Evening star., 1935-03-02
THE LIBRARY TABLE
BY SARAH C.. BOWERMdN.
MEN, MIRRORS AND STARS. BY
e. Edward Pendray. New York:

MEN, MIRRORS AND STARS. BY
e. Edward Pendray. New York:
Funk & Wagnalls Co.
AS science editor of the Literary
Digest, Mr.. Pendray knows how to
pre-digest scientific knowledge for
the ordinary man. In this book he
has chosen the field of astronomy and
its servant, the telescope. In the first
part, How Men Became Acquainted
With the Universe" he tells what Is
known of the visible universe, the
| progress of astronomy before the in
vention of the telescope and the his
tory Of the early telescope and their
"handmaidens, the camera and the
| spectroscope. The second part, RE
vealing the Instruments That Reveal
the Stars" describes the telescopes of
today, the glass and metals which go
into them, and the other instruments
which "help measure and interpret
what the telescope sees" Part three,
Modern Men and Modern Mirrors, :"
is about telescope makers in Europe
and America, including the amateur
telescope makers who have con-
tributed to the advancement of the
| difficult art. The chapter describing
! the 200-inch rejecting telescope of
the California Institute of Technology
to be completed in three or four years,
introduces one of the wonders of the
modern world. The disc will weigh
trifle less than 20 tons and the
whole telescope will weigh about IS
tons. Mr.. Pendray asks, in connec-
tlon with this giant telescope, Has
the ultimate beer reached?" Reason
ing from our knowledge of the past,
we can safely answer that it has not,
that other and greater telescopes lie
in the future, which will reveal mys-
teries of the universe not yet dreamed
by the mind of man.
y y X
FRENCH REVOLUTIONS. BY e. L.
Woodward, M. A. oxford: At the
Clarendon Press.
Nine times since 1889 the French,
| different generations of them, have
changed their form of government.
Mr.. Woodward, fellow of All-Souls'
College, oxford, studies these govern
ments and inquiries concerning them
why they were revolutionary, why
riots in Paris accompanied the
changes, what is the significance as
regards national temperament and
national constitutional history of
these experiments in terrorism and
| dictatorship. The big revolution of
1889 was rising of the middle and
lower classes against royalty and aris-
| tocracy; in terms of the individual
rising against poverty and heavy
taxation, in terms of politics an at
tempt to bring freedom and law into
the institutions of France. Following
| the Revolution there were several revo-
lutionary relationships, the Terror
under Danton and Robespierre, the
Directory, the Consulate and the En-
pire, all but the first dominated by
Napoleon. When Napoleon was exiled
to Elba the BourbonS were restored
to the throne in the person of Louis
XVIII, who fled from the Tuileries at
the beginning of the Hundred Days,
| when the news of Napoleon's landing
in the south of France reached him.
After Waterloo and the exile to st.
Helena Louis XVIII resumed the
crown. He was succeeded by Charles
x, who reverted to medieval policies
during his brief reign, brought about
a coup d'etat, which in turn brought
about revolution and his abdication.
Louis Philippe of the collateral Bour-
bon house of Orleans became the
"citizen king" but abdicated during
the revolution of 1848 and his place
was taken by Louis Napoleon, nephew
of Napoleon I, first as President. then
as Emperor Napoleon III. With the
! end of his rule after the battle of
Sedan came the two sieges of Paris,
the Commune and the third republic.
Through all these vicissitudes of gov
ernment and revolution Mr.. Wood
ward searches for the principle of lib
erty. He concludes: Suddenly. in
our own day, the frontiers of liberty
are narrowed again; the problem OF
reconciling liberty and order Is no
longer a problem of the past, but a
problem of the present and future
PECKOVER. BY j. D. Beresford
New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons
Whether the psychoanalysis ap-
piled to Gilbert Peckover for the pur-
pose of unifying his dual personality
and the lecture given him by DR.
MarSton on consciousness and per-
sonality. five pages long, are sound,
we are not prepared to say, but they
probably represent certain theories on
the subject and in any case do very
well in fiction. This is one of Mr..
Beresford's lighter books, such as he
! has been writing in recent years. not
at all of the quality of the Jacob
Stahl' series or THE House in De-
metrius Road" 1t is. however, enter
tanning and has a piquant plot. Gill
bert Peckover, after many years of
domestic infelicity and nervous indi-
gestion, due to Illustration" of his
! personality. DR.. Marston tells him,
walks out of his house in Dulwich one
evening, after his wife has auto
cratically turned off the overture of
"Tannhauser" on the radio and
turned on something lively" with an
accompanying TRADE of her own such
as he is only too familiar with. He
is wearing his old velvet house jacket
and has only a few coins with him.
From shortly after that time, for six
months, his memory leaves him and
he leads an entirely new life, much
more youthful and successful life
than that of the respectable Gilbert
Peckover. He is jostled out of this
new and exciting personality by his
| arrest for bigamy, and in his prison
cell becomes again the old Peckover,
resuming Immediately his nervous in
digestion. The friends of his second
life take charge of his case and,
with the psychoanalyst, straighten
out his difficulties, more easily be-
cause his wife, Iris, has already made
other arrangements to her Satisfac-
ton. When Peckover's two person.
alities are brought together the re-
suit more nearly resembles the second
and happier personality.
X II X X
PUBLIC UTILITY VALUATION FOR
PURPOSES OF RATE CONTROL.
BY John Bauer, Ph.D., and Ma
thaniel C>old II,R New York.