214 



NATURE 



[December 31, 189 1 



by T. E. Thorpe, F.R.S., and A. E. Tutton. In this paper 

 the authors have continued their description of the properties of 

 phosphorous oxide, ^^i^- In their first paper they state that 

 phosphorous oxide becomes red on exposure to light. They 

 have now obtained the oxide in large crystals, unaffected by 

 light, by exposing the freshly-distilled oxide to sunshine for 

 several months at a time, and decanting the melted oxide from 

 the red phosphorus produced. Large crystals of the oxide are 

 also obtained by sublimation in a vacuum, and these are un- 

 affected by light so long as they retain their crystalline form. 

 The authors also describe the reactions of the oxide with the 

 following substances: bromine, iodine, hydrogen chloride, 

 sulphur, sulphur trioxide, sulphuric acid, sulphur chloride, 

 ammonia gas, nitrogen peroxide, phosphorus pentachloride, and 

 phosphorus trichloride. The following substances are apparently 

 without action on phosphorous oxide : hydrogen, phospboretted 

 hydrogen, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide, 

 nitrogen, nitric acid, cyanogen, and ethylene. — Frangulin, 

 Part ii., by T. E. Thorpe, F.R.S., and Dr. A. K. Miller. 

 The authors have prepared frangulin more nearly in a state of 

 purity than was previously possible. They finti that crude 

 frangulin contains a substance isomeric with emodin, which ciings 

 to it persistently, and is very difficult to remove. They have 

 succeeded in proving the correctness of Schwabe's formula, 

 CoiHgQOg, for frangulin. On hydrolysis it yields emodin, 

 CigH^oOg, and rhamnose, CrHj-jOs, according to the equation 

 C21H20O9 + HoO = CjgHioOg + CeHijOg.— The structure and 

 chemistry of flames, by A. Smithells and H. Ingle. The 

 authors have been engaged for twelve months in investigating 

 the chemistry of flames produced by burning known hydro- 

 carbons, and are still continuing the experiments. If a long 

 glass tube be fitted over the metal tube of a Bunsen burner so as 

 to form a wider continuation of it, and if the gas be carefully 

 regulated, it is possible to divide the flame into two cones, one 

 of which remains at the top of the tube, and the other oscillates 

 inside the tube. By heating the glass tube at one point 

 so as to increase at that point the rate of inflammation, it 

 is possible to fix the oscillating inner cone — that is, to prevent 

 its re-ascent. The same result is obtained by narrowing 

 the bore of the glass tube at one point, so as to diminish the 

 rate of inflammation, i.e. to prevent the descent of the inner 

 cone past that point. In this way the two cones can be kept 

 any distance apart for any length of time. This permits of Ihe 

 aspiration of the gases from the space between the cones with- 

 out any chance of admixture of outside air or of products of 

 combustion from the upper cone. The apparatus used by the 

 authors is described. The flames of liquid hydrocarbons were 

 examined by charging air with the vapour of the liquid, and 

 afterwards mixing this vapour- charged air with more air 

 in suitable proportions. The hydrocarbons examined were 

 ethylene, methane, pentane, heptane, and benzene. The 

 results obtained show that the products of combustion of 

 the first cone are essentially COg . HgO . CO and Ho, and that 

 the second cone is due to the combustion of the CO and Hg with 

 the external air. These results are in harmony with the con- 

 clusions of Blochmann, and with the work of Dalton on the ex- 

 plosion of methane and ethylene with oxygen in quantities in- 

 sufficient for complete combustion. The authors point out : 

 (i) that, even in excess of oxygen, carbon turns preferentially to 

 CO and not to COg ; (2) that the heat of combustion of gaseous 

 carbon to CO is probably greater than that of hydrogen to HoO ; 

 (3) that, according to Dalton, CH2, when burnt with its own 

 volume of oxygen, gives products represented in the equation 

 CHo -I- O2 = CO + HyO -f- Ho. But as the two substances, 

 CO and HoO, act upon one another, CO -f HgC^lTCOg -f Hg, 

 the case is one of reversible change, and four products will result 

 — viz. CO2, HgO, CO, and H2. They have succeeded in divid- 

 ing into two cones the flame produced by admixture of air 

 with cyanogen ; the products of the inner cone were found to 

 consist of 2 vols, of CO and i vol. of CO2. — Note on the struc- 

 ture of luminous flames, by A. Smithells. A brief summary of 

 the various views that have been held on this subject is given. 

 The author would describe a luminous flame as follows: (i) 

 an outer sheath or mantle, with (2) an inner, bright blue portion, 

 visible at the base of the flame — these two parts correspond 

 respectively to the outer and inner flame cones of a Bunsen 

 flame, and mark the region where the coal gas or candle gas is 

 burning with a large quantity of air ; (3) the yellow luminous 

 part, where the heat of the parts (i) and (2) is decomposing 

 hydrocarbons, setting free carbon which rapidly glows and 



NO. II 5 7, VOL. 45] 



burns ; (4) the dark inner region, consisting of unbujned gas. 

