34$ Mr. Davy’s Electrochemical Researches on 
gained weight in the process, and were in the highly caustic 
or unslacked state; for they produced strong heat by the 
contact of water, and did not effervesce during their solution 
in acids. 
The evidence for the composition of the alkaline earths is 
then of the same kind as that for the composition of the com- 
mon metallic oxides ; and the principles of their decomposi- 
tion are precisely similar, the inflammable matters in all cases 
separating at the negative surface in the Voltaic circuit, and 
the oxygene at the positive surface. 
These new substances will demand names ; and on the same 
principles as I have named the bases of the fixed alkalies, 
potassium and sodium, I shall venture to denominate the 
metals from the alkaline earths barium, strontium, calcium, 
and magnium ; the last of these words is undoubtedly ob- 
jectionable, but magnesium * has been already applied to 
metallic manganese, and would consequently have been an 
equivocal term. 
IV. Enquiries relative to the Decomposition of Alumine, Silex, 
Zircone, and Glucine. 
I tried the methods of electrization and combination with 
quicksilver, and the common metals, by which I had suc- 
ceeded in decomposing the alkaline earths, on alumine and 
silex ; but without gaining distinct evidences of their having 
undergone any change in the processes. 
Obliged to seek for other means of acting upon them, it 
was necessary to consider minutely their relations to other 
* BergM-an. Opusc. tom. ii. p. zo<v 
