main of Biology," and consists of two totally distinct portions. The first comprises an excellent monograph, in the author's happiest manner, on the influence of locality upon coloration, and brings together a number of valuable facts upon which future theory may be founded when the time becomes ripe. But the second part is a criticism upon the views generally entertained by the scientific world on the origin and antiquity of man: and the conclusion toward which (though nowhere clearly stated) it implicitly points is the author's favorite dogma that the human intellect has not been evolved by the same natural causes which have developed the human organism. As elsewhere, Mr. Wallace seems disposed to believe in a special and solitary miracle, whereby a new form of consciousness was suddenly and supernaturally foisted upon the human brain. Readers of Mr. Herbert Spencer's "Psychology" will scarcely incline to accept this incongruous and ill digested hypothesis.
The eighth essay treats of the "Distribution of Animals as indicating Geographical Changes." The author here treads again on firmer and more familiar ground, and his conclusions carry considerable weight.
As a whole, the work, in spite of many crudities and a marked increase of the teleological bias, is fully worthy of Mr. Wallace's deservedly high reputation. Every page is laden with fruitful and suggestive ideas; while the same charming and natural style as ever carries on the reader with unflagging interest from the first page to the last. The book is one which will arouse much controversy upon special questions; but it cannot fail to extort praise for its width of view, its subtilty, its firm grasp of principles, and its perfect mastery of facts. It should find a place at once in the library of every thinking naturalist and every general reader who feels an interest in the great and absorbing problem of organic evolution.
The Sugar-Beet in North Carolina. By A. R. Ledoux. Raleigh: Farmer and Mechanic print. Pp. 50.
We have in this pamphlet an account of certain experiments in the cultivation of sugar-beets in North Carolina, together with a statement of the present condition of the sugar-beet industry in the United States. Further, there is a synopsis of the results obtained in beet-culture in Europe. The information here contained would doubtless be of interest to farmers everywhere, though it is addressed primarily to those of North Carolina, the author being chemist to the Department of Agriculture of that State.
A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life. By William Rounseville Alger. Tenth edition, with Six New Chapters, and a Complete Bibliography of the Subject comprising 4,977 Books relating to the Nature, Origin, and Destiny of the Soul. The Titles classified and arranged chronologically, with Notes and Indexes of Authors and Subjects. By Ezra Abbott, Librarian of Harvard College. New York: W. J. Widdleton. 1878. Pp. 913. Price $3.50.
The new and enlarged edition of this erudite and exhaustive work is now especially timely and opportune, as the doctrine of punishment in a future life is undergoing so thorough and searching a scrutiny. Dr. Alger's book is a perfect treasury of history, analysis, and criticism, in relation to the course of human speculation and of religious belief respecting man's future state. We published some strictures not long since, on the doctrine of eternal punishment, and aimed to show that the belief in hell is confined to no religion and no period, but in a great variety of forms is an ancient and universal belief. Our assertion has been feebly contradicted by an eminent Catholic authority, to whom we refer the encyclopedic work now before us. The added chapters in the tenth edition, it may be stated, greatly amplify and strengthen the proofs of the position we assumed—proofs that were already as overwhelming and demonstrative as anything to be found in the history of human opinion. Dr. Alger has contributed a standard and most valuable work to the literature of this interesting subject, which will be made doubly useful to all scholars and inquiring readers by the comprehensive and careful bibliography which has been appended to it, and we are glad to notice that the liberal publisher has issued the book in a handsome form and at a price so extremely low that it may take its place in every private library.
