BETWEEN MURIATIC ACID AND CHLORINE. 347 



gases, both dried previous to their union. He heated the salt 

 by itself, or passed it through hot charcoal. 



I have exposed the above salt, as well as ordinary sal ammo- 

 niac, to very numerous and diversified trials of the same kind, 

 but never could obtain in similar circumstances, any satisfac- 

 tory product of water. Nor can I imagine on what principle 

 this profound and ingenious chemist should have expected to 

 obtain water from such sal ammoniac, by the agency of heat, 

 or of heated charcoal. The water present in muriatic acid gas, 

 by the old theory, which he espoused, is evidently combined, 

 not hygrometric water ; and ammoniacal gas certainly contains 

 none of that liquid. Now, when the two dried gases unite to 

 form a solid salt, their whole ponderable matter is condensed 

 or fixed in it ; and whatever existed in both these components, 

 has become a permanent and essential constituent of the com- 

 pound. One hundred cubic inches of muriatic acid gas, weigh- 

 ing 38.04 gr., unite to 100 cubic inches of ammoniacal gas, 

 weighing 18.17 gr. j together affording exactly 56.21 gr. of sal 

 ammoniac. 



Now, whatever water existed in the acid gas, is indissolubly 

 attached to the very existence of the salt, and will always sub- 

 lime along with it, when heat is applied. Nay, though by a 

 very intense heat, we resolve the solid into its ultimate ele- 

 mentary constituents, we shall recover nothing but hydrogen, 

 azote, and muriatic acid gases, each as hygrometrically dry as 

 before. It w r ould, indeed, to my apprehension, be as reason- 

 able to hope, to extract, by the agency of heat, the combined 

 water of concentrated oil of vitriol. We shall only vaporize 

 or distil ; the water rising infallibly with the oxygen and sul- 

 phur ; as it rises with the sal ammoniac, being essential to its 

 first formation, and future existence. In both these instances, 

 it is solely by fixing the acid with a base, in some salt, which 



X x 2 requires 



