Apeil 6, 1900.] 



SCIENCE. 



549 



would be interesting to liave tlie term envelope, 



here presented in the usual way, so defined as 



to exclude all curves, such as the node locus, 



which are not properly tangent to curves of 



the family. 



C. J. Kbysbe. 



Columbia University. 



G. V. de Lapouge : I'Aryen: Son role social. 



Paris. 1899. 8vo. Pp. xx + 569. 



The thesis of this work is that the tall, blond 

 dolichocephalic race of the north of Europe has 

 constituted the progressive and socially domi- 

 nant element among the so-called Aryan peoples 

 from prehistoric times to the present. In con- 

 nection with the author's "earlier work les Se- 

 lections sociales (Paris, 1896), it is the best pres- 

 entation of the results of the new school of 

 anthropologists of which Lapouge and Otto 

 Ammon are the leaders. If the results derived 

 from the data now available are confirmed by 

 wider investigation, they will obviously be of 

 great significance for students of psychology, 

 history and sociology, as well as anthropology. 

 Further investigations ought now to be carried 

 forward by individuals or institutions that have 

 the means to prosecute them on an adequate 



scale. 



Cablos C. Closson. 



books bkceived. 

 Mesures electriques. E. Vigneeon et P. Letheule. 



Paris, Gauthier-Villars. 1900. Pp. 179. 2 fr., 



50c. 

 Produits aromaiiques. G. F. Jaubket. Paris, Gau- 



thier-Villars. 1900. Pp. 169. 

 La consiittition dii monde. Clemence Eoyee. 



Paris, Schleicher Freres. 1900. Pp. xxii + 796. 

 Logic. St. Geoege Stock. Oxford, B. H. Black- 

 well. 1900. Pp. xi + 440. 

 A First Book in Organic Evolution. D. Keefoot 



Shute. Chicago Open Court Publishing Co. 1899. 



Pp. xvi+285. 

 Tlie Amateurs^ Praeiical Garden Book. C. E. MuNN 



and L. H. Bailey. New York and London, The 



Macmillan Company. 1900. Pp. vi-fSoO. Sl.OO. 

 Physiology. Buel B. Colton. Boston, D. C. Heath 



& Co. 1900. Pp. xiii + 386. 90 ots. 

 Syllabus of Elementary Physiology. Ulysses O. Cox. 



Mankato, Minn., Free Press Printing Co. 1899. 



Pp. viii + 167. 



SCIENTIFIC JOURNALS AND ARTICLES. 



Tlie Journal of Geology, Jan. -Feb., 1900. Vol. 

 8, No. 1. ' Suggestions Eegarding the Classifi- 

 cation of the Igneous Eocks,' by William H. 

 Hobbs. The article sets forth the present con- 

 dition of the nomenclature and classification and 

 offers many valuable suggestions, which if fol- 

 lowed will certainly assist in extricating the sci- 

 ence of petrology from the burden of names and 

 complication of systems under which its students 

 are now laboring. The importance of chemical 

 composition in determining the classification of 

 rocks and the use of diagrams to show the re- 

 lations is emphasized. 



' Dentition of some Devonian Fishes,' by C. R. 

 Eastman. The dental characters of some species 

 of the genera Dinichthys, Clododus and Dip- 

 terus, with comparative notes and illustrations 

 of some types are discussed. 



' Ancient Alpine Glaciers of the Sierra Costa 

 Mountains in California,' by Oscar H. Hershey. 

 The author describes in detail the characters 

 of several of the ancient glaciers of this moun- 

 tain range, and concludes from their study that 

 they were probably of late Wisconsin age, and 

 that they existed under the same climatic con- 

 ditions as at present, but at an elevation of 

 about 3000 feet higher than now. 



' An Attempt to Test the Nebular Hypothesis 

 by the Relation of Masses and Momenta,' by T. 

 C. Chamberlin. In a comparison of the mo- 

 ment of momentum of the nebular system with 

 moment of momentum of the present system, 

 on the basis of purely mechanical laws, sus- 

 ceptible of mathematical computation, making 

 every concession in favor of the Laplacian 

 hypothesis, the nebular moment of momentum 

 is 213 times larger than the present moment of 

 momentum of the system, where the dynamic 

 law would require them to be equal. Besides 

 this very great discrepancy which is hard to ex- 

 plain on the Laplacian hypothesis, there are 

 individual discrepancies among the planets of 

 even greater significance. These range from 

 141 to 1 for the Jovian nebula to 1208 to 1 for the 

 terrestrial nebula, with very great irregularity 

 in the distribution from Mercury to Neptune. 

 In the relation of the ratios of planetary masses 

 to their momenta, it appears that Jupiter carried 

 away one tenth of one per cent, of the nebular 



