Chapter VII: Part 7

Killing and being killed are serious matters, and everybody understands that the business can not safely be trifled with. That is why science is allowed to have its own way almost entirely in the navy, and to exercise a large measure of control in the army, with the effect of rendering the first a nearly perfect machine, and giving to the latter a high degree of efficiency for its own purposes. But have we not here object lessons which ought to be applied to other departments of the Government? Is it only in the matter of killing that the aid of science is required? Can the public at large not rise to the conception that, if science can make splendid killing machines, it might also, if allowed fair play, make excellent administrative machines for peaceful purposes? We have departments which deal with such important matters as currency and finance, agriculture and statistics, the administration of justice, the control of railway traffic, the erection of public buildings and the improvement of waterways, the carrying out of geodetic and geological surveys, the representation of the country abroad, the protection of the public health, and, finally, the great question of public education. It must be obvious to every thoughtful person that, if science could have its say and its way in relation to these matters, it would put them all on the best footing which the existing condition of knowledge permits. It would ask, "What are the objects to be accomplished?" and would proceed to select the persons and adopt the means best fitted to realize those objects. The country would then have a civil service in which economy and efficiency would be equally conspicuous, and which would furnish examples for imitation in private enterprise of the best ways of doing things.

It is needless to say how far removed the present condition of government business is from anything like scientific organization. If killing must be done scientifically, the injured feelings of the politician find relief in insisting that nearly everything else within the sphere of government action shall be done most unscientifically. In the filling of important positions the first thing considered is not the question of fitness for the work to be done, but the question of party advantage. It is not too much to say that a prejudice frequently exists against a man conspicuously qualified by knowledge, experience, and character for a given post. There is an uncomfortable feeling that such a man might not be sufficiently pliable afterward in the hands of those who had appointed him--that the preposterous idea might get into his head that, having obtained the office on his merits, he was at liberty, in the execution of his duties, to think only of the public interest. The preference of the politician, therefore, for "the boys" is easily understood; but "the boys" and science do not work hand in hand.

Our universities are turning out year by year men possessing the highest scientific qualifications, men who have studied both in this country and in Europe, and who are prepared to take any positions in which scientific work is required. Some of these are absorbed by the teaching profession, but the great majority find employment in the various industries of the country. Unfortunately, the attainments of such men give them no special advantage as regards employment in the public service of the country; to qualify for that they must graduate in another school entirely, and get certificates from a very different class of professors. We are far from holding the opinion that men of high education should dissociate themselves from the political life of the country; but it is unhappily true that the kind of interest which an intelligent man who places the nation above party can take in politics is not likely to recommend him to those who have the dispensing of places. The fact should, however, be emphasized that if science does not receive due recognition in connection with the public services, it is not because of any lack of native-born citizens capable of representing it with credit and even with distinction. In this respect America has placed herself fully abreast with the most advanced nations of the modern world, and the Government has only to say what service it requires in order to have its choice of men possessing every qualification to render that service in the most competent and satisfactory manner.

In the last resort, it must be admitted, the fault rests with the people. It is with reluctance that the average elector acknowledges--if he can be brought to acknowledge at all--that any public office requires special qualifications. Such an idea seems to be at war with true democratic doctrine, and to imply a serious abridgment of the powers of the people's representatives. It is readily conceded that private industries and enterprises of all kinds call for training and experience and special knowledge on the part of those who conduct them; but Government business is supposed to be so simple that a wayfaring man, though a pronounced fool, need not err therein. There is more or less hypocrisy, however, in the pretension. The real underlying thought is that, outside of the two great killing departments, no very serious harm can be done by official incompetence, and that the great thing is to provide for "the boys." No idea could be more false. The evil that can be done by unwise economic measures, for example, is incalculable. The army and navy are brought into action only when the dogs of war have been let loose; but the influence of the civil departments of the Government acts unceasingly, and touches the life of the people at a thousand points.

In the matter of public education science has never had the recognition to which it is entitled; nor will it have until the people as a whole know better what science is--until they cease to think of it as a thing of mysteries and technicalities, and come to understand that it is simply the organization of knowledge and the rendering of it available for guidance in the business of life. Meantime, wherever circumstances are favorable, the education of the young, even of the youngest, should be given as far as possible a scientific character. We are strongly inclined to the opinion that, in a country whose fundamental industry is agriculture, an effort should be made in all schools to impart a few sound elementary ideas as to the principles of agriculture. What better starting point could there be for scientific instruction than the soil out of which we derive, mediately or immediately, all that goes to sustain life? It seems to us that no human being should be permitted to be wholly ignorant of the conditions upon which the successful cultivation of the soil depends, and we are persuaded that the subject might, by proper treatment, be made deeply interesting to the vast majority of school children.

