February 23, 1893] 



NATURE 



405 



laboratory under the direction of the lecturer in Pharmacology. 

 Dr. Ritchie of Edinburgh is carrying out in it some researches 

 in Bacteriology. The CiTemical Club started last term by some 

 of the senior men continues to hold meetings weekly for the dis- 

 cussion of recent chemical investigations. Mr. Ingham of 

 Merton is secretary. The meetings are well attended and 

 useful. 



Mr. R. T. Giinther, B.A., Demy of Magdalen College, has 

 been elected to the Naples Biological Scholarship for the ensuing 

 year. 



Cambridge.— Mr. H. Bury, Fellow of Trinity College, has 

 been appointed by the Board for Biology and Geology to the 

 use of a table at the Naples Zoological Station for March and 

 April, 1893. 



The Boards for Biology and Geology, and for Physics and 

 Chemistry, have reported in favour of extending to Part I. of 

 the Natural Sciences Tripos the plan already adopted for Part II., 

 namely, the substitution of distinct papers in each scientific 

 subject, instead of papers each of which contains questions in 

 all the subjects. They propose that the change come into 

 operation in 1894. 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 

 London. 

 Chemical Society, January 19. — Prof. A. CrumBDwn, 

 President, in the chair. — The following papers were read : — 

 Glucinum, Part I. The preparation of glucina from beryl, by 

 J. Gibson. The methods at present in use for preparing pure 

 glucina from beryl are tedious and difficult to apply on the 

 large scale, as the mineral, which contains but a small quantity 

 of glucinum, has to be reduced to a very fine powder before 

 being treated by the reagents usually employed for the decom- 

 position of refractory silicates. The author has worked out a 

 process which greatly facilitates the preparation of glucina. If 

 the coarsely-ground beryl is heated in an iron vessel with six 

 parts of ammonium hydrogen fluoride, complete decomposition 

 occurs below a red heat. The product contains the aluminium 

 and most of the iron as insoluble fluoride and oxide respectively, 

 together with glucinum fluoride, which dissolves on extraction 

 with water. In order to remove the last traces of iron from 

 crude glucina, advantage is taken of the fact that the precipitation 

 of a lead or mercuric salt by ammonium sulphide effects by mass 

 action the complete separation of small quantities of iron which 

 may be present in the solution. — The determination of the 

 thermal expansion of liquids, by T. E. Thorpe. The author 

 describes various improvements in the ordinary dilatometrical 

 method of determining the thermal expansion of liquids. 

 Amongst these the most important is the application of a device 

 frequently employed in the construction of standard thermo- 

 meters, and consisting in enlarging the bore of the dilatometer 

 stem at some point. On such an instrument the positions of the 

 0° and 100° points may be determined irrespectively of its 

 range, and the thermometer, and the column of liquid in the 

 dilatometer stem may be totally immersed in a bath of moderate 

 size, thus doing away with corrections for the emergent columns 

 of the two instruments. The methods of constructing, cali- 

 brating, and using the dilatometers are described, together with 

 the baths employed in heating them. — The determination of 

 the thermal expansion and specific volume of certain paraffins 

 and paraffin derivatives, by T. E. Thorpe and L. M. Jones. 

 The authors give the data relating to a number of hydrocarbons, 

 alcohols, ketones, and other derivatives of the paraffins. The 

 results show a fairly satisfactory agreement, in most cases, with 

 the values calculated by Lossen's formula, but all the observed 

 specific volumes, with the exception of that of propionic 

 anhydride, differ considerably from those calculated by means 

 of Kopp's values. — The hydrocarbons derived from dipentene 

 dihydrochloride, by W. A. Tilden and S. Williamson. The 

 dihydrochloride, CioHjg2HCl melting at 50°, prepared by the 

 action of moist hydrogen chloride on optically active turpentine, 

 is known to be identical with that obtained from the active 

 citrenes (limonenes) or from inactive "dipentene." On heating 

 it with aniline, an oil is obtained which has hitherto been sup- 

 posed to consist essentially of dipentene ; on oxidising it, how- 

 ever, a certain proportion of aromatic acids is obtained. These 

 a':ids are not formed on oxidising the active limonenes or pure 

 dipentene with nitric acid ; their formation in the previous case 



NO. I 2 17, VOL. 47] 



