March 30, 1899] 



NA TURE 



507 



most inrlined to meander, and to broaden their valleys. 

 If this process is continued for a sufficient time in any 

 region, it will lead to the removal of all land within reach 

 of the stream down to their own level. Base-level of 

 corrasioii thus becomes practically the base-level of 

 erosion. The ultimate result of erosion is to reduce a 

 land area to a plain at sea-level. Such perfect plains, 

 however, are exceedingly rare ; but approximations to 

 the ultimate result are common, and plains in this 

 penultimate stage have been named pe^icplains." . . . 

 " The action of a stream in corradins: its channel in one 

 portion of its course, and aggrading it in another portion, 

 is carried on at the same time and is a highly complex 

 process.' 



And again, 



" What charming pictures of placid rivers flowing be- 

 tween wooded and flower-bedecked banks, softened 

 and partially obscured, perhaps, by moaning mists, 

 enrich the memories of those who have travelled 

 in the Carolinas, Georgia and .A.Iabama ! Whence the 

 fascination of these sleepy streams, flowing through flat- 

 bottomed \alleys bordered by wildly roughened, plateau- 

 like uplands ? What has subdued the broader features 

 of the landscape in a region where every river bank 

 reveals folded and contorted rocks similar to those in the 

 neighbouring mountains ? " 



After describing the development of rivers from 

 observed facts, the author in the last chapter gives his 

 imagination full play, and " pictures in his mind the lead- 

 ing events in the life of a majestic river whose murmurs 

 we may be pardoned for fancying make audible the 

 memoir of a million years." " Looking across the shim- 

 mering sea of fancy, we see the new-born consequent 

 streams appearing like shining threads of silver when the 

 skies are clear," &c. Instead of this imaginative de- 

 scription a reader interested in the history of rivers 

 would naturally regret that the space thus occupied had 

 not been devoted to dealing more fully with the 

 characteristics of the few rivers of which a description is 

 given. Thus in describing that remarkable river the 

 Colorado, and stating that there is nothing of the same 

 class in the whole world, and telling how that it has 

 carved its course through solid rock, and flows in a 

 canyon from 4000 to 6000 feet deep, with a valley more 

 than fifteen iniles across, no explanation is given, or 

 suggestion made, as to what special characteristic the 

 water of this river — which, as its sources flow through an 

 arid plain, must be limited in quantity — possesses that 

 has enabled it to perform this incredible amount of wear- 

 ing away by the action of water alone. The author states 

 that the remnants of the great plateau, across which the 

 Colorado flowed in its infancy, was once 4000 feet lower 

 than now ; at which level it remained for tens of thou, 

 sands of years while the river cut down its channel to 

 base-level, and by lateral corrasion broadened its valley ; 

 during which time the climate was arid, and being subse- 

 quently slowly elevated the river once again had to begin 

 the task of corradiiig its bed to base-level. Although the 

 theory of the author as to the depression of the bed of 

 this river being due to the wearing of water and not to 

 any opening of the ground caused by earthquakes or 

 alterations in the surface-level caused by uprisings, is 

 that generally accepted by geologists, yet in a scientific 

 treatise on rivers it would have been more satisfactory if 

 some cause had been assigned why the water of this 

 NO. 1535, VOL. 59] 



particular river should have produced such remarkable 

 results as compared with those effected by the Niagara, 

 the St. Lawrence, the Mississippi, or other great rivers 

 having larger volumes of water and of equal age. In 

 the case of the Niagara the flowing water has made such 

 slight impression on the limestone rocks over which it 

 flows, that little more than a surface skin has been eroded, 

 and the striated marks due to glacial action may still be 

 traced almost to the water's edge ; and the wearing action 

 of its flowing water has only cut back the rock over 

 which it falls to a distance of seven miles with a fall ol 

 little over 300 feet, as compared with the 300 miles in 

 length and over a mile in depth of the Colorado. 



Although the river systems of America are of a mag- 

 nificent and comprehensive character, this book would 

 have been more instructive as a scientific treatise on river 

 development if the author had taken a wider survey of 

 river action, and given some information as to the 

 characteristics and development of some of the other 

 large river systems of the rest of the world. 



PYRAMID AND PLANISPHERE. 

 The Book of the Master; or., the Egyptian Doctrine of the 

 Light born of the Virgin Mollier. By W. Marsham 

 Adams. Pp. xxii -t- 204. (London : John Murray, 

 1898.) 



IN a book published some three years ago Mr. Adams 

 proclaimed what he considered to be "a clue to the 

 creed of early Egypt." He is doubtless an enthusiast, 

 and of the importance of his work he does not entertain 

 the smallest misgiving. So startling, indeed, to him w-as 

 the originality of his idea that he was convinced of its 

 truth from this fact alone ; to have invented it, he wrote 



" were an intellectual masterpiece which surely demands 

 nothing less than a creative genius of the very loftiest 

 order. So majestic is the outline of the conception as it 

 rises solemnly on the view that I cannot for a moment 

 believe it to be the offspring of my own imagination." 



Mr. Adams therefore, according to his own account, 

 was in the enviable position of being either "a creative 

 genius of the very loftiest order," or the discoverer of a 

 fact that "with overwhelming splendour" illuminates 

 " mystery after mystery of the invisible world." 



The discovery which Mr. Adams heralded in this very 

 enthusiastic manner was a mystical connection between 

 the Egyptian " Book of the Dead " and the Great Pyramid 

 at Gizeh. About both these wonders of ancient Egypt 

 many wild theories have in their time been aired, but 

 perhaps one of the wildest is that which Mr. Adams 

 proclaimed. For three years he published nothing 

 further on the subject, but he has now produced another 

 book in which he repeats and elaborates his ideas. In 

 fact "The Book of the Master" incorporates whole 

 passages from his former work with the change of a 

 word or two here and there, for, as Mr. Adams rathe 

 characteristically remarks in his preface, 



" I have not thought it advisable to rewrite that which 

 I saw no probability of improving by revision." 



Mr. .Adams is not content with the common-sense view 

 of regarding the pyramids as the tombs of Egyptian 

 kings. He suggests a "spiritual and most far-sighted 



