Experimental Researches in Electricity Part 13

430. A piece of common salt previously fused and solidified being introduced into the circuit was sufficient almost entirely to destroy the action on the galvanometer. Fused and cooled chloride of lead produced the same effect. The conducting power of these bodies, _when fluid_, is very great (395. 402.).

431. These effects, produced by using the common machine and the voltaic battery, agree therefore with each other, and with the law laid down in this paper (394.); and also with the opinion I have supported, in the Third Series of these Researches, of the ident.i.ty of electricity derived from different sources (360.).

432. The effect of heat in increasing the conducting power of many substances, especially for electricity of high tension, is well known. I have lately met with an extraordinary case of this kind, for electricity of low tension, or that of the voltaic pile, and which is in direct contrast with the influence of heat upon metallic bodies, as observed and described by Sir Humphry Davy[A].

[A] Philosophical Transactions, 1821, p. 131.

433. The substance presenting this effect is sulphuret of silver. It was made by fusing a mixture of precipitated silver and sublimed sulphur, removing the film of silver by a file from the exterior of the fused ma.s.s, pulverizing the sulphuret, mingling it with more sulphur, and fusing it again in a green gla.s.s tube, so that no air should obtain access during the process. The surface of the sulphuret being again removed by a file or knife, it was considered quite free from uncombined silver.

434. When a piece of this sulphuret, half an inch in thickness, was put between surfaces of platina, terminating the poles of a voltaic battery of twenty pairs of four-inch plates, a galvanometer being also included in the circuit, the needle was slightly deflected, indicating a feeble conducting power. On pressing the platina poles and sulphuret together with the fingers, the conducting power increased as the whole became warm. On applying a lamp under the sulphuret between the poles, the conducting power rose rapidly with the heat, and at last-the galvanometer needle jumped into a fixed position, and the sulphuret was found conducting in the manner of a metal. On removing the lamp and allowing the heat to fall, the effects were reversed, the needle at first began to vibrate a little, then gradually left its transverse direction, and at last returned to a position very nearly that which it would take when no current was pa.s.sing through the galvanometer.

435. Occasionally, when the contact of the sulphuret with the platina poles was good, the battery freshly charged, and the commencing temperature not too low, the mere current of electricity from the battery was sufficient to raise the temperature of the sulphuret; and then, without any application of extraneous heat, it went on increasing conjointly in temperature and conducting power, until the cooling influence of the air limited the effects. In such cases it was generally necessary to cool the whole purposely, to show the returning series of phenomena.

436. Occasionally, also, the effects would sink of themselves, and could not be renewed until a fresh surface of the sulphuret had been applied to the positive pole. This was in consequence of peculiar results of decomposition, to which I shall have occasion to revert in the section on Electro-chemical Decomposition, and was conveniently avoided by inserting the ends of two pieces of platina wire into the opposite extremities of a portion of sulphuret fused in a gla.s.s tube, and placing this arrangement between the poles of the battery.

437. The hot sulphuret of silver conducts sufficiently well to give a bright spark with charcoal, &c. &c., in the manner of a metal.

438. The native grey sulphuret of silver, and the ruby silver ore, both presented the same phenomena. The native malleable sulphuret of silver presented precisely the same appearances as the artificial sulphuret.

439. There is no other body with which I am acquainted, that, like sulphuret of silver, can compare with metals in conducting power for electricity of low tension when hot, but which, unlike them, during cooling, loses in power, whilst they, on the contrary, gain. Probably, however, many others may, when sought for, be found[A].

[A] See now on this subject, 1340, 1341.--_Dec. 1838._

440. The proto-sulphuret of iron, the native per-sulphuret of iron, a.r.s.enical sulphuret of iron, native yellow sulphuret of copper and iron, grey artificial sulphuret of copper, artificial sulphuret of bis.m.u.th, and artificial grey sulphuret of tin, all conduct the voltaic battery current when cold, more or less, some giving sparks like the metals, others not being sufficient for that high effect. They did not seem to conduct better when heated, than before; but I had not time to enter accurately into the investigation of this point. Almost all of them became much heated by the transmission of the current, and present some very interesting phenomena in that respect. The sulphuret of antimony does not conduct the same current sensibly either hot or cold, but is amongst those bodies acquiring conducting power when fused (402.). The sulphuret of silver and perhaps some others decompose whilst in the solid state; but the phenomena of this decomposition will be reserved for its proper place in the next series of these Researches.

