May 22, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



817 



stairway. An examination of the building 

 itself shows that this provides sufficient 

 illumination with diffuse daylight, and even 

 on very dull days it is enough for all ex- 

 cept, perhaps, the main corridor extending 

 between the two lecture theaters on the 

 ground floor, and then resort may be had 

 to electric lighting. 



The two stairways are lighted from the 

 roof, and are so placed as to permit the 

 student reaching any floor directly from 

 the basement, where the reading and wri- 

 ting rooms are situated. The locker rooms 

 and lavatories, on the other hand, are in 

 the subbasement and can only be reached 

 from the basement corridor. 



The wings are, including the basement 

 and subbasement, five stories in height. 

 The main portion is only three stories, if 

 we leave out of account the boiler room. 

 This arrangement is due to the fact that the 

 rear part of the building is placed in a 

 shallow ravine. White brick, with stone 

 facings here and there, is the material ; the 

 roof is flat and bordered all round with a 

 brick parapet. 



The building is heated by air forced over 

 heated coils by large fans driven by steam 

 and the ventilation is thus, in part, pro- 

 vided for, and also by the exhaust currents 

 in the ventilation turrets which rise over 

 the entrances. 



A feature of special interest is presented 

 by the small research rooms. The half 

 units are intended to be used for various 

 purposes, but chiefly for small groups of 

 students pursuing advanced work or for 

 special lines of research, but each of the 

 fifteen small rooms, shown in the plans as 

 adjacent to the lecture theaters, is reserved 

 for individual workers carrying on selected 

 investigations. These, with the other ar- 

 rangements described, have been designed 

 with the view of making the buildings a 

 home for research. A. B. Macallum. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS. 

 A Laboratory Text-Booh of Embryology. By 



Charles Sedgwick Minot. Philadelphia, 



P. Blakiston's Son & Co. 1903. Pp. 380. 



With 218 illustrations, chiefly original. 



The past year has witnessed the publication 

 of several manuals of embryology, among 

 which may be mentioned: (1) The compre- 

 hensive and exhaustive ' Handbuch der ver- 

 gleichenden und experimentellen Entwickel- 

 ungslehre der Wirbeltiere,' edited by Dr. Oscar 

 Hertwig, of which eleven Lieferungen have 

 appeared to date; (2) Korschelt and Heider's 

 ' Lebrbuch der vergleichenden Entwicklungs- 

 geschichte der wirbelloseu Thieren, allgemein- 

 er Theil ' in two parts ; and (3) McMurrich's 

 admirable ' Development of the Human Body.' 

 The first furnishes the student with the only 

 complete summary of the embryology of ver- 

 tebrates published since Balfour's ' Compara- 

 tive Embryology' appeared in 1881; in it the 

 enormous mass of literature since that date is 

 fully digested, and the results are presented in 

 connected form, so that it may serve as a new 

 , starting point for the student of vertebrate 

 embryology. In the general part of their 

 text-book Korschelt and Heider furnish the 

 long-promised completion of the special parts 

 by a full treatment of the structure, origin, 

 maturation and fertilization of the germ- 

 cells, and the experimental embryology of 

 invertebrates. McMurrich's book is an excel- 

 lent brief treatise for the medical student 

 of the main facts of human embryology. 

 Minot's new book is a laboratory guide, 

 mainly in the embryology of marmnals. Thus 

 the teacher of embryology is furnished with a 

 fairly complete ' up-to-date ' equipment of the 

 literature in his subject for the use of his 

 students. 



Minot's laboratory text-book is written from 

 the standpoint of the anatomist rather than 

 of the biologist. In this point of view lie both 

 its limitations and its excellencies. It is the 

 outgrowth of the actual experience of one of 

 the best known of the teachers of embryology, 

 and hence is strongly individualized. Too 

 much praise can not be given to the large 

 number of new and beautifully executed 



