KESEAKCHES UPON THE CHEMICAL PROPERTIES OF GASES. 211 



but that the intermediate products CriiCL and CHCI3 are only formed in relatively 

 small quantity. 



The manufacture of chloroform from natural gas, so far as these experiments 

 indicate, is likely to prove of difficulty. The gas escaping from O has the odor of 

 methyl chloride from methyl alcohol, is readily soluble in water and in alcohol, and 

 burns with a green flame. The gas, after leaving P, passed into a solution of potas- 

 sium hydrosulphide in R and then on into a solution of mercuric chloride in X. An 

 immediate and copious precipitation occurred in X. 



Methyl chloride from methyl alcohol, as is well known, is characterized by the 

 property of forming a solid crystalline hydrate when conducted into icewater. The 

 gas, prepared by the method above described, was passed through the bottle P con- 

 taining broken ice while the ice was slowly melting, but no trace of a crystalline 

 hydrate appeared. 



It was not attempted to analyze the gas, for the reason that an analysis of a 

 mixture of methyl chloride with some unaltered methane and traces of intermediate 

 chlorides would lead to very uncertain results. The odor, the solubility in alcohol, 

 the green color of the flame and the reaction with potassium hydrosulphide, all tend 

 to show that it was methyl chloride. The failure to produce the crystalline hydrate 

 with icewater I cannot explain. 



It has long been considered a settled fact that only one methyl chloride is pos- 

 sible, Berthelot having shown (Ann. CJi. Pliarm., CY, p. 241) that when methyl 

 chloride from methane and chlorine is treated with potash, saponification results with 

 production of methyl alcohol, just as in the case of methyl chloride from woodspirit 

 and hydrochloric acid. 



Bseyer {Ann. CTi. Pharm., CYIT, p. 269, and WaWs Die, III, p. 987) states, that 

 methyl chloride prepared from methyl alcohol and hydrochloric acid is different from 

 the methyl chloride obtained by the action of chlorine on methane in the fact that 

 the chloride from the latter source fails to form a crystalline hydrate when led into 

 icewater, and that there are, therefore, two compounds isomeric, but not identical, 

 having the formula CH3CI. 



Roscoe and Schorlemmer (Yol. Ill, Pt. I, p. 203) explain the failure to form a 

 crystalline hydrate by the methyl chloride from methane on the ground that other 

 chlorinated substitution products occur with the methyl chloride. My experiments 

 lead me to think that this does not satisfactorily explain the diflference. CH.CL and 

 CHCI3 do not occur except in traces in the gas which was produced, while CCl^ was 

 easily condensed in P and G (as it boils at 78° and cannot contaminate the methyl 

 chloride). 



