566 



NATURE 



LUcruHtK 20, 1923 



week. Every paper received is, however, sent to a 

 contributor familiar with the general subject and not 

 likely, therefore, to overlook anything of outstanding 

 importance. Our columns of Research Items, and 

 short articles which follow them, represent the result 

 of such eclectic surveys of a body of literature which 

 increases in volume every week, and from which 

 limitations of space permit only a few specific points 

 to be described. Nothing more can be reasonably 

 expected in a general scientific newspaper such as 

 Nature, the main appeal of which is to the scientific 

 world as a whole and not to a specialised section of it. 

 It is even more difficult to decide how to deal with 

 the great mass of scientific books now published than 

 it is with papers. Within the past four weeks, for 

 example, we have received no less than 150 volumes, 

 almost all of which have distinct characteristics and 

 many of which merit extended notice, on account 

 either of the positions of the authors or the interest 

 of the subjects. It is obviously impossible, however, 

 for us to review more than a fraction of these volumes 

 without destroying the balance and the character of 

 our columns. Our monthly list of Recent Scientific 

 and Technical Books includes bibliographic details of 

 every book received, as well as of others, and this 

 should serve as general guidance to the various works 

 being issued on scientific subjects. By publishing 

 all these titles we are able to do for books what it 

 is impossible to undertake for single papers or memoirs. 

 As regards reviews, experience shows that those of 

 the essay type, which deal with the subjects of the 

 books broadly and descriptively, are most widely read, 

 and therefore serve the best purposes of both author 

 and publisher. Summaries of the contents of the 

 various chapters of a book, with comments upon them, 

 are more appropriate in prospectuses and advertise- 

 ments than in the columns of a journal which aims 

 at interesting its readers in the progress of science 

 generally, and not alone in the special portion of the 

 field in which they are themselves working. A review 

 should, however, be a judgment as well as a descrip- 

 tion ; for readers are guided by it in their decision 

 whether to add the book to their libraries or not. 

 Differences of temperament are sometimes responsible 

 for the same volume being praised by one reviewer 

 and condemned by another of equal authority. Some 

 reviewers are always kind, while others are always 

 critical, looking for faults rather than for points worthy 

 of commendation. To this class belonged the reviewer 

 who concluded his notice with the words " We have 

 not found any mistakes, but no doubt there are some." 

 If a book contains a large number of errors, probably 

 the best plan is to neglect it altogether. We prefer 

 not to print lists of such errors, but to send them [ 



NO. 2816, VOL. I 12] 



to the author or publisher, who is always grateful to 

 know of necessar)' corrections of this kind. 



The authors who are never satisfied with the treat- 

 ment which their works receive arc those who > 

 elaborate theories, or assert new principles, u 

 suflScient knowledge to understand how untenable 

 their views are. If their works are not noticed, author^ 

 of this type nourish the grievance that there is a 

 conspiracy of the scientific world against them. \\ \- 

 useless to publish a short notice stating that the work 

 has no scientific value or is fundamentally unsound. 

 What such authors expect are discussions in detail 

 of the points they raise, though no one eke would be 

 likely to be interested in such discussions. 



From our point of view, the size of a book affords 

 no standard of the space which may appropriate! v 

 be given to it. Interest of the subject and distinc- 

 tion of the author are the chief claims to attention. 

 A slender volume may thus be more worthy of extended 

 notice in the form of an essay review than one of .1 

 thousand or more pages. With the best intention in 

 the world, however, space cannot be found for adequate 

 notice of all such works now published. Necessit\ . 

 and not inclination, determines what can be dealt with 

 in this way, and from the rest it is only possible to 

 select some for notice in our Bookshelf columns. What 

 we particularly desire authors and publishers to under- 

 stand is that the sending of a book for review creates 

 no obligation to publish a notice of it. /Vll that we 

 can undertake is to examine the book and to send it 

 to a reviewer with an invitation to contribute a re\iew 

 of a prescribed length, or to include it in a parcel of 

 books with a request to select a few of the best for 

 notice. The rest appear only in our monthly lists. 



Even with these limitations, the congestion of 

 reviews and minor notices is always severe, and we 

 are never able to outrun the flood of literature which 

 continually threatens to overwhelm us. It would be 

 easy to publish every week an equal number of reNiews 

 and other notices to that included in the present 

 issue, and yet not exhaust the pile of books which 

 merit consideration. Critical minds may deplore this 

 abundance of printed pages, but to us it seems that 

 most of the books have some original characteristics 

 of style, substance or treatment, and we must confess 

 to a feeling of sympathetic regret for the authors whose 

 works have often to be dismissed somewhat summarily, 

 purely on account of considerations of space. They 

 should be as grateful as we are that leading workers 

 in all branches of science are willing to examine books 

 carefully, and to make some of the volumes subjects 

 of such interesting and useful notices as those which 

 continually appear in the columns of Nature, and are 

 represented by the reviews included in the present issue. 



