466 GOLD, PLATINUM, PALLADIUM, c. 



bility may have been owing to the heat to which 

 it had been exposed. 



SECT. IV. 



OF THE ATOMIC WEIGHT OF PALLADIUM. 



MY stock of palladium was so small, that I was 

 under the necessity of making my experiments 

 upon a very minute scale. This precluded the 

 possibility of attaining the mathematical accu- 

 racy necessary for determining the atomic weight 

 with certainty ; but as my experiments, so far as 

 they go, confirm those already made by Berze- 

 lius on this metal, I flatter myself that the num- 

 ber which I have deduced from them is a very 

 near approximation to the truth. From the great 

 scarcity of this metal at present, it is unlikely 

 that quantities sufficiently large to decide the 

 point with certainty, will speedily be at the dis- 

 posal of any chemist. 



1. Palladium, as is known, dissolves in all the 

 acids ; but by far the best solvent of it is nitro- 

 muriatic acid : the solution has a very deep red 

 Properties colour. When we evaporate the solution to 

 of paiiadi. dryness, and re-dissolve the residual salt in wa- 

 ter, the colour of the liquid is a reddish brown ; 

 Hs taste is intensely astringent, without any ac- 

 companying flavour of a disagreeable nature. 



