The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-03-22 00:00:00

of two 'proportions of carbon and two of hydrogen ; thus
alcohol consists, of two carbon, three hydrogen, and one
oxygen. Alcohol obtained by the vinous fermentation is
mixed with a very large quantity of water, and we have
recourse to certain chemical means to free it from this water.

If we submit alcohol to any substance, having a strong
affinity for water, we shall remove the water 'and 'obtain the
alcohol free. This is effected by, paetn'T3 of dry carbonate of
potass. It is also effected by distillation with dry muriate of
lime, which pesv3sts 'a strong affinity for water. Pure
alcohol pOssesses 'powerful inflammatory properties. if a
pottich of it be poured upon a shallow dish, we shall find
that it will speedily inflame, and the products of the com-
bustion- will be carbonic acid and water. The flame of
alcohol is capable of being coloured by a variety of sub-
stances. A peculiar acid called the boracic, communicates
tb its flame a pale yellowish green colour, and this expedient
is an excellent test for boracic acid. If we mb with aldolioi
the salt called nitrate of strontran, the liable Will be coloured
of a pink or crimson. Many other Salts possess the charac-
ter of communicating A 'colour to alcohol, and it is this cir-
cumstance which 'enables us to distinguish these substances
from each btber. The salts of copper communicate a very
remarkable green tinge to the flame of alcohol. The salts of
potass colour the flame of alcohol violet. These experiments
suffice to show the peculiar properties which substances have
of communicating a colour to the vapour of alcohol when it
is burnt. Alcohol possesses the property of dissolving the
resins, camphor, &c. and when these substances are dissolved
in spirits of wine, they are precipitated from this sbiutibn
by means of water, the water uniting with the alcohol hid

quitting the resins. A very ready mode of showing the
sence of oxygen in alcohol is by bringing it into loonta'et Wieh
Totassium, which has very poViterful affinity for oxygen.
here is not, however; the tame 'energetic action produced
when potassium f plaVad upon alcohol as when it is dropped
upon water, but gall the alcohol will be decomposed. The
spirits liCeome inflamed, but the potassium does not leave
that violet-coloured flame which it exhibits on water. I have
already stated that when alcohol is examined as to its che-
mical constitution, we shall find it to be composed of water
and of olefiant gas. Now olefiant gas consists of two propor-
tions of carbon and two of hydrogen. The difference, there-
fore, between olefiant gas and alcohol, consists in the former
containing one proportion less of oxygen and h*ctrogn gas
so that if, by any means, we Can separate the water froth the
spirits of wine, we ought to obtain rieffint 4as, and this we
find to be the tase. If we take h)iiits of wine and mix them
with a substance Which 'Possesses a powerful affinity for
water, such as ,P.ittphitric acid, the water will he taken away
from the spirits of wine and the olefiant gas disengaged. The
macs remaining in the retort being a- quantity of charcoal,
because sulphuric acid, when in excess, is capable of decom-
posing olefiant gas, and setting free some of its carbon.
Olefiant gas is characterised by the very great brilliancy with
which it burns. It is composed of carbon and hydrogen in
equal atoms—two of carbon and two of hydrogen. You will
therefore see how large a quantity of carbon and hydrogen
alcohol contains. If we mix two proportions of Chlorine and
one of olefiant gas, and inflame the mixture, we shall be able
to separate the charcoal, as the chlorine will combine with
the hydrogen to forin muriatic acid. By these means, you
will readily understand that oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon
enter into the composition of spirits of wine. There are other
means besides that to which I have'adverted of combining
chlorine with the elements of alcohol. A peculiar fluid, and
one of extreme interest, because it is used in medicine, is ob-
tained by the action of chlorine upon alcohol. It is called
chloroform, and is produced by the distillation of chloride of
lime and alcohol. It is called chloroform because it can be
converted into formic acid. Chloroform is a combination of

chlorine with hydrogen and carbon. I have here a small
quantity of chloroform dissolved in spirits of wine, and I
shall allow it to burn under a bell glass containing a small
portion of litmus paper. The litmus paper will become red-
dened, showing the formation of muriatic acid, and, at the
same time, if I place the glass over the i'apatir of ammonia,
white fumes will arise: This entirely results from the
muriatic acid which was produced by the combination of the
chlorine with the hydrogen, uniting the ammoniacal vapour

