The relation of mandelic acid to benzoic aldehyd is so precisely the same as that of lactic acid to acetic aldehyd, that whatever constitution we assume for the latter acid, a similar one must be ascribed to the former.

The researches of Kolbe and Lautemann, and of Wislicenus, prove that lactic acid is oxypropionic acid. Mandelic acid must therefore be oxytoluic acid, and, indeed, it has been so formulated by Kolbe in his work on Organic Chemistry.

Many of the properties of ozone are very similar to those of peroxide of hydrogen. Thus ozone, like peroxide of hydrogen, is in many cases a powerful oxidising agent. In other cases, however, it acts as a deoxidiser. Thus ozone deoxidises peroxide of hydrogen and peroxide of barium with the production of water and oxide of barium. Peroxide of hydrogen also deoxidises oxide of silver, the peroxides of manganese and lead, permanganic and chromic acids, &c. Again, ozone is decomposed catalytically by dry silver leaf and by several oxides, such as the peroxides of manganese and lead, &c.

The value of the food of soldiers is an important subject, because it presents us with the results of a long experience in feeding adult men, so as to preserve them in health and strength.

In this country fixed rations of ¾ lb. meat and 1 lb. of bread are issued to the soldiers, and the rest of their food is furnished from their own pay.

The author stated that this stalagmite was a calcareous deposit of a columnar shape, which had been brought to Edinburgh, about forty-six years ago, by his father, the late Admiral Sir David Milne.

Whilst commander-in-chief on the North American and West Indian Station during the three years ending 1819, Sir David had passed a part of every winter in the genial climate of Bermuda. He took much interest in the various objects of natural history abounding in the island, and particularly in its remarkable caves.

The author had traced eleven distinct storms of wind passing over parts of Europe, between the 26th October and 18th December. With the view of ascertaining the state of the atmosphere during the progress of these storms, in respect of pressure, temperature, wind, cloud, and rain, he had collected observations from all parts of Great Britain and Ireland, as well as from many places on the Continent. He found that each storm was marked by concentric circles of equal atmospheric pressure.

The idea of atomicity, or the definite equivalence of chemical atoms, is the necessary consequence of the theory of replacement. It was employed by Frankland to explain the nature of the organometallic bodies, and its application was further extended by Kolbe to a large number of organic substances.

It is, however, to Kekulé that we owe the complete generalisation of this idea and its systematic application to all classes of compounds. This first rendered it possible to represent, as it is often advantageous to do, the constitution of compounds by completely dissected formulæ.

The author commenced by distinguishing between an etymology of names of places founded upon mere resemblance of sounds, and one where the names are analysed according to fixed laws, based upon sound philological principles and a comprehensive observation of facts. The former is the ordinary process to which they are subjected, and has characterised all systematic attempts hitherto made to analyse the topography of Scotland. It can lead only to fanciful renderings, and is incapable of yielding any certain results, while the latter becomes an important element in fixing the ethnology of the inhabitants of a country.

The North Island flora has hitherto been regarded (in the absence of a knowledge of the South Island flora) as representing the general vegetation of our New Zealand possessions. But the New Zealand Islands extend through thirteen degrees of latitude, and the floras of their northern and southern extremes necessarily present various marked differences. The former flora is more subtropical, and the latter more antarctic in its affinities. The former, morever, is richer in natural orders, genera, and species.

The samples of wine were furnished to Dr Maclagan by the Earl of Dalhousie; they had been found in a recess in a wall in Panmure House, which was known to have been built up in 1715; the samples were consequently at least 150 years old.

The wines submitted to examination were three in number, and were contained in quart bottles, resembling those ordinarily in use at the present day. They were, when sent to Dr Maclagan, securely corked; evaporation had, however, gone on to a sensible extent in two of the bottles, the third being nearly full.

The Peziza œruginosa is a fungus belonging to the family Ascomycetes, and order Elvellaceæ. Although the fructification is not often met with, the plant itself is by no means rare, growing on dead wood, chiefly of the oak, birch, and ash. It has an intense green colour, and tinges the wood on which it grows to a considerable depth.

In this paper the author gives an account of many experiments made on the loss of weights of different animals in their fresh state, when suspended, exposed to the air, from evaporation; from the results of which he infers, that it is comparatively greatest from the batrachians, not quite so great from fishes, less from mammalia, and least from birds.

While a horizontal plate is in a state of rapid vibration (as in Chladni's experiments), iron filings strewed on the surface, near a point of maximum vibration, are prevented from being scattered to the nodal lines by a magnetic pole held above the plate, but, if the pole be held below, they are speedily dissipated. If too powerful a pole be used, or if the magnet be held too near the plate, the filings nearest to the pole are not dispersed in the latter case.

1st, Scaphocephalus.—After making reference to his previous papers, more especially to that in which he had described several specimens of the scaphocephalic skull, in which he had discussed the influence exercised on the production of deformities of the cranium, by a premature closure or obliteration of the sutures, and to the recent memoirs of Professor von Düben of Stockholm,† and Dr John Thurnam, the author proceeded to relate two additional cases of scaphocephalus to those he had already recorded. He had met with one of these in the head of a living person, the other in a skull in the Natural History Museum of the University of Edinburgh.

As this paper consists almost wholly of formulæ, calculations, and tables, it is not suited for being read to a meeting; and therefore the following short abstract of its contents is alone offered for the purpose of being read aloud :—

In the “Edinburgh Philosophical Journal” for July 1849, the author proposed the following formula forthe pressure of saturated vapour corresponding to a given boiling point:—

where t is the absolute temperature, reckoned from the absolute zero; and A, B, and C are three specific constants, to be determined from at least three experiments on each substance; and he showed that the results of that formula agreed better with experiment than those of any other formula containing three constants only.

The Memoir, of which the subjoined is an abstract, is based upon seventy dissections, and is intended as a contribution to our knowledge of the arrangement of the cardiac nerves in the mammalia.

Among the various functions which our scientific institutions are expected to discharge, not the least important is to foster the labours and protect the interests of discoverers and inventors,—of those who create new forms of matter and new processes of art,—who invent new instruments, and new machinery for controlling and rendering useful the forces of the material world.