Biography of Berzelius. 205 



dustry, and for a long time without any help. He re-exa- 

 mined every important chemical compound with the most 

 admirable care and exactness. In this work, especially, he 

 displayed rare talent, selecting, with the most extraordinary 

 acuteness, those bodies which were the best adapted for in- 

 vestigation. He published an account of his labours, or 

 rather the commencement of them, in the third part of the 

 " Afhandlingar i Fysik, Kemi och Mineralogi" for 1810. 

 They first appeared in German in 1811, in Gilbert's Annalen, 



In these investigations, theory was constantly the touch- 

 stone employed to test the accuracy of the results, to at- 

 tain which he was frequently obliged to vary his experiments 

 almost endlessly. He was, in the first instance, compelled to 

 improve the analytical methods, and to abandon many of 

 those in use at that time, and by this means he was gradually 

 led to those views which are now received by all chemists. 



The most distinguishing characteristic of Berzelius's mode 

 of working was, that with the most insignificant means at 

 his command, he still succeeded in obtaining the most bril- 

 liant results. When he entered upon his great investigation, 

 he was in possession of very small pecuniary means, he was 

 in a condition almost of want, and without public support, 

 which, considering the isolated situation of Sweden, must have 

 been especially depressing and unfavourable. The difficulties 

 against which he had then to contend were, in fact, enormous. 

 At that time it was not possible to purchase in Stockholm 

 pure reagents, as in Berlin ; scarcely any chemical manufac- 

 tories existed in the country, and, to import reagents from 

 abroad, for instance from Germany, was often scarcely pos- 

 sible, on account of the difficulty of communication, especially 

 during the war, and was at all times expensive and tedious. 

 I have myself been a witness how Berzelius, even during the 

 winter of 1820, while carrying out his important investiga- 

 tion of ferrocyanogen and ferrocyanide of potassium (which 

 had long been procurable in Germany for a small sum per 

 pound), was obliged to prepare this salt by the gramme, and 

 indeed from a very bad material, the very impure Prussian 

 blue of the shops. He was obliged to distil the spirit, the 

 use of which in lamps he introduced, from ordinary brandy, 



VOL. LIII. NO. CVI. — OCTOBER 1852. P 



