470 



LIME. 



ot the Netherlands, containing 1,600 square miles, 



n<l 293,000 inhabitants, chiefly Catholics- The 



Balloon. Finnish, Dutch, and C.erman languages 



nr -[Kiken. The principal river is the Meuse. 



i-:i-lit u tin- capital. The celebrated Limburg 



i-, in ali- lit Limburg, a place in the circle of 



Vi-rvirrs province of I. 



1. 1 Ml',, or LINDEN (tilia). The species of lin- 

 ili-ii are large trees, with alternate, simple, ami cor- 

 date leaves, and flowers disposed on a common 

 (irdmirle, which is inserted in the middle of a folia- 

 iV'Mis bract. The American lime, or bass-wood, is 

 a large and beautiful tree, inhabiting Canada and 

 the northern parts of the Union, and very abundant 

 on the borders of lakes Erie and Ontario. The leaves 

 are cordate, acuminate, serrate, and smooth. The 

 flowers are yellowish, supported on long, pendulous 

 peduncles, and add much to the beauty of the tree. 

 The wood is white and soft, and is used for a few 

 unimportant purposes. The wood of the European 

 lime, though light and soft, is smooth, close-grained, 

 and much used by carvers and turners. It is in 

 great demand for the boards of leather-cutters, and 

 makes excellent charcoal for gunpowder, and for 

 painters. In some countries, the fibrous, inner bark 

 is separated by soaking in water, and manufactured 

 into tisliing-nets, mats, shoes, and clothing ; and the 

 cordage made from it is said to be remarkably strong 

 and elastic. The wood is sometimes cut into thin 

 strips, and used in the manufacture of chip hats, 

 which resemble those made of straw. 



LIME. This earth, well known in its most impor- 

 tant properties, from the remotest antiquity, exists 

 in great abundance in nature. In treating of it in 

 the present article, we shall first describe its chemi- 

 cal properties, and afterwards speak of its natural 

 combinations with the acids, or of the minerals to 

 which it gives rise. Lime is obtained with most 

 facility from the native carbonate, from which, by a 

 strong heat, the carbonic acid may be expelled. 

 This process is conducted on a large scale with the 

 different varieties of limestone, which are calcined or 

 burned, in order to obtain the caustic earth, or quick- 

 lime, as it is called. The lime thus obtained, how- 

 ever, is rarely pure enough for chemical purposes. 

 The chemist, therefore, when he would obtain a very 

 perfect article, calcines transparent crystals of carbo- 

 nate of lime, or prepares it from solution, in the follow- 

 ing manner. Marble or chalk is dissolved in diluted 

 muriatic acid, leaving an excess of lime undissolved ; 

 ammonia is added, which precipitates any alumine or 

 magnesia. The filtered solution is then decomposed 

 by carbonate of potash, and the carbonate of lime, 

 being washed with water and dried, is decomposed 

 by a strong heat. The lime thus obtained is a soft, 

 white substance, of the specific gravity of 2-3. It 

 requires an intense degree of heat for its fusion, which 

 is effected only by the galvanic current, by the com- 

 pound blowpipe, or by a stream of oxygen gas, 

 directed through the flame of an alcohol lamp. 

 The light it emits, during fusion, is the strongest the 

 chemist can produce ; and it has, accordingly, been 

 employed for a signal light, and for facilitating 

 the observation of distant stations, in geodetical 

 operations. Its taste is caustic, astringent and al- 

 kaline. It is soluble in 450 parts of water, accord- 

 ing to Sir H. Davy ; and in 760 parts according to 

 other chemists. The solubility is not increased by 

 heat. If a little water only be sprinkled on new- 

 burned lime, it is rapidly absorbed, with the evolution 

 of much heat and vapour. This constitutes the 

 phenomenon of slacking. The heat proceeds from 

 the consolidation of the liquid water into the lime, 

 forming a hydrate, as slacked lime is now called. Il 

 is a compound of 3-5 parts of lime with 1 -25 of water 



or very nearly 3 to 1. The water may be expelled 

 \>y a red heat. " 



