ON THE VOLATILIZATION OF FIXED SALTS IN PLANTS.

HISTORY OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES
M. HOMBERG

1714


When fire decomposes a Mixture, the parts most disposed to take on a lot of movement detach themselves, and rise according to the order given to them by the differences in this arrangement, and the others remain immobile at the bottom of the Vessel. The first, which we call volatile, are phlegm, the Spirits or Acid Salts, either urine, or alkali, oil: the others which we call fixed, are the Earth & the lixivial Alkali Salts, so named, because that we separate them from the earth by lye, or lotions of water, which we then allow to evaporate. These salts were not in the Mixture in the form in which they appeared then, they were intimately united with the volatile salts which escaped, they were even with the oil and with the phlegm, and after having been separated or stripped,

It would therefore be necessary, to make these fixed alkali salts volatile, only to bring in volatile parts, similar to those which abandoned them, and to unite them so closely, that they cannot fly away by fire without them. take with them, at least in part.

We will see in Mr. Homberg's Memoir how chance presented him with fixed salts in soap which volatilized by themselves. We know that soap is a compound of oil & lixivial alkali salt from the plant called soda. On this Mr. Homberg supposed, or rather judged according to his principles of Chemistry, that the oil of which he believes that the volatile salts hold all their volatility, having intimately mixed with the fixed salts of the soda in the soap, had them made volatile.

Then they were no longer alkali, since their pores were filled with the oil they had absorbed. There is even more. The oil always has Acid, and this Acid having joined with the Alkali, the oil had become an average Salt, such as common Salt, but because the acid had not joined with alkali only by means of oil, & accompanied by oil,

By following this first idea, and by carrying out the views it gave through chemical operations, Mr. Homberg found that to dispose the fixed salts of plants to volatility, it was necessary to start by putting them in soap, allowing them to grow naturally at this Soap some small points of salt or crystals which will rise to its surface, & which will be fixed Salts already volatile of themselves, as happened in the first experiment, then put this material on the fire after having soaked & penetrated with a new liquor, which will help a new sublimation of the fixed salts which have become volatile, & repeat this operation as long as salts can rise.

The choice of the liquor with which the soapy substance is soaked is not indifferent. Water is the least suitable for the expected effect, oil is cleaner, distilled oil more than oil drawn by expression; you need not only the most volatile liquor, but the one that binds most easily to salts. The Spirit of Wine is very suitable. Mr. Homberg, taking advantage of all his advantages, managed to volatilize nearly half of a quantity of Tartar Salt, which is a fixed vegetable salt.

Volatility Salt often appears dry in consistency, because as water and oil do not unify willingly, the oil which accompanies this salt guarantees it from the action of the humidity of the air, which would resolve into liquor.

Mr. Homberg said nothing about the usefulness of Fixed Volatility Salts. It is always good for Chemistry to know how to make itself mistress of the Mixes, and to dispose of them as it wishes according to its different views.

Touching MEMORY

The volatilization of fixed salts from Plants.

By Mr. HOMBERG.

Lexivial salt or the fixed alkali of some plant is a saline substance which has lost in the great fire most of what the plant contained in volatile parts, namely its phlegm, its acidic spirit, its urinous spirit, the oils which we can distill it, and the salt which smells of urine; its face is a kind of sponge, so the open and empty pores are ready to receive volatile materials similar to those that the fire has separated; art can join them there, in such a way that its fixity is completely lost, and the new mixture becomes completely volatile.

These operations are carried out by inseparably introducing into the lixivial salt, one or more of the volatile parts which have been expelled from it, the introduction of which into the body of the lixivial salt is done approximately by the same means, namely by cohobations often reiterated, until the volatile has united in such a way with the fixed that the whole or part of it has become volatile.

However, as all these volatile materials are different substances, although drawn from the same mixture, they also require different manipulations, to make these cohobations useful, and which can give volatility to the fixed salts. We will examine all the parts that fire can drive out of a plant, we will take Wine Tartar to serve as an example of all other plant materials, & we will then explain the ways of reintroducing the volatiles that it has. lost in the fire, that is to say, the means of making the Salt of Tartar volatile in various ways, depending on the nature of the volatile that is introduced again.

