Maech 7, 1902. J 



SCIENCE. 



383 



house, one chemist for a packing company, 

 one chemist in a testing laboratory, and 

 one in charge of the teclmical science de- 

 partment in a large library. 



No doubt the list of graduates from 

 other technical schools would show a sim- 

 ilar, or even greater, variety of occupa- 

 tions. It is at once evident that it would 

 have been impossible to fit these men for 

 the specific occupations which they now 

 follow. Only in very rare instances could 

 the occupation be predicted before gradua- 

 tion. Work spent upon the details of tech- 

 nical processes woiild, in the large major- 

 ity of cases, have had no direct practical 

 value. When we consider the ever-broad- 

 ening scope of the chemical knowledge of 

 our time, and the time limits which are 

 practically set for the student's work, we 

 cannot doubt that time spent in laying 

 broad and solid foundations will be much 

 more useful than any great amount of time 

 given to the details of industrial chemis- 

 try. 



At the basis of all must come a thorough 

 training in analytical chemistry, and es- 

 pecially in quantitative analysis. While I 

 think that the laboratory work should be- 

 gin with work in general chemistry and 

 that should be followed by qualitative 

 analysis, no very large amount of time 

 should be given to either by students who 

 are to become chemists. Fifteen hours a 

 week for one half to two thirds of a school 

 year should be sufficient. The work given 

 in general chemistry should be directed 

 toward the illustration of fundamental 

 principles and instruction in accurate ma- 

 nipulation with varied forms of apparatus, 

 rather than to a large amount of detailed 

 demonstration of the properties of ele- 

 ments and compounds. Beyond a very lim- 

 ited amount of the latter kind of study, the 

 attention of the student mil weary and he 

 will acquire the fatal habit of performing 

 experiments as directed, writing descrip- 



tions in his note-book and straightway for- 

 getting all about them. The same is even 

 more true of some kinds of work often giv- 

 en in qualitative analysis. The greater 

 length of time required for quantitative 

 operations, and the comparative simplicity 

 of the processes involved, are better suited 

 for training the beginner in the accurate 

 memory of detail which is so useful for 

 the chemist. 



In the selection of topics in quantitative 

 analysis I heartily believe in beginning 

 with pure salts, which give a rigorous test 

 of the student's accuracy. After a limited 

 number of such determinations, however, 

 the student's work is best directed to the 

 analysis of various commercial products, 

 the object being to give as varied a train- 

 ing as possible and a knowledge of the most 

 practical methods. In general, a reason- 

 able economy of the student's time should 

 be considered and long and tedious meth- 

 ads should not be used, especially when 

 shorter methods give as good or better re- 

 sults. The determination of the principal 

 constituents of iron and steel, determina- 

 tion of iron, copper, zinc and lead in ores, 

 assaying for gold and silver, the determi- 

 nations of sanitary water analysis, coal 

 analj^sis, and gas analysis should be in- 

 cluded for every student. One or more 

 complex analyses, as a clay analysis or an 

 analysis of a mineral water are also very 

 desirable, and beyond this many special 

 topics may be assigned to individual stu- 

 dents. No hard and fast course should be 

 laid down to be followed by all alike. At 

 some point the quantitative work should 

 be broken oif and a few weeks given to in- 

 organic preparations, and a few weeks, at 

 some other point, to organic preparations. 

 There should, of course, be lecture courses 

 in general and organic chemistry and in 

 the history and theories of chemistry. The 

 lecture work in physical chemistry should 

 be supplemented by laboratory work. 



