Although gaseous hydrogen does not act directly46 on many substances, yet in a nascent state reaction often takes place. Thus, for instance, water on which sodium amalgam is acting contains hydrogen in a nascent state. The hydrogen is here evolved from a liquid, and at the first moment of its formation must be in a condensed state.47 In this condition it is capable of reacting on substances on which it does not act in a gaseous state.48 Reactions of substitution or displacement of metals by hydrogen at the moment of its formation are particularly numerous.49
Metals, as we shall afterwards see, are in many cases able to replace each other; they also, and in some cases still more easily, replace and are replaced by hydrogen. We have already seen examples of this in the formation of hydrogen from water, sulphuric acid, &c. In all these cases the metals sodium, iron, or zinc displace the hydrogen which occurs in these compounds. Hydrogen may be displaced from many of its compounds by metals in exactly the same manner as it is displaced from water; so, for example, hydrochloric acid, which is formed directly by the combination of hydrogen with chlorine, gives hydrogen by the action of a great many metals, just as sulphuric acid does. Potassium and sodium also displace hydrogen from its compounds with nitrogen; it is only from its compounds with carbon that hydrogen is not displaced by metals. Hydrogen, in its turn, is able to replace metals; this is accomplished most easily on heating, and with those metals which do not themselves displace hydrogen. If hydrogen be passed over the compounds of many metals with oxygen at a red heat, it takes up the oxygen from the metals and displaces them just as it is itself displaced by metals. If hydrogen be passed over the compound of oxygen with copper at a red heat, then metallic copper and water are obtained—CuO + H2 = H2O + Cu. This kind of double decomposition is called reduction with respect to the metal, which is thus reduced to a metallic state from its combination with oxygen. But it must be recollected that all metals do not displace hydrogen from its compound with oxygen, and, conversely, hydrogen is not able to displace all metals from their compounds with oxygen; thus it does not displace potassium, calcium, or aluminium from its compounds with oxygen. If the metals be arranged in the following series: K, Na, Ca, Al ... Fe, Zn, Hg ... Cu, Pb, Ag, Au, then the first are able to take up oxygen from water—that is, displace hydrogen—whilst the last do not act thus, but are, on the contrary, reduced by hydrogen—that is, have, as is said, a less affinity for oxygen than hydrogen, whilst potassium, sodium, and calcium have more. This is also expressed by the amount of heat evolved in the act of combination with oxygen (see Note 9), and is shown by the fact that potassium and sodium and other similar metals evolve heat in decomposing water; but copper, silver, and the like do not do this, because in combining with oxygen they evolve less heat than hydrogen does, and therefore it happens that when hydrogen reduces these metals heat is evolved. Thus, for example, if 16 grams of oxygen combine with copper, 38,000 units of heat are evolved; and when 16 grams of oxygen combine with hydrogen, forming water, 69,000 units of heat are evolved; whilst 23 grams of sodium, in combining with 16 grams of oxygen, evolve 100,000 units of heat. This example clearly shows that chemical reactions which proceed directly and unaided evolve heat. Sodium decomposes water and hydrogen reduces copper, because they are exothermal reactions, or those which evolve heat; copper does not decompose water, because such a reaction would be accompanied by an absorption (or secretion) of heat, or belongs to the class of endothermal reactions in which heat is absorbed; and such reactions do not generally proceed directly, although they may take place with the aid of energy (electrical, thermal, &c.) borrowed from some foreign source.50
The reduction of metals by hydrogen is taken advantage of for determining the exact composition of water by weight. Copper oxide is usually chosen for this purpose. It is heated to redness in hydrogen, and the quantity of