ZN eR ey, cae Hecate By pamaesrss Bee a sores tere? soak Stes Pastayays Theo Dale, arate Peery Baviap bags pocias Corey Faas Peay esyz 08 rar) berths fetes Ve ete? bende CEPR Ty Anes Hy pee ada Sakti Pe 45 Mpetpreee bat sitet Rytiate oes e a YE re hag T etedtoe: 42> ieee : ng soaps Saeo ahah ene 9 H #51 hoa {EAD epee tty ot / Bae veers en .y . . ev es Cy Feb Bb Bet Wor Faebe 44 4, 3 Waar het hk oe haa se beh Sash PRIM GA Le mile epee a at yes tee naihes SU ek bom g eg ee PGSM IETS phe ce aha) aia nere 42557 04 CaP B Ys eee Sb Y 4 ORAM Be nei aE ga Ecke pea'y. Phi tt) bi Rorrase ay tosis PW Bip As 5828, GUD eA ENERO aah ty AOA eS ery tay aieyive oa WAS 43963 fe i (py) ty Thrk b> es Bes? BI Rear er fib. RIE Rae bp enes flee 2ianieny Sat ees eat, CONTA a i ie owt; we BO, 3 ig ; THE EDINBURGH NEW PHILOSOPHICAL JOURNAL. THE EDINBURGH NEW PHILO SOPHICAL JOURNAL, EXHIBITING A VIEW OF THE PROGRESSIVE DISCOVERIES AND IMPROVEMENTS IN THE SCIENCES AND THE ARTS. EDITORS. THOMAS ANDERSON, M.D., F.RS.E., Sm WILLIAM JARDINE, Barr., F.RS.E. ; JOHN HUTTON BALFOUR, M.A., M.D., F.RSS.L. & EB, F.LS., REGIUS KEEPER OF THE ROYAL BOTANIC GARDEN, AND PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE AND BOTANY, UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH. FOR AMERICA, HENRY DARWIN ROGERS, Hon. F.R.S.E., F.GS., STATE GEOLOGIST, PENNSYLVANIA; LATE PROFESSOR OF GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY, UNIVERSITY, PENNSYLVANIA. 115) Oh Shee OCTOBER 1856. VOL. IV. NEW SERIES, EDINBURGH : ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK. LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, & LONGMANS, LONDON. MDCCCLVI. EDINBURGH: PRINTED BY NEILL AND COMPANY, OLD FISHMARKET. CONTENTS. . An Account of some Experiments on certain Sea-Weeds of an Edible kind. By Joun Davy, M.D., F.R.SS. Lond. & Ed., &c., . Exposition of the Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. By Atexanver Bryson, F.S.A. Scot., . On the Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. By Hucu Mac- MILLAN, F.B.S.E., . Displacement and Extinction among the Primeval Races of Man. _By Danret Witson, LL.D., Professor of History and English Literature, University College, Toronto, . An Experimental Inquiry, undertaken with the view of ascertaining whether any signs of Current Electricity are manifested in Plants during Vegetation. By H. F. Baxter, Esq., - ; . On the Occurrence of Scalariform Tissue in the Devonian Strata of the South of Ireland. By Rozert Harx- ness, F.R.SS. L. & E., F.G.S., Professor of Geology, Queen’s College, Cork, (Plate I.), . Geology ofthe Southern Concan. By Lieut. A, Ayroun, Bombay Artillery. (Plate II.), PAGE 12 27 39 49 64 67 10. 11. 12. Or CONTENTS. . On the Reproduction of Cydippe pomiformis. By T. STRETHILL Wricut, M.D., . On two new Actinias. By T. Stretuitt Wricut, M.D. (Plate III.), On the Double Salts of Cadmium and the Organic Bases. By J. Gattetty, Assistant to Dr Anperson, Glas- gow University, Notice of the Systematic Position and Manners of Bale- niceps rex, Gould. By M. Jutes VERREAUX, Notice of the late James Witson, Esq. of Woodville, REVIEWS :— . The Science of Beauty as developed in Nature and ap- plied to Art. By D. R. Hay, Esq., F.R.S.E., . Neue Lehre von den Proportionen des Menschlichen Korpers. Von Professor Dr A. Zztsine, . Geological Map of Europe. By Sir Ropzrickx I. Mur- cHison and James Nicot, . Sermons in Stones. By Dominick M‘Coustanp, . Pictures of Nature. By Epwin Loss, F.LS., . An Attempt to Classify the Flowering Plants and Ferns of Great Britain, according to their Geognostic Rela- tions. By Joun GitBerT Baker, PAGE 85 92 94 101 106 121 121 137 142 143 143 CONTENTS. PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES :— Royal Society of Edinburgh, Royal Physical Society, Botanical Society of Edinburgh, SCIENTIFIC INTELLIGENCE :— ZOOLOGY. 1. Conclusions drawn regarding the Composition of Eggs. 2. Birds forming Guano. 3. Edible Nests of Swal- 162 168 lows. 4. Scyllarus arctus, : < 177-178 GEOLOGY. 5, Examination of some Deep Soundings from the Atlantic Ocean. 6. Geological Report upon the Gold District in the neighbourhood of Smithfield. 7. On the Pro- bable Depths of the Cretaceous Ocean. 8. On the Grooving and Polishing of Hard Rocks and Minerals by Dry Sand. 9. Extent of the Gold Fields of Cali- fornia, &e. 10. General Statistics of Gold. 11. Rep- tiian Remains found in the Old Red Sandstone of Morayshire, : : : 179-190 CHEMISTRY. 12. On the equivalent of Antimony. 13. On Silicon. 14. On the Detection of Strychnine, 191 iv CONTENTS. BOTANY. — 5. Vegetable Ivory Plant. 16. Yerva de Paraguay, or Paraguay Tea. 17. Textile Plants. 18. Fungus imbedded in Fens of Cambridgeshire. 19. New Method of Disintegrating Masses of Fossil Diatoma- PAGE cee, : : : : : 192-196 MINERALOGY, 20. Voigtite, a new Mineral from the Ehrenberg, near II- menan. 21. Tantalite containing Zirconia from Li- moges. 22. Carnallite, a new Mineral. 23. Com- position of some Varieties of Arsenical Pyrites and Arsenical Iron. 24. Notice regarding the Mineral called Tyrite. 25. Compact Boracite of Stass- furt, : : : : . 196-198 METEOROLOGY. 26, On the States and Prospects of the Scottish Meteorolo- gical Association, MISCELLANEOUS. 27. Notice of the Rock-Basons at Deo (Devi) Dhoora, near Almorah in Upper India, 28. Egg Albumen in Calico Printing. 29, Hints in regard to Dredging Observations, ; ; PuBLICATIONS RECEIVED, . 199 204-206 208 THE EDINBURGH NEW PHILOSOPHICAL JOURNAL. An Account of some Experiments on certain Sea-Weeds of an Edible kind. By Joun Davy, M.D., F.R.SS. Lond. & Ed., &c. The subjects of the experiments I am about to give an account of have been four, Carrigeen Moss (Chondrus eris- pus), Dulse or Dylisk (Rhodomenia palmata), Sloke or Laver (Porphyra laciniata), Tangle (Laminaria digitata), Dough- laghman (Fucus vesiculosus). The results I have obtained are fewer and more imperfect than I could wish; I can offer them only as a small contri- bution, with the hope that they may induce others more fayour- ably situated to engage in and extend the inquiry concerning a class of substances which certainly have not yet received the degree of attention they deserve, especially from the ana- lytical chemist. 1. Of Carrigeen Moss (Chondrus crispus). That which I have examined has been from Ireland, and in its bleached state,—the state in which it is sent into the market, and is coming into use for the purpose of feeding stock. It is of a light-yellowish hue, of a crisp feel, and of a faint peculiar flavour, without saltness, having been steeped and washed in fresh water preparatory to bleaching. NEW SERIES.—VOL. IV. No. I.—JuLy 1856. A bo Dr Davy’s Experiments on It appears to be composed principally of three substances ; one analogous to gum, soluble in cold water, and having most of the properties of mucilage as represented by gum-arabic ; one analogous to gelatine as existing in isinglass, soluble in boiling water ; and the third neither soluble in cold nor boiling water, the nature of which remains to be ascertained. Judg- ing from one trial, these exist in the following proportions :— 28:5 Gummy matter. 49-0 Gelatinous matter. 22:5 Insoluble matter. The gummy matter was separated by repeated infusions of cold water, the gelatinous by repeated decoctions, changing the water each time till no more matter was dissolved; and the quantity of each was determined by weighing the matter abstracted, obtained by evaporation of the several infusions and decoctions, and the loss was considered as representing the undissolved matter, the quantity of which remaining near- ly agreed with this estimate. Of the mucilaginous and gelatinous ingredients, I may briefly mention that the former is precipitated from its solu- tion by subacetate of lead and alcohol, but not, like the latter, by infusion of nut-galls. The gelatine from Chondrus ecrispus, it is worthy of re- mark, even exceeds isinglass in its power of coagulating milk on cooling after boiling. Thus, 1 grain of it boiled and dis- solved in 127 grains of milk, on cooling formed a pretty firm coagulum: repeating the experiment, substituting 1 grain of isinglass, the result was a less firm coagulum, and requiring a longer time to form. Further, when the alga- gelatine is dissolved in such a proportion of water as not to gelatinize on cooling, as 2:3 grains in 130 of water, milk poured into it immediately coagulated, became liquid on boiling, solidifying again on cooling; but isinglass in the same proportion had no immediate effect on milk. Chondrus crispus burns with flame, and yields a consider- able quantity of saline ash; in one trial it amounted to 10 per cent., 7 of which were soluble in water with an alkaline reaction, and consisted chiefly of common salt, with a little sulphate of lime and a minute quantity of an iodine com- certain Sea-Weeds of an Edible kind. 3 pound. The portion insoluble in water was found to contain phosphate of lime, with some carbonate of lime and magnesia, with which was mixed a small quantity of siliceous sand. The carbonate of lime and sand may be considered as acci- dental and extraneous, the former derived from some minute coral adhering to the weed, the latter mechanically entangled in it. Iodine appears to be an intimate ingredient of the plant. I have found it both in the ashes of the mucilaginous portion, when that has been incinerated apart, and also in the ashes of the gelatinous and of the residual insoluble portion. When subjected to destructive distillation, this alga affords an empyreumatic fluid, which, mixed with lime, gives off a strong smell of ammonia. In the sequel I shall state the pro- portion of nitrogen which this and the other species of alge named were found to contain, for which I am indebted to my friend Dr Apjohn, the distinguished professor of chemistry in Trinity College, Dublin. 2. Of Dylisk or Dulse (Rhodomenia palmata). The specimens which I have examined of this alga were procured from Galway and Letterkenny in Ireland, and in the state in which they were brought to market for sale. That from the former town had small mussels mixed with it adher- ing to the fronds ; that from the latter, which was chiefly the subject of my experiments, was free from them. Both were unbleached and unwashed, and consequently re- tained their purple colour, and tasted salt. That from Gal- way, besides the salt taste, had a flavour not unlike that of oysters, which it might have derived from the juice of the shell-fish. When well washed, the alga is almost tasteless ; chewed,—the manner in which it is commonly eaten by the peasantry without being dressed,—it has a mucilaginous feel in the mouth, with a slight acrid after-taste. Its smell, which is best perceived in its infusion, resembles not a little that of violets. The colouring matter of the alga is soluble in water. By boiling in water the colour of the plant is changed to green, as is also thatof itsinfusion. It is capable of combining with A2 4 Dr Davy’s Experiments on alumine ; thus, if alum be added to the coloured aqueous in- fusion, and the alumine be precipitated by ammonia, the colouring matter is carried down with and retained in the precipitate. It appears to be insoluble in cold alcohol. Fronds have been kept many days steeped in alcohol without the spirit acquiring any colour, or the alga losing its colour; but when boiled a partial solution has taken place; the colour of the fronds has changed to greenish-brown, and the spirit has acquired a tint of green. It may be worthy of remark, that on cooling the fronds recover their original colour, but little impaired. This alga appears to be composed of a gummy matter soluble in cold water, of a matter soluble in boiling water having some of the properties of gum, and of a matter in- soluble in both. Twice infused, and during about twenty- four hours, in water at 50° Fahrenheit, the infusions evapor- ated yielded about 16 per cent. ; afterwards boiled for many hours, the decoction, strained and evaporated, left 36 per cent. The solution obtained both by infusion and decoction is rendered turbid by infusion of nut-galls, and is precipitated by subacetate of lead. The alga does not coagulate milk ; boiled in milk, the milk remains fluid on cooling. Freed from adhering salt, it burns with flame, and is readily reduced to a gray ash, equal to about 6 per cent., of which 5:4 were found to consist principally of phosphate of lime, and of carbonate of lime and magnesia, with a trace of iron and a minute quantity of silica, chiefly derived from infusoria, the forms of which were distinct under the microscope. The saline matter of the ash, separated by water, had an alkaline reaction ; it consisted principally of common salt, with a minute quantity of an iodine salt. The indication of the pre- sence of iodine was distinct by the starch test with aqua regia; even in the first washings of the weed to remove the adhering salt, iodine was detected. 3. Of Sloke or Laver (Porphyra laciniata). The specimen of this alga which I have examined was from Ireland, but I am ignorant of its exact locality. Like Ee va i certain Sea-Weeds of an Edible kind. 5 the last-mentioned, it tasted salt, showing that it had not been washed. Rapidly washed, and the water evaporated, the saline matter obtained was chiefly common salt; a trace of iodine was detected by the ordinary test. In its colour this alga differs but little from the preceding. Its colouring matter, like that of the Rhodomenia, is soluble in water ; is capable of combining with alumine; is changed to green by boiling; and is in much the same manner acted on by boiling alcohol. A slight difference is exhibited as to colour on comparing the infusions: by reflected light, its infusion appears to be a rich orange; by transmitted, a bright purple,—a difference less marked in the infusion of the Rhodo- menia. Further, when dried its fronds become black, as seen by reflected light ; whilst those of the former appear only of a darker and duller purple. In composition too, from the few trials I have made, this alga seems to be very similar to the last. It yields but little matter to cold water, about 6:5 per cent., of the nature of gum ; to boiling water—the decoction continued many hours —it gives up a large proportion, about 43 per cent., also having most of the properties of gum. What remains after infusion and decoction—about 50 per cent.—is of a dark green, of soft consistence, like spinach, and nearly tasteless. It becomes black and brittle on drying. It yielded about 5-5 per cent. ash, consisting of about 2 saline matter, and 3-5 matter insoluble in water. The former was composed chiefly of commnton salt, with a trace of iodine ; the latter of phosphate and carbonate of lime and magnesia, in nearly equal parts. Both the infusion and decoction are rendered turbid by infu- sion of gall-nuts, by subacetate of lead, and in a slight degree by the acetate. It has not the property of coagulating milk. Iodine was detected in the ash obtained by burning the mat- ter both of the infusion and decoction. The indication of it in the former was very faint; in the latter it was less so. 4, Of Tangle (Laminaria digitata). For a specimen of this alga I am indebted to a friend in Edinburgh. It was taken from the coast of the Firth of 6 Dr Davy’s Experiments on Forth, and, not having been washed, was impregnated with salt. In the washings to remove the salt, however rapidly made, iodine could be detected, subjecting the saline matter ob- tained by evaporation to the ordinary test. Digested in cold water, the fronds impart to it a brown colour. The infusion is precipitated neither by corrosive sublimate nor infusion of nut-galls, but both by the subacetate and acetate of lead. The precipitate by the latter is peculiar, of a gelatinous consist- ence, and viscid, admitting of being drawn out in threads, mucus-like. The infusion evaporated yields a matter trans- parent like gum, and adhering to the capsule. It burns with flame, and its coal burns with partial, bright scintillations, as if from the presence of a nitrous salt. By boiling the fronds after infusion, a decoction of the same colour as the infusion is obtained. No gelatine or analogous substance could be de- tected in it; it was not rendered turbid by infusion of nut- galls, nor did the fronds, after boiling with milk, coagulate it on cooling. The washings of the stalk of this alga were found to be even more rich in iodine than the fronds. The saline matter, of course, was chiefly common sea-salt. By infusion in cold water, this part of the plant was found to yield about 5:8 per cent. brownish mucilaginous matter, and, by decoction, about 8 per cent. of similar matter, about 86-2 remaining undis- solved. The dried matter from the infusion afforded 54 per cent. of ash, consisting of saline matter soluble in water about 50 per cent., and of matter soluble in nitric acid about 4 per cent., composed chiefly of phosphate and carbonate of lime, with a little magnesia. The saline matter was very rich in iodine, and contained also bromine. The extract, by boiling water, yielded about 54 per cent. also of ash, of which about 26 were soluble in water, and 28 (the greater part of it) were soluble in nitric acid. The latter was composed chiefly of phosphate of lime with some magnesia. The former had a strong alkaline reaction, and, like the salt from the cold infusion, abounded in iodine, and contained some bromine. The portion that resisted infusion and decoction burned with a bright continued flame, and was pretty readily reduced a ati a ® certain Sea-Weeds of an Edible kind. 7 to ash. It yielded about 13:3 per cent., composed of about 7:3 saline matter soluble in water, and of about 8 of matter insoluble in water, but in great part soluble in nitric acid- The latter consisted principally of carbonate of lime, with some phosphate of lime and a little magnesia. The former was very rich in iodine salt, and contained also bromine ; so small was the proportion of common salt, that its flavour was hardly perceptible. 