§ Observations on Naphthaline. 
ranged figure, with a little stretch of the imagination we might 
suppose a peacock, or at least the tail: the spots are larger 
than in the Maple, and the curl more decided. In-some Indian 
woods the small bad is almost hidden in theflourishes round it. 
The Tilia is, I believe, supposed to be the Philyraof the ancients. 
They used to maké bottles of it; and it is mentioned that they 
were often seen spotted, and that the spots often fell out. This 
is so exact a description of the bark and alburnum, with which 
they were made, and of the hearts of the seeds falling out, that 
much is gained to my present studies by examining with care 
into every thing that has vegetables for its object, when either 
Pliny, Virgil, or Cicero mention that subject. I think I have 
heard of the paper of the Tilia being as good as that of the 
Betula alla, and I have repeatedly tried; but the hearts of, the 
seeds are so strongly impressed upon it, that I could never make 
it bear the writing on both sides, which I have effected with the 
Betula alba when well prepared and pressed. Yet I have found 
a passage in one of my books of observations, of a work of 
Cicero, ‘* De ordinanda republica,”’ written on this species of 
paper formed from the Tilia, and now in the public library 
at Vienna. I possess a root which. I suppose to be one of the 
greatest Ihave. It is the root of an Elm of the small leaves, 
one which never flowers in this country though common in our 
hedges : it is hollow, though with a thick exterior ;.in the mid- 
dle an immense bud projects six inches in circumferenee, and 
the root is nearly twelve inches in diameter." ‘The bud when 
cut perpendicularly down, shows a quantity of the nucleus of the 
flower or bud, only not covered with the scales of the bark. It 
was sent me by a gentleman not conversant in botany, but quick 
of observation, who found it in one of the lanes adjoining Ex- 
mouth, Fig. 10. 
II. Observations on Naphthaline, a peculiar Substance resem- 
bling a concrete essential Oil, which is apparently produced 
during the Decomposition of Coal Tar by Exposure to a red 
Heat. By J. Kipp, M.D. Professor of Chemistry, Oxford. 
Communicated by W.H. Wottaston, M.D. F.R.S.* 
Auruoven the existence, and many of the properties of the 
substance above mentioned, have been already noticed in two of 
the Philosophical Journals of this country +, there has not yet ap- 
peared, as far as I can discover, any systematic description of 
* From the Transactions of the Royal Society for 1821, Part I 
+ Thomson's Annals of Philosophy, January 1820, page 74; and Mr. 
Brande’s Quarterly Journal, January 1820, page 287... ° 
the 
