1169.    ---------------.  [GAUTIER, A., AND CLAUSMANN, P.] [Action of Mixtures of Carbon Monoxide and Hydrogen or of Carbon Dioxide and Hydrogen on the Oxides of Iron.]  Compt. Rend., vol. 151, 1910, pp. 355-359; Chem. Abs., vol. 5, 1911, p. 2605.

        Finely divided Fe₃O₄ was heated for 11 hr. at 500° in a mixture of 3 vol. of CO and 1 of H₂.  The product is a mixture of C, FeO, and Fe₁₂C.  Boiled with dilute H₂SO₄, it yields a mixture of CH₄ and H₂.  With steam at 100° it also yields CH₄ and H₂, but at 650° the CH₄ disappears almost entirely, and CO₂ takes its place.  Fe (coated on pumice) was heated to 1,250° in a stream of 2H₂+CO₂; and the resulting gases, after washing with KOH, contained CO, 23.26%; H₂, 75.93%; CH₄, 0.15%; and N₂ (probably from the air), 1.27%.  Fe₂O₃, heated in a mixture of equal volumes of CO and H₂ for 2 hr., yielded a product having properties similar to those of vaseline and the simple solid hydrocarbons.  It is suggested that CO in the depths of the earth (either with or without H₂) has reacted with reducible oxides, forming carbides, which later, at temperatures below red heat, reacted with steam and formed the hydrocarbons issuing from the earth in volcanic regions or deposited as petroleum.