April 5, 1889.] 



SCIENCE. 



265 



phate of sodium, and left the aluminium fluoride ready to be re- 

 duced. The advantages of this process were that all the materials 

 were treated at a comparatively low temperature. The vessel in 

 which the aluminium fluoride was heated, as well as the vessel in 

 which the re-action took place, was lined with cryolite, so that there 

 was no danger of impurities being imported into the aluminium 

 which was the result of the process. The low temperature was 

 very much easier managed than the high temperatures of which 

 Mr. Anderson had spoken. 



On the chairman asking what temperature was necessary, Mr. 

 Siemens replied about goo° (Celsius), just above a dull red. The 

 process, of course, required the action of sodium, and the inventor 

 was engaged in experimenting upon a new process to prepare this ; 

 but, as the necessary patents had not yet been taken, he was not 

 at liberty to describe it in detail.* At a short distance from Han- 

 over the factory was at work producing aluminium on a commercial 

 scale, though it was not on the magnificent scale of Mr. Castner's ; 

 but the process was extremely simple, and the extremely clever 

 way in which the by-products were used promised exceedingly well 

 for the process. 



Mr. W. Boby said it appeared from the tables that 263 pounds of 

 coal were used to produce i pound of aluminium ; and this, to his 

 mind, seemed a very formidable figure. He was himself connected 

 with a rival process for manufacturing aluminium, which was in 

 practical work, by the use of the electric furnace. This process 

 did not produce pure aluminium ; but one of the great and important 

 uses of aluminium was as an alloy. If you got a pure aluminium, 

 it was an extremely light metal, and it was very difficult to alloy it 

 with iron. In the Cowles process the aluminium was produced in the 

 furnace, and it was alloyed with iron, and came out in the proportion 

 of 12 or 16 per cent of aluminium to the entire mass of the product. 

 The aluminium in the alloy may be considered pure, as we know 

 the other constituents. It was reduced from a hard white clay 

 known as bauxite. The interior of the furnace was 5 feet long and 

 2 feet deep. They had a dynamo, which gave a current at 60 volts 

 of 5,000 amperes, and it was conveyed through the furnace by 

 means of carbon electrodes. The charge of bauxite and broken 

 iron was put into the furnace, which was luted with charcoal to 

 resist the heat, the current was turned on, and in an hour and a 

 half they tapped the furnace and got out the charge of alloy. In 

 the mean time the bauxite had become reduced from the intense 

 heat in the furnace. There was a certain admixture of carbon in 

 the charge, which formed a resistance to the current, and enabled 

 it to diffuse heat through the charge. About 200 pounds of alu- 

 minium were produced per day. In answer to the chairman's 

 question as to the percentage of the silicon which the alloy of iron 

 contains, he could not tell the exact percentage, but he knew it was 

 not a large one. In the copper alloy, in making 10 per cent bronze, 

 the percentage was about .5. 



Mr. Oliver J. Williams asked whether Mr. Anderson knew any 

 thing of Brin's aluminium process, which he understood produced 

 aluminium alloy from clay at a very small cost. 



Mr. Anderson, in reply to Mr. Riley, said that wrought iron had 

 been cast into large ingots, and the Germans had a cast-wrought 

 iron ; but it was new to him to hear that small and delicate cast- 

 ings, such as those exhibited, had been made without the use of 

 aluminium. He did not think it could be done. Bauxite was a 

 species of clay, and they had to pick out a material which had the 

 greatest purity. If you could get it at a reasonable price, it was bet- 

 ter to use a pure material than one which was impure, and have to 

 get out the impurities afterwards. In steel a fractional percentage 

 of carbon made a wide difference in the quality. He was not sur- 

 prised, therefore, to find that aluminium would produce wonderful 

 effects in the quality of the casting, and yet be scarcely distinguish- 

 able in the product. He was sorry to hear from Mr. Jeans that 

 aluminium was not likely to be used very extensively in steel cast- 

 ings, and thought he was mistaken in this respect. 



Mr. Jeans said what he meant to say was that the quantity of 

 steel castings made in England up to the present time was so 

 small, that the quantity of aluminium to be used would be com- 

 paratively small, at any rate until the production of castings had 

 extended. 



