958 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXII. No. 835 



to say that while it is scarce a text-book for 

 beginners, it is probably our best text-book 

 of organic chemistry for advanced students. 

 E. Eenouf 



Essentials of Chemistry, experimental, de- 

 scriptive, theoretical. By Eufds Phillips 

 Williams, Teacher of Chemistry in the 

 English High School, Boston. Boston, 

 Ginn and Co. 1910. 



This is an excellent manual for schools, 

 very fully illustrated with portraits and with 

 pictures of apparatus. It contains many in- 

 structive, qualitative and quantitative experi- 

 ments, and technical methods are fully ex- 

 plained. 



Outlines of Organic Chemistry. A book de- 

 signed especially for the general student. 

 By F. J. Moore, Ph.D., Associate Professor 

 of Organic Chemistry in the Massachusetts 

 Institute of Technology. New York, John 

 Wiley and Sons. Pp. 315. 

 This book is of the same size and general 

 contents as most college text-books of organic 

 chemistry, but especial attention is paid to 

 those substances which are of importance in 

 daily life, in vital processes, or are of especial 

 commercial value, such as oils, sugars, cellu- 

 lose-derivatives, urea, amino-aeids, proteins. 

 The size of the book restricts the number of 

 compounds presented, but the presentation of 

 those chosen is scientific and complete. The 

 treatment of the sugars is excellent, in its 

 clear showing of the essential part of Fisch- 

 er's work. It is an exceptionally good book 

 for study. 



Analytical Chemistry. By F. P. Teeadwell, 

 Ph.D., Professor of Analytical Chemistry 

 in the Polytechnic Institute of Zurich. 

 Authorized translation from the German by 

 William T. Hall, S.B., Instructor in Chem- 

 istry, Massachusetts Institute of Technol- 

 ogy. Volume II., Quantitative Analysis. 

 Second edition, thoroughly revised and en- 

 larged. Total issue, six thousand. New 

 York, John Wiley and Sons. 1910. Pp. 

 Y8Y, 110 figures. $4.00. 

 Professor Treadwell's books on " Analysis " 



were first published in German in 1899 and 



have a large circulation abroad. In 1903 Mr. 

 Hall published his translation of the volume 

 on qualitative analysis; this was followed in 

 1904 by the volume on quantitative, of which 

 the present volume is the second edition. Six 

 thousand copies printed indicate the favorable 

 reception of the book in this country and in 

 England. 



Mr. Hall has compared the text with the 

 fourth German edition and has made addi- 

 tions, rendering the book more helpful to 

 American chemists. 



On comparing Treadwell's books with the 

 older manuals one is impressed by the sim- 

 plicity of arrangement and by the wise and 

 careful choice of methods. Instead of pre- 

 senting a host of alternate methods to the 

 student who is incompetent to estimate their 

 relative value, he gives a full description, 

 often illustrated, of those most approved. 



The additions made by the translator com- 

 prise well-tried American methods, most of 

 them technical. Among them are A. A. Blair's 

 methods for determining vanadium, molybde- 

 num, chromium, nickel and phosphorus in 

 steel ;■ the dry combustion method for carbon, 

 the Drown method for determining silicon, 

 both in use at the Bureau of Standards, and 

 the improvements of Hillebrand in mineral 

 analysis. 



E. Eenouf 



The Johns Hopkins Univeesitt 



SPECIAL ARTICLES 

 * NOTES ON THE PASSENGEE PIGEON 



A WELL-WRITTEN Special from New York to 

 the Chicago Evening Post (printed December 

 2, 1910) stating that " A solitary passenger 

 pigeon, ending its life at the Zoological Gar- 

 den at Cincinnati, is to-day all that remains 

 of the species that early in the last century 

 swarmed over the continent in flocks number- 

 ing billions," suggests the desirability of add- 

 ing to the occasional notes on this native 

 bird a record of personal observations. 



During early life in eastern Iowa it was my 

 fortune to see much of the passenger pigeon. 



