106 CHEMISTRY. (MISCELLANEOUS.) 



CHILE. 



used. The whole is then clamped and held firmly 

 together by iron cross-bars provided with ad- 

 justable screws on each end, the bars being in- 

 Milated from the body of the furnace by strips 

 of asbestos. The end bricks are perforated with 

 1.5-inch holes containing a collar of asbestos or 

 a small cylinder of clay, through which the elec- 

 trodes of carbon (1 by 12 inches) pass into the 

 furnace-chamber. Connection is made with these 

 electrodes by copper sleeves lined with copper 

 gauze and tightened with set screws, which at 

 the same time carry copper lugs that hold the 

 flexible cables. 



Miscellaneous. The Electrochemical Soci- 

 ety (of America) held its first meeting in Phila- 

 delphia, Pa., April 3 to 5, Prof. T. W. Richards 

 presiding. Twenty papers were read and dis- 

 cussed during the sessions, and arrangements 

 were made for the publication of the proceed- 

 ings. 



In his presidential address before the meeting 

 of the Chemical Society in Philadelphia, F. W. 

 <Jlarke presented as the chief need of chemistry 

 at present a better organization of research. 

 While appreciating the great work done by in- 

 dividuals laboring independently, the speaker 

 thought that collaboration and systematization 

 were urgently required. Laboratories of re- 

 search, he said, should be established in all civil- 

 ized countries. Work should be so regulated by 

 conference as to avoid repetition, each worker 

 reenforcing the others. The primary function of 

 the scheme should be to perform the drudgery of 

 science, to carry on the tedious, laborious, elabo- 

 rate investigations from which the solitary work- 

 er shrinks, but which are nevertheless essential 

 to the development of chemistry. Brilliant dis- 

 coveries might be made in the course of these 

 investigations, but incidentally and not as their 

 main purpose. 



A large increase has taken place in recent 

 years in the manufacture of artificial graphite 

 in the United States, the product of the year 

 1901 having amounted, according to the reports 

 of the Geological Survey, to 2,500,000 pounds, as 

 compared with 860,750 pounds in 1900, and 162,- 

 382 pounds in 1897, when the commercial produc- 

 tion began. More than half of the output for 

 1901 was in the form of graphitized electrodes for 

 use in the manufacture of alkali and bleaching 

 by electrolytic processes. The rest was employed 

 in the manufacture of paints, lubricants, pencils, 

 motor-brushes, crucibles, and dry batteries. 



Sodium amalgam was allowed by M. Moissan 

 to act upon ammonium iodid in solution in liquid 

 anhydrous ammonia at a temperature of about 

 39 C. Under these conditions the sodium 

 amalgam reacted upon the ammonium iodid and 

 became more fluid without the formation of any 

 gas. The sodium iodid formed, together with the 

 excess of sodium, were next removed by liquid 

 ammonia at a temperature of 40, and then 

 with ether at 86 C. The solid ingot thus pro- 

 duced was then placed in a tube kept at 90 

 C. and connected with a mercury-pump. It was 

 found that a perfect vacuum could be maintained 

 in the apparatus without any gas being given 

 off by the ingot. The temperature was then 

 allowed to rise, when a mixture of ammonia and 

 hydrogen gases in the proportion of two of the 

 former to one of the latter was given off. All 

 these facts apparently point to the conclusion 

 that the radical NH 4 is actually present in the 

 metallic mass prepared at 39 C.; but M. Mois- 

 san believes that this is really not the case, there 

 being a possibility that a metallic ammoniacal hy- 

 drate is formed. He has found that when sodium 



amalgam reacts with a solution of ammonia in 

 water there is a slow evolution of gas without 

 foaming. If, however, sodium hydride in solu- 

 tion in sodium amalgam is placed in the same 

 liquid, there is at once a foaming mass produced, 

 which may last for two or three days. 



Quicklime, if pure and free from silicates, is 

 melted only in small quantity and with great 

 difficulty at the highest temperature attainable 

 with the oxyhydrogen blowpipe. It has, how- 

 ever, been found by M. Henri Moissan to be 

 melted with great ease in the electric furnace, 

 when it may be made to boil. On cooling, crys- 

 tals were found, which belonged to the cubical 

 system; but after keeping for a few months they 

 broke up into other crystals, which acted upon 

 polarized light. The density of the lime was 

 raised from 3.3 to 3.4 by fusion. Since lime 

 forms the basis of the electric furnace, it is of 

 importance to study the effect of heating to high 

 temperature with various substances. The re- 

 sults of reactions with carbon, silicon, boron, ti- 

 tanium, chromium, manganese, iron, nickel, co- 

 balt, and platinum were presented in M. Mois- 

 san's paper. 



In experiments on the decomposition of hydro- 

 gen peroxid on exposure to sunshine, R. T. D. 

 Arcy found (a) that dilute solutions of that sub- 

 stance are rapidly affected by exposure to sun- 

 shine. When an aqueous solution containing 4 

 per cent, of H 2 O 2 was exposed in a flask to a 

 sunshine of five days in June, about three-fourths 

 of the hydrogen peroxid were decomposed. In 

 open dishes the compound was more rapidly de- 

 composed, and the effect was not dependent 

 at any rate, to any considerable extent upon the 

 decomposition taking place simultaneously, and 

 it was not an effect of temperature. (6) That 

 the surface of a solution of hydrogen peroxid 

 undergoing this decomposition is capable of dis- 

 charging negative electrification, (c) That the 

 days in which sunlight decomposes H 2 O 2 most 

 rapidly are the days in which the discharging 

 action is most pronounced. The conclusion is 

 drawn by the author that the decomposition of 

 hydrogen peroxid by light is a possible source 

 of production of positive and negative ions in 

 the atmosphere. 



Experiments are described by J. Matuschek 

 which indicate that the proportion of water pres- 

 ent in petroleum contaminated with bituminous 

 products of distillation raises the flash-point and 

 the combustion-point of the petroleum. This in- 

 crease depends on the quantity of water present. 

 Further, it was found that the regular rise of the 

 flash-point and combustion-point is maintained 

 only up to a certain degree. The regularity 

 ceases as soon as small drops of water begin to 

 form in the mixture during the experiment. 



CHILE, a republic in South America. The 

 Congress consists of a Senate of 32 members 

 elected for six years by the provinces, in the 

 proportion of 1 Senator to 3 Deputies. The 

 Chamber of Deputies is composed of 94 members, 

 elected in the proportion of 1 member to every 

 30.000 people in each department. Every male 

 citizen twenty-one years of age and able to read 

 and write has the right to vote for both Depu- 

 ties and Senators. Ihe President of the repub- 

 lic is elected indirectly through a college of elect- 

 ors for the term of five years. German Riesco 

 was elected President on June 25, 1901, entered 

 upon office on Sept. 18, 1901, and appointed the 

 following Cabinet: Prime Minister and Minister 

 of the Interior, Ramon Barros Luco ; Minister of 

 Foreign Affairs, Worship, and Colonization, Eli- 

 doro Yaflez ; Minister of Justice and Public In- 



