340 



HUNT, JAMES. 



come almost as dangerous as it was before the 

 Crimean War, when it was under the exclusive 

 sovereignty of the Emperor of Kussia. The 

 remedy suggested is to raise a loan of 3.500,000 

 francs for the removal of this obstruction. 



HUNT, JAMES, M.D., Ph.D., F.S.A., an 

 English physiologist, philosopher, anthropol- 

 ogist, and author, born at Swanage, Dorset- 

 shire, in 1833 ; died near Hastings, from the 

 effect of a sunstroke, August 29, 1869. He was 

 educated for a physician, and gave special and 

 earnest attention to the study of anatomy, 

 physiology, and chemistry. Before the com- 

 pletion of his twenty-first year he had published 

 three volumes of great merit, a "Memoir of his 

 Father, Thomas Hunt, M. D. ; " a treatise on 

 "Stammering and Stuttering, their Nature and 

 Treatment," which is still accepted as the 

 standard work on the subject; and an elaborate 

 work on "The Philosophy of Voice and 

 Speech," for which he had drawn largely on 

 Dr. James Rush's "Philosophy of the Human 

 Voice." In 1854 he became a member, and in 

 1859 Honorary Secretary of the Ethnological 

 Society, into which he infused new life. He 

 resigned in 1862, and the next year founded 

 the Anthropological Society of London, of 

 which he was president for four years, and 

 director for one. He edited The Anthropo- 

 logical Review and Journal, the organ of the 

 Society, contributed largely to its two volumes 

 of memoirs, and translated and edited several 

 French and German anthropological works. 

 Belonging to the most advanced section of the 

 modern physio-philosophical school, he was 

 engaged much of the time in active contro- 

 versies, but manifested great tact and ability 

 in the maintenance of his opinions. He was 

 an active member of the British Association 

 for the Advancement of Science, and con- 

 tributed many papers to its transactions. He 

 was a Fellow and Honorary Foreign Secretary 

 of the Royal Society of Literature, and a 

 Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and had 

 been elected a corresponding member of many 

 foreign archaeological and anthropological so- 

 cieties. The University of Giessen had con- 

 ferred on him, in 1855, the diploma of Doctor 

 of Philosophy, and in 1867 that of Doctor of 

 Medicine, honoris causa. 



HYDROGENIUM. Thomas Graham, F. R. 

 S., master of the British Mint (whose death 

 during the year was a great loss to the world 

 of science), submitted to the Royal Society in 

 June a second paper, giving additional ob- 

 servations on hydrogenium, the supposed me- 

 tallic base of hydrogen gas, the discovery of 

 which in 1868, by Mr. Graham, was the most 

 remarkable event in the chemical annals of 

 that year (see article HYDROGEXIUM in AMERI- 

 CAN ANNUAL CYCLOPEDIA for 1868). From his 

 former experiments Mr. Graham had inferred 

 the density of hydrogenium to be a little under 

 2, but he subsequently found that another 

 number of about half that amount could be 

 deduced with equal probability from the same 



HYDROGENIUM. 



experimental data. This double result is a con- 

 sequence of the singular permanent shortening 

 of the palladium-wire, observed after the ex- 

 pulsion of hydrogen which had be^n previously 

 occluded by the palladium. In a particular ob- 

 servation formerly described, for instance, a 

 wire of 609.14 m.m. increased in length to 

 618.92 m.m. when charged with hydrogen, and 

 fell to 599.44 m.m., when the hydrogen was 

 extracted. The elongation was 9.77 m.m., and 

 the absolute shortening or retraction 9.7 m.m., 

 making the extreme difference in length 

 amount to 19.47 m.m. Mr. Graham proceeded 

 to say : 



Now, it is "by no means impossible that the volume 

 added to the wire by the hydrogenium is repre- 

 sented by the elongation and retraction taken to- 

 gether, and not by the elongation alone, as hitherto 

 assumed. It is only necessary to suppose that the 

 retraction of the palladium molecules takes place the 

 moment the hydrogenium is first absorbed, instead 

 of being deferred till the latter is expelled : for the 

 righting of the particles of the palladium- wire (which 

 are in a state of excessive tension in the direction of 

 the length of the wire) may as well take place in the 

 act of the absorption of the hydrogenium as in the 

 expulsion of that element. It may, indeed, appear 

 most probable in the abstract that the mobility of the 

 palladium particle is determined by the first entrance 

 of the hydrogenium. The hydrogenium will then 

 be assumed to occupy double the space previously 

 allotted to it, and the density of the metal will be re- 

 duced to one-half of the former estimate. In the ex- 

 periment referred to, the volume of hydrogenium in 

 the alloy will rise from 4.68 percent, to 9.36 per 

 cent., and the density of hydrogenium will fall from 

 1.708 to 0.854, according to the new calculation. In a 

 series of four observations upon the same wire, pre- 

 viously recorded, the whole retractions rather ex- 

 ceeded the whole elongations, the first amounting to 

 23.29 m.m., and the last to 21.38 m.m. Their united 

 amount would justify a still greater reduction in the 

 density of hydrogenium, namely, to 0.8051. 



The first experiment, however, in hydrogenating 

 any palladium-wire appears to be the most uniform 

 in its results. The expulsion of the hydrogen after- 

 ward by heat always injures the structure of the wire 

 more or less, and probably affects the regularity of 

 the expansion afterward in different directions. The 

 equality of the expansion and the retraction in a first 

 experiment appears, also, to be a matter of certainty. 

 This is a curious molecular fact, of which we are un- 

 able as yet to see the full import. In illustration, 

 another experiment upon a p_ure palladium-wire may 

 be detailed. This wire, which was new, took up a 

 full charge of hydrogen, namely, 956.3 volumes, and 

 increased in length from 609.585 to 619.354 m.m. 

 The elongation was, therefore, 9.769 m.m. With the 

 expulsion of the hydrogen afterward, the wire was 

 permanently shortened to 600.115 m.m. It thus fell 

 9.470 m.m. below its normal or first length. The 

 elongation and retraction are here within 0.3 m.m. of 

 equality. The two charges taken together amount to 

 19.239 m.m., and their sum represents the increase 

 of the wire in length due to the addition of hydro- 

 genium. It represents a linear expansion* of 3.205 on 

 100, with a cubic expansion of 9.827 on 100. The 

 composition of the wire comes to be represented as 

 being 



In volume. 



Palladium 100.000 or 90.895 



Hydrogenium 9.827 or 9.105 



109.827 or 100.000 



The specific gravity of the palladium was 

 12.3, the weight of the wire 1,554 grin., and 



