3©© . Dr, Priestley's Experiments and Obfervations 
rated with water, is expofed to heat in inflammable air, this 
air enters into it, deflroys the attraction between the water and 
the earth, and revives the iron, while the water is expelled in 
its proper form. 
Confequently, in the procefs with fleam, nothing is neceflary 
to be iuppofed but the entrance of the water, and the expul- 
fion of the phlogifton belonging to the iron, no more phlo- 
gifton remaining in it than what the water brought along with 
it, and which is retained as a conftituent part of the water, 
or of the new compound. 
Having procured water from thefcales of iron (whichlmuft 
again obferve is, in all refpeCts, the fame fubftance with iron 
fnelted in dephlogifticated air, or faturated with fleam by means 
of heat) and having thereby converted it into perfect iron again,- 
I did not entertain a doubt but that I fhould be able to produce 
the fame effeCt by heating it with charcoal in a retort; and I 
had likewife no doubt but I fhould be able to extract the addi- 
tional weight which the iron had gained (viz. one-third of the 
whole) in water. In the former of thefe conjectures I was 
right ; butqwith refpeCt to the latter, I was totally miftaken. 
Having made the fcales of iron, and alfo the powder of 
charcoal very hot, previous to the experiment, fo that I was 
fatisfied that no air could be extracted from either of them fe- 
parately by any degree of heat, and having mixed them toge- 
ther while they were hot, I put them into an earthen retort, 
glazed within and without, which was quite impervious to air. 
This I placed in a furnace, in which I could give it a very 
ftrong heat ; and connected with it proper veflels to condenfe 
and colleCt the water which I expeCted to receive in the courfe 
of the procefs® But, to my great furprife, not one particle 
of 
