Januaey 15, 1886.] 



SCIENCE. 



51 



Other prizes were awarded to Mr. Ch. Girard, for 

 various physical and chemical works ; Mr. Van 

 Beneden, for researches on the development of the 

 lower animals ; Mr. Bourbouze (photography) ; 

 Mr. Sidot (chemistry) ; Mr. Valson ; Mr. G. H. 

 Halphen (mathematics) ; and Mr. Sappey, for his 

 work entitled ' Anatomy, physiology, and pathol- 

 ogy of the lymphatic vessels, considered in man 

 and other vertebrates.' 



— Letters had been received at Vienna, Dec. 29, 

 from Professor Lenz, of the Austro-Hungarian 

 Kongo expedition, dated Ango-Ango, Oct. 31. 

 He announces his departure for Stanley Pool, his 

 assistant, Dr. Baumann, having succeeded in ob- 

 taining at Nyombi 80 natives as porters. It is 

 difficult to secure these auxiliaries. The French 

 missionaries, who are also travelling up the Kongo, 

 meet with even greater difficulties, their porters 

 having run away. A similar misfortune has hap- 

 pened to the German expedition under Lieuten- 

 ants Knuth and Tappenbeck. The health of the 

 members of the Austro-Hungarian expedition is 

 satisfactory, although the transition from the dry 

 to the rainy season is very dangerous to Euro- 

 peans. 



— Why Labberton's « Historical atlas ' (New 

 York, Townsend, MacCoun) should have reached 

 an ' eighth edition,' is one of the mysteries of book- 

 publishing in this country. The maps, many of 

 them, are of the rudest description. In fact, so 

 bad is the workmanship, that in some cases 

 important cities are laid down miles away from 

 their actual sites. Nor is the selection much 

 better. There are sixteen maps of Britain, no 

 less than twelve of which relate to a period an- 

 terior to the reign of King Aelfrid. The last of 

 the set is a map showing the Norman conquest. 

 Of England since 1071, nothing is given except 

 a few miserable maps in the corners of the maps 

 of Europe. The Puritan revolution is utterly 

 ignored. The ' explanatory text,' so loudly an- 

 nounced on the titlepage, adds little to the worth 

 of the book, while ' the carefully selected ' bibliog- 

 raphy can appear of value to those only who are 

 ignorant of the literature of the subject. The 

 maps showing the growth of our own country 

 are based on such an inadequate knowledge of our 

 history that they are little more than a mass of 

 error. In fine, although the plan of the atlas is 

 good, the selection and workmanship are so poor, 

 that we lay it down as one of the most unsatis- 

 factory books of the past year. Much better in 

 every respect is the f Standard classic atlas,' bear- 

 ing the following imprint : " Copyright, 1885, by 

 Ivison, Blakeman, Taylor & Co., publishers, New 

 York and Chicago." The maps are well drawn, 



and admirably chosen. In fact, we w r ere just 

 beginning to congratulate ourselves on the ad- 

 vance which American map-makers had made 

 during the last few years, when suddenly our 

 attention was drawn to the following words, 

 attached to map 18: "Engraved by Becker's 

 patent on steel, Stationer's Court, London." So, 

 after all, this is an English book which in some 

 way or other these publishers have copyrighted. 

 If such actions are legal, what need have we for 

 an international copyright law ? As to the book 

 itself, it is a good one, and contains besides the 

 maps a very useful alphabetical index, giving the 

 position of about ten thousand places, with their 

 ancient and modern names. 



— To judge from the statements made in the 

 introduction to a treatise on ' A system of iron 

 railroad-bridges for Japan,' by J. A. L. Waddell, 

 published by the University of Tokio, many of the 

 iron bridges erected by foreign contractors, and 

 now in use in Japan, are of inferior construction. 

 Professor Waddell, who occupies the chair of civil 

 engineering at the University of Tokio, has here 

 aimed to make clear to Japanese engineers the 

 method of designing the class of structures men- 

 tioned, and he has covered the ground in an 

 extremely satisfactory manner, and with much 

 minuteness of detail. The book must prove a 

 great benefit to Japan by securing improved con- 

 struction, and there is much in it that w T ill be 

 serviceable and suggestive to American engineers, 

 even if they should not agree entirely w T ith him 

 in the discussion ; for his devices and methods 

 are not always those which are commonly em- 

 ployed in the United States. He analyzes in all 

 its parts the American type of bridge as adapted 

 to the conditions of the Japanese narrow-gauge 

 railroads. He gives tables and strain-sheets, the 

 preparation of w T hich must have required a vast 

 amount of labor, and which by themselves make 

 a large atlas. Some portions of the memoir have 

 appeared in this country as papers submitted to 

 different technical societies. It is a most agree- 

 able surprise to find that the University of Tokio 

 endeavors to extend its usefulness by publishing- 

 treatises of so eminently practical a character. 



WASHINGTON LETTER. 

 Science and the scientific have in some degree 

 indulged in that suspension of activity which is 

 the recognized privilege of the more serious occu- 

 pations during the holiday season. Some of the 

 societies have suspended their meetings for a period 

 of two or three weeks. When they are resumed, 

 the season's work will begin in earnest, as it is said 

 that papers of considerable importance, growing 

 out of the field-work of last summer, are nearly 



