November 24, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



719 



book in English dealing with this branch of 

 science demands particular attention. 



The great difficulty in writing such a book 

 is in the rapid developments which are being 

 made in the subject, and it seems as if the 

 method followed in Germany, of issuing mono- 

 graphs on a particular branch of applied elec- 

 trochemistry, was really more practical than 

 attempting to include them all in one book. 



In the present volume Professor Thompson 

 has fifteen chapters, ten of which deal with 

 electrolysis in the wet way, the remaining 

 chapters being devoted to the electric furnace 

 and its products. 



There are necessarily a great many processes 

 to be described in such a program, but not- 

 withstanding this a considerable part of the 

 space is devoted to theoretical considerations. 

 While the theoretical discussion is important, 

 there are many good books which deal with 

 this exclusively, and it would seem perhaps 

 better to have expanded the description of the 

 actual processes themselves. 



Thus the refining of copper, which is an 

 electrochemical process of the first magnitude, 

 is described in seven pages, and aluminium, 

 which is manufactured on a very large scale, is 

 dealt with in five pages, and the actual process 

 is described in a few lines without illustration. 



The book as a whole, however, serves a very 

 useful purpose, giving a great deal of informa- 

 tion on a long list of subjects. Abundant ref- 

 erences are furnished and the illustrations are 

 excellent. One typographical error occurs, 

 however, which seems a pity, the name of 

 Moissan is invariably printed Moisson. 



The contents of the book is as follows : 

 Goniometers, Electrochemical Analysis, Elec- 

 troplating, Winning and Refining Metals in 

 Aqueous Solution, Eeduction and Oxidation, 

 Electrolysis of the Alkali Chlorides, Elec- 

 trolysis of Water, Primary Cells, The Lead 

 Storage Battery and the Edison Storage Bat- 

 tery, The Electric Furnace and Products of 

 the Arc and Resistance Furnaces, Electro- 

 metallurgy of Iron and Steel, Fixation of At- 

 mospheric Nitrogen, The Production of Ozone, 

 Appendix, Name and Subject Indexes. 



Samuel A. Tucker 



Lippincott's New Medical Dictionary, a vocab- 

 ulary of the terms used in medicine, den- 

 tistry, veterinary medicine and the allied 

 sciences, with their pronunciation, etymol- 

 ogy and signification, including much col- 

 lateral information of a descriptive and 

 encyclopedic character. By Henry W. 

 Cattell, M.D. Philadelphia and London, 

 J. B. Lippincott Company. 1911. Freely 

 illustrated with figures in the text. Second 

 edition. 8vo. Pp. xvi + 1108. Price $5. 

 There is hardly any field of science that is 

 more in need of a technical dictionary than 

 medicine. One might trace back the first 

 attempt to provide the medical profession with 

 such a work as early as circa 1300, when 

 Simone Cordo of Genoa wrote his " Synonyma 

 medicinae sive clavis sanitatis " (editio prin- 

 ceps, Milano, 1473). In the United States the 

 first medical dictionary (not taking into con- 

 sideration the American editions or reprints 

 of English medical dictionaries) to be issued 

 was published in 1808 by John Redman Coxe, 

 of Philadelphia (1773-1863), professor in the 

 University of Pennsylvania and one of the 

 leading American physicians in the first half 

 of the last century. 



Since then here and abroad numerous med- 

 ical dictionaries have been published. As one 

 of the best, if not the best, in another lan- 

 guage, we consider Walter Guttmann's " Medi- 

 zinische Terminologie " (4 Auflage, Berlin, 

 1911). In England Richard D. Hoblyn's dic- 

 tionary of terms used in medicine and the 

 collateral sciences (14th edition, London, 

 1909) takes a very high rank. 



In Lippincott's " New Medical Dictionary," 

 written by Dr. Henry Ware Cattell, of Phila- 

 delphia, we have a work which not only equals 

 those just mentioned, but even excels them in 

 completeness, thoroughness and encyclopedic 

 method. However, it is only just to state 

 that owing to the low educational require- 

 ments and inadequate instruction in many of 

 our medical colleges an American medical dic- 

 tionary must be written under conditions 

 entirely different from those in other coun- 