5. Of Doughlaghman (Fucus vesiculosus). Of four kinds of sea-weed which are used for food on the coast of Donegal, the species above named, I am informed, is in greatest estimation. The specimen I have examined was from that coast, gathered from the rocks below Gweedore,— rocks which at high tide are covered with water, and at low tide are left dry. It had not been washed. Like the other sea-weeds, it gave up a portion of its sub- stance to cold water infused on it for many hours, and more on decoction. Neither its infusion nor decoction was precipitated by an infusion of nut-galls ; both were copiously precipitated by sub-acetate of lead. When the infusion was boiled, a few flakes formed as if from the coagulation of a minute portion of albuminous matter. And when the fronds, unwashed, were boiled in milk, a very partial coagulation of the milk took place, adhering to the vesicles of the alga, and to them only, as if they contained a trace of gelatinous matter. By infu- sion for many hours, there were abstracted 16 per cent.; by subsequent decoction, about 44; about 39 per cent. resisting both processes. The infusion evaporated afforded a brown transparent brittle matter, which burnt with flame. The ash about 2°8 per cent. consisted of about 1-7 saline matter, soluble in water, and of 1-1, soluble for most part in nitric acid. The former had an alkaline reaction, contained a large proportion of common salt, and afforded a distinct trace of iodine. The latter con- sisted chiefly of phosphate of lime, with a little carbonate of lime and magnesia. The decoction evaporated yielded a brown brittle matter, which burnt with flame. The ash it 8 Dr Davy’s Experiments on left, about 10-5 per cent., consisted of about 7-5 saline matter, soluble in water, and of about 3 soluble in great part in nitric acid. Both were similar in composition to the preceding ; the proportion of iodine in the first was very small. The matter remaining after the infusion and decoction was black and brittle, burning with flame and leaving about 4°5 per cent. ash, of which about 8 was soluble in water; the remainder for most part in nitric acid. These too in composition were very similar to the preceding. Iodine in very minute quantity was detected in the soluble salt. In concluding, I beg to offer a few general remarks :— 1. In none of these alge have I been able to detect any starch, sugar, or oily matter. The Fucus vesiculosus had be- sides a taste of common salt, a faint one, as it appeared to me, of sweetness. This induced me to make a special search for saccharine matter ; but the result was negative. Alcohol digested on the dried fronds, decanted and evaporated, yielded a minute quantity of extract totally destitute of sweetness. 2. Of the proximate principles of which these algze are com- posed, I need hardly say that further research is required to establish their nature in a satisfactory manner; and I would beg that the few terms I have employed, such as mucilage and gelatine, may be considered merely as provisional. When we reflect on the many varieties which are known to exist of oils and fats, of starch and gums, it seems not improbable that each species of algze may possess proximate principles though nearly allied, somewhat different, and the existence of which can only be determined by experiments made expressly for the purpose. bab! Sab tH Dee fy how A AAO] aA | Chondrus crispus, bleached, (from Bewly & Evans)...)17°92 82-08) 1534 9587 Ag crispus, unbleached, (Ballycastle) ........... 21°47 | 78°53 | 2°142|13°387 Gigartina mammillosa, (Ballycastle) .......:.....se00e0 21°55 | 78-45 | 2°198| 13-737 Chondrus crispus, bleached, (Bewly & Evans) 2d expt.) 19°79 80-21} 1:485| 9-281 5 crispus, unbleached, (Ballycastle) 2d expt. 19°96 | 80-04 | 2°510| 15-687 Laminaria digitata, or Dulse Tangle, (Ballycastle)...|21°38 78-62) 1:588| 9-925 a digitata, or Black Tangle, (Ballycastle) |31-05 68-95) 1:396| 8-725 Rhodomenia palmata, or Dylisk, (Ballycastle) ...... 16°56 | 83:44) 3-465 | 21:656 Porphyra laciniata, or Levre, (Ballycastle) ......-...+- 17°41) 82°59 | 4°650 | 29:062 Iridea edulis, (Ballycastle) ............ssseeeeees SODI0C ...| 19°61! 80°39 | 3-088) 19-300 DICOROOCWOOS 17-91) 82:09 | 2°424|15:150 Means....cccecsesscesseeseee seseseseeeee|20°42| 79°58 | 2-407 | 16-045 Alaria esculenta, or Murlins, (Ballycastle) N.B.—The amount of water given in this Table is considerably less than what belongs to the algz when fresh from the sea, for they had all undergone a partial drying preparatory to being sent up from Bally- castle to Dublin for analysis. “ Per-centage of Nitrogen in various edible substances dried at 212°. a Potatoes, ; E 541 Flour of first quality, , 1:817 Beet roots (Mean of 13 experiments), 1-848 Mangolds (Mean of 3 experiments), 1-781 Swedish turnips (Mean of 5 experiments), 1°843 Means, ; 1-567 7 These results are so unexpected, that could there be any doubt (which I have not) of their accuracy, it might be ques- tioned. The mean of them shows that the proportion of ni- trogen these alge contain exceeds that not only of the ordi- nary articles of vegetable food, but even that of wheaten flour of the first quality, being as 2°407 to 1:317. 5. Are not, I would ask, these esculent sea-weeds, on ac- count of the iodine and bromine which they more or less con- tain, deserving of more general use? Nowhere, I believe, where they are in common use, is bronchocele known; and, as far as I have been able to ascertain, scrofulous complaints are rare, and even pulmonary consumption ;—whilst, on the contrary, in inland districts, even in our own country, bron- chocele and scrofula are more or less prevalent, especially certain Sea-Weeds of an Edible kind. 11 amongst the labouring class, who rarely have the benefit of ar- ticles of food known to contain iodine. And this remark ap- plies to our troops, whose dietary hitherto has been regulated with such a marked neglect of medical science. In the West Indies, phthisis was unusually prevalent whilst I was there in the 88th regiment, the Connaught Rangers,—a fine body of men, raised chiefly in the province the name of which it bears —men who at home, we are tolerably certain, made use of sea-weed occasionally and of sea-fish, whilst in foreign service their diet was almost exclusively bread and meat, with a scanty addition of vegetables. In relation to use, these vegetables have most of them the recommendation of cheapness, so as to be within the reach of the poorest; and their not being liable to spoil by keeping, when dried, is another circumstance in their favour; and another, I may add, is that they are grateful to the palate, and some of them—dulse, for instance—even in their undressed state. The blanc-mange that is made, substituting Chondrus crispus for isinglass, is hardly distinguishable from that pre- pared with the more costly article, and is in common use in Treland at the tables of the opulent. 6. Every where, where sea-weeds are easily obtained, they are inrepute as manure. Their fertilizing powers are quite in accordance with their composition, the large proportion of azote, and the considerable portion of the inorganic substances which they contain, and which are equally the elements of our cultivated crops, especially phosphate and carbonate of lime, and one or both of the fixed alkalies. 7. The part which these marine plants perform in the eco- nomy of nature, we are sure, is considerable, and probably is little less important than that exercised by terrestrial plants. May they not be considered as purifiers of sea water, tending always to remove excess of carbonic acid, and probably of azote? and may they not be viewed as the restorers (they certainly are the collectors) of substances possessed of excel- lent medicinal qualities,—viz., iodine and bromine, which so specially belong to them, and in them seems providentially saved and stored up for the use of man. LESKETH How, AMBLESIDE, February 8, 1856. 12 Alexander Bryson on the Exposition of the Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. By ALEXANDER Bryson, F.S.A. Scot.* The possession of two such men as Newton and Hooke is rarely granted to one generation. They were not equal, how- ever, in their greatness. But, while ample justice has been done to the genius of Newton, the labours of Hooke have been sadly overlooked. Hooke’s misfortune lay more in his near- ness to one whose greater glory paled his lesser light, than in any dimness in his own effulgence. But his nearness in time to Newton was not the only obstacle to his fame. He wanted me- thod. His brain was too busy and ready to devise more than his hands could execute or his pen describe, and the eager student of his works, while ready to grasp a new fact or full-grown thought, is too often doomed to disappointment by his quaint remark, “ But of this by and by.” This by and by rarely comes, or if ever, almost always in the wrong place. Ina dis- course of earthquakes, for instance, we find descriptions of a new telescope, the exact orientation of Westminster as evi- dencing the variation of the compass, and observations on the setting of the sun-dial in the Privy Gardens at Whitehall! - That Hooke merited a larger share of the admiration of posterity than has hitherto been awarded to him, I hope the following rough outline of his life and labours will sufficiently show. Robert Hooke was born at Freshwater, in the Isle of Wight, on the 18th of July 1635, and baptized on the 26th of the same month by his father, who was minister of the parish. In his infancy he was so weak that his parents had small hopes of rearing him; but his constitution, after his seventh year, seemed to gain strength, and, though never able to share in the ruder sports of his fellows, he was sharp and lively. His mechanical genius, the strongest intuition of his nature, was first developed. Ina short extract from his diary Waller says, « Being subject to headache, which hindered his learning, his * Read, at the request of the Council, before the Royal Scottish Society of Arts, 12th November 1855. Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. 13 father laid aside all thought of breeding him a scholar, and finding himself also grow very infirm through age and sick- ness, wholly neglected his further education, who, being thus left to himself, spent his time in making little mechanical toys, in which he was very intent, and, for the tools he had, successful ; so that there was nothing he saw done by any mechanic but he endeavoured to imitate, and in some particu- lar could exceed. His father, observing by these indications his great inclination to mechanics, thought to put him ap- prentice to some easy trade (as a watchmaker or limner), he showing most inclination to those or the like mechanical per- formances. For making use of such tools as he could procure, seeing an old brass clock taken to pieces, he attempted to imitate it, and made a wooden one that would go.” So far his diary. His taste for the fine arts seems to have recommended him to the notice of Sir Peter Lely, with whom he served but a short time, as the odours from the oil colours produced aggra- vation of his headache, which beginning as he tells us in his earliest years, continued more or less to afflict him through life. This was perhaps, both for his fame and for science, a for- tunate adversity, as nowhere can I find that his artistic talent was other than a slight accomplishment. In the year 1653 Hooke, then in his 18th year, went to Ox- ford, and by his mechanical genius soon gained the favour of the famous Robert Boyle. Here he seems to have found society andemployment suited to his tastes, and he met with nearly all the philosophers of his generation, who afterwards founded the Royal Society of London. Under the roof of Boyle, and amid the congenial society which there met, Hooke commenced his labours. In his diary he says, “ At these meetings, which were about the year 1655, divers experiments were suggested, discoursed, and tried with various successes, though no other account was taken of them but what particular persons perhaps did for the help of their own memories ; so that many excellent things have been lost. Some few only by the kindness of the authors have since been made public. Among these may be reckoned the Honourable Mr Boyle’s Pneumatic Engine and Experiments, first printed 14 Alexander Bryson on the in the year 1660; for in 1658 or 1659 I continued and per- fected the air-pump for Mr Boyle, having first seen a con- trivance for that purpose made for the same honourable person by Mr Gratorix, which was too gross to perform any great matter.” That Hooke made the air-pump an efficient instrument there can be no doubt; he supplied valves which before were merely stop-cocks worked by hand at every rise and plunge of the piston. He also made its action double ; in short, he contrived the air-pump. It is unnecessary here to dwell on the advan- tages which physical science has derived from the air-pump. Nor can it be urged against the fame of Hooke that Otto von Guericke, the Burgomaster of Magdeburg, had already per- formed wonderful experiments with his gigantic pneumatic apparatus, which I had the pleasure two years ago of seeing in the Royal Library at Berlin. Had Guericke’s instrument remained without Hooke’s improvements, pneumatics would have made but little progress. In this same year, 1659, Hooke contrived many machines for the celebrated Dr Wilkins, to aid him in his futile attempts at flying, all of which ended like the wings of Icarus, shall I say also as those of our ingenious townsman, Mr J ohn Howell. About this period, or as Hooke says two years before, though described later in his diary, he invented the balance spring, an improvement of the first importance in the art of time-keeping. Prior to this invention watches were regulated by increas- ing or relaxing the power of the mainspring, a very rude and unsatisfactory method; but as most watches had but an hour hand, a deviation of many minutes per day was scarcely ap- preciable. In the year 1675 a watch was presented to King Charles the Second, bearing the inscription, ‘“ Robert Hook invenit 1658, T. Tompion fecit 1675.” This watch had the balance-spring applied to a duplex escapement with a double balance. There is every reason to believe that for this invention Hooke applied for a patent, under the auspices of the Lord Brouncker, Mr Boyle, and Sir Robert Moray. The agreement, in the handwriting of Sir Robert Moray, between these gentlemen and Hooke, seems highly favourable to the latter, and is in these terms, “ That Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. 15 Robert Hooke should discover to them the whole of his inven- tion, to measure the parts of time at sea as exactly and truly as they are at land by the pendulum-clocks invented by Mr Huygens: That of the profit to be made thereby, not exceed- ing six thousand pounds, Robert Hooke was to have three- fourths ; of whatever was made more of it, not exceeding four thousand pounds, Robert Hooke was to have two-thirds; of the rest, if more could be made of it, he was to have one- half, and Robert Hooke to be publicly owned the author and inventor thereof.” As Hooke is called master of arts in this agreement, it could not have been drawn up before 1663, in which year that degree was conferred on him at Oxford, by the favour of Sir Edward Hyde, then Chancellor of that University. His ex- pectations of advantage from this invention were disappointed. “Their treaty,” says he, “with me had finally been con- cluded for several thousand pounds, had not the inserting of one clause broke it off, which was: That if, after I had dis- covered my inventions about the finding the longitude by watches or otherwise, they, or any other person, should find a way of improving my principles; he or they should have the benefit thereof during the term of the patent, and not I. To which clause I could noways agree, knowing it was easy to vary my principles an hundred ways, and it was not impro- bable but that there might be made some addition of con- veniency, to what I should at first discover, it being facile inventis addere.” That Hooke did not do himself justice in this transaction is evident. In 1658, as we have seen, he had invented and nearly perfected both the balance-spring and duplex-escapement, (an advance on the old verge-watch, without either spring or minute-hand) which, however rude in their construction, must at that period undoubtedly have gained the prize of 100,000 florins held out by the States of Holland for ascertaining the longitude at sea. And he might have obtained, through the interest of Lord Brouncker and Sir Robert Moray, some por- tion of government aid, which afterwards in the reign of Queen Anne was so liberally offered for the same object, to the amount of £20,000. Yet did Hooke conceal for many years 16 Alexander Bryson on the this invention, which now forms, with the addition of the com- pensation-balance, the best pocket watch of modern times. While at Oxford, Sir Christopher Wren suggested to Hooke a series of observations of the barometer, for the purpose of testing the truth of the hypothesis of Des Cartes, that the tides resulted from the pressure of the moon upon the air in its passage by the meridian. Hooke found that the oscillations of the mercurial column did not comport themselves according to the moon’s motion, but were due to the varying density of the air. Thus the ba- rometer became, in the hands of Hooke, not merely the Torri- cellian tube, but a weather-glass, or, as he quaintly calls it, the “ weather-wiser.” We have said that Hooke made the Torricellian tube vir- tually a barometer. But he did much more; he invented and perfected, with one exception, every form of that instrument now in use (of course I do not allude to the aneroid). To him we owe the double barometer, the four-legged barometer, the wheel barometer, the diagonal barometer, and the marine ba- rometer. The last has been improved by Mr Adie senior, who applied to it the name of Sympiesometer. In four of these five forms Hooke contrived to enlarge the scale, with a view to in- crease the sensibility of their indications ; so that while in the straight barometer of Torricelli a tenth of an inch only indi- cated that precise quantity, in Hooke’s they were multiplied ten times. It were indeed an idle ceremony to describe here instruments so well known to all. But I cannot leave the barometric labours of Hooke, without adverting to the inge- nuity he displayed in devising his marine barometer, the cause of his failure, and the success which attended the la- bours of our venerable townsman, Mr Adie senior, in rectify- ing Hooke’s instrument, and rendering it the truth-telling, steady friend of the seaman. Hooke’s marine barometer consisted of a tube with two bulbs, bent into the shape of a syphon. The upper bulb con- tained air, and was closed; the lower was open and free to the pressure of the atmosphere, and was filled with water. The air was so rarified in the upper bulb as to allow the water to stand half up the tube at the nominal pressure of the atmo- Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. 