Notes on Organic Chemistry. 435 



just mentioned, one may be converted into another. One of 

 the most decided and remarkable animal substances is urea, 

 the chief solid constituent of urine. Those who thought that 

 vital force was alone competent to produce organic bodies, and 

 that it did so by changing the action of chemical forces, are 

 shown to have been in error, through the discovery that, by 

 causing nascent carbonic acid to act upon nascent or free 

 ammonia, urea can be obtained. Many organic compounds 

 can only be formed by bringing certain elements or principles 

 to act upon each other in a nascent state. When a gas, for 

 example, is just liberated from a compound, it exhibits an 

 energy of affinity not subsequently displayed. Bodies just 

 liberated are spoken of as being in their nascent or new-born 

 state. Any process by which carbonic acid and ammonia can 

 be combined, at the same time that water is separated, gives 

 rise to urea. The formula of urea is C 2 , H 4 , Az 2 , O 2 . Thus, as 

 M. Berthelot observes, " it is a neutral carbonate of ammonia, 



(7 4 , 2 Az, H 3 H 2 O 2 — 2 H 2 2 =C 2 H 4 Az 2 QV 

 The philosophical conceptions belonging to these questions are 

 more easily apprehended than the details upon which they rest 

 are understood. Erom what we have already stated, it will be 

 seen that fatty matters and sugars are very similar bodies in 

 chemical composition. Alcohols also are related to them, and all 

 are related to the simple carbides of hydrogen, as, for example, 

 marsh gas or pure coal gas. Marsh gas contains carbon in a 

 very diffused state ; but other compounds may be formed by 

 processes which lead to successive condensations of the carbon, 

 and we then obtain benzine, for example, in which the carbon 

 is six times as condensed as in marsh gas, or napthaline, in 

 which its condensation is tenfold. 



Olefiant gas is composed of C 4 H 4 , and, as M. Berthelot 

 states, " by fixing water on to olefiant gas, we obtain common 

 alcohol, C 4 H 6 0\" This is evident from the formula C 4 H 4 

 (olefiant gas), which becomes C 4 H 6 O 2 by the simple addition 

 of the elements of water, H 2 O 2 . 



Again, " if two equivalents of hydrogen are removed (in the 

 form of water) from common alcohol, a substance called 

 Aldehyde is obtained, C 4 H 4 O." By oxydizing aldehyd vinegar 

 is obtained, and this action, which may take place by purely 

 chemical agency in the laboratory, is what the vinegar plant 

 effects as it lives and grows. Organic alkalies are " generally de- 

 rived by the union of ammonia with divers oxygenized matters, 

 playing the part of alcohols or aldehydes." Another set of 

 bodies, called Amides, "spring from the union of ammonia 

 with acids, or with oxygenated bodies playing the part of 

 acids." In another passage M. Berthelot tells us that " albu- 



VOL. VI. — NO. VI. P F 



