Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 21.djvu/430

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
418
THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.

not now here existing." He reviews all the products from which sugar is obtained or is expected to be obtained, in order to discover which one presents the most hopeful opening for enterprise. His conclusions are, that sorghum offers a difficult problem from a financial point of view; that amber-cane is a little more satisfactory, but not satisfactory enough; that the cultivation of corn-stalks for sugar would exhaust the soil; that sugar-cane can not supply the home demand; that the maple can do this no better; that the expectation of obtaining sugar from sweet-potatoes is delusive, and that of getting it from white potatoes more so. Water-melons deserve more consideration, but they are declared to be inferior to the sugar-beet; and the last is pronounced "the only possible plant which can supply the North with sugar." The question remains, whether beet-sugar can be made profitably without the artificial stimulus of protection. If not, we had better continue to raise what we can derive a profit from without artificial aid, and buy our sugar where we can get it cheapest.

Vaccination: Arguments Pro and Con; with a Chapter on the Hygiene of Small-pox. By Joseph F. Edwards, M. D. Philadelphia: P. Blakiston, Son & Co. Pp. 80. Price, 50 cents.

The energy of the opposition manifested by a considerable number of persons against vaccination has induced the author to make his own independent study of the question. He has gathered information from all available sources and considered the arguments on both sides, as he presents them here, and has become convinced that in vaccination properly performed, and in that only, we can find immunity from small-pox. He attaches much importance to anticipating the opposition that may arise and spread in this country, as it has done in England.

First Aid to the Injured. By Peter Shepherd, M. D. Revised and added to by Bowditch Morton, M. D. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 88. Price, 50 cents.

A brief manual intended for non-professional readers, the object of which is to furnish a few plain rules to enable any one to act in cases of injury or sudden illness, pending the arrival of professional help. The revisions and additions by the American editor have been simply such as would make the work more suitable to this country.

Sir John Lubbock's charming little book on "Ants and Bees" will be the next volume of the "International Scientific Series," and is now in press, to be very shortly issued. It will contain much new, fresh, and entertaining matter on a subject always full of interest. Sir John has been many years a close observer of the habits of these little creatures, and his volume will therefore not be a second-hand compilation, but an original contribution to the most romantic aspect of natural history.

The entertaining sketches entitled "The Mountains of the Moon"; or, Chronicles of Hakim Ben Sheytan, concerning a curious African people, of which we have printed some representative installments in the "Monthly," is now being copiously illustrated for separate publication in a volume.


PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

Circulars of Information of the Bureau of Education. No. 6. 1881. Effects of Student Life on the Eye-sight. By A. W. Calhoun. M. D. And No. 1. 1882. Training-Schools for Nurses. Washington: Government Printing-Office.

Fungi injurious to Vegetation. With Remedies. By Dr. Byron D. Halstead. Pp. 35.

The Opium-Habit, By E. H. M. Sill, M.D. New York: Bermingham & Co. 1882. Pp. 8.

On the Trachyte of Marblehead Neck, Massachusetts. By M. E. Wadswortb, Ph.D. Pp. 7.

Biogen: A Speculation on the Origin and Nature of Life. By Dr. Elliott Coues. Washington: Judd & Detweiler. 1882. Pp. 27.

The Death-Rate of Memphis. By George E. Waring, Jr. 1882. Pp. 6.

How the Great Prevailing Winds and Ocean Currents are produced. By C. A. M. Taber. Boston: A. Williams & Co. 1882. Pp. 82. 40 cents.

History and Description of the Luray Cave. By S. Z. Ammen, A. M. Baltimore: J. W. Burst & Co. 1882. Pp. 48. Illustrated.

Educational Journalism. By C. W. Bardeen. Syracuse: C. W. Bardeen, Publisher. 1881. Pp. 30.

Bulletin of the United States National Museum. No. II. Bibliography of the Fishes of the Pacific Coast to the End of 1879. By Theodore Gill. Washington: Government Printing-Office. 1882.

Notes on Physiological Optics. By W. Le Conte Stevens. 1882. Pp. 28.

Current Fallacies about Vaccination. A Letter to Dr. Carpenter. By Dr. P. A. Taylor, M. P. London: E. W. Allen. 1881. Pp. 37.