280 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



physical properties of the elements. This work should be done with 

 the greatest care and thoroughness. Every element should have its 

 relations to the forces of Nature thoroughly fixed and tabulated. 

 Even the rarest elements ought not to be neglected, since each one 

 has its scientific importance, fills a place in some series or groups, and, 

 for purposes of generalization, is of as great interest as any other. 

 But, as it is to-day, the commonest substances have been very imper- 

 fectly studied. Only a few constants have been determined for some 

 of the most familiar elements, the gases especially. Just enough is 

 known about the commoner metals to show us how ignorant we really 

 are. Here, then, is a great field for work, and in it some of the rich- 

 est materials for both chemistry and physics are to be gathered. It 

 is, indeed, strange that this work, obviously of such vast importance, 

 should have been so long postponed. Of course no single individual 

 could undertake it, but it seems as if some learned society, or even 

 some government, might assume the burden! A twentieth part of the 

 money expended for the determination of one astronomical constant, 

 the earth's distance from the sun, ought to cover all the expenses of the 

 undertaking. If we had in America a laboratory exclusively devoted 

 to research, suitably manned and equipped, our country might carry 

 off the glory of achieving this grand work. In default of such a lab- 

 oratory, however, the labor might be accomplished through the co- 

 operation of many individual workers, each one doing his small part, 

 not aimlessly, but in unison with the others. One chemist might 

 undertake to furnish certain of the elements in a perfectly pure con- 

 dition ; another might carefully determine under varying circumstances 

 their densities and rates of expansion ; a third could work up their 

 specific and latent heats ; a fourth their electrical relations, and so on. 

 Failure to attain grand results would be impossible. Doubtless the 

 labor would prove irksome and monotonous, but the reward would be 

 sure. In five years, more would be done toward rendering chemistry 

 an exact science, than can be accomplished in a century by means of 

 the chemical investigations at present most in vogue. 



The physical properties of the elements being established, the next 

 thing is to do somewhat similar work for compounds. Aud here, be- 

 fore entering on experimental labors, it is necessary to know what has 

 already been done. This knowledge is at present difficult to obtain, 

 since the materials are scattered through many pages of many volumes 

 of scientific transactions and periodicals, and need to be collected and 

 systematically arranged. This work of tabulation having been fin- 

 ished, chemists will be able to see distinctly where experiment is most 

 needed, what must be done entirely new, and what ought to be done 

 over again. Then, some of the experimental details might be easily 

 intrusted by professors to the hands of students. If, for practice, a 

 student is taking specific gravities, let him work upon substances for 

 which that constant has never been determined. So also with such 



