BOOK ERRORS. The biographer of Francis Duke of Bridgewater, in the Biographie Universelle, states that the income-tax which he paid every year amounted alone to L.110,000 sterling. The fact is, that in the returns which the duke made under the property-tax he estimated his income at that amount. Lalande, the French astronomer, designates the famous philosopher Ferguson, Berger au roi d'Angleterre en Ecosse-the king of England's shepherd for Scotland. The fact is, he was merely, for a few early years of his life, shepherd to a small farmer in the neighbourhood of Keith in Banffshire. Thomas Holcroft translated Madame Genlis's Veillées du Chateau with the incorrect title of Tales of the Castle, instead of Evenings at the Country House. Every one has heard of Shakspeare's singular mistake as to the geography of Bohemia, and his supposition that Tunis and Naples were at an immeasurable distance from each other. But his error is not greater than that of Apollonius Rhodius, who mentions the Rhone and the Po as meeting and discharging themselves into the Gulf of Venice; or that of Eschylus, who places the river Eridanus in Spain. The chorus in Buchanan's tragedy of Jephtha mentions, in very familiar terms, the wealth of Croesus, who was not born till about six hundred years after Jephtha. Smollett, in his History of England, states that the ancient Britons 'sowed no corn, and lived in cottages thatched with straw.' If they sowed no corn, how could they get straw in an age when they were wholly cut off from the continent? In Youatt's Treatise on the Horse, p. 9, it is stated that 'the Barb has not the Arab's spirit or action; yet at page 12 we are told 'the Barb excels the Arab in noble and spirited action.' A desire to appear very knowing as to the authorship of popular anonymous works is a frequent cause of amusing blunders. Thus in Bohn's Guinea Catalogue (1841), p. 260, we find a quotation from 'Lord Brougham's Architecture of Birds,' a work written by Mr Rennie; and in Nattali's Catalogue, February 1841, we read of Lord Brougham's Pursuit of Knowledge,' a work written by Mr Craik. In Thorpe's Catalogue (No. 1, 1841, p. 2), a book printed at Mexico is said to be an interesting specimen of the South American press.' GURNEYISM. This term-of whose meaning perhaps nineteen-twentieths of our readers are utterly ignorant-is applied to a new and particular kind of manuring, which has been employed with signal success by Mr Gurney, a farmer in East Cornwall. The operation consists in covering grass land with long straw, coarse hay, or other fibrous matter, about 20 lbs. to the fall; allowing this covering to lie till the grass spring through it (which it does with astonishing rapidity) to the desired length, and then raking it off to allow the bestial to reach the pasture. The covering is then applied to another portion of the field; the operation of removal and covering being repeated so long as the straw or hay remains sufficiently entire to admit of convenient application. The merits of the system, which is yet in its infancy, was thus stated by Mr Gurney at a late meeting of the East Cornwall Experimental Club:'About seven weeks since, he had covered half a field of grass of three acres in this manner, and about a fortnight ago, when examined, the increase had been found to be at the rate of upwards of 5000 lbs. per acre over the uncovered portion of the field. At that time the straw was raked off and laid in rows 12 feet apart on the field, and 115 sheep were put on the grass, with a view to eat it down as quickly as possible. After they had been there about a week, they were succeeded by 26 bullocks, to eat off the long grass remaining, and which the sheep had left. The field was thus grazed as bare as possible. The same straw was now again thrown over the same portion of the field from which it had been raked; and on inspection that morning, he had found the action going on as powerfully as on the former occasion. He thought the sheep, on first raking off the straw, were not so fond of the grass as they were of that uncovered; but after 24 hours' exposure to the sun and air, he thought they rather preferred it. He had 40 acres now under the operation, and in consequence of it, he had had grass when his neighbours had none.' Fibrous covering, or Gurneyism, as thus described, is certainly a cheap and convenient mode of manuring; all that is wanted is only further experiment to test its general applicability. THE LAMENT OF THE IRISH EMIGRANT. And the corn is green again. And your breath warm on my cheek, 'Tis but a step down yonder lane, And the little church stands near- And my step might break your rest; I'm very lonely now, Mary, For the poor make no new friends; Yours was the good brave heart, Mary, When the trust in God had left my soul, And the kind look on your brow; I thank you for the patient smile, I bless you for the pleasant word, Were it fifty times as fair. And often in those grand old woods And the springing corn, and the bright May morn, -From an old newspaper. FORBEARANCE. If the peculiarities of our feelings and faculties be the effect of variety of excitement through a diversity of organisation, it should tend to produce in us mutual forbearance and toleration. We should perceive how nearly impossible it is that persons should feel and think exactly alike upon any subject. We should not arrogantly pride ourselves upon our virtues and knowledge, nor condemn the errors and weakness of others, since they may depend upon causes which we can neither produce nor easily counteract. No one, judging from his own feelings and powers, can be aware of the kind or degree of temptation or terror, or the seeming incapacity to resist them, which may induce others to deviate.