LITERARY NOTICES. 



849 



particularly emphasizes the rapid advance 

 made in all educational matters during the 

 last decade. Since 1880, "each year has 

 chronicled a steady advance, and the aggre- 

 gate results will bear favorable comparison 

 with the educational statistics of any other 

 State. The superintendent has been able to 

 report a gratifying progress in nearly every 

 particular : in the growth of the schools in 

 public favor ; in the increased number of 

 schools and school children ; in improved 

 buildings and enlarged funds ; in a more 

 intelligent and better instructed body of 

 teachers ; in a lengthened school year ; and 

 in a ratio of attendance which, if correctly 

 reported, probably can not be surpassed in 

 any of the older States." Messrs. Allen and 

 Spencer's " Higher Education in Wisconsin " 

 is the first of a series of monographs on the 

 group of Northwestern States in the angle 

 between the Ohio and the Mississippi Rivers. 

 It gives only a general outline of the career 

 of each of the colleges, mostly compiled 

 from the sketches in their alumni records 

 and similar publications. The larger share 

 of space is given to the State University. 

 The five private colleges are described as to 

 the leading features and character of each 

 and the scope and tendency of their work ; 

 and brief notices of three others are given. 

 The execution of all these histories might be 

 improved upon. Mr. Meriwether's on South 

 Carolina shows the most painstaking, but it 

 is considerably short of what such a work 

 ought to be. 



Commercial Organic Analysis. By Al- 

 fred H. Allen. Second edition, re- 

 vised and enlarged. Vol. Ill, Part I. 

 Acid Derivatives of Phenols, Aromatic 

 Acids, Tannins, Dyes, and Coloring 

 Matters. Philadelphia : P. Blakiston, 

 Son & Co. Pp. 431. Price, $4.50. 



Analysts will welcome the third install- 

 ment of this comprehensive and carefully 

 prepared work, which details the properties, 

 methods of proximate analytical examina- 

 tion, and assaying of the various organic 

 chemical substances employed in the arts, 

 manufactures, and medicine. The material 

 has so increased during revision that it will 

 occupy at least double the space of the 

 original two-volume edition. The part now 

 issued consists of a chapter on aromatic 

 acids, with an appendix descriptive of the 

 vol. xxxv. — 54 



tannins, and a chapter on dyes and coloring 

 matters. The material relating to the latter 

 subject is almost all new, coloring matters 

 having been represented in the first edition 

 only by sections on picric acid and basic 

 anilin derivatives. In the present edition 

 these substances are treated under the fol- 

 lowing ten divisions ; nitro and nitroso color- 

 ing matters, aurin and its allies, phthaleins, 

 azo coloring matters, rosanilin and its allies, 

 safranines and indophenols, coloring mat- 

 ters from anthracene, sulphureted and un- 

 classified coal-tar dyes, and coloring matters 

 of natural origin. There remain to be 

 treated in the second part of Vol. Ill, which 

 will complete the work, organic bases, cyan- 

 ogen compounds, albuminoids, etc. 



Stellar Evolution and its Relations to 

 Geological Time. By James Croll. 

 New York : D. Appleton & Co. Pp. 118. 

 Price, $1. 



Mr. Croll in this book presents what he 

 calls the " Impact Theory " of stellar evolu- 

 tion — a theory which, as applied tc our sun, 

 supposes that it was formed from a hot 

 gaseous nebula, produced by the colliding of 

 two dark stellar masses. The stars, being 

 suns like our own, in all likelihood had a 

 similar origin. He believes that this theory, 

 which was proposed as a hypothesis some 

 twenty years ago, has been strengthened by 

 the astronomical and physical facts that have 

 accumulated since that time. The hypothesis 

 does not exclude the nebular theory, but 

 rather includes it, and enlarges it by sup- 

 posing what was in the world previous to the 

 nebula*. It assumes that previous to their 

 formation there were stellar masses in mo- 

 tion ; that the motion was in straight lines, 

 and, as to each mass, without reference to 

 the existence of any other ; that two or more 

 of these masses would casually collide ; and 

 that the collision would result in the break- 

 ing of them up, with the production of heat, 

 and the rebounding of the fragments upon 

 one another would end with the resolution of 

 the whole into a nebula of inconceivably high 

 temperature, whence the universe has been 

 evolved, as supposed by Laplace's hypothesis. 

 Here is an unlimited source for the energy 

 possessed by the sun and solar system, to 

 which the only conceivable alternative is 

 gravitation. The latter is held to be inade- 



