Quarterly Meeting, October 16th, 1860. 



Dr. R. Angus Smith, Vice-President, in the Chair. 



The Chairman gave a short account of his examination 

 of coal pyrites for arsenic. He stated that although the 

 knowledge of the existence of arsenic in the iron pyrites 

 found in coal may not be considered perfectly novel, it cer- 

 tainly does not seem to be known that arsenic is so widely 

 disseminated as to form an ordinary constituent of the coals 

 burnt in our towns, and chemists of celebrity have held it — 

 and now hold it — to be absent there. He had examined 

 fifteen specimens of coals in Lancashire, and found arsenic in 

 thirteen. He had also found it in a few^ others; but Mr. Binney 

 having promised a collection, properly arranged, the examina- 

 tion will then be made more complete. Mr. Dagald Campbell 

 had also lately found arsenic in coal pyrites. The Chairman 

 added, that this had a very direct bearing on our sanitary 

 knowdedge, as we must now be obliged to add arsenic to the 

 number of impurities in the atmosphere of our large towns. 

 It is true that he had not actually obtained it from the 

 atmosphere, but when the pyrites is burnt the arsenic burns 

 and is carried off along with the sulphur. One or two coal 

 brasses (as they are called) contained copper, a metal that is 

 also to some extent volatilized, as may be readily observed 

 wherever copper soldering takes place. Although an 

 extremely small amount of copper is carried up from furnaces, 

 it is not well entirely to ignore it. The amount of arsenic, 

 however, is probably not without considerable influence, and 

 we may probably learn the reason why some towns seem less 

 affected than others by the burning of coals, by examining 

 the amount of arsenic burnt as well as sulphur. 



PiiocBEDiNGS— Lit. & Phil. Society— No. 2.— Session, 1860-61. 



