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flacked, and thus impregnated with animal matter, without 

 deftroying the harder and firmer parts*. 



The application of thefe circumflances is eafily imagined, 

 and will be found to correfpond remarkably with all the ap- 

 pearances in the cafe before us. This depofition, gradually and 

 fucceffively concreting at the bottom of the water, may naturally . 

 beexpefled to affume a flag-like or laminar ftrudure ; the grain 



P p 2 ^°° 



• To this, the cauaidty of lime, and its well-known application to deai bodies, 

 with a view to their deftruaion, may be objeded. On this account it may be 

 looked upon by many as a total defroya- inftead of a partial preferver of animal 

 fubllances But befides the diminution of this caufticity by difFuf.on m fo great a 

 body of water as our cafe fuppofe,, we know that it muft foon have acquired a 

 fufficiency of fixed air, or of the carbonic principle, from the abundance of ammal 

 iuices farni&ed by the immenfe number of fi(h contained, to render it mild and. 

 prevent its preying on the firmer parts. This may eafily be decided by aftual ex- 

 periment —Mean time I beg to refer the Academy to the fubjoined paper, which 

 our learned and ingenious member, Dean Hamilton, who happened to be prefent at 

 the firft reading of this effay, has fince done me the favour to communicate, and 

 which contains fads and reafoning fo appofite, that I believe they may be confidered 

 conclufive as to the objeaion now ftated. That lime, though foaked m water, will 

 ftill greedily abforb oils or other animal fluids, experience will determine, and its 

 avidity for the carbonic principle will fully explaia; add to this the we.gh^ pref- 

 fure and confequent fpeedy condenfatlon of the fubfiding mafs, and I believe the 

 effeas ftated may be regarded as highly probable. But if this be admitted, and 

 (hall be confirmed by fuitable experiments, it will then deferve to be confidered, 

 further whether a greater or lefs degree of caufticity of the inclofing calcareous 

 matter ' fo far from an objeaion, may not prove to have been indifpenfibly requi- 

 fite to' the produaion of the effeas, and, of courfe, whether the exiftence of fuch 

 effeas may not, in that cafe, be found a proof, and a ftrong one, of that ftate of 

 caufticity, and confequently tend greatly to corroborate, if not to confirth, the 

 whole of the account here given. 



