£25 OS EXPECTORATED MATTER. 



Opaque ropy line residue (5). It required an intense fire for fusion in a 

 Blatter, platina crucible. The fused mass did not deliquesce, but it 



grew somewhat moist on exposure to the air. It contained 

 a much smaller proportion of potash than the former fused 

 matter (5) ; also much less of muriate of soda, but a far 

 larger proportion of lime and phosphoric acid, with traces of 

 sulphuric acid, magnesia, oxide of iron, and perhaps silica, 



7. (a) 15400 grains of the third sort of expectorated 

 matter on exsiccation afforded 960 grains, that is, one six- 

 teenth of brittle substance, or about six per cent, and of 

 course this kind of matter contained about ninety-four per 

 cent of water (sect. II. 2). This dried matter was reduced 

 to a charred state by exposing it to fire in a Wedgwood white 

 crucible. In this process it inflamed, emitted the usual 

 smell of burning animal matter, especially of bone, and 

 swelled prodigiously ; at the same time a black oil was com- 

 pounded rendering the mass soft during the inflammation. 

 I could not distinguish the smell of sulphur, but there was 

 in one part of the burning, a smell, to my sense, of phos- 

 phorus. 



{b). This charred matter was kept in a state of ignition 

 in a platina crucible, till it no longer remained in a powdery 

 form, but was reduced to a comparatively small bulk of a 

 substance of the consistence of paste in an intense fire. By 

 continuing the fire, the charge at length was fused; andaf- 

 , ter being kept in a state of fusion to be quite fluid for ten 

 minutes, the fire being withdrawn, a white, brittle, appa- 

 rently saline matter, like melted common salt, was easily 

 detached from the platina crucible, which in some places 

 had received a red tinge. 



(c). The melted matter {b) weighed fifty-nine grains: of 

 course, this saline residue amounted to ^i^- of the expecto- 

 rated matter, and to one sixteenth of this expectorated mat- 

 ter exsiccated. It tasted only of muriate of soda — it had 

 no smell — it effervesced with acids — it betrayed the presence 

 of alkali to the tests above-mentioned — after a few days ex- 

 posure to the air, it partially deliquesced— it precipitated 

 supertartrate of potash with tartaric acid, and emitted no 

 ammonia with lime, or sulphur with muriatic acid, discover- 

 able by the most delicate tests. 



{(/). Th^ 



