Page:Transactions of the Geological Society, 1st series, vol. 1.djvu/254



7. Since therefore, the whole of the muriat of soda, as was before computed (§ XIII. 2), amounted only to 4 grains in a pint, the quantity of crystallized sulphat of soda contained in each pint of the water will be 16 grains.

1. It appears evident, from. all that precedes, that the only acids contained in the water are the sulphuric and muriatic. The whole of the muriatic acid having been shewn to exist in the form of muriat of soda, nothing further remains to be said on this head. But it will be curious to examine how far the total amount of sulphuric acid, obtained from a portion of the water, would coincide with that which might be inferred from the quantities of bases with which it was combined. This inquiry will give rise to the statement of certain results respecting the proportions of acid and base in some of the salts concerned, and the precipitates obtained from their decomposition, which, from their general import in chemical analysis, appear to deserve some attention.

2. It was ascertained by a direct experiment (§ XIII. 1), that the whole of the sulphuric acid contained in a pint of the water, formed, when precipitated by a barytic salt, a quantity of sulphat of barytes, which, after being ignited, weighed 74 grains.

I shall now recapitulate the several sulphats discovered in the water, and from the quantities of each, compute the quantities of barytic sulphat which would result from their decomposition.