NEWS by o-6666, from which weight the percentage of CNO may | being slightly elevated. The coke fire around this gave be determined. Determination of the Chlorine.-Weigh out 1 grm. of the powdered salt into a small porcelain crucible and heat it, gradually adding a mixture of five parts of Na2CO3 and one part of KNO3 until all of the cyanogen is decomposed. Cool and dissolve the mass in water, acidify with nitric acid, and filter to clear the solution. The chlorine can then be determined by titrating with a standard solution of silver nitrate; or it may be precipitated with silver nitrate and determined in the gravimetric way. Determination of Potassium and Soda.-Decompose in a platinum dish o 25 grm. of the powdered salt with dilute hydrochloric acid, being careful to perform the operation under a hood with strong draft to avoid injury from the poisonous fumes; evaporate to dryness, and ignite to drive off all salts of ammonia, cool, and weigh as NaCl-KCl. Then determine the potassium with platinic chloride and the sodium by difference. Remarks on Cyanide.-Pure potassium cyanide contains 40 per cent of cyanogen and in the trade corresponds to 100 per cent cyanide. Ninety-eight per cent cyanide contains only 39.2 per cent cyanogen, and 125 per cent cyanide contains 50 per cent cyanogen. It has been found that potassium cyanide carrying sodium cyanide is more efficient than the pure article, weight for weight, owing to the larger percentage of cyanogen. This is economy-in the reduction in freights and also for the additional reason that the combined cyanide can be made and sold more cheaply than the pure potassium cyanide.-The Chemical Engineer, x., No. 3. CRUDE PETROLEUM AS A REDUCING AGENT FOR ZINC ORES. By HARRY H. HUGHES and HARRISON HALE. THE process generally in use for zinc reduction is exceedingly cumbersome, slow, and far from satisfactory. Comparatively small quantities of the roasted ore are mixed with coke and coal and heated in clay retorts, which must necessarily be of considerable thickness, the zinc distilling over. The time required is about twenty hours, and the expense for heat large. In the best of coals there is quite an amount of matter which does not act as a reducing agent. Some of this is not only not helpful to the process but really injurious, as oxygen is furnished which hinders the reduction. These impurities also occupy space in the retort and consume heat the same as ore. The high percentage of carbon and of hydrogen in crude oil and its resulting reducing power suggest it as a possible reducing agent. Its extreme cheapness makes it all the more desirable. An objection to its use arises at once in the fact that a temperature of at least 1200° C. is required to practically reduce zinc oxide to metallic zinc, and before such a temperature could be reached in the usual furnace all the oil would be volatilised, leaving an insufficient amount of carbon to carry on the reduction. Evidently, ❘ then, if crude oil can be used economically for zinc ore reduction it must be in a continuous process by which the furnace can be heated to a sufficiently high temperature and the mixture of oxide and oil fed into it. It would seem that under such conditions reduction should take place before any quantity of the oil can escape. To test this assumption a series of experiments was carried out in this laboratory. An ordinary gas-pipe, three-quarters inch in diameter, was connected at right angles with a cup from which the mixture of ore and oil could be fed by means of a cock. At first this pipe was placed in a Bunsen combustion furnace, but no reduction occurred as the necessary temperature could not be reached. It was then passed through a Brown assay furnace, entering through a hole cut in the back, and passing out the door with the end nearer the cup ample heat without the use of a blast. The pipe extended some inches from the furnace, acting as a condenser. Fifty grms. of zinc oxide mixed with enough oil to make it pass through the cock was the usual charge. The oil required for this was in considerable excess of the amount needed for reduction. So-called "black oil," the crude with kerosene and the lighter oils removed, was used at first and later the regular crude; either will answer. After the furnace was heated the charge was run in. An effort was made to pass it in slowly, but with this rough apparatus usually without success, as almost the entire charge passed in at once. An evolution of gas from the oil on the heated surface followed. The charge remained in the heated pipe for twenty to thirty minutes, when the pipe was removed and cooled and the contents examined. Beautiful specimens of zinc were found in the condensing portion of the pipe, and there was an almost complete absence of "blue powder." Some of the zinc was feathery, as if both the oxide and the oil were in a volatile state when reduction occurred. This reduction in a gaseous condition greatly shortens the time required as the reducing gas is in immediate contact with the oxide to be reduced. The gas generated by the excess of oil together