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placed in equal bulks of distilled water and left overnight. 
In each case a fine white flocculent crystalline matter, an 
oxide or salt of lead, was observed in suspension, but this 
existed in considerably greater proportions in the water 
containing the lead which had not been treated with anti- 
mony. Thus the small quantity of antimony appears to afford 
some protection against oxidation of the lead by air and 
water. When the suspended matter was filtered off, only a 
trace of the lead was found to be in solution in each case. 
It is sometimes advisable to obtain the lead contained in 
water in a contracted solution, and preferably in an acetic 
acid solution if possible. I have observed frequently that 
weak acetic acid dissolves no lead from the residue left on 
evaporating waters which gave originally a very distinct 
coloration with sulphuretted hydrogen, but on treating the 
residue with strong nitric acid, evaporating off the acid 
completely and again treating the residue with weak acetic 
acid, the lead dissolves with apparent facility, and on evapo- 
rating this acetic solution of the metal to a drop or two, it 
may be obtained in a sufficiently concentrated solution for 
the application of the other tests. It appears as if certain 
organic matters contained in the water combine with and 
render the lead insoluble in acetic acid ; these organic sub- 
stances being afterwards decomposed by the nitric acid, leave 
the lead in a condition in which it is soluble in acetic. 
A curious case of lead poisoning lately came under my 
notice and engaged the attention of a Lancashire coroner. 
A woman, upon whose body the inquest was held, had 
been employed in weaving cloth from yarn, which had been 
dyed of a yellow colour. The colour was the ordinary 
chromate of lead, and it was alleged that the dye had 
caused her death by poisoning. 
I examined some of this yarn, which I found to be of an 
orange yellow colour due to the chromate of lead which had 
been fixed in the fibre, but it was so loosely fixed that by 
