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The Story of Coal-Gas 67 in his laboratory. He was investigating a certain solution into which he dipped a piece of cotton. Afterwards he lighted the saturated material. To his complete surprise he noticed that, although the cotton was burned away, the salt of the solution with which it had been impregnated remained, and what was more remarkable, retained the shape and form of the original cotton material. He also noticed that, when brought into contact with heat, the salt assumed a state of incandescence and emitted a striking illumination. Although his researches were in a different direc- tion and were not influenced by this brilliant light, its occurrence induced him to pause and to reflect. As a result of his pondering he abandoned the investi- gation which he had taken in hand, and devoted his energies towards the new problem which had suddenly thrust itself before him. He repeated the accidental experiment, soaking pieces of material, time after time, in the solution of the rare earths zirconium, lanthanium, yttrium and others, and sub- sequently burning away the combustible fabric. In every instance the astonishing result which he had first detected was repeated. Then he took to shaping pieces of material in the forms of hoods or caps, which were similarly soaked in the solutions. These he found to preserve their shape after the base had been consumed by fire. The solutions of further rare earths, both simple and in combination, were tested, from which he found that some solutions, when converted into a metallic oxide by burning away the base, gave a more brilliant light than others. This led him to ascertain that the