82 Uoyal Snck'f!/ of London. 



vegetable soliitiouri of certala philosophers he seems decicleclly 

 averse, and appears also willing to deny the agency of mu- 

 riatic acid in the formation of coal. For this, however, he 

 has not assigned anv reason, although the almost invariable 

 contiguity of lime to coal would tend to prove, that had any 

 quantity of muriatic acid been present at the formation of 

 cither, a new and very different substance must have been 

 produced. The few saline springs found in the vicinity of 

 coal-mines, he considers as no exception to the general prin- 

 ciple of the inefficiency of muriatic acid ; and the discoveries 

 of Mr. Peel may perhaps render the opinion of our author 

 still more probable. Mr. Hatchett allows that animal matter 

 may have contributed to the formation of pit-coal ; but de- 

 nies that any tire could have been accessory. The great 

 frequency, indeed, of numerous animal substances found in 

 the limestone that is contiguous to coal-strata, renders it 

 ditllcult lo deny that animal matter could not have been pre- 

 sent at the original formation of coal. Mr. Hatchett con- 

 cludes this very able paper with declaring the necessity of 

 adhering invariably to that rigid svstcmatic order which we 

 hinted at In a former report, and without which, he observes, 

 that science can neither be extended nor applied to the pur- 

 poses of civil society. He also recommends such researches 

 to the attention of other chemists, as he has determined to 

 decline them for the ^irescnt, and hopes that his discoveries 

 and numerous experiments may be usefully applied to the 

 arts, and the important ceconomy of fuel, &c. The thanks 

 of the Society were ordered to this philosopher, and we 

 doubt not that he will also receive those of the civilized 

 world. 



On the same evening a letter from Mr. Griffiths to the 

 President was read, containing a brief account of a species- 

 of worm-shell found by him in a bank of clay on the coast 

 of Sumatra, after the shock of an earthquake. Consider- 

 able numbers of the same species are found in the surround- 

 ing seas, in water from one to six fathoms deep, and vary in 

 length from three to fi\c feet, and in diameter from three to 

 nine inches. One of the specimens procured by Mr. Grif-i 

 fifths measures above live feet, is taper, has two tentaculi, 



and 



