Scientific Intelligence.~—Chemistry. 375 
5. Combination of Mercury with metallic wires, by M. Kemp 
(Edinb. Phil. Jour. Apr. 1829.)—When an amalgam of zinc and 
mercury; containing thirty or fifty times as much mercury as zinc, is 
covered with a strong solution of mariatic acid, and wires are made 
to dip into the amalgam, passing through the acid, the quicksilver 
immediately begins to ascend the wires, and having reached the sur- 
ace of the acid, there stops. It ascends different metals with differ- 
ent velocities. Wires of platina, copper, iron and zinc, each four 
inches long, were made to touch the amalgam at the same time ;— 
the mercury reached the top of the zine wire in eight minutes, that 
of the copper in fourteen, and in a little while after, that of the. pla- 
tina and ‘iron. In whatever manner the wire may be contorted, the 
mercury follows its sinuosities, until it attains the level of the muri- 
atic acid, which it never surpasses. id 
If sufficient time be allowed, the quicksilver not only ascends the 
wire, but “penetrates its substance. There appear no limits to the 
height to which it may rise, as long as the presence of the acid solu- 
tion favors its ascension» A stratum of fixed or volatile oil, on the 
surface of the acid, does not cause the mercury to rise higher. 
The’ zine contained in the mercury becomes oxidized, dissolves 
inthe liquid, and in time appears in fine crystals on the surface of the 
wire. When the action has entirely ceased, the mercury which re- 
mains at the bottom of the vessel has resumed its primitive purity. 
‘The cause of this singular phenomenon appears to reside in the 
opposite electrical states of the amalgam, and the wire in contact with 
it; the first being positive in’ relation to the second, but it is diffieult 
to explain in this manner the rapid ascension of the mereury on the 
zinc wire, which is in the same electrical state as the amalgam, or 
which at least cannot be negative in relation to tt, like the other wires. 
Note of the Editor, Bib. Univ.—The phrase above in ‘italies, 
which we have just added to the remark of the author, shews that 
the phenomenon cannot be attributed to ordinary chemical decompo- 
sition, ‘arising from Voltaic electricity. The greater rapidity with 
ich the mercury ascends the zinc and copper wires, — that 
the facility which metals possess in forming amalgams, favors this as- 
cension; nevertheless, the. fact cannot be explained by a simple 
chemical action of mercury on metallic wires, nor by a physical ad- 
hesion; or a sort of capillary attraction. For if so, why should ‘not 
the mercury ascend the other wires, which have not the property of 
forming amalgams, unless with extreme slowness? The electric cur- 
