196 



NA TURE 



[June 29, 1893 



taking the editorship. The latter informs the reader 

 that the text is from Mr. Corner's copy, so far as it goes, 

 with additional matter, from the date of the arrival at 

 Batavia up to reaching England, from the Adniiralty 

 copy. 



In an interesting chapter of fifty pages Captain 

 Wharton gives a spirited sketch of Cook's life and labours 

 from his birth in 1728 to his murder in 1779. It contains 

 a list of the antiscorbutics supplied to the Endeavour, 

 and an account of the preventive measures adopted to 

 ward off sickness in his ship. It is not mentioned in it 

 that this led to his election, after his return from his second 

 voyage, to the Fellowship of the Royal Society ; before 

 which Society he communicated a paper on the above 

 measures, and another on the tides along the east coast 

 of New Holland. Nor that for the former of these he was 

 awarded the Copley medal by the President and Council, 

 the highest honour in the gift of any scientific body, and 

 the more honourable in the case of Cook, from the fact 

 of the medal having been instituted as an award for dis- 

 coveries or researches in experimental science. It is a 

 melancholy fact that Cook's departure on his third voyage 

 prevented his receiving in person this the sole public 

 recognition of his still unparalleled services. 



To dwell upon Cook's professional labours would be 

 out of place here, are they not written in his own Report? 

 which is a model of completeness and conciseness, re- 

 calling in these respects the Wellington despatches. 

 There is a reason for the minutest detail, down to the 

 naming of islands, bays, straits, and inlets, with the re- 

 sult of these being as appropriate as are Linnd's names 

 of animals and plants. 



Captain Wharton has further illustrated his work with 

 valuable footnotes and facsimiles of some of Cook's 

 original charts, as of the Society Islands and New Zealand, 

 making that of the Australian coasts specially inter- 

 esting by placing on the same sheets parallel with Cook's 

 chart of 1770 one corrected up to 1890, and reduced to 

 the same scale, thus showing the marvellous approximate 

 accuracy of the former. It is to be regretted that no list 

 of the charts and plates is appended to that of the chap- 

 ters into which, for convenience, Captain Wharton has 

 divided the Report. It is difficult to find some of these 

 in a work printed on thick paper with uncut edges ; and 

 without such a list there is no assurance that a copy is 

 perfecf. 



In the preface, Captain Wharton says (p. vii) " that 

 it has several times been in contemplation to publish Mr. 

 (afterwards Sir Joseph) Banks' Journal, but this has never 

 been accomplished," and again (p. xxvi) that the said 

 Journal " cannot at the present time be traced." This was, 

 till the other day, true. Captain Wharton had spared no 

 trouble in his endeavours to trace it ; and the writer of this 

 notice had, at intervals, for many years past pursued the 

 same object, he having a personal interest in its discovery, 

 as being one of the few persons living who had seen it. Its 

 history he believes to be the following. On Sir Joseph 

 Hanks' death, without issue, in 1820, his effects passed to 

 the KnatcbbuU family, with the exception of his extensive 

 Herbarium, Library, and the lease of his house in Soho 

 Square, which were left to the late eminent botanist, Mr. 

 Robert Brown, who had been for many years Banks' 

 librarian, with the proviso that the Herbarium and Library 

 NO. 1235, VOL. 48] 



were to be eventually deposited in the British Museum. 

 The Banksian correspondence and papers, including the 

 Report, were thereupon confided to Mr. Brown, with 

 the object of his writing a Life of Banks. Age and in- 

 firmities interfered with the prosecution of the work; and 

 the materials were for the same object transferred, in the 

 year 1833, to my maternal grandfather, Mr. Dawson 

 Turner, F.R.S., a naturalist, and man of high literary at- 

 tainments, in whose house I aided in the collation of a 

 copy of the Journal, which he had caused to be made, 

 with the original. In Mr. Turner's case they met 

 the same fate as in Mr. Brown's, and they were then 

 placed in the hands of the late Prof. Thomas Bell, 

 secretary of the Royal Society, and who succeeded 

 Brown as President of the Linnaeah, in the hope that 

 he would undertake a Life of Banks. After retaining 

 the materials for some time he declined the task, but 

 before returning them (in 1857 or 1858) he submitted 

 them to Mr. John Ball, F.R.S., who also declined. 

 Nothing further was known to me or to Captain Wharton 

 of their history until last week, when (having previously 

 been misinformed on this point) I ascertained that the 

 original of all Banks' correspondence and of his Journal 

 of the Endeavour's voyage, were in the MS. Depart- 

 ment of the British Museum, and the aforesaid copy in 

 the Natural History Department of the same Institution. 

 It only remains to add the hope that this gratifying 

 intelligence may lead to the publication of Banks' Report 

 uniformly with Captain Wharton's admirable edition of 

 Cook's. J. D. Hooker. 



OUR BOOK SHELF. 



The Soil in Relation to Health. By H. A. Miers, M..\., 

 F.G.S., F.C.S., and R. Crosskey, M.A., D.P.H. (Lon- 

 don: Macmillan and Co., 1893.) 

 The attractive title of this little book speaks for itself, 

 indicating that it is one of those numerous endeavours 

 which are being made at the present day to supply just 

 such an amount of information in several different sciences 

 as will satisfy the requirements of men engaged in some 

 particular department of practical life. In the present 

 case it is a combination of chemistry, geology, and bac- 

 teriology which is offered for the benefit of the sanitary 

 officer. The task undertaken by the authors is obviously 

 a difficult one, and, if the book be regarded as a mere 

 outline stimulating the reader to more extended and 

 special study, they may be said to have accomplished this 

 task with a fair degree of success. Our knowledge of 

 the chemical and biological changes taking place in the 

 soil has, during recent years, been so much increased, and 

 is in some respects so complete, that it might have been 

 anticipated that much of this book would have been de- 

 voted to a clear exposition of such matters as nitrification 

 and denitrification, the micro-organisms of water, their 

 removal by filtration and other agencies, the purification 

 of sewage, &c. As a matter of fact, the account given of 

 nitrification is incomplete, whilst of the other subjects 

 referred to above, and which are of such cardinal im- 

 portance in connection with sanitary science, we find 

 hardly any mention whatsoever. On the other hand, 

 there are long passages devoted to such speculative mat- 

 ters as the causes of epidemic infantile diarrhoea, the 

 connection between typhoid and the depression of ground- 

 water, the relationship between soil and the prevalence of 

 cancer and phthisis, &c. In the chapter on water-supply 

 we are informed that the water from the magnesian lime- 



