RECORDS 



OF 



GENERAL SCIENCE 



SEPTEMBER, 1835. 



Article I. 



On Racemic Acid. By Thomas Thomson, M.D., &;c., Regius 



Professor of Chemistry in the University of Glasgow. 



( Continued from p. 108. J 



IV. RACEMATE OF SODA. 



This salt may be formed precisely in the same way as the 

 racemate of potash. I obtained it in very small four-sided 

 prisms, apparently right-angled. Sometimes these prisms 

 terminated in two faces, applied to each other like the roof 

 of a house. Hence, I conceive that the base of the prism is 

 an oblique face. Very often the termination is a four-sided 

 pyramid. One of the edges of the prism is usually replaced 

 by a tangent plane. In general, this salt forms crusts com- 

 posed of an aggregation of minute and irregular crystals. 



The taste is saline and bitter, but it approaches much 

 nearer to the taste of common salt than racemate of potash 

 does. Its specific gravity is 1-511. It is not sensibly soluble 

 in alcohol. 100 parts water, at the temperature of 63°, 

 dissolve 31-73 of this salt. 



When heated, it does not melt as racemate of potash does, 

 but becomes brown, then swells up and burns with flame, 

 leaving carbonate of soda brown or gray, if kept long in 

 fusion. 



105 grs. of crystals of racemic acid were exactly saturated 

 with carbonate of soda, and the solution being evaporated 



VOL II. M 



