888 



CHROMOHYDROCYANIC ACID. 



CHRONICLES. 



880 



Chloroehromic acid is an intense red liquid. In the air it emits 

 dense fumes, that have an odour more suffocating, if possible, than 

 chlorine. Brought into contact \vith ammonia a re-action is set up, 

 that usually is sufficiently energetic to inflame the mixture. Passed 

 through a red-hot porcelain tube the vapour deposits brilliant rhombo- 

 hedral crystals of sesquioxide of chromium. These crystals are of a 

 dark green colour, and sufficiently hard to cut glass. 



Chloroehromic acid (Cr 2 C10 2 ) may be regarded either as chromic acid 

 (CrOj) in which 1 equivalent of oxygen is replaced by an equivalent of 

 chlorine, or as 2 equivalents of chromic acid united with 1 equivalent 

 of terchloride of chromium, thus : 



3(CrC10.,) = (CrCl 3 + 2Cr0 3 ) 



Chromium combines with iodine and bromine, but the compounds 

 formed have not been analysed. The phosphide and sulphide of chro- 

 mium are not important bodies. 



Terftuoride of chromium (CrFl 3 ) is a blood-red liquid, obtained by 

 distilling a mixture of 4 parts of chromate of lead, S of .powdered fluor 

 spar, and 8 of concentrated sulphuric acid, in a platinum retort. It 

 fumes very strongly in the air, giving off irritating vapours of chromic 

 acid. 



Cyanide of chromium (Cr.,Cy 3 ) is a blueish-gray precipitate produced 

 on mixing solutions of sesquichloride of chromium and cyanide of 

 potassium. 



Chromu/tydrocyanic acid (Cr,Cy 3 ,3HCy), or chromocyanide of hydro- 

 gen, is a body analogous to hydroferricyanic acid. The potassium salt 

 (Cr,Cy 3 ,3KCy), isomorphous with ferricyanide of potassium, is pro- 

 duced on exposing to the air a mixture of caustic potash, hydrated 

 oxide of chromium, and hydrocyanic acid. From this salt other 

 chromocyanides may be obtained by double decomposition. By the 

 action of sulphuretted hydrogen on the silver gait, the acid itself is 

 isolated. 



Amido-chromic lose! containing chromic oxide (Cr.,0,,) united with 

 several atoms of ammonia (NH 3 ) have recently been obtained by 

 M. Fremy. An interesting fact connected with these bases is, that the 

 ammonia taken up entirely loses its power of saturating acids. Thus, 

 roteo-chrome (Cr 2 O 3 ,4NH 3 ), like the sesquioxide itself, combines with 

 three equivalents of an acid to form neutral salts ; the four equivalents 

 of ammonia which enter into its molecule exercise, therefore, no 

 influence upon its capacity of saturation. The sulphate of roseo-chrome 

 ((Cr t O 3 ,4NH,),3S0 3 ) is obtained by acting with sulphuric acid on the 

 violet granular body (amide of chromium), that deposits on exposing to 

 the air a solution of metachromie sesquioxide in an ammoniacal salt 

 containing excess of ammonia. 



Testa for the salts of chromium. Sesquisalts give a green precipitate 

 (of oxide) with sulphide of ammonium ; no precipitate with sulphuretted 

 hydrogen ; with ammonia a bulky gelatinous precipitate (of hydrated 

 sesquioxide); with the fixed alkalies a green precipitate, soluble in 

 excess, and reprecipitated on boiling. 



Soluble salts of chromic acid give a yellow precipitate (chromate of 

 lead) with lead salts ; a red precipitate (chromate of silver) with nitrate 

 of silver ; and an orange precipitate (subchromate) with subnitrate of 

 mercury. 



The quantitative estimation of chromium is most conveniently per- 

 formed by obtaining it in the form of chloride, precipitating with 

 ammonia and well washing, and igniting the resulting oxide in a 

 covered platinum crucible : 100 parts contain 68-68 of chromium. 



CHROMOHYDROCYANIC ACID. [CHROMIUM, Cyanides of.] 



