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POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
and man, we deem the language better suited to the columns of BelVs Life 
than to those of the hook lying on our table. We certainly are at a loss to 
understand the anatomical impossibility of standing observed by Captain 
Speke in the female monster of obesity which he describes. Passing over 
his description, which we will not say is more prurient than it need have 
been, we come to examine the measurements of this monster. What are 
they ? Certes nothing to surprise us. The following are the dimensions 
as given by the author : — “ Round arm, 1 foot 11 inches ; chest, 4 feet 4 
inches ; thigh, 2 feet 7 inches ; calf, 1 foot 8 inches ; height, 5 foot 8 inches.” 
It is just possible that Captain Speke has given the above figures as indi- 
cating two different estimates : for example, he may mean that the first 
represent circumference, and the others diameter. If this be the case, he 
has pursued a very blundering method of communicating the results. 
Then, indeed, the woman may be regarded as a curiosity, and we are at 
fault in supposing that the writer’s powers of imagination were over- 
exerted. Here again, however, we fancy we detect a flaw in the evidence. 
Why should the arm of a quadruped-moving woman be only 1 foot 
11 inches in circumference, when the chest attained the enormous girth of 
nearly 14 feet ? 
There are many other portions of this “ Journal” which are equally 
suggestive, but lack of space obliges us to draw our comments to a con- 
clusion. Notwithstanding the failings we have referred to, Captain Speke’s 
book contains a great deal that is both amusing and instructive, and doubt- 
less many will consider it a work which deserves a high position in its own 
department of semi-scientific literature. 
NATURAL HISTORY OF THE HERRING* 
T HIS is a beautiful book, well conceived, and stored with the ex- 
periences of one who has made a world-renown in connection with 
the Scotch herring fisheries. The volume which lies upon our table is in 
part the reproduction of an original memoir published in the Reports of 
the British Association, but the great bulk of the letter-press is quite new. 
It may be said to be divided into three distinct sections : in the first, the 
natural history of the fish is given most diffusely ; the second relates to the 
modes of fishing and curing ; and the third, which constitutes the major 
portion of the entire text, is devoted to the chronological history of the 
herring. The author’s original observations and researches are chiefly 
confined to the first subdivision. They are the most valuable portion of 
the entire book. Mr. Mitchell does not agree with Pennant and others, 
who imagine that the herring is a migratory fish, and he gives us a series 
of objections to the view formerly held, while at the same time he adverts 
to the fact that the author of the article “ Icthyology” in the last edition 
* <c The Herring ; its Natural History,” &c. By John M. Mitchell, 
F.R.S.S.A., &c., &c. Edinburgh : Edmonston & Douglas. 1864. 