441. Notwithstanding the extreme dissimilarity between sulphuret of silver and gases or vapours, I cannot help suspecting the action of heat upon them to be the same, bringing them all into the same cla.s.s as conductors of electricity, although with those great differences in degree, which are found to exist under common circ.u.mstances. When gases are heated, they increase in conducting power, both for common and voltaic electricity (271.); and it is probable that if we could compress and condense them at the same time, we should still further increase their conducting power.

Cagniard de la Tour has shown that a substance, for instance water, may be so expanded by heat whilst in the liquid state, or condensed whilst in the vaporous state, that the two states shall coincide at one point, and the transition from one to the other be so gradual that no line of demarcation can be pointed out[A]; that, in fact, the two states shall become one;--which one state presents us at different times with differences in degree as to certain properties and relations; and which differences are, under ordinary circ.u.mstances, so great as to be equivalent to two different states.

[A] Annales de Chimie, xxi. pp. 127, 178.

442. I cannot but suppose at present that at that point where the liquid and the gaseous state coincide, the conducting properties are the same for both; but that they diminish as the expansion of the matter into a rarer form takes place by the removal of the necessary pressure; still, however, retaining, as might be expected, the capability of having what feeble conducting power remains, increased by the action of heat.

443. I venture to give the following summary of the conditions of electric conduction in bodies, not however without fearing that I may have omitted some important points[A].

[A] See now in relation to this subject, 1320--1242.--_Dec. 1838._

444. All bodies conduct electricity in the same manner from metals to lac and gases, but in very different degrees.

445. Conducting power is in some bodies powerfully increased by heat, and in others diminished, yet without our perceiving any accompanying essential electrical difference, either in the bodies or in the changes occasioned by the electricity conducted.

446. A numerous cla.s.s of bodies, insulating electricity of low intensity, when solid, conduct it very freely when fluid, and are then decomposed by it.

447. But there are many fluid bodies which do not sensibly conduct electricity of this low intensity; there are some which conduct it and are not decomposed; nor is fluidity essential to decomposition[A].

[A] See the next series of these Experimental Researches.

448. There is but one body yet discovered[A] which, insulating a voltaic current when solid, and conducting it when fluid, is not decomposed in the latter case (414.).

[A] It is just possible that this case may, by more delicate experiment, hereafter disappear. (See now, 1340, 1341, in relation to this note.--_Dec. 1838._)

449. There is no strict electrical distinction of conduction which can, as yet, be drawn between bodies supposed to be elementary, and those known to be compounds.

_Royal Inst.i.tution, April 15, 1833_.

FIFTH SERIES.

-- 11. _On Electro-chemical Decomposition._ -- i. _New conditions of Electro-chemical Decomposition._ -- ii. _Influence of Water in Electro-chemical Decomposition._ -- iii. _Theory of Electro-chemical Decomposition._

Received June 18,--Read June 20, 1833.

-- 11. _On Electro-chemical Decomposition._[A]

[A] Refer to the note after 1047, Series viii.--_Dec. 1838._

450. I have in a recent series of these Researches (265.) proved (to my own satisfaction, at least,) the ident.i.ty of electricities derived from different sources, and have especially dwelt upon the proofs of the sameness of those obtained by the use of the common electrical machine and the voltaic battery.

451. The great distinction of the electricities obtained from these two sources is the very high tension to which the small quant.i.ty obtained by aid of the machine may be raised, and the enormous quant.i.ty (371. 376.) in which that of comparatively low tension, supplied by the voltaic battery, may be procured; but as their actions, whether magnetical, chemical, or of any other nature, are essentially the same (360.), it appeared evident that we might reason from the former as to the manner of action of the latter; and it was, to me, a probable consequence, that the use of electricity of such intensity as that afforded by the machine, would, when applied to effect and elucidate electro-chemical decomposition, show some new conditions of that action, evolve new views of the internal arrangements and changes of the substances under decomposition, and perhaps give efficient powers over matter as yet undecomposed.

452. For the purpose of rendering the bearings of the different parts of this series of researches more distinct, I shall divide it into several heads.

-- i. _New conditions of Electro-chemical Decomposition._

453. The tension of machine electricity causes it, however small in quant.i.ty, to pa.s.s through any length of water, solutions, or other substances cla.s.sing with these as conductors, as fast as it can be produced, and therefore, in relation to quant.i.ty, as fast as it could have pa.s.sed through much shorter portions of the same conducting substance. With the voltaic battery the case is very different, and the pa.s.sing current of electricity supplied by it suffers serious diminution in any substance, by considerable extension of its length, but especially in such bodies as those mentioned above.

