Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 42.djvu/433

Rh vented that pre-empting of the field which would have been given by controlling patents at a time when the art was ripe for development. Various miscellaneous matters, that could not well find a place in the body of the work, are treated in an appendix.

is one of the series of technological handbooks, edited by Sir Trueman Wood, Secretary of the Society of Arts, and, like the rest of the series to which it belongs, is excellently done. It is addressed especially to those concerned with the art of which it treats, but is of interest as well to the general reader who may care to know something about an extensive and important industry. The book is made up of a series of papers contributed by the author to the Dyer and Calico Printer, which have been largely recast, and of additional chapters on silk printing and finishing, and testing dyed silks. The author treats of silk fibers, how they are produced by the silkworm, the method of handling the fiber and reeling it, how it is dyed, and now printing is performed. In an appendix he gives a number of recipes for the preparation of color compositions and in a number of plates at the end of the volume he gives samples of dyed materials both of the fiber and the woven goods.

, the well-known writer on economic and kindred subjects, has in recent years been devoting his attention to the subject of cooking, and has reached some startling conclusions. He contends that the present method of quick cooking at high temperatures is a fundamental mistake; that cooking should be done slowly at temperatures of from 300° to 400°, and in closed vessels which will retain all the vapors and juices. He has found by extended experimenting that when this is done the amount of heat required is but a fraction of that now used, and has in consequence devised an oven in which a meal for six or eight persons can be cooked over an ordinary kerosene lamp, such as the Rochester. His apparatus, which he terms "the Aladdin oven," is simplicity itself. It consists of a box made of non-conducting material, such as paper or wood, in the upper part of which is placed an oven of thin sheet metal. The oven is smaller than the box, so that there is a space all around it for the circulation of the hot products of combustion from the lamp, which sets in the oven portion of the box. The oven is provided with trays upon which different articles may be placed. Mr. Atkinson claims that bread may be baked, meat roasted, fish and vegetables cooked in a much superior manner than by current methods. Cereals, such as oatmeal, hominy, etc., can be cooked overnight, so that the longer time required is not a feature that presents any difficulties.

The present volume is made up of an address by Mr. Atkinson at Columbia College on The Science of Nutrition, of description of the oven and the work it does, and elaborate data upon the value of foods, and the quantities of the different classes of foods necessary for healthy adults. If Mr. Atkinson's contention is well founded, and it appears to be abundantly so by the data he submits, he has made a very distinct step in advance in the important field of domestic economy, and his labor is one with which every housewife should make it a point of becoming acquainted.

the making of popular books upon electricity and its applications there appears to be no end. Many of these are of value and of real help to the readers to whom they are addressed, while many more are quite useless. To this latter class belongs the present book. Although four writers have contributed to its make-up, and the entire work has probably undergone the scrutiny of each of its authors, they have failed in producing anything approaching an adequate treatment of the subject. The book is addressed to beginners, presumably those who know nothing of the subject, and consequently should be a clear and concise presentation of the subject, beginning with the simplest phenomena and advancing by steps