214 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. [September 10, 1870. 
The business of this day will comprise :— 
Election of Members. 
(Nearly one thousand names of candidates have been 
received by the Secretaries.) 
Report of Executive Committee. 
Financial Statement. 
Reception of Delegates from Pharmaceutical Societies 
and Associations. 
The President’s Address. 
The following and other papers will then be read:— 
1 . Report on the Purity of the Yellow Bees’-wax of 
Trade. Edward Davies, F.C.S. 
2 . Saccharo-Chirettine: a New Preparation of Chi- 
retta. David S. Kemp, F.C.S. 
3. On the Strength of twenty-four Specimens of Sac- 
charated Carbonate of Iron. Mr. J. J. Nicholson, Sun¬ 
derland. 
4. Chloral: Note on the Best Forms for Internal Ad¬ 
ministration. Joseph Ince, F.C.S., F.L.S. 
5. The Apprenticeship and Early Training of Phar¬ 
macists. Mr. F. B. Benger. 
6 . (Not yet received by the Secretaries.) 
7. Analysis of Bitter Cassava Juice, and Experiments 
in Elucidation of its supposed Antiseptic Properties. 
Professor Attfield. 
On Tuesday evening, at 6.0 p.m., a dinner, at the 
1 Adelphi Hotel,’ will be given by the Local Committee 
to the President and Officers of the Conference. The 
Local Secretary, Mr. Davies, requests that gentlemen 
desirous of being present will communicate with him 
during the day, either at the Royal Institution or at the 
‘ Adelphi Hotel.’ 
Wednesday , September 14. 
The Conference will meet at 10.0 a.m., adjourning at 
12.30 p.m. ; resuming business at 2.0 p.m., and adjourn¬ 
ing at 4.30 p.m. 
The business of this day will comprise :— 
Election of Members. 
Reception of Letters of Invitation to the Conference 
for 1871. 
Papers to be read :— 
8 . A Century of Old Books. Joseph Ince, F.C.S., 
F.L.S. 
9. A Few Notes on Aloes. William A. Tilden, B.Sc., 
F.C.S. 
10 . Sulphite of Zinc. C. R. C. Tichborne, F.C.S. 
11 . The Storing of Poisons. Mr. Edward Smith, 
Torquay. 
12 . Ammoniacal Salts from Gas-Liquor; purified to 
fit them for use in Pharmacy. W. L. Scott, F.C.S. 
13. The chemical constitution of Sulphurated Potash. 
John Watts, D.Sc. 
14 to 21. Papers are expected from Messrs. Greenish 
(lint), Benger (apparatus for maintaining constant tem¬ 
peratures in laboratory operations), Linford (a new hy¬ 
drometer), Scott (purity of commercial alkaloids and 
lithium salts), and from other members. 
Thursday , September 15. 
On Thursday there will be an excursion to Widnes 
and Runcorn at 1.30 p.m. from Lime Street Station. 
Messrs. Hutchinson and Co. and W. Gossage and Sons, 
at Widnes, and the Runcorn Soap and Alkali Company 
have liberally thrown open their works to the inspection 
of members, and the party will have an opportunity of 
inspecting the magnificent bridge recently’built over the 
Mersey by the London and North-Western Railway 
Company. At 7 o’clock a collation will be provided by 
the Local Committee at Halton Castle, a ruin on an 
eminence commanding an extensive view of the sur¬ 
rounding country. Members of the Conference and 
subscribers to the local fund will be provided with 
tickets, entitling them to a return railway ticket at 
Is. 0>d., on application to Messrs. Clay and Abraham, 
87, Bold Street, not later than Tuesday evening. 
Tuesday , September 20. 
Election of Officers for 1871. Appointment of Place 
of Meeting for 1871. 
By the kindness of the committee of the Lyceum, 
No. 1, Bold Street, the news room of that institution 
will be open to members of the Conference during the 
week. 
SOCIETY OF ARTS.* 
Ox Fermentation. 
BY PROFESSOR A. W r . WILLIAMSON, F.R.S. 
Lecture II. 
We left off last week at a point at which we had come 
to recognize a difficulty, which we did not, to any ap¬ 
preciable extent, succeed in solving. By considering 
in succession a certain small number of processes in 
which substances induced chemical changes in others 
which were in contact with them, we classified them, 
beginning with some very complex cases—cases in which 
substances of formulse so long that, even if I ventured 
to give you chemical formulas at all, I should hesitate 
to give you their formulae—took part in the decompo¬ 
sition, and gave rise to products themselves having 
formula) of no small complication. From those we 
passed to the consideration of some bodies less complex 
in their structure, and undergoing changes very much 
like those which we at first considered, but having this 
remarkable peculiarity that, in these somewhat simpler 
cases, the changes were effected not only by organic 
bodies comparable to ferments, but also, in certain in¬ 
stances, by simple mineral bodies, such as the acids. 
In this intermediate class we found that the same effects 
are produced, sometimes by diastase, or such-like bodies, 
and sometimes by sulphuric acid. Then we came to 
some still more simple cases of decomposition, produced 
solely by bodies of such simplicity that we chemists 
have got a tolerably definite idea of them. I gave two 
cases which, I believe I may say, are pretty well under¬ 
stood. The resemblance between the different terms of 
that long series served, as I think it will be admitted by 
those who followed the chain of reasoning, as an argu¬ 
ment in favour of there being some great resemblance 
in the process which takes place in these changes in the 
successive terms of the series ; and I propose, before we 
proceed further in the study of these wonderful decom¬ 
positions, to analyse somewhat the nature of these 
changes in the simple cases which we last considered, 
in order that we may get, if possible, something like a 
master-key—a very simply-formed piece of iron—which 
will open a variety of locks. The two cases which I 
allude to were, first, the formation of ether and water 
from alcohol by the action of oil of vitriol; and, 
secondly, the ordinary process of making oil of vitriol 
in the so-called lead chambers ; and I think it will be 
admitted, even from the very brief and imperfect state¬ 
ment which I was able to make, that we have evidence 
of the fact that the active substances do return, after 
they have been doing one bit of that work, to the point 
from which they started before doing it. I gave a 
couple of illustrations of that fact. Sulphuric acid is 
converted, while making alcohol into ether and water, 
into a substance called sulpho-vinic acid, which differs 
from it in a good many properties, and then it comes 
back again to sulphuric acid. Just so with nitric oxide, 
in the process of making oil of vitriol; it first takes up 
oxygen and assumes the form of those red fumes, then 
hands that oxygen over to the sulphurous acid which is 
in contact with it, thus coming back again to the state 
of nitric oxide from which it had started. Hence the 
term which I have suggested for this process is cyclical, 
to denote the fact, which I consider essential, the leading 
* Cantor Lectures. 
