294 British Association for the Advancement of Science. 
in which it lies by its weight, and is used as water would be. 
But the most remarkable feature still remains. About five or six 
times a day the discharge of gas suddenly stops; ina few sec- 
_onds the surface of the well is calm. The flow of water, amount- 
-ing to 40 cubic feet per minute, also stops, or rather, becomes neg- 
ative, for the water recedes in the shaft even when the pumps, 
commonly used to extract the brine, do not work, and the -water 
subsides during 15 or 20 minutes. . It then flows again, the water 
appearing first and suddenly, the gas gradually increasing in quan- 
tity, till, after three quarters of an hour, the shaft is full as-at first. 
The state of greatest discharge continues with little variation 
since. the bore was made in 1822. Within a short distance isa 
bore 554 Bavarian feet deep, which exhibits somewhat similar 
phenomena. Altogether, Prof. F’. considers. that the: salt spring 
at Kissingen is the most singular phenomenon of its kind in En- 
rope except the Geysers. - 
Mr. Russell gave a description of 3 ag! Substitute ‘for the ot 
tain Barometer in Measuring Heights,’ by Sir John Robison. 
Mr. R. said, that all ‘persons who had.used the mountain. barom- 
eter, when measuring heights, would admit that it was a very 
cumbersome instrument, put out of order by very slight accidents, 
and only to be ‘used by persons well skilled in observing. ‘The 
principle of ‘Sir J. Robison’s contrivance is simple, and such that 
the most ignorant person might be intrusted with the preparatory 
manipulation of it, and might be sent up mountains when the 
philosopher could -not leave*his study, and bring-back the air to. 
be experimented upon ; and, since he could not go to the air with 
his barometer, to cause it to come to him. It consisted-of a wood- - 
en box, containing simply a thermometer and a number of tubes, 
of a bore something wider than those of self-registering thermom- 
eters, open at one end, and blown into bulbs at the other; also a 
small vessel of quicksilver.. All that the person who went up the 
mountain had to do, was to note the thermometer, and immerse. 
the open end of one of the tubes. into the mercury at each sta- 
tion, and then bring down the whole. "The examiner then places 
each bulbed tube, mto the stem of which a considerable quantity 
of mereury will, of course, be found to have entered, under the 
receiver of an-air pump, either along with a barometer, or with 
a well-made gauge; and on pushing the exhaustion until the 
mercury stood within the bulbed tube as it did upon the mouu- 
