ey may be connected with the results in air
(322.). As nitrogen can combine directly with oxygen under the influence of
the electric spark (324.), it is not impossible that it should even take it
from the potassium of the potash, especially as there would be plenty of
potassa in contact with the acting particles to combine with the nitric
acid formed. However distinct all these actions may be from true polar
electro-chemical decompositions, they are still highly important, and
well-worthy of investigation.

338. The late Mr. Barry communicated a paper to the Royal Society[A] last
year, so distinct in the details, that it would seem at once to prove the
identity in chemical action of common and voltaic electricity; but, when
examined, considerable difficulty arises in reconciling certain of the
effects with the remainder. He used two tubes, each having a wire within it
passing through the closed end, as is usual for voltaic decompositions. The
tubes were filled with solution of sulphate of soda, coloured with syrup of
violets, and connected by a portion of the same solution, in the ordinary
manner; the wire in one tube was connected by a _gilt thread_ with the
string of an insulated electrical kite, and the wire in the other tube by a
similar _gilt thread_ with the ground. Hydrogen soon appeared in the tube
connected with the kite, and oxygen in the other, and in ten minutes the
liquid in the first tube was green from the alkali evolved, and that in the
other red from free acid produced. The only indication of the strength or
intensity of the atmospheric electricity is in the expression, "the usual
shocks were felt on touching the string."

[A] Philosophical Transactions, 1831, p. 165.

339. That the electricity in this case does not resemble that from any
ordinary source of common electricity, is shown by several circumstances.
Wollaston could not effect the decomposition of water by such an
arrangement, and obtain the gases in _separate_ vessels, using common
electricity; nor have any of the numerous philosophers, who have employed
such an apparatus, obtained any such decomposition, either of water or of a
neutral salt, by the use of the machine. I have lately tried the large
machine (290.) in full action for a quarter of an hour, during which time
seven hundred revolutions were made, without producing any sensible
effects, although the shocks that it would then give must have been far
more powerful and numerous tha