On the Decomposition of the Alkalis. 89 



Davy*s experiments on potash and soda, but confirmed, if 

 any confirmation had been necessary, the accuracy of his 

 researches, by obtaining similar results by a different pro- 

 cess. 



MM. Gay and Thenard have succeeded in deoxidating 

 potash bv means of iron. The event is announced in 

 Correspondance sur I' Ecole Imperiale Poly technique, No. 10*, 

 in the following; terms : 



i( A letter from London, dated 23d Nov. 1807, announced 

 that Mr. Davy had succeeded, by means of a strong galvanic 

 pile, iti decomposing the two alkalis of potash and soda; 

 and that Mr. Davy had read, to the Royal Society of Lon- 

 don, a memoir, in which he co-ecluded that these two alkalis 

 were metallic oxides. 



" On the 81 h of December, 1807? Messrs. Gay and 

 Thenard repeated at the laboratory of the Polytechnic School 

 the experiments of Mr. Davy, and actually obtained at the 

 negative pole of a pile, with large plates, the two new metals, ' 

 the existence of which had not been even suspected previ- 

 ously to Mr. Davy's experiments. * 



" The above two chemists, however, continued the in- 

 quiry in a new point of view ; they proposed to themselves 

 the discovery of a substance sufficiently oxidizable to take 

 off the oxygen from the alkalis, which had been ascertained to 

 be metallic oxides, and their experiments were followed with 

 the greatest success. 



" On the 7th of March, 1808, Messrs. Gay and Thenard 

 informed the Institute of France, that upon treating potash 

 with iron, in the fire of a reverberating furnace, the iron 

 deoxidated the potash and made it pass to the metallic state." 



" On the Apparatus lest adapted for deoxidating Potash 

 by Iron. By M . Hachette. 

 <( The gentlemen pages to the Emperor being desirous 



* We are indebted to Mr. Davy for the use of this journal. We need 

 scarcely state to our readers that, in the present interrupted state of communi- 

 cation between this country and the Continent, we find it extremely difficult 

 to procure the foreign journals. May we add, that our friends who happen 

 to obtain any of them cannot confer on us a greater favour than by allowing 

 us the use of them for a few days ? 



Of 



