[1] A name misapplied in the southern hemisphere to _Diomedea
melanophrys_, one of the albatrosses.
FULMINIC ACID, HCNO or H2C2N2O2, an organic acid isomeric with cyanic
and cyanuric acids; its salts, termed fulminates, are very explosive and
are much employed as detonators. The free acid, which is obtained by
treating the salts with acids, is an oily liquid smelling like prussic
acid; it is very explosive, and the vapour is poisonous to about the
same degree as that of prussic acid. The first fulminate prepared was
the "fulminating silver" of L.G. Brugnatelli, who found in 1798 that if
silver be dissolved in nitric acid and the solution added to spirits of
wine, a white, highly explosive powder was obtained. This substance is
to be distinguished from the black "fulminating silver" obtained by
C.L. Berthollet in 1788 by acting with ammonia on precipitated silver
oxide. The next salt to be obtained was the mercuric salt, which was
prepared in 1799 by Edward Charles Howard, who substituted mercury for
silver in Brugnatelli's process. A similar method is that of J. von
Liebig (1823), who heated a mixture of alcohol, nitric acid and mercuric
nitrate; the salt is largely manufactured by processes closely
resembling the last. A laboratory method is to mix solutions of sodium
nitromethane, CH2:NO(ONa), and mercuric chloride, a yellow basic salt
being formed at the same time. Mercuric fulminate is less explosive than
the silver salt, and forms white needles (with 1/2H2O) which are
tolerably soluble in water. The use of mercuric fulminate as a detonator
dates from about 1814, when the explosive cap was invented. It is still
the commonest detonator, but it is now usually mixed with other
substances; the British service uses for percussion caps 6 parts of
fulminate, 6 of potassium chlorate and 4 of antimony sulphide, and for
time fuses 4 parts of fulminate, 6 of potassium chlorate and 4 of
antimony sulphide, the mixture being damped with a shellac varnish; for
use in blasting, a home office order of 1897 prescribes a mixture of 4
parts of fulminate and 1 of potassium chlorate. In 1900 Bielefeldt found
that a fulminate placed on top of an aromatic nitro compound, such as
trinitrotoluene, formed a useful detonator; this discovery has been
especially taken advantage of in Germany, in which country detonators of
this nature are being largely employed. Tetranitromethylaniline (tetryl)
has also been employed (Brit. Pat. 13340 of 1905). It has been proposed
to replace fulminate by silver azoimide (Wohler & Matter, Brit. Pat.
4468 of 1908), and by lead azoimide (Hyronimus, Brit. Pat. 1819 of
1908).
The constitution of fulminic acid has been investigated by many
experimenters, but apparently without definitive results. The
researches of Liebig (1823), Liebig and Gay-Lussac (1824), and of
Liebig again in 1838 showed the acid to be isomeric with cyanic acid,
and probably (HCNO)2, since it gave mixed and acid salts. Kekule, in
1858, concluded that it was nitroacetonitrile, NO2.CH2.CN, a view
opposed by Steiner (1883), E. Divers and M. Kawakita (1884), R. Scholl
(1890), and by J.U. Nef (1894), who proposed the formulae:
C : N.OH / N : CH CH : N.O
.. O / . . C : N.OH.
C : N.OH, \ N : C.OH, CH : N.0,
Steiner, Divers, Scholl, Nef.
The formulae of Kekule, Divers and Armstrong have been discarded, and
it remains to be shown whether Nef's carbonyloxime formula (or the
bimolecular formula of Steiner) or Scholl's glyoxime peroxide formula
is correct. There is some doubt as to the molecular formula of
fulminic acid. The existence of double salts, and the observations of
L. Wohler and K. Theodorovits (_Ber._, 1905, 38, p. 345), that only
compounds containing two carbon atoms yielded fulminates, points to
(HCNO)2; on the other hand, Wohler (_loc. cit._ p. 1351) found that
cryoscopic and electric conductivity measurements showed sodium
fulminate to be NaCNO. Nef based his formula, which involves bivalent
carbon, on many reactions; in particular, that silver fulminate with
hydrochloric acid gave salts of formylchloridoxime, which with water
gave hydroxylamine and formic acid, thus
// NOAg // N.OH
C : NO OAg -> HC // --> HC // --> H.CO2H + H2N.OH,
\ Cl \ OH
and also on the production from sodium nitromethane and mercuric
chloride, thus CH2 : NO.Ohg --> H2O + C : NOhg(hg = 1/2Hg). H. Wieland
and F.C. Palazzo (1907) support this formula, finding that methyl
nitrolic acid, NO2.CH : N.OH, yielded under certain conditions
fulminic acid, and vice versa (Palazzo, 1907). M.Z. Jowitschitsch
(_Ann._, 1906, 347, p. 233) inclines to Scholl's formula; he found
that the synthetic silver salt of glyoxime peroxide resembled silver
fulminate in yielding hydroxylamine with hydrochloric acid, but
differed in being less explosive, and in being soluble in nitric acid.
