In the first part of this paper, the author endeavoured to shew, from a comparison of various observations of the red prominences seen at the eclipse of the 28th July 1851, that those objects were not mere optical phenomena, but that they actually existed in the sun.

The object of the present communication is to offer some conjectures regarding the nature of the red prominences, and their possible connection with other solar phenomena.

The object of the present communication is to call attention to the remarkable consequences which follow from Carnot's proposition, established as it is on a new foundation, in the dynamical theory of heat; that there is an absolute waste of mechanical energy available to man, when heat is allowed to pass from one body to another at a lower temperature, by any means not fulfilling his criterion of a “perfect thermo-dynamic engine.” As it is most certain that Creative Power alone can either call into existence or annihilate mechanical energy, the “waste” referred to cannot be annihilation, but must be some transformation of energy. To explain the nature of this transformation, it is convenient, in the first place, to divide stores of mechanical energy into two classes—statical and dynamical.

This paper was written in India as far back as 1839, but many of its suggestions were still untried, and present circumstances seem to urge their importance.

The recent improvements in the hand-rifle have so greatly increased the practical range of that instrument, as to have passed and left far behind, in point of range and precision, the heavy field pieces which heretofore have done accurate execution at distances impracticable to small arms. The large guns therefore imperatively require to undergo the same alteration which, by converting the musket into a rifle, has so greatly increased the directness and accuracy of the flight of its ball.

The author, after alluding to his previous communications to the Society in reference to fluorine, stated that he had always attributed the slight indications of the presence of this element in plants, which his own investigations and those of others had yielded, to the amount of silica which was contained in vegetable ashes. The presence of silica, which throws special difficulties in the way of detecting fluorine, had also prevented him from seeking for it in trap rocks and other mineral masses. Recently, however, he had put in practice two processes, which were applicable to all bodies containing silica and a metallic fluoride, which are decomposed by boiling oil of vitriol.

The object of this communication was to exhibit to the Society a mineral which had been publicly described as a meteoric stone, picked up by a witness of its fall. The author had been induced, by the published account of the alleged fall of the stone, to make inquiry concerning it, and had ascertained that no one had witnessed its descent; and that the only evidence in favour of its being a meteorite was the fact of its having been noticed for the first time in a garden-path, the morning after a thunder-storm.

This paper commenced with an account of Ancient Moraines connected with Corries or Small Valleys. Sir Charles Lyell had described one as forming the retaining dam of Loch Brandy, on the eastern skirts of the Grampians, and Mr Charles Maclaren had discovered another in Glenmessan, near the Firth of Clyde. The author of the paper described a few others which he had discovered. At Corryhashtel, on the side of Ben-Blaven, in the Isle of Skye, there are three distinct parallel lines of blocks along the right side of the valley, which are presumed to mark the right skirt of a local glacier at three points in the history of its shrinking. In a deep rough valley at the opposite side of the mountain, there are several mounds of rough stones mingled with smaller detritus, which are presumed to have been the terminal moraines of a glacier once filling that valley.

The author, after mentioning various cases of this nature, in all of which the evidence was very defective, exhibited a tool of wroughtiron, said to have been found in the coal, but which was only proved to have come out of a coal-pit.

1. The first part was on the distribution of Tourmaline in Mica.—When liquids or gases have been confined in mica, they have often easily escaped and spread between the plates. Crystals, both of tourmaline and quartz, are found in mica, contemporaneous with it, and of considerable size. Such crystals generally have the faces of the hexagonal prism parallel to the laminæ of the mica.

But other crystals of tourmaline formed subsequently, and between the laminæ, are very different. They are hexagonal plates, with faces perpendicular to the axis of the prism. Some of the fluid which deposited them has penetrated between the laminæ, and there deposited hexagonal plates, often in circular groups round the cavity.

Temperature being measured by the pressure of a perfect gas at constant density, the absolute zero of temperature is that point on the thermometric scale at which, if it were possible to maintain a perfect gas at so low a temperature, the pressure would be null.

As no gas is entirely devoid of cohesion, the immediate results of experiment give only approximations to the position of this absolute zero. These approximate positions approach nearer to the true position as the gas is rarefied.

These instruments include all of that smaller class employed by travellers and navigators in determining latitudes and longitudes, and in making surveys.

At sea, the only instrument which can be employed, is some form of the double-reflection instrument, as the sextant, or rather the reflecting circle; and as this is able to compass all the requirements which may be made of it there, great advantage will result in economy, portability, and despatch, if it can be made also to serve the purposes of a traveller by land.

