1887. | MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL. 219 
and war maps, so that they may be conveniently carried in the pockets of the officers. 
It secures as perfect definition at the periphery as at the centre. The lens is accom- 
panied by a table by means of which one can easily calculate exactly what extension 
of camera and distance from the object is needed to secure any desired enlargement 
or reduction. 
Dr. Ferrer exhibited some work he had done with the lens, producing reduced copies 
of some fine large drawing of his own, made with india ink, and showing sections 
of the human eye. The photographs and drawings were much admired. As such 
interest was manifested in the drawings, Dr. Ferrer exhibited the originals which they 
represented. The eye is submitted to the bichromate of potash hardening process, 
sometimes requiring months to harden. Then the specimen is imbedded in celloidin 
upon a base of cork. Placing this in the microtome, the eye is held firmly in the bed- 
ding, and perfect, thin sections secured. A number of these were shown well mounted 
for microscopic examination. After bedding, the eyes can be kept indefinitely by im- 
mersion in alcohol, and are always ready for cutting more sections or for study of the 
exposed surface and adjacent parts. To show the excellent work being done by mem- 
bers of the San Francisco Microscopical Society, Secretary Wickson read a letter 
which was recently received from Dr. Frank L. James, of St. Louis, editor of the Sv. 
Louis Medical and Surgical Journal, in which he made allusion to mountings of 
Bacillus anthracis in situ in lung tissue, made by Dr.S. M. Mouser, of San Francisco, 
stating it as his belief ‘that a better preparation never has been made ’—that he did 
not rely solely upon his own judgment but cited the verdict of Dr. D. V. Dean, of St. 
Louis, a thorough microscopist, who, after a long and careful examination, pronounced 
‘the slide the best he had everseen.’ This testimony is creditable to Dr. Mouser and 
to the San Francisco Society, and indicates that in scientific work, as in other efforts, 
California is making most gratifying progress. 
By unanimous vote Dr. Henry Ferrer was elected president of the society to fill the ' 
vacancy occasioned by the resignation of Mr. Wickson, who retired from the presi- 
dency to take the chair of recording secretary. 
At the next meeting there will be a demonstration of apochromatic lenses, in which 
some of the latest acquisitions by members of the society will be subjected to com- 
parative tests. 
NOTICES OF BOOKS. 
An introduction to the study of embryology. By Alfred C. Haddon. Philadelphia. 
P. Blakiston, Son & Co. 1887. pp. 336, figs. Igo. 
We are thoroughly pleased to be able to present to our readers a notice and review 
of this valuable work and a very hearty endorsement of it. Of the importance of bio- 
logical information to medical men too much has been written to make our omission 
on that point unjustifiable, and of the position which embryology holds in biology the 
same maybe said. Mr. Haddon, thoroughly qualified by having studied embryology 
with the greatest embryologist, the late Professor Balfour, gives to the medical profes- 
sion more especially, but to all biologists as well, a treatise upon the entire subject of 
animal embryology, exhibiting the present status of investigation and opinion in all 
departments. In treatment, the author’s plan is as follows :—The comparative method 
is strictly adhered to throughout and the discussion by organs followed through their 
history in all animal form—the egg, segmentation and gastrulation, origin of the 
misoblast, general development of body form and embryonic form and appendages, 
epiolastic organs, glands, nervous system, sense organs, organs from misoblast, mus- 
cular system, body cavity, vascular system, excretory organs, generative organs, gen- 
eral considerations. 
This hasty sketch is designed to show the plan in dealing with his subject. To one 
. who is familiar with the subject of animal embryology, as it exists at the present day, 
with hundreds of writers who are investigating the topics, many of them still in hot 
dispute, the writer will seem to have performed a very difficult task in stating clearly 
the history of any organ the reader cares to state, giving as fact the undoubted portion 
and abstaining from discursive discussions on many of the fascinating theoretical 
digressions which have a merely speculative basis. For Mr. Haddon has summed 
up in his volume of 336 pages, in clear and readable style, the entire matter, and pre- 
