440 



NATURE 



[July 27, 19 16 



able experience in the training- of mechanics, and 

 he remarks on the surprising number of cases 

 where their knowledge of mathematics is limited 

 to the first four rules. This naturally leads to 

 an unintelligent use of formulae and a marked in- 

 ability to make applications to practical problems 

 as they arise. The plan of this book is desig'ned 

 to meet these cases. It starts with the use of 

 fractions and decimals, and includes chapters on 

 percentage, mensuration, constructions, trigono- 

 metry, and some of a more technical character on 

 lathes, threads, machines, gears, and business 

 organisation. 



{4) This small book includes the principal 

 theorems of the first three books of Euclid. It is 

 intended to be used after the ordinary introductory 

 graphical course, and aims at giving the reader a 

 bird's-eye view of a subject to be covered in more 

 detail at a second reading. Those who are 

 familiar with Dr. Davison's larger work will 

 recognise a similarity of treatment in these pages. 

 It would be an improvement if answers to the 

 numerical exercises were given. 



APPRENTICE TRAINING. 

 The Principles of Apprentice Training, with 

 Special Reference to the Engineering Industry. 

 By A. P. M. Fleming and J. G. Pearce. Pp. 

 xiii + 202. (London : Longmans, Green and Co., 

 1916.) Price 3s. 6d. net. 



MANY interesting opinions are expressed in 

 this book, but the same thing is repeated 

 too often under different headings. The authors 

 give particulars of the mode of selecting and 

 training apprentices which was begun in 191 3 

 at the British Westinghouse Company's 

 works at Manchester ; all the lecturers are 

 either engineers or foremen, and many of 

 the former are graduates in engineering. Men 

 so chosen are not always good teachers, 

 though they may be excellent as practical men ; 

 so future lecturers are being trained from among 

 the apprentices under the supervision of the 

 authors. So far the scheme seems to promise 

 success. In October, 191 5, there were 309 

 apprentices out of a total of 1348 youths in the 

 works ; the number of apprenticed boys is increas- 

 ing. The course, while thoroughly practical, 

 makes reasonable demands on the pupils' intelli- 

 gence. 



On the general question the authors give details 

 as to the present inadequate methods of prepar- 

 ing for work in life both " specialists " — by which 

 term they indicate repetition workers using auto- 

 matic or semi-automatic machinery — and crafts- 

 men, who need wider experience, skill, and intelli- 

 gence. They point out that in the elementary 

 schools book-learning is predominant ; they show 

 how inadequate is the time spent in manual 

 training and other forms of "doing." They indi- 

 cate that in the secondary schools most of the 

 pupils are trained as though their main object in 

 life was to pass the entrance examination to a 

 university — although the percentage of such 

 children who become undergraduates is small. 



NO. 2439, VOL. 97] 



All this is but too true, and there is little likeli- 

 hood that it will be changed so long as prac- 

 tically all the higher officers in the Board of 

 Education and in the Civil Service generally are 

 selected from those who have had a literary 

 training. For science, modern languages, and 

 manual work are regarded as forms of improper 

 educational "specialisation," and Latin and 

 Greek as the sole means for developing the char- 

 acter and intelligence of British youth ; and this, 

 although our naval officers, whose characters and 

 intelligence most of us admire, are trained by 

 means of mathematics and science, and have been 

 deprived of the supposed indispensable benefits 

 of classical training. J. W. 



OUR BOOKSHELF. 



.4 Bibliography of British Ornithology, from the 



Earliest Times to the End of 1912. By W. H. 



Mullens and H. Kirke Swann. Part i. Pp. 112. 



(London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1916.) 



Price 65. net. 

 We have not hitherto had an adequate biblio- 

 graphy of British ornithology, for the one by 

 Elliott Coues begun thirty-six years ago was 

 never, we believe, completed, and, excellent as 

 was the first instalment so far as it went, it is, of 

 course, now out of date. The bibliography upon 

 which Major Mullens (who has already done work 

 which may be considered as the basis of the 

 present book) and Mr. Swann have embarked is 

 of an ambitious and comprehensive nature. The 

 aim of the authors has been to give a biographical 

 account of each author of a separately-published 

 work, followed by a bibliography of their works 

 and of their papers contributed to journals bear- 

 ing on British ornithology. Collations are given 

 and spaced titles of books published before 1850; 

 critical notes also on many books are included. 



The first part of the book (of which there are 

 to be six) has now been issued, and fully comes 

 up to the promise of the prospectus. Even in 

 this one part we meet with many books and 

 authors with which few book-loving birdmen were 

 probably previously acquainted. Under the head- 

 ing " Anonymous " alone there are more than 

 eighty items, and the present biographers have 

 been very successful in hunting down the authors 

 of these. The biographical notices are sufficiently 

 full and, especially in the case of the older writers, 

 very interesting. In fact, the book promises to 

 be not only a very useful work of reference for 

 British ornithologists, but also, what at first sight 

 we might not expect, a very readable and enter- 

 taining book. It is well printed on very good 

 paper. 



An Elementary ManUrOl of Radiotelegraphy and 



Radiotelephony for Students and Operators. 



By Prof. J. A. Fleming. Third edition. Pp. 



xiv+360. (London : Longmans, Green and 



Co., 1916.) Price 75. 6d. net. 

 It is unnecessary to do more than refer very 

 brieflv to the third edition of Prof. Fleming's 



I 