and forming muriate of ammonia. -Chloroform is not inflam-
mable by itself, but when mixed with spirits of wine is readily
so. It is extensively used in medicine, as a stimulant, and
is characterised by the pungent flavour it possesses united
with a strong sweet taste. When alcohol is acted upon by
nitric acid, especially when silver or mercury is present, very
complicated changes take place, the result of which is the
formation of an extremely detonating substance, which is
called fulminating mercury or silver, as these metals are
severally used in its formation. The fulminating mercury
has much less powerful detonating properties than fulminat-
ing silver ; both of them, however, have been used in the
formation of percussion caps. Irr this case the spirits of
wine suffer decomposition. A portion of oxygen and of the
nitric acid unites with the cyanogen formed in the process to
produce cyanic acid, which, uniting with the metallic oxide,
produces the fulminating compound. By striking a few
grains of these fulminating substances with a hammer a loud
report is occasioned, accompanied with the disengagement of
a large quantity of gas. I have stated, that in order to obtain
strong spirits of wine from ordinary weak alcohol, it is ne-
cessary to submit it to the action of certain substances pos-
sessing a strong affinity for water, and that dry carbonate of
potass is used for this purpose. Caustic potass is some-
times resorted to, but it is objectionable, because it occa-
sions the decomposition of the spirits of wine ; and it
is found, experimentally, that when alcohol is boiled
with caustic potash that the alcohol becomes decomposed,
and a peculiar resinous substance formed, similar to the al-
dehyd resin to which I alluded in my last lecture. In fact,
alcohol suffers a portion of its hydrogen to be separated to
produce the substance called aldehyd ; which being mixed
with potash, and subjected to heat, suffers decomposition,
and is converted into aldehyd resin. Carbonate of potash is
therefore employed in freeing alcohol of its water, in order to
render it what is termed absolute. A peculiar effect is pro-
duced upon spirits of wine by the action of spongy platinum.
I observed in my last lecture that this is the case when alco-
hol is allowed to act upon platinum at ordinary temperatures.
But when we submit it to the powerful action of oxygen gas
we find that a very energetic action takes place, so energetic
indeed is the action of oxygen upon alcohol, when platinum is
used, that it is capable of converting the alcohol into carbonic
acid ; and this conversion is only an extension of those
changes which take place during the more slow and less ener-
getic action of the alcohol upon the spongy platinum, with
nothing more than the atmosphere present. When the va-
pour of alcohol is brought into contact with extremely fine
platinum wire a peculiar action is also observed. If the pla-
tinum wire be heated, and then placed over a vessel contain-
ing spirits of wine, this platinum wire will be rendered red
hot, and will continue so as long as the spirit remains. The
method is to take the fine platinum wire, and to coil it into a
spherical form before placing it over the spirits of wine. An
acid substance is produced, which is called the lampic acid.
The next lecture will take place to-morrow evening.

THE FACTORY CHILD.

(From a Paper in The Heads of the People]

