The Constitution of the Nitrososulphates. 



By 

 Edward Divers, M.D., F.R.S. Prof., 



and 



Tamemasa Haga, FCS., Rigakuhakushi, Assist. Prof. 



College of Science, Imperial University. 



Following up the fact we have already made known (this vol., 

 pp. 91, 92), that an aqueous solution of potassium nitrososuJphate be- 

 comes strongly alkaline soon after the addition of alcohol to it, we 

 have got results which seem to supply all that was wanting to bring 

 our knowledge of the constitution of the nitrososulphates up to the 

 standard of the present state of chemistry. 



Some chemists have recently (Berichte. 27, 1508; 326-1; 3498), 

 allowed themselves to call these salts nitroxysulphites, a name which 

 points to the fact that they are produced by the union of nitric oxide 

 and a sulphite, but ignores all else concerning them, ascertained even 

 at the time of their discovery. Pelouze, in 1835, showed a keener 

 appreciation, than these chemists of to-day here display, of the nature 

 of chemical union, and called them nitrosulphates. According to him, 

 they are not sulphates, ordinary sulphates that is, for they do not 

 precipitate barium chloride (unless acidified), but are complex salts, 

 substituted sulphates, as we should now say. Watts, in his Dictionary, 

 adopting Pelouze's view, modified the name to nitrososnlpliates, in order 

 to distinguish these salts from nitroxijl compounds. 



