§5 ACCOUNT OF A NEW EUDIOMETER. 



marked by any thing singular. In confirmation of this it 

 may be added, that the young lady I have mentioned conceals 

 her peculiarity as much as possible by wearing a wig that falls 

 down over her eyebrows, and a bonnet as large as fashion will 

 allow. 



II. 



Description of a new Eudiometer, accompanied ivith Experi- 

 ments, elucidating its Application. By William Hasle- 

 dinePepys, Esq. Communicated by Charles Hatchett, 

 Esq. F.R.S*. 



Atmospheric JJ_ jjj£ important part which atmospheric air performs, in 

 portanceia va- maintaining the principle of life in animals, in combustion 

 rious natural f every description, the acidification, and oxidation of a 

 processes. great variety of substances, and in numerous other processes 



both of nature and art, gives a high degree of interest to 

 every thing calculated to extend our knowledge of its nature 

 and properties. 

 Many other The evidence furnished by modern chemistry, of the ex- 



aenform fluids. i s t ence G f many other aeriform substances, increases this in- 

 terest, especially when it is considered that, owing to their 

 possessing some of the most obvious properties of atmosphe- 

 ric air, as transparency, elasticity, and a power of great ex- 

 pansion, on being exposed to an increase of temperature, 

 they were with very few exceptions, till lately, confounded 

 either with common air, or not even suspected to exist. 

 Frequently When to these considerations we add the facility, with which 



little expected. some products, especially the gaseous, are evolved, in cir- 

 cumstances under which, in the present state of our know- 

 ledge, we should hardly look for them ; the power they pos- 

 sess of decomposing each other, and, by an interchange 

 and new arrangement of principles, of producing com- 

 pounds, possessing properties altogether different from those 

 of the ingredients supposed to be present; and the facili- 

 ties which every new detection of unsuspected principles 



• From the Philosophical Trans, for 1807, Part II, p. 247. 



affords, 



