SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



Royal Society of Edinburgh, 



Kckyal Society \J/N the 7th of January Sir George M'Kenzie continued 

 «t Ediuburgh. j^j^ account of the Mineralogy of Iceland, and described 

 some very curious geological facts. 



On the 21st he concluded his mineralogical detail, with 

 an interesting description of Mount Hecla and other volca- 

 nic districts. In this paper Sir George made some remarks 

 which tended to place obsidian and pumice in a conspi- 

 cuous point of view, as relating to the different theories of 

 the Earth, and clearly proved their origin to be igneous, a 

 position which has hitherto been denied by Werner and his 

 pupils. 



On the 4th of February Dr. Brewster read an ingenious 

 paper on the loss of the comet of 1770. — Sir George 

 M'Kenzie described some remarkable hot springs in Ice- 

 land. To one of these he gave the name of the alternating 

 Geyser, as it spouted from two distinct orifices evidently 

 connected within, but only from one at a time, the opera- 

 tions of which alternated with those of the other at regular 

 intervals of time. 



On the ISth Professor Playfair read part of a Biogra- 

 phical Tviemoir of the late John Roblson, LL. D. and Pro- 

 fessor of Natural Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh. 

 Mr. Allan communicated a letter from Dr. Henry, of Man- 

 chester, describing the position of some singular masses of 

 a substance apparently composed of wax and resin, which 

 had been laid bare by a late overflow of the river Mersey, a 

 little below Stockport, about three feet under the soil, and 

 supposed to be the refuse of some manufactory, of which 

 no other vestige or recollection now remains. 



Geological The First Volume of the Transactions of the Geological 



'**^''^^y* Society, in 4to, with many plates, is in the press, and will 



be ready for publication in the month of May next. 



TO 



