XXV 



Iron manufactured, or from telluric sources, was found to contain car- 

 bonic oxide. 



Silver, gold, copper, osmium-iridium took up little gas, and antimony no 

 hydrogen. He divides the metals into crystalline and colloid. 



His paper of May 16th, 1867, enters more fully into the subject, and 

 shows that meteoric iron contains hydrogen, with the probability, if 

 not certainty, that it was cooled in an atmosphere of that gas. Messrs. 

 Huggins and Miller, as well as Father Secchi, had concluded that hydrogen 

 is one of the gases shown on the spectrum of the fixed stars, and especially 

 mentioned it as found with the unusual increased light of T Coronse in 

 November 1866. The actual handling of the gas brought from distant 

 space was a strange experimental proof, and was remarkably characteristic 

 of Graham's peculiar inclination to place his work before his thought. 

 He seemed to feel his way by his work. He was not able to impregnate 

 iron with above one volume of hydrogen, whereas the meteoric iron contains 

 at least three. He thinks this shows that it may have been absorbed under 

 pressure. 



On May 22nd, 1868, he showed that palladium took up 0*723 per cent, 

 by weight of hydrogen ; and he inclines to believe that the passage of the 

 gas through palladium is analogous to liquid diffusion through a colloid. 



Asa private man, Graham led an uneventful life ; but no man has passed 

 through the world more uniformly respected. Too retired, too quiet, his 

 life appears to have a deep tinge of melancholy in it, notwithstanding its 

 eminent success. Very intimate friends he had few out of the circle of 

 the family of brothers and sisters, who were strongly attached to him, 

 and to whom he was much devoted, being himself unmarried. 



As a scientific man, his claims were never disputed ; he was not called 

 to assert his position, and he remained the undisputed head of his depart- 

 ment. He received in early life (1834) the Keith Medal of the Royal 

 Society of Edinburgh, and the Royal Medal of this Society in 1838, and 

 in 1862 the Copley Medal. He was made a Doctor of Civil Law of Ox- 

 ford, Honorary Member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Corresponding 

 Member of the French Institute and of the Academies of Berlin and 

 Munich, and of the National Institute of Washington. His election into 

 the Royal Society was in 1836. 



On his appointment to the Mint, Mr. Graham laboured assiduously and 

 successfully in acquiring a thorough knowledge of the technical work and 

 financial relations of his office, and discharged his duties with much energy 

 and judgment. It is known that he brought about various reforms and econo- 

 mies in the working of the establishment ; but the service for which he will 

 be chiefly remembered was the introduction of the new bronze coinage, 

 which, besides substituting a more convenient medium of circulation than 

 that in previous use, was attended with a pecuniary profit to the state of 

 very large amount. 



VOL. XVIII. C 



