LITERARY NOTICES. 



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rator of the Department of Ethnology, United 

 States National Museum. He brings his read- 

 er to " the day when the first being worthy 

 to be called a man " stood upon the earth, 

 and he describes his utter poverty of cloth- 

 ing, tools, experience, language, etc. " All 

 Nature laughed at him." But " the one en- 

 dowment that this creature possessed, hav- 

 ing in it the promise and potency of all future 

 achievements, was the creative spark called 

 invention." From this beginning Mr. Mason 

 evolves an interesting narrative of the prog- 

 ress of invention, using "five guides upon 

 his interesting journey." The first is history, 

 the second philology, the third folk lore, the 

 fourth is archaeology, and the fifth ethnol- 

 ogy. And, as a result of the assistance of 

 these mediums, he claims that we now have 

 on earth types of every sort of culture it has 

 ever known. 



The second part of the pamphlet is de- 

 voted to a treatise on American inventions 

 and discoveries in medicine, surgery, and 

 practical sanitation, by John S. Billings, M. D., 

 Curator of the United States Medical Mu- 

 seum. Dr. Billings draws attention to the 

 enormous number of applicants for license to 

 prepare and sell patent and secret medicines, 

 and, while denying the benefits derivable 

 from such nostrums, he claims that their ex- 

 istence is solely due to advertising ; that he 

 knows of only four valuable secret remedies, 

 and that proprietary and secret remedies 

 are largely responsible for the establish- 

 ment and support of some of our newspapers 

 and journals. To give an idea of how far 

 the patent-medicine craze has gone, he tells 

 of a " patent automatic doctor," on the prin- 

 ciple of " put a quarter in the slot and take 

 out the pill that suits your case." In 1880 

 there were in the United States five hundred 

 and ninety-two establishments devoted to the 

 manufacture of drugs and chemicals, the 

 capital invested being $28,598,458, while 

 there were five hundred and ninety-three es- 

 tablishments devoted to the manufacture of 

 patent medicines and compounds, the capital 

 invested being $10,620,880. 



As a pleasure resort and a reminiscence, 

 the White Mountains never tire. As a field 

 for scientific exploration they are likewise 

 perennial. That their powers of literary 

 suggestiveness have not yet been fully drawn 

 upon is proved by a collection of out-of-door 



sketches of Mr. Frank Holies, entitled At 

 the North of Bearcamp Water (Houghton, 

 Mifflin & Co., $1.25). Bearcamp Water is a 

 little river that flows from Sandwich into 

 the Ossipee Lakes. " At the north " of it 

 are the Chocorua Lakes and the mountains 

 Chocorua and Passaconaway and their less 

 imposing companions — Mr. Bolles's home, 

 where he lives when he is not drudging at 

 Harvard University, nearly equally related 

 to the base of Chocorua — famous as the 

 most characteristic and picturesque peak in 

 New England, and the lakes. His " strolling 

 chronicles," as he calls them, give vivid 

 photographs of this most interesting region, 

 the lakes, rivers, valleys, and mountains, 

 and the life there in summer and winter. 

 Mr. Bolles roams around them at will ; regard- 

 less of season or weather, pushes boldly into 

 the obscure recesses of the untrodden wil- 

 derness ; spends an August night in a thun- 

 der-shower alone on the narrow ledge of 

 Chocorua's precipitous peak; essays climb- 

 ing the mountain through the snow ; carves 

 his own way up Paugus ; and accomplishes 

 as a matter of course that which the ama- 

 teur mountaineer of two weeks a year shrinks 

 from as a kind of modified suicide. He 

 knows the birds, the bears, and the squir- 

 rels, and has an Orphean way of calling the 

 birds around him in flocks at will ; and he 

 tells of all these things with the air of one 

 who is occupied with them for the love of 

 them ; and in telling of them has added an- 

 other to the most valuable and attractive of 

 our outdoor Nature books. 



An excellent United States Relief Map, 

 published by the Geological Survey, is of 

 convenient size and shows clearly and dis- 

 tinctly the elevations of all the parts of the 

 country — including coast lands, valleys, pla- 

 teaus, and mountains regions, at convenient 

 intervals. The elevations are designated by 

 a series of nine distinct shades of color, 

 from white to dark brown, showing depres- 

 sions below sea level and elevations from 

 sea level to 100 feet; from 100 to 500, 500 

 to 1,000, 1,000 to 2,000, 2,000 to 5,000, 

 5,000 to 8,000, 8,000 to 11,000, and above 

 11,000 feet. 



Who? When? and What? (Parmalee & 

 Chaffee, publishers, New York) is a chart of 

 the famous men and events of the six centu- 

 ries, 1250 to 1850. It shows the centuries 



