238 



NATURE 



[October 21, 1920 



College of Wales, Sea Front, Aberystwyth," is not 

 similarly distinguished. No development of the 

 past three years has so greatly interested the uni- 

 versities of the United Kingdom as the institution 

 of the Ph.D., yet there is, so far as we can find, no 

 reference to this new degree. The budgets of 

 some of the American universities are likely to 

 make a Briton envious — Wisconsin, for example, 

 has a revenue of 3,532,306 dollars; but it may 

 well be for his peace of mind that Columbia, 

 Harvard, Leland Stanford Junior, and others have 

 modestly declined to disclose their wealth. The 

 statement "No particulars received" follows the 

 names of a large number of American and some 

 British universities overseas. 



(3) The aim of the "Yearbook of the Uni- 

 versities of the Empire" is different from that 

 of the other two books. Each of the fifty-nine 

 universities of the Empire finds it necessary to 

 publish a calendar ; the stouter, the more dignified. 

 In the Yearbook all essential information regard- 

 ing the origin of the university, its history and 

 equipment, admission, faculties, degrees, scholar- 

 ships, fees, hostels, etc., from each of these calen- 

 dars, is reduced to a few pages. The names and 

 offices of all members of the staff are recorded, 

 and ""since a statement of the sources of the 

 various degrees held by university teachers gives, 

 in small space, information regarding the educa- 

 tional history of their holders, much trouble has 

 been taken in ascertaining their source." Under 

 the heading "The Years 1916-19" events of 

 interest in the life of the university, such as bene- 

 factions received, new posts created, alterations 

 of curricula, etc., are recorded. 



Comparing the present edition with the one 

 which preceded it (1916-17), we note that the uni- 

 versities are no longer placed alphabetically 

 throughout, but arranged in groups — England and 

 Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Canada, Australasia, 

 South Africa, India — with an admirable introduc- 

 tion preceding each group. A feature of the book 

 which will make it of great and permanent interest 

 is the Appendix on the Universities and the War. 

 It is a summary of the services, other than com- 

 batant (these had been, in part, dealt with in the 

 1915 edition), rendered by ,the universities. " So 

 numerous and varied have these been that it is 

 impossible, in looking back, to picture the war as 

 progressing towards a successful issue without 

 them." This record, brief as it is, persuades the 

 reader of the justice of the editor's remark. The 

 compression within a book of this size of so much 

 and such varied information reflects great credit 

 not only upon the editor's diligence, but also upon 

 his skill. 



NO. 2660, VOL. 106] 



Encyclopxdic Chemistry. 



Phosphore, Arsenic, Aniimoine. By Dr. A. 

 Boutaric and A. Raynaud. (Encyclopedic 

 Scientifique : Bibliothique de Chimie.) Pp. 

 iii-t-417. (Paris: Octave Doin, 1920.) Price 

 9.50 francs. 



THIS book is one of the forty volumes on 

 chemistry forming part of an encyclopaedia 

 of science which is expected to run to about a 

 thousand volumes. The treatment aims at a com- 

 promise between text-books and dictionaries — the 

 books being intended at the same time for reading 

 and for reference. This is obviously a very am- 

 bitious scheme, and it raises the question as to 

 whether such a compromise between matter and 

 style is one which is likely to be useful. In the 

 opinion of the reviewer, books intended for refer- 

 ence should aim at giving the fullest possible 

 information in the smallest possible space. If the 

 elementary rules of grammar are satisfied, the 

 busy worker will be content, and questions of style 

 have little interest for him. The references to 

 original literature should in each case be 

 checked carefully with the originals, and no dif- 

 ferentiation should be made between the nationali- 

 ties of the various discoverers. Although the well- 

 known treatises compiled by German authors are 

 not perfect, they are all we possess which have 

 any pretension to completeness, and have proved 

 of inestimable service to thousands of chemists of 

 all nationalities. A proposal to publish such works 

 in English has not proceeded beyond the stage of 

 discussion, great as are the possibilities of success 

 if trustworthy compendia could be issued within 

 a reasonable period. 



The book under review is written in a clear and 

 readable style, and the descriptions and references 

 are such as might be expected in a moderately 

 advanced text-book. They are not nearly so com- 

 plete as might reasonably be required in an en- 

 cyclopaedic work. The index is also far from satis- 

 factory. The bulk of the references are to pub- 

 lications in the French language, and in more than 

 one instance grave injustice is done in the text 

 to workers of other nationalities. This is much 

 to be regretted ; science has no nationality, and 

 in a search for information such questions have 

 not the slightest interest for the reader. If this 

 inclination is to be followed in further volumes to 

 be issued, the reviewer has no hesitation in saying 

 that the usefulness of the work will be profoundly 

 prejudiced. It may, for instance, be more gratify- 

 ing to the author to attribute the formulation of 

 the equation for a unimolecular reaction to 

 Berthelot, but as the prior publications of Har- 



