LITERARY NOTICES. 



707 



that book appeared (1871) is much too late 

 to be taken as " the proper origin of the 

 science." Quotations from A. R. Wallace 

 beginning in 1871 come next, and are fol- 

 lowed by some from Haeckel beginning in 

 1874. Having thus examined the theories of 

 what our author calls "the great original 

 authorities," he proceeds with " writers who 

 have turned these theories to account and 

 elaborated them." In this second group of 

 writers he places Herbert Spencer first, and 

 says, " In treating of Mr. Spencer's work, it 

 is necessary to begin with a book which 

 made its appearance before the publication 

 of the Origin of Species, namely, Social Stat- 

 ics (1851)." Mr. Williams's designation of 

 Darwin as ' the first laborer in this line " 

 needs no further comment. The views of 

 Spencer are then presented as found in his 

 Social Statics (both the 1851 and the recent- 

 ly revised edition), his Collected Essays, The 

 Man versus the State, The Principles of Psy- 

 chology, the several divisions of The Princi- 

 ples of Ethics, and one or two minor writ- 

 ings. By letting Spencer speak for himself 

 in quotations our author secures a nearly 

 correct representation of his ethical theory, 

 but he states that Spencer in the original 

 Social Statics "advocates the nationalization 

 of land," and neglects to say that Spencer 

 has since repeatedly abjured this doctrine, 

 and leaves nothing in the revised edition that 

 can be construed as supporting it. More 

 space is found needful for Spencer, forty- 

 eight pages, than for any other writer repre- 

 sented. John Fiske is taken up next, and 

 the theories of the other authors noticed fol- 

 low in the order in which they are named 

 above. 



The treatise which forms the second part 

 of this work is one in which a wealth of data 

 has been used, and a highly instructive and 

 suggestive result has been attained. The 

 author begins by examining the operation of 

 heredity and variation in evolution, and 

 passes next to a consideration of intelligence 

 and " end." Among the other topics con- 

 sidered are the mutual relations of thought, 

 feeling, and will in evolution, egoism, altru- 

 ism, and conscience. There is an interesting 

 chapter on The Moral Progress of the Hu- 

 man Species as shown by History, in which 

 the morals of ancient Greece and Rome and 

 mediaeval England are shown to have been 



far below modern standards. In the closing 

 chapter, on attainment of the ideal, the 

 author touches upon a variety of considera- 

 tions, and ends with some helpful words on 

 the transition from the belief in a personal 

 immortality to the expectation of persisting 

 after death only as an influence upon those 

 remaining in life. 



So valuable a book should not have been 

 issued without an index. 



ON THE OLD FRONTIER, OR THE LAST RAID 

 OF THE IROQUOIS. By WILLIAM 0. STOD- 

 DARD. Pp. 340. Price, $1.50. New 

 York : D. Appleton & Co. 



THIS is a novel dealing with frontier life 

 in Revolutionary times, when most of the 

 fighting men were with Washington in the 

 East, and the frontiers were therefore very 

 weakly garrisoned. It describes the motives 

 and nature of a raid by the Indians on a set- 

 tlement known as Plum Creek. 



The hero is a boy, who was stolen by the 

 Indians when very young and brought up 

 among them. He finally escapes and makes 

 his way to Plum Creek, where he is adopted 

 by the gunsmith of the settlement. He is 

 able, by reason of his Indian training, to 

 render valuable assistance to the settlers 

 during the skirmishes preceding the con- 

 centrated attack, and just at the last, when 

 the fort is about to fall into the hands of 

 the Indians, he appears with a detachment 

 of United States troops and saves its in- 

 mates, besides giving the death blow to the 

 Indian raids. He then discovers a relative 

 in the commanding officer of the soldiers, 

 and learns that his family, which he had 

 supposed were massacred at the time of his 

 abduction, are alive, and mourning his early 

 demise. The characters speak in dialect, 

 and the book is well illustrated. 



The story is " a fiction founded on fact." 



After an interval of seven years the first 

 volume of the History of the Theory of Elas- 

 ticity, by the late Isaac Todhunter, has been 

 followed by the two parts of Volume II (Mac- 

 millan, $7.50). The manuscript that Dr. 

 Todhunter left has been edited and com- 

 pleted by Prof. Karl Pearson, the physical 

 and technical branches of the subject being 

 wholly the work of the editor, likewise the 

 general history of the subject after the date 



