212 



NATURE 



[April 21, 1910 



son ; but it goes without saying that he does not want 

 all this printed. A judicious selection from these 734 

 letters would have been very much more valuable than 

 this unsifted mass of important and unimportant matter. 

 There is an excellent index, which will be of great 

 use to a reader desirous of referring to any particular 

 -subject. In an appendix are given some letters about 

 the negotiations to get Gauss an appointment at 

 Berlin, and three very interesting letters from Bessel 

 to Olbers from the year 1812, which have only recently 

 been found. j. L_ g, D 



COLONIAL FRUIT-GROWING. 

 Fruit-ranching in British Columbia. By J. T. Bealby. 

 Pp. viii+196. (London: A. and C. Black, 1909.) 

 Price 35. 6d. net. 



nPHIS is a practical work on the subject of fruit- 

 J- growing in British Columbia, and we recom- 

 mend it to any who have the intention of emigrating 

 for the purpose of engaging in this healthful and 

 interesting pursuit. But not to these alone, for the 

 style in which it is written is sufficiently good to make 

 the reading agreeable to the general public. It sets 

 forth in plain but picturesque language the reasons 

 that led the rancher to select British Columbia for the 

 scene of his operations; it describes his journey out, 

 relates the difficulties the new settler had to overcome, 

 and proceeds to describe the measure of success that 

 soon attended his labours. 



This success enabled him, not only to win prizes for 

 fruit at exhibitions in British Columbia and in the 

 United States, but also to send excellent apples to the 

 Royal Horticultural Society's shows in London, and 

 gain for them the Society's gold medal! 



The figures relating to the crops obtainable per 

 acre in British Columbia are almost bewildering to the 

 cultivator in this country, who can never be certain, 

 even of a moderate return, until the danger of spring 

 frosts is past at the end of May. The difference is 

 explained by the sunnier skies, freedom from violent 

 winds and storms, and the presence of a most fertile 

 soil. The allurements these things offer are only 

 to those who are content to undertake the hard work 

 inseparable from colonisation. Unless the "tender- 

 foot" possesses a sufficient capital to enable him to 

 purchase an estate already planted, he must com- 

 mence by clearing away the trees and under-shrub 

 from his plot, and in this and all other work he must 

 improvise ways and means for carrying out the details 

 which are simple enough in a more thickly populated 

 country, but very difficult in parts of a colony in the 

 first stages of development. 



In these matters the reader will find much inter- 

 esting information in Mr. Bealby's work. He will 

 realise how important it is that the work of preparing 

 the ground shall be done in a thorough manner, and 

 that careful consideration shall be given to the plant- 

 ing of suitable trees. The settler has to take into 

 account the kinds of fruit most likely to yield profitable 

 returns, and having decided thus far he must select the 

 best varieties of each kind. He must study his 

 market, the means that exist for sending the fruits to 

 market, and the length of time they will be on transit. 

 NO. 2112, VOL. 83] 



The advice given on such matters as these is per- 

 fectly sound, and therefore calculated to assist settlers 

 very materially, provided that instead of slavishly 

 following them in detail they wisely modify them to 

 suit best their own circumstances. 



Mr. Bealby probably underestimates the cost of 

 preparing the land, but this may be expected to varv 

 in different districts, and he apoears to place too much 

 importance upon the fact that in the Kootenay and 

 Okanagan districts the fruit plantations are more free 

 from insect and fungal pests than in other localities. 

 The explanation of this comparative immunity will 

 probably be found in the newness of the land. Pests 

 are seldom epidemic unless the host-plants are present 

 in large numbers and so facilitate the spread of insects 

 or fungi, but they usually appear when the cultivator 

 has planted vast areas with th6 same kind of tree, or 

 crowded them into a hot-house, as is the case with 

 tomato and cucumber culture in our own country. 



For this same reason, the best preventive is to plant 

 thinly, allowing each tree as much isolation as can be 

 spared with due regard to the yield per acre. It is 

 satisfactory from this point of view to note that, so far 

 as can be seen from the excellent illustrations con- 

 tained in the book, it is not the practice to crowd the 

 trees together in British Columbia. The trees 

 depicted appear to have plenty of space around them, 

 therefore they are exposed well on all their sides to the 

 good influences of sunshine and air, which are con- 

 ducive to healthy growth and a free cropping habit. 



The evidence the book contains of the enormous 

 help the settler in British Columbia may expect to 

 receive from the Department of Agriculture and the 

 British Columbia Fruit-Growers' Association should 

 be an extra inducement to emigrants to select this 

 country for their new home. We hope Mr. Bealby 

 will return to the subject when he has gained further 

 experience, for it has to be noted that he has only 

 been engaged in the industry since 1907, a fact that 

 may cause some to receive his recommendations with 

 a certain amount of reserve, especially so far as they 

 relate to yields, prices, and returns. 



STEAM TABLES. 

 Tables and Diagrams of the Thermal Properties of 

 Saturated and Superheated Steam. By L. S. Marks 

 and H. N. Davis. Pp. 106. (London : Longmans, 

 Green and Co., 1909.) Price 7s. 6d. net. 



AN immense amount of painstaking work is repre- 

 sented by this little volume, which will, we 

 think, be of undoubted use to all physicists and 

 engineers who have to deal with problems involving 

 the influence of heat upon water and steam. The 

 two authors are connected respectively with the 

 engineering and physical sides of the great American 

 University of Harvard, and they have evidently 

 formed a combination well suited for such an investi- 

 gation as this. Until quite recently the only authori- 

 tative experiments over a considerable range of steam 

 pressures and temperatures were those made by 

 Regnault more than sixty years ago. We now have, 

 however, the results of later experiments by Dieterici, 

 Smith, Griffiths, Henning, Joly, Grindley, Peake, 