 — The existence of the mydatic alkaloid hyoscyamine in 

 lettuce, by T. S. Dymond. The alkaloid was obtained from 

 the commercial extract of wild lettuce, of the edible plant 

 known as cos lettuce, and from a specimen of the dried flower- 

 ing plant of wild lettuce. It was found to have approximately 

 the same melting-point and other properties as hyoscyamine, 

 the poisonous mydatic alkaloid existing in belladonna, henbane, 

 and other plants belonging to the natural order Solanacece. The 

 aurichloride melted at 159° 75, and on analysis gave results 

 corresponding totheformulaCjyHjgNOg . HAUCI4. — Cryptopine, 

 by D. Rainy Brown and Dr.W. H. Perkin, Jun., F.R.S. The 

 authors have commenced an investigation on the rare alkaloid 

 cryptopine, which occurs in small quantity in opium. Analyses 

 of the base and of the oxalate confirm the results of Hesse, 

 and show that cryptopine has the formula CjiHogNOg. On 

 oxidation with permanganate it yields, among other products, 

 metahemipinic acid (m.p. i79°-i8o°). It contains only two 

 methoxy-groups, as shown by its behaviour with hydriodic acid, 

 these two groups being situated in that part of the molecule 

 which is converted to metahemipinic acid on oxidation. — The 

 action of sodium on ethereal salts. Part iii. benzylic ortho- 

 toluate, by R. VV, Hodgkinson. When benzylic orthotoliiate 

 is heated to 200° and sodium dissolved in it, the temperature 

 rises to 250", when an oil distils over. This oil was separated 

 into toluene, benzoyl alcohol, and a small quantity of the 

 original salt. The sodium salt in the retort gave pure ortho- 

 toluic acid, unchanged benzylic orthotoluate, and a substance 

 of the composition CooHaoOo- The author is continuing the 

 experiments. — The gas-volumeter and gravivolumeter, by G. 

 Lunge. A reply to Prof. Japp's reply to the author's criticisms 

 {Ber. xxiv. 1656). — The action of sulphuric acid en the bromides 

 of hydrogen, potassium, and sodium, by F. T. Addyman. The 

 author has sought to determine the extent to which hydrogen 

 bromide is oxidized by sulphuric acid under varying conditions 

 of mass and dilution. — The iodometric estimation of chlorine, by 

 Dr. G. McGowan. Finkener has stated that Bunsen's method 

 when'applied to chlorates gives less than the theoretical amount 

 of chlorine. The author describes experiments which prove the 

 accuracy of Bunsen's method, and suggests that Finkener's error 

 arose from a slight loss of chlorine. 



Mathematical Society, December 10. — Prof. Greenhill, 

 F.R.S., President, in the chair. — The President announced the re- 

 cent decease of Prof.Wolstenholme, with whom he had been asso- 

 ciated at Cooper's Hill, and paid a feeling tribute to his memory, in 

 the course of which he touched upon Prof. Wolstenholme's mathe- 

 matical work. — The following communications were made : — 

 The equations of propagation of disturbances in gyrostalically 

 loaded media, by J. Larmor. In the first instance an extended 

 body is imagined, in Sir W. Thomson's manner, as built up of 

 rigid solid elements, each containing a cavity in which is 

 mounted a rapidly rotating fly-wheel ; and this structure is then 

 pushed to the limit when it gives a continuous elastic medium. 

 Such a medium possesses at each point two coefficients of inertia 

 — a scalar one which is specified as the density, or mass per unit 

 volume, and a vector one which measures the angular momentum 

 per unit volume. As we can thus imagine a solid with two per- 

 sistent constants of inertia, and as it is apparently not possible 

 to have more than these two, it seems worth while to formally 

 express the general equations of elasticity that will apply to such 

 a body. It turns out that, for a homogeneous body having 

 (LMN) as its vector constant of inertia, there must be added to 

 the force per unit volume due to the tractions of the surrounding 

 parts a term of which the x component is 



-^\^dx''^:iy'-^-dz)'dt\:dr^yy 



{iiv-v) being the displacement. The waves of permanent type 

 in such a medium, otherwise isotropic, are all circularly polar- 

 ized, the coefficient of rotation being simply proportional to the 

 component of the rotary inertia in the direction of propagation. 

 If the rotary apparatus is more complex than a simple fly-wheel, 

 so as to have free periods of its own, these will be indicated by 

 anomalous rotatory dispersion, and the equations will require 

 modification. It is pointed out that of the three terms put for- 

 ward by Sir G. Airy as competent to explain the magnetic rota- 

 tion of light, the one verified by Verdet enters simply in the 

 above manner ; while the others, which do not by themselves 

 agree with experiment, imply absolute time-constants, such as 



