[Book Reviews]

Abstract

THE first of these reprints contains translations of papers by Carl Wilhelm Scheele (1774), C. L. Berthollet (1785), Guyton de Morveau (1787), and J. L. Gay-Lussac and L. J. Thenard (1809). This volume, together with the earlier reprint in this series (No. 9), containing Davy's researches, completes the history of chlorine from its discovery by Scheele to the proof of its elementary nature by Davy. The importance of this discussion upon the development of chemistry is obvious, but it is somewhat, difficult to step back from what is now common-place knowledge, to the standpoint of these early pioneers. The paper of Scheele, although worded in terms of the theory of phlogiston, is remarkable for its terseness and lucidity, and for the clear and correct ideas expressed upon the nature of the new gas. Indeed, if the word hydrogen be substituted for phlogiston, Scheele's explanation of the action of hydrochloric acid upon the black oxide of manganese almost represents our present knowledge. Berthollet, on the other hand, writes very voluminously upon a very slender experimental basis, and as an ardent exponent of the views of Lavoisier, concludes that chlorine gas is the oxide of an, unknown radical, and this fixed idea leads to quite erroneous interpretations of observed facts.

Alembic Club Reprints. No. 13. The Early History of Chlorine. No. 14. Researches on Molecular Asymmetry.

Pp. 46 and 48. (Edinburgh: W. F. Clay, 1897.)