But like the Salt of Tartar, and any other lixivial salt, however calcined and however purified it may be by the various leachings and filtrations, it nevertheless contains a very large quantity of earthy matter, more or less easy to remove by the different volatiles therefore we use, some of these volatiles will change a lot, the others less, and will leave at the bottom of the vessel a part of the earth fixed and, insipid, according to the more or less activity of the volatile that will have been used for this purpose.

The lixivial salt which will have been volatile by one of these operations, will sometimes change into a salty distilled liquor, or into an acidic spirit, or into a urinous spirit; sometimes it will also change into a salty volatile salt, or into an acrid & fetid volatile salt, or finally into an aromatic volatile salt, depending on the different operations and the volatiles that have been used.

The first material that fire separates from Tartar and any other vegetable is its phlegm, which at first does not seem capable of changing a material as fixed as Salt of Tartar into a volatile material; however when we consider that aqueous humidity, when set in motion by fire, is one of the principal causes of all the changes that happen to plants & animals, and perhaps to everything that belongs to our earth ; we will have no difficulty in admitting it here for one of the agents which contributes to removing part of the Salt of Tartar in the fire, and to making it volatile, but as aqueous humidity is the least active of all the principles that distillation separates from plants, that is to say, it acts more slowly and less sensibly than the other principles, the operation in which it is used will last longer than if one of the other principles had been used.

We will see how by its means a part of the fixed lixivial salt was sublimated into volatile salt.

In Chemistry it is not out of place to communicate the succinct history of the circumstances, sometimes due to pure chance, which led to a singular operation, they can serve as an opportunity for a more skilful person to shorten these operations, or to perfect them; I am therefore going to give the first of my operations on the volatilization of the lixivial Salt of Plants, with all the circumstances which accompanied it.

The Soaps I used to wash myself, not being to my liking, I wanted to make others: I therefore took about two pounds of Genoa Soap; I cut it into slices about the thickness of a crown, I put it to dry in the shade for three months, to remove the bad smell that soap usually has; it lost part of it, and became so dry that I could pound it in a mortar; to re-moisten it, so that we could form soaps, I poured three ounces of Spirit of Wine over it, in which I had put a large amount of Lavender oil and a few drops of Amber essence to give them some good smell;

I incorporated this Spirit of Wine well with my Soap, by pounding them together in a marble mortar, but it was not moistened enough to make a bound dough; I was therefore obliged to add about three more ounces of Orange Flower Water; everything formed into a well-conditioned paste, I formed balls which I left to dry in the air, in cold and humid weather. About two months later, I was very surprised to find these Soaps bristling with points of Salt, almost like the Saltpeter which vegetates on stones.

I wanted to use them, but I realized that this Soap did not make any difference. scum, it only softened in hot water, it was spread like butter, and it stuck to the flesh without showing: the singularity of the phenomenon made me carefully examine the Salt which had vegetated on this Soap, I found that he had completely lost the taste of soda or lixivial salt, having almost that of saltpetre, without however bursting into the fire, but throwing a lot of smoke, which smelled neither of acid nor urine.

This smoke made me think that it could well be volatile salt, which would usually sublimate in suitable vessels. I tried it, but I was not entirely satisfied with it; However, a little floury salty material, which had attached itself to the walls of the vessel, made me realize that it could be overcome by changing the operation a little, so I again collected all that I could get. this Salt & when my soap balls no longer grew, having become too dry, I had them taken to the cellar, where some time later they grew again; at the end I washed these balls in water to get out some more salt, which was on their surfaces, & which made their crust hard; I put all these waters together, I added the salt that I had collected, I distilled them in a glass still over a low heat, I mixed this water fifty times or more on what remained in the cucurbit, & I noticed that at the end of the distillations there was attached to the walls of the cucurbit & in the capital a little volatile salt white & light like snow, almost like salt is volatile narcotic of Vitriol, of which I gave the description in 1702. I continued these cohobations until nothing was sublimated anymore, & I had about two gross of concrete volatile Salt, but the Distilled water was loaded with it because it was salty.

I rectified this water, I separated the first portions, which were tasteless, I kept about two ounces, which still contained a large amount of salt. This salt has a taste close to Saltpetre without any acrimony, it makes a very slight boil, or rather a simple simmer with the spirit of the Salt, it slightly reddens the tincture of Sunflower, it melts when it is thrown in. on burning coals & goes away in smoke, without bursting into the fire like Saltpeter.

