Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 47.djvu/428

416 for his report as Superintendent of the St. Louis Schools, in 1871, was afterward published in book form under the title How to teach Natural Science, and now appears in a second edition (Bardeen, 50 cents). It would undoubtedly give very practical help to a teacher confronted with the problem of adding science to the subjects usually taught in common schools, but if Dr. Harris were to rewrite it at the present day, in the light of the advances in science teaching made during the past quarter century, he would probably modify it somewhat. He would not omit to mention the peculiar mental discipline that the study of science affords as a reason for including it in a course of study; he would hardly say that science should "afford relief from the other studies, and not be placed in the same rank with them"; and while in this plan he insists that the teacher rather than a text-book should be the pupil's source of information, he would now probably go further and say that the pupils should get their knowledge of natural objects mainly from the objects themselves.

In the mathematical series of text-books by John H. Walsh, noticed several months ago, the Elementary Arithmetic includes notation, numeration, and the "four rules," the latter being applied in denominate as well as abstract numbers although no tables are given. The arithmetical processes dealt with are exemplified in a great variety of ways, including the use of many practical problems suited to the understanding of young pupils. (Heath, 40 cents.)

The first edition of Joint-metallism, by Anson Phelps Stokes, noticed in our January number, has been followed by a second and this by a third edition, each being an extension of its predecessor (Putnams, $1). Of the new matter, Part II consists of further arguments for joint-metallism and against bimetallism and monometallism. Part III is historical, giving views of writers on the science of money, beginning with Oresme, who wrote about 1366. In Part IV too great reliance on credit is deprecated and objections to the author's plan are answered.

The eleventh edition of the Advertiser's Handy Guide (1895) has been received (L. I). Morse Advertising Agency, New York, $2). It contains the names of the important journals of all the States and Territories of the United States, also those of the Dominion of Canada, in alphabetical order under each State or province. The circulation, politics, and frequency of issue of each paper are given, also the population of the city or town and county in which it is published. In addition to the general list there are separate lists of agricultural, medical, religious, etc., journals and other information valuable to advertisers. The volume contains seven hundred and eighty-six pages and is of handy size—about four by seven inches.

An Introduction to English Literature (Henry Holt & Co., New York), by Henry S. Pancoast, is based upon the author's previously published Representative English Literature, enlarged in some directions and curtailed in others, in order to adapt it to somewhat different requirements. It is intended to meet the needs of teachers who may wish to use the historical and critical portions of a book like that one, without being restricted to the prescribed selections which it gives as representing the successive literary epochs. To this end about two hundred pages of new matter have been added, and the notes and selections in the former work omitted. It is still the author's object to send the student directly to the literature itself, which is done here by suggesting in reading lists the selected works, giving them in some instances with general hints for study.

Volume IX of the Contributions to North American Ethnology published by the United States Geological Survey is the Dakota Grammar Texts and Ethnography, prepared by Stephen Return Riggs, and edited after the author's death with the copy not revised, by J. Owen Dorsey. Mr. Dorsey contributes a preface embodying interesting information concerning the structure, etc., of the language. The texts include eight Dakota myths, Dakota and English interlined, with translations following, the Parable of the Prodigal Son, The Lord's Prayer, and the Fourth Commandment, in the Ethnography are chapters on the Tribes, the Migrations, the Dakota Gens and Phratry, Unwritten Dakota Laws, The Superhuman, Armor and Eagle's Feathers, and Dakota Dances.

The First Latin Readings, selected and compiled by Robert Arrowsmith and George