JOHN RAPIER.
John Napier and the Invention of Logarithms, 1614. By E. W. Hobson. (Cambridge University Press. 18.6d. net.)— The present year is the tercentenary of the publication, by John Napier of Merchiston, of his epoch-making invention of logarithms—a method "which has provided the modern world with a tool that is indispensable for all elaborate arithmetical calculations." The practical value of Napier's work certainly entitles him to be reckoned among the great benefactors of mankind. Not a day passes in the life of the engineer or the actuary when a table of logarithms is not called into service. In his timely opuscule the Sadleirian Professor reminds us that this Scottish laird was also the first of the great thinkers who, in the course of the seventeenth century, brought our country to the highest point of achievement in the domain of mathematical science.
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