17 sphere 29°60, and at the initial temperature 62° F. Were these _ conditions of pressure and temperature to remain constant, it is clear no movement would be made by the fluid in the tube. But suppose the conditions changed. And first, as regards pressure: that the barometer fell to 29:00, while the tempera- ture remained at 62°; it is evident that the fall of the fluid in the tube was due to less compression on the atmosphere in the upper bulb. This being estimated and compared with an equal amount of depression by an increase of vol- ume, caused by increase of temperature in the upper bulb, while the barometer remained quiescent, gave clearly an ele- ment by which Hooke contrived a sliding scale to eliminate the effect or force of temperature over that of pressure. But unfortunately for this fine and elegant contrivance, the water filling the lower cistern caused by evaporation an aqueous atmo- sphere in the aérial one above, and so shortly destroyed all the careful labours employed in completing the scale. This diffi- culty Mr Adie saw and surmounted, by using oil of almonds coloured by anchusa root; and instead of atmospheric air in the upper bulb he employed nitrogen. The oil did not evapo- rate, nor did the nitrogen thicken the oil. Mr Adie did for Hooke’s marine barometer almost what Hooke did for the pneumatic engine of Boyle—he did not re-invent it, but he made it useful. Let us honour Mr Adie’s ingenuity, but for which Hooke’s instrument would have re- mained where he left it, an unknown piece of lumber in the collection of the Royal Society. About 1660, Hooke invented what he calls his circular pen- dulum: it has, however, been described as the conical pendu- lum. A small time-piece, to which this pendulum was attached, was exhibited before the Royal Scottish Society of Arts many years ago, by Mr Dickman, late watchmaker, Leith. This pendulum, being continuous in its motion, was applied by Hooke to a telescope mounted equatorially, so as to keep the instrument always coincident with the star’s motion both in right ascension and in azimuth. This invention of Hooke is more familiar to many under the name of Watt’s governor of the steam-engine. Watt most ably applied it, but (what very few | NEW SERIES.—VOL. IV. NO. I.—JuLy 1856. B 18 Alexander Bryson on the know) Hooke was the inventor. By the revolution of this conical pendulum, Hooke was enabled to divide a second into many parts. He contrived a series of thin vibrating springs touched by the ball in its rotation; and each giving a different tone, he was able to note the passage of a star to a small fraction of a second. In the year 1660, the Royal Society was founded, and two years after Robert Hooke was made curator. In April of the succeeding year Hooke described his discovery of the rising of fluids in capillary tubes. He also discovered that mercury was not subject to the same law, but was de- pressed in tubes in the ratio of their diameters. He also — here hinted, what was afterwards discovered, that mercury in tubes made of different kinds of glass has a different ratio of depression. This law, so well investigated by Ivory, the illustrious uncle of our present judge, Lord Ivory, is an element of correction in every measurement of the heights of mountains by the barometer. About this period Hooke con- trived the telegraph,—not the cumbrous, unshapely machine, with three or four arms, formerly used under the name - of Semaphore; but one more approaching to our present electric telegraph in swiftness of communication. He pro- posed to connect between distant stations a wire, acted on by a series of vibrations or musical notes, and thus commu- nicate almost instantaneous intelligence. This invention has not been put in practice. In our time it were indeed useless ; not in his. He was in this, as in many other of his inven- tions, far before his generation. Hooke’s next invention is one in which I have much in- © terest,—the watch-wheel cutting-engine. This he seems to have invented between the years 1661 and 1663. In this valuable instrument, as in many others, no change has been made since its first construction by Hooke. The only im- provements which have been made on this essential tool in the workshop of the watchmaker is greater rapidity of motion, and the cutter, in its descent against the wheel to be cut, is now let down by a perpendicular instead of a circular motion. This invention was the first which gave accuracy to the art of watchmaking. In this same year Hooke fixed the standard Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. 19 or zero of the thermometer at the freezing point of water, and also a method of supplying air to an operator after leaving the diving-bell. In July 1664, he exhibited an experiment to demonstrate that the vibrations of a wire making 272 vibrations in one second of time, sounded G, soL, RE, UT, in the scale of all music. Also, in this year, he invented a method of grinding spectacle lenses, by means of which more than 100 could be ground at once to the same focal power. This ingenious con- trivance is daily used in our manufactories at Sheffield for the production of this indispensable aid to failing vision, in utter ignorance of its inventor. On the banks of the Avon you will often be asked the question, Who was William Shakspeare ? and in the workshop of the optician, Who was. Robert Hooke? This year was also rendered conspicuous in the life of our author by his invention of an instrument to de- termine the refractive index of fluids. This year, 1664, was ushered in by a circumstance highly flattering to Hooke, and which for some years brought him solid advantage in the shape of a salary of L.50 a year, though perhaps he might have better wanted both the office and the salary. Sir John Cutler having founded a lecture, in connection with the Royal Society, and settled an annual stipend upon Robert Hooke, M.A., of L.50 during life (in- trusting the president, council, and fellows of the said Society to direct and appoint the said Mr Hooke as to the sub- ject and number of his lectures), the Society ordered se- veral of their members to wait upon Sir John Cutler with their thanks for “his particular favour to a worthy member, - and for that respect and confidence he hath hereby exprest towards their whole body.” This appointment at first urged Hooke to the publication of many original papers of his own and others, which might have been lost had he not been ap- pointed Cutlerian lecturer. But, through some misunder- standing, which I have not been able to trace, in a few years we find Hooke pursuing Sir John Cutler for his annual allow- ance, and giving vent to spleen and vexation of spirit by no means in accordance with that placidity with which true philo- sophy ever delights to dwell. This was one of many ts drops 20 Alexander Bryson on the poured into the cup of Hooke’s life, and which, with all his philosophy, he knew not how to neutralize. But he found a true peace, as we shall find, “ by and by,” to use his own expression. At this time, 1664 or 1665, Hooke read general astrono- mical lectures, and described many instruments. The most im- portant is one which has since his days been the constant com- panion of the mariner,—the quadrant. Invention with Hooke seems almost the pabulum of his life; there is no forcing, no labour in his thought. His very dreams seem fraught with good to mankind. In his enunciation of this invention, there is nothing found but the simple description of his method of reflection and joining the two images into one. We can imagine with what delight Hooke would contemplate the mo- dern sextant, as improved by Newton and Hadley, how he would exult, if, permitted to gaze into our time, he could see his improved instrument in the hands of a mariner, “enabling him almost to plant mile-stones in the deep. His proposal of a weather-clock is very remarkable, and as no copy is in any of our public libraries, I willingly tran- scribe it. “The weather-clock consists of two parts; First, that which measures the time, which is a strong and large pen- dulum-clock, which moves a week with once winding up, and is sufficient to turn a cylinder (upon which the paper is rolled) twice round in a day, and also to lift a hammer for striking the punches once every quarter of an hour. Secondly, Of several instruments for measuring the degrees of alteration in the several things to be observed. The first is the baro- meter, which moves the first punch, an inch and a half serving to show the difference between the greatest and least pressure of the air. The second is the thermometer, which moves the punch that shows the differences between the greatest heat in summer and the least in winter. The third is the hygroscope moving the punch, which shows the differences between the moistest and driest airs. The fourth is the rain-bucket, sery- ing to show the quantity of rain that falls. This hath two parts or punches; the first to show what part of the bucket is filled when there falls not enough to make it empty itself; the second to show how many full buckets have been emptied. The fifth is the wind-vane ; this hath also two parts ; the first Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. 21 to show the strength of the wind, which is observed by the number of revolutions in the vane-mill, and marked by three punches. The first marks every 10,000, the second 1000, and the third every 100; the second to show the quarters of the wind. This hath four punches; the first with one point, mark- ing the north quarters, namely, NN. by E., N. by W., NNE., NNW., NE. by N., and NW. by N., NE., and NW; the second hath two points, marking the east and its quarters; the third hath three points, marking the south and its quarters ; the fourth hath four points, marking the west and its quar- ters. Some of these punches give one mark every 100 revo- lutions of the vane-mill. “ The stations or places of the first four punches are marked on a scroll of paper by the clock-hammer falling every quar- ter of an hour. The punches belonging to the fifth, or wind- vane, are marked on the said scroll by the revolutions of the vane, which are accounted by a small numerator standing at the top of the clock-case, which is moved by the vane-mill.” No description could make clearer the anemometer pro- posed by Mr Osler of Birmingham, and communicated to the British Association about fifteen years ago; yet was there no mention made of the name of Robert Hooke. It was the reading of the description now quoted which suggested to my late father the self-registering barometer now on the table. Sir Alexander Keith (the donor of our Keith Prize, so worthily awarded to Professor George Wilson last session, and this night to be presented) contrived a self-registering barome- ter, which he described to the Royal Society of Edinburgh, in which the marker or pencil exerted a continuous friction, thereby constraining the free action of the mercury in its tra- vels in the tube. But Hooke suggested punches indicating that there was no friction during the interval of a quarter of an hour. This hint served my late father in the construc- tion of his barometer, where the marker only exerts a lateral friction once in the hour, leaving the float free to rise or fall with the varying pressure of the atmosphere. On the 20th of March 1664, Hooke succeeded Dr Dacres as Geometry Professor in Gresham College. Besides his duties as Professor of Geometry, he had charge of a large col- 22 Alexander Bryson on the lection of natural and artificial curiosities. John Ward, who was Professor of Rhetoric in Gresham College, says of Hooke, in a short biography he has written of him, in his Lives of the Gresham Professors: “A person of less abilities than he, would have found it difficult to discharge the duty of these several employments at once with reputation; but so great was his industry, so accurate his skill in any province he un- dertook, and his mind so fruitful of new inventions, that he went through them all with great reputation.” Hooke was not long in his office and apartments in Gresham College, when we find him, with his usual energy, engaged in forming the first fixed transit instrument. Mr Grant, in his admirable History of Astronomy, claims this invention for Roemer the Danish astronomer ; I claim it for Dr Robert Hooke on the following grounds: Hooke entered Gresham College, as we have seen, in 1664, the very year when Roemer was born at Copenhagen. In this or the following year, Hooke completed his instrument for observing the transit of the stars, in order to discover their parallax. His description is short, and I will therefore transcribe it : “T opened a passage through the roof of my lodgings, and therein fixt a tube perpendicular and upright of about 10 or 12 foot in length and a foot square, so as that the lower end thereof came through the ceiling, and was open into the cham- ber underneath. Thistube I covered with a lid, housed so as to throw off the rain, and so contrived as I could easily open or shut it by a small string. Within this perpendicular tube I made another small square tube fit, so as to slide upwards and downwards as there was occasion, and by the help of a screw to be fixtin any place that was necessary. Within this tube, in a convenient cell, was fixed the object-glass of the telescope (that which I made use of was 36 foot in length, having none longer by me but one of 60 foot, and so too long to be made use of in my rooms).” Cutting a hole through the upper floor to permit the rays to pass below, he fixed his eye-piece raised above the level of the lower floor, so as to admit his person to observe the passage of the stars. With this instrument Hooke imagined he discovered a sen- sible parallax in the star y Draconis, which afterwards Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. 