492 REVIEWS — ELEMENTS OF INORGANIC CHEMISTRY. 



At pages 307, 331 and 333 the same occurs ; at 339, 347 and 348 

 tlie apparatus is correct, a safety tube being attached to the flask, 

 although in the latter arrangement (348) the use of the wide tube is 

 not very apparent, inasmuch as there is nothing that could possibly 

 flow back under any circumstances. 



In looking over the illustrations in the works of Otto, Mitscherlich, 

 B-egnault, and Pelouze, we do not find any in which the safety tube is 

 omitted, where a dangerous explosion could possibly take place, and 

 we point out this oversight merely for the purpose of showing how 

 necessary it is, in a work intended for learners, to correct the en- 

 gravings as carefully as the letterpress. 



It is much to be regretted that the treatise before us is confined to 

 inorganic chemistry, if it were continued to the organic department 

 with the same completeness and ability that characterise the present: 

 portion," chemists would receive a work of which they are much ia 

 need. By the lamented death of G-melin, his invaluable Handbuch 

 remains incomplete, although it must be confessed that even this 

 excellent work is not free from all objections, inasmuch as his system 

 of arrangement is the most artificial and inconvenient that could 

 possibly be imagined. A reader who is not already a good chemist is: 

 left entirely at the mercy of the index when hunting up the history of 

 any compounds. Tbe different organic combinations being arranged 

 in classes according to the number of equivalents of carbon they con- 

 tain, if he does not remember their composition he cannot know in 

 which group to look for them ; such an arrangement being moreover 

 constantly variable with the results of improved analyses or more 

 rational theories. Kolbe's continuation of Otto drags its slow length 

 along, and promises to be completed about the same time as the 

 CataloD-ue of the British Museum Library. Limpricht's excellent 

 manual has not yet, as far as we know, been translated into English ;, 

 and we cannot recommend to any aspiring translator, who is well 

 acquainted with the advances of organic chemistry, a more praise- 

 worthy undertaking than to prepare an edition of this small but 

 most excellent work, bringing it up to the present state of the science. 

 In Mr. Watts' supplement he has very judiciously introduced a 

 chapter on Chemical Notation and Classification, in which a short but 

 comprehensive explanation is given of Gerhardt's unitary system, 

 somewhat like that which forms the introduction to Limpricht's Chem- 

 istry. We are not aware of Gerhardt's views having been reproduced 



