MISCELLANY. 
Purification of the Hydrated Peroxide of Iron. By M. Victor Legrip. — 
Several Chemists, and among others M. Orflla, have lately discovered 
the presence of arsenic in the hydrated peroxide of iron, which is recom- 
mended as an antidote for that poison. However small the quantity of 
arsenic may be in this preparation, and however inoffensive its effects, it 
is nevertheless desirable that we should be able entirely to eliminate from 
an antidote, the poisonous substance which it is intended to combat. The 
following- process will attain this object: 
It consists in treating a clear solution of sulphate of iron with sulphu- 
retted^hydrogen in great excess. The best way is to pass a current of 
the gas through it for a long time. It is then to be boiled until it affords 
no smell of the sulphuretted hydrogen; allowed to stand for a day, then 
collected on a filter, converted into oxide, at the maximum of oxidation, 
by means of nitric acid with the aid of heat; passed through a filter, and 
the whole of the peroxide precipitated by ammonia. The ferruginous 
precipitate should be well washed and preserved for use. It is important 
to attend to the purity of the water used in the process, which should 
be either distilled water, or at least rain water well purified and filtered. 
Journal de Chirnie Medicale. 
Transformations of Cinnamic Acid, — M. E. Simon states, in a commu- 
nication to the Jlnnalen der Pharmacia, that cinnamic acid is transformed 
into oil of bitter almonds, by distillation with a mixture of sulphuric acid 
and bichromate of potass. If, on the other hand, cinnamic acid be distilled 
with three times its weight of slacked lime, a colorless volatile oil is 
obtained, much resembling benzine, partaking of the same composition, 
but which possesses entirely different properties, and probably also a dif- 
ferent atomic weight. M. Simon calls it cinnamomine. Treated with 
fuming nitric acid, a substance is formed, which, by its taste and smell, 
resembles nitro-benzide, and which he calls nitro-cinnamide. A deeper 
investigation into these compounds would not be devoid of speculative 
interest. — Berzeliush Report on the Progress of Science. 