-Abernethy. Published by W. and R. CHAMBERS, High Street, Edinburgh (also 98 Miller Street, Glasgow); and, with their permission, by W. S. ORR, Amen Corner, London.-Printed by W. and R. CHAMBERS, Edinburgh. CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE,' 'CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE,' &c. No. 83. NEW SERIES. SATURDAY, AUGUST 2, 1845. THE SCIENTIFIC MEETING AT CAMBRIDGE. FROM the accounts given in this journal of the meetings of the British Association at Glasgow and at York, our readers are aware that we regard that body and its proceedings in a favourable light. It has always appeared to us that a good end is served when men can be brought into personal association for the promotion of common objects and the enjoyment of common pleasures, as such meetings are usually found to insure harmony where otherwise there might be hostility, or at least indifference, and much can, of course, be done by combination, where single efforts would be useless. The British Association is also serviceable in awakening and stimulating efforts in behalf of science in the special districts where it meets, and in introducing local objects of scientific and general interest to the notice of many persons who otherwise would remain ignorant of them. It affords, likewise, a brief period of pleasant excitement and recreation to multitudes of studious persons greatly in need of relief from the monotony of their ordinary toils: even on this inferior ground, it could be defended from the ridicule with which certain members of the public press are pleased to assail what assuredly does no harm to any one, whatever may be the amount of positive good which it effects. The meeting of the present year (June 18-25) took place at Cambridge, where it had assembled for its third session (1833). It was allowed to be a good meeting in point of attendance (between a thousand and eleven hundred members), and there never had been any at which so many distinguished foreign savants were present. In one point of great importance, though of little popular interest, namely, the meteorological observations, it stands above all former meetings. Apart from this, it was not scientifically very brilliant, though it presented several salient points of considerable interest. One external circumstance added much to the enjoyment of all concerned, that the meeting was favoured throughout with the most beautiful weather. On arriving in Cambridge on the evening of the 18th, we found, as usual, all bustle and excitement at the reception-room, which on this occasion was in the town-hall. Many members being accommodated in the colleges, we experienced little difficulty in procuring an agreeable lodging; which important preliminary being settled, we sauntered forth to enjoy an evening walk amidst the august shades of those piles of past centuries in which English learning is sheltered-a scene always striking to a Scotchman, as being so different from anything of an analogous nature in his own country. And verily, as we saw the lofty spires of King's College chapel and of Trinity piercing the blue of a June night, and tipped with its palely stars, we could have fancied ourselves transported into a scene PRICE 14d. realised out of eastern fable. We bethought us of the power of even external beauty in protecting the institu tions here established. The most daring innovater might come hither full of eagerness to meddle with systems unquestionably representative rather of past centuries than the present, and we can conceive him so captivated through the agency of the mere æsthetics of the place, that, like Alaric awed by the venerableness of the Roman senate, into which he had intruded, our innovator would shrink from his task, and leave the business of reform to ruder hands. A sunbright morning saw the members hurrying to the various sectional meetings, according to their various predilections. The first section of which we shall speak -the Geological-we found accommodated in the senatehouse, a beautiful Grecian building of about the time of Queen Anne, finely decorated within with carved wood-work, and having a platform with rising seats at the upper end, surmounted by a canopy under which the existing royalty of England had recently sat. This was by far the largest and best room enjoyed by any of the sections, and it was assigned to the geological because the meetings of that body are generally the most numerously attended. It may be mentioned parenthetically, that the geological is also the section usually most frequented by the ladies; indeed it is almost the only section which enjoys any share of feminine patronage. On the present occasion, we found a brilliant assemblage of both sexes seated on benches across the room, while Professor Sedgwick, Dr Buckland, Mr Murchison, Sir Henry de la Beche, and other chiefs of geological science, were mustering on the platform. Mr Sedgwick soon after assumed the presidency of the section, and proceeded, as an appropriate commencement of business, to give an exposition of the geology of the immediate neighbourhood of Cambridge. During this and subsequent days, the geological section maintained its character, as one which mingles more pleasantries with science than any of the rest. The fact is, that its leaders are men of lively