Scientific American Supplement, No. 455, September 20, 1884

cal manuals, Dr. Kolbe's "Inorganic Chemistry," for example, it is also stated that arseniureted hydrogen is formed by the fermentation of the starch-paste employed for fastening the paper to the walls. It is perfectly obvious that the fermentation of the starch-paste must cease after a time, and therefore the poisonous effects of the paper must likewise cease if its injurious effects are caused by the fermentation. I do not think that arseniureted hydrogen could be formed under the conditions, for the oxygen compound of arsenic is in a state of combination, and the compound is in a dry solid state and not in solution and the affinities of the two elements--arsenic and hydrogen--for each other are so exceedingly weak that they cannot be made to unite directly except they are both set free at the same moment in presence of each other. Further, for the formation of this hydrogen compound by the fermentation of the starch, or by the growth of minute fungi, the entire compound must be b