Heat as a Form of Energy. By IL H. Thurston.
(Heinemann.) —This is one of those treatises professing to be an introduction to more advanced and elaborate works, but which can be always read with advantage. Mr. Thurston reviews broadly the progress of thermo-dynamics from Ctesibus to the science of to-day. There is little technical detail ; all is put on the lines of evolu- tion in successive practical stages. It is not so much a practical handbook as a sketch of scientific progress ; and for this reason is perhaps even more valuable to the general student. One in- teresting fact there is for philosophers, and that the exception to the almost universal rule of supersession, as regards the steam- engine. Neither the air-engine, which wastes one-half its heat through its water-jacket, nor the gas-engine, with its costly fuel, seem likely to outrace the steam-engine for the prize of highest
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