The volatile salt which was produced by this operation could only come from a part of the soda which entered into the composition of the soap; & as the salt of Soda is one of the greatest lixivial alkalis that we have, and which in this respect is in no way inferior to the fixed Salt of Tartar, I believed that by the same operation I could have a volatile Salt from the Fixed Salt of Tartar, which Paracelsus & Van Helmont so praised.

To achieve this, I first made a soap in the ordinary way, that is to say, I made a very strong lye of equal parts of calcined tartar and quicklime, because we use lime to make soap, I then made soap with olive oil, namely, three parts of oil and one of this salt, which produced a very firm and very good soap.

I observed in these operations that without the aqueous humidity the volatile salt, although fully prepared, did not separate from the soapy mass, which was at the bottom of the cucurbit and in which it was, so to speak, embedded; as soon as this mass was dried out, nothing was sublimated; and by simply rehumidifying it with the same water which had been distilled from it, a second sublimation was made, and so on, doing the same operation twelve or fifteen times, that is to say, until all the volatile salt was separated from it.

It is necessary that the aqueous humidity, by soaking the soapy & saline mass at the bottom of the cucurbit, unites so well with the volatile salt, that when evaporating it takes each time a part of it with it, which crystallizes against the upper walls of the cucurbit, & which otherwise would always remain wrapped in the dead head; so that we could suspect that in this operation water alone contributes the most to the volatilization of the fixed salts of tartar and soda, and that it could well be sufficient on its own, especially since we have a constant experience, which confirms this thought, which is that water acquires a salty and even acidic quality, when it is distilled and often mixed with common salt;

However, I wanted to clarify this, I rubbed river water on Tartar Salt a hundred times, without noticing any concrete volatile salt, it only seemed to me that the water had become a little salty, it seems that with time we would have had something more, but the length of the work put me off, I abandoned it.
By carefully examining all the other particularities of the previous operations which produced volatile salt, I observed that the fixed salts must be prepared, that is to say, they must be put into soap, to be able to be volatile, we will know the truth in the following operations, which will prove at the same time, that water was the necessary vehicle to remove the volatile salt ready for soaping in the operations of which we have just spoken, but that we can do without it absolutely, and even that it becomes harmful in certain cases.

I therefore imagined not only that the composition of the Soap is necessary to volatilize the fixed Salts of Plants, but I believed that the operation would be more successful, and that it would produce more volatile Salt, by composing the soap with a distilled oil rather than with a simply expressed oil, such as olive oil, which was used in the previous operations, & which requires a very violent fire to become volatile, instead of a distilled oil being already completely volatile, according to appearances will contribute more to the volatilization of fixed salts, than a non-volatilized oil, I tested it which was very successful, as we will see in the following operation , in which I did not want to add to the Salt of Tartar a foreign oil and which was not taken from Tartar itself, so that the volatile Salt which would come from it was more truly volatile Salt of Tartar, I have therefore used oil distilled from Tartar; but as it has an unbearable stench, which would have infected the entire operation,

I took a pound of foul oil of Tartar which I mixed exactly with two pounds of Lime slaked in air & distilled in a sandstone retort over an open fire, the oil that came out was liquid, red & less stinking, thick black & very stinking as it was. I mixed it a second time with two pounds of new slaked & distilled lime as before, I did the same thing for the third time; Tartar oil became very fluid & clear like an essential oil, amber in color & with a very bearable odor, which following the operation changed into a pleasant & aromatic odor.

The oil being thus prepared, you must first make Soap, which is the basis of your operation; but as through these distillations it has become extremely volatile, and as a result it cannot withstand the high fire that we usually use to make soap, we are obliged to do it cold: which is done this way.

You must take a pound of very white and dry Tartar Salt, pour prepared Tartar oil over it until it floats on a finger, in a flat earthenware or earthenware vessel, covered only in so that no rubbish falls into it; stir this mixture with a wooden spatula two or three times a day, until you see that the Salt has drunk all the oil; then you will add more oil as we have already said, stir everything two or three times a day, until the Salt has drunk the oil, do this for the third time, & when the mass will begin to dry, you will mix with the Spirit of Wine until it has the consistency of a very clear porridge, thus the oil and the salt will penetrate each other and unite so well that no oil will appear anymore. when we dissolve a little in water.

