572 



NATURE 



\_April 15, 1880 



the bottom by a small pedicle here. It is extremely 

 aberrant in structure. It is from 1,070 fathoms. 



Most of the interesting forms obtained by us are from 

 comparatively shallow water. As an example may be 

 cited Syllis ramosa of Dr. Mcintosh, which is from 90 

 fathoms. It is a worm which branches in a most extra- 

 ordinary manner, quite unlike any other annelid known. 

 The entire body divides up into a series of complex rami- 

 fications. Nevertheless, as shown by Dr. Mcintosh,' the 

 worm belongs to a well-known shallow-water genus, 

 Syllis. The head or heads of the animal were all broken 

 off the single specimen obtained, and it is uncertain how 

 many it may have had. The animal lives embedded in a 

 sponge, in the canals of which its ramifications are 

 received. 



(To be continued) 



NICHOLAS ZININ 



WE have already briefly alluded to the death of the 

 veteran Russian chemist Prof. Zinin, which occurred 

 at St. Petersburg, February 19. Nicholas Zinin was 

 born August 13, 1812, at Choucha, in the Caucasus 

 district. After completing the course of studies in the 

 Government Gymnasium at Ssaratow, on the Volga, he 

 entered the University of Kasan, where he is recorded as 

 the recipient of two gold medals for superiority in mathe- 

 matical and physical studies. In 1S33 he finished the 

 ordinary course of studies in the mathematical faculty. 

 In 1836 he received the degree of Master of Sciences 

 from the university, and in the following year was 

 appointed assistant professor. At first his lectures were 

 confined to physics and mechanics ; later they embraced 

 chemistry. At this epoch the educational authorities of 

 Russia began to feel the necessity of a more intimate 

 familiarity with the rapid progress then being made in 

 chemistry in Occidental Europe, and it was decided to 

 send the young professor to gain a personal knowledge of 

 the methods then in vogue in the laboratories of the 

 West for furthering chemical research. His face turned 

 naturally towards Giesscn, where Liebig had already 

 gathered about him a brilliant circle of young and 

 enthusiastic chemists of the most diverse nationalities. 

 A special favourite of the great master, his abilities as an 

 independent investigator were rapidly developed. After 

 passing some years at Giessen, and in journeying through 

 England, France, and Switzerland for the purpose of 

 scientific observation, Zinin returned to Russia to receive 

 the degree of Doctor of Sciences from the University of 

 St. Petersburg. Until 1848 he continued in his professor- 

 ship. At that date, however, attention had been so 

 strongly drawn to his talents as a lecturer and as an 

 investigator, that he was elected to the chair of chemistry 

 in the Imperial Academy of Medicine at St. Petersburg. 

 This position he continued to occupy until 1874, when he 

 retired from active professiorial duties. 



