282 CHEMICAL TRANSFORMATIONS. 



ON THE TRANSFORMATION OF BODIES CONTAINING 

 NITROGEN. 



By the examination of the substances most prone to fermenta- 

 tion and putrefaction, it is found that they are all, without excep- 

 tion, bodies containing nitrogen. In many of these compounds, 

 a transposition of their elements occurs spontaneously as soon as 

 they cease to form part of a living organism ; that is, when they 

 are drawn out of the sphere of attraction in which alone they are 

 able to exist. 



There are, indeed, bodies destitute of nitrogen which possess 

 a certain degree of stability only when in combination, but which 

 are unknown in an isolated condition, because their elements, 

 freed from the power by which they were held together, arrange 

 themselves according to their own natural attractions. Hyper- 

 manganic, manganic, and hyposulphurous acids, belong to this 

 class of substances, which however are rare. 



The case is very different with azotized bodies. It would 

 appear that there is, in the nature of nitrogen, some peculiarity 

 which gives its compounds the power to decompose spontaneously 

 with so much facility. Now, nitrogen is known to be the most 

 indifferent of all the elements : it evinces no particular attraction 

 to any one of the simple bodies : and this character it preserves 

 in all its compounds, a character which explains the cause of its 

 easy separation from the matters with which it is united. 



It is only when the quantity of nitrogen exceeds a certain 

 limit, that azotized compounds have some degree of permanence, 

 as is the case with melamin, ammelin, &c. Their liability to 

 change is also diminished, when the quantity of nitrogen is very 

 small in proportion to that of the other elements with which it is 

 united, so that their mutual attractions preponderate. 



This easy transposition of atoms is best seen in the fulminating 

 silvers, in fulminating mercury, in the iodide or chloride of nitro- 

 gen, and in all fulminating compounds. 



All other azotized substances acquire the same power of de- 

 composition, when the elements of water are brought into play ; 

 and indeed the greater part of thtm are not capable of trans- 



