CHAMBERS, EGBERT. 



CHEMISTRY. 



105 



Ited the "Book of Days "and "Chambers's 

 Encyclopaedia." Among the various volumes 

 which were edited by the two brothers may 

 be mentioned "Information for the People," 

 "Editions of Standard English Works," "Tracts 

 for the People," "History of the Crimean 

 War," and " Chambers's Educational Course," 

 of nearly seventy volumes. 



No notice of Robert Chambers and his writ- 

 ings would be complete without mention of an 

 anonymous work of a philosophical character, 

 entitled the "Vestiges of Creation." The 

 controversy which this remarkable book, the 

 matrix of Darwin's, engendered, was most en- 

 venomed ; and when, in 1848, Dr. Chambers 

 was selected to be Lord Provost of Edinburgh, 

 he thought it expedient to withdraw in the 

 face of a storm raised against him as the sup- 

 posed author. There were good reasons why 

 he should not admit the authorship. Had be 

 done so, the religious bodies of Scotland and 

 England would have risen against the firm, and 

 their numerous educational works would have 

 been driven from the schools. For business 

 reasons, rather than from any other cause, the 

 author chose not to father a book which must 

 certainly be regarded as one of the greatest 

 speculative works of the nineteenth century. 

 Should it be proved that Robert Chambers 

 wrote it, his title to fame will be materially 

 strengthened, for the writer of that book was 

 the forerunner of Darwin. In a letter to his 

 friend General J. G-. Wilson, dated St. An- 

 drews, September 9, 1866, Dr. Chambers re- 

 marks: " It is only this last week, after an in- 

 terval of three years, that I have got once 

 more settled in a house of my own. My health, 

 after being out of order for an equal space of 

 time, is now completely restored. I am setting 

 up a household with one young daughter and 

 three grandchildren, hoping to have a few 

 pleasant leisurely years at the close of a life 

 which has perhaps been too active and labori- 

 ous. Of my eight daughters, six have been 

 married (one of these dead), another has died 

 unmarried, and one remains, not yet marriage- 

 able. Occasionally a married daughter comes 

 to see me with one or two little ones always 

 a great pleasure. My eldest son is now the 

 principal partner of any activity in our con- 

 cern at Edinburgh, for my brother, although 

 still fit for that kind of work, has entered up- 

 on a period of office, as Lord Provost of the 

 city, which engrosses all his time." The dis- 

 tinguished author, editor, and publisher, died 

 at St. Andrews, March 17, 1871, and was in- 

 terred by his own request close by the tower 

 of St. Regulus, in the cathedral burying-ground 

 of St. Andrews. Robert Chambers was a man 

 who experienced in its broadest sense the as- 

 surance of the sacred proverbialist : "Seest 

 thou a man diligent in business? He shall 

 stand before kings : he shall not stand before 

 mean men." 



On the appearance several years since of a 

 collection of miscellaneous papers, under the 



title of "Select Writings of Robert Cham- 

 bers,]' in which were included four volumes 

 of his delightful essays, an eminent English 

 critic said : "It is marvellous to imagine how 

 much the writer who dissipates himself in 

 constant periodical publication does actually 

 produce. On an estimate, it would seem as 

 if his very breath had been a printed sentence : 

 as if his mouth never opened but to deposit 

 types, as the gifted fairy princess dropped dia- 

 monds. The many years which Robert Cham- 

 bers, in particular, has devoted to literary pro- 

 duction, have accumulated a mass which, we 

 believe, would astonish, were it all placed in 

 a manuscript heap before his eyes, even him- 

 self. And when we reflect upon the charac- 

 ter of the whole how good it has been, how 

 free from objection, how well calculated to 

 attract and benefit the popular mind in the 

 very humblest circle where the art of reading 

 is taught, yet often addressing the highest and 

 most cultivated we cannot but consider that 

 the writer has been a marked benefactor to 

 his country and his kind. He has displayed 

 great judgment in the choice of his many de- 

 signs, and great talent in his contributions, to 

 their far and wide acceptation as guides to the 

 useful, and pleasant pastimes to the recreative. 

 Scotland has reason to be proud of his and his 

 brother's labors. The influence they have had 

 nationally is incalculable; and the seed they 

 have sown must bear an inestimable harvest 

 for many a future year, and for tens of thou- 

 sands yet unborn." 



CHEMISTRY. Gaseous and Liquid Notes 

 of Matter. Cagniard de la Tour, in 1822, dis- 

 covered that volatile liquids, such as ether, al- 

 cohol, and water, when heated in hermetically- 

 sealed tubes, became vapors of apparently only 

 about three times the original bulk of the liquid. 

 To investigate these phenomena more fully, 

 Prof. Andrews, of Belfast, devised a novel form 

 of apparatus, and made experiments covering 

 a period of ten years. He used glass tubes in 

 which the properties of matter could be studied 

 under such varied conditions of temperature 

 and pressure as had never before been realized. 

 A steel screw was made to enter a space in a 

 tube filled with water and mercury, this space 

 having above it the gas or vapor to be exam- 

 ined. The whole contents and parts of the 

 apparatus were so proportioned that the gas 

 or vapor did not come into view till it was 

 reduced to about one-fortieth of its original 

 volume. This arrangement worked so per- 

 fectly, that accurate measurements of com- 

 pression were obtained at different tempera- 

 tures up to a pressure of 300 atmospheres. 

 Carbonic-acid gas, partly liquefied in the ap- 

 paratus, the temperature being at the same 

 time raised nearly to 31 C., gradually lost the 

 surface of demarcation between its liquid 

 and gaseous states ; and finally, the distinct 

 joining-point of gas and liquid became indistin- 

 guishable. If the temperature exceeded 31 

 0., liquefaction could not be effected even 