23 Bradley discovered to have been caused by the aberration of light. This instrument of Hooke was, of course, a fixed transit, and could only take cognizance of stars passing the zenith of Gresham College. But we have authority for stating (and that authority Mr Grant himself), that Hooke made the first moveable transit instrument in nearly its present form for Greenwich Observatory. Roemer may have made the in- strument traverse; but Hooke certainly had the priority of invention. Inthe year 1666, the great fire of London, though it disturbed the labours of the Royal Society, increased those of Hooke. On the 19th of September, we find him presenting before the Society a model for the rebuilding of the city, with which, as their Journal informs us, they were very well pleased. The Court of the Lord Mayor and Aldermen preferred it to one designed by the city surveyor, and desired it might be submitted to the king. ‘“ What this model was,” says Waller, “I cannot so well determine; but I have heard that it was designed in it to have all the chief streets, as from Leadenhall corner to Newgate and the like, to lie in an exact straight line, and all the other cross streets turning out of them at right angles ; all the churches, public buildings, mar- ket-places, and the like, in proper and convenient places, which no doubt would have added much to the beauty and symmetry of the whole.” How this came not to be accepted I know not; but it is probable it might contribute not a little to his being taken notice of by the magistrates of the city, and soon afterwards made surveyor. In this situation Hooke laid out the ground to the several proprietors for rebuilding the city, and acquired most of his wealth; none of which, it is believed, he ever used, as it was found filling a huge chest after his decease. About this time Hooke entered into his famous controversy with Heyelius, regarding the superiority of telescopic over naked sights in astronomical instruments. Into this controversy I do not enter,—suffice it to say, that it gained for Hooke a character for great irascibility ; but the present practice of astronomers has proved Hooke to be right. The invention of the reflecting-telescope has been awarded to 24 Alexander Bryson on the Newton, to Gregory, and Hooke. The share which our author took in this invention was in perforating the larger speculum; thus enabling an observer to view the object directly. Ina dis- course ona Method of improving Natural Philosophy, he clear- ly indicates the stethoscope. He says, “ By the sound they make, one may discover the works performed in the several offices and shops of a man’s body, and thereby discover what instrument or engine was out of order. I have been able to hear very plainly the beating of a man’s heart; and ’tis com- mon to hear the motion of wind to and fro in the guts; and the stopping of the lungs is easily discovered by the wheezing.” This hint, so valuable to the physician, lay unappropriated until Laennec applied it in the year 1816. As Hooke invented at this time the hearing trumpet, there can be little doubt he had applied it to the discovery of the sounds of the human body. But I must hurry on to a conclusion, and merely catalogue his inventions. He invented the spring-balance, now known as Salter’s Spring-Balance. Instead of at once communicat- ing this instrument to the world, he hid it for some years, under the anagram, C DEIINNOOPSSSTTU U,which, being rendered, means, Ut pondus, sic tensio ; Asis the weight, so is the tension. In his tracts he describes a very ingenious method of sup- porting a weight after the rope has broken by which it was suspended. Hooke’s method of preventing heavy weights falling. “This was effected by a small arm ex- tended out from the top of the weight to the side with a hand or pipe, at the end there- of, which grasped or inclosed another rope or chain, extended from the top to the bot- tom, which hand or pipe was so wide as to BR slip freely upon the said rope so long asthe f |. weight was suspended by its own rope; but F so soon that any way failed the hand grasp- ||) | ed the side rope fast and hindered the © |) weight from descending to the bottom.” He discovered that the awn or beard of the wild oat served —— ll Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. 25 well as a hygrometer, and in most of the wheel-barometers now in use this may be found. To him wealso owe the steelyard ; although, unknown to Hooke, it had long been used as the standard instrument for determining weight in China. Hooke proposed the catenarian curve as the best form of an arch; improved Hero’s Clepsydra; employed a heavy weight mov- ing in a short are for the pendulum, from which its sole ad- vantage is derived. He had the earliest suspicion of what keeps the planets in their orbits,—discovered that the den- sity of the air in a diving-bell is doubled at the depth of 34 feet,—invented a water-pump, having an elliptical rotatory motion acted on by a spring, a model of which I saw in use at Granton Quarry some years ago, re-invented by the late Mr Wightman,—and discovered the various forms which sand as- sumes when placed on a vibrating plane. These have been since investigated by Chladni, and are now known as Chladni’s curves.’ He attributed the revolutions of the planets to the combination of a projectile motion with a centripetal force. Had his mathematical powers equalled his practical sagacity, he might have obtained the laurel which Newton so soon after- wards bore away. He discovered that Jupiter revolved in about eight hours,—he describes a simple method of deter- _ mining the magnifying power of microscopes, by placing a foot-rule on a level with the stage; and by looking with the right eye through the instrument, and the left on the foot- rule, an accurate measure is obtained ;—he makes lenses from drops of hot glass,—hints at the practicability of making silk without the intervention of the silkworm,—shows how the re- fractive index of a mineral or glass may be determined by viewing the contained air-bubbles before and after immersion in water. This ingenious device has been placed to the credit of Sir Dayid Brewster. That Hooke possessed the secret of the steam-engine is undoubted; he, as usual, hides it, how- ever, in the form of an anagram. He describes it as an extra- ordinary invention in mechanics, above the chimeras of per- petual motions, for several uses. Waller, who fortunately possessed a key to the anagrams of Hooke, translates it thus: “ The air presses with force the vacuum left after the use of fire ;’ and refers to the engine of Savery as being con- structed on this principle. 26 On the Mechanical Inventions of Dr Robert Hooke. I have now endeavoured, more as a catalogue than a de- scription, to give a short view of the mechanical labours of Hooke. As an astronomer he has done much; and his dis- coveries have been fairly and fully explained by Mr Grant, in his excellent History of Astronomy. As a naturalist he has yet to be considered ; and a more complete treatise on his life and discoveries will, I hope, soon appear from the prolific pen of our President-elect, Professor George Wilson. In regard to Hooke’s personal appearance, Waller, his bio- grapher, says: “ As to his person he was but despicable, being short of stature, very crooked, pale, lean, and of a meagre aspect, with lank brown hair, which he wore till within three years of his death; his eyes gray and full, with a sharp in- genious look when younger; his nose but thin, of a moderate height and length; his mouth meanly wide, and upper lip thin; his chin sharp, and forehead large. He went stooping and very fast (till his weakness before his death hindered him), having but a light body to carry.” Surely, after such a description as this, there should be no wonder that I have failed to obtain a portrait of Hooke. His temperament is de- scribed by Waller as “restless, indefatigable, even almost to the last, and always slept little to his death, seldom going to sleep till two, three, or four o’clock in the morning, and seldomer to bed, oftener continuing his studies all night, and taking a short nap in the day. His temper was melancholy, mistrust- ful, and jealous, which more increased upon him with his years.” But his sense and love of truth was the greatest feature of his life. He was no bigot; but his religious feelings are ever strong, and are finely evinced by one incident in his life by Waller. I have indicated his quarrel and law-plea with Sir John Cutler, which for many years disturbed his peace. On the 18th of July 1696, being his birth-day, his Chancery suit was decided in his favour. In his diary, he shows his sense of it in these terms, DOMSHLGISS A, whichI read thus —Deo opt. Max. Sit Honor, Laus, GLorIA, IN SECULA SE- cULORUM. “I was born on this day of July 1635, and God has given me a new birth. May I never forget His mercies to me. On the Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. 27 Whilst He gives me breath, may I praise Him.” Nor was this a passing sentiment of his thankfulness for this special favour. We find him, ever and anon, using at the end of any of his descriptions of a new machine which he had perfected, an ana- gram expressive of his utter dependence on the Divine Being. I hope that this short statement of the more important of Hooke’s mechanical inventions will justify me in the remark with which I began, that Hooke stood very near to Newton. They are twin stars, forming, when casually seen, but one luminary, and that luminary Newton, but when more carefully observed, differing in their brightness “as one star differeth from another star in glory.” Had Hooke been born fifty years after Newton, Newton would not have been less. Had he been born fifty years before the great philosopher, Hooke would have been more exalted. Yet was Hooke the forerunner of Newton’s glories, the precursor of one who made many crooked things straight. On the Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. By Hucu MaAcmILLAN, F.R.S.E. Continued from Vol. III. No. 2, page 268. Squamaria lanuginosa, Hook. On the rocks in the wood, at the foot of the hill on the east side. This interesting lichen, which is common in shady, subalpine regions in Europe and America, is distinguished by its white pruinose thallus, and by the dense tomentose bluish-black fibres which clothe the under surface of the crenated lobes of the circumference. The apothecia, which are minute, a little elevated above the thallus, of a pale rufous-fuscous colour, and furnished with an inflexed pulverulent thalline margin, very rarely occur. I have frequently gathered specimens of this species in very shady situations, in which the whole thallus was reduced to a leprous byssine mass, not unlike the Lepraria alba of Acharius. Parmelia fahlunensis, Ach. Parmelia stygia, Ach. the summit; also common on the European and North Ame- \ Abundant on rocks near 28 Hugh Macmillan on the rican mountains, extending as far northward as Greenland and Melville Island. These two lichens are too nearly re- lated to each other to be kept distinct; intermediate states very frequently occurring even on the same stone. This view was entertained by Wallroth, Fries, Schaerer, and Meyer. Parmelia ambigua, Ach. Sparingly in rugged hollows and cracks in the bark of pine trees, at the foot of the hill on the east side. It occurs in a fertile state on trunks of trees and dead wood, in the subalpine districts of North America, and on the birch and pine in Sweden and Germany. It has also been found in these countries on rocks, but invari- ably destitute of fructification. The thallus is usually very imperfect and fragmentary, sometimes only a few segments being present, closely applied to the bark, and sometimes only an aggregation of the soredic warts, constituting almost a mealy crust-like surface. It is generally ochroleucous or greenish straw-coloured ; but old specimens frequently occur even on the same tree, of a dull grayish-white colour, to which Fries refers the P. hyperopta of Acharius. I have never seen native specimens in fruit. To me it appears to be merely a tree form of Parmelia conspersa, and Bluff and Fingerhuth were of the same opinion. From P. alewrites, with which Mougeot and Nestler, in their magnificent “ Stirpes Crypto- gamice Vogeso-Rhenane” have confounded it, the farinose- sorediferous warts which cover its surface, and the elevated scutelle sufficiently distinguish it. Parmelia incurva, Fries. Sparingly distributed over boul- ders, both at the foot of the hill and at a considerable eleya- tion, generally preferring such as are of quartz formation. It resembles very closely certain states of Squamaria saxicola, or a young plant of Parmelia conspersa, for both of which it has very likely been often mistaken; but the presence of the yellow globuliferous warts with which its surface is almost always thickly covered, as well as its peculiar appressed habit, very narrow multifid lacinie, recurved at the apices and black and fibrillose on the under side, afford constant distinguishing characters. Perhaps the lichen to which in form and appear- ance it most nearly approximates, is the Squamaria cesia, pace Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. 29 Hook. ; but from that species too the colour of its thallus and apothecia distinguish it. The specimens found at a high ele- vation on Ben Lawers are of a much darker colour than those found at the foot of the hill, and their segments are generally much broader and more rugose. Several very fine specimens of the normal form occur on boulders by the road side, near Cluny Ferry, about two miles east from Aberfeldy. I have several times gathered the closely-allied Parmelia Mougeotii of Schaerer, on pure white quartz, in the Breadalbane mountains ; and I have received very fine specimens from my friend Mr Mudd, found on sandstone rocks, near Cleveland, Yorkshire. Although long known to our lichenists, it has not hitherto received a place in the British Flora as a native of this country. : Solorina crocea, Ach. Abundant along the ridge on the summit. The normal height of this beautiful lichen on the Scottish mountains appears to be 3600 feet, but solitary un- fructified specimens occur much lower down on Ben Lawers; and on other mountains of the same elevation, even although forming part of a connected range or chain, it is rare to finda single individual. It seems to prefer micaceous soil in very moist situations; and, for this reason, it is much more com- mon and abundant on the Breadalbane range than on any other mountains in Scotland. On the Swiss Alps it occurs in pro- fusion, from an elevation of 5000 feet; and in Lapland it occurs everywhere in the utmost abundance in the pinewood and exposed fields, but chiefly in a barren state. It extends as far northward as Greenland and Point Lake. Solorina saccata, Ach. Inthe damp shady clefts of rocks, in the hollow near the summit. This is a much more com- mon species than the S. crocea, and is not nearly so alpine; isolated specimens occurring in many parts of Scotland, Eng- land, and Wales, at avery low elevation. The apothecia also are very different. When first developed, they burst out from beneath the cortical layer of the thallus, and receive a slight, somewhat irregular, border from it; at this stage they bear a great resemblance to those of the S. crocea, but when they become more mature, they sink into the thallus and form 30 Hugh Macmillan on the these deep holes or sockets which have given rise to its very appropriate specific name. In Dr Menzies’ herbarium, in the Edinburgh Botanic Gardens, a minute and closely-allied spe- cles occurs, gathered on the Pacific coast, and named S. orbi- culata. Ina vertical section of the thallus, we first find a layer of large globose cells, with walls of very irregular thickness; beneath this layer we find another of very dense tissue, composed of smaller polygonal cells, with very thin and transparent walls, in which are developed ovoid grains of a bright green colour, and less solid than those developed in the gonidial layer of Peltidea and Nephroma. These grains are perfectly free in their parent cells, the smallest pressure being sufficient to discharge them. The spores are ellipsoid, bilo- cular, of a very brown colour, and furnished with a very thick obscurely granulose integument. In germinating, they send out at each of their obtuse extremities, a colourless, very slen- der filament, which lengthens and ramifies considerably. Peltidea venosa, Ach. Most abundant on the turfy top of a wall by the road-side, about two miles east from Killin ; and very sparingly in the moist shady clefts of the rocks in the hollow near the summit of Ben Lawers. This lichen is very widely distributed, and occurs in very dissimilar localities ; for while it is found occasionally on the summits of the Scot- tish hills, as well as at a considerable elevation on the moun- tains of the United States, Canada, Sweden, Lapland, and the higher Alps of Switzerland, its favourite situations appear to be the sides and tops of mossy earth-covered rocks, either in the bed of streamlets, or exposed to the spray of waterfalls ; indeed very much the same situations as its congener P. aph- thosa affects. In Hooker’s Oryptogamia antarctica, the Peltidea venosa is stated to have been found on tufts of moss on the hills of Kerguelen’s Land. The specimens observed, however, were stunted and barren, and otherwise in a very unsatisfactory state, presenting, in this respect, a great resem- blance to dwarf individuals found on the summits of the Scot- tish hills, and in the arctic regions, with the difference only of a smoother thallus, and occasional buds on the margin. Peltidea horizontalis, Ach. Common on moist mossy Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. 31 rocks at a considerable elevation above Loch-na-Cat. The spores are linear-oblong, attenuated at the two extremities. They are formed of a transparent membrane, everywhere very thin, and their cavity is ordinarily divided into four compart- ments by three transverse partitions, which it is often diffi- cult to distinguish from the granulose matter with which the ‘whole lamina proligera is filled. They are scattered about the beginning of February on the moist soil, and produce, at each extremity, extremely slender, long, and somewhat branched filaments. This lichen has been found in abundance on wet moss in Kerguelen’s Land, and on the summit of the Pic du Midi, one of the peaks of the Pyrenean range, about 9000 feet in height. I may notice here that I observed on the thal- lus of a specimen of Peltidea canina, gathered near the foot of the hill, that minute and interesting parasite the Seutula Wallrothii, Nob., which appears to the naked eye a mere black point. Tulasne discovered in this plant stylospores, or isolated spores, borne upon short simple stalks, and produced in conceptacles, to which he applied the name of pycnidia. Gyrophora erosa, Ach. On rocks near the summit, Gyrophora cylindrica, Ach. | neti and very variable. Gyrophora proboscidea, Ach./ Spermogones indicated by small, very black, elevated spots upon the upper surface of the thallus, and figured by Hedwig as the male parts of fructifi- cation, are very common on the three species. Those who wish to investigate this difficult and protean genus thoroughly, should consult Flérke’s elaborate Monograph of the Gyropho- re, or the able paper in the Lichenographia Britannica. Gyrophora pellita, Ach. On rocks at a low elevation. This is the least alpine species of the genus, occurring on the moorland rocks above Aberfeldy, at a height of from 300 to 400 feet. In this species the trice are frequently transformed into elevated, irregular clusters of much-branched, minute black fibres. Mr Brunton supposes this transformation to take place only after the trice have discharged their spores. Cetraria sepincola, Ach. On pine trees in the wood at the foot of the hill on the east side, very sparingly, and generally occurring as single isolated individuals. 