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.

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    pressure therefore at freezing point with a pressure of 12-27 lbs. the volume would be— As 12-27 : 2116-4: : 2273-3 cubic feet. The density of a cubic foot would thus be composed of half a tb. vapour, for only half the volume is used and the 12-27 lbs. solid, divided by 2273-3 = -00562 lbs. The density of hydrogen is -0056 lbs. per cubic foot. The poles of a battery are not equal in heating power, and it is found that oxygen escapes from the hotter of the two when both poles are placed in water. Now in the case of saturated vapour there is a decreased volume as the temperature rises, and the weight of the piston required to preserve equilibrium must be increased in due proportion. But the quantity of steam produced must depend upon the speedy reduction in size of the previous atom which filled the containing chamber, it therefore depends upon the velocity acquired by the fall of the atoms in the volume. Therefore, a substance having a vertical volume one quarter that of hydrogen would have half the velocity, or while hydrogen was issuing from the water to become one volume, the lesser but denser and hotter substance would become half a volume. But steam of volume one-fourth that at freezing point requires a pressure of about 48 lbs., and we have taken it for granted that the vapour we are dealing with is similar in nature if not the same. But a gas includes its pressing solid in its volume, therefore while hydrogen is arranging its 12 lbs. in its one volume, oxygen is arranging itself in two quarter volumes of 48 lbs. each, or while the one volume of hydrogen is one atom that of the oxygen is made up of 2 atoms occupying half a volume of hydrogen and weighing 8. The densities of the gases will thus be as 1 to 16 in the quiescent state. To fix our notions of what has been said we may con- ceive that hydrogen has one volume, requiring for the satu- ration of its vapour a pressuro 1, and therefore (neglecting