with the carbon monoxide formed in the reduction was frequently lighted as it passed out of a burner connected with the end of the pipe. It should be possible to use the gases to heat the pipe or other retort containing the charge, largely reducing the fuel expense. A number of trials were made with uniformly good results. From our experiments we conclude : First, that zinc ores can be successfully treated, after roasting, by using crude petroleum as a reducing agent. Second, that the theoretical advantages from the high reducing power of the oil and from the gaseous state of oxide and reducing agent, hold in a practical test. We believe further that a continuous process based on these principles would be much cheaper, more rapid, and more easily controlled than any process now in use. Arrangements have already been made for trying out the process on a large scale, using the continuous process furnace devised by one of us (Hughes, Mining World, July 10, 1909).-Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, December, 1909. TESTS FOR TIN ORE. ACCORDING to Mineral Resources, the simplest and easiest test for cassiterite is to place the mineral in dilute hydrochloric or sulphuric acid with granulated sheet or shot zinc. The zinc and the acid cause a rapid evolution of hydrogen, which takes the oxygen from the tin, and leaves a coating of the metal upon the fragment tested. Hydrochloric acid and granulated zinc are best to use, as the evolution of hydrogen is very rapid, and the zinc particles being small can be made to touch the specimen at many points, and thus bring more of the hydrogen in contact with the tin-oxide molecules. The reaction is 4H + SnO2 = Sn + 2H2O. The metallic coating has a dull grey, somewhat leady appearance as formed, but it may be made lustrous by rubbing with a soft cloth or the hand. In the latter case, the familiar disagreeable odour given when tin is rubbed on the flesh is obtained. This excellent method may be used upon specimens which it is desired not to injure, such as crystals or other choice pieces. However, the smooth surfaces of streampolished wood-tin are roughened, owing to the impurities contained in the mineral, though the surfaces of ordinary crystalline cassiterite are not noticeably affected. After the test is made the metallic tin coating can be removed by immersing the piece in dilute hydrochloric, sulphuric, or nitric acid. A better known and often used test, though one not so readily made, is the blowpipe test. The mineral supposed to be cassiterite is pulverised, and when so treated should yield a light-coloured powder, unless mixed with iron oxides, in which case the powder will be reddish or brownish. A small portion of the powder is mixed with twice its bulk of pulverised charcoal and three times its bulk of sodium bicarbonate (ordinary baking or washing soda). The three substances are thoroughly mixed, and a portion the size of a pea is moistened and placed in a hollow in a piece of charcoal. On application of a reducing blowpipe flame tin is readily reduced in small globules, which are easily distinguished from the flux. After cooling, the metallic globules may be separated from the soda, and will be malleable. If large enough they will give the disagreeable tin odour when rubbed between the ingers, and will give a white precipitate when treated with concentrated nitric acid. They are soluble in hydrochloric acid, and no precipitate forms when the solution is cold. These reactions with acids differentiate the metal from lead. PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. CHEMICAL SOCIETY. Professor HAROLD B. DIXON, F.R.S., President, in the Chair. (Concluded from p. 12). The velocity of esterification of a carboxylic acid in a large quantity of alcohol containing varying small quantities of water is proportional to concentration of carboxylic acid x availability of the catalyst, and the curve only departs from the unimolecular type in so far as the water formed disturbs the availability of the catalyst. As the availability of an acid varies enormously with the solvent, even where its concentration and degree of dissociation are similar, the determination of the exact value of this quantity is of primary importance in all investigations connected with salt formation and catalysis in which acids take part. 297. "Amides and Imides of Camphoric Acid." (Preliminary Note). By WILLIAM ORD WOOTTON. In view of the recent publication of a paper by Abati and stated that he had been engaged for some time past in the Notaris (Gazzetta, 1909, xxxix., [2], 219), the author examination of a number of derivatives of a-camphoramic acid of the type CO2H C8H14 CO NHR, together with the corresponding imides. Amongst the substances prepared are the acids and imides arising from the condensation of camphoric anhydride with ethylamine, n-propylamine, n-butylamine, n-amylamine, n-hexylamine, allylamine, o-, m-, and p-toluidine, o-, m-, and p-chloroaniline, o- and m-bromoaniline, m-nitroaniline, p-aminophenol, p-phenetidine, a- and B-naphthylamine. In the majarity of cases the conversion of the acid into the imide, a process involving ring-formation, is marked by considerable diminution in the specific rotation of the compound. 