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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Eain and Snow in the United States and 

 Adjacent Parts of North, Central, and South 

 America;" "Work on the Fresh-Water 

 Algce;' by Dr. Horatio C. Wood, of Phila- 

 delphia ; and Prof. Newcombe's " Investi- 

 gations into the Orbit of Uranus." The In- 

 stitution has also in preparation '' Vocabu- 

 laries of the Indian Languages of North 

 America ; " a *' Hypsometrical Map of North 

 America ; " and the " Meteorological Ob- 

 servations" of the Institution up to ISYO. 



The report also contains the late Prof. 

 Agassiz's "Narrative of his Expedition from 

 Boston through the Straits of Magellan to 

 San Francisco," and a number of valuable 

 papers by foreign authorities on various 

 scientific subjects, published because of 

 their inaccessibihty to students generally. 



The Construction of Mill-Dams. Spring- 

 field, Ohio : James Leflfel & Co. 312 pp., 

 8vo. Price, $2.50. 



This is a republication in book-form of 

 a series of articles first published in Lef- 

 fel's Milling and Mechanical Xews. It ad- 

 vances no new theory on the subject, but 

 presents a description of various plans that 

 have been tried and found effective in dif- 

 ferent localities. The work is more de- 

 scriptive than scientific in character, but it 

 contains some apparently valuable sugges- 

 tions on the building of small and economi- 

 cal dams, such as are required for a single 

 grain or lumber mill. Descriptions are given 

 of the Housatonic Dam, in Connecticut, the 

 Moline Dam, on the Mississippi, and other 

 remarkable dams. A simple and seemingly 

 sutficient method is given for determining 

 the available power of small streams. The 

 work is admirably illustrated throughout. 



Theory of the Glaciers of Savoy. By M. 

 Le Chanoine Rendu. Translated by 

 Alfred Wills. With Additions by 

 Tait, Ruskin, and Forbes. London: 

 Macmillan, 1874. Price, $3.00. 



This is a work of some historic interest, 

 being one of the earliest contributions to 

 the elucidation of glacial phenomena. The 

 merit of Rendu, as a pioneer explorer in 

 this field, is now generally recognized ; and 

 whatever of truth there was in his views 

 has been absorbed into the common Utera- 

 ture of the subject. Nevertheless, it is well 

 to have his valuable book in an accessible 



form. But we are afraid that its intrinsic 

 interest would have been insufiicient to se- 

 cure its translation, and that the reason of 

 its appearance at the present time is to be 

 sought elsewhere. The train of names upon 

 the title-page gives a clew to the purpose 

 for which it is now reproduced. A clique 

 of Scotchmen, in getting up a biography of 

 Principal Forbes, has contrived to get into 

 a quarrel with Tyndall, in regard to the al- 

 lotment of the honors of discovery, and 

 Rendu's book is now used as a means of 

 bespattering the Royal Institution pro- 

 fessor. We publish Prof. TyndalPs review 

 of the work, and readers who wish to go 

 deeper into the matter can consult the book 

 itself. 



Bulletin of the Buffalo Society of Nat- 

 ural Sciences. 



The last number of the Bulletin is 

 full of interesting matter. It contains, 

 besides other entomological contributions, 

 several papers on the study of butterflies, 

 by A. K. Grote, Samuel H. Scudder, and 

 others. In " Contributions to the Geology 

 and Physical Geography of the Lower Ama- 

 zons," Prof. C. Frederick Hartt gives some 

 valuable information on the topographical 

 features, drainage, and geological formation 

 of the Erere-Monte-Alegre district of South 

 America. The number is embellished with 

 numerous fine plates. 



Anatomy of the Invertebrata. By C. T. 

 H. V. SiEBOLD. Translated from the 

 German, Avith Additions and Notes, by 

 Waldo I. Burnett, M. D. Boston': 

 James Campbell, 1874. 8vo, pp. 470. 

 Price, $5.00. 



This work was first published in 1848, 

 and, five years later, was rendered into 

 English, with notes and additions, by an 

 American translator. Since its appearance, 

 the subject of which it treats has been rap- 

 idly advanced, twenty-five years of obser- 

 vation and active work having added hosts 

 of new facts, and, in many instances, totally 

 changed the interpretation of old ones. Yet 

 the work is now reissued in its old form, 

 without so much as a recognition of later 

 investigations, or of the changes that have 

 taken place in methods of classification. 

 The book is also defective in the total ab- 

 sence of illustrations, which are indispen- 