Mr. Anderson said that the production of steel castings was 



increasing immensely every day. Aluminium would be used for 

 the following reason : that when one made a bad steel casting it 

 was a desperate job to get rid of it. It was very important to be 

 sure that the castings made were sound ; and, when aluminium 

 could be obtained pure, it would come very much into use. It was 

 no use making impure aluminium. It was quite possible, with a little 

 extra expense, to get aluminium containing only one per cent of 

 impurity. French aluminium had had the pre-eminence in this re- 

 spect up to the present, but the purity of the French material had 

 not exceeded 98 per cent. It aluminium could be got at 99 per 

 cent of purity, or even a little above this, it would be an invaluable 

 material for the manufacture of fine wire for making into braid, as 

 it did not tarnish. The process referred to by Mr. Siemens was a 

 very interesting one, and the only objection to it was the use of 

 cryolite. The Aluminium Company were doing their best to get 

 rid of the use of cryolite. 



Mr. Siemens said the cryolite was a by-product of the raw prod- 

 uct ; it was made from the sulphate of aluminium. 



Mr. Anderson thought that any process which would produce 

 the metal on a large scale, and cheaply, would be a great advan- 

 tage. He was not aware that any aluminium was made of a greater 

 purity than 98 per cent, or at a lower price than 40 shillings per 

 pound. His paper had nothing to do with the electrical process for 

 making aluminium alloy. 



BOOK-REVIEWS. 



Stiggestive Therapeutics : a Treatise on the Nature and Uses of 

 Hypnotism. By H. Bernheim, M.D. Tr. by Christian A. 

 Herter, M.D. New York and London, Putnam. 8°. $3.50. 



Hypnotism is no longer a novelty. Its long apprenticeship 

 among the charlatans has been served ; the ill name it gained dur- 

 ing the days when pretension took the place of proof has been 

 outlived ; its apparent contradiction to the recognized laws of 

 physiology has been minimized, if not removed. It holds a rec- 

 ognized place as a psychological method, as an extension of the 

 domain of medicine, as a most promising field of scientific psycho- 

 logical advance. However interesting would be the history of the 

 steps by which this favorable change of aspect has been accom- 

 plished, it must for the present be dismissed with the remark that 

 it was in France that the movement grew and prospered, and it is 

 to French scientists that most of our knowledge is due. The ob- 

 ject of Dr. Bernheim's work is to give an exposition of the present 

 appearance of the topic, especially with reference to its application 

 to practical medicine. 



At the risk of repeating what is well known, it must be prefaced 

 that students of hypnotism are divided into two camps, — the 

 school of Paris, of which Dr. Charcot is the leader ; and the school 

 of Nancy, represented by Dr. Bernheim. The former recognize 

 three stages of hypnotism marked by constant physiological char- 

 acteristics, transition from the one to the other of which is obtained 

 by physical means ; they believe, too, in the action of the magnet 

 upon hypnotic patients, regard the appearances in hysteria as 

 typical of hypnotism, and in part lay claim to such abnormal effects 

 as the action of drugs at a distance. The school of Nancy may be 

 characterized as " suggestionists," for this is the keynote of their 

 view. They regard the phenomena as psychical in origin, recogniz- 

 ing no physical effects except as they act upon the mind ; and they 

 see differences of degree in the various stages of hypnosis, but no 

 sharp distinctions of kind ; furthermore, they assimilate the appear- 

 ances to natural sleep, repudiating all claims to supernatural ef- 

 fects. 



In this work of Professor Bernheim's we have the best exposition 

 of the Nancy school, — a view, it should be added, that is daily 

 gaining ground, and has received the sanction of almost all the 

 German, Swiss, and Italian investigators, who have critically ex- 

 amined both views. No work is better suited for translation into 

 English ; and, with the translation of Binet and Fere's " Animal 

 Magnetism," the English reader is favorably situated for gaining a 

 clear insight into this enticing study. The arrangement of the 

 book is capable of improvement. After explaining the modes of 

 producing the state, the various degrees of its intensity, the role of 



