381 
from Sir John Herschel, and which was found investing the 
rocks at the mouth of one of the rivers of Southern Africa. 
It resembles the other very much in external appearance, 
except that the fibres are coarser, and more compactly mat- 
ted together. It appears to consist almost entirely of con- 
ferva, but apparently of a different species. 
A paper was read by Mr. J. Huband Smith, descriptive 
of certain porcelain seals, amounting to upwards of a dozen, 
found in Ireland within the last six or seven years, and in 
places very distant from each other. 
He exhibited to the Academy one of these seals, with 
impressions of several others in sealing-wax. He stated 
that they were all uniform, consisting of an exact cube, 
having, by way of handle, some animal (probably an ape) 
seated upon it ; and that they were so precisely similar in size 
and general appearance as to be undistinguishable, except 
by the characters on the under surface. Little is known 
respecting these seals beyond the mere fact of their having 
been found in this country. 
An extract from the Chinese grammar of Abel-Rémusat 
showed that the inscriptions on these seals are those of 
a very ancient class of Chinese characters, ‘‘ in use since 
the time of Confucius,” who is supposed to have flourished 
“in the middle of the sixth century, before J.C.” The 
remote period to which these characters are assigned, leaves 
open a wide field for conjecture as to the time in which these 
porcelain seals found their way into this country. 
The situations in which some of them have been found are 
remarkable. One was discovered in ploughing a field near 
. Burrisokane, county of Tipperary, in 1832; another was found 
. last year at Killead, in the county of Down; another in the 
| bed of the river Boyne, nearClonard, in the county of Meath, 
in raising gravel; and a fourth was discovered many years 
ago at a short distance from Dublin. 
