110 Me. W. Keddie on the Early History and Proceedings of the Society. 



appears to have been then abandoned, to be taken up at a subsequent 

 period, as it has lately been in Phillips's patent. 



Sadler the aeronaut ascended in his balloon at Glasgow in the year 

 1816, and his method of inflating the balloon by the help of a fan-blast, 

 suggested to Dr. Watt the application of a similar plan, since generally 

 adopted, for ventilating coal mines. This year Dr. Kobert Watt, a 

 medical practitioner, and author of the Bibliotheca Britannica, and several 

 professional works, became a member of the Society. He read a paper 

 on " The Natural History of Man," and also brought before the Society 

 his views of the nature of flame, the same, probably, which he embodied 

 in his Abstract of Philosophical Conjectures ; or, an attempt to explain the 

 principal Phenomena of Light, Heat, and Cold, by a few simple and obvious 

 Laivs." 



The versatile Dr. James Watt produced an essay " On Old Age and 

 the Means of in some measure Preventing for a time its Effects." About 

 the same period he reported the result of an operation he had performed 

 on himself for an issue. Having cut open the skin with a scalpel he 

 introduced (not a pea, but) a 2}earl button, which he said, answered the 

 purpose better than any other mode he had seen. 



The Union Canal from Lock Sixteen to Edinburgh was now projected, 

 and the Society received on this subject communications and reports 

 from Mr. Hugh Baird, the civil engineer who du'ected the work. 



The Secretary raised the following question, which was discussed by 

 the Society: — " As this age is famous for rising in the air by balloons, 

 and diving in the sea by bells, what would be the result of boring 

 deeper into the earth than ever was attempted ? " 



A still more whimsical entry soon after occurs: — "June 16, 1817. 

 Discussion on the question. Why oatmeal cakes baked without salt, have 

 not that wershness of taste that oatmeal porridge has when unsalted? 

 This question proposed by the vice-president. Decided that the em- 

 pyreuma in toasted oaten bread, and its dryness, requiring more saliva 

 than porridge, may be its cause !" 



Mr. Eobert Owen's proposed scheme to ameliorate the condition of 

 the poor was considered by the Society this year (1817), and pronounced 

 to be illusory and impracticable. 



Mr. E. Hastie read an account of an instrument contrived by Mr. 

 Hunter, called the Nautical Indicator, on the pi'inciple of the ArmiUary 

 Sphere by Ferguson, for finding the latitude at sea by a double solar 

 observation, and thence the longitude, and variation of the compass. 

 IVIr. Hart remarks that the description of the invention shows that it 

 must have been very similar to the instrument constructed for the same 

 purpose by our townsman Captain Small. 



