1$Q ON •ALVANISM AND ELFCTRICITY. 



dary action, determined by the equal deeomposability of the 

 acid and the base; the free acid being too fugacious to be 

 The galvanic reached by the action of the pile. The facility with which 

 current easily tne <, a i van j c current vaporizes in some measure the most 

 vaporizes sub- . . . . . in 



stances. fixed substances, as earths, the fixed alkalis, metals, &c, 



and causes them to circulate with it, is astonishing. The 

 Its effect. current raust intimately dissolve, or strongly divide, the 



substances it transfers ; since after this transference these 

 substances crystallize, as in the beautiful experiments of 

 Brugnatelli, and in experiments similar to those of that il- 

 lustrious Italian chemist and natural philosopher, which I 

 Decomposi- have performed with earths and alkalis. When the decom- 

 twnof water, position of water is effected without a perceptible separa- 

 tion of gas, as in the last experiment mentioned by Pac- 

 chiani and others, the two gasses follow the galvanic current 

 along the wire with different velocities, and separate only in 

 succession on the body of the pile itself. Most of the sub- 

 stances, that are decomposed by the immediate action of the 

 plates, do not quit the current till their return to that plate 

 or element of the pile, from which they set out; and there 

 they are deposited, recombined, or extricated. To this ef- 

 Long continu- feet is owing the long continued activity of piles, in which 



ed activity ot ^ interposed substance is of a nature to be transferred 



some piles. r 



Numerous ex- without being dissipated. I have subjected to the imme- 



periments of diate action of the plates all known substances, both solid 

 aad liquid, and aeriform in a state of composition; and I 

 have obtained results as extraordinary with respect to the 

 influence of the pile on these substances, as of these sub- 

 stances on the action of the pile. They form a body of 

 facts, from which I have yet deduced but few consequences: 

 but the first moment of leisure I have from my extensive 

 occupations, I shall arrange them, and lay them before the 

 Institute. 



Water not de- I cannot conceive how some persons persist in admitting 



coin P 03ed in , to the decomposition of water into muriatic acid by the pile, 



muriatic acid. , ., , . T , . . . «,"■.,« 



while the experiments 1 have inserted in my Chemical and 



Physical Journal evidently demonstrate, that, in all caseg 

 Source of the where this acid is obtained, it comes from a muriate, with 

 acld - which the interposed pasteboards are moistened. This is so 



Other acids t t ^ at jj a so ] u ti on f S0JUe other salt with an indecom- 

 produced. " " 



posable 



