# Popular Science Monthly/Volume 33/September 1888/Literary Notices

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Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution, to July, 1885. Part II. Washington. Pp. 264 + 939.
The first portion of this volume comprises the report of the United States National Museum, made by the assistant director, Prof. G. Brown Goode, reports of the curators of the several departments, a bibliography of the museum publications, and a list of accessions to the collections. These documents cover only the first half of the year 1885, because the reports of the Institution in future are to cover the fiscal instead of the calendar year. The more considerable part of the volume embodies a monograph, by Thomas Donaldson, on "The George Catlin Indian Gallery in the United States National Museum, with Memoir and Statistics," which is illustrated with one hundred and forty-two plates and several maps and portraits. From Mr. Donaldson's memoir, it appears that George Catlin was born at Wilkesbarre, Pa., July 26, 1796, and died at Jersey City, N. J., December 23, 1872. He studied law at Litchfield, Conn., and while there became noted as an amateur artist. He began practice in Luzerne County, Pa., but the law soon had to give way to art, and he removed to Philadelphia in 1823, where he became very popular as a miniature and portrait painter. Catlin's boyhood was passed on his father's farm in the Ocquago Valley, Broome County, N.Y., and on another near Hop Bottom, Pa. The Indians were then being pushed further west, but the locality was still rife with tales of the red men and the pioneers. George's father had served six years in the Revolutionary War; his grandfather on his mother's side had escaped from the "Wyoming massacre" by swimming the river; and when the Indians captured Forty Fort his grandmother and his mother, then a girl of seven years, were among the prisoners. Thus the recollections of his own family, and the stories told by the Revolutionary soldiers, Indian fighters, hunters, trappers, and explorers, who were frequent guests at his father's house, aroused in young George's mind that interest in the Indians which was to become his ruling passion, "The plows in my father's fields," Catlin afterward wrote, "were daily turning up Indian skulls or Indian bones, and Indian flint arrow-heads, which the laboring-men of his farm, as well as those of the neighborhood, were bringing to me, and with which I was enthusiastically forming a little cabinet or museum.… I was in a position to increase rather than to diminish the excitement already raised in my mind relative to the Indians." While practicing his art at Philadelphia, he says, "my mind was continually reaching for some branch or enterprise of the art on which to devote a whole lifetime of enthusiasm, when a delegation of some ten or fifteen noble and dignified-looking Indians from the wilds of the far West suddenly arrived in the city, arrayed and equipped in all of their classic beauty.… In the midst of success (as a painter) I again resolved to use my art and so much of the labors of my future life as might be required in rescuing from oblivion the looks and customs of the vanishing races of native man in America." This resolve was carried out in his "Indian Gallery," to which he untiringly devoted himself during forty-two years. From 1829 to 1838 Mr. Catlin lived among the Indians, traders, trappers, and hunters of the West, and in this period created the original "Catlin Gallery." His adventures, as recounted in his "Eight Years among the North American Indians," are most entertaining. The medicine-men in some places aroused an opposition to his painting by asserting that the operation took away part of the life of the sitter. But the good-will of a powerful chief generally turned the tide in his favor, and the portrait-making became an honor. But this introduced a new embarrassment when he proposed to paint some of the women, they not being deemed worthy of such distinction. After much debate this also was permitted. Catlin's "Indian Gallery" was exhibited in this country, England, and France, from 1837 to 1852, During this period Mr. Catlin won the esteem and friendship of explorers, scientists, statesmen, and artists, among whom were Mayne Reid, Joseph Henry, Henry Clay, Benjamin Silliman, von Humboldt, Bunsen, William M. Hunt, Daniel Webster, William H. Seward, John A. Dix, Michael Faraday, and John Murray. Before going to Europe he had attached to his gallery of six hundred paintings a museum of several thousand Indian articles, ​and during his stay abroad three parties of Indians, brought over by other persons, were exhibited under his management. His "Notes in Europe," describing his experiences, is singularly interesting, especially the parts telling the impressions of European customs gathered by his Indians. In 1852 Mr. Catlin was overtaken by financial disaster, and his gallery and museum were seized, but were released by Mr. Joseph Harrison, Jr., who shipped them to Philadelphia, where they were stored till 1879. From 1846 to 1874 several unsuccessful attempts were made to persuade Congress to buy the Catlin collection. Finally, in 1879, Mr. Thomas Donaldson solicited of the executors of Mr. Harrison the gift of the