.APPENDIX. (77) 



occafioned by a report of fome experiments made by the Comte ^r Roebuck. 

 DE BuFFON, from which the Comte had inferred, that matter is 

 heavier when hot than when cold. Dr Roebuck's experiments, 

 made with great accuracy before a committee of the Royal So- 

 ciety at London, feem to refute that notion. 



It is the works and eftabliihments projedled and executed by 

 Dr Roebuck, with the immediate and more remote effeifls of 

 them upon the indufbry, arts, and manufactures of Scotland, 

 which urge a juft claim to the refpedl and gratitude of his coun- 

 try. This tribute is more due from the difcerning part of man- 

 kind, as this fpecies of merit is apt to be overlooked by the bufy 

 or the fuperficial, and to fail in obtaining its due reward. The 

 circumflances of Dr Roebuck have, in this refpecft, been pecu- 

 liarly hard : For though, inofl certainly, the projector and au- 

 thor of new eftablifliments highly ufeful to his country, and 

 every day becoming more fo, he was, by a train of unfortunate 

 events, obliged to break off his connexion with them, at an un- 

 feafonable time, when much was yet wanting to their complete 

 fuccefs : and thus he left others in the poiTellion, not onlv of 

 the lucrative advantages now derived from them, but even, in 

 fome meafure, of the general merit of the undertaking, to a con- 

 fiderable part of which he had the moft undoubted claim. 



The eflablifliment of the laboratory at Birmingham, in the 

 year 1747, the firfl public exhibition of his chemical talents, was, 

 at that particular period, and in the ftate of the arts and manufac- 

 tures at that time, highly beneficial, and fubfervient to their fu- 

 ture progrefs : and the continuance and fuccefs of it, in that place, 

 is a proof of the advantages which many of the manufaclurers 

 receive from it. Much had already been done, and many 

 improvements made in arts and manufadures, chiefly by 

 the fuggeftions of that ingenioufnefs and experience, which, in 

 the detail of bufinefs, might be expeded from the pradical ar- 

 tift. Dr Roebuck was qualified to proceed a ftep farther; to. 



direjSc 



