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 various modes of treatment, palliative and radical, are set forth. The volume has an index and a bibliography. A number of cuts illustrate the appearance of diseased parts and methods of operation.

Studies in American History, by Prof. Mary Sheldon Barnes (Heath, 60 cents), is a teachers' manual, consisting of a series of outlines for lessons. It is designed to direct pupils in studying history from the original materials, and to that end gives lists of authorities, with critical comments, summaries of points to be made under each head, notes, suggestions, and references for the teacher's reading. The studies are divided into seven groups, one being introductory and the others covering the history of the territory occupied by the United States from Columbus to 1892. Machine teachers had better let this book alone; it is a tool they can not handle.

An Elementary Treatise on Trigonometry, by E. W. Hobson and C. M. Jessop, has been issued from the press of Cambridge University (Macmillan, $1.25). It is a book for beginners in its subject, and parts are indicated which students are advised to pass over until they have been once through it. A large number of problems are given, many of them practical, and the answers are put at the end of the volume.

Having received from Prof. Kükenthal for examination some specimens of Apus brought from Spitsbergen, Mr. Henry Meyners Bernard has made a study of the species and come to the conclusion that it is a variety of Lepidurus glacialis, which he proposes to call L. Spitzbergensis. His observations of this Apus form Part I of a book, The Apodidæ, which he has contributed to the Nature Series (Macmillan, $2). In Part I, also, he undertakes to prove that Apus is an original crustacean easily derivable from an annelid. Going on, in Part II, the author maintains that Apus is, moreover, the original of all the modern crustaceans.

The Heredity of Acquired Characters is the title of a paper by Dr. Manly Miles, Lansing, Mich., which was published in The Proceedings of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The inheritance of acquired character has been denied by Weissman, who claims the "continuity of the germ plasma as originally formulated, and all inheritable variations are assumed to be the result of fortuitous changes in the reproductive germs." Dr. Miles claims that it is impossible that a living substance, undergoing constant changes, can be "a substance of extreme stability" to "grow enormously without the least change in its molecular structure," as advanced in Weissman's theory, and he adds that the fact of the germ plasma being brought into intimate relations with the metabolism of the body plasma, the habits of the organism in modifying the general metabolism of the body must also exert an influence on the system of the germ cells, and, through their constantly changing substance, on the forms of activity that are transmitted from one generation to another. From Dr. Miles's standpoint it is an almost impossible supposition that from two germs of identical qualities and tendencies, two adult forms could be evolved, precisely alike in every detail. To arrive at such a perfect reproduction it would be necessary to have the same series of anastates in the constructive processes of every organ, and the same destructive metabolism throughout the entire period of growth, which, of course, could very rarely occur in the surrounding conditions of two individuals; but he admits that the repetition of an acquired habit for several generations, uniformly transmitted, might establish a dominant, inherited family characteristic.



Baldwin, C. C. Review Extraordinary of "Man and the Glacial Period." Pp. 22.

Balfour, Henry. Evolution of Decorative Art. New York: Macmillan & Co. Pp. 131. $1.25.

Bell, Clark. Bulletin. Psychological Section of the Medico-legal Society. New York. Pp. 8.

Blackwell, Antoinette Brown. The Philosophy of Individuality. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 593. $3.

Bolles, Frank. At the North of Bear Camp Water. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Pp. 293. $1.25.—Students' Expenses. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University. Pp. 45.

Browning, W. W. Modern Homœopathy. Philadelphia. W. J. Dornan, Printer. Pp. 32.

Burnham, W. P. Three Roads to a Commission in the United States Army. New York: D. Appleton & Co. Pp. 160. $1.

Bulletin, U.S. Fish Commission. Volume X. 1890. Government Printing Office. Pp. 450. With Maps and Plates.

Catalogue, Michigan Mining School. Houghton. Pp. 175.

Clute, O. Spurry. Flat Pea. Michigan Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin. Pp. 13.

Conn, H. W. Bacteria in the Dairy. Pp. 20. Reprint.