i873»] Notices of Books. 123 



find man after man assigning a certain exact sum as this ratio, 

 every man a different amount, and every man confident not only 

 that he alone is right, but that were it not for pride and obstinacy 

 or some such feelings the great mathematicians and astronomers 

 must acknowledge him to be so. These men think they have 

 made lucky hits ; but the real discoverers, those whose opinions 

 were at first deemed absurd, but have afterwards convinced the 

 world, such as Galileo, Copernicus, Harvey, and Jenner, have 

 patiently won their way through all previously attained knowledge, 

 making sure of each step as they went along, and then building 

 upon the foundation already laid; thus they have raised them- 

 selves above the level of their day. All this is drawn out with 

 much humour and great kindliness of feeling, and so the book 

 is one which is calculated to do great good to those who fancy 

 that they have made great discoveries, whilst they have omitted 

 to acquire the necessary qualifications for discovery, by showing 

 how others have failed in similar pursuits, and also to those who 

 have the power of enlarging our knowledge by encouraging them 

 to proceed in spite of the opposition of the ignorant, after they 

 have assured themselves of all the preliminary steps. 



In a work of such varied contents, and so brimful of humour, 

 it is impossible almost to make fair selections. The editor her- 

 self evidently has felt this, for whilst she acknowledges that 

 there are repetitions and redundancies, she has found it impossible 

 to cut out these flaws without materially damaging the work. 

 Many of the peculiarities of the writer naturally exhibit them- 

 selves in a work of this kind. Many a good story about mathe- 

 maticians, and especially Cambridge men ; many anagrams, 

 evidently a favourite amusement with the author; a few striking 

 remarks about language ; and not a few additions to the English 

 language, will afford pleasure to many who would not care much 

 for the mathematical part of the work. A liberal and highly in- 

 dependent view of politics and theology, which one cannot but 

 admire in the man, rather disfigure, a work professedly on other sub- 

 jects. At the same time we miss some discussions which we were 

 entitled to expect, notably the writings of Professor Piazzi Smyth 

 on the Pyramids, who is dismissed with a single casual sentence 

 in the middle of an article on another subject, though his pre- 

 decessor in the same discussion, Mr. John Taylor, receives longer 

 notice but no criticism of his results. On page 236, immediately 

 before the discussion of the share that Adams and Le Verrier 

 took in the discovery of Neptune, there is a rather glaring mis- 

 print : 1826 should be read 1846. On page 385 also there is a 

 discussion of the word aneroid founded on a mistaken derivation; 

 it was formed by the discoverer of the instrument from a , privative, 

 and vrjpng, moist, because no liquid was employed in this measure 

 of the atmospheric pressure. Our old friend bogy is misspelt 

 boguey. A few words new to the English language occur occa- 

 sionally as an " almamaternal brother," " antipharmacopceal 



