Very true; you see how admirably the nomenclature of modern chemistry is adapted to assist the memory; when you hear the name of a compound, you necessarily learn what are its constituent parts; and when you are acquainted with these constituents, you can immediately name the compound which they form. CAROLINE. Pray, how were bodies arranged and distinguished before this nomenclature was introduced? MRS. B. Chemistry was then a much more difficult study; for every substance had an arbitrary name, which it derived either from the person who discovered it, as _Glauber’s salts_ for instance; or from some other circumstance relative to it, though quite unconnected with its real nature, as potash. These names have been retained for some of the simple bodies; for as this class is not numerous, and therefore can easily be remembered, it has not been thought necessary to change them. EMILY. Yet I think it would have rendered the new nomenclature more complete to have methodised the names of the elementary, as well as of the compound bodies, though it could not have been done in the same manner. But the names of the simple substances might have indicated their nature, or, at least, some of their principal properties; and if, like the acids and compound salts, all the simple bodies had a similar termination, they would have been immediately known as such. So complete and regular a nomenclature would, I think, have given a clearer and more comprehensive view of chemistry than the present, which is a medley of the old and new terms. MRS. B.