448 Miscellaneous Intelligence. 
trand, 192 Broadway, 1863. 8vo. pp. 333.—General oats treatise 
is number nine of a series of “ Papers on Practical Engineering” issued 
from the U.S. Engineer Department. It is admirable for its iucid method, 
its clearness and exactness of statement, and the amount of original 
matter it embraces on a subject of the greatest practical importance. 
For the first time we have here presented a full account of the various 
American building materials embraced under the three heads considered. 
They are considered in their geological relations, their geographical dis- 
tribution, mode of manufacture, chemical constitution before and after 
preparation, and sperially:t in their economical value. This last has been 
important eae of eee cements are presented fe diagrams in 
the form of curves projected in such a manner as to present to the eye 
the comparison between various samples, more prominently than a written 
description could do. The volume is prepared in the best mechanical 
_ style. The pressing public duties of the distinguished author before 
Charleston have prevented his careful revision of the sheets, although the 
tSiearaphy.i is Se ae Pr Sere A few slips of this sort will be easily 
corrected in a second editi ; 
OBITUARY. 
Srittman Masrermay.—It is with pain that we record the early de- 
eease of our contributor Stillman Masterman, of Weld, (Maine,) who died 
of pulmonary consumption in that town on ‘the 19th J July, at the age of 
32 years. 
From an interesting and touching account of his life written by him- 
ph tle his last moments, and with a perusal of which we have been 
, we learn the prominent incidents of his life. It has been sim- 
oy a new version of the old, yet always new, story. It has shown a pure 
and aspiring etal athirst for knowledge, and yearning to take part in 
the enlargemen its bounds,—a mind formed “for thorough investiga- 
tion, and sealed ‘oes all local discouragements and the sneers 0’ wn 
ince,—an enthusiasm, rising almost to devotion, for Natur 
grandest and most majestic manifestations,—a character full of all deli- 
cacy, modesty, and native refinement; but with all these pitts, which, if 
panied by a sturdier physical frame and aided by larger advan- 
tages in youth, would have su rely led to high eminence in science, 
restricted y circumstances over which he had no control until it was too 
Such an earnest, truthful, follower of science, Masterman truly was. 
None who met him could fail to note the almost feminine delicacy of his 
moral nature, and vide — 1 drop soon remarked that the reserve of 
dness, 
