Prof. Connel on the Voltaic Decomposition of Alcohol. 47 



The author i-emarks, in conclusion, that amalgamated iron 

 (which is obtained without difficulty by immersing iron in a 

 solution of the chloride of mercury, or in metallic mercury to 

 which a dilute acid has been added), combined with zinc and 

 acid, produces a considerably weaker current than, under simi- 

 lar circumstances, the non-amalgamated iron : it is, however, 

 still much more powerful than that from a zinc-copper cir- 

 cuit. Amalgamated iron is less attacked than the non-amal- 

 gamated by dilute sulphuric acid, and is somewhat more nega- 

 tive. The latter circumstance, connected with the silvery 

 lustre of the amalgamated iron, shows distinctly the insuffi- 

 ciency of the position lately advanced by Vorsselman de 

 Heer, that amalgamated zinc is more positive than the non- 

 amalgamated, from its surpassing this in lustre ; an asser- 

 tion which, if not already disproved in general by the well- 

 known action of alloys, of which just as many stand be- 

 lo'w and above as between their constituents in the electro- 

 motive scale, would be contradicted by the fact that non- 

 amalgamated zinc still always remains considerably negative 

 towards the amalgamated, even when it has acquired the 

 greatest possible degree of lustre by filing. An inquiry re- 

 specting the order of succession of various easily oxidizable 

 metals, in the amalgamated and non-amalgamated state, gave 

 the following result, enumerated from the positive to the nega- 

 tive : amalgamated zinc, zinc, cadmium, amalgamated cadmium, 

 amalgamated tin, amalgamated lead, lead, tin, iron, amalgama- 

 ted iron. Of these five metals, therefore, three, viz. zinc, tin, 

 lead (the latter, however, but very slightly), are in the amal- 

 gamated siate 7}wre jjositive, two, on the contrary, cadmium and 

 iron, more negative in this state than in the non-amalgamated. 



XI. Additional Observations on the Voltaic Decomposition 

 of Alcohol. By Arthur Connel, Esq., F.R.S.Ed., Pro- 

 fessor of Chemistry in the United College of St. Salvalor's 

 and St. Leonard's, St. Andrew's. Head at the Meetifig of 

 the British Association in Glasgow.'* 



TN the course of the experiments by which I endeavoured 

 ■■■ to establish, some years agof, that under powerful voltaic 

 agency, the water entering into the constitution of absolute 

 alcohol is resolved into its elements, the hydrogen being 

 evolved at the negative pole, and the oxygen going to the 

 positive, where it is usually employed in producing a second- 



• Communicated by Sir David Brewster. 



j Transactions of'tiie Uoyal .Society of Edinburgh, vol. xiii. and Lend. 

 & Edinb. Pliil. Mag. 1835. 



