454 NOTICES OF THE MEETINGS [June 5, 
larly electrified atoms, were distinguished by an intensity of affinity 
affinity which was quite foreign to their proximate, or even elemen- 
tary, constituents. Zinc and methyl, for instance, were neither of 
them distinguished for any remarkable energy of affinity in their 
free state; but united as zinc-methylium, they formed a compound 
whose combining energy surpassed that of all known bodies, and 
this behaviour was shared in also by the corresponding compounds 
of zinc with ethyl and amyl. In cacodyl, stanethylium, stibethy- 
lium, and the new compounds of arsenic with ethyl, we had addi- 
tional and striking evidence of the same law, for the affinities of 
arsenic, tin, and antimony, were, in these compounds, exalted in 
a most remarkable manner by the approximation of similarly elec- 
trified atoms. 
These examples seemed to prove clearly the great influence of 
the electrical character of elements upon the chemical properties 
of their compounds; but further study of the subject also revealed 
the paramount influence of molecular structure, which modified and 
controlled the effects of electrical character, and limited all affinity 
however heightened by electric induction. To this effect of mo- 
lecular arrangement was no doubt to be attributed the occurrence 
of some apparent anomalies which, at first sight, appeared to 
contradict the general law just laid down, such as perchloric acid, 
biphosphide of hydrogen, &c.; but the pursuit of the subject into 
this ramification would have far exceeded the limits of the lecture, 
the chief object of which was to point out that, although all the 
electro-chemical theories hitherto proposed were far from satisfac- 
tory, yet, that amongst the factors of chemical action, the electrical 
character of elements could not be denied a place, without ignoring 
and leaving unexplained some of the most remarkable of chemical 
phenomena. [E. F.] 
GENERAL MONTHLY MEETING, 
Monday, June 5. 
Wittiam Wiperrorce Birp, Esq., Vice-President, in the Chair. 
George J. Lyons, Esq. 
Charles Roderick Macgrigor, Esq., and 
The Rev. Thomas George Alfred Rushton, B.A., F.S.A. 
were duly elected Members of the Royal Institution. 
John Ferguson, M.D. 
was admitted a Member of the Royal Institution. 
