204 HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY. [LECTURE XI. 



deavoured to make their ideas in this connection plain to their 

 opponents, but still they do not appear to have succeeded in 

 convincing them. Telling experiments were still wanting. 

 Gerhardt required hundreds of examples in order to show that 

 H 4 O 2 , and not H 2 O, corresponds to the formulas N 2 H 6 and 

 H 2 C1 2 . Laurent's proof with respect to the doubling of the 

 molecular weights of hydrogen, chlorine, etc., is also clumsy. 

 In spite of this, it cannot be denied that these chemists at that 

 time possessed accurate fundamental ideas, and I do not doubt 

 that they also would have been able to deduce the same con- 

 clusions, productive as they were for our science, from the facts 

 which were now discovered and so excellently turned to account 

 by Williamson. 



By the action of potassium ethylate upon ethyl iodide, 

 Williamson had hoped to be able to effect the synthesis of an 

 alcohol ; 25 ethyl was expected to take the place of the potassium, 

 with the formation of an ethylated ethyl alcohol an expecta- 

 tion quite in conformity with the views of the period. A short 

 time previously, Wurtz had discovered ethylamine, 26 which he 

 regarded as a substituted ammonia a view which was con- 

 firmed by the interesting mode of formation of this and many 

 analogous substances, discovered by Hofmann. 27 Frankland 

 had already tried by means of zinc ethyl, a substance discovered 

 by himself, 28 to introduce alcohol radicals into organic sub- 

 stances. 29 But Williamson's experiment gave unexpected 

 results : instead of an alcohol, he obtained ether. He under- 

 stands, however, how to adapt his ideas, which had been 

 turned in an altogether different direction, to his results, and 

 he at once recognises the full importance of his experiment. 

 He explains the formation of ether under the conditions which 

 he had observed, and then the formation of ether in general ; 

 and he proves the accuracy of his view by means of a series of 

 brilliant experiments. 



Different views were at that time held as to the formulae of 



25 Annalen. 77, 37. 26 Comptes Rendus. 28, 223. 27 Annalen. 66, 

 129, etc. 28 Ibid. 71, 213 ; 85, 329. Ibid. 85, 354. 



