490 Intelligence and Miscellaneom Articles, 



The opinion which I am obliged to entertain of an individual ca- 

 pable of this groundless assertion, would cause me to consider him 

 unworthy of notice, had not his misstatement been made before an 

 assemblage which I most highly esteem, and had he not been ho- 

 noured by a premium for his pretended invention by a respectable 

 British Society. 



The blowpipe which is thus falsely alleged to have been used by 

 me, differs immaterially from one of which I published an engraving 

 and description in the American Journal of Science for 1820, vol. ii. 

 p. 298, being a modification of that originally contrived by me and 

 republished in Tilloch's Philosophical Magazine, vol. xiv. for 1802. 

 Between the instruments described in these publications, or in the 

 Franklin Journal, and that employed by Maugham, the only differ- 

 ence worthy of notice is, that the latter is near the apex bent so as 

 to form an acute angle, and is thus rendered suitable for directing 

 the flame iipon a revolving cylinder of lime. 



Although I purchased of Newman a blowpipe bent as described, 

 with an apparatus attached for holding and turning a cylinder of 

 lime, / have never made any use of it, having for the purpose of sub- 

 jecting lime to the flame, found my modification above referred to as 

 described in this Journal, preferable. It only required the jet pipe 

 to be directed upwards in an angle of about forty-five degrees with 

 the axis of the lime cylinder. 



I do not consider the form of my blowpipe employed by Mr. M. 

 as qualified for the fusion of any metal. 



It is remarkable that an apparatus of gasometers employed by 

 Maugham at the Adelaide Gallery for the supply of the gases for the 

 blowpipe differs but little from the apparatus proposed for the same 

 jjurpose in my communication above adverted to, and published 

 nearly twenty years ago. 



However the process by which I have lately extended the power 

 of the hydro-oxygen blowpipe may differ from those to which I had 

 previously resorted, it differs still more from that modification which 

 Maugham has claimed as his own. — American Journal of Science 

 and Arts, vol. 35, No. 2. 



ACTION OF FERROCYANIDE OF POTASSIUM ON CHLORIDE OF 

 CALCIUM, ETC. 



M. Reiset added a solution of ferrocyanide of jDotassium to one of 

 chloride of calcium : the well-known white, crystalline and slightly 

 soluble precipitate was obtained, which he found to consist of one 

 equivalent of ferrocyanide of potassium and one equivalent of fer- 

 rocyanide of calcium. He further observed that compounds of ana- 

 logous constitution are formed when the salts barium, strontium, or 

 magnesium are substituted for those of calcium. 



The crystals obtained when a solution of chloride of barium is 

 poured into a hot solution of ferrocyanide of potassium, and which 

 are described in many chemical treatises as being j)ure ferrocyanide 

 of barium, are composed of 1 equivalent of ferrocyanide of potassium 

 and 1 equivalent of chloride of barium. The ferrocyanide of ammo- 



