Mr Johnston on Vanadiate of Lead, 339 



bears some resemblance, it is at once distinguished by its much 

 smaller size and more regularly dichotomous frond ; by the 

 solitary subterminal imbedded capsules, and by the granuliferous 

 swollen apices of such specimens as do not produce capsules. 



The granules in this species being not all of them simple, but 

 many of them oblong, and transversely parted into four or five 

 portions, are opposed to the character I have given of them in 

 the Algce Britannicce. In this respect, the character will have 

 to be modified. Ternate granules, however, do not exist in any 

 oi the species. 



' ^micnf vTBnibfomJXB t^om 8idi to am.Tfioit.i'juit ori'i .el083« 



ART. II. — Notice regarding Vanadium a^ri the Vanadiate of 

 Lead, a New Mineral Species. By James F. W. Johnston, 

 A.M. &c. &c. , 



While at Alston Moor, in December last, I purchased some 

 specimens of a mineral called neio, and sold by Mr Couper as 

 muriate of lead, and of which he afterwards sent some fine 

 specimens to Edinburgh, and sold them at high prices. This 

 mineral, on examination, I found to be merely an arseniate, con- 

 taining, as most of the imperfectly crystallized arseniates do, 

 about two per cent of muriatic acid. For the sake of comparison, 

 I took up a supposed arseniate of lead, from Wanlockhead, and 

 found it also to contain about two per cent of muriatic acid ; but 

 the result of my experiments was, that this supposed arseniate 

 was a new mineral species, and that it contained a new metallic 

 substance. 



Thus far I had proceeded : but, afraid of committing myself 

 by publishing as new what might prove ultimately to be only an 

 impure chromium, I suffered the matter to lie over till I should 

 make myself more perfectly acquainted with the phenomena 

 exhibited by the latter metal and its compounds ; and I had 

 again resumed the subject, when the letter of Berzelius, in the 

 Annales de Chimie, came under my observation, and I found the 

 new metal I had discovered to be identical with the vanadium of 

 8efstrom. I soon after announced the circumstance to the Royal 

 Society of Edinburgh, and exhibited specimens of the new 

 substance. I have only to regret, that since it has fallen to the 

 lot of Sefstrom to give a name to a metal, discovered nearly at 

 the same time in three diiferent and distant countries, he should 

 have chosen one so barbarous and unwieldy ; and which, instead 

 of reminding us of some characteristic property of the substance, 

 turns back our thoughts to the heathen rites of a local and 

 degraded superstition. To propose another now, however, would 

 be only to cumber the science with useless terms. 



The vanadiate of lead, from which I obtained the metal, was 

 recognized, some years ago, at Wanlockhead, by Mr Rose, an4 