CHROMOTARTARIC ACID. [CHROMIUM, Tartrates of.] 



CHROMULE. [CHLOROPHYLL.] 



CHRONICLE, CHRO'NICON (xpoms, time), denotes a history in 

 which facto are digested in order of time, though not necessarily in 

 successive years, as is distinctly implied in the word Annals. It must 

 be owned, however, that the two terms have been indiscriminately used 

 for histories in which the succession of years has been the governing 

 principle of the nairative. The term chronicle, at the present day, is 

 seldom used but in S] leaking of our old histories, as the 'Saxon 

 nicle;' ' Carton's Chronicle ;' ' Fabyan's Chronicle ;' 'Holiushed's 

 Chronicle ; ' &c. This term was also adopted by the French, as in 

 ' Froissart's Chronicles,' ' Monstrelet's Chronicles,' and in ' Les Chro- 

 niques de France (appelle's la Chronique de St. Denys), compiles par 

 1'ordre du Roy Charles VIII.' [ANNALS.] 



r 1 1 KO N I < i ,KS, the name of two books of the Old Testament. In the 

 original Hebrew they constitute only one book, entitled D^OVl ^~!?"T 

 (I)ibrB Hayyamim), Verba Dieitim, AVords of Days; that is, diaries or 

 journals. In the Septuagint they are called TJapa\fm6^fva, res prcetcr- 

 mistte, "things omitted. The Books of Chronicles have been so 

 called from being considered as supplementary to the Books of Samual 

 find of Kings ; the histories of which they repeat with considerable 

 variations. The name Chronicles seems to have been first applied by 

 St. Hicronymus (Jerome). Much difference of opinion has been enter- 

 tained as to the compilers ; but the general tendency of all critical 

 opinion, ancient and modern, ascribes the authorship to Ezra, after the 

 return of the Jews from the seventy years' captivity in Babylon. 

 Ki'-hhorn enumerates several reasons for attributing them to Ezra 

 .It-Hung/ vol. ii.), one of which is a similarity to the books of 

 Kings and Ezra in style, orthography, and idiom ; but this assumes that 

 Kings was written by Ezra, an opinion not now generally entertained. 



The Jews also ascribe them to Ezra. Several objections have, how- 

 ever, been taken as to the probability of their being his work (Calmet's 

 'Diet.' by Taylor), one of which is, that (Chron. iii. 19, et <'</.) an 

 account is given of the posterity of his contemporary Zei-ubbabel, 

 which extends to nine generations, or about 300 years, beyond the 

 time of Ezra ; but nothing, as Eichhorn observes, is certainly known 

 of the time either of Ezra's birth or his death, and nothing is more 

 likely than that a genealogy of the house of David, a matter of great 

 interest to the Jews, should have been interpolated by a later hand. 

 An objection has also been raised on account of certain discrepancies 

 between the statements in the books of Chronicles and of Kings, on 

 the supposition that if Ezra compiled Kings he would not have con- 

 tradicted himself in Chronicles. But the most likely theory is that 

 Kings was compiled by Jeremiah. Dr. A. Dillman (in Herzog's ' Real 

 Encyklopiidie,' 1853) contends that the Books of Chronicles must have 

 been written about 330 B.C., but that they and Nehemiah also contain 

 fragments of the older composition. The Rev. T. H. Horne (' Intro- 

 duction to the Holy Scriptures ') also decides against the author-ship 

 of Ezra. 



The numerous contradictions throughout Chronicles and Kings, in 

 facts, dates, numbers, names, and genealogies, are acknowledged by many 

 learned critics. They form the subject matter of nearly the whole of 

 Dr. Kennicott's ' First Dissertation on the State of the Hebrew Text ; ' 

 where they are treated as corruptions, interpolations, and mistakes. 

 In the narrative 1 Chron. xviii. 3, which is taken verbatim from 2 Sam. 

 viii. 3, there occurs, besides a variation of proper names, an alteration 

 of 700 horsemen to 7000 : and exactly "the same mistake" (Kennicott) 

 occurs in the passage cited in 1 Chron. xix. 18, from 2 Sam. x. 8. 

