soda; but the circumference was strewed with numerous and perfectly regular crystals of muriat of soda.[1]
3. This saline mass being dissolved in water the solution had the following properties:
a. It was neither acid nor alkaline.
b. Its most obvious taste was that of muriat of soda.
c. It formed copious precipitates with nitrat of barytes, nitrat of silver, and nitrat of lime.
d. Oxymuriat of platina, oxalat of ammonia, and prussiat of potash, produced no precipitate whatever.
Therefore the only salts contained in this solution were sulphat of soda, and muriat of soda.
4. As to the proportions of those two salts, it would have been easy to ascertain them by precipitating their acids. But it occurred to me that the sulphat of ammonia formed in the solution by the ammoniacal salts which had been introduced for the precipitation of the earths, had probably reacted upon the muriat of soda when
- ↑ This result shews the compatibility of muriat of soda with sulphat of iron, the latter being in excess, which has been questioned by some chemists. Being desirous of obtaining a confirmation of this by a direct experiment, I mixed together solutions of two parts of sulphat of iron and one part of murat of soda. The mixture became yellowish, and on applying heat reddish Hakes subsided. On separating these by filtration, and repeating this process two or three times, I nevertheless obtained by evaporation distinct crystals of muriat of soda, partly cubic, partly octohedral, deposited in the centre of a saline yellowish mass, without any appearance of efflorescence or of any thing resembling sulphat of soda. Therefore muriat of soda is compatible with sulphat of iron, although these two salts evidently exert some degree of action on each other, as appeared from the change of colour and the formation of reddish Hakes, which I suppose to be sub-sulphat of iron. I may take this opportunity of mentioning that by an analogous experiment on sulphat of iron and muriat of alumine, and by the assistance of alcohol, I satisfied myself that those two salts could not exist together.