H. Wieland and his collaborators regard "glyoxime peroxide" as an
oxide of furazane (q.v.), and have shown that a close relationship
exists between the nitrile oxides, furoxane, and fulminic acid (see
Ann. Rep., London Chem. Soc., 1909, p. 84). _Fulminuric acid_,
(HCNO)3, obtained by Liebig by boiling mercuric fulminate with water,
was synthesized in 1905 by C. Ulpiani and L. Bernardini (_Gazetta_,
iii. 35, p. 7), who regard it as NO2.CH(CN).CO.NH2. It deflagrates at
145 deg., and forms a characteristic cuprammonium salt.
The early history of mercuric fulminate and a critical account of its
application as a detonator is given in _The Rise and Progress of the
British Explosives Industry_ (International Congress of Applied
Chemistry, 1909). The manufacture and modern aspects are treated in
Oscar Guttmann, _The Manufacture of Explosives_, and _Manufacture of
Explosives, Twenty Years' Progress_ (1909).
FULTON, ROBERT (1765-1815), American engineer, was born in 1765 in
Little Britain (now Fulton, Lancaster county), Pa. His parents were
Irish, and so poor that they could afford him only a very scanty
education. At an early age he was bound apprentice to a jeweller in
Philadelphia, but subsequently adopted portrait and landscape painting
as his profession. In his twenty-second year, with the object of
studying with his countryman, Benjamin West, he went to England, and
there became acquainted with the duke of Bridgewater, Earl Stanhope and
James Watt. Partly by their influence he was led to devote his attention
to engineering, especially in connexion with canal construction; he
obtained an English patent in 1794 for superseding canal locks by
inclined planes, and in 1796 he published a _Treatise on the Improvement
of Canal Navigation_. He then took up his residence in Paris, where he
projected the first panorama ever exhibited in that city, and
constructed a submarine boat, the "Nautilus," which was tried in Brest
harbour in 1801 before a commission appointed by Napoleon I., and by the
aid of which he was enabled to blow up a small vessel with a torpedo. It
was at Paris also in 1803 that he first succeeded in propelling a boat
by steam-power, thus realizing a design which he had conceived ten years
previously. Returning to America he continued his experiments with
submarine explosives, but failed to convince either the English, French
or United States governments of the adequacy of his methods. With steam
navigation he had more success. In association with Robert R. Livingston
(q.v.), who in 1798 had been granted the exclusive right to navigate the
waters of New York state with steam-vessels, he constructed the
"Clermont," which, engined by Boulton & Watt of Birmingham, began to ply
on the Hudson between New York and Albany in 1807. The privilege
obtained by Livingston in 1798 was granted jointly to Fulton and
Livingston in 1803, and by an act passed in 1808 the monopoly was
secured to them and their associates for a period depending on the
number of steamers constructed, but limited to a maximum of thirty
years. In 1814-1815, on behalf of the United States government, he
constructed the "Fulton," a vessel of 38 tons with central
paddle-wheels, which was the first steam warship. He died at New York on
the 24th of February 1815. Among Fulton's inventions were machines for
spinning flax, for making ropes, and for sawing and polishing marble.
See C.D. Colden, _Life of Robert Fulton_ (New York, 1817); Robert H.
Thurston, _History of the Growth of the Steam-Engine_ (New York,
1878); George H. Preble, _Chronological History of Steam Navigation_
(Philadelphia, 1883); and Mrs A.C. Sutcliffe, _Robert Fulton and the
Clermont_ (New York, 1909).
