SODIUM OR POTASSIUM : EDWARD DIVERS. 79 



SHO.NH.SOsNa + 4XaOH = NaON : NONa + 2NaS03^Ta + 4OH2. 



Hantzsch and Sauer liave also given an equally convincing 

 proof of the same point, Ly introducing nitrosyl into dimetliylhy- 

 droxycarbamide and decomposing the product by alkali (see 

 below). The facts, that cuprous hyponitiite cannot exist and 

 that mercurous hyponitrite, on the otlier hand, and not the 

 mercuric salt, is stable, point also to the metals being united 

 to the oxygen and not to the nitrogen. 



Hantzsch and Saner, in their desire to prove that nitramine 

 is not H2N.NO0, but a stereoisomer of hyponitrous acid, would 

 have it that their interesting formation ot'hyponitrous acid from 

 dimethylhydroxy-nitrosocarbamide is analogous to that of nitra- 

 mine from nitrosourethane — 



Et O.CO[NAH)+HOH=H(NAH)+Efc O.CO.OH ; 

 NMe2.C0(NAhI) +HOH=H(NAH) +NMp,.CO.OH (decomposing). 



However, by displaying what (NAH) conceals, namely, the dif- 

 ference between the nitramine and the isonitramine— 



Tliiele Ilantzscli 



Et O.CO.N H.NO.. or Et O.CO.N-NOH+OR, =H,N.NO., or HN-NOH+ &c. 



NMe,.CO.N(OH).NO + OH, = N(OH) :NOH + &c.- 



it becomes evident that the hydrogen of tlie water (or metal of 

 the alkali) goes, in the case of the nitramine, to tiie amidic 

 nitrogen united to the carbonyl, while, in the case of the isoni- 

 tramine, it goes to the nitroxy or nitroso nitrogen not united 

 to the carbonyl, even if Hantzsch and Sauer's free resort to 

 tautomery could be justified. Surely, this difference is too great 

 to allow of nitramine being treated as a probable or actual 

 stereoisomer of hyponitrous acid. Hantzsch's formula, 



KON— N.SO..K, 

 0/ 



