COMPOUND SALTS, CONTAINING 



salts, Mr. Macintosh sent me a quantity of them 

 to ascertain their nature. 



The crystals were pretty regular six-sided 

 prisms, which were obtained of a pretty large 

 size by a second crystallization. The taste was 

 cooling, and alkaline, and they rendered cud- 

 bear paper violet, indicating the presence of an 

 alkali. The salt was pretty soluble in water, 

 and the crystals were not altered by exposure to 

 the air. They effervesced slightly, but distinctly 

 in nitric acid. 



I neutralized a portion of these crystals by 

 means of nitric acid, and then mixed the solu- 

 tion with a sufficient quantity of nitrate of ba- 

 rytes a white precipitate fell, which, when 

 washed, and dried on the filter, was a beautiful 

 white soft powder, which dissolved without ef- 

 fervescence in nitric acid, was again precipitated 

 by ammonia, and exhibited all the properties 

 of phosphate of barytes. I therefore decom- 

 posed a portion of it by means of sulphuric acid. 

 The acid which I obtained possessed the follow- 

 ing properties : 



It threw down nitrate of barytes, and nitrate 

 of lead white, and both precipitates were dis- 

 solved by nitric acid. Persulphate of iron was 

 thrown down white, and the precipitate became 

 red when digested in potash ley. Nitrate of 

 silver was thrown down yellow, and the precipi- 

 tate was dissolved in nitric acid. Muriate of 



