THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



sessing gifts direct from the hand of God, 

 for which he is a specially selected and or- 

 dained recipient, either a fool, a fanatic, or 

 a rascal ? " 



The Religious Herald (Hartford, Conn.) 

 presents to its subscribers as a souvenir of 

 fifty years' publication of the paper, a large 

 and profusely illustrated volume entitled Pic- 

 turesque Chicago and Guide to the World's 

 Fair. It consists of descriptions of the city, 

 its parks, benevolences, business houses, in- 

 stitutions, and other peculiar features, illus- 

 trated by more than fifty photographic re- 

 productions. The mechanical execution is of 

 the most pleasing character. 



A view of what some socialistic agitators 

 might do if they had opportunity is given in 

 a little book entitled Is it Right to rob Rob- 

 bers? by Morrison L. Swift, published by 

 the Commonwealth Society, Boston. The 

 ''robbers" of the story are capitalist em- 

 ployers. A plot formed by a few clerks to 

 steal regularly from the moneys of their con- 

 cerns and distribute the sums among the 

 needy, spreads till it includes nearly all the 

 employed and vast corporative concerns have 

 been built up out of the proceeds, " labor " 

 has found its level as high as capital, and all 

 of society manufacturers, the legal profes- 

 sion, education, and what not are affected 

 by the conditions developed. Detection 

 comes at last ; capital shows its cruel hand 

 in the prosecution of the thieves, now num- 

 bering many thousands ; convulsions and al- 

 most revolution follow, till at last insolent 

 capital is forced to yield and share in the 

 universal partnership. 



No. 10 of the third volume of Werner's 

 Readings and Recitations, compiled and ar- 

 ranged by Caroline B. Le Row, (quarterly, 

 Edgar S. Werner, 28 West Twenty-third 

 Street, New York), is known as America's 

 Recitation Book, and includes pieces, by 

 American authors only, on great events in 

 the history of our country, arranged accord- 

 ing to the chronology. The pieces are classi- 

 fied as relating to Discoveries, Settlements, 

 French and Indian Wars, Revolutionary War 

 and Declaration of Independence, the War 

 of 1812 and the Mexican War, and the Civil 

 War and Emancipation Proclamation. 



The Conversations on some of the Old 

 Poets were published by Mr. /. R. Lowell in 

 1845, and again in a revised edition in 1846; 



and were reprinted in London in 1845. They 

 were afterward allowed to pass out of print. 

 Mr. Lowell did not include them in his col- 

 lected works, regarding them as in a measure 

 superseded by his later and more mature 

 writings on like subjects. They have, how- 

 ever, a value and interest that have not been 

 lessened by time or by the author's growth 

 in fame ; and although a self-restraint with 

 which we can find no fault may have pre- 

 vented the author from pressing his thoughts 

 on the same subjects twice upon the public, 

 often greatly modified the second time and 

 perhaps contradictory of the first impression 

 such scruple need not now exist to exclude 

 the reading public from what is really a very 

 enjoyable and instructive series of essays. 

 The conversational form was adopted partly 

 because the essays were discursive, and part- 

 ly to enable them to be so without violation 

 of the canons of literary propriety. They 

 have their faults, which appertain to the 

 youthfulness of the author at the time he 

 wrote them ; but, as the present publishers 

 well say, Mr. Lowell's reputation can better 

 afford the faults than our literature can 

 afford the suppression of the work. The 

 present edition is published, with an intro- 

 duction by Robert Ellis Thompson, by David 

 McKay, Philadelphia. 



PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED. 



Agricultural Experiment Stations. Bulletins: 

 Michigan. Potatoes, by P. M. Harwood. Pp. 20. 

 Mass chusetts. Meteorological Summary. May 

 and June, 1892-1893. Pp. 8. Iowa. Various Arti- 

 cles. Pp. 84. 



"A. L. A. 11 Library. Catalogue, 5,000 volumes 

 for a Popular Library. Washington : U. S. Bu- 

 reau of Education. Pp. 260. 



The Altruistic Review. Monthly. Chicago. 

 Pp. 45. 20 cents; $2 a year. 



American Chemical Society. Journal. March, 

 1893. Pp. 40. $5 a year. 



Arnold, Matthew. Sohrab and Rustum. Amer- 

 ican Book Company. Pp. 44. 20 cents. 



Beal, Dr. W. J. Report of the Botanical De 

 partment, etc., University of Michigan Pp. 37. 



Bolton, Henry Carrington. A Select Bibliogra- 

 phy of Chemistry, 1492-1892. Washington : 

 Smithsonian Institution. Pp. 1212. 



Bottome, S. R. Electricity and Magnetism. A 

 Popular Introduction. Macmillan & Co. Pp. 203. 

 90 cents. 



Bradley, F. H. Appearance and Reality. Mac- 

 millan & Co. Pp. 558. $1.75. 



Clerke, Agnes M. A Popular History of As- 

 tronomy during the Nineteenth Century. Lon- 

 don : Adam and Charles Black. Pp. 573. 



Cleveland, The Duchess of. The True Story of 

 Kaspar Hauser. Macmillan & Co. Pp. 112. $1.50. 



Cummins, W. F. Notes on the Geology of 

 Northwest Texas. Austin : Geological Survey of 

 Texas. Pp. 60. 



