688 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Air and Fire, written in 1775, is the most remarkable one, were 

 collected and published in 1793. His contributions to the Acad- 

 emy of Sciences in Stockholm have been issued in an English 

 translation by Thomas Beddoes. Prof, von Nordenskjold pre- 

 pared for the recent celebration a complete collection of Scheele's 

 scientific notes and of his letters to eminent contemporaries, 

 which has just been issued in a Swedish and a German edition.* 

 This voluminous and splendidly prepared work is an important 

 supplement to all former publications of Scheele's writings and 

 the several historical sketches of his life and labors, and is of 

 paramount value to every student of the history of chemistry. 

 From among the many interesting new facts brought to light in 

 it are : Scheele obtained and recognized oxygen (fire-air) as early 

 as in 1765 in connection with his researches of nitrous acid. Be- 

 fore the year 1771 he obtained oxygen in various ways by heating 

 silver and mercury carbonates, silver and gold oxides, alkaline 

 nitrates, arsenic acid, and black oxide of manganese. He there- 

 fore obtained and recognized oxygen several years before Priest- 

 ley's independent discovery of it. At about the same time he ob- 

 tained and recognized nitrogen, hydrogen sulphide, hydrogen chlo- 

 ride, ammonia, and nitrogen dioxide gases. He knew before 1772 

 the color reaction of the blowpipe flame with potassium and 

 sodium compounds, and made use of them, as also the methods 

 of separating iron from manganese by means of acetic acid. He 

 was also familiar with the transformation of insoluble silicates 

 into soluble ones by fusing them with alkalies. 



Scheele's letters and laboratory notes just published by Prof, 

 von Nordenskjold bear evidence of his advanced knowledge in 

 most departments of chemistry, and of the unusually large num- 

 ber of his researches, observations, and exact discernment in his 

 numberless experiments and deductions. The book abounds in 

 novel views and facts relative to the interesting period of the 

 transformation from the phlogiston epoch to the modern doc- 

 trines of chemical philosophy and application. It furthermore 

 bears ample evidence of the fundamental influence and part 

 which Scheele's labors and ingenuity have had in preparing and 

 clearing the domain of chemistry for Lavoisier's subsequent theo- 

 retical consummation. 



* Carl Wilhelm Scheele. Nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeichnungen. Herausgegeben 

 von A. E. Nordenskjold. One large octavo volume, pp. 506, with illustrations and fac simile 

 letters. Stockholm, 1892. This work is published by subscription only, and according to 

 order the German or Swedish edition will be sent postpaid by mail on receipt of five dollars 

 paid by international money order addressed to Dr. E. Svedmark, Geological Survey, Stock- 

 holm, Sweden. 



