Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume III.djvu/112

 106 BORODINO BORON really resides in an Arab sheik. The sultan is surrounded by a body guard of nobles and chiefs, clad in a grotesque and unwieldy garb. The military force of this monarch amounts to about 30,000, mostly cavalry. The principal towns are Kuka, the royal residence, Ngornoo, Dikoa, and Old and New Birnee. Most of them are populous, well built, and walled. BORODINO, a small village of Russia, on the left bank of the Kolotcha, 2 m. above its junc- tion with the Moskva, in the government and 70 m. W. S. W. of Moscow. It is famous for a battle between the French and Russians, Sept. 7, 1812. The French army, under Napo- leon, numbered 125,000, while the Russian forces, commanded by Kutnzoft', Prince Bagra- tion, and Barclay de Tolly, were nearly 160,000 strong. The battle commenced in the early morning, and raged with great fury until 3 o'clock in the afternoon, when the Russians gave up the field and retreated. The total loss of the Russians was 52,000 men, and that of the French 30,000. The former, having re- treated in good order, never acknowledged the battle as a defeat, and in 1839 raised a mau- soleum on the field as a trophy of victory. The French call it the battle of the Moskva, and it gave Marshal Ney his title of Prince of Moskva. The actual battle field was on the opposite side of the Kolotcha from Borodino. BORON, the characteristic combustible ele- ment of the acid contained in borax. In na- ture it is always met with in combination with oxygen. It is found in small quantities, and only in a few localities. It presents considera- ble analogy with silicon in its properties and its mode of combination, and like it may be obtained in two distinct modifications, the crys- talline and the amorphous. Berzelius obtained boron by heating the borofluoride of potassium with an equal weight of potassium in a covered iron crucible. Boron as thus obtained is an amorphous, dull olive-green powder, which be- fore it has been strongly ignited soils the fingers, and is dissolved by pure water in small quantity, forming a greenish yellow solution; from which, however, it is precipitated un- changed on adding a little solution of sal am- moniac. Boron is not oxidized by exposure to air, to water, or to solutions of the alkalies, whether cold or boiling. It is, however, easily oxidized when treated with nitric acid or with aqua regia. After exposure to intense heat in vessels from which air is excluded, it becomes denser and darker in color. It may be fused by the application of a heat still more intense than that required to melt silicon. As first obtained, boron exhibits a strong attraction for oxygen, and, if heated in air or in oxygen, takes fire below redness, burning with a reddish light and emitting vivid scintillations; it is thus converted superficially into boric anhydride, B 3 O 3, which melts and protects a portion of the boron. Mixed with nitre and heated to redness, it deflagrates powerfully. It is also oxidized when ignited with hydrate of potash ; and when heated with carbonate of potassium in fusion it sets carbon free, and forms berate of potassium. Pulverulent boron, like silicon, is a non-conductor of electricity. Boron may be obtained in the amorphous form in large quantity by the following method (WShler and Deville ; Liebig's Annalen, cv. 67) : 1,500 grains of fused boric anhydride are coarsely powdered and mixed rapidly with 900 grains of sodium cut into small pieces. The mix- ture is then introduced into a cast-iron cru- cible previously heated to bright redness ; 700 or 800 grains of solid but previously fused chloride of sodium are placed upon the top of the mixture, and the crucible is covered. As soon as the reaction is over, the still liquid mass is thoroughly stirred with an iron rod, and poured while red hot, in a slender stream, into a large and deep vessel containing water acidulated with hydrochloric acid. The nn- dissolved pulverulent boron is then collected on a filter and washed with acidulated water till the boric acid is got rid of; after which the washing is continued with pure water till the boron begins to run through the filter. It must finally be dried upon a porous slab with- out the application of heat. Crystallized Bo- ron. In order to convert the amorphous into the crystallized form, the following method may be adopted : A small Hessian crucible is lined with the pulverulent boron made into a paste with water, and the boron is pressed in strongly, as in the ordinary mode of lining a crucible with charcoal. In the central cavity a piece of aluminum weighing from 60 to 90 grains is placed; the cover is luted on' and the crucible enclosed in a second, the interval between the two being filled with recently ig- nited powdered charcoal. The outer crucible is next closed with a luted cover, and the whole exposed for a couple of hours to a heat suffi- cient to fuse nickel. The temperature is then allowed to fall, and when cold the contents of the inner crucible are digested in diluted hy- drochloric acid, which dissolves out the alu- minum; beautiful crystals of boron are left, generally transparent, but of a dark brown color. Numerous scales of boron are formed at the same time, in pale copper-colored, opaque, six-sided plates, which consist of an alloy of aluminum and boron, formerly erroneously called graphitoid boron. Crystallized boron has a specific gravity of 2'68 ; it assumes the form of transparent octahedrons belonging to the pyramidal system. These crystals when pure are nearly colorless, but they usually contain traces of foreign matter, which give them a pale yellow or red color; they re- fract light powerfully, and are hard enough to scratch the ruby, and even sensibly to wear away the diamond. Crystallized bo- ron burns imperfectly in oxygen when heated to full whiteness, and becomes coated with a layer of fused boric anhydride. It however burns easily when heated to redness in dry gaseous chlorine, becoming converted into the