42*2 
DR. E. FRANKLAND ON A NEW SERIES OF 
powder, having a pungent and very nauseous smell, resembling decayed horse-radish; 
when heated it fuses, froths up and decomposes, emitting vapours of a most insup- 
portable odour. Heated with nitric acid it is decomposed with the formation of per- 
oxide of tin. 
Chloride of Stanethylium. 
C 4 H 5 Sn Cl. 
This salt is best prepared by dissolving oxide of stanethylium in dilute hydrochloric 
acid ; on evaporation at a gentle heat or over sulphuric acid in vacuo, the chloride 
crystallizes out in long colourless needles, isomorphous with the iodide, which salt it 
also closely resembles in all its properties ; it is however more volatile, and therefore 
emits a more intensely pungent and irritating odour than the iodide. 
Stanethylium. 
When a strip of zinc is immersed in a solution of a salt of stanethylium (a solution 
of the chloride of stanethylium is the best for this purpose), it speedily becomes 
covered with dense oily drops of a yellow colour, which finally separate from the 
lower extremity of the zinc and accumulate at the bottom of the vessel ; the forma- 
tion of the oily liquid is much favoured by the application of a gentle heat. The 
yellow oil was separated from the supernatant liquid by means of a pipette, and well 
washed with successive large portions of cold water ; being then dried over chloride 
of calcium and submitted to analysis, it yielded the following results : — 
I. -SlSOgrm., burnt with oxide of copper and oxygen gas, gave *3498 grm. carbonic 
acid and *1757 grm. water. 
These numbers correspond sufficiently with the formula 
C4 H5 Sn, 
M'htn it is considered that the stanethylium, as thus prepared, contains traces of un- 
decomposed chloride of stanethylium, which I did not succeed in removing by the 
most protracted washing ; and as stanethylium does not crystallize and cannot be 
distilled without decomposition, I could not avail myself of these means of purifica- 
tion. The above formula requires the following numbers : — 
Calculated. Found. 
C 4 24 27-32 26*95 
H 5 5 5*69 5*51 
Sn 58*82 66*99 
100*00 
The isolation of stanethylium from its chloride by zinc, is therefore expressed by 
the following simple equation : — 
C 4 H 5 Sn Cl|_ fZn Cl 
Zn J-lC^HsSn. 
Stanethylium exists at the ordinary atmospheric temperature, as a thick, heavy, 
oily liquid, of a yellow or brownish-yellow colour, and an exceedingly pungent odour, 
resembling that of its compounds, but much more powerful. It is insoluble in water, 
