August 15, 1889] 



NATURE 



369 



THE INTERNA TIONAL CHEMICAL 

 CONGRESS. 



A N International Chemical Congress has just been 

 -^"^ held in Paris under the presidency of M. Berthelot. 

 The Congress was composed of some 300 members, in- 

 cluding the most eminent French chemists, and a certain 

 number of distinguished foreigners. It was much re- 

 gretted that foreign countries should not have been more 

 numerously represented, and it was explained that owing 

 to the protracted illness of M. Hanriot, Secretary of the 

 Paris Chemical Society and of the Congress, the invita- 

 tions were not sent out till very late, and still further 

 delay was caused by their passage through the Ministry of 

 Public Instruction. Much credit is due to M. Fauconnier, 

 who undertook to replace M. Hanriot at the last moment. 



The opening meeting was held on the 29th ult. at the 

 Conservatoire des Arts et Metiers, the proceedings being 

 of a purely formal character. M. Berthelot, who occu- 

 pied the chair, said that a large number of communica- 

 tions had been received by the organizing Committee, 

 and that from the nature of these communications it had 

 been found expedient to divide the Congress into four 

 Sections, which he proceeded to enumerate, together with 

 the list of Sectional Presidents and Secretaries proposed 

 by the Committee : — 



Section I. Analysis of Food-Products : President, M. 

 Riche ; Secretary, M. Bishop. 



Section II. Analysis of Agricultural Products: Pre- 

 sident, M. Joulie ; Secretary, M. Demoussy. 



Section III. Analysis of Pharmaceutical Products : 

 President, M. Petit ; Secretary, M. Bocquillon. 



Section IV. Unification of Chemical Nomenclature : 

 President, M. Friedel ; Secretary, M. Bouveault. 



The Sectional meetings took place in the day-time ; the 

 evenings of July 30, August i, 2, and 3, being reserved 

 for the discussion of the reports presented by the various 

 Sections. 



Section I. — The Section discussed a certain number of 

 methods used in the analysis of flour, bread, wine, coffee, 

 &c. At the general meeting the following resolutions 

 were passed : — 



(i) That the Government be requested to inspect regu- 

 larly the factories of salted meats, as at present the brines 

 used are added to constantly, but never changed (report 

 by M. Combes). 



(2) That the Government be requested to inspect all 

 teas on their entry into France. 



(3) That not more than 0-3 per cent, of lead should be 

 permitted in the alloy used for " tinning," nor more than 

 5 per cent, in the alloy for tin vessels. 



(4) That it is desirable that the methods of wine 

 analysis should be verified and codified. 



Section II. — After discussion of the methods at present 

 in use for the analysis of earths, manures, &c., it was 

 resolved that in the case of judicial disputes no single 

 method should in any case be obligatory,' but that the 

 fullest latitude should be allowed to the experts. 



Section III.— It was resolved that a certain number of 

 permanent Commissions should be appointed for the 

 inspection of some of the most important substances 

 used in pharmacy — quinine, morphine, chloroform, phenol, 

 salicylic acid, analgesme, &c. The Commissions should 

 endeavour to investigate and improve the methods of 

 analysis used for these substances. 



Section IV.— Section IV. was the one of by far the 

 greatest general interest, as was testified by the presence 

 of Profs. Alexeieff (Kiew), Calderon (Madrid), Franchi- 

 mont (Leyden), Graebe (Geneva), Istrati (Bucharest), 

 Noelting (Mulhouse), Boukowski Bey (Constantinople), 

 and Colonel da Luz (Rio Janeiro), who were elected Vice- 

 Presidents. 



The Comit^ Consultatif des Stations Agronomiques et des Laboratoires 

 Agricoles has issued a code of the methods of analysis of manures, and these 

 are at present obhgatory. 



The following is a short account of the discussions held 

 at the Sectional meetings : — 



The Nomenclature 0/ Unsaturated Hydrocarbons. — 

 M. Calderon read a paper, in which he proposed to re- 

 place the present arbitrary names of the hydrocarbons 

 by a series of names derived from the fundamental terms 

 of each series. He proposes to name paraffins, proto- 

 mcthane, deuto-methane, &c., the olefines deuto-ethylene, 

 trito-ethylene, &c. The radicles are derived from the 

 hydrocarbons by the insertion of Latin numerals between 

 the Greek numeral and the generic name ; thus, methyl 

 becomes proto-uni-methane, &c. The author advocated 

 these changes as calculated to facilitate the teaching of 

 organic chemistry. — MM, Friedel, Grimaux, Graebe, and 

 Maquenne expressed the view that it was impossible to 

 make changes so radical, and that Hofmann's nomencla- 

 ture was quite sufficient so far as the normal hydrocarbons 

 are concerned. 



M. Bdhal presented a report to the Section on a system 

 for the nomenclature of complex open-chain compounds. 

 He regards them as formed by the addition of char- 

 acteristic groups {groupements fonctionnels)^ in which 

 certain atoms of hydrogen are replaced by various radicles. 

 These radicles are given in the order of the number of 

 carbon atoms they contain, starting with the lowest. To 

 denote different isomers the Greek letters, a, /3, y, S, are 

 employed. One or two examples may be given. The 

 body 



CH3— CO— C=C— CH2— CHO 



would be called acetyl-acetylene-ethaldehyde (ac^tyl- 

 ac^tyl^ne alddhyde ethylique). The body 



CH3— CH2-CO. /COOH 



>C=C=C< 



CHo— CO^ 



'\ 



CH, 



would be called acetyl propionyl allene - methyl formic 

 acid.-— Many objections were raised to M. Bdhal's pro- 

 position by MM, Friedel, Graebe, Grimaux, and others, 

 and it was finally decided to refer it to the Permanent 

 Committee. 



Derivatives of Ethylene and Urea. — M. Graebe pro- 

 posed to denote the two atoms of carbon in ethylene 

 derivatives, united by the double bond, by the letters a 

 and b. If two similar radicles are introduced into the 

 ethylene molecule, as, for example, in dimethyl ethylene, 

 the two isomers would be called «(^-dimethyl ethylene and 

 dimethyl ethylene, or for greater clearness ^-dimethyl 

 ethylene. In the case of trisubstituted compounds it 

 should be understood that the first two radicles were linked 

 to the same carbon atom. — M. Franchimont proposed 

 to adopt the same nomenclature for the urea derivatives. 

 — Attention was drawn to the possibility of new isomers, 

 if Wislicenus's extension of the Van 't HofT-Lebel hypo- 

 thesis should be proved to be of general application, but 

 it was decided for the present not to number the four 

 atoms of hydrogen in ethylene, and M. Graebe's proposition 

 and M. Franchimont's rider were adopted. 



Aldehydes. — M. Grimaux proposed a resolution recom- 

 mending that in future aldehydes should be named after 

 the corresponding alcohols, and not after the acids. He 

 pointed out that this usage was consistent with the ety- 

 mological origin of the word, and that the practice of 

 giving the same name to alcohols and their corresponding 

 acids would give rise to confusion in the names of the 

 acid and hydrocarbon radicles which they contain ; the 

 names corresponding to ethyl and acetyl, to benzyl and 

 benzoyl, would become identical if we used the names 



'In France the word function is used in the following sense. Methyl 

 alcohol gives rise by substitution to compounds whose chemical behaviour 

 is similar to its own, and are therefore .said to have the same chemical 

 function. The group CH.j . OH is thus characteristic of the /riinary alcohol 

 fiinction ; similarly, the group C^^C of the ethylene function, the group 

 H . C=^0 of the aldehyde function, &c., &c. 



^ Ot isoallylene. 



