SCIENTIFIC NE\VS. 



[Jan. 27, 1888. 



the non-metallic elements are then described ; and next 

 follows a chapter upon the higher principles of chemical 

 philosophy. Here the author draws attention to Berthol- 

 let's and Richter's laws, points out the influence of mass 

 in chemical change, explains specific and atomic heat, 

 indicates the method of calculating heats of combustion, 

 and describes the periodic law, but does not refer to 

 modern thermal chemistry. 



After a description of the metals and their compounds, 

 analytical tables are given. Scattered through the first 

 portion of the work are numerous tables, comparing 

 together the properties of the different groups of elements 

 and showing the action of heat upon their compounds. 

 These tables form a valuable feature of the book. 



In the first chapter of the second part there is a curi- 

 ous mistake ; the figure to which the reader is referred in 

 the description of the method for estimating carbon and 

 hydrogen in organic substances being the figure for the 

 determination of nitrogen by the soda-lime process de- 

 scribed a little further on. In the determination of vapour 

 densities, we do not notice a description of Victor Meyer's 

 process now much used ; otherwise this section seems 

 well written, although the isomerism of the benzine ring 

 deserves a little more notice. 



The book ends with a useful chapter on animal and 

 vegetable chemistry and with a glossary of chemical 

 terms. 



The treatise seems remarkably free from mistakes ; we 

 having only noted two slight printer's errors. We can 

 strongly recommend its use as a text-book. 



Studies in Philosophy. By the Rev. J. Lightfoot. Edin- 

 burgh and London : Blackwood and Sons, 1888. 

 Mr. Lightfoot dances well in his fetters ; he has pro- 

 duced a little book on a big subject, which would be a 

 very nice little book indeed were it not that the big 

 subject demands a great deal of room and fresh air and 

 freedom, and that Mr. Lightfoot wrote his little book 

 without any one of them. Nevertheless it is almost a 

 nice little book, and is quite worth reading by the many 

 people who want to begin to know something about 

 Realism and Idealism, Monism and Dualism ; and who 

 are not content to refute Berkeley, as Dr. Johnson did, 

 by kicking a stone. As an effectual warning to those who 

 have passed the initial stage of philosophic inquiry, we 

 quote Mr. Lightfoot's last few words : — " Come with me 

 into the laboratory," says the scientist to the philosopher, 

 " and I will show j'ou once and for all the solution of 

 the great question. You see this bag with hydrogen 

 and that with oxygen. Here, you see, we mix the 

 two ; here also is the spark ; you hear the ' pop ' ; now 

 you see the water. Having seen that, now look on this 

 other table," he says, " and I'll show you how life is 

 produced. Here, you see, I have some water, ammonia, 

 carbonic acid. And whilst j'ou gaze with hushed breath, 

 expecting the revelation of the mighty secret, looking 

 curiously for the electric spark which is to turn these 

 into living organism {sic), you merely hear him tell you 

 that, by feeding protoplasm which is already alive 

 with these, it will by-and-by turn out a fresh supply of 

 life. Alas, for your expectations ! you come away 

 sadly. The explanation of life is life. The scientist, 

 you will say, can conjure very cleverly when he has got 

 the whole universe to conjure with." N.B. — The empha- 

 sising type is Mr. Lightfoot's own, but he says that the 

 lecture from which we quote "is largely based upon 

 Dr. H. Stirling's book ' Concerning Protoplasm,' " a book 



supposed by Mr. Lightfoot to be a "crushing criticism 

 of Professor Huxley's theory" of the basis of hfe, 

 and also " of that school of philosophy generally 

 with which the Professor is identified." Poor Professor 

 Huxley ! With Dr. Stirling, and Mr. Lightfoot, and his 

 Grace of Argyll, he should indeed be having a hard time 

 of it ; but then he is a bold, bad man, and perhaps he 

 does not feel such castigations as he ought. 



The Autobiography of an Acorn, and other Stories. By 

 James Crowther. London : Sunday School Union. 



This work is scarcely what might have been expected 

 from its title. The acorn in question, though produced 

 in the midst of a fine old forest, and springing up as a 

 young tree, does not become a giant patriarch, and tell us 

 its centuries of experience. It is prematurely cut down 

 at the untimely age of forty, and hewn into walking- 

 sticks, one of which narrates the remainder of the story. 

 Now, we can very well conceive of a living plant as 

 endowed with a dim consciousness, but when after its 

 death this consciousness is supposed to survive in one 

 of its fragments, transformed into an oaken cudgel we 

 feel an unpleasant shock. 



This, however, would soon be overlooked if the bocik 

 were to a greater extent free from inaccuracies. Un- 

 fortunately, it is rich in errors of various kinds, which, 

 with a little care, might have been avoided. Thus we 

 read that gold is the softest and heaviest of all the metals. 

 Such is by no means the case ; potassium, sodium, 

 gallium, and lead are softer than gold, and platinum is very 

 decidedly heavier. Nor can we accept without evidence 

 the statement that " at a distance of twenty-one miles 

 below the earth's surface gold is found in a pure and 

 liquid condition." In like manner we must demur to the 

 assertion that " no stone but a diamond will write upon 

 glass. A few pages further a diamond is reported as saying 

 that " my native home is chiefly India, South America, 

 Golconda, and Brazil." Any one who had not " passed" 

 in geography, on reading this passage would suppose that 

 we had here four distinct diamond-yielding countries, 

 instead of learning that Golconda is and was the diamond 

 region of India, and Brazil that of South America. Nor 

 is there any reference to the great African diamond fields. 



Mr. Crowther is again at fault in declaring that bees 

 always leave their lives in the wounds which they inflict 

 with their stings. Elsewhere Ceres is said to have been 

 " the heathen goddess of flowers and fruit," functions 

 which belonged respectively, in the Roman mythology, 

 to Flora and Pomona, Ceres being merely the tutelary 

 genius of corn. Chlorophyll is said to mean in Greek, 

 " green flesh." It is generally known to signify " leaf- 

 green," i.e., the green colouring-matter of leaves. But 

 we do not care to accumulate further instances of 

 inaccuracies in detail, since we must refer with regret to 

 the author's absolute views on instinct, and to his attempts 

 to uphold the doctrine of individual, mechanical creation 

 in opposition to the much loftier and worthier views of 

 creation commonly known as Evolution. It is sad when 

 a book intended for children, and in other respects 

 calculated to be popular, is made to teach what in after 

 life will have to be untaught. We notice with pleasure 

 the author's protest against the slaughter of humming- 

 birds for the gratification of a barbarous vanity. 



t-^i^'^i^-^ 



Honey. — It has been calculated that to make i lb. of 

 honey the bees must visit from 90,000 to 225,000 flowers. 



