(VA TURE 



THURSDAY, JULY 27, 1911. 



THE ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA. 

 The Encyclopaedia Britannica : a Dictionary of Arts, 

 Sciences, Literature, and General Information. 

 Eleventh edition. Vols, xv.-xxix. (Italy — Zymotic 

 Diseases, and index volume.) (Cambridge : Univer- 

 sity Press, 191 1.) 



A GENERAL notice of fifteen volumes of the 

 dimensions of "The Encyclopaedia Britannica" 

 can, at best, be based only on a process of " browsing " 

 through them, and of turning to a subject here and 

 there as it strikes the mind. In these volumes there 

 is ample scientific material on which to examine two 

 claims that have been put forward on behalf of the 

 work on general grounds. The first is that its use 

 as a work of reference purely, for the discovery of 

 one isolated fact or another, is not its only use, not 

 even its primary use, since for this purpose a reference 

 book of less ample size probably fulfils any demand 

 that the ordinary inquirer is likely to make. Not that 

 "The Encyclopaedia Britannica" fails in this object; 

 the number of its article headings is well known to 

 have been enormously increased in the present edition, 

 every judicious addition of a heading adds to its value 

 as a work of reference simply, while the existence of 

 an index volume, though somewhat elaborating the 

 mechanical process of discovering an isolated fact, 

 eliminates the necessity of exercising imagination in 

 finding information to which no article heading 

 directly points. But beyond this, it is claimed that 

 the work is usable by readers as a library in itself, 

 and, secondly, that the desire to make it thus usable 

 has justified the new editorial policy of making the 

 articles under the broad scientific or other headings, 

 not exhaustive treatises on the whole of each subject, 

 but, wherever possible fit is not always so), compara- 

 tively brief notices confined strictly to main lines, and 

 indicating to the reader the further headings to which 

 he may turn if he desires to pursue the subject. 

 Another most important aid in this pursuit has been 

 given, as will presently be seen, as a new feature of 

 the index volume. 



A few of the articles under general scientific head- 

 ings in the second half of the volumes may be taken 

 as illustrating the above thesis. Dr. A. N. White- 

 head's article on mathematics covers little more than 

 four pages ; it defines the science, briefly reviews its 

 history, and indicates its scope and application, and in 

 doing the last it indicates upwards of fifty other head- 

 ings, under which any branch of the subject may be 

 pursued. Dr. Max Verworn's notice on physiology is 

 laid out on similar lines; anatomy, cytology, digestive 

 organs, respiratory system, touch, smell, taste, vision, 

 hearing, plants (physiology), are a few of the branch 

 lines to which this concise summary shows the way. 

 In the article on zoology, Sir E. Ray Lankester writes 

 at greater length, it is true, than do either of the 

 authors just named in their general treatises, but he 

 does not go outside the history of the whole subject, 

 with particular reference to the various important 

 NO. 2178, VOL. 87") 



systems of classification which have been laid down, 

 leading up to that adopted in " The Encyclopaedia 

 Britannica " itself. It may be added here that the 

 editors have not feared the adjectival heading (a form 

 open to much abuse in reference books, as such head- 

 ings are not easy of preconception by the reader) when 

 it appears appropriate, from the point of view of the 

 specialist, to a clearly defined compartment of a 

 general subject. Thus Zoological Distribution and 

 Zoological Nomenclature are very properly made the 

 headings of separate articles, instead of being made 

 great sections under the general heading of zoology. 

 The one is dealt with very clearly by Mr. Lydekker, 

 who has contributed a great mass of zoological matter 

 to the whole work ; the other is by Dr. Chalmers 

 Mitchell, who incidentally gives his high authority to 

 the subject of zoological gardens. 



The index has in a large degree followed the model 

 of that provided in the tenth edition, but certain 

 obvious improvements have been introduced. By the 

 use of a distinctive type it is made clear when any 

 index heading is also an article heading in the text. 

 The reader is thus able to appreciate at once that any 

 references which follow under such an index heading 

 are merely supplemental to the article itself, and it 

 would appear that a more judicious selection of such 

 "casual" references has been made than was made 

 in the index to the last edition. Indeed, some of the 

 larger blocks of index references, as, for example, 

 those dealing with the history of large countries, have 

 obviously been made, not by simply collecting and 

 editing the references gathered by independent in- 

 dexers in the course of their work, but by means of a 

 selection (by one hand) of the verbal references which 

 a user of the index would naturally expect to find, and 

 the subsequent attachment of the proper page and 

 volume numbers to them. This must have involved a 

 great deal of research, and as such work was de- 

 pendent upon the completion of the whole of the text, 

 it may be said that the index has been issued with 

 laudable promptitude. 



But the new feature of the index volume referred 

 to above, as an aid to the pursuit of a given broad 

 subject through the whole of the work, is perhaps 

 more worthy of praise than the index itself. This is 

 the classified list of articles, which the editors "believe 

 to be the first attempt in any general work of refer- 

 ence at a systematic catalogue or analysis of the mate- 

 rial contained in it." Under such broad divisions as 

 art, biology, geography, history, medical science, 

 physics, &c. (there are twenty- four of these divisions 

 in all), and under appropriate departments within 

 each, practically the whole of the article headings in 

 the " Encyclopaedia " are classified and subclassified, 

 so that a reader who wishes for a bird's-eye view of 

 all the article headings in the department (say) of 

 pathology, therapeutics, and surgery, can turn up that 

 group and see them at a glance. This is a most 

 important addition to the use of the " Encyclopaedia," 

 not as a work of general reference, but as a special 

 encyclopaedia on any given subject. Incidentally it 

 furnishes perhaps a more remarkable conception of 

 the magnitude of the work than do even the textual 



