On the Action of Voltaic Electricity on Alcohol, Ether, and Aqueous 

 Solutions. By Arthur Connell, Esq., F. R. S. E. 



{Read 9,1th April 1835.) 



I was led into the following train of investigation from ob- 

 serving, that, when minute quantities of certain substances were 

 dissolved in alcohol, and the liquid was acted on by a moderate 

 voltaic power, evident signs of decomposition were exhibited by 

 the evolution of elastic fluid at the negative pole. In investi- 

 gating the nature of the changes produced, I was farther led to 

 examine the action of voltaic electricity on a variety of alcoholic 

 solutions, and also the agency of more powerful galvanic batteries 

 on pure alcohol and on ether ; and, ultimately, I was conducted 

 into a field, into which I should have hesitated voluntarily to en- 

 ter, namely, the voltaic decomposition of aqueous solutions, 

 which has recently been investigated with so much success by 

 a distinguished cultivator of science. In the following paper, 

 it will be my object to give some account of the experiments 

 which I have made on these different subjects, and of the results 

 and views to which I have been led. I shall begin with the vol- 

 taic action on alcohol and ether, and as I hope to be able to draw 

 some conclusions bearing on the various theories which have been 

 formed as to the intimate nature of these fluids, it will be neces- 

 sary that the experiments made on them shall be detailed with 

 considerable minuteness, as it is only by a very careful considera- 

 tion of the experimental results, that the validity of the conclu- 

 sions can be judged of. 



I. Voltaic Action on Alcohol. 



I found, then, that when alcohol (sp. gr. .830), having about 

 ^\-q part of pure caustic potash dissolved in it, was acted on by 



VOL. XIII. PART II. S S 



