Scientific American Supplement, No. 365, December 30, 1882 | Page 8

simplify the study of organic compounds. The full value of the discovery was recognized at once by Berzelius, who, in a letter to the authors of the paper, proposed that they should call their radical proin or orthrin (the dawn of day), for the reason that the assumption of its existence might be likened to the dawn of a new day in chemistry. The study of this paper should form a part of the work of every advanced student of chemistry. It is a model of all that is desirable in a scientific memoir. The paper on uric acid is remarkable for the number of interesting transformation products described in it, and the skill displayed in devising methods for the isolation and purification of the new compounds. Comparatively little has been added to our knowledge of uric acid since the appearance of the paper of Liebig and W?hler.
It would lead too far to attempt to give a complete list of the papers which have appeared under the name of W?hler alone. In 1828 he made the remarkable discovery that when an aqueous solution of ammonium cyanate, CNONH{4}, is evaporated, the salt is completely transformed into urea, which has the same percentage composition. It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of this discovery. That a substance like urea, which up to that time had only been met with as a product of processes which take place in the animal body, should be formed in the laboratory out of inorganic compounds, appeared to chemists then to be little less than a miracle. To-day such facts are among the commonest of chemistry. The many brilliant syntheses of well-known and valuable organic compounds which have been made during the past twenty years are results of this discovery of W?hler.
In 1823 he published a paper on secretion, in the urine, of substances which are foreign to the animal organism, but which are brought into the body. He discovered the transformation of neutral organic salts into carbonates by the process of assimilation.
In 1832 he investigated the dimorphism of arsenious acid and antimony oxide. In 1841 he made the discovery that dimorphous bodies have different fusing points, according as they are in the crystallized or amorphous condition.
Among the more remarkable of his investigations in inorganic chemistry are those on methods for the preparation of potassium (1823); on tungsten compounds (1824); the preparation of aluminum (1827); of glucinum and yttrium (1828). In 1856, working with Ste. Claire Deville, he discovered crystallized boron.
Analytical methods were improved in many ways, and excellent new methods were introduced by him. Further, he did a great deal for the improvement of the processes of applied chemistry.
With Liebig he was associated in editing the "Annalen der Chemie and Pharmacie" and the "Handw?rterbuch der Chemie." He wrote a remarkably useful and popular "Grundriss der Chemie." The part relating to inorganic chemistry appeared first in 1831, and was in use until a few years ago, when Fittig wrote his "Grundriss" on the same plan, a work which supplanted its prototype.
The above will serve to give some idea of the great activity of W?hler's life, and the fruitfulness of his labors. While thus contributing largely by his own work directly to the growth of chemistry, he did perhaps as much in the capacity of teacher. Many of the active chemists of the present day have enjoyed the advantages of W?hler's instruction, and many can trace their success to the impulse gathered in the laboratory at G?ttingen. The hand of the old master appears in investigations carried on to-day by his pupils.
W?hler's was not a speculative mind. He took very little part in the many important discussions on chemical theories which engaged the attention of such men as Dumas, Gerhardt, Berzelius, and Liebig, during the active period of his life. He preferred to deal with the facts as such; and no one ever dealt with the facts of chemistry more successfully. He had a genius for methods which has never been equaled. The obstacles which had baffled his predecessors were surmounted by him with ease. He was in this respect a truly great man.
Personally, W?hler was modest and retiring. His life was simple and unostentatious. He had a kindly disposition, which endeared him to his students, to which fact many American chemists who were students at G?ttingen during the time of W?hler's activity can cordially testify. In short, it may be said deliberately that W?hler, as a chemist and as a man, was a fit model for all of us and for those who will come after us. Though he has gone, his methods live in every laboratory. His spirit reigns in many; could it reign in all, the chemical world would be the better for it.
I.R.
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LOUIS FAVRE, CONSTRUCTOR OF THE ST. GOTHARD