A practical treatise on the construction, heating and ventilation of hot-houses; : including conservatories, green-houses, graperies and other kinds of horticultural . egas — yet, not only separate themselves during combustion in aremarkable manner, but, by two distinct processes, form two essen-tially different unions. This is an important feature of thedevelopment of chemical action which the law of equivalents atonce points out and enables us to satisfy, although this doubleprocess does not appear to be understood, much less to be pro-vided for, in practice, though familiar to
A practical treatise on the construction, heating and ventilation of hot-houses; : including conservatories, green-houses, graperies and other kinds of horticultural . egas — yet, not only separate themselves during combustion in aremarkable manner, but, by two distinct processes, form two essen-tially different unions. This is an important feature of thedevelopment of chemical action which the law of equivalents atonce points out and enables us to satisfy, although this doubleprocess does not appear to be understood, much less to be pro-vided for, in practice, though familiar to every chemist. On the first application of heat, or what may properly betermed the firing or lighting the gas, when duly mixed with air,the carbon separates itself from its fellmu-constituent, the hydro-gen, and forms a union with the former, the produce of whichis carbonic acid gas. Now, the laws of chemical proportion teach us that carbonicacid is composed of one atom of carbon vapor, (by weight 6,)and two atoms of oxygen, (by weight 16,) the latter, in volume,being double that of the former, as in the annexed figure : PRINCIPLES OF C031BUSTI0N. 141 Carbonic acid. s o a. Thus, as far as the carbon is concerned, we obtain the infermation we sought, namely, its saturating equivalent of oxygenand which we find to be just double its own volume; or, byweight, as 16 is to 6. But, without the aid of chemistry, weshould here have remained satisfied ; combustion would appearto have been complete; there would be no smoke, and no visi-ble indication of an imperfect or unfinished process. Yet, chem-istry tells us, we have only disposed of the one constituent ofthe gas, namely, the carbon, and that the hydrogen, the secondconstituent, remains yet to be accounted for, and converted toheating purposes. ^ It is true, the carbon was, in weight, equal to six parts out ofeight (the original weight of the gas.) In bulk, however, it wasbut one fifth; and when it is recollected, that, although
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