1876.] 
Notices of Books. 
xi3 
houses built with concrete in iron frames, which may possibly not 
prove sufficiently porous for the walls of healthy houses. Slag 
he very rightly condemns as a building material, and gives from 
Pettenkofer an instance of a house constructed of blocks of this 
material being permanently and incurably damp. 
The author quotes the experiments of Dr. Angus Smith, 
showing that carbonic acid alone, quite irrespective of organic 
matter derived from the lungs and the skin, &c., has a bad effedt. 
One part of carbonic acid in 1000 of . air occasioned an increase 
of 18 to 19 respirations per minute, the speed of the pulse at the 
same time being diminished. We observe the statement made 
on the authority of Dr. Odling, that for equal illuminating power, 
candles yield a larger amount of “ impurity” than gas. We 
presume the impurity here meant is carbonic acid, but it must 
not be forgotten that all ordinary coal-gas contains sulphur com- 
pounds, whose products of combustion are far from desirable. 
In concluding this necessarily brief examination, we must pro- 
nounce Mr. Hartley’s book a valuable addition to our popular 
scientific literature. All persons of decent education, be they 
young or old, may read it with pleasure and advantage. 
The Dictionary of Chemistry and the Allied Branches of otliev 
Sciences. By H. Watts, F.R.S. Second Supplement. 
London : Longmans, Green, and Co. 
A Dictionary of chemistry is in its very nature interminable. 
So rapid is the growth of the science that by the time the com- 
piler has completed his task and reached the end of the alphabet, 
the crop of new researches which have sprung up in the mean- 
time compel him to resume his pen and to amend, add, and 
rescind in accordance with the most recent authorities. 
This supplement, we are told, only brings the record of 
chemical discovery down to the end of the year 1872, including 
some of the more important discoveries which have appeared in 
1873 and 1874. Among the chief articles in this volume are 
papers on the phenols and on sulphur chlorides by Professor 
Armstrong; on magnetism, Prof, by G. C. Foster; on digestion, 
gastric juice, muscular tissue, respiration, and urine by Dr. H. 
N. Martin ; on the chemical adfion of light and on spedtral 
analysis by Professor Roscoe, and on topics belonging to agri- 
cultural chemistry by R. Warington. The articles on analysis, 
chemical adtion, gases, and many others from the pen of the 
editor are deserving of notice. The work may be considered as 
an essential requisite in the library of every chemist. 
VOL. VI. (N.S.) 
Q 