and varied talents, who, being on the most friendly footing with each other, cannot meet even before a large miscellaneous audience without indulging in their customary familiarity of discourse. There was, therefore, hardly a paper read, or an exposition made, that was not followed by a conversation in which sober and instructive remarks were relieved by facetiæ more or less generally appreciable. The quick vivacious movements of Professor Sedgwick, whose ideas flow too rapidly even for an unusually rapid discourse, contrasted delightfully with the measured oratorical tone and grave demeanour in which the jocundities of Dr Buckland were enunciated. The audience on these occasions seemed to feel that it added much to the enjoyment of the knowledge imparted, that its authors should thus be able to come down, not inde corously, to the level of the unlearned. And here we may remark, that, at one of the general evening meetings, when the beautiful electro-magnetic machine of Mr Armstrong of Newcastle was exhibited, several of the physicists, as Sir David Brewster and Mr Faraday, joined heartily in the amusement occasioned by the shocks which were circulated amongst the ladies and gentlemen present. At one time, we observed a long loop of people with joined hands, extending through the multitude in the senate-house, somewhat like a party standing up for a country dance: several philosophers were of the number. When the engine was put in motion, the whole of these persons might have been seen in a kind of dance at one moment, from the effects of the electricity. Two minutes after, Mr Faraday was on the platform, expounding the nature of the agent that had excited them all so much, in language that introduced awe and deep feeling where recently nothing but merriment had been. Of the other sections, two were on this occasion hardly existent, namely, the Medical and Mechanical. The rest were active, and to make up in some degree for the failure of these, there was a sub-section for the new science of Ethnology (the characters of nations), which abounded in valuable papers. Hereafter, the Medical is to appear under the title of the Physiological, so as to embrace a wider range of subjects. We now propose to present notices of a few of the most generally interesting matters brought before the various sections. MR BONOMI ON CERTAIN GIGANTIC BIRDS OF FORMER TIMES. The existence of slabs of the new red sandstone of America marked with footsteps of large birds apparently of the stork species, is well known. As some of these animals are calculated to have been fifteen feet high, they were at first supposed to have no parallel in the present state of nature; but this was soon found to be not the case, as several specimens of the bones of a bird not less gigantic have since been sent home from New Zealand, where it is spoken of by the natives as recently existing under the name of Moa. There have also been discovered by Captain Flinders, on the south coast of New Holland, in King George's Bay, some very large nests, measuring twenty-six feet in circumference and thirty-two inches in height; resembling, in dimensions, some that are described by Captain Cook, as seen by him on the north-east coast of the same island, about 15 degrees south latitude. It would appear, by some communications made to the editor of the Athenæum, that Professor Hitchcock of Massachusetts had suggested that these colossal nests belonged to the Moa. In connection with these discoveries is another from an opposite quarter. Between the years 1821 and 1823, Mr James Burton discovered on the west coast, or Egyptian side of the Red Sea, opposite the peninsula of Mount Sinai, at a place called Gebel Ezzeit, where, for a considerable distance, the margin of the sea is inaccessible from the Desert, three colossal nests within the space of one mile. These nests were not in an equal state of preservation; but, from one more perfect than the others, he judged them to be about fifteen feet in height, or, as he observed, the height of a camel and its rider. These nests were composed of a mass of heterogeneous materials, piled up in the form of a cone, and sufficiently well put together to insure adequate solidity. The diameter of the cone at its base was estimated as nearly equal to its height, and the apex, which terminated in a slight concavity, measured about two feet six inches or three feet in diameter. The materials of which the great mass was composed were sticks and weeds, fragments of wreck, and the bones of fishes; but in one was found the thorax of a man, a silver watch made by George Prior, a London watchmaker of the last century, celebrated throughout the East, and in the nest or basin at the apex of the cone, some pieces of woollen cloth and an old shoe. That these nests had been but recently constructed, was sufficiently evident from the shoe and watch of the shipwrecked pilgrim, whose tattered clothes and whitened bones were found at no great distance; but of what genus or species had been the architect and occupant of the structure, Mr Burton could not, from his own observation, determine. From the accounts of the Arabs, however, it was presumed that these nests had been occupied by remarkably large birds of the stork kind, which had deserted the coast but a short time previous to Mr Burton's visit. To these facts,' said Mr Bonomi, 'I beg to add the following remarks:-Among the most ancient records of the primeval civilisation of the human race that have come down to us, there is described, in