Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 32.djvu/583

Rh of fossils, the idea of homotaxy, as proposed by Professor Huxley to express the existence of close biological relationship between formations in different parts of the world which might not, or could not, have been contemporaneously deposited. Dr. Goode's address we have found extremely interesting. It gives a clear account of the progress of observation and the growth of science in this country from the first observations of Oviedo y Valdes in 1525, and Thomas Harriott, of Virginia, in 1590, through a considerable list of original contributors, to the end of the last century. The men whose names are mentioned, the author says, "were the intellectual ancestors of the naturalists of to-day." The volume also contains lists additional and supplementary to those heretofore published, of flora of Washington and vicinity.

the general review of the work of his bureau by the Entomologist, the "Report" contains papers on the "Cottony Cushion Scale," "Buffalo Gnats," the "Fall Web-worm," and "Joint-worms"; each paper embodying a description of the insect, an account of its depredations, and suggestions of remedies. A paper on "Silk Culture" represents the prospects of this business in the United States as not yet hopeful, but speaks well of the Osage orange as a food-plant for the silk-worm. Reports of agents are given upon various insects affecting small grains and grasses; and the last paper is a "Report on Experiments in Agriculture." The experiments with insecticide substances of which the second pamphlet gives accounts, were directed chiefly to insects affecting garden-crops, and were performed at Ames, Iowa, Lafayette, Indiana, and Trenton, New Jersey, with ice-water, chemical solutions, and vegetable decoctions. They are described in detail. The insect defoliators of shade-trees whose cases are considered in the third pamphlet are the imported elm-leaf beetle, the bag-worm, the white-marked tussock-moth, and the fall web-worm. The information given is full. As "one simple preventive remedy for all," spraying the trees with arsenical mixtures in the middle of May, and once or twice at intervals of a fortnight later in the season, is recommended.

has been the intention of the author of this book to confine what he wrote, with few exceptions, to his own experience, and to present no more of the theory of the subject than is essential for understanding practical operations. A feature of the work is the estimates of cost, both of plant and of operating, which the author has presented in considerable detail. In order to keep the volume within moderate size, the so-called "wet methods" have been excluded. After a description of the methods of copper-assaying practiced in this country, he describes the several ways of roasting lump-ore and matte, recommending for the building of roasting-stalls "slag-brick" molded in sand. The calcining of fine ore and matte is then treated, and a short chapter is given to the chemistry of the calcining process. The smelting of copper comes next in order, and this naturally falls into the divisions of smelting in blast-furnaces and in reverberatory furnaces. Dr. Peters maintains the general excellence of the American form of the blast-furnace process, while admitting the necessity of using reverberatories for certain portions of the matte concentration in many cases. A few pages on separating the precious metals from copper, and on Bessemerizing copper mattes are added.

that the words which denote love picture the heart of those who use them, the author has studied their history and derivation in the American languages as furnishing evidence of the development of the altruistic principle among the races, and as illustrating the wonderful parallelism