On tthe Oxi-hydrogen Blow-pipe. 109 
perhaps the follovving experiments may not be altogether unin- 
teresting, especially as they were performed with an apparatus 
of a construction. somewhat more simple than the original. 
It will be necessary to recollect that Mr. Hare not only melted 
alumine, which Lavoisier had done before, but also. selex and 
Larytes, and by subsequent experiments he added strontiles to 
the list of fusible bodies: he was inclined to believe that he had 
volatilized gold and silver, a conclusion which was rendered 
highly probable by his having afterwards evidently volatilized 
platinum. 
The experiments of Mr. Hare, as will appear below, have 
been repeated by the writer of this paper with success; and many 
other bodies among the most refractory in Nature have been 
melted. For the sake of showing how far the experiments now 
to be recited have affected our knowledge of the dominion of 
heat, quotations, for comparison, will occasionally be made from 
one of the latest and most respectable chemical authorities— 
Murray’s System, 2d ed. 
Bodies submitted to the Heat of the Compound Blow-pipe of 
Mr. Hare. 
PRIMITIVE EARTHS, 
 Silex—being in a fine powder, it was blown away by the cur- 
rent of gas; but when moistened with water it became aggluti- 
nated by the heat, and was then perfectly fused into a colourless 
glass. 
Alumine—perfectly fused into a milk-white enamel. 
Barytes—fused immediately, with intumescence, owing to 
water, as observed by Laveisier; it then became solid and dry, 
but soon melted again into a perfect globule, a grayish-white 
enamel. 
Strontites—the same. 
Glucine—perfectly fused into a white enamel. 
Zircon—the same. / 
Lime—in small pieces, it was immediately blown off from the 
charcoal: to prevent this, as well as to obviate the suspicion 
that any foreign matter had contributed to its fusion, the fol- 
lowing expedient was resorted to. A piece of lime, from the 
Carrara marble, was strongly ignited in a covered platinum cru- 
cible; one angle of it was then shaped into a small cylinder, 
about one-fourth of an inch high, and somewhat thicker than a 
great pin: the cylinder remained in connexion with the piece 
of lime: this was held by a pair of forceps, and thus the small 
cylinder of lime was brought into contact with the heat, without 
danger of being blown away, and without a possibility of conta- 
mination: there was this further advantage, (as the experiment 
was 
