LITERARY NOTICES. 



2 73 



Travels among the Great Andes of the 

 Equator. By Edward Whymper. With 

 a Supplementary Appendix, bound sepa- 

 rately. New York : Charles Scribner's 

 Sons. Pp. xxvi + 456, and xxvi+147. 

 Price, $6. 



Whether regarded as a book of travel 

 or as a record of scientific exploration, Mr. 

 Whymper's production has eminent claims 

 to attention. The chief object of his expe- 

 dition was to investigate the physiological 

 effects of the diminished air pressure at high 

 altitudes. That some disturbance of the 

 bodily functions is caused by ascending to 

 great elevations had been established by the 

 testimony of "multitudes of persons of di- 

 verse conditions by cultured men of science 

 down to illiterate peasants. . . . Nausea and 

 vomiting ; headaches of a most severe char- 

 acter ; feverishness, haemorrhages, lassitude, 

 depression, and weakness ; and an indescrib- 

 able feeling of illness have been repeatedly 

 mentioned as occurring at great elevations, 

 and have only been cured by descending into 

 lower zones. To these maladies the term 

 mountain sickness is now commonly ap- 

 plied." AVhile such effects have been felt 

 by persons who have slowly climbed mount- 

 ains to heights of fourteen thousand to fif- 

 teen thousand feet, balloonists have often 

 risen within an hour to much greater heights 

 without such inconvenience. This fact 

 gives reason to believe that symptoms pro- 

 duced by fatigue have been attributed often 

 to rarefaction of the air. Accordingly, in his 

 Andean explorations, Mr. Whymper took 

 especial care to eliminate the effects of fa- 

 tigue from his observations. 



The scene of his operations was that 

 part of the chain of the Andes crossing the 

 Republic of Ecuador, and among the mount- 

 ains climbed were Cotopaxi, on the summit 

 of which a night was spent, and Chimborazo 

 twice, the summit being reached only in the 

 second ascent. Many less noted peaks also 

 were scaled. Besides making the observa- 

 tions which were his chief care, Mr. Whymper 

 determined the altitudes and the relative posi- 

 tions of the chief mountains of Ecuador, made 

 comparisons of boiling-points and aneroid 

 readings with the readings of the mercurial 

 barometer, and made botanical, lithological, 

 zoological (chiefly entomological), and archae- 

 ological collections. As stated in the intro- 

 duction, he concerned himself "neither with 



VOL. XLI. 21 



commerce nor politics, nor with the natives 

 and their curious ways." Yet the incidents 

 of the expedition, which are plentiful and are 

 recounted with much vividness and humor, 

 tell not a little about the " curious ways " of 

 Ecuadorian bipeds and quadrupeds, likewise 

 of hexapods and centipedes. The baggage- 

 mules were inexhaustible mines of original 

 sin, and the insects in the lower regions 

 were everywhere. One full - page plate 

 crowded with figures of flying and creeping 

 things is described by the author as " selec- 

 tions from my bed-fellows at Guayaquil." The 

 volume is copiously illustrated with carefully 

 drawn and engraved pictures, many of them 

 from the author's photographs. The mete- 

 orological observations are appended to the 

 main volume. In the supplementary vol- 

 ume Mr. Whymper's zoological collections 

 are described, with illustrations. They in- 

 clude a goodly number of species which were 

 new to science. 



The Chinese Scientific and Industrial 

 Magazine, John Fryer, LL. D., editor, is now 

 in its sixth volume. Its purpose is to con- 

 vey to intelligent Chinese a knowledge of 

 the principles and progress of Western sci- 

 ence and art. It contains, quarterly, one 

 hundred pages of matter, printed in the best 

 Chinese style, liberally illustrated, relating 

 to subjects of practical as well as theoretical 

 interest. In the number before us such sub- 

 jects are treated as photography, the art 

 of living long, sugar-making, therapeutics, 

 pressing, drawing, shearing, and stamping 

 machinery, electricity, materia medica, ice- 

 making machinery, the manufacture of lu- 

 cifer matches, dual consciousness, electric 

 railroads, Edison's kinetograph, and mathe- 

 matical problems. Presbyterian Mission 

 Press, Shanghai ; Ralph Waggoner, 10 

 Spruce Street, New York. Price, $1 a year. 



Dr. John Aulde, acting upon the belief 

 that with the better knowledge of the physi- 

 ological action of drugs large doses are not 

 needed to produce desired clinical effects, 

 has prepared The Pocket Pharmacy a book 

 intended both for practical use and as a plea 

 for small doses, to be administered in ac- 

 cordance with physiological deductions. We 

 are learning, he holds, instead of the gross 

 manifestations of disease, to regard more 

 closely the derangement of cell function on 



