Apeil 2, 1915] 



SCIENCE 



485 



get his chemistry wholesale as it is dis- 

 pensed in some of our hot-bed-method edu- 

 cational institutions. He had to get at his 

 facts piecemeal, one by one, adjust them, 

 ponder over them — collect his facts with 

 much effort and discrimination ; he did not 

 acquire his knowledge merely to pass ex- 

 aminations, but to use it for accumulating 

 further knowledge. 



It seems rather fortunate for him that 

 one of the first employments he got in New 

 Tork was with a chemical concern which 

 made photographic chemicals. This was 

 the time of the wet-plate, when photograph- 

 ers made their own collodion, their own 

 silver bath, their own paper. Whoever 

 went through those delicate operations 

 knew the difficulties, the uncertainties 

 which were caused by small variations in 

 the composition of chemicals or in the way 

 of using them. Photochemistry is excellent 

 experience for any young chemist who is 

 disposed to generalize too much all chem- 

 ical reactions by mere chemical equations. 

 "Whoever has to deal with those delicate 

 chemical phenomena, which occur in the 

 photographic image, knows that many un- 

 foreseen facts can not easily be accounted 

 for by our self-satisfying but often super- 

 ficial generalizations of the text-books. 



"Weston's tendency to observe small de- 

 tails in chemical or physical phenomena led 

 him to improve the art of nickel-plating 

 and electrolytic deposition of metals to a 

 point where it entered a new era. "When 

 he undertook the study of the difficulties 

 in this art, he took nothing for granted, but 

 by close observation he succeeded in de- 

 vising methods not only of improving the 

 physical texture of the deposit, but for in- 

 creasing enormously the speed and regu- 

 larity with which the operations could be 

 carried out; all these improvements are 

 now embodied in the art of electro-typing, 

 nickel-, gold- and silver-plating. 



At this time, attempts had already been 

 made for the commercial refining of copper 

 by means of the electric current. But this 

 subject was then in its first clumsy period, 

 far removed from the importance it has at- 

 tained now amongst modem American in- 

 dustries. Here again, "Weston brought 

 order and method, where chaos reigned. 

 His careful laboratory observations, har- 

 nessed by his keen reasoning intellect, es- 

 tablished the true principles on which eco- 

 nomic, industrial, electrolytie-copper-refin- 

 ing could be carried out. Professor James 

 Douglass^ referred to this fact in a recent 

 address : 



I suppose I may claim the merit of making in 

 this country the first electrolytic copper by the ton, 

 but the merit is really due him (Weston) who in 

 this and innumerable other instances, has concealed 

 his interested work for his favorite science and 

 pursuits under a thick veil of modesty and gener- 

 osity. 



The whole problem of electrolytic refin- 

 ing, when "Weston took it up, was hampered 

 by many wrong conceptions. One of them 

 was that a given horsepower could only de- 

 posit a maximum weight of copper regardless 

 of cathode- or anode-surface. This fallacious 

 opinion was considered almost an axiom 

 until "Weston showed clearly the way of in- 

 creasing the amount of copper deposited 

 per electrical horsepower, by increasing the 

 number and size of vats and their elec- 

 trodes, connecting his vats in a combina- 

 tion of series and multiple, the only limit 

 to this arrangement being the added inter- 

 est of capital and depreciation on the in- 

 creased cost of more vats and anodes, in re- 

 lation to the cost of horsepower for driving 

 the dynamos. 



The electro-deposition of metals forced 

 "Weston into the study of the construction 

 of dynamos. Until then, the electric cur- 



1 Commencement address, Colorado School of 

 Mines, MetaUurgieal and Chemical Engineering, 

 Vol. XI., No. 7, July, 1913, page 377. 



