10 MARCH 1888, Page 44

Electricity. By W. Larden. (Longmane, Green, and Co.)—This is a

comprehensive treatise on the elements of electricity, containing the principal laws and theories. The mathematical part, indeed, is perhaps rather more than "the higher boys in a classical school" would care for. The writer, as far as we can see, has accumnlated a great number of facts to the exclusion of a great deal of necessary historical matter, thus rendering an otherwise interesting subject somewhat dull and forbidding. The historical development of electricity is such an important and integral part of the science itself, that "reasons of space" must not be allowed as a sufficient excuse for this defect. The last chapter, however, on "Applications of Electricity," possesses considerable interest.