the language the most universally intelligible, a gigantic stork bearing, with respect to a man of ordinary dimensions, the proportions exhibited in the drawing before you, which is faithfully copied from the original document. It is a bird of white plumage, straight and large beak, long feathers in the tail; the male bird has a tuft at the back of the head, and another at the breast; its habits apparently gregarious. This very remarkable painted basso-relievo is sculptured on the wall, in the tomb of an officer of the household of Pharaoh Shufu (the Suphis of the Greeks), a monarch of the fourth dynasty, who reigned over Egypt while yet a great part of the Delta was intersected by lakes overgrown with the papyrus-while yet the smaller ramifications of the parent stream were inhabited by the crocodile and hippopotamus-while yet, as it would seem, that favoured land had not been visited by calamity, nor the arts of peace disturbed by war; so the sculpture in these tombs intimate, for there is neither horse nor instrument of war in any one of these tombs. At that period, the period of the building of the Great Pyramid, which, according to some writers on Egyptian matters, was in the year 2100 B.C., which, on good authority, is the 240th year of the deluge, this gigantic stork was an inhabitant of the Delta, or its immediate vicinity; for, as these very interesting documents relate, it was occasionally entrapped by the peasantry of the Delta, and brought with other wild animals, as matters of curiosity, to the great landholders or farmers of the products of the Nile-of which circumstance this painted sculpture is a representation, the catching of fish and birds, which in these days occupied a large portion of the inhabitants. The birds and fish were salted. That this document gives no exaggerated account of the bird, may be presumed from the just proportion that the quadrupeds, in the same picture, bear to the men who are leading them; and, from the absence of any representation of these birds in the less ancient monuments of Egypt, it may also be reasonably conjectured they disappeared soon after the period of the erection of these tombs. With respect to the relation these facts bear to each other, I beg to remark, that the colossal nests of Captains Cook and Flinders, and also those of Mr James Burton, were all on the sea-shore, and all of those about an equal distance from the equator. But whether the Egyptian birds, as described in those very ancient sculptures, bear any analogy to those recorded in the pages of the great stone book of nature (the new red sandstone formation), or whether they bear analogy to any of the species determined by Professor Owen from the New Zealand fossils, I am not qualified to say, nor is it indeed the object of this paper to discuss; the intention of which being rather to bring together these facts, and to associate them with that recorded at Gezah, in order to call the attention of those who have opportunity of making further research into this interesting matter.'* DISTRIBUTION OF PLANTS. Professor Edward Forbes, of King's College, excited great interest in the Natural History section by a curious speculative paper respecting the distribution of plants. He started with the proposition, that, admit * Athenæum Report. islands, or members of chains of islands, extending to the area of Norway through a glacial sea, and clothed with an arctic vegetation, which, in the gradual upheaval of those islands, and consequent change of climate, became limited to the summits of the new-formed and still-existing mountains. 5. The distribution of the fifth, or Germanic flora, depended on the upheaval of the bed of the glacial sea, and the consequent connexion of Ireland with England, and of England with Germany, by great plains, the fragments of which still exist, and upon which lived the great elk and other quadrupeds now extinct. The breaking up or submergence of the first barrier led to the destruction of the second; that of the second to that of the third; but the well-marked epoch of migration of the Germanic flora indicates the subsequent formation of the Straits of Dover and of the Irish Sea, as now existing. ting or assuming the theory, that there have been seve 4. The distribution of the fourth, or Alpine flora of ral distinct centres of creation for plants (the idea now Scotland and Wales, was effected during the glacial paramount amongst naturalists), the isolation or separa-period, when the mountain summits of Britain were low tion of assemblages of individual plants from their centres, and the existence of endemic or very local plants, are not satisfactorily accounted for by the agency of the sea, rivers, and winds, and carriage by animals, or through the agency of man. It is usual to say' (here we quote from Mr Forbes's abstract*), that the presence of many plants is determined by soil or climate, as the case may be; but if such plants be found in areas disconnected from their centres by considerable intervals, some other cause than the mere influence of soil or climate must be sought to account for their presence. This cause the author proposes to seek in an ancient connexion of the outposts or isolated areas with the original centres, and the subsequent isolation of the former through geological changes and events, especially those dependent on the elevation and depression of land. Selecting the flora of the British islands for a first illustration of this view, Professor Forbes calls attention to the fact, well known