FULTON, a city and the county-seat of Callaway county, Missouri, U.S.A.,
25 m. N.E. of Jefferson City. Pop. (1890) 4314; (1900) 4883 (1167
negroes); (1910) 5228. It is served by the Chicago & Alton railway. The
city has an important stock market and manufactures fire-brick and
pottery. At Fulton are the Westminster College (Presbyterian, founded in
1853), the Synodical College for Young Women (Pres., founded in 1871),
the William Woods College for Girls (Christian Church, 1890), and the
Missouri school for the deaf (1851). Here, too, is a state hospital for
the insane (1847), the first institution of the kind in Missouri. The
place was laid out as a town in 1825 and named Volney, but in honour of
Robert Fulton the present name was adopted a little later. Fulton was
incorporated in 1859.
FULTON, a city of Oswego county, New York, U.S.A., on the right bank of
the Oswego river, about 10 m. S. by E. of Oswego. Pop. (1900) 5281;
(1905, state census) 8847; (1910) 10,480. Fulton is served by the
Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, the New York Central & Hudson River, and
the New York, Ontario & Western railways, by electric railway to Oswego
and Syracuse and by the Oswego Canal. The city has a Carnegie library.
Ample water-power is furnished by the Oswego river, which here flows in
a series of rapids, and the manufactures are many in kind. On the 3rd of
July 1756, on an island (afterward called Battle Island) 4 m. N. of the
present city of Fulton, a British force of about 300 under Captain John
Bradstreet (1711-1774) defeated an attacking force of French and Indians
(numbering about 700) under De Villiers. Soon after this, Bradstreet
built a fort within the present limits of Fulton. The first civilian
settler came in 1793, and the first survey (which included only a part
of the subsequent village) was made in 1815. Fulton was incorporated as
a village in 1835, and in April 1902 was combined with the village of
Oswego Falls (pop. in 1900, 2925) and was chartered as a city.
FUM, or FUNJ HWANG, one of the four symbolical creatures which in
Chinese mythology are believed to keep watch and ward over the Celestial
Empire. It was begotten by fire, was born in the Hill of the Sun's Halo,
and its body bears inscribed on it the five cardinal virtues. It has the
breast of a goose, the hindquarters of a stag, a snake's neck, a fish's
tail, a fowl's forehead, a duck's down, the marks of a dragon, the back
of a tortoise, the face of a swallow, the beak of a cock, is about six
cubits high, and perches only on the woo-tung tree. The appearance of
Fum heralds an age of universal virtue. Its figure is that which is
embroidered on the dresses of some mandarins.
FUMARIC AND MALEIC ACIDS, two isomeric unsaturated acids of composition
C4H4O4. _Fumaric acid_ is found in fumitory (_Fumaria officinalis_), in
various fungi (_Agaricus piperatus_, &c.), and in Iceland moss. It is
obtained by heating malic acid alone to 150 deg. C., or by heating it
with hydrochloric acid (V. Dessaignes, _Jahresb_., 1856, p. 463) or with
a large quantity of hydrobromic acids (A. Kekule, _Ann._, 1864, 130, p.
21). It may also be obtained by boiling monobromsuccinic acid with
water; by the action of dichloracetic acid and water on silver malonate
(T. Komnenos, _Ann._, 1883, 218, p. 169); by the cyanide synthesis from
acetylene di-iodide; and by heating maleic acid to 210 deg. C. (Z.
Skraup, _Monats. f. Chemie_, 1891, 12, p. 112). It crystallizes in small
prisms or needles, and is practically insoluble in cold water. It
sublimes to some extent at about 200 deg. C., being partially converted
into maleic anhydride and water, the reaction becoming practically
quantitative if dehydrating agents be used. Reducing agents (zinc and
caustic alkali, hydriodic acid, sodium amalgam, &c.) convert it into
succinic acid. Bromine converts it into dibromsuccinic acid. Potassium
permanganate oxidizes it to racemic acid (A. Kekule and R. Anschutz,
_Ber._, 1881, 14, p. 713). By long-continued heating with caustic soda
at 100 deg. C. it is converted into inactive malic acid.
