514 



scii:::tific kkcord for i882. 

 ].i;J of New LJcviciil.s annotiiKid since 1877. 



The six years < ndiug in 1882 liavo been niinsually prolific in new 

 elements, or at least in annonneeiiients of the same, for it must be con- 

 ceded that most of tliem uill fail to stand tlie test of more thorough 

 investigation. These alleged discoveries are widely scattered in pe- 

 riodical literature, and the iollowing list may prove useful* for reference: 



List of vTonentarij siui^lunccB announced from 1877 io 18j;2. 



New Elementary Svhsiances. — At the meeting of the Eussian Chemical 

 Society held October 20, 1881 (and reported in the Bnlletin dc la 8ocict6 

 {Jhimiquc de Paris, for August, 1882), Jlendelejefi", the distingiiished au- 

 thor of the periodic law, remarked that only two of the recently an- 

 nounced elements — scandium and ytterbium — had been satisfactorily 

 confirmed. These have been obtained in a pure state by Nilsou, and 

 neither of them has absorption spectra. All the other metals seem to 

 be mixtures, as was the case with the old erbium of Bunsen and Bahr, 

 and which proves to contain iSc, Yb, Er, Tr, and other elements. Scan- 

 dium corresponds in its atomic weight and properties to elcabor, a hyi)o- 

 thetical substance, the existence of which had been foreseen by the 

 8I)eaker. 



Mendelejcff" expressed himself convinced that his periodic law will find 

 further confirmation in the results to be yet obtained in studying the 

 elements of cerite and of gadolinite. {Evil Soc. Chim., xxxviii, p. l-W).) 



A new element aecowpanying didiimium is announced by the Swedish 

 chemist, Prof. P. T. Cleve. He has long studied the rare earths existing 

 in cerite, gadolinite, and similar minerals, and the behavior of the oxide 

 of didymium obtained from the latter has led him to suspect the prcvsence 

 of a new element. In the beginning of the year 1882 he submitted to 

 fractional precipitations about 200 grams of didymium oxide, and sepa- 

 rated from the yttria earths with potassium sulphate by repeated pre- 

 cipitations; the atomic weight of the first fraction was 140, that of the 



