314 
NATURE 
[ FEBRUARY 4, 1897 
ance of the latter bacillus in analytical work is not con- 
sidered at all. In fact, the whole chapter on typhoid 
fever, while omitting all that is wanted, contains nothing 
worth reading. Instead of reading page after page of 
diseases of deer, buffalo, boars, swine, fowls, horses, 
cows, ducks, grouse, mice, rats and other animals, the 
student would have preferred a serious discussion of the 
present position of the cholera or diphtheria question. 
The yeasts and moulds are also unsatisfactorily treated, 
and there again we cannot get away from cows, calves, 
fowls and mice, while man is of quite secondary import- 
ance. A few pages are devoted to the hamatozoa, and 
here also the malaria parasite which occurs in man comes 
off badly, while the parasites of surra, of the common 
rat, and of fish are much more fully discussed. There is, 
of course, much regarding small-pox, cow-pox and other 
pox in the book, and also, for some reason or another, 
lengthy extracts from the final Report of the Vaccination 
Commission. All this is unsatisfactory reading, because 
the author does not write impartially on this matter. 
In conclusion, we must say that the book, although 
well got-up, is not one which can be considered as 
worthy of English bacteriology. The best parts in the 
book are some of the illustrations of animal diseases ; 
but even as a picture-book it is unsatisfactory, for some 
drawings are too diagrammatic and on an excessive 
scale. The absence of sound criticism, the lack of a 
just sense of proportion, and the want of a true appreci- 
ation of the problems of disease, and more especially of 
human disease, compel us to speak severely of the work, 
and to warn the student of bacteriology, who is needs 
surrounded by doubt and dogma, against placing his 
confidence in such a guide. A. A. KANTHACK. 
PREHISTORIC MAN AND BEAST. 
Prehistoric Man and Beast. By the Rev. H. N. 
Hutchinson, B.A., F.G.S. Pp. xxii + 298. (London ; 
Smith, Elder, and Co., 1896.) 
HE unscientific reader cannot fail to find much that 
is instructive in this work; it brings into a com- 
paratively narrow compass information which could only 
otherwise be obtained by a wide course of reading, and 
it makes good its pretension to be fairly well abreast of 
the times. 
There are many “good things” in it, generally dis- 
tinguished by inverted commas. The author has the 
true instinct of a writer for the populace, and steadily 
pursues effect : to a striking passage he will succumb, 
even if it be a trifle meretricious, and it will be found 
inserted in its due place, with an apology if necessary. 
Witness the long extract giving “a rather fanciful 
picture” of paleolithic man” (pp. 34-36). 
Naturally he has little sympathy with the technical 
details on which scientific results depend. ‘‘ Every work 
dealing with prehistoric man contains,” he says, “long | 
and tedious descriptions of the famous skulls .. .” (p. 
75). No doubt, yet we fancy there is more than one 
place in this work where a familiar knowledge of these 
details would have proved useful to the author. Again, 
on p. 22, we find “detailed evidence from sections in 
NO. 1423, VOL. 55] 
gravel-pits, &c. (séc), such as would be almost unintelligible, 
with the probable result that he would lay down the book 
at once.” The detailed evidence was probably omitted 
in this case with judgment, but there are others in which 
some knowledge of “sections” would have greatly 
assisted the reader, and might possibly have saved the 
author from the following. “ First of all stone was used. 
. . . Hence the stone age is the earliest.” (The italics 
are ours.) On a question of fundamental importance, 
like the order of succession of the different prehistoric 
periods, the reader is likely to require evidence of a 
different nature to this. 
The impatience for all that is technical savours of in- 
gratitude when the author, speaking of those original 
investigators who have provided him with so much 
valuable material, remarks of them that they “have so 
obscured the romance by their ‘ dry-as-dust’ descriptions 
and ponderous reports of their labours, that no ordinary 
reader would care to plod through a single chapter of 
their writings.” Probably these writers were too Solicitous 
about the truth to care much about the romance, which 
for the present may be left in the care of the author, 
who, let us hasten to add, is not always so censorious as 
these extracts might suggest ; he praises the artist who 
has embellished his work with fancy pictures, and he 
praises Sir Henry Howorth, who generously returns the 
compliment. 
It is a pity the book is not better illustrated ; several 
sketchy drawings, spoken of as “restorations,” occupy 
some ten plates, but of figures of real interest there are 
none. The ordinary reader would have welcomed repro- 
ductions of palzeolithic drawings, and figures of ancient 
weapons; maps would have assisted him, and even 
geological sections might not have come amiss. Of the 
plates, some are worse than others. It will, perhaps, be 
fairest to choose the frontispiece for comment. It repre- 
sents a palzeolithic family receiving a call, at the photo- 
graphed entrance of Wookey Hole, from three different 
kinds of wild beast. One, which we took to be a polar 
bear, we are informed isa machairodus ; the next, a very 
stuffed-looking specimen, is a cave bear ; and the third, 
a hyena. The author recognises that a triple alliance of 
this kind is improbable ; why, then, does he represent 
it? Because—and here we find the true popular 
writer—“it makes a more interesting picture,” and 
“scientific accuracy should not be pushed too far.” We 
let this pass, as well as the toy harpoon with which the 
cave man is defending his weeping wife and family, to 
ask if the author really supposes that paleeolithic man is 
fairly represented by the tall, fair Caucasian with long 
straight nose, and orthognathous jaws, who does duty for 
him here. 
It may be that this is, as the author claims for the 
illustrations, “a thoroughly artistic and vivid picture,” 
though it is more than doubtful whether it “would well 
bear reproduction on a larger scale”; but we are in 
cordial agreement with him when he remarks that it is 
not a scientific, “‘mere scientific” diagram, and—we 
should prefer the diagram. 
We are not quite sure whether the author has any 
really clear ideas of the bodily aspect of the people he 
wishes to portray. In speaking of the stage of culture of 