454. I endeavoured to apply this facility of transmitting the current of electricity through any length of a conductor, to an investigation of the transfer of the elements in a decomposing body, in contrary directions, towards the poles. The general form of apparatus used in these experiments has been already described (312. 316); and also a particular experiment (319.), in which, when a piece of litmus paper and a piece of turmeric paper were combined and moistened in solution of sulphate of soda, the point of the wire from the machine (representing the positive pole) put upon the litmus paper, and the receiving point from the discharging train (292. 316.), representing the negative pole, upon the turmeric paper, a very few turns of the machine sufficed to show the evolution of acid at the former, and alkali at the latter, exactly in the manner effected by a volta-electric current.

455. The pieces of litmus and turmeric paper were _now_ placed each upon a separate plate of gla.s.s, and connected by an insulated string four feet long, moistened in the same solution of sulphate of soda: the terminal decomposing wire points were placed upon the papers as before. On working the machine, the same evolution of acid and alkali appeared as in the former instance, and with equal readiness, notwithstanding that the places of their appearance were four feet apart from each other. Finally, a piece of string, seventy feet long, was used. It was insulated in the air by suspenders of silk, so that the electricity pa.s.sed through its entire length: decomposition took place exactly as in former cases, alkali and acid appearing at the two extremities in their proper places.

456. Experiments were then made both with sulphate of soda and iodide of pota.s.sium, to ascertain if any diminution of decomposing effect was produced by such great extension as those just described of the moist conductor or body under decomposition; but whether the contact of the decomposing point connected with the discharging train was made with turmeric paper touching the prime conductor, or with other turmeric paper connected with it through the seventy feet of string, the spot of alkali for an equal number of turns of the machine had equal intensity of colour.

The same results occurred at the other decomposing wire, whether the salt or the iodide were used; and it was fully proved that this great extension of the distance between the poles produced no effect whatever on the amount of decomposition, provided the same _quant.i.ty_ of electricity were pa.s.sed in both cases (377.).

457. The negative point of the discharging train, the turmeric paper, and the string were then removed; the positive point was left resting upon the litmus paper, and the latter touched by a piece of moistened string held in the hand. A few turns of the machine evolved acid at the positive point as freely as before.

458. The end of the moistened string, instead of being held in the hand, was suspended by gla.s.s in the air. On working the machine the electricity proceeded from the conductor through the wire point to the litmus paper, and thence away by the intervention of the string to the air, so that there was (as in the last experiment) but one metallic pole; still acid was evolved there as freely as in any former case.

459. When any of these experiments were repeated with electricity from the negative conductor, corresponding effects were produced whether one or two decomposing wires were used. The results were always constant, considered in relation to the _direction_ of the electric current.

460. These experiments were varied so as to include the action of only one metallic pole, but that not the pole connected with the machine. Turmeric paper was moistened in solution of sulphate of soda, placed upon gla.s.s, and connected with the discharging train (292.) by a decomposing wire (312.); a piece of wet string was hung from it, the lower extremity of which was brought opposite a point connected with the positive prime conductor of the machine. The machine was then worked for a few turns, and alkali immediately appeared at the point of the discharging train which rested on the turmeric paper. Corresponding effects took place at the negative conductor of a machine.

461. These cases are abundantly sufficient to show that electrochemical decomposition does not depend upon the simultaneous action of two metallic poles, since a single pole might be used, decomposition ensue, and one or other of the elements liberated, pa.s.s to the pole, according as it was positive or negative. In considering the course taken by, and the final arrangement of, the other element, I had little doubt that I should find it had receded towards the other extremity, and that the air itself had acted as a pole, an expectation which was fully confirmed in the following manner.

462. A piece of turmeric paper, not more than 0.4 of an inch in length and 0.5 of an inch in width, was moistened with sulphate of soda and placed upon the edge of a gla.s.s plate opposite to, and about two inches from, a point connected with the discharging train (Plate IV. fig. 47.); a piece of tinfoil, resting upon the same gla.s.s plate, was connected with the machine, and also with the turmeric paper, by a decomposing wire _a_ (312.). The machine was then worked, the positive electricity pa.s.sing into the turmeric paper at the point _p_, and out at the extremity _n_. After forty or fifty turns of the machine, the extremity _n_ was examined, and the two points or angles found deeply coloured by the presence of free alkali (fig. 48.).