Acids, Alkalis, and their Compo7i7ids. 185 



adventitious, though from the volatility and facility of decompo- 

 sition of the acid it may not be easily abstracted. 



On this vieu', the composition of the acid will be found to be 

 100 of nitrogen, 34 of oxygen, and 0'76 of hydrogen, which gives 

 6 as the multiple of oxygen to the first proportion of that ele- 

 ment. The proportion of hydrogen is to the nitrogen as the first 

 or lowest equivalent, that in ammonia being the third, th.e former 

 being 0-76 to 10, the latter to the same quantity of nitrogen 2-3. 



The same view of the composition of hydro-nitric acid may be 

 inferred from the proportion of oxygen and nitrogen in the dry 

 nitrates. In these, as in other analogous cases> the abstraction 

 of oxvgen in the formation of water at their formation is com- 

 pensated by the oxygen of the base; the metallic radical of the 

 latter inerely replaces the hydrogen of the acid, and the propor- 

 tion of oxygen to the radical of the acid remains tlie same. 



It thus appears, that the series of the nitrous compounds is 

 nitrous oxide, nitric oxide, nitrous acid, and nitric acid. The 

 oxygen in the first is to the nitrogen as 5*7 to 10; and taking 

 this first proportion of oxycen as i, that in nitric oxide is 2, in 

 nitrous acid 4, and in hydro-nitric acid G, — a ratio sufficiently 

 conformable to the law of definite proportions. 



If it uere admitted, that the oxygen and nitrogen remaining 

 after the action of hydro-nitric acid, and anhydrous nitrous acid, 

 formed binary compounds which entered iiito direct combination 

 Avith the alkali, then from the abstraction of one proportion of 

 oxvgen in tlie one bv the fi^rmation of water, and in the other 

 by the production of nitric acid, compounds would be formed, 

 intermediate in the former between hydro-nitric and nitrous acid, 

 and in the latter between nitrous acid and nitric oxide, and thus 

 the series of the proportions of oxygen of 1, 2, 3, -i, 5, (J, would 

 be completed. This view, however, is not probable. At the same 

 time, the relation of these elements in these intermediate pro- 

 portions may exist in other ternary compounds, thougli they are 

 not found in binary combination, or in the ternary combinations 

 which they form with hvdrogcn, or with metallic bases. 



Tlie composition of tlie acids, of which phosphoruses the base, 

 is so imperfectly determined, and tlie most recent experimental 

 researches are so niuch at variance in their results, that scarcely 

 any satisfactory application of a princi])!e can be ap])ried to them. 

 There is some reason to believe, that the three acids which ap- 

 jiear to i,o of definite composition, the hyi)o-pliosphorous, j^hos- 

 phoroub, and piiosj)horic acid, contain oxygen in proportions af- 

 fording the mnlti])lcs 1, 2, A. The iute'nnediate multiple of 3 

 is jtrobably to be found in the combination which is established 

 of |)liospIi<)rous acid acting on a base, conformable to the view 

 illustrated in the analogous case of sulpluuous acid, — the acid 



receiving 