298. "The Nomenclature of Imino-compounds and of those Compounds Exhibiting Imino-amino-isomerisms." By JOCELYN FIELD Thorpe. Some confusion exists owing to the present system of 295. "Cyanocarone." By REGINALD WILLIAM LANE nomenclature adopted for the imino-compounds. CLARKE and ARTHUR LAPWORTH. The preparation and properties of cyanocarone, and some of its derivatives were described. The cyanoketone very readily gives up the elements of hydrogen cyanide, and is then at once converted into eucarvone. This confirms the usual view of the mechanism of the conversion of carvone into eucarvone, and indicates that the relative stabilities of carbon rings of different sizes may be inverted when a double linking is introduced. 296. "The Influence of Water on the Availability of Hydrogen Chloride in Alcoholic Solution." BY ARTHUR LAPWORTH and JAMES RIDDICK PARTINGTON. The influence of water on the advisability of very dilute solutions of hydrogen chloride in absolute alcohol has been carefully examined. Several tintometric experiments were made with five different specimens of alcohol dried over excess of calcium, two different indicators being employed in all cases but one, involving a large variation in the total concentration of the hydrogen chloride used. In each case, too, the change in the velocity of esterification of phenylacetic acid by the alcoholic hydrogen chloride, brought about by the addition of water, was estimated. The results prove that within the limits of experimental error, the availability of hydrogen chloride in very dilute alcoholic solution is proportional to concentration of HCl/r+concentration of water, r being identical with the constant used by Goldschmidt and Udby, and termed by them the "hydrolytic constant" of ethyl alcohol hydrochloride, but which the present authors prefer to call the "water-value" of the alcohol. The value of found was nearly o'10 at 25° in all cases (that is, 1 litre of alcohol at 25° is equivalent to oro grm.-molecule of water, the discrepancy between this and the number o'15 adopted by Goldschmidt and Udby being apparently due, in the main, to the fact that in the former instance the hydrogen chloride was highly dilute and more fully ionised, These substances, which possess the group C:NH, are obviously just as different from the secondary amines having the group C>NH as the ketones with the group C:O are different from the ethers with the group Co, yet the general name of imine is applied to both these classes. It is suggested that as the compounds containing the group C:NH are in many respects analogous to the ketones, the general name ketimine should be applied to them, leaving the name imine to be applied to the secondary amines, thus: : Moreover, the well-established existence of tautomerism and desmotropism between compounds of the type CH C(NH) C and C:C(NH2) C renders it advisable to apply some general term to this form of isomerism, similar to the phrase keto-enolic isomerism in use with the oxygen derivatives. It is proposed that the name ketimine-enamic isomerism should be applied to this phenomenon. It is not proposed to alter the name of the enamic individual, since such substances can evidently be classified as amino-compounds without entailing any confusion. Thus, in a compound showing ketimine-enamic isomerism, the two forms would be CH3 C(:NH)·CH(CN)·CO2Et CH3°C(NH2): C(CN) CO2Et CH3 C(OH):C(CN)·CO2Et Ethyl-hydroxy-a-cyanocrotonate (enol form). This nomenclature would be applicable to a number of other classes of compounds in which tautomerism of this 300. "The Combustion of Naphthalene and other Organic Substances, and the Atomic Weight of Carbon." By ALEXANDER Scott. Although Dumas and Stas (Am. Chim. Phys., 1841, 3, i., 40) used the combustion of naphthalene, cinnamic, and benzoic acids, and some other organic substances to justify their new value of C = 12.00, in preference to that of 12:24 advocated by Berzelius, neither they nor anyone else seem to have recognised or utilised the advantages of such a substance as naphthalene for affording data for an accurate determination of the atomic weight of carbon. The experiments of Dixon, Baker, and others suggest that it is more than likely that the combustion of pure dry carbon in dry oxygen might lead to carbon monoxide escaping even with a large excess of oxygen. The combustion of a hydrocarbon would lessen any loss from such a cause enormously, as some trace at least of water may be assumed to be present throughout the combustion. Each grm. of naphthalene burnt ought to give 3'4359 grms. of carbon dioxide if C-12'000 and H-10075, but if C=12018 only 34325 ought to be produced, hence for a difference of oo18 in the atomic weight of carbon we get a difference of 3.4 mgrms. in the carbon dioxide produced. Two series of combustions have been carried out with naphthalene, one set in a glass tube and the other in a quartz tube, both in a current of oxygen. In all, six