1824.] Mineral Waters of Carlsbad. 135 



soda The solution was then evaporated to dryness by a mo- 

 derate heat, and the dry mass was treated with alcohol of the 

 specific gravity 084. Not a trace of muriate of platinum and 

 potash remained undissolved : the water therefore contained no 

 potash, for that double salt is quite insoluble in alcohol. Potash 

 must, however, on some occasions, constitute an ingredient of 

 the water, for I have detected the fluosilicate of that alkali in 

 several sprudelstones. 



Although no circumstances gave occasion to a suspicion that 

 lithia existed in the water, its presence was still possible. To 

 ascertain the point, I mixed a quantity of the soluble salts with 

 a solution of subphosphate of ammonia: the liquid neither be- 

 came turbid, nor did it yield a precipitate by evaporation. 

 When, in a comparative experiment, this salt was mixed with a 

 solution of lithia, there was deposited during evaporation a 

 crystalline powder, the greater portion of which remained un- 

 dissolved, on treating the dry saline mass with water. When 

 the salt examined in this manner had not been previously fused 

 in a red heat, it always gave with phosphate of ammonia a slight 

 precipitate, similar to phosphate of lithia ; but on examining 

 this substance before the blowpipe, I found that with nitrate 

 of cobalt it fused to a pale red coloured pearl, and that when it 

 was treated on charcoal with carbonate of soda, the latter salt 

 was absorbed, and left an earthy matter behind. Phosphate of 

 lithia fuses with nitrate of cobalt to a blue pearl, and is absorbed 

 by the charcoal at the same instant with the carbonate of soda. 

 This precipitate proceeded therefore from a residue of carbonate 

 of magnesia in the alkaline liquid. 



It still remains to make some observations upon the manner 

 in which these different ingredients were combined with one 

 another in the water. Murray first directed the attention of 

 chemists to the fact, that the analysis of a mineral water often 

 gives the ingredients in the state of compounds, totally different 

 from those which existed originally in the water. This is very 

 true ; but he overlooked the difference between the results of 

 analysis, and the actual relations of the substances. Berthol- 

 let's investigations respecting the action of chemical masses in 

 conjunction with that of the relative affinities, had already, long 

 before, given a satisfactory answer to this question. He has 

 demonstrated that if a number of salts which do not decompose 

 one another according to the usually admitted laws of affinity, 

 be dissolved in water, a decomposition nevertheless ensues to a 

 certain extent ; a portion of each acid uniting with a portion of 

 each base, so that combinations are formed between the whole 

 of the substances, individually, which exist in solution. Thus, 

 if caustic soda be mixed with sulphate of potash, a certain 

 quantity of sulphate of soda is formed, and the acid is divided 

 between the bases in such a manner, that the uncombined por- 