is, however, satisfactorily explained by the authors, who firid 

 that the dipentene obtained from the dihydrochloride con- 

 tains large proportions of cymene, terpinene, terpinolene, 

 and a small quantity of a saturated paraffinoid hydrocarbon 

 boiling at about 155°. — Sulphonic derivatives of camphor, by 

 F. S. Kipping and W. J. Pope. The authors have succeeded 

 in preparing camphorsulphonicacid,CioH,50.S03H, a compound 

 hitherto unknown, by the direct action of anhydrosulphuric 

 acid or chlorosulphonic acid on camphor. The acid is purified by 

 the conversion of its sodium salt into camphorsulphonic chloride, 

 C10H15O. SOoCl ; the latter substance is apparently obtained in 

 optically different modifications which are separated only with 

 considerable difficulty. The sulphonic chloride is readily 

 hydrolysed on boiling with water.yielding the sulphonic acid from 

 which a seriesof well-defined salts has been obtained. The action 

 ofanhydrosulphuricacidonbromocamphor results in the forma- 

 tion of bromocamphorsulphonic acid ; this on suitable treatment 

 yields a sulphonic chloride, C]oHj4BrO.SO.^Cl, which crystal- 

 lises in magnificent colourless octahedra, melting at 136-137". A 

 bromocamphorsulphonic chloride of similar composition has 

 been previously described by Marsh and Cousins as a "black, 

 semi-crystalline tar ; " a repetition of their work shoWs this to 

 be merely an impure form of the substance now described. The 

 corresponding chlorocamphorsulphonic chloride described by' 

 Marsh and Cousins as a "microcrystalline, black solid," crystal- 

 lises in massive colourless octahedra when pure ; it melts at 

 I23-I24°, and has a specific rotatory power [ajn = + 110°. 

 The authors describe a number of salts and derivatives of these 

 sulphonic acids. — The preparation of dinitro-a-naphthylamine 

 [NHo : NO, : NOn =1:2:4] from its acetyl and valeryl de- 

 rivatives, by R. Meldola and M. O. Forster. Meldola's process 

 of preparing dinitro-a-naphthylamine from a acetnaphthalide 

 having been questioned, the authors have re-investigated the 

 method and confirm it in all respects ; they give full workiiift 

 details of the process, and show that thft same product is obtained 

 by the nitration and subsequent hydrolysis of valeronaphthalide. ' 

 — Thionyl bromide, by J. Hartog and W. E. Sims. Thionyl 

 bromide is obtained as a heavy, crimson liquid by the action of 

 sodium bromide oh thionyl chloride; its colour is possibly due 

 to impurity. At 150° the bromide decomposes, yielding bromine 

 and sulphur bromides. — Desulphurisation of the substituted 

 thioureas, by A. E. Dixon. The monosubstituted thioureas are 

 all de>ulphurised on boiling with an alkaline solution of a lead 

 salt ; the same is true of disubstituted thioureas containing 

 benzenoid groups, but not if such groups be absent. The tri- 

 and probably also the tetra-substituted thioureas are not de- 

 sulphurised under similar conditions. A number of new 

 thioureas are described. — Salts of active and inactive glyceric 

 acid : the influence of metals on the specific rotatory power of 

 active acids, by P. F. Frankland and J. R. Appleyard. The 

 authors have prepared and analysed a number of salts both of 

 inactive and dextro-glyceric acid ; the solubilities and specific 

 rotatory powers are also given. Certain remarkable numerical rela- 

 tions apparently exist between .the rotationsof many of the salts ; 

 these should have considerable bearing on the vexed question of 

 multiple rotation, and will be discussed after they have been 

 submitted to a more detailed investigation. — Dibromo-)3 lapa- 

 chone, by S. C. Hooker and A. U. Gray. Monobromo-i8- 

 lapachone cannot be converted into dibromo-j3-lapachone by the 

 action of bromine alone ; the formation of the latter derivative 

 in the preparation of monobromo-)3-lapachone from lapachol, 

 is due to the production and subsequent decomposition of an 

 additive compound of monobromo-derivative and hydrogen 

 bromide. — The conversion of para- into ortho-quinone deriva- 

 tives, by S. C. Hooker. Both in the lapachol and other groups, 

 compounds derived from a-naphthaquinone, of the type repre- 

 sented by formula I., are far more readily converted, by the 

 action of acids, into anhydrides derived from j8-naphthaqainone 

 (II.) than into anhydrides of the oquinone type (III.). 



CO 



IL 



CO 

 IIL 



CO 



— The nitro-derivatives of phenolphthalein, by J. A. Hall 

 The author has prepared dinitro- and tetranitro-phenolphthalein, 



