14. CARBON. PARTI. 



candle or a lamp. The products of combustion are 

 carbonic acid gas, whether pure or mixed with smoke, 

 for ashes are the incombustible earthy matter mixed 

 with coal or wood, and smoke is unconsumed carbon 

 arising from the bad construction of our chimneys ; so 

 that the waste is enormous in a great city like London 

 where coal is the only fuel. Light is given out by in- 

 candescent solid particles, which become luminous sooner 

 than gas, for all gases have a feeble illuminating power, 

 and heat results from the chemical combination of the 

 carbon with oxygen, a process in which the chemical force 

 merges into its correlative heat. Mr. Faraday observes, 

 that had the result of the combination of carbon and 

 oxygen been a gas only, we should have had very little 

 light, and had it been a permanent solid, the world 

 would have been buried in its own ashes. 



Diamond and pure carbon leave no residuum when 

 consumed ; they combine with the oxygen of our at- 

 mosphere into carbonic acid gas, which is invisible, 

 poisonous, and so heavy, that it may be poured from 

 one vessel to another like water, thereby showing how 

 much carbon it contains in an invisible state. The 

 quantity of carbonic acid gas thrown into the atmosphere 

 in this invisible yet ponderous state is immense, since 

 six tons weight of atmospheric air rushes hourly through 

 an average size blast furnace, carrying with it more 

 than half a ton of carbon in the form of that gas, whose 

 constitution and properties are always the same, whether 

 it arises from combustion, fermentation, or respiration, 

 which latter may be regarded as a slow combustion, 

 consuming us to the bones if not supplied with carbon 

 by means of food. It has been computed that two 

 thousand million pounds weight of oxygen gas is daily 

 converted into carbonic acid gas by these operations, 

 and given into the atmosphere, which would soon be 

 contaminated by its poison and suffocating quality, were 



