A course of six lectures on the chemical history of a candle : to which is added, a lecture on platinum / by Michael Faraday ; edited by William Crookes.

  • Michael Faraday
Date:
1865
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A course of six lectures on the chemical history of a candle : to which is added, a lecture on platinum / by Michael Faraday ; edited by William Crookes. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Woodruff Health Sciences Center Library at Emory University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Woodruff Health Sciences Center Library, Emory University.

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    with it before it burns, you see how pale and blue the flame is. And if I blow upon a bright gas-flame, so as to consume all this carbon before it gets heated to the glowing point, it will also burn blue. [The Lecturer illustrated his remarks by blowing on the gas-light.] The only reason why I have not the same bright light when I thus blow upon the flame is, that the carbon meets with sufficient air to burn it before it gets separated in the flame in a free state. The difference is solely due to the solid particles not being separated before the gas is burnt. You observe that there are certain products as the result of the combustion of a candle; and that of these products one portion may be con- sidered as charcoal, or soot; that charcoal, when afterwards burnt, produces some other product; and it concerns us very much now to ascertain what that other product is. We showed that something was going away; and I want you now to understand how much is going up into the air; and for that purpose we will have com- bustion on a little larger scale. From that candle ascends heated air, and two or three experiments will show you the ascending cur-