248 Scientific Intelligence. 
of haath ig acid on ethylene dibromide. This latter — 
treated with a strong solution of the acid in excess and agita 
for an hour, gave an oily liquid and a supernatant liquid solbhed 
The oil heated in a watch glass for four or five hours, crystallized 
on cooling, the mass being purified by pennies from boiling: 
d th 
alcohol. It then gave the formula C,H,Br,O, an s by its reac- 
tions was proved to be an acetone, having its oxygen jones to the 
carbon by twobonds. On reduction with sodium amalgam, ethyl- 
methyl-acetone C,H,O was obtained, which gave a crystalline com- 
pound with hydrosodium sulphite. Hence the st _ body was hexa- 
brom-ethyl-methyl-acetone. Oxidized with fuming nitric acid, 
it yielded malonic acid, easily ironed alae its properties and 
those of its barium salt. This shows the structure of the hexa- 
brom-ethyl-methyl-acetone to be CBr,—CO—CH,—CBr,, the ter- 
minal carbon ere having all the promine.—Bull. Soe : Che Hi, 
xxx, 482, Dec. 
5. Relative Affinities of Oxygen and the Haloid bak id 
the October number of the Annales de Chimie et de Physique, 
Berthelot has a very interesting article on the Relative Affinities 
and Power of Replacement of Oxygen saa the Haloid Elements, 
ne union with o oxygen is pte a few exceptions less than that 
resulting from the union of the same metal with either of the three 
h 
shown by the replacing amo reversed as well. Moreover a 
few other apparent exceptions to the general rule are shown to 
result aie the formation of idtorkeadids products. 
, however, the heat evolved by the combination of the 
siete rielb-o oxygen is less than that resulting from the formation 
of the corresponding haloid salts, these conditi 
reversed in the case of the compounds of the metalloids with the 
same coven and so the order of replacement is reversed as well. 
own t 
rus ) 
evident that certain anomalies, depending on the production of 
oxichlorides, are really confirmations of this law of thermo-chem- 
i 80 
spe- 
cially worthy of notice is a new general method of thermo-chem- 
