"Considering the near affinity between water and fixed air, I concluded that if a quantity of water was placed near the yeast of the fermenting liquor, it could not fail to imbibe that air, and thereby acquire the principal properties of Pyrmont, and some other medicinal mineral waters. Accordingly, I found, that when the surface of the water was considerable, it always acquired the pleasant acidulous taste that Pyrmont water has. The readiest way of impregnating water with this virtue, in these circumstances, is to take two vessels, and to keep pouring the water from one into the other, when they are both of them held as near the yeast as possible; for by this means a great quantity of surface is exposed to the air, and the surface is also continually changing. In this manner, I have sometimes, in the space of two or three minutes, made a glass of exceedingly pleasant sparkling water, which could hardly be distinguished from very good Pyrmont, or rather Seltzer water."
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Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air
Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air (1774–86) was a six-volume work published by 18th-century British polymath Joseph Priestley. Later editions were "in three volumes: being the former six volumes abridged and methodized, with many additions." The work reports a series of Priestleys experiments on "airs" or gases, most notably his contributions to the discovery of oxygen gas (which he named "dephlogisticated air") and its properties. The book is an original source for study in
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