collection to the Smithsonian Institution, which was speedily effected. In 1852 Mr. Catlin went to South America, visiting the Indians of the Orinoco and Amazon regions, and crossing the Andes to Lima, whence he sailed northward to Panama, California, British Columbia, the Aleutian Islands, and Kamchatka. Returning southward, he visited Yucatan, and, after a trip to France, continued his explorations in Uruguay, Paraguay, and the country south to the Strait of Magellan, and also made some geological observations in Venezuela. These travels are described in his books, "Life among the Indians," "Last Rambles," and "Lifted and Subsided Rocks of America." He went to Europe in 1858, where he remained, painting his "Cartoon Collection," till 1870, when he returned to the United States, and exhibited the collection till his death. The "Catlin Cartoon Collection" consists of copies of some of the original gallery, with a large number of North and South American Indian portraits and scenes, in all six hundred and three pictures. It is now the property of Mr. Catlin's three daughters. A large part of Mr. Donaldson's monograph consists of a catalogue of the Catlin Gallery, interspersed with biographical material from Catlin's books and other sources, concerning the famous Indians whose portraits are therein preserved, and with copious notes on the landscapes, sporting scenes, manners and customs depicted in the views. The plates which illustrate the paper are reproductions of the paintings. The catalogue is followed by the "Itinerary of Mr. George Catlin, 1830 to 1871, with Notes." The concluding portion of the volume is a sketch of the Indian policy of the Government from 1776 to 1886, with statistics, and includes a map showing all the Indian reservations in the United States in 1885, and another, on a large scale, of the Indian Territory. It is rare that so readable a volume comes from the Government Printing-Office.
Principles of the Economic Philosophy of Society, Government, and Industry. By Van Buren Denslow, LL. D. New York: Cassell & Co. Pp. 782. Price, $3.50.
The dignity of a science is readily claimed for political economy by those who talk or write about it. Yet the application of scientific principles to the investigation of the subjects embraced under that head, or a suggestion to enforce practically the results of a purely scientific investigation, is scornfully rejected by the whole of one of the great schools of economists. Hence, the author, who writes from the point of view of this school, is capable of saying that "political economy has thus far been conducted in a way that makes it a body of fault-finding and carping, by men innocent of any connection with government and but slightly acquainted with business, as to the effect of that legislation whose responsibilities they have never borne, upon that industry toward which they maintain a parasitic rather than a controlling relation." Among the men thus ungraciously snubbed are such authorities as Adam Smith, Mill, Bastiat, Jevons, Cairnes, Bonamy Price, Fawcett, Thorold Rogers, Sumner, John Bright, Prof. Perry, and others, to whose lucid and convincing expositions of the solid elements of national prosperity the world at large has been glad to give an attentive ear. So, "apprehending that political economy must needs teach the functions of government concerning industry, it next follows that the economist must no longer be a member of a mere sect of anti-government critics. Political economy can not attain its true dignity as a scientific expositor of the relations of government to industry so long as the statesmen of the world monopolize the ability to see things as they are, and to do things in a way that is practicable, while the economists indulge in the mere imaginative occupation of theorizing in the ​subjunctive mood as to how they might, could, would, or should do. It is time that the economists of every country had ceased to be a sect antagonizing the statesmen; especially is it time that the economists of America, France, and Germany had ceased, in antagonizing the statesmen of their own country, to fall into a species of disloyal alliance with the statesmen of countries whose economic interests may not be in harmony, in certain important and vital aspects, with their own"—the familiar cry of the practical politicians against the "literary fellers." In spite of this one-sidedness, there is a great deal that is valuable in the book, in the fullness of the historical presentations of the various questions, the ample citations of facts, the author's own lucid comments where his bias does not overrule him, and the notes giving views of nearly all economists, all going to justify his belief that it may prove "convenient as a book of reference to the very large number of persons who, if amply supplied with facts, find it not difficult to arrive at their own conclusions." One feature that we can commend in the highest degree is the excellence and fullness of the table of contents and the two indexes. Among the subjects specifically treated are "Wealth," "Value and Prices," "Title and Use," "Profit and Loss," "Capital," "Land," "Labor," "Money," "Crises," "The State" as a factor in various ways, and the different aspects of taxation, protection, and free trade.
