Voltaic Electricity on Alcohol, Sc. 319 
Jar appearance was observed in certain other equally singular cir- 
cumstances. If, after the action had been going on for a few 
minutes in a glass or porcelain vessel, the poles being of platinum 
foil, the action was stopped by removing one of the wires from the 
battery, and when gas had ceased to come, the poles were rever- 
sed, the foil which before had been negative being made positive, 
and the former positive made negative, then a few bubbles arose 
for a minute or two from the positive foil, with the usual effer- 
vescence from the negative ; and this might be repeated, after a 
sufficient interval, as often as was thought proper. The only ex- 
planation I can offer of these curious appearances is, that the 
negative foil, when suddenly made positive, still retains for a 
short time some portion of its former negative character, and 
therefore exerts a kind of repulsive action on the electro-negative 
substance the oxygen, at the very time when the electric current 
is determining its passage to the positive side of the pile. The 
action of the metallic vessels seems more difficult to explain, the 
property being possessed as well by electro-positive metals as by 
those of an electro-negative character ; but probably depends on 
some peculiar electric influence exercised on the constituents of 
the alcohol, by which they are rendered less disposed to combine 
with the nascent oxygen. 
These different modifications of the phenomena do not, how- 
ever, I conceive, affect the constant nature of the action. The 
evolution of hydrogen from the negative pole is invariable, and 
the determination of oxygen to the positive pole I apprehend to 
be equally so, the only variation being in the circumstance of its 
being visible or not. 
Before, however, attempting to develope this view farther, I 
wish to state the electric action on alcohol, holding small quan- 
tities of other bodies than potash in solution, and on pure alcohol. 
I found that similar quantities of several other substances, 
soluble in alcohol, produced analogous effects to potash. Thus, 
when small quantities of chloride of calcium, of nitrate of lime, 
