286 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XIII. No. 323 



may also be used as a work of reference. For this purpose a great 

 many more names have been included in the index than are named 

 on the maps, their position being given by latitude and longitude. 



The atlas is certainly of great value, and marks a new departure 

 in the teaching of geography in higher schools. While we acknowl- 

 edge the full importance of the work as a whole, we have to 

 remark on a few minor points. The first of these is the lack of 

 uniformity in the use of colors. Thus the author designates de- 

 pressions by approximately the same color which is used for land 

 between 500 and 1,000 feet on other maps. Furthermore, we miss 

 throughout a uniformity of treatment of the depths of sea. In the 

 contour-line maps of England, Ireland, and Scotland, the hundred- 

 fathom line only is indicated, no additional details being given to 

 the map of western Europe. It is the object of lines of equal 

 depth to continue the representation of the earth's surface under 

 the level of the water : therefore lines of height and of depth must 

 be given in equal detail. The same applies to the other maps of 

 the atlas. Map 3, illustrating methods of hill-drawing, is evident- 

 ly an imitation of the corresponding map of " Sydow-Wagner's At- 

 las ; " but it compares very unfavorably with it, the hachures in the 

 various engravings of the same region not representing the same 

 slopes and even configuration. An appendix contains a great num- 

 ber of typical views of landscapes, towns, products, and human 

 races. 



AMONG THE PUBLISHERS. 



A DESPATCH from the City of Mexico reports that Adolph 

 Sutro, of Comstock Mine and Sutro Tunnel fame, who is travelling 

 in South America, bought in an old bookstall in that city what is 

 claimed to be a genuine copy of the first folio edition of Shakspeare 

 for an insignificant price. 



— Messrs. Cassell & Co. will publish at once a new edition of 

 William Robertson's " Life and Times of the Right Hon. John 

 Bright," which has been brought down to date by a well-known 

 American writer. The adding of the last lines to these chapters 

 has been held back to await the death, which has been for so long 

 anticipated. Mr. Robertson had especial advantages for writing 

 this life of the great reformer and statesman, and it reads with all 

 the absorbing interest that attaches to the well-written biography 

 of a great man. The frontispiece of the book is a portrait of Mr. 

 Bright taken from a recent photograph. A few proof impressions 

 on India paper, suitable for framing, of the etching from the fa- 

 mous Ouless portrait of John Bright, are offered for sale by Messrs. 

 Cassell & Co. The original painting is owned by the Manchester 

 Reform Club, by whose kind permission it was etched. 



— Harper & Brothers will publish in May the second volume of 

 Justin McCarthy's " History of the Four Georges." 



— J. B. Lippincott Co. have nearly ready an anonymous story 

 entitled " John Charaxes." Some who have seen the work think 

 that its familiarity with Boston society, traditions, etc., the peculiar 

 religious and political views occasionally expressed, and the 

 scholarly style, point to the eminent lawyer, George Ticknor 

 Curtis. This accords with certain rumors which have recently 

 been afloat regarding his intention to write a novel bearing some- 

 what on the questions culminating in the civil war. 



— Houghton, Mifflin, & Co. will publish next week Miss How- 

 ard's novel, " The Open Door ; " an important religious work by 

 Professor J. F. Weir of Yale, entitled " The Way : the Nature and 

 Means of Revelation," a thoughtful book of the " New Theology; " 

 " Prolegomena and an Index to In Memoriam," a book of notes on 

 Tennyson's great poem ; and a new edition of the reliable " Satchel 

 Guide to Europe," carefully revised and printed from wholly new 

 plates. They bring to the attention of the trade and the public 

 Dr. Holmes's admirable memoir of J. L. Motley. 



— Charles Scribner's Sons have just ready the second volume of 

 Dr. M. R Vincent's " Word Studies in the New Testament," 

 treating of the writings of John. The purpose of the author of 

 this work is to enable the English reader and student of the New 

 Testament and of the Bible to get at the original force, meaning, 

 and color of the significant words and phrases as used by the dif- 



ferent writers. They have also just issued a volume of musical 

 essays entitled "Chopin, and Other Musical Essays," by Henry T. 

