Page:Various Forces of Matter.djvu/92

80 Now when water is opened out in this way by means of the battery; which adds nothing to it materially, which takes nothing from it materially (I mean no matter, I am not speaking of force); which adds no matter to the water; it is changed in this way—the gas which you saw burning a little while ago, called hydrogen, is evolved in large quantity, and the other gas, oxygen, is evolved in only half the quantity; so that these two areas represent water, and these are always the proportions between the two gases.

But oxygen is sixteen times the weight of the other—eight times as heavy as the particles of hydrogen in the water; and you therefore know that water is composed of nine parts by weight—one of hydrogen and eight of oxygen; thus:—