SECTION A INORGANIC CHEMISTRY 



(Hall 16, September 21, 10 a. m.) 



CHAIRMAN: PROFESSOR JOHN W. MALLET, University of Virginia. 



SPEAKERS: PROFESSOR HENRI MOISSAN, The Sorbonne; Member of the Institute 



of France. 



SIR WILLIAM RAMSAY, K.C.B., Royal Institution, London. 

 SECRETARY: PROFESSOR WILLIAM L. DUDLEY, Vanderbilt University. 



INORGANIC CHEMISTRY: ITS RELATIONS WITH THE 

 OTHER SCIENCES 



BY HENRI MOISSAN 

 (Translated from the French by Professor R. S- Woodworth, Columbia University) 



[Henri Moissan, Professor of General Chemistry at The Sorbonne, University of 

 Paris, since 1900. b. September 28, 1852. D.S., LL.D., Universities of Princeton, 

 Glasgow, and Oxford. Professor at School of Pharmacy of Paris, 1887-1900. 

 Member of Institute of France; Academy of Medicine of Paris; Academies of 

 London, Berlin, Vienna, St. Petersburg, Washington, Brussels, Amsterdam, 

 Munich, Denmark, Turin, etc., etc. Author of The Electric Oven; Fluorspar 

 and its Component Parts ; Treatise on Mineral Chemistry.] 



CHEMISTRY, though young as a science, traces its first applica- 

 tions back to the very cradle of the human race. As soon as man 

 in his struggle with nature had come into possession of his individu- 

 ality, his observing intelligence enabled him to take cognizance 

 of some of the phenomena occurring about him, and to engage in 

 the study of them. He saw the importance of fire, and soon recog- 

 nized that certain metallic substances could take the place of flint 

 in the manufacture of weapons. Thereupon he devoted himself to 

 that primitive metallurgy of copper, of which we still find so many 

 examples, more or less transformed, in the earliest foundations of 

 Babylon; these remain as witnesses, not dumb, though far from 

 explicit, of the most remote of our civilizations. 



The importance of metal in the different stages of human develop- 

 ment is so well recognized that a single name is used to cover all the 

 centuries that have made use of the same metal. 



To the age of copper succeeds the age of bronze. At the same time 

 gold, being found in the native state, becomes known, and is wrought 

 with the hammer. Iron, since its preparation is much more difficult, 

 cannot be utilized till later. 



In these distant times, the epoch most fertile in chemical applica- 

 tions was that of the Egyptian civilization. After many industrial 

 experiments, this people succeeded in dyeing fabrics with purple, in 



