NOVEMBEE 15, 1912] 



SCIENCE 



677 



these, supplemented by intelligent action, will 

 circumvent, to a large extent, any lasting dam- 

 age from even extreme boreal conditions. 

 A. J. Mitchell Jacksonville, Florida 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 

 The Life of Ellen E. Richards. By Caroline 



L. Hunt. Boston: Whitcomb and Barrows. 



1912. Pp. xiv + 329. 



It is seldom that a biographer is confronted 

 with a more difficult task than that of bring- 

 ing together in moderate compass a record of 

 a life of such unremitting, aggressive and 

 varied activity as that of Ellen Henrietta 

 Richards. In this instance, however, both au- 

 thor and publishers have been inspired by 

 warm, personal friendship to prepare a me- 

 morial which should give worthy expression 

 to the ideals, purposes and deeds of this most 

 remarkable woman, and the outcome is a 

 volume which will gratify the legions of those 

 who, because of personal contact or helpful 

 inspiration, will always count Mrs. Richards 

 among their friends. 



The preparation of this memorial volume 

 was undertaken, at the request of Professor 

 R. H. Richards, through the cooperative ef- 

 forts of a committee of nine of Mrs. Rich- 

 ards's intimate associates. They have gath- 

 ered materials from many sources, including 

 family records, letters from classmates, col- 

 lege associates, graduates and former stu- 

 dents of the Massachusetts Institute of Tech- 

 nology, friends in all walks of life, and from 

 the officers and records of the many organiza- 

 tions in whose activities she took a leading 

 part. From this material Miss Hunt has pre- 

 pared a most readable and interesting narra- 

 tive. This she has subdivided into sketches, 

 in separate chapters, relating, respectively, to 

 Mrs. Riehards's childhood, girlhood, college 

 life (two chapters), her experiences as a stu- 

 dent of chemistry, her laboratory work, her 

 home life, her association with the Woman's 

 Laboratory, her teaching by correspondence, 

 the beginnings of euthenics, her work among 

 and for college women, her activity as a mis- 

 sionary of science, her journeyings, her ac- 

 tivities in connection with the Lake Placid 



Conference, and with the Home Economics 

 Movement. The remaining two chapters of 

 the book deal with the enlarged influence of 

 the last years of her life and the fortunate 

 perpetuation of that influence in the future 

 through the continuation of the helpful ac- 

 tivities which she organized and inspired, and 

 which others are now maintaining with en- 

 thusiasm. 



It is obviously too early to estimate accu- 

 rately the full measure of what Mrs. Rich- 

 ards accomplished, but this disadvantage is 

 more than offset by the opportunity to obtain 

 accurate information at first hand from many 

 reliable sources, and by the enthusiastic zeal 

 of so many to do honor to the memory of one 

 who had so recently been to them a source of 

 inspiration and help. 



Even to those most closely associated with 

 Mrs. Richards, who witnessed her untiring 

 energy and devotion to her work and her 

 ideals, the story of her life, as told in this 

 volume, must excite renewed wonder and re- 

 spect. It is a singular record of severe and 

 often disheartening obstacles overcome by pa- 

 tient purpose and ceaseless effort, inspired and 

 supported by a breadth of thought and out- 

 look which was distinctly in advance of the 

 period in which she was working. This is 

 strikingly true of her girlhood and young 

 womanhood, where she was a pioneer in her 

 undertakings with respect both to her own 

 education and development and that of her 

 fellow-women ; and it is hardly less true of the 

 work of her later years for the improvement 

 of life in the commimity, and especially in the 

 home. Her viewpoint had much in common 

 with that which in other fields leads to the in- 

 ception of large engineering operations of 

 wide significance. Whether as teacher, in- 

 vestigator, organizer, missionary, companion 

 or friend, her efforts were essentially con- 

 structive, and, while the results may lack 

 something of the tangible permanence and 

 glory which belong to the creations of the 

 engineer, they are none the less abiding and 

 real. It is a pleasure to note that two me- 

 morial funds, the proceeds of one of which is 

 to be used for the endowment of research 



