LITERARY NOTICES. 



709 



phraseology that only graduates of scientific 

 schools can understand. Sucli explanations 

 as the above should be multiplied. 



A pamphlet with the title Ethereal Mat- 

 ter ; Electricity and Akasa, has been made 

 by Nils Kolkin, consisting of extracts from 

 two books by the same author (J. M. Pinck- 

 ney Co., Sioux City, Iowa, fifty cents). The 

 subjects treated are the less known forces 

 of Nature and various hypothetical sub- 

 stances, and the pamphlet will doubtless 

 have interest for those who enjoy excursions 

 into the unexplored domain of physics. 



A stirring and practical address on 77ic 

 Tcaclier as he should be, delivered by C. W. 

 Bardccn in July, 1891, has been published in 

 a pamphlet (Bardeen, Syracuse, N. Y.). The 

 drift of the address is that personality is of 

 far more importance in a teacher than pe- 

 dantically accurate knowledge on every sub- 

 ject. 



A weekly magazine, called Railway Laiv 

 and Legislation, and conducted by W. P. 

 Canaday and G. B. West, began to appear in 

 September, 1891 (712 Tenth Street, N.W., 

 Washington, D. C, $3 a year). It is con- 

 cerned with legislation, litigation, and finan- 

 cial and economic developments affecting 

 common carriers. The first article is a his- 

 torical sketch of The Nicaragua Canal Pro- 

 ject. Other subjects treated are Canadian 

 Competition and Discrimination, The Postal 

 Telegraph Bill, The Coming Committees (a 

 forecast), and various minor matters men- 

 tioned in notes. 



Among the Miscellaneous Documents of 

 the Fifty-first Congress was one entitled 

 Postal Savings- Banks ; an Argument in their 

 Favor by the Postmaster-Oeneral. The rea- 

 sons for adding the function of savings- 

 banks to the post-offices are set forth in a 

 communication of fifteen pages, and an ap- 

 pendix of seventy-two pages contains a pro- 

 posed bill to establish postal savings-banks, 

 details of such systems of banks in other 

 countries, opinions of previous postmasters- 

 general, a large number of press comments 

 concerning postal savings-banks, and some 

 minor exhibits. 



The first number of a quarterly maga- 

 zine, devoted to matters of interest to in- 

 habitants of Kansas, was published at Saii- 

 na, Kan., July, 1891 (C. B. Kirtland Pub- 

 lishmg Company, $1 a year). It is called 



Tlie Agora, and the contents of its first num- 

 ber include The Kansas " Mulligrub," by 

 Hon. William A. Phillips ; Imagination in 

 Science, by Prof. L. E. Sayre; A New So- 

 ciology, by Rev. E. C. Ray, D. D. ; " Bleeding 

 Kansas," by Prof. J. W. D. Anderson ; be- 

 sides other articles, poetry, and book notices. 



An Introductory French Reader, the ob- 

 ject of which is to prepare the pupil in the 

 shortest possible time to read French easily, 

 has been prepared by William Dioight Wliit- 

 ney and M. P. Whitney, and is published by 

 Henry Holt & Co. and F. W. Christern. The 

 exercises have been selected, with this end 

 in view, from the works of the best-known 

 French authors, choosing such passages as 

 are simple enough to present little difficulty 

 in translation, and so varied and interesting 

 as to rouse and hold attention. A full vo- 

 cabulary, in which the ordinary idiomatic 

 phrases and expressions in the text are ex- 

 plained, and a table of irregular verbs are 

 added ; while the grammatical difficulties 

 and a few literary and historical points are 

 treated in the notes. (Price, 70 cents.) 



The A B C of the Swedish System of 

 Educational Gymnastics is a practical hand- 

 book for teaching the subject, prepared by 

 Ilartvig Nissen, an experienced teacher of 

 the exercise in the public schools of Boston, 

 and published by F. A. Davis, Philadelphia. 

 The first two chapters contain such ques- 

 tions as have been frequently put to the au- 

 thor, the answers to which give a satisfac- 

 tory idea of the foundation of the system. 

 Other chapters contain prescriptions for 

 daily lessons, arranged for school classes of 

 different grades. Full instructions and com- 

 mands are given for each lesson, and the 

 whole is illustrated by seventy-seven engrav- 

 ings. (Price, 75 cents.) 



Mr. Thomas Bertrand Branson's little 

 manual of Colloquial German is designed to 

 be a drill-book in conversation for school 

 classes or self-instruction, and is intended to 

 offer in convenient form a short course in 

 that art and in German composition. It 

 contains exercises in ordinary English con- 

 versation, which the student is expected to 

 turn into German, to aid him in doing which 

 a vocabulary, a summary of grammar, and a 

 list of the irregular verbs arc added. (Pub- 

 lished by Henry Holt & Co. Price, 65 

 cents.) 



