LIME.
333
sing the dead bodies of animals very rapidly,without their undergoing the process of putre-faction.—1 have here some quick-lime, which iskept carefully corked up in a bottle to preventthe access of air; for were it at all exposed to theatmosphere, it would absorb both moisture andcarbonic acid gas from it, and be soon slaked.Here is also some lime-stone—we shall pour alittle water on each, and observe the effects thatresult from it.
CAROLINE.
How the quick-lime hisses! It is become ex-cessively hot!—It swells, and now it bursts andcrumbles to powder, while the water on the lime-stone appears to produce no kind of alteration.
MRS. B.
Because the lime-stone is already saturatedwith water, whilst the quick-lime, which has beendeprived of it in the kiln, combines with it withvery great avidity, and produces this prodigiousdisengagement of heat, the cause of which I for-merly explained to you ; do you recollect it ?
EMILY.
Yes; you said that the heat did not proceedfrom the lime, but from the water which wassolidified , and thus parted with its heat of li-quidity.
MRS. b. 1
Very well. If we continue to add successive