November i6, 1899] 



NATURE 



51 



tried to look at a few sections from the point of 

 view of personal knowledge, and others from that of 

 ignorance ; for in the one case I might test the in- 

 formation, in the other regard the book as a learner. 

 For the former purpose I have read in a carping spirit. 

 Not that I hold it right to do this with a really 

 good book. Horace lays down the true rule, " Ubi 

 plura nitent in carmine non ego paucis ofifendar 

 maculis '' ; but I did it, and now give the results to 

 show that the book will stand a test which is almost 

 unjust. A short glossary of rock names and some other 

 geological terms would be a useful addition for the sake of 

 the unlearned. In the course of my reading I have found 

 one misprint, "Apis" for Alps, which is very likely due 

 to that familiar of the printer who should be out of place 

 in a chapel. Editors are not always responsible for press 

 errors. However, here they must be few indeed. In 

 mentioning Suess' idea that sometimes it is rather the 

 ocean which has sunk than the land which has risen, a 

 writer says that the loo-foot beach-line in Western 

 Scotland 



" maintains its level, lying on rocks of different ages 

 and hardness, and crosses undisturbed great faults and 

 dislocations." 



But if the antiquity of the faults, as is the case 

 here, is much greater than that of the beaches, 

 the last reason is not conclusive, for the mass 

 might be so far welded together as to move as a whole 

 But is the fact itself certain ? If it be so, it does 

 away with an objection commonly urged against the 

 marine origin of the parallel roads of Glenroy. At 

 any rate it should have been added that in Norway, not 

 to mention other parts of the northern hem.isphere, a 

 beach level often varies in height. Perhaps, also, a little 

 too much prominence is given to the theory of the earth's 

 tetrahedral figure, for it is still on its trial, and apparently 

 fails, as the author admits, to explain every fact. On p. 57 

 boulder clay is said to be an accumulation left by 

 ice-sheets or in extra-glacial lakes. As not a few persons 

 who have carefully studied the subject maintain that 

 some boulder clay has been deposited in the sea, and 

 have added proofs which have been met only by hypo- 

 theses, that view also should have been mentioned as a 

 third possibility. In another aspect of ice-work, one 

 author (p. 258) boldly abandons glacial excavation to 

 account for the origin of the Alpine lakes, and attributes 

 them, rightly as I believe, to crust movements ; yet we are 

 told on p. 272 that the lakes of the Alpine foreland are 

 clearly related to the great ice-sheet which once overspread 

 it. We presume this signifies glacial excavation ; but, if so, 

 what about the " hinter land " ? Again, has it yet been 

 proved (see p. 269) that the Scandinavian ice-sheet ex- 

 tended over northern Germany .-' It is, no doubt, an 

 article of faith with a large school ; but as difficulties sug 

 gest themselves to a sceptical mind after examining the 

 ground, a less positive statement would have been 

 better. As regards the Alps, it is not a happy phrase to 

 speak of the Finster Aarhom, Jungfrau, Moneh, Wetter, 

 horn, &c., as 



*' grouped in one compact mass of snows and rugged 

 peaks round the valleys of Lautebrunnen and Grindel- 

 wald '' ; 



NO, 1568, VOL. 61] 



for nothing can be more striking than the apparent ending, 

 of those valleys at the foot of that great mountain wall. We 

 find no mention of the Viso among the Italian Alps, yet 

 no peak is more conspheuous than it from the Pied- 

 montese plain ; and the fact that the south-eastern Alps 

 near the Austro-Italian frontier — so remarkable in their 

 scenery— are magnesian limestone is not clearly stated. 



The Pelvoux (p. 237) is not over 13,000 feet high, for 

 only two peaks in the Dauphine group, the Ecrins and 

 the Meije, exceed that elevation. To say that "since 

 historic times not the slightest eruption has taken place 

 in Auvergne " assumes a controverted point. • In Italy 

 the remarkable group of the Carrara mountains is not 

 distinguished so clearly as it should be from the rest of 

 the Appennines, and to say that Pozzuoli "stands in the 

 midst of vast ruins of the Roman period" is not quite the 

 most accurate of phrases. 



Enough however of such criticisms, for they are so 

 trivial as to be hardly worth mention. We only write 

 them down to show how difficult, even if one tries to 

 carp, it is to find any fault. When we come to ex- 

 cellencies their name is legion. With seventy con- 

 tributors, all of whom have done their work well, it is 

 almost invidious to select, but we may mention Prof. 

 De Lapparent's article on the physical geography of 

 France as no less lucid in statement than powerful in 

 grasp, and those on Natal, the Transvaal and the Orange 

 Free State, by the Right Hon. J. Bryce (which we 

 naturally selected to look at from the standpoint of 

 general ignorance), as singularly clear and informing. 

 The book must have cost Dr. Mill no little toil as 

 editor. Organisation and correspondence in a work 

 like this must have been heavy tasks ; and besides 

 these he has himself contributed some excellent 

 articles, and translated wholly or partially those of 

 seventeen contributors. We heartily congratulate him 

 on the final result. He deserves our gratitude for 

 giving us a geography which is at once good in literary 

 form and invaluable for reference, far in advance of any 

 similar work which has been produced in this country. 

 No teacher, indeed no advanced student, can afford to 

 be without it ; more than this, it must be on the shelves 

 of every important library, and will be of the greatest 

 use to literary as well as to scientific men, indeed to all 

 who read for the love of culture. T. G. Bonney. 



CHEMISTRY FOR THE PEOPLE. 

 Einfuhrung in die Chimie in leichtfasslicher Form. 

 Von Prof. Dr. Lassar-Cohn. Pp. xi -i- 299. (Ham- 

 burg and Liepzig : Leopold Voss, 1899.) 

 THIS book begins with an interesting apologia. 

 When the author first took up the work of teach- 

 ing in Volkshochschulen he lectured to the pupils very 

 much in the same way that he himself had been lectured 

 to in the University durmg his first semester. He 

 soon came to think, however, that this was a mistake, 

 and that a class of people, meeting in the evening hours 

 for the improvement of their general knowledge, should 

 not be treated like students taking up a professional 

 study. He therefore altered the form of his lectures, 

 and endeavoured to present a more general and ex- 

 pansive view of chemistry, and to impart, as it were, the 