Physical Development; or, the Laws governing the Human System. By Nathan Allen, M. D. Boston: Lee & Shepard. New York: Charles T. Dillingham. Pp. 348.
Dr. Allen has been known for twenty-five years as a writer on the various subjects that fall under the heading of the title of this book. While some of the papers have appeared in special journals and the transactions of societies, many of them have been published in channels through which they went at once to general readers. In all his work he has sought to improve the standard of American manhood and womanhood. Two of the papers in this volume—"Changes in New England Population" and "The Law of Human Increase"—appeared first in "The Popular Science Monthly"; and the former paper, with the one on "The New England Family," attracted very general attention, and were extensively copied and commented upon. They exposed a sore spot in the domestic economy of Americans, and pointed out an evil concerning which there was more sorrowing in silence than brave remarking. There is no doubt that their influence was wholesome, and that in publishing them Dr. Allen did a service to his-country. The other papers—there are twenty-four in all—if of less pronounced importance, are valuable as teaching truths bearing upon the health and longevity of the race, and presenting them in such a literary form as to commend them to general reading. We observe that they have been edited in such a manner as to constitute the volume, instead of a mere collection of scattered essays, a compact and harmonious book. The papers are preceded by a biographical sketch of the author, which is accompanied with an excellent steel-engraved portrait.
System of Economical Contradictions; or, the Philosophy of Misery. By P. J. Proudhon. Vol. I. Boston: Benjamin R. Tucker. Pp. 469, Price, $3.50.
Mr. Tucker is engaged in publishing, by subscription, the complete works of the French socialistic philosopher, in fifty volumes, of which this is in order the fourth, although the second and third volumes have not yet been published in English. As implied in the title, the book is in reality a budget of contradictions, beginning with the question of the existence of God, in respect to which positive and negative statements are hypothecated. Social economy is distinguished by an opposition between fact and right; the science is real, but it is "an immense plain, strewn with materials prepared for an edifice. The laborers await the signal, full of ardor and burning to commence the work; but the architect has disappeared without leaving the plan." The principle of value is discussed in the light of the opposition of value in use and value in exchange. Division of labor is studied as the economic fact which influences most perceptibly profits and wages. The machine and the workshop having given the laborer a master and reduced him from the rank of artisan to that of common workman, the problem is in place ​how to cause them, instead of serving exclusively the interests of the least numerous, the least industrious, and the wealthiest class, to be employed for the benefit of all. Against these evils, Providence has sent us competition, whose opposite is monopoly, another evil; and socialism, while it has not succeeded in regulating competition and keeping it from becoming anarchical, is powerless against monopoly, so that we see all reforms ending "now in hierarchical corporation, now in state monopoly, or the tyranny of communism." These contradictions and evils constitute a "long succession of torments" through which it was necessary that society should pass in order that the victory of intelligent and free labor might produce all its consequences. Still other necessities must be met, to disappear, until "the supreme necessity, the triumphal fact, which must establish the kingdom of labor forever," shall come at last.
The American Anthropologist. Quarterly. Washington: Thomas Hampson. Price, $3 a year.
With January, 1888, the Anthropological Society of Washington began the publication of this magazine as a continuation of the "Transactions" heretofore published, and for the additional purpose of affording a medium for recording the work of investigators in anthropology who are not members of the society. The first number contains four papers: "The Law of Malthus," by Dr. James C. Welling; "The Development of Time-keeping in Greece and Rome," by F. A. Seely; "Anthropological Notes on the Human Hand," by Frank Baker, M. D.; and "The Chane-abal Tribe and Dialect of Chiapas," by Daniel G. Brinton, M. D. Dr. Baker's paper is of a popular character, dealing with beliefs in the curative or magical virtue of the "dead hand," with palmistry, with expression in the hand, etc. The second number contains the annual address of the retiring president of the society, Major J. W. Powell, delivered March 16, 1886. This is followed by a review of Dr. Rink's "Eskimo Tribes," a paper on "Discontinuities in Nature's Methods," by Henry H. Bates, and "The Prayer of a Navajo Shaman," by Dr. Washington Matthews, with miscellaneous notes and news.
