ETHYL AMMONIUMSÜLPHITE. 203 



fact. Again, if sodium pyrosulphite and ethyl pyrosulpliite 

 had been the products, then the latter would also have been 

 noticeable as a compound new to science. Szarvasy's and our 

 own experience and the difficulty of interpreting Rosenheim 

 and Liebknecht's results have caused us to prepare ethyl 

 sodiumsulphite and test its behaviour with sulphur dioxide. 



Sodium, bright and clean-cut under dried ether, was 

 quickly transferred to a little dry alcohol in a small flask 

 until the solution thickened and became inactive on more 

 sodium. The solution was quickly decanted, in a cold, dry 

 atmosphere, into another flask and cooled in a freezing mixt- 

 ure, which caused abundant crystallisation of sodium ethoxide. 

 Sulphur dioxide was now passed in until it was in large excess 

 in the liquefied state. Its efi'ect was to cause the sodium 

 ethoxide to gradually dissolve and give place to the micaceous 

 crystals of Rosenheim and Liebknecht's salt, until the solution 

 had almost all dried up. After this, it appeared to have no 

 farther action. The very sulphurous mother-liquor was drained 

 off and the flask placed in a vacuum-desiccator to dry its 

 contents. The dry salt was weighed in the preparation-flask 

 and then aqueous solution of potassium hydroxide poured on 

 to it. Oxidised, first by bromine and then by potassium 

 chlorate and hydrochloric acid, it gave 24.67 per cent, sulphur, 

 thus, confirming the observation that the salt did not seem 

 to be affected by excess of sulphur dioxide, for the calculated 

 quantity of sulphur in ethyl sodiumsulphite is 24.24 p. c. We 

 conclude, therefore, that Rosenheim and Liebknecht failed to 

 guard sufficiently against the entrance of moisture, and that 

 their salts are not destroyed by dry sulphur dioxide. The 

 sulphur dioxide mother-liquor poured off in our experiment 



