Page:The fundamental laws of electrolytic conduction.djvu/31

 the present conditions, the oxygen would be far the most liable to solution; but when to these is added its well-known power of forming a compound with water, it is no longer surprising that such a compound should be produced in small quantities at the positive electrode; and indeed the bleaching power which some philosophers have observed in a solution at this electrode, when chlorine and similar bodies have been carefully excluded, is probably due to the formation there, in this manner, of oxy-water.

That more eras was collected from the wires than from the plates, I attribute to the circumstance, that, as equal quantities are evolved in equal times, the bubbles at the wires having been more rapidly produced, in relation to any part of the surface, must have been much larger; have been therefore in contact with the fluid by a much smaller surface, and for a much shorter time than those at the plates; hence less solution and a greater amount collected.

There was also another effect produced, especially by the use of large electrodes, which was both a consequence and a proof of the solution of part of the gas evolved there. The collected gas, when examined, was found to contain small portions of nitrogen. This I attribute to the presence of air dissolved in the acid used for decomposition. It is a well-known fact that when bubbles of gas but slightly soluble in water or solutions pass through them, the portion of this gas which is dissolved displaces a portion of that previously in union with the liquid: and so, in the decompositions under consideration, as the oxygen dissolves, it displaces a part of the air, or at least of the nitrogen, previously united to the acid; and this effect takes place most extensively with large plates, because the gas evolved at them is in the most favorable condition for solution.

With the intention of avoiding this solubility of gases as much as possible, I arranged the decomposing plates in a vertical position, that the bubbles might quickly escape upwards, and that the downward currents in the fluid should not meet ascending currents of gas. This precaution I found to assist greatly in producing constant results, and especially in experiments to be hereafter referred to, in which other liquids than dilute sulphuric acid—as, for instance, solution of potash—were used.

The irregularities of the indications of the measurer