Country people, who are so much frightened by those appearances, would soon be reconciled to them, if they knew from what a simple cause they proceed.
MRS. B.
There are other combinations of phosphorus that have also very singular properties, particularly that which results from its union with lime.
EMILY.
Is there any name to distinguish the combination of two substances, like phosphorus and lime, neither of which are oxygen, and which cannot therefore produce either an oxyd or an acid?
MRS. B.
The names of such combinations are composed from those of their ingredients, merely by a slight change in their termination. Thus the combination of sulphur with lime is called a sulphuret, and that of phosphorus, a phosphuret of lime. This latter compound, I was going to say, has the singular property of decomposing water, merely by being thrown into it. It effects this by absorbing the oxygen of water, in consequence of which bubbles of hydrogen gas ascend, holding in solution a small quantity of phosphorus.
EMILY.
These bubbles then are phosphoretted hydrogen gas?
MRS. B.