A prominent Englishman, Mr. Boyd-Kinnear, has lately been discussing this matter in a London paper. He points out that a knowledge of the scientific principles of agriculture is of fundamental importance, and that whatever else is taught in the national schools, the sciences on which farming rests--physics, chemistry, mechanics, and the physiology of plants and animals--should hold a principal place. He observes that in order to know agriculture it is necessary to understand, first of all, the elements and the action of the soil and the air. There is urgent need, he contends, for teaching what is known on these subjects and for pursuing research into the much larger field of the unknown. In these remarks we entirely concur, and we believe that it would be a happy thing for this country, and for every country, if education could be so administered that, instead of tending, as it so often does, to separate human beings from the soil, it should tend to establish in their minds a sense of their dependence on it and an intelligent, if possible a loving, interest in the operations by which the living of the world is won and the face of Nature is beautified. Here, as we conceive, is where scientific teaching should begin. Such a system of instruction would do much more than increase the intelligence of the farming community, though that would be a benefit of the first magnitude; it would so transform public opinion in general that the divorce we now see between science and the State would no longer be possible. The whole national life would be placed on a sounder basis; and it would probably be found that the result of doing other things scientifically was to diminish very greatly the importance of the arrangements for scientific killing. A nation governed by science would be a peace-loving and peace-maintaining nation.

_AGRICULTURE AND NATIONAL LIFE._

Some very interesting points of view are presented in an article on the food supply of England which appeared a few months ago in The New Century Review of London. The writer, Mr. Richard Higgs, Jr., is very unwilling to admit the commonly accepted view that Great Britain must be dependent upon other countries for the food her people require. He holds that all that is required to make the production of grain profitable in England is the application of higher intelligence and more businesslike methods to the work of the farm. "Speaking generally," he says, "agriculture has been of late a despised industry; intellectual activity has not been brought to bear on it; the men of force and enterprise have failed to recognize that it offers an absolutely unrivaled sphere for the exercise of personal initiative, skill, and knowledge.... Agriculture has not been regarded as a means of assisting human development, but rather as a hindrance to progress. A low type of manhood and a slow, unprogressive condition of life are usually regarded as indispensable to agriculture, and consequently it has been neglected by reformers who desire to further the progress of the race."

The writer proceeds to describe the various ways in which, as he believes, agriculture might be made more profitable, partly through lowering of the cost of production, and partly by improvement of the yield; and, finally, he sets forth the disagreeable and very serious conclusions which flow from the proposition--if it is to be accepted as established--that Great Britain can not feed herself by the remunerative production of wheat in the face of low prices. In the first place, the national policy must be one of "bluff and weakness toward other nations: bluff, because it will not answer our purpose to appear weak; and weakness, because, seeing that possible enemies are our largest feeders, we are not in a condition to deal with other nations on equal terms, but must ever face the galling necessity of being dependent upon the good will of a few powerful nations for our daily bread." A nation so situated must be "in the front rank of the nations which are engaging in the mad scramble after markets"; must give itself over "to all the orthodox requirements of diplomacy by engaging in bullying, cringing, lying, deceit, and massacre, in order to secure an outlet for its manufactured goods." Such a fact further implies "the eternal persistence on the face of the land of those hideous monstrosities--our manufacturing towns; those excrescences which, like the dragon of old, are daily vomiting fire and smoke, and by their foulness are blasting and cursing the lives of the people and causing the physical, mental, and moral deterioration of the race.... It banishes the poetry, the music, and the glories of an agricultural life, and condemns untold millions to the artificial and unhealthy moral atmosphere of our towns."

It may be said that all this has not much application to the state of things in these happy United States. It has application to at least this extent, that our towns too are becoming bloated and our country places starved. We are fully at one with the writer in his estimate of the agricultural life, and believe that no greater service could be rendered to any country than to place its agriculture on the moral and intellectual, as well as on the economic, level which it has a just claim to occupy. It is the application of science to agriculture that will bring about this result.

Scientific Literature.

SPECIAL BOOKS.

_The Theory of the Leisure Class_[58] of Mr. _Thorstein Veblen_ is primarily an inquiry into the place and value of the leisure class as an economic factor in modern life. Hardly less attention, however, is given to the origin and line of derivation of the institution, and to features of social life not commonly classed as economic, into the very heart of some of which the study goes. The institution of the leisure class, which is defined generally as that class whose occupation is not industrial, is found in its best development at the higher stages of the barbarian culture, as in feudal Europe or feudal Japan. Whichever way we go from this point it is modified. Its origin appears at a very early stage in history, and appears in the germ in the savage division of the occupations of men and women. The women carried on the industries, and the men went to the hunt or to war--occupations with which the idea of prowess or exploit was associated, giving the stamp of aristocracy. In the highest development of this distinction, the nonindustrial upper-class occupations may be roughly comprised under the heads of government, warfare, religious observances, and sports. In the sequence of cultural evolution the emergence of a leisure class coincides with the beginning of ownership, ownership of women being one of the most conspicuous forms in earlier times, then ownership of property and its symbols. Among the signs of wealth are conspicuous leisure, which includes social distinction and functions and conspicuous consumption, or the possession of fine things not necessaries, and plenty of them. These lead to the setting up of a pecuniary standard of living and pecuniary canons of taste, and the adoption of dress as an expression of the pecuniary culture. In the chapter on Industrial Exemption and Conservatism we are introduced to the reason of conventionalism and of its power. "The fact that the usages, actions, and views of the well-to-do leisure class acquire the character of a prescriptive canon of conduct for the rest of society gives added weight and reach to the conservative influence of that class. It makes it incumbent upon all respectable people to follow their lead." Hence it exerts a retarding influence on social development, stiffening the resistance of all other classes against innovation. Further, the code of proprieties in vogue at any given time or in any society has the character of an organic whole, and any important infringement upon it is likely to derange it. This conservative quality goes so far as to tend toward spiritual survival and reversion. The idea of prowess survives in our barbaric admiration of military exploits, in the taste for sports, and in the gambling tendency, which is based on belief in luck and is enhanced by the desire to triumph at the expense of another. A connection is traced between the admiration of prowess and the cultivation of the devotional spirit which, joined with the fondness for display, leads all worshipers eventually to elaboration of rituals. A further development, classed as Survivals of the Non-Invidious Interest, is that of beneficences. The Higher Learning was primarily the exclusive privilege of the leisure class, and has still attached to it a mass of ritual in the shape of paraphernalia, ceremonies, degrees, and privileges which grow more elaborate as the college and the community become richer. Devotion to classical learning, which is practically useless, is a form of "conspicuous leisure" and "conspicuous expenditure," but now encounters a rival in athletics, which is equally useless and conspicuous and more costly.

