208 . Miscellanies. 



The preliminary facts, were as follows: — A cider barrel being 

 brought empty to the mill, stood over night and was filled in the mor- 

 ning with Fresh made cider. As one head proved leaky, the cider 

 was removed, and some pounds of a substance resembling flour were 

 found in the barrel with several lumps of a heavy wliite firm matter, 

 doubtless introduced as a poison. The latter was conjectured to be 

 corrosive subliiliate, and the opinion was proved to be correct by the 

 following observations and experiments. 



1. The substance yielded to a knife blade and a slight blow — flew 

 apart with some elasticity, had a glistening diamond like (adaman- 

 tine) lustre, was rather acrid to the taste, leaving a lasting metallic 

 impression, and was readily soluble in rain water, to the bottom of 

 which the larger fragments fell, although the fine powder floated for 

 a time. 



2. From charcoal, when by the blowpipe, a candle flame was di- 

 rected upon it, it rose rapidly in white acrid clouds, without any 

 other odor. 



3. Placed in a small vial loosely stopped with a cork, the vial be- 

 ing moved rapidly and horizontally over the clear blaze of a candle, 

 the substance readily sublimed and concreted on the cooler side of 

 the vial, partly in a while coating, and partly in crystalline spiculae. 

 The crystallization was very conspicuous when the substance was 

 sublimed from the bottom of a glass tube bent into the form of the 

 letter U. 



4. The solution gave a brick red precipitate with a solution of sub- 

 carbonate of soda, and a white one with sub-carbonate of ammonia. 



5. A silver quarter of a dollar and a bright copper cent being laid 

 in contact with the cent uppermost, a drop of the solution was placed 

 on the bright part of the cent, and a connexion formed between it 

 and the silver by an iron staple brightened at the points ; instantly 

 the mercury began to precipitate upon the copper, and in half an 

 hour there was a distinct silver white coating with minute points or 

 globules of mercury. It is not necessary to say that this was a gal- 

 vanic circle, and that the mercury was evolved at the copper or ne- 

 gative pole, according to a general law, propounded by Sir H. Davy, 

 in 1806. These metals were used for the circle, because they were 

 at hand. A piece of bright zinc was partly covered with gold leaf, 

 and a drop of the solution being placed on the gold, it became speed- 

 ily white, even before a metallic communication was established by a 

 wire placed so as to touch both the fluid and the zinc. 



