The unity of matter : being thoughts on the nature, weight, & expansion of gases / by G.T. Carruthers.

  • Carruthers, G. T. (George Thompson)
Date:
[1883]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The unity of matter : being thoughts on the nature, weight, & expansion of gases / by G.T. Carruthers. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    6/22 (page 4)
    its former tension at freezing point. The weight of the gas will be made up of the confined vapour, together with the weight of solid which keeps the vapour at its maximum den- sity for the temperature which it had when it was inclosed. Watery vapour at freezing point has a tension of about 12. 27 lbs to the square foot, and at its point of saturation, a pound of it occupies 3390 cubic feet. It is known also that water contains 2 parts by volume of hydrogen and one of oxygen, we may therefore suppose that two-thirds of 3390 is the volume of hydrogen. The pressure upon these 2260 feet is, I suppose, the same as in watery vapour, for the heat is not diminished and the oxygen only swells each little hydrogen volume as a balloon in a chamber of compressed air occupies room. This appears pro- bable since the hydrogen alone can be withdrawn, or the oxy- gen, which could not occur if the gases were mixed unless by the use of some magnetic sorter which would have power over the gases like a magnet over iron filings; and even then there would require to be two sorters ; but we have no evidence that the poles of a battery are magnets to either oxygen or hydro- gen when they have once got out of the water. The gas, if formed under these conditions, would, from our definition of a gas, have a density of 12*27 lbs., together with one-ninth of a pound, due to the weight of the vapour, divided by 2260 the volume occupied. This would give a density of -0055 lbs. per cubic foot, which approaches to the density of hydrogon which is -0056 Saturated watery vapour differs from watery vapour by the fact of its being confined in a chamber and by the form given to its vapour which is contained, in a saturated state, in little water vesicles and no longer radiates from a central solid. If we chose to call the compressing chamber a part of the mixture then in that condition it would be a gas, for we should have the solid and the vapour. The vapour in a gas need not be derived from the sides of the volume but from an evaporating liquid in the centre. Thus, saturated water vapour has the barren sides of the chamber, and perhaps