The colouring-matters introduced in 1878 by the Höchst factory under the names of "Ponceaux" of various brands, and "Bordeaux," although to some extent superseded by later discoveries, still occupy an important position. Their discovery not only increased the consumption of beta-naphthol, but also that of the bases which were used for diazotising. These bases are alpha-naphthylamine and those of the aniline series. The intimate relationship which exists between chemical science and technology--a relationship which appears so constantly in the foregoing portions of this work--is well brought out by the discovery under consideration. A little more chemistry will enable this statement to be appreciated.
Going back for a moment to the hydrocarbons obtained from light oil, it will be remembered that benzene and toluene have thus far been considered as the only ones of importance to the colour-maker. Until the discovery embodied in the patent specification of 1878, the portions of the light oil boiling above toluene were of no value in the colour industry. Benzene and toluene are related to each other in a way which chemists describe by saying that they are "homologous." This means that they are members of a regularly graduated series, the successive terms of which differ by the same number of atoms of carbon and hydrogen. Thus toluene contains one atom of carbon and two atoms of hydrogen more than benzene. Above toluene are higher homologues, viz. xylene, cumene, &c., which occur in the light oil, the former being related to toluene in the same way that toluene is related to benzene, while cumene again contains one atom of carbon and two atoms of hydrogen more than xylene. This relationship between the members of homologous series is expressed in other terms by saying that the weight of the molecule increases by a constant quantity as we ascend the series.
The homology existing among the hydrocarbons extends to all their derivatives. Thus phenol is the lower homologue of the cresols. Also we have the homologous series--
Benzene. Nitrobenzene. Aniline. Toluene. Nitrotoluene. Toluidine. Xylene. Nitroxylene. Xylidine. Cumene. Nitrocumene. Cumidine.
The bases of the third column when diazotised and combined with the disulpho-acids of beta-naphthol give a graduated series of dyes beginning with orange and ending with bluish scarlet. Thus it was observed that the toluidine colour was redder than the aniline colour, and it was a natural inference that the xylidine colour would be still redder. At the time of this discovery no azo-colour of a true scarlet shade had been manufactured successfully. A demand for the higher homologues of benzene was thus created, and the higher boiling-point fractions of the light oil, which had been formerly used as solvent naphtha, became of value as sources of colouring-matters. The isolation of coal-tar xylene (which is a mixture of three isomeric hydrocarbons) is easily effected by fractional distillation with a rectifying column, and by nitration and reduction, in the same way as in the manufacture of aniline, xylidine is placed at the disposal of the colour-maker.