Curie and Laborde[1] have tested the waters of a large number of mineral springs and found that the great majority contain the radium emanation. In this connection, it is of interest to note that Curie and Laborde found very little emanation in the waters of Salins-Moutiers, while Blanc[2] observed, on the other hand, that the sediment from the spring was very active. A closer examination of this deposit by Blanc revealed the fact that it contained a considerable quantity of thorium. This was proved by finding that it gave out an emanation, which lost half of its activity in one minute, and produced excited activity, which fell to half value in about 11 hours. Boltwood[3] has tested a number of samples of spring water from different sources in America and has found that many of them contain the radium emanation.
Most of the results upon the amount of radium emanation from different sources have been expressed in arbitrary units without, in many cases, any comparative standard being given. Boltwood (loc. cit.) has described a satisfactory method for collecting and testing the emanation from different waters, and has suggested that the rate of discharge observed by the electroscope or the electrometer should be expressed in terms of the effect due to the emanation liberated on solution of a definite weight of the mineral uraninite. Since in every mineral so far examined, the amount of radium present is proportional to the amount of uranium, such a standard would be sufficiently definite for practical purposes. The emanation liberated from a few centigrams of the mineral is sufficient to give a convenient rate of discharge of an electroscope. Such a method is preferable to using a known quantity of a radium compound as a standard, since it is difficult to know with certainty the activity of the preparations of radium which may be in the possession of the different experimenters.
277. Radio-activity of constituents of the earth. Elster
and Geitel[4] observed that, although in many cases the conductivity
of the air was abnormally high in underground enclosures, the
conductivity varied greatly in different places. In the Baumann
