milar:

NH_{3} + 3Cl = 3HCl + N.

The same tendency is very strikingly seen in the action of chlorine upon
turpentine. The latter substance is largely made up of compounds having
the composition represented by the formula C_{10}H_{16}. When a strip of
paper moistened with warm turpentine is placed in a jar of chlorine
dense fumes of hydrochloric acid appear and a black deposit of carbon is
formed. Even water, which is a very stable compound, can be decomposed
by chlorine, the oxygen being liberated. This may be shown in the
following way:

[Illustration: Fig. 54]

If a long tube of rather large diameter is filled with a strong
solution of chlorine in water and inverted in a vessel of the
same solution, as shown in Fig. 54, and the apparatus is placed
in bright sunlight, very soon bubbles of a gas will be observed
to rise through the solution and collect in the tube. An
examination of this gas will show that it is oxygen. It is
liberated from water in accordance with the following equation:

H_{2}O + 2Cl = 2HCl + O.

5. _Action on color substances,--bleaching action._ If strips of
brightly colored cloth or some highly colored flowers are placed in
quite dry chlorine, no marked change in color is noticed as a rule. If,
however, the cloth and flowers are first moistened, the color rapidly
disappears, that is, the objects are bleached. Evidently the moisture as
well as the chlorine is concerned in the action, and a study of the case
shows that the chlorine has combined with the hydrogen of the water. The
oxygen set free oxidizes the color substance, converting it into a
colorless compound. It is evident from this explanation that chlorine
will only bleach those substances which are changed into colorless
compounds by oxidation.

6. _Action as a disinfectant._ Chlorine has also marked germicidal
properties, and the free element, as well as compounds from which it is
easily liberated, are used as disinfectants.

~Nascent state.~ It will be noticed that oxygen when set free from water
by chlorine is able to do what ordinary oxygen cannot do, for both the
cloth and the flowers are unchanged in the air which contains oxygen. It
is generally true that the activity of an element is greatest at the
instant of liberation from its compounds. To express this fact elements
at the instant of liberation are said to be in the _nascent state_. It
is nascent oxygen which does the bleachi