This eight-volume, reset edition in two parts collects rare primary sources on Victorian science, literature and culture. The sources cover both scientific writing that has an aesthetic component – what might be called 'the literature of science' – and more overtly literary texts that deal with scientific matters.

Table of Contents:
Part II Volume 5: New Audiences for Science: Women, Children, Labourers Thomas Twining, Science Made Easy (1876) Women: Mary Roberts, The Wonders of the Vegetable Kingdom Displayed, 2nd edn (1824); 'M S R', 'The Englishwoman in London: I: Dr Elisabeth Blackwell' (1859); 'M S R', 'The Englishwoman in London: VII: The Sanitary Movement' (1859); Lydia Ernestine Becker, 'On the Study of Science by Women' (1869); Richard Anthony Proctor, 'Mrs Somerville' (1871); Henry Maudsley vs Elizabeth Garrett Anderson: Henry Maudsley, 'Sex in Mind and Education' (1874); Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, 'Sex in Mind and Education: A Reply' (1874); John Law [Margaret E Harkness], A City Girl: A Realistic Story (1887); Sophia Jex-Blake, 'Medical Women in Fiction' (1893) Children: Thomas C Girton (ed), The House I Live In (1837); Henry Mayhew, The Wonders of Science (1858); John Henry Pepper, 'Aerostation' (1861); [H Frederick Charles], 'Some Boys who became Famous: The Errand-Boy of Jacob's Well Mews [Michael Faraday]' (1879); Sir Robert Stawell Ball, 'A Juvenile Lecture at the Royal Institution' frontispiece and 'Lecture VI: Stars' (1889; 1890); S F A Caulfeild, 'Women and Girls as Inventors, and Discoverers: Part I', The Girl's Own Paper (1894); 'Women and Girls as Inventors, and Discoverers: Part II', The Girls' Own Paper (1895); Florence Sophie Davson, 'Women's Work in Sanitation and Hygiene', The Girls' Own Paper (1899) Labourers: Henry Brougham, A Discourse of the Objects (1827); Alfred Smith, An Introductory Lecture on the Past and Present State of Science (1831); 'Introduction', Popular Science Review (1862); Edward Aveling, Darwinism and Small Families (1882); Arthur Ransome, On Some Dangers Connected with Dwellings and How to Avoid Them (1883); John Sibbald, Work and Rest (1884); Alfred Russel Wallace, Vaccination a Delusion, its Penal Enforcement a Crime (1898); Roger Langdon, The Life of Roger Langdon (1909) Volume 6: Science, Race, and Imperialism Travel and Exploration: Jehangir Naoroji and Hirjibhoy Meherwanji, Journal of a Residence of Two Years and a Half in Great Britain (1841); George Biddell Airy, 'Astronomy' (1849); Joseph Dalton Hooker, Himalayan Journals (1854); Paul Du Chaillu, Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa (1861); Nasir al-Din Shah, The Diary of H M The Shah of Persia during his Tour in Europe in AD 1873 (1874); Francis Galton, Narrative of an Explorer in Tropical South Africa (1889); 'Lady Astronomer' [Elizabeth Brown], Caught in the Tropics (1891) Exhibiting and Collecting: Andrew Smith, 'Introductory Remarks' and 'A Description of Birds Inhabiting the South of Africa' (1830); The Industry of Nations as Exemplified in the Great Exhibition of 1851 (1852); John Conolly, The Ethnological Exhibitions of London (1855); Trailokya Nath Mukharji, A Visit to Europe (1889); William Fawcett, 'The Public Gardens and Plantations of Jamaica' (1897) Natural Theologies: John Williams, A Narrative of Missionary Enterprises in the South Seas (1837); Alexander Wylie, 'Brief Introduction' to the Shanghae Serial (1857); Henry Baker Tristram, The Natural History of the Bible (1867) Race and the Human Sciences: John Crawfurd, 'On the Malayan and Polynesian Languages and Races' (1848); James Hunt, 'The Negro's Place in Nature' (1863); Report on Charles Staniland Wake, 'Psychological Unity of Mankind' (1868); Jones Henry Lamprey, 'On a Method of Measuring the Human Form for the Use of Students in Ethnology' (1869); Thomas H Huxley, 'On the Geographical Distribution of the Chief Modifications of Man' (1870); T G B Lloyd, 'On the "Beothucs", a Tribe of Red Indians, Supposed to be Extinct, Which Formerly Inhabited Newfoundland' (1875); Edward Tregear, The Aryan Maori (1885); Isaac Taylor, Origin of the Aryans (1890); Harry Johnston, 'The Empire and Anthropology' (1909) Imperial Technologies and the Sciences of Governance: 'Construction of a Road from Colombo to Kandy', Anonymous Ballad from Sri Lanka, palm-leaf manuscript ([c.1825]); Robert Schomburgk, Twelve Views in the Interior of Guiana (1841); Roderick Murchison, 'Address to the Royal Geographical Society of London' (1852); Abdul Latif Khan Bahadur, A Discourse on the Nature, Objects, and Advantages of the Periodical Census (1865); J Clerk, 'Suez Canal' (1869); John Augustus Voelcker, Report on the Improvement of Indian Agriculture (1893); John Henniker Heaton, 'An Imperial Telegraph System' (1899) Science, Nationalism and Anti-Colonialism: Mahendralal Sarkar, 'On the Desirability of Cultivation of the Sciences by the Natives of India' (1869); James Hector, 'On Recent Moa Remains in