to botanists, of certain species of flowering plants being found indigenous in portions of that area at a great distance from the nearest assem blages of individuals of the same species in countries beyond it. Thus many plants peculiar in the British flora to the west of Ireland, have the nearest portion of their specific centres in the north-west of Spain; others confined with us to the south-west promontory of England, are, beyond our shores, found in the Channel Isles and the opposite coast of France; the vegetation of the south-east of England is that of the opposite part of the continent; and the Alpine vegetation of Wales and the Scotch Highlands is intimately related to that of the Norwegian Alps. The great mass of the British flora has its most intimate relations with that of Germany. The vegetation of the British islands may be said to be composed of five floras:-1st, A west Pyrenean, confined to the west of Ireland, and mostly to the mountains of that district; 2d, A flora related to that of the south-west of France, extending from the Channel Isles, across Devon and Cornwall, to the south-east and part of the south-west of Ireland; 3d, A flora common to the north of France and south-east of England, and especially developed in the chalk districts; 4th, An Alpine flora, developed in the mountains of Wales, north of England, and Scotland; and, 5th, A Germanic flora, extending over the greater part of Great Britain and Ireland, mingling with the other floras, and diminishing, though slightly, as we proceed westwards, indicating its easterly origin and relation to the characteristic flora of northern Germany. Interspersed among the members of the last-named flora, are very few specific centres peculiar to the British isles. The author numbers in ascending order these floras, according to their magnitude as to species, and also, in his opinion, according to their relative age and period of introduction into the area of the British islands. His conclusions on this point are the following:: 1. The oldest of the floras now composing the vegetation of the British isles is that of the mountains of the west of Ireland. Though an Alpine flora, it is southernmost in character, and is quite distinct as a system from the floras of the Scottish and Welsh Alps. Its very southern character, its limitation, and its extreme isolation, are evidences of its antiquity, pointing to a period when a great mountain barrier extended across the Atlantic from Ireland to Spain. 2. The distribution of the second flora, next in point of probable date, depended on the extension of a barrier, the traces of which still remain, from the west of France to the south-east of Britain, and thence to Ireland. 3. The distribution of the third flora depended on the connexion of the coast of France and England towards the eastern part of the Channel. Of the former existence of this union no geologist doubts. * Literary Gazette, June 28. To determine the probable geological epoch of the first or west Irish flora-a fragment perhaps with that of north-western Spain, of a vegetation of the true Atlantic-we must seck among fossil plants for a furthermost starting point. This we get in the flora of the London clay, or eocene, which is tropical in character, and far anterior to the oldest of the existing floras. The geographical relations of the miocene sea, indicated by the fossils of the crag, give an after-date certainly to the second and third of the above floras, if not to the first. The epoch of the red or middle crag was probably coeval with the second flora; that of the mammaliferous crag with the third. The date of the fourth is too evident to be questioned; and the author regards the glacial region in which it flourished as a local climate, of which no true traces, as far as animal life is concerned, exist southwards of his second and third barriers. This was the newer pliocene epoch. The period of the fifth flora was that of the post-tertiary, when the present aspect of things was organised. 6 Adopting such a view of the relations of these floras in time, the greatest difficulties in the way of changes of the earth's surface and destruction of barriers-deep sea being found where land (probably high land) wasare removed, when we find that those greater changes must have happened during the epoch immediately subsequent to the miocene period; for we have undoubted evidence that elsewhere, during that epoch, the miocene sea-bed was raised 6000 feet in the chain of Taurus, and the barriers forming the westward boundary of the Asiatic eocene lakes so completely annihilated, that a sea several hundred fathoms deep now takes their probable place. The changes required for the events which the author would connect with the peculiar distribution of the British flora, are not greater than these. 