REVIEWS 525 



The physiology of the absorption, elimination, and storage of lead in the 

 human body is described. The fact that females are more adversely affected by 

 lead than males is pointed out, and the injurious effect on motherhood demon- 

 strated. 



A series of experiments, in conjunction with Prof. Bloxam, on the influence 

 of lead injections on blood pressure, show that a general fall takes place, and 

 the charts clearly illustrate this point. The preventive measures described should 

 be thoroughly well known to employers in all trades where lead is extensively 

 used. Attention is drawn to the use of what is called the " double-electrical bath 

 treatment," with which the names of the author and Mr. T. M. Clague are 

 associated. The book concludes with a compilation of Factory and Workshop 

 Orders which relate to industries in which lead is employed. 



The book is of a handy pocket size, and would afford interesting and valuable 

 reading alike to the medical man, the technical expert, and the layman. 



J. VV. Cropper. 



GENERAL 



Emma Darwin. A Century of Family Letters, 1792—1896. Edited by her 

 daughter Henrietta Litchfield. In 2 volumes. [Vol. I., pp. xxxi + 

 289, with 11 illustrations; Vol. II., pp. xxv + 325, with 8 illustrations.] 

 (London : John Murray, 191 5. Price 21s. net.) 



THESE two pleasant volumes give us an insight into the home life and surround- 

 ings in which the Darwin family were brought up. When Charles Darwin married 

 his cousin, Emma Wedgwood, three families that had long been friendly were 

 bound more closely together by yet another tie. Charles was the grandson of 

 Erasmus Darwin ; his mother, Susannah Wedgwood, was the eldest and Emma's 

 father, Josiah Wedgwood, the fourth child of Josiah Wedgwood the potter, and 

 Emma's mother Elizabeth was one of the Aliens, a family of landed gentry from 

 the north of Ireland that had settled in Wales. The Wedgwoods and Aliens were 

 already closely connected by the marriage of two brothers of the former to two 

 sisters of the latter. 



The first volume consists, in the main, of letters of the Aliens and Wedgwoods, 

 which are for convenience termed the Maer letters, since they are mainly to do with 

 the Wedgwoods of Maer, the family of Emma. Both families were large, and it 

 must be admitted that but for the list of dramatis persona given at the beginning 

 it would be a puzzling task to follow the subsequent letters. With this aid it is not 

 difficult, and one finds in these pages an intimate picture of intellectual, well-to-do 

 middle class life of nearly a century ago. In both families the men were firm and 

 straightforward, the women sympathetic and vivacious, and together they formed 

 a group keenly alive to the many interests of life and with a wide outlook. Of the 

 Aliens one married Sir James Mackintosh, a politician and remarkable conversa- 

 tionalist — in some opinions, including Darwin's, better than Carlyle or Macaulay — 

 and another married Sismondi, the historian. Through the latter and Madame 

 de Stael, with whom they were friends, they came into contact with the literary 

 aristocracy at Geneva, one of the most remarkable associations of the time. Tom 

 Wedgwood was, if not the inventor of photography, as has been claimed, one of 

 the first to practise it ; Hensleigh was a mathematician and philologist of no mean 

 order ; and John with Sir Joseph Banks were the co-founders of the Horticultural 

 Society. Altogether they gathered round them a truly interesting circle of friends, 

 and their letters gain an added value from the thumb-nail sketches of many 



