42 



NATURE 



Feb. 



1890 



native life and temperament which is the special and most 

 valuable characteristic of the Danish explorer's record. 

 Moreover, Mr. Giles had to pass through much desert 

 country, the description of which could have been invested 

 with charm only by a writer of genius. The book, how- 

 ever, shows that he has the courage, resource, and spirit 

 of enterprise which are absolutely essential to an explorer, 

 and here and there his story is lighted up by what he has 

 to say about the few well-watered and pleasant tracts of 

 land through which he passed duringhis various journeys. 

 His explorations were necessary links in the chain of 

 Australian geographical research, and he has acted wisely 

 in preparing a full and accurate account of them. The 

 value of the work is considerably increased by maps and 

 illustrations. 



New Zealand for the Emigrant, Invalid, and Tourist. 

 By John Murray Moore, M.D. (London: Sampson 

 Low and Co., 1890.) 



Dr. Moore spent nine years in New Zealand, and 

 not only enjoyed his stay, but derived from it renewed 

 health and vigour. When, therefore, he began to set 

 down the results of his observation and experience, he 

 was in the right mood for the production of a genial 

 and appreciative record ; and his book ought to be of 

 considerable service to each of the three classes men- 

 tioned on the title-page. The most original parts of 

 the work are two chapters, in one of which he indi- 

 cates the various climatic zones into which New Zealand 

 as a health-resort is divisible, while in the other he 

 presents a full account of the characters and therapeutic 

 achievements of the principal thermal springs of the North 

 Island. Both of these chapters will be read with interest 

 by medical men, and by invalids who may feel disposed, 

 as the author puts it in the rhetorical style he sometimes 

 affects, to " fly on the wings of steam to the realm of the 

 Southern Cross." He gives a good description of Auck- 

 land, " the Naples of New Zealand," and sets forth plea- 

 santly and effectively the impressions produced upon him 

 during excursions to the hot lakes and terraces, and to 

 the west coast Sounds. An instructive chapter is 

 devoted to the volcanic eruption of Mount Tarawera, 

 and Dr. Moore offers much valuable information about 

 self-government in New Zealand, and the settlement of 

 the land ; and about social life, public works and institu- 

 tions, productions and industries. The volume includes 

 several maps, in one of which are shown New Zealand's 

 climatic zones. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



\Tht Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions ex- 

 pressed by his correspondents. Neither can he undertake 

 to return, or to correspond with the writers of, rejected 

 manuscripts intended for this or any other part of Nature, 

 No notice is taken of anonymous communications. ^ 



A Key to the Royal Society Catalogue. 



In his anniversary address to the Royal Society, the President, 

 referring to the great catalogue of scientific papers, used these 

 words : — " The utility of the work would obviously be much 

 increased if it could be furnished with some sort of key, enabling 

 persons to find what had been written on particular subjects. I 

 am n )t without hopes that this very desirable object may yet be 

 accomplished, notwithstanding the magnitude of any such under- 

 taking." Almost everyone engaged in scientific research must 

 have felt the want of such a key, and will join in the President's 

 hopes. My present object is to suggest a scheme for supplying 

 the want at comparatively little trouble and expense. 



A complete subject index, arranged in alphabetical order, 

 would indeed be a great undertaking. The subdivisions being 

 minute, most of the papers would have to be catalogued more 

 than once, and, even if the references were only to the name of 

 the author and the number of the paper in the present catalogue, 



the new catalogue would probably be as large as the old. The 

 key that I suggest would be much smaller, and yet in many cases 

 more convenient. The proposal can hardly be novel, but its 

 advantages may not have been fully realized. Divide up the 

 whole of science into some 5000 heads, classified in their natural 

 order underthe various branches — pure mathematics, astronomy, 

 physics, chemistry, &c. Under each head place the names of the 

 writers who have treated of the subject, with the dates of their 

 earliest and latest papers thereon. If the heads are skilfully 

 selected it will seldom be necessary to classify a paper under 

 more than one head. 



Some idea of the size of the suggested work may be gained 

 from the following considerations. In the eight volumes of the 

 catalogue at present published (1800-63 and 1863-73) are the 

 names of about 57,000 authors, treating the names in the second 

 part as entirely new. Of these, about 30,000 have only one 

 paper each, and the remaining 27,000 average about eight papers 

 each. In view of the tendency of all writers to devote them- 

 selves to special subjects, three heads seem a fair allowance for 

 the papers of each of the 27,000 authors. We have thus 1 1 1,000 

 authors' names to be catalogued under 5000 heads, giving an 

 average of about 22 names to each head. Such a list, printed 

 in the style of the present catalogue, but with three columns 

 instead of two in a page, would fill a volume of about 800 pages. 

 Each of the present volumes contains about looo pages, and is 

 sold at 20s,, which we are told covers the cost of the paper and 

 printing. If the sections devoted to the various sciences — 

 chemistry, geology, &c. — were published separately, the sale 

 would probably be large. 



With regard to the use of this list, the labour of looking up 

 20 or even 50 names in the main catalogue would generally be 

 trifling compared with the unavoidable labour of reading the 

 actual papers when the references had been found. In many 

 cases the dates would show at once that certain authors need not 

 be referred to. Even if we had a complete alphabetical subject 

 index, it would be necessary to think of every possible word by 

 which the particular subject in question might be denoted, so 

 that the classified list, though more troublesome at first, would 

 often prove more satisfactory in the end. With 5000 heads for 

 the whole of science, perhaps 750 might be allotted to physics, 

 and of these, 150 to light. This would admit of such sub- 

 divisions as velocity of light, colour sensation, fluorescence, 

 selective reflection, magnetic rotation of the plane of polariza- 

 tion, &c. Those subdivisions should be selected, into which 

 the actual papers most naturally fall, rather than those which 

 seem ideally correct. 



The labour of preparing such a list as I propose would be in 

 itself considerable, but, compared with the colossal enterprise 

 which the Royal Society has already carried out, it would be 

 small, and the service to science would be great. 



Hotel Buol, Davos, James C. McConnel, 



Osteolepidae. 

 The letter of your correspondent " R. L. -f E." somewhat 

 misses the issue raised in the passage to which he refers. In 

 that passage the question was not raised whether or no we are 

 right in making family names from the inflected form of the 

 generic ones, the sole contention being for uniformity in this 

 respect. Thus, if we are right in making Rhizodontida: {z.XiA not 

 Rhizodid(2\ {torn Rhizodtts, we clearly ought to have Ostcolepidida- 

 (and not Osteolepida:) from Osteolepis, both these generic names 

 being precisely analogous compounds. If, on the other hand, 

 your corresp mdent is right in saying that we should regard all 

 such names as adjectival, then we ought at once to abolish family 

 names MlVlq Macropodida:, Dasypodidcc, Octodontldcc, &c. , in favour 

 oi Macropidcc, DasyptdcB, and Octodidcr. R. L. 



There can be no question that " R. L, + E." is himself 

 mistaken in his arbitrary assumption of a rule for the formation 

 of compound adjectives in Greek. Sometimes the lengthened 

 genitive is used as the stem, as in hiawtmros ("disomatus ") ; 

 sometimes the short nominative stem is employed, as in Sitrro/ios 

 ("distomus ") ; and sometimes both forms occur side by side, as 

 <l>t\aifj.aTos ('* philsematus ") and (p'lKaifjLos (" philsemus "), the 

 former seeming to be preferred. These are words actually in 

 use in Greek writers, and any lexicon will give plenty of other 

 instances. But his whole argument is beside the point ; the 

 question is not whether an adjective is formed from the lengthened 

 genitive, but whether an adjective, formed from a noun 



