1844-54. TEXT-BOOK OF CHEMISTRY. 339 



bers, we find his paper on Dalton specially mentioned. " The 

 scientific strength of the Eeview is indicated by a truly admir- 

 able paper on the ' Life and Discoveries of Dalton/ in which 

 the atomic theory of that great lawgiver of quantitative chemis- 

 try is expounded with a clearness, precision, width of view, and 

 philosophic eloquence, which reminds us of Playfair, and in 

 which the whole question of Dalton's merit as a discoverer is, 

 through original research, placed in a new point of view, by 

 tracing the independent and altogether peculiar course of in- 

 quiry by which he was led to his atomic hypothesis." " ' The 

 Life and Discoveries of Dalton,' one of the greatest of English 

 chemists, is treated with a learned appreciation of the subject. 

 It is one of those delightful essays which serve to open the lights 

 of science upon the uninitiated, without dazzling them, or de- 

 terring them with too abstruse details." 



His ' Text-Book of Chemistry,' which forms one of the 

 volumes of 'Chambers's Educational Course/ was written to 

 dictation in the summer of 1849, in the "Sleepy Hollow" of 

 Morning-side. Eheumatism was an unfailing visitor in summer, 

 frequently affecting the arms to a painful extent. In that year 

 it compelled the abandonment of spring classes, and this text- 

 book was undertaken as the only work of which he was capable 

 at the time, idleness being to him an impossibility. He was 

 quite unable to hold a pen for months, and dictated its pages to 

 a sister while pacing the room with compressed lips, that showed 

 the pain could scarcely be endured ; but pain never stopped 

 work, and the success of the book has been such as to repay the 

 effort abundantly. Its sale has been at the rate of 2,500 copies 

 yearly, and upwards of 24,000 copies, in all, have been sold in 

 the nine years which have followed its publication. It has 

 been recommended by the Council of the Society of Arts, Lon- 

 don, to the students preparing for examination for its certificate 

 of proficiency, and has met with general acceptance. It is thus 

 noticed in periodicals of the day : " There are few books on 

 chemical science in our language which so fully explain its lead- 

 ing features. . . . His little work may be studied as a choice 

 example of scientific literature." l 



1 ' Athenaeum,' January 4, 1851. 