Put this mixture in a cucurbit, or in a large glass retort; distill with sand over a very low fire, first an ardent spirit will come out, and then a useless and watery phlegm, which you will throw away; rectify the spirit & put it back on what will be at the bottom of the cucurbit, mix everything well, & leave it in a glass vessel in the air, until it is dry, then the Soap is made . You must keep it until the crystals or points of salt come out of it, as we observed in our first operations, & when you see that no more crystals are growing, crush the material, & soak there little by little of the quantity of oil which is lacking there, until the pound of Salt of Tartar which you first put there, has absorbed three pounds of oil, and the whole dry mass weighs four books, then you will put your material in a cucurbit, you will soak it with Spirit of Wine which you will rub on it ten or twelve times, distilling it each time over a very low heat, whereby the material will complete volatilization enough to sublimate. , and when nothing more comes up, due to lack of humidity, you will re-imbibe it with the same spirit which was distilled from it, after having rectified it; thus almost half of the fixed salt that you have prepared will rise to volatile salt.

after having rectified it; thus almost half of the fixed salt that you have prepared will rise to volatile salt. after having rectified it; thus almost half of the fixed salt that you have prepared will rise to volatile salt.

We have seen a very considerable difference in the effect of this last operation, and in that of the two previous ones. Firstly it produced incomparably more volatile salt than the first ones, then it only took ten or twelve cohobations with the Spirit of Wine in this one, instead of more than fifty with water. common in the previous ones.

We know that salts cling easily to oily materials, we join these two materials by means of soaping, so that they penetrate each other and bond as closely as the operations allow, in the former the Fixed lixivial salt joined to a non-volatile oil, that is to say, difficult to be reduced into vapors, to then be able to be removed by heat, but in the latter, the oil having been volatilized before, it could be removed very easily by heat.

We also know that salts are only volatile because of the oily substances to which they are joined, which carry them with them when they are pushed by fire, as I have proven elsewhere by several constant facts, it is therefore easy to judge why the last operation produced more volatile salt than the first.

We can add to this that in the first operations the vehicle which served for cohobations was simple water, which in truth unites easily with salts, of which it is the solvent, but it clings with difficulty to oils, & consequently it can only conveniently raise in the fire one of the parts which compose the Volatile Salt, the oily part, moreover non-volatile, always remaining behind, whereas in our last operation the vehicle in the cohobations is the 'Spirit of Wine which easily unites with distilled oils, and with our Salt, since it is the solvent of both, and which consequently being pushed by the fire, easily reduces our Salt into vapors ,

I attributed the first and main cause of the volatilization of the fixed salts of plants to soaping. Here is how I understand that it contributes to it: the Soap is a compound of lixivial salt & oil, the lixivial salt lost in the fire the greater part of the acidic salt that it contained, which makes it fixed, but he takes this acid with avidity wherever he can find it, and he finds it in the oil of soap; a proof of this is that oils always make the spirit acidic when analyzed; this acid of the Soap is absorbed little by little, and then the fixed Salt changes its nature and becomes Medium Salt which is semi-volatile, and which manifests itself by vegetating on the Soaps, as we noticed in our first operation, but as the acid part of the oil is very closely linked, and so to speak embedded in the compound of the oil, the fixed salt cannot absorb it pure and entirely detached from its oil; thus a part of the very oil of the Soap without any alteration, lodges with the acid in the floccules of the lixivial Salt, and thereby it becomes an average oily or sulphurous Salt, but it is certain that volatile Salts are not such, that because they inseparably contain a certain quantity of oily matter, which being easily removed by the flame in the capital of the sublimatory vessel, also carries with it the saline part, & thus it becomes Volatile salt properly so called, which often appears in dry consistency, without resolving into an aqueous liquor, because the oily parts which accompany it,

It must be observed here that the lixivial salt does not receive all the perfection of the volatile salt in the soaping, as we have already noticed, there is only the first necessary clinging, which then ends in the cohobations , because the viscous consistency of the soap does not allow the acid to detach and join freely with the lixivial salt; but when by a foreign humidity the parts of the Soap have been made fluid, as happens in cohobations, and then the fire which is used there gives them the movement which they need to meet, to penetrate each other and to uniting closely, they complete the perfect compound of volatile salt. I will follow up on these operations in another Memoir.