416 Wells — Complex Chlorides containing Gold. 



It is to be noticed that the summations 2 of these three 

 analyses are about 1.2% low in each case. This is to be 

 explained by the fact that the products when dried at 

 100° were in a lumpy condition, and the additional circum- 

 stance that cesium chloride when dissolved in hydro- 

 chloric acid, as experience has often shown, can be solidi- 

 fied and dried at 100° only with extreme slowness. Very 

 probably a rather stable acid cesium chloride is formed, 

 which is very hygroscopic, although cesium chloride itself 

 is not hygroscopic to any marked extent. It is believed 

 that the lumps of these products held a little of this liquid 

 even after drying for an hour or two, to practically 

 constant weight, at 100°. The possibility that the double 

 salt contains a molecule of water of crystallization, cor- 

 responding to 1.02%, has been considered, but this seems 

 very doubtful on account of the higher summations of the 

 other analyses where the products were pulverulent when 

 dried, and because of the additional circumstance that all 

 of the crops contained small amounts of filter-paper 

 fibers, which should give somewhat low summations in 

 any case. 



From the facts that have been presented here, there 

 seems to be no doubt that the formula for this salt is 

 Cs 5 Au 3 Cl 14 . This can be written 3CsAuCl 4 .2CsCl, but it 

 is entirely improbable that the yellow double salt retains 

 its identity in the more complex red one, on account of 

 the remarkable change in color. • 



The new salt, in view of its very minute crystals, its 

 increased stability with hydrochloric acid, its striking 

 color, and its very sparing solubility in the solutions from 

 which it is deposited, appears to resemble the cesium- 

 auric triple salts that have been described in the preced- 

 ing articles of this series, and it seems possible that it 

 may be a triple salt in the sense that the gold plays two 

 different parts in its structure, although the gold is 

 undoubtedly wholly in the trivalent state. 



New Haven, Conn., March, 1922. 



2 These were unchanged by the corrections for CsCl. 



