An Introduction to Determinants, with numerous Examples

Abstract

THIS text-book is very accurately described by its title. It belongs to a class of which many examples have appeared on the continent for use in the secondary schools, and of which the object is to give the more common properties of determinants, illustrate the said properties copiously with examples of the second, third, and fourth orders, and give additional examples of the same kind for practice. The object is here on the whole well attained, there being more examples for the pupil than is usual. For a “beginner's text-book,” however, it is unquestionably long-drawn-out and expensive. A book (e.g. Dölp's, Bartl's, &c.) with very much more matter and, to say the least, as good in quality, would be got in Germany for two shillings, and this costs five. The object of the author “to render an interesting and beautiful branch of mathematical analysis more accessible to junior students” is thus somewhat frustrated at the outset.

An Introduction to Determinants, with numerous Examples.

By William Thomson (Edinburgh: Jas. Thin, 1882.)