A Hand-Book of the Lick Observatory has been written by the director. Prof. Edward S. Holden (The Bancroft Company). The book contains a sketch of the life of James Lick, descriptions of Mount Hamilton, and the buildings and instruments of the Lick Observatory, information for intending visitors, a poem "To the Unmounted Lens," by A. V. G., together with chapters on the work of an observatory, telescopes, astronomical photography, clocks and time-keeping, and the principal observatories of the world. The text is illustrated with woodcuts.
A little book of Chemical Problems has been prepared by Dr. J. P. Grabfield and Mr. P. S. Burns, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Heath). The problems are classified according to the chemical principles on which their solutions depend. These principles are stated briefly at the head of each section, and the method of solving the problems is illustrated. The latter half of the volume is made up of examination papers, which consist partly of problems and partly of questions.
The three introductory lectures on The Science of Thought, by Prof. F. Max Müller, and the correspondence on "Thought without Words," all of which has been published in "The Open Court," are now issued in book form (The Open Court Publishing Company, 75 cents). The three lectures deal with "The Simplicity of Language," "The Identity of Language and Thought," and "The Simplicity of Thought." In the second of these the author sets forth his doctrine that it is impossible to think without words, which provoked the correspondence that is appended. The writers of these letters are Prof. Müller, Mr. F. Galton, the Duke of Argyll, Mr. George J. Romanes, and others.
It will be pardonable to give a little space to Law of Heat, by Mrs. Maria R. Hemiup (The author, Geneva, N. Y., 75 cents), with the view of dissuading others from wasting time and money as she has done in promulgating impossible theories in science. Twenty years ago Mrs. Hemiup hit upon a theory to account for the bursting of containing vessels by freezing water, differing from the one commonly accepted. The. present volume consists of her original newspaper article stating the theory, with some ​correspondence about it, several quotations from eminent physicists, which she imagines support her theory, and a lot of irrelevant matter. Her screed is a "terrible example" of the way untrained persons form conclusions about scientific matters in absolute defiance of the scientific method of investigation. She says,"I assume that heat always causes bodies to expand, and that cold always causes bodies to contract, but never expand." Again, "I claim that cold water is always more dense than that of a more elevated temperature, and can not rise upon the surface of that which is warmer." Not a measurement nor a test of any sort does she bring forward in support of these assumptions, and, of course, can not, for her statements are flat contradictions of readily demonstrable facts. Further, she says, "As electricity is diffused throughout all space, it pervades water to a certain extent, and it always remains in a latent state except it is excited to action by some disturbing influence. And, again, as cold increases in temperature the water increases its density, and when it reaches the freezing-point it condenses to that extent that the pressure and fraction excites the electricity to heat and converts little particles of ice into steam, which moves with great velocity and power; as the steam rushes out the cold air rushes into the little voids and takes the place of the steam, which causes the report called cracking of the ice. . . . It is first little particles upon the surface that are condensed into ice, and they would instantly sink if they were not arrested in their course and rendered light by the above-mentioned process." Has Mrs. Hemiup ever observed any one of these phenomena? Has she ever detected an electric current in a dish of freezing water with the galvanometer? Has she ever collected any of the little puffs of steam as it escaped from the forming ice? Has she ever seen, either with the naked eye or the microscope, the first-formed little particles of ice floating free on the surface of the water? Other people have seen the first ice-particles attached to the sides of the containing vessel or the shore; hence it can not be true that "they would instantly sink if they were not arrested in their course" by the action she describes. The letters about her theory which she has extracted from prominent scientific men are no indorsement of it, but are either politely non-committal or frankly opposed to her view. She gives the reader no reason to believe that she has ever performed a single experiment to test her supposition, or that in the twenty years or more during which she has speculated on scientific subjects, she has found out what valid evidence is, or what makes a hypothesis tenable. The effect of such a publication is harmful if it falls into the hands of persons whose common sense is not of the robust type, for it is sure to increase any tendency to foggy thinking which the reader may have.
