330 EXPERIMENTS ON THE RELATION 



compound of muriatic acid and oxygen, as was previously ima- 

 gined, and as its name seemed to denote. Tie accordingly as- 

 signed to it the term Chlorine, descriptive of its colour ; a name 

 now generally used. 



Chlorine when combined with an equal volume of hydrogen, 

 forms Muriatic Acid Gas, the Hydrochloric of Gay Lussac 

 This muriatic acid gas, hygrometrically dry, unites with its own 

 bulk of dry ammoniacal gas, to constitute the dry pulverulent 

 solid called Sal Ammoniac. Hence this saline body is ulti- 

 mately composed of chlorine and hydrogen, for its acid; and 

 of azote and hydrogen, for its base. By comparing the weights 

 of muriatic acid and ammoniacal gases, in equal volumes, we 

 obtain the proportion of 67.8 muriatic acid gas, to 32.2 ammo- 

 nia, for the composition of 100 parts by weight of the solid 

 salt. If we saturate liquid muriatic acid with gaseous ammo- 

 nia, or with the base of the ammoniacal carbonate, and evapo- 

 rate carefully to dryness, we find the resulting salt to have pre- 

 cisely the same constitution, namety, in 100 parts, 51 of dry 

 muriatic acid, equivalent to 67.8 of the acid gas, and the re- 

 mainder 32.2 ammonia. This concurrence of results, whatever 

 way the salt may be obtained, is fully demonstrated in my re- 

 searches on the ammoniacal salts, (Annals of Philosophy for 

 September 181 7J, and proves it to be a substance of very uni- 

 form and determinate composition. 



Those chemists who consider chlorine to be oxymuriatic 

 acid, must suppose, when a volume of it weighing 44.13 unites 

 with an equal volume of hydrogen, weighing 1.32, that, in the 

 resulting hydrochloric or muriatic acid gas — \5A5, this hy- 

 drogen exists combined with 10.00 of oxygen, its saturating 

 quantity, forming 11.32 of constituent water. In this view, 

 muriatic acid gas, like gaseous, sulphuric, and nitric acids, con- 

 tains water as an essential element. There seems to be no 



violation 



