May 3, 1901.] 
literature renders it impossible to present 
a complete survey of so immense a field of 
labor in the address of an evening. What 
has been said is little more than a begin- 
ning of what has been done in this line of 
biochemical research—the promise of its 
future remains to be told. 
Beside the great intellectual gain must 
be placed the immense practical benefits 
such investigations have secured for man— 
as witnessed in the saving of millions of 
lives of human beings, many times more of 
the lower animals, and large areas of plant 
life. They have ever made for the better- 
ment and happiness of man, and for the 
highest progress of civilization, and so will 
they continue. : 
Henry Winston HARPER. 
AN ELECTROCHEMICAL LABORATORY AT 
THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA. 
THE great importance of electricity in 
chemistry is universally recognized. Uni- 
versities and technical schools are rapidly 
adding appliauces for the use of this agent 
to their chemical equipments. Here, at the 
University of Pennsylvania, the first work 
done in electrochemistry was in the year 
1878. It consisted in the precipitation of 
cadmium from its salts, also the separation 
of this metal from copper, and the precipita- 
tion of uranium as protosesquioxide by the 
electric current. Since that time numerous 
other methods have been devised, and the 
practical work has been greatly amplified 
and incorporated in the course of chemical 
instruction designed for undergraduate and 
graduate students in chemistry. 
The electric energy was, at first, derived 
from various types of primary batteries, but 
as the demand for powerful and steady 
currents grew, several storage cells of the 
Julien type were introduced, early in the 
year 1888, and constantly used until 1895, 
when the equipment was increased by the 
addition of twelve chloride accumulators 
SCLENCE. 
697 
(Type E), connected to a plug-board, by 
which any number of cells could be arranged 
in series or parallel, and attached to any 
one of three sets of terminals, conveniently 
placed on a working table. Fig. 1 repre- 
sents a photograph of the table, showing 
the board in position. The storage cells 
were placed in the cupboard back of the 
distributing board. The arrangement of 
the plug- board with its connections is clearly 
indicated in Fig. 2, where the lettered and 
numbered squares represent brass blocks 
mounted on a slab of hard rubber, and the 
dotted lines indicate the electrical connec- 
tions on the back. Provision was thus 
made for three students. 
As this device and our present laboratory 
were installed at the writer’s suggestion 
and under his direction by A. W. Schramm, 
of the Electrical Department of the Univer- 
sity, it seems best, to insure accuracy and 
avoid uncertainty, to introduce the latter’s 
own language in describing the two schemes: 
‘““The brass blocks marked P are each 
connected to the positive terminal of a 
storage cell. These cells are marked in the 
figure by A, B, C, ete. The negative ter- 
minals are each connected to two blocks 
marked N, as shown. The upper line of 
blocks, numbered 1, are joined together, 
and, in fact, might be made of one strip ex- 
cept for economy of material. This row is 
attached to, and forms part of, the positive 
lead running to outlet No. 1 on the operat- 
ing table. The negative lead for this same 
outlet is connected to the lower row of 
blocks marked 1. Thus: If the operator 
at outlet No. 1 wanted to use the two cells 
A and K in parallel it would only be neces- 
sary for him to insert plugs between the 
upper row of 1 blocks and the P blocks of 
A and K respectively, and between the 
N blocks of A and K, and lower row of 
1’s. Similarly, the upper row of blocks 
marked 2 are connected to the positive 
lead running to outlet No. 2, and the 