The second annual report of the Photographic Study of Stellar Spectra, conducted at the Harvard College Observatory, and constituting the Henry Draper Memorial, relates that the additional facilities provided by Mrs. Draper have permitted a considerable extension of this research during the past year. The 1 1-inch refractor belonging to Dr. Draper, and an 8-inch photographic telescope, have been kept at work throughout every clear night. The 28-inch and 15-inch reflectors constructed by Dr. Draper have been moved to Cambridge, and the first of these instruments will probably soon be employed regularly. Four assistants take part in making the photographs, and five ladies have been employed in the measurements and reductions. The catalogues of spectra of bright and of faint stars, and the detailed study of the spectra of the brighter stars, will be finished, except for about one quarter part of the sky, which is too far south to be conveniently observed at Cambridge, in about a year, and it is proposed to then send an expedition to the southern hemisphere to complete the work to the south pole. The 28-inch reflector will be used for observing faint stellar spectra.
Bulletin No. 3 of the New York State Museum is an account of the Building-Stone in the State of New York, by John O. Smock (Albany, State Museum). All the large quarries were visited, to obtain material for this paper, and information was obtained also from quarry-owners and managers. The Bulletin comprises an account of the geological position and geographical distribution of building-stone in New York, and descriptive notes of quarry districts and quarries. ​These notes give the location of each quarry, the character and position of the rock, manner of working, uses of the product, etc. The results of tests to determine the structure, hardness, and comparative value of these stones are deferred to another Bulletin.
Studies from the Biological Laboratory of Johns Hopkins University, Vol. Ill, No. 3, contains papers, based on experiments, with plates for illustration, "On the Laws of Muscular Stimulation and Contraction," by George T. Kemp; and "On Tetanus and the Velocity of the Contraction Wave in Striated Muscle," by John P. Campbell.
In a letter to the Prince of Boncompagni on Various Points in the History of Mathematics, which is published at Rome and Paris in French, M. Charles Henry discusses the problem of inscribing a triangle within a circle, as proposed in Ménon; the origins of the planetary signs and the Arabic numerals, and a number of other problems that have engaged the attention of students at various times.
The eight lectures on The Social Influence of Christianity, delivered by David J. Hill, LL. D. (Silver, $1.25), before the Newton (Mass.) Theological Institution in 1887, have been issued in book-form. The purpose of these lectures is to show how much and in what way Christianity has improved the character of our civilization. In the first lecture the nature of human society is discussed; the second is a summary reply to the question "What has Christianity done for Society?"; and the other lectures deal respectively with the relations of Christianity to the problems of labor, wealth, marriage, education, legislation, and repression. Doubtless some readers would be inclined to ascribe to other causes a part of the effects which the author credits to Christianity. In connection with the pictures which he gives of past progress, the author frequently expresses his opinions, or presents arguments, on sociological questions which are to be decided in the future. The book is methodical in arrangement, scholarly in tone, and readable in style.
The Realities of Heaven, eight lectures by the Rev. T. F. Wright (W. H. Alden, Philadelphia, 40 cents), is an exposition of the doctrine of resurrection and immortality, from the point of view of the Swedenborgian or New Church.
Opposite in point of view from the two preceding volumes is The Bible of Nature, by Felix L. Oswald (Truth-Seeker Company, $1). This is a spirited effort to state the principles of a religion of Nature, pointing out incidentally many ignorant, cruel, and revolting practices that have gone on under the authority of Christian churches. "The religion of the future," says Dr. Oswald, "will preach the gospel of redemption by reason, by science, and by conformity to the laws of our health-protecting instincts." Its principles as here set forth are comprised under "Physical Maxims," viz., health, strength, chastity, temperance, and skill; "Mental Maxims," viz., knowledge, independence, prudence, perseverance, and free thought; "Moral Maxims," viz., justice, truth, humanity, friendship, and education; and "Objective Maxims," viz, forest-culture, recreation, domestic reform, legislative reform, and the priesthood of secularism. The author sets forth the promptings of our normal instincts in regard to each of these matters, states the penalties of neglecting such promptings, and the rewards of conformity to them, with suggestions for reforming the present condition of society.
