Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 39.djvu/434

420 Bruno and his Monument, containing half a dozen papers by as many authors, and representations of the monument as originally designed and as erected; Ingersoll's Centennial Oration on the Declaration of Independence and Memorial Oration on Roscoe Conkling; The Myth of the Great Deluge, by James M. McCann; Church and State; and a statement of What constitutes a Freethinker? by Mr. Green. The last presents several points of interest. Freethinkers, we learn, "have no war with the Bible—they should have no prejudices against it"; but they are disposed to regard it as like other books, and to decline to accept it, on trust, at the value at which Christians hold it. The author contends that his best and safest friend in matters of religion is reason, and holds everything subject to investigation. "But, notwithstanding the freethinker rejects the Christian view of the Bible and religion, he is an earnest advocate of certain views and opinions of his own. He accepts the truth wherever found. For this reason, although he rejects the claim made for the Bible and religion, he accepts whatever is true or good in either."

In The Death Penalty (Putnam's Questions of the Day Series, price $1.50) Mr. Andrew J. Palm presents, in rather an impassioned manner, the principal objections to capital punishment. He holds that it is essentially cruel; and that justice as well as mercy should make great allowance for human conduct. He puts aside the Bible argument as not bearing upon the relations of capital punishment to society at the present time; dwells upon the capriciousness of juries, the perils of convicting the innocent, and the harshness of treating the insane as if they were criminals; holds up the detestation with which the executioner is regarded as evidence that the death penalty is repulsive to the better feelings of men; shows how inadequate is fear of the death penalty to repress crime; cites "the voice of experience"—of states which have abolished capital punishment—as being on his side; and quotes the opinions of some noted men on the subject. He then pleads for the reformatory theory of treatment; and closes with a chapter on war.

The compact little work on Mixed Metals or Metallic Alloys, by Arthur H. Hiorns (Macmillan, $1.50), gives the composition and mode of making a great number of alloys, and in some cases describes the apparatus used in producing them. The author, who is principal of the School of Metallurgy in the Birmingham and Midland Institute, states that his book is designed to give practical men and students a more intimate acquaintance with the nature and properties of metals in the alloyed state, as well as with metals in the free state. The first portion deals with the principal chemical elements, and their classification into suitable groups; the refractory materials used in making crucibles and in furnace construction; as well as the properties and uses of various fluxes. "It has been thought advisable to give a brief account of the main properties of the separate metals, and of the effect of certain elements upon them, seeing that commercial metals are not chemically pure substances, and that the presence of the common impurities often produces a characteristic result, which may be a useful guide to the manufacturer in special cases, and assist him to determine the cause of those anomalies which are constantly occurring in practice."

A manual for medical students and physicians, on The Physical Diagnosis of the Diseases of the Heart and Lungs, has been published by Dr. D. M. Vammann (Putnams, $1.25). Some topics in this field which have especially interested the author, or on which a reasonable difference of opinion exists, have been considered more in detail than is usual in such a work. In particular the author has improved this opportunity to explain at length his modification of the Cammann stethoscope and the binaural hydrophone. The volume contains twenty-two figures.

A great deal of material is compressed into a small compass in the Lessons in Applied Mechanics, by James H. Cotterill and John Henry Slade (Macmillan, $1.25). The volume is a text-book consisting largely of matter contained in a more extended treatise by the senior author. The chapters are grouped under three heads: Part I, The Principle of Work, includes the subjects of motion, friction, work and energy, the operation of simple machines, the direct-acting engine, unbalanced forces, and dynamometers. Part II deals with Strength of Materials and