find a number of statements to which he would take exception it must be pronounced a success in the method of treatment. That the publishers have not shunned the great extra expense of making it as good in this respect as a first edition could well be made stands to their credit.

Like the U. S. Pharmacopoeia itself, this commentary had to have an appendix of reagents and tests and other information of an analytical character, of numerous tables for ready reference, etc. Last, but not least, the mass of detailed information contained in the volume, is made available through a carefully prepared index of over one hundred three-column pages containing in the neighborhood of twenty-five thousand references. The amount of work that is represented in writing practically for the first time such a massive volume as this is truly enormous. As far as commentaries on the U. S. Pharmacopoeia are concerned the new century has been begun most auspiceously. E. K.

pp. 86.

INDEX PHYTOCHEMICUS. Bewerkt in het Laboratorium van het Kolonial Museum te Haarlem door Dr. I. C. Ritsema en Dr. J. Sack, met Inleidung van Dr. M. Greshoff. One vol., J. H. De Bussy, Amsterdam. 1905. Fl. 3.50. Authors of phytochemical treatises not infrequently supplement the text of their works with a list of chemical substances found in plants. Such a list, arranged according to the percentage composition of the elements, is found as an appendix to Dragendorff's treatise in plant analysis. This list is naturally out of date.

This fact, and possibly the appearance, a few years ago, of Richter's tables of carbon compounds, arranged in accordance with the same principle, apparently have induced the chemists of the Colonial Museum at Haarlem to prepare a similar list of carbon compounds found in plants.

As the explanatory title informs us, this treatise is a systematic oversight of all phytochemical substances arranged according to their percentage of carbon. In addition, the formula, synoyms, percentage composition, molecular weight, melting point, boiling point and references to the literature are given.

The Introduction by Dr. Greshoff and the bibliography of phytochemical works ought to prove excedingly useful to those who wish to acquire a library on this subject. The list of phytochemical names

and synonyms also should prove useful although the Dutch spelling may occasionally prove a stumbling block to many. On the other hand, it ought to be very welcome as a key to much valuable phytochemical literature that has emanated from the Colonial Museum, and from other laboratories, in the Dutch language.

The major portion of the treatise is devoted to the "Stelselmatic Overzicht" consisting of tables with the information quoted above from the explanatory title.

It is a matter of some curiosity to note that the compound with lowest carbon content is phytine, C2H8O9P2 with 10.1 p. c. The next one, guanidine, CH5N3 jumps to 20.3 p. c. of carbon, whereas the eighth allantoine reaches 30.4 p. c.; the fifty-eight compound, formaldehyde, 40 p. c.; the two hundred and twenty-sixth, bergenine 50 p. c. The last name on the list is sequoiene and bears the number 2016. It is represented by the odd formula C1зH10 and contains 94 p. c. of carbon. There are only two other compounds, styrene and naphthalene with 90 p. c. of carbon or more.

How useful such a tabulation will prove to be remains to be seen. In twenty years of phytochemical research the writer has not once had occasion to refer to Dragendorff's list, but this one contains additional information. Besides others may be more inclined to use lists such as this. Putting the list to a test in three instances of substances recently found for the first time in the vegetable kingdom, the writer found one mentioned with a reference to Beilstein, the other two not. That some of the complex formulas must be regarded as exceedingly doubtful goes almost without saying, yet the compilers could do no better than the investigators in this respect.

As an unusual aspect of book writing and making, attention should bs directed to one of the last pages which is practically blank but for the invitation to record corrections and omissions and to send the page to the Laboratory of the Colonial Museum at Haarlem.

All in all we have every reason to welcome this new addition to phytochemical literature and to express the hope that investigators of plant chemistry will not only fill out the correction sheet and return it but to send to the Museum reprints of their papers. E. K. GRUNDZÜGE DER CHEMISCHEN PFLANZENUNTERSUCHUNG von Dr. S. Rosenthaler. Ein Bd., pp. 124. Verlag von Julius Springer, Berlin. 1904. M. 2.40.

The rapid advancement made in plant chemistry within the past decade or two has been pointed out repeatedly in this journal: also that the progress has taken place within special fields rather than in the general domain of plant chemistry. Nowhere does this become more apparent than in the study of phytochemical book literature. Thus, e. g. we have special treatises on alkaloids, glucosides, volatile oils, ferments, etc., but no general up to date treatise on plant chemistry, unless the recent work of Czapek be placed in this category.

This statement applies also to the analytical aspect of phytochemistry. The guides of Wittstein and Dragendorff have not been brought up to date, neither have plant chemists, until recently made an attempt to replace these older works by a new one.

The attempt, if it may so be called, that was made last year does not impress one as a serious one but rather as an after thought. It makes the impression of a "Habilitationschrift" to which later a number of footnotes and references were added. Never the less we welcome it for it may lead to something more serious and systematic if revised for a second edition. There certainly is a need for a work of this kind, but it ought to be more than primarily suggestive.

Paper and press work are of the usual excellence of the publisher and we shall welcome a second, revised and enlarged edition fully as much and more than the present attempt to give us something new and up to date in this domain of chemistry. E. K.

THE ELEMENTS OF PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY. By J. Livingston R. Morgan. 3rd edition, revised and enlarged. John Wiley & Sons, New York. One vol., pp. XII, $5.10, cloth $3.00. The general character of this treatise has already been presented to the readers of the Review in connection with the appearance of the first and second editions. In this new edition errors have been corrected, some new material has been added, the number of problems has been increased, but the general character and scope of the book has not been altered. L. Kahlenberg.

ATLAS DER HEILPFLANZEN. Verfasst von Seiner Kaiserlichen Hoheit Erzherzog Josef von Oesterreich. Bildlich dargestellt von Ihrer Kaiserlichen Hoheit Margarethe Clementine, Erzherzogin von Oesterreich. Sämmtliche in Prälat Kneipp's Schriften vorkommende Heilpflanzen auf 230 Tafeln in 60 Lieferungen à 50 Pf. Of this work seventeen parts have been completed to date. Each plant is illustrated by a large brilliantly colored plate. Of the smaller herbaceous plants the entire plant is shown with all its parts. In the case of the larger plant forms, the flower, fruit, twig and leaf are illustrated, and a separate portion of the plate is devoted to a picture of the entire plant. These latter pictures might better have been omitted for in them the artist has made a sacrifice of true porportions and perspective, in an effort to show detail.

With each plate, the Latin and German names of the plant are given, also the range and part of the plant used.

R. H. Denniston.

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