P J E Peebles 1980 Princeton: Princeton University Press xiii + 422 pp price £16.50 (£5.60 paperback) This book is concerned with the structure of the universe at scales down to the size of galaxies, and in particular with the problem of why the universe seems to be homogeneous and isotropic on a large scale, and yet matter has aggregated into galaxies and clusters of galaxies. It begins with a review of the historical development of ideas concerning the homogeneity and clustering of the matter distribution within the framework of standard Big Bang cosmology.