414 . Scientific TnteUigenee. — Geology. 



Sciences, for April 1829, and in the article Hygronietry of the En- 

 cyclopaedia Britannica, vol. xii. p. 132, he has distinctly laid down 

 the same theory in detail, and accompanied with various calculations 

 and illustrations, which shew how it will satisfactorily account, not 

 only for the production of clouds, mountain-caps, rain, snow, &c., but 

 also thunder, lightning, and water-spouts, if not some of the pheno- 

 mena of volcanos, and the northern lights. 



GEOLOGY. 



2. Temple of Serapis. — In a letter addressed to Professor Leonhard, 

 from Naples, by Russegger, and dated December 1839, there is the 

 following statement regarding the Temple of Serapis ; — " In respect 

 to this temple, I differ entirely from Arago and others, who maintain 

 that the surface on which it stands has been depressed, has remained 

 under the sea, and has again been elevated. There is nothing either 

 in the vicinity of the temple, or in the temple itself, which affords 

 proofs, to justify this too bold hypothesis. Every thing rather leads to 

 the belief that the temple has remained unchanged in the position in 

 which it was originally built, but that the sea rose, surrounded it to a 

 height of at least twelve feet, and again retired. The elevated position 

 of the sea continued sufficiently long to admit of the Pholas boring 

 the pillars. This view can even be proved historically ; for the Cav. 

 Niccolini has this year published a memoir, in which he gives the 

 heights of the level of the sea in the Bay of Naples for a period of 

 1900 years, and has, with much acuteness, proved his assertions his- 

 torically. The correctness of my opinion can be demonstrated and 

 reduced to figures, by means of the dates collected by the Cav. Nic- 

 colini." 



3. Enormous Soundings at Sea. — Captain James Ross, in a letter 

 to the Geographical Society, gives an account of some enormous sound- 

 ings made by him at sea ; one of these, 900 miles west of St Helena, 

 extending to the depth of 5000 fathoms or 30,000 feet, the weight em- 

 ployed amounting to 450 lb. Another made in Lat. 33° S. and Lon. 

 9° W., about 300 miles west of the Cape of Good Hope, occupied 

 49^ minutes, in which time 2226 fathoms were sounded. These 

 facts w^ere thought to disprove the common opinion, tliat soundings 

 could not be obtained at very great depths. 



4. Living Barnacles above the Sea-Level. — When in the island 

 of Elba, in the summer of 1837, 1 observed on rocks exposed to the 

 mid-day sun, at the height of at least six feet above high water-mark, 

 and in situations where they could be reached by the spray of the 

 waves in rough weather only, numerous small living specimens of a 

 common barnacle (Lep)as halanoides P). This fact may perhaps be 

 worth recording, as likely to mislead, on a cursory examination of 

 a foreign shore, into the opinion of there having been a recent eleva- 

 tion of the coast. — W. C. Trevelyan. 



5. Height of Tides in the Mediterranea^i. — I may also take this 

 opportunity of remarking, that veiy eiToneous opinions appear to pre- 



