526 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 42. 



ence was also had with Professor Ayrton, which 

 served to clear up points of uncertainty. The 

 committee of the British Board of Trade, how- 

 ever, preferred to adhere to the test-tube form 

 of cell and proceeded to secure the legalization 

 of their own specification without reference to 

 the finding of the international committee. The 

 work had all been done by the committee be- 

 fore the death of von Helmholtz, except the 

 drawing up of a formal report. Upon the ap- 

 pointment of the committee of the National 

 Academy of Sciences, all the information in the 

 hands of the writer and the conclusions reached 

 by the majority of the international committee 

 were communicated to the chairman of the new 

 committee, and they are embodied in his report 

 (see Mi.-j. Doc. No. 115, 53d Congress, Senate). 

 I take pleasure in adding that the specification 

 relating to the Clark cell, which was reported 

 to Congress by the Academy committee, meets 

 my entire approval and has some points of su- 

 periority over that legalized by the English 

 'Order in Council.' It is not likely, however, 

 that any discrepancies between the E. M. F.'s 

 of the two will be found to exist. 



It seems necessary to add that the volume 

 now under review is somewhat seriously marred 

 by many typographical and other errors. The 

 proof should certainly have been read by more 

 than one person and by some one familiar with 

 the details of the Congress. 



Heney S. Caehart. 



The Alps from End to End. By SlE William 

 Maetin Conway. Westminster, Constable. 

 New York, Macmillan & Co. 1895. 

 Sir William M. Conway, who has gained dis- 

 tinction among explorers of high mountains by 

 his expedition to the Himalayas, made a rapid 

 scramble over the Alps from end to end in the 

 summer of 1894, and now presents a simple 

 narrative of his excursion in a rather large book 

 of four hundred pages with a hundred full-page 

 plates ; the latter being notable for the high 

 average elevation of the points of view. Hav- 

 ing taken Swiss guides to aid him in the Hima- 

 layas, Conway now briugs two Gurkhas — 

 natives of Nepal — to go with him over the Alps, 

 at the same time advancing their mountaineer- 

 ing education, and thus enabling them better to 



assist in Himalayan exploration on their return 

 to the East. The use of a compass, an aneroid 

 and a good contour map to find the way in the 

 clouds is ingenious and worth learning. There 

 is extremely little physiographical or geological 

 matter in the book, but it abounds with the 

 minutiae of personal incidents. For example, 

 opening the book at random, we read : ' ' On 

 calling for provisions we found that the men 

 had devoured all the fresh meat at breakfast, 

 and that the day was to be a bread-and-butter 

 one. Fitzgerald and I purloined the end of a 

 •sausage in revenge. It was easily secreted, but 

 the straits to which we were put to eat it 

 secretly," etc., etc. Of a day opening with 

 rain it is frankly recorded : ' ' We were de- 

 lighted to hear that the morning was one for 

 bed rather thau mountains;" the glory of trips 

 at headlong speed being apparently in having 

 done them rather than in the doing. The book 

 records a redoubtable athletic experience, but 

 almo.st any one might write a volume if such 

 shadowy substance is worthy of permanent 

 record in large pages with open type. The 

 only chapter of scientific value is on Mountain 

 Falls ; this being based chiefly on the account 

 by Buss and Heim of the landslide of Elm, 

 Canton Glarus, in 1881. W. M. D. 



A Handbook for Surveyors. By Mansfield 

 Mereiman and John P. Beooks, of Lehigh 

 University. New York, J. Wiley & Sons, 

 1895. 16 mo., pp. 242. 



This little book is at once text-book and field 

 reference book for students and for surveyors 

 in the field. It contains, in compact and sys- 

 tematic form, the information, the principles 

 and the methods of surveying, so far as required 

 in advance of the subject of railroad location — 

 those of land and town surveying, leveling, 

 triangulation and topography. It is given the 

 pocket-book form in order that it may be con- 

 veniently used in the field, where its tables are 

 likely to be at any moment useful, and where 

 reference to the text-book is sometimes found 

 advisable by the old practitioner as well as by 

 the student and no\'ice. Special attention is 

 given to the testing of instruments and their 

 comparison, and standard methods with some 

 excellent new processes are described with the 



