Chemistry : general, medical, and pharmaceutical including the chemistry of the British pharmacopœia / by John Attfield.

  • John Attfield
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Chemistry : general, medical, and pharmaceutical including the chemistry of the British pharmacopœia / by John Attfield. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    78/650 (page 62)
    doubtless derived from the nitrogen of the plants from which the coal has been produced. Ammonia.—When this gas (I^Hg) comes into contact with water (H^O), in the process of washing and cooling coal-gas, hydrate of ammonium (NH^HO, or AmHO) is believed to be formed, the analogue of hydrate of potassium (KHO) or sodium (KaHO). The grounds for this belief are the observed analogy of the well- known ammoniacal salts to those of potassium and sodium, the similarity of action of solutions of potash, soda, and ammonia on salts of metals, and the existence of crystals of an analogous sul- phur salt (FH^HS). Chloride of Ammonium.—The ammoniacal liquor of the gas-works is usually neutralized by hydrochloric acid, by which chloride of ammonium (sal-ammoniac) is produced, ]N'H^HO+HCl=I^Hp+H^O; and from this salt, purified, the others used in pharmacy are directly or indirectly made. Chloride of Ammonium (Ammonii Chloridum, B. P.) occurs *'in colourless^ inodorous, translucent fibrous masses, tough, and difficult to powder, soluble in water [1 in 10 is the Solution of Chloride of Ammonium/' E. P.] and in rectified spirit. Volcanic Ammonia.—The purest form of ammonia is that met with in volcanic districts, and obtained as a by-product in the manufacture of borax; the crude boracic acid as imported con- tains about 10 per cent, of ammonium salts, chiefly sulphate, and double sulphates of ammonium with magnesium, sodium, and manganese (Howard). Eeictions HAvmo (a) Gej^eral, (h) Sti^thetical, ai^d (c) Al?-ALYTICAL InTEEEST. (a) General Reaction.—To forty or fifty grains of dry mercury in a dry test-tube, add one or two small pieces of sodium (freed from adhering naphtha by gentle pressure with a piece of filter- paper), and amalgamate by gently warming the tube. To this amalgam, when cold, add some fragments of chloride of ammo- nium and a strong solution of the same salt. The sodium amalgam soon begins to swell and rapidly increase in bulk, pro- bably overflowing the tube. The light spongy mass produced is