February 17, 19 16] 



NATURE 



67, 



know Latin, not to write Latin verses in imitation 

 of Vergil, but to speak it or to read the latest 

 work on theology or tactics or geography. The 

 introduction of Greek into the curriculum of 

 schools came with the Renaissance, but was not, 

 as is often suggested, responsible for the birth of 

 the new learning. Greek was introduced into Win- 

 chester and Eton, New College and Magdalen, in 

 the fifteenth century, because these schools and 

 colleges were the advanced institutions of the day, 

 and their scholars the leading humanists of their 

 age, eager for new light. Humanism then 

 meant the substitution of new teaching for old, 

 and its follpwers aimed at moulding "the nature 

 of man as a citizen, an active member of the 

 State," rather than at continuing the studies of 

 doctrines relating to the next world upon which 

 the attention of educated mankind had been con- 

 centrated for a thousand years. 



We want to see a like recognition of the need 

 of scientific knowledge on the part of the human- 

 ists of to-day, in the place of that attitude of 

 obscurantism which they present to it. We want to 

 make science the keynote of our Public School 

 and University system, as Humboldt and others 

 did in Prussia at the beginning of the nineteenth 

 century, when Germany was under the heel of 

 Napoleon; for to it are due the position and 

 power gained by that country since then. The 

 lesson which the French learnt from their dis- 

 aster in 1870 was that attention must be given 

 to education at every stage, and more especially 

 to higher education, in order to secure their posi- 

 tion most effectively. Are we to await like defeat 

 before taking the necessary steps to ensure that 

 our legislators, governing officials, and others who 

 exert the highest influence in the State receive the 

 scientific education which modern life demands? 



CATALYSIS. 

 Text-books of Chemical Research and Engineer- 

 ing. Catalysis and its Industrial Applications. 

 By E. Jobling, Reprinted from The Chemical 

 World. Pp. viii+i20. (London: J. and A. 

 Churchill, 1916.) Price 2s. 6d. net. 



THIS little book consists of a series of 

 articles originally contributed to The 

 Chetnical ]Vorld, and deals with a class of phe- 

 nomena which have attracted special attention of 

 late years owing to their growing importance in 

 many operations of chemical technology. The 

 fact that certain chemical processes can be 

 initiated or greatly accelerated by the presence of 

 some foreign material which apparently remains 

 unchanged was recognised in the early part of 

 NO. 2 AT 6. VOL. q61 



the last century and denoted by the term cata^ 

 lysis, first applied by Berzelius in 1835. One of 

 the earliest facts which is brought to the know- 

 ledge of the chemical tyro is the influence of 

 manganese dioxide in promoting the disengage- 

 ment of oxygen from potassium chlorate, and if 

 he ponders at all upon the circumstance one of 

 his earliest impressions must be of the inade- 

 quacy or unsatisfactory nature of the explanation 

 of the cause of the phenomenon. But as his 

 knowledge increases he learns to recognise that 

 the influence of extraneous substances in pro- 

 moting chemical change is in reality a very 

 common phenomenon. At the same time, com- 

 paratively little is known of the mechanism of 

 these catalytic actions. In a few cases it has been 

 definitely ascertained that the catalytic agent does 

 experience a series of changes. During the course 

 of a reaction it is being continually decomposed 

 and recomposed, and by suitable means the pres- 

 ence of the intermediate product can be detected. 

 Hence it is reasonable to suppose that all catalytic 

 phenomena depend upon the alternate decomposi- 

 tion and recomposition of the catalytic agent. 

 Another curious fact brought to light by the in- 

 dustrial application of catalysis is that the activity 

 of a catalytic agent may be wholly inhibited by 

 the presence of another foreign body or, in the 

 language of the technologist, of a so-called poison. 

 In Mr. Jobling's book much that is known of 

 a rapidly developing subject has been brought 

 together and described in a clear and interesting 

 manner. In an introductory chapter he deals with 

 the purely scientific aspects of catalysis and the 

 characteristics of catalytic reactions, autocatalysis, 

 pseudo-catalysis, etc. The rest of the book is con- 

 cerned with the industrial applications of catalytic 

 agents, as, for example, in the manufacture of 

 sulphuric acid by so-called contact processes; of 

 chlorine and salt-cake by Deacon and Hasen- 

 clever's process and the methods of Hargreaves 

 and Robinson ; of sulphur recovery by the Claus- 

 Chance and Gossage processes; of the fixation of 

 atmospheric nitrogen by the Haber and Ostwald's 

 processes, etc. ; of surface actions as illustrated 

 by the work of Bone and his co-workers on surface 

 combustion ; incandescent gas-mantles, etc. ; of 

 hydrogenation, the work of Sabatier and Sen- 

 derens and its application to the " hardening " of 

 oils — a phenomenon of the greatest practical 

 utility. Lastly, we have two short chapters on 

 dehydrogenatio'i and oxidation ; and on dehydra- 

 tion, hydrolysis, etc., interesting as serving to 

 throw light upon a variety of complex reactions 

 depending apparently upon catalytic agencies, and 

 as suggesting their applications in technical pro- 

 cesses. 



