The Chemistry of India-rubber

Abstract

DURING the last few years the development of the india-rubber industry to meet cycling, motoring, and electrical requirements has produced quite a crop of descriptive handbooks, among which those of Brannt, Henriques, Seeligmann, Clouth and Warburg are the works which come most readily to mind. As a rule, however, these treatises have dealt more particularly with the manufacturing and commercial aspects of india-rubber production, and the scientific side of the subject occupies in them a relatively subordinate place as one matter among many. In the volume before us, the author has applied himself specifically to the chemistry of india-rubber, and incidentally to that of its various substitutes. Dealing, as he does, with only the scientific portion of the subject, he has naturally treated this branch far more exhaustively than previous writers have done. But pure science is even here tempered to the technologist, for almost throughout the book the point of view is that of the working-one had almost said of the works-chemist. Theoretical exposition and practical application jostle one another in every chapter; what to do, and the reason for doing it, rub shoulders together from cover to cover. It may be said at once that the result is an eminently useful contribution to the literature of india-rubber and-its congeners.

The Chemistry of India-rubber.

By Carl Otto Weber Pp. x + 314. (London: Chas. Griffin and Co., Ltd.). Price 16s. net.