The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-12-01
LABORATORY-MADE FOOD.
From the New York Tribune.

Men of learning are not particularly
concerned in the political success or fail
ure of at least one man recently elevated
to the French cabinet. That man is NJ
Pierre Eugene Marcellin Berthelot, who
is perhaps the foremost authority of the
present age in organic chemistry, chemi-
cal synthesis being with him an estab-
lished hobby, to use a layman's term.
AS Prof. Charles E. Colby of Columbia
remarked to the Tribune reporter Paris
is the center of France and it is the fash
ion there to elevate men of scientific at
tainments to public office in some capaci-
ty, generally the Senate" So that this
is not a mark of peculiar distinction in
that country. Public position gives a man
an income. and therefore added opportu-
nifty to prosecute his work under, if any
thing, more favorable auspicies than be-
fore. Especially is this true if, as is often
the case, he be blessed with more intellect
than cash.
NJ. Berthelot, at the time of life when
the majority of men in active business
contemplate retirement is called forth
from his laboratory into the glare of pub
lie criticism and is made minister of for
eign affairs. He will have to deal with the
synthesis of nations. The synthesized
product will be awaited with interest, and
by the bi-product produced will his sue
cess or failure as political quantity be
measured. His laboratory has been en-
larged. Like Ko-Ko, he has worked his
way up through not the animal but veg
etable Kingdom, until he has come to man.
What will he do with him? That is the
question men in politics will ask. What
has he not done for science? is the query
of scholars. What will come to the COM
mercial world from his discoveries? is the
question business men are asking when
they look about them and note the pos
sibilities underlying his theory of syn
thetlc relationship.
This is the great question to be an
sWered, and in the Laboratories of Ger
many and of France and of this country
men of great fertility of thought and re-
source are seeking the answer Some
enthusiasts are looking to synthetic chem
istry to produce a sort of commercial
millennium, doing away with vegetable
gardens, chicken yards, sugar cane fields,
tobacco plantations, indigo beds and
things of that sort. Everybody is to be
fed on synthetic food, made so cheaply
that even the anarchist will have no cause
to cOVet his neighbours goods or to envy
his neighbors superior station in life
Fine. is it not? But il has not been ac-
complished yet. 1t is venerable saying
however, that wonders never cease, and
enough has been accomplished in the field
of organic chemistry to warrant the exer-
else of an almost unlimited optimism in
predicting for the future Yet there are
few chemists who Will go as far in this
direction as NJ. Berthelot appears to have
gone. Indeed, Prof. Colby, seated in the
laboratory of the School of Mines of Gu
lumbia college, uttered to the Tribune re-
porter his conclusion that recent dis
patches regarding the French scientist's
utteranceS might be somewhat tangled
with journalistic fancy. Tbe has met NJ
Berthelot more than once, and spoke with
the quiet and determinate enthusiasm of
solid thinker and chemical expert of the
wonderful achievements of the present
French minister of foreign affairs He
researches into the secrets of thermo-
chemistry have been equally as wide and
the results obtained of as decided impor-
lance as anything he has brought out of
the field of chemical synthesis. Yet this
field is constantly widening, and Prof
Colby was not prepared to draw any line.
A familiar instance of advancement
along synthetic lines is that of the dis
covery of aliZarin, which is the essential
used in dyeing the world over. 1t was
late in the sixties that the discovery of
this in Germany gave a new tendency to
the dyeing industry. 1t was perfected
with so much success that the growing of
the madden root, which was a tremendous
agricultural pursuit in Persia, India and
the Levant, and followed in less degree
in Holland, Spain and some of the Rhine
provinces was wiped out, throwing many
thousands of tillable land into diSuse.
The importations into England alone of
the root reached the enormous value of
more than $60000 600 annually, to say moth
ing of the vast quantities brought to this
country. The synthetic product was SUI
perior as a dyeing medium to the natural.
giving better color to the fabric treated
with it,
Then, again, the bi-product proved to be
valuable in another direction, so that the
whole problem was solved on its ecOnO-
mic side. Therein lies the single secret
of success for synthetic production, the
one item of enonomy over the natural
growth. Prof. Colby referred to indigo
produced synthetically. He said the stu
dents in COlum bias chemical department
produced indigo every year in their class
work. But its synthetic manufacture on
a large scale has never been made profit
able as il has not yet been made cheaply
enough to enable the producer to com
pete in the open market with the natural
product The difficulty appears to lie in
the excess of bi-proGuct for which no
use has been found. The ratio of pure
synthesized indigo is about as one to
three. When this difficulty has been over
come. the dream of the synthesist viii be
realized. and indigo growing as an agri-
cultural pursuit viii so the way Of the
madder industry. Prof Colby turned TO
the discovery of theObromne which is
the essential principle OF cocoa. which IN
turn Us "a modification of chocolate from
tho chocolate bean. Chocolate be pro-
nounced an invigorating dish for invalids.
often prescribed by physicians because OF
the large proportion or fatty substance
contained iu -. Cocoa was IT'S mlccr SUB .
atifutc FOR extreme cases Of Illness. whore
the pure chocolate would tend TO Oger-
load the stomach of tho patient
Now the proportion OF clements D. ~ /
chocolate bean WlF 20 fF ~