160 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 



It is a noteworthy fact that ethylisocyanide can be heated in a 

 sealed tube for one hour to a temperature of 130° -170° with sodium 

 ethylate (free from alcohol) without the slightest change. For this 

 reason, it seems to me that in the action of caustic potash or sodium 

 ethylate * on the inert carbonic oxide,t an addition of these reagents 

 to the carbouylgroup t must first take place, as follows : 



/OH /ONa 



C : + HOK or NaOCgHs = C or C 



^OK ^OC^Hs. 



The bivalent carbon atom present in these addition products must, 

 according to the ideas heretofore developed in these Proceediugs,§ be 

 far more reactive than the unsaturated carbon atom present in the 

 isocyanides ; and, in consequence, a further addition of sodic ethylate 

 or of caustic potash takes place, giving rise to the ortho derivatives, 



C2H5. .ONa H. OK 



C and C 



NaO^ ^OC^Hs KO^ OH, 



which naturally, on treatment with water, go over into propionic acid 

 and formic acid salts, respectively. 



II. FuLMiNic Acid is identical with Carbyloxime, and 

 CONTAINS Bivalent Carbon, C : NOH. 



TT 



Formylchloridoxime, HON : C,,, . The synthesis of fulminate of 



mercury from sodic nitromethane, described in the preceding paper, 

 leads directly to the conclusion that this substance must be identical 

 with mercuric carbyloxime, C : NOhg. The behavior of the salt 

 towards concentrated hydroclilnric acid is also in favor of this conclu- 

 sion ; there is formed, as Steiner,|| Carstanjen and Ehrenberg,1[ and 

 especially also Divers and Kawakita,** have shown, not a trace of 

 oxalic acid, but only formic acid, corrosive sublimate, and hydroxyl- 

 amine hydrochloride. 



* Berthelot, Ann. Chem. (Liebig), XCVII. 125 , Geuther and Frohlich, Ann. 

 Chem. (Liebig), CCII. 290. 



t Ann. Chera. (Liebig), CCLXX. 267. J Ibid., CCLXX. 322. 



§ Vol. XXVII. pp. 102-104. 

 II Ber. de. chem. Ges., XVI 1484, 2419 

 IT Journ. f. prakt. Chem., [2.], XXV. 232; XXX. 38. 

 ** Journ. chem. Soc, XLV. 13-30, 75. 



