70 Mr. A. H. Church on the Action of Water 



quantity of crude sulphate of methyle may be distilled off. This 

 liquid^ as also the body obtained by the action of sulphuric acid 

 upon methylic alcohol, when placed in water is slowly decom- 

 posed at oi'dinary temperatures, almost instantaneously at 100° C. 

 The chief products of this reaction are methylic alcohol and 

 ^-sulphomethylic * acid. The acid produced differs from ordi- 

 nary sulphomethylic acid. For if the acid solution f obtained by 

 treating sulphate of methyle with water be saturated wth car- 

 bonate of baryta, a beautiful baryta salt may be obtained from 

 it by evaporation, or by precipitation with strong alcohol ; the 

 aqueous solution of this salt is not decomposable by ebullition, 

 and the substance itself agrees in all its properties with the 

 ^-sulphomethylate of baryta which I have already described. 

 A portion of this salt dried at 100° C, gave by ignition and sub- 

 sequent treatment of the residue with nitric and sulphuric acids, 

 the following numbers : — 



•27 grm. salt furnished "175 grm. BaSO^=64*81 percent., 



while theory, as C^ H^ Ba 2S0^ requires 64-9 per cent. Ba SO''. 

 In M'hatever way the sulphate of methyle be prepared, and the 

 transformation in contact with water effected, /8-sulphomethylic 

 acid is invai-iably produced. Only once, indeed, have I obtained 

 in this reaction traces of a baryta compound of the same com- 

 position as the sulphomethylate, which was alterable at the boil- 

 ing-point of water. The modified sulphomethylic acid is obtained 

 from the methylic sulphate in a state of the greatest purity when 

 water is allowed to act upon it at the ordinary summer tempera- 

 ture ; when a greater degree of heat is employed, secondary de- 

 compositions occur. The methylic alcohol produced in the reac- 

 tions described is usually contaminated at first with a trace of 

 sulphate of methyle^ imparting to it an alliaceous odour. As it 

 is only by processes of purification, in which a considerable loss 

 takes place, that dilute methylic alcohol can be rendered perfectly 

 anhydrous, and so fit for analysis, I have contented myself with 

 ascertaining that the distillate which came over between 66° and 

 68° possessed a most considerable inflammability ; identifying it 

 with methylic alcohol by a few qualitative experiments, and pi*e- 

 paring a baryta salt of the acid produced by treatment of this 

 dilute methyle spirit with sulphuric acid. 



The salt employed in the analysis last given was prepared from 

 the product of the reaction between sulphomethylate of silver 

 and iodide of methyle. An analysis of the salt made from sul- 



* For an account of this acid, which corresponds in the methyle series 

 with the parnthionic acid of the sethyle series, see PhiL Mag. S. 4. vol. x. 

 pp. 40-44. 



t Occasionally a trace of free sulphuric acid is present in this liquid. 



