MARSH GAS • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Marsh gas

... connected or hooked up with atoms at both ends, that there shall be no free hands reaching out into empty space. Carbon, for instance, has four bonds and hydrogen only one. They unite, therefore, in the proportion of one atom of carbon to four of hydrogen, or CH{4}, which is methane or marsh gas and obviously the simplest of the hydrocarbons. But we have more complex hydrocarbons such as C{6}H{14}, known as hexane. Now if you try to draw the diagrams or structural formulas of these two compounds you will ...

— Creative Chemistry - Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries • Edwin E. Slosson