March 22, 1900J 



NATURE 



489 



advantage, especially when it tells us that " sponges 

 possess, essentially, a bilateral symmetry," and various 

 other things which are not true? {b) In an elementary 

 work of this sort it is of the utmost importance that 

 there should be precision in the use of words, and though 

 the author has been unusually careful we do not think 

 that he has always succeeded. Thus, he speaks about 

 " the forces of heredity" ; he tells us that " Darwin con- 

 vinced naturalists that the great underlying principle of 

 the tree-like system of classification was heredity " ; he 

 calls the nucleus of the fertilised ovum " hermaphroditic," 

 and so on. Is it wise at present to call the chromo- 

 somes "the hereditary threads " ? is it fair to speak of 

 " the gastrula phase in man's existence," and to refer to 

 a figure of a typical gastrula, as if it were all plain 

 sailing ? is it warrantable to say " the evidence seems 

 to favour the view that acquired characters can be trans- 

 mitted " ? is anything gained by making a special category 

 of " insect-selection " ? Without criticising the exposition 

 of the Pangenesis hypothesis, we should also like to ask 

 if it is not the case that Darwin expressly said that he 

 thought of the genimules not as circulating in the blood, 

 but as diflfusing from cell to cell .^ But a book should 

 be judged relatively to its aim, and Prof. Shute is to be 

 congratulated on the success with which he has accom- 

 plished a difficult and serviceable piece of work. 



J. A. T. 



OUli BOOK SHELF. 



Mining Engineers' Report Book and Directofs' and 

 Shareholders' Guide to Mining Reports. By Edwin 

 R. Field. Pp. 39. (London : Charles Griffin and Co., 

 Ltd., I9CX5.) 



Ever since the search for the gold mines of El 

 Dorado in 1595 was described by Sir Walter Raleigh 

 in his work on the discovery of Guiana, the proto- 

 type of modern mining reports, experts have con- 

 stantly been engaged in reporting on mineral deposits 

 with a view to induce capitalists to invest money. 

 A report on a mining property should set forth 

 clearly details of the position, means of access, fuel, 

 water and timber supply, amount of development, and 

 the character, value and form of the deposit. It should, 

 moreover, be written in so lucid a manner as to be in- 

 telligible to the educated investor. Unfortunately, this 

 is not always done. Many so-called experts of eminence 

 have been known to fill up their reports with a bewilder- 

 ing mass of abstruse technicalities and theories, and to 

 omit many essential details requisite for arriving at the 

 value of the mine. While it is obvious that a thorough 

 examination of a mine cannot be covered by a set of 

 rules, it is highly desirable that the work should be 

 carried out in a systematic manner, and errors of omission 

 avoided. With this object in view, Mr. Field has drawn 

 up a series of suggestions in a convenient form. He 

 enumerates 126 queries that should be answered as far as 

 possible in the report on any mine. Blank pages are 

 appended ; and it is recommended that the various 

 heads should simply be indicated by numbers during 

 the inspection of the property, and subsequently in- 

 corporated in the observations recorded in the report. 

 The volume is issued in pocket-book form so arranged 

 that the blank pages, which can be replaced by others, 

 shall be facing the page of questions. The right hand 

 pages, which would be covered when the book is in use, 

 are devoted to selected tables and memoranda. The 

 volume is of handy size— it measures 5 by 3^ mches— 



NO. 1586, VOL. 61] 



and will undoubtedly prove useful to experienced mining 

 engineers. Whether it will also be of assistance to 

 directors and shareholders, as the title-page suggests, 

 may be questioned, B. H. B. 



Flora of Kent. By F. J. Hanbury, F.L.S., and E. S 



Marshall, M.A., F.L.S. Pp. 444 ; with two maps. 



(London : F. J. Hanbury, 1899.) 

 Many years ago " The Flora of Middlesex," by Trimen 

 and Dyer, showed the way for a scientific construction of 

 a local flora, and it has served as a model for all the best 

 works of this kind which have appeared since its pub- 

 lication. To say then that the present volume strongly 

 recalls the best features in the Middlesex Flora is to 

 pay it a well-earned compliment, and, indeed, from cover 

 to cover Messrs. Hanbury and Marshall's book exhibits 

 abundant evidence of a careful, sound and successfully 

 accomplished sifting of an immense body of facts, with 

 the result that the rea'der is furnished with an exceedingly 

 able and interesting account of the flora of the south- 

 eastern county of England. The introduction includes a 

 sketch of the physiography and geology of the county, and 

 then follows the customary delimitation of the botanical 

 districts into which the whole area is divided. These 

 divisions are, as the authors admit, not entirely based on 

 scientific considerations, but are partly determined by 

 convenience, and some of them are consequently some- 

 what artificial in character. It would, perhaps, have 

 been advantageous to have added another chapter on the 

 more purely natural geographical distribution of the 

 plants. 



The body of the flora is devoted to an account of 

 the plants found growing in the county, together with 

 brief topographical and historical notes. 



The work is excellently printed, and will be found of 

 great service to those who care to know about the flora 

 of one of the most interesting counties in England. 



Leitfaden fiir den Unterricht in der Anorganischen 

 Chemie. Didaktisch bearbeitet von Dr. Joachim 

 Sperber. Erster Teil. Pp.120. (Zurich : E. Speidel, 

 1899.) 

 A BOOK expressly " didaktisch bearbeitet," and bearing a 

 motto Repetitio est mater dnctrinarum, would be expected 

 to disclose some novelty of treatment for good or ill. 

 This expectation is, however, not realised in Dr. Sperber's 

 book. It may be described as an aggregation of con- 

 densed chemical information, from which it is impossible 

 to augur any good educational result. We have already 

 had a surfeit of this kind of book in England, and can 

 only regret that the improvements now so evident here 

 do not seem to have spread to Switzerland. The 

 illustrations in the book are unnecessarily elaborate, and 

 in some cases altogether superfluous. There are, tor 

 example, two striking full-page illustrations — one to show 

 the holding of a platinum spiral in a bunsen flame, the 

 other to show a burning magnesium ribbon. It is really 

 difficult to understand the attitude of mind of a teacher 

 who considers that any intellectual or practical value can 

 lie in pictures of this kind. A. S. 



Aufgaben aus der Chemie und der physikalischen 

 Chemie. Von Dr. P. Brauer. Pp. 70. (Leipzig : 

 B. G. Teubner, 1900.) 



The author has collected a number of exercises dealing 

 with some of the most important provinces of general 

 chemistry. The book differs from previous attempts in 

 this direction, inasmuch as attention is paid not only to 

 purely chemical problems, but also, and more especially, 

 to such points as the Laws of Avogadro, Faraday, Joule, 

 &c., together with the elements of thermal chemistry. 

 The explanatory notes at the head of the various sec- 

 tions will be found of great assistance to students 

 working without the aid of a teacher. N. 



