202 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



The singular fact of the universal decrease of temperature in the 

 liquid, when in a spheroidal state, was then adverted to. Numerous 

 experiments had proved it. This phenomenon has given a result 

 wholly unforeseen, and most remarkable. The chemist knows that 

 liquid anhydrous sulphurous acid boils at a very low temperature. 

 M. Boutigny, in submitting this acid to similar conditions in a slightly 

 humid atmosphere, the acid first took an opaline appearance, then lost 

 its transparence, and finally solidified. The solid formed was ice ! 

 As a variation of this experiment, some drops of water were thrown 

 upon the acid while in the spheroidal state, and the water immediately 

 congealed. In order to demonstrate that liquids, when in this state, 

 do not touch the surface of the metal, some concentrated nitric acid 

 was dealt with, but it did not act upon the copper disc on which the 

 experiment was made, until the copper was cooled. A cylinder of 

 silver, at a white heat, was also plunged into water ; it was distinctly 

 observed for many seconds (the room being darkened) not to be 

 affected by the surrounding medium. The lecturer then insisted that 

 it was not alone to such physical results that we are to look on the 

 curious phenomena he has unveiled, but to the new method of chem- 

 ical analysis and synthesis which they suggest. He has thus found 

 that some bodies, which are not decomposed at boiling heat, are so 

 when put in a spheroidal state ; while others, placed in contact under 

 the influence of this new molecular state, produce new combinations. 

 When wine and alcohol are in a spheroidal state, their elements are 

 found to be in a new order ; ether is decomposed, and disengages 

 aldehyde ; chloride of ethyle decomposes nitrate of silver ; ammonia 

 dissolves iodine, &c. 



PREPARATION OF MAGNESIUM. 



BUNSEN has observed, that fused chloride of magnesium is readily 

 decomposed by the voltaic current, so that it is possible, in a short 

 time, by the employment of a battery of a few pairs only, to obtain a 

 mass of metal weighing several grammes. For the preparation of the 

 chloride, Liebig's method is recommended ; particular care must be 

 taken, however, in drying the mixture of magnesia and sal-ammoniac, 

 to avoid the formation of a basic chloride. As a decomposing cell, 

 Bunsen employs a porcelain crucible divided into two parts by a dia- 

 phragm reaching to half the depth of the crucible. In this manner 

 the chlorine set free at one electrode is prevented from again com- 

 bining with the magnesium deposited upon the other. The electrodes 

 used are of carbon, in the form in which it is prepared for Bunsen's 

 battery ; into the surface of the negative pole kerfs are cut to prevent 

 the magnesium set free from floating to the surface of the fused liquid 

 and there taking fire. To determine the quantity of magnesium 

 formed in a given time, the author introduces a tangents-compass into 

 the circuit, and deduces by a well known formula the relation between 

 the chemical and the magnetic effects of the current, so that the latter 

 being observed, the former may easily be calculated. Magnesium, as 



