120 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



deny that the " reserve " at any period of 

 the policy's existence can be easily ascer- 

 tained. But the " reserve " is roade up of 

 one part of the premiums, and, if this part 

 can be ascertained, why cannot the " insur- 

 ance value," which is made up of the other 

 part of the premiums, be also ascertained ? 

 It is unnecessary to know any other factors 

 than these, to be able to determine the 

 amount of the " surrender value." The 

 latter factor forms the basis of the " sur- 

 render charge," which may be eight per 

 cent, of it, and the " surrender charge " de- 

 ducted from the former leaves the " sur- 

 render value." 



"We have thus endeavored to give a 

 brief outline of the main feature of Mr. 

 Wright's book ; the others are chiefly inci- 

 dental to the illustration of this one. The 

 glimpses occasionally given of the manner 

 in which matters are conducted beneath 

 the surface of hfe insurance are not cal- 

 culated to leave on the reader's mind a fa- 

 vorable impression of at least one or two of 

 the actors. In this connection, however, the 

 tone of the writer is not always as dignified 

 as it might be. The chapter at the end of 

 the book, on the relation between curren- 

 cy and life insurance, exhibits some sound 

 financial views. The book aims a vigorous 

 blow in defense of the people, and it is to 

 be hoped that its effect will be decisive. 



CONTRIBUTIOXS TO SOLAR PhTSICS. By J. 



Norman Lockter, F, R. S. New York : 

 Macmillan & Co. ISH. 676 pages. 

 Price, $10. 



The avidity of the general public for in- 

 formation in regard to recent researches in 

 physics, and particularly in regard to re- 

 searches made by aid of the spectroscope, 

 is witnessed by the number of volumes 

 which have appeared within the past few 

 years devoted solely to the popular exposi- 

 tion of these subjects. The announcement 

 of a new book with the same purpose is 

 one which, we should fancy, the average 

 reader of these books would receive with 

 mingled feelings. It seems to us that this 

 average reader, while feeling that it was his 

 duty to rejoice that the class which he rep- 

 resents was being so very fully supplied 

 with treatises on a certain class of topics, 

 would hkewise begin to doubt whether 



the topics themselves had not been ex- 

 hausted. 



At least, he might doubt whether the 

 popular exposition of them had not been 

 carried to an extreme point. Certainly it 

 seems very hard to add to the books of 

 Roscoe and Schellen any thing in regard to 

 the fundamentals of Spectrum Analysis, 

 which shall be worth adding. It is easy to 

 conceive our average reader turning the 

 pages of a new book of this sort with a 

 kind of nervous fear, lest he should come 

 across those tiresome wood-cuts of a Ger- 

 man-looking man gazing intently into a 

 prism in the hope of seeing a candle-flame 

 double, or of two sombre individuals shut 

 up in a dark and very large room, alone 

 with Newton's experiment. These wood- 

 cuts he has seen for years, and they seem 

 to him as the brown-stone houses on the 

 Fifth Avenue seem to the weary traveler ; 

 mile-stones that he can never pass — "a 

 procession which never gets past its given 

 point." 



Now, we distinctly sympathize with our 

 average reader, and we claim that a book 

 of this nature, to be necessary or even ac- 

 ceptable at this time, must be a decided 

 step in advance of the former ones. 



The volume before us contains 676 

 pages (including a good Index), and it is 

 divided into two parts : Part I. is devoted 

 to a popular account of ancient and modern 

 Sun work ; Part II. contains communica- 

 tions made by the author to the Royal So- 

 ciety of London, and to the French Acad- 

 en^y of Sciences. Added to these we have 

 sixteen valuable Notes on various special 

 points ; and two Appendices, one giving the 

 "Instructions to Observers of the Eclipse 

 of 18*71," and the other being Respighi's 

 " Memoir on Solar Prominences." 



To consider the volume in inverse order, 

 we may say that, of Part 11. , the valuable 

 Notes and Appendices are the only parts 

 which ought to have been given in their 

 present form, according to our judgment, 

 and it may even be doubted whether the 

 Notes should not have been worked into 

 the text. Mr. Lockyer'says, in regard to 

 the contributions to the Royal Society and 

 to the Academy of Sciences, that they are 

 " of course " given verbatim. Here the 

 author has, it seems to us, forgotten the 



