278 
ON THE DETECTION OF METIIYLIC ACID. 
To the Editors of the 1 Leeds Mercury 
Gentlemen,—A cutting from your paper of Saturday, headed “ What is olive oil ?’ 
has been handed me from your neighbourhood, asking for an explanation as to the 
correctness of a statement of the defendant in an action in our County Court against 
him for mixing olive oil with cotton-seed oil, viz. that “he had shipped hundreds of 
tuns of cotton-seed oil to Italy.” This is a mistake, as he is simply an oil refiner 
and not an exporter or Shipper. He had sold the oil for export to Trieste, which, he 
afterwards said, he thought was in Italy. 
It is a fact that cotton-seed oil is refused admittance into Italy. The inhabitants 
consume and eat large quantities of olive oil. Besides, the Italian Government are 
too fully alive to the importance of maintaining the purity of an article of such vital 
importance to their commerce, to suffer the slightest attempt at trickery with one of 
their staple articles well known to all the world. 
I am, Gentlemen, yours obediently, 
John Smith, Consular Delegate. 
Italian Consular Delegation , Kingston-upon-Hull, 
18 th October , 1865. 
Of course, no attempt is made to upset the admission that the oil was adulte¬ 
rated, and this is the essential fact to the consumer. 
R. R. 
ON THE DETECTION OE METHYLIC ALCOHOL WHEN MIXED 
WITH RECTIFIED SPIRIT OF WINE, AND OF DISTINGUISH¬ 
ING BETWEEN ETHER AND SWEET SPIRIT OF NITRE 
WHEN PREPARED FROM PURE AND FROM METHYLATED 
SPIRIT RESPECTIVELY. 
BY MR. W. YOUNG. 
Aware of the great interest taken at the present moment in the above subject, 
I thought a few remarks, on a method I have adopted for some time for detect¬ 
ing the presence of methylated spirit, might prove acceptable to your readers; 
especially as not much time or trouble are involved in its application. 
The evidence of the presence of methylated spirit in, or having been used in 
the preparation of, the above articles, is based on the change produced by it in 
the colour of the solution of permanganate of potash. 
The solution I use, and which, in what follows, will be spoken of as “the 
test,” is made by dissolving 1 grain of crystallized permanganate of potash in 1 
fluid ounce of distilled water. 
Spirit of Wine.— 1. If 10 minims of the test be added to 4 fluid drachms of 
the purest rectified spirit in a test tube, the mixture will be found to retain the 
bright pinkish colour so characteristic of permanganate of potash, for at least 
ten minutes, when it gradually fades. As regards colour, this may be taken as 
a standard for comparison. 
2. Add 10 minims of the test to 4 fluid drachms of the same spirit, previously 
mixed with 2 per cent, of wood naphtha. The difference between this and the 
pure spirit is at once apparent. The liquid no longer retains its characteristic 
colour, but almost instantly changes to a dull pale-brown tint. 
3. Add 10 minims of the test to 4 fluid drachms of pure spirit, previously 
mixed with 10 per cent, of wood naphtha, as in methylated spirit. Here the 
change in the colour of the test is even more striking, the liquid at once as¬ 
suming the brown tint, as in experiment 2, only in a greater degree. 
So great is the delicacy of the test, that 1 part of wood spirit in 300 of recti¬ 
fied spirit of wine may be readily detected by its aid ; but I imagine it will be' 
mostly valued in the next application I shall speak of, viz. to sulphuric ether, as 
