William Whewell to Faraday   4 October 1846

Trin. Lodge, Cambridge | Oct 4, 1846

My dear Sir

I have been reading your paper (P.T. 1845 P. 1) on the liquefaction and solidification of gases1; and now see better than I did the importance of what you call "the Cagniard de la Tour state"2 and the convenience of designating it by a name. Why should you not call it the Tourian state? You have so prepared the way for this term by your periphrases that it will scarcely be felt as an innovation.

You say in this paper that C. de la Tour has shown that a liquid under certain circumstances becomes clear gas having the same bulk as the liquid3. In the account of his expt (in 18234) which I have by me, I find that the gas was 2, 3 or 4 times the liquid. I should be glad if you would give me the reference to the expts you speak of.

I should like much to hear what you think of Dumas's types as genera of substances5, but must not attempt to involve you in so wide a discussion.

Believe me, my dear Sir, | Yours very truly | W. Whewell

M. Faraday Esq

1
Faraday (1845c). Whewell was presumably referring to an offprint of this paper.
2
See letters 1646, 1648 and 1650.
3
Faraday (1845c), 171. Cagniard De La Tour (1823b).
4
Cagniard De La Tour (1823a).
5
Dumas (1840). See Partington (1964), 364-72 for an account of Dumas's theory of types.

Bibliography

CAGNIARD DE LA TOUR, Charles (1823a): “Sur les Effets qu'on obtient par l'application simultannée de la chaleur et de la compression à certains liquides”, Ann. Chim., 22: 410-5.

CAGNIARD DE LA TOUR, Charles (1823b): “Expériences à une haute pression avec quelques substances”, Ann. Chim., 23: 267-9.

DUMAS, Jean-Baptiste-André (1840): “Premier mémoire sur les types chimiques”, Ann. Chim., 73: 73-100.

FARADAY, Michael (1845c): “On the Liquefaction and Solidification of Bodies generally existing as Gases”, Phil. Trans., 135: 155-77.

PARTINGTON, J.R. (1964): A History of Chemistry. Volume Four, London.

Please cite as “Faraday1917,” in Ɛpsilon: The Michael Faraday Collection accessed on 10 May 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/faraday/letters/Faraday1917