106  The  Detection  of  Methyl  Alcohol        { Am]vd?e£&05rm' 
methyl.  If  it  be  methyl  alcohol,  the  practice  should  receive  an  ad- 
ditional condemnation  because  of  the  greater  toxicity  of  this  com- 
pound. 
THE  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  FRENCH  GOVERNMENT  TOWARDS  METHYL 
ALCOHOL. 
Article  V,  paragraph  I  of  the  law  of  the  16th  of  December,  1897, 
provides  that  there  shall  be  considered  from  the  fiscal  point  of 
view  as  assimilated  to  ethyl  alcohol,  methyl  and  other  alcohols 
susceptible  of  being  consumed  as  beverages  either  unmixed  or  mixed. 
"  The  Consulting  Committee  of  Arts  and  Manufacture  shall  de- 
termine which  of  these  products  by  their  degree  of  impurity  or 
their  specific  characters  should  be  considered  as  unfit  for  consump- 
tion, and  to  be  exempt  from  excise  or  from  denaturing. 
In  view  of  this  authority  the  Consulting  Committee  of  Arts  and 
Manufactures,  on  the  14th  of  March,  1900,  decided  that,  in  order 
to  be  considered  as  unfit  for  consumption  by  the  mouth,  and  free 
from  the  expense  of  excise  and  denaturing,  methyl  alcohols  should 
contain  at  least  5  per  cent,  of  acetone  and  3  per  cent,  of  pyrogenic 
impurities,  which  give  to  them  a  disagreeable  empyreumatic  odor. 
Under  date  of  the  4th  of  January,  1905,  the  President  of  the  Repub- 
lic, through  the  Minister  of  Finance,  Monsieur  Rouvier,  promul- 
gated the  following  official  decree: 
Article  I.  The  decision  of  the  Consulting  Committe  of  Arts 
and  Manufactures  of  the  day  of  the  14th  of  March,  1900,  shall  re- 
ceive its  full  and  entire  execution. 
Article  II.  The  Minister  of  Finance  is  charged  with  the  execu- 
tion of  the  present  decree,  which  will  be  inserted  in  the  Journal 
Officiel  and  in  the  Bulletin  des  Lois. 
THE  DETECTION  OF  METHYL  ALCOHOL  IN  LIQUIDS 
CONTAINING  ETHYL  ALCOHOL. 
By  Samuel  P.  Sadt^kr,  Ph.D. 
The  increasing  tendency  to  substitute  methyl  alcohol  under  some 
one  of  the  trade  names  by  which  it  is  now  known,  for  ethyl  or  grain 
alcohol,  in  the  manufacture  of  tinctures,  essences  and  other  alcoholic 
preparations,  makes  the  detection  of  such  substitution  or  adultera- 