_Maleic acid_ is obtained by distilling malic or fumaric acids; by
heating fumaric acid with acetyl chloride to 100 deg. C; or by the
hydrolysis of trichlorphenomalic acid ([beta]-trichloraceto-acrylic
acid) [A. Kekule, _Ann._, 1884, 223, p. 185]. It crystallizes in
monoclinic prisms, which are easily soluble in water, melt at 130 deg.
C., and boil at 160 deg. C., decomposing into water and maleic
anhydride. When heated with concentrated hydrobromic or hydriodic acids,
it is converted into fumaric acid. It yields an anilide; oxidation
converts it into mesotartaric acid. Maleic anhydride is obtained by
distilling fumaric acid with phosphorus pentoxide. It forms triclinic
crystals which melt at 60 deg. C. and boil at 196 deg. C.
Both acids are readily esterified by the action of alkyl halides on
their silver salts, and the maleic ester is readily transformed into
the fumaric ester by warming with iodine, the same result being
obtained by esterification of maleic acid in alcoholic solution by
means of hydrochloric acid. Both acids yield acetylene by the
electrolysis of aqueous solutions of their alkali salts, and on
reduction both yield succinic acid, whilst by the addition of
hydrobromic acid they both yield monobromsuccinic acid (R. Fittig,
_Ann._, 1877, 188, p. 98). From these results it follows that the two
acids are structurally identical, and the isomerism has consequently
to be explained on other grounds. This was accomplished by W.
Wislicenus ["Uber die raumliche Anordnung der Atome," &c., _Trans, of
the Saxon Acad. of Sciences_ (Math. Phys. Section), 1887, p. 14] by an
extension of the van't Hoff hypothesis (see STEREO-ISOMERISM). The
formulae of the acids are written thus:
HC.CO2H HC.CO2H
.. Maleic acid. .. Fumaric acid.
HC.CO2H HO2C.C.H
These account for maleic acid readily yielding an anhydride, whereas
fumaric acid does not, and for the behaviour of the acids towards
bromine, fumaric acid yielding ordinary dibromsuccinic acid, and
maleic acid the isomeric isodibromsuccinic acid.
FUMAROLE, a vent from which volcanic vapours issue, named indirectly
from the Lat. _fumariolum_, a smoke-hole. The vapours from fumaroles
were studied first by R.W. Bunsen, on his visit to Iceland, and
afterwards by H. Sainte-Claire Deville and other chemists and geologists
in France, who examined the vapours from Santorin, Etna, &c. The hottest
vapours issue from dry fumaroles, at temperatures of at least 500 deg.
C., and consist chiefly of anhydrous chlorides, notably sodium chloride.
The acid fumaroles yield vapours of lower temperature (300 deg. to 400
deg.) containing much water vapour, with hydrogen chloride and sulphur
dioxide. The alkaline fumaroles are still cooler, though above 100 deg.,
and evolve ammonium chloride with other vapours. Cold fumaroles, below
100 deg., discharge principally aqueous vapour, with carbon dioxide, and
perhaps hydrogen sulphide. The fumaroles of Mont Pele in Martinique
during the eruption of 1902 were examined by A. Lacroix, and the vapours
analysed by H. Moissan, who found that they consisted chiefly of water
vapour, with hydrogen chloride, sulphur, carbon dioxide, carbon
monoxide, methane, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen and argon. These vapours
issued at a temperature of about 400 deg. Armand Gautier has pointed out
that these gases are practically of the same composition as those which
he obtained on heating granite and certain other rocks. (See VOLCANO).
FUMIGATION (from Lat. _fumigare_, to smoke), the process of producing
smoke or fumes, as by burning sulphur, frankincense, tobacco, &c.,
whether as a ceremony of incantation, or for perfuming a room, or for
purposes of disinfection or destruction of vermin. In medicine the term
has been used of the exposure of the body, or a portion of it, to fumes
such as those of nitre, sal-ammoniac, mercury, &c.; fumigation, by the
injection of tobacco smoke into the great bowel, was a recognized
procedure in the 18th century for the resuscitation of the apparently
drowned. "Fumigated" or "fumed" oak is oak which has been darkened by
exposure to ammonia vapour.
