M. Rossi on Homocuminic Acid. 361 
acid. It crystallizes im nacreous lamine. Its formation may be 
thus expressed :— 
CSHIOEN+K HO+ H?O=C9 H® KO8+ NH. 
Cyanide of Homoanisate 
anisyle. of potash. 
Rossi* has applied to cuminic alcohol the same series of trans- 
formations, and has obtained a new acid homologous with cuminic 
acid. He prepared the chloride of cumyle, G!° H'’ Cl, by the 
action of hydrochloric acid on cuminic alcohol, and treated it 
with cyanide of potassium, by which means he obtained the cor- 
responding cyanide. This crude cyanide of cumyle was boiled 
with strong caustic potash until its decomposition was complete ; 
and to the mixture was then added hydrochloric acid in excess, 
by which the new acid was precipitated. On recrystallization it 
was obtained in small needles. Its formation is thus expressed : 
Gl HEN + KHO+ H? O= 6"! H KO?4 NH, 
Cyanide of Homocuminate 
cumyle. of potash. 
Homocuminic acid, G!! H!? 02, can be distilled without decom- 
position. It is difficultly soluble in cold water ; but its solution 
reddens litmus, and decomposes the carbonates. Its salts are 
obtained by double decomposition: most of them crystallize 
well. , 
As the result of a lengthened investigation on filtration of the 
air in reference to fermentation, putrefaction, and crystallization, 
Schroder f is led to the following conclusions :— 
1. A vegetable or animal can only be formed from living vege- 
table or animal organisms. Ommne vivum ex vivo. 
2, There is a series of phenomena of fermentation and putre- 
faction which arise solely from microscopic germs furnished by 
the atmosphere. These are more especially the formation of 
mould, of wine-yeast, of the lactic acid ferment, of the ferment 
which produces the decomposition of urine. 
3. Vegetable or animal substances, boiled and closed while 
hot by means of cotton, remain im that condition quite protected 
against every kind of fermentation, putrefaction, or formation of 
mould, if all the germs in them capable of development are de- 
stroyed by boiling; for the germs which might reach them from 
the air are filtered out by the cotton. 
4, The germs of most vegetable or animal substances are com- 
pletely destroyed by simple boiling. A boiling for a short time 
at 100° C. isalso sufficient to kill all germs furnished by the air. 
* Comptes Rendus, March 4, 1861. 
t+ Liebig’s Annalen, March 1861. 
