Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 77 



nected with a vessel containing a solution of nitrate of silver, through 

 which the products of the decomposition had to pass, the unab- 

 sorbed gases being collected in a jar at the pneumatic trough, hoping 

 to collect the gases as they were liberated. After gaseous matter 

 had been quietly evolved for twelve hours, it exploded with greater 

 violence than before, no portion of the bottle remaining (except the 

 neck) larger than a pea. A quantity of chloride of silver had pre- 

 cipitated from the nitrate, and the gas jar contained free nitrogen. 

 Another portion of the salt was then placed on a sand-bath, the 

 temperature of which was about 120° Fahr. ; this soon underwent 

 decomposition, but only detonated slightly, giving off dense white 

 fumes, with the smell of nitrous acid. 



Finding the salt was so easily decomposed, I proceeded to ex- 

 amine more closely the nature of the changes that took place. 20 

 grains of the salt were introduced into a strong flask, connected, as 

 in the previous experiment, with a vessel containing solution of ni- 

 trate of silver, but with the mercurial instead of the pneumatic 

 trough ; the flask was then very carefully warmed by a spirit-lamp ; 

 the salt instantly exploded with great violence and a loud detonation, 

 breaking the flask to atoms. Five grains of the salt were then ope- 

 rated upon, without the vessel containing the solution of the silver 

 salt, and the products of the decomposition collected over mercury ; 

 they were nitrogen, chlorine, nitrous acid and water, with a little 

 chloride of ammonium; but from the rapidity with which the gases 

 were eliminated, it was impossible to collect the whole of the pro- 

 ducts of the decomposition, though the experiments were repeated 

 six or seven times, both with and without the vessel containing the 

 solution of nitrate of silver. When five grains of the salt were em- 

 ployed, the tubes (which were filled with mercury when no salt of 

 silver was used) were not broken ; still the action was so energetic 

 that it did not allow of accurate indications of the quantity of the 

 gases evolved being obtained. 



From the presence of free nitrogen and chlorine, both in the pro- 

 ducts of the spontaneous and produced decomposition, I am led to 

 conclude that chloride of nitrogen is formed ; but as the whole of 

 the products were in no case obtained, it was impossible to deter- 

 mine this experimentally. 



XII. Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 



NEW ANALYSES OF THE CYMOPHANE (CHRYSOBERYL) OF 

 HADDAM. BY M. A. DAMOUR. 



THE author states, after reading the analyses of chrysoberyl by 

 M. Awdejew*, he should not have completed the experiments 

 previously commenced, if he had not observed that M. Awdejew's 

 analyses were confined to the chrysoberyls of Brazil and Siberia ; 

 but it appeared to him that it would not be useless to examine the 

 composition of the mineral from Haddam, which occurs in well-de- 

 fined crystals in the midst of the primitive rocks of Connecticut. 

 Three analyses were performed in the following manner : — In 

 ♦ S. 3. vol. xxii. p. 501. 



