Notices respecting New Boohs. 219 



Girders." He then stated he had met with nothing to help him in 

 English text-books, and his references were confined to the now 

 well-known papers by Eankine* and Clerk-Maxwell t. It was 

 at the same meeting that the late Mr. Merrifield and Prof. Henrici 

 drew the attention of English mathematicians to a work then little 

 known in this country, Culmann's Calcolo Grcifico (1866), in which 

 Prof. Crofton's constructions had been anticipated, and the methods 

 applied to a wide range of subjects. It was at this same meeting 

 (April 13, 1871) that Prof. Henrici illustrated the subject by a 

 very simple and ingenious notation, which is now known as Bow's 

 notation. In the Appendix to vol. iii. of the London Mathematical 

 Society's Proceedings (pp. 320-2) Prof. Henrici has given a sketch 

 of Culmann's work ; now, such progress has been made on the 

 Continent in the interim, this work itself is almost antiquated. In 

 a Synopsis of Lectures on the Elements of Applied Mechanics J 

 (p. 76) Prof. Crofton gives a short space to Culmann's method. 

 We have a short notice of it also in Minchin, and more recently 

 still in Lock's ' * Elementary Statics.' Now and again we have 

 seen questions in Cambridge Examination Papers requiring a 

 knowledge of the art. To the craft of Engineers, of course, the 

 method is familiar nowadays, but we give the above notes to show 

 that it is gradually finding its way into more exoteric circles. A 

 fine opportunity is open to some practised hand to bring these 

 modern methods more fully before an English-speaking audience 

 than has yet been done. Mr. Smith has had this opportunity, but 

 we do not find in his book altogether what is wanted. As he has 

 read, we presume, the recent works by Levy, Eavero, and Savolti, 

 in addition to the earlier works by Culm ami and Cremona, and 

 possesses, we believe, the requisite manual skill — his book of plates 

 which accompanies the text is most admirable, the constructions 

 being most carefully drawn — there is still the opportunity open to 

 him of supplying more effectually than he has done, in our opinion, 

 in the work before us, the much wanted text-book. We have 

 omitted to state that the student will find much interesting matter 

 in Eagles's (why does Prof. Smith always quote him as " Eagle" ?) 

 ' Constructive Geometry of Plane Curves/ 



"We rapidly run through a list of the matters treated. In the first 

 place the instruments required are described and their use explained ; 

 and then the subject is subdivided into Graph-Arithmetic, Graph- 

 Algebra, Grapho-Trigonometry, Grapho-Dynamics, Grapho-Statics, 

 Grapho-Kinematics, and then tabulations of Results, experimental 

 and mathematical, are given. The last three chapters, in which 

 there is a good deal of good work, discuss flat static structures 

 without, and with, Beam Links and Solid Static Structures. 

 In Part II. we are promised a treatment of the following sub- 

 jects : — The distribution of Stress and Strain ; the strength, stiff- 

 ness, and design of Beams and Struts ; Statics and Dynamics of 

 Machines, Governors, Elywheels, and many such like important 



* Cf. 'Papers/ pp. 562-4. 



t "Reciprocal Figures and Stiff Frames," Phil. Mag. 1864, vol. xxvii. 



X Hodgson (1877). 



