NATURE 



[September 17, 1896 



If) electrolyse a solution of chloride of sodium, and to produce 

 thereby chlorine and caustic soda, I am not aware that up to this 

 day any quantity of caustic soda made by electrolysis has been 

 put on to the market. 



Only two electrolytic works producing chlorine on a really 

 large scale are in operation to-day. Both electrolyse chloride of 

 pota.ssium, producing as a bye-product caustic potash, which is 

 of very much higher value than caustic soda, and of which a 

 larger quantity is obtained for the same amount of current e.\- 

 ]iended. These works are situated in the neighbourhood of 

 Stassfurt, the important centre of the chloride of potassium 

 manufacture. The details of the plant they employ are kept 

 .secret, but it is known that they use cells with porous dia- 

 phragms of special construction, for which great durability is 

 claimed. There are at this moment a consideral)le number of 

 smaller works in existence, or in course of erection in various 

 countries, intended to carry into practice the production of 

 chlorine by electrolysis by numerous methods, differing mainly in 

 the details of the cells to be used ; but some of them also involv- 

 ing what may be called new principles. The most interesting of 

 these are the processes in which mercury is used alternately as 

 kathode and anode, and salt as electrolyte. They aim at obtaining 

 in the first instance chlorine and an amalgam of sodium, and 

 subsequently converting the latter into caustic soda by contact 

 with water, which certainly has the advantage of producing a 

 very pure solution of caustic soda. Mr. Hamilton Castner has 

 carried out this idea most successfully by a very beautiful 

 decomposing cell, which is divided into various compartments, 

 and so arranged that by slightly rocking the cell the mercury 

 charged with sodium in one compartment passes into another, 

 where it gives up the sodium to water, and then returns to the 

 first compartment, to be recharged with sodium. His process 

 has been at work on a small scale for some time at Oldbury near 

 Birmingham, and works for carrying it out on a large scale are 

 now being erected on the banks of the Mersey, and also in 

 Germany and America. 



Entirely different from the foregoing, but still belonging to 

 our subject, are methods which propose to electrolyse the 

 chlorides of heavy metals (zinc, lead, copper, (Sic.) obtained in 

 metallurgical operations or specially prepared for the purpose, 

 among which the processes of Dr. Carl Hoepfner deserve special 

 attention. They eliminate from the electrolyte immediately 

 both the products of electrolysis, chlorine on one side and zinc 

 and copper on the other, and thus avoid all secondary reactions, 

 which have been the great difficulty in the electrolysis of alkaline 

 chlorides. 



All these processes have, however, still to stand the test of 

 time before a final opinion can be arrived at as to the effect they 

 will have upon the manufacture of chlorine, the history of 

 which we have been following, and this must be my excuse for 

 not going into further details. I have endeavoured to give you 

 a brief history of the past of the manufacture of chlorine, but I 

 will to-day not attempt to deal with its future ! \'et I cannot 

 leave my subject without stating the remarkable fact that every 

 one of these processes which I have described to you is still at 

 work to this day, even those of Scheele and Berthollet, all 

 finding a sphere of usefulness under the widely varying con- 

 ditions under which the manufacture of chlorine is carried on in 

 diflferent parts of the world. 



Let me express a hope that a hundred years hence the same 

 will be said of the processes now emerging and the processes 

 still to spring out of the inventor's mind. Rapid and varied as 

 has been the development of this manufacture, I cannot suppose 

 that its progress is near its end, and that nature has revealed to 

 us all her .secrets as to how to procure chlorine with the least 

 expenditure of trouble and energy. I do not believe that 

 industrial chemistry will in future be diverted from this Section 

 and have to wander to Section A under the ;egis of applied 

 electricity. I do not believe that the easiest way of effecting 

 chemical changes will ultimately be found in transforming heat 

 and chemical affinity into electricity, tearing up chemical 

 compounds by this powerful medium, and then to recombine 

 their constituents in such ft>rm as we may require them. I am 

 .sure there is plenty of sco]5e for the manufacturing chemist to 

 solve the problems before him by purely chemical means, of 

 .some of which we may as little dream to-day as a few years ago 

 it could have been imagined that nickel would be extracted from 

 its ores by means of carbon-monoxide. 



