152 Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 



astronomically true, he will perhaps pause when he finds that his 

 own system would sometimes cause it to happen that St. Paul's Ca- 

 thedral must keep Easter a week after Westminster Abbey, and 

 would very frequently make a week's difference between the festivals 

 of the colonies and the mother country. 



University College, London, Yours faithfully, 



July 11, 1844. A. De Morgan. 



EFFECTS OF NASCENT OXYGEN ON CERTAIN ORGANIC ALKALIES. 

 BY EUGENE MARCHAND. 



When excess of peroxide of lead is boiled in a solution of sulphate 

 of cinchonia, quina, morphia, narcotina, strychnia or brucia, and sul- 

 phuric acid is added drop by drop, until a portion of the filtered 

 liquor, tested with ammonia, potash, or its carbonate, ceases to be- 

 come turbid, there occurs a brisk effervescence of carbonic acid gas, 

 and the liquor becomes of a deeper colour ; if the operation be then 

 stopped and any free acid which may exist in it be saturated with 

 litharge, the solution evaporated to dryness, and the mass be treated 

 with distilled water, and the solution obtained with sulphuretted 

 hydrogen, which sometimes precipitates a little sulphuret of lead, 

 and lastly the filtered liquor be evaporated to dryness, very distinct 

 colouring matters are procured from each organic alkali ; these co- 

 louring substances are the following : — 



Cinchonetin ; this is obtained by the process above described from 

 cinchonia ; its properties are that it is an uncrystallizable amorphous 

 mass, of a very deep violet colour when viewed in mass, and yellow- 

 ish red in very thin layers. It is deliquescent, and has a bitter taste. 

 When attempts are made to incinerate it, it fuses, yields white va- 

 pours as cinchonia does, the odour of which is not at all ammonia- 

 cal ; it inflames and burns with a sooty flame, and leaves a charcoal 

 which it is very difficult to incinerate. 



Cinchonetin dissolves more readily in boiling than in cold water ; 

 its best solvent is alcohol ; sether does not act upon it ; concentrated 

 sulphuric acid dissolves it very easily and becomes of a red colour, 

 but without apparently altering it ; if this solution be treated with 

 water, it assumes a yellow tint, but is not rendered turbid. 



The aqueous solution of cinchonetin, which is of a red colour, is 

 not rendered turbid either by ammonia or potash, but they change 

 the colour first to purple and afterwards to fawn colour, and acids 

 do not restore the original tint ; subacetate of lead occasions a violet 

 precipitate, which soon subsides ; chlorine instantly destroys the 

 colour. By the combined action of sulphuric acid and peroxide of 

 lead, cinchonetin may be converted into fresh colourless compounds, 

 and acetic acid appears to be one of them. 



Quina. — The result of the action of nascent oxygen upon this 

 alkali is a complex substance, upon which heat acts as it does upon 

 cinchonetin ; and it may be separated into at least two distinct prin- 

 ciples, quinetin and modified quinetin. The former of these remains 

 when the complex colouring matter is treated with water, in which 

 it is insoluble ; it dissolves, however, in alcohol, and imparts a violet 



