Organic Chemical Manipulation

Abstract

THIS is in some respects a useful little book, but it might easily have been made much more useful. It is divided into two parts. The first portion—102 pages —is occupied mainly with a very brief description of processes of purifying organic substances, namely, crystallisation, distillation, melting-point determination, and sublimation; and a short outline of the processes of ultimate organic analysis. A large part of the matter in this section of the book is what the student will find in almost any text-book on quantitative analysis, and. might perhaps with advantage have been omitted here, and its space devoted to an extension of the matter in Part ii., and to more exact and detailed directions for carrying out the “manipulations” therein described. The second part of the book, covering 150 pages, is on the “preparation of organic substances.” This, at least, is what it professes to be; but there is so much “descriptive” matter distributed throughout it, that in parts it more resembles a simple text-book on organic chemistry, with experiments thrown in. For example, after giving very fair directions for the preparation of methane from sodium acetate, and the performance of two or three experiments illustrative of its properties, the author proceeds to describe, in the true text-book style, the various other methods for the preparation of marsh gas. Thus:—

Organic Chemical Manipulation.

By J. T. Hewitt Pp. xi + 253. (London: Whittaker and Co., 1897.)