This section contains four sub-sections, the first three of which constitute a review of the fundamental principles of the Mechanical Theory of Heat, which are investigated by a method different from any that has been hitherto employed; while the fourth contains the application of those principles to the determination of the inferences to be drawn from the recent experiments of Mr Joule and Prof. William Thomson on the thermic phenomena exhibited by currents of air rushing through small openings.

While the condition of the mineral masses in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh furnish interesting illustrations of the structural characters of rocks, such as the columnar, the concretionary, and the fragmentary, &c., the author proposed to confine his remarks at present to what he denominated the FLAWED STRUCTURE.

In the ordinary language of quarriers, the flaws are termed backs, while they are known to masons as dries, and to geologists, when referred to, as slicken-sides. This last term, independent of its provincial character, refers to one peculiar form of the flaw only, and, although explicable according to the same views entertained respecting the origin of the others, is far from being a typical form. The flaw of the lapidary, in reference to crystals or gems, comes sufficiently near in character to justify its adoption.

The object of this paper was to recal attention to the celebrated controversies on this subject, carried on during the last century; chiefly because some expressions used by Dr Brown, by Lord Jeffrey, Sir James Mackintosh, and M. Morell, convey the impression that the doctrines of Reid and Stewart on this essential part of their system of Metaphysics, are now generally neglected or abandoned.

The series proposed for summation is

In which series each line or term is the product of two factorials, the first consisting of p, the last of q factors of successive numbers. And in each successive term the factors of the first factorial are diminished each by unity, and the factors of the last increased.

The author, after some general remarks on the Infusoria generally, and especially on , their occurrence in the fossil state, mentioned that the earth in question had been discovered by the Duke of Argyll at Knock, near Aros in Mull, and its geological position briefly described by him to the Society, two years ago. The author had undertaken an examination of it, and had found it to contain, besides Phytolitharia, silicified pollen of grasses and coniferse, and spicules and gemmules of fresh-water sponges, the unprecedented number of about 60 species of Diatomaceæ. He had consulted the Rev. W. Smith, who had observed in it the following 59 species, all belonging to fresh water, which he named, the names being those of his forthcoming Synopsis, and one species which he cannot at present refer to any known form.

The author, after alluding to the influence of compression and dilatation in producing the doubly refracting structure in solids of all kinds devoid of it, and in modifying it where it exists, mentioned that the phenomena to be described have no relation to those alluded to.

In experimenting on the double reflexion and polarization of light discovered by him in the chrysammates of potash, and magnesia, murexide, and other crystals, he found that they could be spread out on glass by hard pressure, like grease or soft wax; and that in the case of dark powders, he could thus obtain a transparent film, exhibiting double reflexion and polarization from its surface, as well as if it had been a large crystal.

The author, after a brief summary of the observations of Donati, M. Edwards, Forbes, Johnston, and Huxley, on various species of Tethea, described the structure, and deduced the probable economy of a large species apparently undescribed, some specimens of which he had procured from the Spitzbergen Seas.

The author, after mentioning Mr Fox Talbot's observation, in 1836, of circular crystals from a solution of borax in phosphoric acid, stated, that about twenty years before Mr Talbot's paper was published, he had obtained circular crystals from oil of mace, and from a mixture of that oil with tallow or rosin. These circular crystals are groups of radiating prisms, in optical contact, so as to appear like individual crystals. Viewed by polarized light, they exhibit four luminous sectors, separated by a rectangular black cross, which often has its arms so divergent, as to form four dark sectors. The arms of the cross are parallel and perpendicular to the plane of primitive polarization. When a bright disc of ordinary light was looked at through these circular spots, there was seen a halo, or two halos, produced by the crystals of the oil of mace.

The author, after referring to the opinions of those who contend that plants derive their nitrogen only from ammonia, shewed, in justification of the belief, that they also derive that element from nitric acid:—

Firstly, That nitrates are largely offered to plants, both as they grow wild, and as they are artificially cultivated.

Secondly, That plants do not refuse the nitrates thus offered to them.

Thirdly, That the nitrates which enter plants do not, if properly diluted, do injury to any class of them.

The author read some “Observations on the Amount, Increase, and Distribution of Crime in Scotland,” being the results of an analysis of the Official Tables of criminal offenders for the ten years ending 1850, and of the Prison Board Returns, compared with various statistical data.

The criminal tables of Scotland confirm, in many important particulars, the observations of M. Guerry, M. Quetelet, and Mr Joseph Fletcher, as to the causes of the occasional fluctuations in the amount of crime, the chief of which appear to be—1st, Scarcity of the chief articles of subsistence; 2d, Disturbances of commercial credit, and of the labour market; 3d, Political excitement.