New Zealand' (1871); 'Introduction' to al-Muqtataf (1876); 'India's Gift to the World' (1895); Charles Metcalfe, 'Presidential Adrress' (1903); Edward W Blyden, Africa and the Africans (1903); Bal Gangadhar Tilak, 'Bharata Dharma Mahamandala' (1906) Volume 7: Science as Romance Critical Reflections: Anon., [Review of Hugh Miller's] 'The Old Red Sandstone' (1841-2); [Charles Dickens], [Review of Robert Hunt's] 'The Poetry of Science' (1848); William Wilson, A Little Earnest Book upon a Great Old Subject (1851) Familiar Didactic Exposition: Charles Kingsley, Glaucus (1855); John Cargill Brough, The Fairy Tales of Science (1859); Arabella Buckley, The Fairy-Land of Science (1878); John Gordon McPherson, The Fairyland Tales of Science (1891); Henry Hutchinson, Prehistoric Man and Beast (1896) Heroic Autobiography: Thomas Hawkins, Memoirs of Ichthyosauri and Plesiosauri (1834) The Voices of Nature: Mary Roberts, Voices from the Woodlands (1850); [Richard H Horne], The Poor Artist; or, Seven Eye-Sights and One Object (1850); John Mill, The Fossil Spirit (1854); Frank Constable, The Curse of Intellect (1895) Scientific Fairytales: 'Acheta Domestica' [L M Budgen], Episodes of Insect Life, 1st series (1849); [Henry Morley], 'The Water-Drops: A Fairy Tale' (1850); Albert and George Gresswell, The Wonderland of Evolution [1884] Visions: Gideon Mantell, Wonders of Geology (1838); Horace Smith, 'A Vision' (1838); Robert Hunt, Panthea, a Spirit of Nature (1849); 'ALOE' [C M Tucker], Fairy Frisket; or, Peeps at Insect Life (1874) Fantastic Voyages: Agnes Catlow, Drops of Water: Their Marvellous and Beautiful Inhabitants (1851); Hugh Miller, Sketch-Book of Modern Geology (1859); Richard Proctor, 'A Voyage to the Ringed Planet' (1872); 'Chrysostom Trueman', The History of a Voyage to the Moon (1864) Romancing the Future: Technological Utopia: [W T Stead], 'Looking Forward: A Romance of the Electric Age' (1890) Songs of Scientific Courtship: Robert More, 'The Scientific Man; or, Mrs Crucible's Lamentation' [1843]; Edward Forbes, 'A Naturalist's Valentine' [1845]; Constance Naden, 'Scientific Wooing' and 'Love versus Learning' (1887); Arnold Beresford, 'Botany (The Professor's Love-Story)' (1909) Volume 8: Marginal and Occult Sciences Phrenology: John Yelloly, 'A Letter from Charles Villiers to George Cuvier' (1802); John Spurzheim, 'Dr Spurzheim's Lectures on Physiognomy and the Physiology of the Brain' (1814-15); George Combe, Elements of Phrenology (1824); [Daniel Noble], True and False Phrenology (1840); George Henry Lewes, 'Eighth Epoch: Psychology Finally Recognized as a Branch of Biology - the Phrenological Hypothesis' (1867) Mesmerism: 'University College Hospital: Abstract of a Clinical Lecture by Dr Elliotson, on remarkable Cases of Sleep Waking, and on the Effects of Animal Magnetism on Patients with Nervous Affections', Lancet (1837); 'University College Hospital: Animal Magnetism', Lancet (1838); Harriet Martineau 'On Mesmerism' (1844); 'Prospectus', Zoist (1843); Edmund Gurney, 'The Stages of Hypnotism' (1884) Spiritualism: Robert Dale Owen, Footfalls on the Boundary of Another World (1860); John Tyndall, 'Science and the Spirits' (1864), from Fragments of Science (1872); Rev. Charles Maurice Davies, 'A Shilling Seance', in Unorthodox London (1873); William Henry Harrison, 'Spiritualism' (1873); Alfred Russel Wallace, 'A Defence of Modern Spiritualism' (1874); 'The Spiritualists at Bow Street' (1876); Jean-Martin Charcot, 'Spiritualism and Hysteria' (1889) Psychical Research: Edward Cox, The Province of Psychology (1875); Society for Psychical Research, 'Objects of the Society' (1882); Society for Psychical Research, 'Report of the Literary Committee' (1882); Frederic W H Myers, Science and A Future Life (1893); Sir William F Barrett, 'Psychical Research' (1891); 'Spookical Research' (1886) Occultism: Annie Besant, Why I became a Theosophist (1891); William Thomas Stead, 'How We Intend to Study Borderland' (1893); Arthur Edward Waite, 'In the Beginning' and 'The Threefold Division of Mysticism' (1894); Arthur Edward Waite, 'What is Alchemy?' (1894); Eliphas Levi, Transcendental Magic, its Doctrine and Ritual (1896); William James, 'A Suggestion about Mysticism' (1910) Fantastic Topographies: Flat Earth: 'Parallax' [Samuel Birley Rowbotham], Zetetic Astronomy (1865; 1873); 'Common Sense' [William Carpenter], Theoretical Astronomy Examined and Exposed (1864-6). The Fourth Dimension: Johann C F Zollner, 'On Space of Four Dimensions' (1878); 'I Awoke!': Conditions of Life on the Other Side Communicated by Automatic Writing (1895); Charles Howard Hinton, What is the Fourth Dimension? (1897). Hollow Earth and Lost Worlds: Symmes's Theory of Concentric Spheres, Demonstrating that the Earth is Hollow, Habitable Within, and Widely Open about the Poles (1826); Ignatius Donnelly, 'The Purpose of this Book', in Atlantis: The Antediluvian World (1882); William Scott-Elliott, 'Description of Lemurian Man' (1904)