Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 7.djvu/518

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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

complete, and is a part with the above, which is as yet but fragmentary, we would instance Dr. Coues's "Birds of the Northwest," so full and yet so concise; so accurate, and yet so lively. It seems to be for them all a promise that the great Government reports shall stand in striking contrast with that of the famous New York survey—so unmethodical and verbose; so excessive in quantity and so turgid in style.

Meteorological Observations in Colorado and Montana.

This publication is a sort of appendix to the report of Lieutenant Hayden for the year 1874. It consists of tables, based upon the observations of meteorologists stationed at Bozeman, Judith Basin, and Trout Creek, in Montana, and on the summit of Mount Lincoln, at Fairplay, and at Canon City, in Colorado. The observations at these various places were made three times a day, for the whole of the year 1873, and during the early part of 1874.

List of Elevations, principally in that Portion of the United States west of the Mississippi.

These lists, compiled and arranged by Henry Gannett, M. E., form part of Lieutenant Hayden's Report in the Geological Survey of the Territories. Table L gives the elevation of towns and cities; Table II. those of mountains in the United States; while Table III. states the elevations of various mountains in other countries. The Twin Lakes, in Colorado, have an elevation of 9,357 feet, being situated at the greatest height of any lakes in the United States. Of the States and Territories west of the Mississippi, Colorado has the highest mean elevation, 6,600 feet, and Arkansas the lowest, 350 feet.

Annual Address before the Alumni of the Medical Department of the University of Pennsylvania. By Cornelius G. Comegys, M. D.

This address contains many serious and timely reflections upon such topics as state medicine, the physical basis of mind, the effects of cerebral overwork, etc. The history of medical sciences in the present century is briefly but ably sketched. Finally, the author advocates a reform in medical education. The age of teaching by lectures has almost gone by; the demands of science now are demonstrations. The student must be taught to acquire his anatomy, physiology, physics, chemistry, pathology, materia medica, and practical medicine, with his own hand and eye. The classes of clinical medicine, above all, should consist of small groups, in order to secure the closest personal scrutiny of the phenomena of disease, and of the effects of modes of treatment.

Bulletin of the United States Geological and Geographical Survey of the Territories. Numbers 2 and 3, Second Series.—No. 2 contains able papers by Ridgway, Coues, Gill, and Ingersoll. These papers are severally contributions to zoölogical science, and in this intense technical shape are meant to commend themselves simply to hard workers in the field. No. 3 is mainly topographical, and contains several plates and maps.

The Brooklyn Journal of Education.—The external appearance and matériel of this publication are very attractive, and by themselves alone are calculated to win for it pubUc favor. The editorial management appears to be no less excellent; and with both of these conditions combined there is no reason why the Brooklyn Journal of Education should not meet with distinguished success. Among the articles in the first number is one on the Packer Institute, being the first of a series on the educational institutions of Brooklyn. Dr. Jerome Walker writes concerning the physique of public-school teachers. "The Philosophy and Methods of Primary Instruction" is treated by James Cruikshank. The periodical has special science and art departments. $2.50 per annum.


PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

Six Notes de Chimie Moléculaire. Par M. Gustave Hinrichs. Paris: 1873-'75.

Moments and Reactions of Continuous Girders. By Mansfield Merriman, C. E. Pp. 23.

Principia, or Basis of Social Science (Wright). Lippincott & Co.