Voltaic Electricity on Alcohol, &c. 317 
myself that it consisted of somewhat variable proportions of hy- 
drogen and of atmospheric air, or rather of the constituents of 
atmospheric air in relative quantities, also somewhat variable. 
The conclusion which I drew from this result was, that the gas 
evolved from the negative pole under the proper galvanic influ- 
ence, was pure hydrogen, and that the oxygen and azote had been 
simply held in solution by the alcohol, and had been liberated 
along with the hydrogen in the manner which is known to occur 
when a gas is passed through a liquid holding another elastic 
fluid in solution. 
Accordingly, I found that when the experiment was made 
without the contact of atmospheric air in a close tube, as Fig. 1, 
the proportion of atmospheric air mixed with the hydrogen was 
much diminished ; and by acting on only a dram and a-half of 
fluid inclosed in a small tube, Fig. 2, and exposing the liquid, 
before commencing the galvanic action, to the vacuum of an air- 
pump, to separate the common air, I obtained a gas which, when 
mixed with half its bulk of oxygen, and fired by the electric spark, 
left no sensible residue after the explosion, and was therefore 
pure hydrogen. By placing the foils side by side in the manner 
done in this latter experiment, the quantity of gas liberated is 
considerably increased. 
Precisely the same result was obtained by employing alcohol 
of sp. gr. .7928, at 66°F., as had been got with alcohol of sp. 
gr. 830. A dram and a-half of alcohol, sp. gr. .7928, having in 
solution from 74, to 71, of potash, yielded, when acted on in the 
tube, Fig. 2, by seventy pairs of four-inch plates, the poles being 
of platinum foil, and placed side by side at a short distance, a 
cubic inch of gas from the negative pole in less than a quarter of 
an hour, and 2} cubic inches in 2+ hours from the commence- 
ment. The action was so intense, that the liquid boiled in a 
short time, although the lower part of the tube was kept plunged 
in cold water. The liquid also acquired a reddish colour soon 
ss2 
