3Y8 Scientific Intelligence. 



SCIENTIFIC INTELLIGENCE. 



I. Chemistey and Physics. 



1. Lucium^ a supposed new element. — M. P. BareierEjId inves- 

 tigating monazite sand, has separated what he believes to be a 

 new element ; to this he has given the name lucium. Its chemi- 

 cal properties, compared with those of related elements, are 

 stated to be as follows : 



"The salts of cerium, lanthanum, and didymium form with 

 sodium sulphate insoluble double salts ; lucium does not. Thorium 

 and zirconium form insoluble double salts with potassium sul- 

 phate; this is not the case with lucium. Yttrium, ytterbium, 

 and erbium are not precipitable by sodium thiosulphate, whilst 

 lucium chloride is precipitable. From glucinium lucium diflfers, 

 as its salts are precipitable by oxalic acid. 



According to the results obtained by Prof. Schtitzenberger, con- 

 firmed by those of Cleve, Fresenius, and Lecoq de Boisbaudran, 

 lucium dissolves in sulphuric, nitric, or acetic acid, forming salts 

 either white or slightly tinted with rose-colour. All its salts are 

 soluble in water, forming limpid, colourless solutions. 



The spectral rays of lucium are special, and only approximate 

 slightly to those of erbium. Erbium oxide, on ignition, appears 

 of a very pure rose-colour, and its nitrate is red. On the con- 

 trary, lucium oxide is white, slightly greyish, and its nitrate is 

 white. The aqueous solutions of the erbium salts are red or rose- 

 colour ; those of lacium, even if containing 15 or 20 per cent of 

 the salt, are almost colourless. 



The atomic weight of lucium is calculated as z=. 104, whilst — 



Thorium = 238 



Yttrium _ _ = 89 



Ytterbium.- _ = 173 



Scandium = 44*5 



Cerium = 140 



Lanthanum „_ = 156 



Erbium = 166 



Zirconium = 90 



Samarium _ = 150 



Glucinium = 9 



Hence the authorities cited regard lucium as a new, distinct 

 elementary body." — Chem. JVews, Sept. 25, 1896. 



2. On the occurrence of gallium in the clay-ironstone of the 

 Cleveland district^ Yorkshire. — In the course of an investigation 

 of flame spectra at high temperatures, W. N. Hartley and Hugh 

 Ramage have examined the flames from the converters of the 

 basic Bessemer process at Middlesbrough-on-Tees. A large num- 

 ber of photographs were taken, which are stated to have been 

 remarkably fine in definition, and extending from the less refran- 