32 Hugh Maemillan on the Cetraria islandica, Ach. Most abundant from an eleva- tion of 1500 feet to the very summit, but very rare in fructi- fication, only one specimen having been found in that state. Dr Hooker says that it is “ one of the most Arctic of plants, having been collected on Ross Islet, the northernmost known land in Europe (81° N.), and on Melville Island (76°), on the limits of Arctic American vegetation. It inhabits the level of the ocean only within the Arctic circle, or in the extremely cold plains of Central Russia (as Moscow, 55° N.); Dahuria, in Asia, 50° N.; and in North America (as Labrador, 55° N.); thence, in progressing south, it ascends, attaining the tops of our Scotch Alps, 4000 feet (56° N.); about 10,000 feet on the Swiss Alps (46° N.), 9000 feet on the top of the Pyrenees, and 4000 feet on the mountains of North Carolina and Virginia (in 36° N.). The last locality is the lowest latitude it attains in the northern hemisphere; in the southern, it reappears only at the extreme point of South America, and there is confined to the pinnacles of the very highest mountains. There is per- haps no vegetable common to both hemispheres more typical of extreme cold than this lichen.” Citraria nivalis, Ach. Very diminutive, and very rare on the west shoulder of the hill, near the top. This lichen, which is very scarce on the Breadalbane mountains, occurs in the utmost profusion on the summits of the Braemar and Cairngorm range. It is almost as widely distributed over the surface of the globe as the C. islandica. Cornicularia tristis, Ach. Abundant on rocks at a consi- derable elevation. This lichen, which Schaerer, Meyer, and Wallroth were disposed to consider merely a variety of Parmelia fahlunensis, Ach., is said by Tulasne to approach very closely in its structure to Ramalina scopulorum, from which, in its external form and appearance, it differs so widely. The spermogones are precisely similar as regards their form and position in both, being developed towards the top of the compressed branches, or on their obtuse edges, and consisting of round prominent tubercles, dehiscing as usual by a terminal pore. With regard to the present plant, Tulasne says, “ Sur la coupe du thalle pratiquée en un sens quelconque, elles des- a Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. 33 sinent, dans la profondeur du tissu filamenteux medullaire (blanc 4 cause de l’air qu’il retient emprisonné), un petit noyau globuleux et d’une teinte noiratre presque aussi obscure que celle de la région epidermique du lichen. Si la spermogonie est observée trés prés du sommet d’un rameau thallien, on la trouvera farcie de mucilage ainsi que de spermaties linéares, droites, et longues de 6 4 8 milliémes de millimetre. Les sper- mogonies situées plus bas, et qui sont naturellement plus agées, se sont fréquemment vidées de leur contenu, et ne renferment plus alors que de lair.” Cornicularia bicolor, Ach. Upon rocks among mosses, at an an elevation of about 1000 feet. Cornicularia lanata, Ach. On rocks at a great height, and generally barren. The best stations for this interesting lichen which I have ever seen, are the quarizose rocks of Schiehallion, where it grows in the utmost profusion, almost every specimen bzing covered with the beautiful black shin- ing apothecia. Next to Ben Lawers itself, I would recommend this celebrated hill as the best place for the usual rare alpine lichens ; and no cryptogamist if within a reasonable distance, should omit to pay it a visit. Stereocaulon paschale, Ach. Very common on rocks from an elevation of 500 feet, and often assuming very varied ap- pearances. This lichen ascends to the summit of the Pyre- nees, and to the level of perpetual snow on the Alps; attain- ing its extreme northern point in Melville Island, and its southern at Cape Horn and Kerguelen’s Land. Spermogones frequently occur on the little brown capitules near the apo- thecia, and differ little, except in colour, from the rough gra- nulations with which the whole thallus is covered. The sper- matia are linear and almost straight. Sticta crocata, Ach. I found two or three specimens of this very beautiful lichen growing along with S. sylvatica on a mossy rock near a little waterfall in the wood, at the foot of the hill on the east side. I have also gathered it by the Falls of-Moness near Aberfeldy; in the Duke of Argyle’s grounds at Inverary; and on the beech trees of Glenmoriston ; and Mr Borrer informs me that very fine specimens occur on the rocks of Dartmoor in Devonshire. It seems to have been noticed by NEW SERIES.—VOL. IV. NO. 1.—JuLy 1886. c o4 Hugh Macmillan on the the older botanists ; for Lightfoot, in his Flora Scotica, evi- dently alludes to it when he says,—“ In one specimen we observed these tubercles, and the little holes (cyphelle) among the down, of a bright yellow colour.’ This lichen has a very wide geographical range, being found on the mountains of New England, in North America, in Jamaica, along the west- ern slopes of the Andes, in the Sandwich Islands, down to the Straits of Magellan, Cape Horn and the Falkland Islands, in New Zealand, Van Diemen’s Land, and Australia. It occurs very frequently on the larger trees; and I possess magnificent specimens gathered on the summit of Table Mountain, Cape of Good Hope, where they grew on tufts of Racomitrium lanuginosum and Grubbia rosmarinifolia. In Europe, it is found in Great Britain and Ireland, Spain, Greece, Turkey, and Germany. Hooker states that it attains its northern limit at Inverary in Scotland (lat. 56° N.), which singularly coincides with the latitude of the most southern habitat, Cape Horn. A variety occurs especially at the Cape of Good Hope—the 6 gilva of Acharius—which differs from the typical plant in the margins of the lacinie being of the same colour as the rest of the thallus, and in the absence of the yellow pulverulent lines on the upper surface, which have given the species its appropriate name. This powder is very abundant and very yellow in New Zealand and South Ameri- can specimens; but the Scottish plant is very often bare, while the cyphelle alone are filled with a pale lemon-coloured pow- der. Sometimes, too, specimens occur in which the rime, on the upper surface, are of a white colour, when it is somewhat difficult to distinguish it from the S. limbata, and others of its congeners. The scattered fuscous brown apothecia are very rare in the normal plant, but very frequent and abun- dant, according to Acharius, in the variety gilva. Like the other species of the magnificent genus Sticta, it fructifies more freely and uniformly in tropical than in temperate regions. Ephebe pubescens, Fries. Common on wet rocks by the side of the shady stream that flows down the east shoulder of Ben Lawers, sometimes covering them with its broad, loose, irregular, very dark-green tufts. This curious production— the Cornicularia pubescens of Acharius—usually referred to Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. 35 the genus Stigonema of Agardh, and in its barren state, and in several of its protean forms, described by Kutzing and others as different species of rupestral alge, is now included by Fries, Nylander, and other eminent lichenists, with the well-known Lichinas of our sea-coasts, among the angiocar- pous lichens, under the family of Lichineew. Its microscopic structure is extremely curious, and will well repay a careful examination. Each filament is found to consist of three layers of tissue; the outermost one, which is of a cartila- ginous texture, presenting no peculiarity ; the intermediate layer, formed of spherical or angular cells, which resemble gonidia in colour and appearance, and are disposed differently in different filaments—irregularly heaped together in the more slender ones—and in more developed individuals, ranged in transverse dotted septa, separated from each other by tissue of a lighter colour; and the central or medullary layer in which the conceptacles and spermogonia are developed. These forms of fructification are produced on different fila- ments; the presence of conceptacles being externally indi- cated by fusiform swellings towards their extremities, and that of the spermogonia by subterminal spheroidal dilata- tions. The conceptacles open by a terminal pore, and are lined internally with clavate thece, each containing eight linear-oblong uniseptate sporidia; while the spermogonia dehisce by a similar ostiole, and contain numerous linear acrogenous spores or basidia, bearing somewhat oblong sper- matia, of extreme tenuity, lying motionless in a mucilage of such great transparency that in some cases it can hardly be observed at all. To those individuals who are inclined to adopt the hypothesis of the sexuality of lichens, the pre- sence of these organs on separate individuals seems to prove the dicecious nature of the fructification of the plant. The Ephebe pubescens, I may add, has been made the subject of minute investigation by Bornet, Berkeley, Brown, Von Flotow, and Fries, to whose admirable papers I refer the stu- dent for fuller information. Isidium oculatum, Ach. Running over mosses and on the bare soil of the west shoulder of the hill at a considerable elevation, very sparingly. Specimens of this rare lichen were c2 36 Hugh Macmillan on the gathered during the “ Antarctic Voyage” on Hermit Island, the Falkland Islands, and Kerguelen’s Land, on the bare earth ; but they were either in too young or imperfect a state for accurate determination, and were merely referred pro- visionally to this species. It is extremely doubtful whether this plant has any claim to be considered a true Isidium. Mr Sowerby depicts in the very admirable and characteristic figure he gives of it in “ English Botany,” the peculiar thece found only in the scutellate lichens; while Schaerer was dis- posed to regard the whole plant merely as a monstrous isi- dioid form of Lecanora subfusca, running over moss, and altered from its usual appearance by the peculiar nature and circumstances of its place of growth. It is well known indeed, that various species both of Parmelie and Lecanore, in a young and undeveloped state, and especially in abnormal situations, are scarcely distinguishable from one another, and have been referred by various writers to this very accommo- dating species. Cladonia vermicularis, Decand. No lichen occurs in such immense profusion on Ben Lawers as this species, parti- cularly on that part of the hill which faces Loch Tay. It covers the bare turf in exposed situations from an altitude of 1200 feet up to within a short distance of the summit where it terminates, or at least occurs in very small quantity. In wet weather it becomes so conspicuous as to attract the notice of even the most unscientific observer. It appears to be no less frequent on the high continental mountains, and especially on the Rhaetian, Pennine, and Lepontine Alps, where Schaerer mentions that it occurs everywhere, either on the bare earth or among grass or moss. Tuckerman also records it as a common species on the higher hills of North America; while Dr Hooker found abundant specimens at an elevation of nearly 17,000 feet on Donkia, one of the loftiest peaks of the great Himalayan range. In the “Cryptogamia Antarctica” likewise, it is described as “a highly arctic and antarctic plant, in the northern regions advancing to the extreme limits of vegetation, in islands beyond Spitzbergen, and in the southern occurring abundantly on Hermit Island, Cape Horn, and the Falkland Islands; being also common on the Andes Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. 37 of Peru and Columbia.” The fructification has never yet been gathered in this country. Dickson represents, in his figure of the plant, globose lateral tubercles ; and Mr Menzies’ American specimens, we are informed by Sir J. E. Smith, were furnished with what seemed the young shields of a Parmelia. Robert Brown also, in “ Parry’s First Voyage,” Appendix, p. 307, mentions that he observed in some arctic specimens, “apothecia lateralia, sparsa, atra, thallo innata, eoque sub- marginata, apotheciis Rocelle aliquo modo accedentia.”” Fries does not consider it a genuine and distinct species at all, but merely a degenerate or monstrous form of Scyphophorus gra- cilis, Hook., produced by growing in moist situations at a great altitude. To all appearance, indeed, it seems a spurious form of some Scyphophorus ; either of the above species or of alcicornis or endiviefolia, which are well known to be ex- ceedingly protean in their forms. On Ben Lawers we have very distinct regions of altitude, marked by lichens which prevail in them, and which seldom or never occur either at higher or lower elevations; and this hill, from its great height and bulk, represents tolerably well the distribution of similar species, not only on the other moun- tains in Britain but also on those of foreign countries. These regions or zones of altitude are somewhat analogous to, and very nearly as well defined as those of the phanerogamous plants; and the same names I think might be employed to designate both. For instance, at the base of the hill we have the lichens peculiar to the plains and the valleys, of which Parmelia saxatilis, Evernia prunastri, and other saxicolate, terricolate, and tree species too numerous to mention, may be considered as the representatives. This zone might be called the Agrarian Zone; the plants which compose it, in general, seldom ascending higher than a few hundred feet, but are widely dispersed over the level surface of the globe. It con- tains by far the largest proportion not only of species but of individuals. The next, the middle zone, comprises such lichens as Parmelia omphalodes, Cladonia rangiferina, Leca- nora ventosa and tartarea, Lecidea geographica, Gyrophora polyphylla and pellita, Cornicularia tristis and aculeata, Isidium corallinum, and Stereocaulon paschale. Some of 38 On the Rare Lichens of Ben Lawers. these lichens are very erratic, occurring at very high and low altitudes, and in some instances occupying the very last out- posts of vegetation on the lofty snow-crowned mountains of the globe ; but in general they are found in the greatest quan- tity and luxuriance in portions of the mountains commencing at an altitude of 800 feet, and terminating at that of 2000 feet, and, like the lichens of the zone beneath, are very widely distributed, some being even cosmopolitan ; and in some coun- tries occurring in such immense profusion as to give quite a peculiar character to the scenery. The next zone, beginning at a height of 2000, and terminating at that of 3000 or a few more hundred feet, which may very appropriately be termed the Arctic Zone, as its plants are eminently northern species, contains, among several others, [sidiwm oculatum, Cladonia vermicularis, Cornicularia lanata, Cetraria islandica, So- lorina saccata, Gyrophora proboscidea, deusta, and erosa, Parmelia fahlunensis, Squamaria leucolepis and gelida, and Lecidea fusco-lutea ; and the highest or Super-arctie Zone comprehends Verrucaria Hookeri, Lecanora frustulosa, Solorina crocea, Parmelia stygia, and Cetraria nivalis. It will thus be seen, 1 think, that the lichens in general are con- gregated in such a way as to form distinct regions or zones of altitude, which have remained unchanged as long as we have anyrecord. It is indeed much easier to indicate precisely the geographical range and distribution of the lichens, both as re- gards altitude and latitude, than it is of the mosses, although both, from the thousand varied and unaccountable circum- stances which operate in their dispersion, may seem to obey no constant controlling or regulating laws. — 39 Displacement and Extinction among the Primeval Races of Man. By Dantet Witson, LL.D., Professor of History and English Literature, University College, Toronto.