JUNE 14, 1912] 
cellence of his work, without which the plates 
would be of much less value. 
Freprerick H. GETMAN 
on Modern Explosives. 
By Grorce W. MacDonaup. Whittaker & 
Co., N. Y. 1912. Pp. 192. $9.50 net. 
When the age of the world as fixed by the most 
recent observers, such as Becker and Clarke, the 
probable length of time it has been inhabited by 
man, and the important part which chemistry 
played, both in the creation of the earth and 
of its inhabitants, is considered, it is an amaz- 
ing thing that man was so very slow in as- 
sembling a systematized knowledge of chemis- 
try and especially slow in recognizing those 
compounds which are reservoirs of energy, for 
though compounds of this kind, such as the 
nitrosubstitution compound, picrie acid, dis- 
covered by Hausmann in 1788, were described 
in the latter part of the eighteenth century, 
it was not until the opening year of the nine- 
teenth century, in which Howard discovered 
mercuric fulminate and demonstrated its 
properties, that man apparently began to real- 
ize that energy could be stored up in individ- 
ual compound molecules which was ready for 
release at command, so that it might be em- 
ployed like the bent bow, the coiled spring, the 
head of water, the wind, or the energy of 
man or animals applied through the many 
mechanical devices then invented, or mixtures 
of substances, such as gunpowders, to do 
work. 
This new conception of a capacity with 
which compound molecules might be endowed 
was, in the middle of the nineteenth century, 
reinforced by Schénbein’s discovery of cellu- 
lose nitrates and Sobrero’s discovery of gly- 
ceryl nitrates; and the discovery and recogni- 
tion of the value of molecules so constituted 
to mankind in the accomplishment of work 
has gone on with continued acceleration ever 
since, for masses of the mercuric fulminate, 
cellulose nitrates, glyceryl nitrates, alone or 
compounded into mixtures such as the many 
dynamites, smokeless powders and permissible 
explosives, have been put to do work in engi- 
neering projects and in military operations, 
Historical Papers 
SCIENCE 
929 
and they have, when wisely used, materially 
increased the resources of man in his contest 
with the material world in which he is placed 
and environed. 
The period covered by MacDonald in the 
book under review is from 1800 to 1887 and it 
deals with the discovery and development of 
the three explosives last enumerated. This 
wasaperiod of marked scientific and technical 
activity with regards to these bodies and 
much was published regarding them in widely 
scattered publications, some of which are now 
difficult of access, and because of this, and 
further because the earliest literature “ often 
contains observations and experiments which 
are generally considered to be the results of 
much later investigation” the author has 
brought them together here after having pub- 
lished them as separate articles in Arms and 
Explosives. 
Mr. MacDonald has not given reprints but 
rather condensed résumés in which he has 
divided single articles into several smaller 
ones and introduced comments of his own. 
Further he has drawn his material from pa- 
tent literature and unpublished correspond- 
ence as well as from scientific journals, and 
recast or “reduced tabulated results to state- 
ments of fact.” It will be seen therefore that 
the book is not authoritative, even to the ex- 
tent that carefully supervised reprints would 
be, and that its usefulness is limited. 
There appears a lack of proportion in the 
treatment since 149 out of the 192 pages are 
devoted to gun cotton and 98 of these to Abel’s 
work leaving Schénbein the discoverer, and 
von Lenk, whose pioneer work in Austria was 
presented freely and in detail to the Com- 
mittee of the British Association, quite in the 
background. In fact there is a distinctly 
British tendency permeating the book. 
Cuartes EK. Munroe 
Insect Pests of the Farm, Garden and Or- 
chard. By E. Dwicut Sanperson. New 
York, John Wiley & Sons. 1912. $3.00. 
The author explains in the preface how his 
attempt to revise his former book “ Insects 
Injurious to Staple Crops” finally resulted in 
