Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VI.djvu/719

 EKEMAOAUSIS nitric acid is formed it combines with the alka- line and earthy constituents of the vegetable juices, forming nitrates. According to Kuhl- mann, ammonia may also be transformed into nitric acid when the access of air is small ; and in this way the nitre in the caves of Zeilan and in the grottoes on the banks of the Seine, and also in cellars, has been accounted for. Fungi are plentifully developed during slow decay, appropriating considerable nitrogen, often more than is contained in the decaying body, but whether directly from the air or through the intervention of other chemical processes, which is probable, is uncertain. Whatever combina- tion takes place between the carbon of the de- caying body and the oxygen of the air is also probably not direct, the gas being first ab- sorbed by moisture, and then delivered to the elective affinity of the constituents of the woody fibre. Eremacausis is retarded or com- pletely arrested by all those substances which prevent fermentation or putrefaction, such as creosote, carbolic acid, the mineral acids, and salts of mercury, copper, and other metals. Pasteur, who contends that fermentation and putrefaction are processes carried on by living organisms, adduces a number of experiments which he regards as proving that eremacausis also never takes place except by the influence of certain lower organisms. ERETRIA, an ancient city of the island of Eu- bcea, situated a few miles S. E. of Chalcis, whose rival it was in commerce. It was founded prior to the Trojan war, and became rich, powerful, and one of the chief maritime states of Greece. It was early engaged in disputes with the Chal- cians, and for having given assistance to the Ionic cities of Asia in their revolt from Persia it was razed to the ground by the Persians in 490 B. 0. It was soon rebuilt S. of the old site, and took part in the Peloponnesian war. The philosopher Menedemus, a disciple of Plato, here established a celebrated school of philoso- phy. The ruins of the city are still visible. ERFURT, a city of Prussia, in the province of Saxony, capital of an administrative district of the same name, midway between Gotha and Weimar, 145 m. S. W. of Berlin ; pop. in 1871, 43,616. It was formerly a city of considerable importance, having at the end of the 16th cen- tury nearly 60,000 inhabitants. It is a fortress of the second class, and derives great strategi- cal importance from its situation on the military high road of central Europe. Erfurt contains nine Lutheran and eight Roman Catholic churches, a synagogue, a deaf and dumb asy- lum, and several schools. The cathedral, a fine Gothic structure, which had suffered much from war, has been well restored within the present century. It contains one of the most massive bells of Germany, weighing 275 cwt. and dated 1447, called Maria Gloriosa, and in popular parlance Grosse Susanna, this having been the name of the bell melted during the fire in 1251. The finest modern churches are the Barfiisserkirche and the Augustinerkirche.