212 Objections to Sir H, Davy’s Theory of Chlorine, (Surv. 
100 parts of the acid are combined with 559 parts of oxide of 
copper and with 1331 of water. Here the oxygen ia the water is 
likewise equal to that in the oxide. | 
You are aware, I presume, that neither Davy, nor the partisans. 
of the new theory, agree with themselves in what ought to be con- 
sidered as a hydro-chlorate or a chloride, Sometimes they speak of 
chloride of potassium, barium, copper, iron; sometimes they give 
the name of muriate or hydro-chlorate to these bodies, Sych is the 
looseness of the theory, that we cannot point out any essential dif- 
ference between the hydro-chlorates and chlorides, (Yet if we 
confine ourselyes to analogy, to which these chemists, hawever, do 
not seem to attach any value, there is a decided difference between 
the sulphuret of potassium and the hydro-sulphuret of potash, one 
of which represents the chlorzde, and the other the hydre-chlorate.) 
Therefore when we wish to discuss their opinions, we must foresee 
all their methods of escaping from the examination ; because if you 
prove that such a bedy cannot be a chloride, they answer that it is 
a hydro-chlorate, decomposing and forming water at the pleasure: of 
the hypothesis, with a facility which has no other example in the 
whole science of chemistry ; for the sulphurets, phosplurets, and 
tellurets, of the alkaline metals decompose likewise water; but 
water in these cases cannot be formed at pleasure, provided the 
access of air be withheld. If we ask the partisans of the new theory 
what is their opinion of the composition of the submuriates in ques- 
tion, they will immediately answer that they are real subhydro- 
chlorates, composed of hydro-chloric acid, oxide of copper, and 
water. Butif the existence of such a hydro-chloric acid be real, it 
is to be supposed that the subhydro-chlorates in question are com- 
posed according to the same laws as all the other salts. 
We must then, in order-to convert the 100 parts of muriatic acid 
(supposed by the old theory) into hydro-chloric acid, take away the 
fourth part of the 1331 of water, the oxygen of which constitutes 
an integrant part of the chlorine, and the hydrogen of which added 
to the chlorine produces hydro-chloric acid. The weight of the 
metallic oxide remains the same. The 133°5 parts of water, then, 
which the analysis gives, do not exist wholly in the salt in the state 
of water. Only 100°2 parts exist in that state. The remaining 33-3 
parts are produced by the operation when the hydrogen of the acid 
unites to a portion of the oxygen of the oxide in order to produce a 
chloride. But the oxygen of the metallic oxide is 117-8, while 
that of 100°2 parts of water only amounts to 8S°6 ; that is to say, 
precisely three-fourths as much as the oxygen of the base. Here, 
then, we have a body composed of an acid without oxygen, of an 
oxide base, and of water of combination. ‘The oxygen of the water 
ought to he in this ease, as in all other salts, both neutral and with 
excess of base, a multiple or a submultiple by a whole number of 
_ that of the base. But we have just seen that it amounts only te 
three-fourths of it. Hence it follows that either the hypothesis of 
Davy, or the rule concerning the combination of oxides, is inaccu- | 