Yes, our little factory girl is nine years old ; she is no
longer a child ; she is a dwarfed woman. Her infancy was
passed in pining, puling want ; from the first, almost an un-
tended thing, left days and days alone, the mother denied the
enjoyment of maternal sympathies by sharpest penury (the
fiend that, at the hearths of the poor, now chills, now blights,
and now makes stony hard the human heart), by keen neces-
sity of out-door toil for the infant mouth at home. God
knows how the child learned to walk ! A short time, and
another baby engrosses the few hours (nay, half-hours) stolen
from work to lavish on the last born :—and then, another
helpless squalid thing ; and then, another : and then our little
factory girl becomes a nurse, and, at six years old, hugs in
her lean arms her half-naked tatterdemalion brother. She
has not strength to carry him, meagre as he is, but shuflles
and stumbles with him along the street : and now she sits in
door-ways ; agd now in lanes and alleys her infant mind re-
ceives the seeds of future things : if things of goodness, a
blessed chance ; if otherwise, the unthinking virtuous throw
up their eyes and marvel at the wrong ! And thus the child
passes her first nine years of infant life. What an infancy !
Lean and withered, and care-worn (yes, care-worn ! her baby
countenance made duil and colourless by the miserable
aspects every where surrounding her), she seems as if she
had never been younger ; nay, more, that years could hardly
make her look more old, there is within her face of babyhood
so deep a stamp of sad maturity. All the better yearnings of
the heart—the peace, the sportiveness, born and abounding
at the hearths of competence—what has she known of these ?
Life to her has been a joyless, selfish,'hungry, peevish thing.
Her home has been the home of grinding want; at her fire-
side, man, the lord of creation, has been a serf to the lowest
necessities, and not always a silent and unrepining one. How
often is the brutal husband and the reckless father the horrid
handywork of misery alone'! Of all the violence, the
cruelty, inflicted on each other by the miserably poor,
how much of it is bat the wild outburst of intolerable
self-suffering ! And our little factory girl has seen this ;
and the shadow of the evil has fallen upon her face.
Let us, however, accompany the child to the factory.
What a bitter season ! How the wind howls—with what a
dash the sleet is flung against the windows ! The earth is
frozen hard as iron, and the wind cuts blightingly ; snow is
on the ground. It is five o'clock on a January morning.
The child is up, and with its scanty covering pulled about it,
descends shivering to the street. Poor little wench'! her
blood is frozen under her very finger nails. Her foot, too
(for her shoes have been patched past further patching, and
yawn in half-a-dozen places) is galled with a nasty chilblain,
and she limps most painfully. Her father, bound to the same
factory, lifts her upon his back, and checking an oath, groans
from :between his teeth. The girl is nine years old ; and,
half-clad, in a desolating January morning, is carried—
through cold and darkness carried—to work !
The girl is now in the factory. From this moment her
childhood utterly ceases : she is bondswoman to all the cares
of mature life. Nine hours a day is her allotted time for
work ; the remainder of the 24 to be passed—in what ?in the
sports of youth—in the happy, artless recreations of children,
to whom even the consciousness of existence is at times a
source of the keenest pleasure ? An hour and a half is given
to breakfast and dinner ; and when we •remember the wages
earned by the factory girl, sometimes as much as 4s. 6d. per
week, and the costliness of the luxury of bread, an hour and
a half for two meals is surely time sufficient ; they might, we
have no doubt, be eaten—ay, both—in half the allotted time.
There yet remain many hours—hours for what ? For the
merest rudiments of education ? After nine hours' unceas-
ing labour in the cotton factory, how elastic the mind ! how
apt for instruction ! how strong to pore over a book ! how fit-
ted to receive any impressions that shall rise its possessor a
degree above the beast slaughtered for the shambles ! The
factory girl returns home, and what can she do but sleep ?
What should she do but seek oblivion from the noise, the
racking noise of engines, the hell of sounds, which she has
all day suffered ? Who would keep her one half-hour from
her miserable bed? Who would lessen the blessings of sleep,
since sleep may sometimes bring to her at least dreams of
quiet, visions of happiness ? What to her is reading and
writing I—let her quaff forgetfullness.

The hat trade is brisker. in the North of England than it
has been for 10 years past.—Bridol Mirror.
THE Imasit POMPEII.—It is bounded on the north by
Thomas-street, to the south by Harold's Cross and the Royal
Canal, to the east by St. Patrick's Cathedral, and to the west
by the new market and the Circular Road ' • and contains,
upon a moderate computation, the ruins of not less than
10,000 houses, and a pauper population of probably 60,000
souls. It is termed, with great propriety, the Liberty ; I
presume, from the free and easy style of the tenements and
their inhabitants; The most unbounded hospitality would
prevail, if there happened to be any thing to give ; for every-
body keeps open house all the year round, the doors having
long since been removed, and the windows having in like
manner disappeared in search of another situation. Street
after street of these tenements present themselves to the eye
of the curious stranger, naked of window as of door, and,
save that they are densely inhabited, and still retain staircases
and floors, more like a city sacked by fire than the result of
any ordinary process of gradual decay. The sewers are long
since impervious ; and a mantle of chickweed verdantly
luxuriates over the stagnant' puddle that fills the various ave-
nues from side to side. It is no stroke of imagination to say
that you breathe an atmosphere of typhus. Contagion is
palpable : you may cut the malaria with a knife. If I were
to tell you of the solitary rambles I have had in this metro-
polis of utter desolation—of the sights I have seen—of the
sermons I have drunk in with my eyes, that with mute elo-
quence would melt the very stones under our feet—half-grown
boys literally naked, in their buff about the streets—growa
girls hiding their nakedness tinder dirty straw within doors—
exanimate wretches drawing their carcases along, holding on
by the wall, attenuated by no disease, sick of the want of
food alone—if I were to particularise an instance from this
mass of misery, and concentrate its hideousness before you,
I dare say you would conclude me deranged or drunk.—
Blackwood.