Miscellanies. 195 
to M. Sertiirner for having ascertained the alkaline nature of mor- 
phine, and thus opened the way to important medical discoveries.— 
Annales de Chim. Aout, 1831. 
4. Process for hastening acetic fermentation and for preparing on 
a large scale, and in an economical manner, strong vinegar in forty 
eight hours, by M. Dingler. 
The method recommended by this author consists 
1. In providing suitable rooms or buildings which can be easily 
kept at the requisite temperature by stoves, hot air flues or other 
modes of heating, and by which, during the process of rectification 
they should be maintained at the temperature of about 100° F. 
wo or more thermometers should be suspended in the room by 
which the heat can be regulated. 
2. In placing in each of these rooms a convenient number of casks, 
containing about one hundred and thirty gallons each. These casks 
must stand erect on blocks of wood which will raise them from one 
and a half to two feet from the floor. The casks may be constructed 
with open tops, but a cover must be made of inch plank which will 
fit accurately into the top and rest upon a hoop or ledge nailed on 
the inside for a support. This cover is for the purpose of prevent- 
ing evaporation. A hole of about three eighths of an inch wide must 
be made in the bung of the cask for the admission of the air which 
is to oxygenize the materials of the vinegar. _ 
3. In procuring a quantity of wood shavings sufficient to fill the 
casks when pressed pretty closely together, without being trodden 
however into a very compact mass. The wood of the red beech 
is found to furnish shavings of the best quality for this purpose. To 
prepare the shavings, the wood should be cut into logs two feet in 
length, split into suitable pieces, and boiled during two hours in 
water in which it should be allowed to remain twenty four hours. 
Thus soaked, the wood is, when dry, more easily planed into shavings, 
which should be about the twentieth of an inch in thickness. If it 
would be more convenient, the operation of boiling may be performed 
on the shavings th ves in lieu of the wood. a, 
4. In preparing the liquor, of whatever kind, which is to be con- 
verted into vinegar, in the usual manner, for the rocess of acidifica- 
tion, viz. by mixing it with a proper ferment, if needful, and placing 
it in a condition favorable to the commencement of the acetic fer- 
mentation 
