3^ ON SOME CHEMICAL AGENCIES Of EtECTRIClTT. 



Action of elec- Th^ bataiice that I employed was made for the Roya! 



iTicity in de- ini^titutiOQ, by Mr. Fidler, after the model of that belong- 



composing com- i t^ r^ 



poondi. J»g to the Hoyal Society 5 it turns readily with ^a^ of a 



grain when loaded with 100 grains on each side; a glass 

 tube with a piatina wire attached^ weighing 84 grains ^^^ 

 was connected with an agate cup, by amianthus ; they were 

 tilled with purified water, and electrified by a power from 

 150 pairs of plates, in such a way that the piatina in the 

 glass tube was negative. The process was continued for 

 four days, when the water was found alkaline. It gave by 

 evaporation and exposure to a heat of about 400'' Fah- 

 renheit, soda mixed with a white powder insoluble in acids, 

 the whole weight of which was ^W of a grain. The glass 

 tube carefully cleaned and dried weighed 84 grains, ^y^. 

 The dilFerence between the loss of weight of the tube and 

 the weight of the products in the water may be easily ex- 

 plained : some minute detached particles of amianthus were 

 present, and the soda must have contained water, a sub- 

 stance which it is probably perfectly free from in glass. 



Having obtained such results with regard to the disengage- 

 ment of the saline parts of bodies insoluble in water, I made 

 a, number of experimewts on soluble compounds: their de- 

 composition was always much more rapid, and the pheno- 

 / mena perfectly distinct. 



In these processes I employed tlie agate cups with piatina 

 wires, connected by amianthus moistened in pure water ; 

 the solutions were introduced into the cups, and the elec- 

 trifying power applied from batteries of 50 pairs of plates, 

 in the usual way. 



. A diluted solution of the sulphate of potash treated in this 

 manner, produced in four hours at the negative wire a weak 

 lixivium of potash; and a solution of sulphuric acid at the 

 positive wire. 



The phenomena were similar when sulphate of soda, ni- 

 trate of potash, nitrate of barytes, sulphate of ammonia, 

 phosphate of soda, succinate, oxalate, and benzoate of am- 

 monia, and alum were used. The acids in a certain time 

 collected in the tube containing the positive wire, and the 

 alkalies and earths in that containing the negative wire. 



Solutions of the muriatic salts, decomposed in the same 

 way, uniformly gave oximuriatic acid on the positive side. 



When 



