SULPHURIC ACID.
SuiiFHUßrc acid, or oil of vitriol^ is certrinly the moat important of all chemical products. It is seldom used for domestic purposes, and we presume there are thousands of our readers who never saw an ounce of ithe concentrated acid in their lives. But this sour, corrosive liquid is of immense yaluo to mankind. In the great industrial world it occupies a position second perhaps to no other substance. If the amount of its manufacture and consumption by any people does not measure the degree of their civilization, it must be regarded as a common pivot around which revolve all the industries pursued by any nation. It is through the agency of this acid that we have soda, j soap, glass, paper, bleaching and dyeing salts, nitric acid, aniline colorus, kerosene j oil, superphosphates for farmers, and a i thousand other agents which our modern civilization demands. Indeed, it is from the reactions to which it gives birth, that j the greater part of the chemical products employed in the arts and sciences, the greater part of the medicaments used in the art of healing, result. Only thdse who are engaged in some pursuit demanding its employment, or those who are specially acquainted with chemical industries, have any cerrect idea of the colossal scale upon which this acid is manufactured both in this country and in Europe. At one establishment in the city of Brooklyn, N.Y., the stream of, concentrated acid which runs from the platinum retorts is nearly three-fourths of an inch in diametei", and this Stream is constant, day and night, month after month, and year after year. This is but one of the many immense acid factories scattered over our country. In Europe it is produced upon a still grander scale, and the united streams of the fiery liquid which flow from the thousands of retorts in active operation, would aggregate in volume some of the -mountain cascades so much admired in Switzerland. It is estimated that the annual production in Europe, reaches 800,000 tons. In order to gain some conception of the volume of the liquid, let us imagine that all the acid made in Europe were carried to Central Park and poured into a canal lined with lead. ' This canal would require to be six and a, half feet. deep, 34 .feefr. w..ide, and trjore than half a mile long; The acid wouhl nearly fill the basin of the beautiful lake over which the boatmen convey passengers in their gay barges, during the summer^ In Europe the acid is manufactured mostly from iron pyrites, and in this Country the .pyrites are to a considerable extent being substituted for sulphur. The acid made in this,. city from the mineral is sold at a lower price than .that' from sulphur. The strength and effectiveness of the acid from the, two sources are .the 'same, but the iron sulphide is apt to contain traces of arsenic, which is found in the acid.'* This does not, however, interfere with its use in the arts. The enormous consumption of the pyrites inEurope in this manufacture fills, one with astonishment. It is estimated that more than 660,000 tons are used, a quantity which would require nearly 100,000 railroad cars to convey the mineral from the .mines to the acid works. The statements here presented are well calculated to show the great importance of one of our ' industrial products not well understood by the 1 majority of readers.— -"Journal of Chemistry."
Pigeons v. Slugs. — An Auckland set~tilG^w»iios_to one of the local papers to' say that he has; iuu ml- that a few tarne 1 pigeons kept down the slugs in his garden j better than anything, else, and adds : — {C I know many- people* who think pigeons ' .are destructive to seed and roung plants, but my experience teaches the contrary. , While they, can: get slugs they will eat j little or nothing else. When there are none you. must feed them, or they will naturally help themselves to anything going." .. Little story about a Chicago' church usher :^A man indifferently dressed went to his church. The usher did not notice hirn^ but seated several well; dressed'pjersons who 'presented themselves, when finally the man addressed the usher, saytng, " Can you tell me whose church this is?" " Fes, this is Christ's Church." " Is He in ?" was the next question, after which a seat was not so hard to find. ! The following remarks upon Melbourne by "^Egles," in the '"'Australasian" of the. 14th inst, are- very applicable to Dunedin : — ''M never hear a boast of the population of -Melbourne without a cold shiidder. Contrast the whole number engaged in the work of exchanging with the whole number occupied' in producing throughout the •colony, and substantial ground for xmeasiness will be found. If three-fourths of the residents of the metropolis were gold-getting, or wool-growing, or wheatproducing, 1 or' wine-making, there would "b,e a far safer basis for congratulation ; Melbourne is, 1 - we are told, the eighth city in the . British empire in point of populatipn,,but then it contains a fourth of the whole people in the-cplony. t l,t irreaiatibjly suggests] that big-headed baby with thin legs and arms and emaciated trunk."
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Tuapeka Times, Volume VII, Issue 413, 2 December 1874, Page 3
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867SULPHURIC ACID. Tuapeka Times, Volume VII, Issue 413, 2 December 1874, Page 3
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