The Theory of Heat. By Professor Thomas Preston. (Macmillan.) —In
a volume of some seven hundred pages, Professor Preston has treated the theory of heat in a comprehensive and scientific spirit. The style is lucid and attractive, and the tenor of the whole work is markedly philosophical. All the more recent researches and theories on the fluid and gaseous states of bodies, and the probable relation between the fluid and gaseous state of the same element, are treated with especial fullness. The rela- tion of historical investigations on important physical laws, add, of course, to the attractiveness of the volume ; and if it may be urged that the reader probably knows them by heart, none the less is the recapitulation of methods of incalculable value to the student, indicating possible lines of fresh research, and reminding physicists that the most trivial experiments, if they possess some definite purpose, aid real progress. Professor Preston explains clearly methods of investigation, and his exposition of principles is clear as well as scientific.
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