Ea | 

Oct, 12, 1871] 
organic chemistry. 

NATURE 
469 

and is not yet completed. The following extract from the 
introductory observations will indicate the spirit in which 
it is written —“ A few are still dissatisfied with the argu- 
ments against the dualistic system, and continue to em- 
ploy the atomic weights of Berzelius, or the equivalents of 
elin ; and among those who have adopted the new 
System of atomic weights and formule, there are many 
who have done so merely in a spirit of concession, and 
make a display of scepticism respecting its intrinsic value ; 
others, on the contrary, push their faith to the extent 
of fanaticism, and give equal value to the essential 
and accessory parts of the system, or even cling to hypo- 
theses that merely lean against it or have been Second. 
They often speak on molecular subjects with as much dog- 
matic assurance as though they had actually realised the 
ingenious fiction of Laplace—had constructed a micro- 
scope by which they could detect the molecules, and ob- 
serve the number, form, and arrangement of their con- 
stituent atoms, and even determine the direction and 
intensity of their mutual actions, These things, which 
have been offered merely as hypotheses more or less 
probable, and to be taken for what they are worth as 
Simple artifices of the intellect, are valuable, and have 
done good service in collocating facts and inciting to 
further careful investigations that one day or other may 
lead to a true chemical theory ; but when perverted by 
being stated as actual truths, they falsify the intellectual 
education of students of inductive science, and bring re- 
proach upon the modern progress of chemical science.” 
We learned a great cee from Italy in the Middle Ages, 
and may yet learn more, I earnestly commend the above 
lesson to some of our laboratory aspirants, who are occu- 
pying themselves in ringing the changes upon organic 
compounds, and who afterwards describe their atomic 
achievements as glibly, mechanically, and confidently, as 
though they had been laying bricks or piling shot. 
An interesting paper (a note it is modestly called) on 
“The Absorbent Power of Red Phosphorus” is contri- 
buted to the May number, by Fausto Sestini, from the 
Laboratory of the Royal Technical Institute of Udine. 
(Udine is a small town, smaller than Croydon, and situ- 
ated about 7o milés N.E, of Venice. How many of such 
towns in England have Royal Technical Institutes with 
laboratories for original research?) The author finds that 
red phosphorus absorbs many substances without com- 
bining with them, after the manner of porous charcoal. 
Thus it may be made to take up 37369 per cent. of iodine, 
a considerable quantity of sulphur, rosaniline, &c. This | 
wer of “chemical adhesion * may be easily and strik- 
ingly shown by shaking powdered red phosphorus in a test 
tube containing a coloured solution of iodine in bisulphide 
of carbon. When a sufficient quantity of phosphorus is 
used, the whole of the iodine is taken up and the solvent 
rendered colourless. Rosaline is similarly removed from 
an etherial solution, and a portion of it may be again re- 
covered unaltered from the phosphorus by washing with 
alcohol. 
The July number contains some further contributions 
by Sestini from the same laboratory, on the proportions 
of bisulphide of carbon, its solubility in water, and the 
compounds formed by its contact with aqueous solutions 
of the oxides of the metals of the alkaline earths. Also 
some interesting communications from the laboratory of 
the University of Siena by Prof. G. Campani, among 
which is one showing that the absorption bands of an 
ammoniacal solution of carmine so closely coincide with 
those of blood, as to be undistinguishable in a spectro- 
scope with a scale of twenty degrees. Mr. Sorby will 
probably be able to tell us whether any difference ts dis- 
tinguishable by more minute examination. 
Lieben and Rossi contribute a series of rather impor- 
tant papers on some of the alcohols, and besides these there 
are some of the ordinary miscellaneous contributions to 
W. Marrisu WILLIAMS 

THE CRYSTAL PALACE AQUARIUM 
N Naturs of April 20 last appeared a short i. 
Stating that this © enterprise, of which great scientific 
use can certainly be made,” was taking form, and that 
when some of the marine animals were introduced, and 
the thing was in working order, a description of it would 
be given, 
The building undertaken by the Crystal Palace Aqua- 
rium Company was commenced in July 1870, much too 
late therefore to be opened when at first contemplated, 
April 1, 1871, though at Easter last half a dozen of the 
marine tanks were temporarily converted into freshwater 
ones, and some pike, tench, carp, eels, &c,, were shown 
therein for three days ; when the place was closed, and 
the progress of the works continued, and then the estab- 
lishment was finally opened on August 22, 1871, It would 
have been well if the sea-water had been in good condition 
in the early part of the summer, so that advantage might 
have been taken of the then exceptionally cool weather 
to transport some of the great abundance of animals at 
that time on the coasts of England; but that was not 
possible, and then; when the water wey fit, the weather 
became very hot, and the sending of many animals was 
thereby prevented, Such creatures as could be got, how- 
ever, were obtained, and the opportunity is now being 
taken of the present increasingly colder season to add other 
animals constantly, so that ina short time most of the 
tanks will be populated. 
The accompanying plan, on page 471, drawn to a scale of 
about soft. to rin., shows the ground occupied by the 
Aquarium and its adjuncts to be nearly 4ooft, long and 
ott. broad, and it is situated at the northern end of the 
Palace, on a portion of the site of it burnt in 1865. Itis 
of one story high, and, therefore, this ground plan shows 
everything, except the sea-water reservoir beneath the 
Saloon GG, extending under its whole width, and run- 
ning below Tanks 9 and 10, and going lengthwise from 
Eto H2, This reservoir contains $0,000 gallons of sea- 
water, and the tanks above contain 20,000 gallons, in 
all 100,000, gallons weighing a million pounds; and 
the fact of the aggregate contents of the tanks being only 
one-fourth of the contents of the reservoir, is extremely 
serviceable in keeping the water clear, as, supposing the 
water in, say tank ro (holding 4,000 gallons), became 
turbid from any cause, it can be emptied by syphons in 
less than an hour into the reservoir, where so comparatively 
small a quantity of fluid would not appreciably disturb 
the purity of so great a mass, from which, in less than 
half an hour, No, ro can again be filled, and thus all the 
tanks where animals exist, are, by being constantly pumped 
into, day and night, from the large, clear, and cool reser- 
voir below, where there are no creatures, kept ever in good 
order. The main aération which is thus depended on for 
the health of the creatures, is by these means produced by 
mechanical agitation, and the quantity of sea-weed neces- 
sary to decompose the poisonous carbonic acid gas evolved 
from the animals, which could not be effected by mechani- 
cal agitation, is grown upon the rocks of the aquarium by 
the action of light on the spores of algz existing invisibly 
in the water. As the motion of the water needs to be 
incessant, all the machinery is in duplicate, there being 
two boilers, each of four horse power, two steam-engines, 
each of three horse power, and two of Forbes’s patent 
pumps, and one of each is kept ever in action, the other 
being in reserve in case of accident. The sea-water 
issuing from the pumps at the rate (indicated by a 
counter, while a tell-tale clock furnishes evidence of the 
attention of three enginemen, each working for eight con- 
secutive hours) of from 5,000 to 7,000 gallons an hour, 
passes in the first place into the two highest tanks, 9 and 
10, half into each, and from thence it runs, diverging 
north and south, as far as tanks 1S and 1, From 1§ it 
flows into 60, and from 1 into 39, in each case passing 