[Footnote 58: The Theory of the Leisure Class. An Economic Study
in the Evolution of Institutions. By Thorstein Veblen. New York:
The Macmillan Company. Pp. 400. Price, $2.]

The American Economic Association, at its meeting in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1897, authorized the appointment of a committee to inquire into the scope and method of the eleventh census, with a view of determining what ought to be attempted in the twelfth. In order to make an adequate review of the eleventh census this committee invited a certain number of critical articles on particular portions of the work; and further, in order to discover what might seem weak points in the work and what inquiries it might seem desirable to elaborate in the twelfth census, addressed a circular letter of questions to all the members of the association. Only about sixty replies were received to the questions, but a generous response was made to the invitations to contribute reviews, the result of which is a series of papers by independent authors upon specific topics which are regarded as constituting a very valuable commentary on the Federal census and on statistical methods in general. These criticisms are now embodied in a book[59] of more than five hundred pages, containing twenty essays by authors each of whom is specially interested in the particular topic of which he treats. These articles include a general review of the statistics of population, by Walter F. Wilcox, and special articles on the negro population, by W. Z. Ripley; the North American Indians, by Franz Boas; Age, Sex, Dwellings, and Families, and Urban Population, by George K. Holmes; Illiteracy and Educational Statistics, by Davis R. Dewey; Statistics of Occupation, by Richard Mayo-Smith; Various Aspects of the Vital and Social Statistics, by Cressy L. Wilbur, Irving Fisher, Roland P. Falkner, and Samuel M. Lindsay; of Agriculture and Farms, by N. I. Stone and David Kelley; Transportation, by Emery R. Johnson and Walter E. Weyl; Manufactures, by S. N. D. North, William M. Stewart, Worthington C. Ford, and Charles J. Bullock; Wealth, Debt, and Taxation, by Carl C. Plehn; Municipal Finance, by Henry B. Gardner; and the Scope and Method of the Twelfth Census, by William C. Hunt. A number of general conclusions are pointed out by the committee as deducible from the papers contributed by these writers. The criticism throughout touches not so much the accuracy of the census as the treatment of the data and the lack of continuity from census to census--both defects believed to be largely due to the insufficient time allowed by law for preparing plans and schedules. The work of the census is believed to be seriously impeded by the number and variety of the investigations ordered, in consequence of which fundamental inquiries can not receive attention. A number of subordinate inquiries might advantageously be transferred to established bureaus or departments under whose scope they would properly fall, and some of which already publish annual volumes of kindred statistics. Among classes of defects or weaknesses in method pointed out in the criticisms are a lack of comparability in data from census to census, lack of co-ordination, certain specified faults in method, and faults in the textual analysis of the figures. A summary of the answers received to the circular letter of questions is appended, particularly of the answers to the request to suggest what special information might be furnished by the twelfth census which is not in the eleventh. Many of the writers point to the desirability of a permanent census bureau. The committee has a right to congratulate itself, as it does, "upon this noteworthy collection of papers--the result of the scientific zeal and effort of so many men."

[Footnote 59: The Federal Census. Critical Essays by Members of
the American Economic Association, collected and edited by a
Special Committee. Published for the American Economic
Association by the Macmillan Company, New York. Pp. 516. Price,
$1; cloth, $2.50.]

GENERAL NOTICES.

The qualification of Mr. _Frederick A. Ober_ to write a book about _Puerto Rico and its Resources_[60] is indicated by the facts that he visited every point of importance on the island in 1880, and revisited it as West Indian Commissioner for the Columbian Exposition. To the fruits of observations made during these two visits he has added information gathered from the books that have been written about Puerto Rico by Spanish and other officers. A plain, concise account of the island is presented, without sensational exaggerations and free from apparent padding. It begins with the consideration and estimation of the commercial and strategic value of the island. Next its coastal features, rivers--of which it seems to have a relatively good supply--and harbors are described. Then the climate, which is "hot and moist, yet in the main less injurious to the health of white people than that of adjacent islands"; seasons, which are not very variable; and hurricanes, which appear to be rather an important feature. As to products, they are of course tropical, and grow, as in Mexico, in three zones of climate and vegetation. Considering these more specially a chapter is given to Sugar, Tobacco, Coffee, and Cacao; another to Fruits, Spices, Cereals, and Food Plants; and a third to Dyes, Drugs, Woods, and Minerals. The chapter on Natural History includes accounts of game and insect pests. The topographic description begins with San Juan, the capital, and takes in the cities and towns of the coast and the inland towns and routes of travel. A few words are devoted to the government as it has been, and the general characteristics of the people are briefly sketched. Accounts of their foods, drinks, diversions, etc., are given, after which the author passes to the Indians of Puerto Rico. Two chapters relate to the general and the recent history of the island respectively. Considerable information of a statistical character is included in an appendix.

