Biography of Berzelius. 193 



living at Jena, the happy idea of employing mercury as the 

 negative pole in the decomposition of the alkalies, which 

 were placed at one side in contact with it in a moist state, and 

 at the other in contact with the positive conducting wire. 

 Berzelius made these experiments in conjunction with 

 Pontin. In this way he succeeded in obtaining amalgams 

 not only of potassium and sodium, but also of calcium and 

 barium. Davy had in vain attempted to exhibit the metals 

 of the alkaline earths by the methods which had for- 

 tunately yielded him the metals of the fixed alkalies ; he 

 could only obtain barium, strontium, and calcium, from 

 amalgams prepared according to the method communicated 

 to him by Berzelius. 



But the most surprising results were those which Berze- 

 lius obtained on decomposing ammonia by the voltaic pile, 

 likewise employing mercury as the negative pole. He ob- 

 tained the ammoniacal amalgam, respecting the nature of 

 which he even then entertained correct views. He had em- 

 ployed in this experiment caustic ammonia, while Seebeck, 

 at the same time, and in a manner quite similar, obtained 

 the amalgam with moistened carbonate of ammonia. Troms- 

 dorf also, in conjunction with Gottling, obtained this amal- 

 gam at about the same time as Seebeck. 



While at the commencement of his scientific career, Ber- 

 zelius thus occupied himself in experimenting with the vol- 

 taic pile, he was also led to form a theory of this pile in 

 some respects at variance with that of its famous discoverer. 

 Volta, in constructing his theory, had not taken into account 

 the cliemical activity of the pile, regarding that merely as 

 as an effect, and not as the cause of electrical action. Ber- 

 zelius as a chemist put forward the opposite view, that the 

 electricity of the pile results from the chemical action of the 

 moist conductor and the positive metal. This chemical 

 theory of the pile found great support, and it is still enter- 

 tained by many distinguished physicists, and among them 

 even by Faraday. Berzelius, however, unbiassed by prejii- 

 dice, candidly returned again to the original view of Volta, 

 after having convinced himself of its accuracy by a lengthened 

 series of experiments. Long previously to the introduction of 



