242 
NATURE 
of “exact science” is (according to our editors’ preface) 
in danger of being underrated. 
Moreover, it becomes a question whether the memoir 
on the “‘ Oceanic Hydrozoa” should not be incorporated, 
to ensure absolute completeness. We are quite aware 
that the editors, in their preface, give reasons for excluding 
this ; but we venture to think that if, when they took this 
step, they had realised the extent of the Survey memoir 
on the Elgin Crocodiles, and had reflected that the 
memoir on “The Development of the Elasmobranch 
Fishes,” despite its bulk, was incorporated in the volumes 
memorialising the late Francis Maitland Balfour, they 
might perhaps have acted otherwise. 
There are thus a possible series of six or seven im- 
portant scientific communications to be yet reprinted, in 
order to justify the fulfilment of the memorial. As the 
matter stands a supplementary volume is imperative, and 
we leave the plea for it, with respect and full assurance, 
in the publishers’ hands. 
The frontispiece to the present volume is a highly 
successful photographic reproduction of the obverse of 
the Huxley Memorial Medal. As a likeness it tran- 
scends the statue ; and it affords us pleasure to remark 
that the artist (Mr. F. Bowcher) who produced the model 
is at present engaged upon an enlargement of it, which 
promises to be even more true to life, and is to be 
mounted in the Town Hall at Ealing, the place of 
Huxley’s birth. GyBy RL 
GEOLOGICAL HISTORY. 
History of Geology and Palaeontology to the End of 
the Nineteenth Ceutury. By Warl Alfred von Zittel. 
Translated by Maria M. Ogilvie-Gordon., D.Sc. 
London, Ph.D. Munich. Pp. xiii + 562. (London: 
Walter Scott, Ltd., 1901.) Price 6s. 
V HAT may be called the archeological side of the 
history of this science has been often treated ; 
but what has long been needed is such a history that the 
serious student can ascertain exactly the position of any 
branch at the present day, and the more important steps 
in the advance towards its position. For a task re- 
quiring such a wide range of knowledge and such a 
well-balanced and unbiassed mind there is probably no 
one better fitted than Prof. von Zittel, while to translate, 
condense and adapt the work to the needs of British 
readers has been a congenial duty to one of Zittel’s own 
talented pupils, Mrs. Ogilvie-Gordon. 
The author, judging from his preface, is himself in 
doubt as to the possibility of combining the difficult 
task of writing a work which will satisfy the specialist 
and also commend itself to every man of culture. 
Frankly we think that to do this is impossible ; the needs 
of the two types of readers are so wholly distinct. For 
even the best class of popular readers something different 
from the steady and level plod through division after 
division of the subject is required. There must be what 
might be called “ picture-writing,” colour, shading, pro- 
minence, gradation, grouping, and above all perspective. 
Without these the ion-technical reader cannot see wood 
for trees; he has no landings on which to pause for 
NO. 1706, vol. 66] 
[JULY 10, 1902 
breath, and, worst of all, he hardly realises when he has 
attained a summit and obtained a view. 
But, cutting adrift the man of general culture, what is 
there here for the specialist? There is a most con- 
scientious, concise, complete, and well-balanced record of 
the chief steps forward in each of the numerous branches 
of a complex subject, perfect fairness in the treatment 
of the different workers and of the claims of various 
nationalities, a remarkable clearness in indicating the 
general advance of the science as a whole while treating 
of its many subdivisions, and a powerful presentment of 
the significance of the inauguration and final proofs of 
the chief principles of geology. 
About a quarter of the whole work is devoted to geo- 
logical knowledge in the ages of antiquity, the beginnings 
of palzeontology and geology, and the “heroic age” of 
geology (1790-1820). Under the first head we read that 
“fanciful hypotheses and disconnected observations can- 
not be acknowledged as scientific beginnings of re- 
search”; the next stage brings us to the first mineral 
maps and sections, the earliest ideas of mineral succes- 
sion, and to primitive opinions about fossils and vol- 
canoes, The ‘heroic age” was the time of Werner and 
Hutton, von Buch and Humboldt, Kant and Laplace, 
Cuvier and Buckland, and above all of William Smith. 
We are thus brought to the beginning of the nineteenth 
century, and henceforward we follow the development of 
the science under the following heads :—Cosmical 
Geology, Physiographical Geology, Dynamical Geology, 
Petrography, Palaontology, and Stratigraphical Geology. 
The treatment of these branches is singularly even, 
the weakest, perhaps, being the first and last, while 
for the strongest it is difficult to choose between the 
dynamical, petrographic and paleontological sections. 
The translator has shifted the position of the strati- 
graphical section and omitted that on topographical 
geology, we think wisely ; and she has also shortened the 
work, partly by abridgment and partly by omission. 
This difficult task has been discharged with considerable 
skill and discretion, though we might, perhaps, be inclined 
to cavil at some of the omissions; for instance, the 
suppression of the “kern theory” of Rosenbusch and 
the rock-formuleze of Michel-Lévy, to note only two 
examples. 
One characteristic of some of the heroes cf geology 
seems not to have died out at the present day. We read 
that 
“Tt was the spoken word of Werner that carried. 
Of written words no man of genius could have been 
more chary. His dislike of writing increased as he grew 
older, . . .” 
Again, 
“Hutton’s thoughts had been borne in upon him direct 
from nature ; for the best part of his life he had conned 
them, tossed them in his mind, tested them, and sought 
repeated confirmation in nature before he had even begun 
to fix them in written words, or cared to think of any- 
thing but his own enjoyment of them.” 
And once again, 
‘a dinner was arranged ... and William Smith con- 
sented to dictatea table of the British strata from the 
Carboniferous to the Cretaceous formation.” 
Zittel is seen at his best when dealing with the classical 
works of those masters of the science who have given us 
