168 Louis Figuier. [April, 



regretted should have found its way into a work intended to enlighten 

 the populace, and convey the results of advancing science. 



M. Figuier (Gruillaume Louis) was born at Montpellier, 19th 

 February, 1819, and is the son of a chemist, and nephew of a pro- 

 fessor of chemistry in that town. 



He was admitted as Doctor of Medicine at Montpellier in 1841, 

 and then removed to Paris with a view to study chemistry, which 

 he did under M. Balard (of the Institute). In 1846 he was nomi- 

 nated by the Minister of Public Instruction to the post of Professor 

 in the School of Pharmacy at Montpellier, and returned to his 

 native town, where he remained five years engaged in his professional 

 avocations. In 1850 he obtained the degree of Doctor of Physical 

 Science at Toulouse ; in 1853 he returned to Paiis and secured a 

 vacant Professorship in the School of Pharmacy, by competition; 

 and from that time to the present he has been occupied either in 

 original researches, chiefly in chemico-physiology, or in the com- 

 pilation of popular scientific works. Of these the best known in 

 England are naturally those which have been translated into our 

 own language, and we now mean to devote a few pages to their 

 consideration. 



In his ' World before the Deluge'* M. Figuier, consistently 

 with the views of modem men of Science, adopts the nebular 

 hypothesis as his cosmical theory ; but although he seeks to state it 

 as fairly as possible, yet seeing that his nationality precludes him 

 from following the latest researches of English physicists, and that 

 Mr. Bristow, his able translator and editor, is a mineralogist, and not 

 a student of physical science, we think it would have been better if 

 he had passed over the hypothetical, and leaving the nebular theory 

 to take care of itself, had commenced at the beginning of known 

 Geological history. 



It must not be supposed, from these remarks, that we object to 

 the original speculations of professed geologists as to the origin of 

 the earth, for these must necessarily precede or accompany the 

 determination of the true character of its constitution, but in 

 the volume before us we find the hypothesis, as enunciated in the 

 ' Fortnightly Pieview,' of Mr. Tyndall put forward in support of the 

 nebular theory, whilst the sohd researches of Balfour Stewart, 

 Miller, and Huggins are left unnoticed. It may be as clear to 

 M. Figuier or to Mr. Bristow, as it is to Mr. Tyndall, that the 

 luminiferous ether is infinitely more attenuated, but more sohd, 

 than gas ; and " rather resembles jelly than air ; " but if the author 

 or translator had described the experiments of Stewart to show 



* ' The World before the Deluge,' by Louis Figuier ; a new edition : the Geological 

 portion carefully revised and much original matter added by Henry W. Bristow, 

 F.R.S. Thirty -four Full Page Illustrations of extinct animals and Ideal Landscapes 

 of the Ancient World, by Riou ; and 202 other figures. London : Chapman & Hall, 



