Mav 1 6, 1895J 



NA TURE 



made exiicriments lo ascertain the rate of corrosion of arsenical 

 steel. He had suljmerged wires in a 2 per cent, solution of sal- 



tiiinoniac, had placed others in fresh water, and still another 



iiiiple to a pile of the wharf at the Middlesbrough Ironworks 

 in such a position as to be alternately covered and exposed as 

 the tide ebbed and flowed. The conclusions arrived at were that 

 arsenical steel is not more liable to corrosion than the same 

 material without arsenical addition ; in fact, o.Kidation is 

 retarded by the presence of small (juantities of arsenic. 



It is in steel that is to be used in positions where it will require 

 to be welded that arsenic appears most injurious, for that process 

 is rendered more <lifticult by even very small quantities of arsenic ; 

 so that, as Mr. Stead says, when welding material is required, 

 arsenic should be most carefully avoided. In regard to electrical 

 conductivity, «too, arsenic is injurious, for the value of the material 

 in this respect is materially reduced by even small quantities of 

 arsenic. .\ quantity equal to o'25 per cent, diminishes the con- 

 ductivity by about 15 per cent. 



The paper concludes with an appendix in which the author 

 gives a method he has worked out in detail for deterinining the 

 arsenic in iron ores, in steel, and in pig iron. It has been the 

 general practice to preciiiitatc the arsenic as sulphide or hydric 

 sulphide from the distillate, and either weigh the pure sulphide 

 after drying at 212^ K. or to oxidise it in bromine and hydro- 

 chloric acid, and then precipitate the arsenic acid with ammonia 

 and magnesia solution, and weigh the precipitate |iroduced. 

 This process, although accurate, is tedious and takes at least 

 twenty-four hours to complete. .Mr. Stead has found that if the 

 distillation is conductefl in a special manner the whole of the 

 arsenic may be obtained in the distillate, unaccompanied with 

 any traces of chloride of iron, and that if the hydrochloric acid 

 is nearly neutralised with ammonia and finally completely neu- 

 tralised with aciil carbonate of soda, the arsenic can be deter- 

 mined volumetrically with a standard solution of iodine, using 

 starch solution as an indicator. 



Emil Fischer proposed the process of distillation with ferrous 

 chloride and titration of the distillate with iodine solution ; but, 

 as the details are not given in " Crookes' .Select Methods," Mr. 

 Stead had to work them out for himself. These he gives in full 

 in his |>aper, to which we must refer our readers, as it would 

 take too much space to describe the process in full. Mr. Stead 

 says that a more simple and accurate device for the determina- 

 tion of small quantities of arsenic it would, he thinks, be im- 

 possible to conceive. 



The discussion of this paper, although of an interesting nature, 

 did not produce any new facts of importance. The majority of 

 those who spoke were either steel makers or those interested in 

 the production of steel, and they naturally congratulated them- 

 selves on the conversion of a long-supposed enemy into a neutral, 

 if not into an ally. It should be remembered, however, th.at the 

 meeting consisted chiefly of persons only too anxious to reduce 

 the difficulty and cost of steel making ; and not likely to accept 

 any explanations tending to that end in a captious spirit. Xo one 

 is likely to question the scientific accuracy or bona fides of so 

 eminent and conscientious an observer and experimentalist as 

 Mr. .Stead, yet there may be something to say on the other side. 

 This appears more likely from the remarks of the one user of 

 steel who spoke -Mr. Wighani, the manager of a wire-drawing 

 firm who had made a report lo .Mr. Stead, which was quoted in 

 the paper. It should lie reinembered, also, that Mr Stead himself 

 says that further exjieriments are necessary. 



The only remaining paper that was read was Mr. Scott's con- 

 tribution on the Iron .Mines of Elba. This.was not discussed. 



The autumn meeting of the Institute will take place in 

 Birmingham, commencing Tuesday, August 12. 



THE SCHORLEMMER MEMORIAL 

 LABORATORY. 



P^ interesting ceremony took place at the Owens College, 

 Manchester, a few days ago, when Dr. Ludwig Mond 

 formally opened the Schorlemmcr Laboratory for Organic 

 Chemi.stry, together with a large laboratory for medical .students 

 and a room for the [ireparation and storage of reagents. It 

 may be remembered that, after the death of Prof. Schor- 

 lemmcr, his friends and pupils, under the lead of Sir 

 II. K. Koscoe, late professor of chemi.stry at the College, 

 took steps with a view to fittingly commemorate his services 

 to the College and to the .advancement of organic chemi.stry. 