[Footnote 60: Puerto Rico and its Resources. By Frederick A.
Ober. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 282, with Map.]

President _D. S. Jordan's Footnotes to Evolution_[61] is made up of popular essays or addresses on the general subject of organic evolution which were given originally as oral lectures before University Extension Societies. Three of them have been also published in this Monthly, and as many in another magazine. Besides the author's own twelve essays, he has inserted in this volume three other papers of special importance, setting forth the present state of knowledge concerning the methods of evolution and of heredity. These are on the Factors of Organic Evolution as displayed in the Process of Development, by Prof. E. G. Conklin; the Physical Basis of Heredity, by Prof. F. M. McFarland; on The Testimony from Paleontology, by Prof. J. P. Smith. President Jordan's own essays begin with a discussion of the kinship of life. This is followed by three articles on evolution, relating to its nature, elements, and factors from the point of view of embryology, and an application of the subject in the paper on The Heredity of Richard Roe, in which the rise of race types from the survival of the existing race with its best results modified and preserved by the survival of the fittest is illustrated. In the seventh essay certain facts of animal distribution as related to the origin of species are considered; in the eighth (Latitude and Vertebrata) the curious biological problem of the possession of more numerous vertebræ by northern than by tropical fishes is considered--a problem the solution of which on any other hypothesis than that of the derivation of species would be impossible. The evolution of mind is then taken up as the sum total of all psychic changes, actions, and reactions, and this development is extended to nations the laws of whose greatness "expand themselves from the laws which govern the growth of the single cell." In the essay on Degeneration a lesson is drawn in favor of individual initiative. Hereditary Inefficiency is discussed in view of the danger from pauperism. Some of the aspects of the woman question are considered in another of the essays. In the paper on The Stability of Truth some recent enunciations of Lord Salisbury, Mr. Balfour, and Haeckel respecting science are criticised. The last essay is on The Struggle for Realities, and concerns the relations of science and conservatism, the Church, etc.

[Footnote 61: Footnotes to Evolution. By David Starr Jordan. With
Supplementary Essays by Edwin Grant Conklin, Frank Mace
McFarland, and James Perrin Smith. New York: D. Appleton and
Company. Pp. 392. Price, $1.]

Mr. _Robert P. Porter's_ volume on _Industrial Cuba_[62] deals with living questions of the island. It aims to give a description of Cuba as it appeared to the author when he visited it in the fall of 1898 as special commissioner of the United States to report on its industrial, commercial, and financial condition. It is the result of nearly seven months' inquiry and hard work, in which the island was visited three times, more than five hundred witnesses were examined, and "numerous statements" were studied and analyzed. Among the special subjects treated of are the political and economical condition of Cuba, the outlook for labor, the population, sanitary work, Colonel Waring's report, municipal problems in Havana, banks and currency, the revenue and tariffs, commerce, sugar, tobacco, mines and mining, agriculture and stock, timber and fruit, transportation, navigation, education and religion, and the outlook for the future.

[Footnote 62: Industrial Cuba. Being a Study of Present
Commercial and Industrial Conditions, with Suggestions as to the
Opportunities presented in the Island for American Capital,
Enterprise, and Labor. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 428.
Price, $3.50.]

Naturalists and bibliophiles have reason to be grateful to Mr. _Call_ for his verbatim reproduction of Rafinesque's _Ichthyologia Ohioensis_.[63] The book is of importance as constituting, in the language of the editor, the foundation of fresh-water ichthyology in America. No book dealing specifically with the Ohio Valley area as a region has since been published. The original description of many fish forms which are now recognized by ichthyologists as good species were first given in this book, and many have not since been reprinted. Further, the book contains the first and most complete description, to date, of the Ohio River from Pittsburg down, with notices of all its tributaries. Its value as a book about fishes is not limited to the Ohio River, for the species of that stream are found, to a greater or less extent, throughout the Mississippi Valley, so that it is in effect a necessity to all students of the fresh-water fishes of that territory. The editor regrets that Rafinesque did not preserve in some manner the types of his genera, instead of which, when the technical description was completed and some common form, if one was known, was referred to, the specimen was discarded or rejected. Hence his descriptions can not be compared conveniently with prepared specimens in cabinets or with descriptions made from them, but the student must go to the river and look up the living fish. The original papers of Rafinesque on fishes were published in The Western Review and Miscellaneous Magazine, Lexington, Ky., in 1819, 1820, and 1821. The matter was then arranged in book form from the same type. Two different systems of pagination resulted. These have both been indicated in the present edition by the insertion of the numbers at their proper places. The reprint is an exact copy of the original, including even typographical errors, excepting only the style of type. Of the original edition only eight copies are known to exist, so that the republication was desirable to preserve the book, as well as for the facilitation of reference, and of this only two hundred and fifty numbered copies are printed for the market.

[Footnote 63: Ichthyologia Ohioensis: or Natural History of the
Fishes inhabiting the River Ohio and its Tributary Streams. By C.
S. Rafinesque. A Verbatim and Literatim Reprint of the Original,
with a Sketch of the Life, the Ichthyologic Work, and the
Ichthyologic Bibliography of Rafinesque. By Richard Ellsworth
Call. Cleveland: The Burrows Brothers Company. Pp. 175. Price,
$4.]

