380 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLVII. No. 1216 



timely, the organic volume of Vanino is the 

 best at present and it gives plenty of refer- 

 ences to original papers. 



If these fail him, he, with the inorganic, 

 physical and industrial man, must plunge 

 into what librarians call the abstract and 

 review serials, giving currently or for an 

 annual period the literature with abstracts, 

 and, in review serials, some critical discus- 

 sion as well. There are many in English, 

 German and French; perhaps a few suggest- 

 ions may be of service — at least the plan has 

 worked fairly, during a trial of six years with 

 the senior graduate students and an occasional 

 faculty member. 



For rapid work, take those abstract serials 

 in English first: when the ten-year collective 

 index to Chemical Aistracts appears that will 

 be for a time the best starting point. Barring 

 that, take the annual indexes of the Chemical 

 Aistracts or the London Journal, going back 

 to the newest collective index of the London 

 Journal, for 1903-12 ; then use these collective 

 indexes, which take the literature back to 1841. 

 If these articles and cross references are not 

 enough, turn to Liebeg and Kopp's Jahres- 

 hericht, from 1847, but published so far only 

 through 1910, and use collective indexes again. 

 To insure finding everything, one may check 

 by use of the collective indexes of the French 

 Bulletin, 1858-1896, and Chemisches Central- 

 hlait; the latter has no collective index pub- 

 lished for 1880-96. For work done before 

 1847 there are two chief sources : (a) Ber- 

 zeliua's Jahreshericht, 1822 to 1850, with a 

 collective index for the first twenty-five vol- 

 umes; we have one also, made at Illinois, for 

 the volumes 26-30; (6) the collective indexes 

 of the Annales, 1789 to approximately 1870, 

 when it ceased giving abstracts. For 1901 on. 

 International Index to Scientific Literature: 

 Chemistry, may give some references omitted 

 by accident from the other lists, though it 

 does not often happen. Supplementary too, 

 are the collective indexes of the Chemical 

 News, Vol. 1—100, and Journal fiir prahtische 

 Chemie, Vol. 1-100, but neither of these at- 

 tempts to include all chemical literature. 

 This list does not pretend to be complete. 



though the foregoing are enough in most 

 cases, but some divisions of chemistry have 

 excellent special publications; as, in agricul- 

 tural chemistry the collective indexes of the 

 Experiment Station Record, Biedermann's 

 Centralblatt and Hoffmann's Jahreshericht. 

 For industrial chemistry in general, the two 

 indexes of the Journal of the Society of 

 Chemical Industry, 1882-1905, the one, 1887- 

 1907, of Zeitschrift fiir angewandte Chemie 

 and two for Wagner's Jahreshericht for 1855— 

 1894; here for dyes, explosives and coal-tar 

 products in general the Friedlaender, noted 

 for organic chemistry, is invaluable; biochem- 

 istry has a worthy rival to Beilstein and more 

 up-to-date, in the indefatigable Abderhalden's 

 " Biochemisches Handlexikon " and its sup- 

 plement, ten volumes now, but without a 

 collective index as yet; the Biochemisches 

 Zentralhlatt, dating from 1902, has only one 

 collective index as yet; the most thoroughly 

 satisfactory source for the time it covers is 

 Maly's Jahreshericht, 1870 to date, though un- 

 fortunately the collective index for 1901-10 

 has not yet reached this country, if it has 

 even appeared. For pharmaceutical chemis- 

 try, the 50-year Index to Proceedings, now 

 continued as Yearbook, of the American Phar- 

 maceutical Association, 1851—1902, is usefid, 

 as well as the collective and annual indexes of 

 the British Pharmaceutical Journal, 1841 to 

 date, and of the American Journal of Phar- 

 macy, 1833 to date. The U. S., National- 

 Standard, and the American Dispensatory, all 

 give references, particularly to medical litera- 

 ture, not to be had elsewhere. 



The work as offered seems in part to solve 

 the problem, when the number of students is 

 too large for individual instruction, and it has 

 the advantage of calling to the students at- 

 tention the literature in several divisions of 

 chemistry, Seniors pride themselves on being 

 able to find books on the shelves, as well as 

 references for their own use. Some training 

 is gained by presentation of the oral reports, 

 since the outline for these is discussed with the 

 instructor before presentation in class; the 

 class furnishes a critical audience; notebooks 

 are expected to contain date, topic, speaker. 