The author of "A Modern Zoroastrian," Mr. Samuel Laing, has issued a pamphlet entitled Agnosticism and Christianity (Watts & Co., London), in which he debates the question whether the two subjects of his essay are reconcilable. With that form of Christianity which disregards theological theories, and consists in imitation of the character of Jesus of Nazareth, he says agnosticism may well join hands, but that many of the harsh and incredible doctrines of the Old Testament and the churches may be, and are becoming, neglected by both Christians and agnostics. He does not believe that the loss of faith in a system of rewards and punishments in a future life would be a death-blow to morality, for the reason that, by the evolution of the human race, morality has become instinctive in civilized communities. He states briefly the "philosophy of polarity," which he has found most satisfactory, and closes by saying that the duty of a man of the nineteenth century being to follow truth at all hazards, he will find himself ​constrained to adopt the scientific theory of the universe. But he must show "that the larger creed leads to a larger life; that it makes him more liberal and tolerant, more pure and upright, more loving and unselfish, more strenuous, as becomes a soldier fighting in the foremost ranks in the campaign against sin and misery; so that, when the last day comes, which comes to all, it may be recorded of him that his individual atom of existence left the world, on the whole, a little better, rather than a little worse, than he found it."
The latest attempt to design an ideal republic is contained in Looking Backward, by Edward Bellamy (Ticknor, 50 cents), which has the form of a story about a Boston young man who went into a trance for over a century, to recover consciousness among the family of a retired physician with a charming daughter. Stripped of its narrative dressing, the author's plan for reorganizing society is, that the people manage the whole industry of the country through the government. Each individual contributes to the common labor all he can of the kind of work he is best fitted for, and each draws from the public storehouses an equal share of goods. The saving of misdirected effort under this system makes it possible for all to be mustered out of industrial service at the age of forty-five, having entered it at twenty-one, after a liberal education. Houses and land are rented from the government. Money has no function. Accumulations of personal property become burdensome the moment they exceed what adds to the real comfort. The dread of want and desire of luxury being eliminated, the motives relied on to draw out the best efforts of the citizens are honor, patriotism, and the sense of duty. For the first three years after persons reach the industrial age they are assignable to any occupation, which makes all work of equal honor, and gives a prodigious impulse to the invention of labor-saving devices. The classes deficient in body or mind are regarded as members of the same family as their stronger brethren, and receive support and care as a right, not as charity. Hours of labor are less in the more disagreeable and laborious occupations, so as to make all equally attractive. Women are organized as an allied force in the industrial army, and employed for a few years in occupations suited to their sex. They have a world of their own, instead of entering into an unnatural rivalry with men. Marriages are contracted only from inclination or sexual selection. Most of the evils of all sorts which we at present deplore are eliminated by removing the conditions which put a premium on baseness.
The alcohol question is treated in a liberal but earnest manner by G. H. Stockham, M. D., in his little book entitled Temperance and Prohibition (The author, Oakland, Cal., 75 cents). Dr. Stockham gives a sketch of the temperance movement, accounts of the making and adulteration of alcoholic beverages, and a statement of the observed physiological action of alcohol. He includes also a summary of the liquor laws of Great Britain and America, with a chapter on prohibition, and one on suggested remedies for intemperance. He condemns prohibition as being ineffectual and tyrannical, and condemns also the licensing of saloons, as encouraging drunkenness and crime. He thinks a great step in the right direction would be to grant licenses only for the sale of beer, cider, and light wines to be drunk on the premises, and for the sale of spirits not to be drunk on the premises. He would be glad to see closer restrictive measures than these when society has been educated up to the point of supporting them.
Modern Speculation is an address by M. W. Quick, of Titusville, Pa., before the New York State Grange, January 24, 1888. The address points out the evil effect of gambling in agricultural produce on the prices of such articles, and asks the support of farmers in securing legislation to prevent fictitious sales of agricultural commodities. The pamphlet contains also the text of a bill having this object, with answers to objections, and explanations of the terms used on the exchanges.
A number of documents important for students of American and English history are made readily accessible in the Old South Leaflets (Heath, 5 cents a copy; one hundred copies, $3). They are pamphlets of twelve to twenty pages, without covers, and the General Series at present comprises the ​following thirteen numbers: 1. Constitution of the United States; 2. Articles of Confederation; 3. Declaration of Independence; 4. Washington's Farewell Address; 5. Magna Charta; 6. Vane's "Healing Question"; 7. Charter of Massachusetts Bay, 1629; 8. Fundamental Orders of Connecticut, 1638; 9. Franklin's Plan of Union, 1754; 10. Washington's Inaugurals; 11. Lincoln's Inaugurals and Emancipation Proclamation; 12. "The Federalist," Nos. 1 and 2; 13. The Ordinance of 1787.