'Professor Forbes maintains that the peculiar distribution of endemic animals, especially that of the terrestrial mollusca, bears him out in these views. He proposes to pursue the subject in detail, with reference both to animal and vegetable life, in connexion with the researches of the geological survey.' EXPERIMENTS OF PROFESSOR BOUTIGNY-FREEZING OF WATER IN RED-HOT VESSELS. No subject before the Association excited more popular interest than certain experiments performed in the Chemical section by Professor Boutigny. The room of assembly being small, it was impossible that one-half of those desirous of witnessing the experiments could be admitted. They were repeated, and yet, on the second occasion, many, amongst whom were ourselves, went away ungratified. The exposition of M. Boutigny, which was in French, referred to the spheroidal state of bodies, and the application of this knowledge to steam-boilers.' As is well known from every-day experience, when drops of water are thrown upon red-hot iron, they assume a spherical form. It is not so well MODIFICATIONS OF SHELLS IN SUCCESSIVE STRATA IN Professor Edward Forbes made a joint communication for himself and Captain Sprat, R.N., on a remarkable phenomenon connected with certain freshwater tertiary strata in the island of Cos. In a diagram exhibited, three such strata, marked A, B, and C, in ascending succession, lay against a mass of scaglia, and were unconformably surmounted with a marine formation. In stratum A, there were shells of well-known species of fresh-water mollusca, especially paludina and nereitina as usual, their convolutions were devoid of ribbings or humps. But in stratum B, the same shells were found with a hump on each convolution; and in stratum C, the same shells had three humps. There were here appearances of either a transmutation of species, or a creation of new species, neither of which propositions he was willing to admit. He had therefore suppressed the surprise he felt at the phenomenon for upwards of two years, until at length a better explanation had occurred to him. It had been ascertained, that when fresh-water molluscs were put into brackish water, their shells in time experienced a distortion, provided that the species could survive and propagate in such circumstances. He was therefore of opinion that an intrusion of the sea had taken place in the freshwater lake in which stratum B was formed, and that this had been attended by the destruction of several of the weaker-lunged species which appear in A, and the distortion of the shells of the stronger-lunged (pectenibranchiate) which remained. In stratum C, more salt water had come in, and increased the deformities, as described. There was thus a modification of forms, but not a change of species. At the conclusion of this paper, which was listened to with great interest, Mr Lyell and other gentlemen present stated other instances of a change of figure experienced by fresh-water molluscs which had been exposed to the influence of salt water. It has the effect of dwarfing and distorting them. DR BUCKLAND ON THE AGENCY OF LAND SNAILS IN FORM ING HOLES AND TRACKWAYS IN COMPACT LIMESTONE. The learned doctor here made further observations on a subject which he had brought before the Association four years ago, and which, he complained, had then and since been treated with much scepticism. He had found limestone at various places (Tenby, Boulogne, Plymouth) presenting surfaces downwards, and in these surfaces there were holes in which land snails were sheltered. In some instances, these holes were several inches deep, and in a few, two or three met together in the interior of the stone Dr Buckland said he had found these marked surfaces invariably in the neighbourhood of pastures where snails were numerous; and so certain was their appearance in certain circumstances, that oftener than once he had, in travelling, pointed to a rock as one that would be found marked, and it had proved to be so. He exhibited specimens of limestone from several localities, showing perforations still containing the shells of snails, or furrows leading to the perforations, and he insisted that these were unlike any that are produced by other causes. The fact of their always being on the under surfaces of ledges, and thus presented downwards, proved that they were independent of atmospheric causes. He did not mean that the snails required holes for their residence; but he maintained that the perforations were a result of their sheltering there, and acid exuding from their skin being the agent which wore down the stone. Dr Buckland had even made some approach to an ascertainment of the rate at which the stone becomes perforated. He had found the lower faces of the ledges in the wall of Richborough castle marked in this manner to the depth of about an inch and a half. Richborough was a work of the Romans, who had left it fourteen hundred years ago. Assuming that the snails commenced operations at that time, it appeared that they wrought their way into the stone at the rate of an inch in a thousand years. The reading of this paper excited some merriment; but the view taken by Dr Buckland of the operation of the snails was generally acceded to; and its being one of no unimportant character in science, is shown by its demolishing an inference which had been drawn from certain perforated rocks, as evidence of a raised beach. It is now seen, that what a former inquirer deemed to have been effected by the wearing action of the sea, was the work of a few humble land snails. Besides the meetings at the seven sections, there were general assemblages in the evening at the senate-house : the first, on Thursday evening, was devoted to the business of installing the president elect, Sir John Herschel. The Dean of Ely (Dr Peacock), the president of the past year, introduced his successor in terms which were almost affecting, from the allusion they contained to the two men having been competitors thirty-two years before for college honours. Sir John, on taking the chair, replied with like feeling, and read an address embracing a variety of philosophical subjects. It was painful to find that this eminent person, while possessing the usual appearances of health, has |