PREPARATION. 



355 



ceding elementary bodies, have little or no action upon each 

 other, or upon the mass of hydrogenous, carbonaceous and 

 metallic bodies to which they are exposed in the material world ; 

 all these substances being too similar in nature, to have much 

 affinity for each other. But the class to which chlorine belongs, 

 ranks apart, and, with a mutual indifference to each other, 

 they exhibit an intense affinity for the members of the other 

 great and prevailing class, an affinity so general as to give the 

 chlorine family the character of extraordinary chemical activity, 

 and to preclude the possibility of any member of the class ex- 

 isting in a free and uncombined state in nature. The com- 

 pounds again of the chlorine class, with the exception of those 

 of fluorine, are remarkable for solubility, and consequently find 

 a place among the saline constituents of sea water, and are of 

 comparatively rare occurrence in the mineral kingdom \ with 

 the single exception of chloride of sodium, which besides being 

 present in large quantity in sea water, forms extensive beds of 

 rock salt in certain geological formations. 



Preparation. The fuming hydrochloric acid or muriatic acid 

 (as it is also called) of commerce, is a solution in water of 

 hydrochloric gas, a compound of chlorine and hydrogen, from 

 which chlorine gas is easily procured. The liberation of chlorine 

 results from contact of the acid named with peroxide of 

 manganese, and the reaction which then occurs is made most 

 obvious in the following mode of conducting the experiment. 

 A few ounces of the strongly fuming hydrochloric acid, are intro- 

 duced into a flask a } with a perforated cork and tube b, upon 



FIG. 38. 



A A 2 