Zinin's first researches, made under Liebig's direction, 

 were devoted to the products of decomposition of the oil 

 of bitter almonds, to a new method of preparing benzilic 

 acid, and to the formation of various compounds in the 

 benzoylic series. They indicated painstaking labour and 

 an unusually thorough insight into the nature of the 

 reactions taking place. In 1842 he published a short 

 research which attracted universal attention in the 

 chemical world. It was entitled " Organic Bases Re- 

 sulting from the Action of Sulphuretted Hydrogen on 

 Nitro-naphthalene and Nitro-benzene," and described for 

 the first time the formation of bases from nitro-com- 

 pounds by means of reducing agents. It is chiefly in 

 connection with this discovery that Zinin's name will 

 remain closely associated. The interest excited at the 

 time of its announcement was purely of a scientific cha- 

 racter, but after a lapse of fifteen years it assumed a 

 1 Linn. Soc. Journ. Zoology, vol. xiv. p. 720, 1879. 



commercial importance of the highest kind, and to-day 

 manufacturing interests involving many millions are 

 based on that simple reaction of reducing nitro-com- 

 pounds, to which we owe all the wealth of colour derived 

 from aniline and its homologues. In 1844 he followed 

 up the same line of discovery by producing the bases 

 derived from the dinitro derivatives of benzene and 

 naphthalene. By means of the same reaction he 

 obtained also in 1854 the amido acid from nitro- 

 anisic acid. In this connection should be mentioned 

 likewise the interesting production of oxanaphthalide and 

 formonaphthalide from oxalate of naphthylamine under 

 the influence of heat (1858). In 1852 he discovered the 

 formation of diamidodiphenyl by the action of sulphu- 

 rous acid on azobenzene, a reaction which he found some 

 twelve years afterwards to be induced also by hydrochloric 

 acid. The nitro-derivatives of azobenzene and azoxyben- 

 zene were also submitted to a thorough investigation by 

 him (i860). In 1S52 he discovered likewise the aromatic 

 thiosinnamines due to the action of mustard oil on aniline, 

 naphthylamine, &c. 1854 witnessed the discovery of the 

 ureides, the important class of compound ureas obtained by 

 exposing urea to the action of acid chlorides or anhydrides. 

 In this manner he prepared the first types of this group : 



acetureid GO N t, 2 c tt q benzureide, butylureid, and 



valerureide. In the "following year Zinin increased the 

 then comparatively limited number of organic compounds 

 occurring in nature, or resulting immediately from the 

 simple decomposition of natural bodies, which could be 

 prepared artificially, by the synthesis of oil of mustard 

 from allyliodide and potassium sulphocyanide. At the 

 same time he claimed for the allyl group its now accepted 

 position among the alcohol radicals, and prepared a num- 

 ber of allylic ethers in order to prove its ability to replace 

 hydrogen atoms in acids. In 1857 he returned to the 

 field of investigation which had enlisted his interest while 

 under Liebig's guidance, viz., the study of benzoin and its 

 derivatives ; and with few exceptions his researches up to 

 the close of his life were confined to this subject. At 

 this date he succeeded in introducing acid radicals into 

 benzoin by exposing it to the action of acid chlorides, and 

 prepared in this way acetyl- and benzoyl-benzo'in. In 1S60 

 he was successful in regenerating benzoin from benzile — 

 the product of its oxidation— by making use of reducing 

 agents. At the same time he prepared a number of 

 derivatives of benzile. Hydrobenzoin was also obtained 

 by him in 1862, as the result of reducing the oil of bitter 

 almonds. In this connection may be mentioned his 

 elaborate study, in 1868, of Laurent's be/isimide— the 

 complicated amide resulting from the action of acids on 

 the oil of bitter almonds — in which he showed it to be a 

 combination of the latter with the imide of formobenzylic 

 acid. In 1S67 Zinin submitted benzoin to the action of 

 hydrochloric acid, and obtained a compound, C a3 H 20 l ', 

 named by him lepidetu. This body was studied exhaus- 

 tively by him throughout a series of years. While unable 

 to fathom the mysteries of its constitution, he prepared 

 an extensive array of derivatives, oxylepidene, diox\ lcpi- 

 dene, oxylepidenic acid, many products of substitution, 

 &c, of nearly all of which two or more isomerides were 

 obtained. So thorough was the study of the relations 

 existing between the members of this series, that they 

 will all fall into naturally-assigned places when once the 

 bond between the lepidene group and bodies of known 

 constitution is fairly established. In 1861, by the reduc- 

 tion of benzoin, he obtained desoxybenzoi'n, C^HjoOj, a 

 compound which the reduction of chlorobenzile likewise 

 yielded him a few years later. This body he changed by 

 the action of nitric acid into nitrobenzile ; and in 1868, 

 by successive treatment with phosphorus pentachloride 

 and reducing agents or potash, he changed it into stilbene 

 and tolane/thus throwing an interesting light upon the 

 constitution of benzoin and its derivatives. In 1870 he 



