de- 

 clined to reproduce it after the third 

 number, and the work has been kept 

 in stock by the help of others and by 

 advances from Mr. Spencer himself. 

 The appearance of the above notice of 

 discontinuance has, moreover, been the 

 occasion of no little misrepresentation, 

 both in England and in this country. 

 In England it was rumored that Mr. 

 Spencer's losses from publication have 

 been so great as to compel him to go to 

 America to recruit his means by lecturr 

 ing ; and in this country the newspa- 

 pers have intimated that the failure of 

 his "French Sociology" has brought 

 him to actual want. These statements 

 are wholly groundless. Mr. Spencer 

 has never for a moment entertained the 

 idea of lecturing here, although offered 

 very liberal terms; and, while he is not 

 a rich man, he is by no means in strait- 

 ened circumstances. He could, of course, 

 ill afford to lose sixteen thousand dol- 

 lars , besides many years of labor, on a 

 single publication, but it has certainly 

 not made him a bankrupt. 



It must be added that Mr. Spencer 

 has never accepted a farthing from any 

 source contributed for his private or 

 personal benefit. "When his "System 

 of Philosophy," which was not self-sus- 

 taining, was threatened with suspen- 

 sion, some funds were sent him from 

 this country to meet the expenses of 

 its continuance, but they were accepted 

 solely as a public trust, and to be applied 

 to an object recognized by all as of a 

 purely public nature. 



ELECTRIC STORAGE-BATTERIES. 



Sixce the first announcement of M. 

 Faure's improvement of the Plante sec- 

 ondary battery, speculation has been 

 rife as to the great number and kinds 

 of uses to which such batteries could 

 be applied; and, while much of it has 

 been only sober prediction, some of it 

 has been altogether fanciful. The re- 



