SYNTHETIC CHEMISTRY 



which electricity may play in chemical synthesis. 

 The formation of acetylene from its elements 

 was realized by means of the electric arc, a meth- 

 od which has since, in his own hands and those of 

 M. Moissan and others, yielded such astonishing 

 results. 



Patents, looking to a commercial exploitation of 

 this electrical process for fabricating nitrates, were 

 recently taken out in this country. They were not 

 from the French chemist. It is the pride of his 

 countrymen that in all his career he has never 

 turned one of all his long roll of brilliant discov- 

 eries to his own profit. Pasteur, Claude Bernard, 

 Faraday, were men of the same stamp. In our 

 Yankee land such an attitude seems a little in dis- 

 accord. Is it for this reason that America can pro- 

 duce no great figures like these ? Does this inten- 

 sity of self-interest explain why, spending a greater 

 sum each year on its colleges and universities than 

 ) any other nation, the United States cannot claim 

 a single epoch-making discovery in the whole wide 

 field of scientific work? 



M. Berthelot has never had time to make money. 

 With an inventive genius like his, fortunes needed 

 only an outstretched hand. But there were too 

 many interesting things to do, to know. 



Yet these pages have quite failed to depict the 

 man if they have left the impression that M. 



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