the accountant, the dentist, and the farrier, each has his college, but where is the college for the "home-maker?" Its necessity is not even perceived. The women are trying with might and main to get into nearly all the colleges that have grown up as preparations for the business of men, and, when they attempt to make one of their own, they are content to imitate as far as possible those of the opposite sex, and never think of demanding institutions in which they may be educated for that line of activity which the great majority of them are destined to pursue.
Mrs. Beecher sees clearly enough that the modern tendency of feminine culture is not in the direction of home improvement, and that whatever is done in the way of help to this end must come in the shape of such occasional contributions as ladies interested in the subject are prompted to offer. She has a chapter on "Home Colleges," which is an excellent idea, as nothing better is yet to be had, while her volume will serve as an admirable text-book for it. The work is well suited where the class-drill is not very severe, being lively and interesting in its manner, as well as useful and instructive in the information it gives. We have read it through with profit, and cordially recommend it to everybody who lives in a house—especially if it has a plurality of occupants. If the hundred pages of receipts at the close (which are no doubt in themselves excellent) were omitted, the volume would make a first-rate reading-book for girls' schools.
United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries. Report for 1875-'76. Washington: Government Printing-Office. Pp. 1079. 1876.
In the popular mind, the sole aim and object of the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries is to devise and apply measures for the increase of the fish-supply in our lakes, rivers, and smaller streams; but in fact the commission is also charged with the duty of promoting by its researches the interest of the sea-fisheries, and hence it is that much of the present volume—indeed, by far the greater part of it—is taken up with an historical and statistical account of the American whale-fishery. We are inclined to think that it would be best to restrict the labors of the commission to the one department of propagation of food fishes. The "History of American Whaling" is no doubt very interesting and valuable, but it has no organic relation to the work of the Fish Commission. The commissioner, Prof. Baird, in the report proper, first briefly rehearses the history of the commission; then details the results of the inquiries that have been made into the decrease of the food-fishes; next he reviews the work that has been done in the propagation of food-fishes; and, finally, gives tables showing the number of fish distributed by the commission since the beginning of its work. Then follows Appendix A (780 pages), on the "American Whale-Fishery." Appendix B, "The Inland Fisheries," comprises reports on "The Fisheries of Chicago and Vicinity," on "The Salmon-Fisheries of the Columbia," and "Notes on some Fishes of the Delaware." There are five papers in Appendix C, treating of the carp, the shad, the Schoodic salmon, salmon-breeding in the McCloud River, and the exportation of fishes and hatching apparatus to various foreign countries.
The Life of George Combe. By Charles Gibbon. London: Macmillan & Co. 2 vols. Pp. 739. Price, $8.
It may be thought that an elaborate two-volume biography, issued twenty years after the death of its subject, whose chief claim to be remembered is the close association of his name with a science which is now generally considered as belonging to the past, must rank as a not very judicious literary venture. No doubt a smaller and more inexpensive work would have had a wider sale, yet it is better that the work should have been done just as it has been done. While merely because he was an eminent phrenologist it would not have been worth while to write Combe's life at all, yet as the author of the "Constitution of Man," and as the representative of a transition period in knowledge and education, and as giving us an account of a very interesting character, the biography deserved to be fully written out. That Combe regarded phrenology as the key to all knowledge, that he devoted himself to it with great assiduity, and applied it everywhere as a sufficient