Mr. _Douglas Houghton Campbell_ has endeavored, in his _Lectures on the Evolution of Plants_,[64] to present in as untechnical a manner as seemed feasible the more striking facts bearing upon the evolution of plant forms, believing that it will fill an existing want among English text-books. The substance of the work was given originally in the form of lectures to classes in Leland Stanford Junior University. After an introduction, in which a few fundamental principles are presented, elementary structures are defined, and accepted classification is mentioned, the conditions of plant life are treated of as relating to food substances, water, life, division of labor, and movements, of which all plants exhibit more or less marked ones, that may be spontaneous. While in the simple unicellular plants all the functions are performed by a single cell, a gradual division of labor takes place as we go up, first in a separation of the vegetative and reproductive cells, and later a further specialization of both vegetative and reproductive functions, culminating in the seed plant. This course is described as exemplified in the simplest forms of life, algæ, fungi, mosses and liverworts, ferns, and seed plants of the different classes. The study of the geological relations, fragmentary as their teachings are, has yielded most important evidence for tracing the succession of plant forms. Observation of geographical distribution casts much light on the subject. The relations of animals and plants have an important bearing. The influence of the environment embraces many factors, and is often shown in conspicuous features of form and structure adapting plants to certain sorts of conditions and enabling them to resist others. Plants have thus succeeded in adapting themselves to almost every environment.

[Footnote 64: Lectures on the Evolution of Plants. By Douglas
Houghton Campbell. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 319.
Price, $1.25.]

Prof. _Augustus de Morgan's_ book _On the Study and Difficulties of Mathematics_,[65] though originally published more than sixty years ago, is still fresh and suggestive and full of matter valuable alike to students and teachers, and possesses qualities of clearness of reasoning and intelligibility from which many mathematical treatises are unfortunately free. Its purpose is to notice particularly several important points in the principles of algebra and geometry which have not obtained their due importance in elementary works in those sciences. Metaphysical points are avoided, and the method of explaining by reference to some particular problem, with hints as to more general adaptation, is adopted. Among the points taken up and classified are the nature and objects of mathematics, arithmetical and algebraic notation, rules and principles, equations, the negative sign, roots and logarithms, geometrical subjects, and application of algebra to measurements. The editor of the present edition, Mr. Thomas J. McCormack, has corrected the errata of the old edition and incorporated such changes as the progress of time and mathematical literature have made seem proper. An excellent portrait of De Morgan is given.

[Footnote 65: On the Study and Difficulties of Mathematics. By
Augustus De Morgan. New edition. Chicago: The Open Court
Publishing Company. Pp. 288.]

The purpose of _Carpenter's Geographical Reader, North America_ (American Book Company), is to give its readers a living knowledge of some of the wonders of the country and continent in which they live. They are taken by the author, Mr. _Frank G. Carpenter_, on a personally conducted tour through the most characteristic parts of the American continent, studying the most interesting features of life and work among the people, learning how they are governed, and how they make their living. Much information is also given concerning the natural resources and the physical features of the countries visited.

The _Japan-American Commercial Journal_ is a monthly periodical started with the beginning of the year, with an especial view to the opening of the empire of Japan to unrestricted foreign trade and residence, for the advancement of the reciprocal interests of Japan and the United States. It is printed in English and Japanese, and is published at Tokio by the Japan-American Commercial and Industrial Association, for $2.50 a year.

_The Anglo-Saxon_ is a monthly magazine, the first number of which is dated November, 1898, "devoted to the identity of the Anglo-Saxon race with the house of Israel." It is edited by _George E. Inglis_, and published by the Anglo-Saxon Publishing Company, Chicago. The title of the first paragraph--"Cui bono"--seems to us to suggest a very appropriate question. The argument seems to be that the house of Israel was appointed to universal dominion, and the Anglo-Saxon race, between England and the United States, with its late war "as nearly a Christian war as any war might be," is getting it.

Among the general papers in the second volume, containing Parts II and III, of the _Report of the Commissioner of Education_ for 1896-'97 are those on Federal and State Aid to Higher Education, the First Common Schools of New England, the Learned Professions and Social Control, and the Beginnings of the Common-School System in the South. Statistics of foreign universities are given, with a paper on the Teaching of Geography in certain foreign countries, and consular reports on educational topics. Professor Boas's paper on the Growth of Toronto Children is included. Educational matters of interest in various States are reported upon. An Eskimo vocabulary is introduced. A special report on education in Alaska appears. Part III is devoted to statistical matter.

The _Occult Science Library_ is a course of seven essays on the subject of practical occultism by _Ernest Loomis_. The author assumes that the rules based on the occult principles of Nature would, if fully applied, enable any person to invoke the assistance of occult forces in every practical rule of life, and that they may with like success be applied in matters of health, the acquisition of knowledge, the formation of plans, and the solution of religious and ethical enigmas. The publishers claim that the maxims of the book have proved their efficiency to the satisfaction of thousands who have read them. (Published by Ernest Loomis & Co., Chicago.)

