18 Biographical Memoir of Sir Humphry Davy. 



menon appeared to them remarkable; water, they said, is an 

 ingredient necessary to the formation of muriatic acid ; but how 

 does it happen to adhere so forcibly, that no means are sufficient 

 to disengage it ? May it not be only by one of these elements 

 that it concurs in forming this acid ? and may not the oxygen 

 which is disengaged during the operation, and which is suppos- 

 ed to proceed from the oxygenated muriatic acid, be simply an- 

 other element of water ? Thus, neither oxygenated muriatic 

 acid, nor common muriatic acid, would contain oxygen. 



This opinion they ventured to express at the end of their me- 

 moir as a possible hypothesis ; but they dared not support it in 

 the face of their old masters, in whose eyes the theory of Lavoi- 

 sier had acquired almost a religious sanctity *. 



Mr Davy, who was under no such restraint, read a memoir 

 in 1810 "f , in which he advances this hypothesis, and supports 

 it by a multitude of additional experiments I. The pretended 

 oxygenated muriatic gas was therefore an agent of combustion 

 equal with oxygen ; at the same time when becoming to us a 

 simple substance, it required a simple name ; that of chlorine 

 was given to it, subsequently abridged and changed to chlore. 



A theory so new, it will readily be believed, was not so soon 

 adopted as it was proposed. Mr Murray, a skilful chemist of 

 Edinburgh, and Berzelius himself, defended the old theory with 

 as much spirit as perseverance. Never was a scientific dispute 

 conducted with so much propriety on both sides ; to each expe- 

 riment and explanation of an adversary, the other replied by ex- 

 periments and explanations which seemed not less important, 

 and the chemical world appeared in a state of suspense, when 

 the appearance of a new substance caused the scale to turn in 

 Mr Davy's favour, by associating with chlorine in its properties, 

 and especially by producing combustion and acidification. 



• Memoires de la Soc. d'Arcueil, torn. ii. p. 357. 



•j* Researches on the Oxymuriatic Acid, its nature and combinations, and on 

 the elements of the muriatic acid. Roy. Soc. 12th July 1810. PhU. Trans. 

 voL c. p. 231. Ann. de Chem. torn. Ixxvi. p. 113 and 129. Joum. de Phys. 

 tom. Ixxi. p. 321. Biblioth. Brit. voL xlv. p. 229. 



X On some of the combinations of oxymuriatic gas and oxygen, and on the 

 chemical relation of these principles to inflammable bodies. Roy. Soc. 15th 

 November 1810. Phil. Trans, vol. ci. p. 1. Ann. de Chem. tom. Ixxviii. 

 p. 298. Jmm. de Phys. tom. xlii. p. 358. Biblioth. Brit. torn. xlviL p. 34, 

 245, 340. 



