Eoyal S^ociefy. ^7^ 



skips with diaj^onal timbers, and afterwards abandoned the mode 

 as useless. The utmost, he maintained, that tlie French had 

 done, was buikhng one ship the hning of whicli was placed dia- 

 gonally ; but this, as might be expected, was attended with none 

 of the advantages which his method possessed, and on the con- 

 trary had several peculiar disadvantages. Mr. S. also produced 

 various certificates from different naval surveyors, and others, all 

 of whom concurred in proving that the ships built according to 

 the plan which he had carried into execution were almost en- 

 tirely exempt from hogging or becoming bro];en-backed. 



May 4. Sir Humphry Davy, having happily returned fiwnj 

 his scientific tour on the contiiu^nt, comrar.nicated an iut2re>',tinf5 

 paper on the hyperoxymuriates, and on what Gay Lu .^ac c alls 

 chloric acid. 



Dr. Phillip, In a short paper, stated his having found a foetus 

 in the abdomen of a child. At the age of two years and a h^jlf 

 a hard tumour was observed in a child's abdomen ; various means 

 were taken to redaoe or discuss it, Imt in vain; all medicine was 

 ineffectual ; and when the child died, its body was opened, and 

 ^vhat had been supposed a tumour, proved to be a fcKtus. Dr. P. 

 thinks this an instance of one foetus being inclosed within another 

 in the womb. 



May 1 1 . Mr. Poret junior related a series of very delicate and 

 complex experiments, in addition to his former paper, which ap- 

 pears in the Phil. Transactions on the salts called triple prussiates. 

 Notwithstanding the apparent accuracy, however, of his experi- 

 ments, he found them not quite correspondent with the atomic 

 theory, and therefore rejected the inferences to be drawn from 

 themj or the facts which they developed, preferring rather to be- 

 lieve iu the infailibllity of his calculations of atoms, than in the 

 correctness of his actual exptTiments, The Society then ad- 

 journed over one week. 



May 25. A papL-r bv Dr. Pu.rry was read, on the nature and 

 cause of the pulse. Dr. P. toor, a reviev/ of tlie different theo- 

 ries vvl(ich have !)een proposed to account for the phaeiwmenon 

 of pulsation, observing that tlie greater part of physioloti,ists had 

 coiitente.l themselves with the, opinion of Haiier, that |)uIsation 

 was occasioned by the diastole and systole of the heart. His 

 view, however, of the question is much simpler : on examining 

 different arteries where they v.-ere exposed to no obstruction or 

 pressure, he found that they bad no pulse : by pressing the fin- 

 i/er on an artery over a soft part of the body, which yielded suf- 

 f.ciently to the j)ressure, no pulse was manifested ; but when- 

 ever an artery was pressed over a solid part, then a pulse was 

 immediatelv found. Me repeated thc?c operations several times, 

 <=nd uniformly found the same effects. Hence he concludes that 



A a 1 th(i. 



