X NOTES BY THE EDITOR. 



The late eclipse imdoubtedly awakened greater interest in 

 this new braneh of science. 



Prof. ^Magnus has lately published a research upon heat spec- 

 tra. 



Angstrom and Thalen have also lately published laborious 

 and accurate tables of the wave lengths of the ditlerent metals. 



Roscoe's work on Spectrum Analysis, published this year, 

 presents the subject in a very lucid manner. 



We incorporate herewith the notes of ]Mr. Nichols on the 

 progress in the field of chemistry. 



In Chemistry no startling discoveiy has been made during the 

 past year. Yet each 3car marks progress, especially in the con- 

 tributions to the history of the compounds of carbon, and each 

 year adds to the number of those complex bodies which, a short 

 time ago, were found onl}^ in the bodies of animals or in plants, 

 but which now can be prepared at will, in the laboratory. Es- 

 pecial attention may be called to the jDroduction during the past 

 year, by artificial means, of alizarine, the coloring matter of the 

 madder root (vide p. 205). Such discoveries extend our views of 

 the domain of chemistry and cause us to have less apprehension 

 in regard to the limited supply of many substances, the demand 

 for which is continually increasing. 



The publication by Professor Bunsen, of Heidelberg, of a paper 

 on the "Washing of Precipitates" (videp.210),has wrought a great 

 change in the manner of conducting in the laboratory an opera- 

 tion of constant occurrence, that of filtration. By his method, as 

 contrasted with that formerly employed, the saving of time 

 amounts in certain cases to many hundred per cent., — an advan- 

 tage which, at the present day, we cannot aftord to overlook. 



The researches of Graham (vide p. 194) on the metallic character 

 of hydrogen as deduced from the deportment of the alloys of pal- 

 ladium and hydrogen show liow close is the relation between 

 mechanical force and chemical affinity. It seems as if he were 

 '* led not only to manifest the metallic character of hydrogen, but 

 also to seize the very moment at which the plienomenon of tlie 

 mechanical condensation of a gas b}' a j^orous bod}' changes into 

 a truly chemical comlnnation."* 



The council of the Chemical Society (London) having deter- 

 mined to found an annual lectureship in honor of Farada}', the 

 inaugural lecture was delivered this year (June 18) by the French 



* Dumaa. Faraday Lecture. 



