no 



in question. If, after being thus prepared, the twx 

 gases, instead of being inflamed, were placed together 

 over lime-water, carbonic acid was, in like manner, 

 formed ; but the same result, which in one case was 

 effected in an instant, required, in the other, a much 

 longer time to produce. It is farther remarked, 

 that pure hydrogen gas burns with a lively white 

 flame, but that the gas which has been employed as 

 an atmosphere in germination, yields a tinge more 

 or less blue, although it may have been washed in 

 lime-water. From these facts, says Sennebier, it 

 must be concluded, that hydrogen gas, which has 

 been used in germination, becomes charged with 

 carbon, and that this carbon can have been furnish- 

 ed only by the operation of germination or vegeta- 

 tion, which produce upon this gas the same effect. 

 It is farther proved by these facts, he adds, that 

 growing seeds and plants are not the direct sources 

 of the carbonic acid found in the atmosphere in 

 which they have lived ; but that this acid is a com- 

 bination of the carbon which escapes from these bo- 

 dies with the oxygen gas of the air *. The decom- 

 position of carburetted hydrogen in the foregoing ex- 

 periments of M. Huber, accords with the phenome- 

 na which take place when it is placed in contact 

 wkh oxymuriatic acid gas : for all the varieties of 

 carburetted hydrogen gases, if mixed in due propor- 

 tion with this acid, are converted into water, carbonic 

 acid, and carbonic oxide gas; and if, instead of allow- 

 ing the mixture to remain at rest, the electric spark 



* Sur la Germination, p. 86. et sen. 



