ANALYSIS OF AMMONIA. J3>* 



I have examined the potassium j^enerated in the process. Nature of po-. 

 It has precisely the same prooerties as potassium produced t^^siuni not 

 in the common experiment of the guu-barrel ; and gives 

 the same results by combination in oxigen, and by the ac- 

 tion of water. 



In cases in which I had distilled the olive-coloured fusible Other n«gatiTt 

 substance in an iron tray, the surface of the truy appeared 1"^°"'*' 

 much corroded, the metal was brittle, and appeared crystal- 

 lized. I made a solution of it in muriatic acid; but hidro- 

 gen alone was evolved. 



I distilled a quantity of the fusible substance from 9 

 grains of potassium in an iron ves el, which communicated 

 with a receiver containing about 100 grains ot mercury, and 

 by a narrow glass tube the gas generated was made to pass 

 through the mercury; the object of this process was to de- 

 tect if any of the same substance, as that existing in the 

 amalgam from ammonia, was formed ; but during the whole 

 period of distillation, the mercury remained unaltered in 

 its appearance, and did not effervesce in the slightest degree 

 when thrown into water. 



That the nitrogen which disappears in this experiment is Nitrogen con- 

 ab^olutely conveited into oxigen and hidrogen, and that its ^^f/ed into 



1 . ' uifu-f-ujr . • oxigen and hi- 



elements are capable or bemg turnished irom water, is a drogen. 



conclusion of such importance, and so unsupported by the 

 general order of chemical facts, that it ought not to be ad- 

 mitted, except upon the most rigid and evident experimen- 

 tal proofs. 



1 have repeated the experiment of the absorption of am- ^j^g absorpti- 

 monia by potassium in trays of platina or iron, and its dis- on of ammonia 

 tillation in tubes of iron more than twenty times, and often ofte^n^repeated. 

 in the presence of some of the most distinguished chemists 

 in this country, from whose acuteness of observation, 1 hoped 

 no source of errour could escape. 



The results, though not perfectly uniform, have all been Results of the 

 of the same lund as4:hose described in page 55*. Six grains ^^"^^ kmd. 

 of pota>sium, the quantity constantly used, always caused 

 the disappearance of from 10 to 12*5 cubical inches of well 

 dried ammonia. From 5'5 to 6 cubical inches of hidrogen 



• Journal, voJ. XXIU, p. 254. 



