THE CENTURY'S PROGRESS IN CHEMISTRY 



proportions as to volume. Exactly two volumes of 

 hydrogen, for example, combine with one volume of 

 oxygen to form water. Moreover, the resulting com- 

 pound gas always bears a simple relation to the com- 

 bining volumes. In the case just cited the union of two 



JOSEPH LOUIS GAY-I,USSAC 



volumes of hydrogen and one of oxygen results in pre- 

 cisely two volumes of water vapor. 



Naturally enough the champions of the atomic theory 

 seized upon these observations of Gay-Lussac as lending 

 strong support to their hypothesis all of them, that is, 

 but the curiously self-reliant and self-sufficient author of 

 the atomic theory himself, who declined to accept the 

 B 257 