 Finck, author of " Romantic Love and Personal Beauty," who in 

 this volume discusses such timely questions as German opera in 

 New York, and the differences between the German and Italian 

 vocal styles, as well as Chopin, Schumann, and the philosophical 

 relation between music and morals. They will publish shortly J. 

 A. Froude's new historical novel, to be entitled " The Chiefs of 

 Dunboy." The period is the middle of the last century, and the 

 characters include Irish exiles who have taken refuge and acquired 

 influence in France, which they use as a base of supplies in their 

 intermittent warfare against England. It will be issued in cloth 

 and in paper bindings simultaneously with its appearance in Eng- 

 land, being the first volume which the Scribners have issued for 

 some time among their yellow-cover paper novels. 



— The March number (No. 41) of the Riverside Literature 

 Series (published monthly at 15 cents a number by Houghton, 

 Mifflin, & Co., Boston) contains " The Tent on the Beach," and 

 other poems, by John Greenleaf Whittier, with notes especially ar- 

 ranged for this edition. " The Tent on the Beach " tells of a sum- 

 mer holiday, spent by Whittier and his friends Bayard Taylor and 

 James T. Fields ; and in the poem, which by many is considered 

 one of Whittier's best, some characteristics of these writers are 

 very interestingly described. The other poems, among which may 

 be mentioned " The Wreck of the Riverraouth," " The Grave by 

 the Lake," " The Maids of Attitash," and " Abraham Davenport," 

 are principally 



*' Legends and runes 

 Of credulous days, old fancies that have lain 

 Silent from boyhood taking voice again, 

 Warmed into life once more, even as the tunes, 

 That, frozen in the fabled hunting horn. 

 Thawed into sound." 



— A group of articles on fishing will begin in Scribner's for 

 May, with a paper on " The Land of the Winanishe," by Dr. Leroy 

 M. Yale of New York, and J. G. Aylwin Creighton of Quebec, 

 who will describe a fishing-trip to Lake St. John after land-locked 

 salmon. This region was recently made accessible to sportsmen 

 by a new railway. Eugene Schuyler will publish in the same num- 

 ber some reminiscences of " Count Leo Tolstoi Twenty Years 

 Ago." Mr. Schuyler was a visitor at Tolstoi's home, and had 

 many long and intimate conversations with him, which are now 

 for the first time published. The recollections will be concluded 

 in the June number. Charles Eliot Norton of Harvard will con- 

 tribute the end paper, the subject being " The Lack of Old Homes 

 in America," and the associations and sentiments of which we are 

 thereby deprived. 



— T. Y. Crowell & Co. will publish at once a new edition, in 

 paper covers, of " My Religion," by Count L. N. Tolstoi'. This 

 book, which was the first to attract attention to Count Tolstoi's 

 remarkable personality, immediately caused more discussion than 

 any other work of its kind that has been published since " Ecce 

 Homo." 



— The editor and publisher of the International Etluiographicai, 

 Archive, not content with publishing yearly six magnificently illus- 

 trated and printed numbers, propose to issue supplements as oc- 

 casion may offer. The first of these contains a learned description 

 of the Indians of Guatemala, by Dr. Otto StoU, whose studies on 

 that country have won him so well deserved renown. The author 

 treats fully, on the ground of his extensive observations and studies 

 of literature, the social organization, religion, the practices of war, 

 technology, and trade of the ancient inhabitants. The chapter on 

 technology is admirably illustrated by two chromolithographs. The 

 author describes the division of land among the gentes, — the chi- 

 namit, — the laws of marriage, terms of relationship, government, 

 and the social position of the common men and of slaves. The chap- 

 ter on religion is a very clear and succinct representation of what is 

 known on this important subject, the famous Popol Vuh receiving 

 its due attention. Psychologists will be particularly interested in 

 the chapter on " Suggestion and Hypnotism," which phenomena 

 are so widely spread among primitive people, but have not yet re- 

 ceived their proper share of attention. 



