solution and the mixture added to the other reactions while removing water the temperature being within the range of 174 u00b0 196 u00b0 c xylene is used as inert solvent and distilled out until the desired temperature is reached the moles of formanilide k 2 co 3 and koh per mole of p nitrochlorobenzene pncb are summarized in table i table i______________________________________ formanilide k sub 2 co sub 3 koh conver moles moles moles sionex per mole per mole per mole yield of pncbample of pncb of pncb of pncb ______________________________________2 1 30 50 28 sup 1 78 2 91 73 1 30 39 52 sup 1 78 3 86 34 1 30 19 91 sup 2 75 4 85 75 1 45 42 56 sup 3 80 1 sup 4 87 sup 46 2 00 42 56 87 9 96 6______________________________________ sup 1 added as 85 koh to carbonate in 89 parts by weight of water sup 2 added as 45 koh to carbonate in 27 parts by weight of water sup 3 added as 45 koh to carbonate in 58 parts by weight of water per mole of pncb sup 4 figure is average of two runs the results in table i show that yields from reaction with aqueous potassium carbonate solution are improved by adding potassium hydroxide to the solution improvements are also observed by having the potassium carbonate or other salt present in the reaction mixture to which aqueous potassium hydroxide is gradually added at reaction temperature in examples 7 15 0 55 moles of 45 aqueous potassium hydroxide 1 42 moles per mole of pncb is gradually added to a mixture of 65 4 grams 0 54 mole of formanilide 1 4 mole per mole of pncb and 60 6 grams.