Jdly 3, 1885.] 



SCIENCE. 



15 



for Structural purposes, under direction of this 

 society, at the Watertown arsenal. The most im- 

 portant action, however, was the passage of a reso- 

 lution providing for the appointment of a committee 

 of seven, to consider what changes in the organiza- 

 tion of this society might be advisable in connection 

 with local engineering societies, and with sections or 

 chapters of this society. 



WORK OF THE CHALLENGER EXPEDI- 

 TION.— I. GENERAL AND PHYSICAL. 



Two immense quarto volumes luxuriously 

 printed, and crowded with maps, plates, and 

 woodcuts, form vol. i. of the series of Chal- 

 lenger reports, and the official introduction to 

 that series when it shall be complete. This 

 publication, unlike the monographs of which 

 the series is composed, is the work of many 

 hands, and has been editorially supervised by 

 Staff-commander Tizard, R.N., Prof. H. N. 

 Moseley, Mr. J. Y. Buchanan, and Mr. John 

 Murray. 



Owing to the recall of Capt. Nares for duty 

 with the last British arctic expedition, the 

 death of Sir Wyville Thomson, and other un- 

 foreseen occurrences, modifications of the ori- 

 ginal plan became necessary. The result is 

 not altogether satisfactor}^ to the editors, as 

 they explain in the preface. It may be sur- 

 mised that official red tape had something to 

 do with the retention of a system, or rather 

 want of system, which certainly might have 

 been much improved ; though, for that, the 

 gentlemen named would appear not to be re- 

 sponsible. Thus, instead of finding the con- 

 tributions of the expedition to an}^ one branch 

 of science summarized, or systematically and 

 continuously indicated, the text abruptly 

 changes, without apparent reason, from (let us 

 say) hydrography to narrative, or to some 

 abstract of new organic forms in a particular 

 group, which seldom seems connected in any 

 intimate way with the locality' being described 

 or with the subsequent text. Occasionally we 

 get a section of transcendental theorizing on 

 abstruse questions, of a sort which, however 

 proper in its place, seems to us out of place in 

 a volume intended for the general reader. The 

 editors were also hampered by the fact that 

 many of the special reports were incomplete, 

 or not in a state to be briefly summarized. 

 The inconveniences of the construction of the 

 book will be sufficiently obvious to every 

 reader ; but, having said this, little more re- 

 mains in the way of adverse comment. That 



Report on the scientific results of the voyage of H. M. S. 

 Challenger [etc.]. Narrative. 1 vol. in two parts. London, 

 Government, 188.5. 4°. 



the work is a mine of wealth for the hydrogra- 

 pher, the biologist, and the geographer, goes 

 without saying. Even the ethnologist will find 

 himself well rewarded for his study of its 

 pages. The illustrations, though of unequal 

 merit, are, for the most part, of a high degree 

 of excellence ; and some of the woodcuts, 

 especially of corals, are extremely beautiful. 

 Much of the success in this direction is doubt- 

 less due to the efforts of the artist of the ex- 

 pedition. Dr. J. J. Wild. There is a notable 

 absence of the cheap ' process ' cuts so con- 

 spicuous in most of our own government pub- 

 lications. 



It is of course impossible, within the limits 

 of Science^ to adequately review a work of 

 twelve hundred quarto pages, which in itself 

 is a summary and a synopsis. We shall en- 

 deavor to touch upon a few of its more promi- 

 nent features, premising that our references 

 must necessarily be mere samples of the 

 harvest gathered in its pages. 



The voyage of the Challenger began, for 

 deep-sea work, off the coast of Spain ; thence, 

 via the Canaries, across the Atlantic to the 

 West Indies at St. Thomas ; northward in a 

 nearly direct line to Halifax, via Bermuda ; 

 southward along the coast to a point off the 

 capes of Delaware to Bermuda, and again across 

 the ocean to Madeira ; southward again along 

 the African coast nearly to the equator ; west- 

 ward to St. Paul Rocks and Cape Roque ; south 

 and south-east to latitude 40° south ; eastward 

 to Tristran da Cunha, the Cape of Good Hope, 

 Marion, the Crozets, Kerguelen, and Heard 

 Island ; south to the antarctic ice ; north-east 

 to Melbourne and New Zealand ; northward to 

 Tongatabu ; and westward through the Coral 

 Sea and through the Philippine archipelago, 

 and to Hong Kong. Thence they retraced 

 their way, and, passing north from Papua to 

 Anchorite Island, made a straight wake for 

 Japan ; and then eastward across the Pacific 

 to the meridian of 156° west ; southward to 

 the Hawaiian Islands, Tahiti, and south lati- 

 tude 40° ; thence eastward to Juan Fernandez 

 and Valparaiso ; south, and through Magellan 

 Straits, to the Falklands ; and across the At- 

 lantic to the 13th westerly meridian, near 

 which they struck northward to the Cape 

 Verdes, and so home. This course, it will be 

 observed, gave, in the Atlantic, practicalh' four 

 transverse and two axial sections, a complete 

 though rather irregular belt about the southern 

 hemisphere, and an immense rectangle in the 

 Pacific. The opportunities of such a naviga- 

 tion ma}' be better imagined than described ; 

 and that they were not neglected, the magnifi- 



