500 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



ed in a large capsule, first with one third its weight of nitric 

 acid, and warmed. When the mass becomes viscous the 

 heat is withdrawn, and a few grammes of strong sulphuric 

 acid added. Then, after warming again until white vapors 

 begin to come off, half the original quantity of nitric acid is 

 poured in, drop by drop. The mass is now to be heated un- 

 til it begins to carbonize, and a black residue is obtained 

 which can be easily lixiviated by boiling water. To the 

 hot, filtered solution sodium bisulphite is to be added, until 

 sulphurous acid is given off, and then the arsenic may be 

 precipitated in the usual manner by sulphureted hydrogen. 

 In a test experiment 0.005 gramme of white arsenic was 

 mixed with 100 grammes of beef muscle. This should con- 

 tain 0.00378 gramme of the metal, and 0.00365 was act- 

 ually recovered. 6 B, August 2. 



DETECTION OF FUSEL-OIL IN ALCOHOL. 



According to Bettelli, in order to detect fusel-oil in alco- 

 hol it is only necessary to shake the suspected sample, di- 

 luted by six or seven times its volume of water, with fifteen 

 to twenty drops of chloroform. The latter takes up any 

 fusel-oil which may be present, leaving it behind after evap- 

 oration, to be recognized by its odor. By this method a 

 fraction of one per cent, of fusel-oil is easily detected. Bull. 

 Soc. Chimique^ July 20, 1875. 



GROUNDWORT AS A FEBRIFUGE. 



Glocener, of Hainault, announces that he has discovered in 

 the groundwort (Senecio arvensis) virtues as a febrifuge 

 superior to those of cinchona and its derivatives. Fifty 

 grammes of the fresh plant, exclusive of the root, are to 

 be boiled for ten minutes in 500 grammes of water, and the 

 solution strained. This is to be taken in three doses, at in- 

 tervals of two hours, after the attack. In nearly every case 

 positive relief, if not a cure, is claimed as the result. 1 B, 

 Jcuiuary 10, 1875, 240. 



EFFECT OF MORPI1IA OX SECRETIONS. 



From a paper by Kratschmer upon the influence of mor- 

 phia, and of carbonate and sulphate of soda on the formation 

 of sugar, and the excretion of urea in diabetes, it appears 