 Compare also the numbers in 1 Kings iv. 26, with 2 Chron. ix. 25 ; and 

 1 Kings ix. 23, with 2 Chron. viii. 18 ; and the statement of Ahaziah's 

 age in reference to that of his father, in Chron. xxi. Most, if not all 

 these apparent inconsistencies, are, however, reconcileable, and this 

 has been well done by Dahler and Keil, Eichhorn and Hitverneek, in 

 Germany, and by Dr. Kitto in the ' Pictorial Bible,' and Dr. S. David- 

 son in his ' Sacred Hermeneutics.' Spinoza, De Wette, and Gramberg 

 have been the most strenuous opponents to the credibility of the 

 books of Chronicles. 



Many passages and chapters in Chronicles and Kings appear to have 

 been transcribed verbatim from records made before the Babylonian 

 captivity, while the Temple was standing : as 2 Chron. v. and 1 Kings 

 viii., which are word for word alike, and speak of the ark, the former 

 in v. 9, the latter in v. 8, as being in the Holy Place " unto this day ; " 

 though neither Kings nor Chronicles are supposed to have been written 

 until from sixty to ninety years after the Temple, and all its contents 

 had been demolished, or carried off by Nebuchadnezzar. Another 

 instance is in 2 Chron. viii. 8. The last thirteen verses ot 1 Chron. i., 

 occur verbatim in Genesis xxxvi., and appear to have been transcribed 

 from some historical document made after Saul, the first king, reigned 

 in Israel (see v. 31), which was 400 years after the death of Moses. 

 Another curious particular is that the two last verses of 2 Chron. 

 concerning the proclamation of Cyrus, are the same which begin the 

 following books of Ezra. This has been shown by Grotius to have 

 been merely a mark of continuation in ancient books, and that it was 

 so used by Procopius in his ' Hist. Vandalicorum et Gothicorum.' 

 The broken sentence with which Chronicles end at " go up," is com- 

 pleted in v. 3 of Ezra "to Jerusalem," &c. 



To this may be added a fact not noticed by the commentators, that 

 the Jews, in the public reading of their scriptures, to avoid ending 

 with the recital of any calamity producing dejection, add the com- 

 mencement of the next paragraph, or repeat a portion of that which 

 precedes, in order to finish with something consolatory. Accordingly, 

 in Hebrew copies, at the end especially of Isaiah, Malachi, Lamenta- 

 tions, and Ecclesiastes, a masoretic sign is given, formed of the initials 

 of these four books (rjrtfv) to indicate the recital of some antecedent 



or subsequent passage. It is supposed by St. Hieronymus that the 

 present books of Chronicles are those of the kings of Judah and of 

 Israel, so often referred to in the books of Kings. The objection to 

 this supposition is, that these references are not unfrequently made 

 to what is not to be found in the present book of Chronicles. The 

 Chronicles referred to in Kings are generally thought to have been a 

 voluminous work from which ours arc only a brief and mutilated abstract. 

 Grotius, Capellus, Spinoza, Clericus, 11. Simonius, Whiston, and others, 

 hold this opinion. The chief design of this compilation seems to have 

 been to exhibit, first, the genealogies, ranks, and functions of the 

 priesthood, in order that, after returning from the captivity, they 

 might re-assume their proper dignities; and secondly, by describing 

 the distribution of lands before the captivity, to direct the families 

 of each tribe in regaining their ancient inheritances. The first book 

 is a recapitulation of sacred history from the creation to the death 

 of David. The second book gives the history of the kings of Israel 

 and Judah from Solomon to the return from Babylon. The authority 

 of the books of Chronicles is established by St. Paul applying a pro- 

 phetic passage (Heb. i. 5) to the character of our Saviour from 

 1 Chron. xvii. 13 and 14; see also chap xxii. 10. (Bishop Mant's 

 'Bible.') For the purpose of comparison and critical investigation, 

 see the table of Chronicles, Samuel, and Kings, in Home's ' Intro- 

 duction to the Bible,' also Cruttwell's ' Concordance of Parallels.' The 



