30 THE ANALYST. REVIEWS. PRACTICAL CHEMISTRY." THIS is an extremely useful handbook, containing a large amount of carefully collected and well arranged information on the analysis of the principal articles of diet in daily use, and the detection and estimation of organic and inorganic poisons. Tho author has, of course, drawn largely from the published works of others, but he has followed, or we might almost say, set an example which might well be used more generally, by giving at the end of each chapter a list of the works consulted and from which the information has been partly drawn.By this means he affords a valuable opportunity for estimating the importance t o be attached to those determinations or etatements which appear to differ to any extent from those ordinarily accepted.A very small amount of space is devoted to the ordinary laboratory manipulations, and this is certainly an advantage, for it is monotonous to read in handbook after hand- book full instructions for carrying out processes which are supposed to have been learnt even by a junior student in a laboratory. I n the classification of the starches and directions for the microscopical examination, the author has followed closely the instructions laid dovn in Muter'~ Orgat& Hateria bledica.The chapter on sugar is well and carefully written, and is one of the first cases in which we have seen the polariscopic estimation of sugar by the more recent optical method fully and accurately described. In reference to wheat, bread and flour all the most recent reeearcbes are referred to, and the only thing we can see to regret is, that a method proposed by Wanklp for the determination of gluten by means of alkaline and permanganate solution ahould have been referred to as a fairly accurate one, for, after all, such a process as this can only by any possibility yield a small percentage of the total nitrogen present.As to milk and butter the author has availed himself freely of all recent papers that have been written on the subjects, and the chapters contain a very complete com- pendium of nearly all that is now known on the matter.Tea, coffee and cocoa are treated very fully, and there are, perhaps, a larger number of original analyses than are t o be found in any other book of the same class. The chapters on alcohols, wines and beers are complete, and contain not only the necessary instructions for their ordinary analysis, but also the tables of original gravities ; and in the case of wines, a reprint of Gautier's tables for the detectiou of the colouring matters which have been added.The latter half of the book is devoted entirely to the detection and estimation of poisons, and a good deal of care has evidently been taken t o arrange this matter in such a systematic and consecutive form that it should be handy for reference.We think the author has been very successful in his attempts in this direction, and all those who are occasionally troubled with difficult and tedious examinations for poisons will find the book of value. THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BOARD REPORT.THE seventh report recently issued devotes about five pages to the work done by public analysts under the Sale of Food Act, and these contain a good deal that is interesting to analysts generally. During the year endinrr March, 1878, to which the report refers, 27 * A Xanual of Practical Chewbistry. The Aualysis of Foods and the Deteclion of Poisons. By A. fvynter Blyth, M,R.C.S., F.C.S.0, Gri5n & Co., 1579.THE ANALYST. 31 additional appointments of analysts were made, and up to that time the appointments then existing mere as follows :-Counties, 42 ; boroughs, 72 ; district boards and vestries in the metropolis, 39 ; total, 153. The Board have recently addressed communications to all authorities who had not appointed analysts, and they note with satisfaction that many of those have since complied, or are complying, with the provisions of the Act.The Board point out as noteworthy that, “in several English counties, and in the greater part of Wales, no analyses whatever have been made, and the counties of Buckingham, Essex, Kent, Oxford and Suffolk have, together, only furnished 30 samples.” This is precisely the same information, and is conveyed in almost the same words that we used when we drew the attention of the public t o the matter in the early part of 18’7’7, and again in 18’78, and the same remark mill have to be made year after year until compliance with the Act is made compulsory.I t is scarcelF likely that a number of men interested in commerce- many of them in retail commerce-will, themselves, put a penal Act of this kind in motion.The tabulated statement of the description and number of samples nnalysed during the year is fairly concordant with that we have already published, allowing for the fact that there is three months difference between the dates of the commencement and close of the two tables. The remarkable fact again comes to the front that drugs are considerably more adulterated than the average of all other samples, and that, in fact, if we exclude spirits, the adulteration of drugs is 25 per cent.of that of all other samples taken together. This does not seem a very creditable state of things for chemists and druggists, and we can scarcely wonder that the opinion of the Board should be ex- pressed in such terms as the following :-(( We regret that a larger number of samples of drugs haye not been submitted to analysis; it is obvious that the use of adulterated drugs may defeat the intentions of the physician, and that the consequences may be exceedingly serious.Of the samples examined, more than one-fifth are reported against, and some of them were far below Ihe standard of the British Pharmacopma. There was one case in which suspicion was aroused by the death of two dogs, t o which medicine bought as jalap had been administered, and an analysis showed that two-thirds of the SO- called jalap consiated of strychnine.” It is worth while to note that the number of samples of drugs examined, which the Board regret as insufficient, was larger than tho number of samples of spirits other than gin, nearly as large as the number of samples of beer, and about 80 per cent.of the number of samples of flour, so that on the whole it appears that drugs were fairly looked into. As to the dilution of spirits, the Board state they are aware that dissatiefaction has arisen as to the Torking of the Act, and that they have received petitions on the subject, but they sum up the matter by saying it does not appear to us that any altcratioa of the lam is necessary to meet this case ; there is no reason why a publican should not sell a mixture of gin and water, provided that he does not sell the mixture asgin, which i t certainly is not.” The total number of samples included in the returns for the year is 14,706, of which 2,826, or 19.2 per cent.were adulterated. The results of the examination of te:t in bond show that out of 662 samples one chest was destroyed as unfit for food, 7 samples, representing 1,578 packages, were still under detention, and 36 samples, representing 10,491 packages, were allowed to be exported, i e , , we presume they were considered too bad for consumption by civilized Englishmen, and so mere sent out to the barbarians. Mr. J. B. Kecne, the analyst concludes his report bg’ saying that with one exception, the whole of the tcas that were detained were from China, and the chief objcction was the prcsence of exhausted leaves.