Feb. 2, 1888] 



NATURE 



Z^^l 



necessity for systematic inquiry into its processes became 

 obvious in this country. The publication of Dr. F 

 Kick's supplement to his treatise " Die Mehlfabrication," 

 which tabulated the improvements in machinery for pre- 

 paring and grinding cereals introduced up to the year 

 1883, placed at the disposal of the translator a manual 

 complete in its investigations into the nature of grain 

 from the miller's technical standpoint, and into the best 

 means of reducing it to flour. It is true that the book 

 does not concern itself with the construction of the mill 

 building nor with the motive power to be employed ; but, 

 from this point onward, the leading principles which 

 should guide the milling engineer are carefully* and 

 accurately related, and their application justified when 

 necessary by mathematical demonstration ; the rationale 

 at the same time being within the comprehension of 

 the practical miller. Of this method the chapters on 

 " balancing millstones " (p. 113), and on "disintegrators " 

 (supplement, p. 25), afford admirable examples. The 

 various operations of grain preparation, grinding, and of 

 bolting, sifiing, and dressing the meal, with descriptions 

 and plates of the best known machines employed, are 

 fully detailed, whilst -the controversy between the advo- 

 cates of " high " milling and " low " milling is discreetly 

 adjusted by the author in the incidental remark that 

 " which of these methods is to be used can only be settled 

 by the local demand, if, as is generally the case, the mill 

 works for the home market." 



It is, however, to those portions of the work which 

 relate to roller-mills that the reader at the present time 

 will probably turn in the first instance. He will find here, 

 not only information as to the various kinds in use and as 

 to the manner in which they have been found to perform 

 their work, but an intelligible account of the operations 

 involved in the reduction of cereals by rollers, and good 

 reason shown why the time honoured millstones have 

 become almost entirely discarded in the manufacture of 

 wheaten flour. 



The book is very fully illustrated by woodcuts through- 

 out the text, and by some thirty supplementary sheets of 

 diagrams; whiilst a preliminary chapter contributed by Dr. 

 August Vogel, of Vienna, on the histology of farinaceous 

 grains, adds completeness to the work. 



We congratulate the translator on his introducing to 

 the English reader a volume of the utmost value to millers 

 and engineers, and of great interest to many other 

 persons more or less concerned with this important 

 industry. 



Elements of Chemistry : a Text-book for Beginners. By 

 Ira Remsen. (London : Macmillan and Co., 1887.) 



Opinions no doubt differ much as to what is simple 

 enough for a beginner. A good deal depends on the age 

 of the beginner. We hold, in opposition to the author 

 in his preface, that the present production is not well 

 adapted for very young pupils. 



There is a good deal of promise in the book which 

 might be better fulfilled, and there is an attempt to cover 

 far too large a field, with the result — not intended by the 

 author — that it reads more like a book on general chemical 

 information than an elementary introduction to chemistry. 



Metals and non-metals are dealt with under " family " 

 groups, and most of their common, and many uncommon, 

 compounds described, generally with formulas, and this in 

 cases and with equations which cannot be termed simple ; 

 for instance, technical processes like soda-making, or 

 bleaching powder, or potassium chlorate, or nitro-benzene, 

 &c. Otherwise the order and arrangement of matter and the 

 questions attached to each section are most excellent, and 

 the book would be most useful even for general reading, 

 exercise, and information on the chemistry of common 

 things to the great mass of partially informed, ordinarily 

 well educated, people of any age. To the senior boys of 

 public schools, who have already had a little instruction 



in science, this book would be really useful, as taking 

 them in a different manner over ground already partially 

 covered, widening their general knowledge, and culti- 

 vating the main thing, " thinking. " 



A Primary Geometry, with Simple and Practical 

 Examples in Plane ajid Projection Drawing, and 

 suited to all Beginfters. By S. E. Warren, C.E. 

 (New York : Wi'ley and Sons ; London : Triibner, 

 1887.) 



This work bears as motto, " Geometry should be begun 

 as early and as simply in behalf of industrial life as arith- 

 metic is in behalf of business life"; and its object is, 

 accordingly, to contribute to a general earlier beginning 

 of the study of geometry. " The truths oiform, as needed 

 in drawing, have been made prominent, while not neglect- 

 ing elementary ones of measure^'' 



The text treats of straight lines, triangles, regular 

 figures, areas, lines and planes in space, the elementary 

 bodies, and projections of elementary solids, the subject 

 being considered in a common-sense fashion without 

 much use of purely geometrical proofs. Having perused 

 a very large portion of his book without detecting any 

 flaw, we consider the author competent for the task he has 

 undertaken, but we do not take kindly to such present- 

 ments of geometry. We believe, however, the book to be 

 well adapted to junior pupils as an introduction to the 

 study, and also to artisans and others who are likely to be 

 able to grasp the illustrations given better than they 

 would purely geometrical proofs for which their ante- 

 cedents have not prepared them. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



[The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions 

 expressed by his correspondents. Neither can he under- 

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

 rejected manuscripts. No notice is taken of anonymous 

 communications. 



[The Editor urgently requests correspondents to keep their 

 letters as short as possible. The pressure on his spcue 

 is so great that it is impossible otherwise to insure the 

 appearance even of communications containing interesting 

 and novel facts. 



The Duke of Argyll's Charges against Men of Science. 



I REGRET to find that the Duke of Argyll has once more 

 evaded the point at issue. The question is one not ol formulas 

 but oi facts. If the statements upon which his Grace bases the 

 severe strictures of his "Great Lesson" were true, I for one 

 should take no exception to any "metaphorical or rhetorical 

 expression " by which he chose to enforce his lesson. 



Three months have elapsed since the Duke's attention was 

 directed to the discussions which during the last seven years 

 have taken place upon the subject of Mr. Murray's theory of 

 coral reefs — and especially to that one in which the Director- 

 General of our Geological Survey, and the most eminent of 

 American geologists, Prof. J. D. Dana, bore the leading parts ; 

 the Duke has been referred to the scientific journals in which 

 this and the other discussions have been carried on ; and the 

 fact has been pointed out to him that all the principal text-books 

 of geology, foreign as well as British, which have been published 

 since the theory was announced, have given it a prominent 

 position in their pages. In the face of these facts, is the Duke 

 of Argyll still prepared to maintain that, with respect to the 

 theory in question, there has been "a grudging silence as far 

 as public discussion is concerned" ; that there has been "a 

 silence of any effective criticism" ; and that "no serious reply 

 has ever been attempted"? If his Grace admits that he was 

 mistaken in making these assertions, is he prepared to withdraw 

 them and also the comments which he has based upon them ? 



Instead of doing anything of the kind up to the present, the 

 Duke of Argyll has fathered two stories about the wrong-doings 

 of geologists — both of which stories have as little foundation in 

 fact as his statements in " the Great Lesson." 



