606 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVII. No. 955 



liquids in the diet. Such investigations as 

 have been made do not bear out this state- 

 ment. Nuts are said to be of little value as 

 food, but their composition and digestibility 

 show them to be highly nutritious. Fish is 

 classed as " an economical kind of protein 

 food." This may be true of certain species, 

 especially when salted or smoked, but some 

 species when bought in the fresh condition, as 

 for instance blue fish, furnish a very expen- 

 sive diet, much more so than even the expen- 

 sive meats. 



Gravity cream is said to contain 16 per 

 cent, of fat. If the term " gravity " is used in 

 the usual sense as applied to cream raised by 

 deep setting and pan setting, then under some 

 conditions it would contain double that per- 

 centage of fat and even more. Cream does 

 not have a uniform composition, but varies 

 greatly according to conditions. 



It is hardly necessary to multiply these ref- 

 erences. There is running through the first 

 part of the volume, which relates to the general 

 principles of nutrition, a general tendency to 

 inaccuracy and indefiniteness of statement. 

 For the purposes of instruction, the language 

 might wisely be condensed and reference to 

 unimportant details omitted. 



No discussion is attempted in this connec- 

 tion of the author's recommendations as to the 

 diet for invalids and for persons in health 

 under various conditions because he states 

 that the recommendations " are largely based 

 upon my own observation " and such observa- 

 tions constitute original data. No intelligent 

 discussion is possible unless the extent and 

 character of these data are understood. 



W. H. Jordan- 

 New YOEK Ageicultukal 

 Experiment Station 



Home University Lihrary of Modern Knowl- 

 edge. Edited by Herbert Fisher, Gilbert 

 Murray, J. Arthur Thomson and William 

 T. Brewster. New York, Henry Holt & 

 Company. 



The Camhridge Manuals of Science and Lit- 

 erature. Edited by P. Giles and A. C. 

 Seward. New York, G. P. Putnam's Sons. 



An anecdote which greatly impressed my 

 boyish imagination some thirty-five years ago 

 related to certain little scientific primers in 

 terra-cotta colored cloth, written by such men 

 as Huxley, Tyndall and Lubbock, and pub- 

 lished, I think at a shilling, by Macmillan. 

 The story was that some one had remonstrated 

 with Macmillan for getting such eminent men 

 to prepare these simple little works, when 

 " any schoolmaster could have written them." 

 The publisher replied that his experience had 

 shown him that it took just such men to write 

 good primers; that it was one of the most 

 difiicult things to accurately and effectively 

 present the gist of any scientific sabject, and 

 attempts to have such work done cheaply by 

 inferior men had always given more or less 

 unsatisfactory results. Since that time mul- 

 titudes of elementary scientific works have 

 appeared, and the opinions attributed in the 

 story to Macmillan have not been shared by 

 all their publishers. We could hardly say, at 

 the present time, that excellent works may not 

 be written by men of small scientific reputa- 

 tion; but it assuredly remains true that they 

 must be written by men of good training and 

 ability. The abounding faults of our current 

 text-books bear witness to the reprehensible 

 lightness of heart and mind with which, in a 

 commercial age, the teaching profession at- 

 tempts to gain money and reputation. 



The two series of volumes now before us, 

 issued from New York, but prepared and orig- 

 inally published in England, represent new 

 attempts to carry out the Macmillan plan. 

 Essentially products of the universities, they 

 are part of the general scheme of " university 

 extension " which now finds so much favor. 

 Varying greatly in literary and perhaps sci- 

 entific merit, they maintain on the whole a 

 high standard; and in nearly every case it 

 may be said that the author is an eminent 

 representative of the branch of science he dis- 

 cusses. The field covered is so large that no 

 reviewer can critically consider more than a 

 small minority of the volumes, yet in a sense 

 he can judge best the ones on unfamiliar sub- 



