The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1892-11-25
SUBSTANCES FROM COIL.

| Does any one, except a practical
chemist, ever stop to think of all the
substances which we get from al,
and the almost inconceivable variety
Of their uses
| Everybody is familiar with those of
of them that are in daily use, such as
| gas, illuminating oils, coke and par
affine, but of the greater part few per-
| sons know even the names, science adj
vances SO rapidly and its nomencla-
ture is so extensive and so abstruse.
1t is no wonder that merchants and
manufacturers take advantage of this
| ignorance to foist upon the public
| articles of food, of drink, or for the
toilet, that, if they are not always
dangerous to the health, have not in
them a particle of the substance which
they pretend to contain.
| Though coal has been known for
some hundreds of years, the discovery
of its numberless products is confined
to the present century. Illuminating
gas was unknown Il hundred years
ago. Petroleum has been in use only
about forty years, and it is scarcely
more than fifty years since some one
| discovered that stone coal was infiam-
mable. Nearly all the other products
derived from soft coal have been dis
covered and applied in the interests
of science or of fraud within the last
twenty-five years.
The first thought in regard to coal is
| that it is made to give warmth :;
! heat the next, that one of its princi-
| pal uses is to illuminate But there
are obtained from it the means of pro-
ducing more than four hundred colors
or shades of color, among the chief of
which are saffron, violet blue and in
digo.
There are also obtained a great va
riety of nerfumes-cinnamon bitter
almonds, queen of the meadows Glove,
wintergreen, anise, camphor, thymol
IA new French odor), vaniline and
| henotrophine. Some of these are used
| for flavoring.
Among the explosive agents, whose
discovery has been caused by the war
spirit of the last few years in Europe.
are two, called dinitro- benzine, or
bellite, and pierates.
To medicine coal has given hyp-
none, salicylic acid, naphtol, phenoi
and antipyrine Benzine and naph-
thaline are powerful insecticides
There has been found in it ammo
niacal salts, useful as fertilizers, tan
min, saccharine "a substitute for sugar.,
the flavor of currants, raspberry and
pepper, pyrogallic acid and hydro
quinone used in photography, and
various substances familiar or I'M
familiar, such as tar, rosin, asphalt
tum, lubricating oils, varnishes md
the bitter taste of beer. By means of
some of these we can have wine with
out the juice of the grape, beer with
out malt, preserves without either
fruit or sugar, perfumes without flow
ers, and coloring matters without the
vegetable or animal substance from
which they have been hitherto chiefly
derived.
What is to be the end of all this
Are our coal beds not only to warm and
illuminate, but to feed and quench
the thirst of posterity? We know
that they are the luxuriant vegeta-
ton of primal epochs stored and com
pressed in way that has made them
highly convenient for transport and
daily use. They are Natures savings
laid up for a rainy day for her chill
dren.
Creoiin is the name of q new dis
injecting and deodorizing medium.
The substance is obtained in the dis
tillation of a heavy coal-tar oil mixed
with an alkali. According to Prof.
Frohner, creoline has the advantage
over carbolic acid of being totally in
noxious to the human organism, non
corrosive, and producing no stains on
application. At the same time it acts
quite as energetically upon morbid
matter, insects and bad smells, and,
under certain circumstances, even
more effectually than carbolic acid.
Another advantage of creolin is that
it mixes easily with water, and is void
of the evil odor of carboIic acid and
chlorine. Creolin acts as an antisep-
tic in illness, as Il GiSinfectant and
deodorizer for chambers, stables, pri-
vies, etc, and as an insect destroyer
for worms and other animal and hui
man parasites, and for impregnating
the wood of houses to free the latter
from cockroaches Prof. DR.. Froh-
ner, Director of the Pharmacological
Institute of the Ryyal Veterinary
School in Berlin, has made searching
experiments with creolin, and has
come to the conclusion that it is an
innoyious and highly effective anti
septic, which is to be ranked among
the best disinfectants we possess, and
is, on the whole, preferable to carbolic
acid.-ChaaleS Hite Smith.