70 Royal Society.—Meteorological Queries. 
the temperature of 158°, a beautiful dense violet-coloured elastic 
fluid rises. This the French chemists propose calling iode gas, 
from iddys, violaceous; but Sir Humphry, considering the 
English idiom, denominates it violaceous gas. Its properties 
are singular: combined with hydrogen, with phosphorus, and 
with oxymuriate of silver, (argentane of Davy) it forms a 
peculiar acid; it is a simple or uncompounded gas, at a 
suitable temperature a permanently elastic fluid, but heavier 
than any known gas, 100 cubic inches weighing 95:5 grains : 
it is a non-conductor of electricity, experiences no change ex- 
posed to the action of the Voltaic battery with charcoal, is not 
inflammable, and does not support combustion, As a simple 
substance it has many analogies with oxygen, chlorine, and the 
alkalies: like oxygen, it rapidly unites with the metals : mercury, 
tin, lead, zinc, and iron, are converted by it, in a moderate tem- 
perature, into salts of orange, yellow, and brown tints, which 
are soluble in spirits, ether, and water} and form beautiful pig- 
ments, and most probably may be equally serviceable in the dye- 
house. Exposed to a moderate cold it condenses into solid plum- 
bago-coloured crystals. Combined with hydrogen, it forms what 
the French call hydroionic gas. Like the alkalies, it unites with 
oxygen, from which it can be expelled by heat. The existence of 
this substance confirms the opinion previously given by Sir Hum- 
phry, that acidity and alkalescence do not depend on any spe- 
cifie principle, but on certain modifications of matter. This 
chemist concludes his important paper'with some observations on 
the necessity of a new nomenclature, and proposing several ar- 
bitrary terminations to distinguish the various substances which, 
according to the principles of a significant nomenclature, would 
be called todais. But his observations on this head are, as 
usual, submitted with the utmost diilidence, and merely as hints 
on which some general principles may be founded. It is, in- 
deed, evident that the whole nomenclatural theory of Lavoisier 
is completely set-aside by the subsequent discovery of facts, and 
it is time that chemists would unite together to form a new che- 
mical vocabulary better adapted to the actual state of our know- 
ledge. 
‘ 
XVIII. Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 
METEOROLOGICAL QUERIES. 
F ROM reading Adams’s extracts from his Journals of the wea- 
ther, Iam induced through your yaluable miscellany to put two 
questions ; 
Has 
