382 Scientific Intelligence, 8^c. 



members of the Association would favour him with a visit at his 

 house, they would be received with hospitality, though in a wild and 

 ' savage region on the Quantock hills, and he should be proud to 

 repeat his experiments in their presence. 



Professor Sedgwick said he had discovered in Mr. Cross a friend 

 who some years ago kindly conducted him over the Quantock hills on 

 the way to Taunton. The residence of that gentleman was not, as he 

 had described it, in a wild and savage region, but seated amidst the 

 sublime and beautiful in nature. At that time he was engaged in 

 parrying on the most gigantic experiments, attaching voltaic lines to 

 the trees of the forest, and conducting through them streams of 

 lighting as large as the mast of a 74-gun ship, and even turning 

 them through his house with the dexterity of an able charioteer. 

 Sincerely did he congratulate the Section on what they had heard 

 and witnessed this morning. The operations of electrical phenomena, 

 instances of which had been detailed to them, proved that the whole 

 world, even darkness itself, was steeped in everlasting light, the 

 first-born of heaven. However Mr. Cross may have hitherto con- 

 cealed himself, from this time forth he must stand before the world 

 as public property. 



Professor Phillips said the wonderful discoveries of Mr. Cross and 

 Mr. Fox would open a field of science in which ages might be 

 employed in exploring and imitating the phenomena of nature. 



Coal Fields of South Wales. — The Chairman then called on Mr. 

 Conybeare to read his paper on this subject, but that gentleman said 

 that the subject would now be so uninteresting after the splendid 

 discoveries that had been detailed to them, that he should only point 

 them to the map, and request them to imagine that he had read his 

 paper, and that they had been asleep all the while. 



Mr. Murchison read a j)aper " On the Geological Relations of 

 certain Calcareous Rocks near Manchester ;" after which the Section 

 adjourned to the evening. 



Evening Sitting. — The River Severn. — Mr. Murchison made a 

 communication respecting the ancient Hydrography of the River 

 Severn, and entered into statements respecting the drifts, in the 

 course of which he expressed an opinion that the River Severn had 

 been thrown into a southern direction by a convulsion of nature. 



Friday, 2Qth August. — 1. Lord Nugent described the sea rivulets 

 at Argostoli, in Cephalonia, referred to by Mr. Babbage at Dublin. 

 They flowed from the sea into the land, and one of them had been 

 employed to drive a mill. Some persons accounted for this pheno- 

 menon, by supposing that there was a difference of level on difterent 

 sides of the island, and that the streams flowing through a subterra- 

 nean tunnel restored the equilibrium. Others thought that it was 

 connected with volcanic action. Dr. Daubeny considered it a con- 

 firmation of the first vokanic theory of Davy. 



2. Mr. Charlesworth expressed some doubts with regard to the 

 correctness of the views of Mr. Lyell, as to the proportion of recent 

 and extinct species in tertiary strata. M. Agassiz could detect no 

 recent species of shells or fish in the Norfolk crag. 



3. Professor Forbes stated, that he had traced a remarkable con- 



