Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: PREFACE. j)HIS course of experiments has been arranged for students in high schools, and is intended to lead directly to the courses in the State University. Since many of the principles of chemistry are founded upon quantitative relations, a number of such experiments has been introduced; but no exercise has been incorporated into the course that has not been successfully performed. Special care has been taken in clearly describing the experiments, so that pupils may not fail to obtain good results. Considerable attention has also been given by questions and suggestions to cause the student to think carefully over observed phenomena. The use of symbols has been avoided in the earlier stages of the work, and qualitative analysis has been entirely omitted. Very little of real value can be accomplished in the way of qualitative analysis in so short a time. A number of the most important elements and their compounds has been considered, and the experiments outlined are only those which may be performed by the student during the year. The course may be modified, whenever desirable, by supplementary directions prepared by the instructor. The writer is of the opinion that a few elements and their most important compounds studied carefully, are of much more value than a great many studied hurriedly. The exercises are intended to develop in the pupil a"scientific habit of thought" and lead him to discover for himself by a purely inductive method many of the fundamental principles of the science. A course of recitations, and an occasional lecture illustrated by experiments should accompany the labora tory work. The note-book should be used in the laboratory only, so that it may always represent the pupil's own thoughts. Large "folders" with perforated paper that may be re...