CHEMICAL HISTORY OP A CANDLE 



105 



and into that flask, and there behaves very differently from 

 what it does in the open air. It not only escapes from the 

 end of the tube, but falls down to the bottom of the flask 

 like a heavy substance, as indeed' it is. We find that this is 



FIG. 6 1 



the wax of the candle made into a vaporous fluid not a gas. 

 (You must learn the difference between a gas and a vapor: 

 a gas remains permanent ; a vapor is something that will con- 

 dense.) If you blow out a candle, you perceive a very nasty 

 smell, resulting from the condensation of this vapor. That 

 is very different from what you have outside the flame ; and, 

 in order to make that more clear to you, I am about to pro- 

 duce and set fire to a larger portion of this vapor ; for what 

 we have in the small way in a candle, to understand thor- 

 oughly, we must, as philosophers, produce in a larger way, 

 if needful, that we may examine the different parts. And 

 now Mr. Anderson will give me a source of heat, and I am 

 about to show you what that vapor is. Here is some wax 

 in a glass flask, and I am going to make it hot, as the inside 

 of that candle-flame is hot, and the matter about the wick is 

 hot. [The lecturer placed some wax in a glass flask, and 

 heated it over a lamp.] Now I dare say that is hot enough 

 for me. You see that the waxul put in it has become fluid t 



