LITERARY NOTICES. 



371 



portions and combinations of characters 

 which distinguish classes and individuals, 

 nothing whatever has been done toward 

 their quantitative elucidation, und we can 

 only say that the phenomena are vaguely 

 comparable as more or less. 



To illustrate the difficulties of attaining 

 exact, ideas in relation to quantity, we may 

 refer to the history of chemistry, a science 

 in which all the phenomena are at absolute 

 experimental command. A century ago the 

 law of exact proportions in chemical com- 

 bination was arrived at, and, from the equal- 

 ity of affinity and neutralization among 

 different bodies, they were held to be equiv- 

 alents of each other, and the term " equiva- 

 lence " came to be settled and fundamental 

 in expressing chemical relations. But, after 

 a hundred years of the closest thinking and 

 the most exact experiment, we now find that 

 the " old chemistry " is swept away, and the 

 idea of " equivalence," which was its cor- 

 ner-stone, has gone with it. With the new 

 facts, and finer discriminations, and broader 

 views that have arisen, a whole crop of new 

 terms has sprung up, and, instead of the 

 equivalence of combining bodies, we now 

 speak of their "univalence" and "multiva- 

 ience," their "bivalence," " trivalence," 

 "penti valence," etc. ; and, finally, the whole 

 set of relations has to be expressed by the 

 general term " quantivalence." But if the 

 conception of equivalence is thus discredited 

 in one of its oldest and simplest scientific 

 applications, what meaning can it have when 

 applied to phenomena that have not yet 

 even taken on the quantitative form? We 

 can write down the contrasted characters 

 of the sexes, as Mrs. Blackwell has done, 

 and carry them out to no end of detail, and 

 prefix the terms plm and minus to the ele- 

 ments that are brought into comparison, 

 and thus give a gerferal idea of Nature's 

 compensations; but to undertake to add up 

 or to reduce to any strict equational form 

 these most indefinite things seems like tri- 

 fling. With man the scheme of comparison 

 is carried out to nineteen particulars, of 

 which the following five are examples : 



MALES. 



Structure. 

 -+- Size. 



+ Strength. 



Endurance. 



Products. 



FEMALES. 



4- Structure. 



Size. 



Strength. 

 + Endurance. 

 + Products. 



We looked over this enumeration with 

 special interest, to see what value would be 

 assigned to maternity, the grand function of 

 the female sex, to which every thing else is 

 subordinated. But it is either left out of 

 the estimate, or must be included under 

 products. Maternity is thus so generalized 

 as to be described in terms applicable to 

 both sexes. Now, we do not like this de- 

 preciation of the feminine side. Denying, 

 as we do, the equality of the sexes, and 

 holding to the superiority of the female 

 sex, we protest against the degradation of 

 woman implied in losing the supreme and 

 distinctive purpose of her nature among 

 the plus and minus products common to 

 the sexes. 



The Text-Book of Botany, Morphological 



AND PHYSIOLOniCAL. By JdLIDS SaCHS, 



Professor of Botany in the University 

 of Wiirzburg. Translated and anno- 

 tated by Alfred W. Bennett, F. L. S., as- 

 sisted by W. T. Thiselton Dyer, F. L. S. 

 Macmillan & Co. Pp. 848. 461 Illus- 

 trations. Price $12.50. 



This admirable translation of the work 

 of Prof. Sachs .supplies a want long felt in 

 our literature. Students who have been 

 cut off from the German work, by their in- 

 ability to read that language, may congrat- 

 ulate themselves that, for once at least, the 

 translation offers advantages not found in 

 the original. The Germans, it is well 

 known, are doing a very large proportion of 

 the world's thinking, and it has been hinted 

 that the German consciousness of this fact 

 is perhaps somewhat exaggerated, and may 

 sometimes betray its men of learning into 

 an unprofitable ignoring of the labors of 

 other nations. But no criticism of this kind 

 will hold against the present volume. Its 

 translators, being themselves eminent bota- 

 nists, have enriched the work with com- 

 ments and contributions embodying English 

 thought and discovery in this important di- 

 vision of science. We may also add that 

 the German work reached its fourth edition 

 while the translation was passing through 

 the press, so that the new views adopted by 

 the author, and the new matter added, are 

 indicated in the English volume. 



This text-book of Prof. Sachs is at once 

 comprehensive in scope, and minute and ac- 

 curate in detail. It is the aim of the author 