A gossipy little book is From Lands of Exile, by Pierre Loti (Gottsberger, 90 cents), consisting of letters written by a French naval officer from Annam and neighboring stations, with a story about "An Old Salt" and his daughter.
A rival of Volapük for the office of the universal language is presented by Alexander Melville Bell, in his pamphlet entitled World-English (N. D. C. Hodges, New York, 25 cents). World-English is the English language unburdened of its chaotic spelling, and with this change Prof. Bell deems it better suited than any other language for international use, on account of its grammatical simplicity and its already wide diffusion. Another use for this simplified form of the language which he urges is in teaching children and foreigners to read the present form, or "literary English," which he does not seek to displace. Prof. Bell recognizes the same sixteen vowel-sounds as the American Philological Association does in its scheme for the phonetic writing of English, for, although he omits two of them from his list, he distinguishes them in his exemplifications. He clings to the peculiar English uses of the vowel-letters, which makes the step from a foreign language to World-English harder, and that from the latter to "literary English" easier, but he distinguishes the unrepresented vowels by the aid of diacritics, in agreement with the usage of other languages. He thus avoids new letters in representing the simple vowels, but introduces one for the diphthong known as "long i", while "long u" (as in mute) he resolves into yu. He proposes no less than nine new letters for unrepresented consonants, three of these being the initial sounds in when and hue, and the sound of r when not before a vowel—refinements of notation which the Association does not deem necessary. In the case of the "obscure" sounds of unaccented vowels, however, he agrees with the Association in not deeming a special marking necessary. If we must have new letters for six or nine consonants, by all means let us take Prof. Bell's, for they are the simplest and neatest yet devised. Six of them are simply c, s, z, i, d, and u, with the tail of p added; the others are slight modifications of w, n, and r. He retains k rather than c for the final consonant in pack. He makes an odd slip in one place, in giving nation and vicious as words containing the sound of ch in church; he also marks the u in January like that in February. He says that "the terminations in certain, fountain, foreign, cottage, courage, language, etc., are regularly contracted to -in, -ij, and are so written in World-English," but we believe most persons pronounce these syllables more like -en and -ej. Prof. Bell uses no capitals in World-English, and marks the accent, when this is not on the first syllable, by a vertical line after the vowel of the accented syllable. In the case of a diphthong, he puts the mark between the two letters, which is somewhat confusing. The above objections refer only to details, and the scheme as a whole is much preferable to the mixture of Roman letters and "visible speech" symbols which Prof. Bell proposed in "Science" in 1883. The appearance of World-English, Volapük, and the various other plans for simplifying our mediums of communication, are signs that language is coming to be regarded as a tool that may be improved without disrespect to our grandfathers.
In an essay on Science in Secondary Schools, which received a prize of fifty dollars, recently offered by "The Academy," Charles R. Dryer, M. D., says that the best branch of science with which to break up the memorizing habit acquired by the pupil in the primary school, and introduce him to observation and induction, is physical geography. After this should come physics and chemistry combined, then biology, and last geology. In biology and geology, he advises proceeding from the known to the unknown, to study first what is nearest, rather than what is structurally the simplest. The spirit which he would have dominate science ​teaching may be gathered from a couple of his maxims: "Never teach with books what can be perceived in objects," and "Never require belief where seeing and understanding are possible."
Judge's Young Folks is the title of a new sixteen-page monthly periodical for children and youth, published by the Judge Publishing Company, at $1.50 a year. It contains entertaining stories and sketches by popular authors, colored and wood engravings, "What Little Folks are Wearing," correspondence, and puzzle departments.
Anthropological Society of Washington. The American Anthropologist. Quarterly. Vol. I, No. 3. Pp. 104. $1, $3 a year.
Archives do Museu Nacional do Rio Janeiro. Vol. VII. Ladislav Netto, Director. Rio de Janeiro. Pp. 286, with 27 Plates.
