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AMERICAN PUBLISHERS' NOTICE.

IN passing this volume through the press, the publishers have availed themselves of the services of a gentleman in every way competent to ensure the accuracy necessary to a scientific text-book. Various errors, which had escaped the author's attention, have thus been corrected, and occasional omissions supplied. A series of questions and examples has also been appended to each subject, for the purpose of drawing the student's attention to the practical applications of the various laws and theories explained in the text.

In order to supply the wants of those who desire to obtain separate manuals on the different subjects embraced in this volume, it has been arranged for binding either in three parts, or as a whole. The First Part embraces Mechanics; the Second, Hydrostatics, Hydraulics, Pneumatics, and Sound; the Third, Optics. The paging at the head of the pages is for the Parts; that at the foot is continuous throughout the volume. It will be seen that the references in the Table of Contents apply to the former, and those in the Index to the latter.

PHILADELPHIA, August, 1851.

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AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

In the composition of this work the author has had in view the satisfaction of those who desire to obtain a knowledge of the elements of physics without pursuing them through their mathematical consequences and details. The methods of demonstration and illustration have accordingly been adapted to such readers.

The present volume will, it is hoped, be understood, without difficulty, by all persons of ordinary education, and may, with some aid from the teacher, be with advantage placed in the hands of pupils in the higher classes of the schools for either sex.

The work has been also composed with the object of supplying that information relating to physical and mechanical science, which is required by the Medical and Law Student, the Engineer, and Artisan, by those who are preparing for the universities, and, in fine, by those, who, having already entered upon the active pursuits of business, are still desirous to sustain and improve their knowledge of the general truths of physics, and of those laws by which the order and stability of the material world are maintained.

The second course will contain Heat, Electricity, Magnetism, and Astronomy.

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A full special Table of Contents on each subject will be found

at the commencement of each Hand-Book.

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