* Among the many difficult problems which the thoughtful observer has to encounter, in an attempt to harmonize the ac- tual with his ideal of the world as the great theatre of the human race, none assumes a more intricate and inexplicable aspect than the displacement and extinction of races, such as the Anglo-Saxon has witnessed on the American continent for upwards of two centuries. In all ages history discloses to us unmistakeable evidence, not only of the distinctions which ci- vilization produces, but of the fundamental differences where- by a few highly favoured races have outsped all others; tri- umphing in the onward progress of the nations, not less by an innate constitutional superiority, than by an acquired civili- zation, or by local advantages. And if we are still troubled with the perplexities of this dark riddle, whereby the colonists of the New World only advance by the retrogression of the Red Man, and tread, in their western progress, on the graves of nations, it may not be without its interest to note some un- mistakeable evidences of this process of displacement and ex- tinction, accompanying the progress of the human race from the very dawn of its history. One, and only one record supplies any authoritative or credible statement relative to the origin of the human race. Geology has indeed, by its negative evidence, confirmed in its response the inspired answer of the patriarch,—< Enquire of the former age, and prepare thyself to the search of their fa- thers, for we are but of yesterday ;” but it is to the Mosaic record we must turn for any definite statement on a subject concerning which the mythologies of all nations have professed tofurnish some information. Every attentive reader of the Bible must have observed that the Book of Genesis, or the Beginning, is divided into two separate and perfectly distinct histories: the first, an account of the Creation, and the gene- ral history of mankind till the dispersion: the Genesis, pro- * Read before the Canadian Institute, lst Dec. 1858. 40 Professor D. Wilson on the Displacement and perly so called, extending over a period of considerably more than two thousand years, and contained in the first ten chap- ters and nine verses of the eleventh; while the remaining chapters, and indeed nearly the whole of the historical Books of the Old Testament, are exclusively devoted to the one se- lected race, that of Abraham and his descendants. Looking then to the first of these, and to its narrative in relation to the immediate descendants of Noah, the recognized protoplasts of the primary subdivisions of the human family, we perceive that certain very marked and permanent differ- ences are assigned to each. Ham, the father of Canaan, by negation is left without a blessing, while Canaan is marked as the progenitor of a race destined to degradation as the ser- vant of servants. The blessing of Shem is peculiar, as if it were designed chiefly to refer to the one branch of his descend- ants, “ to whom pertained the adoption, and the glory, and the Covenants, and the giving of the Law, and the service of God ;” but to his various descendants a special rank is assigned in the world’s future; special, predominant in relation to some branches of the human family; but yet inferior and of tem- porary duration when compared with the destinies of the Ja- phetic races, who, enlarging their bounds, and encroaching on the birthright of the elder nations, are destined to “ dwell in the tents of Shem,” and Canaan shall serve them. Thus from the very first we perceive that one important subdivision of the human family is stamped, ab initio, with the marks of degradation; while another, the Semitic, is privileged to be the first partaker of the blessing, to be the originator of the world’s civilization, and to furnish the chosen custodiers of its most valued inheritance, through the centu- ries which anticipated the fulness of time; yet the nations of this stock are destined to displacement, for “ Japhet shall be enlarged, and shall dwell in the tents of Shem.” Thus, also, from the very first we perceive the origination of a strongly marked and clearly defined distinction between diverse branches of the human family; and this, coupled with the apportionment of the several regions of the earth to the distinct types of man, distinguished from each other not less clearly than are the varied faune of these regions, seems to ‘ Extinction among the Primeval Races of Man. 41 leave no room for doubt that the genus Homo was as clearly subdivided into diverse varieties, if not into distinct species, as any other of the great mammalian types of species ranged over the earth’s surface according to a recognised law of geo- graphical distribution. At the same time it is apparent that such assigned differences do not, thus far, affect the question of the unity of the race. To the claim of a common manhood for those strongly marked and greatly diversified subdivisions of the human fa- mily, including its most immobile and degraded types, Shak- speare has furnished no inapt reply :— * Aye, in the catalogue, ye go for men; As hounds, and greyhounds, mongrels, spaniels, curs, Shoughs, water-rugs, and demi-wolves, are ycleped All by the name of dogs: The valued file Distinguishes the swift, the slow, the subtle, The housekeeper, the hunter, every one According to the gift which bounteous Nature Hath in him clos’d; whereby he doth receive Particular addition, from the bill That writes them all alike: and so of men,’* Looking, then, to the recorded descendants of the Noahic forefathers of the human family, we can, partially at least, trace their primitive subdivisions and occupation of the ancient earth. The sons of Japhet, the final inheritors of pre-emi- nence, are first recorded as dividing among them “the isles of ' the Gentiles,” a term which, looking to the geographical limits known to the ancient world, may be assumed, with little hesi- tation, as referring to the islands of the Eastern Mediterranean, and probably the Grecian Archipelago, with the adjacent coast lands of Asia Minor, and of Europe. There have been ingenious attempts made to assign to each of the Noahic generations their national descendants: the Cymri fromm Gomer, the Getz from Magog, the Medes from Madai, the Ionian Greeks from Javan, &c.; but the majority of such results commend themselves to our acceptance at best as only clever guesses at truth. A considerable number of the names which occur in the Noahic genealogy undoubtedly re- main, very partially disguised by subsequent changes, as the - * Macbeth, Act ILI. Scene 1. 42 Professor D. Wilson on the Displacement and appellations of historic or surviving races and kingdoms; of some of them, indeed, it appears, from their dual or plural number, or their peculiar Hebrew termination, that they are used in the Mosaic record, not in reference to individuals, but to families or tribes out of which nations sprung. Some of those have disappeared, or been transformed beyond the pos- sibility of tracing the relations between their ancient and mo- dern names; but of the most remarkable of the Hamitic de- scent we can be at no loss as to their geographical areas. The Canaanites occupied the important area of Syria and Pales- tine; and Nimrod, the son of Cush, moving to the eastward, settled his descendants on the banks of the Euphrates; so that, of the distinctly recognisable generations of Ham, it is in Asia, and not in Africa, that we must look for them, for cen- turies after the dispersion of the human race. But the Semitic races were also to share the Eastern Conti- nent before they enlarged their area, and asserted their right to the inheritance of the descendants of Ham. By Nimrod, the grandson of Ham, the settlements along the valley of the Euphrates were originated, “ and the beginning of his king- dom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar ;” all sites of ancient cities, which recent explora- tion and discovery seem to indicate as still traceable amid the graves of the East’s mighty empires. But the eponymous of the rival kingdom on the banks of the Tigris was Asshur, the son of Shem, and in that region also it would appear that we must look: for the locality of Elam (Elymais?), as well as others of the generations of the more favoured Shem; while nearly the whole habitable regions between their western bor- ders and the Red Sea appear to have been occupied, from this very dawn of human history, by the numerous Semitic de- scendants of Joktan, the protoplast of a branch of the human family to whose pedigree a special and curious attention is devoted in the Sacred Genealogies. By an expressive figure of speech, Shem is spoken of as the father of all the children of Eber, of whom came Joktan and his sons, “ whose dwelling was from Mesha, as thou goest unto Sephar, a mount of the East,” and of whom as surely descended Mohammed and the Semitic propagators of the monotheistic creed of the Koran; Eetinction among the Primeval Races of Man. 43 as came the Hebrews, according to Jewish belief, and through them the great Prophet of our Faith, from Eber, the assumed eponymus of those whom we must look upon, on many ac- counts, as important above all other Semitic races. Deriving our authority still from the Sacred Records, we ascertain, as the result of the multiplication and dispersion of one minutely detailed generation of the sons of Ham, through Canaan, that for eight hundred years thereafter they increased and multiplied in the favoured lands watered by the Jordan, and stretching to the shores of the Levant; they founded mighty cities, accumulated great wealth, subdivided their goodly inheritance among distinct nations and kingdoms of a common descent ; and upwards of eleven hundred years there- after, when the intruded tribe of Dan raised up the promised judge of his people, the descendants of Ham still triumphed in the destined heritage of the seed of Eber. At length, however, the Semitic Hebrew accomplished his destiny. The promised land became his possession, and the remnant of the degraded Canaanite his bond-servants. For another period of like du- ration, a period of more than eleven hundred years, the Semi- tic Israelites made the land their own. The triumphs of Da- vid, the glory and the wisdom of Solomon, and the vicissitudes of the divided nationalities of Judah and Israel, protracted until the accomplishment of the great destiny of the princes of Judah, constitute the epos of those who supplanted the settlers in the historic lands lying between the mountains of Syria and the sea, when first “‘ the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, and set the bounds of the people.” Then came another dis- placement. The Semitic Hebrews were driven forth from the land, and, for eighteen hundred years, Roman and Saracen, Mongol Turk and Semitic Arab, have disputed the possession of the ancient heritage of the Canaanite. For very special and obvious reasons, the isolation of the Hebrew race, and the purity of the stock, were most carefully guarded by the enactments of their great Lawgiver, prepara- tory to their taking possession of the land of Canaan ; yet the exclusive nationality, and the strictly defined purity of race admitted of exceptional deviations of a remarkable kind. 44. Professor D. Wilson on the Displacement and While the Ammonite and Moabite are cut off from all permis- sive alliance, and the offspring of an union between the He- brew and these forbidden races is not to be naturalized even in the tenth generation, the Edomite, the descendant of Ja- cob’s brother, and the Egyptian, are not to be abhorred; but the children that are begotten of them are to be admitted to the full privileges of the favoured seed of Jacob in the third generation. This exception in favour of the Egyptian is a remarkable one. The ostensible reason, viz., that the Israelites had been strangers in the land of Egypt, appears inadequate fully to account for it, when the nature of that sojourn and the inci- dents of the Exodus are borne in mind, and would tempt us to look beyond it to the many traces of Semitic character which the language, arts, and civilization of Egypt disclose. Miz- raim, the son of Ham, and the brother of Canaan, is indeed ordinarily regarded as the first inheritor of the Nile valley, and this on grounds fully as conclusive as those on which other apportionments of the post-diluvian earth are assigned; but along with the direct evidence of Scripture, we must also take the monumental records of Egypt, which show that that land was speedily intruded on by very diverse races, and that by the time its civilization was sufficiently matured to chronicle, by pic- torial and idiographic writings, the history of that cradle-land of the world’s intellect, its occupants stood in a relation to each other precisely similar to that in which we find the Semitic and Hamitic populations of Palestine in the days of Joshua. The ethnological affinities of Egypt are certainly Asiatic rather than African, although she stands isolated, and in some im- portant respects unique, in relation alike to the ancient and the modern world. The ethnologist must be tempted to look for the congeners of the ancient Egyptian rather among the Semitic Asiatics, speaking and writing a language akin to her own, than among the Berber, Ethiopian, or Negro aborigines of Africa. But around the shores of that expressively desig- nated Mediterranean Sea, how striking are the varied memo- rials of the world’s past. A little area may be marked off on the map, environing its eastern shores, and constituting a mere spot on the surface of the globe, yet its history is the Extinction among the Primeval Races of Man. 45 whole ancient history of civilization, and a record of its eth- nological changes would constitute an epitome of the natural history of man. All the great empires of the old world clus- tered around that centre, and as Dr Johnson remarked in one of his recorded conversations: “ All our religion, almost all our law, almost all our arts, almost all that sets us above sa- vages, has come to us from the shores of the Mediterranean.” There race has succeeded race; the sceptre has passed from nation to nation, through the historical representatives of all the great primary subdivisions of the human family, and “ their decay has dried up realms to deserts.” It is worthy of consideration, however, from its bearing on analogous modern questions, how far the political displacement of nations in that primeval historic area was accompanied by a corresponding ethnological displacement and extinction. Tt is in this respect that the sacred narrative, in its bearings on the primitive sub-divisions of the human family, and their appointed destinies, seems specially calculated to supply the initiatory steps in relation to some conclusions of general, if not universal application. However mysterious it be to read of the curse of Canaan on the very same page which records the blessing of Noah and his sons, and the first covenant of mercy to the human race, yet the record of both rest on the same indisputable authority. Still more, the curse was what may strictly be termed an ethnological one. Whether we re- gard it as a punitive visitation on Ham in one of the lines of generation of his descendants, or simply as a prophetic fore- telling of the destiny of a branch of the human family, we see the Canaanite separated at the very first, from all the other generations of Noahic descent, as a race doomed to degrada- tion and slavery. Nevertheless, to all appearance, many gene- rations passed away, in the abundant enjoyment, by the off- spring of Canaan, of all the material blessings of the “ green undeluged earth ;” while they accomplished, as fully as any other descendants of Noah, the appointed re-peopling, and were fruitful and increased, and brought forth abundantly in the earth, and multiplied therein, even as did the most favoured among the sons of Shem or Japhet. When some five centu- ries after the Canaanite had entered on his strangely burdened 46 Professor D. Wilson on the Displacement and heritage, the progenitor of its later and more favoured inheri- tors was guaranteed by a divinely executed covenant, the gift to his seed of that whole land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the covenant was not even then to take place until the fourth generation, because the ini- quity of the Amorites—one of the generations of Canaan, used by synecdoche for the whole—was not yet full. When that appointed period had elapsed, and only the narrow waters of the Jordan lay between the sons of Israel and the land of the Canaanites, their leader and lawgiver, who had guided them to the very threshold of that inheritance on which only his eyes were permitted to rest, foretold them in his final bless- ing: “ The eternal God shall thrust out the enemy from be- fore thee, and shall destroy, and Israel shall dwell in safety alone.” No commandment can be more explicit than that which required of the Israelites the utter extirpation of the elder occupants of their inheritance: ‘“‘ When the Lord thy God shall bring thee into the land, and hath cast out before thee seven nations greater and mightier than thou, thou shalt smite them and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them.” Neverthe- less we find that the Israelites put the Canaanites to tribute, and did not drive them out ; that the children of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites; but, according to the author of the book of Judges, they still dwelt there in his day; and so with various others of the aboriginal tribes. So also, the Gibeonites obtained by craft a league of amity with Israel, and they also remained—bondmen, hewers of wood, and drawers of water, yet so guarded by the sacredness of the oath they had extorted from their disinheritors, that at a long subsequent date we find seven of the race of their supplanters, the sons and grandsons of the first Israelitish king, sacrificed by David to their demand for vengeance on him who had then SEES their extirpation. Even more remarkably significant than all those evidences of a large remnant of the ancient Hamitic population, surviving in the midst of the later Semitic inheritors of Canaan, is the appearance of the name of Rahab, the harlot of Jericho, in the genealogy of Joseph, as recorded by Matthew. The purity of Extinction among the Primeval Races of Man. 47 descent of the promised seed of Abraham and David was most sacredly guarded all through the