2/0 On the Chemical Composition of Metacetonic Acid. 



oxalic acid, with the formula C4 H5 Cg Og, the decomposition 

 may be expressed by the equation 



Kl0^'^'V|KaaC,H,,C,03 

 3HO J '-^^"s- 



The assumption will be rendered still more palpable, if, 

 as there is little doubt, at a future period we_^are able again to 

 produce cyanide of ethyle from metacetonate of ammonia. 



If, on the contrary, metacetonic acid is considered as an 

 oxide of the radical Cg Hg, then it must be assumed, that 

 during the process of oxidation the two atoms of carbon, in the 

 cyanogen, amalgamate themselves, as it were, with ethyle, in 

 order to form the new radical metacetyle. Setting aside the 

 great improbability attached to such an fissumption, to which 

 there would be at present no analogous case, we feel justified 

 in giving preference to the former explanation, because it is 

 the more simple, and because it completely agrees with the 

 known transformation of cyanogen and water into oxalic 

 acid and ammonia ; and if, as one of us has found, valerianic 

 acid, placed in the circuit of the voltaic current, by the 

 assumption of 1 atom of oxygen, becomes converted into car- 

 bonic acid and the carbo-hydrogen Cg Hg, we consider that 

 our view has gained by that fact an additional support, and 

 that the acid in question contains that carbo-hydrogen in 

 conjugate combination with oxalic acid. 



The foregoing observations lead to a great simplification of 

 our hypothesis in regard to organic radicals, inasmuch as 

 they do away with the necessity of supposing a specific ra- 

 dical for each acid belonging to an alcohol. The series of 

 radicals which are produced by the addition of one or more 

 equivalents of the carbo-hydrogen Cg Hg to 1 equivalent of 

 hydrogen, namely Cg H3, C4 H^, &c., the hydrated oxides 

 of which form the alcohols, are again found in accordance 

 with our view in the acids derived from them, conjoined 

 with oxalic acid. It may be conceived that the oxygen, in 

 converting alcohol or oxide of ethyle into acetic acid, first 

 acts upon the equivalent of carbo-hydrogen Cg Hg, which 

 alone distinguishes ethyle from methyle, and that the suc- 

 cessive products of oxidation of this body take up the re- 

 maining radical methyle into conjugate combination ; thus in 

 the formation of aldehyde and acetic acid, 



20 J -\ no 

 c,n,oi_rc,ns,c,o^ 



30J-\2HO 