NO. 1333, VOL. 52] 



It was generally felt that the best memorial would be the 

 erection of a laboratory for organic chemistry, to be called 

 after his name, and a subscription list was accordingly opened. 

 The appeal, which was generously headed by Ur. .Mond, was 

 so well responded to, both in this country and in Germany, that 

 in a short time a sum of £2-fio was subscribed. Meantime the 

 Council of the College had to take into serious consideration the 

 rapid growth of the chemical department. Originally designed 

 for 100 stiulents, the laboratories had for several years been 

 overcrowded, and the private rooms built for research work had 

 to be given up for the general instniction of the students. The 

 number of the students in the chemical laboratories has steadily in- 

 creased during the past five years, and, in view of this increase, the 

 Council became convinced of the necessity of extending the chem- 

 ical department. They accordingly accepted the fund raised by the 

 Schorlemmer Memorial Committee, and instructed Mr. Alfred 

 Waterhouse to prepare plans for a "Schorlemmer" Organic 

 Laboratory, and ibr a new laboratory for elementary students, on 

 a plot of land adjoining the present laboratories acquired by the 

 College for the purpose of their extension. The Schorlemmer 

 Laboratory, designed by Mr. Waterhouse, is at the end of the 

 main corridor in the old chemical building. It measures sixty 

 feet by thirty feet, and has an arched roof thirty feet high. The 

 laboratory is designed to accommodate a professor, two dem-jii- 

 strators, and thirty-six students. It is fitted in the most compLte 

 manner with every requisite for the important work which is to 

 be carried on within it, and in some particulars is arranged after 

 the plan of the Munich organic laboratories. The lower 

 laboratory is designed for forty-five students. The fittings are 

 similar to those in the old laboratories designed by Sir Henry 

 Roscoe. The total cost of the new building was ^4800. 



A full report of the opening ceremony is given in the Manchester 

 Guardian, to which source we are indebted for the following 

 condensed account : — 



In connection with the inaugural proceedings, a large and re- 

 presentative company gathered in the Chemical Theatre of the 

 College. -Messages regretting inability to attend, and wishing 

 prosperity to the laboratory, were received from a number of 

 eminent chemists. Prof. H. B. Dixon referred to the esteem in 

 which Schorlemmer's name was held, and expressed, on behalf of 

 his colleagues and himself, their admiration of the life and 

 character of the man to whose memory the laboratory had been 

 erected. 



Sir H. E. Roscoe sketched Schorlemmer's life, and, in the 

 course of his addre-ss, said : — Schorlemmer added another name to 

 the list of distinguished foreigners who had found a home in 

 these islands. Never again could it be said that England failed 

 to recognise and appreciate the value of the services of those who 

 sough; her shores. The names of Herschel, of Hofraann, of Max 

 .Miiller. and, lastly, of Schorlemmer indicated that we are not 

 slow to give honour to those who were once strangers in the 

 land, but who had made themselves members of our national 

 family. They might have good hopes that the time would 

 soon come when the leaders in chemical industry would appre- 

 ciate the necessity of a thorough scientific training, as had long 

 been the case in Germany ; and that as Giessen was, under 

 Liebig, the means of raising the standard of chemical education 

 throughout the Fatherland, so the chemical department of Owens 

 College might, under the direction of Prof. Dixon and Prof. 

 Perkin, the director of the new laboratory, be pointed out as the 

 institution in England which had done the same for this great 

 empire. 



Dr. Ludwig Mond next addressed the meeting. He remarked 

 that the opening of the first laboratory solely devoted to the 

 study of organic chemistry, at the only University in England 

 which could boast of a professor of that science, was a dis- 

 tinct step forward in the development of science in this country. 

 He considered it a great step in advance to have a special labora- 

 tory and special professors appointed for the study of the chem- 

 istry of carbon, because the subject-matter of chemistry now 

 covered so va.st a domain, and was increasing at such an immense 

 rate, that for any one desiring to further contribute to it, it had 

 become a necessity, after mastering the main facts of the science, 

 to give his attention specially to the details of one or other part 

 of it. While it was true that carbon was only one out of many 

 elements, it possessed such very special properties that the nud- 

 titude of its compounds probably outnumbered those of all the 

 rest of the elements together, and it h.ad the unique interest that 

 all the innumerable .substances that were found in plants and 

 animals, which built up their tissues, and by their constant 

 changes jiroduccd the phenomenon we called life, were all 



