188 List of Patents. 



of these sounds, however, in the mountain woods, during the hours 

 of darkness, prove that they are very abundant. Even when seen 

 by day, their agility in leaping renders it a difficult matter to lay 

 hands on them. The sounds in question bear a strong resemblance 

 to the objurgations of an inveterate snorer, but are much louder ; 

 or sometimes remind one of the groaning and working of a ship's 

 timbers in a heavy gale at sea. 



These are probably the voices of some of the greater Hyladee. But 

 there are other and different noises still. While I am writing this 

 note at Content — it is a lovely night in June — all around I am saluted 

 with strange sounds. Now and then comes the singularly harsh and 

 cracked voice of the Gecko, like the notes of a child's penny trumpet, 

 or like a stick drawn across the teeth of a comb : — this I am fami- 

 liar with. But I hear another voice, far more abundant, but quite 

 unknown to me. It is now (about midnight) coming up from every 

 part of the moonlit forest below me, with incessant pertinacity. It 

 is a clear shrill note, so like the voice of a bird, and in particular so 

 like that of the Solitaire, that it might easily be taken for it, but for 

 the inappropriate hour, and the locality. Like that, it is beautifully 

 trilled or shaken, and, like it, the individual voices are not in the 

 same key. As I now listen to the mingling sounds, I distinguish 

 two particularly prominent, which seem to answer each other in 

 quick but regular alternation ; and between their notes there is the 

 difference of exactly a musical tone. I have little doubt that this 

 is the sexual call of some Tree-frog. The groanings and snorings, 

 which are sometimes so incessant, I do not now hear, except one 

 such sound now and then in the course of an evening. — A Natu- 

 ralist's Sojourn in Jamaica. By P. H. Gosse, p. 358. 



List of Patents granted for Scotland from 22d September to 

 22d December 1851. 



1. To John Macdowall, of Walkingshaw Foundry, Johnston, in the 

 county of Renfrew, North Britain, engineer, " improvements in cutting 

 wood and other substances, and in the machinery or apparatus employed 

 therein, and in the application of power to the same." — 22d September 

 1851. 



2. To Henrietta Beown, of Long Lane, Bermondsey, widow and 

 executrix of the late Samuel Brown, *' improvements in the manufacture 

 of metallic casks and vessels." — 24th September 1851. 



3. To RoBEET Newell, of the city of New York, in the United States 

 of America, lock manufacturer, and a citizen of the said United States, 

 " certain new and useful improvements in the construction of locks." — 

 24th September 1851. 



