2 4° Analyses of Books. [April, i 
fl° ra buried beneath the volcanic ash appears totally 
different from that of modern Australia. 
Mr. Russell communicates a paper on “ Tropical Rains,” illus- , 
trated with six maps. The heaviest rain on record in the Colony 
was in i860, when downfall began at 4 p.m., and by 3 a.m. the 
bhoalhaven River had risen 100 feet ! 
The Rev. J. E. Tenison Woods describes some mesozoic fos- ! 
sils from the Palmer River, Queensland. 
Mr. James Manning, in “ Notes on the Aborigines,” maintains 
that the blacks have a general belief in a Deity, all knowledge of 
whom is carefully concealed from the women and children. 
The Aborigines form the further subject of discussion in a 
paper by J. Fraser, B.A. 
We regret that Zoology in all its branches seems to be entirely 1 
overlooked by the Royal Society, — a fact the more serious in a 
country where so much work remains to be done. 
Experimental Chemistry for Junior Students. By J. Emerson i 
Reynolds, M.D., F.R.S., V.-P.C.S., Professor of Chemistry 
in the University of Dublin. Part III. Metals and Allied 
Bodies ; with an Analytical Appendix. London : Longmans J 
and Co. 
Rarely do we open an elementary treatise on Chemistry without 
regret. The present volume forms, we are happy to say, one of i 
the rare exceptions. It contains not a word of reference to any if 
examination. No “ syllabus,”— or “ syllabub ” as we heard it 
called by a rustic sage,— whether new or old, is here held up as 
the object to be held in remembrance by the learner. Dr. Rey- 
nolds rationally seeks “ to place the student to some extent in 
the position of an independent investigator of chemical pheno- j 
mena.” He is to be led “to recognise the natural affinities of 
the elements, as well as their distinctive characters.” Such an 1 
exception from the ordinary run of manuals, which aim rather J 
at qualifying the student to pass some examination than to give ] 
him a living and fruitful insight into the science, is truly refresh- | 
ing. Let us hope that it is an omen of better things for the 1 
future, of a reaction against that miserable examinationism I 
which earns for us the title of the “ Chinese of Europe.” 
