90 Scientific Intelligence. 



Castle, the birthplace and home of Napier, now occupied by a 

 boj s' school. 



In the present handsome volume, Dr. Knott lias collected the 

 addresses, lectures and papers given at the Congress together 

 with an account of the celebration, copies of the congratulatory 

 addresses to the Royal Society of Edinburgh, lists of the institu- 

 tions which participated and of their representatives. It is illus- 

 trated by portraits of Napier, facsimile pages from his works and 

 from other important early books, and by engravings of Merchis- 

 ton Castle at different times. 



The papers which deal with the historical development of the 

 subject, especially the memorial address by Lord Moulton, can 

 scarcely fail to excite the eager interest of anyone who has a 

 taste for mathematics. The methods by which Napier reached 

 his great discovery and the course of subsequent progress are at 

 once fascinating and surprising. -As one comes to realize, how- 

 ever, what the state of mathematical knowledge was three hun- 

 dred years ago, the wonder is that such a discovery could have 

 been made at that time and in a place so remote from the centers 

 of intellectual life as Scotland then was. It was an achievement 

 of genius and well worthy of being celebrated, as it was, by the 

 last International Congress before the beginning of the Great 

 War. h. a. b. 



5. The Mining World Index of Current Literature. Vol. 

 VIII. Last Half Year, 1915 ; by Geo. E. Sisley. Pp. xi, 228. 

 xxv. Chicago, 1915 (Mining World Company). — The Index 

 published by the Mining and Engineering World, which covers 

 the world's current literature in this field, has now been completed 

 for the last half year of 1915 ; it forms volume VIII of the 

 Series (see earlier notices). 



Obituary. 



Professor Sylvanus P. Thompson, the noted physicist and 

 electrical engineer, died in London, June 13, in his sixty-sixth 

 year. He was the author of several volumes on electricity and 

 optics, etc., and made important contributions particularly in 

 electrical machinery. 



Professor Octave Lignier, the able French paleobotanist of 

 the university of Caen, died on March 19 at the age of sixty-one 

 years. 



Professor Emile Jungfleisch, of the College de France, dis- 

 tinguished particularly for his work in organic chemistry, died on 

 April 24 at the age of seventy-seven years. 