Mr. _James G. Needham_ has furnished, in _Outdoor Studies_ (American Book Company), one of the fullest and most systematic guides or "reading books," as he calls this one, for Nature study that we have seen. Recognizing that there is no lack, in numbers, of books offering object lessons, etc., for children of the earlier years intervening between the primary and the high school, he has prepared this book to supply for the later years of that period "a few lessons of greater continuity, calling for more persistence of observation and introducing a few of the simpler of our modern conceptions of Nature at large." The lessons presuppose some years of experience of life and some previous training in observation; they are given simply for the sake of the interest and educative value of the facts and phenomena of Nature which they set forth; and they have been written more for the boys and girls than for the teachers. The things described--birds, insects, plants, etc.--are such as can be seen anywhere. Mr. Needham tells how to study them and learn what they mean.

In _Commissioner Hume, a Story of New York Schools_, a sequel to Roderick Hume, the Story of a New York Teacher, Mr. _C. W. Bardeen_ has undertaken to give a picture of rural New York schools, or rather of the administration of school affairs by commissioners as they were in 1875, and he declares it to be accurate. He represents, however, that the general tone of the commissioners has vastly changed in the period that has intervened since then, and the conditions described in the volume no longer prevail. The book is offered, therefore, as a contribution to educational history. (Published by C. W. Bardeen, Syracuse, N. Y.)

The southern half of Missouri and the Black Hills of South Dakota offer exceptionally delightful regions for the study of caves, or speleology, as well as of geology and geography. Each of these regions has its peculiar geological history and its own scenery, and possesses a number of truly wonderful caves. Some of the more important of these caves and the scenery amid which they lie are described by Mrs. _Luella Agnes_ Owen in the book _Cave Regions of the Black Hills_ (Cincinnati: the Editor Publishing Company), and we have been much interested in reading the accounts. The descriptions are introduced by summaries of the methods of the formation of caves and of the results of the geological and topographical explorations of the regions in which they are situated, as presented in official reports and scientific memoirs. The descriptions are for the most part relations of the author's personal explorations of the caves. The most important of these caves are Marble Cave, "the finest yet explored in Missouri," and Wind Cave, in South Dakota, said to be the largest known after the Mammoth Cave. Others are Fairy, Powell, Stone County, Oregon County Caves and the Grand Gulf in Missouri, and the Onyx and Crystal Caves in South Dakota. Many illustrations are given. The author has fine descriptive powers, but her literary style needs discipline. She is the first American, and the only woman, so far, elected to membership in the Société de Speleologie of Paris.

A valuable paper on _Sympathetic Strikes and Sympathetic Lockouts_ is published by Mr. _Fred S. Hall_ as the first number of the eleventh volume of the Columbia University Studies in History, Economics, and Public Law. In it, the author having fixed the definition of sympathetic strikes and lockouts as distinguished from those not sympathetic, and having found the difference between a strike and a lockout, discusses the origin and development of the two sympathetic movements, analyzes them, and forecasts the future as it is indicated by the past. Illustrations are freely drawn from the important strikes and lockouts that have occurred in the United States and abroad for a number of years past.

_The Year Book of Colorists and Dyers_, in the opinion of the author, Mr. _Harwood Huntington_, supplies a want, for, so far as he is aware, there are no other portable works in the English language to which the color-chemist can refer and find the information which he requires the oftenest. The object of the present publication is to meet the demand for a review of the advances made annually in the special field worked in by dyers and colorists--in the bleaching, dyeing, printing, and finishing of textiles--and it endeavors to do this with accuracy and brevity. (Published by the author, New York.)

The first number of _The Socialist Almanac and Treasury of Facts_ has been issued in accordance with a decision of the National Convention of the Socialist Labor Party, held in New York in July, 1896. It has been prepared by _Lucien Sanial_, to whom the task was assigned by the National Executive Committee. A large proportion of it is historical, and consists mainly of monographs presenting views of the movements and condition of "militant socialism" in Germany, Austria, Italy, Spain, and Belgium, from its beginning to the present day. Special attention is invited by the author to the monographs on Italy and Spain as tracing the struggle between socialism and anarchism to its beginning. The second part of the book contains statistical matter and comments on economical and social conditions, which, if the argument on "Who owns the Savings?" is a specimen of its quality, must be accepted with many reservations.

Prof. William Wadden Turner, a native of England who came to this country at an early age, became an eminent scholar in Oriental literature, and in 1842 a professor of that subject in Union Theological Seminary. He was called thence to Washington in 1852 to organize the library of the Patent Office, where his work was of great value. Thence he was taken by Professor Baird to catalogue and arrange the library of the Smithsonian Institution. He associated his sister with him in this work and as recorder of scientific collections and exchanges in 1858. She continued there after his death the next year, and served the library faithfully and efficiently, going with it to the Congressional Library when it was removed there, till 1886, when she resigned on account of age. She died in 1896. A _Memorial_ of the two and of their elder sister Susan has been prepared by Mrs. _Caroline H. Dall_ and has been printed privately.

The author of _What is This?_ after a brief discussion of the personality of Jesus and the present degenerate condition of Christianity, goes on to say: "We must have another revelation, therefore. It seems to be a necessity. But what troubles me is this: can it be possible that any part of this revelation can come through one as humble as myself? What have I seen and what have I heard?... I have often pondered the great questions of man's origin and future; never until now, never until I heard this voice, have I had any glimmer of a solution of this great puzzle. I know I am nothing, but can not the Supreme Being use a mere nothing to accomplish his purpose?" Notwithstanding the author's avowed unworthiness, he seems to have been selected, and we have from his pen a new and considerably detailed book of genesis.

PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

Acetylene Gas Journal. Monthly. Vol. I, No. 1. June, 1899. Buffalo, N. Y. Pp. 12. 5 cents. 50 cents a year.

Agricultural Experiment Stations. Bulletins and Reports. Delaware College: No. 43. Veterinary Studies, Milk Legislation, and Basic Slag as a Fertilizer.--Michigan State Agricultural College. No. 169. Notes from the South Haven Sub-Station. By L. R. Taft and T. T. Lyon. Pp. 108; Nos. 170, 171. Vegetable Tests and Bush Fruits. Pp. 42; Nos. 172, 173. Combating Disease-producing Germs and Killing the Tubercle Bacillus in Milk. Four authors. Pp. 30.--Montana: No. 18. The Alkali Soils of Montana. Preliminary Bulletin. Pp. 30.--United States Department of Agriculture: No. 24. Proceedings of the Convention of Weather-Bureau Officials, held at Omaha, Neb., October 13 and 14, 1898. Pp. 184, with plate.

Anglo-American Magazine. Monthly. May and June, 1899. Pp. 120 and 128. 25 cents. $2.50 a year.

Blackman, William F. The Making of Hawaii. A Study in Social Evolution. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 266. $2.

Breese, B. B. On Inhibition. (Monograph Supplement to the Psychological Review.) New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 65.

Bulletins, Reports, Transactions, etc. Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 1899. Part I. January, February, and March. Pp. 216, with plates.--American Society of Naturalists: Records. Vol. II, Part IV. Providence, R. I. Pp. 36.--New York Academy of Sciences: Annals. Vol. XII, Part I. Pp. 89.--New York State Reformatory, Elmira: Year-Book for 1898. Pp. 126.--Société Royale de Canada: Report of the Geographical Society of Quebec. Pp. 2.--United States Department of Labor: Bulletin No. 22. May, 1899. Pp. 42.--University of Tennessee: Record, Review of 1898. Knoxville, Tenn. Pp. 56.--Wyoming State Medical Society: Transactions. May and June, 1899, E. Stuver, Secretary. Pp. 75.--Zoölogical Society of Philadelphia: Twenty-seventh Annual Report of the Board of Directors. Pp. 25.

Cragin, Belle S. Our Insect Friends and Foes. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 377. $1.75.

Dana, Charles A. Recollections of the Civil War. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 296. $2.

Davis, Lucius D. Ornamental Shrubs for Garden, Lawn, and Park Planting. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 338. $3.50.

Dexter, E. G. Conduct and the Weather. (Monograph Supplement of the Psychological Review.) New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 101. $1.

Erlingsson, Dr. Thorstein. Ruins of the Saga Time. (Travels and Explorations in Iceland.) London: David Nutt. Pp. 112, with map.

Fergusen, James. A New System of Natural Philosophy. Book I. The Physical Universe. Published by the Author at Talmage, Neb. Pp. 240.

Field Columbian Museum, Chicago. Publication No. 30. New Rodents from the Olympic Mountains. By D. G. Elliot. Pp. 4.--No. 31. Cold-Blooded Vertebrates from the Olympic Mountains. By S. E. Meek. Pp. 10.--No. 32. Catalogue of Mammals from the Olympic Mountains, Washington. By D. G. Elliot. Pp. 36, with plates.--No. 33. The Ores of Colombia. By H. W. Nichols. Pp. 56, with maps.--No. 34. The Mylagaulidæ. An Extinct Family of Sciuromorph Rodents. By E. S. Riggs. Pp. 8.--No. 35. A Fossil Egg from South Dakota. By A. C. Farrington. Pp. 8, with plates.--No. 36. Contributions to the Paleontology of the Upper Cretaceous Series. By W. N. Logan. Pp. 16, with plates.--No. 37. Mammals from Oklahoma Territory. By D. G. Elliot. Pp. 4.--No. 38. Mammals from the Indian Territory. By D. G. Elliot. Pp. 8.

Heilprin, Angelo. Alaska and the Klondike. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 315.

Hrdlicka, Dr. Ales. Anthropological Investigations of Children in the New York Juvenile Asylum. Pp. 86, with plates.

Irish, Cyrus W. Qualitative Analysis for Secondary Schools. American Book Company. Pp. 100.

James, Charles C. Practical Agriculture. American edition. Edited by John Craig. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 203. 80 cents.

Jordan, David Starr. Imperial Democracy. New York: D. Appleton and Company. Pp. 293. $1.50.

Jordan, David Starr, Leonhard Stejneger, and other Official Associates. The Fur Seals and Fur-Seal Islands of the North Pacific Ocean. Part IV. Washington: Government Printing Office. Pp. 384, with maps and plates.

Kenne, A. H. Man Past and Present. Cambridge, England; New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 584. $3.

Lavignac, Albert. Music and Musicians. New York: Henry Holt & Co. Pp. 504. $3.

Miller, Olive Thorne. The First Book of Birds. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Pp. 149.

Missouri Botanical Garden. Tenth Annual Report. William Trelease, Director. St. Louis. Pp. 209, with plates.

Moon, J. Howard. Better-World Philosophy. Chicago: The Ward Waugh Company. Pp. 275.

