68o SCIENCE PROGRESS 



sumptive members of the community are convincing, and their whole treat- 

 ment of this difficult problem is obviously based on sound lines. 



One point in particular is strongly emphasised, and that is that on no 

 account must one allow such patients to foster the idea that they are useless 

 members of the community, and the main theme running throughout the 

 whole conception of colonies and settlements for consumptives is that such 

 institutions should afford the dwellers therein a solid opportunity of proving 

 themselves useful members, able to do a good day's work and obtain a 

 remuneration commensurate with the work done. 



With regard to the actual character of the employment, it appears that 

 members skilled in any particular branch of work should, if possible, be given 

 a chance to continue in that branch, although at times a change of occupation 

 might be beneficial ; also that, whilst working, plenty of fresh air and sunshine 

 should be an important consideration, and that in the event of suspicious 

 physical signs arising, a rest, under special treatment, should be available 

 in a hospital attached to the colony. 



A condition of mental repose is insisted upon by the authors as an 

 important factor in treatment ; and it is claimed, and rightly so, that to convert 

 these patients into useful members of society, and afford them an opportunity 

 of earning a living wage in pleasant surroundings and under conditions where 

 strain and anxiety are removed, certainly conduces to a mental state which 

 contributes materially to the success of such treatment. 



The business and financial aspects of the colony problem are also gone 

 into, and the authors hold that any expense incurred in the running of such 

 settlements, on the lines they put forward, would be amply repaid by the 

 lasting results obtained. 



By means of such a scheme as described it is possible in numerous instances 

 to use the colony as a link between the sanatorium and the patient's former 

 conditions of existence, although it must be acknowledged that in many 

 cases it is undesirable for members to return to such conditions, especially 

 where overcrowding and other vitiating circumstances obtain. 



It cannot be denied that the general scheme outlined in this volume is 

 one which goes a long way towards solving a problem of immense national 

 importance. 



H. A. H. 



MISCELLANEOUS 



Australian Meteorology. By Griffith Taylor, D.Sc, B.E., B.A., F.G.S., 

 F.R.G.S. [Pp. xi + 312, with 229 figures.] (Oxford : at the Claren- 

 don Press, 1920. Price 125. 6d. net.) 



The student of Meteorology in Australia needs a special textbook, for 

 Australia is so very differently situated from England, Germany, and America 

 that the standard works of these countries have only a limited application 

 there. It is only the southern coasts that experience the prevailing westerly 

 winds and frequent depressions so familiar to us, and over a great part of 

 the country heat and drought exist to a degree exceeded in but few parts 

 of the world. In addition, the relation between the direction of the wind 

 and the horizontal pressure gradient is reversed for the Southern Hemi- 

 sphere. 



Dr. Griffith Taylor deals attractively with the climatological portions of 

 his work, and shows much ingenuity in his method of conveying information 

 diagrammatically. In the physics of the free atmosphere, however, he does 

 not appear to be so much at home. For instance, as a picture of conditions 

 aloft, his comparison of the troposphere and stratosphere (p. 229) to the 

 inside and outside of a greenhouse which is heated by a stove is useful ; but he 

 goes further than this, and would have it that the clouds at the Cirrus level 



