My dear Sir
I think I told you that I was a little dissatisfied with the word cation from its resemblance to the common termination of words which is made into cayshun in pronunciation1. To avoid this I would recommend putting two dots over the i, catïon. You might also write anïon and ïon in the same way, but there is not the same reason for this, though it would prevent your German translators from making your ïons into jons as they do in Poggendorf[f]2. I am desirous your terms should be as unexceptionable as possible because you say you intend to use them freely, and it is easy to see how important are the purposes to which you and your successors will have to apply these terms.
I will mention a notion which has been suggested to me by your experiments and you shall judge if there is anything in it. You show (891, 904, 910)3 that electrolysis is the result of the superior action in the exciting over that in the decomposing cell. You also show (993 &c)4 that decomposing power increases with the number of exciting cells. Of course I suppose the resistance to decom‑position might be increased by increasing the number of decomposing cells. If this could be done might we not take such a number of exciting and such a number of decomposing cells that the decomposing force was exactly balanced by the resistance and thus find the ratio of the forces. Thus if 5 cells of iodide of potassium resisting 2 cells of sulphuric acid were not decomposed while 4 cells of the iodide are decomposed, the ratio of the voltaic forces is between 5:2 and 4:2.
I am more solicitous to hear of some connection being traced between voltaic action and crystalline structure or crystallising activity, the more I think of it, Crystalline forces are polar in their own way, and must, it would seem, be connected with your polar chemical forces.
I trust to your good nature for excusing my troubling you thus and am always
Very sincerely yours, | W. Whewell
Trin. Coll. Cambridge | Dec. 11, 1835
Will you allow me to make a request to you? I have all your "Series" of Researches from the 4th to the 10th inclusive5: but I have not 1, 2, 36[.] If you can spare copies of them I should be much gratified by having them from you, as I shall bind you up, when the time comes, in a suitable manner.
Address: Dr Faraday | Royal Institution | Albemarle Street | London
FARADAY, Michael (1834c): “Experimental Researches in Electricity. - Eighth Series. On the Electricity of the Voltaic Pile; its source, quantity, intensity, and general characters”, Phil. Trans., 124: 425-70.
FARADAY, Michael (1834g): “Siebente Reihe von Experimental-Untersuchungen über Elektricität”, Pogg. Ann., 33: 301-31, 433-51, 481-520.
WHEWELL, William (1837): History of the Inductive Sciences, From the Earliest to the Present Times, 3 volumes, London.
Please cite as “Faraday0862,” in Ɛpsilon: The Michael Faraday Collection accessed on 6 May 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/faraday/letters/Faraday0862