At a meeting of this Association which brings before us an 

 entirely new form of energy, the Riinlgen rays, which have 



NO. 1403, VOL. 54] 



enabled us to see through doors and walls and to look inside the 

 human body ; which brings before us a new form of matter, re- 

 presented by Argon and Helium, which, as their discoverers, 

 Lord Kayleigh and Prof. Ramsay, have now abimilantly proved, 

 are certainly elementary bodies, inasmuch as they cannot be split 

 up further, but are not chemical elements, as they possess no 

 chemical affinity and do not enter into conil>inations — at a meet- 

 ing at which such astounding and unex]5ccted secrets of nature 

 are revealed to us, who would call in doubt that, notwithstand- 

 ing the immense progress pure and applied science have made 

 during this century, new and greater and farther-reaching dis- 

 coveries are still in store for ages to come? 



THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE 

 ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE. 

 nPHE action of the nominating Committee of the American As- 

 sociation (see N.mure of September lo), in recommending 

 a merely formal meeting next year at Toronto, on the day pre- 

 ceding that of the British Association, evoked a storm of oppo- 

 sition in the general session, and a vote was passed requiring the 

 Council to arrange for a regular meeting and fix the time and 

 place. 



The Council subsequently fixed on August 9, 1897, as the 

 time, and Detroit as the place, providing for a recess to Toronto 

 before the final adjournment, in order to welcome the British 

 Association. 



Of the viirious Sections, popular interest evidently centred in 

 that of Social and Economic Science, as was evinced by the very 

 large attendance, and by the attention devoted to its proceedings 

 by the daily press of Buffalo. The first paper read before this 

 section, on "The Monetary Standard," taking strong ground for 

 the gold standard, was read by Wm. H. Hale. Edward Atkinson 

 sent a paper entitled " What is True Money?" ; also one en- 

 titled "Crime against Labour." Other papers were : "The 

 Competition of the Sexes and its Results," by Lawrence Irwell ; 

 "Fashion — a Study," by S. E. Warren; "Citizenship, its 

 Privileges and Duties," "Relics of Ancient Barbarism," and 

 " Practical Studies in Horticulture, Art and Music," by S. F. 

 Kneeland ; " An Inheritance for the Waifs," by C. F. Taylor ; 

 "The Proposed Sociological Institution," by James A. Skilton ; 

 "The Value of Social Settlement," and "The Wages Fund 

 Theory," by A. B. Keeler ; " Better Distribution of Forecasts," 

 by John A. Miller: "The Tin-plate Experiment," by A. P. 

 Winston, and " Suicide Legislation," by W. L. O'Neill. 



Thirty-five papers were read in the Anthropological Section, 

 including contributions from Brinton, Boas, McGee, Fletcher, 

 Beauchamp, Wright, Mercer, and others. Especial interest was 

 felt in the paper of Secretary F. W. Putnam, on the researches 

 made in the ancient city of Coapan, located in Honduras, just 

 over the border from Guatemala. 



Prof Putnam was the first to go beneath the surface. He began 

 in Yucatan, and soon found that buildings now on the .surface 

 were of recent date : but underneath were indications of remote 

 antiquity. City has been built over city, in one place as many 

 as five having been superposed, showing as many successive 

 occupations. 



The two Biological Sections had twenty-three papers in zoology 

 and forty-two in botany. Among the well known contributors 

 were L. O. Howard, E. D. Cope, L. M. Underwood, T. N. Gill, 



D. S. Kellicott, C. E. Bessey, J. M. Coulton, and N. L. Brit- 

 ton, The Botanical Club also held several meetings, and the 

 botanists devoted all day Friday to an excursion by lake to Point 

 Abino. 



The Geological Section was enriched by all the papers from the 

 Geological Society of America, which held merely a business 

 meeting, an arrangement now adopted for the first time, but so 

 successfully that it will be extended next year to the Chemical 

 Society, and ultimately to other affiliated societies. Thirty-four 

 papers were read to the geologists, among prominent con- 

 tributors being B. K. Emerson, Warren U|iham, I. C. White, 



E. W. Claypole, G. K. Gilbert, and J. \V. Spencer. H. O. 

 Hovey, who has made a speciality of cave explorations, gave 

 interesting accounts of new discoveries in Mammoth Cave and 

 elsewhere. The feature of this Section was the commemorative 

 exercises on Wednesday afternoon, referring to the sixtieth 

 anniversary of the work of Prof. James Hall in connection with 

 the survey of New York State. Addresses and papers were 

 given by Prof. Emerson, Prol. Joseph Le Conie, W. J. McGee, 



