Aquametry

Abstract

IN the whole area of chemical analysis few estimations are more important than that of moisture, and few in the past have received such casual treatment. That a volume of this size and character should be devoted substantially to one chemical method of estimating water is welcome evidence of the growing importance attached nowadays to precision in this field. The pendulum may, indeed, have swung a little too far ; occasionally in this book the enthusiasm of the authors for their subject and for the work of Karl Fischer approaches the mystical. The word 'aquametry', too, is awkward on the tongue and strange to the dictionary. Its coinage may be thought to imply that a new sub-branch of science has been established within narrow limits, and hence may disturb more than the linguistic pedants.

Aquametry

Application of the Karl Fischer Reagent to Quantitative Analyses involving Water. By John Mitchell Jr., and Dr. Donald Milton Smith. (Chemical Analysis, A Series of Monographs on Analytical Chemistry and its Applications, Vol. 5.) Pp. xi+444. (New York and London : Interscience Publishers, Inc., 1948.) 48s.