Encyclopaedia Britannica

Abstract

THE prominence given to scientific subjects in the seventh of the new volumes of what has long been regarded as our national encyclopædia serves in a measure to indicate how large a part the work of men of science has taken in the increase of knowledge during the last quarter of a century. Among articles of prominent importance in this volume, so far as the student of science is concerned, are those dealing with palæobotany, pathology, and physiology, though there are many other articles of a less exhaustive kind dealing with problems of great scientific interest. Technological questions receive due attention, and are represented, among others, by essays on navies, ordnance, paper manufacture, petroleum, photography, and electric, hydraulic, and pneumatic power transmission. Students of geography and history are provided with an abundance of material, including the latest statistics referring to the chief countries of the world the names of which fall alphabetically between Natal and Portugal, besides an elaborate account of the polar regions, and an able review of the present state of our knowledge of oceanography. Mathematicians will find the article on “Number ” both interesting and original, and readers who prefer biographical studies will meet with appreciative estimates of the lives of such celebrities as Owen, Paget, and Pasteur, to name only three.

Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Vol. xxxi. New volumes. Vol. vii. Mos—Pre. (London: A. and C. Black; and the Times Office, 1902.)