Lime-water is astringent, and somewhat acrid to 

 :he taste. It renders vegetable blues green ; the 

 yellow, brown ; and restores to reddened litmus its 

 usual purple colour. When lime-water stands ex- 

 posed to the air, it gradually attracts carbonic acid, 

 and becomes an insoluble carbonate, while the water 

 remains pure. If lime-water be placed in a capsule 

 under an exhausted receiver, which also encloses a 

 saucer of concentrated sulphuric acid, the water will 

 be gradually withdrawn from the lime, which will 

 concrete into small six-sided prisms. Lime, submit- 

 ted to the action of galvanism, in high intensity, af- 

 forded Sir H. Davy satisfactory evidence of its com- 

 pound nature. It was discovered, in common with 

 the other earths, to consist of a metallic base, which 

 he denominated calcium, and oxygen. The calcium 

 was obtained, in these experiments, in the state of 

 amalgamation witli mercury. On exposing the 

 amalgam to the air or to water, oxygen was absorbed, 

 and lime re-produced. In an experiment designed to 

 obtain the base in an insulated state, by distilling the 

 quicksilver from it, the tube broke while warm, and, 

 at the moment that the air entered, the metal, which 

 had the colour and lustre of silver, took fire, and 

 burnt with an intense white light. Lime, it used to 

 be supposed, combined with sulphur and with phos- 

 phorus ; but it rather appears that it is its base only 

 that unites with these inflammables. The sulphuret 

 of calcium is formed by heating sulphur with lime in 

 a covered crucible. It is of a reddish-yellow colour. 

 When thrown into water, mutual decomposition takes 

 place, and a sulphureted hydro-sulphuret, of a yellow 

 colour, with a fetid odour, is produced. Phosphuret of 

 calcium, or phosphuret of lime, as it has usually been 

 called, is obtained in the following manner : a few 

 pieces of phosphorus are placed at the bottom of a 

 glass tube, which is then filled with small pieces of 

 Rme. The part of the tube where the lime is, is 

 heated red-hot ; and the phosphorus is then sublimed 

 by heat. Its vapour, passing over the lime, decomposes 

 it, and a reddish coloured phosphuret of calcium is 

 formed. This substance is remarkable for decompos- 

 ing water, whenever it is dropped into it, causing an 

 immediate production of phosphnreted hydrogen, 

 which takes fire at the surface of the water. When 

 lime is heated strongly in contact with chlorine, oxy- 

 gen is expelled, and the chlorine is absorbed. For 

 every two parts in volume of chlorine that disappear, 

 one of oxygen is obtained. When liquid muriate of 

 lime is evaporated to dryness, and ignited, it forms the 

 same substance, which is the chloride of calcium. It 

 is a semi-transparent, crystalline substance ; fusible 

 at a strong red heat ; a non-conductor of electricity ; 

 has a very bitter taste ; rapidly absorbs water from 

 the atmosphere, and is hence often employed, in 

 chemical experiments, to deprive gases of any hy- 

 grometric vapour existing in them. 



Chlorine also combines directly with lime, forming 

 the very important substance used in bleaching, for- 

 merly under the name of oxymuriate of lime, but at 

 present, and more correctly, called chloride of lime. 

 It is formed by passing chlorine gas over slacked 

 lime. A great variety of apparatus has been, at dif- 

 ferent times, contrived for favouring the combination 

 of chlorine with slacked lime, for the purposes of 

 commerce. In the opinion of doctor Ure, who has 

 given particular attention to this manufacture, the 

 following construction for subjecting lime-powder to 

 chlorine is the best : It consists of a large chamber, 

 eight or nine feet high, built of siliceous sandstone, 

 having the joints of the masonry secured with a 

 cement composed of pitch, rosin and dry gypsum, in 

 equal parts. A door is fitted into it at one end, 



