3i6 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



sesses certain very definite features of its own which distinguishes it from 

 most of its predecessors. In passing, it may be noted that the work was com- 

 pleted at Ghent in October 191 6, during the German occupation, and only 

 the good services of Cardinal Mercier, which are duly acknowledged, enabled 

 the manuscript to find its way to Paris, where in due course it was awarded 

 the Prix Binoux of the Institut de France. 



The object aimed at by the author has been to write a more or less 

 objective history of Chemistry — or, as he terms it, " Histoire de la Chimie 

 positiv " — not dealing so much with a mere chronological statement of 

 chemists, discoveries, and the rise and fall of theories, as endeavouring to 

 trace the historical development of various matters which may now be 

 regarded as more or less definitely settled ; in particular our present table 

 of atomic weights and the constitution of organic compounds. 



For this reason the work may appear to be rather one-sided in certain 

 respects, and the zeal of the author is reflected in the copious — perhaps 

 too copious — extracts from original documents which fill the pages of the 

 book. 



One has the feeling, whilst reading, that one is perusing some technical 

 legal work requiring documentary proof at every step, and there is also the 

 suspicion that Prof. Delacre has sometimes overwhelmed himself in a flood 

 of extracts and quotations, so that at the end it is not always clear just 

 what conclusions he has drawn from his evidence, or whether, indeed, he has 

 reached any definite conclusions at all. 



In drawing attention to this obvious defect due to the general treat- 

 ment adopted, it is not intended to minimise in any way the value of what 

 is obviously a careful and painstaking work, which should prove a most 

 valuable source of information for those chemists who may desire to study 

 in detail the historical development of their science, though the absence of 

 a subject index diminishes somewhat its value as a book of reference. 



F. A. M. 



Chemistry in Everyday Life (Opportunities in Chemistry). By Ellwood 

 Hendrick. [Pp. xii + 102.] (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1919. 

 Price 3s. 6d. net.) 



Chemistry is fortunate enough in having so delightful an interpreter as Mr. 

 Ellwood Hendrick, who, besides being the author of Everyman's Chemistry, 

 is President of the American Chemists' Club amongst his other activities, 

 and is thus in the centre of things, and able to keep his eye both on the latest 

 developments of chemical science and on the trend of popular interest. 



In his earlier book he leapt into fame largely owing to the fresh, un- 

 trammelled view he took of Chemistry in its relation to everyday life, and 

 in the present little work he endeavours to show how closely chemistry 

 touches all our human activities at a hundred points. A glance through 

 the book makes even a hardened chemist look at things from a new point 

 of view. Whilst Mr. Hendrick does his best to show the man in the street 

 how much he owes to chemistry, he does not place the chemist on a pedestal ; 

 for instance, at the end of Chapter IV, on " The Great Cycle of Nature," 

 dealing with fuel and plant growth, he writes : " Whenever we get to fancy- 

 ing that we are as clever, able, or as wise as anybody need be, it is worth 

 while to take a glance at a tree, at any old tree, even the scraggly backyard 

 runt with the wash hung out on it to dry, and say to ourselves that, when 

 we can turn the little trick that that tree does daily, it will be plenty of 

 time to perk up and grow chesty ! " 



There is such a cheerful fresh atmosphere about Mr. Hendrick's writing 

 that one thinks of him as a young man of an inquiring turn of mind rather 

 than as " grey-headed and fat," as he describes himself. Anyway, a man 



