362 
language given by Mr. Griffith on pp. 726-731, while it 
contains much matter on which all scholars are agreed, 
and have been agreed since the time of De Rougé, nay, 
since the time of Champollion, is, in the main, as he him- 
self makes quite clear, a statement of the views of a 
particular school of German Egyptologists, led by Dr. 
Erman, to which Mr. Griffith has attached himself. 
Now, leaving English Egyptologists out of account, 
we find that these views are more or less shared by 
Prof. Sethe, Prof. Steindorff, Prof. Spiegelberg, Prof. 
Breasted, Dr. Schafer, and a few others of less note. 
They are not only not shared, but are constantly criticised, 
by Prof. Maspero, Prof. Naville and Prof. Piehl, while 
Profs. Wiedemann, Lieblein and Schiaparelli, MM. 
Revillout, Lefébure and others, have not shown the 
slightest disposition to accept them. In England, Prof. 
Petrie himself has, so far as we are aware, never yet 
signified his adhesion to the views which Mr. Griffith 
expounds. Certainly Prof. Petrie never uses the hideous 
transliteration of the hieroglyphs, without conventional 
vowels, which is the shibboleth of the Berlin school. 
Mr. Griffith does, and he is justified in using it in scien- 
tific work, but we regret his use of it in a popular 
encyclopzedia, for no person ignorant of the hieroglyphs 
can possibly comprehend it, and words written according 
to its rules cannot be pronounced without the insertion of 
the necessary conventional vowels, which might just as 
well be inserted in print. Mr. Griffith uses a tran- 
scription which is intelligible to the layman in the pub- 
lications of the Egypt Exploration Fund ; why not in the 
“Encyclopedia Britannica” ? 
Scientific opinion is therefore sharply divided on the 
subject of the language, and, this being so, we are of 
opinion that Mr. Griffith should not have stated the 
Ermanian theory without giving his readers any hint of 
the existence of this division of opinion. 
Prof, Petrie’s historical summary is, after the debat- 
able period of the earliest dynasties is passed, naturally 
no longer so much an exposition of his own personal 
views, although on one or two points (e.g. the date of the 
Antef kings) he seems to differ from the opinion of the 
majority nowadays. His section dealing with archeology 
NATURE 
-article is a recognised authority. 
generally is of great interest and value. Fig. 10, giving the | 
principal types of Egyptian pottery from the early pre- 
dynastic period to the twenty-sixth dynasty, is very ap- 
propriate to an encyclopzedia. 
The existence of differences of opinion on important 
matters among Egyptologists in no way points to any 
condition of chaos in Egyptology; on the contrary, it 
rather indicates the energy and vigour of the study, to 
the furtherance of which men like Prof. Naville and 
[AuGusT 14, 1902 
temporary History ” (séc), given parallel to the Creation, 
we find under “Babylonia” the statement ‘7-6000. 
Temple of Bel at Nippur founded.” Sothat the Creation 
Week must have been in a year somewhat anterior to the 
foundation of the Temple of Bel. Indubitably, but surely 
in the present year of grace this sort of thing is some- 
what ridiculous, and worthier of a theological text-book 
for the use of Boer predikants (who are credited with also 
believing that the world is flat and that the sun goes 
round it) than of the “ Encyclopedia Britannica ! ” 
The article on “ Earthquakes” contains some valuable 
sections. Within the compass of two and a half pages, 
we have accounts of most of the best instruments that 
have been constructed for the registration of earth- 
quakes, whether of near or of very distant origin. These 
should be read in conjunction with the article on “ Seis- 
mometers” in the ninth edition, which as yet is far from 
obsolete. Following the -section referred to are para- 
graphs in which the results obtained from instrumental 
records are pithily described, those on velocity being an 
admirable summary of the important work of recent 
years. The practical applications of seismometry in the 
regulations to be observed by builders and engineers in 
earthquake countries will be read with no less interest than 
profit. These are all subjects on which the writer of the 
Other branches of the 
science are treated in less detail. The sections on the 
origin and on the frequency and periodicity of earth- 
quakes are hardly representative of our present know- 
ledge on these subjects. Nor are there more than bare 
allusions to seismic sea waves, earthquake sounds and 
the changes of surface features produced by earth- 
quakes. In particular, we miss a consecutive account of 
the phenomena of a typical earthquake. The progress 
of seismology, however, has been so rapid since the issue 
of the corresponding article in the ninth edition that to 
treat all branches in their due proportion within the 
limits of eight pages would be a difficult task and one 
requiring very extensive reading. 
With the exception of the article “ Dynamo,” by Mr. 
C. C. Hawkins, the volume does not contain much of 
special interest to the electrical engineer. The article on 
the “Compass,” by Captain E. W. Creak, is a useful addi- 
tion to that in the ninth edition, and that on “ Copper ” 
contains a brief summary of the growth and importance of 
the electrolytic refining industry. 
Mr. Hawkins’s contribution deserves fuller mention, not 
| only onaccount of its intrinsic merit, but because it fills a 
Prof. Maspero are, no less than Prof. Erman, Prof. Petrie | 
and Mr. Griffith, devoting the best energies of their | 
lives. 
In Prof. Driver’s article on ‘Old Testament Chron- 
ology,” which is, generally speaking, very learned and 
comprehensive, we have one fault to find. At the begin- 
ning of the chronological table (p. 77), the professor, 
after giving Ussher’s date for the Creation, proceeds in a 
most absurd manner to give the “ probable real date” for 
the creation of man, which date, he opines, is “ indeter- 
minable, but much before 7000 B.C.” (!) Why 7000 B.c. 
in particular? Because, in the column “Events in Con- 
NO. 1711, VOL. 66] 
gap more keenly felt, since the references to the dynamo 
in the ninth edition are very meagre. The present 
article, however, brings the subject quite up to date. It 
opens with a brief discussion of the general theory of the 
induction of electric currents and an account of the 
development of a practical machine from Faraday’s 
revolving copper disc. The different methods of field 
and armature winding for continuous-current machines 
and alternators are then considered more in detail, but 
not too elaborately. A general summary of the leading 
types of machine and a consideration of the suitability 
of each for different classes of work are also given, As 
a whole, the article forms a valuable contribution to the 
literature of the subject, and, without going into the 
| matter very deeply, gives an interesting survey of the 
