124 MR CONNELL ON THE ACTION OF VOLTAIC ELECTRICITY 



equally satisfactory evidence as the other, of the existence of water as such in 

 absolute alcohol. I have now, however, to describe a variety of experiments ana- 

 logous to those made with aqueous solutions of haloid salts, from which I con- 

 ceive it follows that water is directly decomposed in alcoholic solutions of such 

 bodies, as well as in those of other substances, and that the appearance of iodine 

 at the positive pole in such solutions, is a secondary effect ; and I hope I shall be 

 pardoned for some minuteness of detail, with a view to the general conclusion 

 alluded to in the commencement of the paper. 



Absolute alcohol containing in solution as much dry and pounded iodide of 

 potassium as it took up in three quarters of an hour's digestion, at a temperature 

 of about 130°, which was about loth, was placed, when cold, in a glass tube A fig. 1 . 

 of the capacity of 1^ dram, connected with the negative side of a battery of fifty 

 pairs of 2-inch plates ; and distilled water in a tube B of similar capacity connect- 

 ed with the positive side, a bunch of asbestus of about ^th inch thick, and moistened 

 with alcohol, being interposed between the tubes. In one or two minutes gas be- 

 gan to be evolved from both poles. In five minutes a little brown matter like iodine 

 began to be deposited in the positive water, in the immediate neighbourhood of 

 the positive pole ; and at the same moment an acid reaction was observed on the 

 asbestus at its extremity on the positive side, and an alkaline at the negative pole, 

 as well as on the positive side of the negative liquid. Both the broA\ming and the 

 acid reaction went on encreasing ; as weU as the effervescence at the negative 

 pole, that at the positive continuing but not encreasing.* In about half an hour, 

 in which time the positive Uquid had become pretty brown, whilst the negative 

 was not at all discoloured, the battery was reversed as before described, and 

 without renewing the charge. The positive pole now in the alcoholic solution 

 was immediately covered with reddish brown matter, and a red liquid couuinued 

 to fall from it, there being no evolution of gas from that pole, but an effervescence 

 from the negative, and in a few minutes alkali was detected at the negative pole. 



In some previous experiments, with a similar arrangement and the same 

 voltaic power, the principal differences being, that the connecting bunch of asbes- 

 tus was not so thick, and the positive pole perhaps a little farther from the asbes- 

 tus, the acid reaction could not be detected, although the browning appeared af- 

 ter a certain time, and these experiments, as well as the circumstance that iodine 

 usually appeared at an earlier period with an alcoholic than with an aque- 

 ous solution, at first led me to think that iodide of potassium in solution in alco- 

 hol was really directly decomposed under voltaic agency ; but the detecting acid 



* It was necessary from time to time to add a little alcohol to the negative liquid, to prevent its 

 level getting too low, an observation which applies to all the subsequently detailed experiments with al- 

 coholic solutions. 



