138 



SCIENCE. 



[5f. S. Vol. XII. No. 291. 



EIGHTEENTB ANNUAL BEPOET OF TEE COM- 

 3IITTEE ON INDEXING CHEMICAL LIT- 

 ERATURE. 

 The Committee on Indexing Chemical Lit- 

 erature respectfully presents to the Chemical 

 Section its Eighteenth Annual Eeport, cov- 

 ering the nine months ending June 1, 1900. 



WOEKS PUBLISHED. 

 Index to the Literature of Zirconium. By A. C. Lang- 

 muir and Charles Baskerville. Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution, Washington City, 1899. 29 pp. 8vo. 

 This forms No. 1173 of the Smithsonian 

 Miscellaneous Collections. The chronolog- 

 ical list of references is followed by a Mat- 

 ter-Index. 



A Bibliography of Steel- Works Analysis. By Harry 



Brearley. Chem. News, 80, 233, et seq. (Nov., 



1899). 



The partial bibliography is confined to 

 the contents of three English journals : 

 Chem. News, J. Chem. Soc. (London), and /. 

 Iron and Steel Inst. 



The Committee also reports the publica- 

 tion of two foreign bibliographies : 



Filhrer durch die gesammte Calcinm-Cariid und Acety- 

 len-Liiteratur. Bibliographie der auf diesen Gebie- 

 ten bisher ersohienenen Biicher, Journale, Aufsatze 

 in Zeitschriften, Abhandlungen und wiohtigeren 

 Patentsohrifteu. Herausgegeben unter Mitwirkung 

 von L. Ludwig. Berlin, 1899. 8vo. 

 This covers the industrial field as fully as 

 the bibliogi-aphjr by Matthews (Smithsonian 

 Miscellaneous Collections) does the scien- 

 tific field, and both taken together are im- 

 portant for students of the subjects. 



Repertoire generate, ou Dictionnaire inethodique de bib- 

 liographie des industries tinctoriales et des industries 

 annexes depuis les origines jusqu' d, la fin de I'annee 

 1896. Par Jules Garf on. Paris, 1899-1900. 

 The first volume of this extensive work 

 contains a chapter on the sources of chem- 

 ical bibliography, iu which the author fully 

 recognizes the works issued under the aus- 

 pices of this committee and those pubUshed 

 by the Smithsonian Institution. The author 

 writes : ' ' America yields to no nation in 

 the matter of bibliography ; an American 



devised the decimal system of bibliography, 

 and Americans framed the Committee on 

 Indexing Chemical Literature, of which the 

 Reports, edited by Mr. H. C. Bolton, are 

 found in the Proceedings of the American 

 Association for the Advancement of Science, 

 since 1883." 



EEPOETS OF PEOGEBSS. 



Dr. Alfred Tuckerman has completed and 

 sent to the Smithsonian Institution a Sup- 

 plement to his Index to the Literature of the 

 Spectroscope, which covers the period from 

 1887 to 1899. 



Dr. H. Carrington Bolton's Second Sup- 

 plement to his Select Bibliography of Chemistry, 

 containing a list of 7500 chemical disser- 

 tations is passing through the press ; it will 

 form a volume of the Smithsonian Miscel- 

 laneous Collections. 



Mr. A. G. Smith, of Cornell University, 

 is engaged on an Index to the Literature of 

 Selenium and Tellurium, which, it is expected, 

 will be completed this summer. 



Dr. Frank I. Shepherd, Secretary of the 

 Cincinnati Section of the American Chem- 

 ical Society, plans a bibhography of the 

 Alkaloids. 



Mr. Frank E. Fraprie, of the University 

 of Illinois, Urbana, 111. , writes to the Com- 

 mittee that he contemplates preparing an 

 Index to the Literature of Lithium. 



The Committee chronicles the new method 

 of indexing chemical substances used by M. 

 M. Eichter in his Lexicon, and by the edi- 

 tors of the Berichte der deutschen chemischen 

 Gesellschaft, in which the references to or- 

 ganic compounds are arranged under their 

 empirical formulae ; the Chairman of your 

 Committee finds that Mr. Edwin A. HiU, 

 of the U. S. Patent Office, has been engaged 

 for more than two years in cataloguing 

 chemical bodies under their empirical form- 

 ulae for convenience of his office. Mr. 

 Hill's system is adaptable to inorganic com- 

 pounds as well as to those of carbon, and 



