36^ PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [anNO 1 676-7. 



October 28, next. All done with great care and pains at his Majesty's com- 

 mand. 



New Experiments on the Superficial Figures of Fluids, especially of Liquors 

 contiguous to other Liquors. By R. Boyle, Esq. N° 131, p. yjd. 



What has been said about the pores of liquors may be somewhat illustrated 

 or confirmed, if I subjoin to it some of the trials I have made about the sur- 

 faces of fluids contiguous to other fluids. For this being a neglected subject, 

 and the little that has been said about it consisting of a few slight and casual ob- 

 servations, that seem to have been rather presented to us, not to say obtruded 

 upon us, than designedly made by us; I many years ago thought it might be 

 worth while to spend some hours on experiments of this sort ; which I was es- 

 pecially induced to do, because I think one may probably enough suppose, that 

 in the tract of the universe that is yet known to us, there is not the hundredth, 

 perhaps not the thousandth part, that is formed into solid bodies, such as the 

 earth, the moon, and the other planets; and consequently all the rest is made 

 up of celestial fluids and the atmospheres of solid globes, which, for ought we 

 know, though not manifestly differing in transparency, may be disterminated 

 by distinct surfaces. So that, to observe and consider the effects of the con- 

 gruity and incongruity, that liquors, or such fluid bodies, as directly or other- 

 wise fall under sensible observation, have when they are contiguous to each 

 other, or to the surfaces of solid bodies, may not only improve what is yet 

 known about the ascension of liquors in small pipes, but may perhaps serve to 

 illustrate the formation of those great masses of matter, of which the Divine 

 Architect has framed the mundane globes, and some other considerable parts of 

 the universe, especially if we admit the Cartesian hypothesis, that the sun and 

 all the fixed stars are fluid bodies. 



The cause why water in narrow pipes ascends above the level of the surround- 

 ing water having been already inquired into by some ingenious men, and parti- 

 cularly by Mr. Hooke, I shall not now treat on that subject, nor mention what 

 I have tried about it ; but shall rather remark, that because I suspected that the 

 concave figure, which may be observed in the surface of water included in 

 slender pipes, may, at least in great part, depend on its relation to the conti- 

 guous fluid, which commonly is the air, I thought fit to try whether this con- 

 cave figure would not be altered by substituting another liquor in the room of 

 the air; and accordingly having procured a strongly alcalizat menstruum, viz. 

 that made of fixed nitre, dissolved by the moisture of a cellar, into a tube of 

 glass, sealed at one end, and not quite a quarter of an inch in bore, that the 



