402 Proceedings of' the Society for the 



gress. This rising is estimated to proceed at present at the rate 

 of about one foot in twenty- five years. 



The absence of any record of violent volcanic action in the Scan- 

 dinavian Peninsula, renders it improbable that the rise is due to 

 such a cause. The author referred it, therefore, to the gradual 

 cooling of the crust of the earth, which, by causing a contraction 

 and compression in parts where the cooling was a maximum tend- 

 ing to elevate other portions of the earth's surface at points or in 

 lines of minimum resistance. 



The centre of the action in Scandinavia, he considered to be 

 in the mountain chains which traverse Norway, and Sweden, and 

 Finland respectively ; and which are mutually connected beyond 

 the head of the Bothnian Gulf: and attributing the original ele- 

 vation of these chains with Elie de Beaumont, to the secular refri- 

 geration of the earth, he found in the rise still observable in Scan- 

 dinavia a relic only of that once powerful action by which these 

 mountain ranges were originally projected. He suggested the 

 probability also, that on other coasts where high mountain ridges 

 ran parallel with the sea, accurate measurements of the mean 

 level of the water, in reference to the scarped rocks on the coast, 

 if repeated at certain distant intervals, might make known other 

 gradual elevations still in progress, similar to those observable on 

 the shores of the Baltic. 



Proceedings of the Society for the Encouragement of the 

 Useful Arts in Scotland. 



The following articles and communications were laid be- 

 fore the Society during the month of January 1833 : — 



Jan. 9. — 1. Description of a Turnip and Potato Slicer, invented 

 by John Baird, Esq. of the Shotts Iron-v^'orks. Communicated by 

 Dr D. B. Reid. 



With this slicer a man and boy can cut as many turnips in 

 about an hour and a quarter, as will serve eight score of sheep for 

 twenty-four hours. 



A model of the machine was exhibited. 



2. Remarks on some prevailing Misconceptions concerning the 

 Actions of Machines. By Mr Edward Sang, teacher of Mathe- 

 matics, Edinburgh, Memb. Soc. Arts. 



