Researches on Cellulose | Page 2

in importance those of which the carbohydrates are the basis; whereas the former are quite insignificant by comparison. A little reflection will prove that cellulose, starch, and sugar are of vast industrial moment in the order in which they are mentioned. If it is an open question to what extent science follows industry, or vice versa, it is not open to doubt that scientific men, and especially chemists, are called in these days to lead and follow where industrial evolution is most active. There is ample evidence of activity and great expansion in the cellulose industries, especially in those which involve the chemistry of the raw material; and the present volume should serve to show that there is rapid advance in the science of the subject. Hence our appeal to the workers not to neglect those opportunities which belong to the days of small beginnings.
We have especially to acknowledge the services of Mr. J. F. BRIGGS in investigations which are recorded on pp. 34-40 and pp. 125-133 of the text.

CONTENTS
THE MATTER OF THIS VOLUME MAY BE DIVIDED INTO THE FOLLOWING SECTIONS
PAGE
INTRODUCTION--DEALING WITH THE SUBJECT IN GENERAL OUTLINE 1
SECTION
I. GENERAL CHEMISTRY OF THE TYPICAL COTTON CELLULOSE 13
II. SYNTHETICAL DERIVATIVES--SULPHOCARBONATES AND ESTERS 27
III. DECOMPOSITIONS OF CELLULOSE SUCH AS THROW LIGHT ON THE PROBLEM OF ITS CONSTITUTION 67
IV. CELLULOSE GROUP, INCLUDING HEMICELLULOSES AND TISSUE CONSTITUENTS OF FUNGI 97
V. FURFUROIDS, i.e. PENTOSANES AND FURFURAL-YIELDING CONSTITUENTS GENERALLY 114
VI. THE LIGNOCELLULOSES 125
VII. PECTIC GROUP 152
VIII. INDUSTRIAL AND TECHNICAL. GENERAL REVIEW 155
INDEX OF AUTHORS 177
INDEX OF SUBJECTS 178

CELLULOSE

INTRODUCTION
In the period 1895-1900, which has elapsed since the original publication of our work on 'Cellulose,' there have appeared a large number of publications dealing with special points in the chemistry of cellulose. So large has been the contribution of matter that it has been considered opportune to pass it under review; and the present volume, taking the form of a supplement to the original work, is designed to incorporate this new matter and bring the subject as a whole to the level to which it is thereby to be raised. Some of our critics in reviewing the original work have pronounced it 'inchoate.' For this there are some explanations inherent in the matter itself. It must be remembered that every special province of the science has its systematic beginning, and in that stage of evolution makes a temporary 'law unto itself.' In the absence of a dominating theory or generalisation which, when adopted, gives it an organic connection with the general advance of the science, there is no other course than to classify the subject-matter. Thus 'the carbohydrates' may be said to have been in the inchoate condition, qualified by a certain classification, prior to the pioneering investigations of Fischer. In attacking the already accumulated and so far classified material from the point of view of a dominating theory, he found not only that the material fell into systematic order and grew rapidly under the stimulus of fruitful investigation, but in turn contributed to the firmer establishment of the theoretical views to which the subject owed its systematic new birth. On the other hand, every chemist knows that it is only the simpler of the carbohydrates which are so individualised as to be connoted by a particular formula in the stereoisomeric system. Leaving the monoses, there is even a doubt as to the constitution of cane sugar; and the elements of uncertainty thicken as we approach the question of the chemical structure of starch. This unique product of plant life has a literature of its own, and how little of this is fully known to what we may term the 'average chemist' is seen by the methods he will employ for its quantitative estimation. In one particular review of our work where we are taken to task for producing 'an aggravating book, inchoate in the highest degree ... disfigured by an obscurity of diction which must materially diminish its usefulness' ['Nature,' 1897, p. 241], the author, who is a well-known and competent critic, makes use of the short expression in regard to the more complex carbohydrates, 'Above cane sugar, higher in the series, all is chaos,' and in reference to starch, 'the subject is still enshrouded in mystery.' This 'material' complexity is at its maximum with the most complex members of the series, which are the celluloses, and we think accounts in part for the impatience of our critic. 'Obscurity of diction' is a personal quantity, and we must leave that criticism to the fates. We find also that many workers whose publications we notice in this present volume quite ignore the plan of the work, though they make use of its matter. We think it necessary to restate this plan, which, we are satisfied, is systematic, and, in fact, inevitable. Cellulose is in the first instance a structure,