240 METALS. 



CLASS III. 



IRON. 

 595. DESCRIPTION. Pare iron is nearly 



Mention some 



properties of white, quite soft, exceedingly malleable 

 and highly tenacious. It may be rolled 

 into leaves so thin that a bound book containing forty- 

 four such leaves shall be only one-fifteenth part of an 

 inch in thicknesss. In the condition of perfect purity 

 it is never seen except in the chemist's laboratory. 

 Even the purest iron of commerce contains traces 

 of other substances. Dilute sulphuric or 

 muriatic acids are its proper solvents, form- 

 ing with it green solutions. The addition 

 of nitric acid, or chlorine, changes the color 

 to red. Iron may be readily burned, as has al- 

 ready been shown in the section on Oxygen. 



596. OCCURRENCE. Iron is a most 



Does metallic . 



iron occur in abundant metal, but is rarely or never 

 nature? found in the metallic form, excepting as 



meteoric iron. In this condition it is always alloyed 

 with nickel. The latter metal being uniformly com- 

 bined with it in masses known to have fallen to the 

 earth as meteors, its presence in similar masses dis- 

 covered on the surface of the earth, is regarded as evi- 

 dence of their meteoric origin. Iron is a constituent 

 of a great variety of minerals, of all soils and plants, 

 and even of the blood of animals. The peroxide of 

 iron, the magnetic oxide, and clay iron stone, are its 

 principal ores. Whole mountains of the magnetic oxide 

 exist in Missouri, and in Sweden. 



