June 13, 1872] 



NATURE 



119 



understood by an average schoolboy who has mastered 

 any ordinary treatise on Plane Geometry. We have found 

 our own pupils to read it with interest, partly for a reason 

 put forward by the author, that " the geometrical imagina- 

 tion is exercised." We notice for the first time, we 

 believe, in a text-book, the term " disposition," in the 

 following connection : — " Parallel planes are those which 

 have the same disposition in space : " the discussion 

 raised in these columns in connection with Mr. Wilson's 

 application for a suitable term will be within the recollec- 

 tion of most readers, and if we mistake 'not we are in- 

 debted to Dr. Hirst for the suggestion of this appropriate 

 word. We note on this page (9) a curious oversight, 

 which, however, the student can readily correct." On p. 

 45, for \ir read 27r. In the short and handy notice of 

 transversals we observe the use of the term " sense," as 

 equivalent to direction. On p. 64, last line but one, read 



DA BD , . ,jv jAB.CD 



Q-p^ — — jTp ; and on p. 67, third Ime, read up^T) = 



&c. Other slight typographical mistakes will give the 

 reader no trouble. The last of the three parts contains a 

 capital summary of the chief properties of the conic sec- 

 tions — ^just sufficient, we think, for class use; for, with the 

 limited time at our disposal now-a-days, it is almost use- 

 less attempting to take up such extended treatises as the 

 admirable ones by Drew and Besant. The figure on p. 

 128 is not quite correctly lettered in accordance with the 

 proof that accompanies it. 



We ha\'e examined and used this book with much satis- 

 faction, and hope to see it pass through several editions, 

 as we think it calculated to raise the study of solid 

 geometry " to a more prominent position in geometrical 

 instruction," and to put the subject of geometrical conic 

 sections in a more satisfactory state than it at present 

 occupies. R. T. 



OUR BOOK SHELF 



The Yea f- Book of Facts in Science and Art. By John 

 Timbs. (London : Lockwood and Co. 1872.) 



Mr. Timbs's books always produce upon us the effect of 

 an ill-assorted dinner. There is plenty of solid food, but 

 along with it some that is anything but wholesome ; and 

 the concatenation is badly managed, and the cooking 

 none of the be?t. To take the concatenation first : The 

 paragraphs in this volume are arranged under a variety 

 of headings, but on what principle the assortment is made 

 we have failed to discover. Thus we have paragraphs on 

 Surface Movements of the Earth and on the Secular 

 Cooling and Figure of the Earth, under Natural Philo- 

 sophy ; on Earthquakes and \'olcanoes, under Geology 

 and Mineralogy ; on Protuberances of the Sun, under 

 Natural Philosophy ; and on Vast Sun Spots, under 

 Astronomy and Meteorology ; while two long accounts of 

 the Gun-Cotton Explosion at Stowmarket are given, one 

 under Mechanical and Useful Arts ; the other under 

 Chemical Science. Next, as to the cooking, in other 

 words, editing. Very little pains appear to have been 

 taken to go to the best authorities on each subject, or to 

 trace statements to their original source. For instance, 

 admirable papers as are the Spectator and Pall Mall 

 Gazette, we hardly care to know what the one thinks as 

 to the chance of men ever being able to fly, or the other 

 about the sensitiveness of frogs during vivisection ; and 

 some more authoritative judgment on Prof. Tyndall's ex- 



* There is a similar oversight in the proof of Cor. i.. Theorem 27, p. 35. 



periments on the purity of water might have been found 

 than that of an anonymous writer in the Times. It is 

 surely the result of careless editing to find on the same 

 page two descriptions of the same bone-cave in Pennsyl- 

 vania, although in one instance it is described, by a slight 

 geographical confusion, as being situated "in Philadelphia." 

 Very familiar proper names are constantly misspelt or mis- 

 quoted. Thus we hardly recognise Padre Secchi under the 

 disguise of " Seeche ; " or the admirable Genevan Society 

 which has published so many valuable contributions to 

 science, under the name of " The Society of Physics and 

 Natural History of Ginevra." As to the unwholesome and 

 absolutely indigestible food, we will refer only to a single 

 actual error. Canon Kingsley will be surprised to be made 

 responsible, on the authority of our excellent contemporary 

 the Builder, for the statement that " lime is a metal called 

 by chemists ' calcium ; ' but it is never found in that state in 

 nature. It is found in a rocky or chalk form." Other 

 blunders almost as gross could be quoted. The book 

 gives us the impression that the compiler was under the 

 necessity of filling a certain number of pages, and that 

 for this purpose the scissors and paste were freely used 

 on the material that came the readiest to hand. The 

 worst is that by the non-scientific public such books are 

 taken as an authoritative record of the progress of science 

 during the year, and of the most important inventions 

 and discoveries, and the most striking new applications of 

 old principles. 



Rightliandedness. By Daniel Wilson, LL.D., Professor 

 of History and English Literature in University Col- 

 lege, Toronto. Pp. 40. (Toronto, 1872.) 

 This pamphlet contains some useful facts bearing on 

 the question why some people are left-handed, and 

 the antecedent question why more are right-handed. 

 Prof. Wilson takes a sufficiently comprehensive view of 

 the subject. He admits that the problem does not con- 

 cern the hand alone, but the foot, the eye, and the whole 

 body. He admits that a similar preference for one side 

 may be found among the lower animals ; and he re-states 

 with some fresh illustrations the grounds which have led 

 previous writers on the subject to conclude that right- 

 handedness is the normal condition of all the existing 

 tribes of man, and has been so as far back as history, 

 tradition, or language extend. He raises the question 

 whether, in some cases, we have not translated the ancient 

 terms inversely, so that the favourite and stronger hand 

 may have been with certain of the ancient nations the 

 left ; but has no difficulty in showing, from the described 

 relations to the points of the compass, frcm the form of 

 weapons, and from many other sources, that what we call 

 the right hand has always been the one chiefly used. 

 In another passage Dr. Wflson refutes the idea that the 

 Egyptians were a left-handed race, and shows that it has 

 arisen from the greater convenience of drawing the figure 

 left handed in certain cases. The evidence from language 

 is discussed, and the etymology of the words dexter, 

 deciiH, qiiinque, sinister is accepted, as given by Grimm, 

 Donaldson, and other philologists, who long ago pointed 

 out the connection in various languages between the words 

 which express the number ten and those for the right 

 hard, the fingers of which complete the tale often. 



The learned Canadian Professor does not ofler any new 

 theory of the reason for the general preference of the' right 

 hand, or the occasional preference of the left. He dis- 

 cusses the hypotheses advanced by Barclay, Hyrtl, Gra- 

 tiolet, and Buchannan ; and rightly rejects them all, as 

 insufficient or contradicted by anatomical facts. Besides 

 these writers, and Prof. Humphry, of Cambridge, who is 

 also quoted, Dr. William Ogle has lately published, in 

 the '• INIedico-Chirurgical Transactions," an interesting 

 paper on " Dextral Pre-eminence," in which several new 

 facts and observations are recorded. 



Prof. Wilson's paper is a valuable contribution to the 

 literature of the subject. It seems, however, to have been 



