308 
for most of our comparatively sluggish British 1 rivers. | 
The Thames flows at the rate of two or three miles an 
hour, the Severn at three or four miles, and most of our 
upland streams run still faster. Surely there is just cause 
of complaint against a writer who, in support of a theory 
which he has adopted, cites facts which are wholly excep- 
tional without saying that they are 
time he is led in his ardour unconsciously to misstate the 
facts which do not tell in his favour. 
We have read this book with a feeling of regret that it 
should ever have been published. Its author is 
a hard-working observer, and perhaps had he been less 
ambitious, and been content to wait some years longer 
until his experience had widened, and he had found time 
to mature and methodise his opinions, our verdict upon 
his labours might have been different. As it is, he has 
hastened before the world with a book of which, in a 
year or two hence, no one will see the crudity more keenly 
than he will do himself. A work which aims at giving a 
popular version of any branch of scientific inquiry should 
be eminently clear, accurate, and readable. Mr. 
tosh’s volume fulfils none of these conditions, and we 
only fear that its effect may be to discourage readers from 
seeking to learn more of what is in reality one of the 
most fascinating fields of geology. 
OUR BOOK ‘SHELF 
Medical Chemistry. — Manuel de Chimie Médicale 
Pharmaceutiqgue. Par Alfred Riche. 8vo., pp. 771, 
figures 104. (Paris: Germer-Bailliére, 1870. Lon- 
don : Williams and Norgate.) 
E have here a comprehensive text-book of chemistry, in 
cee the medical and pharmaceutical applications of the 
science are specially noticed. The author is one of the 
professors in the School of Pharmacy at Paris, and the 
“mineral chemistry ” 
duction of his course of lectures. The “organic che- 
mistry” is based on the course of Professor Berthelot, 
and the toxicological portions of the work reflect the 
teaching of Professor Bouis. 
use of students of medicine and pharmacy, this manual is 
primarily a systematic exposition of the fundamental facts 
of chemistry, and its technical character is revealed only 
in incidental explanations. Thus, sulphuric acid is noticed | 
with the oxygenated sulphur compounds, and its proper- 
ties, preparation, commercial manufacture, purification, 
and chemical constitution, receive adequate treatment 
before its medical employment and its action as an irri- | 
tant poison are considered. Again, in the section on the 
natural alkaloids we get the chemical history of each of the 
more important opium bases before we obtain any informa- 
tion respecting the assay of opium, the action of the drug 
on the human system, or the symptoms of poisoning by 
opiates. The officinal processes for preparing the che- 
mical substances used in medicine are plainly but briefly 
described, and practical directions are given for testing 
the purity and estimating the strength of commercial pro- 
ducts. ‘The author has devoted 150 pages to “ biological 
chemistry,” an important section of the science which 
receives scant notice in most manuals, and has minutely 
described methods of analysing milk, blood, urine, and 
calculi, which may be adopted by the physician to obtain 
trustworthy indications of the progress of disease or the 
effects of medicines. Professor Riche’s manual has so 
many good qualities that we reluctantly call attention to 
a characteristic w hich detracts from its value as a treatise 
on general chemistry. While admitting that the modern 
or molecular notation is preferable to the notation based | 
on the old equivalents, the author deliberately rejects the 
NA [fee 
so, while at the same | 
evidently | 
Mackin- | 
of the manual is essentially a repro- | 
Though designed for the | 
[| Fan. 20, 1870 
former “because it is not yet recognised in the official 
programmes.” Consequently, the book is filled with sym- 
| bolic formulze which do not accord with accepted theories. 
| In the introduction to the “ organic chemistry,” M. Riche 
attempts to adapt the exoteric notation of his school to 
modern ideas by doubling the symbols of oxygen, sulphur, 
| and carbon ; but English students will look with little 
favour on the hybrid formulae thus produced. We trust 
that the author will burst his bonds of red tape before the 
second edition of his manual is issued. JG. 3B; 
Hleads and Tales; or, Anecdotes and Stories of Quadru- 
peds and other Beasts, chiefly connected with Incidents 
in the Histories of more or less Distinguished Men- 
| By Adam White, late Assistant in the Zoological 
Department, British Museum. (London : Nisbet and 
| Co. 1870.) 
THE idea of bringing together the anecdotes of animals 
| recorded in the biographies of great or well-known men 
| is a good one ; but the notion of interlarding these anec- 
| dotes with facetize selected chiefly from Mr. Mark Lemon’s 
| “Jest Book” can hardly be commended. Mr. White is 
| sadly mistaken if he supposes that well-written stories of 
animal life require to be made palatable to school-boys 
by the addition of puns and shallow witticisms. School- 
boys may well be amused at the solemn way in which the 
author announces his discovery (in the pages of Macaulay) 
of the cause of the death of William III. ; but they will 
think it beyond a jest when they themselves discover that 
six pages which should have been filled with anecdotes are 
occupied by Macaulay’s account of the last days of King 
William. Mr, White does not exclude man from what 
he is pleased to term his anecdotical treatment of the 
great order Mammalia. ‘Three stories of a ludicrous 
character, however, suffice to illustrate the human species. 
The schoolboy reader is duly warned against the theory 
of the genesis of man by natural causes in the following 
terms :—‘“ Let us never for a moment rest in such falla- 
| cious theories, or accept the belief of Darwin and Huxley, 
with a few active, agitating disciples, that animals, and 
eyen plants, may pass into each other. Darwin and 
' Huxley cannot change nature. They may change their 
| minds and opinions, as their fathers did before them. It 
| is, we expect, only the old heathen materialism cropping 
out.” This extract is, perhaps, sufficient to show the 
author’s mental calibre. It is not necessary to praise the 
illustrations of this book ; it is quite sufficient to mention 
that they are from the drawings of J. Wolf. 
Facts and Dates; or, The Leading Events in Sacred and 
| Profane History, "and the Princ cipal F acts in thevarious 
Physical Sciences: the memory being aided through- 
out by a simple and natural me thod. By the Rev. 
| Alex. Mackay, LL.D. (Blackwood and Sons.) 
A SO-CALLED system of mnemonics may possibly be of 
use to young men cramming history and geography for 
competitive examinations ; but we see no room for it in 
science-teaching. The scientific facts capable of being 
expressed by numbers, and which it is desirable to com- 
mit to memory, are really very few. Indeed, we believe 
they are so few in any given science, that it would take 
most people longer to master Dr. Mackay’s system of. 
_ artificial memory than to learn the numbers themselves. 
The author has spent a good deal of labour in so framing 
his mnemonic sentences as to contain ideas having some 
connection with the fact intended to be remembered. 
This is all very well; but the essential fault of his system, 
and of every such system, is, that it is not sufficient to 
every word of it must be accurately retained. We are 
sorry to see that Dr, Mackay is sadly afflicted with the 
Great Pyramid craze. The introduction of such a matter 
as the pretended scientific revelation into a book intended 
for school use is very much to be deprecated, 
remember the z¢@ea contained in the mnemonic sentence : - 
