86 Intelligence arid Miscellaneous Articles. 



'to 



was obtained in considerable quantity ; the analysis was then under- 

 taken, and besides a large proportion of oxygen, certain interesting 

 properties were discovered with respect to the isomeric transforma- 

 tion of mineral compounds. 



The nevv- compound is immediately obtained by dropping chloride 

 of sulphur into a moist bottle containing moist chlorine. Too large 

 a quantity of moisture would immediately destroy this compound, 

 or would retard its production ; but under the circumstances de- 

 scribed, the bottle soon becomes covered with colourless transparent 

 crystals, which attach themselves to the sides. It is not always 

 possible to detach the compound thus spread in thin laminae, and 

 which the moist air destroys ra2}idly. To prepare the compound in 

 considerable quantity, a bottle, capable of containing 8 to 10 pints, is 

 to be filled with moist chlorine, and then there ai-e to be added to it 

 from 300 to 450 grains of chloride of sulphur, quite saturated with 

 chlorine, and afterwards 30 to 45 grains of water. The bottle is to 

 be shaken and surrounded with a mixture of salt and ice for four or 

 five hours. A great disengagement of hydrochloric acid takes place ; 

 the bottle is to be again filled with moist chlorine and again im- 

 mersed into the freezing mixture : these operations are to be repeated 

 until the chloride of sulphur becomes an abundant crystalline mass, 

 containing an excess of the chloride. The formation of these cry- 

 stals, which are either fine needles or large rhombic laminse, is 

 usually preceded by the production of a yellowish liquid, heavier 

 than the chloride of sulphur, and from which it separates like an oil. 



It is very difficult to separate the crystals from the chloride of 

 sul])hur which they contain ; it is effected bypassing into the bottle, 

 during six to twelve hours, a current of chlorine gas dried over sul- 

 phuric acid : at the same time that the chlorine is passing through 

 the bottle, the crystals are to be volatilized and made to pass from 

 one side of the bottle to the other by means of red-hot charcoal. 

 Notwithstanding this troublesome operation, the crystals always re- 

 tain one or two per cent, of chloride of sulphur, which analysis dis- 

 covers to be in proportion to the shortness of the time which the 

 chlorine is passed. "* 



It is scarcely possible to analyse these crystals immediately after 

 their production ; they are in fact destroyed and projected with great 

 violence as soon as they are touched with water, alcohol or dilute acids. 

 To determine their composition, the author availed himself of an inter- 

 esting property which they possess, and which is the following : — 

 when the crystals have been freed as much as possible from the chloride 

 of sulphur, they are made to drop into a very dry glass tube, closed at 

 one end, and the other is drawn out by the lamp ; in two or three 

 months the crystals begin to soften, become pasty, moisten, and in 

 six or eight months they are converted into an extremely thin liquid 

 and of a scarcely perceptible yellow tint, when the current of chlorine 

 has been long continued. No a])sorption takes place, and the liquid 

 cannot be restored to the crystalline state even by exposure to a cold 

 of 2° below zero. It is therefore an isomeric transformation, which 

 is shown, not only by the change of its physical but also of its che- 



