274 0N "CARBONATE OV rOTASlf. 



of/igure every time, as well as of the colours, with which the? 

 Chinefe feem to have the art of clothing fire at pleafure. On 

 each fide of the large box, was a correfpondence of fmaller 

 boxes, which opened in like manner, and let down a kind of 

 net work of fire, with drvifions of various forms, which (hone 

 like burnifhed copper, and flathed like lightning at every im- 

 pulfe of the wind. The whole ended with a volcano, or 

 eruption of artificial fire, in the grandeft ftile." — See Staunton's 

 Bmbajfy to China, Volume III, page 73. 



XV. 



On the Carbonate of Potajh. By M. Stein ac her *. 



Carbonate of <L/HEMISTS know that carbonate of potafh well faturated,. 

 to be formed by f° as to efflorefee, can only be formed by making pafs through 

 pafliag the gas a cold alcalrne folution a quantity of carbonic acid fufficient 

 lkaline folution to c^^e a fpontaneous cryftallization. For on flopping the 

 till itcryftal- difengagement of gas at the moment when the earth of the 

 liees, and not a ik a |j a pp ears to be depofited t and evaporating the liquor by a 

 mild heat, there are only laminated cryftals obtained, which 

 foon deliquefce. 

 The gentle heat Alkaline ley warmed by heat of tan, according to the me* 

 of Curaudeau thod f JV1, Curaudeau, does not fucceed any better in form- 

 ' ing a well faturated alkali by evaporation. I have experienced 

 that its cryftab grow moift, and the author himfelf acknow- 

 ledges a flight deliquefcence. 

 •jyrtter's appa- It is generally agreed, that the apparatus of Welter, de- 

 rates is too com- fcribed in the twenty-feventh Volume of the Annales de Chi- 

 is that of Pelte-"'- e » « s * 00 complicated, and that of M. Pelletier has been 

 tier. adopted in its place in almoft all laboratories, with fome al- 



terations in the difpofition of the firft bottle, to which is fixed 

 a tube with a double or triple perpendicular curvature, for 

 the introduction of the acid, or a long pipe of glafs terminated 

 in a tunnel. The chalk mixed with water to the confiftence 

 of thin foup, is poured by degrees into this pipe, which is 

 Hopped by a glafs rod accordingly, and the gas is forced to 

 traverfe the bottles containing the alkaline ley, 



* From the Annales de Chimie, Tom. LV\ 

 . - l This 