Reprints. Abbott, Samuel W. Infant Mortality in Massachusetts. Boston: Small, Maynard & Co. Pp. 19.--Baillairgé, Charles. La Vie, L'Evolutlon, et le Materialism. (Life, Evolution, and Materialism.) Pp. 37.--Le Grec, le Latin: leur Utilité, etc. (Greek and Latin: their Utility, etc.) Pp. 48; L'Antiquité de la Terre et de l'Homme. (Antiquity of the Earth and of Man.) Pp. 23; Royal Society of Canada.--Burt, Stephen S. Recollections and Reflections of a Quarter of a Century. New York. Pp. 12.--Cathell, W. T. On the Reduction of Obesity. Pp. 12.--Goode, John P. The Piracy of the Yellowstone. University of Chicago. Pp. 12.--Halsted, Byron D., New Brunswick, N. J. Root Tubercles and Nitrogen Appropriation. Pp. 14.--MacBride, Thomas H. Botany, How Much and When? Iowa City. Pp. 11.--Marsh, Othniel Charles, Biographical Sketch by Charles E. Beecher. From the American Journal of Science. Pp. 28, with portrait.--Meyer, Max. Ueber Beurtheilung Zusammengesetzer Klänge. (On the Estimation of Composite Sounds.) Leipsic, Saxony. Pp. 33.--Poteat, W. L. Leidy's Genus Ouramoeba. Pp. 5.--Sexton, Pliny T. Reasons and Authorities for Favoring Education Unification under the Regents of the University. Pp. 56.--Von Schrenck, Herman. A Disease of Taxodium known as Peckiness, etc. St. Louis. Washington University. Pp. 54, with plates.

Scudder, Samuel H. Everyday Butterflies. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Pp. 386.

Sutro, Emil. Duality of Voice. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 224. $1.

Sites, C. M. L. Centralized Administration of Liquor Laws in the American Commonwealths. (Columbia University Studies in History, Economics, and Public Law.) New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 162.

Union Pacific Railroad Company, Passenger Department. Some of Wyoming's Vertebrate Fossils. Pp. 31.

United States Geological Survey. Eighteenth Annual Report. Part I. Director's Report, Triangulation, and Spirit Leveling. Pp. 440.--Part II. Papers chiefly of a Theoretic Nature. Pp. 653, with maps.--Part III. Economic Geology. Pp. 861, with maps.--Part IV. Hydrography. Pp. 756, New York City and Vicinity Map.

United States National Museum: Lord, E. C. E. Petrographic Notes on Rocks from the United States-Mexico Boundary. Pp. 10, with map.--Richardson. Harriet. Key to the Isopods of the Pacific Coast, etc. Pp. 56.--Stejneger, Leonhard. The Land Reptiles of the Hawaiian Islands. Pp. 32.

Vita Nuova. (New Life.) A Fortnightly Illustrated Review of Letters, Arts, and Sciences. Clelia Bertini-Attilii, Director. Rome. Pp. 16.

Walter, Robert, M. D. Vital Science based upon Life's Great Law, the Analogue of Gravitation. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company. Pp. 319.

Watson, David K. History of American Coinage. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 278. $1.50.

Fragments of Science.

=Climate and Acclimatization.=--In view of the rapid growth of West Indian and South American commerce and the considerable emigration to Cuba and neighboring islands, which our present relations with them will probably bring about, the following extracts from an editorial in the London Lancet are of interest: "The American nation has entered upon a new and, in a sense, imperial policy, which may be regarded as forming an epoch in its history. This brings it face to face with the problem of colonization and acclimatization--a problem which we have had to confront long ago and toward the solution of which we have ever since been slowly fighting our way by following on the lines of the best practical measures of hygiene known to us. 'The white man's burden' has proved a tragical one in its drain on the life of the young manhood of this country, notwithstanding the very large measure of success which has attended our sanitary efforts in this direction. The Americans, having taken up their burden, will, no doubt, like the practical people they are, set about their task in a practical way. The four principal factors in the production of climate, according to Buchan, are distance from the equator, height above the sea, distance from the sea, and prevailing winds. The equatorial region has the most equable climate; tropical regions have much greater variations of temperature than those near the equator, and have a hot and cold or dry and rainy season. The isothermal lines of mean temperature do not supply a graduated measure of the effects of temperature on animal life. So far as climate is concerned, no single meteorological influence appears, however, to equal the effect of temperature upon health, and its range is of more importance than its mean. The European under a tropical climate suffers from anæmia, diseases of the digestive system, especially of the liver, from malaria, dysentery, typhoid fever, and yellow fever. It is not at all easy to say, however, how much of the excess of mortality of Europeans in tropical and subtropical countries is simply attributable to climatic heat _per se_, and is consequently inevitable and not the effect of malaria, or how much of it is the direct consequence of habits of life and of the neglect of sanitary laws and of personal hygiene. As Arnould rightly said, the _habitudes alimentaires_ of the Anglo-Saxon constitute one of the stumbling-blocks to health, but by far the most important is malaria, compared with which the rest are relatively insignificant. Mr. Chamberlain was right when he said the other day that 'the man who shall successfully grapple with this foe to humanity and shall find a cure for malarial fever and shall make the tropics livable for the white man, will do more for the world and more for the British Empire than the man who adds a new province to the wide dominions of the Queen.'"