Bancroft, Hubert Howe. California Inter Pocula. San Francisco: The History Company. Pp. 823, $5,
Blair, Andrew Alexander. The Chemical Analysis of Iron. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company. Pp. 282. $4.
Bonham, John M. Industrial Liberty. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 414. $1.75.
California, The, Florist's Monthly. Vol. I, No. 2. Florist Publishing Company. Santa Barbara and San Francisco. Pp. 16. 10 cents, %l a year.
Chamberlin, Edwin M. Eight Hours the Margin of Profits. Boston: Frank K. Foster. Pp. 9.
Columbia College School of Mines. Summer Schools in Chemistry and Photography. Circulars of Information. Pp. 8 and 7.
Drayton, H. S., M.D. The Servant Question. New York: Fowler & Wells Company. Pp. 23. 10 cents.
Hague, Arnold, U. 8. Geological Survey. Geological History of the Yellowstone Park. Pp. 21.
Hering, Rudolph. Notes on the Pollution of Streams. Concord, N. H.: American Public Health Association. Pp. 8.
Hawkins. F. B. Mount Vernon, N.Y.: The Growing Youth. June, 1888. Pp. 8. 10 cents, $1 a year.
Hopkins. II. R., M.D., Buffalo, N. Y. The Relations of Mind and Body. Pp. 7.
James, Joseph F., Oxford, Ohio. Index to the Journal of the Cincinnati Society of Natural History. Vols. I-X. Pp. 33.
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Keyes, Charles R. On some Fossils from the Lower Coal-Measures at Des Moines, Iowa. Pp. 6.
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Levis, R. J., M.D.. Philadelphia. The Traditional Errors of Surgery. Pp. 15.
Miles. Manley, Lansing, Mich. On Feeding Experiments again. Pp. 8.
McGill University, Montreal. Annual Calendar. Faculty of Medicine. 1888-'89. Pp. 95.
Martin, H. Newell, and Brooks, W. K. Studies from the Biological Laboratory of Johns Hopkins University. Vol. IV, No. 4. June. 1888. Baltimore: N. Murray. Pp. 72, with Plates. $1, $5 per volume.
Lowell, James Russell. The Independent in Politics. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 27. 25 cents.
Meagher H. A., Manager, Cleveland, Ohio. The Historical American Monthly. Vol. I, No. 1. July, 1888. Pp. SO. $3 a year.
Meyer, Isaac, translator. On Dreams, by Saint Synesios. Philadelphia. Pp. 36.
Michigan. Agricultural College of. Experiment-Station. The Jack Pine Plains. Pp. 8.
Ohio, Agricultural Experiment-Station, Columbus. Experiments in preventing Curculio Injury to Cherries; and Midsummer Remedies for the Chinch-Bug. Pp. 20.
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Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, N.Y. Prospectus and Announcement for 1888-'89.
Remsen, Ira, Baltimore. American Chemical Journal. July, 1888. Pp. 84.
Shufeldt, R. W., M.D. The Sternum in the Solitary Sandpiper, etc. Pp. 3. Osteology of Porzana Carolinia (the Carolina Rail.) Pp. 16.
Simmons, J. Edward, New York. The Higher Education a Public Duty. Pp. 91.
Signal Service, U.S. Annual Report of the Chief Signal-Officer for 1887. Part I. Washington: Government Printing-Office. Pp. 361.
Stedman, Edmund Clarence, and Hutchinson, Ellen Mackey. A Library of American Literature. Vol. IV. New York: Charles L. Webster & Co. Pp. 503. $3.
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Thomson Electric Welding Company. Electric Welding of Metals. Pp. 16.
Topinard, M. P. Les Dernières Étapes de la Généalogie de l'Homme (The Last Stations in the Genealogy of Man). Paris: G. Marson. Pp. 40.
Vaughan, Victor C. and Novy, Frederick G. Ptomaines and Leucomaines. Philadelphia: Lea Brothers & Co. Pp. 316. $1.75.
Vuillemin, Paul. La Biologie Végétale (Vegetable Biology). Paris: J. B. Baillière & fils. Pp. 380.
Ward, Lester F. What shall the Public Schools Teach? Pp. 10.
Ward. Thomas Humphry. International Copyright in Works of Art. Pp. 37.