THE CORROSION OF IRON 



73 



and' pure oxygen under conditions such that carbonic acid (or 

 any other acid) can neither be present nor be formed during the 

 reaction." 



The only possible comment on this is that Mr. Lambert 

 cannot read, that is to say, interpret, his own observations. The 

 apparatus used by him is shown in the figure. The oxygen 

 vessel to which reference is made above is that marked D in the 

 figure. In the earlier experiments, carbon dioxide was removed 

 by merely exhausting the apparatus of which parts only had 

 been subjected to the cleansing action of steam ; while in the 

 later series the exhaustion was proceeded with, the temperature 

 of the part between H and L was raised " by heating a large 

 metal plate fixed under the apparatus, with a hood of sheet 

 asbestos covering the parts above it. The oxygen storage 



vessels and other parts which could not be heated thus were 

 heated by means of a large blowpipe flame." At once it may 

 be asked : Were the thick glass taps E and F thus heated ? It 

 stands to reason that they were not : so that the " other parts 

 which could not be heated thus " were not all heated thus but 

 only some of them ; and in the case of those that were heated 

 the heating could not have been carried to more than a moderate 

 temperature. 



Now what are the facts reported ? Experiment : The vacuum 

 was examined by means of the discharge produced by a large 

 coil in the Plucker tube T. Observation : " During the last 

 stages of this first exhaustion, whilst the glass surfaces zvere 

 being heated (my italics), the spectrum of carbon dioxide was seen 

 but it disappeared after some time, etc." Inference: Carbon 

 dioxide was present in the first series of experiments criticised 

 in the former article in this journal. Therefore, far from none 