experiments were made, and 17·6175 grms. of naphthalene gave 60 5355 grms. of carbon dioxide, hence i grm. of naphthalene gave 3'4361 grms. of carbon dioxide, whence C=11.999. Similarly, with cinnamic acid each grm. ought to yield 267459 grms. of carbon dioxide if C 12.000, but only 267276 if C=12.018. Two experiments have been made giving together 8.61537 grms. of cinnamic acid, which yielded 23 0413 grms. of carbon dioxide; that is, I grm. of cinnamic acid yielded 2.67444 grms. of carbon dioxide, whence C = 12.0015. These results therefore agree with all other combustion and physical results in indicating that C=12.00. The cause of the discrepancy between these results and those derived from the alkylammonium bromides remains still to be discovered. It might be thought that the enormous number of combustions of organic compounds which are continually being made would have indicated whether C = 12.000 or C = 12018 were the correct number. This is hardly likely, however, for if we calculate the percentage of carbon in naphthalene, taking C = 12:00 and C=12018, this comes out 93 706 and 93.715 respectively, and both would be stated as 93.71 per cent within the limits of experimental error. The weights given above are all corrected to vacuum standard. SOCIETY OF CHEMICAL INDUSTRY. Dr. J. LEWKOWITSCH in the Chair. REFERENCE was made to the great loss the Society and Section has sustained in the death of Dr. Ludwig Mond, F.R.S. "The Relation between the Mineral and the Chemical Industries." By G. T. HOLLOWAY. After tracing the production of a number of typical | minerals from the original rocks and primary minerals, whose decomposition or metamorphism produced them, and pointing out the purely chemical action which results in their formation, the paper referred to the importance of by-products, and to the importance of study of the market. example, the chemical market, formerly the principal one, The manganese ore industry was pointed out as a typical being now quite subordinate to the iron and steel trade, while the ores for one were absolutely unsuited to another. An attempt was made to explain the origin of certain of the rare metals, especially of such heavy metals as are employed for hardening steel, and the connection between minerals containing them and the peculiar manner in which they occur in combination with each other and with certain of the lighter rare elements. It was pointed out that a knowledge of the habits of minerals, and the curious manner in which they occur in nature in association one with another, was of enormous importance, as it aided the prospector by indicating what a surface indication might be expected to lead to. The manner in which demand created supply even in the case of rare metals was brought out in connection with the monazite industry, and the production of tantalum, &c. The monazite industry, through which over 200,000,000 incandescent mantles are now annually made, was instanced as yielding large quantities of rare earths other than the thoria, which (amounting to only about 5 per cent of the whole) is practically the only constituent utilised. The ceria, zirconia, didymia, &c., which are thus obtained as by-products, furnish an important field for the industrial chemist to work upon with a view to finding new uses for them. The waste matter from the tin ores of Cornwall was referred to as a material in which many of the known rare metals, and probably certain of the missing links in the Periodic Table, would be found. RÖNTGEN SOCIETY. Ordinary Meeting, January 6th, 1910. Skotographic and Electroscopic Effects of certain Animal Substances." By Dr. LAZARUS-BARLOW. Dr. Lazarus-Barlow, Director of the Cancer Research Laboratory at the Middlesex Hospital, delivered a lecture on certain of his investigations which have an interest for the chemist and for the physicist as well as for the medical man. He showed, first, some skotographic effects of certain animal substances. If a piece of liver were taken, dried at 100° C. in the hot air oven, pounded to a powder, and placed on a photographic plate in the dark, the plate on development would reveal the situation of the powder by a deposition of silver. Various other substances would produce a similar effect, but, even amongst animal tissues, not all would do so. As to the characteristics of the particular substance causing the effect, Dr. Lazarus-Barlow said that he was sure it was not protein, fat, carbohydrate, colouring matter, mineral salt, or any of the extractives that he had been able to get hold of. After removing as many of these substances as he could, he came down to a honeylike material which was non-crystallisable, dialysable, not volatile in the ordinary sense of the word, and which had a special relation to X-ray plates. He had found that the skotographic effect persisted even at a temperature of 300° C., that it was possible for a substance, such as watery extract of sheep's liver, to be 15 mm. distant from the photographic plate and still to produce an effect, and that, moreover, the effect was different upon different kinds