ON THE ASBESTUS LAMP. 
241 
platinum separates under the form of platinum black. The 
acid from sulphuric ether dissolves completely, by the aid of 
heat, the deutoxide of mercury; and when this oxide has 
been used in excess it is changed into a body, as white as 
snow, in the form of thick focculi, and which has much 
resemblance in its external characters to the acetate of the 
protoxide of mercury. By the addition of an equal volume 
of sulphuric acid at common temperatures, it was neither 
clouded or discolored, but, on the mixture being heated, it 
became of a deep yellow, but without any true carbonization. 
The vapors disengaged by heating it with sulphuric acid, had 
an extremely penetrating odor, much resembling that of con- 
centrated formic acid, and strongly affecting the olfactory 
nerves and the eyes. If it is boiled with a solution of the 
chloride of mercury, much calomel is separated, of a snow- 
white color, with a trace of metallic mercury; if a little of 
the solution of iodide of potassium be now added, iodide of 
mercury is formed, which, by the addition of a large quantity 
of the iodide of potassium, is re-dissolved, forming a deep 
yellow solution; the same phenomena do not take place, as 
we have seen, with the acid from nitrous ether submitted to 
the same treatment. The acid from sulphuric ether disen- 
gages, with rapid effervescence, carbonic acid from the 
carbonate and bicarbonate of soda. 
C. — The acid from Nitrous Ether. 
The nitrous ether employed in these experiments, was 
recently prepared, agitated with a weak solution of potassa, 
and then rectified from chloride of calcium; it was totally 
free from acid, and had, at 17° R., the specific gravity of .877. 
To obtain the acid from this ether, it is necessary to take 
care not to spread the asbestus wick too much, because the 
nitrous ether takes fire with great facility by contact with 
the red hot filaments of the asbestus; this phenomenon does 
not take place so easily with the other species of ether. The 
acid from nitrous ether is without color; its odor is like that of 
the acid from sulphuric ether, resembling, nevertheless, that of 
