415 



nations on which the final result depends. Oxamide may be, and 

 was considered to be, probably composed of amide and carbonic 

 oxide (in the foregoing notation, NHg+CjOJ ; but it was perceived 

 to admit also* oih^vag possibly compounded of nitric oxide and a 

 certain combination of carbon and hydrogen (NOj+C^Hj); or of 

 cyanogen and water (CaN+HjO^). And even the amidides of potas- 

 sium (KNHj) and of sodium (NaNHJ, have, from the energetic 

 affinities ofthose metallic bases, been thought to prove less decisively 

 the existence of amidogene itself, than the amidide of mercury 

 (HgNHj) discovered by Dr. Kane, in his analysis of the white preci- 

 pitate of the last mentioned metal. (Trans. R. I. A., vol. xviii. part iii.) 



Although this precipitate had been long known, and often ana- 

 lyzed, erroneous views (as they are now regarded) were entertained 

 respecting its composition, and it had, for instance, been supposed 

 to contain oxygen, till Kane pointed out the absence of this element, 

 and showed, with a high degree of probability, that the proximate 

 elements were the chloride and the amidide of mercury ; white pre- 

 cipitate being thus a chlor-amidide of that metal (HgCl-j-HgNHj, if 

 theBerzelian equivalent of mercury be adopted, instead of its double). 

 UUgren, a friend of Berzelius, obtained the chemical prize from the 

 Swedish Academy of Sciences, for the year 1836, for a paper in 

 which, having with great care repeated and varied the experiments, 

 he confirmed this and other connected results of our countryman; 

 and Berzelius himself, in his Eeport read to the above-mentioned 

 Academy in 1837, on the recent progress of the Physical Sciences 

 in Europe (to which Report allusion has been made above), ex- 

 pressed his opinion that these researches of Kane were among the 

 most important of the preceding year.f 



In the essay for which your Council have awarded the present 



* L'Oxamide peut done, k volonte, etre consideree comme un compose de cyano- 

 gene et d'eau, ou bien comme un compose de deutoxide d'azote et d'hydrogdne 

 bicarbone, ou bien enfin comme un compose d'oxide de carbone et d'un azoture 

 d'hydrog^ne different de I'ammoniaque. — Dumas, sur I'Oxamide, &c. Annales de 

 Chimie et de Physique, tome xliv. page 142. 



+ Dlese Untersuchungen von Kane gehoren meiner Ansicht nach zu den wich- 

 tigeren des verflossenen Jahres. — Wohler's German Translation of Berzelius's 

 Report, Jahres-Bericht iiber die Fortschritte der physischen Wissenschaften, 

 J 7th year, page 179. (Tiibingen, 1838). 



