Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 155 



According to the author the experiments detailed in this memoir 

 prove : 



1st. That albumen has the property of combining with a great 

 number of metallic salts without decomposing them, and forming 

 with them compounds, which are insoluble in water, when they are 

 united in certain proportions, but susceptible of dissolving in them se- 

 verally when there is either an excess of albumen or of the metallic 

 solution combined with it. 



2nd. That these compounds, which may be designated by the 

 name of albuminates, appear to result from the union of several atoms 

 of albumen with one atom of metallic salt, as shown by the analyses 

 which have been performed. 



3rd. That these compounds possess the singular property of dis- 

 solving, without undergoing any immediate alteration, in the solu- 

 tions of alkaline salts, which decompose the metallic salts when taken 

 by themselves, and they remain dissolved for a shorter or longer pe- 

 riod, according to the temperature. 



4th. That it is extremely probable that when metallic salts are 

 externally exhibited, there takes place in the oeconomy, effected by 

 absorption, an analogous combination between these salts, the tis- 

 sues and the albumen contained in the various animal fluids, and 

 that it is probable they are conveyed in the humours, and their me- 

 dicinal effect is thus most commonly produced. 



5th. That it would be interesting if physicians would ascertain 

 the therapeutic effects of these compounds of albumen and metallic 

 salts. 



6th. That in the action of a metallic salt on any tissue, a com- 

 bination is effected between these two bodies, which must modify 

 its vital properties and effect a change in its functions. 



7th. That the property of certain metallic salts of combining either 

 with albumen or with the base of various tissues of our organs, ge- 

 neralizes what has been already stated with respect to bichloride of 

 mercury and the same substances. — L'Institut, No. 313. 



HAYDENITE. 



M. Levy has read the following notice respecting this mineral to 

 the Academy of Sciences : — 



" Cleaveland, in the second edition of his Treatise on Mineralogy 

 and Geology, published at Boston [U. S.] in 1822, has given the name 

 of haydenite to a mineral which had then been recently discovered by 

 Dr. Hayden of Baltimore [U. S.] . He gives the following description 

 of this mineral substance. — It is found in small crystals of a reddish 

 colour, the form of which is cubic or slightly rhombic, and the sur- 

 face of the faces vary from |-th to ;^th of an inch square. It appears 

 susceptible of ready decomposition, and becomes porous and spongy, 

 but always retains its form. Before the blowpipe, it fuses with some 

 difficulty into a yellow enamel ; it is soluble in hot sulphuric acid, 

 and the solution deposits small white needles. It has also been 

 found accompanied with zeolite and carbonate of iron, in the fissures 

 of gneiss at a mile and a half from Baltimore. 



