CHLORIDE OF LIME.
Chloride of lime or “bleaching-powder” is made for the purposes of bleaching calicoes, linens, &c., and also for purifying foul air, which it does by giving out chlorine, a gas capable of uniting with and changing the injurious properties of foul air (which generally contains some combination of sulphur and hydrogen). Chloride of lime is made on the large scale by mixing hydrochloric acid with black oxide of manganese. This mixture gives off chlorine. This is made to pass over a layer of slaked lime, which absorbs it greedily, and becomes converted into the bleaching powder. The hydrochloric acid used is a product resulting from the manufacture of soda, and was formerly wasted; it is now used in large quantities for the process above described. “Burnett’s Disinfecting Fluid” is a solution of chloride of zinc. It is made by dissolving scraps of zinc in hydrochloric acid; hydrogen gas is given off, with effervescence, and the liquid remaining is the solution of chloride of zinc, which acts like chloride of lime, by giving off chlorine; for the chloride is slowly decomposed by the air, the oxygen of which takes the place of the chlorine, uniting with the zinc to form oxide of zinc, while the chlorine is set free.