146 



NA TURE 



[June 14, 1894 



the repetition of the word in the index proves that it is 

 not a mere slip of the pen. 



The same inexactness pervades his mineralogy and 

 geology ; he looks upon tungsten ore and wolfram as two 

 different minerals, and he puts down cadmium and 

 phosphorus in his list as if they occurred native. If he 

 had taken the trouble to consult the details of the official 

 statistics, which he quotes, he would have been spared 

 the erroneous statements that all the British tin comes 

 from Cornwall, and that only small quantities of zinc ore 

 are obtained in Great Britain. 



When dealing with coal-mining Prof. Lupton is standing 

 upon firmer ground, and he has brought together much 

 general information and many useful details, which will 

 render the book acceptable to students. Considering the 

 amount of matter and the number of illustrations, the 

 treatise is remarkably cheap. 



During his long stay in Japan, Prof. Milne seems to 

 have acquired the deftness of a native in packing, for it 

 is difficult to conceive how more information could have 

 been crammed into a book no bigger than a cigar-case, 

 and weighing only six and a half ounces. It is a veritable 

 miniature compendium of mining, which is likely to find 

 a place not only on the shelves, but also in the luggage of 

 most mining engineers. 



A NEW ST A NBA RD DICTION A R Y. 



A Standard Dictionary of the English Language. Vol. i. 

 (New York : Funk and Wagnall's Company, 1893). 



IT has been said that " a dictionary of language should 

 contain all the words which may be reasonably looked 

 for in it, so arranged as to be readily and surely found, 

 and so explained as to make their meaning, and if 

 possible their use, clear to those who have a competent 

 knowledge of the language or languages in which the 

 explanations are given.' In other words, a dictionary 

 should be an " inventory of language," and this being so, 

 it constitutes an index to the state of knowledge at any 

 epoch. Not so very many years ago it was held that words 

 belonging to sciences and the arts should be omitted 

 from dictionaries. The French Academy at first went 

 so far as to reject all technical terms from their 

 dictionary, though they afterwards decided to admit 

 them, and, when the Philological Society projected their 

 dictionary in 1856, they resolved to accept all English 

 words except " such as are devoted to purely scientific 

 subjects, as treatises on electricity, mathematics, &c." 

 But time has changed all that. No man is now con- 

 sidered well-informed if he is not familiar with common 

 scientific words, and therefore no work in which such a 

 sin of omission is committed deserves the name of a 

 dictionary. 



In the dictionary before us, special attention has 

 been paid to science, and words have in all cases 

 been submitted to specialists. As a guarantee of the 

 trustworthy character of the definitions, it is sufficient 

 to mention the names o( some of the eminent scientific 

 men upon the editorial staff. Among those responsible 

 for words pertaining to astronomy, physics, and mathe- 

 matics, are Prof Simon Newcomb, Prof Frank H. 

 NO. 1 285, VOL 50] 



Bigelow, Dr. A. E. Bostwick, and Prof. A. J. Kimball. 

 Meteorological definitions have been edited by Prof. 

 Mark \V. Harrington, and zoological ones have been 

 controlled by Prof. T. N. Gill, Mr. L. O. Howard, and 

 Mr. Ernest Ingersoll. Special biological terms have 

 been referred to Prof. F. Starr and C. S. DoUey. The 

 editors of botanical definitions are Prof. Frank H. 

 Knowlton, with Mr. E. F. Smith (mycology), Mr. David 

 White and Mr. W. T. Swingle (Palajozoic flora), and 

 Mr. A. A. Crozier (pomological terms). Anatomy was 

 under the editorship of Prof. Frank Baker ; bacteriology , 

 of Dr. T. M. Prudden ; medicine, of Dr. F. P. Foster ; 

 chemistry, of Prof R. O. Doremus and Dr. M. Benjamin. 

 Dr. W. Hallock and Mr. R. Gordon are responsible for 

 the formula; of colours ; Prof N. S. Shaler and W. R. 

 Dwight for geological words ; Dr. G. H. Williams and 

 Dr. W. G. Brown for mineralogy and crystallography ; 

 and Mr. G. F. Kunz for gems and precious stones. Dr. 

 G. P. Merrill has been the referee for words relating to 

 building-stones ; Mr. R. W. Pope for words used in 

 electricity ; Prof. W. H. Pettee for those belongini^ 

 to metallurgy ; Prof. Huxley has had evolution under 

 his care ; Dr. P. T. Mason, anthropology, and Mr. 

 E. Muybridge, animal locomotion. These are only a 

 few of the names of men of science who have helped m 

 the production of the dictionary. One has only to read 

 through the complete list to come to the conclusion thai 

 the projectors of the dictionary have done ever\ thills; 

 possible to render the work authoritative and uniformly 

 accurate. 



It is for us to point out the special features of the 

 dictionary as regards science. Beginning with chemistry, 

 we find that the rules adopted for the spelling and pro- 

 nunciation of chemical terms are those recommended in .1 

 resolution passed by the ChemicalSectionof the American 

 Association for the Advancement of Science, at the 

 Rochester meeting, in 1892. The following changes 

 have, therefore, been introduced. In the case of termina- 

 tions in ide the final c has been dropped, thus giving 

 chlorid, iodid, hydrid, oxid, hydroxid, sulfid, amid, &C. 

 In names of chemical elements and compounds terminat- 

 ing in inc (except doubly unsaturated hydrocarbons) the 

 final e is also dropped, and the syllable pronounced //;, as, 

 for instance, chlorin, bromin, &c. ; amin, anilin, morphin, 

 quinin, vanillin, emulsin, caffein, and cocain. The ter- 

 mination inc is retained, however, in the case of the 

 hydrocarbons referred to. Preference is given to the use 

 of/ in the pl.ace of//; in sulphur and all of its derivatives, 

 as sulfate, sulfite, sulfuric, &c. But though this system of 

 spelling has been accepted by most American chemists, 

 there is little possibility of its being generally adopted in 

 our own chemical literature. 



Handicraft terms are given with great completeness 

 and grouped under the different trades. By a new system 

 of grouping applied to the names of fruits, (lowers, coins, 

 weights, measures, stars, kSic, the facts concerning this 

 class of words are very fully given. Thus, in consli-tlation 

 Prof Newcomb gives the names of all the constellations ; 

 under apple are found the names of 368 varieties, under 

 dog the names and characteristics of all the different 

 kinds of dogs, under coin a complete list of coins, under 

 element a list of 'chemical elements, with their atomic 

 weight, specific gravity, melting points, valency, date 



