Wolcott Gills. 257 



laboratory which he built for the purpose ; and also invaded 

 the only remaining department of inorganic chemistry, which 

 could be ranked for complexity and difficulty with the three 

 already occupied by him, — this was the cerium group, but 

 advancing years prevented him from making more than a pre- 

 liminary exploration in this Held. 



In these last years at Newport he also took up an extended 

 study of the effect of isomeric organic compounds on animals, 

 at first with Dr. H. A. Hare and later with Dr. E. T. Reichert. 

 In addition to this work in physiological chemistry he had in 

 his earlier papers made occasional excursions into theoretical 

 chemistry, organic chemistry, mineralogy, and physics, an 

 astonishingly broad field to be covered by one man. His fame, 

 however, rests on his work in inorganic and analytical chem- 

 istry, and it seems to me that his two qualities, which make 

 this preeminent, are thoroughness and accuracy. Next to 

 these I should place his wonderful suggestiveness. His ideas 

 flowed rather in a torrent than a stream, and occasionally bore 

 him away from some good subject, after he had little more 

 than broken the ground in it. Even old age did not check 

 this current, his paper on the cerium metals published at 72 

 containing five new and ingenious suggestions for their sepa- 

 ration. The criticism, which might be made on his work, is 

 that he was content to prepare the experimental foundations, 

 but left it to others to build the theoretical structures upon 

 them. The reason for this, I think, was that before all else 

 he was an experimentalist. His table was always covered with 

 a multitude of test tubes each with a label in its mouth setting 

 forth the substances reacting within, and it was beautiful to 

 watch the sharpness of insight with which he seized on the 

 favorable indications in these numerous experiments, and the 

 rare skill and robust energy with which he followed any line of 

 work that promised results of value. 



As a teacher he had an especial faculty for imbuing his stu- 

 dents with the enthusiasm and spirit of original work ; and 

 they felt the greatest admiration and affection for him. The 

 only instruction I received from him was a single voluntary 

 lecture in my senior year. In this his ideas came hurrying out 

 with an impetuous speed, as if there were too many to be 



