Destructive Distillation of Animal Substances. 185 



Products of Decomposition of Petinine. 



The want of substance, which prevented the full investiga- 

 tion of the salts, has likewise curtailed this branch of the sub- 

 ject to a very few observations; which is the more to be re- 

 gretted, as the general properties and low atomic weight of 

 petinine give promise of definite products, which might enable 

 us fully to determine its position in the chemical system. 



When treated with concentrated nitric acid, it dissolves 

 without any remarkable phenomena, and on boiling, a feeble 

 evolution of nitrous fumes takes place; but the petinine is 

 attacked only to a very small extent; for after being kept boil- 

 ing for a long time, and then supersaturated with potash, it 

 evolved the smell of the base apparently unchanged. Solution 

 of chloride of lime immediately acts upon it in the cold, and 

 developes a highly irritating odour, and some compound is 

 manifestly produced : the solution remains colourless. Bro- 

 mine water dropped into an aqueous solution of petinine oc- 

 casions the precipitation of a yellow oil heavier than water, 

 and insoluble in acids : the solution contained hydrobromate 

 of petinine. From the analogy of the other volatile bases, we 

 should expect this to be tribromopetinine, C 3 H 7 Br 3 N. My 

 material being exhausted, I was not able to extend these ob- 

 servations further. 



Picoline. 



Having determined the properties of petinine, I next turned 

 my attention to that portion of the mixed bases which boiled 

 between 270° and 280°, where I had every reason to expect 

 the presence of picoline. After several rectifications, in each 

 of which the first and last portions of the product were sepa- 

 rated, I obtained a fine colourless transparent oil, possessed 

 of all the properties of that substance. It dissolved readily in 

 water ; gave, with chloride of gold, a fine yellow compound 

 depositing in needles from the hot solution, and with bichloride 

 of platinum, a salt crystallizing in orange-yellow needles, ana- 

 logous in all its properties to that of picoline. This identity 

 was confirmed by analysis, which gave the following results : — 



{5*648 grains of picoline from bone-oil gave 

 15*990 ... carbonic acid, and 

 3*998 ... water. 



Carbon . 77*21 77*41 C 12 

 Hydrogen 7*86 7*53 H 7 



Nitrogen . 14*93 15*06 N 

 100*00 100*00 

 Phil. Mag. S. 3. Vol. 33. No. 221. Sept. 1848. O 



