Year: 1870

Chemistry is science, which treats
of tho intimate nature of bodies, and
their mutual action on each other.
There is no study that comes so per-
fectly home to every human being,
whether inventor or mechanic, farmer
or housewife, as chemistry. Many n
valuable invention is based on chemis-
try, and very slight knowledge of
the science enables the farmer to as
certain i'll moment whether his soil
contains an excess or deficiency of lime
If n deficiency, that slight knowledge
teaches him to add to it, either pure
lime, or bone, or shells, or n multi
tide of articles containing it. So of
other qualities of his soil-chemical
analysis alone can show him how to
add what is wanting, or les Ell what is
III excess.


When the housewife knows why the
yeast or the soda and cream tartar eau sc
her dough to rise, she gives us better
bread. She can make better soap, If
she knows the principle on which the
oil and the alkai unite to form it.
The tanner and cloth dresser are both
governed purely by chemical princi-
pies i'll their operations. Long since,
the proprietor of n wooden factory told
the writer that he had cleared fifty
cents on every yard of broadcloth,
since his foreman in the dying depart
ment had studied chemistry. This
had come from the economy i'll the use
of dyes, and from the improved finish
of the cloth.


But of all men, the physician most
needs q knowledge of chemistry.
Standing by the side of one poisoned
by arsenic, or corrosive sublimate, he
can, If he knows the antidote in time,
save his patient. The same is true,
generally of the vegetable poisons.
The science shows how they may be
|counteracted.


But in the preparation and admin
istration of all his medicines. the ply
sicians should know what remedies
are incompatible with others, and this
he cannot, without knowing their mu-
tual action on each other.


We were once called to visit pa
tient of another physician, who had
by mistake taken tablespoonful of
sugar of lead (acetate of lead.) The
doctor was preparing to give castor-oil
bit was persuaded to exchange it for
Epson salts, (sulphate of magnesia. J
The sulphuric acid left the megnesia
and united with the lead, forming a
sulphate of lead, a harmless article.
The patient had no further trouble.
At an other time the writer was called
to an alarming case of hemorrhage,
when the sufferer was using Dover's
powder, made of opium, sulphate OF
potash, ect., combined with acetate OF
lead, thus rendering it inert. On
throwing aside the Sulph. the lead
cured the hemorrhage. On such small
pivot hang great results.


Practically considered, chemistry is
recent science. Until the opening
of the present century, it was scarcely
taught, and little known ON this con-
tinent. Now the steam-engine is every
where The steamboat and the rail cal
cover the waters and the land. The
drummond light begins to illuminate
our cities. All these have sprung from
chemistry-and where the end will be
no one knows.


The colleges, and some higher ac-
ademies, teach chemistry, why should
not the common school? The masses
acquire knowledgein them, and always
will. Instead of spending SO much
time on algegra and geometry, fol
which not one in hundred has prac
tical use, let us wisely teach in all oul
schools, something about the air We
breathe, the food we eat, and the wa
ter we drink.