454 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 40. 



Professor Halsted has since added to our 

 obligations to him as the bibliographer of this 

 subject by obtaining the original Latin treatise 

 of Saccheri and translating it into English. He 

 found from the beginning that the two words 

 quoted by Beltrami and fi'om Beltrami by me, 

 diuturnum prcelium, were meant by Saccheri to 

 indicate a mental attitude of constant war 

 against the ' hypothesis ' as heretical, without 

 any such ' struggle ' in his own mind as he ap- 

 peared, from my reading of Beltrami, to have 

 'confessed.' The words of Beltrami are not 

 inconsistent with my rendering of the two Latin 

 words. 



In May, 1894, on Professor Halsted chal- 

 lenging my word 'confessed,' etc., and sending 

 me his Latin copy of Saccheri, I denied my 

 mistranslation of what Beltrami had set before 

 me, though acknowledging that I had, through 

 the ambiguity of my material, credited Sac- 

 cheri with a confession of what he did not con- 

 fess (though he doubtless felt it, as intimated 

 by Beltranii), the ' distracting heretical ten- 

 dency.' In the last letter which I find on this 

 subject from Professor Halsted, May 8, 1894, 

 he says properly: " In my interpretation of the 

 facts as they exist in the book I am inclined to 

 go much further than Beltrami or yourself. 

 But I wish to distinctly separate historic fact 

 from interpretation, however probable or how- 

 ever much called for." There was no hint that 

 I should publish any correction. I assumed 

 that he would make the case clear in bringing 

 out his translation of Saccheri. 



The reader will now observe that I am 

 charged with 'other mistakes,' of which no 

 specification is or has ever been given, publicly 

 or privately, and will form his own judgment. 

 He will kindly note that I am charged with 

 ' mistranslation,' after I had quoted to Professor 

 Halsted the Italian and Latin context of the two 

 Latin words in question and received no reply ex- 

 pressing dissatisfaction, and will form his own 

 judgment. He will finally remark that my 

 references to Beltrami's surprise, etc., are ridi- 

 culed as a ' pure fairy tale, ' contrary to the 

 fact, by this usually staunch upholder of 

 historical accuracy, and will form his own 

 judgment. And after all he will probably form 

 a wholly incorrect judgment of Professor Hal- 



sted's motives, however correct it may be of his 

 imprudence; for I have had too many proofs of 

 personal friendliness from him not to feel surCy 

 in spite of this injury he has done me, that he 

 had no idea that his hasty phrases could injure 

 me, and no motive other than that of ' pointing 

 a moral ' for the moment. 



Emory McClintock. 

 MoEKiSTOWN, Sept. 24, 1895. 



SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE. 

 The Climates and Baths of 0-reat Britain. Vol. I. 



London and New York, Macmillan & Co. 



1895. 8vo. pp. xvi+640. 



This volume contains the first part of the re- 

 port of a Committee of the Eoyal Medical and 

 Chirurgical Society of London, which Committee 

 was appointed in 1889 to investigate certain 

 questions relating to the climatology and bal- 

 neology of Great Britain and Ireland, and in- 

 cludes the results of correspondence with med- 

 ical men, of personal investigations by members 

 of the committee and of the analysis of meteor- 

 ological and medical statistics relating to the 

 various localities. This first volume relates to 

 the climates of the South of England and the 

 chief medicinal springs of Great Britain. 



The chairman of the Committee is Dr. W. M. 

 Ord, of London, and his name is a suflBeient 

 guarantee of the accuracy and scientific im- 

 partiality of the statements made. In his intro- 

 ductory remarks he points out the contrast be- 

 tween England and Continental Europe from 

 the point of view of the seeker of health, the 

 former furnishing chiefly seacoast resorts while 

 the main sanatory resources of the continent 

 are inland and mountainous. 



While a large part of this report is mainly of 

 local interest, being intended especially as a 

 guide to English physicians in prescribing cer- 

 tain health resorts to certain classes of patients, 

 the general principles upon which its recom- 

 mendations are based are as applicable to many 

 American resorts as they are to the English 

 ones. For example, much of what is said as to 

 the class of cases which may hope for benefit 

 or as to the other class of cases which are likely 

 to be injured by the hot waters of Bath is 

 equally applicable to the Hot Springs of 'Vir- 

 ginia or of Arkansas. So far as seaside resorts 



