aV2 
these unfortunate Colonies to secure this first number of 
the West Indian Bulletin, carefully study the array of 
facts contained therein, and see whether it is not possible 
to do more for reviving the ancient glories of the islands 
by personal energy, and the adaptation of modern 
methods of culture and preparation for the markets of 
the world, than by any possible benefits that can accrue 
from abolishing the sugar bounties by France and other 
countries, or the imposition by us of countervailing 
duties in favour of our own Colonies. While it is ex- 
tremely doubtful whether the removal of the bounties 
would benefit the West Indian sugar planters to any 
appreciable extent, it seems almost absolutely certain 
that if they resolutely determined on keeping abreast of 
the times in management, machinery, selection of plants, 
&c., instead of being content with what was thought good 
enough by their fathers and grandfathers before beet- 
sugar entered into the competition, they would soon see 
an end to the worst features of that perpetual millstone | 
—the depression in the West Indian sugar industry. As 
Dr. Morris said in his opening address, “The sugar 
industry in the smaller islands will never be in a satis- 
factory condition so long as the processes of crushing 
the canes and manufacturing the sugar remain as at 
present.” H. 
SIR EDWARD FRANKLAND, K.C.B., F.R.S. 
EWS of the death of Sir Edward Frankland will 
come asa surprise as well as a shock to all his 
friends, and will be received by the whole scientific world 
with feelings of the deepest regret. 
The end came on Wednesday, August 9, in Norway, where 
Sir Edward had been in the habit of spending his summer 
holidays for many years. Born at Churchtown, near 
Lancaster, on January 18, 1825, he had entered upon 
his seventy-fifth year, but his upright, spare and active 
figure until quite recently gave the impression of a much 
younger man. It was noticeable, however, that he had 
aged in appearance perceptibly after the death of Lady 
Frankland (his second wife), which occurred rather 
suddenly in the spring of the present year. 
Frankland received his early education at the Lancaster 
Grammar School, and subsequently became one of the 
first science masters at Queenwood College. From 
Queenwood he proceeded to Germany, and studied 
chemistry at Marburg and at Giessen. Returning to 
England he was appointed in 1851 first professor of 
chemistry at Owens College, Manchester, and there he 
remained for about seven years till his removal to 
London in 1857 to take charge of the chemical depart- 
ment in St. Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical School. In 
1863 he was appointed Fullerian Professor of Chemistry 
in the Royal Institution, and in 1865 he succeeded Hof- 
mann at the College of Chemistry. 
which was soon afterwards transferred to the united 
School of Science and Royal School of Mines at South 
Kensington, he held till his retirement in 1885. Frankland 
was for many years a regular attendant at the meetings of 
the Chemical Society, and was president in 1871-72. His 
scientific work was rewarded also by honours from many 
foreign universities and academies, including the Insti- 
tute of France, of which he was a corresponding member. 
For the last five years he held the office of Foreign 
Secretary of the Royal Society, and in 1894 he received 
the Copley Medal. 
Sir Edward received the honour of knighthood in 
1897, on the occasion of Her Majesty’s Jubilee; but 
this, strange to say, was conferred, not in recognition 
of his very eminent services to chemical science, but 
in his more ordinary professional capacity as water 
analyst to the Home Department, having been for more 
NO. 1555, VOL. 60) 
Vian OTE 
[AvGcusT 17, 1899 
The latter chair, | 
than thirty years responsible for the annual reports to 
the Local Government Board on the quality of the 
metropolitan water supply. 
Frankland’s title to fame rests securely upon his import- 
ant experimental investigations in pure chemistry accom- 
plished chiefly within the twenty years from 1848 to 1868, 
and upon the impetus which was given to theoretical 
chemistry by the promulgation of his views concerning 
the combining capacity, or valency as it is now called, of 
the elements, which he derived from the results of his 
experimental work. In the years following 1840 the 
views of Liebig and of Dumas as to the nature of the 
| carbon compounds, usually spoken of as organic, attracted 
the attention of the whole chemical world, and efforts 
were especially directed to the problem of how to isolate 
the compound radicals which they were supposed to 
contain in the form of oxide, hydrate, chloride, bromide, 
iodide and so forth. The radical of common alcohol was 
naturally one to receive early attention, and to this 
subject Frankland devoted his earliest efforts. He was 
successful in 1848 in isolating a substance to which he 
and all the chemists of that day gave the name e/hy/, in 
the belief that it was really the radical of which common 
alcohol was the hydrate and common ether the oxide, 
and which was present as the characteristic basis 
of all the numerous compound ethers or ethereal salts 
then known. Though in strictness an error, long since 
corrected by apjlying the law of Avogadro, was involved 
in this assumption, the experimental method employed 
led to the further discovery of the remarkable series 
of compounds known as organo-metallic, and to the 
subsequent recognition of the varying power possessed 
by the metals and metalloids of uniting with alcohol 
radicals, with the halogens and with oxygen. The recog- 
nition of this diversity of combining capacity, and of the 
fact that each elementary atom possesses a maximum 
capacity beyond which its power of chemical union is in- 
capable of extending, supplied the basis of the modern 
doctrine of valency and of all the consequences which 
follow from the idea of the orderly linking of atoms, after- 
wards developed by Kekulé into the theory of structure, 
upon which the whole system of organic chemistry is at 
the present day established. 
At a later period Frankland pursued investigations in 
the then new and always difficult department of syn- 
thetical chemistry. In this he was associated for a time 
with Mr. B. F. Duppa. 
Among others of his researches must be mentioned 
his experiments on the influence of pressure upon the 
luminosity of flame. These resulted in a theory of 
luminosity which for many years divided the favour of 
chemists and physicists with the older theory of Davy, 
according to which the luminosity of hydrocarbon flames, 
at least, is attributed to the presence in the flame of in- 
candescent solid particles. Frankland’s theory pointed 
to the effect of density in the ignited vaporous con- 
stituents of luminous flames. 
Reference must also be made to the protracted and 
laborious study of gas and, especially, water supplies, 
which occupied so many of the later years of his life. 
Having been appointed a member of the Royal Com- 
mission on the Pollution of Rivers and Domestic Water 
Supply in 1863, he continued henceforward to give close 
attention to this important subject, and if his analytical 
methods and his conclusions were not universally adopted, 
he remained to the end of his life the most eminent 
authority on the chemical examination of water. 
Sir Edward Frankland left several sons and daughters, 
among whom his eldest son, Dr. Percy Faraday 
Frankland, F.R.S., professor in the Mason University 
College, Birmingham, is distinguished as a scientific 
chemist. 
The funeral will take place at Reigate on August 22. 
