LITERARY NOTICES. 



627 



rather to confirm their illustrious dis- 

 coveries." 



Of his travels, explorations, suffer- 

 ings, and adventures, during the last 

 nine years, not much is yet known, but 

 it is hoped that records will be found 

 giving additional information concern- 

 ing the geography of interior Africa. 



BEATS OF FERNAND PAP1LLON. 



The readers of the Monthly will 

 be pained to learn of the recent and 

 sudden death of this brilliant young 

 writer, with several of whose masterly 

 papers they have become acquainted in 

 the pages of this periodical. He died 

 January 2d, at the age of twenty-six, 

 of an attack of acute peritonitis, the 

 result of a cold contracted by attend- 

 ing the funeral of a friend. The son 

 of a distinguished physician, he was 

 born at Belfort, in 1847. He studied 

 at the Colniar Lycee, and there acquired 

 a taste for chemistry. He attended 

 the chemical lectures of Wiirtz at the 

 College de France ; and, at the age of 

 sixteen, he made full abstracts of the 

 course, which were so well done, that 

 "Wurtz sent the copy to the printer 

 with scarcely any alteration. He was 

 recommended by Prof. Wtirtz to the 

 editor of the Moniteur Scientifique, and 

 had been employed upon that journal 

 since 1864. He pursued original work 

 in chemical physiology, and discovered 

 the possibility of substituting, in the 

 bones of animals, phosphate of mag- 

 nesia and of strontia for phosphate of 

 lime. He has published several im- 

 portant papers besides those that have 

 been reproduced in the Monthly, the 

 most interesting of which will continue 

 to appear in our pages. He was of 

 very amiable disposition, strongly at- 

 tached to his friends and teachers, and 

 much beloved by all who knew him. 

 His short career was in a remarkable 

 degree successful, as he had attained a 

 reputation and influence in France 

 which is usually reached only by men 



in the riper years of life. His papers 

 are being prepared for the press in 

 Paris, and will be also separately re- 

 published in this country. 



LITERARY NOTICES. 



INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC SEEIES, NO. 

 VII. 



The Conservation of Energy. By Dr. 

 Balfour Stewart. With an Appendix 

 on the Vital and Mental Applications of 

 the Doctrine. 236 pages. Price, $1.50. 

 D. Appleton & Co. 



We speak, in another place, of the im- 

 portance of the great principle of the con- 

 servation of energy as a fundamental truth 

 of modern science. The literature of this 

 subject has hitherto been copious, but, as it 

 has been mainly the product of minds en- 

 gaged with the original research, it has of- 

 ten been so technical and complicated as to 

 be difficult to popular apprehension. The 

 writers have generally been too busy with 

 the investigation to give the needed atten- 

 tion to the art of familiar statement. No 

 subject was in greater need of thorough 

 simplification and careful elementary treat- 

 ment. Dr. Balfour Stewart, the distinguished 

 physicist of Kew Observatory, and Professor 

 of Owens College, was solicited to undertake 

 this task for the " International Scientific 

 Series." This he consented to do, and, al- 

 though master of the philosophy, and entitled 

 to a place among its original investigators, he 

 has shown that he can enter into the spirit 

 and do the indispensable work of the pure 

 teacher. His book has been written in the 

 simplest language, with abundant and fa- 

 miliar illustrations, so that the ordinary 

 reader, by its perusal, can get a complete 

 understanding of the elements of the sub- 

 ject. His volume is quite remarkable for 

 its clearness and the success with which it 

 explains many of the hitherto difficult parts 

 of the subject. 



Dr. Stewart, as we have said, is a physi- 

 cist, and he has wisely limited himself to the 

 operations of the law, as disclosed in physi- 

 cal phenomena. But, to give completeness 

 to the volume, an appendix has been added 

 incorporating two able essays, by distin- 

 guished men who have studied the question 

 in its vital and mental relations. Prof. Le 



