•94 



NATURE 



[December 27, 1894 



example of this is seen in the authors' treatment of the 

 eudiometric synthesis of water vpp. ;4.6-25o). The actual 

 details of an experiment are given, with the experiment- 

 ally determined data, and the conclusion to be drawn is 

 then stated. It is much to be regretted that the authors 

 do not quote the results obtained by Scott regarding the 

 volumes of hydrogen and oxygen which combine to form 

 water, but content themselves with the less recent, and 

 certainly less accurate, measurements made by Morley 

 (P- =50- 



The authors would have done well to have fol- 

 lowed their own practice elsewhere, and to have given 

 moderately complete details of the methods, and the data, 

 whereby the atomic weight of each element has been de- 

 termined. In describing the electrolysis of dilute sul- 

 phuric acid solution (pp. 45, 129, 251), the authors might 

 have more clearly insisted on the fact that the electric cur- 

 rent is employed to set free hydrogen and oxygen froin 

 an aqueous solution of sulphuric acid, and that they had 

 not, following it is true almost every other text-book, 

 spoken of the phenomena as the electrolysis of water. 



Chemical equations convey, at the best, only a small 

 portion of the information one wishes to have regarding 

 chemical occurrences : but, by the simple devices of using 

 three kinds of type, and adopting a symbol to represent 

 an aqueous solution of a substance, these equations may 

 be made to tell much more than is conveyed to the 

 reader by the equations used in this " Treatise.'' 



In the extract from their preface already quoted, the 

 authors say that they enter into "a discussion of chemical 

 theory so far as the size of the work and the transition 

 stale of the science permit." The subject-matter of 

 chemistry is so large, and the difficulties of bringing the 

 vast array of facts into a focus are so great, that the 

 science is likely to continue for a long time in a transi- 

 tion state, and the principles of chemistry to continue to 

 be, as they are at present, rather a number of somewhat 

 loosely attached hypotheses than an harmonious and 

 binding theory. Nevertheless, more unity might profit- 

 ably have been given to the chapter on the " General 

 Principles of the Science." Many portions of this 

 chapter are admirable ; the whole of it is characterised 

 by lucidity. The portions dealing with the laws of com- 

 bination and the Daltonian atomic theory are especially 

 excellent. Brief but very clear accounts are given of 

 the experimental methods for determining molecular 

 weights, including the methods which are based on 

 van't Hoff's extension to dilute solutions of the law of 

 Avogadro. In connexion with the molecular condition 

 of substances in solution, there is a deliciously airy note 

 (p. Ill) : " P'or the literature of this subject the volumes 

 of the Zcitschri/t Jiir Physikalischc Clicmie . . . may be 

 consulted." The student who proceeds, with a light heart, 

 to consult the journal in question will find he has his 

 work cut out for him. 



The book, taken as a whole, is admirable. The sure 

 position that the earlier editions of the " Treatise " have 

 taken in chemical literature has shown how much the 

 work was wanted, and how cordially it has been welcomed 

 by chemists. It is sufficient to say that this, the first 

 volume of the revised edition, well maintains the repu- 

 tation of the original " Roscoe and Schorlemmer." 



M. M. Patiison Muir. 

 NO. 1313, VOL. 51] 



MAN-THE PRIMEVAL SAVAGE. 

 Man — the Primex'al Savage. By Worthington G 



Smith. (London: Stanford, 1894.) 

 ]\ r R. WORTHINGTON SMITH has devoted him- 

 •'■'J- self for many years to a study of the localities 

 near London where implements have been found, and 

 has described the various paheolithic floors with great 

 minuteness, and illustrated them with great artistic skill. 

 In this book he brings all his previous discoveries 

 together, and groups them round his last work at 

 Caddington, near Dunstable, on the borders of Hert- 

 fordshire and Bedfordshire. He has presented to us a 

 monograph on palx-olithic camping-places, rather than a 

 general treatise on Man, the Primeval Savage. 



The pahtolithic floor at Caddington was buried under a 

 depth of clay, sand and gravel, amounting in some 

 places to thirteen feet from the surface. The strata 

 occur in the following order from the surface : (i) Con- 

 torted drift ; (2) reddish-brown clay, with implements 

 stained with red ochre ; (3) subangular gravel with 

 ochreous implements, slightly worn and battered ; (4) 

 white clay ; (5) gravel, with white unworn implements; 

 (6) reddish-brown clay with implements ; (7) clayey 

 gravel with implements ; (8) clayey brick-earth ; (9) 

 palKolithic floor resting on a clayey brick-earth similar 

 to that above it. .Vll these deposits form a thickness 

 about eight feet in this section, and belong to the 

 complicated series of superficial sand clays and gravels 

 grouped together by the Geological Survey as brick- 

 earth, and clay-with-rtints, and which are clearly proved 

 to be later than the boulder-clay of the district. The 

 interest chiefly centres in the pala-olithic floor No. 9, 

 resting upon a sun-cracked surface in some places, and 

 in others supporting heaps of flints carefully selected, 

 and evidently piled together for the purposes of imple- 

 ment-making. Around them lay worked flints by the 

 thousand. It is obvious that here we are on the track 

 of a pala;olithic camping-ground, and that the deposits 

 which now cover it up have been accumulated, the fine 

 clays by heavy rains on the margin of a stream or on 

 the borders of a lake, and the sands and gravels by the 

 natural drift of the soil downwards from a higher level. 

 The distribution also of the flint implements in the section, 

 prove that man inhabited the district while the strata 

 were being accumulated above the pakvolithic floor up 

 to No. 2 inclusive. As the mud accumulated on the old 

 floor, the hunters, attracted probably by the water close 

 at hand, visited the same spot from time to time, and 

 left their implements in 7, 6, and 5 of the section. These, 

 our author considers to be the same age as those of the 

 palx'olithic floor. The worn ochreous implements in Nos. 

 2 and 3, he relegates to a later time in the pala;olithic 

 age, and considers them to have drifted downwards from 

 a higher level into their present position. '' The water 

 must have drained elevations which have now vanished, 

 and thehilltops of the Dunstable district of the present 

 time must represent the valleys of the old lime." Cad- 

 dington is now on the water-parting between the sources 

 of the Lea and the V'er, and under present conditions 

 there is no higher grounJ from which these materials 

 could have been derived. 



The worked flints on the paleolithic floor represent 



