French Nathnal Injlltute. 331 



of its compofition, is expofed fometimes to fo great heat 

 while the piece is ufed, that it becomes fufed, which gradu- 

 ally renders the cannon defective. To remedy this incon- 

 venience, Cit Baume propofes to harden the copper with 

 nickel, or with what was formerly called regulus of anti- 

 mony, neither of them being fo fufible as tin. 



ExDeriments made at Rambouillet, and in different parts 

 of France, have already {hewn the pofiibihty of propagating 

 and preferving in all their purity fheep of the Spanifh breed. 

 Cit. Gilbert has communicated on this important point of 

 rural economy the fulled inftruclion^, and given the beft 

 founded hopes that thefe valuable animals may be reared in 

 the terrirorities of the republic, without ever degenerating. 



The conquefts of our army of the North, bv augmenting 

 the riches of the Mufeum of Natural Hiilory at Paris, have 

 given Cit. Lamarck an opportunity of pointing out with 

 precifion the dillinclive characterifing marks of ihe common 

 cuttle hfh [fepia officln 7/j), the calm.ir or fea fleeve {fepia 

 loligo), and poulpe or eight armed cuttle {fepia otlopus) y 

 which had bten confounded and claffed in one genus. He 

 has rectified an error received among fome naturalifts, who 

 confidered as the animal which forms the argonauta or 

 paper failor, a poulpe which is accuftomed to lodge itfelf in 

 that (hell, in the fame manner as the crab called the hermit 

 takes up its lodging in different kinds of fhells. 



Cit. <_uvier, in a very long memoir on the organs of the 

 voice, fhews that the greater part of birds, independently of 

 the inferior glottis, which is the principal organ of their 

 voice, have a fujierior larynx, by which mechanifm they are 

 the more enabled to vary their tones, as by its means they 

 can more eafily rh?nge the ftate of their glottis, the length 

 of their trachea, and the aperture of their upper larynx. It 

 refults fruin this organifation, that the graveft tones, and 

 the harmonics of thefe tones, are produced by a prolongation 

 of the tracheal artery and the greateft relaxation of the 

 glottis ; while by a fhortening of the trachea, and a contrac- 

 tion 



