Universities and Scientific Life in the United States. By Maurice
Caullery. Translated by James H. Woods and Emmet Russell. (Harvard University Press and H. Milford. 10s. 6d. net.)—Professor Caullery, of the Sorbonne, temporarily exchanged his chair for that of the Professor of Biology at Harvard in 1916. He took the opportunity of studying the American university system, and he describes it in this thoughtful and
instructive book for the benefit of his countrymen. He was profoundly impressed, of course, with the external magnificence and abotinding wealth of the American universities. He was not fully convinced that the universities, as distinct from tee Carnegie Institution, the Rockefeller Institute, the Federal Bureau of Entomology and other well-endowed places, were doing as much as they should for research. " The material resources have developed much more rapidly than individuals of ability." The author concludes with some candid criticisms of his own nation. Returning from America, he has
" the impression that our national fabric, intellectual as well as economic, is scanty and oldish. Our institutions were brilliant and fruitful a century ago : they were then ahead of their time. But we have remained content with our past glory without adapting ourselves to the new conditions."
He attributes this to " bourgeois mentality "—the desire of a well-to-do people to seek security and comfort and to cling to
the old ways. Professor Cannery's remarks must not be taken too literally. French men of science—and women, too, like Madame Curie—are contributing greatly to the advancement of knowledge, though their universities may be relatively poor and ill-equipped.
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