MATURE AVD DECOMPOSITION OF THE FIXED ALKALIS, 3^5 



All new facts must be accompanied however by a train of But conjectured 

 analogies, and often by suspicions with regard to the accuracy gp„^°"^*^'^ ^^* 

 of former conclusions. As the two fixed alkalis contain a 

 small quantity of oxigen united to peculiar bases, may not 

 the volatile alkali likewise contain it ? was a query which 

 soon occurred to me in the course of inquiry ; and in perusing 

 the accounts of the various experiments made on the subject, 

 some of which I had carefully repeated, I saw no reason to 

 consider the circumstance as impossible. For supposing 

 hidrogen and nitrogen to exist in combination with oxigea 

 in low proportion, this last principle might easily disappear 

 in the analytical experiments of decomposition by heat and 

 electricity, in water deposited upon the vessels employed or 

 dissolved in the gasses produced. 



Of the existence of oxigen in volatile alkali I soon satis- This proved, 

 fled myself. When charcoal carefully burnt and freed from 

 moisture was ignited by the Voltaic battery of the power of 

 250 of 6 and 4 inches square, in a small quantity of very 

 pure ammoniacal gas*: a great expansion of the aeriform 

 raatter took place, and a white substance formed, which 

 collected on the sides of the glass tube employed in the pro- 

 cess; and this matter, exposed to the action of diluted mu- 

 riatic acid, effervesced, so that it was probably carbonate 

 of ammonia. 



A process of another kind offered stiil more decisive re- A more decisive 

 suits. In this the two mercurial gazometers of the inven- 

 tion of Mr. Pepys, described in No XIV of the Phil. Trans, 

 for 1807+ J were used with the same apparatus, as that 



* The apparatus in which this experiment was made is described 

 in page 214 Journal of the Royal Institution. The gas was con- 

 fined by mercury, which had been previously boiled to expel any 

 moisture that might adhere to it. The ammonia had been exposed 

 to the action of dry pure potash, and a portion of it equal in vo- 

 lume to 10980 grains of mercury, when acted on by distilled water, 

 left a residuum equal to 9 grains of mercury only. So that the gas, 

 there is every reason to believe, contained no foreign aeriform mat- 

 ter; for even the minute residuum may be accounted for by sup- 

 posing it derived from air dissolved in the water. 



I See Journal, vol XIX, p. 217. 



employed 



