REVIEWS. 



NouvEAU Traite des Eaux Souterraines. By E. A. Martei.. 



Ijarge octavo, 840 pp., with 384 figures. Published by Octave 



Doin, Paris. Price 50 francs. 

 A LTHOUGH boring to effect the release of subterranean water 

 -^ under pressure was accomplished in Egypt and elsewhere in 

 early times, even before the Carthusian monks of Lillers opened the 

 first well in the province of Artois in 1126, the people of France, 

 wherever they settle, seem to be as much impelled by an inevitable 

 tendency to put down an artesian well as the British soldier is to 

 lay out a football ground wherever his army halts for jnore than a 

 week. The application of science to the search for underground 

 water seems to be with the French a distinctive national trait, an 

 irresistible instinct. One cannot read M. Martel's fascinating work 

 without becoming infected with the spirit which runs through every 

 page of the text and is reinforced by numerous well-reproduced 

 illustrations. Throughout there is the personal touch of the devoue, 

 who is — if one may be permitted the metaphor — simply saturated 

 with his subject, and wishes his reader to share with him the joy that 

 he has had during the thirty-eight years which he has devoted to the 

 varied aspects of water underground. M. Martei speaks of his 

 Nouveau Traite as a mere appendix to Daubree's classical Eaux 

 Souterraines. It is, in effect, the product of restating in systematic 

 form the results embodied in fifteen special works and some 500 

 shorter papers on various branches of the question which have arisen 

 from the author's researches in many parts of Europe and America 

 since 1 883. Although abundant references to previous literature are 

 methodically arranged and systematically summarized with a due 

 sense of relativity, the mechanical effort of the laborious compiler 

 is everywhere dominated and enlivened by the spirit of the 

 enthusiast. 



The author passes lightly over those aspects of the subject that 

 are widely knowm and generally accepted, such as the meteoric 

 cycle, the general geological activity of water, the theory of artesian 

 springs, the chemical and bacteriological qualities of potable v/ater, 

 the processes of search -for and captage (" exploitation " is perhaps 

 the most convenient English word) of water, and the processes for 

 its purification for domestic and industrial uses. On the other hand, 

 he plunges more deeply into those subjects that have given rise to 

 theoretical controversy, in w^hich new ideas have been developed 

 and old prejudices have been shaken by recent researches. A full 

 discussion is accordingly given of the importance of rock-joints, 

 fissures, and faults in determining the direction of underground 

 channels, the common laxity of ideas expressed by the teriii " water 

 table ", the distinction between porosity and permeability, the 

 relations of infiltration to evaporation and run-off, the circulation of 

 subterranean water and its influence on the production of mineral 



