18 Dallonian Theory of Chemical Proportions. [July, 



I shall not attempt to carry this table of chlorides any farther. It 

 would not be difficult to add a few more from the analyses of the 

 muriates of those metals that have been omitted ; but I do not con- 

 sider these muriates as analysed with sufficient precision to found 

 upon them such important consequences. The reader may easily 

 supply this deficiency by attending to the two following rules : — 

 1. If the muriate has been analysed by means of muriate of silver 

 (which is the common way), to find the composition of the chloride 

 divide the quantity of muriatic acid found by 3 '5, add the quotient 

 to the muriatic acid : the sum is the quantity of chlorine in the 

 chloride. Subtract the same quotient from the metallic oxide. 

 The remainder gives the quantity of metal in the chloride. 2. If 

 the muriate has been analysed by obtaining the metallic basis in the 

 metallic state, let the weight of metal thus found be a ; then the 

 chlorine = 100 — a. 



There is a striking resemblance between the formation of the 

 chlorides bv means of muriatic acid and that of the oxides bv means 

 of nitric acid. Nor would there be any thing singular in the case 

 were it not that most of these chlorides, when exposed to the air, 

 absorb moisture, and are converted into muriates. Nothing 

 analogous takes place with the oxides. 



The number of chlorides contained in the preceding table is 29. 

 Many, no doubt, remain unknown. Several of the most striking 

 of them are liquids remarkable for their volatility, and capable of 

 dissolving sulphur, phosphorus, oils, and resins. They are analo- 

 gous to oxides, and probably capable, like them, of combining 

 with acids and forming salts ; but we have no means of trying to 

 form such combinations, except in a few instances ; because the 

 chlorides cannot come in contact with water without undergoing 

 decomposition. The acids that contain chlorine for their acidifying 

 principle, as muriatic acid, chloride of carbonic oxide, are those 

 that probably will be found to combine most readily with these 

 chlorides. Indeed I think it very likely that with sufficient care a 

 considerable number of these new saline bodies may hereafter be 

 discovered, though it is not likely that many of them will be of 

 much importance, as far as utility is concerned ; as we have reason 

 to believe that water, or even simple exposure to the air, will de- 

 compose most cf them. 



statement in the table, it is a compound of 100 chlorine + 38'928 

 carbonic oxide. Mr. John Davy's analysis, when corrected, gives 

 us J00 chlorine + 3S-505 carbonic oxide. 



