Thomas Beddoes to Thomas Henry, 17 October 1793
Bristol Hot Wells, Oct. 17th 1793
Dear Sir
I beg you to communicate, to the Gentlemen of your Society, a fact similar to those related by Mr. Willis. At the bottom of one of Mr. Reynolds’s smelting furnaces, at Ketley, there was found a green, glassy mass, which, after some exposure to the air, partly deliquesced; and, after a somewhat longer exposure, exhibited white efflorescences over its surface. These efflorescences I found to consist of carbonate of soda. Upon adding distilled water to some of the recent mass, and filtering it afterwards, I obtained a limpid solution, which, on the addition of vitriolic acid, yielded a blue precipitate, exactly, as far as I can judge from the description, of the same nature, at least of the same appearance, as some of Mr. Willis’s precipitates. The filtered solution, probably, contained a triple salt, consisting of soda (mineral alkali) iron, and some third material. When the vitriolic acid detached the alkali, the two other ingredients subsided on account of their insolubility. What this third material might be, I never investigated.
I am, dear Sir,
Yours with great regard,
Thomas Beddoes
Published: Memoirs of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester, 4 (1796), 302–3