Miscellanies. 203 



Some of them are exceedingly remarkable and interesting ; but the en- 

 tire series of vegetable proximate principles is appalling from their num- 

 ber and from the copious vocabulary of new terms which have been intro- 

 duced. We hardly know whether to congratulate the young student on 

 the vast accumulation of facts, especially in vegetable chemistry, although 

 in a degree, the remark may be extended to all the branches of the sci- 

 ence. Let a beginner look at it as it now stands in the great works of 

 Thenard, Dumas, Schubart, Mitscherlich, Berzelius, and Thomson, and 

 he will feel that a great labor is before him merely to know what others 

 have done, still more to folloiv them with experimental research, and most 

 of all, to pass beyond them and enlarge the boundaries of the science. 



The period has already arrived when it is and must be taught bij selec- 

 tion, and it will be a happy result should the time ever come, when it may 

 be presented by a teacher under general principles, with no more facts 

 than are necessary to illustrate the principles, leaving the immense ency- 

 clopedia of the literature of chemistry, like the store houses of the other 

 sciences, to be explored as far as occasion may require, without compel- 

 ling the professor to lead, and the pupil to follow, through every maze of 

 the vast labyrinth. 



If the full detail of facts is still to be given, the science must be divided 

 under different professors and comprised in several courses constituting a 

 system. 



31. Olmste^s Introduction to Astronomy. — Professor Olmsted has in 

 press, an elementary work on Astronomy, for the use of the students of 

 Yale College, designed as a sequel to his Text Book on Natural Philoso- 

 phy. Illustrated by numerous wood cuts and copper-plate engravings. 

 1 vol. 8vo., pp. 350. 



32. Temperature of the Earth. — The following observations were 

 made by Dr. Magnus with his Geothermometer, on the temperature of 

 a bore sunk by M. C. V. Wulffen, at Pitzpuhl, near Burg, about nine 

 English miles from Magdeburgh : 



At a depth of 150 feet, the temperature was 49.77 F. 

 200 " " 50.67 



250 " " 51.8 



300 " " 53.15 



350 " " 54.61 



400 " " 55.62 



457 " " 56.63 



The bore was provided with iron tubes to the depth of 427 feet ; 

 but when the observations were made, the portion below the tubes had 

 already become so filled up with mud, that it was impossible to cause 

 the thermometer to descend farther than 457 feet. The increase of 



