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Art. XVI. ANALYSIS OF SCIENTIFIC BOOKS. 



I. A Course of Lectures on Chemical Science, as delivered at the 

 Surrey Institution, by Goldsworthy Gurney. London, 1823, 

 8vo. pp. 310. 



Our attention was originally called to this book, by the exor- 

 bitant and solemn praises bestowed upon it in the daily and weekly 

 papers. The Times holds it up as a model of scientific composi- 

 tion ; the Morning Post deliberately represents it as a never-suffi- 

 ciently-to-be-valued collection of new and important truths ; John 

 Bull says " there is no extant work on chemical science so full 

 of important investigations ;" and the Literary Museum concludes 

 a critical review of its merits, by asserting that " in more than one 

 instance, much new matter is presented to us in the way of theory 

 as well as of practice ; and the experiments by which the lectures 

 are illustrated, are in almost every case original." With such re- 

 iterated testimonials in favour of Mr. Gurney's u Lectures," we 

 should hold ourselves remiss in passing them over without notice, 

 and our readers might suspect us of prejudice and partiality, 

 attached as we are, to another school of chemistry, were we to 

 withhold the important information, which according to the highly 

 respectable scientific authorities above quoted, has thus emanated 

 from the Surrey Institution. 



In respect to our author's originality, we confess we were some- 

 thing startled at finding some long and unacknowledged quotations 

 in the introductory lecture from works which we happened lately 

 to have perused; but our apprehensions were speedily relieved, 

 by the tale unfolded in Lectures II and III. For instance : " Put," 

 says Mr. Goldsworthy Gurney, " into a glass vessel, contain- 

 ing water, a few grains of sugar of lead, and stir them together 

 with a glass or other rod, the water will soon become turbid in 

 consequence of the sugar of lead being insoluble in that fluid, and 

 simply a mixture of the particles with the water will take place ; 

 if the water be minutely examined, these particles may be seen 

 floating in it, and they will ultimately, if left to themselves, fall to 

 the bottom, If to this milky fluid be now added a few drops of 

 aqua-fortis, it will instantly become perfectly clear and transpa- 

 rent, and now not the minutest portion of the lead can be pcr- 

 ceivtd in it. In the first instance then, it was only a mixture, in 

 the latter a perfect solution, because the combination of lead and 

 aqua-fortis is soluble in water, whereas the sugar of lead is not 

 so." p. 39. 



The insolubility of sugar of lead in water was to us a new fact, 

 and as Thomson's Si/stem, and Henry's Elements, happened to be 



