Textbook of Biological Chemistry. JAMES B. SWMNER, Ph.D., Cornell University. The Macmillan Co., New York City. 283 pp. First edition. 1927. xxv 14 X 21.5 cm $3.50.
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The author states that the hook is meant first and Last for the elementary student, and for a book of this sort the ability to omit is fully as important as the ability to include. The topics included for discussion in an elementary text of two hundred and siuty-five pages are well chosen. The chapters are sufficiently complete in themselves to permit a choice in the order of presentation of the topics. Although it is claimed in the introduction that the aim of the biological chemist is to explain the chemical composition of plants and animals and the chemical structure of the compounds present, the text is written primarily from the animal point of view although the treatment is more general than in the conventional text on biochemistry advised largely for the student in medicine. The book closes with a very goad c h a ~ t eon r the physical chemis~. . . try of protoplasm. The discussion of each of the well-chosen topics in this chapter is brief and concise and serves to emphasize the important applications of physical chemistry in biological problems. C. 0. APPLEMAN ~
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History of the Sciences in Greco-Roman Antiquity. ARNOLDREYMOND, Professor of Philosophy a t the University of Lausanne. Translated by Ruth Gheury De Bray. E. P. Dutton and Company, 245 pp. 40 diaNew York, 1927. x grams. 13 X 20 cm. $2.50.
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Part I of this relatively small volume is an historical outline of the drigins of the physical and biological sciences and mathematics. It begins with the work of the
Egyptians and Chaldeans and traces the development through the Hellenic Period (650300 B.C.), The Alexandrian Period (300 B.C. to the first century of the Christian Era) and the Greco-Roman Period (from the Christian Era to the Sixth Century, A.D.). Part I1 is an analysis of the "Principles and Methods." I n this the development of science, attended by rational explanations and recognition of cause and effect relations, from an irrational helief in occultism and other forms of mysticism is interestingly told. There are chapters an The Mathematical Sciences, Astronomy, Mechanics and Physics, and the Chemical and Natural Sciences. The reader will be pleased with the brevity of a book which a t the same time carries such a wealth of historical facts, yet many times he will wish for a fuller interpretation For example, the general reader will wonder haw the practice of embalming the bodies of the dead in Egypt favored the practice of dissection and he will wish for some analysis of the circumstances which attended Herophilus' discovery of the nervous system. These important events are dismissed with a mere statement of the fact in one or two sentences. The book has numerous faotnotes-some to original sources and others to secondary treatises. There is a hibliography of the principal puhlicationsrelating to the science of the Egyptians, Chaldeans, Greeks, and Romans. There is a definite recognition of the importance of the history of science, not only in the education of scientists but also in liberal training. It is valuable far its contribution to an understanding of the meaning of science and for its humanistic value. The translator has done a real service to lecturers and instructors in science by making available to them Pro-