of photographic plates. He exposed the same calculus or other material under identical conditions on Imperial special rapid and Ilford X-ray plates. On the Ilford plate he always found a much denser effect produced than on the Imperial, and in the case of the former the first appearance of action occurred earlier. It had been suggested that the effects were similar to those produced by certain woods. On taking pine sawdust, however, he found the effect on the Imperial plate and the Ilford plate to be practically the same. It seemed clear, he thought, that the effects obtained with these tissues were more akin to those of the radio-active group of substances which specially acted on the X-ray plate than to effects which were purely chemical, and might be thought to affect both plates alike. With regard to screens, he pointed out that these skotographic effects were never obtained through screens as thick as those which were employed in radio-active work. One might place between the most active substances, skotographically speaking, and the photographic plate as thin a layer of mica as could possibly be shaved off, and even though it were left for six weeks at 55° C. in the hot-air oven no effect whatever would be obtained. In the case of a piece of dried liver or a betel nut coated with a thin film of celloidin, however, so far from the effect being absent, as it would be in the case of mica, it was actually increased. It was suggested that this was due to the celloidin, but celloidin itself only had a skotographic effect when it was freshly prepared, and in these cases the celloidin was not fresh, and had no skotographic power. As to the length of time for which the skotographic effect lasted, Dr. Lazarus-Barlow said that the effect was still persistent after one year in the case of an extract of sheep's liver; a gallstone had been in the Middlesex Hospital Museum for at least twenty-five years before he obtained it, and yet it still produced a skotographic picture; while a calculus which had been removed from a pre-dynastic Egyptian mummy showed exactly the same thing. Passing to the electrical side of the story, Dr. Lazarus Barlow said that he used gold-leaf electroscopes, which, he maintained, had a very small natural leak. He had discarded all electroscopes, the leak of which was greater than 1 mm. per hour, and in the majority of cases the leak in his electroscope was 0.6 mm. per hour or less. He used four electroscopes charged plus, four charged minus, and two control electroscopes, one plus and one minus. Certain of the substances investigated electroscopically accelerated the discharge on the electroscope whether the discharge on the leaves was plus or minus, but certain others, including substances of liver and cancer substances, actually retarded the action of the electroscope whether the discharge on the leaves were plus or minus. One of his tables demonstrated the influence upon electroscopic leak of four specimens of liver before and after extraction, and of the extracts themselves. In almost every instance there was a retardation effect, quite irrespectively of the plus or minus character of the charge on the gold-leaves. In his opinion this retardation was a real effect, and had a definite existence. He went on to remind his audience that the biologist's point of view in these matters was different from that of the chemist and the physicist. Even supposing a radio-active substance to be present in the animal body, it would not be present, probably, in the same sense as that in which the chemist or the physicist had to deal with it. That is to say, it would be in combination. The evidence of radio-activity in the shape of the leak of the electroscope was only the evidence of the surplus energy which remained after the internal conditions of the molecule protein or other-had been satisfied. Some experiments were therefore carried out under his direction in which the same element was combined with chemical substances of varying atomic weight. The length of time during which it was required to leak 10 mm. when the same quantity of substance was in the electroscope was worked out, and the substance tested in its natural and in its incinerated state. In the case of black uranium oxide the mean rate of leak per hour in mm. in the natural state was 175, and after being put in the Bunsen flame it was only raised to 177. In the case of uranium egg-white, however, which contained on analysis 10 per cent of uranium, the rate of leak in the natural state was 13 per hour, but in the incinerated state it went up to 95. The effect of incineration seemed to be to liberate a certain amount of radio-active material that had been masked or bound previously, and he found that this masked energy was almost entirely com- In the course of the discussion, Dr. Lazarus-Barlow NOTICES OF BOOKS. Annuaire pour l'An 1910, publié par les Bureau des Longi- 1909. Cape Colony To-day. Second Edition. Issued by the Van Nostrand's Chemical Annual, 1909. Second Issue. THE cordial welcome given to the first edition of this The Iron and Steel Institute.