of Notation in Chemistry. 453 



cially on the subject of mineralogy ; yet the objections to it are 

 of the most weighty character. Its formulae are merely un- 

 connected records of inferences which are in some degree arbi- 

 trary ; the analysis itself, the fundamental and certain fact 

 from which the inferences are made, is not recorded in the 

 symbol ; and the connexion between different formulae, the 

 identity of which is a necessary and important circumstance, 

 can be recognised only by an entire perversion of all algebraical 

 rules. In the system which I have proposed, the fundamental 

 analysis is the simplest shape of the formulae ; the various in- 

 ferences from it are made by the most obvious changes, and the 

 identity of these with the analysis, and with each other, is evi- 

 dent on the face of the notation. One method, by a misappli- 

 cation of mathematical symbols, gives us a sign which can 

 only record an opinion possibly false : the other represents 

 simply what is certainly true, and enables us to reason from 

 the fact tp all its possible inferences, without considering any- 

 thing except the notation itself. It will not long be pos- 

 sible to dispense with some such instrument in this country ; 

 and I should hope that what I have said may tend to induce 

 our chemists to purify and improve the foreign system, before 

 it is admitted to a familiarity and circulation among us, which 

 may make the correction of its faults a task of great difficulty 

 and inconvenience. 



Trinity College, Cambridge, 

 March 15, 1831. 



ON THE PLANT INTENDED BY THE SHAMROCK OF 

 IRELAND. 



BY I. E. BICHENO, ESQ., F.R.S., SEC. L. S., &c. 

 [Read at the Linnean Society.] 



rpHE festival of St. Patrick has been so long recognised by 

 -" those who traverse the streets of this great city, by the 

 clover they see in the hats of the Irish, that any one who 

 should entertain an opinion that this plant is not the original 

 emblem of Ireland, will be thought to have no ground for 

 VOL. I. MAY, 1831 2 H 



