4 o2 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



handedness, which has no near bearing on the main thesis, but 

 which serves as a means of introducing the largest episode in 

 the book, which is an account of Leonardo da Vinci and his 

 work. This is so entertaining, and is done with such sympathy, 

 that it might perhaps be one day removed to a book of its own, 

 which would leave the present one stronger and more concen- 

 trated. Part of the Leonardo episode is concerned with a very 

 difficult, important, and exciting question as to whether 

 Leonardo did or did not design the very beautiful open stair- 

 case in the Chateau of Blois. This will interest all those who 

 have seen this wonderful piece of work, and all those, also, who 

 are interested in the work of one of the greatest men who have 

 ever lived. It will no doubt excite further research, and by the 

 time it comes to a book of its own something more definite may 

 have been found, so as to confirm Mr. Cook's already convincing 

 view that it was the work of Leonardo. 



Connected with the Leonardo episode are some very 

 careful and detailed chapters on the connection of spirals with 

 architecture, beginning with the development of spiral stair- 

 cases and leading up to the finest example of this kind of work 

 in the Chateau of Blois; and in regard to this it is desirable 

 to remember how much the spiral is concerned in all beautiful 

 architecture and ornament, and to consider how much of the 

 pleasure taken both in ornament and in natural forms is 

 founded elementarily on groups of spiral lines. As Ruskin 

 has pointed out, the older architects made the spiral "eloquent 

 with endless symbolism." No doubt the twisted pillar 

 was used first (in Lombard Gothic) as a pleasant variety 

 of form, but later it was used constructively (as by Giotto). 

 It is very curious (as shown by Mr. Banister Fletcher) that it 

 is possible to describe an Ionic volute by the unwinding of 

 a string from the fossil shell Fiisus antiquus, the volute also 

 showing the same divergence from mathematical exactitude as 

 the shell. Mr. Cook gives, as an instance of the artistic use of 

 the spiral, the head of a violin, many of which are finished off 

 in this way. He might have added, which is of interest, that 

 the proportions of many of the older violins— examples by 

 Stradivarius and Amati have been measured — are in <£ ratio. Mr. 

 Cook has much to say of Greek architecture, and of its devia- 

 tions and inflections, but there is nothing particularly new in this 

 part of the book, and it is probable that too much already has 



