The tests for methyl alcohol are principally used for the detection of this substance in ethyl alcohol. Hence their value is dependent first upon the sharpness with which they distinguish between the two alcohols, and then on their delicacy and rapidity. Occasionally, however, it is merely a question of identifying methyl alcohol alone, mixed with more or less water, in which case readier methods of no great degree of delicacy are called for. The first three methods given below will generally meet such cases.

1 Circular 74, 1911, U.S. Dept. Agr. Bureau of Chemistry.

2 J. Amer. Chem. Soc, 1905, 27, 892-906.