—_—s 
Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. if 
“We are therefore led to represent carbonic acid as being formed 
of a molecule of carbon weighing 6, and 2 molecules of oxygen 
weighing 16, which constitute a molecule of carbonic acid weighing 
22. 
*‘Carbonic acid then, like water, is represented by the most 
simple numbers. 
“‘ Composition of Ammonia.—Lastly, ammonia seems also formed, 
in whole numbers, of 3 parts of hydrogen and 14 of azote, which 
may be represented by 3 molecules of hydrogen weighing 3, and 
1 molecule of azote weighing 14. 
“Thus, as if better to exhibit her power, nature in organized 
substances always acts upon a very small number of elements com- 
bined in the most simple proportions. 
“The whole atomic system of the physiologist turns upon these 
four numbers, 1, 6, 7, 8. 
1 is the molecule of hydrogen ; 
6 that of carbon; 
7 or twice 7, that is to say 14, that of azote ; 
8 that of oxygen. 
Let the chemist always attach these numbers to these names, and 
there will no longer exist for him either hydrogen, carbon, azote, or 
oxygen in the abstract. These are substances the reality of which 
he has always seen ; it is of their molecules that he always speaks, 
and to him the word hydrogen means a molecule which weighs 1, 
the word carbon a molecule which weighs 6, and the word oxygen 
a molecule which weighs 8.”—Essai de Statique Chimique des Etres 
organisés, 1842. 
ON SANGUINARINA. BY M. SCHIEL. 
According to M. Dana, sanguinarina is extracted from the root 
of the Sanguinaria Canadensis by treating it with anhydrous alcohol, 
adding water and ammonia to the solution, then washing the red 
precipitate formed with acid, and boiling it in water and animal 
charcoal. After pouring off the water, the mixture of the base and 
charcoal is to be treated with alcohol, and the solution being evapo- 
rated, the base remains in the state of a mass of a pearl-gray colour. 
M. Schiel prefers in preparing this substance the process adopted by 
Probst for that of chelérythrina, procured from the Chelidonium majus, 
the appearance of which resembles that of the sanguinarina. 
The dried and powdered root is to be treated with ether; the solu- 
tion is to be filtered and a current of. hydrochloric acid gas is to be 
passed into it. This acid occasions the precipitation of impure 
hydrochlorate of sanguinarina, which is separated by filtration; this 
being dried by a gentle heat is to be dissolved in hot water, and ex- 
cess of ammonia added to the solution. The precipitate, which is 
then formed, is washed upon the filter and then dissolved in ether. 
The solution is to be shaken with blood-charcoal recently calcined, 
until, on depositing the charcoal, it appears quite colourless; on 
passing hydrochloric acid gas into the solution, a precipitate of pure 
