Elementary Chemical Microscopy

Abstract

THIS book forms a welcome addition to the very restricted literature of chemical micro scopy. It affords a considerable amount of in formation concerning the microscope itself, and its special adaptation to the purposes of the chemist and metallurgist. It also places at the disposal of the chemist the data for performing a large number of more or less trustworthy microchemical reactions. One notices immediately, however, a singular omission, that of any reproductions of either drawings or photomicrographs of the crystals produced in these reactions as observed under the microscope. A book on mierochemical analysis without any indications other than verbal of the appearances seen under the microscope is surely like the play of “Hamlet” without the title-rôle. Considering the excel lent photomicrographical apparatus now available such an omission is not easy to understand. More than twenty years ago the reviewer prepared and showed to his students in the form of lantern slides numerous photomicrographs of the crystal line products of chemical reactions. The book of Haushofer (which does not appear to be mentioned at all by Prof. Chamot), published so long ago as 1885, although faulty in many respects, contained a large number of reproductions of careful drawings of the appearances on the micro-slip, and the later work of Behrens was also well illustrated in a similar manner.

Elementary Chemical Microscopy.

By Prof. E. M. Chamot. Pp. xiii + 410. (New York: J. Wiley and Sons, Inc.; London: Chapman and Hall, Ltd., 1915.) 12s. 6d. net.