Ved Ores 27 
THURSDAY, “MARCH: r2, 
IQT4. 
CHEMISTRY FOR ADVANCED 
STUDENTS. 
(1) A Treatise on Chemistry. By H. E. Roscoe, 
F.R.S., and C. Schorlemmer, F.R.S. Vol., ii., 
The Metals. New edition completely revised by 
the Rt. Hon. Sir Henry Roscoe and others. 
Pp. xvit+1470. (London: Macmillan and Co., 
Ltd., 1913.) Price. 30s. net. 
(2) A Dictionary of Applied Chemistry. 
Edward Thorpe, C.B., F.R.S. 
Eminent Contributors. Revised 
edition. In five volumes: Vol. 
830. (London: Longmans, 
1913.) Price 45s. net. 
ies as the leaves of our deciduous plants 
fade away in autumn, and in winter 
perish, so do our science books have their autumn 
and their winter. They cannot live long under a 
régime which changes with the Teens years. 
The publisher’s spring-time brings forth an array 
of fresh books, but none are more welcome than 
some of the Bie. and familiar. forms revitalised 
and newly adapted to the change of environment. 
The reviewer has therefore a pleasing task in 
introducing the new editions of the above-named 
books to readers of Nature, and this the more 
because each book is a familiar friend to chemists 
the world over. 
(1) The new edition of “Roscoe and. Schor- 
lemmer ”’—as it is colloquially called—merits a 
hearty welcome. This book stands on the most 
convenient shelf in the libraries of thousands of 
chemists, and its well-thumbed pages bear eloquent 
testimony to its utility and value. This has con- 
tinued, edition after edition, since 1878, when 
vol. i. was published. The first edition was thus 
born before many of us, in this generation, took 
up- the test-tube and the wash-bottle; and we 
have grown up using “Roscoe and Schorlemmer ” 
as a kind of alkoran. The book, in consequence, 
must have exercised a deep influence on the 
present generation, and it is a book of which 
British chemists have been proud. 
It is interesting to see how the concepts. of 
physical chemistry gradually permeate, modify, 
and illume even so conservative a subject as the 
“ Systematic Description of the Metals and their 
Derivatives.” True enough, there are no very 
marked changes in the descriptive matter ranging 
from pages 224 to 1406, yet the first 223 pages 
are largely occupied by physical chemistry, and 
the last 42 pages have a clear succinct account 
of the present state of our knowledge of that 
NOw2g055, VOL. 93 
By- Sir 
Assisted by 
and enlarged 
wepeeeps Vill + 
Green and Co., 
fascinating subject, ‘“The Radioactive Elements.”’ 
In the chapter on specific heats, a page or two 
might perhaps have been spared for Einstein’s 
work on the atomic heats of solids to show how 
theory has at last given a reasoned explanation 
of the “constancy” of the number 6. The 
chapters on crystallography and on spectrum 
analysis are specially good. The new edition has 
all the strong points of former editions, and it can 
therefore be confidently recommended to advanced 
students as the best text-book extant on descrip- 
tive inorganic chemistry. 
(2) The fifth volume of “Thorpe’s Applied” 
completes the work. The concluding volume 
maintains the high standard of those which pre- 
cede, and the observations on the fourth volume 
in Nature, August 14, 1913, are of equal weight 
here. This volume covers subjects ranging from 
“Sodium to Z.”. The longer articles deal with 
sodium, soils, solutions and _ solubility, specific 
gravity, spectrum analysis, starch, sugar, sulphide 
dyes, sulphur and sulphuric acid, synthetic drugs 
or medical products, tannins, tartaric acid, tea, 
terpenes, thermometers, thermostats, thorium, tin, 
toluene and toluidines, toxins 
triphenylmethane colouring 
matters, tungsten, ultramarine, uranium, urea, 
uric acid, urine, vanadium, varnish, vat dyes, 
vegetable alkaloids, water, waxes, whisky, wine, 
destructive distillation of wood, wool, zinc, zir- 
conium, etc. This list is quite inadequate, and 
gives but a feeble idea of the immense range of 
the subjects discussed in this volume. I am in- 
formed that the whole set of volumes contains 
some six thousand articles—short or long. The 
work is therefore ganz deutsch in its thorough- 
ness. 
As a rough imperfect test, in order to find how 
the fifth volume happens to fit the subjects in 
which I personally am interested, I wrote a list 
containing twenty items, and then consulted the 
“dictionary.” I did not succeed in finding any 
mention of a thermostat for high temperatures 
(say 500°-1100°) for electrically heated muffles ; 
or of p- and A-sulphur and their effect on the 
melting-point of the so-called “pure” sulphur. 
In the remaining eighteen cases the dictionary 
emerged triumphant. This result is very good, 
and illustrates the high probability that the work 
will not be found wanting when occasion demands, 
The dictionary, as a whole, reflects great credit 
on the wisdom and acumen of the editor, on the 
skilful and accurate condensations by the con- 
tributors, and on the enterprise and good taste 
of the publishers. 
titanium, tobacco, 
and  antitoxins, 
MAR 25 1914 
itt Ay 
