112 Scientific Intelligence. 
it will be remembered he has described cerine, the part of ordinary 
wax soluble in boiling alcohol; which consists essentially of cerotic 
acid ina free state. ‘The chinese wax was found to be a compound 
ether, analogous to spermaceti, which by fusion with rotates is i i 
into a cerotate and cerotol, the latter the alcohol of this series (C, 
The portion of ordinary wax which remains afier repeated ar al 
with boiling alcohol, is generally designated as myricine ; it is greenish, 
unerystalline, and melts at 64° C, Dilute potash has no action upon it, but 
it is saponified by boiling with a concentrated solution, or fusion with hy- 
drate of potash. The result is a mixture of potash salts with neutral 
bodies avalogous to cerotol ; but the — of these is very difficult 
and tedious ; by decomposing the soap by an acid, and treating the 
mixture with alcohol, the greater solubility of the acids effects a par- 
tial separation. The neutral waxy matter thus obtained, yields by re- 
peated crystallizations from ether, or better from coal naphtha, a highly 
crystalline body of a satiny lustre and a fixed melting point of 85° C. 
This substance which constitutes the greater portion of the myricine is 
a new alcohol which yields by analysis the formula C., fe Os (G.. 
0,(C,, Hy. 0, . which resembles the preceding wax acid but 
fuses at 88°—89° C. The action of chlorine upon melissol, a chlorin- 
ized aldehyde, chlor-melal (melissal) ; its action with sulphuric acid is 
also precisely similar to cerotol, a coupled acid being formed. By heat, 
part distils unchanged, and part is converted into water and a hydro- 
on. 
The principal acid resulting from the saponification of myricine, is 
one which when purified from accompanying acids still more fusible, 
has a fixed melting point of 62°C. his was found by its analysis 
nr by a of its silver salt, to be the palmitic or ethalic acid C2 Hg2 
Op, (ip Hs,0, 
The se of myricine gives a mixture of acids and hydro-car- 
bons ; the first part of the ‘eect herpes almost entirely of acids 
and the final portions of the hydrocarbons ; an odor of butyric acid is 
observed during the process. The whole product was saponified, and 
the acids resulting, when purified te repeated crystallization, gave pure 
palmitic aci 
Among the hydrocarbons is one which from the examination of Ett- 
ling, was sup to be identical with the parafine of Reichenbach 
and isomeric with olefi r. Brodie’s analyses confirm ieay: 
analyses of this iiteireaiene show that it is one of ihe hea Pale rep- 
resented by (C, H,)n, (Rin M. Gerhardt’s notation,) and as the differ- 
ence between its fusing point and that of melissol is the same as exists 
between cerotene and its corresponding alcohol, the author regards this 
as the bt 0,8 (Cs, Heo) and designates it as melene 
(better melissene). 
Daeke ed 
