178 ELECTRIFICATION OF WATER 



While the ordinates of these curves represent the height in the 

 manometer 20 minutes after the beginning of the experiments, the 

 same form of curves is obtained when the readings are taken after 

 5, 10, or 30 minutes. 



The interpretation of this comphcated system of curves becomes 

 simplified if we compare it with the curves for non-electrolytes in 

 Fig. 1. We then notice that the character of both sets of curves 

 agrees in the region of the higher concentrations above from m/32 to 

 m/4, and we are therefore inchned to assume that the second rise in 

 the curves for solutions of sodium salts beginning with m/32 to m/4 

 (according to the nature of the salt in solution) is due mainly to the 

 gas pressure effect of the solution. 



The abrupt rise and fall of the curves in Fig. 3 for lower concen- 

 trations than m/32 are not repeated in the case of the curves for the 

 non-electrolytes in Fig. 1 , and we are inclined to ascribe these pecuH- 

 arities of the curves to the electrical action of the ions on the rate of 

 diffusion of the electrified particles of water. Fig. 4 expresses this 

 division of the curves diagrammatically. 



In a preceding paper^ we have shown that in the presence of neutral 

 (or alkahne) salts with monovalent or bivalent cation the particles 

 of water diffuse through the membrane as if they were positively 

 charged, being attracted by the anion of the salt and repelled by the 

 cation with a force wliich increases with the number of charges of 

 the ion (and inversely with a quantity which we arbitrarily designated 

 as the "radius" of the ion). The source of the electrification of the 

 water particles as well as the specific mechanism by which the ions of 

 the solution influence the rate of diffusion of water will not be dis- 

 cussed in this paper. It will, however, simphfy the presentation of 

 our experiments if it be permitted to describe our results as if the 

 charged water particles were attracted or repelled electrostatically 

 by the ions of the solution. We notice that in Fig. 3 the curves rise 

 the more rapidly with increasing concentration the higher the valency 

 of the anion of the salt, and with the reservation just mentioned we 

 may ascribe this initial steep rise in the curves between a concentration 

 of the solution of to a concentration of m/256 to the fact that the 

 attractive action of the anion of the sodium salts upon the rate of 

 diffusion of the positively charged particles of water through the mem- 



