5o On ihe ldenUly of the Pjrorducdus, 



even different kinds of mould itfelf arc charged with it, as may 

 be eafily proved by diftilling them with a little diluted iul- 

 phuric acid: tan, when heated, emits an odour of vinegar, 

 and furni flies fome of it by the fame treatment: water in 

 which pulfe, cabbages, carrots, turnips, potatoes, cucum- 

 bers, the pods of French beans, &c. hdve been fteeped and 

 grown four, is exceedingly acetous : the water from the ftarch 

 manufactories is the fame: the juices of acid fruits, thofe of 

 apples, pears, goofeberries, ftrawberries, raipberries, cherries, 

 oranges, and lemons, when expofed fome hours to the warm 

 air, afiume, along with a ftrong and pungent odour, a tafte 

 differently and more ftrongly acid than that which they had 

 naturally; befides perceiving in them acetous acid, you will 

 obtain it pure and infulated by fubjecting thefe juices to dis- 

 tillation. It is well known from the experiments of Scheele, 

 that milk in becoming four gives acetous acid; we have 

 found that bouilli and animal jelly form this acid alfo : in a 

 word, we have faid in other memoirs that the urine of the 

 mammiferaf, and that of man in particular, had the pro- 

 perty of becoming acetous, and gave a great quantity of very 

 ftrong acid by diftillalion. 



Thus the number of the fubfiances fufceptible of acetili- 

 cation is very confiderable : extractive matter, mucilage, fae- 

 charine bodies, faecula, and ftarch ; even ligneous bodies, 

 tan, the greater part of the primitive vegetable acids, the ge- 

 latin of animals, the pafeous matter, and even uree, that body 

 peculiar to urine, and which characterifes it by its remark- 

 able properties, all thefe products of vegetable and animal 

 organifation and Jife are equally fufceptible of acetification. 



It is true, that the circumftances under which we have 

 presented their conversion into acetous acid, feem all to be- 

 long to a fermentation, arfd that it might be thought that 

 thev follow a formation more or lefs ftriking or fugitive of 

 vinous matter, but it remains for us to fliow that thefe mat- 

 ters may be acetified bv phenomena or caufes different from 

 fermentation; and this fact is already proved by the acid 

 productions of the diftillation, which form the principal fub- 

 iecr of this memoir. It is here feen that the action of fire 

 really acetifies gums, mucilages, tartriles, wood, A know- 

 7 ledge 



