A treatise on chemistry. Vol. 1, The non-metallic elements / by Sir H.E. Roscoe & C. Schorlemmer ...

  • Henry Enfield Roscoe
Date:
1881
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A treatise on chemistry. Vol. 1, The non-metallic elements / by Sir H.E. Roscoe & C. Schorlemmer ... Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by University of Bristol Library. The original may be consulted at University of Bristol Library.

    141/792 (page 125)
    Avliich was soluble in water was evolved when sal-ammoniac and oil of vitriol were heated together. It was not, -however, until Priestley^ collected the gas thus evolved over mercury, by using this metal instead of water in a pneumatic trough, tlaat the gaseous hydrochloric acid was first prepared, and to this gas Priestley gave the name of marine-acid air, as calling attention to its production from sea-salt. Lastly, Davy i]i 1810 proved that the gas, which had been considered to be an oxygen com- pound, was entirely composed of chlorine and hydrogen. Hydrochloric acid gas, the only known compound of chlorine and hydrogen, occurs in the exhalations from active volcanoes,'^ especially in Vesuvius,^ and in the fumeroles on Hecla.* In aqueous solution, the acid has been found in the waters of several of the South American rivers rising in the volcanic districts of the Andes. 50 Hydrocliloric acid can be formed by the direct union of its constituent elements. If equal volumes of chlorine and hydro- gen be mixed together, no combination occurs so long as the mixture remains in the dark and at the ordinary atmospheric temperature; but if the mixed gases be exposed to a strong 1 Oh!trrimt,inm on Different Kinds of Air, 1772, vol. iii. 208. 2 P.-icvdo-Volmnic Phenomena, of IcrJmid, Gav. Soc, Man. p. 327. ^ r'almirri, The Lata Erupfdon of Vesuvius, 1872, p. 1,6. * Btiiiscn, Ann. Chem. P/irmn. Ixii. 1.