Elements of the Theory and Practice of Chymistry, 5th ed.

by Pierre Joseph Macquer

If the two liquors thus mixed be distilled with a very gentle heat, there rises first a spirit of wine of a most penetrating and grateful odour: when about half thereof is come over, what follows has a quicker and more sulphureous smell, and is also more loaded with phlegm. When the liquor begins to boil a little, there comes off a phlegm which smells very strong of sulphur, and grows gradually more acid. On this phlegm floats a small quantity of a very light and very limpid oil. In the still there remains a thick blackish substance, somewhat like a resin or bitumen. From this substance may be separated a good deal of a vitriolic but sulphureous acid. When that is extracted, there remains a black mass like a charred coal, which being put into a crucible, and exposed to a violent heat, leaves a small portion of earth, very fixed, and even vitrifiable.

By rectifying the ardent spirit, which came over in distilling the above-mentioned mixture, a very singular liquor is obtained, which differs essentially both from oils and from ardent spirits, though in certain respects it resembles them both. This liquor is known in Chymistry by the name of Æther, and its chief properties are as follow.

Æther is lighter, more volatile, and more inflammable, than the most highly rectified spirit of wine. It quickly flies off when exposed to the air, and suddenly catches fire when any flame approaches it. It burns like spirit of wine without the least smoke, and consumes entirely without leaving the smallest appearance of a coal or of ashes. It dissolves oils and oily matters with great ease and rapidity. These properties it has in common with an ardent spirit. But it resembles an oil in that it is not miscible with water; and this makes it essentially different from spirit of wine, the nature of which is to be miscible with all aqueous liquors.

Another very singular property of Æther is its great affinity with gold, exceeding even that of aqua regis. It does not indeed dissolve gold when in a mass, and in its metalline form; but if a small quantity of Æther be added to a solution of gold in aqua regis, and the whole shaken together, the gold separates from the aqua regis, joins the Æther, and remains dissolved therein.

The reason of all the phenomena above-mentioned, resulting from the mixture of spirit of wine with oil of vitriol, is founded on the great affinity between this acid and water. For if the vitriolic acid be weak, and as it were over-dosed with watery parts, neither oil nor Æther can be obtained by means thereof: but when highly concentrated, it attracts the aqueous parts very powerfully; and therefore, being mixed with spirit of wine, lays hold of most of the water contained in it, and even robs it of some portion of that which is essential to its nature, and necessary to constitute it spirit of wine: whence it comes to pass, that a certain quantity of the oily particles in its composition being separated from the watery particles, and so brought nearer to each other, they unite and assume their natural form; and thus the oil that swims at top of the sulphureous phlegm is produced.

The vitriolic acid moreover thickens and even burns some of this oil; and hence comes the bituminous residuum left at the bottom of the still, which looks like the result of a vitriolic acid combined with common oil. Lastly, the vitriolic acid becomes sulphureous, as it always doth when united with oily matters, and also very aqueous, on account of the quantity of phlegm which it attracts from the spirit of wine.

Æther may be considered as a spirit of wine exceedingly dephlegmated, even to such a degree that its nature is thereby changed; so that the few aqueous particles left in it are not sufficient to dissolve the oily particles and keep them asunder; which therefore being now much nearer to one another than in common spirit of wine, the liquor hath lost its property of being miscible with water.

Spirit of nitre well dephlegmated, and combined with spirit of wine, presents likewise some very singular appearances.

First, in the very instant of its mixture with spirit of wine, it produces a greater and more violent effervescence than the vitriolic acid occasions.

Secondly, this mixture, without the help of distillation, and only by stopping the bottle in which the liquors are contained, affords a sort of Æther, produced probably by the vapours which ascend from, and swim at top of the mixture. This is a very singular liquor. Dr. Navier was the first that took notice of it, and gave a description thereof, which may be seen in the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences.