AND SCHONBEIN 85 



the letter of June 20th seems to me to indicate this : 

 "It will perhaps interest you to know that I have made 

 many experiments with my guncotton." This alone is 

 enough to show that the writer assumes on the part of 

 Berzelius an accurate acquaintance with the then state of 

 affairs; and this would be simply and easily explained 

 from the correspondence which they were usually so fond 

 of keeping up. Though according to Schonbein's own 

 account in the Allgemeine Zeitung of 25th October 1846, 

 the first experiments with guns on a large scale had been 

 performed in the week April 6-12, and the discovery 

 had attracted the attention of the general public to a 

 very unusual degree, Schonbein had given a public lecture 

 on his first invention for the first time as late as May 

 27th, before the Scientific Club of Bale. In this lecture 

 he referred directly to the experiments described in the 

 letter of March 5th, on which moreover he had not 

 lectured to the Club till March llth, after he had com- 

 municated them to Berzelius. So if Berzelius knew about 

 the experiments with guncotton he must have derived the 

 information either from Schonbein directly or from notices 

 in the papers, for the scientific journals had not yet 

 received accounts of them j and this last assumption 

 seems to me, as I have said, to be rendered untenable by 

 the expressions which Schonbein employs. 



