FEBRUARY 28, 1907 | 
NATURE 
419 
the Council would be wise is somewhat doubtful. 
There is no engineering impossibility in wiping out 
all the existing generating stations with their various 
systems of supply and in producing the whole of the 
electricity required for London in a station erected at 
Barking or Erith, as the Council proposes. But from 
the financial point of view the magnitude of the scheme 
appears to be its chief difficulty. Seventeen millions 
have already been sunk in electricity supply in London, 
and, according to a careful estimate in a leading 
financial journal, this sum would have to be nearly 
doubled before the Council could secure the monopoly 
at which it aims. Before embarking upon such a 
scheme, from which when once started there is no 
turning back, the ratepayers need to be very sure of 
the future developments of electricity. Three times 
in the past twenty years have the prime movers used 
for electrical production been entirely changed. The 
slow-speed horizontal engines which had been deve- 
loped during the nineteenth century were first used, 
and gave place during the ‘eighties to high-speed 
engines of the single-acting or forced-lubricating 
type for electrical supply. These are now being re- 
placed by steam turbines. Many inventors are, how- 
ever, at work upon the improvement of large gas 
engines and other internal-combustion machines, and 
the attempts which have been made to construct a 
satisfactory internai-combustion turbine may any day 
bear fruit. 
Now it is obvious that if electricity production in 
London should become municipalised, so far as London 
is concerned the rate of development and the adoption 
of improved methods will be much hindered. Ex- 
perience has shown that local authorities are, as 
in fact they should be, very cautious in adopting 
scientific improvements. This partly arises from a 
proper regard for the ratepayers’ money, but partly 
from their objection to acknowledge that they have 
made a mistake and to the consequent criticism of the 
electorate. 
This being so, it would be most unfortunate if 
anything should be done that would hinder the pro- 
gress of electrical developments in the metropolis. 
London is so large that it could certainly afford to 
get the best in the first instance; the difficulty is to 
ensure a continuance in the adoption of the most 
efficient methods when concerns are municipalised. 
To-day the generating station erected by the Council at 
Greenwich is practically obsolete as an up-to-date 
power house. 
The problem is one, however, crying for solution. 
The need for some improvement in London electrical 
supply is generally admitted, as are the advantages 
arising from concentration. The best solution of the 
difficulty is probably that outlined in the report of 
the Council’s Finance Committee issued in December, 
which closed with the following words :— 
‘““The financial difficulties to which we have called 
the attention of the Council would to a large extent 
be obviated if the Council saw its way to adopt some 
scheme of exercising the powers sought, if and when 
conferred by Parliament, by which the Council, while 
retaining general control, would be relieved of the 
responsibility of working the undertaking in whole 
or in part.”’ 
Whether the solution will be brought about by 
enlarging the existing stations, as their owners pro- 
pose, or by erecting new and larger stations on more 
convenient sites outside, as other experts desire, is 
a question which must be settled by a Parliamentary 
Committee and the Board of Trade. But more delay 
in concentration will be fatal to London’s industrial 
future, and is quite unnecessary if only the Council 
will realise the need for cooperating with private 
enterprise, as the Select Committee suggested. 
NO. 1948, VOL. 75 | 
PROF. HENRI MOISSAN.? 
le was with deep sorrow that the scientific world 
learnt of the 
death of the illustrious French 
chemist Henri Moissan, which oceurred on Wednes- 
day, February 20, following an operation for appen- 
dicitis. 
Born in Paris on September 28, 1852, Moissan 
early developed an interest in chemistry, and in 1872 
entered the laboratory of Fremy at the Muséum 
d'Histoire naturelle, attending also the courses of 
Henri Sainte-Claire Deville, Debray, and others. 
This early training firmly fixed the direction of his 
life’s work, for it is precisely along the lines so ably 
developed by this brilliant school of French ‘chemists 
that Moissan’s genius and resource in experiment- 
ation were applied. Worthily to have upheld the 
traditions and high quality of this school and to 
have widened the field of inorganic chemistry  re- 
quired powers of no mean order. ; 
From 1873 to 1879 Moissan held the post of 
assistant in the laboratory of MM. Decaisne and 
Deere at the Muséum d'Histoire naturelle, and in 
874 published, in conjunction with M. Dehérain, his 
first contribution to science, a study of the absorption 
of oxygen and emission of carbonic acid by plants 
kept in a darkened room. In 1877 a series of papers 
on the oxides of the metals of the iron group was 
commenced, the whole work being collected and 
presented in 1880 as a_ thesis for the degree of 
Docteur és sciences of the Faculty of Sciences of the 
Paris University. This research, carried out with 
much experimental skill and precision, considerably 
extended our knowledge of the reduction products 
of the oxides of iron, manganese, nickel, and 
chromium. 
A long connection with ts Ecole supérieure de 
Pharmacie commenced in 1879, by his appointment 
as demonstrator in chemists: the chair of toxicology 
being given him in 1887, after his memorable isola- 
tion of fluorine, and ‘finally the professorship of 
chimie minérale in 1899, when his first opportunity 
occurred for holding a course of lectures on chemistry. 
After his graduation, Moissan, from 1879 to 1883, 
devoted himself chiefly to the studv of the ‘compounds 
of chromium, investigating in particular the 
chromous salts and perchromic acid. Subsequently, 
in the laboratory of Debray, and with the active 
encouragement of Troost and Friedel, he commenced 
his researches upon fluorine which culminated in 
1886 in the isolation of this element. 
The difficulties, which had baffled the experimental 
ability of Humphry Davy, Faraday, Fremy, and 
many others, were overcome, and fluorine itself was 
presented to us. That this may justly be considered 
to be one of the greatest achievements of experi- 
mental chemistry in the nineteenth century can be 
judged not so much by the brilliant result attained 
as by the display of indomitable pluck and perse- 
verance which assured the successful issue. 
After a number of fruitless but well-planned 
attempts to separate the element from its compounds 
with silicon, phosphorus, and arsenic, Moissan, on 
June 28, 1886, communicated to the Academy of 
Sciences the first details of his experiments on the 
electrolysis of anhydrous hydrofluoric acid containing 
potassium bifluoride. The definite proofs of the 
identity and elementary nature of fluorine were pre- 
sented in the following month, whilst, on 
November 8, Debray reported to the academy the 
complete conviction of the section of chemistry in the 
validity of the experiments. 
From 1886 to 189t Moiss 
1 See also the article on Moissan’s laboratory and his work in it in 
Nature, January 16, 1902, vol. Ixv.. p. 252. 
ssan published numerous 
