Chemistry in daily life : popular lectures / by Dr. Lassar-Cohn ; translated by M.M. Pattison.

  • Lassar Cohn
Date:
1896
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Chemistry in daily life : popular lectures / by Dr. Lassar-Cohn ; translated by M.M. Pattison. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    colder surroundings. In a subsequent lecture we shall discover what weight of carbon must be burnt daily for this purpose. But even now it is clear from what has been said that the supply of carbon compounds in the body must soon be exhausted unless there be sufficient compensation; and hence, as well as to make up for other withdrawals, we are compelled to absorb sufficient quantities of nourishment. Before leaving our present subject, we shall glance for a moment at the processes of combustion, and next time we shall deal in more detail with the phenomena of flame which accompany combustions, as both of these are conditioned by oxygen, about which we have learnt something. All the materials used in ordinary life for burning are rich in carbon; wood and turf, for instance, have been used for ages, and in more recent times coal and peat have come into use, as fuel. The process of burn- ing such fuels consists, in the main, in the combination of the carbon of the fuel with the oxygen of the air to form carbonic acid, while at the same time the small quantities of hydrogen in the materials are burnt to water. Carbon and oxygen do not combine when cold; but if the combination is started, the material continues to burn, since the heat produced by the part which is burnt directly suffices to make the neighbouring parts hot enough to begin burning—that is, so hot that combination of carbon with oxygen occurs. We cannot at present go into the methods that have been so fully developed nowadays for the most economic employment of fuel; but when we come to speak of
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