generations of their race, yet even in that line a singularly remarkable exception is admit- ted; and the son of Ham, and the seed of Canaan, have also their links in the genealogy of the Messiah. Turning to another portion of the same subject, we trace in the Noahic genealogies the primitive occupants of ancient Pheenicia among the descendants of Ham; while looking to other and independent sources of evidence pertaining to the people of historical Phcenicia, we find them a race philologi- cally Semitic, but in so far as their mythology and legislation, and those of their Carthaginian offshoots, supply data, we should class them as a race psychologically Hamitic. The le- gitimate inference would seem to be, that in Pheenicia, as in Palestine, the Semitic and Hamitic races were brought together by the extension of the former over the grea primarily occu- pied by the latter; and that then, unrestrained by any of the checks which so materially circumscribed the tendency to in- termixture between the conquerors and the conquered, in the inheritance of the Hebrews, a complete amalgamation took place, though with such predominancy of the later intruded Semitic conquerors, as history supplies abundant illustrations of in the well-detailed pages of more recent national annals. From all this it would seem to be justly inferred that ethno- logical displacement and extinction must be regarded in many, probably in the majority of cases, not as amounting to a literal extirpation, but only as equivalent to absorption. Such doubt- less has been the case to a great extent with the ancient Euro- pean Celtz, notwithstanding the definite, the distinct historical evidence we possess of the utter extinction of whole tribes both of the Britons and Gauls, by the merciless sword of the intrud- ing Roman ; and such also is being the case with no incon- siderable remnant of the aboriginal Red Indians of this conti- nent. Partially so it is the case even with the Negro popula- tion of the United States, in spite of all the prejudices of caste or colour. It is impossible to travel in the far West of the American continent, on the borders of the Indian territories, or to visit the reserves where the remnants of the Indian tribes displaced by us in Canada and the States linger on in passive 48 Professor D. Wilson on the Displacement and process of extinction, without perceiving that they are disap- pearing as a race, in part at least, by the same process by which the German, the Swede, or the Frenchman, on emigrat- ing to the Anglo-Saxonized States of America, becomes, in a generation or two, amalgamated with the general stock. I was particularly impressed with this idea during a brief residence at the Sault Ste. Marie this summer (1855). When on my way to Lake Superior, I had passed a large body of Christianized Indians, assembling from various points both of the American and the Hudson’s Bay territories, on one of the large islands in the river Ste. Marie, and while waiting at the Sault a considerable body of them returned, passing up in their canoes. Having entered into conversation with an in- telligent American Methodist Missionary who accompanied them, I questioned him as to the amount of intermarriage or intercourse that took place between the Indians and the whites, and its probable effects in producing a permanent new type resulting from the mixture of the two very dissimilar races. His reply was, “ Look about you at this moment, compara- tively few of these onlookers have not Indian blood in their veins ;” and such I discovered to be the case, as my eye grew more familiar with the traces of Indian blood. At all the white settlements near those of the Indians, the evidence of admixture was abundant, from the pure half-breed to the slightly marked remoter descendant of Indian maternity, dis- coverable only by the straight black hair, and a singular wa- tery glaze in the eye, not unlike that of the English Gypsey. The Indian may remain uncivilized, and perish before the ad- vance of civilization, which brings for him only vice, famine, and disease, in its train; but such is not the case with the mixed race of a white paternity. Much. perhaps all, of their aptitude for civilization may come by their European heritage of blood, but the Indian element survives even when the all- predominating Anglo-Saxon vitality has effaced its physical manifestations. In this manner, the ancient Celtic element of European ethnology doubtless still asserts no inconsiderable influence. The Briton of Wales retains nearly all his early characteris- tics; his philological and physiological peculiarities are alike On Current Electricity in Plants during Vegetation. 49 unchanged. The Cornish Briton, on the contrary, retains only the last of these, his language having ceased to be a living tongue; while the continental Gaul has not only resigned his language for a neo-Latin tongue, but has so intermingled his blood with Roman, Frank, Norman, Iberian, and Arab, that he is no longer looked upon, like the Welshman or Irish Galwegian, as a pure Celt. Yet few, if any, doubt the predo- minance of the Celtic element, or hesitate to trace to that source many of the characteristic peculiarities wherein the Frenchman differs so essentially, either from the continental German or the Anglo-Saxon. Ina like manner, though doubt- less in a much less marked degree, it may be that the Red Indian of America may leave some permanent traces of his intermixture with that race by whom he is being displaced, proving here also that absorption, and not absolute extirpation, plays a part, at least, in the extinction of modern as well as primitive aboriginal races, when left to the operation of natu- ral causes. An Experimental Inquiry, undertaken with the view of ascer- taining whether any signs of Current Electricity are manifested in Plants during Vegetation. By H. F. Baxter, Esq. That electric currents may be obtained by inserting the’ platinum electrodes of a galvanometer into different parts of vegetables, has been proved by Becquerel,* Donné,t Wart- mann,} and Zantedeschi.|| According to Becquerel,§ “The * Traité de l’Electricité, tome iv., p. 164; Comptes Rendus, Noy. 4, 1850, Mai 5, 1851; or Phil. Mag. 1851. t Traité de l’Electricité, tome iv., p. 164. } Bibliothéque Universelle de Genéve, Dec. 1850; or Phil. Mag. 1851. || In the Comptes Rendus for Mars 24, 1851, Zantedeschi refers to the Comptes Rendus des Sciences de 1’Institut Vénitien des Sciences, Lettres, et Beaux Arts, 26 Mai 1850, as containing the results that he has arrived at. We have been unable to meet with this publication, Since this paper was read before the Royal Society (Nov. 1852), a paper by Professor H. Buff, on the Electricity of Plants, has been published, an account of which will be found in the Phil. Mag. for Feb. 1854, and Annales de § Phil. Mag., 1851, p. 578. NEW SERIES.—VOL. IV. NO. I.—JULY 1856. D 50 H. F. Baxter on distribution of the ascending sap, and the liquid of the cortical parenchyma, leads to the belief that currents continually circulate in vegetables, from the bark tothe pith.” . . “The leaves act like the green part of the parenchyma of the bark ; that is to say, the sap which circulates in their tissues is negative with relation to the wood, to the pith, and to the earth, and positive with regard to the cambium.” . . . . ‘The chemical actions are the first causes, it cannot be doubted, of the electric effects observed in vegetables.” ‘*In the roots,” says Wartmann,* “the stems, the branches, the petioles, and the peduncles, there exists a central descend- ing current, and a peripherical ascending current ; I call them axial currents.” . . . . “In most leaves the current proceeds from the lamina to the nerves, as well as to the central parts of the petiole and the stalk. In certain fleshy plants, it is directed from the medullary or cortical portions of the stalk towards the mesophyllum, and from the latter towards the superior and inferior faces.” . . . . “They arise from an electro-chemical action between the liquid sub- stances brought into contact by the tearing of the tissues. The weak residual current (which is the normal current) owes its origin to the interposition of the porous vegetable walls between juices of different concentration, and proceeds through them from the densest to the least dense liquid.” The results of these inquirers would lead us to suppose that the effect upon the needle is due to what may be called second- ary actions—viz., to the reaction of the different vegetable juices upon each other, and to the reaction of the fluids upon the surface of the platinum electrodes. The very fact, Chimie et de Phys. 3™° Serie, tome xli., p. 198. The general conclusion that Professor Buff appears to have arrived at is the following :—“ The roots, and all the internal portions of the plant filled with sap, are in a permanently negative condition; while the moist or moistened surface of the fresh branches, leaves, flowers, and fruits, are permanently positively electric. . . . . The electro- motive action arises from the moist surface of the plant on the one hand, and the liquids which are in its interior on the other.” We may refer also to Becquerel’s original memoir in the Mémoires de VAcadémie des Sciences de Paris, tome xxiii., p. 301, 1853, and to a valuable paper by Professor Goodsir in the Edinburgh New Phil. Journal, Oct. 1855. * Phil. Mag., 1851. Current Electricity in Plants during Vegetation. 51 however, that a difference in the fluids exists, proves also that a force capable of causing this difference must likewise exist ; and the question naturally arises, are not these primary actions accompanied with the development of electrical actions ? The primary actions we refer to are those of secretion, nutrition, and absorption. Now, as the leaves and the roots perform some of the most important functions in plants, it appeared probable that it would be in these organs that we might obtain a solution of our problem ; and the two following questions now occurred—1 st, What would be the effect if the external surface of the leaf, and the sap flowing from it, be formed into a circuit? and, 2dly, What would be the effect if the external surface of the root (the spongioles), and the fluid ascending from it, be formed into a circuit? § I. On the manifestation of Electric Currents in the Leaves of Plants during Vegetation. The galvanometer, and mode of employing it, has been already described in the Phil. Trans. for 1852, p. 279. The mode of conducting the experiments was as follows :— The leaf was placed upon a clean piece of glass, and the extremity of one platinum electrode, to the extent of half an inch or an inch, was placed upon the upper or under surface of the leaf; a small notch was cut in the petiole, and, as the sap flowed out, the extremity of the other electrode was placed in contact with it. We may just remark, that after having worked for some time upon plants growing in pots and in London, we were led, from the unsatisfactory results that were obtained, to repeat the experiments upon plants growing in the open air and in the country; and it soon became evident that, in order to obtain anything like satisfactory results, strong, healthy, and vigorous plants should be employed.* Experiment 1.—Vegetable marrow. A healthy middle- sized leaf, and the sap from the petiole ; the latter positivet 3°. * The experiments were performed during the months of July, August, and September, 1852. T Some difficulty is experienced in comprehending the results obtained by p2 52 H. F. Baxter on A large leaf slightly tinged with yellow, and dry, and the sap from the petiole—no effect. Various leaves were tried with similar results; when any effect was obtained, the sap was positive. The surface of the leaf was occasionally mois- tened with water, with doubtful results as to the effect being increased. If the leaf had been separated from the plant for any time before the circuit was formed, no effect oc- curred. As several of the experiments were carried on in the open air, one or two circumstances occurred which it was necessary to guard against. If the weather was at all boisterous, it became utterly impossible to continue the experiments, the slightest breeze being sufficient to shake the instrument. To obyiate this difficulty, the galvanometer was firmly fixed upon a heavy block of wood, and sheltered. We were, however, perplexed by another circumstance. Working during a fine and calm day, it occasionally happened that just upon the point of completing a circuit, the needle would move to the extent of 10° or 15°, or more, without any apparent cause, the needle up to that time having been perfectly steady, and the circuit not yet completed. After some time it was noticed to — occur just after a cloud had passed over the sun, and it was thought to be due to a slight breeze that might be then pro- duced; but we are now disposed to consider it as owing to the heating effect of the sun’s rays upon the glass shade of the instrument creating a motion of the air within the shade. Some facts bearing upon this question have been noticed by Prof. Tyndall * in reference to some experiments of Dr Good- man. We may just mention another fact worthy of notice. 161 Proceedings of Societies. 00-001 O8G 96:96 ) | i ; | } ; ‘SOLBILY PUG y[VqoH Jo opixg “BIsOUS I, SOULITY “LOPOAY, “BULMN,Y pue Wory Jo oprxoaogy “BOIS SHUVd OOT NI NOWMISOdNOD “AyyUENnh [wus U4 “epog puv vssuqo,[ £ OULITT ‘wurninypy oon @ ‘osounsun yy q[BqoL) JO OpIxO *BISOULTT [AT ‘UOAT JO OPTXO.10 7 pur ‘outry “qooy orqno sod *yooy o1qno aod *qo0yF OTQno aod *qooy orgno aod ‘WOLT JO OpIXOJOIy | ‘MOAT Jo OpTxoz,O.LT squid [wroduy gg | syurd yemoduy Zp | syurd porsodary ge | sootno pmnpil 4.g poaposstcy ; PoAosstcy 5 ‘dun g-arv oy} aop |uoyowmypy Arepprdep *doTs F “OUTS O44 “ou0qyg -un poqtosqe aoyve ry | Aq poqatosqe oye Aq pogtosqe coy Ay “LOTT poutryuo0o qe Sur Ruts ssory uodn poy onmopyo joyg uodn aoe Prov -O1pATyT JO uolpoy OLUOgAUD JO UOLJOY ‘ued JO 1G. VL UOT POATOssIp ‘soqnuret OP puw anoy J Loy OU0jS JO sures OL-:G0G UO poptog LOPVAL SOOUNO O ——. ‘ouodg ON} UO LOPV AA JO UOTOY EVPG “AVTATYD oyroodg rn ‘quoi ypopbwag fo sishpoup JULY 1856. NEW SERIES.—VOL. IV. NO. I. 162 Proceedings of Societies. Royal Physical Society. Thursday, 28th February 1855. Rosert K. Grevitie, LL.D., in the Chair. The following Communications were read :— 1. On Uigite, a new mineral (?) By M. Forster Hepprez, M.D. In a quarry near Uig, in Skye, I obtained indifferent specimens of Faroelite, a single crystal of Analcime, and a few pieces of a substance which, being unknown to me, I analyzed, and which may be considered new. Should this be admitted, I would propose for it the name Uigite. It occurs in small nests in the amygdaloid, which is here very vesicular, is not distinctly crystallized, being in radiated sheafy plates, somewhat resembling the structure of a plumose mica, but in general appearance intermediate between Faroelite and gryolite; colour white, slightly yel- lowish ; lustre tremulous and pearly: hardness, 5°5, brittle; specific gra- vity, 2°284 ; before the blow-pipe fuses readily and quietly, with strong re-action of soda, to a white opaque enamel, which is not frothy. On ana- lysis, it afforded 45-98 per cent. of silica, 21°93 of alumina, 16°15 of lime, 4-7 of soda, and 11:25 water. These proportions give equivalents,—silica, 7; alumina, 3; lime, 4; soda,1; water,9. The mineral, therefore, con- sists of 1 equivalent of a silicate of lime and soda (where the lime is to the soda as 4 to 1), 1 equivalent of a sesquisilicate of alumina, and 9 of water. The calculated percentage proportions of which compound are,— silica, 46°09; alumina, 21°93; lime, 15°97; soda, 4°46; water, 11°55; which agree closely with the analytical results. No mineral has the above formula, which differs, however, from that of Faroelite (Mesole), merely in the insertion of the compound 2 (Ca O, SiO) + HO. 2. Remarks on the Scientific bearings of recent discoveries in Helmin- thology. By James Warprop, Esq. 3. Notice of a curious Metamorphosis in a Zoophyte-like Animal. By Cuartes W. Pracu, Esq., Wick. In March last year, I obtained from a fisherman’s line an old and much corroded valve of Psanombia ferroensis, which had been hooked up from deep water ; on it I noticed jelly-like spots, and placed it in a shallow glass of sea water ; the next day | fancied that I could make out, with my pocket lens, zoophyte-like animals. At once I transferred the shell in a watch glass, filled with sea water, to my microscope, and was delighted to find my suspicion correct, for after a little management, so as to catch the light, I could see the forms as figured (Fig. 1) attached to the shell by a short foot-stalk, a little inflated near the upper part, tipped with a slightly raised and rounded centre, from which extended four long and four short leaf-like arms, each granulated down the centre; one or two had, in ad- dition, springing from these, delicate tentacle-like arms, probably in a farther stage of development. They were easily disturbed, but soon again displayed themselves ; their transparency, added to this shyness, rendered it difficult to catch their forms. At first I thought they were the early stage of a Hydractina, and probably, H. brevicornis of Miiller, men- tioned in Johnston’s second edition of ‘‘ The British Zoophytes,”’ page 35. My next examination was on the 2d of April. After giving them a sup- ply of sea water, they were still fixed; I could, however, perceive a dif- oa Proceedings of Societies. 