340 Accmint of some Experiments 



use of simple vegetable paper for the intermediate disks, and 

 I frequenilv moistened with distilled water the cloth used 

 tor corking the tubes ; I was certain, by this means, iliat the 

 substance which served as a conductor to the metal disks 

 had no influence whatever upon the decomposition of the 

 water, nor upon the formation of the muriatic acid and the 

 alkali. In consequence of this, I did not think that I should 

 deprive mvself of the advantage 1 might o:;tain by moisten- 

 ing the disks with some saline solution, an abundant source 

 of electrical fluid, and which for this reason wonderfully in- 

 creases the activity of the pile. 



On the 11th of November, about two o'clock, I con- 

 structed a pile of 900 disks of zinc, copper, and paper : the 

 jiaper ones had been previously soaked in a solution of mu- 

 riate of soda. 1 placed two wires of pure gold at the two 

 poles of zinc and copper; each of them communicated with 

 a particular tube filled with distilled water, closed up at the 

 lower end by a piece of cloth several times washed in water 

 equally well distilled : these tubes were plunged into a glass 

 of the same water, and were closed in the upper part with 

 Spanish wax : I had adapted to them a small crooked glass 

 pipe, bv means of which each of them communicated with 

 a small bell glass, full of water, at the temperature of 15 

 degrees of Reaumur's thermometer. The atmosphere being 

 very damp, the pile had done very little at the end of 48 

 hours. From the 13th to the 14th the air became drier; a 

 quantity of air bubbles, which were disengaged around the 

 gold wires, jiarticnlarly towards the negative pole, indicated 

 thai t!ie piic acted wiih much force. On the 14th, at seven 

 o'clock in the morning, I looked at the two tubes ; that of 

 the positive pole presented a. slight citron colour, and half 

 the hell glass was filled with gas; towards the other pole 

 there was no alteration. At cic;ht o*clock a red powder, 

 inclining a little to the violet, was suddenly precipitated, 

 and in great alnrndance, in the tube of the positive pole. 

 On the 15th, at one o'clock /;. m., I analysed the gas which 

 was liberated from this tube in the presence of several mem- 

 oers of the society: it was oxygen gas, with which I filled 

 a hell glass that contiiined six scruples and a half of water; 



the 



