1876.] 
Notices of Books . 
129 
notice., We fear that not a few recent circumstances could be 
found to support the position of the author, and that the tide 
which he regretfully pointed out has not yet turned. 
The career of Agassiz is one which we must contemplate with 
a strange mingling of satisfaction and regret. We rejoice that 
he effected such great things for science ; we sympathise with 
his enthusiasm in the cause of discovery ; we fully appreciate 
the fearlessness with which he attacked many of the most 
rooted prejudices, in connection, for instance, with the notion of 
a broad and abrupt boundary line between man and the rest of 
the animal creation ; but we view with astonishment and grief 
his attitude in connection with the great doctrine of evolution. 
He received the first announcement of a theory which has shed 
such an invaluable light upon organic science, not like a philo- 
sopher, critical, or if you will, even sceptical, but like an eager 
partisan who feels his interests at stake. The explanation of 
this painful fact may be deduced from the work before us. His 
brain, like that of many a noble follower of science, was giving 
way under the pressure of severe and continuous study. Had 
he lived longer he would have outlived his real self. There can 
be no doubt that at the time when the views of Darwin were 
first brought under his notice he was already labouring under 
incipient cerebral disease. We do not desire to dwell further 
upon the spectacle of the decay of a genius so exalted. Agassiz 
was a man for whom the world should feel thankful, and with 
whose final short-comings it should deal reverently. 
Magnetism and Electricity . By Frederick Guthrie, Pro- 
fessor of Physics at the Royal School of Mines. With 300 
illustrations. London and Glasgow : William Collins, Son, 
and Co. 1876. 
Works on electricity have somewhat multiplied of late, but with 
one or two exceptions they have belonged to the popular and 
slight class of books, rather than to the solid and precise 
student’s manual. For many years De la Rive’s “ Electricity ” 
was the standard work on the subject, supplemented, of course, 
by Faraday’s admirable “ Electrical Researches;” and, from the 
more popular point of view, books like Noad’s “ Manual.” Now 
we have Clerk Maxwell’s magnificent mathematical treatment of 
electrical phenomena, and the numerous papers of Sir William 
Thomson, which form a treatise in themselves, and one or two 
works like Fleeming Jenkin’s “ Electricity,” in which many of 
the most recent mathematical deductions are introduced, and 
are treated in a more or less popular manner. Dr. Guthrie’s 
work belongs to this last class. It is based upon the lectures 
which he has been in the habit of giving, during the last six 
years, at the School of Mines to mining students and science 
VOL. VI. (N.S.) s 
