134 COMBINATIONS OF OXIMURIATIC GAS AND OXIOEN. 



potassium I find produce rather more than one of so- 

 dium. 



Thccxpen. p^om the series of proportions that I have communicated 



ments agreea* . ^ • 



Uetocakula. '° ^"7 last paper, it is evident, that 1 grain of potassium 



•*"»• ought to absorb 1*08 cubical inches of oximuriatic acid ; and 



that the potash formed from one grain of potassium ought 

 to decompose about 2'l6 cubical inches of muriatic acid 

 gas; and these estimations agree very nearly with the result 

 of experiments. 



The estimation of the composition of soda, as deduced 

 from the experiments in the last Bakerian lecture, is 25*4 of 

 oxigen to 74*6 of metal, and this would give the number re- 

 presenting the proportion in which sodium combines with 

 bodies 22*; from which it is evident, that a grain of sodium 



ought 



• Or^ if soda be considered as dentoxide, which seems probable from 

 the experiments detailed page 114, -44; and on this supposition, tli* salts 

 of soda must be conceived to contain double proportions of acid. On 

 cither datum the proportion of oxigen in water must be taken as 7*5, 

 and that of hidrogen as 1, though other numbers might be found as di- 

 visors or multiples of these, which woiild equally harmonise with the 

 genera! doctrine of definite proportions. In my last communication to 

 • the Society, 1 have quoted Mr. Dal ton as the original author of the hy- 



pothesis, that water consists of t particle of oxigen, and 1 of hidrogen ; 

 but I ha^e since found, that this opinion is advanced in a work publisheH 

 In 1789, A comparative View of the Phlogistic and Antiphlogistic Them- 

 Hvnothes'sof "**> ^y William Higgins. In this elaborate and ingenious performance 

 Mr. Higgins. ^^ Higgins has developed many happy sketches of the manner in which 

 (on the corpuscular hypothesis) the particles or molecules of bodies may 

 be conceived to combine j and some of his Tiews, though formed at this 

 rarly period of investigation, appear to me to be more defensible, assum- 

 ing his data, than any which have been since advanced ; for instance, he 

 considered nitrous, gas as composed of two particles of oxigen, and one of 

 nitrogen. Mr. Higgins had likewise drawn the just conclusion respect- 

 ing the constitution of sulphuretted hidrogen, from its electrical decom- 

 position. A,s hidrogen is the substance which combines with other bodie* 

 in the smallest quantity, it is perhaps the most fi;ted to be represented by 

 unity ; and on this ideji the proportions in ammonia will be 3 of hidrogen 

 to I of nitrogen, and the number representing the smallest proportion in 

 Remarks on ^^ich nitrogen is known to combine will be 13-4. Mr. Dalton, New Sys- 

 some of Mr. tein of Chemical Philosophy, pages 323 and 436, has adopted 4*7 or 5*1, as 

 Daltoirs. the number representing the weight of the atom of nitrogen ; and has 



quott'd my experiment, Researches, Chemical and Philosophical, as au- 

 thorising these numbers j but all the inquiries on nitric acid, nitrous gas, 

 • , . nitrous 



