330 COMPOSITION OF SULrilURIC ETIILK. 



glass jar. In the latter process the distiilafion is slov/rr, 

 because we lose a larger quantity of Mater raised in va- 

 pour; and that which is collected, having been longer ex- 

 posed to the air, suffers more ammonia to fly off. 

 Fiivther proof One ounce of the water obtained from ether in Meus- 

 of its presence, pjgj.'g apparatus, and received in a bottle into which I had 

 put a few drops of muriatic acid, in order to saturate the 

 ammoniacal vapours during distillation, was evaporated to 

 dryness in tlie t'^mperaturc of the atmosphere. The resi- 

 duum it left was ch-y and well crystallized muriate of am- 

 monia, but mixed with a little muriate of lead. The mu- 

 riate of ammonia, separated from the metallic salt by a 

 fresh solution and crystaliization, weighed one grain and 

 three tenths. Here therefore its proportion Avas greater 

 than in the water obtained from the combustion of alcohol, 

 § IV. 

 Peiliapt; the Though it is possible, that ether may contain a little ni- 



'*"'"'°"!^ "°'^, trogcn, I doubt whether the ammonia, found in the aque- 

 wlK'lly from the ° ' . ' ^ 



eihcr. ous product of ths combustion, come wholly from the ether. 



Whatever care I have taken in my eudiometrical trials, I 

 have not been able to satisfy myself, that the nitrogen gas 

 is not condensed into ammonia in the combustion of the va- 

 pour of ether. My results on this point havenotbeen uni- 

 form. The greater number have indicated this condensa- 

 tion, and I am inclined to admit it, because the manipula- 

 tions and sliglit errours incident to Volta's eudiometrical 

 process have a tendency to produce the opposite effect, in 

 other words, to introduce nitrogen gas into the residuum of 

 the detonation *. 

 The water eva- ^ evaporated to dryness, in a very gentle heat, 288 grains 

 porated left a of water obtained from ether burned under the mouth of a 



ii^ie residuum. 



glass jar. It left as a residuum a transparent varnish, 

 weighing at most an eighth of a grain, and attracting mois- 

 ture from the air. 



* If we operate over mercury, there is always in this metal, and 

 some interstices of the eudiometer, a little common air, which 

 mixes with the residuum of the detonation, to fill the vacuum it 

 produces. When the operation can be performed over water, the 

 air contained iji this fluid separates from it for the same reason, but 

 it is in less quantity than from mercury. 



To 



