My attempts to interest my students in books and bibliographies are briefly these: For one term of 15 weeks of the junior year the students of the course in chemistry devote an hour each week (with two hours assigned for preparation) to practice in reading chemical German. The subject matter assigned is either from some work on general or analytical chemistry or from some current journal. Of late I have confined myself mostly to a work on inorganic chemistry. The purpose here is not at all to attempt to teach German, but to assist the students in acquiring a moderate facility in reading, that is, sufficient to enable them to get the essentials from an article, rather than to make a finished translation.
During the term following this, there is assigned to the class one or more (usually two) topics, and they are required to prepare and submit for inspection a bibliography of the journal literature upon these subjects. This year the topic assigned to the whole class was the "Determination of sulphur in irons and steels." The class (of 30) was divided into squads, and to each squad a second topic was assigned, such as "The use of sodium peroxide in analytical chemistry," "The preparation and analysis of persulphuric acid and the persulphates," "The recovery of molybdic acid from residues," etc.
General directions are given as to procedure in the compilation of the bibliography, the use of such periodicals as the Centralblatt as a starting point, and also the way to record and classify the references found.
This year we have used library cards for the recording of the references for the first time, with marked success. Each card was to bear the original reference, the Centralblatt or Jahresbericht reference, the title of the article (if possible) and a very brief statement of its contents. The cards were then to be grouped according to a classification to be worked out by the student.
Each student had finally about 200 cards, often with several references on a card. They were allowed to divide the journals among the members of a given squad, and to exchange cards.
The results are most satisfactory. The work has been well done as a whole, and already I hear of resolves on their part to keep up a card catalog of interesting articles, which is a promising symptom.
Each year for some time, I have devoted a single hour near the close of the year to a brief discussion of books, from the point of view of the needs of a person desiring to collect a small library. In this connection I have put into the students hands a list of "Standard works" citing the essential reference books on the subject, and have commented briefly on the list. Please understand that this list is not by any means infallible, and that there are doubtless other works just as good as those mentioned.
Our senior students are all required to compile a bibliography of the literature of the subject chosen as a thesis, and to prepare a brief review of all recorded work, before they can begin their investigation, and the way in which they attack this work seems to indicate that the familiarity with journals and methods gained in the work of the junior year outlined above stands them in good stead.
In connection with the instruction in the history of chemistry, frequent preparation of memoirs and a study of works in this field is also required.
The list of books referred to in Dr. Talbot's letter was divided under the following heads: History of chemistry, Physiological chemistry, Organic chemistry, Technical chemistry, Agricultural chemistry, Analytical chemistry, Biography, Dictionaries, Tables, Dyeing, Foods, General chemistry, Toxicology.