exxviii Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. [N.S., XV, 
In view of — t sersoaes that the tubes themselves might be 
permeable to atmospheric neon while the discharge was pass- 
ing, the susie tube was enclosed in an outer tube, which in 
the usual quantity of neon, quite free from helium, was found 
in the inner tube; but in the one in which the outer tube had 
been evacuated, on washing the latter out with a little an 
oxygen, a residue was obtained about fifty times as great a 
that from the inner tube, consisting of nearly pure helium, with 
a trace of neon. 
the meantime Patterson, working independently at 
Leeds, had submitted pure hydrogen at very low pressures to 
the action of the discharge, a ad in many cases obtained 
the discharge obtained helium therefrom. On ing a dis- 
charge through the inner tube when the sbenipeee: was filled 
with pure oxygen at about 15 mm. pressure, neon, not helium. 
was obtained. The volume of the helium or neon obtained 
from the outer jacket, both in Collie’s and Patterson’s experi- 
ments, was about 1 ¢.mm., the amount iene the inner tube 
corresponding roughly with ‘that i in 1 ¢.c. of a 
The next contribution, > Merton, appeareas in the follow- 
ing year. Merton made use of a very simple and ingenious 
tus in which no ‘reautetense of the gas for examination 
was submitted to bombardment by cathode rays. In eight 
consecutive experiments, a Aero capillary tube full of mixed 
neon and helium at about 2 mm. pressure was obtained. For 
the ninth experiment a more powerful coil with a mercury 
break was used, and no helium or neon obtained; on reverting 
to the use of the old coil, these gases appeared as before. In 
no one of these experiments was sufficient argon present to 
give anything but a faint spectrum ore a nee set disc e. 
A general description of the types of apparatus used, and o 
the results obtained, was published oa ty “Collie, Patter- 
son and Masson in 1915. It me ‘Stated that by the rine 
tinum, 
fluoride, potassium chloride, vouiuianin iodide, rubidium ohis- 
with a trace of neon, whereas if no special anticathode was 
