BETWEEN MURIATIC- ACID AND CHLORINE. 331 



violation of chemical analogy in this supposition. The quan- 



1 1 32 

 tit j will be represented by the fraction ^j^g, being nearly one- 

 fourth. 



If chlorine, however, be a simple body, which forms with 

 hydrogen, muriatic acid gas, then sal ammoniac is rightly na- 

 med Hydrochlorate of Ammonia* And since ammonia itself 

 results from three volumes of hydrogen and one of azote, con- 

 densed into two volumes, that saline body can contain neither 

 water, nor its indispensable element oxygen. 



On the other hand, if chlorine be oxymuriatic acid, then the 

 fourth part of water existing in the resulting muriatic acid gas, 

 must necessarily enter into the sal ammoniac as an essential 

 constituent ; for the whole ponderable matter of that gas, as- 

 well as of the ammonia, passes into the salt. This water being 

 as indispensable an ingredient of sal ammoniac as it is of oil of 

 vitriol ; heat alone can no more separate it from the former, 

 than it can from the latter compound. 



Moreover, if we decompose sal ammoniac by the agency of 

 any body containing oxygen, an evident source of fallacy exists 

 relative to the watery product, which may be referred by the 

 supporters of the chloridic theory, not to the salt itself, but to 

 the hydrogen of the hydrochloric acid, united with the oxygen 

 of the decomposing substance. This ambiguous interpretation, 

 is experimentally illustrated, in my paper on the Ammoniacal 

 Salts. 



If, however, we shall decompose that equivocal salt, by means 

 of a substance, which certainly contains no oxygen ; and if we 

 still obtain water in nearly the above proportions ; then this re- 

 sult is no longer equivocal, nor will it admit of two interpreta- 

 tions. We must thenceforth be compelled to recognise in mu- 

 riatic acid gas, as in the other acid vapours, water as an ingre- 



T t 2 dient 