163 ference, the centre of the head more raised and cone-shaped, and the arms shorter. I continued my examinations daily; and on the 6th, in- stead of moored creatures, I had a fleet of probably one hundred minute, free, naked-eyed, medusoid-like beauties (Fig 2), jerking about in all direc- tions, with the exception of size all alike, perfectly transparent; the umbrella Fig. 1. well rounded and pilose; the sub-umbrella large; each had four larze ocelli-like bulbs on the edge of the mantle, furnished with a stiffly turned- up tentacle, tipped with a disk having a dark centre ; this surrounded by a light ring, and outside a darker edge, dark but short bars arranged in a quincunx manner on these tentacula. The ocelli were composed of mi- nute, dark granules. As well as these long tentacula, there were four smaller and shorter ones, also turned up, but no ocelli where the edge of the mantle is shown. On the lower part of the mantle runs a canal com- municating with the bulbs of the large tentacula ; in the canal I observed a granular circulation passing along, and, as if revolving in the bulbs and a short way down each large tentacle; into these bulbs smaller granules descended from the sub-umbrella, by the gastro-vascular canals ; these canals extended to the upper part of the stomach, the stomach being at- tached to them, and is rounded on the upper part, and divided into four lobes ; it then narrows and runs out bell-shaped to the quadrate mouth, which has four long lips fimbriated at the tips. They were very active up to the 10th, when some little change took place. I supplied small quantities of water, and used every precaution, from being anxious to see all I could of them. On the 11th they became sickly, and the upper part of the umbrella in eight festoons, the tentacula slightly drooping. On the 13th, nearly inactive, hyaline, and turned inside out. I began to hope that, as the mouth had become elongated into a peduncle-like form, they were about to become fixed again; they, however, dwindled away, and although I kept the water for months, I could trace nothing more. I have not yet seen Steenstrup’s work on ‘‘ The Alternation of Genera,” therefore am unable to say whether it may be one of the interesting facts noticed by him. They differed in the fixed state from any of the zoophytes figured and described by Johnston ; and when free from all the naked-eye medusz figured in the monograph of Forbes, it may be one of the latter in its earlier stages, and probably is, from beimg pilose, this being the case with many of the young of the medusoid tribe which have fallen under my notice, and I have seen many. This is the most interest- ing of all. The most like the free state, is Lizzia octopunctata of For- bes, Pl. xii., fig. 3; it agrees thus far in the form of the umbrella, in L 2 164 Proceedings of Societies. having & tentacular bulbs, 4 gastro-vascular canals, the shape of the sto- mach, quadrate mouth, and long fimbriate-tipped lips. It differs in being pilose, and having only 8 tentacula, instead of 20, viz., 3 at each large ocelli bulb, and 2 at each of the smaller ones ; even this difference in the number of tentacula, &c., ought not to put it out of court, for I have seen, and have a long list of notes and numerous drawings of the strange changes from the young to the adult state of these lovely gems. At present I cannot spare the time to make the drawings and extend the notes. I present this fact, so that others may be aware that such transformations are to be met with on our own coasts, and that by watching for shells from deep water thus begemmed, a series of observatious may be made, and more facts collected, so that the true nature and phases of these Pro- teus-like objects may be made out. 4. A Letter was read from the Rev. H. M. Wanpett, Old Calabar, to Anprew Murray, Esq., containing additional information re- garding the new Electric Fish (Malapterurus Beninensis, Mur.) Mr Waddell writes as follows :—‘‘ As you attach some importance to an observation I had formerly made concerning the power of the small electrie fish of this river to benumb other fish with which they come into contact, I should have verified my observation by renewed experiments. An opportunity soon offered of accomplishing this object, and I now com- municate the result, which you will probably deem to be of a very satis- factory description. I have four electric fish in a large basin, the largest about six inches long, and as thick as the neck of a quart bottle ; the smallest about three inches long, and the thickness of your finger. They have been there in a healthy state for some months. I procured eight small fishes, varying from two to three and a half inches in length, which I put in with the others. The electric fish continued, as usual, side by side, quiescent at the bottom, while their visitors swam and darted about in a lively manner, and even ventured down among their dangerous neigh- bours, rousing them to activity, passing through their ranks, and dis- turbing them not a little, without seeming to be either afraid of them or molested by them. They frequently rubbed sides without any effect similar to what I had before observed being produced, and I began to fear that my former observation would not be confirmed. Having watched their movements in vain, I retired for a while, but returned in half an hour to see how they were getting on. I then found the new-comers, all but one, the largest of them, lying at the bottom among the electric fish. Having taken out the seven which were evidently struck, I found four of the smallest quite dead and stiff, their backs twisted or curved, and their mouths gaping open. Three of them, though much benumbed, revived when transferred to another basin of water, and, after an hour or two, recovered perfectly, and were as lively as before. The one which escaped at first was left with his dangerous companions, but was not so lively as at the first. It would swim about a little, then sink, again rise and make a few darts, and then sink again. Tired of watching him, I went on with my book, but after a little returned, and found him quite dead, his back curved downwards very considerably, and his mouth gaping half an inch open. Taking him by the tail, I lifted him out as stiff as if frozen, and further, observed his colour quite gone ; a very dark brown before, he was now as pale as ashes. I had noticed something of this change of colour in the first four affected, but not of so marked a kind as in this last one. The three which recovered from the first attack remained to be tried again, and were put in with the electric fish a second time, when quite strong and lively. They swam and frisked about as playfully and safely al a Proceedings of Societies. 165 as on the first occasion, and I watched them intently, and for a longer time than before, but observed no movement on the part of the electric fish, though the others sometimes darted down among them. They seemed to be more intent on eyeing me than minding their little visitors, one of which was nearly three inches long, the others about twoeach. Tired of looking and seeing nothing, I left them as before, and after a little re- turned, when all three were lying benumbed at the bottom. Being re- moved to another basin, one of them revived, the others were dead. The dead ones were not, however, so powerfully affected as their companions in misfortune ; they were not rigid, nor contorted, nor pallid, nor gaping. Obviously they were not so severely struck as the others had been, the powers of the electric fish being probably by this time somewhat weakened. The one that still survived recovered completely to admit ofa new experi- ment. I confess to some misgivings of feelings on subjecting it to a third and final trial ; but a remark in your note, if the electric fish eat those they stunned, was yet unanswered. Therefore, in retiring for the night, I gave it to them for their supper, if they should have any fancy to make that use of their victim. But in the morning I found hin, though dead, yet otherwise uninjured. If you ask me what do they live on? I cannot answer. Those with me eat nothing. They are on my study table, and I see them daily, but give them nothing. Even their water is seldom changed, yet are they strong and lively. As I am told that they lie much in the ooze at the bottom of the river, I have given them sand to lie on, which they sometimes stir up with their tails. A few times daily, but chiefly in the evening and early night, they plunge about and make the water muddy. I cannot learn that they have been ever found larger than a herring.” 5. On the Reproduction of Cydippe pomiformis. By T. StrerHity Wricut, M.D. (This paper appears in the present number of the Journal.) 6. On Two new Actinias from Arran. By T. Streraitt Wriaeut, M.D. (One of them is described and figured in the present number of the Journal.) Wednesday, 26th March. Wiutttam H. Lower, M.D., President, in the Chair. The following Communications were read :— 1. On Zoological Classification. By Professor M‘Dona.p. 2. Revision of the Genus Catops. By Anprew Murray, Esq., W.S. 3. On Gemmiparous Reproduction (multiplication) in Actinia dianthus. By Tuomas Wricut, M.D. (Living specimens were exhibited.) The author stated that Actinia dianthus, the Plumose Sea Anemone of Dalyell, was found on the shores of the Firth of Forth, generally on rocks which were uncovered by the seaonly at very low tides. Its habitat was not extensive; it is gregarious, great numbers being frequently found in a very limited space. At Arran he had seen several hundreds closely aggregated together, clothing the roof of a wide low cave, and hanging down like so many membranous bags half filled with water. A similar colony had existed on the perpendicular surface of a single large stone opposite to the Baths at Seafield ; and, again, another on the under sur- face of a large overhanging rock at Wardie. It had been a matter of question with the author, how the young of these Actinias, if ejected trom the mouth, as in Actinia mesembryanthemum, troglodytes, bellis, and gemmacea, were able to attach themselves to the rocks, instead of falling down and being washed away by the tide. It was known that 166 Proceedings of Societies. Actinia mesembryanthemum, troglodytes, and bellis, were exceedingly prolific, Sir John Dalyell and Dr Cobbold having seen twenty or thirty produced at a single litter from the first species, and yet the number of very young Actinias found in situations where old specimens abounded was very small, and certainly bore no proportion to the number generated. The cave at Arran was very difficult of access, on account of its shallow- ness and the floor being covered by a pool of water ; and the Actinias were only to be reached by assuming a posture which could not be main- tained for more than a few minutes. A number were, however, obtained, which, being attached to sponges, were easily stripped from the rock, and with them were associated a great number of very small specimens. Not long afterwards the author noticed a number of young surrounding a large white dianthus in the Vivarium of a friend at Leith, and was told that the Actinia, while moving round the tank, had left behind it small white bodies, which separated themselves from the foot or sucker and became young Actinias. Sir John Dalyell had described a similar mode of multiplication in Actinia lacerata, and Hollard in Actinia rosea (?) The former writer had observed that Actinia lacerata protruded from all parts of its foot, stolons or suckers, which became detached, and pre- sently put forth tentacles, and were developed into minute Actinias. After reading Sir John Dalyell’s account of Actinia lacerata, Dr Wright was anxious to ascertain whether there might not be included in the pro- longations separated from the foot, either true ova or germs, or some tissue specialized for the production of young. In the hydroid zoophytes, such as Hydra, Coryne, &c., the walls of the body consisted of three elements or layers,—a dermal or integumental, an areolar or muscular, and a mucous or intestinal layer; and when gemmation took place in these animals, it occurred by the protrusion of a simple diverticulam or sac from the canal of the body, formed of all the three elements. This diverticulum was developed into a polype body, with mouth and tentacles like those of the polype, from which it pullulated; the two bodies having the digestive canal and all the tissues continuous with each other. In Hydra tuba, multiplication took place by stolons, which ex- tended to some distance from the body before the new polype bodies sprouted from them, but in that case also a prolongation of the intestinal element passed through the stolon from the old into the new body. These new polypes were not young; their production was a simple increase of the individual, becoming afterwards a multiplication, either by accident, in some cases, or in others by a natural process of absorption. The structure of the helianthoid zoophytes or Actinias was more complicated in its development than that of the hydroid polypi, but it consists of the same three elements. The dermal coat was succeeded by the muscular element, which constituted the chief part of the external wall of the body and tentacles, and then passed inward to the stomach, in the form of septa or partitions, which suspended that viscus in the centre of the body, and divided the intervening spaces into numerous chambers. The mucous or intestinal element existed as a flattened sae or stomach, which appeared, when viewed edgeways, as a mere line extending down about half the centre of the body. The stomach communicated freely with the general cavity of the body. This cavity, which corresponded to the water-vascular system of the Acalephe, was single below, but as it passed upward it formed a number of chambers divided from each other by the septa before mentioned, and finally communicated with the tentacles, each chamber terminating in the cavity of a single tentacle. 7 The whole of the general cavity and its chambers was lined with cilia, by which a constant circulation of the fluid was sustained, and the fune- tions of nutrition, respiration, and excretion were all carried on simulta- —_-- =" Proceedings of Societies. 167 neously. From the lining membrane of the general cavity, the male and female reproductive organs were also developed, and there, in some spe- cies, the ova were hatched, and the young (at first mere shapeless, ciliated germs, swimming rapidly in the fluids of the cavity, chambers, and ten- tacles) became fully formed, passed into the stomach of the parent, and were ejected from the mouth as perfect Actinias, with mouth, tentacles, and suctorial foot. The author had thought it possible that the prolon- gations from the foot of Actinia lacerata might contain one of these hatched germs in its imperfect state, and that it might be thus deposited on the surface occupied by the parent, and its safety insured. Having some specimens of dianthus in his possession, he had waited for some time in vain for their multiplication by fissure; he therefore determined to try an experimentum crucis, and for that purpose having placed the spe- cimen in a jar of sea-water, and fed it until it had become fully distended, he examined the edge of the foot, which was perfectly transparent, with a powerful lens, and convinced himself that no ovum or germ existed in that situation. He then separated a piece about a line in length, by half a line in breadth, from the edge of the foot. The parts immediately re- ceded from each other, and the next day he found that the separated por- tion had crept to a considerable distance along the glass. In two or three days it had raised its divided edge from the surface to which it was at- tached, and had become a curved column; in a fortnight tentacles had © appeared; and in three weeks it had become a perfect Antinia, with a single row of beautiful long tentacles. From the foot of this small Ac- tinia he eut two other exceedingly minute slips, which also became Ac- tinias; and from the foot of the original Actinia he also separated, at various times, fuurteen other slips, all of which became developed as the first. The author stated that this case of gemmiparous increase was an instance of the development of a perfect and very complicated organism, from a minute fragment of one similar to itself, all that was essential to the process being apparently the existence of a portion of each of the - three elemental tissues of the original, the dermal, the muscular, and the mucous tissue,—the last being represented by the lining membrane of the general cavity. And it appeared to be analogous to the instance of gem- mation from the water-vascular system observed by the late Professor Edward Forbes in Sarsia prolifera, in which animal the young meduse pullulated forth from the hollow bulbs which supported the tentacles. 4. Memorandum of Shells and a Deer's Horn found in a cutting of the Forth and Clyde Junction Railway, Dumbartonshire. By James M‘Faruane of Balwill, Esq., W.S. (Specimens exhibited.) Wednesday, 23d April 1856. W.H. Lowe, M.D., Pres. in the Chair. 1. Account of an Undescribed Marine Animal. By T. Srretuiii Wricut, M.D. (This paper will appear in the next number of the Journal.) 2. Note on Indications of the Existence of Bilateral Symmetry, and of a Longitudinal Axis in Actinia, as shown in Living Specimens. By T. Streraitt Waicut, M.D. The author stated, that he had lately received from the south of England several specimens of