-The Annual General 3 CHEMICAL NOTICES FROM FOREIGN | matters analogous to malachite green. The results of SOURCES. NOTE-All degrees of temperature are Centigrade unless otherwise expressed. Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Séances de l'Académie des Sciences. Vol. cxlix., No. 19, November 8, 1909. Phosphorescence and Oxidation of Arsenic.-L. Bloch.-The phosphorescence of arsenic which occurs at about 200° is accompanied by the formation of arsenious anhydride. No ozone is produced as in the case of phos phorus and sulphur, and no ionisation occurs. It is thus a new example of combustion with luminescence, but without any conductivity of the medium. Some arsenic anhydride is always formed. Metallic Iridodisulphates.-Marcel Delépine.-Two series of metallic iridodisulphates exist, the green and the red-brown salts. The former appear to be derived from a (H2O)OH¬ dibasic acid of formula SO4 [ H2, while the red-brown salts are derivatives of the tribasic acid, The latter are obtained from the (OH2)-SO4SO4 H3. former by the action of an excess of base, and the former from the latter by an excess of acid. This change of -(H2O)OH into (OH)2H is a genuine mineral tautomerism comparable with the transformations well known in organic chemistry. New Generai Methods of Synthesising Aromatic Aldehydes.-A. Guyot. The a- 8-diketonic esters, X-CO-CO-CO2R, can fix a molecule of a phenol, carbide, or tertiary aromatic amine to the a-ketonic carbon atom, giving as condensation products acidylphenylglycolic X-CO .он esters, >c< These esters are decomY-C6H4 CO2R posed quantitatively by certain reagents giving the corresponding aldehydes. Thus excess of concentrated sulphuric acid below 100° induces the following reactions :X-CO OH >c Y-C6H4 CO2R+2H20= | analysis agree with the formulæ C23H27ON3, C23H26ON3X, C23H25ON3X2, of paraoxyorthoamino-malachite green. No. 20, November 15, 1909. Alkaline Acid Carbonates.-M. de Forcrand.-When dilute solutions of the carbonates of potassium, rubidium, and cæsium are left exposed to the air for some weeks they all absorb carbon dioxide, and the author has subjected this phenomenon to a thorough study, determining from time to time the index of the acidity, which finally closely approximates to unity. At the end of a month the values obtained are fixed and correspond to the following formula: 8K2CO3+2KHCO3, 3Rb2CO3+2RbHCO3, 4Cs2CO3+2CsHCO3, 2.5CS2CO3 + 2CSHCO3. Starting with dilute solutions of the bicarbonate and heating on the water-bath with the addition of water from time to time, it is found that the potassium salt behaves differently from the other two. It loses carbon dioxide, but never gives the neutral carbonate, the product after a week's treatment being a liquid of index 106 (the same as before), and crystals which have the composition 5(K2CO3 + 1·5H2O) + 4KHCO3. The bicarbonates of rubidium and cæsium in the first few hours lose all the acid carbon dioxide, and then if the experiment is continued they begin to absorb carbon dioxide from the air, until finally the following crystals are obtained :-3(Rb2CO3 + 1·5H2O) + 2RbHCO3, 5(Cs2CO3+3*5H2O) + 2CsHCO3. The last carbonate may lose 7.5H2O, its formula then becoming 5(Cs2CO3 + 2H2O) + 2CsHCO3. Action of Heat and Light upon Silver Sulphite and its Double Alkaline Sulphites. H. Baubigny.-When silver sulphite is decomposed by the action of heat 89.84 per cent of the decomposed substance yields dithionate and 10.16 per cent sulphate. In a sealed tube the action of heat must not be continued too long, for then the dithionic acid is decomposed and the amount of sulphuric acid is increased. With the double sulphites 97.5 per cent yields dithionate. Light has the same effect as heat, but its action is less rapid. Mixed Stannic Halogen Compounds.-V. Auger.Any compound of formula SnBra14-a when fused behaves like a mixture. When the temperature is slightly lowered crystals are deposited, having a composition different from =X-CO2H+R.OH+Y-C6H4-CHOH-CO2H, that of the fused mass. Hence it must be concluded that =X-CO2K+R.OH+Y-C6H4-CHOH-CO2K, and may readiy be transformed into aldehyde by alkaline oxidation, Y-C6H4-CHOH-CO2H+0= = CO2+H2O+Y—C6H4—CHO, The mesoxalic esters, RCO2-CO-CO2R, give the same reactions. Acid Properties of Haloid Amides. - Charles Mauguin. The author has prepared the sodium salts of Na brominated amides, e.g., CH3CON<Br and has found that they decompose spontaneously at the ordinary temperature according to the equation in a molecule in which tetravalent tin is combined with MISCELLANEOUS. Liquid Mixtures for Maximum and Minimum Thermometers.-Robert E. Bradley.-A homogeneous liquid mixture may, by a change of temperature or by certain additions, become separated into two layers. For example, a mixture of 15 cc. amyl alcohol, 20 cc. ethyl alcohol, and 32'9 cc. water is homogeneous above 20° C.; but the least lowering of temperature below this, even by one-tenth of one degree, causes the division of the liquid into two nearly equal layers. This phenomenon can be made use of in the construction of an exceedingly delicate |