New Pullkatm!, }A| 



jeft as being very laborious, and in its praftical application difficult to be eftabliflied. 

 Under fuch impreffions, much is not to be expe£led in the progrcfs. It feems neverthelefs that 

 mankind have rejeded univerfal charaders when offered to them, not becaufe they were 

 averfe from the means of facility and perfpicuity, but becaufe thofe means were not in reality 

 difpUyed. The Arabic numerals, the notation pf mufic, and the fymbols of quantity and 

 operation ufed by algcbrai/ls, are univerfal charadters confined to no language, and have been 

 univerfally received becaufe they are fimple and appropriate ; but the charafters of chemifts, 

 as well as the few attempts at the more ample defignation of things in the fame manner, 

 have not been received, becaufe their authors have {topped fhort in their ufe and adaptation. 

 If Bifhop Willcins, and the great men of the laft century who favoured his univerfal cha-^ 

 ra<Sler, had ftudied and ufed it to fuch an extent as to have written treatifes according to that 

 notation ; or if the great Bergman had attempted a reform in the charaflers of chemiftry, 

 and adopted fuch as could be readily formed, eafily diflinguifhed, and compounded, with all 

 the advantages of pofition, of which he was fo well aware } if he had completed a fet of 

 tables exhibiting the whole of chemical fcience, and e.xpreffing things, quantities, adtions,. 

 temperatures, and other habitudes, in a few pages, which thofe who attentively meditate 

 on his compound tables of/eleiSlive attraftion may without difficulty conceive to be polBble j 

 the lovers of that fcience would have learned to read his work, and to write others accord- 

 ing to the fame method; and that for reafons of the fame kind as have induced arithmeti- 

 cians, muficians, and algebraifts, to become mailers of the univerfal charaders proper to theif 

 refpeftive fciences. — 16. On the Procefs of Bleaching with the Oxygenated Muriatic Acid, 

 and a Defcription of a new Apparatus for Bleaching Cloths with that Acid diffolved in Water 

 without the Addition of Alkali. By Theophilus Lev/is Rupp. — 17. Account of a remarkable 

 Change of Colour in a Negro. By Miers Fifher. This man's father was the fon of- a native 

 African and an Indian of Philadelphia. His mother was the daughter of an African man 

 and an Irifli woman. By a certificate here exhibited, it appears, that until the month of 

 February 1792, being then at leaft 30 years old, he was of as dark a complexion as any 

 African; at which period his fkin began to change white, like that of an European, com- 

 mencing at his fingers' ends, and proceeding, chiefly in the fummer or warm weather, over 

 the reft of his body. The greater part of the furface was thus changed at the time of the ac- 

 count being written, which was the I'lA of November 1796. The change was not uniform 

 over the whole furface, but gradually progreffive along the fkin ; the black and white parts 

 being feparated by an irregular line. No faifls are mentioned in explanation of this re- 

 markable change. ■. . . . 



Tranfatlions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Vol. IV. Quarto. 470 pages, with 12 



plates. Printed for Cadell and Davies in London j and Dixon and Balfour, Edinburgh. 



1798. 



This work is divided into three parts. 



Part I. contains the Hiflory of .the Society, or Reports concerning Memoirs prefented, 

 and Communications made, with a Lift of the Officers and Members, Donations, and other 

 fimilar Particulars. It alfo contai- Biographical Accounts of Lord Abercromby ; ofWil-- 

 liam Tytler, Efq. of Woodhoufelee ; of Mr. William Hamilton, late ProfefTor of Anatomy 

 and Botany in the Univerfity of Glafgow 5 and of John Roebuck, M, D. 



Part II. 



