1872.] Mechamical Science. 515 
were descended from one primordial source. Passing on to consider the 
valuable work done at Kew, the President said that any change would be cal- 
culated to affe@ its completeness or impair its scientific character. 
Dr. Carpenter proposed the vote of thanks to the President. 
Mr. Spence Bate then read the Fourth Report of ‘‘The Marine Fauna of 
the South Coast of Devon;” Prof. Newton contributed a paper on ‘‘ The 
Extinct Birds of Mascareen Islands;”’ Mr. J. Robertson a paper on ‘ The 
Pholades ;” and Dr. Dhorn a Report on Zoological Stations. 
On subsequent days papers on Zoology and Botany, Anatomy and Physi- 
ology, and Anthropology, were read, but are of too technical a nature to be 
abstracted. 
SECTION E.—GEOGRAPHY. 
This Se@tion was under the presidency of Mr. Francis Galton, F.R.S., 
F.G.S., F.R.G.S.; and as the main subject was the discovery of Dr. Living- 
stone, now perfectly familiar to our readers, we pass on to the consideration of 
the proceedings of the next Seétion. 
SECTION F.—ECONOMIC SCIENCE AND STATISTICS. 
President.—Prof. Henry Fawcett, M.A., M.P. 
Vice-Presidents.—Sir John Bowring; Grant Duff, M.P.; Sir James K. 
Alexander; Right Hon. J. G. Dodson, M.P.; James White, Esq., M.P.; R. 
Dudley Baxter, M.A.; William Newmarch, F.R.S. 
Secretaries.—J. G. Fitch, M.A.; Barclay Phillips. 
Professor Fawcett, in his Inaugural Address to the Se@tion, considered the 
present rise in prices, and the incompatibility of this rise with the possession 
of a fixed income, the caution with which a man should leave only a fixed in- 
come to his widow and children, when he has other means of disposing of his 
money, and the time that must necessarily elapse before the incomes of the 
clergy and others at fixed rates can be advanced to meet essential require- 
ments. The danger of limiting the liberty of the subje& by over-legislation, 
with the view to the amelioration of the condition of the poorer classes, was 
the subject finally discussed. 
Sir John Bowring, who proposed a vote of thanks to the President, then 
read the Report of the Committee on Uniformity of Weights, Measures, and 
Coins; and Mr. Burgess a paper on International Coinage. 
On subsequent days papers were read upon—* Our National Accounts,” by 
Mr. Frank P. Fellowes, F.S.S.; ‘‘ The Education of Women,” by Miss Emily 
A. Shirreff; ‘‘On Preserved Meats,” by Dr. Edward Smith; and “ The Pol- 
lution of Rivers,” by Major-General Sir James E. Alexander, F.R.S.E. 
SECTION G.—MECHANICAL SCIENCE. 
President.—F. J. Bramwell, C.E. 
Vice-Presidents—John Hawkshaw, F.R.S.; C. W. Merrifield, F.R.S.; 
Charles B. Vignoles, F.R.S.; W. J. Macquorn Rankine, LL.D., F.R.S.; James 
Nasmyth, F.R.S.; W. Froude, F.R.S. 
Secretaries.—H. M. Brunel; P. Le Neve Foster, M.A.; John G. Gamble, 
B.A.; James N. Shoolbred. 
The President, Mr. F. J. Bramwell, in his Address, dwelt chiefly upon the 
subje& of “Coal,” as being that, at the present time, most prominent in the 
minds of the public at large,—if for no other reason than this, that the steam- 
engine is still the very crowning glory of mechanical engineering, and that 
coal is the staff of life, and, so to speak, the breath of the nostrils of the 
steam-engine. It was pointed out that the supply of coal is a finite quantity ; 
that, unlike the fuel wood, which grows year by year to replace the annual 
consumption, the fuel coal is given to us once for all; that we are therefore 
dealing with a store that knows no renewal; that if we waste it the sin of 
that waste will be visited on our children ; and that it becomes us to look upon 