FUMITORY, in botany, the popular name for the British species of
_Fumaria_, a genus of small, branched, often climbing annual herbs with
much-divided leaves and racemes of small flowers. The flowers are
tubular with a spurred base, and in the British species are pink to
purplish in colour. They are weeds of cultivation growing in fields and
waste places. _F. capreolata_ climbs by means of twisting petioles. In
past times fumitory was in esteem for its reputed cholagogue and other
medicinal properties; and in England, boiled in water, milk or whey, it
was used as a cosmetic. The root of the allied species (_Corydalis cava_
or _tuberosa_) is known as _radix aristolochia_, and has been used
medicinally for various cutaneous and other disorders, in doses of 10 to
30 grains. Some eleven alkaloids have been isolated from it. The herbage
of _Fumaria officinalis_ and _F. racemosa_ is used in China under the
name of _Tsze-hwa-ti-ting_ as an application for glandular swellings,
carbuncles and abscesses, and was formerly valued in jaundice, and in
cases of accidental swallowing of the beard of grain (see F. Porter
Smith, _Contrib. towards the Mat. Medica ... of China_, p. 99, 1871).
The name fumitory, Latin _fumus terrae_, has been supposed to be derived
from the fact that its juice irritates the eyes like smoke (see Fuchs,
_De historia stirpium_, p. 338, 1542); but _The Grete Herball_, cap.
clxix., 1529, fol., following the _De simplici medicina_ of Platearius,
fo. xciii. (see in _Nicolai Praepositi dispensatorium ad aromatarios_,
1536), says: "It is called Fumus terre fume or smoke of the erthe
bycause it is engendred of a cours fumosyte rysynge frome the erthe in
grete quantyte lyke smoke: this grosse or cours fumosyte of the erthe
wyndeth and wryeth out: and by workynge of the ayre and sonne it turneth
into this herbe."
FUNCHAL, the capital of the Portuguese archipelago of the Madeiras; on
the south coast of Madeira, in 32 deg. 37' N. and 16 deg. 54' W. Pop.
(1900) 20,850. Funchal is the see of a bishop, in the archiepiscopal
province of Lisbon; it is also the administrative centre of the
archipelago, and the residence of the governor and foreign consuls. The
city has an attractive appearance from the sea. Its whitewashed houses,
in their gardens full of tropical plants, are built along the curving
shore of Funchal Bay, and on the lower slopes of an amphitheatre of
mountains, which form a background 4000 ft. high. Numerous country
houses (_quintas_), with terraced gardens, vineyards and sugar-cane
plantations occupy the surrounding heights. Three mountain streams
traverse the city through deep channels, which in summer are dry, owing
to the diversion of the water for irrigation. A small fort, on an
isolated rock off shore, guards the entrance to the bay, and a larger
and more powerfully armed fort crowns an eminence inland. The chief
buildings include the cathedral, Anglican and Presbyterian churches,
hospitals, opera-house, museum and casino. There are small public
gardens and a meteorological observatory. In the steep and narrow
streets, which are lighted by electricity, wheeled traffic is
impossible; sledges drawn by oxen, and other primitive conveyances are
used instead (see MADEIRA). In winter the fine climate and scenery
attract numerous invalids and other visitors, for whose accommodation
there are good hotels; many foreigners engaged in the coal and wine
trades also reside here permanently. The majority of these belong to the
British community, which was first established here in the 18th century.
Funchal is the headquarters of Madeiran industry and commerce (see
MADEIRA). It has no docks and no facilities for landing passengers or
goods; vessels are obliged to anchor in the roadstead, which, however,
is sheltered from every wind except the south. Funchal is connected by
cable with Carcavellos (for Lisbon), Porthcurnow (for Falmouth, England)
and St Vincent in the Cape Verde Islands (for Pernambuco, Brazil).
FUNCTION,[1] in mathematics, a variable number the value of which
depends upon the values of one or more other variable numbers. The
theory of functions is conveniently divided into (I.) Functions of Real
Variables, wherein real, and only real, numbers are involved, and (II.)
Functions of Complex Variables, wherein complex or imaginary numbers are
involved.