INDEX TO THE LITERATURE OF URANIUM, 



1789-1885. 



By H. Caerington Bolton. 



PREFACE. 



" Index-learning turns no student pale, 



Yet holds the eel of science by the tail." 



Dunciad, I, 279. 



When engaged in researches on the compounds of uranium, nearly 

 twenty years ago, the writer compiled for his convenience an index to the 

 hterature of the element and of its principal compounds. At the sugges- 

 tion of several friends who thought the compilation ought to be placed at 

 the disposal of chemists, the manuscript was extended and printed in the 

 Annals of the New York Lyceum of i!^atural History (Vol. ix, Feb., 

 1870). As published, the index was far from complete ; but the simple 

 plan adopted, a chronological arrangement of authorities and references, 

 with brief notes of the subject-matter, seems to have commended itself 

 to chemists, for the Index to the Literature of Uranium was followed 

 by several others similarly arranged. A list of these will be found at 

 the close of this preface. 



Impressed by the great importance of index-making, in 1882 the 

 writer proposed to the Chemical Section of the American Association 

 for the Advancement of Science, at the Montreal meeting, the formation 

 of a committee to encourage chemists in a scheme of co-operative in- 

 dexing briefly outlined at the time. The Chemical Section kindly ap- 

 proved the proposal, and a committee was appointed to " devise and in- 

 augurate a plan for the proper indexing of the literature of the chemical 

 elements." This committee reported in August, 1883, that it had con- 

 sidered three methods of collecting material for the indexes, viz: 



1. Reviewing the Catalogue of Scientific Papers published by the 

 Royal Society. (8 vols. 4to.) 



2. Indexing sijecial journals by different individuals and collating 

 the matter. 



3. The independent plan, whereby each chemist indexes all the jour- 

 nals accessible to him with reference to a given element, in which he is 

 presumably especially interested. 



915 



