424 Analyses of Books. [July, 
lightning-stroke, the nature of the damage done should be more 
carefully examined than has been hitherto generally done. 
We remember, long ago, going to inspect a cottage near the 
Droylsden Copperas Works, Manchester, which had been 
wrecked by lightning in a very complicated manner. We can 
distinctly call to mind our being very much puzzled to trace the 
course of the flash, assuming that it must have come from above, 
since the damage appeared to be subdivided in passing from the 
floor towards the roof. Once, when weather-bound at a country 
inn, we took up, to pass the time, a novel by G. P. R. James, in 
which a terrible storm is described in which the strokes ascend. 
The author, as far as we recoiled, stated in a note, or in his 
Preface, that the possibility of such an occurrence having been 
questioned he had referred the matter to an eminent physicist, — 
we believe Sir David Brewster, — who, in reply, stated that up- 
ward lightning-strokes were by no means unprecedented. 
On the Origin and Reproduction of Animal and Vegetable Life 
on our Globe. By Thomas Spencer, F.C.S., F.R.M.S., &c. 
London : Effingham Wilson. 
Mr. Spencer, we believe, is an inventor and discoverer whom 
for some occult reason the world has thrust aside, giving the 
credit of his results, as regards the purification of water, to 
another. In connection with eleCtro-metallurgy, of which he 
was our pioneer, his name is now rarely, if ever, mentioned. 
He seems to share the fate of Dr. Walker in the matter of sani- 
tary reform, and of Thomas Grey as concerns railways. The 
treatise before us does not, however, deal with these subjects. 
Its objeCt is to show the aCtion of magnetic iron-oxide in effect- 
ing the combination of oxygen with carbon at common temper- 
atures, in presence of moisture. His observations have further 
rendered it extremely probable that this oxide exists in every 
reproductive germ, animal or vegetable, and exists, too, in a 
state of the highest activity. At least, as Mr. Spencer informs 
us, he has in twenty years’ search never failed to find in seed 
germs iron-oxide in combination with water. Even the soil, he 
shows, in the absence of iron-oxide is sterile. In demonstration 
he recommends the attempt to grow seeds in a soil carefully 
freed from oxide of iron, as compared with a similar soil con- 
taining iron. Mr. Spencer contends that the leaves of plants do 
not absorb'aerial carbonic acid, but only sufficient oxygen for its 
formation. But whence, then, comes the oxygen which they 
give off? He states that if a healthy growing plant is put in an 
