466 
DE. A. W. HOFMANX OX THE PHOSPHOEUS-BASES. 
By decanting the liquid from the excess of zinc and treating it with oxide of silver, oxide 
of zinc, bromine and sulphuric acid are removed, and a solution of oxide of teti’ethyl- 
phosphonium is obtained, which, when mixed with hydrochloric acid and dichloride of 
platinum, yields well-developed octohedra of the platinum-salt of tetrethylphospho- 
nium. 
0-444 grm. of this salt, decomposed by hydrosulphuric acid, yielded &c., 0-1240 grm. 
of platinum. 
The formula 
Cg H 20 P Pt CI 3 = [(C 2 K,), P] Cl, Pt CI 2 
requires the following values : — 
r 
Theory. 
1 equiv. of Tetrethylphosphonium . 
147-0 
41-75 
1 equiv. of Platinum 
98-7 
28-02 
3 equivs. of Chlorine 
106-5 
30-23 
1 equiv. of Platinum-salt .... 
352-2 
100-00 
Experiment. 
27-93 
The chloride obtained in the analysis was converted, by successive treatment ^vith 
oxide of silver and hydriodic acid, into the corresponding iodide. This characteristic 
salt appeared on careful comparison exactly similar to the iodide of tetrethylphospho- 
nium prepared in the ordinary way. 
Here, then, we have an instance of the direct reproduction of an ethyl-compound from 
a body of the ethylene-group by a simple process of reduction. Similar transformations 
would doubtless succeed in many other cases, and this is perhaps a fitting opportunity 
of directing attention to the interest which the employment of this reaction would have 
in connexion with the intermediate hydrochloric glycol-ether discovered by Wurtz. 
Probably this compound, when subjected to the action of nascent hydrogen, would be 
directly converted into alcohol : 
C2H5C10, 
C,HeO; 
and when considered with reference to this decomposition, would appear as monoclilo- 
rinated alcohol. 
It was chiefly the facility with which a tetrethylphosphonium-compound may be 
obtained from the bromethylated bromide that induced me to designate the hydrogen- 
replacing molecules €3 H 4 Br and C 2 Hg O, which we meet in the compounds aboi e 
described, as h'omethyl and oxetliyl. I was anxious to submit the ideas which guided 
me in the selection of these terms to the test of experiment. We know from the expe- 
riments of Regnault, that dichloride of ethylene and monochlorinated chloride of ethyl 
are essentially different bodies ; and not less distinct are dibromide of ethylene and 
monobrominated bromide of ethyl, which I have obtained in the course of these experi- 
