x8;7‘J 
Notices of Nooks . 
131 
The Sun- — Ruler , Force, Light, and Life of the Planetary 
System. By Richard A. Proctor, Author of “ Other 
Worlds than Ours,” “ Saturn and its System,” ££ Light 
Science for Leisure Hours,” &c. With nine Lithographic 
Plates (seven coloured), and one hundred Drawings on 
Wood. Third Edition. Longmans and Co. 1876. 
This, as the Preface informs us, is a carefully revised new edition 
of Mr. Proctor’s well-known treatise, with some important sec- 
tions added, and from which the Appendix concerning the transit 
of Venus has been removed, as the purpose of that Essay has 
been accomplished. 
We are glad that Mr. Proctor has thus re-issued his work on 
the Sun, and has not written a new book on the same subject 
with another title. In common with the majority of the most 
sincere admirers of Mr. Proctor’s splendid abilities, we have 
watched his literary career with something akin to fear and 
trembling. So many new books following so closely one upon 
the other, with imminent risk of treading upon the heels of their 
predecessors, and mutually tripping each other, may ultimately 
overtask and dilute the energies even of Mr. Prodtor’s powerful 
intellect. It is therefore very satisfactory to find that he is 
working upon standard books as well as bookseller’s books, or 
books for the season. This work with its companion treatises, 
££ The Moon ” and ££ Saturn and its System,” will doubtless hold 
their ground as standard works on their respective subjects, and 
be followed, we hope, with corresponding standard treatises on 
the other members of the solar system. 
Such works unfortunately are, at the outset, far less remune- 
rative to the author than Mudie-books, that run for a season or 
two, and must be replaced by something that seems to be dif- 
ferent, and must be, above all things, new, if only in title ; but 
there can be no doubt that carefully- written and slow-selling 
standard works are ultimately, by virtue of their permanency, 
the most profitable, not only as regards reputation, but even as 
a source of income to the author, who, unlike the publisher, 
cannot take up another writer, and trade upon another reputation 
when his own is worked out. 
The great merit of this work, as of the carefully-written por- 
tion of Mr. Proctor’s other productions, is that it is popular 
without any sacrifice of scientific precision or soundness ; and 
this popularity is attained without treating his readers as though 
they were babies, with any overwrought affectation of extreme 
simplicity. The facts and phenomena are plainly and directly 
described, without any excess of those ££ familiar illustrations ” 
with which so many of our modern popular treatises are so 
thickly padded, to the confusion of the student and the exclusion 
of important information on the actual subjedt of the work. 
