VI.—On the Extraction of pure Phosphoric Acid from Bones, and on a new and anomalous Phosphate of Magnesia

Extract

The usual methods of obtaining pure phosphoric acid by the oxidation, with nitric acid, or by combustion, of pure phosphorus, are well known; but, although they yield a pure product, yet, as the phosphorus must be prepared from phosphoric acid, it is obvious that we shall derive a great advantage from any method of purifying easily and cheaply the phosphoric acid from bones, instead of first reducing it to phosphorus, and then re-oxidizing it. In practice, phosphorus is made from the superphosphate of lime, and it is from the same salt that phosphoric acid may be most economically prepared.