PHARMACEUTICAL SOCIETY, EDINBURGH. 
257 
Allow me in conclusion to say, that while I am deeply sensible of the honour you have 
conferred upon me, in placing me in this chair, I must throw myself upon your kind 
forbearance, in any shortcomings, which I fear will be many; assuring you at the same 
time, it will be my utmost endeavour, to the best of my ability, to discharge the 
various and onerous duties attached to the office of your President. 
Dr. Stevenson Macadam will now add to the deep obligation under which we already 
lie to him, by giving us an address, "which I doubt not will be, as all his contributions to 
our meetings have ever been, full of instruction and interest. 
Dr. Macadam then read the following Paper on 
THE RECENT PROGRESS OF ORGANIC CHEMISTRY. 
Dr. Macadam mentioned that the department of organic chemistry had made great 
advances during recent years, not only in pure chemistry, but in the relations of that 
science to the industrial arts. He stated that not only does the manufacturing chemistry 
of the age transform starch and sugar into alcohol by fermentation, as in brewing 
operations; sawdust into oxalic acid by the action of soda and nitre; starch or saw¬ 
dust into grape-sugar by the aid of sulphuric acid; wood and coal into paraffin and 
paraffin oils by the process of destructive distillation; coal into aniline and the 
coal-tar colours ; and guano into a magnificent colaur, rivalling that from the cochineal 
insect; but the organic chemistry of the day has proceeded to produce artificially many 
alcohols and ethers, including jargonelle pear essence and pine-apple essence; and to 
construct many alkaloids resembling quinine, strychnine and morphine in their com¬ 
position and chemical properties, encouraging the hope that we may soon be in pos¬ 
session of the means of preparing by artificial processes these powerful medicines, and 
possibly others equally efficacious, but which Dame Nature has never dreamed of pre¬ 
senting us with in a ready-formed condition. 
And more than that, and principally through the researches of Berthelot, dead 
mineral matter has been worked up by stages into organic compounds. Thus Berthelot, 
taking carbon and sulphur, combines these into bisulphide of carbon, a mobile ethereal 
liquid; and thereafter, by the mutual reaction of copper, hydrosulphuric acid, and the 
bisulphide of carbon, he obtains olefiant gas. The latter is absorbed by sulphuric acid 
(oil of vitriol), to the extent of 120 volumes of the gas in one of the acid, and there¬ 
after by dilution with water and distillation, the acid mixture yields alcohol of the 
same composition and properties as that obtained from ordinary grain. Strecker takes 
the olefiant gas in solution in sulphuric acid, and by adding water, neutralizing with 
ammonia, evaporating and heating, obtains crystals of taurine, one of the constituents of 
bile. Wohler combines the simple elements, nitrogen and oxygen, by electric dis¬ 
charges into nitric acid, and then by the successive mutual reaction of this nitric acid 
with tin, hydrochloric acid and black lead, and lime (or oxide of lead), he obtains a 
complicated organic substance, called the hydrocyanate of ammonia. The latter may 
also be prepared by passing a mixture of the gases ammonia and carbonic oxide through 
a red-hot tube. The hydrocyanate of ammonia may then be employed in yielding 
cyanogen, hydrocyanic acid (prussic acid), oxalic acid and urea; also formic acid, 
paracyanogen, cyanuric acid, sulphocyanogen, and mellon. 
When cast-iron (which contains carbon) is dissolved in dilute sulphuric or hydro¬ 
chloric acid, there is evolved a volatile oil resembling turpentine, and there is left in the 
vessel a small quantity of graphite, and a brown mould resembling vegetable mould. 
Ordinary carbonate of soda (washing soda) can have carbon abstracted from it, and if the 
latter is acted upon by dilute uitj-ic acid, and the solution evaporated, an artificial tannin 
is obtained, which has the property of precipitating gelatine or glue from its solution, 
like ordinary tannin obtained from gall nuts or oak bark. Berthelot has taken carbonic 
oxide and caustic potash, and compelled them to produce formic acid (yielded naturally 
by red ants); and with a single link of the chain awanting, he has manufactured 
glycerine, which is the base of fatty substances, and combining it with the fatty acids, 
he has prepared artificially the oils and fats generally obtained from the plant and the 
animal, and many more new oils and fats not known in nature. Berthelot has acted 
upon glycerine by putrefying animal matter, and obtained artificially grape sugar; and 
has converted oil of turpentine into ordinary camphor and Borneo camphor ; whilst in 
conjunction with De Luca, he has prepared artificially one of the chief constituents of 
oil of mustard (sulphocyanide of allyl). 
