H H 



H 



C = c x 



^C = N ^ 



CH 



HC CH 



C -C* 



xX c-c^ 



H H 



H H 



MR JAMES DEWAR ON THE OXIDATION PRODUCTS OF PICOLINE. 195 



pyridine, then the a and /3 lutidines may, in all probability, be represented as 

 dimethyl-and ethyl-pyridine respectively, and we would expect the dimethyl- 

 pyridine to give directly dicarbopyridenic acid, or an isomer, on oxidation. 

 Pyridine may be written graphically as benzol in which nitrogen functions in 

 place of the triatomic residue CH'", and thus may be represented as a closed 

 chain, — 



HC 



And, considering the stability and mode of formation of these bases it is not at 

 all improbable that they may not be produced by the simultaneous action of 

 acetylene and its derivatives on hydrocyanic acid ; thus as three molecules of 

 acetylene condense and form benzol, so may two molecules of acetylene, and 

 one of hydrocyanic acid, condense and produce pyridine. 



There is a large class of substances that bear the same relation to the mona- 

 mines that dicarbopyridenic acid does to pyridine, with this difference, that the 

 best known are all monobasic instead of being bibasic acids. Thus glycocol, 

 alamine, leucine, and their homologues, may be looked upon as the monocarbo- 

 acids of the ethylamines, in which the carboxyl radicle is united directly to the 

 carbon, the isomeric carbamic acids (or urethanes, as they are called) being the 

 derivatives in which the carboxyl is united directly to the nitrogen, — 



Ammonia. 



Methylamine. 



Glycocol. 



Methyl-carbamic Acid 



H 



CH 3 



CH 2 C0 2 H 



CH 3 



N H 



N'H 



N H 



N H 



H 



H 



H 



C0 2 H 



Analogous derivatives are obtained from the aromatic ammonias. A class of 

 derivatives similar to the above, must necessarily be derivable from the diamines. 

 In the case of the nitrile bases or triamines, only derivatives could be obtained 

 analogous to glycocol and its homologues. Bodies of a like constitution to 

 glyCocol readily break up into carbonic anhydride, and the corresponding 

 ammonia ; the reverse transformation has not yet been effected. The amido- 

 bibasic acids bear the same relation to the monamines that dicarbopyridenic 

 acid does to pyridine, with the exception of the difference in the constitution of 

 the closed nitrile nucleus. No bibasic acid, other than pyridenic, has been 

 discovered. A strictly analogous compound, in the monobasic series, is the 

 acid carbo-pyrrolic, C 5 H 5 N0 2 , which bears a similar relation to pyrrol that the 

 amido-mono-carbon acids do to the ammonias, only that the pyrrol, although a 

 nitrogenous body, is not, strictly speaking, a nitrile base. But the close analogy 



