2 eee 
Aug. 31, 1871] 
NATURE 
343 

weakened but not destroyed vitality. At this stage the 
beautiful red and yellow tints are developed, which produce 
such a fine effect in certain kinds of scenery. Then comes 
more complete death, when the affinity of oxygen acts 
without any opposition, and the various brown tints of 
later autumn make their appearance, due to changes which 
__We can imitate in our experiments with dead compounds. 
This may not be a pleasing way of viewing an otherwise 
charming subject, but I think we must all admit that it is 
substantially true. 
H. C, SORBY 


HUMAN ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY 
The Physiological Anatomy and Physiology of Man. 
By Robert B. Todd, William Bowman, and Lionel S. 
Beale. A new edition by the last-named author. Part 
2 of Vol.i. (Longmans and Co., 1871.) 
1 Rises part corresponds to the third, fourth, and fifth 
chapters of the last edition ; it is now divided into 
four chapters, one of which is devoted to a general con- 
sideration of the properties of tissue, and the others con- 
tain detailed accounts of the connective, cartilaginous, 
osseous, and adipose varieties. Dr. Beale seems to have 
spared no time or trouble upon the present part, which 
has been carefully revised throughout ; a considerable 
amount of new matter has been added, and many parts, 
especially those relating to the development of the different 
tissues, have been entirely re-written. 
The chapter on the forms of connective tissue is very 
full and complete, and compares very favourably with 
that in the last edition; descriptions of several well- | 
marked varieties, which were before omitted, being now 
introduced, such as those occurring in the Whartonian 
jelly, the vitreous humour, and the cornea. With respect 
to yellow elastic tissue, Dr. Beale states that the fibres, 
usually considered to belong to it, which are found in 
tendons, and resist the action of acetic acid, are not of 
elastic nature at all, but are merely imperfectly-formed 
white fibrous tissue ; and in his account of areolar tissue 
he strongly contests one of the most generally-received 
pathological doctrines of the day, that which supposes in 
many cases of degeneration that the interstitial areolar 
tissue of the organ is the active agent, becoming hyper- 
trophied, and then contracting and compressing the 
structures in its meshes, Dr. Beale considers, on the 
contrary, that in most cases the areolar tissue is quite 
passive, and that the phenomena ascribed to it are really 
produced by the rapid multiplication of parts of white | 
blood corpuscles which have passed through the walls of 
the bload vessels, 
In his account of cartilage Dr. Beale dissents from the 
opinion held by some, that the capsule of a cartilage cell 
differs from the matrix in its origin and nature ; he points 
out that in some cases there is no matrix, in others no 
cell-wall can be demonstrated as distinct from the matrix; 
and again, in others the capsule passes gradually into the 
matrix ; and maintains that the matrix when present is 
entirely formed of old capsules, and is xo¢ developed 
independently of the cells. Fibro-cartilage and elastic 
cartilage are both well described ; no mention at all of 
the latter form was made in the previous editions. 
. The chapter on bone contains a good account of its 

histological structure, but is chiefly interesting from the 
views put forward as to the mode of origin of the canali- 
culi. Virchow states that they are formed by the deposi- 
tion of calcareous matter round processes radiating from 
corpuscles contained in the lacuna, while Kolliker thinks 
they are formed by resorption after the lacuna has been 
entirely surrounded by calcareous matter. Dr. Beale 
differs from both—he says the bone corpuscles of the 
lacuna have frequently no processes, and that when pro- 
cesses are present they are always much shorter and 
much less numerous than the canaliculi, and he points 
out that the formation of these little channels begins at 
their distal end, not at the end next the lacuna, as has 
been supposed ; his own view is that in an early stage of 
the development of bone, it is all permeable to nutrient 
fluids, but that as calcareous matter is deposited this per- 
meability gets restricted to constantly narrowing channels, 
which ultimately remain as the canaliculi, and are at first 
filled with soft matter (cartilage or membrane), which in 
fully formed bone dries and shrivels up, leaving the 
canaliculi as true tubes. 
The concluding chapter, that on adipose tissue, is on 
the whole good, but in the account of its histological 
structure the impression is conveyed that an adult fat cell 
consists merely of an envelope containing oily matter— 
no mention being made of the fact that by proper treat- 
ment a nucleus also can be almost always demonstrated. 
Dr. Beale considers that the fatty matter contained in the 
cell is formed by the degeneration of the mass of “bio- 
plasm,” or “ germinal matter,” of which it was once entirely 
composed. 
The part is illustrated by a large number of very good 
figures, and several full-page plates. 


OUR BOOK SHELF 
Elementary Treatise on Natural Philosophy. By A. 
Privat Deschanel. Translated and edited by Prof. 
Everett, M.A., D.C.L., &c., Professor of Natural Phi- 
losophy, Queen’s College, Belfast. In Four Parts. Part 
2.—Heat. (London: Blackie and Son.) 
THIS work is intended to be an elementary treatise on the 
science of Heat. The remarkably fine engravings that 
embellish it throughout, give it an air of reality which, un- 
fortunately, is not generally possessed by English scientific 
books. Still, some of the original engravings might have 
been improved ; for example, figs. 223, 240, 245, and 264 
are peculiar, and do not represent what is likely to be seen 
in the laboratory. Having said this much in favour of 
Prof. Everett’s translation, we cannot avoid making some 
unfavourable criticisms. We decidedly object to the 
numerous formule and equations which may almost be 
said to disfigure many of the pages ; they are not suffi- 
ciently explained for a popular work, and might have been 
more compressed if intended for advanced scientific 
students. And seeing that formule and explanations 
usually vary inversely as each other within the same 
volume, we should have been pleased—indeed, we expected 
—to find as many of the former eliminated as possible. 
This expectation was occasioned by the translator himself, 
who complained that oftentimes we are confronted with 
“unexplained formulz, which burden the memory without 
cultivating the understanding.” Can Prof, Everett assert 
that he has explained the formula on page 362 of Part 2? 
Has he not rather fallen into the very error which he so 
ably deplores in his preface ; failing to see amid V, KT, 
and other algebraic mystifications, that his H and h are 
