Apeil 23, 1897.] 



SCIENCE. 



665 



•cyanides, they are not such as would aid specu- 

 lation on the nature of their salts. 



On the Analogies in Composition of the Salts of 

 Calcium, Strontium and Barium : By J. H. 

 Kastle. The author calls attention to the 

 strong analogies which exist between the cal- 

 cium, barium and strontium salts. According 

 to the views of Lenssen strontium and barium 

 show greater analogies, in the composition of 

 their salts, to one another than they do to 

 •calcium. In this paper the author cites a 

 large number of salts, and concludes from 

 a study of their composition that the analogy 

 and composition of the calcium, barium and 

 strontium salts of any given acid is just as 

 likely to show itself between the salts of all 

 three of these metals, or between the calcium 

 and strontium salts of that acid, as it is between 

 the calcium and barium salts, or those of stron- 

 tium and barium, and vice versa; or that, so far 

 as composition of their salts is concerned, these 

 three metals are altogether similar. 



Action of Mercaptides on Quinones : By H. S. 

 •Grindley and J. L. Sammis. This article 

 •contains a preliminary notice of an investiga- 

 tion being carried on by the authors, on the 

 action of mercaptides or substituted quinones. 

 They have obtained a product, by the action of 

 sodium mercaptide on dichlor-diphenoxyqui- 

 none, which is very unstable and decomposes in 

 the presence of water, forming tetrathioethyl- 

 quinone. Some of the derivatives of this sub- 

 stance were also prepared and studied. 



The Action of Sodium Ethylate on Amide Bro- 

 mides : By S. E. Swaetz. It has been shown 

 that amines can be formed from acid amide 

 bromides by treatment with caustic alkali, and 

 that the peculiar rearrangement which takes 

 place in the molecule is perfectly analogous to 

 the so-called Beckmann's rearrangement of 

 ■ketoximes. These changes take place in alco- 

 holic solutions, and it was suggested that, per- 

 haps, if the substances were brought together in 

 some solvent which would not produce electro- 

 •lytic dissociation, the rearrangement might be 

 prevented and direct substitution effected. It 

 ^was found that succinimide bromide, treated 

 with dry sodium methylate, regenerated suc- 

 -cinimide, that no rearrangement took place, 

 •and that at the same time bromine was not re- 



placed by the methoxy group. When the re" 

 action was carried out in alcoholic solution in 

 every case rearrangement was effected. A 

 number of amide bromides were decomposed in 

 this way, and in every case the action took 

 place as described above. One of the products, 

 phenyl urethane, was treated with phosphorus 

 pentachloride and chloroformanilide and phenyl 

 isocyanate were obtained. As these compounds 

 had been studied very little, a number of their 

 derivatives were prepared and studied. 



The Hydrolysis of Acid Amides : By Ira 

 Remsen. The author calls attention to the 

 changes produced by the action of dilute acids 

 on acid amides. It has been shown by him, in 

 the course of an investigation on the oxidation 

 of substitution products of aromatic hydrocar- 

 bons, that when chromic acid is used, an oxidi- 

 zable residue, situated in the ortho position 

 with reference to a group that is not oxidizable, 

 is almost completely protected from oxidation, 

 while similar groups in the meta or para posi- 

 tion are easily oxidized. An investigation is 

 now being carried out which, up to the present, 

 shows that the ortho amide resists the action of 

 the hydrolysing agent to a marked degree, while 

 the meta and para amides yield readily, the 

 latter more so than the meta. The investiga- 

 tion will be extended to other amides to see if 

 they will conduct themselves in the same way. 



A review of Lehrbuch der allgemeinen 

 Chemie, W. Ostwald ; Zweiten Bandes, zweiter 

 Teil ; is also contained in this number of the 

 Journal. 



J. Elliott Gilpin. 



terrestrial magnetism, march, 1897 . 



With the present number, this journal, de- 

 voted to Terrestrial Magnetism and allied sub- 

 jects, such as Earth Currents, Auroras and At- 

 mospheric Electricity, enters on its second vol- 

 ume. The editor. Dr. L. A. Bauer, having 

 been appointed assistant professor at the Uni- 

 versity of Cincinnati, the office of publicatiou 

 has been transferred to that institution. The 

 contents of the present number are : 



The Effect of Hardness on the Electrical and Mag- 

 netic Constants of Steel, with Particular Reference to 

 the Tempering of the Magnetic Parts of Instruments, 

 Carl Barns ; Vertical Earth-Air Electric Currents, 



