201 





NOTICES AND PROCEEDINGS OF SCIENTIFIC 



SOCIETIES. I omTR ,»!i«>nf>aia 



EDINBURGH. tw ? '^^^ 



Roy at Society.--^ Jan. 17, 1831. Professor Russell in the chair. A paper 

 was read by Professor Wallace on the Pantograph, an instrument calculated 

 to reduce curved figures to a smaller zone of proper proportions. After 

 giving a detailed history of the instrument, which was invented in 1603, the 

 Professor shewed that rough diagrams only could be taken by means of 

 it, and described the improved one invented by him, which he calls an Eido- 

 graph, by which much finer and more accurate reduced copies may be taken 

 in a short time. The instrument was exhibited along with, some plates 

 executed with it, which" ^hewe^ that it might be applied to very delicate 

 delineations. - ''^ ■: - ! ^ . ; ^ 



An interesting commuriication 'was then read from Arthur Trevelyan, 

 Esq. noticing, that during the cooling of rods of certain metals, when in 

 contact with masses of lead, sounds were produced, resembling those of an 

 iEolian harp, accompanied by a tremulous motion of the rod. The sounds 

 varied with the length of the metallic bar, its degree of heat, and the metal 

 of which it was composed. • 



Feb. 7 Professor Hope in the chair. At this meeting the following 



communications were read: — Is^, On the proper construction of tide harbours, 

 by Mr Matheson, civil engineer : 2c?, A short notice by Mr Robison of some 

 peculiarities in the construction of a clock recently made for the Royal 

 Society, by Mr Whitelaw, of Edinburgh : Qd, A report by Professor Chris- 

 tison, on various articles sent to the Royal Society, by Mr Swinton of 

 Calcutta. Amongst other things, the Professor mentioned, that he had 

 detected a peculiar principle in petroleum from Rangoon, differing in density 

 and in the effects produced on it by heat, as well as in other respects, from 

 naphthaline, as described by Mr Kidd ; he proposes to call it petroUne. 



Wernerian Society. — Feb. 5. Henry Witham, Esq. in the chair. The 

 Secretary read an account of a new and very beautiful species of West 

 Indian moth, named Attacus Wilsonii, after James Wilson, Esq. by the Rev. 

 LansdoAvn Guilding ; and exhibited a drawing of the perfect insect of both 

 sexes, with its larva and cocoon. 



Professor Jameson made a commimication to the Society, regarding the 

 flints found in Banffshire, by Mr Christie of the Banff Institution. 



Professor Jameson read an essay on the form of Noah's Ark, by an anony- 

 mous F. R. S. L. and E. 



Dr Scot, of Corstorphine, read a paper on the alabaster of the ancients. 



Feb. 19. Professor Jameson in the chair. A paper on the beacon-lights 

 of remote antiquity, by Robert Stevenson, Esq. civil engineer, was read by 

 the Secretary ; the chief object of which was to shew the probability that 

 the Cyclopes of the ancients were personifications of light-houses in their first 

 rude state. 



A communication from Dr Murray, of Aberdeen, on the influence of rocks 

 on the nature of vegetables, was then read, in which the author expressed 

 his opinion, that rocks do not influence the distribution of species in any 

 general point of view. 



The last paper submitted to the meeting was an interesting and vivid 

 description of a great flood of the Mississippi, by Mr Audubon. 

 VOL. III. 2 C 



