10 NOVEMBER 1849, Page 8

A bottle has been sent to us of " Collins's

Disinfecting Powder, for the prevention of cholera, typhus, and other fevers, by discharging malaria and offensive smells." We have had opportunities of causing it to be tried in a variety of ways for which such compounds are useful, and can speak with strong confirmation of its properties in destroying effluvia and purify- ing the air, so far as that can be tested by the sensations of scent and re- spiration. We have trustworthy report from those to whom wo have re- ferred it, that it is found to purify the air of the printing-office, the sick- room, the store-room, the dust-bole, the air of places where animal refuse is accumulated, and that of places casually tainted by unlucky neighbour- hood. It destroys bad smells immediately, and makes the air fresh to the sense. Caution should be used in breathing the gas exhaled from the pow- der, as it irritates the respiratory organs; but that is easily avoided, and copious directions are given.:with the drug. It appears to be cheap; and it is the most convenient disinfectant that has come before us in -point of form —which is that of a light whito powder, portable and cleanlyoitud dif- fusing its purifying gas spontaneously.