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Aug. 11, 1870] 
NATURE 
295 
certain knowledge, 14, Lancaster Gate is supplied by the 
Grand Junction Company ; thus Dr. Frankland has been 
analysing two samples of the same water, supposing them 
to have come from different sources. This mistake could 
not have been found out till after the report was printed, 
and the results obtained by the two experiments are as 
follow :— 
] : o 
Bete] lotle lee g 
S18) leeleg(os| $|5 
3.) 8)2) 8 (Scie s)-21 8 
Bel 2].e) 8 ies sise) = |= 
_ 181 e}4 estes] o|z 
< | P| Blo 186 S 
s 916 ZI5 |a° >: 
Grand Junction, collected | 
at the cab standin Wood- ||24°7|"235] 020|'000] 184/204) 1520)1°62)19°36 
stock Street, May 17. J 
Water collected at 14, Lan- 
caster Gate, supposed | 
be from the West Mid-\\24°6|'129|'023}'000}'r88|:211/1560|1"60| 19°36 
dlesex Company; but 
actually from the Grand 
Junction, May 15. 
It may be objected that even these numbers do not 
approximate so closely as those of Messrs. Wanklyn and 
Chapman, but they represent actual quantities obtained 
from water, and nota theoretical “ albumenoid ammonia,” 
which may not be an indication of the quantity of organic 
impurities. 
Since Frankland and Armstrong’s paper was published 
an immense number of analyses have been made with the 
process, and in his annual report to the Registrar General, 
Dr. Frankland states that he has seen no reason to be 
dissatisfied with the results. Probably no one, uncon- 
nected with Dr. Frankland’s laboratory, knows better than 
Mr. Chapman that improvements in the details of the 
manipulations have been made during the last two years ; 
and it is, therefore, with very questionable taste that he 
has reprinted the appendix to the first edition of the book 
without a single word of qualification. 
It is much to be deplored that two young chemists, with 
such undoubted abilities as Messrs. Wanklyn and Chap- 
man possess, should have rendered themselves notorious 
by attacking older workers in scientific investigation. It 
is, no doubt, very laudable in a young and ardent investi- 
gator, when he points out that high authorities may eir 
and frequently have erred, but the manner in which these 
gentlemen have carried out their corrections has made 
their matter more distasteful. It would almost seem as 
if they found an incentive to work in the hope of being able 
to overthrow the “huge superstructures” which have 
been raised by men who have been longer in the field of 
scientific research. 
OUR BOOK-SHELF 
A Sketch of a Philosophy. Part U1. The Chemistry of 
Natural Substances. Mlustrated by two folding plates 
and 150 figurate diagrams of molecules in the text. By 
John G. Macvicar, LL.D.,D.D. (Williams and Norgate, 
1870.) 
Ir is a hard matter to give a just account of this pam- 
The views propounded by the author are so 
entirely different from those usually held by chemists, and 
according to the author’s own statement they have been 
so little studied by others, that it is difficult to know ex- 
actly how to treat the subject. We should scarcely be 
justified in saying that the whole system is mere imagina- 
tion, though some hold this opinion; but the book, 
though evidently written with the intensest earnestness, 
is the work of an enthusiast, which will explain the bitter 
complaints he makes against modern chemists for not 
taking more notice of molecular morphology. The author 
endeavours to explain the formation of all matter by the 
aggregation of the ethereal element, supposing that all 
bodies tend to assume a symmetrical, and more or less 
spherical form. The simplest form of aggregation Dr. 
Macvicar considers to be the ¢e¢rad, consisting of four 
specks of the material element so arranged in space that 
they form the angles of a tetrahedron, the lines joining 
them indicating the attracting and repelling forces operat- 
ing between the units. Two tetrads are also assumed to 
join base to base producing the éz¢e¢rad, and from these 
two forms the tetrad and the bitetrad, all the atoms and 
molecules of our planet are supposed to be produced. 
This tetrad by attracting another unit opposite to one of 
its faces constitutes a group of five units, considered to 
be the atoms of hydrogen, and with the atomic weight of 
five. The author proceeds to show the mode of genesis 
of many other elements and compounds by the juxta- 
position of these elemental forms, By calculation he 
can determine by his system the specific gravities of solids 
and liquids referred to water as unity, in a manner simi- 
lar to that by which the densities of gases and vapours 
may be deduced by the old system. This alone would 
seem to show that the method deserves more attention 
from chemists than it has yet received. The non-recep- 
tion of this molecular morphology may be ascribed to 
several causes : the diction of the author is peculiar, and 
he writes in a dogmatic manner, which might be expected 
in a theological work, but is not usually found in a 
treatise on natural science ; then he pushes his inferences 
to such an extent (or as some would say, rides his hobby 
so hard) that his conclusions appear somewhat ludicrous, 
unsupported as they are by experiment : thus he traces 
the coincidence between the assumed hexagonal form of 
the molecule of aqueous vapour andthe shape of the 
minimum snow-flake and ice-flower, and “the inflorescence 
of plants of the monocotyledonous order, in which an 
aqueous tissue predominates ” ; he thinks that one of the 
forms of aqueous vapour which occupies half the volume 
of the other, may possibly be converted into the second 
variety at a high temperature, and thus explain the ex- 
plosion of steam boilers. Again the dimorphism of 
water may be the cause of the production of animal heat ; 
for water in the body may be transformed from one of its 
varieties into the other with evolution of heat; but on 
escaping from the body as perspiration, the inverse action 
takes place and cold is produced. But underneath all 
these extravagances there may be a stratum of truth, and 
we hope that either the author or some one who under- 
stands and accepts his views thoroughly, will so develop 
them as to ensure their reception by chemists. 
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 
[ The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions expressed 
by his Correspondents, No notice is taken of anonymous 
communications. | 
The Source of Solar Energy 
I HAVE not Mr. Proctor’s ‘* Other Worlds ” by me to refer to, 
but my impression on reading that book some little time ago, 
certainly was, that if it did not directly support the meteoric 
theory of solar energy, it at least favoured the idea of innumer- 
able meteors fallinginto the sun. The principal portion of my 
letter in last week’s NATURE, was not, however, so much ad- 
dressed against any special views of Mr. Proctor’s relative to this 
meteoric theory, as it was against the probability of meteors fall- 
