A Practical Treatise on Roads, Streets, and Pavements. By Q. A. Gillmore, A. M. Pp. 258. New York: D. Van Nostrand. Price, $2.
A much-needed and most excellent little manual. There is no better measure of civilization than the state of the highways in city or country, and judged by that standard the American people are not much advanced. Bad roads prevail—roads badly laid out, badly constructed, and kept in bad order—and, while this general badness is an enormous burden upon the community, involving waste of horse-flesh, vehicles, time, and obstruction of business, there is still a degree of ignorance concerning the mechanics of the subject that is surprising among a people who make such large pretensions to enterprise. There are well-established principles in road-laying, road-making, and road-management, the violation or neglect of which entails such serious losses that it is a matter of public economy to wake up any community to the importance of the subject. General Gillmore's book gives the latest information regarding it, within moderate limits, and he thus states the leading objects that have been kept in view in its preparation:
"1. To give within the compass of one small volume such descriptions of the various methods of locating country roads, and of constructing the road and street coverings in more or less common use at the present day, as will render the essential details of those methods, as well as certain improvements thereon of which many of them are believed to be susceptible, familiar to any intelligent non-professional reader. 2. To make such practical suggestions with respect to the selection and application of materials, more especially those with the properties and uses of which builders are presumed to be the least acquainted, as seem needful in order to develop their greatest practical worth and realize their greatest endurance. 3. To institute a just and discriminating comparison of the respective merits of the several street pavements now competing for popular recognition and favor, under the varying conditions of traffic, climate, and locality, to which they are commonly subjected."
Uses of a Topographical Survey of New York. By James I. Gardner.
The uses of a topographical survey of the State, as set forth in this paper, are as follows: 1. Such survey is a necessary basis for equalizing taxation; 2. It will establish imperishably every property boundary in the State; 3. It will make it possible to describe correctly the area of real estate conveyed by a deed; 4. It will afford facilities for proper plans of suburban drainage and water-supply, and extensions of village streets and country roads; 5. It will furnish a basis for a scientific survey of the State's resources.
The American State and Statesmen. By W. G. Dix. Boston, Estes & Lauriat. Price, $1.50.
In his preface the author asks the question, "Have we not been trying to get along somehow for nearly a hundred years without any principle of government?" If so, it is full time to discover a principle of some kind. From the titles of two or three chapters, such as "Christianity the Inspirer of Nations," "America a Christian Power," "Materialism the Curse of America," it would appear that the author's prescription for all our political ills is Christian statesmanship. And, when the nation has been saved, we must head a grand crusade against Mohammedan sovereignty in Eastern Europe, Western Asia, and Northern Africa!
The Bible and Science. By J. Weiss. Also, The Sympathy of Religions. By T. W. Higginson.
These are tracts published by the Free Religious Association, Boston. They are intended to popularize the ideas and aims of a body of thoughtful men and women, and are sold at the low price of $3.00 per hundred copies. The tracts already published are four in number, including, besides the two named above, one on "Taxation of Church Property," by James Parton, and one on "Transcendentalism," by the late Theodore Parker.
Notes on the Yucca-Borer. By C. V. Riley, Ph. D. Pp. 23. St. Louis: R. P. Studley.
The roots or subterranean trunks of yuccas are often found to be hollowed' out along the axis; this tunneling is the work of the yucca-borer (Megathymus yuccœ). In the paper before us, Prof. Riley gives the results of his studies upon this insect. He is inclined to regard the yucca-borer as the representative of an ancient type from which are derived on the one hand the Castnians, on the other the Hesperians.
